Suspensions For Causing Injuries

[JLP]

My opinion is when a player injures another he should be suspended, and for something like the amount of time the injured player misses. Consider Jason Williams -- he was careless with his stick and almost took out the Habs' best player's eye. Why is he not punished for that? And I don't mean two/four minutes, I mean suspended. How else can the league get the message across that players have to be careful with their sticks?

[CerebusClone]

You can't suspend a player for an unvoluntary incident like this one. High sticking happens to everyone, especially with how light sticks have become, and the only way to prevent such injuries would be to force all players to wear full face visors... which won't happen anytime soon. I think I would be more in favor of suspending legal but premidated moves like Scott Stevens' hits on Paul Kariya and Eric Lindros for his intent to cause harm (those hits were planned).

Also, that schoolyard rule of "if I can't play, you can't play" doesn't cut it in the real world; it's childish, there are too many variables involved, and it opens up a door to brand new ways to cheat the system. There should be strick rules for punishing players who commit infractions regardless of the other player's state (a player should be suspended even if the other player isn't injured), with maybe a little bit of flexibility to take into consideration the severity of that other player's injury, of injury there is.

The league can't even properly take care of intentional incidents, so maybe they should work on that first...

[Fanpuck33]

I've said for years that I would suppport a system like that. However, you can't go punishing accidents like Williams' high stick. I would only advocate such a rule on plays deemed dirty by a special NHL committee. With such a rule in place, guys like Marchment would have no value to their team.

I wish I could find my old thread about this, I had a lot of good ideas there.

Basically, have a strict suspension for the act itself and then additional suspension time for as long as the other player in injured. I agree that a disgusting hit with no bad consequences should still result in a long suspension.

I think such a system would make guys think twice about dirty hits.

And as for the argument that it would encourage teams to dress crappy players to injure star players, what's to prevent that now?

[Mils]

What would happen in a case like Bertuzzi's? (I think he should be done for life) Or Kim Johnsson (I think it was Kim) for ending Jeff Beukeboom's career? I would support a system like that, but it would have to be extremely well planned so when something like Hossa/Berard happens then there is a clear procedure to determine who to punish and how?

Another good example is VandenBussche (I think it was him) who ended Nik Kypreos's career in a fight. Jovanovski had essentially the same effect on Deadmarsh's career, but Deadmarsh tried for 3 years to come back but was never himself again.

[BTH]

I disagree with people who think the injurer should sit until the victim returns. That encourages divers and for players to purposely miss more of the season to take out an opposing star. I don't think the victim getting injured should have anything to do with the judgement of the play. For example, Orpik got 3 games for nailing Cole and everyone complained that it should have been way more because Cole was out for the season. I think it should have been 0 games. There was no intent to injure and it was just a clean check into the boards. The league admitted that there was no intent to injure but still gave him 3 games. I think the sentence should matter 100% on the intent and not on the outcome.

[Mont Royale]

I think I would be more in favor of suspending legal but premidated moves like Scott Stevens' hits on Paul Kariya and Eric Lindros for his intent to cause harm (those hits were planned).

Those hits were planned? I didn't know that. How far in advance? Was it:

a. "At the game tonight I'm going to catch Lindros with his head down and give him a concussion he won't soon forget! Er, I mean WILL soon forget!"

or,

b. "Here comes Eric with his head down - I think I'll clock him, because THAT'S HOCKEY!!"

I vote b. You can't suspend for clean hits. Big players hit, sometimes players get hurt. Part of the game.

Edited May 3, 2006 by Mont Royale

[RobRock]

You can't suspend a player for an unvoluntary incident like this one.

There's a difference between an accident, like Williams' high stick, and an involuntary act. The fact that Williams failed in his attempt to lift Koivu's stick and caught him under the shield isn't relevant, he could have used another way to break up the play.

There should not be a zero-tolerance, black-and-white punishment for infractions that result in injuries, especially long term injuries or career-ending ones. However, if a situation arises whereby a player is deemed to have deliberately set out to hurt someone - and I think we all know at least two incidents that would apply very easily - then I think it's justified to link their punishement to the length that the injured player is unable to perform. And as a precaution against a team holding out a player to increase that punishment, then there are a couple of ways to circumvent that, or at the very least mitigate it.

First, an independent review of the injured player's condition could be done, with the league, the injured player's team and the suspended player's team choosing the physician to oversee the case. There's a number of well-respected sports doctors in both Canada and the US - Dr. Karen Johnson in Montreal and Dr. Robert Andrews in Atlanta come to mind - who have experience with NHL players.

Second, instead of waiting until an injured player is actually returns to the line-up, maybe it could be based on when a player is cleared to particpate in full contact practices. In some cases, especially for players who aren't top line guys, those guys who are called up to fill that spot play as well, or better, than the one who got hurt. That gives the team the luxury of holding them out of the line-up until they are 100%, or not play them at all and wait for a trade. If an independent doctor clears the injured player, then the suspended play can return.

Edited May 6, 2006 by RobRock

[CerebusClone]

Those hits were planned? I didn't know that. How far in advance? Was it:

a. "At the game tonight I'm going to catch Lindros with his head down and give him a concussion he won't soon forget! Er, I mean WILL soon forget!"

or,

b. "Here comes Eric with his head down - I think I'll clock him, because THAT'S HOCKEY!!"

I vote b. You can't suspend for clean hits. Big players hit, sometimes players get hurt. Part of the game.

First, I said I would be more in favor to punish a Stevens-like hit than an accidental high stick, not actually in favor of it. Those hits were indeed clean. However, I still believe that Stevens practiced those plays with the guys on his team. Both hits were identical; the Devils players forced Kariya/Lindros right in the middle at the blue line while Stevens, at the very same time, skated at full speed towards that exact spot. The defenders also made sure that the attacker couldn't get away from the hit... If it wasn't planned, I doubt a veteran defenseman like Stevens would have taken such huge risk; had he missed, even by just a little, those plays would have turned into breakaways. If those hits were planned, they could be seen as intents to injure...

Legal doesn't necessarily mean right. A player is allowed to shoot the puck, but if he intentianlly aims at someone's face (ex. a great defenseman like Lidstrom standing in front of the net), that's still very wrong...

Edited May 6, 2006 by CerebusClone

[RobRock]

Those hits were indeed clean. However, I still believe that Stevens practiced those plays with the guys on his team.

It could also be seen that Stevens read where the back-checking forward was steering the attacker, and moved into that position to make the hit. I doubt very much if Scotty got a lot of volunteers to take one for the team like that in practice, even if he just pulled up. It's part of the playing the defense position to read where the play is going and to stop the attack before it can gain the zone. It's also part of the back-checking forwards job to guide the attacker away from open ice and scoring areas as much as possible. Anywhere Scott Stevens was, was not a scoring area or open ice for long. The fact that Stevens was one of the most ferocious and effective body-checkers only makes him that much more effective when he reads plays like that. The best counter to that type of player is to avoid skating or turning into the middle of the ice, and like Wayne Gretzky would always do, turn away from the flow of the play and set up the play from there.

But you do bring up a point. The NFL doesn't allow an offensive lineman to hit a rusher if he is engaged with another player at the line of scrimmage. I've seen some hits where there is a back-checker skating side-by-side with an attacking player, only to be met at the blueline by a defenseman. If the defenseman comes from the front, then the attacker has an option to pull up and take the hit or turn back away from the back-checking forward to avoid the hit completely. But if the defenseman is coming across the blueline, it's possible he can use the back-checker as a screen and completely surprise the attacking player. This is especially dangerous if it occurs along the boards. It's one thing to get blind-sided in open ice, but along the boards you can separate shoulders, break bones, and cause concussions. I'd like to see a rule whereby you can't check a player if another teammate is in contact with the attacker, either body-to-body or stick-to body. If the NFL sees it as dangerous, then it must me just as hazardous in an enclosed field of play and at the speed which hockey is played.