R.I.P. Derek Boogaard

It shocked me this morning to see the news about the Rangers' forward Derek Boogaard passing away at the young age of 28. This year was his 6th year in the NHL. He played his first 5 in Minnesota for the wild before being given a ridiculous contract by the Rangers over last offseason. Not known as a goal scorer, Boogaard is one of the most respected fighters in the game. Tweets were being...tweeted..throughout the NHL about their condolences toward him and his family. BizNasty wrote "Had to call my folks after hearing that awful news. Derek Boogard you were pure nails on the ice, and an even better person off. R.I.P" Bobby Ryan wrote "Absolute tragedy, RIP Derek Boogaard" and there were more tweets just like these. Teammate (and apparent roommate) Brandon Prust wrote "At a loss for words. I'll miss my roomy Derek Boogaard.. You will be missed by everyone. Great friend and teammate".

Known as a fighter, people say his actions off the ice were quite remarkable. He was a fun, nice guy and a great friend. He's also known as a very charitable guy and it was even reported that his family donated his brain towards science and research. 

Boogaard didn't have such a good season this year health-wise and scoring-wise. He had 1 goal and 1 assist in only 22 games as a Ranger. He also totaled 45 penalty minutes. He also fought 7 times this season and according to hockeyfights.com he won 4 of them and 1 of them resulting in a draw.

I'm not 100% clear on how contracts work in the NHL but the Rangers offered him a lot of money during the offseason last year. So I don't know if they still owe him money even though he's deceased or if it will affect salary-cap space or not.

One last line:

I know it's a sad time and everything, but when I saw the news in the paper this morning, my first response was "Why couldn't it have been Avery?!?!"

But in all seriousness, it sounds like the hockey world (and non-hockey world) lost a great fellow in Derek Boogaard. RIP and my condolences to the family.

Edit: Results of the autopsy showed that Boogaard died from a mixture of alchohol and oxycodone toxicity (generally speaking, it is not a good idea to mix these two). It was not a suicide.