Kris Draper is known to most NHL fans as one of the toughest guys ever to wear a pair of skates. He was a key part of the Detroit Red Wings dynasty that dominated the league in the late 1990s and early 2000s. But very few know how cheap the Red Wings actually acquired him.
Born in Ontario in 1971, Kris Draper always dreamt of becoming a hockey player. In a piece for The Players’ Tribune, Draper recalls how one of his classmates mocked him for saying out loud that he wanted to play hockey for a living. That moment lit a fire inside him — a determination that would define his entire illustrious career. Standing at 5’10”, Draper knew he would have to fight hard to make it to the NHL.
Road to the Red Wings
Kris Draper was drafted in the third round in 1989 by the Winnipeg Jets but struggled to earn a permanent spot on their roster. In 1993, he was traded to the Detroit Red Wings. The Wings had just hired a new coach, Scotty Bowman, who went to watch Draper play in the minors. Draper scored a hat trick, and when he saw Bowman outside the locker room afterward, he thought that performance had punched his ticket to the big leagues. But Bowman had noticed something else entirely: Draper had won 19 of 21 faceoffs during the game.
That’s when Kris Draper realized what he needed to do to make it in the NHL.
“The implication was pretty clear. So my mindset was that I was going to be the biggest pain in the ass you ever played against,” Draper wrote for The Players’ Tribune. And boy, did he succeed.
Traded for One Dollar
In the 1994 playoff series against the San Jose Sharks, Draper’s role on the Red Wings became even more defined. After Game 3, a reporter asked how it felt to have been traded to Detroit for just one dollar. Draper was stunned — he hadn’t known the exact details of the trade from Winnipeg.
“I turned and looked at our public relations guy, totally confused. He says, ‘Yeah, well, you know, when Scotty called you up from the AHL, they still hadn’t worked out the considerations, officially. So Bryan Murray called Mike Smith and… well… you were traded for cash considerations. A buck.’”
Kris Draper’s Stanley Cups
Draper’s mentality only grew stronger over the years — especially during the violent rivalry with division foes Colorado Avalanche. That feud reached its peak with the infamous ”Fight Night at the Joe” on March 26, 1997 — a game that saw 18 fighting majors and 144 penalty minutes. The Red Wings came out on top with a 6–5 overtime win — a turning point that fueled their run to back-to-back Stanley Cup victories in 1997 and 1998. When Draper finally hung up his skates in 2011, he did so with four Stanley Cup rings, 1,157 games played, and 790 penalty minutes. Not too bad for a guy who got traded for one dollar.
