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The Debate Of Fighting In The NHL

Fighting. It’s one word that’s sparking a debate among both NHL fans and many other people who aren’t necessarily NHL fans. Some people want it left in the game, others want it banned.

If you ask me, I would tell you out right that I want it kept in the game and the rules of penalties and suspensions of fighting left the way they are. There are enough penalties and suspensions about fighting already, and they are just fine the way they are now. If you change the rules on penalties and suspensions about fighting, or take out fighting all together, the game loses its appeal for fans. After all, fights create an atmosphere that makes the game fun. People want to see fights during games because it’s entertaining. Not to mention the fact that it’s been part of NHL history for as long as anybody can remember - probably even started in the early days before the NHL was created, which was around the beginning of the 20th century in the late 1890s and early 1900s.

Fighting in the NHL is a tradition and if it’s taken out of the game, then a lot of hockey fans will stop going to games. If you polled fans at games about whether fighting should be kept in the game, I wouldn’t be surprised if at least half of them said that they want it left alone and not be taken out. And why should it? It creates excitement that the fans want. Not to mention, fans almost expect a fight at some point during the season whether it’s once a week, once a week, or even once a month because it’s just part of the game, and it’s fun to see the teams’ goons, as they are called, go at each other and fight. Players know the rules of the game and of fighting and they knowingly play by these rules.

Not to mention the fact that if fighting is taken out of the game, you have the problem of how long a player should be out of the game if he fights even once. Do you ban him for the rest of his career? Do you make him serve a suspension worth so many games (10, 15, etc)? If fighting is banned in the NHL, it will create more of a debate and more of a problem that it already is. Plus there would probably be some questionable calls by the referees as well. A referee might call a two-minute roughing penalty on a player if he pushes and shoves someone else. A referee might also just put someone in the penalty box for instigating a fight. On the ice it’s the referee’s call on what penalties are called with the rules as of right now; but if you completely ban fighting in the NHL then you’ll have referees making more calls that are completely bogus than they are right now.

Yes, players do get hurt from time to time but sometimes they get what they deserve. I do understand that. I know that there have been a lot of players who have gotten knocked unconscious, etc and there have been serious consequences from the injuries they receive. I know there are fights that erupt from players knocking each other into the boards, the glass, onto the ice, etc and have needed to be carried off on a stretcher. There is always going to be the fear of getting hurt from fights or from unnecessary hits, but most of the time players don’t always have time to think about getting into a fight and possibly getting hurt. Much of the time of time fights happen in a split second.

Take the Todd Fedoruk-Derek Boogaard fight toward the beginning of the 2006-2007 season for example. The Minnesota Wild were playing the Anaheim Ducks and at some point during the game, Fedoruk was following Boogaard around the rink, trying to pick a fight with him. Boogaard didn’t want anything to do with Fedoruk but they ended up “going at it” anyway. When all was said and done, Boogaard ended up winning the fight and punching in Fedoruk’s face. Fedoruk had to be taken to the hospital and ended up getting metal plates in his face.

Later in the season in late February, the Buffalo Sabres’ Chris Drury got hit in the face by the Ottawa Senators’ Chris Neil. Shortly after the hit, the Sabres’ Drew Stafford went after Neil and both of them received fighting majors, which is an automatic five-minute penalty. Lindy Ruff, the Sabres’ coach, sent out his fourth-line of Andrew Peters, Patrick Kaleta, and Adam Mair after that to face-off against Ottawa’s line of Dany Heatley, Jason Spezza and Mike Comrie. Mair went after Spezza and everything just escalated from there. As one can imagine, everybody got riled up. Players from both teams were fighting each other and even the goalies got into the action.

Fighting impacts the game for everyone involved, from the player from who the coach sends out on the ice, to who gets penalties during the game, the player that gets suspended - if applicable, and of course a player that misses games due to injury. Fighting does have its consequences, but it’s something that’s a part of the game. It always has been and always should be, no matter what. The league should leave this subject alone because there are players that want it left in the game, not to mention the coaches and fans who want it left in the game as well. It’s something that fans like to see happen and if taken out, hockey will lose a big part of its tradition and background. Not to mention the fact that momentum, which can play a big part after a fight, would be lost and that the game would probably have no flow to it because players won’t have the ambition to go out and play to win.

There are people that think that there should be at least some sort of regulation or punishment for fighting in the NHL and for some of the “cheap shots.” There are a number of regulations in place already in the NHL. For example, if you start a fight, you get an instigator penalty, which is an automatic two-minute penalty. Both players get a five-minute major penalty for fighting, or it could be even longer such as a ten-minute game misconduct penalty or possibly miss the rest of the game. There could also be any combination of these, depending on the severity of the fight. There is also the possibility of a fine of $10,000, which doubles every time after, for fighting in the last five minutes of a game, which the coach has to pay. Not to mention the fact that the player who instigates a fight in the last five minutes of regulation is automatically suspended for the next game. If the league really wanted to take it a step further, and not totally eliminate fighting in the game, maybe they could re-evaluate what the penalties are for fighting. Whether it’s starting a fight, fighting in general, third-man in, game misconducts, etc and perhaps even look into what kind of suspensions they give to players who commit “cheap shots” on other players. Perhaps they should turn to the fans who actually care about the game and actually start listening to them. Fans are important to hockey and the league doesn’t seem to see that at times, especially with the topic of fighting and violence in the game.

Towards the end of the season, New York Rangers’ player Ryan Hollweg got hit in the face with New York Islanders’ Chris Snow’s stick and Snow got a 25-game suspension. But when Chris Neil hit Chris Drury, who went straight down to the ice and received a concussion, he didn’t so much as get a penalty or suspension.

What people might not realize is that in the official handbook for the NHL, there are a lot of different penalties, game misconducts, suspensions, and a lot of other different categories for fighting. Some of these are fighting before the drop of the puck, being the instigator, instigating in the last five minutes of regulation, match and major penalties, and fines and suspensions for aggressor, not going directly to the penalty box, and for instigator among other things. There are seven pages of rules and regulations that help regulate penalties, etc when a fight does happen.

The violence and fighting that has gone on in the NHL recently, such as the incidents described above, is nothing compared to the early years of the NHL. In fact, in the early years, there were many more fights and a lot more violence in the game. Millian, who hosts The Blue Line: Hockey Talk Radio and has covered the topic extensively, told me that the critics of the sport as well as the media are looking at recent events, like the ones I mentioned earlier of the Hollweg and Drury incidents, “and say[ing] that the game is more violent than ever.” But really, if you compare today’s game to the 1960’s and the golden age of the goons, today’s modern hockey is actually tamer by comparison. What people have forgotten about hockey is that it does have a long tradition of violence behind it and that each player in the NHL was, and is, willing to play in that kind of condition. Millian also told me that if roughness, intimidation, violence, and fighting are allowed to be part of the rules “and that players knowingly play by the rules, then it [goes to show that they are] showing sportsmanship and not being mindless, violent goons.”

If fighting were to be taken out of the game completely, it would be a very boring game with players not being able to hit each other. Players would just be skating around the rink with no emotion and pretty much no ambition to play because the rules have changed so much. Players would be afraid to hit anybody in fear of other players over-reacting and starting a fight.

Fighting is an essential part of the game and it can happen at any time due to the emotional charge it has on players. Whether they’re getting angry about a certain hit or something happening in the game, it can change the momentum for a team. That in turn could mean that a team could come from behind and win the game. Players can get very emotional and angry when something happens to a teammate or something happens in a game. Players take their emotions and anger out on the ice sometimes and fights end up coming about. They know they can hit players on the ice with their body, like a hip check, because hockey is such a contact, as well as collision, sport where players hit each other and tempers flare. It just happens to be that that kind of sport, and is accepted as being the nature of the game whether people like it or not.

Another factor of why fighting should stay in the game is that the league has already changed so much in terms of how the game is played. They added the trapezoid behind the goalie net, took away two line passes, expanded the offensive zone, and having goalie equipment being smaller than what it was before the lockout of the 2004-2005 season among other changes. The league is trying to change too much at one time and they need to step back and see the progress that they have already made since the end of the 2003-2004 season. The fans, for the most part, like the game as it stands right now and they don’t want anything changed too dramatically, and so soon. And right now, it’s the case of fighting in the NHL that they don’t want changed.

Fighting should be left alone by the league and maybe in a couple years, be brought up to see whether it should have a place in the game. But don’t be surprised if people have the same kind of answer then as they do now - leave it alone and leave it in the game. Fighting, violence, roughness, intimidation - it’s all a part of the game and if that’s taken away, then you just lost the interest of the fans and hockey will become as boring as figure skating but with all the pads and such of hockey. Plus, if it’s completely banned by the league, there will be a bigger mess of how long a player should be out of the game for fighting just once. Players are willing to play by the rules and realize how violent the sport can be, and if they are willing to play under the conditions, why change a darn thing about fighting?

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