OT: Study says Rule 48 has not lowered concussion rates in NHL

[Danton Heineken]

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=427916

The research suggests the rule, which outlawed bodychecks aimed at the head and checking from a player's blind side, has not led to lower concussion rates among pro hockey players.

The senior author of the work says part of the problem is that referees aren't enforcing the rule.

And Dr. Michael Cusimano says another issue is that these types of incidents aren't the major cause of concussions in hockey.

Cusimano says fighting is a more common cause of concussions in the sport.


KPD will be as giddy as a schoolgirl when he reads this.

Click to read more...

 

[thegodfather]

I do not hold a Phd and I did not sleep at a Super 8 last night, but even I know that repeated punches to the head over a period of time will cause concussions.

But in the NHL these are grown men and they make the choice to drop the gloves and fight.

So they should be left the Hell alone.

Take the body armour off the players and then you will see things change.

 

[patty59]

Does the article have the % of concussions from fights compared to hits?

 

[CamFan81]

imo.
The only thing to reduce concussions (by hits) is to slow the game down. Ever since they got rid of the two line pass, the speed of the game has changed dramatically.

Not advocating either way, just stating an observation

 

[Whiskey Sam]

Does the inconsistent application of discipline play any part in this?

 

[patty59]

"If there were more severe consequences to those who inflict that kind of injury -- let's say that player was out for an equal amount of time as Crosby -- that might have more impact," he said.

Ya, except Crosby wasn't illegally hit and it was accidental contact.

 

[Kaoz*]

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=427916

The research suggests the rule, which outlawed bodychecks aimed at the head and checking from a player's blind side, has not led to lower concussion rates among pro hockey players.

The senior author of the work says part of the problem is that referees aren't enforcing the rule.

And Dr. Michael Cusimano says another issue is that these types of incidents aren't the major cause of concussions in hockey.

Cusimano says fighting is a more common cause of concussions in the sport.


KPD will be as giddy as a schoolgirl when he reads this.

I'd go one better and say the whole problem is that no one, including the referee's and more importantly the players, know what constitutes an illegal hit to the head.

And for that, I blame Shanahan and his panel. There is zero consistency in the way calls are made and suspensions handed out.

Agree with godfather as well, players go out with pads that make them look like the legion of doom. It used to hurt handing out those types of hits, and less damage was done due to the style of pads.

 

[RussellmaniaKW]

"If there were more severe consequences to those who inflict that kind of injury -- let's say that player was out for an equal amount of time as Crosby -- that might have more impact," he said.

Ya, except Crosby wasn't illegally hit and it was accidental contact.

yeah I caught this too, but I think he was just using Crosby hypothetically in this case. Replace Crosby with Savard and his point still stands.

One thing this study doesn't seem to take into account is the severity of concussions. Maybe the highest percentage of concussions come from fights, but I'd guess that they are generally mild compared to the ones that come from hits.

 

[BergyMeister]

As others have said I think the body "armor" these guys wear is the main issue not fighting.

I wasn't around (as in a hockey fan)for the 2 line pass. How much would it actually slow down the game?

 

[patty59]

yeah I caught this too, but I think he was just using Crosby hypothetically in this case. Replace Crosby with Savard and his point still stands.

One thing this study doesn't seem to take into account is the severity of concussions. Maybe the highest percentage of concussions come from fights, but I'd guess that they are generally mild compared to the ones that come from hits.

I don't think they said the highest percentage came from fights, I think they said the highest percentage of concussions that resulted in a penalty was from fighting. They also never said what that percentage was.

According to them, 28% of concussions resulted in a penalty and a percentage of those were in fights. So it's likely less than 24% of concussions are from fighting, I would guess substantially less. But the way they display the data and write the article they try to leave the reader thinking that a majority of all concussions are resulted from fighting.

 

[Cutielemon07]

yeah I caught this too, but I think he was just using Crosby hypothetically in this case. Replace Crosby with Savard and his point still stands.

One thing this study doesn't seem to take into account is the severity of concussions. Maybe the highest percentage of concussions come from fights, but I'd guess that they are generally mild compared to the ones that come from hits.

I can think of a good few examples of severe concussions from hits that have occurred in the last 10 years, you know, ones that aren't Bergeron and Savard.

When I played hockey I had a few concussions from fighting (I was the Milan Lucic of my team!), but my teammate, she had a particularly nasty one from a check-and it was a legal check. My point is, yes, there's concussions from players fighting, but they generally aren't as bad as the ones you see from players getting checked and hit.

 

[Dellstrom]

Maybe this means that all concussions aren't from hits?!?!?!

No... The Bergeron and Marchand ones were both from elbows, Bergeron's being accidental as he was just in the wrong spot.

 

[SpeedyLazaro]

I dream of Jeannie Cusimano

 

[chizzler]

As others have said I think the body "armor" these guys wear is the main issue not fighting.

I wasn't around (as in a hockey fan)for the 2 line pass. How much would it actually slow down the game?

Bottom line. Hard plastic protects the player from getting hurt but hurts the player getting hit. I know I wouldn't go hard at someones's head with an elbow pad if it was just padding as opposed to hard plastic. Just common sense. It wouldn't take concussions away altogether but it would help. I know nay Sayers out there have stats to prove me wrong, but I still believe this.

 

[BMC]

I'm no genius at this stuff but it seems to me the study hasn't run long enough- only two seasons. I thought for a study like this to be considered accurate the research had to be done over a fairly lengthy period of time???

As for the answers we've been down this road before- better helmets, better protection/padding on the boards, reducing the size/rigidity of player padding etc.
Nobody seems to want to do anything- as usual it will take a death or someone becoming a para/quadraplegic before something is done.

 

[Danton Heineken]

I'm no genius at this stuff but it seems to me the study hasn't run long enough- only two seasons. I thought for a study like this to be considered accurate the research had to be done over a fairly lengthy period of time???

It's only 2 seasons, but across the league that adds up to several thousand games of a sample size.

 

[BergyWho37]

I would like to know how many of these players have concussions before they make the NHL .. I watch the OHL a fair bit and the top flight hits that occur in the OHL make me wonder why this is allowed when I barely see this in the NHL .. Charging rule seems different in OHL

Other then this it's such a fast game now and it almost open season on defencemen those are my thoughts ...

 

[patty59]

I'm no genius at this stuff but it seems to me the study hasn't run long enough- only two seasons. I thought for a study like this to be considered accurate the research had to be done over a fairly lengthy period of time???

As for the answers we've been down this road before- better helmets, better protection/padding on the boards, reducing the size/rigidity of player padding etc.
Nobody seems to want to do anything- as usual it will take a death or someone becoming a para/quadraplegic before something is done.

The problem is the people in charge think that adding more rules is the answer. It's not.

This "study" or least from what I read of the "study" in the article is seriously flawed and I'm not sure what point they are trying to get to?

Is it that the referees aren't calling the penalty enough? Where's the data?

Of course, they attack fighting, but they give no concrete data to back it up, only that more concussions that result in a penalty are from fighting than rule 48. But has a referee ever missed a fight? NO.

You can't have a sport like hockey and not have injuries, it's impossible.

 

[KrejciMVP]

well no kidding. Rule 48 was only made to sooth the whiners of the league like Pitt MTL and Van. I didn`t think it would have an actual effect

 

[missingchicklet]

I agree with the idea that punishment has been inconsistent. There are players who routinely go high with their hits and have learned to stay on one side of the border with those hits so as to avoid punishment. There are also players who seemingly jump into many of their hits without punishment. If the NHL wants to decrease concussions by going the punishment route then they will be suspending players left and right until the players learn what will get them suspended. The problem is that the punishment has been so inconsistent that the players don't have a good idea of what will be looked at and what won't, other than the more egregious acts.

Rule 48 is all fine and good, and consistent enforcement would help things, but when you get down to it there will still be plenty of concussions no matter what the rules says. The best way to address the issue of concussions IMO is to change up the material used for player protection in the areas that make contact with heads of opposing players. I know this may not be a great comparison, but auto racing has become ridiculously safe compared to the past. This is due to better car safety and much better track safety. In other words, technology has been used to protect the drivers. Surely protecting hockey players can be better done by designing safer equipment. They are already protected pretty well from pucks, just go a step further and protect them from each other in a better way.

As for fighting. Get rid of fighting and you will see concussion rates stay the same or go up. There has to be some outlet for players' aggression. If fighting is taken away then players will get justice somehow, which would mean lighting players up during play.

 

[ODAAT]

imo.
The only thing to reduce concussions (by hits) is to slow the game down. Ever since they got rid of the two line pass, the speed of the game has changed dramatically.

Not advocating either way, just stating an observation

While I agree with your points, I disagree about it being the "only" thing that would reduce concussions.

My biggest issue is the equipment these guys wear now. I play in a brutally average beer league here, I was on the hunt for some new shoulder pads (I was using some that were over 10 years old and the stink........whew, that stink was killin us), and NOWHERE could I find anything that wouldn`t have made me look like a bloody linebacker

The material they are made from is both unnecessary and ludicrous, nothing, not even non contact hockey will eliminate concussions, more respect from players with their peers on some occasions would be nice to see.

 

[TCL40]

I think one thing is simply that a lot of concussions occur because crap happens-no rule violation a guy just gets hit weird. Part of the problem is the speed of the game and the strength of the players (some players make hard clean hits and players end up injured-Neil's hit on Boychuk a couple of seasons ago is a good example).

Two things they could do is change to hybrid icing like college rules and also when a player is injured review the hit and assess the right penalty. College has an instant video review of the hits. This happened in the playoffs when a UNH player took a hit to the head (and did end up with a concussion). No initial call-they reviewed it and kicked the player out of the game).

I also think they shoul assess minor penalties for attempted hits to the head.

I think supplementary discipline is a mess and therefore makes it hard for the refs and players. Also the suspension system doesn't particularly appear to be much of a deterant.

But then I think too often the players are injured on clean plays which makes me wonder if changing the equipment wouldn't be best.

 

[ODAAT]

I think one thing is simply that a lot of concussions occur because crap happens-no rule violation a guy just gets hit weird. Part of the problem is the speed of the game and the strength of the players (some players make hard clean hits and players end up injured-Neil's hit on Boychuk a couple of seasons ago is a good example).

Two things they could do is change to hybrid icing like college rules and also when a player is injured review the hit and assess the right penalty. College has an instant video review of the hits. This happened in the playoffs when a UNH player took a hit to the head (and did end up with a concussion). No initial call-they reviewed it and kicked the player out of the game).

I also think they shoul assess minor penalties for attempted hits to the head.

I think supplementary discipline is a mess and therefore makes it hard for the refs and players. Also the suspension system doesn't particularly appear to be much of a deterant.

But then I think too often the players are injured on clean plays which makes me wonder if changing the equipment wouldn't be best.

Rarely do I agree with Don Cherry but he has, for years now, continued to bring shoulder/elbow pads onto Coach`s Corner to show the public just how dangerous the equipment is these days.

I haven`t one clue if there would be enough of an impact by changing to a less dangerous shoulder pad but truth is, speed of the game and the size of these players nowadays combined with that equipement?? Crazy. We have all seen seemingly innocent plays occur where someone is concussed, have to wonder on some of those occasions if a player were wearing smaller, less dangerous shoulder pads if it would have happened?

I don`t have the answers, but IMO, the NHL is consistently producing nothing as far as progress in their quest to make the game safer

 

[ODAAT]

Bottom line. Hard plastic protects the player from getting hurt but hurts the player getting hit. I know I wouldn't go hard at someones's head with an elbow pad if it was just padding as opposed to hard plastic. Just common sense. It wouldn't take concussions away altogether but it would help. I know nay Sayers out there have stats to prove me wrong, but I still believe this.

I still see more injuries today than before, then again, could be that the players of years past, were simply tougher and played through more??

 

[Danton Heineken]

I still see more injuries today than before, then again, could be that the players of years past, were simply tougher and played through more??

There are enough truly psychotic players in the league like Matt Cooke and Raffi Torres who do everything in their power to flat out injure opposing players, that rule changes and/or equipment changes will only make them do it in a different way rather than stop doing it.

You can change the pads, change the helmets, change the rules... and Matt Cooke will still slice the Achilles tendon of one of the best young players in the game.

But for all the evil Matt Cooke does on the ice, at least he's not murdering people and assaulting police officers.