[Sunday,
February 3rd is that national holiday known as Super Bowl Sunday.
For this year’s Super
Bowl series I’ll AmericanStudy a handful of great sports debates—add your
opinion into the mix in comments, please!]
On the way not
to argue for a sport’s violent tradition, and a possible way to do so.
First, in the
interest of full disclosure: of the four major sports, I know by far the least
about hockey. And that’s especially true of hockey history—other than a few big name players and the occasional interesting story (both
of those hyperlinked pieces focus on Boston-related topics, which
is likely why I know a bit more about them than I do other hockey histories),
what I know about the history of hockey can be fit inside a box much smaller
than the penalty one. So as always, and especially when it comes to topics like
this one on which I am generally and admittedly ignorant, I’ll very much
appreciate any responses and challenges and other ideas in comments (or by email). I don’t think I’m ever
gonna get to full octopus-on-the-ice
level hockey fandom, but there’s no topic about which I’m not excited to learn
more, this one very much included.
So with all of
that said, it’s my understanding that one of the most heated debates in the
hockey world is over whether fighting is a central
and beloved element of the sport that must be preserved or an outdated
and dangerous aside that should be discarded to attract more widespread fan
support. Obviously I don’t know enough to have a strong opinion (I’m opposed
to fighting-based sports, but this is somewhat of a different story of
course), but I will say this: from what I can tell, many of the arguments in
favor of fighting seem to come from what we could call hockey
traditionalists. And having had more than my share of experiences with baseball
traditionalists, I’d say that “This is how we have always done things” is
an incredibly ineffective way to argue for any aspect of a sport (or most
anything else for that matter). For one thing, such an argument would by
extension make any change impossible, and anything that is going to endure over
time needs to evolve in at least some ways in order to do so. And for another
thing, there are many cases where we learn things that require specific changes
in the way we do things—and it seems to me that what we now know about
head injuries, for example, just might make that the case when it comes to fighting in hockey.
I’m pretty
serious about CTE (although I haven’t been able to give
up football yet), so if I were to weigh in more fully on the fighting in
hockey debate, I’d likely be in the opposition camp. But I try to be open to
different perspectives of course, and in a debate like this what I’d be
interested to hear is how pro-fighting perspectives might argue for its role in
how the sport is played. That is, when it comes to fighting
in baseball (something I know a lot more about), fights represent an
entirely unsanctioned and illegal element, one that always leads to ejections
and suspensions and fines and so on. Whereas fighting
in hockey is more or less entirely sanctioned, with the two fighters
surrounded by the referees and allowed to complete their fight before the
regular gameplay resumes. So perhaps there are reasons beyond tradition alone,
ways that fighting contributes to the play of hockey within games, within a
season, as a sport. After all, all rules in sports are arbitrary and
constructed, and don’t necessarily need changing as a result. This one features
violence to be sure, but so for that matter does hockey overall—so I’m open to
hearing (including here if you’d like!) for how this element of hockey might
also feature other sides to this sport, past and present.
Next debate
tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Other great debates you’d highlight?
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