Ken Dryden's The Game and accuracy thereof

[cupcrazyman]

Dryden's record against Toronto was 22-2-9 with a .934 save percentage. Any soft goals he let in were few and far between.

Sorry I was probably thinking about Dave Reece from Boston.

 

[The Panther]

Dryden's record against Toronto was 22-2-9 with a .934 save percentage.

Wasn't that pretty much Dryden's record against every team?

 

[hacksaw7]

Fear of getting "exposed" had nothing to do with Dryden retiring. As is clear in The Game he was already considering retiring after the third straight cup in '78, and was convinced to return by management. Dryden retired because there was nothing left to prove after 6 cups in 8 yrs and he had other interests he wanted to pursue. If he was so worried about being exposed he wouldn't have approached the Soviet authorities about going and training in Russia. As for the high flying 80s, Montreal continued to be a very good defensive team. The hydra of mediocrity that was Herron, Larocque, Sevigny & Wamsley won a Vezina and the initial Jennings trophy and collectively that bunch wasn't anywhere near as good as Dryden was. *** If he plays to say 35 he's winning those awards, just doesn't likely wind up with more Cups, but either way his legacy would've been stellar.

Regarding his aloofness, his being "different", welcome to the wonderful world of goaltenders. None of Sawchuck, Plante, Hasek, Roy, Thomas were known to be particularly good teammates or locker room presences. As long as their teammates believed in them on the ice, that's all that mattered.


***thinking about this the Vezina was changed from goalie(s) surrendering fewest goals to "best" goaltender. The Jennings then became the trophy to recognize the previous distinction. In a world of the purely theoretical Dryden winning the Vezina in '81 instead of the committee of Herron, Sevigny, Larocque, does the change in awards even happen? A Dryden/Larocque tandem wouldn't lead to the impetus for change as Dryden at the very least is considered a "legitimate" Vezina winner. Montreal surrenders the fewest goals against again the following year (the Herron/Wamsley Jennings) so Dryden theoretically wins back to back Vezinas and ties Plante for the record with 7. Just a thought.

Ok I can buy that. Habs were still solid defensively in the shadow of the dynasty and Dryden probably does indeed win what they did

But I mean it's not about having nothing left to prove. It's about doing the most meaningful and important thing you'll do in your life (backstop the Montreal Canadiens) Winning Cups shouldn't get boring...the league is always changing so the challenge to prove yourself and keep performing is still there. The friendship, comradery, of being in that historic locker room. Why not squeeze all you could out of it. You'll never have more fun in your life. You'll never matter more, you'll never be admired and respected more. Once you give that up...most players miss it more than anything

 

[reckoning]

Wasn't that pretty much Dryden's record against every team?

Dryden's record against each team:

Washington: 19-0-1, .949
Atlanta: 9-1-5, .935
Toronto: 22-2-9: .934
Clf/Clv: 14-1-4, .931
St.Louis: 19-3-3, .930
Vancouver: 23-1-4, .929
Minnesota: 21-2-3, .928
Detroit: 19-4-5, .928
Philadelphia: 11-7-7, .925
KC/Colorado: 9-1-1, .918
Pittsburgh: 15-3-2, .916
Chicago: 11-4-1, .916
Boston: 16-5-9, .914
Los Angeles: 14-5-5, .908
Buffalo: 13-8-3, .908
NY Rangers: 10-6-6, .905
NY Islanders: 13-4-2, .894

Maybe he just didn't like the State of New York?

 

[hacksaw7]

Good save percentage vs Philly but not exactly a sparkling won/loss record against them either (by his standards)

 

[double5son10]

Ok I can buy that. Habs were still solid defensively in the shadow of the dynasty and Dryden probably does indeed win what they did

But I mean it's not about having nothing left to prove. It's about doing the most meaningful and important thing you'll do in your life (backstop the Montreal Canadiens) Winning Cups shouldn't get boring...the league is always changing so the challenge to prove yourself and keep performing is still there. The friendship, comradery, of being in that historic locker room. Why not squeeze all you could out of it. You'll never have more fun in your life. You'll never matter more, you'll never be admired and respected more. Once you give that up...most players miss it more than anything

Well, clearly Ken Dryden isn't "most players". I've certainly never read that he's regretted his decision to move on. He won, A LOT and that was what was meaningful, until it wasn't. Dryden clearly loves hockey still, but he's also accomplished more after hockey than most. He found a balance that worked for him. Just a different bird, and that seems to bother a lot of people.

 

[Mount Suribachi]

Well, clearly Ken Dryden isn't "most players". I've certainly never read that he's regretted his decision to move on. He won, A LOT and that was what was meaningful, until it wasn't. Dryden clearly loves hockey still, but he's also accomplished more after hockey than most. He found a balance that worked for him. Just a different bird, and that seems to bother a lot of people.

I mean, in The Game, he literally quotes the title of legendary England goalkeeper Gordon Banks autobiography, Goalies Are Different.

As for how Bowman is depicted. Manny Legace, describing how Bowman treated Steve Yzerman: "Scotty had the personality of an ant."

 

[JianYang]

Wasn't that pretty much Dryden's record against every team?

On hockey dB, he has a career 2.24 GAA, and a 919 save percentage, but it seems they only tracked save percentage for 3 of his seasons, including his first year where he only had 6 games.

 

[Doctor No]

On hockey dB, he has a career 2.24 GAA, and a 919 save percentage, but it seems they only tracked save percentage for 3 of his seasons, including his first year where he only had 6 games.

Ralph's numbers for those three years are the unofficial ones before the NHL produced official totals (which I'll note do still contain errors).

 

[Jumptheshark]

I've recently been reading Ken Dryden's "The Game". Many years later than I should have, of course. That said... Just how accurate is this book supposed to be anyway?

He clearly sets the book in the latter half of the 78/79 season, as he is playing out his final season and the Canadiens are en route to their fourth straight Cup. He goes on to vividly describe a number of games supposedly from that season, starting with a visit to Toronto with roughly three months to go. That places the game some time around late January / early February. He describes the flow of the game, and names specific goal scorers leading to a Canadiens win. Now there was a Montreal / Toronto game on Feb. 3/79 which fits the timeline. But the box score is all wrong. The real game didn't unfold the way Dryden described. The goal scorers didn't match.

Next he says the team went to Boston. But they didn't. Their next game was in Washington. They didn't go to Boston for nearly two more months. He also described a home game against Colorado earlier in the season that he tried to lose single handedly, surrendering numerous bad goals but they escaped with what he called a 6-5 victory. Except the closest real game to that would have been in December, the Habs did win only 3-2, but Dryden didn't even play that night. Nor was Dryden in goal during the other Colorado / Montreal game in Montreal that season.

It's knocking me right out of the flow of the book. Just how many times did he get a puck in the head that season?

It is from Dryden's point of view

 

[JianYang]

Ok I can buy that. Habs were still solid defensively in the shadow of the dynasty and Dryden probably does indeed win what they did

But I mean it's not about having nothing left to prove. It's about doing the most meaningful and important thing you'll do in your life (backstop the Montreal Canadiens) Winning Cups shouldn't get boring...the league is always changing so the challenge to prove yourself and keep performing is still there. The friendship, comradery, of being in that historic locker room. Why not squeeze all you could out of it. You'll never have more fun in your life. You'll never matter more, you'll never be admired and respected more. Once you give that up...most players miss it more than anything

Dryden is a different guy. He liked hockey, but he had other interests that he liked just as much.

I think he has a law degree, he has served as a member of Parliament in Canada, and he's written books.

I also seem to remember him talking about how his body was beat up in his book, but I don't know how heavily that weighed into his decision to move on.

 

[Skrudland2Lomakin]

Bit of an old thread but I’m currently reading this and came across this post. I thought I’d throw my hat in the ring to say that my perception of the narrative format of taking place a little over a week with each chapter being a different day and not one to one with the actual facts to be an intentional literary device. One of the themes in Dryden’s book seems to be that there is a rhythm to a season, but also that a career of doing this rhythmic dance takes a toll on guys, especially one like him who is always looking for intellectual stimulation. By structuring the book in the way he does he’s able convey both how the day in and day out feels and how grueling the march of a season can be.

Dryden is a sharp guy obviously, my assumption is he had a lose collection of thoughts he recorded over a season but then he realized that just trying to write it as something that is over the course of 9 months didn’t really capture the vibe he was going for. I suspect he chose the opponents he put as games in that window because they allowed him to talk about interesting thoughts he had whereas Washington was ass then and he probably didn’t have many thoughts or anecdotes.

 

[Staniowski]

Bit of an old thread but I’m currently reading this and came across this post. I thought I’d throw my hat in the ring to say that my perception of the narrative format of taking place a little over a week with each chapter being a different day and not one to one with the actual facts to be an intentional literary device. One of the themes in Dryden’s book seems to be that there is a rhythm to a season, but also that a career of doing this rhythmic dance takes a toll on guys, especially one like him who is always looking for intellectual stimulation. By structuring the book in the way he does he’s able convey both how the day in and day out feels and how grueling the march of a season can be.

Dryden is a sharp guy obviously, my assumption is he had a lose collection of thoughts he recorded over a season but then he realized that just trying to write it as something that is over the course of 9 months didn’t really capture the vibe he was going for. I suspect he chose the opponents he put as games in that window because they allowed him to talk about interesting thoughts he had whereas Washington was ass then and he probably didn’t have many thoughts or anecdotes.

Yes, for sure. He wanted it to be day-to-day, moment-to-moment....and he wanted to talk about certain things, teams, situations, so the games were against Boston (he said his favourite game was against the Bruins in Boston), where he could remember back to Orr and Esposito, and also the current (late '70s) team; and against Philly, where he could talk about Clarke, and violence, etc., and the Leafs, where he could talk about his childhood in Toronto....

 

[VanIslander]

Ken Dryden's Home Game was great.
I recall it had chapters on Soviet encounters.

Peter Gzowski had said Dryden was most cogent when talking about the Soviets.