NICK MURRAY
The Brunswickan (University of New Brunswick)

FREDERICTON — Using his influence and elite hockey status, Bob McKenzie has certainly inspired an in-depth look into the ugly side of “crazy” minor-hockey parents.

McKenzie himself admits that since his sons have grown to the ages of 22 and 25, he doesn’t spend as much time around the rinks as he used to.

So if these jaw-dropping and seemingly scandalous stories of calling stick measurements on 11-year-olds happened more than a decade ago, how bad has it really gotten?

Crazy hockey parents aren’t the usual topic of discussion for Bob McKenzie (right) and the TSN hockey panel.

“I suspect it’s probably getting worse in that the nature of the ‘crazy’ hockey parent has changed,” McKenzie said in an exclusive interview with The Brunswickan.

“In my universe, the crazy hockey parent was the one who pushed his kid too hard and would act up in the rink — the primary thing being that he made his kid’s life very difficult,” he said. “The crazy hockey parent now has probably gone to the other degree in terms of a sense of entitlement as a family that everything will be given to their kid and that he is going to get all the quality ice time. And if things aren’t the way they want them to be, they start causing problems.”

It seems he’s absolutely right, but not quite right enough. Not only are parents becoming more demanding in terms of having their kids get every opportunity, all the while taking opportunities away from other kids — they are also becoming more violent.

At a recent event, McKenzie shared a story about a team from Detroit, where parents verbally and physically assaulted a coach for not stacking his lines toward the end of a game. The team needed a win in a tournament and with the game tied, the coach kept to his philosophy of even play and rotated all of his lines instead of only playing his top two.

It’s not just coaches facing abuse, but officials too. In Manitoba last year between January and March, there were 16 individual cases in which referees had been physically abused by both players and coaches.

Incidents included punching, biting and even being struck in the head with a stick by a player — that particular victim was only 16 years old.

“For referees, it’s gone from a way to make a few extra bucks and a way to give something back to the community to a pain in the neck and a physically dangerous [job] dealing with unstable people,” McKenzie said.

“Then again, let’s be honest. Minor hockey is still filled with mostly good people, but it doesn’t take very many crazies to ruin it for everyone.”

When asked about the nature of the game, McKenzie agreed that the game itself has become too fast.

“Oh, no question,” McKenzie said. “We came into the lockout saying that the game was too slow, that there was too much clutch and grab. Now we come out of the lockout with zero tolerance for hooking and holding to speed the game up. And people love it. The brand of hockey being played right now has never been more popular, and attendance post-lockout has been very strong. I would agree that the game has become too fast, but it’s so much fun to watch… It’s hard to find that happy [medium].”

In an attempt to slow the game down, the Moncton Wildcats will be playing this season with soft pads as opposed to the hard plastic pads commonly used in the game today — a mandate that has already been put in place in the Ontario Hockey League.

“The NHL wants to do it and has planned to do it, but is awaiting approval from the NHL players’ association, and the more teams that do it, the better. It’s long overdue. It’s almost criminal that it hasn’t been done,” McKenzie said.

Although the soft-cap pads are a great step, McKenzie states that they pale in comparison to the pads used by NHL greats Paul Coffey and Brendan Shanahan, and used even last year by then-Boston Bruin Mark Recchi.

“The pads… are so protective now that it’s almost too protective to the point where the guy wearing them has no fear of hurting his shoulder,” McKenzie added. “And that’s part of the reason why we have as many severe head injuries and concussions as we do.”

That being said, players back in Shanahan’s day had to adjust their checks to not hurt themselves. Today with the equipment being as protective as it is, players can go into the boards at 100 miles per hour without having fear of injury.

“I understand the players’ association being concerned about guys getting hurt and everything else, but I think the number one problem in this game right now is the head injuries and everybody needs to be in as soft of shoulder pads as can possibly be designed with still having some relative degree of safety.”

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Photo: s.yume/Flickr