COLUMBUS, Ohio – There is an old Rodney Dangerfield routine that goes “I went to a boxing match and a hockey game broke out.” Fighting has been a part of the game of hockey for decades; “It get’s both teams fired up to play harder,” “It prevents people from making dangerous penalties that could cause injury.”
These are some of the more common arguments people use in favor of fighting. However in recent years fighting has decreased and people are questioning more and more whether it should be a part of the game. The biggest arguments being the high possibility of a head injury, sportsmanship, and the fact that other leagues in Europe, the NCAA, the International Ice Hockey Federation, and the Olympic Games, have banned fighting. We will explore both sides of the argument.
Statistics have shown that fighting has decreased over the last five years during the regular season. According to hockeyfights.com in the 2009-2010 season out of 1230 games, there was a grand total of 714 fights. In the 2014-2015 season, there was a total of 1230 games played with 331 fights. That is a decrease of 46%, a huge decrease in fights over the past five seasons.
According to a 2013 Sports Illustrated article written by Sam Page There is no reason to ban fighting in the NHL because its worst aspects are already fading away.
“If you’re considering entering the NHL’s great fighting debate, save your breath for the eulogy — fighting’s already dying.” writes Page.
Page argues that teams are now emphasizing puck possession. He also brings up the point that there is a divide between the talent of goons verses the average fourth-liner.
“That is why fighting, the ugly sideshow is dying.” Page continues, “Fighters have to be able to play the game.”
Former Flyer and Broad Street Bully of the 1970’s, Bob Kelley even states,
“Basically fighting doesn’t exist anymore. It’s about basically gone. Watching these guys play the game, the Stanley Cup Finals have been outstanding. It’s just hard skating, and nobody fights in playoffs anyways. You get the odd one here or there. To me it’s pretty well gone as far as anything substantial out there.”
There is no argument that fighting is a part of the NHL game. As a matter of fact, in a 2011 poll by the NHLPA and the CBC showed that 98% of the players were in favor of fighting. There is no guarantee that putting an end to fighting will make the game any safer, as Brian Burke, Calgary Flames President of Hockey Operations points out. He thinks it’s safer with fighting.
“The fact of the matter is I think the game is safer with fighting in it. The amount of fighting in the game has been reduced dramatically, and that is a good thing. It’s not going to go up, but I think it’s a central part of player safety.”
Former Dallas Stars center, and current Anaheim Duck, Shawn Horcoff shares Burke’s argument for player safety.
“I think there would be a lot more guys running around, a lot more high sticks a lot more hitting from behind.”
Washington Capitals coach Barry Trotz believes that without fighting in the NHL there would be a lot more cheap shots in the game.
“I have played in leagues where they didn’t have fighting, and there is a lot of cheapness to a lot of players, a phoniness that can’t be challenged.”
Safety is an issue in the game of hockey. Measures have been taken to help ensure player safety.
In 1992, the NHL implemented the Instigator Rule to help prevent players from starting fights. Leaving a bench to join a fight has a ten game suspension. Still, the Instigator Rule hasn’t completely stopped players from being punched in the jaw. During the 2013-2014 season, the NHL made it mandatory that all incoming players and those who haven’t played 25 games have to wear the half shields on their helmets. In an interview that very season, NBC sportscaster Mike Emerick said,
“Now that we’ve adopted the face shields for all guys coming in, and we have 73 percent of players wearing face shields a year ago, eventually that evolutionary process, I think, will continue, will continue where there won’t be much fighting at all.”
Still, not all people agree that the decrease in fighting is enough. In 2013, Mayo Clinic researchers in Rochester, Minnesota presented new data suggesting even stronger evidence that repeated hits to the head that hockey players suffer can cause serious harm.
“My concern is that we can’t wait for the data that tell us all the neurons that died with each head impact before we stop unnecessary fighting.” said Aynsley Smith, a Mayo Clinic sports psychologist. “We need to take action now.”
Another finding came from the University of Ottawa where researchers simulated hits that caused concussions in hockey players. They found that the left or right hooks were by far the most likely to cause concussions due to the sharp rotational forces they deliver to the brain.
“Boxers and fighters in hockey know that the way to knock someone out is to catch him with a hook, and down he goes,” said Blaine Hoshizaki, director of research at the university’s Neurotrauma Impact Science Laboratory. “And lo and behold, we found that the hook delivered more than twice the rotational acceleration than anything else. It’s the most effective way to give someone a concussion.”
There are some die hard hockey fans who see fighting in hockey as barbaric and unnecessary. Other fans who are more traditional see fighting as an important part of the game. In his blog, “The Sports Ethicist” Shawn E. Klein believes that fighting in hockey is wrong.
“It’s a lack of sportsmanship and self control, and overall does more harm to the sport than any purported benefits.”
Klein makes a list of arguments that traditional hockey fans have that make fighting a big part of the game. One of them is retaliation. In order to prevent cheap shots or dangerous play as previously described by Horcoff, Burke, and Trotz, fighters engage in fisticuffs. The goalies and or skilled players who don’t fight are protected by the team goons, Klein states,
“I am sympathetic to this view. It is one thing for a fight to break out in the course of self/team defense. It is quite another thing for the coach to send out a player later in the game, or even a subsequent game, to fight someone on the opposing team in retaliation for some earlier improper action. This latter induces more violence rather than curbing it. The former might reduce violence by countering it at the point of attack and possibly deterring it in the first place. But to strike back later, after the fact, likely merely initiates a new round of violence.”
In an eye opening article, written in 2013 for the Globe and Mail, called “The Game Changer: Majority of Canadians Want Fighting Ban in Hockey; Survey”, highlights some interesting statistics.
Two thirds of Canadians- fans as well as general public believe fighting should be banned at the professional level. One quarter of Canadians (27%) oppose eliminating fights at the professional level.
With the decrease of fights in the NHL decreasing, it begs the question of what hockey would look like without fighting.
“Some people would probably like it.” said San Jose Sharks tough guy John Scott. “It’d be a little more skilled and flowed and probably less hitting and more transition play, probably like games in Europe.”
In the European leagues, international hockey and Olympic hockey, fighting is banned. It is punishable by ejection and a five-minute penalty. The rinks in Europe or more specifically the KHL (Kontinental Hockey League) are larger than the NHL rinks. Former NHL great Jari Kurri makes a very interesting observation.
“To begin with, the game is a whole lot different because of the size of the rink. In the smaller, North American rinks the game is more straightforward and you don’t have that much time or space. There’s an expression in the NHL ’jump to the net‘ which basically means that you just deliver the puck to the net and drive to the net for rebounds. In KHL, on the other hand, the larger rink means that the individual skill is more present. You have more time and space to keep the puck, especially in the attacking zone. But the game is different, so it’s really hard to make comparisons.”
A good possible look at what the NHL might look like if fighting were banned.
The debate whether or not fighting in hockey should be allowed is not going away anytime soon. Still, with a decrease in fights, head injury and concussion issues and the argument over sportsmanship, one can wonder whether fighting has lost ground. At the same time, the players have no objections to fighting on the ice.
Unless the NHL culture changes, fighting in hockey is here to stay.
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