By Terry Ryan

Hang in there TG,

In the near future players may as well have forcefields around their bodies. Everyone will be wearing full cages and fighting will be outlawed. And if injuries keep happening they will take out hitting. Until everyone is happy with the football like scores and going into Philly is no more intimidating than going into Chuck E. fucking Cheeses.

It's a physical game played on emotion and the best players ever to play were brought up in a manner in which people were held accountable and the men were separated from the boys. Trevor I am pissed because you worked so God Damn long and hard to get there and now 19 games pay in the big show are taken away because a list of so-called experts decide it should be that way. With Gillies out of the line-up, mark my words someone else gets injured because he isn't there to protect them. I am not against suspensions and God knows you should have been suspended many times for some of the crazy shit you pulled off (Hell, you nearly knocked me out in Cincinnati), but in this case the punishment doesn't fit the crime. Shoulder to shoulder in defense of a teammate, which is exactly why your there in the first place. Accountability is being pushed out of the game and the red line is a thing of the past, in order to speed things up. However, it happens at a time where obstruction penalties are rampant and you can't hold up players anymore, leaving your teammate a sitting duck while you watch some fired up youngster drill him in full stride, all the while not having to answer for it. Put 1-2 Trevor Gillies/Greg Smyth(Bird Dog)/Bob Proberts on every team and the injuries decrease because people aren't as quick to chirp and sucker when the big boys are aloud to patrol the ice if needed. Gretzky thrived in an era of hooks, holds, and hacks while rewriting scoring records. How ya doin’ Dave Semenko? I know there is a happy medium but come the fuck on. Gimme some fucking wine and fucking cheese, I am going to watch a hockey game.

P.S.  Along the same lines (accountability), I don't think there is a place in the game for fighting in minor hockey and I am not barbaric, I just think the more you take fighting out in men's hockey at any level, the more violent it gets and I don't think the hit was worth ten games.  Take our senior league for example this season.  Fighting in the last ten minutes is game plus a game suspension and if you get in 3 in a season your suspended further, until 5 lands you out for the yr.  So, naturally some players goad others into fights to get them suspended.  Some players hit dirty to start a brawl when a talented line is on the ice, and boom, 5 meatheads can get 5 regulars suspended on one play.  It becomes STRATEGY. And I am not whining, our guys do it too if needed.  Why wouldn't they?  All the leagues I played in, I never talked about staged fights before a game, and very very rarely heard anyone else do it for that matter.  And you can ask anyone who played junior or pro, they will tell you the same thing.  You just go and play hard. Yet this season people are counting how many fights they have and looking at the clock to make sure there is less than 10 minutes left, to make sure their opponent is ejected, or vice versa. So I have never heard so much fight talk till this season and the rules supposedly protect guys. Hockey is great to watch don't get me wrong, but it's tough to take the physicality out of a game that's so fast and emotional, with no out of bounds.  And all these guys getting injured in record numbers in the NHL?  I mean figure it out.  Trevor Gillies is no angel, I will be the first to say that.  He has done shit William Munny would be wary of, but I think this is bullshit.

TR

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