As Ryan said in his post, we'll be hearing all about the James Wisniewski's hit on Chicago's Brent Seabrook tomorrow (the video is hidden under the jump). I don't often write about head shot things or hits of intent to injure because I have very mixed feelings on it. I like big hits and feel that fightning has it's place in hockey, and know that players will get injured. This doesn't have to do with that, hear me out and feel free to disagree.

Since the Olympics, we have gone from talking about Cooke on Savard, to Ovie on Campbell, to Downie on Crosby, to Wisniewski on Seabrook in all of what, 2 weeks? In what should be one of the most exciting times in hockey (the stretch drive), I find myself being overloaded by stories and opinion on head shots and hits that cause injuries. I find myself asking, does what we say even matter? The majority of fans can agree that hits that appear to have intent to injure sicken us, especially when they have effects of career ending injuries or concussions but a new one keeps occurring every couple of days.

Everyone saw Cooke on Savard hit and did that make you stop watching the NHL? Ok, maybe a select few of you will give up on hockey, but the majority will still enjoy the sport. It seems the fans and media are more concerned with the players health than the players or league themselves. We will continue to debate possible rules to reduce injuries to players, which I think is healthy for us to do, but it is beginning to get tiresome. To me, it seems that if players want to reduce the occurrences of these disgusting hits, the players need to stop doing them. In the end it is the player them self that executes the action that has the intention to hurt the other player.

Where I find the NHL at fault is two fold. First, they need to make the changes to the rules to help the players who can't seem to help themselves. The second, is that some memo needs to go out to the organizations which should get passed to the coaches that should get passed to the players that read: THIS IS NOT MARKETABLE. The NHL just came off from the Olympics where some great hockey was displayed, and instead of focusing on hockey, hits/injuries like what has been displayed in the last two weeks will discourage non-hockey fans from becoming hockey fans. If you are a parent and saw the Cooke hit on Savard, would you enroll your kid in hockey?

So, back to our regular programming of a mix of Westcoast links:

View From My Seats is growing and has added some new writers. Congrats to Matt for continuing to put out great work, I'm sure this won't reduce the amount he actually writes per day. Interesting post he wrote on the self-awareness of hockey players

This one is from the weekend, but still good if you haven't read it yet. James Mirtle write about the Sharks' Jamie McGinn who has been recalled and demoted a league-leading 14 times

Jibblescribbits suggests TV shows that would be good fits for NHL stars to appear on

The Royal Half explains how 3rd jerseys came about and also admits that they also frequent the Pavel Bure Fan Club website

Fear the Fin reconstructs the Western Conference Playoff Standings, words cannot describe how long it looks like Mr. Plank took to write it, but it's worth the read

Since so many hockey bloggers seem to love haiku's, here's something poetry related: Copper and Blue introduces us to Randall Maggs who wrote Night Work: The Sawchuk Poems