The NHL should tear down its league-sanctioned wall of silence and provide a forum to address issues facing the game.
The National Hockey League fined Tampa Bay Lightning coach John Tortorella $10,000 for comments he made about the officiating in an overtime loss to the Atlanta Thrashers this week.
Happy American Thanksgiving, coach!
Now there's no surprise in any of this. Tortorella is a fiery and passionate coach and one to speak his mind. The NHL has a good many who believe in policing thought and are so passionate about it that they created a bylaw (Bylaw 17) that allows them to whack coaches, general managers and various team personnel for doing what you and I do every day: complain about real or perceived injustice.
I bring this up for a couple of reasons, not the least of which is a simple question: What if Tortorella was right?
His complaint was that his team received three questionable penalties late in the game, the last being what observers might argue was a phantom call on Brad Richards that led to the game-winning goal.
It's debatable, but it's not like these things don't happen from time to time: just ask anyone in Edmonton who holds a grudge against Mick McGough.
"The frustrating part for me is these organizations pay the players millions upon millions of dollars," Tortorella said after his team lost, 4-3. "They're the ones who need to decide outcomes of games. Listen, I'm trying to stay away from criticizing as far as the calls, but (expletive) that. I just don't get it.
"And it makes the coaching job that much harder; how you coach your players in playing when you get that (expletive) out there."
Now Tortorella would help his argument if he cleaned up his language a bit (not to mention how he could ease parents' fears of letting their kids watch a Lightning post-game show). Fire and passion are fine and there's a legitimate argument regarding the heat-of-the-moment culture and the cult of locker room language.
But if Tortorella has a case he should be allowed to make a clear and reasoned argument that the officiating crew failed in its duties. That's not just important for the morale of his team, it's important that fans realize that something happened out there that cannot be overlooked.
To be sure there are coaches who have and would abuse a free-speech system, but one can argue that's no greater crime than a league-sanctioned wall of silence concerning problems in the game.
An open dialogue about what is already in the public domain is always a good thing. A smash-mouth fine designed to allow nothing more than league-speak is not.
Open debate led to some of the changes we see in hockey today, a debate where all sides chimed in and where players didn't just voice their criticism, they had a seat at the table with the competition committee and helped implement real change in the game.
Critics might argue -- via hindsight -- that the committee was little more than window dressing, something the league allowed largely as a public relations and contract negotiation move, but few can deny that it had some impact on the way the game is played today. Just as importantly it gave the impression that all people who love and watch hockey would be heard and that their ideas might not just be heard, but also accepted. That no longer seems to be the case in a league that looks very much the same as it did before it fought so hard to get the public on its side during the lockout.
Tortorella may be the wrong choice to lead this fight. He's not what you would call all-inclusive regarding his opinions about what goes on in the game, what needs to be changed or simply challenged, but he deserves to be heard.
And it doesn't stop with him.
Currently there is a debate about whether the game is backsliding toward the pre-lockout days when defence ruled and scoring was as rare as a hockey player's teeth.
But even without Bylaw 17, the league seems to be doing its best to silence that debate. Recent comments by commissioner Gary Bettman acknowledged only that the league was "monitoring" a notable decline in scoring. It was a faint acknowledgement of a topic that coaches and general managers are screaming about behind closed doors but tend to avoid making a public comment because of fear of a fine or worse.
Worse happens to be the subtle way the NHL deals with malcontents. It's seldom proven but often whispered that the NHL has ways of threatening teams that don't toe the corporate line regarding the state of the game and how "good" it is. A professional lifetime in the game leads me to think they have a case.
One needs only to look at the replay of a controversial no-goal call in an eventual 2-1 Lightning loss to the New York Rangers in a game Wednesday (the same day Tortorella was fined) as a case in point.
The NHL will always have challenges, especially with how the game is called. There are rules, but it's also a subjective thing and very much open to debate.
That shouldn't be viewed as a bad thing.
In a league desperate for attention, a free and open-minded airing of the issues might well be the best thing the league could do in drawing attention to it.
