SPN Commentary: No need for fighting in hockey
Commentary by Caezar Ng
for South Peace News
If the NHL is contemplating taking fighting out of the league it should consider doing it sooner rather than later.
If it’s going to happen they may as well do it now and get it over with.
Potential fans are turned off by the fighting. Fans of the sport are split on whether or not it is good for the game.
Oldtimers, such as Hall of Fame member Ken Dryden, openly endorse the end of fighting in hockey. Enforcers, such as Georges Laraque and Donald Brashear, have told media they never relished their roles.
Last summer, three NHL enforcers’ lives ended tragically, either by drug toxicity or suicide. Although their deaths were linked to mental health issues, fighting was a suspected indirect cause.
The passing of Derek Boogaard, Rick Rypien and Wade Belak could be sheer coincidence, but it wouldn’t surprise me if brain trauma experts connect fighting to brain injuries in studies years later.
Enforcers in professional hockey are a more dangerous breed than those in the past.
Many are professionally trained in martial arts during the off season, and are paid solely to intimidate the opposition.
When NHL league commissioner Gary Bettman made his announcement to address the growing concerns of fighting, he called the deaths of Boogaard, Rypien and Belak “simply a tragedy” and called the brain scan data by Boston University “a very limited database.”
From a statistical and scientific standpoint, Bettman’s somewhat got his tracks covered, but not his common sense. The basis of his argument is on the Boston University study, which has a grand total of four dissected brains of professional football and hockey players.
The data is limited, but Bettman has failed to notice that fighting in hockey is more similar to boxing.
If modern hockey players are so well-trained in fighting, NHL stakeholders should be looking at the numerous studies on boxing, which have long concluded that long-term brain problems are very common in many boxers.
How many more studies do we need?
The NHL might not be able to control accidents that lead to brain injury, but it certainly has the ability to cut controllable factors, such as fighting, to reduce the number of cases of brain trauma.
The argument that fights are needed to protect players has some merit, and the NHL should be commended for trying to weed out dirty hits, often the spark of physical protests.
If the NHL takes the stick slashing and dirty hits away, fighting is no longer necessary to stand up for one’s self and teammates. Hockey legend Maurice Richard, a player recognized for both skill and grit, only ever fought back when he felt his opponents took too many liberties with their sticks and dirty play.
Danger is real for many sports, but their draw can never be taken away.
You can’t take the punch out of boxing, nor can you ever take speed - and it kills - in skiing or motorcar racing. It just doesn’t make sense.
Fighting used to make sense in hockey, but less so nowadays. Take the fighting out of hockey and you still get a great sport. Take the fighting to a ring, not a rink.
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