While some physical contact will always be accepted, I don't think there should be any deliberate hitting or body checking allowed at any level of hockey including the NHL, and so deliberately body checking or hitting other players should be banned.
Outline
- Hitting Is Barbaric
- Hitting Is Unhealthy
- If It's Bad For Kids It's Bad For Adults
- More Protection Only Makes People Think They Can Hit Harder
- Players Skate Way Faster Than They Used To
- Intelligent And Talented Athletes Will Choose Not To Play Hockey
- Hitting Causes More Injuries And Is As Harmful As Fighting
- Fighting Would Not Be Needed If Hitting Was Removed
- There Is More Talk About Concussions And Suspensions Than The Game
- Hitting And Fighting Are Psychologically Unhealthy Too
Introduction
Being able to deliberately hit someone as hard as you can should be completely taken out of hockey at all levels. In fact I think this idea is way overdue. To me, it's almost like stating the obvious at this point. I'm surprised I haven't heard more people suggest that body checking should be completely removed from hockey. Here's why.
1. Hitting Is Barbaric
Physically hitting someone else when you can hurt them is both barbaric and cruel. I just looked up the definition for cruel and the first definition said "willfully or knowingly causing pain or distress to others." To me, it's pretty clear that you are knowingly causing distress to someone when you hit them in any way. But I don't care what the definition is, it just doesn't seem right to me to hit someone else. I don't care if it's part of a sport, or if they've agreed as part of the game to let them hit you. It's just not civilized to hit someone else in my opinion. To me, it doesn't really matter if it's your wife, a co-worker, a friend, or someone you play a game against for money. Hitting people is bad. Boxing is barbaric. Football is barbaric. Hockey is barbaric. The more we can move to a society where hurting other people for sport is not accepted, the better off we are in my opinion. In boxing and football, it's hard to get around the idea that you have to hit someone, but hockey could completely remove hitting, and still keep the main part of the game as it is. There is no reason hitting can't be completely removed from NHL hockey.
2. Hitting Is Unhealthy
It's quite clear that hitting in hockey is unhealthy. It's just bad for our bodies. I don't think we needed all the talk and reports about concussions recently to realize this. Broken shoulders, broken legs, damaged internal organs, and various other serious injuries over the years should have been enough. But with more and more reports about concussions it has certainly been making the point better known. I'm actually writing this point last out of these 10 points, as I was thinking of what to say to make people realize how bad that hitting is in hockey. But I don't really want to go research to make as strong of a point as I should. But I do think it's pretty obvious that concussions are bad, and hitting is bad. Enough said hopefully as I think it's pretty obvious at this point how harmful hitting in hockey is, whether you are a kid or an adult.
3. If It's Bad For Kids It's Bad For Adults
The debate I've most often heard so far about hitting in hockey is at what age level body checking should be allowed for kids. Though I'm sure it's been brought up, I haven't heard that much about completely removing hitting from hockey. But while we may like harming our bodies or feel we need to relieve stress in certain harmful ways as adults, it doesn't mean it's healthy. And what is bad for kids is generally bad for adults. Of course this can turn into a much bigger topic about whether people should be able to do things to their bodies even if it's harmful. But hockey is a sport, not mainly a stress reliever like smoking, drinking, or doing drugs. It should be fun. Instead of trying to figure out what age we allow kids to harm themselves by hitting each other as part of a sport, we should take it out of the sport altogether. It solves the debate of what age kids should be allowed to hit, and instead admits that hitting is harmful for anyone at any age and has no place in a fun sport like hockey.
4. More Protection Only Makes People Think They Can Hit Harder
"Back in the day when I used to play hockey in the 1940s, we didn't hit as hard as the guys nowadays". I'm sure some smart old guy without a big ego has said that. And do you know why he's said it? Because he didn't wear a helmet or nearly as much equipment or protection as hockey players do now. If you didn't have a helmet then you have to protect your head. If you don't have on three inches thick of plastic and padding on, then you have to think about how hitting someone as hard as you can will affect your body as well. The problem is that even though players have more protection, the impact is still great on their bodies. Players are less likely to get cuts or small injuries, but even with all of the equipment they wear they are still very likely to suffer a concussion, a neck injury, a broken shoulder, or a broken leg by being hit hard. This can occur when they hit the other player, hit the ice, or get hit into the boards. And when an impact does make it through a chink in their armour it can cause horrible injuries because the plastic and metal protection for one guy turns into a brute force object hitting the other guy if it makes it through his equipment.
5. Players Skate Way Faster Than They Used To
Besides having more protection now, players are also in better physical shape. They can skate faster than they used to and are stronger physically. It's bad enough to run as fast as you can into someone and hit them, such as in football. But when you are skating you can go at even faster speeds than two linemen hitting each other in football. And because players are now skating at even faster speeds and are much stronger than they used to be the result it pretty damaging. When two players are skating as fast as they can now and hit each other as hard as they can, which is completely within the rules, the impact is very big. And the damage is way worse than in the past and worse than we could have realized when the sport was first created.
6. Intelligent And Talented Athletes Will Choose Not To Play Hockey
Athletes aren't all stupid, and athlete's parents aren't stupid either. Hockey was already a rough sport to play 20 years ago as fighting is pretty much allowed, and often encouraged. Plenty of parents kept their kids from playing hockey. But with all the attention given to concussions and how unhealthy it is in the last few years, more and more parents should and will stop their kids from playing hockey; at least from playing hockey at any level with body checking. And more and more kids may even realize in their teens that they should maybe choose soccer, or baseball, or basketball over hockey when all they see in the media is their favourite player sitting out again with a concussion.
7. Hitting Causes More Injuries And Is As Harmful As Fighting
I personally feel that taking hitting out of hockey is way more important than taking out fighting. If two guys want to fight, whether it's on the street or in a hockey rink they will. It can even be banned and it will still sometimes happen. But hitting probably causes more injuries and affects every single person that plays the game. You can't avoid it, as every time you are out on the ice five other guys are allowed to hit you as hard as they can to take the puck away from you. There has been so much talk about fighting in hockey in the past. But I think removing hitting from hockey is much more important as it causes more injuries and doesn't just happen once in awhile, but constantly as part of the game.
8. Fighting Would Not Be Needed If Hitting Was Removed
Fights can happen sometimes even in sports even when there is no physical contact. I mean, I'm sure we've all had one or two bowling games where things got out of hand. But I think the main reason fighting is popular in hockey is because there is hitting in hockey. Fighting is just a balancing act, mostly because hitting another person is allowed in the game. It's legal. I understand that people can jab someone with a stick and get away with it too. But that is against the rules, and the guy should get a penalty. Hitting is legal, so you are allowed to hit someone as hard as you can, even if it's the other teams best player. And you do it all the time. Because of this, the talented players have needed to be "protected". But if hitting was removed, I think the need and desire to fight in hockey would go down dramatically.
9. There Is More Talk About Concussions And Suspensions Than The Game
Unneeded media stories about player's personal lives and the finance and business side of hockey are inevitable. They detract from the game sometimes and there is too much talk about both of them in the media. I don't think that will ever change as the media needs any stories they can find. But the amount of media attention and talk about concussions recently has reached a pretty high level. The first story in the hockey news always seems to be about what great player is out because of a concussion whether it's Eric Lindros, Paul Kariya, or Sidney Crosby. If it's not that, it's about showing the three big hits from five different angles where a guy got hurt. And if it's not about that, it's about a hit that they aren't sure should be legal or a talk about if the guy should be suspended, and how many games. What's the common theme with those three types of stories? It's all about hitting in hockey, and nothing to do with the score in the game, or the skillful plays in the game.
10. Hitting And Fighting Are Psychologically Unhealthy Too
Harming our bodies physically is unhealthy psychologically and causes us emotional and mental stress. I don't know that the previous sentence is a fact as I sit here and I never actually remember reading this specifically but I'm pretty sure it's true. Go look it up somewhere and I'm sure you'll find articles by doctors about how hurting our body physically isn't good for our minds either. Do a search for torture and mind, or cutting and emotions, or boxing and stress. In just one offseason, a number of hockey players who were known as enforcers committed suicide. This is one possible example of the mental stress that hitting and fighting can cause in hockey. I'm not going to look for more proof now, but I think we all just know naturally that hurting our bodies physically or having to do something that hurts our bodies physically can cause us quite a bit of stress and affect us poorly, mentally and psychologically. When you know you are going to be hit every day it can be tough on you psychologically, whether you are a boxer, a football player, or a hockey player.
Conclusion
I played hockey competitively until I was about 21 and enjoyed it. It's fun. But as I've grown older I've realized that the hitting and fighting parts of the game have just been accepted, but it doesn't mean that allowing them is best for everyone. Looking back at these points, I think I'd have to say that the first two points are certainly the most convincing in my mind and really all that needs to be said. Why do we think it's ok to hurt other people and to do something to our bodies that's completely unhealthy just because we call it a sport and people pay to watch it? Whether enough people would watch the game without hitting and fighting is another debate, and I've decided to focus this article not on that aspect of the debate at all and just think about what is best, healthy, and civilized. Hitting in hockey needs to go. I'm pretty sure that its part in the game will be questioned and debated more in the coming years.
May 13, 2012
