One of the first things that I see every morning when I wake up is a framed newspaper article, yellowed and cracked with age, from an issue of Newsday dated May 25, 1994. The headline from this rather smallish, less than a full page article efficiently read "Mark Isn't Worried." The subheading: Messier vows Rangers will take it to a seventh game. This article is now 11 years old, eleven like the number of the man that inspired it all.

Rangers fans know the rest. Backs against the wall, Captain Mark Messier guaranteed victory for his reeling Rangers, and down by one goal into the third period, he put on quite simply the most amazing single athletic performance I have ever seen in my life. I watched Michael Jordan tear the heart out of the Knicks in more playoff games than I can remember. I've seen almost every play in Derek Jeter's career. I've seen Gretzky, Lemieux, Bonds, Favre, Rice, Taylor, Brodeur, Pedro, Ewing, Shaq, and every other superstar that delivered a moment when his team needed it most. Nothing matches up to the final twenty minutes of Game Six. The history, the moment, the stakes, and the reputation of the man will never be repeated in sports.

(And naturally we're going to ignore all the subsequent "We'll make the playoffs" guarantees that Messier issued in the past few years. Those never happened.)

Messier came to the Rangers as just a washed-up player, acquired in another one of those brainfart classic Ranger "deal youth for fossils" moves, a pouting older superstar that wasn't paying his bills in the small market and yearned to cash checks as the newest member of Club MSG. When the Rangers made the deal, I was a freshman in college and my father called me to announce the good news.

"Messier?" I said. "Isn't he like 75 years old? Who'd they trade to get him?"

"Bernie Nicholls, Louie DeBrusk, and Steven Rice."

"Steven Rice!" I yelled. "That kid is going to be a star! I hate this team."

That season, Messier won the Hart Trophy and brought the Rangers two rounds into the playoffs. Steven Rice scored maybe 40 points in his Oilers career.

Thanks, Mark

We had gotten a different type of player. It was obvious. Inevitable. This was lightning in a bottle. This was a genie in the lamp. This was one of those purely magical things that can't be explained logically to those that don't understand the frustration and disappointment of watching a doomed franchise repeat its mistakes every decade, always futily reaching for that brass (or silver) ring, and always falling short in ways that make you question almost everything about your life. You have to be a lifetime loser to understand the significance of a player like this. Mark Messier changed everything.

Mark Messier changed everything.

Messier was the Captain that sold the Rangers on being more than just the 54-year also ran. Messier was the player that convinced Leetch, Richter, and Graves not to be afraid of greatness. Messier was the player that forced Rangers fans to hold their heads high and not be ashamed of their woefully history, because things were going to change, and change immediately on his watch. As a captain he demanded nothing short of everything from his teammates. And he required the same from every person that thought they were worthy enough to watch his team play at MSG. Messier made you proud to be a Rangers fan again.

And then '94 happened. And Game Six. Rangers fans know the rest.

It can't be argued that Messier's retirement comes as a whimper and not a bang. For a player whose timing for drama has always been impeccable, he surprisingly fell at least a season too short with this decision. But we'll let it slide. We'll let many things slide with Messier -- we'll let his self-imposed exile to Vancouver slide; we'll let his reported insistance that Neil Smith trade Sergei Zubov and Petr Nedved for Ulf Samuelsson and Luc Robitaille slide; we'll let those Lays Potato Chip commercials slide. He's earned the right to have his Rangers legacy corrected by pencil and firmly revised in legendary ink.

There's another picture on my wall, one of the first things I see every morning when I wake up. It's taken from Game Seven, Stanley Cup, 1994. Mark Messier has just scored the go-ahead goal, his hands held high to the air, his feet elevated inches off the ice. Hours later his arms would be held in similar pose, only with a Stanley Cup propped between them.

Thanks, Mark. You changed everything.

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