Violent times

The hockey news have recently started to feel more and more like a police report of some serial abuser. Is this a sign of rising tempers on the ice or just a mere reflection of the current world and its increasing focus on peeking into nasty incidents and filth? If the first theory is true, we'll be seeing a lot of Mr. Shanahan on the video clips to come. If the latter, well I guess it's time to look in the mirror and ask what are we relly looking for in the coverage of our favorite sport.

I'll chip in by producing another article on the violent topic. I'll try to inject some sense within the gallery of gore.

I'll try to avoid the Sidney Crosby threshold here, otherwise I'd have to write about every bump that happens in the game. Instead, I'll focus on some of the recent serious incidents on the rinks around NHL.

Let's start with fellow Finn Ville Leino of the Buffalo Sabres. I knew the guy was extremely talented, but his nasty elbow on the head of Flyers rookie sensation Matt Read was in its viciousness a tribute to superhuman limb coordination. Leino used his left knee to knock Read's stick up, his right foot to kick the puck to himself and delivered a "no-look elbow" straight to the head of the unsuspecting rookie. All this in a fragment of a second, with perfect coordination. One game suspension is light and likely mostly so because Shanahan, regardless of his unquestionable merits on ice, couldn't have pulled that off himself and thus writes it off as an reckless accident. Hopefully Read didn't get any damage on the play and Leino vents his frustration of unproductiveness on other levels of play in the future.

Moving then to a distinguished bad boy Krys Barch. On his first game as a Florida Panther, he managed to destroy Boston's Daniel Paille on a thunderous hit near the boards. Paille spent four games on the press box after vicious headshot in February. Conspiracy theorists should all already connect the dots on the fact that the victim on Paille's check was Raymond Sawada, then a teammate of Krys Barch in Dallas. Barch hasn't yet received a suspension on the hit, but Paille is very likely out with a concussion. To make matters worse for Daniel Paille, he just returned from some time off the roster after stopping a slap shot with his nose. The ratio of buck for pain is definitely getting worse for him. Tough guys..

On the same night, Edmonton Oilers' Andy Sutton jumped off the ice to smash Carolina's Alexei Ponikarovsky's head on the boards. That's a 245lbs of mean meat aimed directly at someone's head. He's been suspended a few times in the past for irresponsible hits on ice and this is just getting ridiculous. Ponikarovsky is a big guy himself and there's no info on his status, but I find it very unlikely that he'll be able to play for a while. Sutton on the other hand is suspended indefinitely and will likely be looking at some extended time on the stationary bike and gym. Definitely not on the ice for a while.

And to cap the night of irresponsibility, Colorado's fourth liner Kevin Porter's knee-on-knee hit destroyed David Booth's dreams of starting to click in the Vancouver Canucks' lineup. Booth is out for at least a month with knee injury and Porter sits out the next four games as reminder.

On a week where we already saw Nashville Predators' Jordin Tootoo get suspended for trying to re-concuss Buffalo's star goalie Ryan Miller and Dallas Stars' Mark Fistric get three games ban for jumping off the ice to knock Islanders' Nino Niederreiter out with concussion, this recent burst of violent incidents just seems to underline the dangers of this game.

But in the end, has anything changed? Ice hockey is, and will always be, a rough sport. The players know it and the fans expect it. The players are professionals and practice every day to be able to navigate the hazards on ice. You can't take the physicality off the game without changing the whole sport. Everyone knows that.

The league is working hard on limiting the number of severe injuries, especially on the head area. But at the same time these get picked up to the headlines way easier than before and thus portray the picture of ice hockey as more violent than ever. I wonder will this new focus on injuries subconsciously also program some of the game's loose cannons to aim for the spotlight? There must be a sociopath or two out there who'd like to steal the headlines for a day or two on the sports coverage, right?