Concussion discussion updated with Bettman plan

Lots of talk about consussions, now the GM's are meeting and discussing this a great deal.

I have heard these ideas out there here and there, but it's what I think and I'm sure it won't be popular with the younger fans and causual fans.

1.  Put the redline back in play.  While this opens the game up and has more scoring changes it just increases the high speed collisions and contact on the ice.  If you can't get a nice tape to tape pass to charge the net, all you do now is put a guy at the blue line and he tips it into the zone and you got 3 guys skating full speed into the corners ready to just pound the D back there.

2. Let the goaltenders play the puck anywhere like they used to. Again where the goaltender has such a small zone to play the puck than can't stop those charging forwards into the zone.  As it was before on some dumps the goaltender would play it and that would stop the forwards from blazing in. A goaltender like Turco or Marty would play the puck like a forward and you had to defend that.  The rule was pretty much put in for those guys.  It was like having another D-man back there.

Oh BTW, that rule was also put in to protect Roy. How many goals did he give away by playing the puck in the corners.

3.  This seamless glass has gotta go.  This stuff has no bend hardly at all.  In another thread I posted where I went full charge across ice and threw myself against it and was almost thrown on my ass.  It doesn't not absorb energy at all.  We need glass that flexes back at least a couple of inches to absorb energy.  It's 2011 for gods sake. You can't tell me we can't design a glass with some sort of shock absorbing  ability that can bow back without breaking

4. The equipment....well it's in play and it's not going anywhere.  It's used as a weapon now in some cases but it does give the player better protecction so it is what it is

I have some more, but this the quick way to elimate a ton of injures.

Tell me what ya think.

Bettman presents 5-point plan to reduce concussions

Here is the action plan NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman laid out at the start of Monday first session of the General Managers Meetings:

-- Brendan Shanahan has been directed to focus on equipment, in conjunction with the Players' Association, in an effort to reduce the size of the equipment without reducing its protectiveness but also without compromising the safety of an opponent who is contacted by that equipment.

-- The NHL Protocol for Concussion Evaluation and Management has been revised in three areas: 1) Mandatory removal from play if a player reports any listed symptoms or shows any listed signs (loss of consciousness ... Motor incoordination/balance problems ... Slow to get up following a hit to the head ... blank or vacant look ... Disorientation (unsure where he is) ... Clutching the head after a hit ... Visible facial injury in coombination with any of the above).

2) Examination by the team physician (as opposed to the athletic trainer) in a quiet place free from distraction.

3) Team physician is to use 'an acute evaluation tool' such as the NHL SCAT 2 [SCAT stands for Sports Concussion Assessment Tool] as opposed to a quick rinkside assessment.

-- The Board will be approached to elevate the standard in which a Club and its Coach can be held accountable if it has a number of 'repeat offenders' with regard to Supplementary Discipline.
 
-- In the continuing pursuit of the ultimate in player safety with regard to the rink environment, a safety engineering firm will be used to evaluate all 30 arenas and determine what changes, if any, can and should be made to to enhance the safety of the environment. For the 2011-12 season, the teams that have seamless glass behind the nets, on the sides, or surrounding the entire rink will be directed to change to plexiglass.
 
-- A 'blue-ribbon' committee of Brendan Shanahan, Rob Blake, Steve Yzerman and Joe Nieuwendyk -- all players who competed under the standard of rules enforcement that has been in place since 2005 -- to examine topics relevant to the issue. 

A few more, some radical:

Well I like your 5 with a change.  Maybe not a suspension, but every hit to the head gets at least a 2 minute penalty or if we really want to send a message make it a double minor.

I agree something has to be done about the hits to the head, too many players missing time in the league. Incidental or 5 and a game for high sticking? I disagree.. A cut lip would be a 5 and a game, that's extreme.

I agree with Lippsman that the seemless glass needs to go, that stuff is brutal. I also think the goalies should be allowed to play the puck like old, get rid of that trapezoid. I would also go to to no touch icing. Stiffer penalties for shots to the head, would help also. The main thing though is player respect, I know it's a fast game and decisions are made in a split second. However, elbows, shoulders, etc to the head need to stop.

You know how the league made a rule to force players to pay their own fines, rather than having teams pay fines for players? 

Well with the respect thing.  You are getting younger guys in the league now.  It used to be you sat in the minors for a bit then went to the bigs and sat on the 4th or 3rd line for a season.

Now the younger guys are hitting the bigs much faster of course because of money mostly. So younger you do lose a good bit of the respect. But come on, we were all in our early 20's once and we all thought we knew it all and were indestructible.

Let me show some age here and go back to something that happened in 1979.  Helmets were made mandatory for new players coming into the league.  What was the first thing that started happening in the years after that.  The sticks started going higher and higher.  You had a helmet so there was no fear.  Just carry that stick high and swing away. But the thing was that a number of the vets were still not wearing helmets. (They had to sign a waiver to keep doing this)

It's the same thing with the pee-wees and on up to college wearing cages.  The sticks fly around more where your head is encased in a vault.  You got to change things a bit when you go to the big dance. But it's not happening.  You got to make it understood that any hits to the head will not be accepted.

Double minors for any head hit or intent to injur.  Give the refs broad power with this, no matter how tough it was to type that.

1.  Put the redline back in play.  don't think that's a primary cause. guys used to get "corked" over the middle under the old "two line" rule (prime examples being the Scott Stevens hits on Eric Lindros and Vyacheslav Kozlov)

2. Let the goaltenders play the puck anywhere like they used to.  the "freekazoid" was always JOKE. it actually removed scoring by not allowing skilled goalies make an outlet pass (that's why it's know is "The Brodeur Rule") AND, like you said, it makes the D-men vulnerable to getting boarded.

3.  This seamless glass has gotta go.  according to the "Hot Stove" guys on Saturday, it's going to be removed, at least in the end zones, in the rinks that still have it this summer.

4. The equipment....  esp the shoulder pads. not that many years ago shoulder pads were like a padded bra. now there like what a football linebacker would wear. you notice most recent concussions, it's usually a shoulder to head hit (Crosby in the Winter Classic the recent prime example)

as for the latest "wreck" with Chara and Pacioretty, put some damn PADDING on those STANCHIONS. Cherry had a good idea on "Coach's Corner". slightly ANGLE the glass AND add padding. and btw, from what I sw on the replay, I don't think Chara was at fault. he didn't drive Pacioretty into the stanchion. he just checked him along the boards and Pacioretty's momentum took him into the stanchion which had little to NO padding.

 

head protction need the most attention, same with the blind side hits..accident or no accident...its a cheap way of kncking the guy off the puck or out of play

Those are some good ideas, Lipps, and I would support all of them if they were ever implemented. I hate the trapezoid rule. It handcuffs a lot of goalies who have a talent for handling the puck. Forecheckers can go into the offensive zone at full throttle because they know the goalie can't play the puck, and defensemen can't run interference and hold up the forecheckers anymore...just a recipe for more concussions.

As for the equipment, I have the same gear as a lot of pros, and that stuff is pretty hard. I have been hit and I've dished out a few myself so I know how painful it can be.

I had an idea where something could be done to the end boards to help reduce concussions from those huge hits along the end boards. It's a design for double-layer end-boards. If you can imagine taking a section of the existing end-board, and cutting it in half (resulting in something that is like 2 slices of bread). Then in between the 2 halves, you place a layer of energy absorbing material so it's sandwiched between the 2 halves. That layer of cushioning-material would run along the end boards at both ends of the ice. The boards would still provide the lively bounce if you shoot the puck off the end boards, but the layer of cushioning will absorb enough of the impact of huge hits which will reduce the possibility of a concussion. If you combine the energy absorbing material in the end-boards without the seamless glass, the effectiveness could be increased twofold.

Anyways, I hope something meaningful will come out of those meetings that will help reduce concussions.

I think your ideas about the boards is great Saresatake.  Even have the boards made out of some sort of rubber material that is like a puck.  Not bouncy, but can absorb some of the energy of the impacts.

I know this won't be a popular stance, but maybe you eliminate things like blows to the head and hits from behind by changing the 'culture' of the game. And one of the ways you do that is by eliminating fighting from the game.

I mean, seriously, why is that out of all the major sports, hockey is the only one that more or less actively condones fighting? Football is just as fast and just as violent (probably even more so), yet you don't see guys routinely exchanging punches with one another and, if you do, they get tossed from the game right away. Basketball and soccer throw guys out of the game immediately for attempts to injure and/or fighting; hockey you go to the box for a few minutes (the majority of the time), and then you're right back on the ice.

And for those who would say hitting and fighting are part of the game's appeal, I would say take a look at the Olympics which featured some pretty wide open exciting hockey without the spectacle of goons being sent out on the ice at the end of games or, better yet, the Capitals who've gone from being the most exciting team in the league to unbelievably dull and boring in less than a year with their increased emphasis on physical play.

Eliminate fighting and you begin to change the culture of violence that surrounds the game; that and the usual suspects like Steve Downie and Matt Cooke would find themselves out of the league, thereby taking out a large part of the equation when it comes to things like head shots and hits from behind.

I'd like to see something done about hitting from behind. So many guys are getting their heads rammed into the glass and boards.

Kids are wearing the stop sign on the back of the jerseys would it be to much of an ego thing for NHL players to have something on the back of theirs or maybe a helmet. It might just make the difference in a guy seeing that and letting up.  

 

 

 

I'd like to see something done about hitting from behind. So many guys are getting their heads rammed into the glass and boards.

once again, Don Cherry has a good idea he's been promoting for years. angle the top of the boards 45 degrees and PAD them. some of the worst checking from behind board hit facial injuries I have seen are from hitting the top edge of the board.

 

I agree with the 'trapezoid' goalie playing the puck.. Except I think that you would run into a problem of goalies getting hit, tripped, fallen over.. And part of the rule was to prevent that from happening.. I just hated when goalies would come up and a player would 'barely touch them' and get a penalty.. If the goalie wants to come out that far he should be fair play for minimal body contact.. So I say use the trapezoid.. But if the goalie wants to play it in that zone he's fair game!! (for minimal body contact.. No runs!)

So anyone else have any input.  We have a great deal of posters here for such few people giving opinions here. A great deal of people coming home from work now, maybe we will have some more great discussion when they get in fromt of the computers

Yes, but let's face it Lipps... You already got the 'A' list to show up. What more do you want?

This is a great start, I really like where an actual saftey engineering firm will be used to ebaluate every rink.

Also taking out that damn seamless glass will be huge.

Having a physician to look at the players is a great step up.

BTW if you have any ideas about changing thing to help the players post it.

Great thread Lipps!  Here are my thoughts:

1- No touch icing.  If the goalie isn't moving to play the puck, and the offending team isn't closest to the puck at the hash marks (or even the blue line)...  play is blown dead.

2- Seemless glass...  gone.  Surely they can develop something that would be safe for the players and the fans.  Especially since they have the net along the back walls.

3- Goalies should be able to play the puck like they used to.  Done.

4- Equipment needs to be downsized.  If you don't feel like you're wearing armour, you might not run full speed into anyone or anything.

5- I kinda like the idea of truly enforcing the boarding/charging call for plays when icing is waved off.  In that situation, and only that situation...  if you hit someone behind the goal line without letting up/slowing down ( meaning full speed, three strides or not )...  automatic 5 minutes.  With a full game and potential additional game suspension if warranted.  Those hits from behind are the worst.  You can still make contact, but you can't run at full speed and then coast for the last 10-20 feet and lay all your weight on the defender. 

6- Every rink has to have the same padding around the turnbuckle.  The fact that the Bell Centre basically has a foam floating device wrapped around that thing is absolutely embarrassing.  Whether or not Grapes' idea of an angled turnbuckle would also make sense, I'd like to hear more on it.

7- This is my biggest contribution to this thread.  Head shots are the focal point, and for good reason.  So what happens if the refs don't have a good angle or even miss the play?  You have a replay official that can buzz the referee that the hit in question is under review.  Chances are, the player will be down on the ice anyway...  so it wouldn't even disrupt the game more than it already is.  But you'd have a qualified person in the booth to determine is someone raised their hand, stick or elbow in a "reckless" move.  That play is an automatic 5 minute and potential game misconduct.  With the potential for the league to administer an additional 1-5 game suspension after a closer look and status of the injured player.  Something like that.  But at least it doesn't put all the pressure on the ref on the ice to make that split second call.  If we're gonna have replays to make sure a goal is a goal...  let's make sure a head shot is a head shot.  If the players know that they won't be "sneaking" anything past the booth...  I guarantee they become a little more responsible with their bodies and sticks.  I'm thinking of the Matt Cooke hit here.  Something that is pretty blatant. 

Carry on fellas. 

That's some great ideas Phish.....

I know there has to be a ton of posters from Canada that has input on this. 

How about some across the pond posters where the play is less physical.

When i played back in high school we had a new rink built in my town so it had seemless glass. i remember one game i went to go throw a hit on somebody, he ducked out of the way and my arms ran into the glass... it was so stiff that it just popped my shoulder right out ! That glass does more than just damage peoples heads

What was their reasoning for changing the goalie rule in the first place?

Thanks Lipps.

This is a very hot topic around these parts.  Sid Crosby being the local boy hero that hasn't played in 2 months, and a lot of Habs fans that are still upset about the Pacioretty thing. 

On a side note, I don't think bringing the 2 line pass back in would really change things in a good way or combat the dangerous plays.  There were good reasons why that was changed...  to increase scoring/making the game a little more wide open and to combat the trap game.  If that rule comes back in, we go back to watching a bunch of 2-1 or worse 1-0 games this time of year.  If they implement a couple of the ideas in this thread...  that will go a long way in reducing the chaos.

So the forwards could dump and chase better.  Some of the better puck handing goaltenders could take that puck and stop things cold.  Or just fall on the puck and get a whistle.