Great backread going to last night.
I appreciate fighting as a way of sticking up for your teammates. It's the ultimate sacrifice in terms of hockey. It's not fun... those few players who've said they enjoy it are crazy, but it's - for lack of a better word - heartwarming
to see guys willing to take some punches in the face and bloody their knuckles up on a helmet for someone else.
The last fight I was in was in a men's league. We had, as far as men's league was concerned, a fairly high-caliber "star" player. One game, against this team of meatheads, he was getting clobbered. Spears, elbows, checks behind the play and punches in the back of his head when he went down. So finally, after someone slew-footed him and he went down hard, I just went after that someone and we had a pretty spirited bout (again, as far as men's leagues go). Sure, I got ejected from the game (men's league, FTW!), but NO ONE bothered our "star" the rest of the night. But dude, I won't lie... it sucked being the one fighting
And I know, I know, "get even by winning" and all that. I get it. But I've had teammates fight for me just like I've fought for them, and I'll tell you, it really brings dudes together. I know people are going to disagree with me... it's an argument we've had over and over in this thread. And I'm comfortable with that now. Just giving my opinion.
Now the "staged fights" and stuff? Different story.