Brad Marchand

Throughout his NHL career, Marchand has been characterized as a "pest", a hockey player who attempts to frustrate his opponents through physical or verbal attacks and annoyance. Marchand developed many of his agitation tactics from a young age: he knew that he was smaller than many of his opponents at only 5 feet 9 inches (1.75 m) and 181 pounds (82 kg), and subsequently developed a system of hits and trash talking that would give him an advantage over some of the more prominent players. Marchand has modeled his behavior after that of Theo Fleury, a 5 feet 6 inches (1.68 m) former pest who could leverage the frustration that he caused his opponents into offensive production.

In recent years, Marchand has tried to overcome his reputation as an agitator and focus more on statistics and productivity.