If Ernest Hemingway played hockey: defenseman, rated 83

Ernest Hemingway as a hockey player: scouting report

Ernest Hemingway would play defense, and he would bring a boxer's instincts to the blue line. He boxed for much of his life, sparring with friends and writers wherever he lived, and he spent long days fighting giant marlin from his boat, the Pilar, in the waters off Cuba and Key West. A man who has battled a fish for hours is not going to lose a puck battle in the corner. Physical play is a major strength, and he would finish his checks and clear the front of his net with authority.

His defense is the best thing on his card, and it matches the way he wrote. Hemingway described his style as an iceberg, with most of the meaning hidden beneath the surface, and a great defenseman works the same way: the positioning, the stick placement and the reads you never notice are what stop the play before it starts. His short, clean sentences translate to short, clean first passes. He won the Pulitzer Prize for The Old Man and the Sea and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954, and his goaltending grade reflects that discipline.

His scoring touch is the weakest part of his card, so he is a shutdown defenseman rather than a power play threat. Goalie is a strong second spot and left wing a usable third. He was a devoted follower of bullfighting who wrote about Pamplona in The Sun Also Rises, so he admires courage in the face of a charge. Pair him with a puck moving partner, put him against the other team's top line and let him do the quiet work beneath the surface.

Plays like A hard nosed shutdown defenseman with a boxer's instincts

Put Ernest Hemingway in your lineup

8 rolls, a starting six and a bench, 82 games. Can you go 82-0? Free, no account.