In doing the book, I tracked the history — 150 years — of violence in hockey. Violence has been a part of hockey since day one; it’s always just been part of the culture. Actually, it was way worse once upon a time. You had stick fighting. Toe Blake. In the last 25 years it’s evolved a lot, and I point to the Broad Street Bullies as the turning point. 1987 was the last year we had a bench-clearing brawl in the NHL — the penalty became too steep. My book chronicles this evolution. Fighting’s down 37 percent post-lockout. You notice Tie Domi retiring as quietly as he did. The goons are gone. Guys today gotta be able to skate, to take a shift. Having said that, hockey remains a game of fear and intimidation. You have to carry your head on a swivel. It’s not like football where guys are wearing a mask — it’s a totally different game. Fighting has always been a part of it.

Expansion also played a key part in perpetuating fighting’s legacy. Fighting was made more prevalent to sell the game. I’m talking about regions where the kids don’t play the game; fighting became a selling point there. What if NASCAR said, ‘We’re eliminating crashing?’ But the way I’d put it is, fighting isn’t as gratuitous in the new NHL.

pucksandbooks: My father and I have had a 25-year disagreement about fighting in hockey. He hates it, thinks it’s a nuissance that harms the sport’s overall appeal. He’d outlaw it yesterday if he were made commissioner tomorrow. I on the other hand see it as altogether organic or indigenous — an extension of the sport’s rugged checking, and a byproduct of the novelty that is racing a round a playing surface at upwards of 30 mph while wielding a weapon. Which one of us is right?

Ross Bernstein: You’re both right. I try to show that in the book. For the purist like your Dad, there’s international hockey — the Olympics and such, college hockey — where there’s no fisticuffs. You can make a case either way. You know you mentioned the commissioner. I was in the Minnesota Wild’s owner suite recently, and Gary Bettman was there, and I got almost an hour with him. He told me that he loved my book. I could tell that he’d read it. He told me that I had explained fighting in an honorable way. It doesn’t condone it. I break down the [Todd] Bertuzzi and [Marty] McSorley incidents, showing their genesis. You have literally about 20 events that most often lead up to incidents like those. This is what the common hockey fan doesn’t realize. Things are constantly going on as prelude that spectators almost never catch. [In fighting] people are defending the honor of others — 90 percent of fights are related to the behavior of others.

You know I’m doing book signings at arenas across the country, and hundreds of folks have come up to me and said, “I learned so much about watching for things from shift to shift.” Women love my book! They are telling me that they’re watching line formations ’cause in my book I tell them that fights almost always occur at the start of shifts — that’s part of the Code. You don’t fight at the end, when guys are tired. The bottom line is this: When the gloves drop, the crowd always rises as one, no matter what era you’re talking about, and you can’t deny that.

pucksandbooks: For years I’ve made the argument that the mature, Original Six glory years, the 1950s and ’60s NHL, when players played helmetless and with total accountability, were also the league’s safest. There were injuries, there were brutal, bloody fights, but guys had a respect for one another that I think is lacking today, to some extent. When a guy like Daniele Briere samurais Alex Ovechkin in the jewel case — well, you know what would have happened to him if say Ted Lindsay had been flanking Ovechkin on the left side? Anyway, there was back then precious little of the stickwork up high, and especially the crippling checking from behind we so commonly see today. Your thoughts?

Ross Bernstein: Absolutely. Guys talk about this in my book. The simple shoulder check today can hurt a guy badly. Guys are so enormous now, so fantastically conditioned, such specimens, and they can do real damage. You’ve got visors, the full visor . . . part of the Code of course is that enforcers don’t wear visors. These guys, as you mentioned, are in battle armor, and they feel invincible, unhurtable. You look at the way they block shots now, taking angles guys a generation ago never would have dreamed of.

Bob Probert’s equipment was velcro-ed on, by design. He wanted to get naked [to have the most freedom of movement]. When everyone had little tiny pads everyone played with respect. I think that even trickles down to youth hockey today. They feel so protected they’re running around, like you said, like warriors. Take a look at the college game. You’ll see guys 5′6 running guys 6′5.

Lynx/Baton fight

pucksandbooks: Let me play angel’s advocate for a moment. Let’s say I’m a hockey mom and I’ve seen my son migrate through the pee wee and bantam and midget levels, and even into U.S. college hockey — all of which forbid fighting. Why then suddenly at the Major Junior and minor pro levels should it be tolerated — what’s specifically in the culture at those levels that allows for the sanctioning of fighting?

Ross Bernstein: Great question. Major Juniors are in Canada. This is gonna sound simple, but toughness — simple toughness — is at the heart of the answer. You know I’ve written about 35 books. Last year I interviewed 100 current and former Gophers about the current state of hockey, including Ben Clymer. I asked all of them: Why aren’t more Minnesotans making it to the next level? You know what I learned from them? In American culture, we see the college degree as the natural course [to pursue]. Minnesota has a lot of hockey players and a lot of college hockey. But playing college hockey is nothing like playing juniors. Again, this sounds simple, but the reality is that our guys don’t have that culture, that sacrifice or work culture if you will . . . they won’t make the sacrifices that the kid from Moose Jaw will, and does. I’m telling you, those guys will do whatever it takes [to make it]. I interviewed guys who weren’t originally enforcers but were willing to do whatever it took to get to a higher level. Up in Juniors, you gotta get tough, you gotta get beat up, and you gotta ride those buses. The difference between that experience and playing 30 games on weekends in college? Are you kidding? Anyway, to answer your question, fighting is learned and honed in juniors.

I interviewed [Minnesota Wild left wing] Derek Boogaard. He’s from Saskatoon, 6 ‘7, 255. He was like 6′4 as a bantam, and he knew that [fighting] was what he was gonna do. He got scholarship offers from Major Junior teams cause of his toughness. If you’re a tough Canadian, you won’t play college in the U.S., and Canadian college hockey is nothing. This is gonna sound harsh, but for a lot of Canadian hockey players going the U.S. college route is the [anatomical euphemism for wimpy] route. Those guys just want it so badly and are willing to make extraordinary sacrifices to get it.

pucksandbooks: The NHL, it seems, has maintained a delicate and oftentimes conflicting posture when it comes to fighting. It clearly doesn’t support its abolition. And yet it’s loathe in any way to market fighting to any degree. In your view, are there any significant consequences to this vaguely defined position — and a follow-up: is hockey fighting, in your view, unfairly scapegoated by the sport’s detractors?

Ross Bernstein: Here’s the thing about hockey. It used to be one of the top 4 sports. Now it’s 8. Eight. Today, based on television ratings and revenues, you’d have say golf, college hoops, NASCAR are all above it. Hockey has always been about hockey. And by that I mean, it’s always taken care of its fans. Seventy percent of revenues are from the fans. Football makes billions — literally billions — before the game gates even open. Hockey . . . it’s a Catch-22: it’s always had to take care of its fans.

This issue will come to a head when, sadly, someone’s killed. These guys are too big today. Boxing has a couple killed every year. Derek [Boogaard] has been trained as a lethal fighter. Trained to do the most damage. [Phoenix Coyote right wing] George Laraque, what a specimen. They’re all specimens. These guys are bringing a technical training and sophistication [to fighting] we’ve never seen before. Guys go on YouTube after every game and are studying their fights and others guys’, always analyzing, always identifying another guy’s tendencies. I chronicle in my book all the [hockey fight related] lawsuits in Canada. Up there, the juries seem so far to understand that it’s part of the game.

pucksandbooks: Where in your view does George McPhee rank in the pantheon of pugilists — and in thinking about smaller guys who gave a lot better than they got, who would you identify?

Ross Bernstein: I’m not one of those guys that goes to hockeyfights.com. I enjoy them. But I play three or four days a week. I played this morning before you called. McPhee was definitely a tough guy. All of these guys are. I can tell you Bob Probert was the most feared, the toughest, when you talk to the league’s enforcers.

– pucksandbooks: in a moment, I am going to ask you for your list of the toughest . . .

Ross Bernstein: Fans can’t appreciate what these guys go through. Think about having a family, tending to kids, taking care of things, then going to bed every night knowing that the next day — and remember, these guys are beat up and sore from training camp til the end of the season — their job is to get even more beat up and sore. I don’t know how they sleep at night.

pucksandbooks: Tell OFB readers what the Code is — its origins, its status in today’s hockey.

Ross Bernstein: The Code is a living, breathing honor system. It’s an unwritten set of rules, and it’s been passed down by generations of hockey players. The Code fills in the gaps left by the rulebook. It’s a samurai code of ethics. It’s hockey’s rules of engagement. You don’t break the rules of the Code, ever, because if you do, your own teammates won’t want you back on the bench. Fighting has so many causes, and the Code keeps players honest, it forces them to keep their heads on a swivel. It governs the three root causes for fighting: protection, intimidation, and retribution.

European players don’t learn the Code. They play on a larger sheet, and notice that European players and teams dominate the Olympics. The NHL is trying to blend both philosophies. We won’t see its full effects for a few more years, as more [goons] are purged by salary caps. But it’s all about respect, playing with respect.

pucksandbooks: One of the guys you interviewed was Dale Hunter. What did you learn from him?

Ross Bernstein: I interviewed more than 100, and 50 went on the record with me. Dale was one who went on the record. Of course we talked about [Pierre] Turgeon. “I broke the code,” he told me. “I took my medicine.” He actually didn’t want to talk that much about the incident. I got the sense that he had a lot of regret about it. I’m sure there was a lot more to [the hit] than what we know, but Dale didn’t want to go into it a great deal. His role was to go out and stir things up. Dale really nailed him. Guys like Dale and Claude Lemieux, their teammates love them.

You know, not one of the 100 I talked to told me that they thought Todd Bertuzzi was a dirty player. All 100 said he broke the Code. He lost his emotion. Interesting when you think about the media coverage of that incident — all you saw was the replay, then we got the verdict. Again, the context of everything leading up to it — why was Moore on the ice then, what was said — all of this is absent the coverage.

– pucksandbooks: I was at Verizon Center the night the Caps retired Dale’s sweater. You know how they acknowledged him? They presented him with the penalty box from the Old Capital Centre. I thought that was great.

Ross Bernstein: That is great. I’m not positive about this, but I think the Bruins may have done the same thing with [Terry] O’Reilly. It was like, in your retirement, you may as well recline in your most comfortable perch.

pucksandbooks: ok, give me your five roughest, toughest glovedroppers in NHL history.

Ross Bernstein: Probert . . . [Tony] Twist . . . McSorley . . . I’ll tell you who I think is the toughest Mr. Hockeyof all time, and it’s not even close. Gordie. Pound for pound the toughest. And for me he’s the greatest ever overall. Better than Gretzky, and again, it’s not even close, not for me.

– pucksandbooks: I couldn’t agree more.

Ross Bernstein: Gordie took care of himself. Gretz had McSorley, and others, looking out for him. Gretz could never take care of himself. But Gordie . . . he had a prison mentality, a career with it. He’d shank the first day. A new guy’d show up and he’d pop him in the head with an elbow. That made space. Like taking candy from a baby. Gordie did it all. Crosby — great player, but the Pens had to go out and get [Eric] Cairns to protect him.

– pucksandbooks: and there’s talk of acquiring even more for him with an eye on the playoffs.

Ross Bernstein: Right!

pucksandbooks: OK, this last question is my most important one for you. Tell me your favorite scene from ‘Slapshot.’

Ross Bernstein: I was working on the [Hanson brothers'] book last summer — the whole thing blew up, trademarks and stuff. The movie’s a classic. Tell you a story. A true one. Dave Hanson’s most memorable fight. Absolutely true story. A lot of people don’t realize that those guys played in the big leagues. Well, one time, Dave had just got called up, and this night the gloves drop, everyone on the ice in the brawl. Just a keep-your-head-down, swing away kind of go-for-it melee. Guys throwing haymakers, hoping they land. Anyway, Dave’s partner was no less than Bobby Hull! And they’re going for it. This was in Chicago.

All of a sudden, the crowd goes silent. Dave’s still throwing but the rink is stone silent. He stops for a second and looks down at his hand. Bobby’s toupee was stuck to his knuckles! They both just skated away. Dave got death threats from it . . . the team bus was almost attacked, cause Bobby had been disrespected by Dave. They actually became friends over it, but I don’t think they talk about it much anymore (laughing).

But my favorite ‘Slapshot’ scene . . . has to be the race car scene. It’s a true story! They had an apartment when they went to one club and they actually brought that stuff along with them.

You know it’s the no. 2 rented VHS [of all time], behind ‘Animal House’ and ahead of ‘Caddyshack.’ It’s on every [hockey] bus, on a loop, from Vancouver to Prince Edward Island.

pucksandbooks: Ross, congratulations not just on the new book but on your insightful and impassioned contributions to hockey’s literature that date now a good many years. I am really looking forward to the new take on Frozen Memories. And I’m gonna make you the same offer I do my other interview subjects, on behalf of the OFB team, for sharing this time with me and our readers: if a book signing ever brings you to D.C., your puck sodas are on our tab.

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Posted at 6:55 am. Filed under Fighting, OFB Interviews, Washington Capitals.
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21 Comments

  1. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    First off, we need to link! :) Second, GREAT interview with Bernstein. He has been great with getting out there on the net and be willing to answer questions about the book. More anectodal evidence as to why fighting is so important in fighting. There is research out there that supports this too. Let’s just hope the GMs get it right and come up with some modifications for the instigator rule. There is just too much evidence out there that cannot be ignored.

    Tuesday, February 20, 2007 at 1:06 pm | Permalink
  2. Caps Nut wrote:

    Once I finish up with school in May, I’ll have to pick up this book and give it read.

    But here are a few points.

    #1. Fan rise as one and cheer for a fight no matter what sport it is in.

    http://capsnut.blogspot.com/2006/10/sarcasmwhat-are-these-guys-thinking.html

    #2. Why do you think NASCAR mandated the installation of restrictor plates, roof flaps on the cars, and HANS devices?

    But the bottom line remains that hockey STILL has fighting in it today which is why it hasn’t made any progress in shedding its image as a thug sport. However, there is not enough fighting today to satisfy the bloodthirsty Ultimate Fighting On Ice fans.

    However, we know what the “old time hockey” brings to the table in terms of revenues. I’ve been over this a million times myself and nobody has ever stepped up to the plate to confront it.

    BTW, nice typo/ Freudian slip there Sigafoose! LOL!

    Tuesday, February 20, 2007 at 2:56 pm | Permalink
  3. ThunderWeenie wrote:

    Caps Nut, I respectfully disagree. I think that the issue of fighting is a complete red herring, especially when it comes to hockey’s image problems in the United States.

    It seems to me that US audiences have no problem watching men in loincloths beat the holy poo out of each other on UFC (or, for that matter, in boxing, a sport which has very deep roots in America). But put the guys in pads and on skates, and suddenly it’s considered a “thug sport”? Sorry, but I don’t follow.

    I just don’t see how fighting can possibly be the stumbling block, not when violence is so omnipresent in the culture, and in forms far more graphic or disturbing than you would ever see in a hockey rink in a hundred years. Americans love violent entertainment and consume millions upon millions of dollars worth of it (as do Canadians, Europeans, and others). From this side of the border, it looks to me like Americans in general just don’t particularly like hockey.

    I think the explanation for that is fairly simple. If you didn’t grow up in the Northeast, or in Michigan, Wisconsin, or Minnesota, there’s a good chance that you have never put on skates in your life and that you don’t know a blue line from a blue bird.

    So, we’re supposed to be surprised when the Nashville Predators only average 14,000 per game in spite of being the best team in the NHL? We’re supposed to be surprised when the League can’t get a better US TV contract than Versus, a network almost no one has heard of?

    I think its obvious where I’m going with this.

    I am not a fan of, as you call it, Ultimate Fighting on Ice. I don’t support unrestrained thuggery (which is why I hope the NHL keeps the instigator rule in some form).

    But I respectfully submit that you could ban fighting from the game tomorrow, with 10-game suspensions for anyone whose gloves hit the ice, and it wouldn’t grow the US market for the game one iota. Florida Panthers and Nashville Predators games would not start selling out night after night. The US national TV contract would still not happen. The reality is that hockey has shallow roots in American society, and banning fights will not change that.

    US fans who do follow hockey (fans like yourself, Caps Nut) tend to be passionate and devoted, and I admire you for it. But it really seems to me that any American who might like the sport is probably already watching it. Outside of a few core markets, I think that it will remain a relatively marginal sport in the US whether it is “UFOI” or not.

    Lets fix the real problems of the game (shootouts, overexpansion, idiotic marketing practices, etc.), and stop being distracted by the fighting non-issue.

    ThunderWeenie

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 6:56 am | Permalink
  4. Meza wrote:

    ThunderWeenie that was a spot on remark. I think the NHL is horribly marketed. Basketball will tolerate brawls, football is thug central on and off the field. Fighting is the smallest of the NHL’s audience woes.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 8:54 am | Permalink
  5. pucksandbooks wrote:

    ThunderWeenie - I think we at OFB had the wrong guy interview Ross.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 9:27 am | Permalink
  6. Caps Nut wrote:

    The constraints of this comment board will preclude more details however:

    #1. The NFL has taken steps over the past few years to tone down their violence. I’ve covered this multiple times on my blog. Use the “UFOI Fans” tag to see more.

    #2. The NBA does NOT tolerate brawls. I don’t know where you get that from Meza. How many games did the Knicks-Nuggets brawl get? (BTW, was anybody in MSG booing during that?)

    #3. Boxing has been on the decline for years. Yes, corruption has a lot to do with it, but where are the athletes that used to gravitate towards the “sweet science”? My grandfather was interested in being a boxer until somebody punched him back.

    #4. UFC is growing by “leaps and bounds” but that is a bit of a misnomer because they’re nowhere near the numbers of an established sport to begin with. (They too BTW have cut down on the violence in their sport)

    I didn’t grow up in the Northeast, Michigan, or Minnesota. Yet I’m a big fan. I’ve taken friends who are big sports fans to begin with to games and most of them get turned off by the fighting and bloodshed. They’ll watch something like football, but hockey they won’t.

    Getting rid of fighting right away won’t change the NHL’s image overnight either because it didn’t get the reputation overnight either. As for our violent culture; there’s a difference between video game and movie violence and real life violence. Yeah, video games and movies may “desensitize” us and make certain people more prone to committing it, however it still seen as something beyond the pale when it happens in real life.

    Fighting isn’t hockey’s only problem. Like millions of kids in the U.S. I played soccer when I was young, yet soccer still can’t get a foothold in the U.S. Why? Well soccer has the same problem that hockey suffers from. Both are terrible sports to follow on TV. In soccer the frame is too wide to really see the players well. In hockey, the frame is too narrow to keep up with the puck.

    However, as I’ve said a million times, we know what the glorified 1970’s and 1980’s brought the NHL too and it wasn’t pretty. Despite what Don Cherry says, other sports are toning down the violence, why shouldn’t the NHL head in the same direction?

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 9:50 am | Permalink
  7. Thunderweenie wrote:

    Caps Nut,

    I could go on for pages, so maybe out of respect for everyone else here we’ll have to do this at length in another forum.

    But there is one point I feel I have to make here: I strongly disagree with your point on violence in the culture, particularly your argument about fantasy violence versus real violence.

    Real violence makes real money, too. I don’t just mean UFC–look at all that grisly “true crime” stuff, truly brutal fight videos on YouTube, “America’s Worst Car Crashes”, guys getting punched in the nads on America’s Funniest Videos (admit it, you laugh at that!), etc. etc. etc. Violence sells, and it sells big time.

    But, in spite of all that, Americans are completely repulsed by a 30-second fisticuff between two guys in pads and on skatesâ€â€-something which by no means happens in every hockey game?

    Sorry, but to me, it just doesn’t square.

    I’m not looking wistfully back at the goon hockey of the 70s as the glory days, not by any stretch. I just think that the focus on fighting is misplaced, and obscures the real problems that hockey has in the United States.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 12:28 pm | Permalink
  8. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    Thunderweenie… don’t mind Capsnut. After he tried to slander my name on his blog without knowing anything about me, I dug through mountains of his blog entries (he does not openly offer an email address or his name on his blog) to finally come up with an email address to invite him to a debate. He accepted, but eventually, the back-and-forth emails yielded little progress and Capsnut continued flinging insults… this from an anti-fight supporter. His characterization of UFOI fans tells you all you need to know about him. Simply put, if you think that fighting belongs in hockey, you fall under his definition of a UFOI fan… that’s right, Brett Hull, Wayne Gretzky, and Steve Yzerman are all UFOI fans to Capsnut. What he won’t admit, however, is that there is no right or wrong answer to this age old debate that has a dividing line as thick and as dark as one gets… there are only opinions. After our debate went nowhere and he resorted to name calling, I offered to agree to disagree on the matter. That is the best you can do in a situation when both sides are not budging on their opinion. He proceeded to go on his blog and post lies about our debate (I can share our emails if you would like to verify any of this). Again, this from an anti-hockey fight supporter.

    Here are the facts about fighting in the NHL. Published research, from the American Journal of Economics and Sociology, display that fighting is more highly correlated with attendance than scoring is. The NHLPA approaches the owners EVERY year about removing the instigator rule… that is the players that want the instigator removed. In a recent CBC poll, 82% of hockey fans said they want the instigator removed completely. The majority of anecdotal evidence overwhelmingly supports hockey fights. The recent move by the NHL GMs to increase the number of instigators to five before a suspension displays that even the NHL is finally coming around to the notion. I can only point to one incident where a players career was cut way too short because of fighting (Trevor Halverson)… the same cannot be said for other elements that occur in the game that cause way more harm to players.

    Hockey fans, like Capsnut, would rather sacrifice the success of hockey for their own personal preference. There is a style of game that fits their preferences well… European hockey. If that is what he wants, that is what he should watch. The overwhelming majority of hockey fans, especially American hockey fans, completely disagree with him. But like a good anti-hockey fight supporter, he’ll fight back and flail his arms like a cornered red-headed step child.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 12:48 pm | Permalink
  9. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    And since the NHL has tried to clean up its violence, it lost a major t.v. contract and now sits on a pseudo-sports station. And other hockey games out there draw ratings that barely measure on Neilson. Wasn’t it a professional lacrosse game that outdrew two combined NHL games a few weeks back? Wasn’t it the NHL All-Star game that had a mere 450,000 viewers watch the game. At the same time, UFC now sits firmly on a major cable t.v. station… odd.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 12:56 pm | Permalink
  10. Caps Nut wrote:

    “Here are the facts about fighting in the NHL. Published research, from the American Journal of Economics and Sociology, display that fighting is more highly correlated with attendance than scoring is.”

    Which explains why Nashville and Anaheim (the two teams with the most fighting majors) are 23rd and 20th in overall attendence.

    Thanks for playing now please let the adults have a conservation.

    Thunderweenie.

    I don’t dispute that violence sells. But look at the NFL, they’re going in the other direction. No more hits to the heads of players.

    UFC did away with stomping on a guy on the ground and shots to the gonads.

    Hades, look at what happened to Jerry Springer. A great rise to super stardom then people above him started cracking down on his show. Why? Because unless you are some kind of sociopath, you know that stuff is wrong.

    Jerry Springer is now back to its bad old self but who is paying attention to it anymore?

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 2:34 pm | Permalink
  11. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    The above statement is exactly why our debate ended. Capsnut has just tried to strike published research by replying with two examples that are not in line with the research. This line of thinking is completely inaccurate and, even more so, it is inexcusable. Do you know any good old wives tales while you are at it? I don’t know about you, but I research for a living. And I know that any piece of research that is published in a major journal has to go through an extensive review process. It’s a good thing you don’t sit on any of these boards/panels because nothing would get published no matter how extensive and valid the research was. I mean, how could that research be valid when there are a handful of examples, in your eyes, that can rip down years of sound statistics? Pretty smart… keep it up.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 3:04 pm | Permalink
  12. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    BTW… would you care to enlighten everyone on your theory about why the NHL would benefit from more Olympic style play? Because, as you said, if Olympic hockey is so successful, why wouldn’t that success translate to the NHL? Feel free to disregard, as you did before, the elements of national pride and that the games are played by the world’s best players once every four years. Feel free, as you did before, to chalk it all up to the style of play and the lack of fighting.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 3:18 pm | Permalink
  13. The OFB Team wrote:

    At OFB, we love comments and debate … respectful comments and debate. We want to foster dialogue that will make all feel wanted, even if they have differing views from us or each other.

    With that being said, we follow the comments left carefully and will not hesitate to edit or remove comments that are found to be impolite, disrespectful, and/or intimidating.

    We have a comment policy you can read here and will amend the policy as is warranted.

    We hope you not only understand our position, but respect and abide by it.

    Thank you.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 3:19 pm | Permalink
  14. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    Beautiful… I haven’t checked to see if you have edited my comments, but feel free to if they are out of line. This is a perfect forum for debate as your rules prohibit name calling and attacking unlike certain others’ blogs and email interactions. I would enjoy continuing on with the debate and will be resepectful of your policies. Personally I am just happy that you allow comments on your blog… again, certain others mysteriously do not.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 3:32 pm | Permalink
  15. Thunderweenie wrote:

    CapsNut,

    I think we’ve pretty much beaten this subject to death (so to speak).

    My last word on the subject: even without the aforementioned stomps and gonad-shots, the most subdued UFC bout still makes the NHL look like a day at kindergarten.

    It therefore makes no sense to me whatsoever to argue that fighting is somehow a barrier to the NHL’s popularity in the US. I just don’t see any convincing evidence of that, not when you look at the wider context of the culture.

    As I said in my first post, the fighting issue is a red herring. Fans should be much more concerned about issues like overexpansion, moronic marketing, high ticket prices, and terrible scheduling. Those, I think, are among the things that are really ruining the game.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 3:42 pm | Permalink
  16. Caps Nut wrote:

    Thunderweenie.

    I’ve covered a lot of this ground over at my blog. You’re right, fighting isn’t the only problem the NHL has. It however is the biggest albatross hanging around its neck. Just click on my name at the top to get there and look around.

    The point about UFC outlawing certain tactics wasn’t well explained because I was in a rush on that last comment. However, the UFC had plateaued and was losing ground when they stepped in and “cleaned it up.” It got rid of those two things and took off again.

    Now I don’t deny that UFC is growing, but how far is it really going and can it sustain its growth rate and hold onto those new viewers? Only time will tell. But I would be willing to bet that it gets no further than professional wrestling.

    We know what fighting in the NHL brings in terms of revenues. I don’t need “peer reviewed” journal articles and unscientific polls to tell me otherwise. The facts are facts and they are indisputable. What is the harm in going the direction that other professional sports are and seeing what happens with the NHL?

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 4:00 pm | Permalink
  17. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    Again, I think we covered that the NHL HAS tried that. And as fighting has decreased (it was cut in half last year and is down another 40% this year), so have t.v. ratings… and what did that lead to? Bye bye ESPN ($600 million) and hello Versus ($75 million). And what has it led to on other stations? Oh yes… solid .01 and .02 ratings. And what has the UFC been doing in the mean time? Placing themselves on a solid cable provider in Spike T.V.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 4:09 pm | Permalink
  18. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    And everyone is still waiting on the solid Olympics arguement… that is a real eye opener on the lack of importance that national pride plays in the success of the Olympics in general.

    Wednesday, February 21, 2007 at 4:11 pm | Permalink
  19. spark wrote:

    Fans should be much more concerned about issues like overexpansion, moronic marketing, high ticket prices, and terrible scheduling. Those, I think, are among the things that are really ruining the game.

    Indeed on everything except for the supposed effects on the “game”. The game of hockey is fine, maybe even better than that - it’s hockey as a business that is suffering. Save for the largest markets hockey as a business should just give up trying to crack the south. There simply is not the “tradition”, or connection with ice and snow, that Northern markets have. If the NHL was smart it would somehow consolidate with Europe, maybe replicate in some form the way club and league football/soccer is done over there.

    More or less fighting is not the answer to fixing hockey as a business. Connecting with cultural “truths” of lands that actually hibernate is the key. In the same way that American Football connects with American cultural truths of celebrity, specialized labour, showmanship, etc… or basketball that is all about the individual, hockey with its “code” is in part about protection, intimidation and retribution. These are social attributes, they imply and necessitate a form of community. It goes beyond just teamwork, it speaks a kind of tribalism that even in this modern age is fundamental to survival - mental survival if nothing else - during the months of quas-hibernation. That cannot be known by the south on a deep level, ever.

    That’s what cold lands have going for them, and it’s something that all hockey, business and otherwise, should embrace. Hyping stars as part of a business model is fine, but that only goes so far in the land of reserved and staid Swedes & Finns, polite Canucks, communitarianish Russians and Socialist central Europe. There is a culture barrier, and just like NFL Europe there really is a futility in trying to push something in a place that just ain’t buying. It’s not “Go West, young man”, it’s “Go East, and North, Bett-man”.

    Okay, I’ll shut up now.

    Thursday, February 22, 2007 at 12:50 am | Permalink
  20. Gustafsson wrote:

    From Al Strachan in a special to FoxSports.com titled “As usual, a brawl brings attention to hockey”:

    There are those who will decry all this. There are also those who say that fighting must be taken out of the game. But as old-time coach Glen Sonmor once said after a few fight-filled matches, “If we don’t stop this fighting, we’re going to have to build bigger rinks.” It’s worth noting that during the Senators’ telecast, the home-town announcers wasted no time mentioning that the two teams would be staging a rematch Saturday night in Ottawa and that tickets were still available.

    After the Thursday night brawl, the Senators can count on a sellout because the inescapable fact is that hockey fans love the fighting.

    There are plenty of people in the world who don’t and who never tire of telling the NHL that it has to ban fighting. Even Canada”s national newspaper, The Globe and Mail, had an editorial to that effect a few days ago.

    But for the most part, the people who want to ban fighting aren’t hockey fans. As a result, hockey people say, not unreasonably. “Why should we ban fighting? Those people don’t come to games anyway.”

    Would those people become hockey fans if there were no fighting? Perhaps. Perhaps not.

    But this much hockey people know. The sport never gets as much attention as it does when there’s a good scrap.

    And you know what they say in the sports business  there’s no such thing as bad publicity, only degrees of good publicity.

    Friday, February 23, 2007 at 10:00 pm | Permalink
  21. Matt Sigafoose wrote:

    Bleatings… everyone is still waiting for you to make commenting a feature on your blog, give your name, or email address. You are a coward for once, once again, slandering other people’s names on your blog and not even being man enough to leave any sort of identifying information about yourself.

    Sunday, February 25, 2007 at 12:09 pm | Permalink

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