Quote Originally Posted by Raven T. View Post
Another question: I never understood the fascination with hockey. I find it a difficult sport to follow, much less get into. By follow, I mean, you can't see the bloody puck and the camera's going everywhere, possession is changing constantly so you don't know if you're cheering at the right time, and I don't understand why players get away with fighting. In any other sport, you get ejected/fined/suspended/worse for a little pushing, yet hockey matches are more like NASCAR used to be (not a fan of that, either:) people go to see the wreck/fight and not the game.

I guess there's no question in the jumble of random mutterings, but I would appreciate an explanation as to the nature of liking this...sport.
A couple of minor answers here:

On the issue of being able to follow the play, hockey's like any other sport - the more you watch it, the better you're able to see what's happening.

As for the fighting, well, it is a debate inside hockey circles as well. A lot of hockey fans would like to see fighting gone. On the flipside, a lot of fans (and teams, for that matter), like having a fighter around to protect the star players from physical intimidation. At least, so runs the reasoning. It's also worth pointing out that at a lot of levels (college hockey, Olympic hockey, etc.), fighting does get a player ejected immediately.