Ice Guardians Page #12

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the easy one, right?

It's just a lazy story.

"Fights make concussions."

The game makes concussions.

I think Sidney Crosby has had more...

concussions than I have

and I fight...

10 to 20 times a year.

So, I mean...

he's had more concussions than me.

We have a list of, uh...

About 40 NHLers for example.

Who have had to retire

because of concussions.

On that list,

the minority are enforcers.

So I don't think we can say yet...

Whether the enforcer is

particularly vulnerable

But certainly, they are vulnerable.

It's not limited to hockey.

We see obviously in football

the great problem that

we have with that.

And there's no fighting

in that element of the game.

But it's much harder to

look at a game where

the violence is sort of

spread throughout

and find fault with that

than it is to sort of look at hockey,

which is a classic scapegoat here,

because we're actually

saying, "It's the fight"...

when in reality... it's the contact.

It's the element of the sport.

The reason logic can't be used

is because it's money.

It's big, big business.

Otherwise the NFL

would have to stop playing.

The... tremendous strides

that they've been able to

produce better equipment

has caused a lot of this.

Some of the equipment

has really gone overboard.

For example, the elbow pads

and the shoulder pads.

You can go to f***in' war

in those things.

You can launch yourself at full speed

and hit somebody in the head with 'em.

Shoulder pads have become

"knockout pads."

That's ridiculous.

Shoulder pads are meant

to protect the wearer,

not to knock out the opponent.

Yeah, sure, it's great

you're not getting hurt

y'know, from your neck down

but, y'know, the one thing

that you really can't protect...

is your head.

Go into the corner at...

y'know, 30 miles an hour

and aren't worried about

bracing themselves,

they just kinda throw

themselves cannonball-style

into somebody.

So it's this, uh.. kind of

counterintuitive argument

that the equipment has

actually gotten so good

that it's dangerous for players.

There's not the same amount

of stories written about,

"Why don't we change equipment?"

If they did look at it properly,

they would have already

got rid of the shoulder pads.

Because if you wore

the shoulder pads that

Chris Chelios or... myself,

Brendan Shanahan wore,

you'd never throw a body check again.

Because you're -

It hurts!

There's also that need

to get the player out

and playing again.

And that kind of tendency

to sort of push the player

to be ready.

And no hockey

player is ever gonna tell you

that they're not ready

because they want to be out there,

they want to be performing again.

That is where the most damage comes.

Is where you get one concussion...

And maybe not even

know that it's a concussion,

you just "get your bell rung"

but then, soon after,

and before you're recovered,

you get that second one.

Unless you do take the time

to allow recovery...

If you allow that vulnerable

brain to be hit again

It can cause catastrophic results.

For example, Sidney Crosby.

He was allowed to continue playing

after his first concussion

and then, when the

second one came along,

a couple of days later,

he was then out for a year.

In fact some people

thought he might never get back

but he did ultimately come back.

He was smart enough to stay away

until he was fully recovered

but that took a year in his case.

I'm not happy to be watchin' or

to be dealin' with this, but

I've got a pretty good idea

of things now

and know this is, not where I was before

so, that's, that's an encouraging part.

We can't see the physical,

and sort of psychological

aspects of a concussion

so it makes it sort of seem like

the person is just sort of wimping out

and isn't sort of, "tough

enough" to deal with the sport.

Whereas actually, we need to be

able to understand the injury

and the length of time

it takes to recover.

And I think they're doing that now.

These, these assessments now

for a player who is groggy,

who, who has taken a severe, um... hit.

Before, y' just... smelling salts

and you're back out there again.

Certainly

the responsibility of the leagues

and the unions and the players

to... make these games

as safe as possible

but at the end of the day that's...

Exactly why they are... what they are.

They're contact and collision sports

where people have

the possibility of getting hurt.

We have discussions about

how we could eliminate

all concussions in hockey.

Impossible.

We are going to have

the risk of concussion.

We'll never get rid of all of them

but we have to minimize the risk.

One of the ways to save the game

is to get rid of the enforcers.

Every single rule change

comes with unintended consequences

and... that is a major,

major effect on the game.

If you... take out fighting,

you could be opening the game up for...

Those guys that run each other,

the guys that y'know, throw

their shoulders first into chins

and, uh, y'know, are willing

to take that 2, 5, 10 game ban

to knock out, y'know, the best

player on the other team.

One thing that I've always,

y'know, wondered.

If I handed the NHL rulebook

to a doctor,

and said, "Here, re-write this

so you'll be happy,"

what would the game look like?

I'm willin' to bet that

there was less concussions

in the '80s and '90s

than there are right now.

Now, certainly we know

there was less documented.

Because we didn't run at guys

the way they do.

We didn't...

We didn't run at Sidney Crosby

and Steven Stamkos.

The National Hockey League

took a dramatic turn in the fighting

that was taking place

when they, when they put

in the instigator rule.

Normally, if something happened

right there in front of you,

one of your teammates

would take care of business

right there on the spot.

What a chance! And another shot!

And Tarasenko is drilled

back of the goal by Clifford.

And Bortuzzo goes after him

...and here we go.

Usually they got five minutes

for fighting... either way.

No matter how many punches you threw

before th'other guy threw a punch.

It was usually a wash.

With the instigator rule,

if the ref deemed that you

threw the first punch illegally,

or you went in there

and you shouldn't have,

he would give you 'two for instigating,'

5 minutes for fighting and

a 10 minute misconduct.

Which puts you down for 17 but

your team down for an extra 2.

That's the difference between

winning and losing games

It was applied to the wrong person.

By that I mean,

If one of the opposition

runs one of my teammates

like Bob Clarke

and tries to drive his head

into the boards

and I...

Go over there... to try

and straighten him out,

I get the instigator.

Personally...

Wouldn't ya think the guy

that just ran Bob Clarke,

tried to run'im through the boards,

is the instigator?

You could still run all these

players, y'know, into the boards

n'give 'em concussions, whatever!

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