Lindros calls for significant changes to reduce concussions

[Resolute 14]

Not a new idea, and once again, the evidence I've seen argues it doesn't work. So even if it was a novel suggestion, I'm not opposing it on the basis of it being a new idea.

[Steve Bozek]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Taking hitting out?

I think open ice hitting is fine, with penalties for lateness, blindsiding and headshots.

I don’t like the heavy slam into the boards (“finishing the check” - nudge nudge, wink wink), particularly when the modern equipment is armour and the boards will always be just as hard.

I’d prefer changing the rules to make play along the boards be focused on gaining control of the puck, and not trying to inflict pain. Pretty liberal use of the boarding penalties might accomplish this.

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by Textcritic

Hockey was never really an option for us, but my wife and I actively decided against enrolling our youngest son in football this year as a result of the high risk. My oldest son played rugby and one of his teammates suffered a serious concussion that has had a permanent affect on his day-to-day life.

Thanks for the response. My son was asked to play high school football this year (small school, few athletes) and we came to same conclusion as you, particularly because he plays hockey and we felt that was too much for his body. He has suffered concussion symptoms once from hockey, in peewee before checking was allowed resulting from a collision in practice. So accidents can happen without checking and contact too. Hockey is a fast game.

To me this question isn't about the NHL and what we as fans think, But the game itself. A game that most of us played, maybe continue to play, and for some of us, a game that our kids and family members play.

I just don't think I could be a serious fan of the game, and devote time and money to it, while at the same time believing it was not something I would want anyone I care about playing. Or maybe I could. Compartmentalizing is not that hard after all.

But really I believe the calls to remove body contact from the game are awfully premature. If we sat in a room, we could probably brainstorm a hundred potential ideas that could reduce the risk of head injuries. I am sure many wouldn't work but really very few things have been done to date. To jump to removing contact from the game doesn't seem too well thought out IMO.

[Philly06Cup]

More needs to be done to increase safety. Anyone who disagrees is a lunatic. Nobody wants to remove all body contact from hockey.

One obvious measure is to institute a 'targeting' rule like in the NFL. You can't take 4 or 5 strides to line up a big hit. Hits should be about separating opponent from puck.

My bigger vision is to instill more respect in the game. In the NBA or NFL, throwing a punch in a scrum is usually an automatic ejection. Even starting a scrum in the NBA or NFL generally results in some penalties. This should NOT be the norm in the NHL after every other goalie stoppage. It is, and it's stupid, and it's stupid that fans are conditioned to cheer for scrums. Any non-hockey related violence should be suspendable. Scrum punches should result in ejections. Hacking at someones ankles/shins after a whistle should clearly be a suspension. Even facewashes should be penalties. Get rid of the childish nonsense. Respect your opponents. Play hockey.

[CroFlames]

Wow, that coming from a Flyers fan? Now I've seen it all.

[PepsiFree]

Good suggestions though.

[Jiri Hrdina]

I would make the following changes
- Eliminate fighting immediately
- Institute extremely severe suspensions for any hit that targets the head
- Institute extreme punishments (e.g. loss of draft picks) for any team that doesn't follow the concussion protocol

The second point is the key one because you can't allow it to be subjective. You can't allow the victim of the hit to be blamed. You need to demonstrate that you can retain bodychecking while eliminating the head hits.

And when i say severe punishments I'm talking 10 games minimum for first offense. 25 games second.

If you do that and you see that there is a decline in concussions then perhaps you can retain some of the physicality.

At this point just eliminating fighting I think would be a very tangible step in the right direction that shows the league grasps the severity of the issue and is willing to do the things to change.

[868904]

They might as well stop playing the game if they take hitting out.

I have a problem with some of these players like Lindros who made so much money from the game and now are whining about the risks.

You didn't think hitting someone at 20 mph was going to hurt them or you? You didn't think slashing someone on the wrists or ankles was going to hurt them? You didn't think firing a rubber disc at 100 mph at a goalie might hurt them? You didn't think punching someone in the head might hurt them?

There are risks in everything in life and the higher the risks, the higher the reward. These players know the risks, they accept the risk because they like the reward. Don't tell me it's because of the love of the game. If they love the game, they can play beer league hockey at minimal cost while working a less dangerous job.

Society is just way too protective now. I find it insulting that hockey players are whining about the dangers of their chosen career which pays them handsomely, yet firefighters and police officers literally put their lives on the line everyday and get paid only a fraction of what these players do.

I don't want to die in a fire or shot in the line of duty, therefore, i'm not a firefighter or a cop. If these hockey players don't want concussions, then don't be a hockey player.

I'm not going to pay for tickets or support a league where the competitive fire and combative nature is neutered.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Again I don't grasp what the amount of money someone has made has anything to do with this. Is there a certain amount of money that makes it OK? 1M? 10M? How much money would it take for you to accept living with concussion symptoms the rest of your life?

I would further suggest that only in the last few years we've been able to truly understand the long-term impacts of concussions. To say that Lindros understood this while he was playing is unfair.

Society is too protective?
Former players are dead. You are OK with that?
comparing it to people that choose to be a firefighter or cop is not apples to apples.

Hockey CAN be played with reduced physicality. It is possible. if you choose to stop watching it that's fine, but it is a sport that can actually evolve and still be incredibly entertaining.

[PepsiFree]

The firefighter/police analogy is also poor because those jobs are essential to a safe society.

Hockey players are our entertainment.

[Oil Stain]

I'd like to see everyone take a breath and give some time to see what the changes the NHL has already made in the last few seasons (Enforcers disappearing/ Head shot enforcement) will do to concussion rates.

I feel like concussions are down considerably in the last few seasons.

[flambers]

Concussion issue is not only associated with Hockey, to remove physical contact would be an interesting debate in terms of how would this effect the other major league sports?

From a kids sports perspective, from my view soccer had the bigger issue in terms of concussions.

More likely area to focus is the equipment and is the game to quick.....

My view, there is no chance the player associations would approve the elimination of body contact.

[The Boy Wonder]

Originally Posted by Philly06Cup

More needs to be done to increase safety. Anyone who disagrees is a lunatic. Nobody wants to remove all body contact from hockey.

One obvious measure is to institute a 'targeting' rule like in the NFL. You can't take 4 or 5 strides to line up a big hit. Hits should be about separating opponent from puck.

My bigger vision is to instill more respect in the game. In the NBA or NFL, throwing a punch in a scrum is usually an automatic ejection. Even starting a scrum in the NBA or NFL generally results in some penalties. This should NOT be the norm in the NHL after every other goalie stoppage. It is, and it's stupid, and it's stupid that fans are conditioned to cheer for scrums. Any non-hockey related violence should be suspendable. Scrum punches should result in ejections. Hacking at someones ankles/shins after a whistle should clearly be a suspension. Even facewashes should be penalties. Get rid of the childish nonsense. Respect your opponents. Play hockey.

This sounds like 'old man yelling at the clouds'

They are top tier athletes who want to get every possible mental edge over their opponent. If i can face-wash him a little bit in front of the net and its gonna make him pause for even a quarter of a second before going into the corner with me, thats the sort of advantage these guys need. If I can knock you off your game because you are focused on being mad at me instead of thinking about where your outlet pass is, even better.

calling pushing after the whistle violence is taking it way too far, its a little jostling and I think you can ask any player in the NHL if they see a major problem with it and they will tell you no. But if you think players will respect each other more just because they can't jostle after the whistle you are wrong. The trash-talk and crude language that goes on in the NFL and NBA is way worse than in the NHL. Would you rather kids look up to a bunch of whiny babies like nba players or heart on their sleeve hockey players.

I think what im trying to say is players will always find a way to get an edge on their opponent. That is at the heart of any competition where you compete head to head, and removing the physical aspect will only lead to something else which I would say is worse to teach the next generation.

Obviously the NHL needs to do something to eliminate the egregious high hits and a targetting rule would be a very logical step. But it doesn't need to go the no hitting, no fighting route.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by flambers

My view, there is no chance the player associations would approve the elimination of body contact.

Does the PA have a say in those types of rule changes though? Maybe “say” isn’t the right word as I’m sure there would be consultations between the league and the PA, so I guess what I’m asking is does the PA have the power to veto a rule change?

[iggy_oi]

Personally I don’t think contact needs to be removed from the game entirely but there are a number of different areas where it could be removed without ruining the on ice product. At the end of the day though if the league won’t enforce their stricter penalties with better consistency any changes would be moot.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

Again I don't grasp what the amount of money someone has made has anything to do with this. Is there a certain amount of money that makes it OK? 1M? 10M? How much money would it take for you to accept living with concussion symptoms the rest of your life?

I would further suggest that only in the last few years we've been able to truly understand the long-term impacts of concussions. To say that Lindros understood this while he was playing is unfair.

Society is too protective?
Former players are dead. You are OK with that?
comparing it to people that choose to be a firefighter or cop is not apples to apples.

Hockey CAN be played with reduced physicality. It is possible. if you choose to stop watching it that's fine, but it is a sport that can actually evolve and still be incredibly entertaining.

I don't mean to sound crass or insensitive to the men living with CTE, but the money thing counts to a large extent.

No one says here is a 10M paycheck and a guaranteed concussion and CTE.

It's more like here's a 10M paycheck, but you may get concussed.

Personally, I would take that chance 10 out of 10 times.

[nik-]

I don't mind the fights that happen when two guys are battling each other and get pissed off and start fighting right in the heat of the moment, but that's probably like 5% of fights.

I won't miss the stupid, 80 feet behind the puck, totally stop the flow of play bull#### fights though. Or the right off the face-off fights. They're so dumb.

[the2bears]

Originally Posted by CroFlames

I don't mean to sound crass or insensitive to the men living with CTE, but the money thing counts to a large extent.

No one says here is a 10M paycheck and a guaranteed concussion and CTE.

It's more like here's a 10M paycheck, but you may get concussed.

Personally, I would take that chance 10 out of 10 times.

Without knowing the odds of "that chance"?

[Bandwagon Surfer]

People get far to defensive on these types of subjects and take things personally, when there is really no need to. Since the scientific revolution we have changed from a mindset where our traditions and holy books know everything, and switched to a mindset which acknowledges that we do not know everything and it is up to us to discover and learn more.

But with this comes the fact that everything will always be changing to keep with what we know now. This means that you cannot fault people for making decisions in the past that we now know better about. As long as the person made the decision with the best knowledge available at the time, they were responsible. Where problems come is when people do not adapt to what we have learned.

You see this all the time in things like medicine. There are many traditional treatments that we now know are dangerous, and we have developed better alternatives to them. For example, say there is a traditional treatment that we now know has the side effect of increased child mortality. The people who used it at the time were not horrible people for risking their child's life, they could not have known any better at the time. The people who are horrible are the ones who are still using the old treatment and needlessly killing children do to the higher risk.

But our brains do not draw that distinction very well, so people who used it before we knew better get defensive and defend its use now because they feel like admitting that we now know better would somehow make them guilty in the past. This turns them from innocent victims of our lack of knowledge, to actively defending a practice which results in more children dying. It is sad, but we need to compassion if we want to break these cycles.

[The Boy Wonder]

Originally Posted by nik-

I don't mind the fights that happen when two guys are battling each other and get pissed off and start fighting right in the heat of the moment, but that's probably like 5% of fights.

I won't miss the stupid, 80 feet behind the puck, totally stop the flow of play bull#### fights though. Or the right off the face-off fights. They're so dumb.

I would wager it is much higher in the past few years. the NHL has almost eliminated the staged fights, sure some still occur, but I see that most of them are "staged" because a guy made a dirty play and then got off the ice before anyone could fight him.

Not saying it's right, but I think the number of staged fights is really low