Offside Sean Avery

Hockey’s most polarizing figure takes us inside the game, shedding light not only on what goes on behind closed doors, but also what makes professional athletes tick. Sean Avery has one of the biggest profiles of any NHL player in the past decade. He has appeared on Dancing with the Stars, Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight Show, Letterman’s Late Show, Good Morning America, and more. He’s modeled for ads in Vanity Fair and was named to People Magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive list. He writes for The Players’ Tribune. His wedding to supermodel Hilary Rhoda was covered in the media across North America. And when he was arrested the day before the ceremony, the story appeared in media as varied as the New York Times, the Daily Mail in the UK, and Perez Hilton. (The charges were later dropped.) Avery is not afraid to break the rules laid down by hockey tradition. And the most respected of these is the code of silence. For the first time, a hockey player is prepared to reveal what really goes on in the NHL, in the spirit of what Ball Four did for baseball. The money, the personalities, the adultery, and the drugs–and also the little things that make up daily life in the league. Most athletes have little to say, but Sean doesn’t have that problem. Yes, he tells us about the guys he’s fought and the guys he’s partied with, and he tells us where to find the best cougar bars in various NHL cities and what it’s like to be hounded by the media when you’re dating a celebrity. But Sean’s job on the ice was always to get inside the heads of the guys he played against, and that insight on human nature is on full display in Offside. What makes millionaire athletes tick? What are their weaknesses? And in the end, what makes Sean Avery–once called “the most hated player in the NHL”–who he is? What is it like to make people hate you for a living? Sean Avery’s misdeeds on and off the ice are well-documented, and he certainly has his detractors. But on the other hand, he has a lot of supporters, in part for things like being the first North American athlete to come out in favour of marriage equality, and in part just for being an interesting guy. Love him or hate him, he is one of the best-known players of the past few decades, and certainly one of the most colourful and outspoken. In Offside, he meets his accusers head-on, and gives them something to think about.