If Don Cherry is Right it Means Banning Hockey

I have always tried to give Don Cherry some credit for his knowledge of the game so I listened when he said fighting was necessary as a relief valve for players because otherwise they would take cheap shots and inflict even more violence when the officials were not looking.

As we learn more about the impacts of violence in hockey, including fighting, and particularly concussions, I am convinced that we must ban fighting in hockey and if hockey players really are the neanderthal brutes that Cherry seems to believe they are and they just turn to greater violence to replace fighting, then we have no choice but to ban the game.

It is time to find out if Don Cherry is right or just the fool he appears to be.

Canada's Hockey Legacy

Can they do it. The Toronto Star reports:

The dream of another NHL team in Toronto was unveiled today, though even the pitchmen for the project admit it is a long way from coming true.

The proposal contains some unique features that may be the key to the teams success.

-- Twenty-five percent of the Legacy's annual profits would be divided between charitable foundations and non-profit organizations. Carnegie's Future Aces Foundation for at-risk youth would be the first recipients.
-- About 15,000 seats for every Legacy game would cost no more than $50 apiece.

So how would such a team be financially feasible. Perhaps by appealing to the players love of the game rather than their greed. There may just be enough players in the league, and some of them superstars, who see this as a chance to be part of something special – a team in the best hockey town in the NHL (and the best market) that allows ordinary working hockey fans to watch the games and devotes a substantial portion of profits, not to owners greed, but to charity. For this there may be enough Canadian players willing to play, not for outrageous salaries, but for decent salaries looking for a chance to put a superteam together and keep the Stanley Cup in Canada forever.

Indeed it is a dream. Will they make it come true.

I'm Confused About Fighting In Hockey

According to The Code on CBC's The Fifth Estate almost everyone involved in professional hockey from the head of the NHL down believes that fighting is an important and integral part of the game. So why are there rules and penalties against it. And why are the rules and penalties so lax as to be ineffective.

There seems to be something just a little bit hypocritical about having purposefully ineffective rules against something that they claim to be an integral part of the game.

The Problem With Hockey

If Canadians are supposed to be so polite and Americans so aggressive why is their national game a gentlemens game and our national game a thugs game.

This is just the most recent example of thuggery in Canadian hockey.

Is it the big money involved at the highest level that has removed any semblance of ethics and sportsmanship from hockey, where experts and commentators routinely talk about “good penalties” and where it considered acceptable and even good strategic play to break the rules if the benefit is worth the penalty time. If you can wipe someone out for the season and not get caught it is even better and you can probably expect a bonus somewhere down the line.

Some will argue (why do I have visions of gawdy sports jackets when I type this) that fighting is an intrinsic part of the game and is required to reduce tensions and prevent even more dangerous infractions. If that is so there is something extremely wrong with the game where the most basic ethical principle has become winning at all costs.

In light of this most recent incident some have argued that fighting should be “banned” in junior hockey. By “banned”, I assume they mean that the “powers to be” should actually take the rules against fighting seriously with serious consequences such as not allowing participants in fights to continue to play.

However, junior hockey is the training ground for the NHL where players learn the skills necessary to play in the big league and fighting is an “essential” part of the NHL. Hockey players of all ages are always going to aspire to be like their NHL heroes. If you “ban” fighting at the lower levels players will still aspire to the day they can make it into the NHL and fight like real hockey players.

It has to start at the top in the NHL. As long as hockey players aspire to be like their heroes there will always be fighting at all levels until it is no longer acceptable at the highest level. Players who insist on continuing to participate in thuggery should no longer be allowed to play in the NHL, forever.