Deke

I agree. No touch icing would cause a new strategy to be in play where the defenders can just try and force bad passes into the zone where icing is going to automatically be called. Then move the puck back and take another face off. It's going to suck and it's not in the spirit of hockey, which is constantly EARNING your puck position. You also pretty much garuntee that the goalie isn't going to go fetch the puck and just let it go over the imaginary line so the puck will be iced. If we want to improve icing, they need to: Take away the free TV time out for home team icing and limit the contact for puck races. To GS&T: You can bring up that the NHLAPA wants no touch icing all you want. In fact, you have, over and over again. Repeating yourself doesn't help. I don't care if the players want it, I still don't like it and that isn't going to change my opinion or make you right. At this point I'm convinced that you don't even care that much about the rule and would argue with a wall if you thought it would make you look smarter. Keep repeating the same crap over and over again, keep having Don Cherry feed you your opinions. I'm just going to put you on ignore and focus my replies on people who use logic and are rational. Even if I don't agree, at least the other guys in this thread are more interested in talking about the topic rather than boosting your forum ego. I seriously envision your thought process going something like: ZOMG I WON AN INTRAWBEZ THREAD, ALL THE GIRLS WILL LIKE ME NOW.

If that were in fact true, you wouldn't be allowed to post on the forum.

Don Cherry also thinks Jovanowksi should win the Norris trophy. Cherry just says whatever will stir up the most controversy and attention, just like his clothes. The same way they determe who initiates contact in any other penalty. Seeing contact is a hell of a lot better and definitive than trying to use an imaginary line in your head.

Good question. It comes from all of the articles about the GM's talking about revisiting the no touch rule after they agreed not to talk about it for 3 years at the last GM summit. They are revisiting the topic due to the recent injury. http://www.globesports.com/servlet/story/R...ortsHockey/home From the article: This isn't the only article I've read that suggests if the NHL does go with no-touch, that it will be the rule. It is a compromise that allows for a limited race, but one that doesn't take place near the boards so makes it less dangerous. What I don't like about it, is that a defender could be on one side, a forward could be on the other side near the puck. If the defender gets behind this imaginary line first, all the sudden you had what might have been a break turn into an icing call. And you're right that the refs already have discretion to wave it off or not. But I think that is different because the call can be made long before the critical race can happen. The ref pretty much has to wave it off long before the puck would have been iced, so there is constantly a race going until the moment that icing is indicated and the defender has to touch. If it was waved off, the play doesn't stop. It seems like with a no touch rule there will be let up as the ref decides icing or not and where the race was. A ref could potentially stop a race from happening with a whistle and even if that won't happen but 1 in a million and seven games, if it happens once in a game I'm watching that matters, it'll suck. The counter arguement here is the injury aspect. Well if the refs would just start calling contact on the races then it would go away on it's own.

Back on topic, you guys are seriously ok with the Refs having to draw an imaginary line in their heads between the two face off dots and determining who crossed that line first? Because that's likely going to be rule if the NHL goes with no touch. If you guys are ok with that kind of Referee discretion during a game, you must watch different games than I do. I don't trust refs on anything ambiguous and want more concrete rules to the game. Me, I just don't trust the refs to make the right call half the time.

You've taken 2 games and that's your proof? Wow, here comes the 3rd grade math again. Congrats, your sample has a confidence of about 0 percent. That's what people who understand numbers like to call "anecdotal". Go ahead and look it up, this post will be here when you get back. Go to NHL.com and get some real stats, those stats you posted are very much past the league average. Proven wrong? I can't believe I'm even dignifying this with a response, but you can't prove my opinion about the no-touch rule wrong. I don't want no-touch icing in the NHL. Why you feel the need to be so right about the subject makes wonder about your personal life. You strive so hard to be some INTRAWEBZ BLAGOSPHERE WRITING tough guy and it makes me laugh. Ok you win, you're opinion about hockey is some how more right than mine if that were some how possible. Do me a favor and go look up opinion and fact and write a 1 paragraph essay on the difference. I'll expect your essay on my desk tomorrow morning.

Yes I'm against boarding. Boarding is a rule, partly because the injuries that can happen, but also because it's not fair to use the arena equipment as part of your hit. I see the argument you are going to try and make, that if I am against boarding, I should be for no touch icing. But I don't agree. I would like to see the type of contact you can make on an iced puck limited to contact that you are allowed to do during a break away. No tripping, no cross checking from behind, no boarding. Basically... Following the rules already in place. The Refs need to make this call more so that iced puck races come down to using the sticks in a race. I do not want to see no touch icing because I don't want the play to stop if the puck is dumped over the base line. And if they are going to try the "invisible line" rule where the face off dots present a line, if the forward crosses it first, and then no icing. I don't like that either. It lets the refs decide another ambiguous call. All the defender has to do is step behind that line, whether they are even near the puck or not and the play is stopped. Maybe the forward could have gotten there. I don't want to let the refs decide more games with calls that could have gone either way. I don't want some invisible line to exist where you can't definitively say the puck did or did not cross it. I like the fact that there is a strict rule to icing. A defender has to touch the puck. That means icing. No call one way or another, it's icing. If you put flexibility in the rules where the refs get to call whatever they feel like, then you take something away from the players. I want rules that anyone can look at and come to the same conclusion. Not something that can be decided by Mcgoo seeing that the defenders left skate's shoelace was behind an invisible line before the forward got there.

I'd love to see Homer back, but this situation really has given Franzen a chance to shine. In my opinion his play as of recent has been better than what Homer was producing. It'll be great to have them both playing the "front office" position. However, when Homer does come back, I would rather see Franzen stay out there with the first defensive unit. He's really doing well out there when he has Nicky and Ralfi to blast the puck his way.

You're right -- The rules really need to change. Ice is just too slippery and dangerous, so I propose we remove the ice surface in favor of something like grass. Someone got hit by a puck and it hurt, so we're going to have to change that to a ball. A body check is just rude, so no contact between players. Goal scoring doesn't happen enough so we'll have extend the nets to 24 feet wide and 8 feet high. Sticks can be used for slashing so those are out, and to make the game fun we'll say you can't use your hands. Oh s***, someone already thought of that sport. Guess I'll just have to keep watching hockey.

Muley won't fight. He's had so many dirty things done to him and the worst he does is bare his teeth and say something nasty. If he was going to fight, it'd probably be over something done to someone else, and that is what downey is for anyway. Which is good, I don't want to see Franzen fight, he's sweedish and they are too cool for school. On a semi-related note, does anyone else think Franzen is starting to look a little like Forsberg in the way he's been brining in the puck, protecting it behind the net and in the slot? He's really coming into his own. If he can study a little more with zetterberg and keep using his size to look like forsberg, he can graduate from in front of the net and become a top forward.

I'm not arguing one way or another about how many icings should or should not take place. I'm making a point that catering to lazier play style will change the game for the worse. Don't take the battles out. If you implement no touch icing, then the defense will just watch the puck go over the line and wait for the whistle. I don't like that. All that's really happening here is that a mistake by one player can be turned into an opportunity by another player. I don't want to see that go away. The only arguement I see here is based on injuries. And there just aren't that many of them. There are far more injuries from open ice hits and contact with the puck.

Interesting break down. It's interesting to note that there is a statitiscally significant different in shots allowed depending on what goalie is in. The goalie has nothing to do with shots allowed, that's defense. Varaibles that would have to be considered. Do the Red Wings trust Osgood more and therefore do not work as hard to prevent shots when he's in net? Or perhaps Babcock favors one goalie for a given team. And that team has a higher Shots For average, thereby raising the average of that goalie when facing that team.

You don't have to. Go to NHL.com and look at the play by play for 10 games. Hit ctrl F and type in icing. Count how many timse you hit enter before you are done. Or do some simple google searching on icing per game. Your still making strawman arguements. My contention is that if you implement no touch icing you are setting a precident for lazy play where at least one puck race is eliminated from the game. Suddenly you have defensemen getting lazier becuase they know they don't have to go back for the puck because it's no touch. It might not impact the stats of the game that much, or the number of whistles, but it's just against hockey philosophy if you ask me. It's weak. There are not that many injuries related to icing races. Fact: This year there have been more injuries related to contact with the puck than there have been related to icing. Do you want to change the puck now? Following your logic, you'd like to make the puck out of soft kitten fur held together with hopes and dreams. Case closed.

I think the team should go for a new type of playoff beard, seperate them from the status quo. Presenting... the playoff mutton chop.

Datsyuk is worse, he's got the 4 random stubbles on the bottom of his chin.

Your numbers are amazingly off. There are generally only about 4 to 5 icings per game. Any quick search can validate this stat, as well as a quick sampling of game summaries available on NHL.com. This number used to be 10 plus until the rule change that says you can't change lines if you ice the puck. Your strawman arguement regarding Lidstrom is pretty weak. Hockey is about competition. Without races to the puck there is no competition. There would be a ton of stoppages in play as mishandled passes suddenly turn into icing. If hockey changed the rules every time someone was injured, hockey would be played on a surface of pillows with nerf sticks. Any play can result in an injury. How many injuries have happened this year due to icing races? Well I don't know that number, but I would be willing to bet a very large sum of money that it's around 1%. If you want to reduce the number of injuries, no-touch icing is not the place to do it. Players need to be allowed to race and battle for the puck. The only rule change I would be in favor of would be one that limits the type of contact you can have while racing for an iced puck. But honestly it's hockey. Injuries happen. Smart players avoid injury by not putting themselves in position to get injured. Take away the battle for the puck and you take away the passion. Take away the passion and you take away the sport. I like how fluid hockey is. The fewer stops in play, the better.

There is no correlation goals for and goals against to teams actually winning the cup. The cup does not go to the team with the best statistics, it goes to the team who wants it the most. This year, I think that team is Detroit, but it has zero to do with statistics.

They seem like they make up a surprising majority. If they do not, they still are the "face" of Nashville fans.

Edit, double post.

Dude I hate to say it, but those generalizations are there because they are generally the perception of Nashville. It's not made up stuff. That's what the rest of us see when we watch Nashville fans. That's what I see, and that's what the poster you were replying to see. We aren't just making this up. I watched the game on HDnet and they pick up a lot more stadium noise than most channels. Hearing some of the drunken hillbillies do nothing more than shout for blood really irritates me. They show them on the screen too with a big ass 32 oz beer, a shotgun handle mustache (I think I just made that up, but it sounds redneck appropriate), a beer belly that would make Santa Claus jealous, staggering drunk and yelling at the ice when someone runs into the boards and makes a loud noise even though they didn't actually check anyone. Loud noises impress these guys. That's just one example. But then you see one more example. 5 examples, 10 examples. You've got the Tootoo whistles. You've got the Tootoo cross checks to the face. I counted two, one on sammy and a failed one Kronwall. You've got the dirty plays. You've got the players trying to fight players who don't want to fight. That was hilarious when Lilja had a player that was trying to go with him. He just strong armed him into place and was ******* with him, smiling, raising his eyebrows, just laughing at the guy for wanting to fight Lilja, like it'd be a waste of his time. You've got Hanhous (sp?) punching zetterberg, a STAR FORWARD for zero reason. You've got the fans who have the worst chants I've ever heard, yelling out negative s*** for the other team instead of positive stuff for their own team. What's with the you suck shouts when they are getting beat. It doesn't even make sense to shout HASEK YOU SUCK after the makes a great play. The only time it would have made sense to make fun of anybody, would have been Maltby, and by then what good would it have done being down 5-3. It's just classless. This kind of player and fan activitiy may be prevelant in other sports, but not in hockey. That's why we like hockey so much. In my opinion it's the only true sport left with class and poise. But teams like the Preds and the Ducks want to ruin that.

That really sucks. At least he'll be back for when it counts. Guess that means Ledba or Lija get a playoff spot during the first round. I'm pretty sure with that injury Chelios is no question on whether he'll get a spot now. He just has too much vetran presence to not play. Would love to see Erricson start a playoff game or two as well but the odds of that happening are equal to the odds of Sammuelson getting a hat trick.

It didn't look like a hit whatsoever to me. A hit mean he put his balance and weight into him. It really looks like Mithcell knew they both had too much speed and put his arms out to try and create space. Whether or not that caused foster to go off balance and that's what caused him to hit the boards like that is up for debate. But I definetly don't think that was an intentional hit. As far as touch ups go, I don't think they belong in the NHL. It's great to see a near icing averted by someone with the will to get there first. If every injury that occured resulted caused a change in rules, hockey would just be 1 man shoot outs played on padded carpet with nerf sticks and pucks. Injuries suck, but that's part of the bargain. To have a sport with the passion and the level of pure physical battle like hockey, you have to play it on the edge. That edge should be well regulated. But if you regulate the play too far to one side of that edge, you lose the play that makes hockey a battle worth fighting in the first place. Every hockey player knows this and damned if they don't get paid well enough to take the risks.

Man I can't decide which is more sad. The fact that someone actually made that, or the fact that someone will actually choose to buy that.

Meech playing forward is great. I like that kid a lot, he's mad hustle. He's not bad on D, but he LOVES to crash the net and get in behind the boards. He does it dcecently well as a young defenseman. Should be interesting to see how he does it as a forward without defensive responsibilities to ultimately worry about.

I agree, that's the biggest flaw in the Wings game. One of the best things about the wings styleis that they never panic and never get off their game. Which works most of the time, but when it doesn't, it bites them in the ass. Sometimes it'd be nice to see a little panic when their game isn't working. He's getting better though. He changes the lines appropriatetly when things aren't meshing. He'll play variable lines where he just swaps out positions and the lines will overlap. But that really is just a system, not true adaptation. Babcock strikes me as a tried and true, if it ain't broke don't fix it, type of guy. Maybe he needs a bit more creativity to truly be a great coach. At the end of the day though, Babcock has Bowman at his disposal, so there's more to these things than we think. Bowman doesn't make mistakes.