06-03-2008, 06:49 PM
[quote ztirffritz]True. Hockey REALLy cracked down on fights over the last decade. Mario Lemieux was very actively involved in changing the face of the game. He convinced the players and the owners to increase penalties and fines for fighting, unsportsmanlike conduct, and other behaviors that detracted from the game. Before Lemieux it was largely a game of brute force. After Lemieux it became a game of finesse.
Ah, Mario Lemieux. I remember when all of the "foreign" sounding names of hockey players were French-Canadian. Maurice Richard, Jean Beliveau, Guy Lafleur, etc. When I was a kid, the Montreal Canadians were gods. After the original expansion of the league, teams like the Philadelphia Flyers and Boston Bruins popularized a "goon" style of hockey that gave the game a bad name. Of course, there is still some of that today. It seems like every team has to have one or two bad boys on it.
Ah, Mario Lemieux. I remember when all of the "foreign" sounding names of hockey players were French-Canadian. Maurice Richard, Jean Beliveau, Guy Lafleur, etc. When I was a kid, the Montreal Canadians were gods. After the original expansion of the league, teams like the Philadelphia Flyers and Boston Bruins popularized a "goon" style of hockey that gave the game a bad name. Of course, there is still some of that today. It seems like every team has to have one or two bad boys on it.