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In reply to the discussion: Passengers watched killing on Metro car. Should they have intervened? [View all]Chan790
(20,176 posts)it's not really relevant to the larger thread, but I get that. Different context...but I get that.
I was a middle LB on my HS football team, a pretty good one with a reputation earned early as a hard hitter and cerebral player. (I'm also not small. 6'3 245# then.) Between my sophomore and junior football seasons, I was approached by the school hockey coach and asked if I'd consider trying out for the hockey team; I pointed out that I had never played hockey before and doubted I'd be good at it since I can't skate. He said..."Don't worry. You've got 9 months to learn to skate...as for good. You're already good. You just don't know it." I soon learned what he meant. Big physical defensive defensemen are worth their weight in beef. "If you fight, you get suspended for the year...if they find out I told you to fight, so do I. So...don't fight. Your job is simple...people are going to take runs at our skill players because we're a small, fast high-scoring team upfront or they're going to try to crash the net or rough-up our goalie. It might be the next shift or the next game, but you're going to make them realize those are bad ideas." So...I did. Being that kind of defenseman, teams have two choices on how to attempt to score against you ...they can keep to the outside and eventually settle for the long-distance low-percentage-angle shot as you keep backchecking and taking away their attacking-lane or they can try to come inside, knowing they have to get near enough to you that you're going to try to level them and take the puck. I did a lot of the second. Every once in a while, someone would take a cheap shot on our conference scoring-leading RW and at some point, that player or their team's skilled forward would find themselves in a situation where I had the opportunity to hit them a bit harder than was necessary or to plant an elbow or knee or stick where the ref wouldn't see it. People generally didn't take a run twice.
I was an all-state LB my senior year at football...but it was as a 0G, 3A (this is terrible offensively, statistically); +7, 11GA (this is defensively-exceptional, especially for a 2nd-pair/1PK defenseman), 46PIM, 3 G.Misc. (this is just rather vicious) lifetime HS player on the hockey team in 26 games...but I got recruited for college hockey. Hockey teams need guys that "will get you. Period." for trying to play dirty and are just flat-out unpleasant to play against. Enforcers and lunch-pail defenders. Guys that just won't quit hitting no matter how much they get hit back for it.