Head shots in hockey

There’s been a whole bunch of discussion on this topic in the last couple of years, and the NHL board of governors is reportedly exploring ways to eliminate dangerous hits from the game. As far as I’m concerned, the rules are already there to penalize the problem hits.

For example, Matt Cooke’s hit on Marc Savard a few nights ago:

And section 21.1 of the NHL rule book:

A match penalty shall be imposed on any player or goalkeeper who deliberately attempts to injure an opponent in any manner.

That looked to me like a deliberate attempt to injure an opponent. 100% of the contact on that hit was directed to the head of an unsuspecting player. If we can’t call that an attempt to injure, then we might as well just tear that page out of the rule book.

Exhibit B, Richards on Booth:

Very similar to the Cooke hit in that the brunt of the contact is targeting the head. In both instances, this is entirely avoidable by the player delivering the hit (that is to say, the contact could have been made shoulder-to-shoulder had the delivering player made the effort to target the hit in that way).

For the sake of comparison:

Toews receives a suicide pass, Mitchell delivers a solid hit. No infraction in my books.

I’m all for rules that protect players and reduce injuries, and I certainly believe there is a problem with head shots in hockey; however, I don’t understand why we need to explore adding more rules to address this. To me, the answer is simple: make it clear that directing a hit to the head of an opponent is considered an attempt to injure, and start assessing match penalties and suspensions to the guys who are endangering the safety of their colleagues.