A Disgrace Formerly Known as The NHL

Please view this video and read these ([1] and [2]) articles before reading this article.

It was a profound moment. Profound. Watching a hockey player, a YOUNG hockey player, lying unconscious on the ice, his teammates and players of the opposite team crowding around him. He is lifted onto a stretcher and taken to a hospital. The cause? A push, or a hit or however you'd like to refer it, into a stanchion between the benches. I'll put it like this, he ran head first into a wall. To add thunder to that, a body pushed him into that wall.

I am by no means a Habs fan, nor a Bruins fan, and I wasn't even watching the game. And although I usually smile at Habs misfortune, this time I couldn't. I found myself ashamed of what the league has become.

It seems the year of the tiger is actually the year of the concussion. Never before has this injury received so much attention. First it was Sidney Crosby, face of the NHL and captain of the Pittsburgh Penguins - when he was diagnosed with a concussion, the timeline was a week - and now, there is no timeline at all. To make matters worse for his team, their second star, Evgeni Malkin, is out for the rest of the season with knee injuries. Oh, and their team is plagued by injuries.

And after Crosby was gone, it all kind of spiraled out of control. I am sure I don't need to refresh your memory on some recent events, as you probably heard of them. There is a lot of men out with concussions right now, and so far, the NHL has turned its head. While everyone else, and I mean everyone, is voicing concern about this, the NHL just isn't. Players, fans, well-known people, but not the NHL.

And then on Tuesday, a player is taken to the hospital, diagnosed with a serious concussion, and a non-displaced fracture of the first vertebrae in his neck. Sure, this wasn't technically illegal, but when a player is out indefinitely because of this, you'd think the NHL would do something. But, nothing. Not even a one game suspension.
And so, I find myself asking this: What is it gonna take for the NHL to do something about these head shots? I'm starting to think that the NHL won't do anything until someone dies because of these head shots.

As someone with a little experience with these things, I know what a concussion can lead to. Six years ago, my uncle Mike suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. He's not the same. He's in a 24-hour care home. This came from an unnoticed concussion, but a concussion none the less. So, the fact that the NHL is putting players at risk for stuff like that, is just ridiculous.

I'm ashamed. I'm disappointed.