The Hall of Fame story of Grant Fuhr, the first black superstar in the National Hockey League and the last line of defense for the Edmonton Oilers dynasty, told through Fuhr's 10 most important games. Grant Fuhr was the best goalie in the league at a time when hockey was at its most exciting. Wayne Gretzky's Edmonton Oilers were arguably the greatest team in league history, and during the 1980s arguably the most popular team across the United States, even if many had little idea where Edmonton was. They were that good. And so was Fuhr: Gretzky called him the best goaltender in the world. Fuhr broke the colour barrier for NHL goaltenders when he played his first game for the Oilers in 1981, and was an inspiration for later players including future Hall of Famer Jarome Iginla. But in addition to their dynastic run of Stanley Cup championships, the Oilers were also synonymous with the excesses of the decade: Fuhr himself was suspended for substance use, a discredit he had to fight back from--and did, going on to set career records and earning election to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility.

Grant Fuhr: The Story of a Hockey Legend

Sports & Outdoors

Dowbiggin, Bruce

Fuhr, Grant

Biographies

Random House Canada

The Hall of Fame story of Grant Fuhr, the first black superstar in the National Hockey League and the last line of defense for the Edmonton Oilers dynasty, told through Fuhr's 10 most important games. Grant Fuhr was the best goalie in the league at a time when hockey was at its most exciting. Wayne Gretzky's Edmonton Oilers were arguably the greatest team in league history, and during the 1980s arguably the most popular team across the United States, even if many had little idea where Edmonton was. They were that good. And so was Fuhr: Gretzky called him the best goaltender in the world. Fuhr broke the colour barrier for NHL goaltenders when he played his first game for the Oilers in 1981, and was an inspiration for later players including future Hall of Famer Jarome Iginla. But in addition to their dynastic run of Stanley Cup championships, the Oilers were also synonymous with the excesses of the decade: Fuhr himself was suspended for substance use, a discredit he had to fight back from--and did, going on to set career records and earning election to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility.

Vintage Canada

Hockey is more than a game. It's more than a way of life. In Canada, it's a portrait of who we are. It's a window into our very soul. In The Meaning of Puck, bestselling author Bruce Dowbiggin takes a peek into that window and - frankly - it's not always such a pretty picture. Viewed through the prism of hockey, Canada is, Dowbiggin argues, a land of compelling and surprising - even ugly and embarrassing - contradictions. In a series of essays that is a road trip across the nation's cultural landscape, he shows how the national passion of hockey reflects - or deflects - the issues of globalization, regionalism, anti-Americanism, militarism, violence, racism and greed. Why are Canadians, for instance, such strenuous advocates of pacifism and non-militarism around the world while simultaneously embracing - and promoting - the world's most vicious and violent brand of hockey? It's not the Americans who popularize violence in hockey. It's us. Dowbiggin comes to terms with the absurd hero worship of The Great One. Or why Canadians so smugly spoof American ignorance while making a cultural icon of Don Cherry. Is it because in a nation without rules or standards he still stands for something, however distasteful? The Meaning of Puck is a funny, acidic, irreverent, argumentative and often infuriating but always thought-provoking look into the fabric of a nation straining to keep old traditions alive and incorporate new national myths.

The Meaning of Puck: How Hockey Explains Modern Canada

Hockey

Red Deer Press

The Amazing Rise and Fall of Bob Goodenow and the NHL Players Association. 
 In late February 2005, NHL owners and Bob Goodenow of the NHL Players Association met behind closed doors in what was purported to be a last-ditch effort to end the lockout and save the season. At issue was a salary cap-and who called the shots in the hockey business. 
 As the director of the union, Bob Goodenow used strikes and hardball negotiations to push up player salaries, and while players got rich, the health of the game was ignored. The NHL owners demanded a salary cap, and Goodenow refused. The result was a 103-day lockout that cost a season. The owners got their salary cap, but at what cost to the sport? 
 One thing was clear: the only real loser was the fan. 
 Money Players is a bare-knuckled brawl of a book about how the real game has been played behind closed doors between rich executives and agents. Bruce Dowbiggin's controversial, but eye-opening report takes readers from the locker rooms to the boardrooms. And it's not a pretty picture.

Money Players: How Hockey's Greatest Stars Beat the NHL At It's Own Game

Business & Money

Economics

Rich, insightful, and highly engaging, Bruce Dowbiggin’s much-praised examination of the craft of hockey was hailed by critics as an enduring addition to the literature of sports. What makes the best in the hockey business the best? By analyzing forward Steve Yzerman’s superb talent for leadership, defenseman Chris Chelio’s two-way brilliance, goaltender Dominik Hasek’s unrivalled ability to stop the puck, and hockey executive Glen Sather’s gift for construction, shaping, and inspiring a team, Dowbiggin not only illuminates hockey greatness, he also documents the subtle evolution in how the NHL game is played.

Of Ice and Men: The Craft of Hockey

MacFarlane, Walter & Ross

Industries

Pick up a hockey stick. You hold an iconic symbol of the place that gave it birth, a tangible bit of Canadian culture, a link to Canada’s past. From the earliest one-piece sticks, carved from tree roots by the Mi’kmaqs of Nova Scotia, to the two— and three—piece models turned out in small towns in Ontario and Quebec, to the composite models now produced with scientific precision by Easton, the stick has always reflected something distinctly Canadian. Today it has become "cyber-product," globally sourced, anonymously produced, and expertly marketed. As sporting tool, as weapon, and as cultural artifact, the stick is a part of Canadian history. Consider the London schoolteacher whose basement is a treasure trove of old sticks. The Calgary handyman who turns broken sticks into kids’ furniture. The NHL owner whose rec room floor is made of hockey sticks. The artist who sculpts oversized sticks out of granite. Dowbiggin introduces us to Stan Mikita, who invented the curved blade (or did he?); Jeremy Roenick, who lets no one else touch his stick; Adam Oates, who uses a stubby, cut-off blade; and Eric Lindros, whose stick is so stiff most people can’t even bend it. We discover how Carl Brewer helped bring European laminating expertise to North America and how Ken Dryden inadvertently changed the way sticks were marketed. Full of love and lore, The Stick is a celebration of our past that’s destined to become as treasured as an autographed, game-used, Wayne Gretzky Titan 1002.

The Stick: A history, a celebration, an elegy

Incredibly, the legacy of one-time hockey czar Alan Eagleson still poisons professional hockey. The generation of players that “the Eagle” systematically abused, misled, and defrauded continues to take its revenge on his successors. When a former Boston player, Mike Gillis, suffered a career-ending injury, Eagleson, his agent, bilked him out of some $40,000 in insurance money. Gillis sued and won. What Gillis learned from the episode is that players need hard-nosed and honest representation and that no quarter needs to be given in encounters with the good old boys who run the game. Gillis is an agent now – one of the best. The players he and other trained agents represent routinely get contracts worth tens of millions of dollars. Over the past ten years, the NHL’s payroll has shot up from nearly $200 million to more than $1 billion. Around 350 players make more than a million dollars per annum. And the league’s owners are crying the blues. But these owners often buy up sports teams for reasons of ego and for kicks. And the general managers often are former players who like to shoot the breeze with old friends and do deals on the strength of a handshake. Neither is a match for the new breed of agent or for the players’ association president Bob Goodenow. Something’s got to give. Bruce Dowbiggin’s eye-opening report takes readers from the locker rooms to the board rooms. His inside view makes sense of the seemingly crazy labour conflict that is about to batter the NHL.

Money Players: How Hockey's Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at its Own Game

Pick up a hockey stick. You hold an iconic symbol of the place that gave it birth, a tangible bit of Canadian culture, a link to Canada’s past. From the earliest one-piece sticks, carved from tree roots by the Mi’kmaqs of Nova Scotia, to the two— and three—piece models turned out in small towns in Ontario and Quebec, to the composite models now produced with scientific precision by Easton, the stick has always reflected something distinctly Canadian. Today it has become "cyber-product," globally sourced, anonymously produced, and expertly marketed. As sporting tool, as weapon, and as cultural artifact, the stick is a part of Canadian history. Consider the London schoolteacher whose basement is a treasure trove of old sticks. The Calgary handyman who turns broken sticks into kids’ furniture. The NHL owner whose rec room floor is made of hockey sticks. The artist who sculpts oversized sticks out of granite. Dowbiggin introduces us to Stan Mikita, who invented the curved blade (or did he?); Jeremy Roenick, who lets no one else touch his stick; Adam Oates, who uses a stubby, cut-off blade; and Eric Lindros, whose stick is so stiff most people can’t even bend it. We discover how Carl Brewer helped bring European laminating expertise to North America and how Ken Dryden inadvertently changed the way sticks were marketed. Full of love and lore, The Stick is a celebration of our past that’s destined to become as treasured as an autographed, game-used, Wayne Gretzky Titan 1002. From the Hardcover edition.

Who can forget — or forgive — the image that played out in headlines in sports pages and television screens across North America when NHL owners and the players union met in a desperate last-minute vote in their protracted labour negotiations: NHL Owners and Players Association Vote: Screw You! to Fans. Money Players is a bare-knuckles brawl of a book about the way the real game is played — the game that goes on behind doors behind rich execs and greedy agents — and even greedier players.

Money Players: The Amazing Rise and Fall of bob Goodenow and the NHL Players Association

Key Porter Books

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Dowbiggin, Bruce. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Dowbiggin, Bruce

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Dowbiggin, Bruce. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Grant Fuhr: The Story of a Hockey Legend

Grant Fuhr: The Story of a Hockey Legend

The Meaning of Puck: How Hockey Explains Modern Canada

Money Players: How Hockey's Greatest Stars Beat the NHL At It's Own Game

Of Ice and Men: The Craft of Hockey

Of Ice and Men: The Craft of Hockey

The Stick: A history, a celebration, an elegy

Money Players: How Hockey's Greatest Stars Beat the NHL at its Own Game

The Stick: A history, a celebration, an elegy

Money Players: The Amazing Rise and Fall of bob Goodenow and the NHL Players Association