zambonicyouth

I probably couldn’t write a song like “Achy Breaky Heart” I’m not sure I’m clever enough to write something that stupid. – Lyle Lovett

Writing even a bad book is hard enough. – Richard Ford

Leafs Abomination
by Dave Feshcuk and Michael Grange
Random House, $19.67

Review by MF37

I’m going to be honest with you: this is a book I had bad feelings about before I even cracked the spine.

From the moment I opened the envelope from Random House, it felt like a title driven more by a half-baked marketing plan and a few punch-lines hastily scribbled on beer coasters than a legitimate attempt to explain the long-standing misfortunes of a sporting franchise.

Just look at that cover – a Leaf fan wearing a paper bag, an upside down logo,  the all-too prominent price point ($19.67 Ha! Those marketing guys sure are clever). I’m guessing either Random House was too busy to come up with so much as a second cover design option or the summer intern finally got a shot at Chip Kidd infamy (and failed).

It’s hard to figure out just who the target audience is.  The cover and tone won’t appeal to general Leafs fans and the bulk of the book is so clumsy and dull that it won’t appeal to the cynics of Leafs nation who are genuinely interested in the inner workings of this troubled franchise.  So what audience is left? Is there really a market out there amongst the tiny segment of the hockey-loving book-buying public that’s fueled by hate?

If someone wrote an expose on the Habs or why Les Glorieux have stunk for the past 15 years, I doubt I’d read it – even if I found it in the seatback in front of me on a transatlantic flight – never mind actually pay for the thing.

Are Sens fans insecure enough that they’d spend $20 to read about the Ballard years? Even that’s pushing things a bit too far.

But enough of the business behind the book and my initial response,  what’s actually between the covers?

When it comes to the Toronto Maple Leafs there is plenty of source material ready to be mined. This book could have been an incredible long-form magazine piece, unfortunately it has been stretched and pumped with filler into a not-so-great book.

That said, there is high-quality, insightful, material here – some of which I’ve never encountered before. The chapters featuring profiles and interviews with Richard Peddie, Larry Tanenbaum and John Ferguson Junior are genuine must reads for Leaf fans, especially those who want to know as much about the boardroom as they do the players on the bench.

Pat Quinn comes off as more fascinating than ever, Tie Domi cements his well known eponymous anagram, Tannenbaum emerges as a very sympathetic character (who knew?) and Peddie sinks to new lows (yeah, I didn’t think it was possible either).

Friend of this blog, Julian from Pension Plan Puppets gets five whole pages about his love of the leafs and his work at PPP that’s worth a read (meanwhile, yours truly gets incorrectly named dropped – how par for the course is that?).

The chapter on the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Fund is good, although it’s little light on the hockey content for the average Leaf fan. (The profit motive of the various owners is cited as the primary reason the Leafs have struggled for so long. While the authors can spell “fiduciary” I’m not sure they know what it means. Left unexplored is the question of how much more profit this money-hungry organization could milk from a rabid fan-base if they actually put a winning team on the ice or, heaven forbid, won the Cup. This is a huge question to go unasked considering they’ve dedicated 252 pages to the matter).

The parts about the ’93 Leafs with Doug Gilmour and Wendel Clark are a fun, albeit thin, read but the rest of the book is little more than in-fill, the literary equivalent of waiver-wire call ups, career AHLers, and 4th line wash-outs.

Unfortunately, for anyone keeping score that’s three must read and two ok chapters out of ten (plus a prologue and epilogue). Five for 12 sounds more like the Leafs’ standard January swoon than a successful ratio for a book.

Oh, and if context or nuance is your thing, you better have a red pen or a sense of humour at the ready as the authors aren’t exactly going for subtlety here.  Sadly, there are parts of the book that barely rise above the inane comments and shoddy analysis found on most on-line discussion groups (go Flyers!!!1). There are plenty of small errors too. And yes, the picture of the skeleton in a Leaf jersey next to a “waiting for the cup” sign makes an appearance. At least there’s no “leaf blower” photo. I guess I should be happy for small mercies.

To add to the confusion, after 250+ pages of organizational failures, finger pointing and inane blather the authors conclude by telling Leaf fans to take hope.  I’m not sure if this platitude is:

a) insulting
b) hollow
c) a joke
d) an attempt to soften the critics
e) all of the above

Bottom-line: read chapters 2 (Peddie), 4 (Tannenbaum) and 5 (JFJ) over a couple of coffee breaks at your local bookstore or library. Dip into chapter three if you want to read about the drinking habits of the ’93 Leafs and be sure to read pages 175-180 for the profile of PPP.

Other than that, it’s best to skip or skim the rest. There’s not much value in it and it’s likely nothing you haven’t heard, read or dismissed before. And it’s a shame, because this is a franchise and an ownership group that really deserves to be put under the microscope.

One last message: whatever you do, don’t buy this book.

Seriously.

One of the authors’ central arguments about the Leafs is that fans have supported crap for far too long and that support is partially responsible for perpetuating a four-decade string of mediocrity.

If you shovel $20 at product like this, there’s a real danger that it’s only going to encourage more publishers to hire basketball writers to pen a half-baked book about your favourite hockey team. And no matter what franchise you’re a fan of (and there are plenty of them that have gone 30+ years without a Cup to chose from) no good can come from that.