Quote:
Originally Posted by flamesfever
Are you trying to give the impression that the frequency of fighting in hockey in the old days is the same as today?
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The same? Impossible to say. Significant? Certainly. But I will state, as my opinion, that hockey was a much dirtier sport in its earlier days. "Bad" Joe Hall, for instance, earned his nickname for his involvement in a litany of incidents throughout his career. Among them were incidents of trying to drive opponent's heads through the catch fences around the rinks and he was even arrested once for an on-ice fight. And after spending a game being slashed in the head repeatedly - with no penalty calls - he eventually slashed the referee. Nearly got him banned, but the referee forgave him after Hall paid to repair the hole he put in the ref's pants.
Now, that is merely an anecdote involving one player, but there are countless examples to argue that hockey in much of last century was
brutal. It is impossible to believe that straight fighting was not a large part of it as well. Not when guys like Hall were putting up 100PIMs in 16 game seasons.
It has been argued that the advent of the enforcer/goon did help calm the sport down - and that is the opinion that many modern players hold today (i.e.: Iginla). There is an argument to be made that the game's evolution to designated enforcers vs. the free-for-all days where every player had to be prepared to defend themselves was a contributing factor to this. That is obviously subjective, and at the same time, I don't believe that removing fighting (or simply the enforcer role) would cause a return to the free-for-all days, either.
But to the original point, no, I do not believe fighting is a modern day phenomenon that was born in the 1960s when the Canadiens brought up John Ferguson and invented the enforcer role.