| The Game (Sports pages) |  | Author: Ken Dryden
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Ltd
Category: Book
Buy Used: $37.48
Used (3) from $37.48
Avg. Customer Rating:  17 reviews
Format: Import
Media: Paperback
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
ISBN: 0671698931
EAN: 9780671698935
ASIN: 0671698931
Publication Date: October 10, 1988
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| Customer Reviews: Read 12 more reviews...
 Wonderfully insightful look at the NHL in the 70's May 25, 2008
As a hockey fan growing up in the late '60's and early '70's, Ken Dryden was one of my heroes. The Canadiens seemed to always win the Stanley Cup in those years and Dryden was the goalie to watch in the '70's. The Game chronicles the latter stage of his career and provides a great deal of insight into the NHL, the Canadiens and, of course, Dryden himself.
My favorite part of this book is when he takes the time to drill down deeper into the quirky personalities of certain teammates. When you think of the Canadiens of the '70's, players like Guy Lafleur, Larry Robinson, Bob Gainey, Guy Lapointe, Steve Shutt, and of course, coach Scotty Bowman come to mind. Dryden devotes much of The Game to coverage of teammates, coaches and even trainers, all written in the cerebral style he was known for throughout his career.
Any true hockey fan will want to read this book, regardless of how much or little you know about Dryden and Canadiens history. Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the NHL today is where it stands after the 2004-05 lockout. Although Dryden didn't touch on this in The Game, he offered these prescient thoughts towards the end of the book (and his NHL career):
"Expansion and the WHA behind it, it will be a time to turn inward, to put its (the NHL's) unwieldy house in order. Like an aging adolescent having grown too fast, it will get reacquainted with its parts, get them in hand, and do something with them. It will be a time for realism, and stability, for chastened hopes and dreams deferred--except one. Off ice, the whispered word will be "cable." But it will represent a more modest dream this time, and more realizable, if the promised bonanza is only for some. It is time for a deep breath, a pause, a time to return the game to the ice. For that is the real tragedy of the 1970s, and the real opportunity for the 1980s. It is on the ice that its next great challenge lies."
Gee, he could have written much of that in the last 3 years and it would have been just as applicable. The league is on the rebound but the first two games of the Stanley Cup Finals, the ultimate hockey championship, are relegated to the Versus network. Ugh. I even had to bite the bullet and sign up for Versus network service yesterday so that I could watch games 1 and 2, featuring my beloved Pittsburgh Penguins against the evil Detroit Red Wings.
How sad is that? The Stanley Cup Finals start out on some third-tier cable network. Maybe it's time to toss Gary Bettman out as NHL commissioner and replace him with someone like Ken Dryden...
A deeply intelligent meditation on Hockey and Life February 16, 2008
This is no ordinary sports autobiography. Dryden does not sing his own praises and tell us how he became the greatest goalie of his generation. Instead this is a deeply meditative book in which he shares with the reader his own questions as to the character and meaning of his own career in hockey. He provides in the course of this an inside look at the game, and long interesting descriptions of the people he has known in it, most notably his teammates.
The book does not really tell a consecutive story. It also leaves out certain things the reader might want to know. I for instance would have liked to have heard more about Dryden's family, his wife and parents, their relation to his success and career. But he pretty much keeps them out of it and focuses on the game.
His own relation to himself and his success , is I believe , quite admirable. He describes in detail the pleasures and the pains of goalkeeping. He describes too the part this position has in the whole game. I imagine a real hockey fan ( I am not) would be tremendously interested in the inside look he gives at the way players actually think about themselves and what they are doing.
Dryden is both tremendously intelligent and articulate- a truly outstanding writer.
Many have said this is one of the best sports books ever written. It is certainly one of the best I have read.
 Scotland Yard Outlook of Hockey February 13, 2008
When I saw this book I said to myself I will give it a try-- After reading parts about the conversations in the locker rooms between players. I liked his own history about the game when growing up and the teams day to day conversations--going to practice, before certain big games. But he has a nasty annoying knack of disrespecting other players on any page in the book. The first read of the book you think it is just great sense of humor, but afterwards I think about and it is a tremendous disrespect to other professional players on his team. An example includes page 110 "The one original part of his game around which it might be done he seemed anxious to deny." Page 77 "On the one hand he is a good skater and forechecker, capable of playing any of the forward positions, a better-than-average playmaker and penalty-killer;on the other, he is not big,not strong, not tough, often injured, a worse-than-average shooter, and has surprisingly little goal-scoring ability.
Overrated book!!! May 25, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
As a big fan of Les Canadiens who frequently took a weekend and stood in the Forum to watch Dryden and his teammates play, I was expecting a great book. Look at the glowing reviews.
But when I read this, I found it rambling, full of topics not explored. And the characters in the book come across as half-baked.
The Ken Dryden I see in this book is introspective to the point of being morose. He gripes so much about the pressures, the disjointed life he lives. True, his role during the Canadien dynasty was not to lose the game. Of course, when you have guys like Gainey, Lemaire, Robinson, Lapointe, Lafleur, all in front of you, it does take the edge away.
But I got no real feeling as to why he plays, with all the dislikes he has of it. The cameraderie? I am not convinced.
But you get no real feeling for the writer, for his family, or his teammates.
The book takes a bizarre turn 3/4 through on a history lesson, quite interesting but out-of-place. And his whining about the physicality of the game grinds on me.
Dryden got a lot of attention for being a law student. But he has left his law studies behind and you hear nothing of why.
The edition I have has a 20-year afterword. He is the president of the Toronto Maple Leafs now, with relatively little success.
I guess the overall impression of the book was to appreciate parts of it but to wonder why it was written. Dryden comes across as quite introspective, often unwilling to share his thoughts and feelings. No problem with that, but why did he write the book?
 Ken Dryden-Intellectual May 7, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Having grown up in the Boston area and having been a goaltender myself, I simultaneously despised Dryden for his mastery of our beloved Bruins, and admired him for his unparalleled consistency in a position fraught with inconsistency. In an era when college graduates in the NHL were few and far between, Dryden as a graduate of Cornell and later McGill Law School was a genuine odity. His level of intelligence is unquestioned however, it may have also been in part, what made for something of a "dry" read.
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