Articles

[hockeygod]

Steve Moore set for justice
Trial committed for Bertuzzi suit

By STEVE SIMMONS, QMI Agency March 7 2011

TORONTO – The unfortunate anniversary of Steve Moore’s last night of professional hockey comes Tuesday, seven years after his head was pile-driven to the ice by Todd Bertuzzi — and still there is nothing resembling justice.

There is no official trial date set for the civil suit launched by Moore. There is no judge yet assigned to the case. But there is, finally, after so much paper work filed, after so many depositions and counter-claims, some hope that justice is on its way.

To be accurate, the matter has been officially set for trial. Maybe it will begin late this year. More likely, the expected two-month trial that is certain to rock the hockey world, will find its way to court in early 2012. Already, some national networks have talked about applying to have the case televised live, which is highly unusual by Canadian judicial standards.

But this is not just a hockey story anymore. It’s about a career ruined and a life seemingly placed on hold. It’s about a Harvard graduate still having headache issues almost every time he thinks. It’s about the premeditation of an on-ice stalker. And now, with brain injuries and concussions and head shots being so much the focus of the problems of pro hockey, the trial arrives with new information about the largest single issue facing the sport.

Moore’s case is considered by many to be the single largest civil suit involving professional athletes in Canadian legal history. And with each passing year, the price has gone up.

“It has been very difficult for the process to take this long,” said Tim Danson, the lawyer representing Moore in his action against the Detroit Red Wings’ winger. “But actually, we needed the passing of time to fully understand the magnitude of the brain injury. This (incident) just didn’t terminate his NHL career. It impacted everything in his life. It impacted his future and his future employment.

“We’ve had years to look at this now and because Steve Moore has exceptionally high intelligence and is a Harvard graduate, we needed to evaluate all the factors involved. If we went to a jury too early, you wouldn’t have had the answers. It has been a lot of years and a lot of tests and we’ve learned a lot about the brain. I can’t really go into details right now because that will be a live issue at the trial.”

This will be a civil trial of suits and counter-suits, with a litany of lawyers everywhere and fingers pointed in all directions. Moore is suing Bertuzzi and Orca Bay Ltd., the former owner of the Vancouver Canucks, and the figure he is asking for is certain to be enormous. Danson will represent Moore. Geoffrey Adair will represent Bertuzzi, who has blamed then coach Marc Crawford, now head coach in Dallas, for his part in the incident. Crawford is represented by the impressive Jessica Kimmel. Orca Bay is represented by Alan D’Silva.

Understand this: This is an all-star team of litigators, playing for keeps here, with third-party actions involved. Bertuzzi has counter-sued Crawford and Orca Bay has legally pushed to separate itself from Bertuzzi, whose career earnings since the injury to Moore have been just below $20 million US and that includes a season locked out. And dealing with Bertuzzi won’t necessarily be easy.

In one of his depositions, Bertuzzi refused to answer 63 different questions. He won’t be given similar latitude in court.

Right now, Moore, the former Colorado Avalanche player, is going through another round of comprehensive medical tests. He must wonder how many times he must be poked and prodded before he sees anything resembling a settlement. It has been far too long already for a player whose life has been so severely altered by Bertuzzi’s assault.

“This is a unique trial,” Danson said. “The actual event was captured by multiple television cameras. We have video of the game and the assault from seven or eight different angles. There’s not really dispute over what happened.”

Just over how it happened. Why it happened. And who ultimately is responsible?

No doubt the names called to the witness stand in the case will include Bertuzzi, Crawford, Moore, then Canucks’ general manager, Brian Burke, his successor, Dave Nonis, NHL vice-president Colin Campbell. They will be among the headliners.

But this will be a case for the headlines if not the ages, right from beginning to end.

steve.simmons@sunmedia.ca

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

More Moose Jaw and the Crushed Can rink… Carns did play-by-play and wrote newspaper stories / did the radio interviews with us "back in the day!"

Carns and the Crushed Can

Gregg Drinnan Blog – Kamloops Daily News March 10 2011

Some of my best WHL memories are from the Crushed Can. And some of them involve Rob Carnie, a friend from days of yore who once was the radio voice of the Moose Jaw Warriors on CHAB. He now is a 'Featured Personality' on CHAB and is the host of the 800 CHAB Morning Show and The Heartland at Noon.

This being today’s hockey world, his nickname was, uhh, Carns. Unless you were the late Bill Hicke, then a co-owner, GM and sometimes coach of the Regina Pats. To Hicke, Carnie was Brother Love. Might have had something to do with the white suits.

Anyway . . . I got a message from Carns on Wednesday that included something he had written on his Crushed Can memories.

This, hockey fans, is what the Crushed Can and memories are all about . . .

“I started attending hockey games and playing hockey at the MJCC in the fall of '74 when the Carnie family moved to Moose Jaw from Regina. I played in ‘Learn to Play’ for a season and among the other boys was my childhood friend Greg Thatcher. I remember his father Colin ‘coaching’ us while smoking a cigar and telling me I would never be able to take a backhander with a ‘damn curve on the blade of your stick." Why the hell do I remember that?

“I CLEARLY remember my next season . . . in the Church Minor Hockey Association with the St. Joseph Seals, my first ‘real’ team! We practised every Monday morning at 7 in one COLD Civic Centre. We won the championship that season.

“I remember everything was painted orange and blue, including the ice cleaning machine which was an old Willy's Jeep with the ice cleaning apparatus welded on. It even had a name . . . The Connor's Pup. I have no idea why it had a name.

“I remember an old gentleman named Sid who took tickets. He was always smiling and always well-dressed.

“I remember the Regina Silver Foxes coming into Moose Jaw to play the Canucks and my sister's boyfriend, Dave Desautels, who wore No. 10 for the Foxes, blowing out a knee in front of my eyes. He taught me to skate.

“I remember the Japanese national team playing at the Civic Centre and a young man named Doug Smail dominating for the home side in a 4-2 victory. The place was packed.

“I remember what a wonderful player Chris Chelios was as a boy . . . he played two seasons in Moose Jaw.

“I remember hundreds of people smoking while watching the games . . . cigarettes, cigars and pipes . . . and the blue haze that hung over the ice after each Canucks game.

“I saw every home game in a five-year stretch where the Moose Jaw Canucks went to the SJHL championship final versus the Prince Albert Raiders every season. We lost every time. I remember a full-scale brawl in the pregame warmup of one of those games. There were sticks and gloves and helmets, blood and hair all over the ice. There were no penalties.

“I remember the Warriors moving here from Winnipeg. I thought we should have called them the Canucks.

“I remember Graham James. Shame.

“I remember stepping into the broadcast booth as a cocky 21-year-old to assist Bryn Griffiths, then the voice of the Warriors, and thinking I was ‘The Goods!’

“I remember some wonderful young men wearing Warriors jerseys and some wonderful young hockey players. No one was more dynamic and entertaining than Theoren Fleury. No one.

“I remember the adrenaline flowing through my body minutes before ‘Showtime’ on 800 CHAB. I loved that. I used to live for it.

“I remember my old Dad walking up the steep stairs before Warriors games and looking up at me in the broadcast booth and grinning. He was proud of me. He never told me that. I just knew it. I loved him more than I can describe. I miss him.

“And . . . I'll miss the Civic Centre!”

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

Hockey Calgary considers ban on bodychecking in peewee hockey

By Sean Myers and Deborah Tetley, Calgary Herald March 11, 2011

Hockey Calgary is poised to take a harder look this spring at the contentious issue of bodychecking at the peewee level.

President Perry Cavanagh expects a motion at the annual general meeting in June, which could either call for a committee to study the issue or possibly ask for physical contact to be eliminated from the game for 11-and 12-year-olds.

"It's obviously a risk and safety factor that we are obligated to review, discuss, analyze, debate and make a decision if we want to make any changes or modifications to the existing system in the spirit of understanding the risks," said Cavanagh.

"I suspect that there would be a direction to strike a subcommittee to come back to the board with recommendations for changes. That would be more practical and reasonable to do, rather than jumping to any conclusions or taking a knee-jerk reaction to it."

As of Thursday, Hockey Calgary's website features a page of links to studies, reports and articles on both sides of the body checking debate.

The discussion surfaces as Canada's highest level of hockey, the NHL, deals with outrage from across the country following a devastating check that resulted in yet another in a string of recent high-profile concussions from hits.

Violence in the game is once again front and centre following a vicious-looking check Boston Bruins defenceman Zdeno Chara levelled on Montreal Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty in a National Hockey League game on Tuesday.

Although the head-first hit into a stanchion that left Pacioretty with a severe concussion and a broken vertebra isn't directly connected to body checking among preteens, young players do try to emulate their hockey heroes which can lead to dangerous plays, says Cavanagh.

"That's always a concern we have. The kids are watching that level of play and they expect that to be the standard of play at the minor level and they're definitely emulating it.

"But really they are two separate and distinct issues. Head shots versus checking are different situations. Those things need to be dealt with independently, head shots will happen in a league where there is not body checking."

One peewee coach in Calgary -who supports body checking at that level -says his peers are divided on the issue.

"Some say checking should start at the atom level, when they are Timbits," said Troy Brazzoni, of the Westwood Hockey Association.

Brazzoni said pee wee is an appropriate age for players to bodycheck, but notes that the onus needs to be on the coaches to ensure kids are being taught to hit -and be hit.

"Checking is a big part of the game, so they might as well start learning how to do it and do it properly."

Cavanagh wants a review done that would take into account the latest research, including a study by the University of Buffalo that shows 66 per cent of injuries in hockey result from accidents, not body checking, and one completed last June at the University of Calgary that shows body checking dramatically increases rates of concussions in peewee players.

The author of the U of C study, sport epidemiologist Carolyn Emery, said body checking more than triples the risk of concussion and injury in 11 and 12 year olds.

The study compared injury and concussion rates between players in Quebec -where body checking isn't allowed until bantam -with Alberta peewee players. Emery said an estimated 1,000 game-related injuries and 400 game-related concussions could be prevented per year in 11-and 12-year-old Alberta players if body checking was eliminated.

"Not to say that there's not other aspects that need to be addressed, but certainly the science gives us pretty conclusive evidence that a strong consideration to delaying the age of body checking in competition needs to be considered," said Emery.

If Hockey Calgary did change its rules around body checking, Calgary players would still have to play against teams in other Alberta jurisdictions where it would still be allowed in tournaments and provincial playoffs.

This could be a problem said Hockey Alberta president Annie Orton, who said most parents in the province believe body checking belongs in peewee level hockey.

"It would make it difficult, because 90 per cent of our membership want it there. If Calgary chose to change, it would then make it more difficult for those teams that are playing within Calgary to play anywhere else."

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

As NHL GMs prepare to convene in Florida, there's no question what issue will top their agenda.

TSN Mark Spector March 11, 2011

CLEARWATER, FLA — A year ago, on the Sunday before the annual National Hockey League general managers’ meetings, Matt Cooke must have decided the agenda was not to his liking.

It was on Sunday March 7, 2010, when his hit on Marc Savard set the GMs’ mandate, and over the next three days in Boca Raton, Rule 48 was born.

"You have to be conscious of trends, and there was a trend," said Vancouver GM Mike Gillis. "We saw those (back pressure) hits that were resulting in devastating injuries — and they were addressed. Now, that rule is still being worked on. Now we’re seeing a different kind of hit."

They will reconvene on Monday through Wednesday in the same Florida coastal town, and the primary goal hasn’t changed: They’ll remain focused on what the Official NHL Rulebook calls: "Rule 48 — Illegal Check to the Head."

Stand down, anti-fighting lobby. The recent call for eliminating fighting from the NHL is not specifically on the agenda.

"I have not heard anyone suggest that it’s going to be a topic," said Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke. "I assume it will come up … but I certainly do not detect any appetite for the elimination of fighting."

NHL vice president Colin Campbell agreed.

"Anything that is part of the landscape of concussion or hard hits, we will discuss," he said.

Campbell would not divulge the three-day agenda, but he also indicated that the elimination of fighting is not on the National Hockey League’s front burner.

Campbell, who deferred to Mike Murphy on the Zdeno Chara ruling following the hit on Montreal’s Max Pacioretty because Campbell’s son Gregory is Chara’s Boston teammate, also said the recent furor over the Pacioretty incident simply focuses the GMs down a path they have already been travelling.

"Doesn’t change it at all. Not one iota," Campbell said of the furor over the Pacioretty-Chara incident. "It only highlights that people are looking for the NHL to do something (further on head shots). It’s incumbent on us to do something, but not in haste."

Added Gillis: "I do know there is clearly a public outcry. We’ll field that in discussion."

And so on Monday the GMs will view a league presentation chronicling perhaps hundreds of different hits that have resulted in concussions going back through the decades.

Then the GMs will traditionally break into smaller groups charged with examining the different elements of the game that have resulted in concussions.

Rule 48 contains language that states, "A lateral or blind side hit to an opponent where the head is targeted and/or the principle point of contact is not permitted."

This time around, Burke sees three ways the GMs may extend the reach of Rule 48.

"One is status quo, where there is a feeling the rule is working. That some amount of contact has to be permitted," Burke began. "We don’t want this league to be like the OHL or college, where an otherwise clean check that results in contact with the head is penalized."

The second option could be to devise a minor penalty to be called any time the head is contacted during a check. Option No. 3 would be to retain the same standards, but direct Campbell towards protracted suspensions.

"Push for longer, stiffer suspensions. Ask Collie to do more enhanced review," Burke said. "The issue is the role of hitting in our game. We need (north-south, legal hits) in our game. In the OHL that’s a penalty if the head is contacted. We’ve got to keep that hit in our game."

As concussions rise however, the pressure mounts for the NHL to find a solution. And it’s not just coming from inside the game. It is fans, politicians, sponsors — everyone.

That causes Burke and his colleagues to look inward. These guys consider themselves the protectors of the game’s integrity, a role they take very seriously.

"Let’s start with the basic premise that we’re going to have head injuries," Burke said. "The notion that we’re going to get to zero concussions, that’s just ridiculous. You take physical contact out, and people just aren’t interested in watching it."

The GMs will also discuss different overtime formats once again, perhaps moving from 4-on-4 to 3-on-3 at some point in the extra period.

Though Burke admitted his issue with the limited number of post-deadline call-ups will have little traction, he’ll pitch his "bear hug" rule, which would allow a defenceman to wrap his arms around a forward as a protective measure.

We’re doubtful that will fly.

He’ll also re-pitch his "hybrid" icing scheme, which would see the whistle blown if the defensive player is winning the race for the puck at the hashmarks, but allow the race to go the distance if the offensive player is tied or in the lead.

"They use it in the USHL," Burke said. "It eliminates the risk, but saves the race."

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

MCKENZIE: WHICH WAY DOES THE NHL GO IN THE HEADSHOT DEBATE?

BOB MCKENZIE TSN 3/11/2011

It has been a fascinating week in the NHL, especially on the crime and punishment front. The Chara-Pacioretty situation is, hour by hour and day by day, evolving and it remains to be seen what impact it may have on how the game is played and/or governed.

Certainly, when an influential owner such as Montreal's Geoff Molson writes an open letter advocating a significant change – owners, as opposed to general managers, being more proactive on rule changes and setting the agenda of how the game is played – it represents a whole new dynamic and much uncertainty.

All of this is unfolding on the eve of annual NHL GM meetings, which take place Monday through Wednesday in Boca Raton, Fla. The following story and the research for it was completed prior to Chara-Pacioretty. It remains to seen what the fallout will be on the events of the last week, but none of that should serve to diminish the issues and how the GMs intended to deal with them. Nevertheless, it was important to simply note the frame of reference for this story and the research were completed prior to Chara-Pacioretty.

The NHL general managers will gather in Boca Raton, Fla., on Monday for three days of meetings. There will be many items concerning the game that will be discussed but the one that is guaranteed to garner more coverage than any other is that of the issue of hits to the head, concussions and the league's rules to combat them.

This comes as no surprise to anyone. Concussions in hockey appear to be epidemic. And there has barely been a week gone by since a year ago at this time, when the NHL introduced Rule 48 to penalize blindside hits to the head, that hits to the head/concussions/Rule 48 haven't been at the forefront of any issue-oriented hockey discussion.

It's gotten to the point where there's a certain level of battle fatigue for many in the game and also many fans when it comes to the subject of concussions and head hits.

It's a fast, physical game that has only gotten faster and more physical and some would suggest it's never been more dangerous to play than it is right now.

But hockey has always been an inherently dangerous, physical game and many would argue that's never going to change.

Yet if many are weary of the head-checking debate and the mere mention of the word concussion causes eyes to glaze over, no one disputes that it's not going away, not in hockey or football or anywhere else.

Societal and medical standards and pressures are going to keep the issue of brain trauma at the forefront, probably for years to come.

So the GMs in Boca will dutifully discuss it, which raises the question: Where do we go from here? Where, specifically, does the NHL go?

There are no easy answers, but TSN went looking for them nonetheless.

We reached out to all 30 NHL general managers to try to get some sense of their collective mindset as they prepare to meet to discuss this and other issues.

This is far too complex a subject to make easy generalizations but we have attempted to frame the issue in some very broad terms to get a barometer of where they're at. The GMs, keep in mind, are effectively the gatekeepers for the game. That isn't to say the players, via the NHL Players' Association and/or the NHL-NHLPA Competition Committee, don't have a huge say in how the game is played. And NHL owners have ultimate power as any recommendations from the GMs require approval by the board of governors before they become law.

But it is the GMs who set the agenda on rule changes and have the greatest impact on how the game is played and governed on everything from rules to suspensions.

In individual phone calls with every GM in the league — and all 30 responded — they were asked to classify which position currently comes closest to representing their feelings on the issue of head hits and where the league is going next.

Three options or, for purposes of this exercise, three doors were available to them and the only provision was that their standing would be chronicled anonymously.

Door No. 1 was the status quo. That is to say it represents a level of satisfaction with what the NHL has done with Rule 48 as well as other penalites/suspensions for hits to the head with no strong desire to make any further changes at this time.

Door No. 2 was the extreme position that any hit to the head, whether intentional or unintentional, is unacceptable and illegal and should be punished at the very least with a two-minute head-checking minor penalty, a rule that currently exists in the Ontario Hockey League, U.S. college hockey, International Ice Hockey Federation games and youth hockey in North America.

Door No. 3 was the vast middle ground in between the other two doors, where the only position is that "something more" needs to be acted upon now by the league. Precisely what "more" means was left to the discretion of the GMs who opted for this door and, as you will see, they weren't shy about elaborating on what "more" means specifically to them.

So here are the results:

Ten GMs opted for the status quo of Door No. 1; two chose the extreme position of Door No. 2 and 15 opted for the wide middle ground of Door No. 3; three GMs either couldn't or wouldn't pigeon hole themselves in one category or another, although they were more than happy to offer some perspectives on the issue and what concerns them about it and the ongoing debate.

What we can conclude is that with a total of 17 of 30 GMs classifying themselves as not entirely satisfied with the status quo, the ground would appear to be relatively fertile for change. That said, there are no guarantees that change comes swiftly or decisively. But if there was an overriding theme to the discussion, it was clearly how open-minded so many of the GMs were to hear both sides of any equation.

For example, of the 15 GMs who chose Door No. 3, almost half of them, without provocation, said they would be interested in hearing the arguments for Door No. 2 and perhaps could be swayed more in that direction, for example, than the status quo.

But anyone who's been around GM meetings in the past knows there is a significant aversion to knee-jerk reactions, especially on an issue of this significance and one where there's been quite a media feeding frenzy.

"We have to do what's right for the game, not our individual teams and certainly not because the media is pressuring us to do something," one NHL GM, sounding a popular refrain.

So let's try to characterize the sentiment behind each of the three doors:

Door No. 1: The most common comment from this group of nine was that "we haven't even had one full season of Rule 48 and we really need to let this evolve before we go barging ahead with other things. It's a work in progress. Let's see where it goes."

Another offered the following evaluation:

"There is no question in my mind, because I've seen it on multiple occasions this season, players are modifying their behaviour because of Rule 48. I recently saw Matt Cooke turn away from a hit when he had the guy lined up, so it is having an impact. That's not to say we can't have more debate and follow up. We just need to move cautiously now."

Even those who may have previously been regarded as hard-liners on the head-hit issue acknowledge there needs to be ongoing dialogue because of the gravity of the issue.

But that isn't to say there aren't some who wonder if the league hasn't already overreacted.

"I'm not even sure I am entirely comfortable with the new blindside hit (Rule 48) rule," one GM said. "I believe a player has to be responsible at all times to keep his head up and be aware of the danger around him. You can't ask players to let up on their checks. It's a physical game. I don't want to see people get hurt but I don't want to see us put in a lot of rules where the player stops being responsible for keeping his head up. I think that will lead to even more injuries."

Unquestionably, that issue — how much onus is on the hitter versus the hittee — is a constant source of debate amongst GMs. That's why Rule 48 on the blindside hits was, in the eyes of the GM, such a groundbreaking step. It was the first time in the history of the game that the league transferred the responsibility for being hit to the player doing the hitting.

Door No. 2: Only two GMs walked through this portal and they acknowledged the group is probably not ready to accept such an extreme position as a penalty for any hit to the head, but they also suggested there's an air of inevitability, that at some point in the future, whether it's three years or five years or 10 years, it will be unacceptable in pro sports to hit anyone in the head, citing societal, governmental and medical pressures to protect the brains of all people, including elite athletes who ply their trade in dangerous games where high levels of risk are assumed.

The critics of this zero-tolerance policy on head hits fear it will lead to the demise of physical play in the NHL, but the proponents aren't as certain the fabric of the pro hockey game is necessarily at risk.

"I'm just not convinced of that," one GM said. "But it's a good discussion to have. This isn't a crusade, it's just an individual opinion, so let's not be afraid to at least talk about it."

Another GM said the lesson learned from Rule 48 and the intense level of debate on what's a blindside hit and what isn't — and the referees' ability to correctly make that judgment call on the ice — is why the universal head checking penalty should be considered. It's hard, the GM said, to get consistency but if every hit to the head is illegal, there would be less gray area and the players would ultimately adjust.

No one thinks for a moment this is a realistic short term possibility but it was interesting to hear a number of GMs in the middle ground area say they are at least intrigued by the notion of discussing a total ban on head hits and want more and better information on how it works in the OHL and other leagues.

"Most of our information we're getting on this is anecdotal," one GM said. "Someone said they saw this game or that game and this is what happened in a single game. I'd like to get some real hard information, maybe study the OHL game to see if there has been a big dropoff in hitting or what it's meant to them in reducing head injuries. I don't think any of us see enough OHL or college hockey to present a true picture of what it's actually like now with these rules in place."

Door No. 3: Exactly half the GMs in the NHL made this choice and, to varying degrees, opined that more is better. As in the NHL should continue to take further steps in the war against head hits and concussions, that more than the status quo is required.

Not surprisingly, there was a wide variance on the definition of “more” but what absolutely came through from repeated comments was there's a growing sentiment for handing out tougher suspensions. Historically, most GMs have had an aversion to long suspensions, or “super” suspensions, as some like to call them. That worm appears to be turning based on our research.

"The key for me is intent,” one GM said. “If we have the same guys hitting high over and over again, and we all know who they are, we can't be giving these guys the benefit of the doubt and we really need to slap some hard suspensions on them."

“We need to start whacking guys harder with tougher suspensions for the head hits we deem to be bad hit,” another added.

Some said they favor as much as double-digit suspensions in cases where it's clear the head has been targeted.

But there were a tremendous array of opinions on which direction the league should be moving towards.

Some want to see Rule 48 broadened to include not just blindside hits to the head but to come up with criteria that would deal with some forms of the traditional north-south hit to the head that, in some instances, is still very much legal in the NHL. More of a 360 degree approach or protection for players.

“You can have a north-south hit where the hitter goes for the head at the last second and the player getting hit has no way to defend himself,” a GM said. “Just because it's north-south doesn't automatically mean it's any less damaging or sneaky than a blindside hit.”

No one who chose Door No. 3 is suggesting every north-south head contact should be penalized but did say just as the GMs worked on very specific criteria on the blindside hit, the same exercise needs to be rolled out for some of the dangerous north-south varieties.

One GM said the league doesn't need any more new rules on head hits so much as it needs to perhaps reinforce the existing rules on elbowing, charging, interference, boarding and checking from behind, suggesting the rule book currently spells out some fairly specific action on hits to the head but that perhaps there needs to be a greater emphasis on referees calling them.

The whole issue of “transfer of responsibility” from the hittee to the hitter will also be explored and while some are saying they must proceed with caution on that front, others note that the game is so fast now that old “keep your head up” standards from previous eras are tougher to apply now.

“It's so fast now,” one GM said. “It's almost impossible now for a player, in every situation on the ice, to not get caught with his head down sometimes.”

One GM said the battle on head hits may be less about new anti-headshot legislation and more about reviewing the rules package put in after the lockout to improve the pace of the game. Mission accomplished on the speed of the game, but many GMs believe taking out the red line, putting in the trapezoid that prevents goalies from handling the puck have contributed to the rash of big hits and concussions.

But as staunchly as some of the GMs argue for doing “more” – whatever more turns out to be – they all acknowledge improvement is a double-edged sword that can come back to haunt you. The more rules that are instituted, the GMs said, the more players will use trickery and fakery, if necessary, to gain an advantage and make a mockery of some well-intentioned efforts.

“We have to be so careful,” a GM said. “So careful. That's why a complete ban on any contact to the head will not get a lot of traction. The minute you put that in, players will be snapping their head back to draw penalties. Players who aren't seriously injured will drop to the ice and stay there to draw the major penalty. Everyone is in favor of getting rid of concussions but just wait until your team loses a game or a playoff series on a phantom head-checking penalty. There are no easy answers."

Another GM said he's not in favor of making any rule changes until the league, and the Players' Association, make sure everything has been done to provide as safe a work environment as possible, citing boards and glass, shoulder pads and elbow pads and helmet technology as areas where more can be done before messing around with the way the game is played.

For all the flak the NHL takes on the issue of head shots/concussions, it was clearly apparent from our interview process that a great many of the NHL GMs do sincerely care about this issue, and are now recognizing the need to be more proactive but also note there are many pitfalls associated with rushing headlong into new rules or action.

And many of them couldn't stress enough how “open-minded” they now are, whether they opted for Door No. 1, Door No. 2 or Door No. 3.

But they also realize the game is inherently dangerous and you can't legislate concussions out of hockey.

"Let's not kid ourselves," one GM said. "The fact Sidney Crosby has been out a long time with a concussion is a huge part of what's happening right now. And I feel terrible Sidney is injured and our game needs him playing. But he got hurt on what I believe was an accidental collision. It's a fast game played by big people in a small area. There are going to be concussions. We can try to reduce the number but we're never going to get rid of them."

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[DaveM]

March 11, 2011
Ken Dryden on hockey violence: How could we be so stupid?
By KEN DRYDEN
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
The former NHL goalie recalls when helmets and goalie masks were optional. A generation from now, he writes, today's attitude toward hockey violence will seem equally stupid

The brain weighs about three pounds. It floats inside a boney skull, surrounded by spinal fluid, not quite in contact with the skull. Except when the head is jarred.

Then, the brain moves, ricocheting back and forth, colliding with the sides of the skull, like a superball in a squash court. With hard-enough contact, the brain bleeds. And the parts inside it – the neurons and pathways that we use to think, learn and remember – get damaged.

Why would we ever have thought otherwise?

Why would we ever have believed that when the dizziness goes away, everything goes back as it had been before? All the little hits, scores of them in every game, so inconsequential that we don't even know they've occurred – how could we not have known? How could we be so stupid?

I feel the same when I remember that the effects of smoking or of drunk driving were ignored for so long. I feel it when I think of women in the past having no right to vote and few rights of any kind, and when I think about slavery: How could people 50, 100 or 200 years ago not have known? How could they be so stupid?

I wonder what will make people say that about us 50 years from now. What are the big things we might be getting really wrong? Chemicals in our foods? Genetic modifications gone wrong? Climate change?

In sports, I think, the haunting question will be about head injuries. It wasn't until 1943 in the National Football League that helmets became mandatory; in the National Hockey League, not until 36 years after that, in 1979. The first goalie mask wasn't worn in the NHL until 1959.

And in a whole childhood and adolescence of playing goalie, I didn't wear a mask until 1965, when I had to wear one on my college team. How could I have been so stupid?

Smash, crash, bang, maim

A football wide receiver, 220 pounds, cuts across the middle of the field at 35 kilometres an hour; a linebacker, 240 pounds, cuts the other way at 20 km/hour. The wide receiver focuses on the ball; the linebacker focuses on the wide receiver, knowing that a good hit now won't just break up the pass but will break down the focus and will of that wide receiver for each succeeding pass in the game.

Two hockey players, almost as big as the football players, but going even faster, colliding with each other and with the boards, glass and ice exaggerating the force of every hit.

Boxers, snapping jabs and hooks at each other's head, round after round. (But no hitting below the belt; that's not fair.) Ultimate Fighting: Fist, foot, elbow, knee, bone against bone – get your opponent down, get him defenceless and pound away.

In addition, there are the countless mini-collisions that never make the "Highlights of the Night." They make players feel a little dizzy, but then seconds later, almost every time, they feel fine. So they must be fine.

Years later, they may not be thinking so clearly or remembering so well, at a slightly younger age than other people, perhaps. But in the randomness of everything else in life, who's to know why? It could be genes or bad luck. Hockey player Reggie Fleming, known as "Cement Head"; football players Mike Webster, Owen Thomas or Mike McCoy; wrestler Chris Benoit …

A few weeks ago, I read about the suicide of Dave Duerson, a former all-pro safety with the Chicago Bears. He was 50. In recent years, Mr. Duerson had worked with the NFL players' union, dealing with retired players and their physical ailments, head injuries among them, and reading their doctors' reports. He had begun to have trouble himself remembering names and putting words together. Then, one day he shot himself, not in the head but the chest, so as to preserve his brain intact for future examination, bequeathing it to the NFL's brain bank.

On the same day, in the same newspapers, there was another story about Ollie Matson, an all-pro running back in the 1950s and 1960s for several NFL teams. He was 80 when he died, and for the last several years of his life he had been suffering from dementia; over the last four years, he hadn't spoken. Mr. Matson's death and dementia, it seemed, had to do with the consequences of old age. No connection was made to football or Dave Duerson.

A few days earlier, there had been a story about the death of Bobby Kuntz. He had been one of my favourite players as a kid. During the late 1950s and 1960s, he played for the Toronto Argonauts and Hamilton Tiger-Cats, playing "both ways" as players of the time did – a running back on offence and a linebacker on defence.

He was small for the positions he played, and especially small for the way he played them. He'd put his head down and throw himself into the line or into the bodies of ball carriers, the sound of his collisions sharper and more resounding than any others – the kind that, as a fan, made you go "oooh" and laugh. He was fearless. In playground games, I used to pretend I was Bobby Kuntz, head down, fearless in my own mind.

Mr. Kuntz died at 79, having suffered from dementia the last 11 years of his life. The Kuntz family agreed to have his brain donated to a study of athletes and head injuries, the article said.

The myth of the 'nature of the game'

What is our answer to those voices 50 years into the future? We can only say that we didn't want to know. We thought – we hoped – there wasn't a problem, because if there were, something would need to be done, and we didn't want to do it.

To do something would change the nature of the game. It may be all right, or inevitable, for everything in the world around the game to change; but the game itself is "pure" and must remain that way.

Hockey began in Montreal in 1875 because some rugby players wanted a game for the wintertime, and they wanted to hit each other. But the rugby players couldn't skate very fast, their bodies were smaller than ours are today, and they were playing on a smaller ice surface where they had little room to pick up momentum. With no substitutions allowed, the game moved at coasting speed.

Bigger ice surfaces changed the nature of the game; so did the forward pass; so did boards and glass; so did substitutions, shorter shifts and bigger bodies. Helmeted players in today's game are far more vulnerable to serious head injury than helmet-less players were in generations ago.

We choose to ignore the fact that the "nature" of any game is always changing. Today's hockey – in terms of speed, skill, style of play and force of impact – is almost unrecognizable from hockey 50 years ago, let alone 100. Likewise, helmets, facemasks, 300-plus-pound players and off-field, year-round training have transformed football.

These and other sports changed because someone thought of new ways to do things, others followed and nobody stopped them. In many cases, sports have had to change for reasons of safety or economics. For the sake of the players and fans and the game itself, these sports will and do need to change again.

A few days ago, I read the story of Bob Probert. He was a "goon" whose ability to fight got him into the NHL, and gave him the extra years and playing time he needed to learn how to play an all-around game. It has been calculated that Mr. Probert was in 240 NHL fights – few of which he lost – and countless more in his minor hockey years. Before he died last year, his wife reported, he had been forgetting things and frequently losing his temper. In a post-mortem examination, Boston University's School of Medicine recently reported, Mr. Probert was found to have chronic-traumatic-encephalopathy cells in his brain. He was 45.

The voices of the future will not be kind to us about how we understood and dealt with head injuries in sports. They will ask: How is it possible we didn't know, or chose not to know?

For players or former players, owners, managers, coaches, doctors and team doctors, league executives, lawyers, agents, the media, players' wives, partners and families, it's no longer possible not to know and not to be afraid, unless we willfully close our eyes.

Max Pacioretty was only the latest; he will not be the last. Arguments and explanations don't matter any more. The NHL has to risk the big steps that are needed: If some of them prove wrong, they'll still be far less wrong than what we have now.

It is time to stop being stupid.

Ken Dryden is a former NHL goaltender, and is a lawyer, author and member of Parliament.

[DaveM]

Great article on what must be the best team name in hockey….
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March 11, 2011
The long trail to world championship gold
By JAMES CHRISTIE
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
50 Years On: How a scrappy amateur team from a small B.C. town stunned the Russians

It's a history lesson wrapped around a hockey legend.

The year was 1961 and innocence was on the run in a world that was getting swallowed up by the Cold War and by fear.

Canada's Trail Smoke Eaters were making a stand as amateur hockey players against a Soviet system that was decidedly professional – army men recruited from all of its republics against Canadian farm boys, factory workers and firemen. The 1961 world hockey championship in Geneva, Switzerland, would come to be a touchstone of Canadian hockey. There have been other Olympics and other world championships, but the Smokies are an enduring icon.

In Trail, B.C., a small industrial town in southeastern British Columbia, a scrappy amateur team known as the Trail Smoke Eaters had lost the Allan Cup senior hockey title to the Chatham Maroons. The Maroons were asked by the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association to play for the world championship in Geneva, but the Maroons turned down the trip, opting instead to go to another tournament in the Soviet Union where everything would be paid for.

Canadian hockey officials turned to the Smoke Eaters, but told the company team that it would have to be stronger and bolster its ranks with players from elsewhere in the country. The players would also have to pick up the cost of the trip themselves.

"Nobody believed in us," says Don Fletcher, who will join surviving members of the 1961 team Saturday afternoon at Royal Theatre in Trail to relive the improbable world championship – Canada's last world hockey championship until pros named Joe Sakic, Rod Brind'Amour, Rob Blake, Luc Robitaille and Brendan Shanahan restored Canada's global glory with a world title 33 years later in 1994.

"We're famous for being underdogs. The European press called us murderers and butchers. The Swedish papers called us the worst team ever to leave Canada, thugs and gangsters. But I thought it was the greatest team I ever played for," Fletcher said.

The woodsy town of 15,000 believed in them and staged fundraisers to gather $42,000 for a seven-week trip.

The trip involved 14 European countries and 40 kilometres while the Smokies got used to unfamiliar European foods and big ice rinks, sometimes playing hockey outdoors in front of 18,000, and not being allowed to bodycheck in the attacking zone.

Salaries were covered by the town's big employer, Consolidated Mining and Smelting Co. of Canada Ltd. (later known as Cominco and Teck Resources), where most of the players held jobs.

"It was community driven," says Betty Anne Morino, promotions co-ordinator for the town and one of the organizers of the anniversary. "We think about other world championships and the Olympics and the NHL, but these guys were amateurs. They held down jobs. A lot of them didn't turn pro because, in those days, a good job was worth keeping and paid almost as much as an athlete's salary."

As Fletcher put it: "We played for the love of the game."

The Trail team was largely made up of locals – many of whom still live in the Trail area – and the pickups included Jackie McLeod of Saskatoon, Darryl Sly of Cambridge, Ont., and Montrealers Mike Legace and Claude Cyr. The coach was the hard-nosed Bobby Kromm, who not only whipped the team into shape but pioneered the idea of a practice on game day to get them sharp.

The Smokies – there's some debate whether the nickname came because of the huge smelter stack or because a fan disgruntled with a referee's call tossed a smoking corn cob pipe on the ice, which was taken up by several players – played 20 exhibition games before the world championship in Switzerland.

"The tour of Europe was in different conditions than you have for the pros now – the foods for one thing," Fletcher says. "We got up after landing in Oslo and there was herring for breakfast … herring! In Tampere [Finland] it was some kind of hotdogs. In Russia, it was supposed to be fried chicken, but I'm positive it was pigeons from off the sill. Thank God that in Moscow there was a U.S. embassy and they invited us over for hamburger and chips. You couldn't believe how good that was."

"We did the tour on rickety old airplanes and buses," adds McLeod, a pickup who scored twice in the decisive game, including the gold medal goal. "Everybody knew European hockey was getting better – and we wouldn't be world champions again for more than 30 years. I recall that maybe 3,000 of our servicemen were at the last game. And when we won it was something else."

The Smoke Eaters won five games and tied just one (against Czechoslovakia) going into their last match against Russia. The gold was to be decided by a differential of goals scored and goals against. The Czechs, who had the same won-loss record as the Canadians, had a two-goal edge in goals scored and were sitting in the stands, anticipating the presentation of the gold. They didn't believe Canada could win by enough goals over Russia to clinch the gold.

"The heat was on," recalls Dave Rusnell, another Smoke Eaters player. "It was Canada versus Russia, but it was a really small town against an entire land with an amazing number of players to draw from. That was an incentive – and the fact we weren't expected to do well. We had some of the best open-ice hitters I ever saw. In Sweden, we caught two of their national team players with their heads down and put them out for the rest of the year."

The Canadians used their brains as much as brawn. "We had three games in Moscow that helped us," Rusnell says. "We learned the Russians wanted to make the perfect shot. They might have the puck 65 per cent of the time, but Seth [Martin, the Trail goalie] always seemed to know where that last shot was coming from."

The Canadians may have been up against the communist system, says Smokies captain Cal Hockley, "but we had the team where everybody was equal, the same work ethic which Bobby [Kromm] drilled into us, the same drive."

He was a coach who made sure you were in the best condition in your life, so we outworked and outskated the Russians and Swedes every time."

The Smoke Eaters prevailed 5-1, giving them not only the victory over Russia but a big enough goals advantage to secure the gold.

"People will always wonder how a team from a town where eight or 10 of the players grew up together did it," Martin says. "We knew we couldn't just beat them by one, but we didn't actually know how many we had to win by. I remember the goals like it was yesterday: Harry Smith; Jackie McLeod; Harold Jones; McLeod again – it turned out to be the tournament winner, and Norm Lenardon with the insurance goal. "In Canada, people don't want to wind up second, they want to win the gold."

The population of Trail was about 15,000 at the time of the 1961 championship. An estimated 25,000 lined the route into town from the airfield at Castlegar, B.C., upon the Smokies return. "It was gratifying to see," Hockley says. "It brought out our opponents to cheer, guys we're played against in Nelson and Rossland and Spokane. I guess it was big."

[hockeygod]

Dave,

The Trail Smoke Eaters have the best name and (old) logo in the business! The original one with the smoke coming out of the stacks has been made politically correct when their junior team entered the BCHL many years ago – no smoke now… gotta respect nature and the Green Party crowd!! See the old logo here:

http://icehockey.wikia.com/wiki/1938-39_Trail_Smoke_Eaters

I have met several of the players (and their offspring) from the 1961 team. I know one of the old equipment managers and he gave me a replica jersey (with smoke!) of the 1939 team several years ago. Their is an awesome museum in the Cominco rink that has a lot of sports memorabilia from Trail and the local area. Trail also has a pretty good history and passion for minor baseball – I believe a few of their teams have represented Canada and attended the Little League World Series.

I played some junior in the Kootenay's in the 80's; then I coached in Cranbrook and Invermere (east Kootenay's) in the early 90's and was head coach of a couple of BC U17 teams (Brad Larsen was my Captain one year and Shawn Horcoff another year.) I love the old rinks – Trail and Kimberley were my favourites!

My uncle's playing days in the Kootenay's preceded me; he played against many of these guys as they wrapped up their careers in Senior hockey (Allan Cup) in the late 60's / early 70's. My uncle played one year in Nelson for the Leafs and many years for the Spokane Jets / Flyers. I attended many games as a kid in the old "Boone Street Barn" in Spokane and was amazed by the level of skill and brutality! Senior hockey used to be an amazing spectacle… sad that it has been diminished since the early 80's.

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

Ken Dryden on hockey violence: How could we be so stupid?

The former NHL goalie recalls when helmets and goalie masks were optional. A generation from now, he writes, today's attitude toward hockey violence will seem equally stupid

By KEN DRYDEN
From Saturday's Globe and Mail March 11, 2011

Dave,

This article speaks in a tone that cannot / should not be ignored. In 50 years, HOPEFULLY our attitudes will have changed for the better. I HOPE it is only a matter of time. Science is backing up these claims. How can the NHL bury it's head in the sand for much longer?

I plan on using this article in my class this week. Thanks for sharing it with us.

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

The Usual Suspects
Milbury gets upper hand in violence debate

BRUCE DOWBIGGIN
From Monday's Globe and Mail
Published Sunday, Mar. 13, 2011

Has Mike Milbury surpassed Don Cherry as the go-to guy on Hockey Night in Canada? In light of the Zdeno Chara incident last week (and Milbury’s turn on fighting), anticipation was high Saturday to hear from both Hockey Night personalities over Chara’s devastating hit on Montreal Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty – the closest, some feel, we’ve come to a fatality in an NHL game since Bill Masterton died following a 1968 contest.

While neither Cherry nor the former New York Islanders general manager exactly seized the moment, Milbury nudged ahead on all scorecards with a lucid agenda for the sport’s GMs and owners to deal with criticism from the Canadian Prime Minister, corporate heads and players over the game’s overall safety. Given several days to find a new angle, Cherry simply regurgitated talking points heard throughout the week from others.

Cherry first buried the lead with some predictable fawning on Toronto Maple Leafs goalie James Reimer. When he finally got to the Chara story, Cherry trotted out his usual grab bag of ad hominem attacks. Air Canada, being based in Montreal, was disqualified from comment. Canadiens owner Geoff Molson got a tongue lashing for his arena’s apparent safety failings. Politicians were media hogs.

While Chara’s five-minute foul produced a catastrophic result, Cherry defended the league for its lack of a suspension. It was, he felt, the clichéd “hockey play” like others on his video reel. Bizarrely, he insisted Chara deserved a 20-game suspension or none at all. Just another case of unwinding the police tape with a nothing-to-see-here shake of the head.

Milbury didn’t touch the suspension or the hit, preferring to advance the story by asking GMs this week at the general meeting to decide, “What’s an acceptable risk for players?” Milbury, who seemed restrained in his Hockey Night’s Hotstove segment (perhaps his Boston roots?), urged a panel to create a comprehensive, not knee-jerk reaction. Milbury was cogent and remarkably restrained for his often-voluble self. In doing so he’s pressing Cherry to raise his game.

Ready answer

The GMs already have a partial solution in the Vancouver Canucks and Detroit Red Wings. The NHL’s two best teams don’t goon and intimidate. Hockey Night (and its TSN/ Sportsnet equivalent) don’t seem able to grasp this salient fact. They lionize the Matt Cookes, Trevor Gillies and Colton Orrs as being essential to winning hockey. But the Canucks and Red Wings play another, safer way. And they win. Imagine that.

Tone deaf

Hockey Night’s performance in the face of the (sometimes hysterical) firestorm was still better than that of the NHL, with commissioner Gary Bettman putting his hands over his ears while saying, “La-la-la-la, I can’t hear you” to the Prime Minister, corporate leaders and media commentators last week.

Whether Bettman likes it or not, this is hockey’s Dale Earnhardt moment, the time when the speed of the cars and the aggression of the drivers overwhelms the race track. As NASCAR did when its brightest star Earnhardt was killed at the Daytona 500 in 2001, hockey has to take its foot off the accelerator and take stock of how much risk is acceptable. (Earnhardt was the fourth driver to die in NASCAR within a year; since revising its safety standards, no NASCAR driver has died since.) No matter how impulsive Air Canada’s media onslaught seemed, who wants a dead NHL player photographed lying in front of your corporate logo on the boards? Bettman’s petulant response to the week’s criticism, however, indicates he’s still got the pedal to the floor and his fingers in his ears.

Union due

Neither Cherry nor Milbury addressed the NHLPA’s mediocre history on safety issues. The union’s diligence on workplace safety was left to former player Mathieu Schneider, newly minted as hockey mentor to current executive director Don (What’s a Puck?) Fehr.

On Hockey Night’s pregame show Saturday, Schneider cited Chara’s lack of premeditation as the basis for absolution. But intent is just one element of culpability in courts. Chara’s act illustrates the difference between premeditation and negligence – both punishable. What we really wanted to know – and did not find out – was whether the PA had intervened on behalf of Chara or Pacioretty in the NHL’s hearings last week. The PA has had a lamentable habit of protecting aggressors over victims within its own membership.

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

The lessons of one young hockey player’s pain and denial

Rachel Brady
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Published Friday, Mar. 11, 2011

For two weeks, 14-year-old Andrejs Linde was keeping something from his parents. He felt dizzy every time he stood up. He had disorienting headaches nearly all the time. And when he stepped outside, the glare of a sunny, snowy day was overwhelming.

Andrejs knew what was causing the headaches, but he wasn't saying a word. He had been the victim of a nasty check during a hockey game, and at the time, he thought little of the blindside hit that had propelled him sideways, delivering a blow to the left side of his head..

He told coaches that he felt fine that day, and that he could go back out on the ice. Trainers kept a close watch over him, and even followed up later. The teen insisted that he felt okay.

At 5-foot-9 and 120 pounds, Andrejs is one of the biggest kids on Toronto's Leaside Minor Bantam A team. He leads his team in scoring, with 25 goals, and he delivers as many hits as he absorbs. This isn't the kind of kid who gets pushed around.

He kept playing for two weeks after the hit. But his coach noticed that he was backing off plays, and his parents kept asking if he felt all right.

“I could feel players behind me around the boards, even when they weren't there. I realized I was feeling scared,” Andrejs said. “And the headaches weren't going away. I also took a slapshot to my finger, so I kept telling my parents I needed Advil for my finger, when actually I needed it for my head. I didn't want them to know or I would have to stop playing.”

Andrejs's mom, Laima, was persistent. She remembered the hit well and kept asking her son about his head, even weeks later. “He had a look like there was something that needed to be said, like something was really bugging him,” said Ms. Linde, who manages the team. “He finally broke down and said, ‘My head is killing me.'”

So the Lindes took Andrejs to Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children, where they endured a five-hour wait and discovered that he had post-concussion syndrome. “In triage, the nurse asked him, ‘On a scale of one to 10, how much pain are you in?' And Andrejs has had a broken collarbone, so he knows pain,” Ms. Linde said. “He said, ‘Eight.' I was shocked. You're in that much pain, and you're just telling me now?”

He was told to go home and rest in darkness for two days before a reassessment: no school, no video games and definitely no hockey.

He wasn't getting any better, so the Lindes visited a clinic where Andrejs underwent the same concussion testing used in pro sports leagues. First, he did a balance test. Then he struggled through a 20-minute online test that he found very difficult, clicking on shapes, colours and words to test his verbal memory, visual memory, motor speed and reaction speed. His verbal memory tested fine. But in the other areas, his scores were a concern.

“For a kid who … is very strong in math and sciences, these were not great scores,” said Grant Lum, the medical director at the clinic and an adviser to the National Hockey League Players Association. “But we didn't have a baseline test to show how he performed before the injury, so we couldn't tell for sure just how long he will need to recover.” Dr. Lum recommends that schools and sports associations administer such tests to determine athletes' healthy scores, which could later be used for comparison if the athletes suffer head injuries.

Andrejs was told to go home and do nothing for two weeks, which sounded okay at first: at home all day with no parents or siblings. But it also meant sitting in darkness, and he couldn't use computers, watch TV, play video games or battle his two little brothers in mini-sticks. One night, he begged to watch a few minutes of the hockey game or listen to his iPod. Both denied.

“I just sit here. I either listen to the radio or just sit,” Andrejs said, fidgeting on a couch in a back room with the blinds drawn after his two brothers and sister had headed off to school. “It's hard to fall asleep, because there is so much yet nothing going on. You want to do stuff but you can't,” he said. Naps and eating are his only activities these days, unless you count popping Advil.

“It's more than just missing games, he's missing his life,” said his father, Peter. “The blinds are drawn all day. He's basically hanging out in a cave.” His parents try to stay up late with him to keep his spirits up. His eight-year-old brother, Ilmars, “misses the old him.” Andrejs tried watching a couple of his team's games, but the headaches felt worse after the outings.

“I called all the players into a meeting and told them what the outcome was with Andrejs, and said, ‘if you're not honest with coaches, trainers and your parents, you could be out a long time and do a lot of damage to your health,” coach Brian McKeown said. “After that conversation, another kid anted up to his parents that he's been having symptoms.”

While the Lindes can't imagine taking hockey away from their three sons, they want to prompt discussion and educate parents on the need for baseline testing for concussions. Mr. McKeown wants to have the whole team baseline-tested.

“One big thing we've learned is that you can't rely on any type of self-assessment by the child. Kids love the game, they want to play,” Mr. Linde said. “You can't fault them for that.”

Andrejs will undergo further testing next week. If his scores improve, Dr. Lum will recommend easing back into school. Andrejs said the headaches are slowly getting better. He struggles to describe the feeling. It's not a throbbing pain; it's dull, and he just doesn't feel like himself.

“If I was hit again, I would definitely tell my parents right away, because I could have gotten hit again and made it worse, and I could have been healing and maybe back playing by now,” he said.

The Lindes know Andrejs isn't destined to play in the NHL, but he plans to make hockey a part of his life for many years.

“He can teach other kids that getting hit in the head is no laughing matter,” Mr. Linde said. “There's no reason to hide it. Deal with it – it's a real injury. It means nothing if no one else learns from Andrejs.”

Rachel Brady is a reporter with Globe Sports.

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[hockeygod]

A 10-step hockey reformation as imagined by John Allemang

JOHN ALLEMANG
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Published Friday, Mar. 11, 2011

Hockey can't go on like this. The daily carnage has become too much to bear, and there's no excuse to look the other way just because the sport attracts fans and fits a monopolistic kind of business model. Never mind that politicians, police and prominent sponsors are challenging the National Hockey League's complacency on injuries and violence, so far without much success. The bigger issue is about how professional hockey lost its way and allowed the game to get so far out of sync with the nation's better values.

1. Get rid of the boards. There are two games of lacrosse, one played in a rink or box, the other on a field. They're two very different, very separate games and each has its fans. The pond-hockey tradition in hockey is beloved even by people who like the high-energy National Hockey League game – which raises the question of whether hockey truly needs boards at all. Most serious hockey injuries happen close to the boards, and if you took away the game's hard boundaries, hitting from behind or crushing a player's head into a stanchion would become relics of the past. The NHL's business plan is based on a game played within boards, but there's no reason not to experiment with a boardless game that's just about ice. Yes, it might look more like field hockey on skates. But isn't that how the great Gordie Howe got his start?

2. Ban head hits. The NHL overlords work themselves into ridiculous contortions to justify hits to the head. Yes, hockey's a fast game, accidents happen and players put themselves in vulnerable positions where injuries can result. But the blame-the-victim strategy is unnecessary, as well as ineffective and inhuman. Simply follow the example of the International Ice Hockey Federation and take a zero-tolerance approach to head hits. A body-contact sport should be just that – contact with the body.

3. Increase ice size. Players are bigger, faster, stronger, but the narrow NHL rink remains unevolved. International hockey is played on rinks that are 15 feet wider, giving skaters much more room to manoeuvre and avoid harmful contact against the boards. Studies by neurologist Richard Wennberg of Toronto Western Hospital have shown that collisions and head injuries decrease in number and severity in the international rinks. Hockey on a bigger ice surface can be a more agile, free-flowing game, better suited to speedy, smaller skill players and less tolerant of the kind of smothering defensive tactics practised by a tentacled behemoth like Zdeno Chara.

4. Go to four on four. Increasing the rink size will take time and money, and there's a persuasive argument to be made that the compact NHL surfaces create a more intense and energetic style of hockey. In that case, do what is now done in overtime games to encourage offence and speed up play: Simply drop one of the skaters. By opening up more room on the ice, you give players more time to handle the puck and protect themselves from incoming threats. And with fewer players, goon tactics will become less valuable and aggressive body contact less useful – the culture of the sport will shift to a more free-flowing skaters' game.

5. Put an end to fighting. It has nothing to do with the sport, it's harmful and contrived, it discourages skilled young athletes from continuing in the game, puts off more fans than it draws in, dumbs down Canadian culture and isn't necessary despite what all the NHL apologists and armchair sadists contend. Other professional sports manage to ban fighting without losing their appeal or sacrificing their macho DNA. So just get rid of it, and let the lovers of mindless brutality get their fix with mixed-martial arts.

6. Treat violence as violence. Punishment rarely fits the crime in NHL hockey, except for rare moments of damage control where public outrage leads to PR-driven clampdowns. If NHL bosses refuse to punish violent acts like Zdeno Chara's hit against Max Pacioretty, then it's right that police should step in and sponsors should walk away, if only to send a message that both players and the league must be more responsible for their actions. If respect for fellow players can't be taught – and there's every reason to think coaches from minor hockey up instill the opposite message – then basic humanity has to be legislated by the courts and demanded by those who associate their corporate name with the sport.

7. No more “finishing the check.” The hockey rule book mandates a safe, orderly and fair game. But the latitude given to officials means that there is often a huge discrepancy between the rules of the sport and the arbitrary judgment calls on the ice. One of the more dangerous examples of this legalized lawlessness occurs when players are permitted to hit someone after he releases the puck. A player is often at his most vulnerable at this moment – much like a quarterback who has just thrown a pass. Yet hockey coaches at every level still encourage these checks and shift the responsibility for avoiding them from the aggressor to the victim. But checkers shouldn't have carte blanche: It must be made clear that there can be no body contact once the puck is released or not in the player's control.

8. Speed the flow of the game. A game like soccer is continuous: Substitutions have to fit into the course of the game and even on-field injuries don't necessarily stop play. Professional hockey has gone in the other direction and turned itself into a stop-and-start sport that breaks for TV ads, coach-mandated time-outs, between-period corporate networking and seemingly endless line changes. At the aesthetic level, the game is at its best when it's moving fast and furious – overtime hockey is compelling viewing. But there's also a safety issue. With modern hockey's short shifts, players are able to play more “physically,” targeting the body more than in a game where shifts drag on (as can be seen in the rebroadcasts of surprisingly gentle 1950s games that now look nothing like old-time hockey's tough-guy image).

9. Softer pads. Players don't need body armour to play good hockey. Hulking shoulder pads, in particular, do more harm than good, because they're less about protection than they are about inflicting damage, especially at the head level. And the more a player's equipment makes him feel protected from retaliation, the more confident he feels about dishing out pain. Hockey equipment is like a Cold War arms race, but the mutual escalation of physical force and physical protection no longer serves its purpose.

10. Get rid of coaches. Okay, it's not going to happen. But there are far too many coaches on the hockey bench intruding themselves into too many aspects of the game. As hockey has become overcoached, it has lost its breathtaking, spontaneous side, the throwback joie de vivre style displayed by the winning Russian team at this year's world junior championships. Players at all levels now feel tied down by defensive strategies where avoiding mistakes is seen as the key to winning. But what's worse from a safety point of view is that when you turn players into robotic automatons, you take away their judgment and responsibility. Most injuries in hockey occur because a player is just doing his job.

John Allemang is a feature writer for The Globe and Mail.

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[Tom Molloy]

These are the sort of articles written about Lacrosse in the late 1800 and early 1900's. The game didn't adapt to and lost it's popularity as our nationsl sport.

We need to adapt the game to the times. Contact and not Collision. What is the point of two goons agreeing to fight and then dropping the mitts as soon as the puck hits the ice????????????? I find it boring and disrupts the flow of the game.

The game doesn't need the image of a violent sport.

'The Game is the Greatest Coach'
'Enjoy the Game'

[DaveM]

Here's an interesting article about the use of praise in education. Do you you think the same pertains to hockey?
Original: http://www.nea.org/home/42298.htm

The Praise Paradox: Are we smothering kids in kind words?

By Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman

Thomas (his middle name) is a fifth-grader at the highly competitive P.S. 334, the Anderson School on West 84th in New York City. Since Thomas could walk, he has constantly heard that he is smart. Not just from his parents but from any adult who has come in contact with this precocious child. When he applied to Anderson for kindergarten, his intelligence was statistically confirmed. The school is reserved for the top 1 percent of all applicants, and an IQ test is required. Thomas didn’t just score in the top 1 percent. He scored in the top 1 percent of the top 1 percent.

But as Thomas has progressed through school, this self-awareness that he’s smart hasn’t always translated into fearless confidence when attacking his schoolwork. In fact, Thomas’s father noticed just the opposite. “Thomas didn’t want to try things he wouldn’t be successful at,” his father says. “Some things came very quickly to him, but when they didn’t, he gave up almost immediately, concluding, ‘I’m not good at this.’” With no more than a glance, Thomas was dividing the world into two—things he was naturally good at and things he wasn’t.

For instance, in the early grades, Thomas wasn’t very good at spelling, so he simply demurred from spelling out loud. When Thomas took his first look at fractions, he balked. The biggest hurdle came in third grade. He was supposed to learn cursive penmanship, but he wouldn’t even try for weeks. By then, his teacher was demanding homework be completed in cursive. Rather than play catch-up on his penmanship, Thomas refused outright. Thomas’s father tried to reason with him. “Look, just because you’re smart doesn’t mean you don’t have to put out some effort.” (Eventually, Thomas mastered cursive, but not without a lot of cajoling from his father.)

Why does this child, who is measurably at the very top of the charts, lack confidence about his ability to tackle routine school challenges?

Thomas is not alone. For a few decades, it’s been noted that a large percentage of all gifted students (those who score in the top 10 percent on aptitude tests) severely underestimate their own abilities. Those afflicted with this lack of perceived competence adopt lower standards for success and expect less of themselves. They underrate the importance of effort, and they overrate how much help they need from a parent.

When parents praise their children’s intelligence, they believe they are providing the solution to this problem. According to a survey conducted by Columbia University, 85 percent of American parents think it’s important to tell their kids that they’re smart. In and around the New York area, according to my own (admittedly nonscientific) poll, the number is more like 100 percent. Everyone does it, habitually. “You’re so smart, Kiddo,” just seems to roll off the tongue.

“Early and often,” bragged one mom, of how often she praised. Another dad throws praise around “every chance I get.” I heard that kids are going to school with affirming handwritten notes in their lunchboxes and—when they come home—there are star charts on the refrigerator. Boys are earning baseball cards for clearing their plates after dinner, and girls are winning manicures for doing their homework. These kids are saturated with messages that they’re doing great—that they are great, innately so. They have what it takes.

The presumption is that if a child believes he’s smart (having been told so, repeatedly), he won’t be intimidated by new academic challenges. The constant praise is meant to be an angel on the shoulder, ensuring that children do not sell their talents short.

But a growing body of research—and a new study from the trenches of the New York City public school system—strongly suggest it might be the other way around. Giving kids the label of “smart” does not prevent them from underperforming. It might actually be causing it.

For the past ten years, Dr. Carol Dweck and her team at Columbia University have studied the effect of praise on students in 20 New York schools. Her seminal work—a series of experiments on 400 fifth-graders—paints the picture most clearly. Prior to these experiments, praise for intelligence had been shown to boost children’s confidence. But Dweck suspected that this would backfire the first moment kids experienced failure or difficulty.

Dweck sent four female research assistants into New York fifth-grade classrooms. The researchers would take a single child out of the classroom for a nonverbal IQ test consisting of a series of puzzles—puzzles easy enough that all the children would do fairly well. Once the child finished the test, the researchers told each student his score, then gave him a single line of praise. Randomly divided into groups, some were praised for their intelligence. They were told, “You must be smart at this.” Other students were praised for their effort: “You must have worked really hard.”

Why just a single line of praise? “We wanted to see how sensitive children were,” Dweck explained. “We had a hunch that one line might be enough to see an effect.”

Then the students were given a choice of test for the second round. One choice was a test that would be more difficult than the first, but the researchers told the kids that they’d learn a lot from attempting the puzzles. The other choice, Dweck’s team explained, was an easy test, just like the first. Of those praised for their effort, 90 percent chose the harder set of puzzles. Of those praised for their intelligence, a majority chose the easy test. The “smart” kids took the cop-out.

Why did this happen? “When we praise children for their intelligence,” Dweck wrote in her study summary, “we tell them that this is the name of the game: look smart, don’t risk making mistakes.” And that’s what the fifth-graders had done. They’d chosen to look smart and avoid the risk of being embarrassed.

In a subsequent round, none of the fifth-graders had a choice. The test was difficult, designed for kids two years ahead of their grade level. Predictably, everyone failed. But again, the two groups of children, divided at random at the study’s start, responded differently. Those praised for their effort on the first test assumed they simply hadn’t focused hard enough on this test. “They got very involved, willing to try every solution to the puzzles,” Dweck recalled. “Many of them remarked, unprovoked, ‘This is my favorite test.’” Not so for those praised for their smarts. They assumed their failure was evidence that they weren’t really smart at all. “Just watching them, you could see the strain. They were sweating and miserable.”

Having artificially induced a round of failure, Dweck’s researchers then gave all the fifth-graders a final round of tests that were engineered to be as easy as the first round. Those who had been praised for their effort significantly improved on their first score—by about 30 percent. Those who’d been told they were smart did worse than they had at the very beginning—by about 20 percent.

Dweck had suspected that praise could backfire, but even she was surprised by the magnitude of the effect. “Emphasizing effort gives a child a variable that they can control,” she explains. “They come to see themselves as in control of their success. Emphasizing natural intelligence takes it out of the child’s control, and it provides no good recipe for responding to a failure.”

In follow-up interviews, Dweck discovered that those who think that innate intelligence is the key to success begin to discount the importance of effort. I am smart, the kids’ reasoning goes; I don’t need to put out effort. Expending effort becomes stigmatized—it’s public proof that you can’t cut it on your natural gifts.

Repeating her experiments, Dweck found this effect of praise on performance held true for students of every socioeconomic class. It hit both boys and girls—the very brightest girls especially (they collapsed the most following failure). Even preschoolers weren’t immune to the inverse power of praise.

Even those who’ve accepted the new research on praise have trouble putting it into practice. Sue Needleman is both a mother of two and an elementary school teacher with 11 years’ experience. Last year, she was a fourth-grade teacher at Ridge Ranch Elementary in Paramus, New Jersey. She has never heard of Carol Dweck, but the gist of Dweck’s research has trickled down to her school, and Needleman has learned to say, “I like how you keep trying.” She tries to keep her praise specific, rather than general, so that a child knows exactly what she did to earn the praise (and thus can get more). She will occasionally tell a child, “You’re good at math,” but she’ll never tell a child he’s bad at math.

But that’s at school, as a teacher. At home, old habits die hard. Her eight-year-old daughter and her five-year-old son are indeed smart, and sometimes she hears herself saying, “You’re great. You did it. You’re smart.” When I press her on this, Needleman says that what comes out of academia often feels artificial. “When I read the mock dialogues, my first thought is, Oh, please. How corny.”

No such qualms exist for teachers at the Life Sciences Secondary School in East Harlem, because they’ve seen Dweck’s theories applied to their junior high students. Dweck and her protégée, Dr. Lisa Blackwell, published a report in the academic journal Child Development about the effect of a semester-long intervention conducted to improve students’ math scores.

Life Sciences is a health-science magnet school with high aspirations but 700 students whose main attributes are being predominantly minority and low achieving. Blackwell split her kids into two groups for an eight-session workshop. The control group was taught study skills, and the others got study skills and a special module on how intelligence is not innate. These students took turns reading aloud an essay on how the brain grows new neurons when challenged. They saw slides of the brain and acted out skits. “Even as I was teaching these ideas,” Blackwell noted, “I would hear the students joking, calling one another ‘dummy’ or ‘stupid.’” After the module was concluded, Blackwell tracked her students’ grades to see if it had any effect.

It didn’t take long. The teachers—who hadn’t known which students had been assigned to which workshop—could pick out the students who had been taught that intelligence can be developed. They improved their study habits and grades. In a single semester, Blackwell reversed the students’ longtime trend of decreasing math grades.

The only difference between the control group and the test group were two lessons, a total of 50 minutes spent teaching not math but a single idea: that the brain is a muscle. Giving it a harder workout makes you smarter. That alone improved their math scores.

“These are very persuasive findings,” says Columbia’s Dr. Geraldine Downey, a specialist in children’s sensitivity to rejection. “They show how you can take a specific theory and develop a curriculum that works.”

Psychologist Wulf-Uwe Meyer, a pioneer in the field, conducted a series of studies during which children watched other students receive praise. According to Meyer’s findings, by the age of 12, children believe that earning praise from a teacher is not a sign you did well—it’s actually a sign you lack ability and the teacher thinks you need extra encouragement. They’ve picked up the pattern: kids who are falling behind get drowned in praise. Teens, Meyer found, discounted praise to such an extent that they believed it’s a teacher’s criticism that really conveys a positive belief in a student’s aptitude.

Excessive praise also distorts children’s motivation; they begin doing things merely to hear the praise, losing sight of intrinsic enjoyment. Scholars from Reed College and Stanford reviewed over 150 praise studies. Their analysis determined that praised students become risk-averse and lack perceived autonomy. The scholars found consistent correlations between a liberal use of praise and students’ “shorter task persistence, more eye-checking with the teacher, and inflected speech such that answers have the intonation of questions.” When they get to college, heavily praised students commonly drop out of classes rather than suffer a mediocre grade, and they have a hard time picking a major—they’re afraid to commit to something because they’re afraid of not succeeding.

One suburban New Jersey high school English teacher told me she can spot the kids who get overpraised at home. Their parents think they’re just being supportive, but the students sense their parents’ high expectations, and feel so much pressure they can’t concentrate on the subject, only the grade they will receive. “I had a mother say, ‘You are destroying my child’s self-esteem,’ because I’d given her son a C. I told her, ‘Your child is capable of better work.’ I’m not there to make them feel better. I’m there to make them do better.”

When students transition into junior high, some who’d done well in elementary school inevitably struggle in the larger and more demanding environment. Those who equated their earlier success with their innate ability surmise they’ve been dumb all along. Their grades never recover because the likely key to their recovery—increasing effort—they view as just further proof of their failure. In interviews many confess they would “seriously consider cheating.”

Students turn to cheating because they haven’t developed a strategy for handling failure. The problem is compounded when a parent ignores a child’s failures and insists that he’ll do it better next time. Michigan scholar Jennifer Crocker studies this exact scenario and explains that the child may come to believe failure is something so terrible, the family can’t acknowledge its existence. A child deprived of the opportunity to discuss mistakes can’t learn from them.

Offering praise has become a sort of panacea for the anxieties of modern parenting. Out of our children’s lives from breakfast to dinner, we turn it up a notch when we get home. In those few hours together, we want them to hear things we can’t say during the day—We are in your corner, we are here for you, we believe in you.

In a similar way, we put our children in high-pressure environments, seeking out the best schools we can find, then we use the constant praise to soften the intensity of those environments. We expect so much of them, but we hide our expectations behind constant glowing praise. For me, the duplicity became glaring.

I realized that not telling my son he was smart meant I was leaving it up to him to make his own conclusion about his intelligence. Jumping in with praise is like jumping in too soon with the answer to a homework problem—it robs him of the chance to make the deduction himself.

But what if he makes the wrong conclusion?

Can I really leave this up to him, at his age?

I’m still an anxious parent. This morning, I tested him on the way to school: “What happens to your brain, again, when it gets to think about something hard?”

“It gets bigger, like a muscle,” he responded, having aced this one before.

[hockeygod]

Good article Dave. I enjoy reading Carol Dweck stuff. I agree with her findings about too much positivism. I think it needs to be 'deserved praise' and not too overdone.

I think we (coaches) expect things to go good… therefore we don't praise players consistently when things are good… but we certainly let players know when things aren't good! However, I do try to catch my players doing something right and letting them know. As a coach, it is far easier to be overly critical and negative. Sometimes it is tough to break old habits!

Dave King showed me a 2 x 2 Matrix in 1990…

General Positive General Negative
Specific Positive Specific Negative

He said a coach could have someone record and code the comments they made on the bench or during practice, into one of these four categories. Far too many coaches hand out General Positive comments ("good shift") – what the heck does that mean? Be specific! Dave suggested that from coding a game and a practice, you could gain a lot of insight into what you were saying… and then you could see how to fine-tune your coaching style in the future. Specific Positive and Specific Negative are better than general comments.

Plus using the Game Sense Approach, the coach shouldn't 'tell' the athlete anything. Ask them what they did / saw out there and then guide them towards what you really want to get across!

PS – I just watched the CBS 60 Minutes special on Pete Carroll when he was coaching at USC (about two years old). This guy was full of enthusiasm and positives – almost over the top – but it worked for him!

Dean
M.Ed (Coaching)
Ch.P.C. (Chartered Professional Coach)
Game Intelligence Training
"Great education depends on great teaching."

[Author]

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