Colton Orr Fights Matt Carkner

In last night’s game Toronto’s Colton Orr and Ottawa’s Matt Carkner fought for the third time this season.  A head injury was incurred during this fight and the fight was clearly staged.
Read on to watch the video and please comment with your thoughts and opinions of this fight versus head shots from a body check.

A Staged Fight, No Doubt

This is one of those hockey fights that the NHL is supposedly trying to get rid of – the staged fight.

Here is an excerpt  on the matter from the NHL meeting last year:

“The presentation (Monday) on our stats, the history of fighting, where we are at today, injuries, was very extensive,” NHL Vice President and Director of Hockey Operations Colin Campbell said. “We tried to categorize staged fights, fights that were responding to legal and illegal hits, a lot of things. The idea was to understand where fighting is at today and what the League has done about fighting over the years when they thought fighting had became unfair and where and if fighting belonged in the game.”

There was no doubt going into the game that these two were going to fight. Orr and Carkner had each gotten the better of the other in one of the two previous fights this season.

This time, it was Colton Orr that sent Carkner to the ice with a series of 3-4 solid right hands. The last of which had Carkner seeing stars.

Video of the Orr vs. Carkner  fight

Assessing A Head Injury

As the announcers in the video mention, it was good work by the officials and the trainers to get Carkner off of the ice and into the locker room for examination.  However, Carkner was back on the bench several minutes later and resumed regular shifts for the balance of the game.

There is no doubt that this fight resulted in at least some measure of head trauma for Carkner, and we can applaud the staff for taking precautions by getting him examined. As a non-medical professional, I cannot question the decision to let Carkner return to the game, but I do wonder what the true extend of the injury might be.

Supplemental Discipline For This “Head Shot”?

It is interesting that this fight resulted in a head injury and that these types of “staged fights” that the NHL is trying to avoid go unpunished.  It is extremely disturbing to me as a hockey fan to see bodychecks to the head, during the heat of the play (intentional or not – which is a different matter) receive lengthy suspensions, while staged fights like this one that serve no purpose to the game but results in similar injury, go unpunished.

I mean, if any fight was predetermined/staged, it was this fight between Orr and Carkner. The game was 1-0 and it was the first period. No reason to fight for either team to “shift momentum” etc. It happened right off of a faceoff where neither player was lined up directly opposite to the other. Completely unnecessary.

Don’t get me wrong, I like a good tilt just as much as the next guy, but to me an unnecessary fight causing a head injury needs more policing from the league than the currently legal hits (with shoulder/not charging) to the head that happen in the heat of the moment.

Yes, there are two willing combatants that know what they are getting themselves into. But, if the NHL really wants to deter these so-called staged fights, then they have to act accordingly. That said, I’m not so sure that it’s not just lip service from the league at this point.

What do you think?