Column: Alumni show contrasting styles of NHL players

I bring this up because playoff hockey is in full swing, and that can mean only one thing: The intensity of the competition has been ratcheted up, players are getting chippy and it’s time to discuss once again whether fighting enhances or detracts from the game.

The rundown is this: Hockey is brutal. Imagine a hockey player as a cartoon character who is almost certainly missing teeth. Players on occasion get their carotids slashed in freak accidents, but mostly they just get beat up day after day after day, blocking shots and forechecking and crashing the net. This is the reality. And it’s fast — relentlessly fast — with constant movement and shifts under a minute. If you can make your opponent even a little uncomfortable, a little bit skittish, and if going forward that adds any reluctance at all, if it makes him even a half-second slower, that makes all the difference in the world. If you can beat him physically then more often than not, you’ve beaten him mentally, and your job has gotten a whole lot easier.

So yes, physicality is a major component of hockey. Take it out, and it’s no longer the same sport. But remember: These are still human beings, and this is still sociology. Some are going to try to take advantage of the system in place. Lines are going to be crossed, defenseless parties are going to be attacked and injuries are going to occur. Who can be trusted to keep the society civilized? Who prevents hockey from breaking down into non-stop skirmishes and vendettas?

There are two possible answers: Either one believes that the players can self-police (or that the way the sport is structured is self-cleansing), or one believes that the league can provide disincentives against conduct it deems detrimental to hockey. Hey, look at that! Little government, big government. Sociology. We’re rolling.

What does this have to do with our fine university? Nothing, really, except that of the four Princeton graduates currently playing in the NHL, two of them exemplify the two differing viewpoints mentioned above, and that’s sort of neat. George Parros ’03, for example, was put on this Earth to be an old-school enforcer. He’s Greek, 6-foot-5-inches, 228 pounds and has a devastating mustache. In the 2004-05 season in the AHL he logged 247 penalty minutes in 67 games (3.7 a game, for those keeping score at home). Over his five-and-a-half-year stint with the Anaheim (once upon a time Mighty) Ducks, he’s been responsible for 812 penalty minutes and 15 goals. This is a man who literally fought his way onto a team and into millions of dollars, and Anaheim won the Stanley Cup in 2007 in large part because of the overwhelming size, strength and bullying of its defense. Parros’ is predicated on the notion that players can sort themselves out; that the checks and balances needed to keep order in hockey exist entirely inside the boards. Parros majored in economics, for what it’s worth.

Jeff Halpern ’99, meanwhile, has carved out his niche in the league as a solid if unglamorous offensive contributor on second and third lines. At the 2008 World Championships, he had his ACL ruptured on a hard hit and was sidelined for more than half a year. “I think the old days of having a guy who just fights are over,” he said to a reporter in 2011. “There are still a few heavyweights who can play the game ... but the game has gotten too good to hide anybody.”

Tellingly, neither Parros’ actions nor Halpern’s words seem to indicate that they believe the league should be involved in deciding how physical the on-ice product should be. That’s exactly what the first round of these playoffs has seen — but with head disciplinarian Brendan Shanahan handing out multiple fines and suspensions almost every day of competition thus far. Is that the way to deal with the ‘issue?’ Would the player who ruined Halpern’s knee be more likely to let up a little if he knew that someone like Parros was on the opposing bench or if he knew that someone like Shanahan held his fate in his hands? And if retribution does end up coming from above instead of from someone who is looking you in the eye, would enough of what makes hockey fans love hockey survive?

I can’t say for sure but, as always, it’ll be interesting to watch and find out. Who knows? Maybe in the meantime there will be a couple of dekes, some sprints to negate icings, more than a few pretty goals and, before long, the question won’t seem to matter.