Racing Needs Wrecks and Hockey Wants Hits

NASCAR's Carl Edwards was placed on 3 weeks probation for intentionally wrecking Brad Keselowski's car last Sunday at Atlanta Motor Speedway. No suspension or probation following an intentional accident, you ask? Sure, says NASCAR president, Mike Helton.

And, if it matters to anyone in or outside of auto racing, I agree with the decision.

In the world of competition, "intent" is difficult to define. Whether it's a quarterback grounding a football, a basketball player making a flagrant foul, a baseball pitcher plunking a batter or, in this case, a NASCAR driver taking out another car, it's a judgment call. In the case of Carl Edwards at AMS, there was intent and spite. The No. 99 car had earlier been into the wall by Keselowski and Edwards was trailing by 156 laps when the incident occurred. Later, Edwards admitted on his Facebook page what our eyes and common sense already told us.

But it didn't matter because NASCAR needs wrecks and now more so than ever. Television ratings have spiraled downward. This year's Daytona 500 was off 16.3% from last year and the lowest since 1991. Okay, blame that damn pothole.

The next race in Fontana at the Auto Club 500 was down 6% from 2009, in Las Vegas they plummeted 37%. Ticket sales have slumped, and sponsorship money is drying up. The racing aficionados are still watching but the sport needs more fans.

What makes NASCAR more appealing to others? Car wrecks and the ensuing drama between the drivers. That combination of collision plus confrontation jumpstarted the sport to fans in the 1979 Daytona 500. Now once again stock car racing needs to slap some interest into television viewers.

The same night after the NASCAR incident in Atlanta, the NHL was dealt a blow of their own when Matt Cooke of the Pittsburgh Penguins blindsided Marc Savard of the Boston Bruins. The open-ice body check resulted in a Grade 2 concussion for Savard. Cooke had already been suspended twice before by the league since January of 2009 for hits to the head.

This week, NHL chief disciplinarian Colin Campbell decided that Matt Cooke would not receive any suspension, fine or even probation.

Many hockey purists believe there is no need for over-aggressive behavior or fights in the NHL. They even cite the success of Olympic hockey as proof. But the only buzz left over from the 2010 Winter Olympics exists north of the United States border or inside Bode Miller's head. The NHL, to most Americans, is back in hibernation.

When Major League Baseball enjoyed its resurgence during the famous "Summer of 1998" they surely knew, what we all know now, that the tape-measure home runs were enhanced by more than just extra batting practice. If they did care, it wasn't going to take precedent over the attention of McGwire's or Sosa's chase of Roger Maris. Nor did it matter as Bonds broke the record again in 2001. It's what the fans wanted and not until the backlash was too great to ignore did baseball address the issue of steroids.

The only recent exception in American professional sports of putting player safety ahead of ticket sales or television ratings has been in the NFL. Rules have been consistently changed to protect the health of their marquee athletes and more discussions will continue at the annual owners meeting this month to further investigate the effects of concussions.

But unlike NASCAR and, especially, the NHL, the popularity of NFL has been mostly immune to any downturns in fan interest.

Otherwise, we might still see quarterback sacks like this. (For the record and back in 1976, Joe "Turkey" Jones was penalized and fined $3,000 for the tackle)

For now, just like baseball needed a home run chase to revive itself over a decade ago, NASCAR racing needs wrecks and hockey needs hits to have any chance of competing with the NFL for popularity in our lifetime.

"Have at it, boys," NASCAR president Mike Helton recently said.

"I am personally placing a hundred-dollar bounty on the head of Tim McCracken," fictional hockey player/coach Reggie Dunlop famously declared.

And "Chicks still dig the long ball."