This video makes me so mad I could vomit. This is the most barbaric, ill-informed and blatantly offensive piece of trash I have ever seen directed at the sport of hockey.
There are a lot of nay-sayers out there regarding fighting in hockey, but it is uneducated, whorish producers like the ones who developed this show that help perpetuate negative stereotypes and put the wrong idea into a person’s head about what goes on in hockey.
Jeff Marek of Canadian Broadcasting Centre wrote a great piece, “In Defence of Hockey Fights,” taking to task many of the issues of the hockey fight squeamish, but I’d like to touch on just a couple of his main points.
Yes, there are occasionally staged fights. But sometimes Georges Laraque simply has to ask someone if they wanna go, because normally when you’re on the ice with Laraque, you’re on your best behavior. It’s players like him that keep order in the game. If an opposing player took a run at Sydney Crosby, you could bet your paycheck that Laraque would be out on the ice the next shift to make him pay. Checks and balances, folks.
A great example of this is Cam Barker taking on Matt Pettinger after Pettinger got his stick up too high and hit rookie Jonathan Toews in the face. Toews took 40 stitches to the lip, and Pettinger took Barker’s fists to the face for causing him the trouble. You go into battle with your teammates, and you stick up for them if you see one of them go down. It’s rule No. 1 of team camaraderie.
And unlike the bullshit of the video above, hockey players have respect for one another. You can take exception to a play that happens on the ice, but you’re not out there to hurt another player or yourself, you’re out there to keep the game in line. Sometimes minutes go by before a whistle, and you’re out there crashing into each at speeds unlike anything else in sports. Sometimes tempers will flare because of it. This fight between Barret Jackman and Ryan Kesler is a great example of how to duke it out with respect. Kesler wears a half-shield, which could easily cut Jackman’s hand throwing a punch. Or worse, both of their helmets could break each other’s hands in the heat of the fight. So they dump their buckets and have at it. It’s also Jarome Iginla’s signature fighting style.
Fighting is a part of hockey. Some might even argue it’s making a comeback. But it’s nothing like the trash Ripe.tv is trying to portray as a “hockey brawl.” A true hockey fight is born out of the ebb and flow of emotion that can come to a boil over the course of game. It’s not sticking two muscled-up meatheads out there and letting them loose on each other like pit bulls, which is all Ripe.tv seems to be hawking. Maybe they should call their product what it really is: Ultimate Fighting on Ice.
