A problem with the NFL Network has cropped up. Their combine coverage is now being “over”produced. They’ve got too many talking heads and too many cut aways to taped material. The result is that they show less of the athletes and not many drills. Watching the players run around is what I tune in to see. Further, as a San Jose State Alum I was interested in seeing Dwight Lowery but he got no “air time.” As dissappointed as I was at not seeing him, for his family and friends the dissappointment would be even greater. With the 3 hours of coverage each day, it would not be difficult for the NFL Network to give some screen time to each athlete. The draft is still 2 months away. The commentators have more than enough time to share their opinions. They do not need to hog the camera time. Also, as nice as a guy as he seems to be, I don’t need to see Mike Gorcak give instuctions on running the 40 4 separate times! I hope in the future the NFL Network will go back to showing more of the drills.
Now that I’ve got that off my chest, I’ll share some of my thoughts about what I saw. The two athletes that stood out the most were the Defensive Ends Chris Long and Vernon Gholston. No surprise there. They were already touted as top 10 picks. Another player that generated a buzz was TE Dustin Keller. But I don’t think any team is going to go crazy over a tight end that does well at the combine after what’s happened with Vernon Davis. There really wasn’t anything else that stood out. I don’t think any player’s stock moved up or down that drastically as a result of their combine performance.
But I still enjoy watching it. When the guys are out doing their drills you can really see the difference between the players who are athletically gifted and the ones who are sort of clumsy. That’s why I want to see all of the players. One of my sleeper picks is Thomas Brown RB, Georgia. I got to see him run a 40 but not much else. I would liked to have seen more. I didn’t get to see Latrell Hawkins, WR, Cal at all. I think he’s likely to become a more productive receiver at the next level than his highly touted conterpart, Desean Jackson. It would have been nice to see him in some drills. One player who I really liked at the Senior Bowl and got to see plenty of at the combine was Trevor Laws, DT, Notre Dame. The more I see him the more I like him. He’s probably not going to be taken in the top 10 of the draft so some lucky team is going to pick him up for a good value.
My feeling after watching all of the combine is that the teams who hold the first 6 picks are guaranteed of getting a high quality player with the exception of a team that drafts Matt Ryan, QB, Boston College. (That’s not meant to be a knock on Ryan, it’s just harder to tell whether or not a QB is going to pan out.) But besides him, you will see the two Longs, McFadden, Dorsey and perhaps Gholston and Ellis come off the board first. I think the teams that wind up with these players will be happy. I see all of these guys becoming productive starters. Superstars? Probably not. I don’t see that kind of potential in any of them. I mean it’s not like there is a Julius Peppers, Junior Seau or Lawrence Taylor sitting out there. But still good players. That’s what I see.
Monday on Versus the Red Wings were playing the Avalanche and in the first period Niklas Lidstrom, captain of the Red Wings was cranked into the boards by a high hit from the Avalanche’s resident instigator Ian Laperrier. Lidstrom had to leave the game woozy and it was debatable as to whether or not it was a clean hit. The announcers thought it was clean but I think Laperrier’s elbow came up a little high. But whether or not it was clean was somewhat immaterial. You knew the Red Wings would want retribution. You don’t go treating their star player that roughly and expect to get away with it. In a few minutes the Red Wings tough guy, Reed Downey, squared off with Laperrier and they had a tussel. The game got kind of nasty at that point with the Avalanche’s assistant coach Tony Granato leaning around the glass to have a heated exchange of words with Red Wings coach Mike Babcock. The rest of the game was played very spirited and was quite entertaining even though the Red Wings pulled away with a 4-0 shutout.
During some of the rough stuff, the Versus announcers were promoting the following night’s telecast of the Blackhawks and Blues. Eddie Olcyck predicted that it could be a nasty game as well. I thought to myself “yes, traditional rivals, I suppose that could get nasty.” Tuning in the next night, there was a fight on the opening drop of the puck. I guess Eddie had that pegged. There weren’t any more fights the rest of the game, but there was a lot of checking and a lot of energy on the rink and in the building, especially in the first period.
Those are two typical types of fights in the NHL. The former was a form of retribution and the latter was two guys trying to pump up their respective teams. For someone like me who has watched hundreds and hundreds of hockey games, I don’t give the fights much thought at all. I understand why they come about and recognize that it is part of the game. It’s no biggee.
For some people who are new to the sport of hockey or who have not made the effort to truly understand the game, it is a big deal and they don’t like it. Because they do not understand the purpose that fighting serves they believe fights are ridiculous and are nothing more than a blatant grab at the “lowest common denominator” or “Jerry Springer” audiences. Not that the NHL minds that fighting may help put butts in the seats, but if that were the only purpose it served, it wouldn’t be there. Contrary to what many believe, fighting in the NHL is not just a sideshow.
I’m trying to understand why anyone would have a problem with hockey fights to begin with. I suppose they think it is barbaric. That is always the last line of defense among pansy-asses when they can’t come up with a more logical and legitamate reason to back up their pacifist viewpoints. But I admit fighting is barbaric. What of it? It happens on the hockey rink, not while having high tea with the queen of England. Sometimes barbarism is appropriate - like on the battlefield. Why isn’t’ it appropriate on the hockey rink? At least on the hockey rink, instead of grusome dismemberments and atrocious deaths, you are only likely to see at worst, a busted lip, a broken nose and some bruised knuckles.
In exchange for having to put up with some barbarism you get an exciting and passionate brand of competition to watch. That’s the point that is missed by hockey’s critics. You cannot take away fighting and expect to have as compelling a game to watch. If fighting were made illegal, players would not be able to play with the passion and emotion that is required for truly good hockey. If you want good hockey, you need the players playing on edge without fear of the consequences if that passion occasionally crosses the line. When the passion does boil over, players are penalized, they are not criminalized. That’s the key to keeping hockey exciting.
Hockey without fighting would be less exciting for it’s fans and would be even more dull to its critics. If you still can’t understand this then don’t watch hockey and shut up about it. When you open your mouth you are not proving your own superiority, you are merely exposing your own ignorance.