To Check or Not to Check?
In Montreal, the officials who oversee youth hockey would like young players to wear a "stop sign" on the back of their jerseys to discourage their opponents from checking them.
The debate in Montreal, which will surely affect the policy in the states, is whether to teach kids checking from day one, or to discourage checking altogether.
The organization says young players are not allowed to bodycheck, but coach Lorne Rubin sees it happen anyway.
Rubin says players should be learning about fair play from day one.
"If it's taught properly by the organization, if the coaches are taught properly, then it makes sense," said Rubin.
Dr. Scott Delaney says what makes hockey players especially vulnerable to spinal cord injury is the boards.
A fall into the unyielding wood is bad enough, but to be pushed hard in the fastest game on ice can be devastating.
"It's really a pattern we're trying to change," said Delaney.
He figures the best way to protect players is to stop bodychecking before players are strong enough to --even unintentionally --do damage.
Closer to home, USA hockey, the organization that oversees most youth hockey organizations, is preparing to eliminate all checking for kids below 13 years of age, beginning next year. This is a very controversial move: right now, all kids above 10 can check, but not below 10.
My brother, who is 12 years old, plays hockey pretty seriously, so I've been to a lot of youth hockey games, and I've seen a lot of checking, and a lot of kids get hurt, but nothing permanently damaging. I'm not saying that serious injuries don't happen on the ice, they do. But still: I can't imagine a game of hockey without checking. It would be like watching football without tackling. Tackling and checking add an unpredictability to each play that makes it exciting to watch.
My brother recently fell victim to a pretty serious hockey injury, resulting from a check he gave to the son of a former NHL enforcer, Chris Gratton. It happened the first week of December. My parents took him to see a doctor and the doc diagnosed it as a bruise, but nothing more. Tristan, my brother, continued to play and continued to get checked after the injury.
A few weeks later, one of the other parents from one of his teams caught a particularly bad and dirty hit Tristan took on camera. My brother's the one in mid-air.
It was a bad fall. It was painful, but he recovered and in the following weeks, he kept playing. He didn't complain.
Well.
Yesterday, my parents took him to the orthopedist. It turns out that when he checked that kid early in December, he actually did more than bruise himself: he broke his collarbone. Broke his collarbone.
For five weeks, he had been playing hockey--checking and being checked--on a broken collarbone. The doctor, pointing to an x-ray of Tristan's shoulder, said that his body had naturally built up huge calcium deposits that were cushioning the break and allowing it to heal. The doctor also said that he has an unusually high threshold for pain and, if he wants to, can continue playing hockey as the bone heals. No cast or pain meds necessary. He just needs to build up some more muscle around his shoulder to support the bone.
I'm not saying that my brother's story will be the story of every kid who gets injured. My brother is a lucky, tough kid that just won't give up. Some kids who get injured will do irreparable harm to themselves. But isn't that the risk you take when you play serious contact sports? For the faint of heart, there's always chess....or soccer. But for hockey players, there should always be checking.
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Comments :
May '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Many youth leagues in this country and across Canada already have stop signs on the back of jerseys to prevent a player from hitting another player from behind against the boards. Those instances are where a majority of the serious on-ice injuries result.
There is an art to the bodycheck that goes beyond mere hitting and like most other things nowadays in sports, I believe it is not taught properly.
While there are bound to be injuries in any collision sport (a wise man once said dancing is a contact sport), a bodycheck thrown properly is probably less likely to injure than an accidental collision on the ice between unsuspecting players. You cannot take bodychecking out of the sport any more than you can take tackling out of football (although that is probably the next suggestion).
Sports like hockey will always have some risk of injury which is assumed by the participant. I'm pretty sure there are several no-contact leagues available for those parents who don't want their little ones to face the risk of injury. As seems to be a pattern, that is not enough for some people who seek to ruin it for everyone.
Oct '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
I think the best way to minimize injury in hockey is to have zero tolerance for dirty play from the very earliest ages. I've seen far too many dirty players at the high school level and younger. Dirty players or just tolerance of dirty, dangerous play at those levels are encouraged - tacitly or otherwise - by the culture that too many (bad) parents and (bad) coaches and (bad) referees and (bad) league officials refuse to extinctify.
Dirty players lead other players less-inclinded to be dirty...to be dirty in retaliation. Until the punishment for dirty play is swift and certain (that is to say, until refs start being refs), and severe enough - say, banishment for a season rather than a game misconduct penalty or more likely, merely a major penalty - nothing will change.
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Mike Riscili: There is an art to the bodycheck that goes beyond mere hitting and like most other things nowadays in sports, I believe it is not taught properly.
Jan 14 at 12:16pm
Good point. I think that's an argument for teaching the bodycheck to kids as soon as they hit the ice, when they're little tykes, and can't hurt each other as badly while they're learning. Then, through the years, they can master the art.
Oct '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
I would agree with you that checking should be allowed at all ages, but for a different reason. When you play without any checking you don't learn how to take a check. At the younger ages (6 or 7 yrs) kids can't and don't hit as hard, these lighter hits are good lessons on how to take a hit and play with the expectation of getting hit. I remember once getting my stick caught between me (my thigh) and the boards while getting hit. It was incredibly painful, but I never let it happen again. Better to learn that lesson when you're younger and the hits are lighter, rather than learn when the hits are harder.
As for the hits from behind, it's hard to protect yourself against this because you can't see it coming. It will get you a game misconduct in college if you check a player into the boards from behind. Checking from behind shouldn't be allowed at any level.
BTW, based on the pictures it looks like your brother got tripped, which should have been a penalty. I hope he recovers well.
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
I agree that dirty playing is a problem that needs to be immediately stopped (though I would opt to have the kids sit through a penalty or two first before getting kicked off the ice for a season, just in case the ref makes a bad call, as they're wont to do). The issue, a lot of the times, is not so much that the kids play dirty, but that the refs are not doing their job, as you suggest, and not keeping things clean and fair on the ice. It's one of the most frustrating things to watch from the stands.
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Ouch!! But you make another great point: learning to take a check is as important, if not more, than learning to check.
And thanks for the kind words about my bro : )
May '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
This is really what is all boils down to. You've heard it a lot in many professional sports, but respect for one another in sports, as in life, is slowly (or not so slowly) eroding.
May '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed.
The issue, a lot of the times, is not so much that the kids play dirty, but that the refs are not doing their job, as you suggest, and not keeping things clean and fair on the ice. It's one of the most frustrating things to watch from the stands. · Jan 14 at 12:45pm
Emily, although I agree with your comment about officials we must remember that in most cases, the referees at youth levels are amateurs as well. Many of them are learning to be an official and it's not as easy as it seems to know when to pull back and let them play and when to call it close to the vest. It really is a thankless job to have players, coaches and parents yelling at you for every call you make.
I put most of the responsibility on the coaches and parents to teach how to be civil and respectful while being aggressive on the ice.
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Mike Riscili
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed.
The issue, a lot of the times, is not so much that the kids play dirty, but that the refs are not doing their job, as you suggest...
Emily, although I agree with your comment about officials we must remember that in most cases, the referees at youth levels are amateurs as well. Many of them are learning to be an official and it's not as easy as it seems to know when to pull back and let them play and when to call it close to the vest. It really is a thankless job to have players, coaches and parents yelling at you for every call you make.
I put most of the responsibility on the coaches and parents to teach how to be civil and respectful while being aggressive on the ice. · Jan 14 at 1:03pm
Yes, you're right. Parents and coaches need to teach civility. And I'm sure being a ref is tough, but refs also need to step up to the plate. I've seen some pretty nasty and unfair refs.
Nov '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Brought to mind a comment Dennis Miller once made when it was found some officials were trying to ban dodgeball from the schools, and how "instructive" he thought the game was.
Paraphrase of Miller:
"Isn't life just a protracted 75 year episode of being hit in the b - - - s with one thing or another?"
Let them check.
Jun '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Looks like your brother is getting elbowed and tripped. Ouch! As far as a broken collarbone --- it's the most common broken bone in the body & I don't think it's ever treated with a cast. A sling maybe. It should heal up nicely on its own. It's pretty common for kids to break it and walk around for weeks without knowing. (My son broke his as a toddler & we realized it weeks later.) Sometimes you'll notice the kid's shoulders look a bit lopsided and you can feel the break area and it gives off a crunching sound (crepitus) when palpated.
Checking is part of the game. I remember my son wearing the stop sign on his jersey, but he's now 14 and it's been gone for a while. I think that horrible refs, who alow dirty plays and players to go uncalled, are a much bigger injury risk than checking done properly will ever be.
Oct '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Part of the problem is that many of the people who coach minor hockey aren't necessarily qualified to do so. Lo Fon makes a good point about learning to take a hit. I don't know what it's like over there now but, in the bad old days of the USSR, they taught their kids very early how to go down in ways that would prevent injury when they were checked. We learned how to take a hit by taking hits - usually from older siblings and their friends. You simply learned to take it because if you went crying to mom she wasn't going to let you play anymore.
As for non-contact hockey: as someone who plays rec I can tell you that some of the most violent collisions that I've seen have come in non-contact games. When guys have to throw their bodies around in order to avoid levelling someone, it's not unusual to blindside someone else who had his head down and wasn't anticipating your sudden and unexpected change of direction.
If the kids are properly coached then there's nothing wrong with contact in the game.
Oct '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
Emily Esfahani Smith, Ed.
The issue, a lot of the times, is not so much that the kids play dirty, but that the refs are not doing their job, as you suggest, and not keeping things clean and fair on the ice. It's one of the most frustrating things to watch from the stands. · Jan 14 at 12:45pm
I agree, Emily, that much of the time the problem is with the adults (what a surprise!) who don't properly teach the kids, whether it's math or manners or hockey. It seems to me that hockey refs (and thus, their superiors) at all levels are negligent in calling all that they should. The result is that kids learn that a lot of it is tolerated (game misconducts instead of banishment), and so that's how they learn to play the game.
Nov '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
As a lifelong fan of Gordie Howe, one of the most aggressive players in the history of the NHL (ergo the definition of a Gordie Howe hat trick as a goal, an assist and a fight all in one game), am sorry for these attempts to dilute one of the most dynamic aspects of this great sport.
Edited on Jan 14, 2011 at 3:54pmSep '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
As the Montreal father of a 20-year-old hockey fanatic, I have mixed feelings about this.
There is nothing better than watching a non-contact game where the ART of hockey is on display and it comes down to pure skill. Deking, passing, setting up the plays. I love a good goal, regardless of the team that score.
My son has not been taught to check or how to take a check. At the higher levels and only in the double letters do they permit checking. But what he has developed is the ability to push the envelope, to know just what he can do and then a bit more, before being called by the refs.
But even though it's a non-contact game, there is always checking. Some is caught, some isn't. Geez, whenever we played St-Jean last year, the police were called because of the inevitable fights that broke out.
It seems they are a bit more strict these past years. But checking still goes on.
My gut tells me that he should have been taught all about checking, especially how to receive one, but still keep it non-contact.
Jul '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
If we succeed in making hockey a safe game in which all players treat each other with delicacy and compassion, then we will no longer have the game that we know as hockey. This is "mother suffocation", pure and simple.
Jun '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
"This is "mother suffocation", pure and simple." ???? Citations please.
My husband suffered his worst hockey injury in a non-checking game where some bozo checked him into the boards & his shoulder was seperated. He claims it was the worst pain of his life. At least when you play in a checking league you are anticipating getting rocked & skate accordingly.
Nov '10
Re: To Check or Not to Check?
I don't mean to be crude, but hockey is not a game for fruitcakes. It's a tough sport for tough kids. If you don't want to risk your son getting injured, sign him up for tennis.