WHY THE GAME NEEDS FIGHTING

Last night, 20-year-old Garrett Klotz of the Philadelphia Phantoms had a seizure after a particularly long and bloody fight against a member of the Manchester Monarchs. This, plus the untimely death of Don Sanderson, who hit his head on the ice after a fight, and the argument about whether fighting really belongs in hockey is wide open for discussion.

Despite these horrible situations, fighting should remain legal. Believe it or not, fighting actually keeps the players more safe out on the ice, and taking that away would make for more cheap shots and probably more serious injuries. When the Dallas Stars visited the Boston Bruins on November 1, Dallas agitators Steve Ott and Sean Avery (especially Ott though) took cheap shot after cheap shot on Bruins players. He went after the knee of Stephane Yelle, and then backed into Milan Lucic's knees, clearly trying to hurt either one of them. So how did Boston respond? Well, Ott refused to fight, so enforcer Shawn Thornton fought Kris Barch. Andrew Ference fought Avery. In fact, just about all the Bruins were ready to drop the gloves to defend their teammates. And they did it all legally. Had fighting been outlawed in the game, the only way for them to reply to Ott's antics would be to go after him illegally. Maybe they would have hit him low, like he did to them. Maybe a shot after the whistle. Who knows? But what we do know is that fighting let the players police themselves and nobody got hurt.

Taking fights out of the game would lead to more Ulf Samuelsson-Cam Neely situations. And I don't think anybody wants that.