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Well, obviously he'd be acquired to play center.

It’s easy to look at a screen in our living room and say fighting is either necessary, entertaining, futile, or atrocious but what’s transpiring on the ice is often quite different than what we perceive. When I watch the 4th round of Wimbledon in tennis and one of the players isn’t playing up to their standard, it can be easy to overlook the often invisible reality that the player may be injured. We can’t see it from our living room, but the player is feeling the pain. That’s something that watching on television wouldn’t do justice. The same thing happens in hockey, actually. When the year finishes, we often hear of players having dealt with and played through week long fractures, for instance. Often these same players were criticized for not playing well. This type of thing ties in with a viewer’s perception of fighting. When you’re a professional NHL player on the ice and someone is chirping personal insults immediately after having chopped your ankle with their stick, it’s easy for a viewer to say that player A didn’t want to fight so he shouldn’t have to. Maybe that same viewer doesn’t know all the details; all they see is the end result. In the real world, these situations are no different. If someone were to take a crowbar and wack you on the ankle while calling your soulmate pretty, a fight may ensue. In no other sport do we have actual weapons that can be used against another player. If a player takes a slap shot at you after the whistle, a scrum will likely ensue. If a pitcher throws a ball at a batter, a fight sometime ensues. If a basketball player were to purposely elbow an opponent in the back of the head, or throw a basketball at their opponent, a fight would probably ensue. These incidents happen more often in hockey. When I was around 23 and still played hockey, my team was in the final and a player cross checked me in the back of the neck from behind right at the final buzzer. I left the ice right away and didn’t even shake hands but I’m pretty sure one of my teammates went after him and would have dropped the gloves. In this case I’m not sure the other guy was willing and they probably didn’t go beyond a wrestling match but I’m not sure how we can accept the fact that it’s fine to say that the opponent should only have to drop the gloves if he wants to in that situation. Regardless of what people say about the refs, that’s immediately when people will start taking liberties knowing they will face no repercussions. In the case of Domi, Eklbad was doing what every 13 year old is taught by their coach and smiling right in Domi’s frustrated face while “electing” not to fight. Who knows what else he was doing or saying that’s not visible from our television set and apparently Eklbad was indeed taking other liberties throughout the game. The outcome was the worst part, and Domi deserved to be suspended. Demanding that he absolutely should have been suspended for regular season games is going overboard.

I used to love hockey fights. But once you take concussions seriously, they become impossible to support IMHO. I think the idea of hockey as a combination of speed and physicality is what sells tickets. 'Physicality' needn't mean fights. Frankly, I doubt that anyone is shilling out for the high price of tickets today *primarily* because they think there might be a fight or two. And I never heard anyone come out of a good, close, intense hockey game saying it sucked that there were no fights. Besides all of that, I'm actually not convinced you need the 'physicality' element at ALL. Soccer, basketball, and baseball have no integral physical element and they seem to do all right. Heck, soccer in Seattle - faked injuries and all - outdraws the average crowd at a hockey game. Even if hockey banned bodychecking (which could conceivably be the end game of all this concussion awareness) it would still be at least as exciting as those other sports.

It is obvious that Domi let his emotions get the better of him which led to a bone headed, heat of the moment, stupid decision on his part. With that said though, there is WAY too much volatile reaction from some about it, Max is not exactly a league leader in cheap shots, and some of the reactions certainly can't be justified based on his track record. Yes it was dumb, yes it was illegal, yes it deserves a suspension. No it does not make Domi a gutless puke, no he is not his father, and no he is not a cheap shot artist, he is simply a young guy, with a big temper, who can fly off the handle from time to time. He will learn from it, I am sure the staff will inform him how they rather he play hockey than let himself get all fired up to the point of stupid decisions like that. He didn't skate from one zone to another and take someone's knee out, or elbow someone in the head unsuspectingly way after they got rid of the puck, he felt antagonized by Ekblad's wild stick work. For lack of a better term, he lost his shit over it finally, he took it too far, it is not something he should be doing then, or in the future. At least it was an over reaction on a retaliation, and not a head hunting injury attempt, as we have seen so many times from many other more heinous players in this league. So lets take a chill pill on the incident, put the flame throwers away, and react accordingly ourselves, as fans. We know the incident is wrong, we hope to not see that type of thing from him again in the future, we hope he learned something from it that helps him try to keep a more level headed approach to his game management. But it looks an awful lot like some fans are already turning their frustration with the trade that brought him here, into an over reaction about the incident. That is likely just the tip of the iceberg to how little slack this kid is going to have here with some of our fans this year, because he happened to be traded for Galchenyuk, a situation he had full control of, of course. I see it already, on social media, on here, some are already starting to let it boil over, just because of the trade, any Domi situation will start at defcon 3, and hit defcon 5 at marveling speeds. He punches a player who is not answering the bell, and he is the worst person in the league, not a hot head who needs to cool it. If he has a bad game, he will be untalented and a 3rd liner at best, not a young top 6 forward who has an off night like anyone else. It is like we are blind as a fan base, we have this sickening reputation of being volatile, harsh, overly critical, and a hard market to play for, and based on what I've seen from some of our fanbase on different social media platforms today, and anytime we go through a scrutinizing situation, we are only cementing it. Some say to become an attractive place to play for players, you need a winning team, everyone is so quick to blame our losing record for why real top players scoff at us during the summer without looking in the mirror, or the big picture. It is more than that, the on ice situation accounts for 50% of the equation, the off ice situations is the other 50%, and generally speaking our off ice situation in Montreal has just as much, if not even more work to do than our on ice situation, and that's bloody saying something.... Signed, A Hab fan who just doesn't get some of his fellow Hab fans

Just curious and wanted to move it from injury thread. Would Hockey be better if fighting called for immediate ejection of the two combatants, fines imposed and suspensions (at least for repeat offenders)? Obviously would always be hotheads and occasional fights, as happens in NFL-NBA-MLB but are pretty rare and costly.

I’m not sitting on the fence with zero opinion, I thought I made my opinion quite clear. It’s an libertarian opinion of you are a big boy you can make up your own mind if you want to do this or not. Hockey had fighting since the beginning and in a way has been ingrained into the sport and in some way and I can only speak for myself, drew me closer to the game because it had fighting in it. I’ll be honest I watch other sports and sure they can be entertaining at times but hockey is my favourite sport. I love everything about it the skill, the speed, the commeradery, the physical aspect and yes the fighting.

I absolutely hate fighting and would prefer players be ejected when they do. That said, I love watching puck scrambles in front of a fallen goalie (so long as nobody is throwing crosschecks. Guys like Pronger got away with that for too long), I love corner battles, I love two players jockeying for position for the puck, and it's great when players get angry at each other and in their face. At the same time I don't care for the "scrum with players after a blown whistle because they got too close to the goalie" crap that got popular in the western conference. I'm fine with physicality. But after Todd Ewen, a guy who never wanted to fight but was pressured to due to being huge, then got so many concussions and had so much regret he eventually killed himself, I'm done with unnecessary physicality. If two guys want to punch it out? Fine. But get off the ice and go home after so the actual hockey players can finish the game.

The act was troubling because it brings to mind Shaw's first season with us, where he seemed so determined to live up to his rep that he acted like an ass and hurt the team. And let's face it, when you've been traded in return for a player that practically the entire hockey universe believes was an overpay, making such an idiotic play is practically begging for backlash. Fortunately for Domi, the NHL has no interest in protecting players by issuing meaningful suspensions, and so this rash and classless move brings no real ill-effects for him or the team. But he needs to avoid a repeat if he wants to avoid stoking the flames of fan resentment. This will be doubly true if Galy excels in Arizona. Domi has to bear down and play his very best hockey; if he keeps acting like a jerk-off, well, we all know how unpleasant Montreal can be when it turns on a guy.

Domi made a mistake I'm not sure a guy who averages 70 PIMs a year, and averages 2.3 fights per season (7 fights in 3 years) is a "goon"

He may not have character, but I like his attitude.

The great thing about Finland is that the season ends before the NHL season ends. You tell him... look kid... go to Finland, have a good season, have a good World Juniors, work on x,y,z and when the season is done we'll give you a few NHL games in March/April. We only get 9 games with you, so we want to save them. That is also a time of year when there is no roster limit.

The linesman just saved Valiev's life

I would send him to Finland. I absolutely would not rush him. Too much of the future of this team depends on him developping properly I'd be more willing to consider 9 games for Suzuki as he's a year older. Remember, not only is Kotkaniemi an 18-year-old, he is also one of the youngest players in the draft, compare him to Tkachuk and hes like 10 months younger.

Or they could penalize the taking runs.

I am happy to see Peca on back to backs. So happy that Hudon and Lehkonen are in the same line If Ouellet is able to shine while playing with Despres, he would notch up in my D depth list I missed hockey so much!

No one of course. Is a re"tooling" year.

Ah, too bad zero isn't an option.

Two guys fight? Both ejected. One guy tries to force another guy to fight and he isn't willing and he still hits him? Ejection, 20 game suspension, referees disciplined for not stopping it sooner, coach receives $10,000 fine for playing the player.

My god that is the most naive post ever. Owners like fighting and fans seem to love fights breaking out and thus is no suspension nor fine to do it, so it is part of the game, unlike any other sport. Is that OK, of course not, but wont change until someone is killed or paralyzed.

The thing is, Emelin's brand of physical hockey includes checks that cross the line. Look at the few times he actually did fight. When Abdelkader jumped him, it was after a dirty hit on Larkin. When he fought Kane, it was after he delivered two cheap shots to Kane's face. When he fought Chara, it was after he hacked Seguin in the wrist. Emelin is a dirty player and managed to be a dirty player that couldn't back up his teammates. While beaning a guy for getting a big hit or "showing up the pitcher" is idiotic, the comparison does not hold water. It is only against the rules to bean a batter after the umpire has issued a warning. Also, there are times when it is absolutely appropriate to bean a player, i.e. the next time he comes to bat after a dirty slide. Fighting is within the rules of the game - there is simply a penalty for it. If it were illegal, then any fight would result in fines, suspensions, etc. I guess the next thing you'll be telling me is how horrible it is to make an "illegal" play such as a hook to break save a goal. It just sounded like you were taking the comment a bit literally and weren't picking up on the implication. I understand why Emelin avoided fighting - he absolutely should have. At the same time, if you're unwilling/unable to fight, then you shouldn't be playing a style of game where you frequently end up making dirty hits. Of course, I suppose that implies that if you are willing to fight that you should go around playing dirty, but that's not what I am trying to imply.

Eh, the entire jist of that is referees need to be tougher on players and call everything while DOPS needs to deliver harsher suspensions and fines. I personally would be good with people reviewing a game afterwards and delivering fines for calls that were missed. Were you hacking at a players wrist and the ref didn't see? Cool, you are still getting punished for it. In my mind some of the hits from behind and headshots, I would have given full season or half season suspensions and the league thought they were being tough with a 5 game. 5 games is a vacation. I want real punishments. And until we see real punishments, people and players will have this stupid vigilante justice viewpoint.