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Getting ready for 2012-2013


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If you don't think that the concussions suffered by fighters have a dramatic effect on their quality of life after their careers are over.... there is really no use responding to any more of your posts. This bury your head in the sand mentality is sickening.

Look everyone knows someone who smoked a pack a day and lived to be 95-100 years old; however we don't hear people arguing that there aren't dangers to being a smoker.

You can pick out all the fighters you want who are doing well today, doesn't change the fact that CTE is real, and changes people's lives, and is being found at an astonishing rate in the brains of NHL enforcers.

Its utter lunacy to say that just because 100% of fighters don't suffer from it, it means that Fighters don't face an increased risk.

We should eliminate body checking then,because that is where the majority of concussions come from. Look,I love watching fights,especially if there's no injury.So do 95% of players and most hockey fans. And once again,most concussions are caused by bodychecking.

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Are you listing guys that are actual players or just coaches/gm's?? If your trying to give examples of Players the only elite players you'v listed are Robinson and Gainey. Burke never played in the NHL and I believe Julien, Vigneuault were career minor leaguers along with the CBC cross-dressing clown Cherry. Milbury isn't even worth mentioning.

One of the longest serving (if not the longest) serving GM of the big bad bruins was campaigning to get rid of fighting in the 90's, based on his perspective of guys like Henderson in the 72 summit series.

In any even, anyone who cites Milbury as an example to support his arguement isn't even worth responding to.

"In any even, anyone who cites Milbury as an example to support his arguement isn't even worth responding to". Grow up and don't respond.Please. Holmgrem is a great GM and I never mentioned elite,just tough guys,many before helmets,who are doing very well

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We have eliminated checks "where the head is the principle point of contact" yet we still allow people to bare knuckle punch each other in the head. That makes a ton of sense.

"We have eliminated checks "where the head is the principle point of contact" ". Really? Check the NHL concussion list and see how many were from fights and how many were from checks and/or hit to the head. Wouldn't want facts to get in the way of your opinion though :rolleyes:

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I think that there was a time when fighting genuinely did serve a 'policing' purpose, such that players who cheap-shotted generally knew they ran a high risk of getting the snot kicked out of them - or else, their goon did, and tended to discourage the behaviour on the grounds that he would have to be fighting his teammate's battles.

Then, somewhere along the way, this changed. I don't know that the instigator rule was the direct cause - it may have simply been that the fighters were getting too big, too strong, too dangerous to make fighting regular guys a realistic proposition - but somehow 'staged' fights completely came to define the role of the enforcer. Players basically stopped worrying about the goon, whether on their team or the other team, because they knew those guys would get 2 minutes of ice time and were irrelevant to the game. In short, what had once been an 'enforcer' proper (of the game's unwritten and written codes) became reduced to a 'goon' (a circus sideshow). It's difficult to provide conclusive proof but I'd be among those who thinks the rise in 'disrespect' and dangerous plays has increased in rough alignment to the decline of fighting as an integral part of the sport. It's not the only cause, but it is one cause.

We are now at a point where goons only ever fight other goons, and fights hardly ever have any relationship to what's gone on on the ice. This is the point where fighting is redundant.

None of this is even to touch on Commandant's point about the serious dangers of fighting. It's like boxing in this respect...no matter how much you like it (and I do really like boxing) when you see what its consequences tend to be, it becomes impossible to justify. The only thing that worries me about Commandant's argument is where its logic ends. For example, as long as hockey remains a physical sport, hockey players will be at comparatively high risk of concussion. So we quickly hit a reductio ad absurdum whereby physical contact should be banned, too. (Being a lawyer I'm sure Commandant can appreciate that point! ;) )

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I think that there was a time when fighting genuinely did serve a 'policing' purpose, such that players who cheap-shotted generally knew they ran a high risk of getting the snot kicked out of them - or else, their goon did, and tended to discourage the behaviour on the grounds that he would have to be fighting his teammate's battles.

Then, somewhere along the way, this changed. I don't know that the instigator rule was the direct cause - it may have simply been that the fighters were getting too big, too strong, too dangerous to make fighting regular guys a realistic proposition - but somehow 'staged' fights completely came to define the role of the enforcer. Players basically stopped worrying about the goon, whether on their team or the other team, because they knew those guys would get 2 minutes of ice time and were irrelevant to the game. In short, what had once been an 'enforcer' proper (of the game's unwritten and written codes) became reduced to a 'goon' (a circus sideshow). It's difficult to provide conclusive proof but I'd be among those who thinks the rise in 'disrespect' and dangerous plays has increased in rough alignment to the decline of fighting as an integral part of the sport. It's not the only cause, but it is one cause.

We are now at a point where goons only ever fight other goons, and fights hardly ever have any relationship to what's gone on on the ice. This is the point where fighting is redundant.

None of this is even to touch on Commandant's point about the serious dangers of fighting. It's like boxing in this respect...no matter how much you like it (and I do really like boxing) when you see what its consequences tend to be, it becomes impossible to justify. The only thing that worries me about Commandant's argument is where its logic ends. For example, as long as hockey remains a physical sport, hockey players will be at comparatively high risk of concussion. So we quickly hit a reductio ad absurdum whereby physical contact should be banned, too. (Being a lawyer I'm sure Commandant can appreciate that point! ;) )

He's a lawyer ? Oh then that means he's never wrong and his opinion carries more weight than anyone elses. I saw Lucic fight one of Philly "goons" today. I wouldn't call Lucic a goon.Would you ?

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He's a lawyer ? Oh then that means he's never wrong and his opinion carries more weight than anyone elses. I saw Lucic fight one of Philly "goons" today. I wouldn't call Lucic a goon.Would you ?

Great to see that you learned from your previous problems with using stereotypes and applying them to every person you come across.

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He's a lawyer ? Oh then that means he's never wrong and his opinion carries more weight than anyone elses. I saw Lucic fight one of Philly "goons" today. I wouldn't call Lucic a goon.Would you ?

Huh? What are you talking about?

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He's a lawyer ? Oh then that means he's never wrong and his opinion carries more weight than anyone elses. I saw Lucic fight one of Philly "goons" today. I wouldn't call Lucic a goon.Would you ?

I also saw the same bullshit Bruins going after Schenn after a perfectly clean hit delivered by Schenn. I'd rather see a solid hit like the one delivered by Schenn then, have to see a guy have to fight, because the big bad bruins can't tolerate a solid hockey hit being delivered.

Harry Sinden wanted to get rid of fighting and one of the reasons why was the effect he said it had on skilled guys who compete hard, but don't want to fight like Paul Henderson.

He said he thinks guys like Henderson were never as effective in the NHL as they were in international competition were fighting wasn't allowed.

BTW, you have seen what repeated blows to the head do to boxers haven't you - and they wear gloves. There is a also a big diference between guys in the 60's, 70's, 80's throwing punches without really knowing how to fight and guys that are much bigger and train to do damage, like they do now. Not sure if you were asleep during the summer when you had lot of ex-fighters, dying/committing suicide.

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I think that there was a time when fighting genuinely did serve a 'policing' purpose, such that players who cheap-shotted generally knew they ran a high risk of getting the snot kicked out of them - or else, their goon did, and tended to discourage the behaviour on the grounds that he would have to be fighting his teammate's battles.

Then, somewhere along the way, this changed. I don't know that the instigator rule was the direct cause - it may have simply been that the fighters were getting too big, too strong, too dangerous to make fighting regular guys a realistic proposition - but somehow 'staged' fights completely came to define the role of the enforcer. Players basically stopped worrying about the goon, whether on their team or the other team, because they knew those guys would get 2 minutes of ice time and were irrelevant to the game. In short, what had once been an 'enforcer' proper (of the game's unwritten and written codes) became reduced to a 'goon' (a circus sideshow). It's difficult to provide conclusive proof but I'd be among those who thinks the rise in 'disrespect' and dangerous plays has increased in rough alignment to the decline of fighting as an integral part of the sport. It's not the only cause, but it is one cause.

We are now at a point where goons only ever fight other goons, and fights hardly ever have any relationship to what's gone on on the ice. This is the point where fighting is redundant.

None of this is even to touch on Commandant's point about the serious dangers of fighting. It's like boxing in this respect...no matter how much you like it (and I do really like boxing) when you see what its consequences tend to be, it becomes impossible to justify. The only thing that worries me about Commandant's argument is where its logic ends. For example, as long as hockey remains a physical sport, hockey players will be at comparatively high risk of concussion. So we quickly hit a reductio ad absurdum whereby physical contact should be banned, too. (Being a lawyer I'm sure Commandant can appreciate that point! ;) )

I agree with all of that.

There however is always a risk vs reward weight to these things.

As you stated, the usefulness of fighting has dropped.

For those who support fighting answer this: If fighting is such an "important part of the game" and is necessary to winning, why do the number of fights drop off dramatically in the playoffs, when winning is so important?

When we weigh the risk vs reward, we see that there is a ton of risk to fighting, but little to none in terms of tangible rewards. And thats the biggest difference between it and body checking.

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And the team that has the fewest fights in the entire league leads the NHL in points (Detroit). Just goes to show that one mentality isn't necessarily more right than the other...

I agree with you but Detroit seems to be the exception to every rule.

They are simply the BEST team since the major expansion (1990's)

They have the best most winning oriented franchise.

Also I believe CBJ is 2nd in fights and is the worst team in the league.

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I agree with you but Detroit seems to be the exception to every rule.

They are simply the BEST team since the major expansion (1990's)

They have the best most winning oriented franchise.

Also I believe CBJ is 2nd in fights and is the worst team in the league.

With the exception of the last few years, I'd also include New Jersey with Detroit.

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I agree with you but Detroit seems to be the exception to every rule.

They are simply the BEST team since the major expansion (1990's)

They have the best most winning oriented franchise.

Also I believe CBJ is 2nd in fights and is the worst team in the league.

I saw someone look into this months ago on HF.

The stats geeks have done the numbers... I've seen the calculations and the graphs.

In the last 10 years.... both pre and post lockout

There is almost 0 correlation between number of fights and number of wins since the lockout.

There is also almost 0 correlation between number of man games lost to injury and number of fights.

In other words... fights are a nice sideshow, but have 0 effect on the outcome of games, and 0 effect on the prevention of injuries... hence why teams don't dress their goons in the playoffs.

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There are a couple of things about fighting I'd miss. First, I'd miss the Iginla-Lecavalier type of fight, where two bona-fide players in the heat of battle drop 'em and go. That really does add excitement and intensity to the proceedings.

Secondly, I'd miss the type of fight that I saw one time in the late-90s. The Habs were playing Vancouver. Gino Odjick, God love 'im, absolutely demolished Saku Koivu with a crushing and (as I recall) perfectly legal hit. Two seconds later Shane Corson dove in and took Odjick on, going toe to toe with this bruiser in defence of his teammate.

I agree 100% with Habs29's contempt for the fact that players now attack each other for laying legal bodychecks. But in a case like that one, our best (and highly fragile) player had been totalled by a monster twice his size. By fighting, Corson sent an important signal that elite skill player Koivu had to be treated with respect and enforced the tacit NHL rule that you don't go around brutalizing skill guys half your size. That, to me, is an illustration of the kind of healthy role fighting CAN in principle play in the game.

It's also not clear that a couple of regular players going at it are at grave risk of concussions and life-altering injuries in the way that goons are. So if we could somehow reach a perfect world where fights only occured along the lines I just sketched, there might still be a role for it. I doubt we can ever get back to that point, though.

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I saw someone look into this months ago on HF.

The stats geeks have done the numbers... I've seen the calculations and the graphs.

In the last 10 years.... both pre and post lockout

There is almost 0 correlation between number of fights and number of wins since the lockout.

There is also almost 0 correlation between number of man games lost to injury and number of fights.

In other words... fights are a nice sideshow, but have 0 effect on the outcome of games, and 0 effect on the prevention of injuries... hence why teams don't dress their goons in the playoffs.

The only REAL impact i can remember fights having on a team winning a championship are two cases. First when in the mid-seventies the Habs fought and beat up the flyers and showed them they can beat them in the alley and on the ice and I think that totally destroyed the flyers psyche the same way as it does when a school yard bully finds himself getting beatup in the playground.

Second was the post Lemieux hit on Draper brawl in 1997, when the red wings got revenge on the previous year's hit by lemieux and won some of those fights. Wings went on to the cup.

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The only REAL impact i can remember fights having on a team winning a championship are two cases. First when in the mid-seventies the Habs fought and beat up the flyers and showed them they can beat them in the alley and on the ice and I think that totally destroyed the flyers psyche the same way as it does when a school yard bully finds himself getting beatup in the playground.

Pre-instigator rule, I thought fighting had a much bigger effect than it does today. No doubt there was a time in the 70s and 80s where it made a difference.

Second was the post Lemieux hit on Draper brawl in 1997, when the red wings got revenge on the previous year's hit by lemieux and won some of those fights. Wings went on to the cup.

Debateable, some would say the wings were just too good, and eventually would have won their cups anyways.

Not saying your theory is wrong, it very well have had an effect, but we'll never really be certain either way as to what would have happened in the 1997 playoffs without the hit and the fights.

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There are a couple of things about fighting I'd miss. First, I'd miss the Iginla-Lecavalier type of fight, where two bona-fide players in the heat of battle drop 'em and go. That really does add excitement and intensity to the proceedings.

Secondly, I'd miss the type of fight that I saw one time in the late-90s. The Habs were playing Vancouver. Gino Odjick, God love 'im, absolutely demolished Saku Koivu with a crushing and (as I recall) perfectly legal hit. Two seconds later Shane Corson dove in and took Odjick on, going toe to toe with this bruiser in defence of his teammate.

I agree 100% with Habs29's contempt for the fact that players now attack each other for laying legal bodychecks. But in a case like that one, our best (and highly fragile) player had been totalled by a monster twice his size. By fighting, Corson sent an important signal that elite skill player Koivu had to be treated with respect and enforced the tacit NHL rule that you don't go around brutalizing skill guys half your size. That, to me, is an illustration of the kind of healthy role fighting CAN in principle play in the game.

It's also not clear that a couple of regular players going at it are at grave risk of concussions and life-altering injuries in the way that goons are. So if we could somehow reach a perfect world where fights only occured along the lines I just sketched, there might still be a role for it. I doubt we can ever get back to that point, though.

I have no problem when a marginal nhl player goes after a star and has to pay the price. When I look at the Moore-Bertuzzi incident, part of the reason for that getting out of hand was that Moore was the won who targetted and took a cheap shot at Naslund. Had the NHL responded and suspended Moore like he deserved, it may have been the end of the story. But instead, Moore was allowed to get away with it and next time they met you had the shit storm that happened. I believe, the nHL and Bertuzzi are still going through a lawsuit becuase of the vigilante justice that resulted from the NHL not taking any action.

BOttom line though, if fighting was banned, would a guy like Odjick even have been in the NHL???

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Pre-instigator rule, I thought fighting had a much bigger effect than it does today. No doubt there was a time in the 70s and 80s where it made a difference.

Debateable, some would say the wings were just too good, and eventually would have won their cups anyways.

Not saying your theory is wrong, it very well have had an effect, but we'll never really be certain either way as to what would have happened in the 1997 playoffs without the hit and the fights.

I don't doubt that the wings were too good anyways. BUt i'd also argue that the flyers weren't the best team the two year's they won the cup. I think the wings became a tighter TEAM after that fight. Having said that though, if the idiot Burke had suspended Lemieux with a suspension that fit the act, would the wings have been as pissed off as they were??? Most of the incidents that get out of hand is a direct result of two things. First, the NHL doesn't enforce its own rules and also fails to hold people accountable using the rule book and supplementary discipline. Secondly, the culture in the NHL supports vigilante justice.

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I don't doubt that the wings were too good anyways. BUt i'd also argue that the flyers weren't the best team the two year's they won the cup. I think the wings became a tighter TEAM after that fight. Having said that though, if the idiot Burke had suspended Lemieux with a suspension that fit the act, would the wings have been as pissed off as they were??? Most of the incidents that get out of hand is a direct result of two things. First, the NHL doesn't enforce its own rules and also fails to hold people accountable using the rule book and supplementary discipline. Secondly, the culture in the NHL supports vigilante justice.

I agree with these things.

The NHL could get rid of the vigilante justice mentality if they were a lot harsher with supplemental discipline to the cheap shots.

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For the Flyers, intimidation was a huge factor, no doubt about that. However having the best goalie in the game the two years they won the cup was also huge.

When Bernie Parent wasn't as good in 1976 as he had been the previous two years, it also hurt them a lot.

This isn't to say the fighting didn't matter, because it did... but it was a little of column A, a little of Column B going on there too.

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For the Flyers, intimidation was a huge factor, no doubt about that. However having the best goalie in the game the two years they won the cup was also huge.

When Bernie Parent wasn't as good in 1976 as he had been the previous two years, it also hurt them a lot.

This isn't to say the fighting didn't matter, because it did... but it was a little of column A, a little of Column B going on there too.

Agreed. Parent was great. BUt remember that we were also missing Dryden for one of their cup wins.

Growing up, there weren't too many hockey players I hated as much as Bobby Clarke. It was nice when Lafleur won his first Art Ross, he beat out Clarke and ended Clarke's back to back run as the winner of the Hart in the 70's as well.

Growing up, I actually hated the flyers more then the bruins. Back then the leafs were non-factors and with no TSN, they didn't get the type of media coverage that today's mediocore leafs do.

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I have no problem when a marginal nhl player goes after a star and has to pay the price. When I look at the Moore-Bertuzzi incident, part of the reason for that getting out of hand was that Moore was the won who targetted and took a cheap shot at Naslund. Had the NHL responded and suspended Moore like he deserved, it may have been the end of the story. But instead, Moore was allowed to get away with it and next time they met you had the shit storm that happened. I believe, the nHL and Bertuzzi are still going through a lawsuit becuase of the vigilante justice that resulted from the NHL not taking any action.

BOttom line though, if fighting was banned, would a guy like Odjick even have been in the NHL???

I actuallyu bleive Moore would excape suspension again even in todays game, if I remember Naslund lunged for the puck right as Moore went for the hit.

I could be wrong and can not look up the video at this time.

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I actuallyu bleive Moore would excape suspension again even in todays game, if I remember Naslund lunged for the puck right as Moore went for the hit.

I could be wrong and can not look up the video at this time.

I also remember Moore chasing around Naslund most of that night as well though. He isn't really the innocent victim that the media has made him out to be.

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Agreed. Parent was great. BUt remember that we were also missing Dryden for one of their cup wins.

Growing up, there weren't too many hockey players I hated as much as Bobby Clarke. It was nice when Lafleur won his first Art Ross, he beat out Clarke and ended Clarke's back to back run as the winner of the Hart in the 70's as well.

Growing up, I actually hated the flyers more then the bruins. Back then the leafs were non-factors and with no TSN, they didn't get the type of media coverage that today's mediocore leafs do.

Absolutely.... Missing Dryden in 1974, and him not quite being his usual self in 1975 (still good, but not the GREAT Dryden of other seasons, as the year off effected him)... was one of the reasons that Parent was the best in the league those two years

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I also remember Moore chasing around Naslund most of that night as well though. He isn't really the innocent victim that the media has made him out to be.

I loathe Steve Moore, hate the amount he chose to sue over just in general not a fan of that guy.

His brother on the other hand LOVE him wish the Habs re upped his deal.

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