Hockey's Back!!!

[bubba]

Just to change the tempo a bit, there are some Canadians who are not big hockey fans. This being said by a boy from Gordie Howe's home town. Go figure,eh!

Well Casey, lots of us nonfans in the States too. To me Hockey just looks like a bar brawl on ice.

[Jimmy Carbomb]

Thanks for the links and the information Colin! I've done my best to keep out of the hockey loop for the last year. It only makes it tougher. I guess it's time to get myself revved-up again?

As for the Crosby kid... NO PRESSURE THERE!

First Mario was "The Next One".

Then it was Mush-head... I mean Lindros.

Then, to a lesser extend, it was Vinny Lecavalier.

Now this guy.

Suppose he's from a virgin birth?

[bear]

Here's what Naslund thinks about Moore and about the hits. He didn't call the hit dirty because he knows its part of the game. Look at his face in the pic. You don't get scars like that from a clean hit!
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=115695
Naslund says even Moore's teammates don't give him a lot of support.
"I'm not saying what (Bertuzzi did) was right. But if it was me, I'd be doing everything I could to get back and play and show everyone the character I have . . . instead of trying to sue everyone."
Naslund didn't whine about the concussion, even though he only scored 2 goals in the next 14 games. Keep in mind he was the league scoring leader before the Moore hit.
He took the injury with class, missed a few games, and played through a difficult injury. He stuck with the unwritten code and didn't publicly call the hit dirty.

[KMacT]

Here's what Naslund thinks about Moore and about the hits. He didn't call the hit dirty because he knows its part of the game.

These are odd sentances to be placed side by side. They might suggest that Nasland said something about why he didn't call it a dirty hit. But what Naslund was commenting about in the article you mentiuoned was the lawsuit Moore commenced against Bertuzzi and others. A couple of days ago you said that you didn't know why Naslund didn't call the hit dirty. Now you say you know why. Either you have acquired knowledge in the interim (please feel free to share it with us), or one of your statements is simply wrong.

Look at his face in the pic. You don't get scars like that from a clean hit!
http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/news_story.asp?id=115695

Yes, you certainly can get 10 stitches from a clean hit. Absolutely. No question. It happens regularly. Not uncommon occurance in the NHL. In fact, you can even get ten stitches without being hit at all. To suggest that those stitches, or even the fact of a concussion, must lead to the conclusion that the hit was dirty is simply unsupportable.

Naslund says even Moore's teammates don't give him a lot of support.

"Naslund says." This would be a lot more persuasive if you actually quoted from one or more of Moore's teammates. "Naslund says." Really? Well, it must be true. He can't have any other agenda, can he?

"I'm not saying what (Bertuzzi did) was right. But if it was me, I'd be doing everything I could to get back and play and show everyone the character I have . . . instead of trying to sue everyone."

In law there are limitation periods. Lawsuits must be commenced within a certain number of days after an event or they cannot be commenced at all. My understanding from the media is that Morre was facing such a limitatation period and needed to commence his lawsuit when he did or he would be prevented from doing so ever.

But regardless of that, it doesn't take the intellect of Marcus Naslund to conclude that Moore is suing Bertuzzi in order to get money. Well, duh! I think we all knew that. The *reality* is that Moore is unable to work at a job with a *minimum salary of $450,000 per year as a direct rersult of Bertuzzi's self-described assault on him. Is it so unreasonable that he consider the possibility that Bertuzzi might compensate him for that?

And finally, hiring lawyers to sue someone and "doing everything I could to get back and play" are not mutually exclusive, as Naslund in his wisdom suggests. Moore can do both, and by all accounts he is doing both.

Naslund didn't whine about the concussion...He stuck with the unwritten code and didn't publicly call the hit dirty.

No, he just whines about the lawsuit. And why might that be? Because he a defendent in the lawsuit, maybe? As for the unwritten code, oh for goodness sake I wish I had a dollar for everytime some trotted out the unwritten code! If there is such a code, it is often observed in the breach because. There are many many many examples of players saying a hit deserved a penalty or was dirty or that another player is dirty. If there is an unwritten code, then maybe it should be written down and distributed to the players.

Kevin

[KMacT]

Bear,

This exchange will get somewhat lengthy so I'll quote only the parts necessary for my reply. And regardless, the system is only quoting your comments and not my previous onces, so for the history other readers will need to look at previous posts.

There have always been goons that were on the roster for their fighting talent more than their hockey talent. Beliveau was protected by Ferguson, the most feared man in the league.

Certainly Ferguson was not a highly skilled player such as Beliveau was, but few people were. But was Ferguson a goon? Certainly not. Ferguson brought toughness to the Canadiens, but he could play the game. During his NHL career in all but one season he never failed to score at least 15 goals. One year he scored 29 goals. He was twice an All-Star. Ferguson scored 89 goals in his first five seasons in the league. Compare Ferguson with Donald Brashear, Vancouver's goon. In Brashear's 12 NHL seasons he scored a total of 69 goals, far less than Ferguson accomplished in his first five seasons. In Vancouver Brashear never scored more than 11 goals in any one year - the *lowest* goal tally for Ferguson. Brashear has never played in an All-Star game. Brashear brought little to the game other than his fists. Ferguson could play. One was a goon, and it wasn't Ferguson.

All players are afraid of a fight, even the goons. And every fight has injuries, either to the hands or the face. The abs are also injured, due to the jockeying for a good punch while clinching.

Maybe there are some players that are afraid to fight, but very very few. It's difficult to get a firm footing when fighting on skates. You just don't get the same leverage as when on dry ground. Give me a hockey fight any day over a street fight. Hockey players are *not* afriad to get hurt in a fight. Sure, they get their knuckles smashed or hurt their wrist, get cut or a black eye, but these are nothing compared to real hockey injuries. What hockey players fear is getting their knees blown out, or taking a spear, or a cross check to the face, or boarding. These can cause real injuries. But to say "all players are afraid to fight" is just so beyond my experience that I cannot express how strongly I believe that is just completely untrue.

You can't blind-side a man who is facing you.

This is your defence of Bertuzzi? That it's really Moore's fault because in a 8-2 blowout he didn't want to get into a fight with Bertuzzi so he skated away from him? And how many fights does Moore need to have a fight with a Canuck before the payback is taken care of? Moore had already been in a fight earlier in the game, as you probably know. But at least now I understand your position. When a person gets blind-side assaulted from behind, it's really their fault for not turning around and facing their attacker.

Gordie Howe would often wait several games to exact his revenge for a cheap shot, often putting the guy out of the game. As I said before, it is the fan's opinions that have changed, not the unwritten rules of the game.

Gordie Howe would even wait years to get revenge for a clean hit! He said that he still had a list of guys from Junior hockey that he had yet to take care of. But Gordie Howe never did a Bertuzzi, and Todd Bertuzzi is no Gordie Howe. Bertuzzi had plenty of opportunity to settle any score he might have had with Moore. More than six periods of hockey between the two teams had passed since Moore's hit on Naslund. In all that time Bertuzzi chose time and time again to pass up the opportunity to challenge Moore to a fight or otherwise settle the score. Why did Bertuzzi wait until the last minutes before assaulting him?

You should read the Tiger Williams book, where he describes how one of the Flyers was kicking him through his helmet, trying to kill him in a fight. I've seen plenty of concussions in hockey fights, too. Jovo put a guy out for several games wiith one punch.

It's hard to imagine being kicked in the head during a fight - unless you are lying on the ice and the other player is standing beside you - and then the fight is pretty much over, no? Kicking a player in the head has *never* been considered part of a hockey fight. To use it as an example of how players can get injured in a fight is stretching the facts a bit too far. As for Jovo, I'm not famililiar with the specifics of this so I'll take your word for it. Yes, it can happen, but an event like that happens so rarely that it is not a reason for players to fear fights. Concussions happen more regularly in normal play, but players don't fear normal play.

I hope the league sees the severity of the problem from all this mess

I agree. And I would have hoped that Bertuzzi would have seen the severity of goon tactics when he saw, in his own rink, McSorley chase down Brashear at the end of a game and assaulted him because Brashear wouldn't fight him. I would have hoped that the lengthy career ending suspension given to McSorley would have had an impact on Bertuzzi. After all, it was one of Bertuzzi's teammates that was assualted. Apparently the longest suspension in the history of the NHL wasn't enough. Something more needs to be done to take care of these goon tactics - whether that player is a start or a fourth liner.

Kevin

[bear]

We can go chasing all these details forever and not get anywhere. Frankly, I don't have time to answer these long posts endlessly.

Fact: Moore took a cheap shot at the league scoring leader. He left his feet to deliver the elbow to Naslund's face.

Fact: Anyone who knows about hockey knows there will be payback for the hit.

Fact: Most hockey players fear hockey fights. I played hockey from age seven to juveniles, in a rink known for it's goons. I had enough scraps to know how easy it is to get hurt. LaFleur's and Dryden's books tell of the fear when going into tough cities, knowing there would be scraps.

Fact: Bertuzzi was trying to get Moore to fight but Moore wouldn't face him for most of that shift. Moore would only fight Cooke, who is smaller than Cooke. That's cowardly and hardly pays for the brutal hit on Naslund.

Fact: Moore was a league punk who made his rep by taking cheap shots at stars. Portraying him as some young kid whose whole career was in front of him is marketing for the suit. He played dirty to get to the league. It's hardly fair of him to claim dirty play against him.

[KMacT]

Bear,

Merely prefacing every opinion with the word "fact" doesn't make your argument any more persuasive. If you supported your opinions with actual facts you'd have more success - but then again, maybe not, which might be why you do not. I don't know. It doesn't take a lot of time to repeat commonly held beliefs, but yes, it does take time to support those beliefs with facts, and I certainly understand that you can't have have a lot of spare time on your hands.

Kevin

[bjcustard]

Fact: Moore took a cheap shot at the league scoring leader. He left his feet to deliver the elbow to Naslund's face.

Fact: The NHL doesn't think so - or they would have suspended him. Naslund doesn't think so, else why did he say it wasn't a cheap shot? I seem to recall him saying is was not...

Fact: Most hockey players fear hockey fights...

Please show me your survey results from > 50% of the current NHL players... I've played for 20 years, and I've never feared fighting. What I've always been concerned about is someone trying to hurt you when you're unprepared to defend yourself. There is a big difference between playing 'tough' and the lunacy Bertuzzi exhibited on that particular night.

Fact: Moore was a league punk who made his rep by taking cheap shots at stars. Portraying him as some young kid whose whole career was in front of him is marketing for the suit. He played dirty to get to the league. It's hardly fair of him to claim dirty play against him.

Steve Moore played in 69 NHL games, probably most of them on the 4th line. He had a grand total of 41 penalty minutes. I think portraying him as a league punk is ridiculous.

BTW, Bertuzzi's has played in 628 games, and has 911 penalty minutes...

[Jimmy Carbomb]

It's funny to me, but the Bertuzzi actions were an unfortunate action that can be best described as "good guy gone bad". He's no angel, but he's far from a Ted Bundy! I won't defend him either, just as I won't make excuses for the actions that lead-up to his beserk explosion.

Whether this all started with a "hit" on Naslund is inconsequential. Naslund was a "hack" when he was with Pittsburgh, but the entire start of this wouldn't have mattered when he was there... now would it?

I've seen Joe Sakic take slashes at players. I've seen Steve Yzerman give the knee more than once.
Hell... I remember when Ron Hextall... okay... bad example.

I sure hope that I don't EVER see hockey watered-down to restrict the passion. We get enough of the "me" attitude with the other sports. I'll always prefer the heart and blood of the grinding hockey game. If I want to see hockey played with no heart, I'll become a Washington Capitals fan.

[Raphael]

I spoke with someone who played soccer with Bertuzzi when they were kids in Sudbury Ontario and he told me that Bertuzzi ALWAYS had a temper and always aggressive. I guess that never changed.

But still, I want my No.44 back on ice in GM place this October.