Increase in Hockey Violence – Is hockey becoming a blood-sport?

 

There has been and continues to be a steady increase in the violence in the game of hockey. Hockey is, of course a physical sport. However, increasingly it is becoming a blood-sport. The growing lack of respect that players have for each other and each other’s lives is alarming. When fans watch a hockey game they do not want to see a player’s head slammed so hard into the boards or glass that his skull is fractured. Fans don’t want to continue to witness the senseless inflicting of brain trauma that head shots cause. Fans don’t want to see what we saw happen just last night, Sunday January 17, 2010 in a game in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL). The  hit on  – the dirty, violent, and intentional elbow viciously delivered to the head of Mikael Tam of the Quebec Remparts who crashed to the ice convulsing and who actually did stop breathing for 30 seconds.

Let me preface this by saying, like a fairly typical Canadian, I am someone who loves hockey. I played the game when I was younger. I coached and I was a referee for years also. I think that hockey, when it is played the way it is intended to be played,  is one of the world’s best sports. The problem is there is too much disrespect among a growing number of players in the game at both the Canadian junior level and in the National Hockey League.

It was only one year ago now that a senior AAA  hockey player, Whitby Dunlops defenceman, 21-year-old Don Sanderson died after spending nearly three weeks in a coma in Ontario, Canada after hitting his head on the ice when falling awkardly while he was involved in a fight and had lost his helmut in a December 2008 game.

At the time of Don Sanderson’s death, January 2, 2009, the question a lot fans and media talking-heads were asking was why don’t players have to keep their helmuts on and properly fastened as part of a work-place safety issue, at the very least. There was a lot of talk about head shots in hockey as the result of Sanderson’s death too.  The question still going unanswered by hockey’s governing bodies is: Does someone else have to die from head/brain trauma  in these ridiculous attacks before they get it? And, these head shots are attacks, they are not body checks that are just part of the game. The discussion that was so prevelant after Sanderson’s death seemed to be one that was largely in vain. Other than the OHL mandating that fights are supposed to be stopped if one player loses his helmut – they aren’t always, however, that discussion just faded away.

“Sanderson was doing what so many Canadians do with their precious few hours of winter leisure time – playing hockey. Most post-adolescent players sweat it out in various beer leagues. Sanderson plied his craft at a higher level in Major League Hockey, successor to the Ontario Hockey Association.”

 

“One side in the battle over head hits makes the point that violence and fighting have always been a part of hockey. This is historically inaccurate. Organised hockey was originally a game of skill and endurance, having nothing to do with pugilistic punches. The game was so tame, women(referred to back then as the fairer sex) were encouraged to play in their own matches. This camp also makes the case that giving penalties for improperly secured helmets would be too onerous a task for NHL referees. If they can measure for illegal sticks and dole out sin bin minutes for flappy fight straps, shifty helmets should logically be another night at the rink for the zebras.

Those in favour of banning head shots and calling for penalties on improperly secured helmets are accused of changing the game, making it a “sissy” sport. Bad situations require good changes. From the time hockey players first lace ‘em up they’re told to keep both hands on the stick, keep said stick on the ice, and “keep your head up.” The cry to mandate keeping those heads covered, regardless of age, is getting louder and louder.

Don Sanderson did not live long enough to hear it.”

Source: TMLfans.ca

Here are cited just two examples, both of which are from Canadian junior hockey this year. There have also been several examples of this brutuality in the National Hockey League this year as well.

I find it sad to have to include a warning to readers that the video directly below may be very disturbing to watch and is thus labelled as “graphic content”. This is not what the game of hockey that I love is supposed to be about. You’ll notice in this video directly below that Cormier comes off the bench and charges right at  the player that he made his prey. That’s not a hockey body check. There’s something really wrong with someone who shows such blatant disregard for an opponent’s safety.

Warning Graphic Content

From the Canadian Press: 

“Cormier caught Tam with an elbow while skating through the neutral zone during overtime of Quebec’s 3-2 shootout win at Dave Keon Arena in Rouyn-Noranda on Sunday afternoon.

The 18-year-old defenceman went into convulsions and was taken to hospital after the hit, where he is listed in stable condition with brain trauma and several damaged teeth.

Remparts coach Patrick Roy, who said he had feared for Tam’s life after witnessing the hit, was optimistic after visiting Tam in hospital.

“I had a chance to see him and when I was there, the doctor told us everything was going well,” Roy said. “With the head and the neck, everything’s normal.

The Quebec Major Junior Hockey League gave Cormier an indefinite suspension on Monday and will continue to investigate the incident.”

 Source: World junior captain Cormier ejected for head hit in QMJHL; player in hospital

The Quebec Remparts coach and former NHL goalie, Patrick Roy, whose own son Jonathan was involved in a brutual hockey fight when he was a goalie with the Remparts in 2008 and charged in court, has filed a complaint to have the Cormier hit  investigated by the police.

Maybe this idea that hockey can police itself just isn’t working. Maybe if these players and the players in the N.H.L. who brutually attack opponents were charged criminally and made to face the consequences in the justice system that might bring about some much-needed change. Let’s face it, these aren’t hockey hits, they are assaults.

“The hit is not part of the game, Remparts president Claude Rousseau said.

“It’s something that is not part of the rule of hockey. It’s something that, in my mind, is absolutely not acceptable,” he said Monday.”

“Ontario Hockey League commissioner David Branch told Toronto sports radio station Fan 590 that it’s a concern that players don’t seem to be getting the message about head shots.

“That’s not unfair to say,” said Branch, who doubles as Canadian Hockey League president. “It’s a constant challenge, and it’s an education process because we’re dealing with young people, by and large.”

Source: cbcsports.ca

Patrice Cormier Nasty Elbow on Anton Rodin – Sweden vs Canada – Dec 20th 2009 (PRE-WJHC 2010)

Patrice Cormier, who captained the Canadian Junior Hockey team at the World Junior tournament this year, seems to have a habit of hitting opponents with his elbow showing no respect or concern for the safety of other players. His conduct is a disgrace to the sport of hockey and to the fact that he was our captain in that tournament.

 

 

On October 30, 2009, I was actually at the game in person during which Michael Liambas, then of the Erie Otters of the Ontario Junior Hockey League (OHL), visciously ran Kitchener Ranger rookie, 16 year old, Ben Fanelli, into the end boards as the video directly below shows. It was not something that any of us at the arena expected to witness that night. It is not supposed to be a part of hockey. It was breath-takingly horrific to witness and the entire crowd was collectively holding its breath as we all were so worried about Ben Fanelli. When a young man is pursuing the game he loves and the career he hopes to develop in hockey he should not be risking his life to such senseless and purposeless violence. Liambas was suspended for the rest of this season, by OHL league commissioner David Branch, which as an over-age player, means his suspension ended his junior hockey career. Just this week, the International Hockey League suspended Liambas from its pro circuit for five games over a hit that ruptured an opponent’s spleen.

 

Fanelli lay unconscious on the ice after the hit as shown in the video below:

Up-date on Ben Fanelli, the Kitchener Ranger rookie, can be read at the Kitchener-Waterloo Record

According to The Record’s Jeff Hicks, in his up-date story about Ben Fanelli, Fanelli is quoted as saying:

“… that all players, including himself, must be prepared to face the consequences of their actions on the ice.”

Fair enough. However, should players really be risking their lives in the ways that they increasingly are? Hockey is becoming a blood-sport. What is often a beautiful skilled game, thanks to some who take violence over the edge, is loosing itself to this violence. Violence that is becoming more and more commonplace while leagues like the OHL and the NHL give what seems so far to be lip-service to the issues of head shots and hitting from behind. The NHL doesn’t even address the fact that its players continue to wear loose helmuts with long chin straps that aren’t fastened in a way that would enable the helmut to provide the amount of protection it is meant to provide. Helmuts are popping off with each head-shot and as a result players aren’t only absorbing the first assault to the head – the head-shot, but then are also suffering their bare heads bouncing off the hard and unforgiving ice.

I am such a fan but I have to admit that more and more I find myself a bit guarded at what I may witness next when watching my favourite sport. A sport that needs to seriously and quickly address hits to the head and checking from behind. A sport, at all levels that needs to make a distinction between legal and acceptable body checks and illegal criminal and totally unacceptable and unwarranted brutual abuse and violence.

 Hockey is not supposed to be a blood-sport.

What do you think?

© A.J.  Mahari, January 18, 2010

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