Is The NHL Becoming More Lenient On Aggression?

Not only did the four nations faceoff see amazing goals and raucous crowds, but also heavy hitting checks and a handful of brutal fights. But following the tournament, the NHL looks like they are being much more lenient on aggression, as old school physical hockey makes its long awaited return.

The NHL has always been known for its fights and physicality, but there has never been more eyes on the sport than when three massive fights broke it out in the first nine seconds of the Canada vs USA game in the four nations faceoff, and ever since, fights have been breaking out left right and centre in the NHL ever since. 

Its clear since Branden Hagel dropped the gloves in the first second of that game that the NHL has seen a rise in fighting. Since the final of the four nations faceoff the NHL has seen 13 major fights including rookies and veterans, but has also seen much more leeway on big hits. Previously to the four nations NHL referees were often whistle happy when it came to interference and charging calls, but the amount of calls made has declined massively since february 20th, and has given much more wiggle room for players to play physically.

To compare with last season, the NHL saw 311 fights last year across the entire regular season, but this year, with over 652 total games remaining there has been 211, a number that will only keep on growing. But fighting isn't the only aspect of the game which is facing less scrutiny. Fines and suspensions are a massive part in discipline management in today's NHL, but so far this season there has been 13 total suspensions for a total of 68 games, and 21 fines equating to about $227,000. This is a massively different figure to compare with the 2023/24 as a total of 40 fines were given out during the regular season for a total sum of about $223,000, five thousand less than the amount given in half the fines this season. But what does this tell us? It shows that the NHL is allowing much more aggression and physical play, but is sanctioning players with financial sanctions rather than suspensions, allowing the game to move on in the physical manner it should be played. In the 2023/24 season, there was a total of 27 suspensions, most being for illegal checks and cross checking, but this year illegal hits are sanctioned in a way which allows some hits to still be thrown, allowing games to be more fluid and move quicker.

An important note to add is ejections. Often when a player lays down a dirty or illegal hit such as a boarding penalty followed by a fight, it's almost certain the player is ejected, but following the four nations faceoff, players who engage in fights after illegal hits often only find themselves i the penalty box, giving the game some much needed physical edge that today's hockey has been lacking.

Its sure that brandon Hagel, Colton Parayko, and Sam Bennett have sent a clear message to gary Bettman about physicality, and how the game of hockey should be played, but with hundreds of games yet to be played, fights, hits and mayhem is yet to even get started.