NHL '11 - '12 Thread

[mithrilG60]

Originally Posted by icehog3

All valid points, Geoff, with the possible exception of the Player's Union backing the suspensions you propose...it will never happen, bet my job on it.

Also even making the suspensions automatic will be a problem, as there are often hits which impact the head, where the head was not "targeted". Who makes the subjective call on the objective standard.

I agree competely that head hits warrant some changes. I would argue that the Hawks' loss of Toews is more significant than the Canucks losing Daniel, but that is subjective as well. I just doin't think the changes that you propose have a popsicle's chance in Hell of getting put into place. That being said, I reitierate that I think you make lots of valid points.

I don't expect it will ever happen, but it's actions like that which are needed to remove these kind of hits from the game. This air-fairy small suspension crap that the league seems to want to hand out is just not disincentive enough to make a real difference.

The ONLY way to remove it is to enforce mandatory penalties. Given Shannahan (or whoever) the ability to excise judgement calls in headshots just leads to scenarios where weak meaningless suspensions are issued and the game continues on as before because there's no muscle in the punishment. Automatic penalties force players to be accountable for their actions and while some may very occasionally get the shaft the overall result will be to almost entirely remove headshots from the game.

Rugby did it with spear tackles. The NFL did it with head contact. The NHL needs to do it with headshots.

I'd agree with out that Toews is probably more important overall to the Hawks org than Sedin is to the Canucks (especially in March ) but just because the Canucks currently have greater offensive depth doesn't discount the fact that they are now without their top offensive player and the league has lost yet another of it's star players. To me it doesn't really matter whether you're talking about the league's top star or the least skilled 4th liner on the last place team in the league.... the penalty for a headshot should be the same and it should be very very harsh.