creamy
September 21st, 2004, 06:27 PM
Here's Ken Dryden's article "It's time to talk about visors"
-------------------------------------
It was at the March 11 game in Ottawa, sitting in the press box far from where it happened. I could see a Senators player near the Leafs' net spin quickly around to swing at a suddenly available puck. Then I saw Bryan Berard topple to the ice. The stick of Marion Hossa, the highly promising Senators left-winger, had struck Berard in the face with its full force. I looked at the TV monitor beside me. Berard was lying prone, his legs kicking at the ice. A dark spot formed beside him. Blood on ice is crimson; it splatters and streams. This was darker and thick.
I didn't think about his eye. I have seen so many pucks and sticks come threateningly close, then, with the tiniest reflexive twitch of a head, slam on the face's protective armature of cheek bones, eyebrows or nose. I wasn't ready for the news that came early the next morning. Bryan Berard, just a week after his 23rd birthday, was not likely to play again.
There is a sadness in Toronto that still hasn't lifted. And inevitably people are beginning to debate the mandatory use of face protectors in the NHL. The great majority of NHL players wore a full face mask from the time they took their first strides on the ice at age 5 or 6 until they were 18. Most wore visors for a few more years until they reached the NHL and were given a choice. Then most decided to play as they never had before, with no facial protection at all.
In hockey's formantive years, rules were created to protect what equipment didn't. Blows to the head were penalized; so were high sticking and elbowing. In the past 20 years of minor hockey, with its helmets and masks, the head was as well protected as any other part of the body, and these penalties became obsolete even as they were still applied. Today's NHL players grew up knowing that a stick to the head might result in a penalty but not an injury. Sticks could be carried highg or low and used with near impunity--it didn't matter.
Then, in the NHL, thep layers take their face masks off.
What Hossa did was an accident. That isn't the same, however, as saying it's merely an unfortunate part of the game. Some activites are riskier than others. Hockey's imaginable accidends are much more severe than those in basketball or soccer. It's not enough to find explanation in the inevitability of accident. We need to imagine accident as part of the game and generate plans to minimize it.
Would most available visors have saved Berard's eye? Not necessarily. Could a visor be designed that could have? Yes. Would wearing a visor have made most of today's eye injuries less likey? Yes.
Everything we do, sports included, is a compromise between safety and performance. Around the office we don't think of safety much. At wheel of a care we do. Skiers can't ski down a hill fast until they learn how to control their speed and know they can stop if they have to. Hockey players will reack speeds of 40 km/h only when they know they can brake before the end boards. Safety doesn't need to straitjacket performance. Usually, it enhances it.
I know this from personal experience. When goalies first experimented with masks, they were distracted by all the differences they noticed. Masks are heavey, they're hot. When you try to see a puck at your feet, parts of them get in the way. I didn't wear a mask until an NCAA rule foced me to wear one. Then heavy and hot didn't matter, because you didn't have a choice. You learned to see through and past any obstructions. It was the same, years later, for skaters and helmets. IT will be the same for visors.
Mandating visors will take more than a decree from the NHL. IT will require the support of the players and the NHL Players' Association. It isn't the entire answer for a player to say, I don't want to wear a visor, and I shouldn't have to-- it's my choice.
Sports depends on public acceptance. If it doesn't reflect the tastes and values of a time, players and spectators will seek out other activities. People are attracted to risk. Near misses are thrilling. Wipeouts are skiing or surfing; cars brushing a wall, turning broadside, send catapulting into the air over other cars, that's exciting-- when no one gets hurt.
But more hockey players are getting really hurt now. NHL players talk openly about a new lack of respect that players seem to have for one another. With this lack of respect, they are not only hurting one another, they are damaging the sport. This is what takes this beyond matter of simple personal choice.
For the first 80 years of hockey's existence, no gaolie wore a mask. It took nearly 40 more years before every skater was required to wear a helmet. From today's perspective, that doesn't seem possible, just as playing football without a helmet, then without a face mak, to us seems incredible lore. How could they do it? Ten years from now, maybe 20, but sometime, all hockey players will wear facial protection, and 20 years after that, it will seem just as incredible that they didn't always do it.
The questioin is not if but when. And the question for us is whether we drag out this time to its extreme act sooner.
--------------------
I live in Toronto and this is one of the hot discussion. Do you agree with Dryden, that, what is greater importance, a player's right to choose, or the safety of all players in the game? Do you guys think that the madatory use of visors by the NHL needs to be enforced?
-------------------------------------
It was at the March 11 game in Ottawa, sitting in the press box far from where it happened. I could see a Senators player near the Leafs' net spin quickly around to swing at a suddenly available puck. Then I saw Bryan Berard topple to the ice. The stick of Marion Hossa, the highly promising Senators left-winger, had struck Berard in the face with its full force. I looked at the TV monitor beside me. Berard was lying prone, his legs kicking at the ice. A dark spot formed beside him. Blood on ice is crimson; it splatters and streams. This was darker and thick.
I didn't think about his eye. I have seen so many pucks and sticks come threateningly close, then, with the tiniest reflexive twitch of a head, slam on the face's protective armature of cheek bones, eyebrows or nose. I wasn't ready for the news that came early the next morning. Bryan Berard, just a week after his 23rd birthday, was not likely to play again.
There is a sadness in Toronto that still hasn't lifted. And inevitably people are beginning to debate the mandatory use of face protectors in the NHL. The great majority of NHL players wore a full face mask from the time they took their first strides on the ice at age 5 or 6 until they were 18. Most wore visors for a few more years until they reached the NHL and were given a choice. Then most decided to play as they never had before, with no facial protection at all.
In hockey's formantive years, rules were created to protect what equipment didn't. Blows to the head were penalized; so were high sticking and elbowing. In the past 20 years of minor hockey, with its helmets and masks, the head was as well protected as any other part of the body, and these penalties became obsolete even as they were still applied. Today's NHL players grew up knowing that a stick to the head might result in a penalty but not an injury. Sticks could be carried highg or low and used with near impunity--it didn't matter.
Then, in the NHL, thep layers take their face masks off.
What Hossa did was an accident. That isn't the same, however, as saying it's merely an unfortunate part of the game. Some activites are riskier than others. Hockey's imaginable accidends are much more severe than those in basketball or soccer. It's not enough to find explanation in the inevitability of accident. We need to imagine accident as part of the game and generate plans to minimize it.
Would most available visors have saved Berard's eye? Not necessarily. Could a visor be designed that could have? Yes. Would wearing a visor have made most of today's eye injuries less likey? Yes.
Everything we do, sports included, is a compromise between safety and performance. Around the office we don't think of safety much. At wheel of a care we do. Skiers can't ski down a hill fast until they learn how to control their speed and know they can stop if they have to. Hockey players will reack speeds of 40 km/h only when they know they can brake before the end boards. Safety doesn't need to straitjacket performance. Usually, it enhances it.
I know this from personal experience. When goalies first experimented with masks, they were distracted by all the differences they noticed. Masks are heavey, they're hot. When you try to see a puck at your feet, parts of them get in the way. I didn't wear a mask until an NCAA rule foced me to wear one. Then heavy and hot didn't matter, because you didn't have a choice. You learned to see through and past any obstructions. It was the same, years later, for skaters and helmets. IT will be the same for visors.
Mandating visors will take more than a decree from the NHL. IT will require the support of the players and the NHL Players' Association. It isn't the entire answer for a player to say, I don't want to wear a visor, and I shouldn't have to-- it's my choice.
Sports depends on public acceptance. If it doesn't reflect the tastes and values of a time, players and spectators will seek out other activities. People are attracted to risk. Near misses are thrilling. Wipeouts are skiing or surfing; cars brushing a wall, turning broadside, send catapulting into the air over other cars, that's exciting-- when no one gets hurt.
But more hockey players are getting really hurt now. NHL players talk openly about a new lack of respect that players seem to have for one another. With this lack of respect, they are not only hurting one another, they are damaging the sport. This is what takes this beyond matter of simple personal choice.
For the first 80 years of hockey's existence, no gaolie wore a mask. It took nearly 40 more years before every skater was required to wear a helmet. From today's perspective, that doesn't seem possible, just as playing football without a helmet, then without a face mak, to us seems incredible lore. How could they do it? Ten years from now, maybe 20, but sometime, all hockey players will wear facial protection, and 20 years after that, it will seem just as incredible that they didn't always do it.
The questioin is not if but when. And the question for us is whether we drag out this time to its extreme act sooner.
--------------------
I live in Toronto and this is one of the hot discussion. Do you agree with Dryden, that, what is greater importance, a player's right to choose, or the safety of all players in the game? Do you guys think that the madatory use of visors by the NHL needs to be enforced?