www.TED.com
Sir Ted Robinson on Creativity. It inspired me so much that I promptly ordered his book for my Kindle!
(More than welcome Dave! Thanks for adding that link. I enjoy sharing things I read / see / my experiences. I like to help fellow coaches as I believe we should be working together in the coaching / teaching fraternity to make ourselves better - this will rub off on our students / players. Lifelong learning should be our goal - otherwise, our "know-it-all" egos will get the better of us and we will stagnate.
Best of luck with your squad!)
So to keep this thread true to it's roots, here is the aforementioned presentation from www.TED.com:
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/ken_robinson_says_schools_kill_creativity.html
Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining and profoundly moving case for creating an education system that nurtures (rather than undermines) creativity.
DMan
Agents join injured Crosby in asking for action on head shots
By DAVID SHOALTS January 18, 2011
Globe and Mail Update
Players' representatives say rule interpretation is impossible to get right
As Sidney Crosby issued a carefully-worded denial that he would boycott the NHL all-star game because the culprits behind his concussion escaped serious punishment, calls on the league to strengthen its new rule on head shots came from both player and management sides.
J.P. Barry of CAA Sports, who represents the Sedin twins, Daniel Alfredsson and others, firmly believes that the NHL needs to go one step further and ban all blows to the head.
"I am supportive of a football-type rule," said Barry, who noted that it shouldn't be up to hockey operations to decide if a hit was intentional or not because "it's impossible to get it right. The football rule eliminates any uncertainty. It sends a message to the players - that you just can't hit anybody in the head anymore."
Other prominent agents, such as Don Meehan, Don Baizley and Kurt Overhardt, also said it is time to push for a change. Meehan and Overhardt said any lobbying by the agents is best done through the NHL Players' Association and its new executive director, Don Fehr.
"Protecting players' ability to play is as important as any [bargaining] issue," Overhardt said.
There is a sense of unhappiness around the players' union with the way the NHL hands out supplementary discipline such as suspensions for head shots. Those close to the union feel this could become part of the negotiations for a new collective agreement next year.
The number of concussions suffered by NHL players this season, ranging from mild to serious, is now 33. Phoenix Coyotes assistant coach Dave King, whose team just lost defenceman David Schlemko when he was struck on the head by Scott Nichol of the San Jose Sharks, said the affect on hockey "is paralyzing."
Schlemko is the third Coyote to be sidelined with a concussion, joining Ed Jovanovski and Kurt Sauer, who also missed 80 games last season with a head injury. Nichol was suspended by the NHL for four games for the Schlemko hit.
"Every time a guy gets hit now you're holding your breath," King said. "It's affecting our sport. It's paralyzing."
King concurred that the absence of Crosby attracted greater attention to the head shot/concussion issue and believes the NHL is "trying to do the right thing.
"What I like now is that everything goes to replay. Almost every hit is looked at by the league. You can't escape the camera. Will it change the culture? Probably in time it will. It's ridiculous now how many players are on the shelf."
Crosby, who has not played since absorbing head hits from David Steckel of the Washington Capitals on Jan. 1 and Victor Hedman of the Tampa Bay Lightning on Jan. 5, said Tuesday he is feeling better but there is only a "slight chance" he will be healthy enough to play in the all-star game Jan. 30.
While Crosby dismissed a Globe and Mail report on Tuesday, which suggested his anger about the lack of suspensions for Steckel and Hedman was enough to have considered skipping the all-star game even if he were healthy, his presence at the game remains up in the air. Two years ago, Crosby attended the all-star game in Montreal to make public appearances, even though he could not play because of a knee injury.
The NHL and NHLPA did not pick Crosby as one of the captains for this year's game because of concerns he would not be healthy enough to play. Brendan Shanahan, the NHL's vice-president of hockey and business development, said Crosby told him "he wanted to do as much as he can" for the showcase event but they did not discuss his attendance.
"We didn't get into that," Shanahan said.
Crosby said, "I'll be there if I can be there and I still haven't ruled out being there."
A major part of the debate is the intention of players who deliver a hit to the head. One of the reasons Steckel and Hedman were not suspended is that their hits were deemed accidental but Crosby's agent, Pat Brisson, and others say players should be accountable no matter what.
"A head shot may not be premeditated but a player should suffer the consequences," Meehan said.
There is also a lingering controversy about the initial medical treatment Crosby received. While Brisson said he now believes the first hit, by Steckel, led to the concussion, the diagnosis was not made until Jan. 6, the day after he was hit by Hedman.
The Penguins insist Crosby did not show any symptoms aside from a sore neck in the days after the first hit. Brisson said neither he nor Crosby have any complaints about how the team handled his injury.
With reports from Eric Duhatschek, Allan Maki, Matthew Sekeres and The Associated Press
Lindros: Players' disdain for each other poisonous
By Jeff Blair January 19, 2011
From Thursday's Globe and Mail
Former NHL MVP says it will take a culture change to limit concussions
His words are measured and without self-pity. Yes, he will add his voice to those crying out for more respect among National Hockey League players, but attempts to get Eric Lindros to connect his own history of concussions to what Sidney Crosby is going through, or about to go through, get nowhere.
After a career ruined by six concussions and resulting political battles with a game and power structure that didn't want to know what it was really dealing with, Lindros is all too aware that each concussion, let alone each person's response to it, is unique, both in terms of rehabilitation and reintegration into the game. The star player is targeted; the third or fourth-liner worries about his job. Culture change? Good luck with that.
"What happens is you get tagged as being concussion prone, and there's a huge decline in the respect you get because of it," Lindros said in a telephone interview on Wednesday. "It's people trying to make their name, you know? It's little things that occur after the play, like when it switches out of the corner and the play goes up the ice and you're spinning around heading back up to back check and - bam! You know ... where they kind of catch you."
Is culture change coming to the NHL as a result of Crosby's concussion? Or could it be that the only thing that has now happened is that Crosby has just had a target put on his back for the rest of his career? The answer depends on whether NHL players and agents realize how utterly daft they look.
Forget the owners. Forget Gary Bettman or Colin Campbell. They live in a muddle of money and rules and politics; by nature they can't see the forest for the trees. They are lost causes. The agents are speaking up - some of them, at least - but mostly to throw the issue in the lap of the National Hockey League Players' Association.
Note to the agents: You want change? Spend some money and get everybody together at the all-star game and go behind a locked door. Keep the press out. Turn off the BlackBerries. And read your players the riot act. Stress zero tolerance for a shot to the head, any hit above the shoulders. Then lobby for Draconian suspensions. If a few players get screwed for clearly accidental hits? Too bad. The game will go on without them.
Respect?
"Well, we used to talk about this all the time when I was at the players' association," Lindros says, his voice trailing off.
You wait for the next statement. It never comes.
Lindros believes the seminal moment for the discussion of concussions and sports occurred in October of 2009 when the iconic CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes devoted a segment to concussions among NFL players and a possible link to early-onset dementia. "That's when the big push finally started, it seems," Lindros said. "The pressure initially was on the NFL. But then it moved to other organizations."
Is this the NHL's come-to-Jesus moment? As Lindros noted, it is both "ironic and unfortunate" that it appears as if it's taken a concussion sustained by the game's biggest name to create at least a sense of movement. Once upon a time he was that name - or one of them - and nobody seemed to learn much from the lesson that was his career.
So let's see what happens the first time Crosby is back on the ice and in a vulnerable position, with some rock-head circling. "Guys take liberties," Lindros said matter-of-factly. That they do, and until that stops, there will be no culture change. Just lost opportunity and, most likely, more lost careers.
The NHL can't say it wasn't warned.
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Bouchard knows concussion struggle all too well
By ERIC DUHATSCHEK January 21, 2011
Globe and Mail Update
Eric Duhatschek talks to the Minnesota Wild forward about the injuries that cost him more than 100 games in his weekly notebook column
A view from the front lines of the NHL's concussion debate must, of necessity, include a chat with the Minnesota Wild's Pierre-Marc Bouchard, who missed a staggering 104 games over parts of two seasons recovering from a pair of debilitating, career-threatening concussions.
Bouchard never ever thought he would be out as long he was, which goes to the heart of the concussion conundrum. At the time the injuries occur, the players themselves are in the worst position to self-diagnose because they are, after all, suffering from a brain injury that impairs judgment.
"Concussions are really tricky," Bouchard was saying, before the Wild clobbered Calgary 6-0 to sweep the two Alberta teams and unexpectedly move into contention for a playoff berth in the Western Conference.
Bouchard is scoring again, but freely acknowledges that even 24 games into his return, he has not got his old form back.
"To be honest, I don't think it's there, 100 per cent yet," said Bouchard. "I was out for so long. Some games, I feel my game is there. Sometimes, I know there's part of my game that can still be better - that what I used to do in the past, I can be better doing. It's been okay. There are good things and bad things I do in the game, but I think I'm heading in the right direction."
Bouchard was reiterating a point that came up again and again this past week - that the players themselves have a difficult time assessing how bad an injury is, especially when it first occurs.
Pat Brisson, the influential player agent who represents Sidney Crosby and others, says the support group that surrounds an NHL player needs to be at the front of the diagnostic line when it comes to concussion treatment.
"If someone is slightly concussed and we see that, it's our responsibility - meaning the people around the game, the teams, the union, all of us - to be responsible enough to take the player off the ice," said Brisson. "Because the concussed player can't think straight. He doesn't have a bad shoulder. He's concussed."
As for observing the proper back-to-playing protocols, Bouchard suggests that it can be difficult for a player to be honest with himself in terms of the recovery process.
"I had kind of back-to-back concussions and my second one, when I got hit, the next day, I didn't feel right, but you're not sure it's a concussion, because we get hit all the time and your neck is sore and you get headaches sometimes. You think, 'maybe I'll feel better the next day.'
"Then you get into action and your heart rate goes up really high and you're starting to have headaches, so ... I think guys have to be smart about it, because it's not fun to have that injury. If you have a small one and you make sure you're 100 per cent before your next game, you might miss five, six, seven days and then you're fine.
"So I think we have to be a little smarter about how you feel - and I think it's only the player who can say how he feels."
But Bouchard also acknowledged that the most difficult part of the equation is dealing with a players' natural instinct - that he can put up with whatever he's dealing with, that he'll be okay, that he can tough it out, because that is the ethic they've grown up with.
"As hockey players, we don't like to miss games," said Bouchard. "You think you can play through it. You think you'll be able to get rid of it the next few days - and you might. But if you get hit again, there's that danger - that you could get an even bigger concussion."
NHL TO INVESTIGATE LOMBARDI COMMENTS CRITICIZING LEAGUE
TSN.CA STAFF
Jan 21 2011
The NHL will investigate alleged comments made by Los Angeles Kings general manager Dean Lombardi that called into question the integrity of Mike Murphy, the NHL's senior vice-president of hockey operations.
Lombardi's comments came after the Kings' 2-0 loss to the Phoenix Coyotes Thursday night, after a controversial opening goal by Martin Hanzal was allowed to stand.
Hanzal, standing in front of L.A.'s net, appeared to bat the puck out of the air with a high stick. Officials immediately ruled it a goal, and after more than five minutes of video review with the crew in Toronto - led by Murphy - the goal stood.
"When the guy in Toronto making the decisions on the goals, in Ottawa and the one tonight, wanted the G.M.'s job in L.A. and was not happy about not getting it, you have to assume you are going to get those type of calls," Lombardi was quoted as saying on the Kings' website. "However, we have put ourselves in a position where these calls have a monumental effect on our season, and we're going to have to find a way out of it ourselves."
Lombardi made reference to L.A.'s Nov. 22 game in Ottawa, another time this season where he felt the on-ice officiating crew and video review team in Toronto made the incorrect call. In that game, officials disallowed Ryan Smyth's potential game-tying goal with three seconds left in the game. Video replay did not overturn the call on the ice.
Murphy played 10 seasons with the Kings (1974-83) before becoming an assistant coach with the team for two-and-a-half seasons. He was a head coach for parts of the 1986-87 and '88-'89 seasons, stepping in as a mid-season replacement.
Kings head coach Terry Murray also voiced his displeasure in the report.
"I don't know why we have video replay in the National Hockey League," Murray said Thursday on LAKings.com. "That's all I can say. If the replay is there for review of goals and non-goals...I don't know. You've got a guy who gets credit for the goal. He's 6-foot-6, and the stick is up above his head. Matt Greene is 6'3", and he's batting the puck down his hand beside his ear, and the net is four feet high. It doesn't add up.
"It makes no sense. No sense. How does it get called on the ice a goal, first of all, and then how does the replay hold it up? I don't know. I don't have an answer."
Murphy defended his team's decision during the Kings' broadcast on Fox, saying there was no conclusive replay to overturn the goal. He said the crew in Toronto never saw the puck conclusively hit Hanzal's stick, while all the on-ice officials agreed on the goal call.
Once the league confirms with Lombardi that he did indeed make the comments, the NHL is expected to respond with some form of discipline.
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Kings GM likely facing a steep fine
Globe and Mail Blog
Posted on Friday, January 21, 2011
Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday we ask the Globe’s roster of hockey writers to weigh in on an issue from the world of puck.
Today we ask the guys to do weigh in on a statement made last night by Los Angeles Kings general manager Dean Lombardi after a video review failed to overturn a second-period goal by the Phoenix Coyotes in a game the Kings lost 2-0.
The question: How much do you think the NHL will fine Lombardi for his comments?
MICHAEL GRANGE
Well it might be mitigated somewhat because he was right about the poor call, if the photographic evidence is meaningful; and it doesn’t appear that Mike Murphy is going to be out of the lineup for any length of time despite a pretty egregious hit from behind; so I say $50,000.
SEAN GORDON
Whatever happened to 'it's strictly business, not personal'? Didn't these people see the Godfather?
I'll grab any excuse to reference Michael Corleone, but in actual fact, I kinda like what Lombardi did. Not because he's right about Murphy's motivations (although it was certainly a horsespit call, one of many this year), but because any time someone cracks the go-along-to-get-along veneer of the old boy network marks a good day.
I'd guess Lombardi and Murray could both be fined, although by taking a personal run at Murphy, the Deaner will surely be on the hook for the bigger amount. Grange's $50,000 sounds about right, but the league doesn't have a sense of humour about this kind of stuff so it could be significantly more.
You can't have coaches and general managers publicly impugning the integrity of the process, but boy is it fun when they do.
ERIC DUHATSCHEK
The NHL considers some offences more egregious than others and this one - impugning the integrity of someone in the hockey operations department - ranks right at the top of the list. Remember how they went to the mattresses over the Stephane Auger-Alex Burrows matter a year ago, closing ranks around their referee, even if Auger’s conduct in accosting Burrows before the game left him over to criticism? The NHL would have none of that. Burrows was the bad guy; their man squeaky clean, end of story.
I would suggest that Lombardi’s outburst is the frustration of a 2-10 losing streak talking. These Kings were 12-3 in the first month and on their way. Since then, they’ve been arguably the worst team in the Western Conference - or close to it anyway - and Lombardi’s attempts to trade for what he likes to call a “big dog” have proved fruitless. The result is a team without a coalescing force in the dressing room to dig them out of their current predicament.
However much they fine is anybody’s guess. It’ll be steep and I suspect there’ll be a forced formal apology coming later today, in which Lombardi mutters a series of mea culpas and pledges never, ever to say anything as untoward as that ever again.
ALLAN MAKI
Here's a copy of Dean Lombardi's forced apology to the NHL:
"I would like to same I am sorry the NHL and senior vice-president of hockey operations Mike Murphy were offended by my recent comments. I'm sorry the NHL has such lousy officiating and review procedures. I apologize for questioning what is already a flawed process in need of revision. I am sincerely sorry we got hosed by a bad call when there were people in South America who saw it was a bad call but could not voice displeasure with Mr. Murphy, who is in Toronto and wanted this job.
"Thank you, with much apologies.
Dean Lombardi
MATTHEW SEKERES
Lombardi only gets fined if it's a crime to point out conflicts of interests in the NHL's hockey operations department. Because as we know, thanks to Colin "Venting Hockey Dad" Campbell, the conflict of interest itself is "much ado about nothing."
JEFF BLAIR
Maybe they can find another unemployed ex-player to put on the league payroll.
THN.com Blog: Gorilla-sized goalies populate NHL
Ryan Dixon
2011-01-19
How big are goalies these days? Big enough to fill in for the guys charged with the task of protecting them, if need be.
Former NHL puckstopper Kevin Weekes is a large man himself, but even he can’t help but marvel at the current size of crease creatures such as Montreal’s MVP, 6-foot-3, 219-pound Carey Price.
“When I saw Carey for the first time last year – in person, not playing against him, but actually in the rink when I spoke to him in Edmonton – he’s stay-at-home defenseman big,” Weekes said. “I’m 6-foot-1 and I can go anywhere between 215 and 225. I’m muscular, but this guy is muscular and tall. He could just as easily be a shutdown ‘D’ crunching guys along the boards.”
I spoke with Weekes about Price because he’s the subject of a cover story for an upcoming goalie-themed issue of The Hockey News. A few other components of that issue include introducing some new-to-the-scene masked men, such as 6-foot-2 Corey Crawford in Chicago, 6-foot-6 Anders Lindback in Nashville and 6-foot-3 Ondrej Pavelec in Atlanta. It also has a top 30 goalie ranking, where players such as 6-foot-2 Jonas Hiller of Anaheim and Lindback’s Nashville buddy, 6-foot-5 Pekka Rinne, receive high praise.
It’s interesting to note that in the post-lockout NHL, players who would have at one time been dismissed for their smaller dimensions are being given a chance to thrive, whereas in goal, you wonder if the opposite is true. Not that long ago, the blue paint was home to sub-six-foot stars such as Curtis Joseph, Mike Vernon, Mike Richter and Grant Fuhr. The difference is so pronounced now that 5-foot-10 Chris Osgood, a starting goalie on two Cup-winning Detroit teams, has wondered aloud whether he’d get a second look these days if he was magically transported back to junior.
The shift in goal isn’t just about long and lanky stoppers. Some of the best goalies in the game now are also some of the strongest athletes in hockey, period. Once upon a time, big and bulky seemed counter to quick and nimble, but with goaltending techniques more finely crafted than ever, it’s led to the desire for big, puck-blocking physiques.
“There’s less of a stigma that comes with being a muscular goalie,” Weekes said. “People used to always say, ‘Weeksie, you’re a goalie, why are you lifting weights?’
“Jonas Hiller is a perfect example. Very strong, explosive lower body and that’s what helps him play the style he plays so effectively.”
Goaltending is about the most bottom-line position in sports, so anybody getting the job done consistently is going to find work. But more and more, the big bodies that used to either whack home or clear rebounds in front of the crease can now be found standing directly in it.
Ryan Dixon is a writer and copy editor for The Hockey News magazine, the co-author of the book Hockey's Young Guns and a regular contributor to THN.com. His blog appears Wednesdays.
Talk of penalizing head shots picks up momentum
By SEAN GORDON January 20, 2011
From Friday's Globe and Mail
Crosby's recent concussion has NHL power brokers considering their options
There are few genuine coincidences in life.
So when people as disparate as National Hockey League general managers, super-agents and organized labour types spontaneously begin using identical analogies to frame an issue, it's fair to say something is afoot.
The analogy: The NHL penalizes even accidental high-sticking, so why couldn't it sanction blows to the head in a similar way?
Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Ray Shero used precisely those terms in arguing for more urgent action against head shots in an interview this week, as did player agent Pat Brisson, who represents injured Pens superstar Sidney Crosby.
Speaking privately, people familiar with the goings-on at the National Hockey League Players' Association - one of whom raised the high-stick comparison - suggested it's probably just a matter of time before the NHL adopts some version of a rule like those already in place in the Ontario Hockey League and elsewhere forbidding checks to the head.
Even if such a rule isn't in the NHL's immediate plans, the discussion about the need to do more to curb head shots is taking place among hockey people - Carolina Hurricanes GM Jim Rutherford and St. Louis Blues president John Davidson have also spoken out - spurred by the recent concussion suffered by Crosby.
Rutherford said he plans to raise the head shot question again at the general managers' meeting in March, and that while "rule 48 is working, can we make it better is the question?"
And while he too stopped short of supporting an outright ban on checks to the head, Rutherford brushed aside the main criticism of that type of rule.
"[Detractors] say it's going to take hitting out of the game. But in my opinion, any time we put in a rule for the players, they always adapt to it," he said. "Whatever we decide to do, the players are going to adjust to it. But at the end of the day, the object is to protect the player and the most important part of their body, the head."
The Hurricanes GM, a longtime advocate for more decisive action on head shots, said "we took a good step last year, but this is a serious issue . . . we don't want players like the best player in the world out of the game because of this injury - or any other player."
Shero is willing to ask the question as to whether a head-checking ban is appropriate, even if he stopped short of answering in the affirmative ("I'm not saying that's the way to go yet.")
Still, he said, "there's an awful lot of players who come to the NHL, whether it's from the OHL, U.S. college or International Ice Hockey Federation countries ... where they've played under those rules."
It's possible for players to change their game to fit new rules, Shero continued, citing the fallout from two cases from last season that made him uncomfortable: the hits by Philadelphia Flyers forward Mike Richards on Florida's David Booth, and by Pittsburgh's Matt Cooke on Boston's Marc Savard.
The NHL adopted its blindside hit rule not long after the latter incident, and Shero said it's had an effect.
"I told Matt [Cooke] that I didn't like the [Savard] hit, and I told him he'll have to change his mentality ... especially in back-pressure situations in the neutral zone. And he has," Shero said, later adding "we see the Flyers a lot, and I have a lot of respect for Mike Richards as a player, and if you watch you can see he's changed how he plays in the neutral zone ... players will adapt."
But at the same time, he continued, the current rule doesn't address other kinds of checks, citing the November check by New York Rangers defenceman Marc Staal on Calgary centre Matt Stajan as an example of legal hits he feels have no place in the NHL.
"I really believe we need to do more to get head shots out of our game," he said.
Brisson, a former player who is broadly considered the most influential agent in hockey, said this week that he favours an unambiguous, unforgiving rule where "even if someone hits someone accidentally, he could be automatically suspended."
The Ontario Hockey League's rule 44B.1 is simply worded, and bans "the act of checking an opponent to the head in any manner." The league's rulebook further specifies that "a hit to the head with a shoulder shall be considered an illegal check and shall be penalized as checking to the head."
Whether the penalty assessed is a minor, a major or a match penalty is left up to the referees.
The rule, which was adopted four years ago, hasn't eliminated concussions in the OHL, nor has it done away with head shots altogether; last week the Kitchener Rangers' Cody Sol was suspended for three games for a head check on an Erie Otters player.
But as OHL commissioner Dave Branch has long argued, nor have the critics' darkest predictions come true: that the regulation would undermine the physical aspect of the game.
Still, several NHL players surveyed informally in recent days remain skeptical; it's reasonable to surmise the rough consensus among players is there is no consensus.
Many appear leery of what they see as a sea change and invoke a "slippery slope" argument, pointing out the difficulties in, for example, 6-foot-9 Boston defenceman Zdeno Chara hitting Buffalo's 5-foot-6 Nathan Gerbe without touching his head.
"How do you police it? There's contact with the head all the time, every game," said a member of the Montreal Canadiens, who, like colleagues interviewed on other teams, didn't wish to have his name used. "It's a contact sport."
With a report from Eric Duhatschek
CTVglobemedia Publishing, Inc
Tough sport, but no head shots
ROY MacGREGOR Published Friday, Jan. 21, 2011
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
There are, as Canadians continually forget, two officially recognized national sports in this hockey-mad country.
Lacrosse is the other one.
And just perhaps, in this time of greater hockey madness than most winters, the one national game has a lesson to pass on to the other national game.
Lacrosse, or baggataway, as it was once known, is no stranger to violence and injury. Blood runs from the game’s role in the capture of Fort Michilimackinac nearly 250 years ago to recent decades in the lacrosse boxes of small-town and suburban Canada. I grew up in one such community myself – Huntsville, Ont. – where hockey was the winter game, lacrosse the summer game, and lacrosse considered the tougher of the two sports to survive.
But no more. Something happened in recent years that has seen a flip-flop between the two national games, with lacrosse dealing with its violence and injury issues and hockey seemingly without the foggiest notion of what to do – even the answer is as obvious as simply saying no, no more.
The National Lacrosse League – as well as various other lacrosse organizations – long ago moved against hits to the head because, as John Tavares, one of the game’s all-time greats, says, “It was simply getting out of hand.
“It was common for players to go for the head,” says the NLL’s career scoring leader. “I’ve personally taken my own shots at other guys. It had to stop.”
The league now has Rule 77 dealing with “dangerous contact to the head” and a myriad of other rules and regulations that have dramatically changed the way the game is played around the head, without significantly affecting how it is played around the net.
A player who dangerously strikes another in the head or neck is considered to have engaged in “egregious conduct.” Not only is it a major penalty, but on first offence the player is given a one-game suspension and fined $1,000.
A $1,000 fine for a professional lacrosse player is roughly the equivalent of an NHLer crashing his Hummer through the front window of his Muskoka cottage.
As well, all players are required to wear a proper helmet, facemask and chin guard. Mouth guards are also compulsory. And you do up your strap, tightly, in lacrosse – or else.
There are strong penalties against high-sticking in the head area, elbowing and boarding. The strict rules cannot prevent all head injuries – two Canadians in the NLL, the Philadelphia Wings’ Merrick Thomson and the Colorado Mammoth’s Dan Carey have missed long periods because of concussion – but they are most certainly a long step forward when compared to hockey’s seemingly frozen ability to act.
“I think it’s great,” says Mr. Tavares, who stars for the Buffalo Bandits. “When you consider the number of head shots we see in all sports, it’s obviously out of hand.”
Putting an end to such hits isn’t only for the benefit of the players, he says, but for their families and whatever work they do when not playing lacrosse. The 42-year-old Mr. Tavares is himself a high-school math teacher in Mississauga and knows only too well the effects of concussion. He has been through it twice.
“It’s not fun,” he says. “Once you’ve had one, the symptoms return easier each time. Last weekend, I got hit a couple of times – head-to-head collisions during play – and my vision in my left eye began to go blurry. I knew what it was. It went away, but it was because of those previous concussions.”
Last October, he was watching the New York Islanders’ home opener against the Dallas Stars when his 20-year-old nephew, also named John Tavares, got clipped by Dallas’s Adam Burish. The younger Mr. Tavares, the NHL’s No. 1 draft pick in 2009, had just suffered the league’s first concussion of the 2010-11 season. It was, fortunately, fairly minor; he only missed the next three games.
“I saw the hit,” says the older Mr. Tavares. “It was whiplash effect more than anything else. My advice to him was simple: take your time coming back.
“One thing with concussions is that you think you’re better, you’re convinced you’re better, and you go out and play and then, a week later, you’re playing again and you realize you weren’t back at all when you thought you were.”
Mr. Tavares, the lacrosse player, says he learned this lesson several years ago when he felt well enough to play again and even convinced himself that, “I was well enough that I could cut through the middle again” – basically bull-ing his way toward the opposition net. “My body knew different. I shouldn’t have tried. The following week I realized that now I felt 100-per-cent better than I had when I tried to convince myself I was already to play.”
The solution in any game where concussions are a threat, he says, is obvious: “There should be no hits to the head.”
And while the total elimination of such hits is impossible in games as fast and physical as Canada’s two national sports, there are ways to reduce the number of concussions significantly.
“The penalties have to be more severe,” he says. “Two minutes? That’s no big deal. Five minutes? Well, some teams would be willing to take that risk, so long as it meant getting a good player out of the game. It’s got to be severe.
“The National Lacrosse League has done a good job, in my opinion. Seven or eight years ago there were guys taking head shots every game – me included – and now you don’t see it.
“So, No. 1 – it’s good for the game.”
Roy MacGregor usually appears Tuesdays and Saturdays in The Globe and Mail’s Sports section
MCKENZIE: FOUR RULE CHANGES SCOTTY BOWMAN WOULD LIKE TO SEE
BOB MCKENZIE TSN
1/24/2011
I had the pleasure of watching a hockey game with Scotty Bowman on Saturday night and as you would expect when sitting with the greatest NHL coach of all time, it was a fascinating night of talking about the game and the way it's played.
Bowman is, of course, a consultant of sorts for the Chicago Blackhawks and his son, Hawks GM Stan Bowman, but what Scotty mostly does now at age 77 is watch hockey, a lot of hockey. It doesn't matter what league or what level or what teams, it's all just hockey to him. He is as fascinated by it now as we are when he offers up the changes he would make to the game, which aren't so much innovations as they are a return to the way things once were.
"There are only four changes I would make," he said, and here they are:
1. Put the redline back in for two-line pass offside until the puck carrier reaches the top of the face-off circle in his own end.
"I don't like that," Bowman said, pointing to a defenceman on his own goalline firing the puck hard up the boards to a teammate at the far blueline, who tips the puck into the offensive zone. "I want to see defencemen make a play. Force him to get the puck to the top of the circles in his own end before you open up the whole netural zone for a pass."
Bowman also thinks that might encourage more forechecking to prevent a player from getting to the top of the circles and putting the whole neutral zone in play.
2. Take out the trapezoid and allow goaltenders to handle the puck anywhere on the ice.
Bowman said it would help protect defencemen from being pulverized on the forecheck and while a good puckhandling goalie could neutralize an opposing team's forecheck, a bad puckhandling goalie could result in turnovers and more offence.
3. Eliminate the automatic delay of game penalty for a player in the defensive zone, who shoots the puck out of play.
"I would like to see it be at the referee's discretion," Bowman said. "The refs know if it's an accident or intentional. Let the ref make the call."
4. Return to traditional offside -- get rid of the tag-up.
"Again, I want to see defencemen make a play with the puck, not just slap it into the offensive zone and just stand there waiting (for teammates to clear the zone)," Bowman said. "Hold onto the puck, try to make something happen, maybe he makes a play, maybe he turns it over. But force him to make a play."
5. Return to 10 feet between the goalline and end boards at each end and have three equal zones of 60-feet apiece, as opposed to the smaller neutral zone/larger offensive zones we now have.
"The offensive zone is too big now," Bowman said. "That's why you see all five guys collapse to the front of the net and you have forwards playing goalie. If the zone were smaller, they (the defensive players) might spread out a bit and go after pucks up top. There would also be more forechecking."
Wait a minute, Bowman originally said he had only four changes he would make. Yeah, well, you tell the greatest coach of all time he doesn't get last change.
Current, former NHL players lose more than $13-million in resort deal
DAVID SHOALTS AND ERIC DUHATSCHEK
From Wednesday's Globe and Mail
Published Wednesday, Jan. 26, 2011
Len Barrie’s misadventures in leading the Bear Mountain golf resort and real-estate development into bankruptcy left more than 100 angry investors and creditors in his wake, including 18 current and former National Hockey League players who lost a total of more than $13-million.
Sean Burke, goaltender coach for the Phoenix Coyotes, is one of the unfortunate 18, having lost more than $600,000. What angers him more than losing the money is the impression Barrie, who used his share of Bear Mountain to help buy part of the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2008, is not going to face any consequences.
“How does a guy get away with being able to build something to that level, with everybody else’s money, and then not be accountable at the end of the day?” Burke said. “He’s walking away with a hell of a lot more than he ever walked in [with], whereas everybody else is walking away with nothing.”
Burke and his fellow investors will see nothing from the bankruptcy settlement. The majority of Bear Mountain was taken over by its biggest creditor, HSBC Canada, last fall. The bank agreed to pay a group of unsecured creditors $500 each with a promise that if a sale of the assets exceeded $195-million in the next three years, some of the excess would go to them. No such promises were made to the investors.
However, on Friday afternoon in a Victoria courtroom, Barrie, 41, will have to provide answers for at least some of his actions at the nearby resort. He is facing charges under the Income Tax Act for not filing tax returns for 2008 and 2009 for Bear Mountain Projects, a small company connected to Bear Mountain Master Partnership, the parent company of the development.
There may be more trouble on the horizon for the former NHL player and owner in addition to a Canada Revenue Agency investigation. The RCMP’s commercial crime unit on Vancouver Island is interviewing people connected with Barrie and Bear Mountain.
Scott Bye, a former member of Bear Mountain’s executive committee, confirmed Tuesday he was interviewed by the RCMP, as did another source who did not want to be identified. In September of 2009, several months before Bear Mountain wobbled into bankruptcy protection, Bye said Barrie admitted using company funds to buy his share of the Lightning.
Barrie denied any wrongdoing at the time and did so again Tuesday. He also said the tax returns in question are now filed. “Everything should be done and filed,” Barrie said.
Barrie added that he is not aware of an RCMP investigation. The RCMP did not respond to a request for comment.
As for Burke and the other unhappy investors, Barrie said that is just the way the ball bounces in the real-estate game. Bear Mountain was caught in the vise of the recession, which dried up bank credit, and falling real-estate prices.
“No one’s very happy,” Barrie said. “What can you do? The world blew up. It was one of those things that happens. It didn’t work out.
“I don’t think Sean Burke understands everything. You’ve just got to start all over again. Things were great for eight years and then the world blew up.”
What Burke doesn’t understand is how Barrie can maintain what appears to be an upscale lifestyle in the wake of the resort’s collapse and the loss of so much money.
“Basically, what he did was turn all this into his own personal bank account,” Burke said. “At the end of the day, when all is said and done, he just funded a lifestyle for himself with everybody else’s money. He was able to buy an NHL hockey club. He was able to do other investments around B.C.
“And here you’ve got these investors, ex-hockey players, who lost anywhere between $650,000 to a million.”
Burke says he’s come to terms with the fact that his investment is lost for good.
“Okay, I lost some money,” Burke said. “I’ve lost money in other investments. You go into investments, you know there’s some risk.”
Barrie still has a home at Bear Mountain that was worth millions of dollars at one time. It was thought to be under foreclosure proceedings, but Barrie said Tuesday it is not even for sale. “We’ll see,” he replied when asked if it could wind up on the block.
As for whether he made a deal with HSBC in connection with the loans in excess of $300-million the bank made to Bear Mountain, Barrie declined to comment.
Burke is waiting to see what happens next for Barrie.
“My opinion with Lennie is, I hope he hasn’t done anything that lands him in jail,” Burke said. “But if that’s the case, then you walk away and say, well, it’s a lesson in investing.”
With a report from Brennan Clarke
NHL INVESTORS AMOUNT INVESTED
Mike Vernon $2-million (plus $7.6-million loan guarantee with HSBC)
Ray Whitney $3-million
Rob Blake $600,000
Sean Burke $600,000
Trevor Kidd $600,000
Scott Mellanby $600,000
Joe Nieuwendyk $600,000
Gary Roberts $600,000
Brian Savage $600,000
Ryan Smyth $600,000
Brian Carlin $600,000
Wes Walz $500,000
Jeff Finley $300,000
Todd Simpson $300,000
Matt Pettinger $150,000
Rob Niedermayer Unknown
Greg Adams Unknown
Source: Supreme Court of B.C. documents
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/hockey/current-former-nhl-players-lose-more-than-13-million-in-resort-deal/article1883049/
Gretzky deserves an $8M birthday present
By STEVE SIMMONS, QMI Agency Jan 26 2011
TORONTO - What do you buy for the Wayne Gretzky who has everything on his 50th birthday?
If you’re the National Hockey League, maybe you start by writing a cheque for the $8 million or so dollars that were never paid out in the bankruptcy proceedings of the Phoenix Coyotes, wrap it all up in a birthday card and call it a day.
Maybe you start by making peace with The Great One, the most important NHL player in modern history, by doing the right thing, the overdue thing, to bring him back to your hockey family, making good on a debt the league essentially strung him out on.
Gretzky, as is his custom, has taken the high road on the matter of the millions he walked away from, after being deemed an unsecured creditor in Phoenix. That’s what he does in most situations, avoids controversy, and fortunately for him, it’s what he can afford to do financially. He could have sued the league. He certainly could have gone public and embarrassed the league.
Instead, as the career good soldier, he went quietly and rather inconspicuously away and removed himself from the Coyotes franchise and from the business of NHL hockey.
Today is Gretzky’s 50th birthday — like you didn’t know — and what better time for an on-the-rise NHL to come to terms with a debt that only makes them look weak. This is one day after an NHL press release indicated just how well the league is, in fact, doing.
For all we like to scream about trouble here and trouble there in the hockey world, the NHL release tells a different story. Their story. These are their words. This is expected to be the highest revenue season in hockey history. Sponsorship revenue is up 32%. Advertising on nhl.com and the NHL Network is up 55%. League-generated revenue is expected to grow 14% over last year and last year was a pretty impressive year economically. In the past four years, in an economic downturn, NHL revenues have increased by 85%.
Which should mean that writing a cheque for Gretzky would be a rather simple piece of business. A birthday present and a peace offering all at the same time.
He is, at least, part of the reason there are three NHL teams in California, not just the one he started with. He is, at least, part of the reason why there are more young Americans playing hockey than ever before, the numbers are on the rise annually. He is, at least, part of the reason why youth hockey is on the upswing in California and there are now first-round draft picks coming out of one of the least likely of states.
For all we like to attach to Gretzky about being the great Canadian — he’s lived 24 of his 50 years in the U.S. — he has had a greater impact on American hockey, on the growth of American franchises, rightly or wrongly in the NHL, on the southern expansion of the game, than he has, truly, on anything Canadian. In fact, you can make a case that if Gretzky never came along, and the NHL never went big time, there would still be franchises in Quebec City and Winnipeg. But the symbol of Gretzky and Canadian hockey lives, as all the 50th birthday tributes in print, radio and television have proven in recent days.
In the case of Gretzky vs. the NHL, the Great One did nothing wrong and also nothing right. He coached the Phoenix Coyotes. He was to be a part-owner of the team. He was paid hugely for learning on the job. But when he put aside his salary for the good of an operation running out of money, and because he could afford it, that changed everything. That meant he was owed, the way Mario Lemieux was once owed in Pittsburgh. The league didn’t make good with Lemieux, either, in that situation. Lemieux was wise enough to make his own ownership in a better market work for him.
Gretzky didn’t have any kind of similar opportunity.
Now as the previous Phoenix owner sues the NHL and the NHL sues back, the Gretzky money gets volleyed around as a part of legal sport. In the meantime, nobody wins. The NHL has a chance to make good with their greatest star. League revenue this year will be just under $3 billion. Why not take $8 million from that — or whatever the exact figure is — and send Wayne Gretzky a birthday present? It’s long overdue.
Life still 'pretty good' for Brent
But Preds' Peterson says some days on the ice it's like 'walking in a straitjacket'
By Tony Gallagher, The Province January 26, 2011
There are some courageous people in the NHL but you'd have to go some to top former Vancouver Canuck centre and now Nashville assistant coach Brent Peterson.
As many know he's still coaching in this league eight years on after being diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, a mean piece of business for which there is no cure and not a whole lot to look forward to save a lot of heartache and torture for both the afflicted and his or her family members.
For Peterson's part, he would just as soon talk about hockey, how the Preds are having another great year behind defencemen Shea Weber, Ryan Suter and Kevin Klein who are stalwarts in front of the goaltending provided largely by Pekka Rinne.
When you try to give him some credit he quickly says, "Barry [head coach Trotz] is the guy," and then goes on to say his team almost beat Chicago last year in the first round and Detroit the year before that and that they are genuinely due to win a first-round matchup one of these years.
They didn't keep faceoff stats in his time, but he never lost a crucial draw in the defensive zone as a Canuck and he is almost certainly one of the all-time best at that part of the game. No Predator can take a draw unless they beat him four out of seven in practice, but now that the disease is taking its toll, more and more guys are beating him and that part really sucks for him.
As far as the rest goes, well, nobody tells it better than Brent himself.
"I'm still getting on the ice every day and enjoying keeping busy, but I'll be brutally honest, this is a progressive disease and it's progressing," says Peterson who, true to form, wants to be sure he doesn't stay on too long so as to do anything to hurt the team's chances. "Some days are real good, some days aren't so good and yes, there are more bad days than there were, but life is still pretty good. I do have some days where I get the freezing (your body freezes up making movement extremely difficult) and it's mostly on my right side, but I'm still going about my business getting my job done and it's been a real blessing.
"On those bad days I can still walk, but it's like you're in a straitjacket. Most days I'm just too busy to think about the future, and that's real good because I'm doing pretty well for a guy eight years on.
"I have friends who were diagnosed two, three years ago and they're in wheelchairs already, so I've been very lucky. And I really don't know where this is going. I don't really have a plan, all I know is that this is the last year on my contract and I want to make sure I don't stay on too long and hurt the team. I'd never do that.
"The bummer in all this is that it's robbed me of a chance of ever being a head coach, which was my goal and now it's taking away my work here. But I don't have time to think about it and brood, and that's the best part. It's what's kept me going. I think if I did, that is what gets people. Today is a good day because we've played back to back and today is a day off so I'm feeling good. I'm managing to get my sleep. I sleep a couple of hours here and there, and then I'll make up for it with a nap during the day. I get what I need most days.
"The thing about it is that it's not like cancer. With that disease, either you get better or you get worse and pass away, but with this, it doesn't kill you, it just eats away at you, makes life difficult, as everything you run into is an obstacle.
"I mean, it takes me an hour to shave in the morning and sometimes 45 minutes to get dressed for a game. My son designed a new way to do a top button because it was taking me forever to do that on my shirt because of the shaking. My hands, they just don't work.
"And of course it's tough on my wife, it's always so tough on the caregivers because of course they go through a lot of pain, but she's been great. She's such a beautiful, vivacious person and my kids, you can imagine but they've been great. My son Ryan is a doctor, Bradley works for us [the Preds] so he's right there with us and Kristin is 22 now. She just got married, so we're pretty happy about that.
"We've had great success with our Foundation, though. In three years we've raised over $100,000 for Parkinson's research with a run and a golf tournament. The website is PetersonforParkinsons.org and we give some of the money to the Michael J. Fox foundation and most to my doctor who heads up the Vanderbilt Parkinson's Research centre. Brian Grant [a retired NBA forward diagnosed two years ago with Parkinson's] came last year and we're trying to get Michael Fox this year. But all the guys come and we have a great day."
Those who know the disease know where it goes from here for everyone involved. Those who don't should be giving thanks to God for their good fortune. But go where it may, you'll be hard pressed to get Brent Peterson on a down day.
The ethics of WHL trading
January 25, 2011
Read more: http://www.theprovince.com/life/ethics+trading/4167104/story.html#ixzz1CHwXn5hu
By Terry Bell
Sports Reporter
The WHL's Vancouver Giants have made 15 trades since July 30, but team general manager Scott Bonner says it's an ethical process.
He says they rarely trade younger players who are still attending school. Players range in age from 16 to 20.
"Our league frowns heavily upon trading kids who are in school," Bonner said Tuesday. "You avoid trading them at all costs, unless they come to you [and ask to be moved].
"We generally try not to ever move a school-age kid, unless they come to us and say it's just not working for them."
Bonner said players sometimes request a trade because they've come to Vancouver from a small town and can't adjust. Sometimes it's because they're having difficulty fitting in on the team.
"If you look at our track record we've done that [traded a school-age player] four or five times over the 10 years and in most of those cases it's because the kid wanted to move on," Bonner said.
"There is a no trade clause in most cases for kids who are attending high school. Usually when a trade is done both parties have agreed to it. Sometimes a trade is the best thing because the kid is not having fun and it's not his fit."
The Giants traded five-year veteran forward Craig Cunningham, 20, to Portland on Dec. 28. Before they made the deal they talked it over with Cunningham, their MVP in 2009-10.
"In Craig's case, we gave him the respect and talked it through with him," said Bonner. "Five years is a long time to play in one place.
"Over the Christmas break we talked a few times and he had elected to give it a shot somewhere else. We wouldn't do that with too many guys, give them that option. But because he's in some ways Giants royalty, he got that."
© Copyright (c) The Province
Tribute to a lost colleague
Mark Spector January 31, 2011
Linesman Don Henderson paid tribute to former colleague Stephane Provost at the NHL all-star game.
RALEIGH, N.C. — Don Henderson is a big, tough Calgary–born linesman who has manned the lines in the National Hockey League when his back was so messed up one of the other officials had to tie his skates for him.
But Sunday night, after his first All-Star Game, he was standing in the official’s room inside the RBC Center, a Bud Light in his hand and tears rolling down his face.
The question was a simple one: "What did you feel like when you skated out in his sweater?"
"Kind of emotional … for me," Henderson said, choking up. "I cry at the best of times."
Hardly anybody in the arena even noticed, but in Sunday’s NHL All-Star game Henderson wore his own sweater No. 91 for the first and third periods, and the late Stephane Provost’s No. 72 in the second period.
It was very likely the last time the No. 72 will ever be worn by an NHL official, one linesman’s final tribute to a lost colleague, father and friend.
•••
This is the story of two baby zebras — one from Montreal, the other from Calgary — who met as trainees at an NHL officials camp 17 years ago. Henderson had made it to major junior in the WHL, trying to make it as a player, with the same dream his young twin sons aspire to now. (They had their picture taken with the Sedin twins Sunday).
But the only way either he or Provost was going to make it to the NHL, was with a striped jersey and a whistle.
The two showed up together in 1994, a couple of wide-eyed rookies who looked at a veteran like Ray Scapinello and couldn’t believe they were on the same sheet of ice with him. Today, Henderson has 944 NHL games on his resume.
And Provost?
"It’s really a sad story," Henderson said of his buddy, whose career stopped abruptly at 695 games during the lockout of 2004-05.
It was Apr. 22, 2005 in Florida. Provost and a buddy picked up their tickets at Will Call at the Marlins-game, left for him by Alfonso Marquez, a Major League Baseball umpire who wears the same No. 72.
Reports said they all went out after the game. Some time before the 3 a.m. accident, Provost shook Marquez’s hand, slapped him on the back and hopped on to his 2003 Harley Davidson for the ride home.
Provost, who was not wearing a helmet, hit the back of a transport trailer on the way home that night. The bike lit afire and landed on Provost. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
•••
"They had started the same year. There was camaraderie," said Archie Henderson, Don’s brother who is a long-time pro scout. Archie has traveled in from airports with the officials in a cab, and occasionally grabbed dinner with the refs when he and his brother were in the same town.
"They’re a pretty tight group those guys," Archie said. "In hockey, there’s closeness in the locker room. But there’s a real closeness in that referees locker room.
"Their families are close. There is a real bond there."
Another long-time friend of Provost’s, a leading referee in the game today, turned down an interview request for this story. Nearly six years later, it’s still too hard for him to go back.
"This would be his All-Star game with me," Henderson says of Provost. "He got his 15-year ring (given posthumously to Provost’s brother), his playoff ring… We’re trying to do the right thing."
•••
Henderson is standing in an All-Star dressing room, post-game. There are the usual pizza boxes, Gatorades and Budweisers that you see in every official’s room after every game. But on this night the four officials have parents, kids, aunts and uncles in town.
The small room is packed with Doreen and Frank Henderson just sitting in a couple of folding chairs off to the side, drinking in the scene. Their son is an NHL All-Star.
Don may not be a player, but there are 42 players in this game. Only four men in the world get the call as officials, and on this day Henderson, Darren Gibbs, Tom Kowal and Kevin Pollock earned their All-Star stripes.
Thanks to one bad night on a bike, Provost never got his chance.
"He’s got all his accolades now. This is the last one," Henderson said of wearing Provost’s jersey for an All-Star period. "He’s never going to work a Stanley Cup Final."
Henderson sent the uniform through the two dressing rooms for the players to sign, and it will end up with Provost’s widow Sandra, and two young daughters, Ashley and Reily.
The NHL Officials Association holds an annual golf tournament to raise money, much of which has gone to Provost’s family.
"We’ve really adopted his girls, our association," Henderson said. "We’ve raised enough money that they’ll never have to pay to go to school."
-----------
This is a great article. Donnie and I crossed paths some 20 years ago in junior. Then we coincidentally moved in right beside him and renewed acquaintances earleir this year. He has one of the best outdoor rinks in Calgary and his twins are always out there. Funny how there seems to be less than seven degrees of separation in hockey - with all the guys I know and he knows... lots of overlap.
Lanny McDonald worried about concussions
By Greg Harder, The Leader-Post February 3, 2011
Lanny McDonald marvels at how much the game has changed since his Hall of Fame hockey career ended in 1989.
The trouble is, not all of those changes have been for the better.
"There's a couple things I think about and kind of worry about," McDonald said Wednesday from Calgary. "Obviously everyone is talking about the concussion challenges. The players today are bigger, faster, stronger, in phenomenal shape, moreso than they were 15, 20 years ago. With the speed of the game and the size of the players and how quickly those gaps close out there, they need to take a long hard look at the equipment, even if they take a step backwards (with more padding).
"Now, just a glancing blow with the new, lighter, harder-than-a-table-top equipment, you'll end up with a concussion. That's a big worry. And the respect factor and what we are demonstrating and trying to get across to our young people because they emulate everything that happens in the pros."
That's why McDonald thinks education on concussions needs to start at the top.
"The NHL has a responsibility to push it down to junior hockey, down to midget hockey and all the way down," he continued. "When you start losing the best players in the game, like a Marc Savard, like a (Patrice) Bergeron, like Sidney Crosby, for extended periods of time, holy God, get your head out of the sand, wake up. It is a tough game and they're trying to address it but it seems like they waited too long.
"They have to move faster or the punishment has to be greater so those liberties can't be taken. I don't care who it is, whether you have kids of your own or family around you, this is not only a game, this is a life that you're dealing with."
McDonald should know. The 57-year-old estimates that he suffered at least six or seven concussions during his 16-year NHL career.
"Back then they just gave you smelling salts and said, 'Are you feeling all right? Can you get back out there?' " he recalled. "You didn't realize that there was more of a problem. I remember playing shifts or even an entire period where you just played on instinct and then all of a sudden you start to come around. It's like, 'Holy god, I missed the whole second period,' yet you played. Thank God you didn't get hurt worse than you did."
McDonald also feels fortunate that he hasn't suffered any long-term effects.
"What's your name again?" he jokingly asked the interviewer. "Yeah, very much so. Especially now, we have four kids, we just celebrated the birth of our third grandchild. I want to be able to hang out and play with them forever. So, yeah, I do feel lucky."
Not only that, McDonald also has great memories from playing in one of the NHL's most-celebrated eras.
"I think if you talk to any person, they always believe their era of the game was the best," added McDonald, who recorded 500 goals and 1,006 points in 1,111 regular-season games. "I truly do believe our era through the '70s and the '80s was more than I could have ever asked for. I loved every second of going to the rink whether it was for practice or the games.
"To be fortunate enough to win the Stanley Cup (with the Calgary Flames) in your last year was pretty damn cool. What a great way to go out! When you think of the game back then and the great rivalries like Montreal-Toronto, like Calgary and Edmonton, oh my gosh, it was so good. There were bragging rights on the line. You wanted to be in the city that hopefully gets the last laugh."
New technology chips in to help assess concussions
U.S. professor working on software to go in helmets
By Sean Fitz-Gerald, National Post February 3, 2011
A mechanical engineering professor in the United States hopes technology he is helping to develop - a chip that can analyze the brain's electrical "signature" - will allow athletic trainers to diagnose concussions as they occur on the field of play, in real time.
Dr. Hashem Ashrafiuon, who works at Villanova University's College of Engineering in suburban Philadelphia, has been using similar software in a study of post-traumatic stress disorder with the U.S. military. It has not been tested in sports, but he said the application would be obvious.
The chip could be planted inside hockey and football helmets, with sensors relaying data from the brain.
"When a person gets a concussion, usually they ask them to count or [ask] what day it is, or 'how many fingers' and things like that, and try to very informally assess if the person might have had concussion or not," Ashrafiuon said. "This, actually, can much more definitively predict whether there has been a concussion."
The technology, known as BCILab software, relies on a headset to monitor brain waves, where something as small as a blinking eyelash creates a signal. Ashrafiuon compares it to the results shown on a heart monitor, except more complex.
"It's not as clear-cut in the brain - cardiac is a lot easier to visualize - but it still has a signature that you can capture, mathematically," he said.
The idea is that the chip would store a sample of the brain activity recorded in an athlete before they stepped on the field, providing a baseline. Any abnormal results fed through the headset to a computer on the sidelines after a big hit could then be read by a trainer, who would know to pull the injured athlete aside.
As it stands, concussion diagnosis often falls to symptoms reported by the athletes. And athletes who want to continue to play might misrepresent or deny those symptoms in an effort to get back on the field.
Complicating matters is the fact many experts have said no two concussions are the same, which raises questions about how a mathematical analysis of brain waves could diagnose concussion. Ashrafiuon said the software remains in the development stage, though his team - which he said includes clinicians - has an eye to expanding into sports.
"We're sort of talking about the future," he said. "This is just what I envision."
He estimated trials in athletes could still be three or four years away, pending approval.
The issue of sports-related concussion has grown to prominence in the U.S. and Canada over the last four years, after a series of medical discoveries associated concussion with conditions such as depression, dementia and Alzheimer's. Chris Nowinski, a retired professional wrestler and football player, has been credited with helping to spur the findings with his advocacy in the U.S. He said he was aware of Ashrafiuon's work.
"I'm certainly hopeful for technological advances to be made in concussion diagnostics," he said Wednesday. "But, having been in this game now for eight years, I've heard a lot of promises. And so far, almost none have been fulfilled."
sfitzgerald@nationalpost.com
© Copyright (c) National Post
Researcher: Raising the age for body checking a mistake
By ROBERT MacLEOD February 2, 2011
From Thursday's Globe and Mail
Higher number of serious injuries would result if plan implemented, Canadian professor warns
Increasing the age at which bodychecking is introduced into hockey could result in an escalation of serious injuries, a leading concussion researcher warns.
And surprisingly, Barry Willer also said the majority of hockey injuries occur as a result of incidental contact, not the deliberate act of one player trying to bodycheck another.
"I don't think the bodycheck should be the culprit it's made out to be," Willer said in an interview on Wednesday.
Willer, a Canadian who describes himself as a passionate hockey fan, is a professor at the University of Buffalo, where he is the director of research for the concussion clinic. He has been studying brain injuries for 25 years and was introduced to the issues of concussions in hockey in 1997 by Carl Lindros. Lindros's son, Brett, had his National Hockey League career cut short after suffering a number of concussions.
Willer didn't like a USA Hockey proposal that would make bodychecking illegal for players under 13.
"Personally, I think that would be a mistake," Willer said. "All you're doing is putting it [bodychecking] off and putting it off to an age where the players are bigger and stronger and have more testosterone. The injury rates will not only be higher, but I think more serious."
The USA Hockey proposal will be voted on at its annual congress in June and will be monitored closely by officials at Hockey Canada, which allows bodychecking to begin at the peewee level (aged 11 and 12).
The topic of when to introduce body contact to young hockey players has become a hot-button issue in amateur hockey circles as the prevalence of concussions appears to be on the rise.
John Gardner is the president of the Greater Toronto Hockey League, which boasts approximately 40,000 players on 2,800 teams.
"That's getting a little crazy," he said when asked for his thoughts on the USA Hockey proposal. "You wait until the kids get older, instead of it becoming an instinctive reaction or action, it becomes a mechanical one. And that's when the kids get hurt."
USA Hockey says its proposal is based on a series of studies, including research conducted by Carolyn Emery of the University of Calgary. Her study followed 2,000 peewee players over one season, half from Alberta, where bodychecking was permitted, and half from Quebec, where it was not.
In Alberta, 73 players reported concussions during the year compared to 20 in Quebec.
While lauding the Emery study, Willer said it did not go far enough to try to examine the underlying reason behind that increase.
Willer's study, which monitored the rates of injuries among roughly 3,000 kids who played in the Burlington Lions Minor Hockey Association over a five-year period, produced some surprising data.
The study, published last month, noted a "spike" in injuries among players in the first year that bodychecking was introduced. The report added that the majority of those injuries (66 per cent) were the result of "unintentional collisions" and not a result of a deliberate attempt to bodycheck.
Willer explained that "unintentional collisions" included players accidentally running into one another or injuring themselves when they fell to the ice, into the boards or goalposts.
Willer said his findings echo that of a study that was carried out in Kingston and released in 2009. The study looked into the effects of Hockey Canada's bodychecking rule in 2002, when body contact was allowed at the atom level (ages 9 to 11).
The report stated that "overall rates of injury to minor hockey players and also hockey injuries due to bodychecking were, in general, equivalent or even lower in the five years" after bodychecking was introduced at the younger age.
Both Willer and Gardner believe it is important to look at areas other than bodychecking when trying to come up with a solution to reduce the number of concussions.
Gardner believes it all starts with the National Hockey League, where head shots and hits from behind have captured plenty of headlines this season.
"Kids are copying what they see in the NHL," Gardner said. "I don't care what anybody says, that's a fact. And when the kids see it, they don't understand why they can't do it."
Soccer a no-lose proposition?
By Michael Platt, Calgary Sun
Last Updated: February 9, 2011
Trash the trophies, scrap the standings.
There’s no room for winners, champions or stars when no one is bothering to keep score — and scoreless games are the likely future for young soccer players in Calgary.
That’s the prediction of Calgary Minor Soccer Association boss Daryl Leinweber, when asked about a growing trend towards taking competition out of competitive sports, especially for kids 12 and under.
Manitoba is headed towards scoreless soccer, as confirmed by Sun Media earlier this week, and it seems Calgary is also getting ready to do away with league titles and season standings.
“Possibly, yes,” said Leinweber, executive director of the association.
The soccer boss says a decision on going fully scoreless will be made as early as June and he says there is a strong appetite for no longer counting goals as part of the Under-12 soccer game.
Right now, Under-10 teams in Calgary only record wins and losses, regardless of the score.
The new system would eradicate even that cotton-soft competition.
Other changes would include smaller pitches and fewer players per side, with equal playing time for all, no matter if the child is a budding Beckham, or a budding Bozo the Clown.
The official reason for deflating the importance of winning is an edict from Sport Canada, which seeks change in all youth sport, from tennis to track and field.
Called Long Term Athlete Development, the cradle-to-podium plan aims to make Canada an international sports powerhouse.
By reducing competition in the early stages, Sport Canada believes kids can focus on their skills instead.
At least, that’s the theory.
Logic may suggest winning is what motivates children to improve their skills in the first place — images of a young Wayne Gretzky toiling endlessly in his backyard rink spring to mind.
Alas, that’s apparently an archaic way of thinking — these days, the cloud of despair that comes with loss must be avoided, lest junior abandon the game.
Before you curse today’s kids as mollycoddled milksops, consider the real source of this defeatist angst — because it isn’t the players.
According to Leinweber, it’s not the children who want to scrap scoring, trophies and the like, but parents who can’t handle the notion of their offspring not winning.
“A lot of what we say today is not driven by the kids, it’s driven by the parents — it’s driven by the people who need to win,” said Leinweber.
“The kids themselves, when they play, know who wins and loses, even when no score is kept.”
Left up to the kids, in other words, the game would remain what it has always been — a win-lose prospect with risks and rewards, much like real life.
“It’s not necessarily the pressure of the kids on each other, it’s the pressures around them that have an influence,” said Leinweber.
Asked if fragile parental egos are to blame and he gives a straight-shooting answer.
“I would say so, yes,” said Leinweber.
It’s clear the soccer boss has mixed feelings about doing away with goals and standings, and Leinweber admits to being an old-fashioned guy — though he says more kids are staying in the game as a result of the trend.
“It’s an adjustment I have to make — we answer to our membership,” he said.
“We’ve adapted the game and seen it grow and so I think the changes have been very positive for the growth of the game and the growth of the sport.”
Which is all swell and good if the goal is fewer kids on the couch.
But this is supposed to be about making Canada an international competitor in soccer — the way it already is in hockey.
Hockey, incidentally, won’t be doing away with goals, or standings, or trophies.
Christina Rogers, spokeswoman for Hockey Calgary, says the system which moulds young players into the kind of athletes who go on to play in the NHL and Olympics is rooted in that drive to win.
“If there’s no winning, that doesn’t teach the kids to compete,” said Rogers.
Hockey coach dislikes 'less-competitive' approach
By ROSS ROMANIUK, QMI Agency Feb 9 2011
WINNIPEG — At least one prominent Winnipeg hockey instructor is taking shots at a proposed Hockey Manitoba move toward a less competition-focused structure for young kids on the ice.
Billy Keane says he "struggles with the concept" of what the province's governing hockey organization is considering in stressing skills development over trophies for pre-teen players.
"To not nurture the competitive spirit, they've really got to be careful," he said, adding such a change could actually hamper player development rather than help. "There's a reason why there are beer leagues and competitive leagues at the adult level. When they're kids, it's still important to instill that competitive component."
Keane, who has long run Winnipeg hockey schools and is an older brother of retired NHL and AHL player Mike Keane, describes Manitoba as a "leader in the last 10 years" in Canada's development of young players — so if the system isn't broken, he says, don't fix it.
"We've put a lot of our Manitobans on the provincial and national stage, and for good reason," he said. "Why change it?"
Hockey Manitoba president Brian Franklin said Monday it's a "strong possibility" that the organization will move toward a greater focus on development and participation than on competition for players at younger ages.
Details haven't been worked out, though Hockey Manitoba executive director Peter Woods said such a move would be co-ordinated "hand in hand" with Hockey Canada, and would not "completely remove the competitiveness of the game by not keeping score or statistics."
Rather, Woods stressed, the change would be aimed at providing young players with more opportunities to develop than through game situations, and even improve their skills.
"A lot of athletes are competing on 12-month scales at a very early age, and are exposed to burnout, muscle overuse or injuries," he said. "Athletes have a tendency to maybe get burned out at a younger age, and the model they're proposing ... is an opportunity for a complete athlete to be developed," he added.
Brad Rice, co-owner of Winnipeg hockey training facility The Rink, echoed Keane's concerns about making changes. If the system could be improved to better develop players, he suggested, it's in providing a more equitable amount of practice ice for teams across the city.
"They hand out schedules of when you play," Rice said. "They could do more to co-ordinate practice ice."
Please, let's end the craziness
Gregg Drinnan Thursday, February 10, 2011
Bob Clarke has become the voice of reason in the debate over headshots and ugly hits that is dominating conversation about the game of hockey.
Clarke, who went by Bobby when he was a whacking and hacking point machine with the Philadelphia Flyers (aka the Broad Street Bullies) back in the day, has been telling people that the puck has become irrelevant.
And he is correct.
Players today are more concerned with eliminating an opponent than they are with gaining possession of the puck. And, hey, if that opponent gets injured, well, gee, hockey is a physical game.
But there are times — hello there, Matt Cooke! — when you wonder if hockey isn’t on its way to becoming UFC on skates.
You watch as forward Daniel Paille of the Boston Bruins launches himself at Dallas Stars winger Raymond Sawada and you notice that the puck is right there, three or four feet in front of Sawada. However, Paille ignores it. That’s because the name of the game far too often is to try to separate the opposing player from his head rather than the puck.
And there is Cooke, who plays for the Pittsburgh Penguins. One night he is initiating knee-to-knee contact with Washington Capitals star Alex Ovechkin. A couple of nights later, he is launching himself at Columbus Blue Jackets defenceman Fedor Tyutin.
(Remember when Cooke played for the Vancouver Canucks and everyone loved the Cooker? That doesn’t seem to be the case any more as the Twitterverse lit up with Cooke-related vitriol on Wednesday.)
We saw it right here in Kamloops on Friday night when defenceman Brandon Manning of the Chilliwack Bruins went in on the forecheck and hammered Blazers defenceman Austin Madaisky.
Manning had dumped the puck into Madaisky’s corner and, as the Kamloops defender turned, Manning streaked across the zone. Manning, completely ignoring the puck, initiated contact and that momentum spun Madaisky around, which meant he crashed awkwardly into the end boards, his back taking the brunt of the impact.
This wasn’t a case of one slug hammering another. Manning, 20, has signed a free-agent deal with the Flyers. In his three WHL seasons, the Prince George native has become known as an offensive defenceman who won’t shy away from the rough stuff. Madaisky, 18, was a fifth-round selection by the Columbus Blue Jackets in the 2010 NHL draft and arguably has been the Blazers’ best defenceman.
That isn’t the case any longer, however, as Madaisky came out of that collision with a fractured C-7 vertebrae and won’t play again this season. He is fortunate that he still is able to walk.
Colin Campbell, who doles out discipline on behalf of Gary Bettman’s NHL, suspended Paille for four games. Coincidentally, Cooke also drew a four-game suspension.
Richard Doerksen, who is the WHL’s disciplinarian, handed Manning a seven-game suspension.
Men like Campbell and Doerksen are charged with a huge responsibility. They want to be fair and, at the same time, they want to make the punishment fit the crime.
That being the case, the time has come for them to lower the boom.
Four- and seven-game suspensions simply aren’t enough when one player shows such a lack of respect for another.
In the first eight days of February, the WHL played 35 games over five nights. According to the WHL’s online scoresheets, referees handed out 15 minor penalties and one major for checking from behind. That doesn’t count other incidents, such as charging or boarding, during which players — like Madaisky — were put at risk.
It is time, too, to stop categorizing these hits as headshots, hits from behind, etc. They all are dangerous hits and should be treated as such.
Brad Hornung, then a centre with the Regina Pats, was hit from behind on March 1, 1987. Left a quadriplegic, he has been in a wheelchair ever since that horrific night.
I was covering that game for the Regina Leader-Post and can tell you that the check by Moose Jaw Warriors forward Troy Edwards wasn’t anywhere near as violent or as frightening as much of what we see today. In fact, it was more of a nudge in the back than a hit from behind.
But heaven forbid anyone should have to go through what Hornung and Edwards did in the aftermath of that hit. Yes, there were two victims that night; they and their families both experienced their own versions of living hell.
But it is obvious today that the message isn’t getting through. There are far too many of these incidents and it’s only been through a stroke of luck that no one has been seriously injured. Although you can certainly make a case that Madaisky, who now is wearing a cervical collar, was seriously injured.
Earlier this season, Doerksen suspended Tri-City Americans forward Brendan Shinnimin for 12 games for an ugly hit on Josh Nicholls of the Saskatoon Blades. Nicholls was left with a concussion and missed only one game because the Blades were in a soft spot in their schedule.
Defenceman Wes Vannieuwenhuizen of the Vancouver Giants drew a seven-game sentence after he drilled Chilliwack forward Robin Soudek from behind on Nov. 11. A concussed Soudek sat out four games.
It would seem then that (a) Manning got off rather lightly, and (b) the message simply isn’t getting through to teams and players.
The onus then is on Doerksen to up the ante. Sooner or later, he is going to have to drop a 20-game bomb on someone, or perhaps end someone’s season.
Please, Mr. Doerksen, do it before more seasons end the way Austin Madaisky’s did.
Or worse.
(Gregg Drinnan is sports editor of The Daily News. He is at gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca and gdrinnan.blogspot.com. You are able to follow him at twitter.com/gdrinnan)
A Battle Across the Border in Recruiting
By ANDREW PODNIEKS New York Times February 9, 2011
Patrick McCarron, 16, is a defenseman with the St. Michael’s Buzzers in Toronto, a team owned by his father that plays in provincial Junior A hockey. Last summer, McCarron was drafted by the Oshawa Generals of the Ontario Hockey League. The Generals put a contract in front of him, but he would not sign it.
“I told them I didn’t want to sign yet because I’d lose my N.C.A.A. eligibility,” McCarron said, “and I was seriously considering going the college route.”
In the eyes of the N.C.A.A., playing major junior hockey in Canada is considered professional, and increasingly young Canadian players are weighing their options.
The number of Americans playing in Canada’s major junior leagues has been growing for years, and American colleges are increasingly fighting back by recruiting Canadian players.
According to Paul Kelly, executive director of College Hockey Inc., there were 67 American players in Canada’s junior leagues six years ago. Now, he said, there are 131.
“As a result, there was a feeling among college coaches that the N.C.A.A. product had become diluted,” Kelly said, adding that that was why College Hockey hired him. He works for the six conferences that comprise N.C.A.A. Division I hockey in an effort to counter the Canadian Hockey League’s encroachment on American talent.
The C.H.L. is an umbrella organization for three Canadian leagues: the Western Hockey League, the Ontario Hockey League and the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. The C.H.L. has developed more pro hockey players than any other organization in the world, primarily for the N.H.L.
“My objective is twofold: to stem the flow of players leaving for the C.H.L. and to attract elite Canadians to college hockey,” said Kelly, a former chief of the N.H.L. players union.
Kelly’s job is complicated by the C.H.L.’s history and tradition — and the allure of being the most successful route to the N.H.L.
“We are the No. 1 development league in the world,” C.H.L. Commissioner David Branch said in a telephone interview from Toronto. “We offer the best coaching, most advanced technology, finest facilities, most competitive environment, academic advisers and every aspect of nutrition, psychology and antidoping.”
Kelly acknowledges the traditional role of junior hockey in Canada. “But times change,” he said. “There are other options now. Recruiting from both sides of the border has ramped up significantly because we are both trying to attract the same pool of elite players. You have about 60 teams in the C.H.L. and 60 teams in Division I, and they all want the best players. There is unavoidable tension.
“All we can do is explain all options to a kid and tell him not to give up eligibility too soon. For some players, the C.H.L. is absolutely the way to go, but for many others, if you can get an education and play hockey, college is the better route.”
Kelly’s best example might be the Chicago Blackhawks’ captain, Jonathan Toews, who is from Winnipeg, Manitoba, but who chose to play at North Dakota for two seasons before being selected third over all in the 2006 N.H.L. draft.
Kelly points out that only 6 percent of players in the college and major junior ranks will ever play in the N.H.L.
“These are daunting odds,” he said. “If I’m in a room with 100 people and I tell a kid that only six will make it, he’ll say he’s one of them, and he doesn’t care who the other five are. At 16, every kid thinks he’ll play in the N.H.L.”
On one hand, Kelly is offering an education as well as a hockey experience. On the other, he is challenging a tradition of getting to the N.H.L. as old as the N.H.L. itself.
Ultimately, McCarron went the college route.
“For me, N.C.A.A. is going to be the best choice,” he said. “I’ll come out of college with a degree, and if I want to take a run at the N.H.L., I can. If it doesn’t work out, I still have that piece of paper in my hand and can get a job.”
Kelly held what he called a summit in Toronto last September, the first in Canada, with 25 college coaches there to scout and answer questions. He said 71 players from the Greater Toronto Hockey League attended, McCarron being one of them. He called it “a real eye-opener.”
“A lot of the kids had no idea that college was an option,” he said. “For them, it’s all O.H.L., O.H.L., O.H.L., but they don’t know that 30 percent of players in the N.H.L. went to college.”
That number reflects Canadians and Americans. Of 1,568 Division I players this year, 481 are Canadian.
Branch, though, promoted the education package offered players in the Canadian junior leagues, including a full scholarship for four years at a Canadian college for players who decide not to turn pro. Players in the C.H.L. earn a minimum of $335 a week and receive meal money.
“We feel our education package is not only the best in North America but probably the world,” Branch said.
The recruiting battle for players has not been universally welcomed.
Bob Nicholson, president of Hockey Canada, which oversees every aspect of hockey in the country, from grass-roots development to the selection of Olympics rosters, said that he supported Kelly’s efforts and that the two have a respectful relationship, but, he added, “What I would like to see is for college hockey to stay out of Canada and for C.H.L. teams to stay out of the U.S.”
Nicholson has just sent a recruiting protocol agreement to USA Hockey in the hope of defining the process better, although he admitted that was probably unenforceable.
TOM RENNEY:
FROM THE CANADA GAMES TO THE NHL,
VIA THE CANADIAN OLYMPIC TEAM
by Coaches of Canada February 4, 2011
What was the catalyst for you to pursue coaching as a career?
TR: I started to identify with coaching when I was attending the University of North Dakota in the mid-70’s. Like most Canadian kids, I hoped to play in the National Hockey League, but coaching seemed the more legitimate shot to get to the NHL since I was on the small side for a defenseman.
Father David Bauer was an important role model to me. I recall how impressed I was that a priest would be coaching the Canadian National Team. I was impressed by the fact that a man of the cloth was speaking of the virtues of commitment, perseverance, sacrifice, and the pursuit of excellence through hockey. Ultimately and over time, I understood that these were important virtues for me to pursue in my journey through coaching, and I have Father Bauer to thank for that. He was the first coach I had ever heard speak of and demonstrate those most valuable coaching essentials.
Prior to leaving school, I recall writing down the five things I wanted to have accomplished by the time I was thirty five years old. One being, coach Canada’s National Hockey Team. In 1993 I was named head coach of the Canadian Men’s Olympic Hockey Team, destination Lillehammer, Norway.
Can you outline the pathway you took to get to the Canada Games as a hockey coach?
TR: Through the B.C. Best Ever program I had been given many terrific opportunities, one of which was coaching British Columbia’s entry in the Canada Winter Games in Halifax and Sydney, Nova Scotia in 1987. I had been coaching the Trail Junior Smoke Eaters in the Kootenay International Hockey League in the mid- to late-80s, and had met with some reasonable success. I had attended and successfully participated in the National Coaching Certification Program (NCCP) during the 80s, and was chosen along with Derek Spring of Cranbrook to co-coach Team B.C. It was a unique and exhilarating experience in every way, and served to “set the hook” in what would be my life’s passion: coaching.
How did your coaching experience at the Canada Games set the stage for coaching at the next level?
TR: It was the Canada Games experience that convinced me that coaching in the highest competitive stream possible was what I wanted to do, and to coach the Canadian Olympic Team was my goal. Since a visit to my minor hockey banquet in Cranbrook, B.C., in 1967 by Father David Bauer, the then coach of Team Canada, I could identify with coaching, and would often think of that visit. And I actually still do when it comes to my continued motivation to coach. From the Canada Winter Games, came the Quebec Esso Cup, the national under-17 festival, the National Under-18 Team, National Junior Team, National Teams, Olympic Teams and numerous IIHF World Championship teams, and luckily enough, the National Hockey League ... all as a head coach. All in all, I have coached in 10 world championships and Olympics for Canada. I feel very lucky.
How would you sum up your coaching career to this point in your life?
TR: When I think back on my coaching career the one thing I really hoped to do was help win a gold medal for my country. We came oh so close in Lillehammer in 1994. With under two minutes to go, we were ahead of the Swedes 2-1 when we were called for a holding penalty. We were crushed when they scored to tie the game at two and although we pushed as hard as we could to win, the famous Peter Forsberg goal in the first shootout in Olympic history erased any hope of Canada’s first gold medal in hockey in 39 years. This feat would finally be recognized by Team Canada in Salt Lake City in 2002. The great irony from a personal point of view is that I was never driven to coach in the NHL ... only for my country. Coaching in the NHL appears to a by-product of that determination and drive.
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On June 22, 2010, Tom Renney became the 10th head coach in Edmonton Oilers’ franchise history, after joining the Oilers as an associate coach for the 2009-10 season.
Tom spent the previous nine seasons with the New York Rangers, the last four as their head coach. After being named the 33rd head coach in franchise history on July 6, 2004, he led the Rangers to 40-or-more wins in three consecutive seasons, a feat last accomplished by the club in 1974. Over the course of 327 games he guided the Rangers to a 164-117-0-46 record including three straight post-season appearances from 2005-08; the second best winning percentage in the history of the Rangers, behind only Emile Francis.
Recently, Tom has served his country on Team Canada’s coaching staff at the 2004 and 2005 IIHF World Championships. At the 2004 tournament in Czech Republic, he helped guide the team to Canada’s second consecutive gold medal at the prestigious tournament. In 2005, Tom and Team Canada once again appeared in the gold medal game, but were left with the silver medal after falling to the Czech Republic.
Tom and his wife Glenda have two daughters, Jessica and Jamie.
Coaching the elements of puck protection
This week;s guest writer is Ted Belisle, assistant coach at Bemidji State University. Ted played at BSU from 1997-2001 (captain in 2001) then worked in the USHL for two years before joining his alma mater as an assistant coach in 2007. He is also the BSU recruiting coordinator.
By Ted Belisle
Bemidji State University
During the Edmonton Oilers; 2006 run to the Stanley Cup, a question was posed to then-head coach Craig McTavish about his definition of the perfect player. His answer was, ;My definition of the perfect player is one whom the play never dies with&#; His answer made so much sense to me and is a great mindset leading into the topic of teaching puck protection.
When I watch youth and high school players doing puck protection drills during practice, the most popular drill I see is a player with the puck standing on a faceoff dot, fending off an opposing player by standing still. While the drill does allow a player to learn how to fend off a defender, it ignores the single most important element of puck protection creating time and space! There are more elements of puck protection that a player must understand in order to become one of those players ;whom the play never dies with
To teach puck protection properly, we must understand the main reason as to why we protect the puck! A player protects the puck to create enough time and space from the defender in order to make the next play. In order to create time and space, I believe that there are five elements of puck protection that enable a player to become a very good puck protector.
1. Teaching the ;puck safe zone
The first element that must be taught is recognition of the ;puck safe zone.; My definition of the puck safe zone is: any area in which the defender cannot reach the puck!
A great puck protector always understands that the odds of losing possession of the puck increase substantially when the puck is fronted or exposed to the reach of the defender;s stick.
The ;puck safe zone; changes constantly, depending on body position, reach of the defender and placement of the puck. Being able to handle the puck quickly into the safe zone (away from the defender;s reach) will help maintain puck possession and the ability to make the next play.
A phrase I use a lot to our players is, ;Don;t front the puck.; When a player fronts the puck, they are immediately exposing themselves and are at greater risk of losing possession of the puck within the reach of the defender.
2. How to create a body shield
With the days of ;hitting and pinning; behind us, the puck carrier has more ability to maintain a safe zone that creates more possession time. The most efficient way to create a safe zone is to create a ;body shield&; between you and the defender.
Creating the ;body shield; is quite simply putting your body between the defender and the puck. The easiest way to create a body shield is to pivot your backside into the defender. This will prevent the defender from being able to enter the player�s safe zone. The puck possessor has now created separation from the defender and should be able to keep their head up and look for the next play.
3. Fending off the defender
After creating a ;puck safe zone; with a ;body shield,; we must be able to prevent the defender from gaining access to the ;puck safe zone.; The puck carrier must learn the element of how to fend off a defender;s attempt to gain possession of our puck.
The puck protector can fend off a defender by using their body to prevent access of the defenders stick into the ;puck safe zone; Focus on teaching the player how to use their own arms and legs to fend off advances by the defender. It is important to create this habit in a player for successful puck protection.
In order for the puck protector to successfully use arms and legs to fend of defenders, it is very important to teach players the skill of handling the puck with one hand. As coaches, we must incorporate drills in which a player handles the puck while using only their top hand or bottom hand.
4. Leveraging the wall
There are times when defenders still find a way to get an opposing player pinned or pinched along the boards. To develop an excellent puck protector, we must teach them how to use the wall (boards) to their advantage. We do this by using the wall as leverage.
The best way to use the wall as leverage is by using both of your hands to push off the wall. This is very much like a push-up or a bench press motion. While we push away from the wall we must also simultaneously push our backside into the defender to create more time and space from the wall to make the next play. By leveraging the wall, we can create enough time and space along the wall to make the next play and keep possession of the puck.
5. Cut-backs:
I believe the ;cut-back; is the most important element of puck protection we can teach. The ;cut-back; incorporates using legs and speed to help create more time and space in order to make the next play. The use of ;cut-backs; enables the puck protector to create ice behind them to escape into by turning away from the defender while not fronting the puck. ;Cut-backs; use misdirection by quickly utilizing a ;C; cut in the ice to change direction away from the defender to create more time and space.
To successfully use the ;cut-back,; we must teach the proper elements. The puck carrier must use deception in order to get the opposing player committed to defending a certain area. I call this ;selling the cutback.;
We must bait the defender into thinking we are attacking the ice in a certain direction. We accomplish this by ;staying busy; and attacking an area while keeping the puck in the safe zone, using our body as a shield and fending off the defender;s advances. By attacking a certain area, we are forcing the defender to protect the area that we are skating into. As such, we have sold the defender on protecting that area.
When the defender commits to that area, we have created ice behind us to cut-back into. When the puck protector decides to cut-back, it is very important to teach them to stay busy and attack the other direction.
While attacking the other direction, they have created enough time and space to make the next play while continuing to use the other elements to maintain the possession of the puck. A player can use many ;cut-backs; in a single possession of the puck until the next play is available.
The best way to teach these habits is by using resistance drills with space to roam. Allow your players to use these habits all together while moving their feet, thus creating more time and space.
You can use one-on-one drills, but some of the best ways to teach puck possession is by creating outnumbered situations. For example have a 1vs2 drill in a corner or a 2vs3 drill low, in which there are more defenders than puck protectors. These drills isolate the emphasis on puck protection and force the puck carrier to have tough odds in maintaining possession of the puck.
Let's Play Hockey wants to publish your hockey stories. From tournament reports, to feature stories on teams, players or coaches, to opinion pieces on the game of hockey, Let;s Play Hockey accepts submissions from readers throughout the hockey community. To submit your hockey story and/or photo(s), e-mail us at editor@letsplayhockey.com.
(Ironically, this was written PRIOR to the Islanders / Pens brawl, according to the author...)
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How to break Neanderthals' grip on hockey?
By ROY MACGREGOR
From Saturday's Globe and Mail February 11, 2011
Head shots are a polarizing issue that's ruining a child's game
If hockey is truly "a man's game," then why are the games brought to us by Cialis and Viagra?
Erectile dysfunction appears to have become to the modern National Hockey League what Imperial Esso's "Happy Motoring" once was to the Original Six - Viagra plastered to the rink boards, Cialis wink-wink ads filling every stop in play on the television, Levitra promising you'll be ready to play should the coach tap you on the shoulder ...
This has been another terrible week for the "man's game." Despite unprecedented criticism of professional hockey's unwillingness to address a matter that is threatening its players, the situation continues unabated: New Jersey's Anton Volchenkov suspended three games for a head shot to Zach Boychuk of the Carolina Hurricanes; Pittsburgh's Matt Cooke (hockey's serial offender) suspended four games for leaving his feet in an attempt to crush the cranium of Columbus defenceman Fedor Tyutin from behind.
It was a week in which one elite player, Marc Savard, packed it in for the season due to concussion, a week in which rumours spread concerning the game's most elite player, Sidney Crosby, possibly losing the remainder of what should have been his greatest season to concussion.
And it was a week in which one sensible player, Boston's Andrew Ference, was attacked on Hockey Night in Canada for daring to say a head shot delivered by teammate Daniel Paillé on the Dallas Stars' Raymond Sawada was "a bad hit."
A wonderful week, indeed, to head into the CBC's Hockey Day in Canada, in which the national game will be sentimentalized, lionized, glorified and worshipped.
It is a great game, but it surely needs some work.
The problem is that head shots have become the global warming of hockey, a polarizing issue that pits the disbelievers against the believers, with no results to show for all the braying back and forth.
Hockey Night in Canada, with its vast array of old-school thinkers, has become Fox News. The mainstream media, with their editorials demanding action against head shots, have become Al Gore.
So nothing ever seems to get done.
The loudest shouting has come from the naysayers. Mike Milbury has groaned about the "pansification" of the game and dismissed those who disagree with him as "soccer moms." Don Cherry - who began his media career with Rock 'Em, Sock 'Em videos - blows a gasket over Ference speaking his mind, suggesting it breaks some imagined "code" of the sacred hockey dressing room.
The quieter voices are more numerous, but have gained little. The NHL did bring in a specific rule against blatant headhunting, but still lags far behind other team sports when it comes to offering protection for vulnerable brains.
For weeks the debate has been about what happened to Sidney Crosby's head, whether the concussive blow was delivered, perhaps by accident, by Washington's David Steckel during the New Year's Winter Classic or by intent when Tampa Bay's Victor Hedman crushed him into the boards a few days later.
No longer. Instead of looking back, the hockey world now looks ahead: When will Sidney Crosby come back? Will he come back at all this year?
He himself says he expects to, but can offer no date. "There's no timetable," he said on Thursday. "I hope I'm back."
So should the league. Crosby was in the midst of a seminal year. He was running away with the scoring race. He had just come off a 25-game scoring streak when the first blow landed at the Winter Classic. His only serious rival over the past few years, Alexander Ovechkin, had been reduced to star status from superstar - of which hockey now had only one.
While hockey is a team game and golf an individual sport, comparing Sidney Crosby's impact on hockey in 2010-11 is not that much of a stretch from Tiger Woods's impact on golf in the years leading up to his self-inflicted blow to his image. When Woods departed the golf scene for a significant time, the PGA went into freefall in terms of interest and TV viewership. The falloff would not be so dramatic if Crosby were lost for the season, but it would be significant. The Crosby-Ovechkin storyline had been compelling for years; that storyline is, for the moment, lost.
It is no stretch at all, however, to compare Crosby's concussion problems to those of earlier players such as Paul Kariya and Eric Lindros. Kariya, it will be recalled, was on the cusp of NHL superstardom when he was struck down. Lindros had reached NHL superstardom when he suffered the first of several concussions. Neither was ever to reach those heights again.
It could be, before all this is over, that Sidney Crosby's greatest contribution to the game will not be the Olympic gold-medal winning goal of a year ago, but his sad situation forcing the NHL - the braying naysayers included - to wake up to what hits to the head have done and are doing to hockey.
It's not a man's game at all.
It's a child's game.
And it has become dysfunctional.
From outsider to QMJHL scout
By SEAN GORDON
From Saturday's Globe and Mail February 11, 2011
The life of a hockey bird-dog isn't glamorous. It starts with a love of the sport, is nurtured with strong opinions and lastly, paying attention, alone, to many, many games involving young players
He's seen their eyes glaze over, heard the mumbled excuses from friends who had wearied of being prodded to go sit in out-of-the-way arenas to watch midget hockey.
This particular passion, he quickly realized, was one he'd mostly have to follow on his own.
But a couple of decades later, Simon Boisvert wouldn't have it any other way.
The 45-year-old translator and model of persistence has fulfilled a lifelong ambition by working his way into the cloistered world that is big-time hockey.
And he's done it in a thoroughly modern way - his Lana Turner soda-fountain moment coming courtesy of the comments section on a popular Quebec hockey blog.
Boisvert, you see, recently landed a paying gig as a part-time scout for the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.
But unlike most people in the hockey industry, he has never played, never coached, never volunteered in a minor hockey association.
He stands as the embodiment of every hard-core fan's dream: an uber-passionate and freakishly knowledgeable outsider who managed to get professional hockey people to actually listen to what he has to say.
And he has quite a lot to say.
As in: Scouts often lack the imagination to spot subtleties ... veteran free agents are almost always over-priced and almost never worth it ... most general-managers are determinedly following yesterday's trends ... goalies should never be drafted in the first round.
"It used to make my teeth grate in the early 2000s when I'd see a team pick a Rick DiPietro or a Kari Lehtonen with the first or second pick overall ... last year you had [Philadelphia's Michael] Leighton and [Chicago's Antti] Niemi in the Cup final, and all of a sudden everyone started saying 'you don't need an elite goalie to win.' I was saying that 10 years ago, and people would throw tomatoes at me," said Boisvert, who lives in Montreal's north end.
The gregarious, animated Boisvert, a high-energy type who owns his translation business, is perhaps best described as a free thinker - not a quality frequently associated with the hockey industry.
But it's what made Richard Liboiron, the Screaming Eagles's director of hockey operations, sit up and take notice.
"I was struck by just how passionate he is," said Liboiron, who agreed to meet with Boisvert on a lark last autumn, and essentially ended up hiring him on the spot 90 minutes later. "He has a lot of interesting ideas and very impressive knowledge of players. I call it a hard disk in his head."
While Liboiron is the first to acknowledge most of the people who work in and around major junior and pro leagues follow the more conventional path - through connections, word-of-mouth, working with former teammates and coaches and the like - but adds he's always been attracted to original thinkers.
"Anyone can follow the template and give you the empirical information, it's much harder to find people who can give a detailed overall picture and extrapolate a given player's profile," Liboiron said. "Simon can do that. His reports are like a turnkey project - it's all there, just move in."
From the first time he sent him to check out players on a trial basis, Liboiron says he could tell he and Boisvert were on the same wavelength.
And Cape Breton, currently languishing in 16th place in the 18-team QMJHL, can use all the help it can find in digging up uncut gems.
Boisvert is eager to pitch in, but he also has a broader goal: to become a chief scout or GM in the QMJHL, or a chief scout in the NHL.
And if Boisvert can harbour those ambitions - which Liboiron suggests are reasonable if he's prepared to be patient - it's due in part to alter ego Snake70, his handle on the blog run by Mathias Brunet, a hockey columnist at La Presse who often writes about junior and minor-league prospects.
Snake70 began standing out a couple of years ago as an acerbic and aggressively opinionated voice who trashed other commentators with panache and delighted in demolishing conventional wisdom.
The ad hominem attacks were an act, the crusades against the hockey consensus weren't (he has since retired Snake70 in favour of a regular satellite-radio gig).
Brunet, who is friendly with Liboiron, eventually put the two in touch.
Among the Snake's many predictions: for all the hype, the best player of the 2009 draft wouldn't be top picks John Tavares or Victor Hedman, but Matt Duchene, picked third overall. So far, he's right.
In 2010, Snake harangued commentators who were touting one of Taylor Hall or Tyler Seguin as the best prospect, arguing the true franchise player in the draft was a certain Jeff Skinner, picked seventh overall by the Carolina Hurricanes - a surprise in itself, most observers had him as a mid to late first-round pick.
"Almost all the pro scouts saw Skinner as a second-line, 20- or 22-goal guy. I always saw him as a top-line, 40 to 50 goal guy," said Boisvert, who wouldn't have hesitated to pick Skinner first or second overall.
And unlike many armchair prognosticators, Boisvert didn't content himself with just watching the kid on television or YouTube, he decided one weekend to drive to Kingston, Ont., to see him live. Then, a few weeks later, made a second trip.
"What can I say, I just had to see if I was right about my impressions," Boisvert said.
Skinner's rookie numbers are eloquent testimony that he was.
Evaluation is something that comes naturally to Boisvert, who studied commerce and actuarial mathematics at Montreal's Concordia University.
By then Boisvert was already a massive hockey fan and nurturing his ambitions ("it sounds dumb when you say it, but it was addictive, like a drug, I was going to an industrial quantity of midget and bantam games on weekends").
His fascination with hockey began as an eight-year-old in the early 1970s, when he used to go see Norm Dupont and Mario Tremblay light it up for the QMJHL Montreal Bleu Blanc Rouge with his dad.
"Even then I was trying to predict which guys would be good as pros and which ones wouldn't," he said.
In his 20s, Boisvert contacted dozens of hockey and baseball teams - he is also a huge baseball nut, and was once asked by a friend to give a pep talk to a fellow-traveller. Things worked out okay for the kid in question (it was Toronto Blue Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos).
Then followed years of cold-calls and faxing résumés - getting a rejection letter was a minor triumph, most just ignored him (in the end he decided to go into translating).
Through it all, Boisvert kept going to games and honed his evaluative approach, which blends empirical, on-ice factors with intangibles and more esoteric methods.
"The real skill is in projecting how a player is going to develop ... I'm always trying to think a few years ahead, how teams are going to be built and how that will influence the market," he said.
Boisvert has also assimilated the basic Moneyball lessons: prize factors others underestimate, ignore what the others overevaluate, and don't buy into reputations.
"I try and run against the herd," he said.
Boisvert doesn't need a GPS to find obscure arenas. He's been to them all in the course of his quixotic quest.
And lately, his longtime girlfriend has developed a stronger interest in the game, so he doesn't sit alone as much as he once did.
In fact, at a recent midget tournament, she pointed out a player she liked ("it kind of shook me up, because I hadn't even noticed him," he said).
"Listen, if people like Richard were open-minded enough to listen to me, I have to keep an open mind too, right?" he said. "And she was right."
Boisvert won't reveal anything about the player, lest the other scouts catch a whiff.
And his approach has already paid at least one dividend for his new employers: the Eagles this week added a U.S.-based player, whom Boisvert uncovered, to their protected list.
No other team had yet contacted him, and Boisvert spotted him watching games on the Internet.
"I think he's good enough to play on the top line," he said. "But that's just my opinion."
CTVglobemedia Publishing, Inc
Hockey Canada targeting immigrants' kids to counter declining enrolment
By Dale Oviatt, Postmedia News February 14, 2011
OTTAWA — It's Canada's game. But for how much longer?
Alarmed by sliding enrolment in minor hockey programs across the country, Hockey Canada is launching a charm offensive in a dozen languages, targeting the households of recent immigrants and First Nations families to boost the number of Canadian kids strapping on skates.
Minor hockey registration continues to be on a downward spiral and there are concerns that in the next 10 years, there could be 200,000 fewer kids playing the sport in this country.
"Through the trending we've gone through here, we feel that by 2020-21 if we continue to do what we are doing, we're going to have 360,000 members as opposed to 560,000 members," said Hockey Canada's vice-president of member services Glen McCurdie from his Ottawa office. "That's a fairly significant decrease in numbers over the next 10 years. From our perspective, it's time to change the way that we are doing stuff."
For the first time, Hockey Canada's annual planner, which is mailed to registered minor hockey players under the age of 10, is available in 12 languages.
In addition to the traditional English and French versions, the planners — which are also available for download at hockeycanada.ca — come in Arabic, Chinese (Cantonese and Mandarin), Cree, German, Inuktitut, Italian, Portuguese, Punjabi, Spanish and Tagalog.
Hockey Canada used Canadian census figures to determine their focus.
The mail-outs, which were sent last month to more than 235,000 players from coast to coast, feature a personalized Hockey Canada season planner with hockey-related activities and comic strips.
"This is pretty exciting for us to have done translation in that many different languages," said McCurdie. "Hopefully the benefits (have) some spinoff when we have new Canadians at least thinking about hockey. That's a start for potentially down the road."
This is the fourth year the mail-outs, which also includes pins and stickers, have been sent to young Canadian hockey players.
"When we got into it, we realized that there was a little bit of power here that we could use from the mail out that extended beyond our own members," said McCurdie. "We had anecdotal situations that came back to us, where kids were taking their mail outs to school and showing other kids and creating a bit of a buzz that way.
"From our perspective, it's now serving three purposes. One is an affinity with the national body, but it also has a recruitment angle to it where other kids that are seeing it are excited about the possibility of playing. And I think our members in that age group certainly feel like they are part of something bigger and it's something they might want to stay involved in more readily with stuff like this going on."
Canadian minor hockey registration peaked in 2008-09 when 584,679 players were taking part. Last year, the number dropped to 577,077. This year, it's expected to drop by a further one per cent when the final numbers are determined near the end of the month.
The number of outside influences distracting kids from hockey these days is huge: the Internet, video games, social media, and even other sports.
"We recognized fairly quickly that there is a decreasing pool of kids in the five to 19 age group and that trend was continuing on at a fairly rapid pace here," said McCurdie. "Really, the only increase in population across the country . . . is through immigration.
"We were sort of an organization that is used to, very honestly, opening up our doors and having people flock to us. We've never really been in a boat where we needed to recruit players. I think that's a mindset that we need to get our (provincial) organizations more on board with."
In the eyes of Hockey Canada, getting people on skates is the first step, and that could mean working together with Skate Canada (figure skating), ringette and speedskating to get the message out.
"We feel if we are able to even get kids on skates, we've done our job," said McCurdie. "Hockey is such a part of our country, it's such a vibrant sport, that if we can get people onto skates, that the natural flow will be for them to try hockey at some point."
Just for laughs.......
NHL Simply Not Going To Bother Reaching Out To Hispanics
Hope you guys are enjoying your seasons.
DMan
Quote by: DManJust for laughs.......
NHL Simply Not Going To Bother Reaching Out To Hispanics
Hope you guys are enjoying your seasons.
Dave, That is funny (true enough that Bettman cannot figure out how to connect with white people!) I love the Onion... have not read it for years... kind of forgot about it I guess... neat that you found this article!
Here's another interesting one from Daniel Coyle:
The Power of Crumminess
DMan
NHL engages ridicule defence
By ROY MACGREGOR
From Tuesday's Globe and Mail February 14, 2011
In shouting down Lemieux, like those who spoke out before him, hockey invites upon itself a blow that could concuss the game
Mario Lemieux, say hello to Senator Hartland Molson.
Some may imagine the owner of the Pittsburgh Penguins is the first NHL owner to speak out against gratuitous violence in the game - "a travesty," Lemieux called Friday night's WWE match between his Pens and the New York Islanders - but Molson beat him by a half-century.
Call me a "pantywaist" if you must, the owner of the Montreal Canadiens told his fellow NHL governors. But also call the rules. Put an end to the mayhem.
"I cannot see any argument," he said, "against criticism of unnecessary roughness."
No argument required, of course - his suggestions were beaten down by the same tool that is being used against Lemieux: ridicule.
Lemieux's tantrum - an Internet posting in which he said the Friday Fiasco made him wonder whether he even wanted "to be a part" of the NHL any more - certainly could have used a little self-flagellation over his own dirty team and, in particular, the antics over the past few years of Pittsburgh's serial offender, Matt Cooke. But simply to dismiss the Penguins owner as a hypocrite is too easy, too convenient for those who use ridicule to butt-end every mouth that opens against violence in hockey.
Speaking out is hardly new to this national game.
As far back as 1904, Ontario hockey head John Ross Robertson was warning that if they didn't clean up the game they would soon have to call in the coroner.
That happened three years later in Cornwall, Ont., when Charles Masson killed Bud McCourt with a blow to the head. The jury recommended that laws be brought in - not hockey rules, but real law - to ensure those engaged in foul play "be severely punished."
It never happened, of course.
As for NHL owners, few thought along the lines of Molson or Lemieux. New York Rangers boss Tex Rickard used to pay ambulance drivers to park outside Madison Square Garden on the theory that the promise of violence brought in the crowds.
Toronto Maple Leafs owner Conn Smythe used the ridicule argument when he stated: "We've got to stamp out this sort of thing, or people are going to keep on buying tickets."
The closest the two differing views at the NHL board of governors table ever got to an airing happened in 1992. A new chair was in place, Los Angeles Kings owner Bruce McNall, with the arrival of a new commissioner, Gary Bettman, was still several months off. It seemed like a good time to discuss changing the violent culture of the game.
Harry Sinden, then-general manager of the "Big, Bad" Boston Bruins somewhat surprisingly suggested a complete ban on fighting. He argued the only way expansion was possible to untried U.S. markets and, in particular, to Europe, was if they cleaned up the "distasteful" side of hockey.
"I'll always love hard-hitting, physical hockey," Sinden said. "But I hate goons and I hate goon tactics."
The board responded by asking that two position papers be prepared for discussion, one "pro" fighting, the other "con."
The "con" side argued it would be in the league's financial interest to get rid of the thuggery. It was pointed out that huge potential sponsors (IBM was one) were shying away from hockey over this issue. European hockey thrives, they said, and doesn't allow fighting.
The "pro" side mostly ridiculed, particularly in its condemnation of European hockey.
Even so, at the next meeting of the board of governors, the "con" side believed it had made some progress. Proposals were tabled that would establish game misconducts for fighting, with an extra game added if the fight took place in the last 10 minutes of a game. They suggested linesmen be allowed to call penalties once play had stopped. They called for a bumping up of multiple penalties, such as cross-checking, to five minutes from two minutes. Penalties for infractions such as hooking and holding, they said, should run their full time allotment rather than end once the team with the advantage has scored.
Of course, nothing ever came of this. The hooking and holding, in fact, took such a strong hold on the game that star various players - Lemieux among them - spoke out about the state of the game and fans grew so increasingly disenchanted that, following the 2004-05 lockout, significant rule changes were made to open the game up again.
In 2010-11, another giant step is required to rid the league of headshots and, with luck, such "travesty" as occurred last Friday.
To simply ridicule and dismiss those who argue such change is necessary - as Hockey Night in Canada analyst Mike Milbury so loves to do on taking hits to the head out of the game - is to invite upon hockey a blow that could concuss the game itself. Minor hockey enrolment is down. By 2016, The Hockey News predicts, at least 30,000 fewer children will be playing the game.
That analysis was made before the current outcry against headshots. The undeniable medical evidence that concussions are life-long and life-threatening have parents everywhere rethinking their child's involvement in a game where, no matter what the lesser leagues do to protect heads, the players themselves continue to copy the open-season style of the NHL.
The league's refusal to act threatens future players and fans - surely it can see this.
However, it has ignored good advice before, such as the 1992 discussion paper against fighting that was prepared by Harry Sinden.
Oh, yes, and by his assistant, Mike Milbury.
But we won't accuse Milbury of hypocrisy.
That word has already been used against Mario Lemieux.
Thanks for the articles Dean- One of your links was cut short....it should read:
http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~duckwort/images/Positive%20predictors%20of%20teacher%20effectiveness.2009.pdf
We're off on a road trip this week, but I hope to start adding to the board soon. Thanks to all for the constant contributions.
Dave