NHL playoff hockey is known for big hits and big ticket prices. But, while players like the big salaries, they're not necessarily fans of receiving the big hit.
VANCOUVER – Maybe it’s a societal thing. Like the 15-year-old Korean lad in Keswick, Ont. this week, who was called a “[bleeping] Chinese” and punched in the mouth by a bully at school.
The Korean boy, who just happened to have a black belt in tae kwon do, retaliated with one punch in return, breaking the bully’s nose.
Now, in the world anyone over 20 years of age grew up in, that scenario would fall under the heading, “Getting What You Paid For.” The bully wanted to take part in a physical confrontation, and got exactly what he was looking for.
However our Korean boy was suspended for four weeks, and received a letter — later retracted — from the school board threatening not only to expel him from all schools in Keswick, but from the entire York Region.
How does this relate to the National Hockey League playoffs? Here’s how:
Players like Jiri Hudler and Rick Rypien want to play in the NHL. They like the lifestyle, the game, and of course, the money. Who wouldn’t?
Partially to support the average player salary of just less than $2 million, fans are charged outrageous prices to watch the games live. (There are $475 tickets in the lower bowl at Canucks games for Round 2).
Though there are many elements that comprise the entertainment value for the paying customer, in hockey, one of them is physical contact. Everyone likes, “The big hit.”
Body checks are part of the equation in the NHL that Rypien and Hudler signed up for, the way car wrecks are part of NASCAR, the way a crushing blow on a receiver is part of football’s culture, the way running over a catcher who is blocking the plate is in baseball.
But hold on.
Now that these players are in the league, they’re not so sure they like being on the other end of one of those hits. “Guys have families, livelihoods,” mused Canucks bruising defenceman Shane O’Brien. “There is so much coverage now, and hits to the head have become such a topic of conversation.”
Rypien, who complained about a hit from Ben Eager in Game 1 of the Chicago-Vancouver series, made $522,000 this season. He has not yet celebrated his 25th birthday.
Hudler, who was crushed on a perfectly legal check from Anaheim’s Mike Brown, pulled in $1.15 million. At age 25 and with his skill level, he could accumulate between $10-20 million more dollars in NHL salary before his career is complete.
The risk of providing for the next two generations of your family and never having to hold another job after age 35 however, is that one day a guy like Darcy Hordichuk might catch Hudler admiring another pass. And whether or not Hordichuk senses vulnerability, well, it won’t matter to him.
“No, not at all,” Hordichuk said. “A guy like Hudler, if you catch him in Game 1 he might not be playing with a full deck of cards for the rest of the series. And the other [Red Wings] too. They’ll be aware.
“I honestly don’t think the [Brown hit] was a penalty. It was Hudler’s fault — the puck was literally right there. With Ripper, the puck was long gone.”
Well, longer gone anyhow. Which, we’ll argue, left Rypien more time to get off the train tracks.
The referees threw Brown out of Game 1 for a hit that was deemed not worthy of suspension. Eager got two minutes for his hit on Rypien. Again, no suspension.
Of course guys like Henrik Zetterberg and the Sedin brothers want those hits out of the game. They are always going to be the fly, never the windshield. We get that.
But even in a game as tough as hockey, weathered, experienced hockey men — including a few reporters and TV types we all know — whined and cried for Colin Campbell to take action when Brown caught Hudler with that text book, elbow-tucked-in, body check.
Detroit’s Mike Babcock is an excellent coach, and seems like one tough S.O.B. But in the culture that is forming in today’s NHL, even he couldn’t accept a hard hit on one of his players, without labeling it “a vicious, dirty hit.”
This is what makes North American hockey more compelling than European hockey:
In the NHL, you’ve got the most highly skilled European and North American players. Guys like Pavel Datsyuk, Martin St. Louis or Patrick Kane, whose pure skill can on some nights be worth the price of admission.
On the nights it is not however, and there are many of those in an 82-game schedule, you have “energy” players like Eager, Curtis Glencross and Chris Neil can on occasion chip in some value for that $100 game ticket.
You’ve got great goaltenders who can steal the show. Or, on occasion, a good fight gets people out of their seats, when all of those other elements have failed.
If I was paying to get in — which I’m not — I would be some upset if “the big hit” were legislated out of the game.
“You know, it’s playoff hockey. There are going to be hits. You’ve got to keep your head up out there,” Eager said.
“I’m not going to turn off a hit like that,” he promised. “If there’s a hit like that, I’m going to take it again."
Countered Rypien: “There's a lot of hockey left.”
Sounds like entertainment to me.
