This just out: “The Finnish journalist calls for a more civilized version of hockey where goons have no part in the game.”

When I was ten years old, I had a classmate who was a little hyperactive. He was an annoying little guy, always teasing others. Me, as well, although we were pretty good of friends.

Once, he banged my head against a brick wall.

I was a popular kind of guy in the class, a star, if you will. However, I was not the coolest guy in class. But I was friends with the cool one, lucky me. He saw the incident and came running to me.

“You want me to beat him up? I’ll do it, just say the word.”

Of course I wanted the guy beat up to a pile of mush. But, at the same time, I knew it was the wrong thing to do. I also knew that it was lame because a real man would get up and do it himself.

But what the heck, I was already crying so I wasn’t a real man anyway. I took the other road, the one that gave me a chance to later say that I had nothing to do with it, but that would still send a message to my head banging friend. I told the coolest guy in the class that he could do whatever he wanted.

“So, you want me to beat him up?”

“Just do what you want,” I said, torn between right and wrong.

He chased the head banger out of the schoolyard so that the entire class had to go look for him. We found him sobbing in the church parking lot across the street. And no, I didn’t see what happened, I was looking at my notes, but I hear it wasn’t that bad.

I guess that’s what hockey coaches feel like when they send their goon onto the ice. Everybody knows why he sends him out. Everybody knows what’s about to happen, and yet, the coach is always oblivious and dumbfounded when a fight breaks out.

“Really? Well, boys will be boys, I guess. Although, I hope this sends a message to them that you can’t just walk all over our best player.”

Or something.

I just can’t wrap my mind around the concept of goons, and how they fit in the self-image of a hockey player or coach. You know the one about hockey players being tough and fair, down-to-earth athletes. How do hit men fit in that?

Because they keep the balance of fear in tact. Because if both teams have one, then nobody’s trying to do anything fishy or … the goons will fight (each other, naturally), and the real players can focus on the game. That’s the official line.

I wonder if the goon culture would rise again if we started the game from scratch, knowing what we know now, the human evolution being where it is now. Is it just a law of the nature to not trust the rules and referees, but instead take the law in your own hands?

Maybe it is.

How pathetic we are.

Anyway, for me, that was the first and last time I ever gave fighting orders to anyone.

The head banger became a military strategist with the Finnish army.

I skipped the military service altogether.