Removing hitting completely is asinine, and I'm hardly a meathead about these things. With the speed and nature of the game, especially at the highest level, contact is literally almost unavoidable. The game is hard enough to call well with hitting allowed, removing it would be damn near impossible to call. Ask an official who works Olympic level or even pro women's hockey where checking isn't allowed what it's like to call those games. It's damn hard, because these are competitive, strong, intense, high level hockey players and you're trying to decipher at game speed what is "acceptable" contact that you don't call and what's a flat out body check that must be called. It's a really tough line to walk, and doing so at high men's levels would be even harder given the additional size and speed on the whole.
Playing strictly the puck with players at that level is also impossible. You get walked playing the puck at the Midget level, let alone the NHL. It just completely changes the game and for the much worse, in my opinion.
If the NHL actually had a discipline department worth a **** and had consistency with its penalties, punishments, suspensions, etc., you rectify a lot of this. Targeting head shots is a must and should happen, and head shots ARE avoidable a high percentage of the time, contrary to popular belief. Eliminating hitting altogether is a terrible idea on numerous levels.
