The three main points are 1) there will be no ban on all contact to the head, 2) stricter enforcement will be applied to charging and boarding, and 3) longer suspensions for headshots, with much longer suspensions for repeat offenders.
I think as a whole this shows the GMs clinging to an old school attitude of "keep your head up" and that the puck carrier still carries a lot of responsibility if he gets clobbered. Particularly if you look at point 3--it's almost as if the NHL is saying headshots are still hockey plays for which we can only half-heartedly go after offenders, and it's only when someone does it over and over that we are going to take a stand.
Apparently, boarding penalties are up this year statistically. I couldn't pinpoint why that is happening, and I hope this increased vigilance on boarding is more in response to that statistic rather than appeasement to the furor over the Chara hit. I say that because I think it would be very narrow-minded to focus rule changes on a rare circumstance because of public outcry in Montreal, while ignoring the all-too common plays that repeatedly cause injury. Total cop-out.
The only thing that could prove to be interesting from this is the expanded use of a charging penalty. The existing rule;
42.1 Charging - A minor or major penalty shall be imposed on a player who skates or jumps into, or charges an opponent in any manner. Charging shall mean the actions of a player who, as a result of distance traveled, shall violently check an opponent in any manner. A 'charge' may be the result of a check into the boards, into the goal frame or in open ice.
Could expanded use of the charging penalty ultimately include unnecessarily predatory hits to the head? There's probably too much grey area there in the end, though Bettman's blue-ribbon committee is supposed to look into it and maybe they'll come up with something worthwhile.
It is somewhat curious to me however that the GMs are relatively open to cracking down on boardings because of the threat to injury and vulnerability of the puck carrier even when a lot of boards are a "hockey play" gone wrong at the last moment, yet the GMs staunchly defend a shoulder to the head as a valid "hockey play". I'm sure they would say a shove from behind to the boards was always dishonorable, while a open-ice hit is just hard play, and if it results in a headshot so be it. I'm not convinced.
We won't get a substantial change on this issue until a strong leader emerges on the issue, and it's certainly won't be Bettman. FWIW, Jim Rutherford, Hurricanes GM, on a ban on all headshots; "We may get to that point, but I'm satisfied with what we've done here this week."
Also of note, the GMs voted 24-6 that the Chara hit on Pacioretty didn't call for supplementary discipline.
Back to the Flyers
A win is a win yesterday for the Flyers. Not the prettiest performance but the Flyers yielded very few scoring chances against, which will get you points more often that not. Probably not a bad idea for Laviolette to shake up the lines too.
Other thoughts;
-I'm really leaning towards Boucher for the playoffs at this point. He has been pretty good, and more in control than he was last year. Also, with Bob I feel there will inevitably be one 10 minute stretch where he lets in some bad goals.
-There was some talk after the game about Pronger's absence meaning the dressing room will be much quieter. Maybe that's not a bad thing right now. Laviolette has definitely been quieter too recently too after losses. Honestly Pronger hasn't been very good this year. If his name wasn't Pronger and he didn't have such a history of playoff success, a lot more questions would be asked of him. As it is, just wait until the playoffs to see what he does then.
-The Flyers have 7 out of a possible 8 points in their last 4 games. Would be nice to blowing out bad teams, but dominance over bad teams in the regular season isn't too great an indicator of success against good teams and in the playoffs (ask the Caps).
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