Simmonds-Edler fight was more performance than payback

Toronto Maple Leafs forward Wayne Simmonds, right, fights Vancouver Canucks defenceman Alexander Edler during first period action in Toronto on April 29, 2021.As hockey fights go, the only interesting thing about it was that the play-by-play guys were discussing its likelihood as it began. This is the closest hockey gets to postmodern.

The fashionable thing these days is to tell people you hate this sort of thing, and then turn the volume up when it happens so the neighbours can’t hear you cheering.A couple of weeks ago, Edler, of the Vancouver Canucks, went knee-to-knee with Zach Hyman of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Whether Edler did it on purpose is not the point. He hurt a Leaf. Now a Leaf had to hurt him. That was the old rule, it’s still the rule, and it will always be the rule.

That fight is gone, but only because the people who fought them went first. The NHL used a few moves taken from big government – change public policy and then attach a tax incentive to smooth transition – to get rid of the enforcer. But it is entirely necessary to maintain balance in hockey’s ecosystem. How do we know that? Because the league and its proxies have done everything they can to dissuade the practice, and yet it continues.

The reason fighting continues in hockey is heritage. The get-even fight in particular has become a sort of northern folk ritual. It’s not practised very often any more, but those who are invested in its mysteries work hard to keep the practice alive.It works because it serves both parties. Simmonds gets to be the hero. He doesn’t have to be told what to do. He just knows, because he was raised in hockey.

“Even the pacifists in the audience like a little blood in their sport. They just don’t like talking about it.” BS!This fan does like talking about fighting in hockey. It’s a ridic mssg to send 2 young fans.Have a problem with some1?Punch them in the face until they bleed. 🙄NHL

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