I would love to see the results of an anonymous poll of NHL players on the matter, as conducted by the NHLPA. It's one thing for us to sit here and conjecture about what is good for the players, but none of us actually play at that level. I imagine that the majority of players would want to see increased protection from head contact, but I would doubt that the majority of players would want to see hitting removed from the game. Seems odd to me that we don't see many players leave hockey at it's highest level due to the potential of injury. I know, the payday makes people take risks.
When I was playing University sanctioned rugby, there was a guy in that league one year that was paralyzed as a result of a scrum that collapsed. Freak accident, nothing intentional or dirty. I played the same position on my team, and there was no financial incentive for me to stay playing (pay or scholarahip ect). The risks were super appearent because of the incident, but there wasn't a single person that I am aware of that quit because of the accident. For sure not on my team. As atheletes, your aware that things can happen, often even see it happen, but even without any financial compensation, you play because you love the sport and the competition.
Eric Lindros is hardly the poster child for reform. Yep, he had a bunch of concussions. Caused a few as well I will bet. But if I was the group trying to get things changed for the better, I would be telling EL to return to obscurity and quit being a hipocrite.
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