Playing Pro Hockey

To play professional hockey, you need plenty of grit and determination?it's a physically and emotionally punishing job. Millions of people are expecting you to give your all, connect on your checks, outskate your competitors, and do whatever it takes to score goals. To perform at that level, you must be in impeccable shape all year round. You'll spend hundreds of hours practicing skills, working with teammates, and watching video. Plus you'll need to cope with constant media attention and all of the travel that goes with the 82-game season. But for those who reach the pros, the long hours and hard work are totally worth it. This book, which was reviewed by 12-year National Hockey League (NHL) veteran Mark Parrish, offers an authentic look at what life is like as a pro hockey player. You'll learn: ? How players climb the ranks to reach the NHL ? The types of workouts and dietary plans NHL players use ? How NHL players prevent and treat injuries Go behind the scenes and see what it's really like to be an NHL star!

Many professional athletes begin their journey as children. Hockey players are no different. Wayne Gretzky learned to skate when he was 2½ years old! However, hard work and practice are what allow those with talent to make it to the next level. Readers are introduced to the common paths to becoming a pro hockey player, from youth leagues all the way to the NHL. Each chapter focuses on one step of the necessary training for pros, including full-color photographs and information about hockey superstars. Aspiring players can learn a lot about what it takes to excel on the ice!

To play professional hockey, you need plenty of grit and determination—it's a physically and emotionally punishing job. Millions of people are expecting you to give your all, connect on your checks, outskate your competitors, and do whatever it takes to score goals. To perform at that level, you must be in impeccable shape all year round. You'll spend hundreds of hours practicing skills, working with teammates, and watching video. Plus you'll need to cope with constant media attention and all of the travel that goes with the 82-game season. But for those who reach the pros, the long hours and hard work are totally worth it. This book, which was reviewed by 12-year National Hockey League (NHL) veteran Mark Parrish, offers an authentic look at what life is like as a pro hockey player. You'll learn: • How players climb the ranks to reach the NHL • The types of workouts and dietary plans NHL players use • How NHL players prevent and treat injuries Go behind the scenes and see what it's really like to be an NHL star!

Hockey Plays and Strategies features a variety of plays, systems, and strategies for game play in the offensive, neutral, and defensive zones. Special situations such as the power play, penalty kill, and face-offs are also featured.

What does it take to make it in pro hockey? Los Angeles Kings forward Dan Bylsma and his father, Jay, offer a wealth of inside information for young players. Dan Bylsma shares his experiences rising up through the ranks of amateur and professional hockey while giving advice on issues including becoming a team player, knowing the rules, relating to coaches and teammates, and working hard.

Canadians have always dreamed about hockey. And we all love our kids. But somehow our desire to give everything we've got to two of the things we love the most has left both worse off. For many families, hockey has become more business than pleasure, where children don't even play anymore--now they compete. The dream of playing in the NHL and the enormous costs that come with it, are killing hockey in Canada. Drawing on decades of combined experience in hockey at all levels, Ken Campbell and Jim Parcels pull back the curtain to show just how far our national game has strayed from its roots. What they reveal is a system driven by unrealistic expectations of a financial windfall, where minor-hockey fees and new sticks for kids are deemed "investments"--and where there is no shortage of entrepreneurs more than happy to take money from starry-eyed parents. Often shocking, always informative, " Selling the Dream " is not only a guidebook for involved hockey parents across the country, it is a defence of the game we all love, and of childhood itself.

Dan Bylsma, of the Los Angeles Kings, has achieved his childhood dream of playing in the North American National Ice Hockey League (NHL). It was a dream cultivated on a small homemade ice rink maintained by his father Jay in the backyard of their home.

Willie O'Ree quietly made NHL history at the Montreal Forum on January 18, 1958, when he became the first black player to take to the ice. In the dressing room before the game, his Boston Bruins teammates told him not to worry. If any one of the Montreal players said anything to him, they'd have his back. There was a round of applause when O'Ree stepped onto the ice, and newspapers ran the story. The colour barrier in the NHL had been broken, yet it would be sixteen years before the next black player, Mike Marson (also a Canadian), was drafted. Four decades later, the NHL pulled O'Ree out of retirement to honour his achievement and make him an ambassador for the NHL's "Hockey is for Everyone" program to encourage kids from all backgrounds to play hockey. This new book by Nicole Mortillaro traces the early life of O'Ree in Fredericton, New Brunswick, his journey to the NHL, highlights from his hockey career, and his work encouraging diversity in the NHL. Fry reading level - 4.9

Players dedicate their lives to the goal of playing professional hockey and teams demand total commitment from their players, giving them complete control over almost all aspects of the players' lives. With the enormous labour turnover in the AHL and the surplus labour pool, players are extremely vulnerable: they must perform well or be replaced by the scores of other men willing to do the same job. With limited education and limited life skills, players seldom meet people who are not connected to the game and, when they do, they do so with trepidation. The constructed universe of the game consumes the players so that, in spite of any wealth they may accumulate, they often know nothing other than the game and have invested everything in an occupation where their services quickly become obsolete. Far from the sensational memoirs of those few players who make it to the top, Robidoux's Men at Play offers a bracing inside look at the dynamics of the fastest game on earth.