Image by Getty Images via @daylifeDerek Boogaard, who died Friday at the age of 28 in Minneapolis, spent six seasons in the NHL, mostly with the Minnesota Wild. He was known more for his brawn than for scoring goals (three of them), having racked up 589 penalty minutes and participated in 61 fights during his career.Yet Boogaard was one of the most popular players to wear a Wild uniform in the short history of the franchise. He even started a fight school in his native Saskatchewan. But to those who knew him off the ice, he was more Clark Kent than one of the league's most notorious enforcers.
Boogaard moved on to the New York Rangers this past season, but played only a few games before a concussion sent him to the sidelines. It was in a fight with an Ottawa Senators player.
It will be weeks before anyone figures out how Boogaard died. But his parents made the decision to donate his brain to science, in which it will be determined if he had a disease associated with concussions.
We are reminded of what happened to Bill Masterton, who played in the inaugural season of the Minnesota North Stars (now based in Dallas). On a January night in 1968 at Metropolitan Sports Center, Masterton suffered head injuries during a game that led to his death. This was when most players in the NHL didn't wear helmets, or much of anything in the way of protective gear. Now, of course, they're mandatory. But that hasn't stopped players from maiming each other as long as they think they can get away with it.
Now that the major sports leagues are finally taking seriously the consequences of athletes getting hit on the head once too often, this should also be an opportunity to educate future generations of hockey players on the dangers of picking a fight with your opponent just for the hell of it. What Derek Boogaard leaves behind should be a legacy of safer hockey on the ice and off.
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