This Is How Kris Draper Ends: Not With A Bang But A Premature Photo Caption

After being traded to the Red Wings for the princely sum of one American dollar, Kris Draper racked up quite the career over 17 years in Detroit. But this past season was a disappointing one for the 40-year-old Draper, in which he missed nearly half his team's games with injuries and (more tellingly) healthy scratches. So it wouldn't surprise anyone if Draper were to call it quits. But this isn't how we wanted to find out. Not like this.

While perusing a photo gallery on the Red Wings' official website, a few Twitter users noticed this caption appended to an all-Draper photo gallery.

"After 1,157 games and four Stanley Cup championships, Kris Draper announced his retirement during a press conference on July 26, 2011."

July 26 is not a day that has happened, so we're forced to presume that the Wings have a new media intern from the future. They promptly took down the photo gallery (though not before the Malik Report snapped the above screenshot), but the news is out.

It's not a huge deal, but the Red Wings dropped the ball on two counts. They shouldn't have told their caption-writers about any big hockey announcements, and they shouldn't have assumed their fans weren't crazy enough to click to slide 68 of a 71-photo slideshow.

Looks Like Draper Retiring Tomorrow [Kukla's Korner]