Profile of Wayne Simmonds

As one of the few black players in the National Hockey League, Simmonds is keenly aware he is watched and judged differently than most. If the 23-year-old from Canada lowers his guard, feeling too comfortable among the white players skating around him, a mindless fan may intervene to interrupt the solitude and remind him of his skin color.

Sometimes the degradation is a word echoing down from the cheap seats or a look from a fan in the expensive padded chairs behind the visitors’ bench. Other times the acts are more hurtful, like when a fan threw a banana peel on the ice before Simmonds attempted a shot during a shootout in a preseason game against the Detroit Red Wings in London, Ontario.

After the game, Simmonds said: “When you are a black man playing in a predominantly white man’s sport, you’ve got to come to expect things like that.”