I understand that this is the case. But there seems to be, among many hockey fans, an implied assumption that fighting and high sticking constitute some sort of unbreakable sum, a Law of the Conservation of Violence if you will, where an increase or decrease in one is necessarily accompanied by the reserve in the other. There is simply no particular reason to believe that must be the case. Aside from the fact that the “fighting = more stickwork” notion has never been backed up with any sort of study, it’s just not logical to think that this particular sport defies human control.
If you want to reduce fighting and stick injuries, do three things:
Ban fighting.
Enforce the rule against hooking.
Impose extremely severe penalties for high sticking.
IF banning fighting supposedly increases high sticking - and I am not convinced it does, but let’s assume the risk is there - you can reduce that problem simultaneously be simplky adopting the policy of automatic game misconducts for all contact between a stick and an opposing player above the shoulder. Severe? Sure. Radical? Absolutely. Effective? Of course it would be.
The other problem in hockey today is incessant hooking and holding, which is a direct consequence of those rules no longer being enforced, as well as the idiotic tendency of referees to try to balance penalties out. Nobody talks about it, but that’s one of the reasons the sticks are getting so high; because they’re perpetually hooked around the waists of other players. Used to be you were supposed to keep your stick on the ICE, since that’s usually where the puck is found; now they’re carried at waist level more than they ever were before, in part to serve as hooking devices at a moment’s notice. This problem is due to a lack of hooking calls; as I said in my first long post, hooking used to be against the rules as recently as the late 80s, but is now effectively a legal act in most cases. It USED to be enforced; there is no reason it can’t be enforced again. Bringing back hooking calls will push the sticks down and get them further away from people’s heads.
Finally, cross-checking is beginning to go the way of hooking and holding; I’ve nticed in the last 5-7 years that refs have stopped calling even blatant, no-questions-asked cross-checks, and are starting to call it along the lines of hooking or holding, so that it’s now “Cross checking is a penalty if it’s really, really egrigious, and the guy you check was an offensive player with the puck, and you haven’t been called for the last two penalties.”
Then with all due respect I don’t consider it to be a valid point. Until I see evidence it’s true, it’s legend.
I haven’t really noticed this, but it seems that the refs have always called only the blatant cross checks in front of the net. I have noticed that more hard hits that are clean, are being called as “charging” and maybe even elbowing. If both these things happen more often, then the NHL could get pretty ugly.
So does anybody have anything to say about the players’ proposal, significantly the rookie cap, the luxury tax, and the immediate 24% rollback in salaries?
The owners have said they’ll have a counterproposal tomorrow.
Highsticking is one of those infractions that happens so quickly on many occasions, that refs miss a good deal of those infractions until a stoppage of play where a coach or player tells the ref what he missed and the blood on the ground. Refs are very reluctant to give out penalties that they don’t see, but usually they see the retaliation (punch, rough, fight) and call that instead. I’ve seen that SO MANY TIMES over the years from my son’s hockey leagues all the way up the chain. Highsticking (intentional or not) happens very quickly and gets missed by the refs.
The hooking and holding has been the downfall of the sport and I agree with you there, but there are legitimate reasons to have the stick up. My son made a living as a stay-at-home defensemen by legally stickchecking the centers/winger’s stick and get it off the ice so they can’t receive a pass and get a shot on net. On the offensive end, a rising slapshot can be tipped by a player’s stick from the height of the goal (4ft.) and below for a possible SOG. Call the hooking, but sticks in the air doesn’t always mean that a hook is about to happen.
It’s the quick one time cross-check to the lower back of a player that usually gets missed, but the refs pretty much call the repetitive shots to the back or the higher cross-checks that make a player fall forward, and all are quite painful on the unprotected parts of the player. The ones that are missed are usually followed up by retaliation…but with one ref(or maybe two refs, since linesmen can’t make calls), and 12 players on different parts of the ice, stuff like this is gonna get missed.
Yeah, I know…I was googling for about a half hour looking for some supporting cites, but didn’t find any…So we leave it as that - legend.