While hockey great Barry Beck had been in fights before, nothing had prepared him for a one-two punch this vicious. On July 26, 2020, Beck's son Brock was murdered. Just over seven months later, Beck's former New York Rangers teammate, U.S. Olympic hero Mark Pavelich, died by suicide.
"With Brock's murder, I was thrust into this prison cell of trauma. You can't get out. You don't have the skills. You're trapped like a prisoner."
With no clear pathway out, and too little support in place, Beck faced a momentous choice: would he be defeated or defiant? Would he surrender to his anger and pain or fight to find a better way through? Giving up would have been easy, but once you're a captain, you're always a captain. Once a Ranger, always a Ranger. For his friend and his son, he wouldn't give in. He would find a better way.
Tormented by tragedy, enraged by his helplessness, betrayed by his battered body, Beck tells the harrowing true story of the events that sentenced him to life in The Cell and his courageous journey to fight through his pain.
Beck's story pulls no punches, offering an honest view of life inside '80s professional hockey and the darkness that follows devastating trauma. It is his hope that, in a world where too many people struggle with insufficient support, his story can help those trapped in their own cells and encourage them on their own journeys.
