Fighting Simmers as Rosters Settle
There have been a few articles published recently about the drastic increase in fighting this preseason. Any time those are written during the preseason, it’s premature. The literal fight for roster spots happens early, and tails off as players are sent to minor league or junior teams and NHL rosters solidify. With only two NHL vs NHL preseason games left (the rest are NHL vs European teams), it’s unlikely there will be many more gloves on the ice and the numbers will only look like a slight bump up from last season. No one at this site would have complained if there were some dramatic increase, but that’s just not the case.
Western Canadian scraps
On that note, there was only one game with a fight (or two) last night, the Canucks at Oilers. Unfortunately I missed the first, although I’m sure video will turn up, but the second scrap, between Jannik Hansen and Gilbert Brule was a good one, and definitely left an impression on anyone who watched it. Something along the lines of “who knew they could throw like that?”
More instigators
The Globe and Mail has a piece about the NHL looking to call the instigator penalty more.
Officials were told that the instigator has been overlooked too often.
“It’s not new,” Gregson said in a recent interview. “We’re not changing the wording and we’re not trying to make every fight an instigator call.
“But if a player travels (to start a fight), you have to ask ‘did someone clearly instigate?’ And if so, apply the rule.”
The extra two minutes for instigating was designed to discourage fighting, which dipped after the 2004-05 lockout season but has come back in force in recent campaigns.
No need to make a reaction until we’re a few months into the season and we see what’s actually being called at that point. Until then, it’s just a nice quote for a league official to give to the press.
Layout tweaks
For those who regularly browse the player and team pages here, you’ll notice the year-by-year listings on each page have flipped to show the most recent years first. This was done for a few reasons. The archives have always displayed them that way, and from feedback, it was easily the preferred listing. Now they’re all consistent. Also, team listings were getting quite long as we add older seasons, and now only the last 10 seasons are shown on team pages, splitting the full list onto its own page.
Adding to that, more NHL logs have been made public. There will be more NHL, AHL and juniors logs released soon. As always, if you notice any errors, please email me.
Still time for giveaway
There’s still time to enter the NHL 10 giveaway.
Videos added
Jannik Hansen vs Gilbert Brule Sep 27, 2009
Kim Clackson vs Stan Jonathan Jan 27, 1980
Kim Clackson vs Stan Jonathan Jan 27, 1980
Jared Boll vs Shawn Thornton Sep 26, 2009
Michael Blunden vs Chuck Kobasew Sep 26, 2009
Some reads
Flames enforcer can’t wait to ‘get ‘em’
Leblond trying to remain optimistic
Thornton has been a nice fit
Rangers coach John Tortorella says lay off new Blueshirt Donald Brashear
Admirals, Lightning mix it up
