In The Dog House
by Steven Ratson
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Kramer, you’re banned! I’m banned? Yeah, that’s right, banned!
February 14, 2010 -
The tradition of Festivus begins with the Airing of Grievances!
January 27, 2010 -
Oh, it's got cachet, baby! It's got cachet up the ying-yang!
January 9, 2010
The tradition of Festivus begins with the Airing of Grievances!
Author: Steven Ratson
January 27, 2010
As Tevya crooned in Fiddler on the Roof, and Don Cherry evangelizes on Coach’s Corner, fighting in hockey is tradition, and you don’t mess with tradition. Now, I’m about as old fashioned as they come, and many a day have a case of the “good ‘ole days syndrome” myself, but, I am starting to actually think that enough is enough already!
With the deplorable flagrant head hunting incidents in junior hockey that have gone on the past few years, I think the “respect for the game” message is not sinking in to “our heroes”! Every time I travel to the States the inevitable conversation comes up about hockey, and of course I am not surprised to hear the average American sports fan passes our game off as not much more than major league roller derby due to the glorification of the game’s barbaric tradition of fighting.
Yes, I said it, for once I have decided to take a stand as I’ve come to the realization that change can in fact be a very good thing, take for instance, my ex-wife’s fancy for engaging in an affair that led to the breakup of our family and the eventual release from prison that was my marriage to her, as I now have never been happier, but I digress.
As I should have given myself a slap upside the head for continuing to put up with in excess of 22 years of emotional abuse by what I thought was my soul mate, and had come to the realization that “if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got”, I could have saved myself years earlier! I know, how could I have not, but, after all, I wanted to keep with “tradition”, you know, fidelity and all that sort of old time family value stuff.
OK, after that little personal diatribe of mine, just for professional literary illustration purposes of course, I can now bring us back to the phenomena of violence and fighting that have prevented the game to grow in the US still after even more than, let’s use for example, a period of 22 years. The acceptance of hockey into the mainstream of the American sports culture is where the future is; is where the fan base is; and is where the dollars will be.
The American market; and European for that matter as well, represent the financial future for our national sport. Outside of the few traditional solid hockey markets in the US, the attendance, the financial state of many teams, and of course the absence of a national major television contract, does not make for a very bullish prospectus for the NHL.
You can’t sell any more tickets to the NHL games in Canada, CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada is not a staple on the television sets south of the border as is Sunday Night Football {and even women’s college basketball for gosh sakes}, and I can’t even stomach to watch TSN coverage of the NHL with those obnoxious analysts and “insiders”. So, if the game is going to grow, as players salaries are not coming down any further, the game has to appeal to the non-traditional hockey fan, who ridicules the game for the omnipresent psychotic intent to injure with cowardly hits from behind and to the head by angry rich young men, and of course, the old tradition of fighting, that in the eyes of our friends to the south, is perceived as being more akin to that of the MMA.
The useless suspensions that do not serve as a deterrent to these punk thugs for their transgressions, warnings by both the diminutive NHL commissioner and the pleasant and polite Hockey Canada Executive Director, the messages on respect for the game, and the political self-serving think tank sessions hosted by the governors and general managers, well, here’s a newsflash, they ain’t workin fellas!
If you don’t make dust, you eat dust! If you want to preserve the game, you have to grow the game. Enough with the violence, enough with the fighting, enough with tradition, it is “finally” time for a change. I love Grapes, but like Tevya, you sometimes have to separate love from tradition, because, as was the case in my marriage, love was just simply not enough. And tradition alone, well, sometimes it’s just not worth holding on to!
Posted by TK West on 2010-02-01 14:05:11
Grow up, find something challenging to write about. What you cleary don't understand is that Don sticks up for RESPECT and FIGHTING b/c they go hand-in-hand. And if you don't understand that they go hand-in-hand then you've never played the game at a level worth discussing. When has he ever promoted head shots or bullies? Never. In reference to ticket sales, the Bruins were President's Trophy runner-ups (2nd place in NHL regular season) in 2008/09. However, their attendance was only ranked 16th, that's in the lower half of the entire league. You best believe that if the Bruins had another Milan Lucic they would have undoubtably been in the top 10 for league attendance. Comparing NHL to MMA is irresponsible. Take out the instiagtor rule, bring back the RESPECT through the fear of having to answer for your actions toe-to-toe. You'll qucikly see less gutless acts on the stars and farless head shots and hits from behind in general. You don't have to go back in time to the 70's Slap Shot era, but more like in the mid-80's & 90's when hockey was special all over.