Taylor Hall, the NHL's first overall pick last June, picked a fight with Derek Dorsett of the Columbus Blue Jackets last night. It was his first career fight in the NHL -- not sure if he's fought at other levels before -- and it really didn't go so well for him.
Lessons We Can Learn From Taylor Hall’s First NHL Fight
There are many things we can learn from this whole mishap.
1. Taylor Hall should not fight. Ever. Look at that little dangle he made just before his fight. That’s what Taylor Hall is supposed to do. Sure, he’s proud that he defended himself. Fantastic. Now he’s out with an ankle injury, potentially for the year. Bro, no more fights.
2. If you’re gonna talk smack, don’t fall over. As Dorsett is skating to the penalty box with assistance of the lineman, he’s yelling and pointing at some Oilers player the entire way. He apparently tripped over his own two feet in mid-sentence. Bad form.
3. Can we stop fighting over clean hits? If there’s one thing that frustrates me more than anything in today’s NHL, it’s the practice of dropping the gloves over a clean hit. Dorsett was clearly pestering Hall quite a bit -- that’s his job, after all -- and he was successful, as he clearly got under the rookie’s skin.
But do we really need to drop the gloves over stuff like that? I guess Hall deserves credit for trying to stop Dorsett’s nonsense, but isn’t that exactly what Dorsett wanted him to do?
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