Sean Avery is back in professional hockey.
The former Rangers forward, who last stepped on the ice in 2012, signed a contract with the ECHL’s Orlando Solar Bears, Tampa Bay’s affiliate, the team announced on Wednesday.
Avery, who led the NHL in penalty minutes twice, played parts of six seasons with the Rangers, scoring 45 goals with 78 assists as a member of the Blueshirts.
The 41-year-old posted a video to his Instagram story on Tuesday in which he said he was in Winter Park, Fla. and skated with the Solar Bears. Avery is being placed on the Solar Bears’ reserve list, meaning he will not play right away.
But Avery’s aspirations do not end with the ECHL.
“I’ve got seven months to be physically ready to walk on to an NHL training camp,” Avery said on the Blackballed with James Di Fiore podcast. “My timing is coming back and it’s getting sharper every single time. I can feel it happening.”
Former Ranger Sean Avery is making a hockey comeback with the Orlando Solar Bears. Anthony J. CausiSince retiring, Avery has competed in “Dancing With the Stars”, published a memoir and was cast in Christopher Nolan’s “Tenet.” In 2016, he was served with a restraining order for harassing his mother-in-law, and in late 2014, The Post reported that Avery had a meltdown in rehearsals of a Broadway production he was part of and quit.
During his playing career, Avery had a reputation as controversial and a bully, getting fined and suspended multiple times over incidents throughout his tenure in the league.
Matt Barnaby, a rival enforcer in the league during Avery’s playing days who’s sparred with him since retirement, took to Twitter to give his take.
Sean Avery fighting the Penguins’ Tyler Kennedy in 2011. REUTERS“If Avery signs in Orlando, I will sign with anyone in that division…You can play me as much as [John Tortorella] did,” Barnaby wrote.
The Jacksonville Icemen, the Rangers’ ECHL affiliate, replied to the tweet with a thinking emoji.
Last summer, Barnaby challenged Avery to a Rough ‘n’ Rowdy fight, leading Avery to call Barnaby a “desperate ankle biter” on Twitter.
With 10 years since his last pro hockey game, though, one imagines Avery will need some time to work up his conditioning.
