‘Be accountable to yourself’: Chris Pronger on new book ‘Earned,’ life after hockey, sobriety and what’s next
TORONTO — In an effort to break the ice with Chris Pronger ahead of our conversation for the release of his book, Earned: The True Cost of Greatness from One of Hockey’s Fiercest Competitors, I thought a good opener would be to give him a chance to tell everyone he is the newest general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs.
His response began with a belly laugh. “I am currently not the new general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs,” he said.
Currently?! While Pronger didn’t share much beyond that when it comes to the prospect of management, the 51-year-old didn’t shy away from how the competitive drive that fuelled his 18-year NHL career never left.
Earned, released Tuesday in bookstores and available for purchase online, isn’t a long read but serves as a microcosm of who Pronger was as a player and a person: straight to the point, no bullshit or tiptoeing around the subject, blunt to a fault. But his first attempt at writing subverts the traditional genre of storytelling retired athletes are known for; Earned isn’t a tell-all memoir that shares anecdotes of late nights on the road or him taking the opportunity to bash coaches and players he hated.
Instead, Pronger paints vivid portraits of critical moments in his career that he calls “forks in the road,” where things could have gone sideways and the entire trajectory of his life would have changed. While putting together a framework of how to write the book, he says he wanted to share the standards that worked for him, hoping that readers can take lessons and apply them in their lives.
“This might work for you, but on your terms, not on my terms,” he told Daily Faceoff. “You’re the only one that can do it. Take ownership. Be accountable to yourself. There’s plenty of moments, as I talk about in the book, where I wasn’t, and frankly, where I need to get my shit together and push myself more.”
SETTING THE STANDARD
The book’s introduction gives readers a vivid point-of-view of growing up in northwestern Ontario, of being a point-per-game player in the Ontario Hockey League, of being drafted No. 2 overall by the Hartford Whalers in the 1993 NHL Entry Draft — then getting booed on home ice in both Hartford and St. Louis after he was traded to the Blues in 1995.
“Early on, I was just a tall, raw defenseman trying to figure things out,” Pronger wrote in the book’s introduction. “My real turning point came when a sports psychologist asked me a simple question: ‘What are your standards?’ I didn’t have an answer, but that question — and the process of finding the answer — changed everything.”
Pronger shares those standards and how they evolved through his Hall of Fame career, one that saw him play more than 1,100 regular-season games, record nearly 700 points and a shade under 1,600 penalty minutes and earn eight suspensions and countless fines. It also saw him win the Stanley Cup with the Anaheim Ducks in 2007, two Olympic gold medals, earn a spot on the NHL 100 and win the Hart Trophy in 2000, an achievement no other defenseman has done in the 26 years since.
He says he wanted to examine those moments of being booed on home ice, and what led to them being replaced with cheers, helping shape the reputation he carried as he evolved into one of hockey’s elite defenders.
“As I started to set standards and as I started to mature and gain some experience is where I found that hardened edge, found the grit and built the resilience that helped shape and mold my character,” he said. “If I can get through this and (find) that ability to not quit, to not be paralyzed by those boos and by everything coming down on top of me and the weight of expectations, to live up to the potential, if I can overcome that, anything else afterwards was easy.”
It was this realization that put a chip on Pronger’s shoulder, one that still remains more than a decade after he retired, giving him the motivation to want to prove others wrong and change the narrative written about him.
“Now they’re not booing you: they’re cheering you,” he said. “You go on the road and now you’re getting booed and you’re soaking up that emotion of the crowd.”
OFF THE ICE
As mentioned earlier, Pronger says the same competitive drive that led to his on-ice success has never waivered, although he doesn’t hesitate in sharing that “you’re never going to replicate” it, even behind the bench or on the managerial side.
“You’re not playing, you’re watching and you’re critiquing and you’re scouting,” he told Daily Faceoff. “It’s something that, no matter what, that rush of adrenaline is the thing that people chase when they retire, and unfortunately, you can’t find it again. A lot of players struggle with that: purpose, identity, and I talk about in the book that to me, that’s where guys can really go off the rails.”
Pronger includes himself in that assessment. After a seven-year stretch that saw him play in three Stanley Cup Finals with three different teams, capped off with a career-ending injury in 2011-12 that he knew immediately sealed his career, he reimagined himself in a variety of roles, pivoting and trying to find purpose and structure in a post-hockey career. He says it was two-and-a-half years ago when he quit drinking alcohol that he was able to reach a point where he determined he could make an impact through the book, broadcasting and other avenues, creating a legacy that stands out apart from on the ice.
“In years past, I’ve talked to guys who’ve had concussion issues, who have quit drinking just because of how it affected them, and that one was one of the reasons why I quit, because of how it was affecting me,” he said. “What they described (after quitting alcohol) was exactly what I got: that clarity, you’re not foggy, you’re able to really think things through. That clarity allowed me to dig in.”
It was through clarity that Pronger says allowed him to “peel back the onion layers” and dig into what he wanted to do the rest of his life. There’s a line in Earned — “Gray areas are where standards go to die” — that Pronger highlights when talking about quitting drinking altogether, instead of cutting it to one or two beers, or just wine with dinner.
“It’s hard to take that first step,” he told Daily Faceoff. “But you have to start somewhere.”
Earned: The True Cost of Greatness from One of Hockey’s Fiercest Competitors, is now available online and wherever you buy books.
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