I was going to post a Central Division roundtable that I’d put together with our blogging friends from around the division. But I’m going to shelve that until tomorrow, even though I’m hesitant to pile even more onto what is admittedly a tired debate about the place of fighting and goons in the game. But it needs to be addressed, I think.

As you know, last night George Parros took a nasty fall and had to be stretchered off. He’ll be ok, as only his Princeton-educated brain was bruised. Or however ok you can be when you have a brain injury (which we really should start calling it, just like “Global Warming” should be “Climate Change.”) His face-plant into the ice didn’t really have much to do with fighting, and could have happened in any portion of the game. I remember Kevin Stevens taking such a fall and having a very nasty injury, and that was just a play around the net.

But of course, it’s going to engender a whole new round of furious discussion. My views are well stated, but just to reiterate: Though I’m not one who calls for the end of fighting, I recognize that there really is no way to keep the fights I can accept (two actual players spontaneously getting angry at each other) while getting rid of those I abhor (the staged ones between two slobs who serve no other purpose, and neither does their fight). So I would have to accept a total ban on fighting, and would be all right with that.

But it doesn’t matter where you stand, because fighting will be phased out. And it will be phased out not only because of player safety, but because of the evolution of the sport.