Changing the Game: A History of NHL Expansion by Stephen Laroche (2014).
Just bought and read this the other day. He goes through every expansion team, starting with the Boston Bruins and ending with the Minnesota Wild. By virtue of publishing date he doesn't have Vegas (or Seattle), but does note the league is starting to consider expanding, and cites Quebec and Kansas City (?) as possible locations.
It is a neat set-up. Each era is given a short summary of a couple pages, detailing the status of the league and a little bit of the idea towards expansion (why they did, why those locations were chosen), then each team is chronicled. It looks at the background of the team itself, then goes over the first season of the team. A few sentences conclude this section going over how things went after that, and for still-existing teams he notes his thoughts on how they are doing circa 2012-13 (which I didn't really enjoy; I don't need Laroche's thoughts that the Blue Jackets still have no future, or that the Canucks should keep doing well). He then goes through several players on that first-year team, usually a page or so detailing how they arrived on the team and what they did that first year. For more recent teams he was able to talk to a lot of players, so lots of quotes from them. There is also up to 4 photos of players from that first-year team, usually from that year, which is a nice touch.
In summary it was a great way to organize the book, though a few things could have made it even better: there are references to the expansion drafts, but there is no lists anywhere of the full drafts. And something like a full list of stats from each team would be nice to have as well, or any stats really. He also quickly goes through the earlier teams, giving them only a few pages, while the more modern teams get a fuller treatment (understandable of course, but still). And again the commentary is not that productive. He also made at least one glaring issue: Balsillie did not buy the Predators in 2007, despite his best efforts. And while I can't fault Laroche for this, that the book came out right before the most recent expansion is tough, as it would have been nice to have at least Vegas included.
Overall I think people here would find this useful, especially the notes about players on the expansion teams. You won't learn much more about the expansion process otherwise, but to have it all in one book is a really nice thing to have.
Just bought and read this the other day. He goes through every expansion team, starting with the Boston Bruins and ending with the Minnesota Wild. By virtue of publishing date he doesn't have Vegas (or Seattle), but does note the league is starting to consider expanding, and cites Quebec and Kansas City (?) as possible locations.
It is a neat set-up. Each era is given a short summary of a couple pages, detailing the status of the league and a little bit of the idea towards expansion (why they did, why those locations were chosen), then each team is chronicled. It looks at the background of the team itself, then goes over the first season of the team. A few sentences conclude this section going over how things went after that, and for still-existing teams he notes his thoughts on how they are doing circa 2012-13 (which I didn't really enjoy; I don't need Laroche's thoughts that the Blue Jackets still have no future, or that the Canucks should keep doing well). He then goes through several players on that first-year team, usually a page or so detailing how they arrived on the team and what they did that first year. For more recent teams he was able to talk to a lot of players, so lots of quotes from them. There is also up to 4 photos of players from that first-year team, usually from that year, which is a nice touch.
In summary it was a great way to organize the book, though a few things could have made it even better: there are references to the expansion drafts, but there is no lists anywhere of the full drafts. And something like a full list of stats from each team would be nice to have as well, or any stats really. He also quickly goes through the earlier teams, giving them only a few pages, while the more modern teams get a fuller treatment (understandable of course, but still). And again the commentary is not that productive. He also made at least one glaring issue: Balsillie did not buy the Predators in 2007, despite his best efforts. And while I can't fault Laroche for this, that the book came out right before the most recent expansion is tough, as it would have been nice to have at least Vegas included.
Overall I think people here would find this useful, especially the notes about players on the expansion teams. You won't learn much more about the expansion process otherwise, but to have it all in one book is a really nice thing to have.
It is a "weighty" book both in mass (coffee table size) and in content (very academic). Not a book I'd recommend to someone looking for a fun hockey storyline or for a quick weekend read. It's definitely a "Hockey History" title, but I'd categorize the subject matter & the author's presentation of it as "hockey adjacent" rather than a mainline hockey read. Being a hockey arena junkie, I did enjoy Howard Shubert's book & I learned a lot from it. But IMO, it's a book that will appeal to a relatively small segment of hockey fans.
