No longer the rivalry Dryden speaks of; Eye on Donruss Preferred; Bruins or Northeastern men's soccer?

I've shot up to page 176 of Ken Dryden's "The Game," and I can say already with confidence that it is one of my favorite books of all-time. Definately, along with Bidini's book on hockey in unlikely places, it is the best hockey book out there. Despite being a die-hard fan, I had little knowledge of what it was like to grow up in Canada, learn to play hockey back then and spend about a decade backstopping the legendary Canadiens teams to six Stanley Cups. Dryden paints a picture of every arena and city he travels to, every player he encounters, every obstacle he stumbles upon. You learn how NHL players started, how they fell apart, how they succumbed to guilty pleasures, how the life of a hockey player isn't always what it is cracked up to be. I have learned what Really made Bobby Orr so special and so different than any other great defenseman. Or why Scotty Bowman never had an NHL career. I found out what made Pete Mahovlich so special to those Canadiens teams, and it wasn't his superstardom. The Canadiens didn't really need any one player's talent; they needed things more abstract, things that you could never buy and never teach.



I will eventually offer a full review, but for now, I just want to say that I would relish a Canadiens vs. Bruins original 6 rivalry like it was 30 some odd years ago. Dryden describes the Stanley Cup-winning Bruins of 1970:

It was a team of great personal chemistry, free-spirited in the worst of times, now as champions rousing and carousing like a pier-six brawl ready to happen. Hard living, hard laughing, a team both on and off the ice, they seemed the image of what every team should be. And on and off the ice, the wind finally at their backs, in the glow of good feeling that had taken over the city and their fans, they built an enormous roll of momentum."

Tonight we have:
* Matt Lashof and probably another no-namer called up from Providence
* Sergei Samsonov, once the B's most exciting first-liner and now of MTL's fourth line, returning to Boston
* The B's and Habs both trying to recover from beatings suffered at the hands of the mighty Sabres



* Cristobal HugeGay with a 50% chance of ruining my night
* Cristobal HugeGay with a 50% chance of sending the Bruins into a tie with the Flyers for the league's worst start
* A viewing dilemma: Do I watch the B's or the William & Mary at Old Dominion men's soccer game, which has playoff for Northeastern's men's soccer team, which can clinch a postseason birth tomorrow night at home? I don't know whether to root for the team I've covered for three months, or hope for a loss so I can attend my first adult league hockey game on Sunday night and my halloween party on Tuesday night.



At this point, I might as well root for the Sabres and see how far they go without a loss. So far this year, there seems to be a real discrepancy in talent. There's like four teams with zero or one loss and four with two wins or less (Bruins). I saw a Sabres fan sporting a jersey (not the new one) of the NHL's elite outside Matthews arena today.

My boss is out today and traveling with the hockey team to Michigan two hockey games this weekend. I couldn't believe they have four first round draft picks, including Jack Johnson on the team. McCauley, me ex-teammate, playing against Johnson? What happened to my career? Now, as I have experienced during free skate hours at work the last couple days, I need 15 minutes to recoup after a few sprints.

HOCKEY SET TO WATCH:

1997-98 Donruss Preferred.



This is a fancy looking set, one a few put out by Donruss that year, including the donruss limited exposure series which I continue to build. The Preferred issue also packed some high-quality rookie cards of a few superstars just reaching their peak now. In the silver verson, Olli Jokinen and Marian Hossa. The gold version has Vaclav Prospal. Prospal is rarer, but Jokinen ($30) and Hossa ($50) have great potential to grow this year. The Thrashers look for real and Hossa looks just as good as Kovalchuk. Jokinen leads an up-and-coming Panthers team. I expect both to at least double in value over the course of this season. In Hossa's case, maybe quadruple if the Thrashers make a postseason run.

I HAVE: one BGS 9.5 Jokinen, one BGS 8.5 Jokinen, one ungraded Hossa, and one BGS 8.5 Hossa.