By: DR Hook

DR Hook — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 13:06:44 +0000

I still have ticket stubs of my seats in C-10 at $8.00 a seat and also the same seats marked $90.00. So, I go back a long way. I just thought I’d throw that out there so there is some perspective. The years prior to the lockout I was getting so bored watching players allowed to clutch and grab opponents that I was ready to put the NHL on the back burner. The league simply slowed down the speedy, talented players thus making the marginal players ‘more valuable’… it’s not that I didn’t enjoy a defensive hockey game and it wasn’t that shutouts were boring as defensive games can be exciting and entertaining. What I am saying is that the NHL slid so far into a defensive style that they had gotten totally away from entertaining hockey. Interference was always against the rules but the NHL ignored it and the entertainment value went into the toilet.
The goaltending equipment got ridiculous and everything combine led to those who loved the game to look the other way.
Fans thought that calling interference would eliminate the physicality of the game. It hasn’t. The physical aspects have change but they are still there. You don’t see as many defensemen taking runs at forwards because if they miss they no longer can use their stick or hands to stop them. Battles in front of the net are different but they do exist. (Usually) the defender must wait until the puck comes into the slot before he can aggressively move an opponent. Physical hockey has not disappeared; but what has happened is it is purer.

Following the rules as they were written and the salary cap has created a much more exciting league… any doubts, just check the attendance.
So, when I hear what the cavemen of hockey like Milbury, McGuire, and Melrose doing that “let them play” routine… I much rather have a questionable call made then to allow it to ever get back to 2003 hockey.

Comments on: The NHL ‘Let Them Play’ Mentality

By: DR Hook