Tie Domi is one of the toughest players ever to play in the NHL. He ranks third all-time in penalty minutes, with 3,515 minutes, and during his 16 seasons in the league, he fought nearly every enforcer there was—often more than once. But when Rob Ray was on the ice, Domi knew things were going to get tough. He once summed up Ray perfectly with one legendary sentence.
Rob Ray and Tie Domi both entered the NHL in the 1989–1990 season. Ray spent most of his career with the Buffalo Sabres, while Domi played primarily for the Toronto Maple Leafs. As a result, the two faced each other frequently and dropped the gloves no fewer than 13 times during their careers.
Rob Ray and Tie Domi fights
Despite playing on rival teams and being known as fighters, both Ray and Domi respected each other. They understood their roles and took them seriously.
“You listen to the people and the guys—even the players—how excited they get. It was something they looked forward to because they knew it was gonna happen. I still look back—it’s an entertainment side of the game that’s disappearing. But I think we understood there was a reason for it—not only for the game itself, but for the people that were here expecting it,” Ray told NHL.com in January.
Brad May, also an enforcer for the Buffalo Sabres during the first half of the 1990s, was grateful to have Rob Ray as a teammate.
“I loved it, first of all, because I didn’t have to fight Tie Domi. Never once. I was in Buffalo for seven or eight years. It was Rob’s guy,” May told NHL.com.
One perfect sentence
Tie Domi was asked what it was like to face Rob Ray and fight him that many times, and he summed Ray up perfectly:
“If they were down two, I knew he was coming,” he told NHL.com.
“We’re the only two who played every game of our careers thinking, ‘We might have to fight that night.’ It was just a different time. When you policed the game the way we used to, guys knew they couldn’t take advantage of our teammates—especially the stars,” Domi said.
Such high praise from one fighting legend to another!
READ MORE: Rob Ray made a phone call after a game – to help an enforcer
