The Hammer: Confessions of a Hockey Enforcer [*SIGNED*]

New York: Summit Books. Very Good+ in Near Fine dj. (c.1981). 4th printing. Hardcover. [minimal shelfwear, thin black marker line (remainder mark) on bottom edge of text block; the jacket has just a bit of faint soiling to the front panel and some light surface wear (essentially invisible inside its mylar covering)]. (B&W photographs) INSCRIBED ("With all my love to my favorite hockey fan") and SIGNED by the author (just "Dave") on the front endpaper. Memoir by the famous hockey "enforcer" -- basically a guy whose primary job on the ice was to get into fights -- who played most notably for the Philadelphia Flyers (from 1971 to 1976), and to this day holds the all-time NHL record for most penalty minutes in a single season (472). He had been retired as an active player for about a year when this book was published, but went on to coach a number of minor-league teams. In 1982 he famously published an op-ed piece in the sports section of The New York Times -- written as a letter to his then 6-year-old son -- in which he expressed regret about his contribution to the level of violence that had come to characterize the game of hockey: "I wanted desperately to be a good, clean player just as I had been in junior hockey," he wrote, "but it was not to be. I was branded a goon [and] there was no turning back." Signed by Author .