CUJO’S BURIED SECRETS
Ex-NHL goalie pens revealing memoir
Curtis Joseph’s on-ice exploits are well remembered by fans of the NHL in the 1990s and 2000s. The former NHL goaltender played for six teams and went on memorable post-season runs with the St. Louis Blues, Edmonton Oilers and Toronto Maple Leafs, and was part of Canada’s gold medal-winning team at the Salt Lake City Olympics.
But while he collected on ice accolades, he kept the off-ice story of his remarkable upbringing largely hidden.
“Nobody really wanted to ask those questions, and I really didn’t want to talk about it, either,” Joseph says. “Even guys I played with, why would I bring it up? I had this great life, I didn’t need to be anything to anybody.”
Joseph is now talking about it in his new memoir, Cujo: The Untold Story of My Life On and Off the Ice, co-written with Calgary’s Kirstie McLellan Day.
The book details how Joseph was adopted and grew up in a group home among mentally ill patients that was run by his adoptive father and mother, who struggled with addiction herself.
“I never really wanted to write a book,” says Joseph. “I was really embarrassed by my childhood and didn’t talk about it much until I met my wife Stephanie. We’ve been together 11 years. She was the one who said, ‘I love that you come from nothing and your story is fantastic.’ ”
He started using his life story as a teaching tool for his own kids, and then when he would do speaking engagements.
“The people were captivated. I could see their faces. Afterward, the feedback is great: ‘You should write a book, that’s a great story.’ ”
He needed one final push, which he got from his youngest son on one of their many drives together to hockey.
“If you can help one person not quit, achieve their goals and their dreams, whatever it is, then you’ve done your job,” Joseph recalls his son saying.
The result is a memoir that goes through the highs and lows of his early life, as well as a behind-thescenes look at his memorable NHL career.
He got a late start to the sport: the first time he played organized hockey was in Grade 4.
It was also the first time he stepped on the ice, as far as he remembers.
“Never in a rink. Maybe other than one time outside. I couldn’t skate to save my life,” he says.
“I was a good athlete, too, but I couldn’t skate at all. That was disappointing, because I really wanted to score goals.”
It was an auspicious start: His team won the championship that year.
“I just fell down because no one could raise (the puck past me),” he recalls.
“I remember in minor hockey, the guys who could raise it used to fool me. I just fell down (on it) most of the time.”
While relying on his adoptive father and then friends’ parents for rides to the rink, he improved his technique and managed to make it to the Ontario Junior Hockey
League and then to the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League, where he received an offer to play for the University of Wisconsin.
From there, as an undrafted free agent, he was signed by the St. Louis Blues in 1989, starting an NHL career that lasted 943 games.
His path crossed with many notable NHL characters — Tony Twist, Brett Hull, Brendan Shanahan, Rod Brind’Amour, Esa Tikkanen, Mike Keenan, Tie Domi, Pat Quinn — who make appearances in his stories that reveal what being an NHL player is like behind the scenes.
The greatest characters are perhaps enforcers like Twist and Domi, guys whose place has disappeared from the modern game.
Twist made his hand bones stronger by punching buckets of sand, then wood pallets, then rocks, then concrete.
“He’d wait for the swelling to go down, and then he’d do it again and again and again,” Joseph writes.
“I have a soft spot for the guys that are tough in our game. It’s a hard job,” says Joseph. “They would fight for their teammates — truly the epitome of team guys, they were fighting for someone else.”
Joseph’s stellar career wasn’t without lows, however. He was named the starting goalie for Canada’s 2002 Olympic team, but lost the first game of the tournament to Sweden, 5-2, and never regained the crease as Martin Brodeur took over and led the team to a gold medal. Joseph isn’t bitter about it.
“When you win, you can never be upset,” he says. “Marty played outstanding.
“Once I faltered, I could see how good he was in practice,” he adds. “He stopped everything. It was the right decision.”
The next summer, Joseph left the Toronto Maple Leafs and joined the Detroit Red Wings on a big-money contract — a move that was poorly received by fans who interacted with Joseph at home in Ontario.
“I went into the bank and held the door open for an older woman, a grandmother, like I normally do,” writes Joseph. “She walked through it and said, ‘Traitor.’ I was like, ‘Wow. Is this how it’s going to be?’”
Unfortunately, his time with the Red Wings didn’t work out. In his first season, they lost in the first round of the playoffs to the Cinderella Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, and the next year Joseph was back in the minors as Dominik Hasek came out of retirement.
After years of back-stopping run-and-gun teams like the Maple Leafs and the Edmonton Oilers, he struggled to adapt to facing few shots behind the Red Wings stalwart defence.
“My wife says, ‘You need to be needed. When your kids call you and they have something they need, you jump off the couch. You need to be needed,’” Joseph says. “That was me. I wish I would have known that earlier in my career. That was me, I needed to be needed on a team. That’s when I would play my best.”
The twilight of his career included a half season in 2008 with the Calgary Flames, where he was the backup to Miikka Kiprusoff. He has fond memories of that time, despite the Flames falling short in the first round of the playoffs.
“Such a great room, we had a chance to win the Cup,” Joseph says.
“I was there to strictly be a backup to Kiprusoff. We had a great time together. I didn’t play a lot, which I knew going in. I had to change my mentality, obviously. It was my first foray into being a backup. I let him know I was there to support him in any way. Any reads on shooters, on teams, on players, anything. I had a Rolodex in my head of where guys like to go.”
He’s returning to the city on his book tour, and despite not wanting to write a book initially, he’s come around, thanks to the response he’s received so far.