Hitting in the NHL
Scotty Bowman has a regular call-in appearance on a Toronto radio program. His comments this morning were pretty insightful regarding hitting and injuries.
I am paraphrasing what he said, but his feeling is that players have become less aware of what is going on around them due to the game being more open with the new rules. The crackdown on obstruction has allowed them to skate freely and as a result they have become less cautious about protecting themselves. He said that when he first came into the league as a coach he emphasized getting players to keep their head up.
It’s an interesting perspective. If the league wants to have a more open game, players are going to adapt by punishing puckhandlers, much like a free safety punishes a receiver coming across the middle of the football field and stretching out to catch a pass. Heck, even in cases like the Mike Knuble and Brendan Shanahan collision, the impact had nothing to do with the puck; the players were moving at a high rate of speed and never saw one another. There was no intent to hit, much less injure in either player’s case.
That doesn’t excuse late hits like Cam Janssen’s hit on Thomas Kaberle. But it does indicate there are ramifications the league might not have anticipated in their quest to open up the game.
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