I Wish I felt differently about this, that I believed hits such as the devastating one Eric Nystrom delivered on Kris Letang on Wednesday night in Dallas should be outlawed.
But I don’t.
What I do believe is that — unlike gratuitous blows to the head — it is not only impossible to eliminate that type of check from the game, but that doing so would dramatically change the intrinsic nature of hockey at the major league level.
Nystrom had the responsibility to eliminate Letang from the play once the gifted and unfortunately previously concussed (on a cheap shot) Pittsburgh defenseman had chipped the puck up the right wing and was on the move to join the rush from deep in his own end.
The notion that the Dallas winger should have let Letang go is ludicrous. Had he done so, Bob and Michelle’s son probably would have been benched. Everyone finishes his checks these days. Everyone. Those who don’t, don’t get back on the ice.
The concept that Nystrom hit a vulnerable Letang too hard in open ice is anathema. The principle that Nystrom had a responsibility to attempt to engage in a puck battle is senseless. Since when?
If hockey has changed, this essential philosophy as elegantly espoused by the late, great Fred Shero four decades ago has not: “Take the shortest route to the puck and arrive in ill humor.”
There’s a reason that passes in players’ skates always have been known as “suicide passes.”
It’s dangerous out there. The sheer speed of the game has turned the NHL into a high-octane demolition derby, albeit featuring luxury vehicles. Players have so little time to make decisions that the artistry and skill that enables them to do so too often is lost and overlooked in the wreckage.
To us mere and unworthy mortals who watch these games rather than participate in them, making a play out of the corner, in traffic or on the fly, is tantamount to a big-league hitter being able to pick up the spin of a 92-mph cutter out of a pitcher’s hand. There’s wonderment, as in, how do they do that?
There is no question, no question, the hockey players of this generation are the best ever when taking into account the demands placed upon them by their coaches.
It goes beyond Rangers coach John Tortorella’s simple precept of, “If you’re not blocking shots, you’re not playing.” It’s more like, if you’re not sacrificing your body, you’re not trying.
I have no doubt Wayne Gretzky would be a Great One in this era. No. 99 would have figured it out. But he would not have been able to carry the puck across the line and make his signature buttonhook move while waiting for his teammates to find openings for him to exploit the way he did back in the day — because there simply is no time and no space for that anymore.
The back pressure is enormous. Gone is the time when Guy Lafleur could fly down the right wing, bring his stick all the way back and wind up for a slap shot, unencumbered by back-checkers. Gone are the shifts of 1:45, of players pacing themselves.
There always has been danger in hockey. Mike Bossy’s career was cut in half because of a chronic bad back caused by the countless malicious cross-checks he took from defensemen trying to move him out from scoring areas around the net, the same brutal cross-checks that were somehow legal back in the day that forced Tim Kerr out of the slot and into premature retirement.
The danger now is of a different and undoubtedly more troubling nature, the aftereffects of head injuries imperiling quality of life, if not life itself. Everyone understands that. It’s why malicious head shots must be dealt with far more severely than the league’s Department of Player Safety has been willing to do on a consistent basis.
It is, however, impossible to eliminate risk, though perhaps reintroducing the red line to cut down breakneck forechecking while also eliminating the anti-Brodeur trapezoid to allow goaltenders to freely play the puck and thus reduce defensemen’s vulnerability would reduce the danger.
There’s a clip that’s played on the Garden scoreboard of Emile Francis preparing his 1966-67 Rangers team in a pregame address, the Cat exhorting: “You’ve got to take the body!”
That is what Eric Nystrom did. That is not only part of hockey, and that is not only part of hockey that must be preserved, but that is the essence of hockey itself.