Brain injuries put Muth into retirement

THE MacBETH REPORT:
D Mark Isherwood (Medicine Hat, 2005-10) signed a one-year contract with Angers (France, Ligue Magnus). He had five goals and 12 assists in 37 games with the Utah Grizzlies (ECHL), one goal and two assists in 13 games with the San Francisco Bulls (ECHL), and was pointless in two games with the Hamilton Bulldogs (AHL) last season.
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If you missed it here yesterday, here’s another plug for Alan Caldwell over at Small Thoughts At Large. . . . He’s endeavouring to keep track of WHL training camp rosters. . . . Which is why every team in the WHL should be making sure that Caldwell receives their most up-to-date rosters ASAP. Here is an opportunity for WHL teams to get some exposure at no cost to them. . . . So come one teams, get those rosters to Caldwell. There are no excuses for you not to get your rosters posted on Small Thoughts At Large.
The email address is: smallatlarge@gmail.co.
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D Tanner Muth, 20, of the Kootenay Ice won’t be back for a fifth season in the WHL. Muth is suffering with post-concussion syndrome. Last season, the Calgary native had nine points in 60 games with the Ice. He also has played with the Seattle Thunderbirds and Swift Current Broncos. . . . Muth’s departure leaves the Ice with two 20-year-olds on its roster — F Zach McPhee and D Jagger Dirk — as it opens camp. . . . Muth is the fourth WHL player to have announced his retirement recently due to previous brain injuries. He joins D Reid Jackson of the Moose Jaw Warriors, and F Shea Howorko and F Brent Benson of Swift Current. As well, F Tyrel Seaman, who has had at least three concussions over the last two seasons, won’t be in camp with the Brandon Wheat Kings when it opens this week, and D Tanner Mort of the Spokane Chiefs has retired due to what the team says is a neck injury. Mort suffered a brain injury during a game in Kamloops last season. . . . F Tyler Alos, 20, who was limited to 10 games with the Seattle Thunderbirds last season due to a brain injury, actually announced in December that he was done with playing. The Thunderbirds have since added him to their coaching staff.
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The Swift Current Broncos have signed F Cole Johnson, the 34th overall selection in th 2013 WHL bantam draft. From Marwayne, Alta., Johnson had 71 points in 33 games with the bantam AAA Lloydminster Heat last season.
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The Medicine Hat Tigers will have 10 eligible players attending NHL rookie or training camps in the next while — F Hunter Shinkaruk, Vancouver Canucks; G Marek Langhamer, Phoenix Coyotes; D Tyler Lewington, Washington Capitals; F Boston Leier, Washington; D Spenser Jensen, San Jose Sharks; D Ty Stanton, Winnipeg Jets; F Miles Koules, Minnesota Wild; D KyleBecker, Anaheim Ducks; and F Jake Doty and F Curtis Valk, both St. Louis Blues. . . . Shinkaruk, Langhamer and Lewington all are draft picks; the others are free-agent invitees.
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The Medicine Hat Tigers signed D Marshall Skapski and F Caleb Fantillo, both 2013 bantam draft selections, on Monday. . . . Skapski, from Abbotsford, B.C., is the younger brother of Kootenay Ice G Mackenzie Skapski and Everett Silvertips D Mitchell Skapski. Marshall was the 54th overall pick in the bantam draft. He had 40 points in 48 games with the Abbotsford Hawks (Bantam A1 Tier 1) last season. . . . Fantillo, from Coquitlam, B.C., was the 123rd selection in the draft. He had 83 points in 60 games with the Coquitlam Chiefs, another Bantam A1 Tier 1 team.
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F Stephane Legault, 20, has chosen not to return to the Edmonton Oil Kings for a fourth season. Legault, from Edmonton, has decided to attend NAIT. In 186 regular-season games, Legault had 108 points. Last season, he put up 41 points in 57 games. . . . His departure leaves the Oil Kings with perhaps one 20-year-old on their roster – D Cody Corbett.
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The Kootenay Ice is to open its training camp on Wednesday with 60 players on hand. It looks like Russian D Rinat Valiev, 18, won’t be among them. Valiev, whose rights were selected in the 2013 CHL import draft, is among those players who has been able to get his visa due to a Canadian foreign service workers’ strike. Jeff Chynoweth, the Ice’s president and GM, has told Trevor Crawley of the Cranbrook Daily Townsman that Valiev’s IIHF transfer has been approved and that he will be in Cranbrook once he gets his visa.
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The Tri-City Americans have signed F Austyn Playfair, 16, to a WHL contract. Playfair, from Scottsdale, Ariz., was listed by the Americans in October. He is the son of former WHLer Jim Playfair, who now is an associate coach with the NHL’s Phoenix Coyotes, and the brother of Spokane Chiefs F Jackson Playfair. . . . Austyn, 6-foot-4 and 200 pounds, had 11 points in 41 games with the Phoenix Jr. Coyotes of the Tier 1 Elite Midget Hockey League.
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The Kelowna Rockets have nine players off their roster heading to NHL camps — F Myles Bell, New Jersey Devils; D Madison Bowey, Washington Capitals; F Tyrell Goulbourne, Philadelphia Flyers; F Colton Heffley, Minnesota Wild; D Jesse Lees, Boston Bruins; F Ryan Olsen, Winnipeg Jets; D Damon Severson, New Jersey; F Colton Sissons, Nashville Predators; and D Mitchell Wheaton, Detroit Red Wings.
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Three players off the Portland Winterhawks’ roster have been invited to play in the CCM/USA Hockey All-American Prospects Game in Pittsburgh on Sept. 26. F Chase DeLeo, F Keegan Iverson and F Dominic Turgeon, all of them eligible for the 2014 NHL draft, will play in the game in the Consol Energy Center. . . . There’s more right here.
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The Moose Jaw Warriors have signed F Ryan Bowen and G Brody Willms, both of whom are from Penticton where they play at the Okanagan Hockey Academy. . . . Bowen was a fifth-round selection in the 2013 bantam draft, while Willms was taken in the eighth round.
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From Dylan Walchuk (@Wally19): “Wont forget that experience for the rest of my life! Best...day...ever @HockeyCanada #thanksforthegoodies #goodluck #Sochi2014”
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F Dylan Walchuk, who played as a 20-year-old with the Spokane Chiefs last season, played some ball hockey with prospective Canadian Olympians on Monday in Calgary. There are 45 NHLers in Calgary for an orientation camp that won’t include ice time. So head coach Mike Babcock and his staff had the players doing some ball hockey run throughs on Monday. With Claude Giroux (thumb) and Joe Thornton (ill child) unable to attend, Walchuk, who will attend the U of Calgary, filled in on a line with Taylor Hall and Jordan Staal. . . . Walchuk is from McBride, B.C., and played some of his minor hockey in Kamloops. He had 60 points in 70 games with the Chiefs last season.
Aaron Vickers of nhl.com has more on Walchuk’s day right here.
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The Regina Pats and Harvard Broadcasting have signed a multi-year deal that will keep the WHL team on 620 CKRM, which has been home to games since 1995-96. . . . The exact length of the contract wasn’t revealed. . . . Phil Andrew will be back calling the play, with Daniel Fink the analyst for a second season.
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Elliott Pap of the Vancouver Sun reports that Russian D Dmitri Osipov, whom the Vancouver Giants took with the first pick in the 2013 import draft, “has been unable to scrimmage due to a shoulder problem that was discovered during team testing. He is skating, however.” . . . Head coach Don Hay told Pap that Osipov is “week-to-week.” . . . That means he isn’t likely to play Saturday in Ladner, B.C., against the Kelowna Rockets or Sunday in Kamloops against the Blazers.

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It wasn't supposed to turn out like this

It is enough to make a grown man weep.
A father, with a concussed son and seemingly nowhere to turn, makes contact with a sports writer.
Names and numbers are exchanged.
A while later, the father writes that his son “is very slowly coming through the fog . . . due in large part to your blog and the contacts it generated.”
Now 22 years of age, the son last played a WHL game in 2012. It was his 20-year-old season. It wasn’t supposed to turn out the way it did.
Five weeks later, the father writes again. There are times when the sunshine is having a hard time cutting through the fog.
There was progress, they thought, when the son got a job this summer. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to hold it.
Why not?
On three separate occasions he returned to the family home in the middle of a shift. However, upon arriving at home, he had no recollection as to why he had left work.
“Upon contacting his employer(s) at the time,” Dad writes, “they all referred to him as having had a ‘meltdown.’ ”
The employers all were “very understanding” and promised that there would be a job for the son “once he gets well.”
The son, feeling “too embarrassed by his brain inury,” hasn’t gone back.
Still, he will forge ahead. He has to; after all, life goes on. Despite still suffering from occasional headaches and some memory loss, he has registered for university and plans to return next month.
“I would wish this upon no one,” the father writes. “And by that I don't mean his mother and me. I mean him.
“Life as a 22-year-old is supposed to be full of wonder and anticipation, of plans and of holding hands by a campfire with the girl of your dreams.
“The girl of his dreams has left him and he is a mere shell of his former confident, bigger-than-life, smiling, loving, laughing self.
“My heart breaks just a little more every time an ‘event’ occurs and his former presence becomes just a little more diminished.”
Meanwhile, another WHL player announced his retirement on Monday. Defenceman Tanner Muth, 20, of the Kootenay Ice is reported to have suffered three brain injuries last season. There won’t be a fourth as he has decided not to return for a fifth winter in the WHL.
At least four WHL players have ended their hockey careers in the last while due to post-concussion syndrome. One other player doesn’t appear to have made it official but he isn’t in training camp. Still another has left the game with what his team says is a neck injury, although he suffered a brain injury during a game in Kamloops early last season.
They fight depression. Some aren’t able to hold any job that is at all physically demanding. The headaches, the dizziness, the lightheadedness, the memory loss . . . it’s all too much.
The toll is mounting. The list of young men whose hockey careers — not just their WHL careers, but oftentimes their athletic careers — have been brought to a screeching halt by brain injuries grows ever longer.
Whatever it is that the WHL is doing to get brain injuries out of its game, it isn’t enough. The elbow pads still are too big and too hard. Ditto for shoulder pads. There are too many hits from behind. There are too many checks in which the head is targeted. There are too many fights where there shouldn’t be any.
In December 2007, former WHL forward Dean McAmmond, by then an NHLer, told the Toronto Star’s Randy Starkman:
“People say I have got concussion problems, but I don't have concussion problems. I have a problem with people giving me traumatic blows to the head, that's what I have a problem with.”
That, in a nutshell, is the problem that faces the WHL. Young men with a sense of invincibility don’t understand the consequences of striking another player in the head, be it helmeted or otherwise.
And don’t think for a moment that the issue of concussions in sport is going to go away. It isn’t. In fact, the spotlight on it is only going to get brighter.
On Oct. 8, a book titled League of Denial: The NFL, Concussions and the Battle for the Truth is to be published. It was written by brothers Steve Fainaru and Mark Fainaru-Wada, who are investigative reporters for ESPN.
On Oct. 8 and 15, the PBS-TV public affairs series Frontline will carry a two-part documentary — League of Denial: The NFL’s Concussion Crisis.
Millions of viewers are expected to tune in. The NFL, the most-popular sporting league in all of North America, will come under fire.
There will be collateral damage and hockey, its season underway by that point, will get caught up in it as questions are asked.
Somewhere a father will watch and he will weep as he wonders what the future holds for his son.
No, it wasn’t supposed to turn out this way.

(Gregg Drinnan is sports editor of The Daily News. He is at gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca, gdrinnan.blogspot.ca and twitter.com/gdrinnan.)

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It was the third annual CH2M HILL Nuclear Night at the Toyota Center in
Kennewick, Wash., so Patrick Holland (41) and the Tri-City Americans wore
what the team calls "nuclear-inspired" sweaters. Those jerseys are available
via on-line auction right here. As you will see by reading Friday's report, Holland
is hotter than nuclear fusion these days.
(Photo by John Allen / AridAcres.com)

THE MacBETH REPORT:
D Micki DuPont (Kamloops, 1996-2000) signed a three-year contract extension with Kloten (Switzerland, NL A). The extension runs through the 2014-15 season. DuPont has four goals and a league-leading 31 assists in 36 games for Kloten this season, good for seventh in league scoring.
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It appears that the Portland Winterhawks are adding F Alex Schoenborn, a 16-year-old from Minot., N.D., to their roster. Ryan Clark of the Fargo, N.D., Forum noted Friday night that Schoenborn had confirmed the move on his Facebook page. . . . The 6-foot-2, 195-pound Schoenborn, who turned 16 on Dec. 12, had 45 points in 27 games for Minot High School last season. . . . This season, he was pointless in three games with the USHL’s Lincoln Stars. He was the 12th overall selection in the USHL’s 2011 futures draft. . . . He is a list player with Portland. . . . Schoenborn also has played with the midget AAA Omaha Lancers this season, picking up 41 points and 118 penalty minutes in 26 games. In North American Prospects Hockeky League games, he has 11 points in six games.
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Marlon Martens, the radio voice of the Victoria Royals, explains the Jesse Pauls situation on his blog.
After speaking with Pauls, Martens explained, “With a plate and nine screws in (a) leg after breaking both bones last (season) he’s been playing with ‘chronic pain’ as he put it, ‘and have decided to look after my health.’ ”
Pauls also told Martens: “It’s affected my game and haven’t been able to play up to my potential . . . it sucks knowing you’ve got more and can’t do it.”
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G Tyler Bunz of the Medicine Hat Tigers is scheduled to appear in a St. Albert, Alta., court on March 5 after entering not guilty pleas to what the Medicine Hat News reports are “two drunk-driving related allegations.”
According to The News, Bunz, 19, was charged “after an incident in his hometown of St. Albert in May.”
Brad McEwen, the Tigers’ general manager, told The News that the team won’t comment on the situation.
The Edmonton Oilers selected Bunz with the 121st pick of the NHL’s 2010 draft.
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In the BCHL on Friday night, the Penticton Vees won their 20th game in a row, beating the Chiefs 6-2 in Chilliwack. . . . The Vees will play the SilverBacks in Salmon Arm tonight.
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WHL TRADE TRACKER (trades made since Dec. 27):
Trades made: 6
Players: 14
Draft picks: 5
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In the OHL, the teams have moved 25 players and 29 draft picks since Jan. 1.
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The Vancouver Giants have dealt D Luke Fenske, 18, to the Regina Pats for a third-round pick in the 2013 bantam draft.
Fenske, from Penticton, has six assists and 40 penalty minutes in 31 games with the Giants this season. He played 30 games with them in 2009-10 and 55 last season. In 116 games, he has four goals and 17 assists. . . . He was selected by the Giants in the third round of the 2008 bantam draft. . . .
The Kootenay Ice has traded F Adam Rossignol, 18, to the Swift Current Broncos for D Tanner Muth, 18. . . . Rossignol, from Surrey, B.C., had 13 points in 39 games. He was a seventh-round pick by the Ice in the 2008 bantam draft. . . . Muth, from Calgary, had four points in 38 games with the Broncos. He was selected 36th overall by the Seattle Thunderbirds in the 2008 bantam draft.
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F Daniel Broussard of the OHL’s Ottawa 67’s has been suspended for eight games for an anti-doping rule violation. The CHL and the Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport made the announcement on Friday. According to a news release, “The violation resulted from a urine sample collected during in-competition doping control in November 2011 which revealed the presence of methylhexaneamine, a prohibited stimulant.”
In a news release, CHL president David Branch stated that Broussard, who turns 21 on on Monday, and the 67’s were “extremely co-operative throughout the process.”
“We are completely satisfied,” Branch continued, “that the player used a supplement which he had purchased over the counter at a local retail outlet and had no knowledge that it contained a prohibited substance.”
Methylhexaneamine is on the World Anti-Doping Agency Prohibited List which is recognized by the CHL.
I said it last season and I’ll say it again . . . this automatic eight-game suspension for a first-time offender is ridiculous. Once again, we have a player who in no way was trying to cheat, but he has been labelled a drug cheat, just like the first-timers who were suspended last season.
Because of the number of major junior players using supplements, if the positive test turns out to be from inadvertent use and that can be proved, then why not issue a warning, and hand out an eight-game suspension for a second positive test?
A player makes a mistake like this and gets a longer suspension than some headshots and stickwork carry. And that’s just not right.
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FRIDAY’S GAMES:
In Prince Albert, the Raiders ran their home-ice winning streak to seven games as they dumped the Brandon Wheat Kings, 4-1. . . . F Justin Maylan had a goal and two assists for the Raiders. . . . Maylan has 19 goals. . . . Prince Albert sophomore F Mike Winther had a goal, his 21st, and an assist. . . . F Logan McVeigh, acquired a week ago from Kamloops, had two assists. . . . The Wheat Kings have lost three in a row and 10 of their last 15, meaning the next few days, leading up to the Jan. 10 trading deadline, will be interesting. . . . Brandon G Curtis Honey stopped 33 shots in his first start. . . . Raiders G Cole Holowenko turned aside 29 shots. . . . F Mark Stone had one assist for Brandon in his first game after playing for Canada at the World Junior Championship. It was his 200th regular-season game. . . . Swiss F Alessio Bertaggia, also back in the Brandon lineup after playing at the WJC, was held off the scoresheet. . . . The teams meet again tonight in P.A. . . .

In Regina, G Matt Hewitt stopped 33 shots to lead the Pats to a 3-0 victory over the Saskatoon Blades. . . . Hewitt has two shutouts this season. . . . The victory was Regina’s 23rd this season, which matches their total for all of last season. . . .  The Pats have won four in a row — they have at least a point in six straight — going into a rematch tonight in Saskatoon. . . . The Blades had won their last two games, scoring 17 goals in the process. . . . Regina F Morgan Klimchuk’s 10th goal, at 13:2 of the second, stood up as the winner. . . . Regina F Jordan Weal had a goal and an assist. He has 67 points, four off the league lead. . . . In the second period, Regina D Colton Jobke wound up and fired a shot . . . and the puck split in two. . . . Les Lazaruk, the radio voice of the Blades, described it this way in a tweet: “OK, I've seen it all...Pats' Colton Jobke shoots puck and it breaks in two when it hits the back boards at the Brandt centre. Crazy!!” . . . G Andrey Makarov, who was so terrific for Russia in the WJC final on Thursday night, wasn’t with the Blades. He didn’t get into Saskatoon in time to make the trip south. . . .

In Lethbridge, D Daniel Johnston broke a 1-1 tie with a PP goal at 6:30 of the third period as the Hurricanes beat the Medicine Hat Tigers, 3-1. . . . Johnston has two goals this season. . . . F Emerson Etem got No. 31 for the Tigers in his first game back after playing for Team USA at the WJC. . . . Lethbridge G Damien Ketlo stopped 31 shots. . . .

In Red Deer, F Taylor Vause had a goal and two assists to lead the Swift Current Broncos to a 3-2 victory over the Rebels. . . . The Broncos took a 3-0 lead early in the second period and then hung on behind 38 saves from G Jon Groenheyde. . . . Vause, who was reportedly feeling under the weather, has 23 goals. . . . He has 49 points in 41 games. Last season, in 62 games, Vause, 20, had career highs of 18 goals, 28 assists and 47 points. . . . The Broncos had lost six straight on the road. . . . Referee Derek Zalaski handed out only three minors, two to Red Deer. . . .

In Portland, F Brad Ross scored three times to lead the Winterhawks to a 3-1 victory over the Everett Silvertips. . . . The Winterhawks have won 14 in a row at home. . . . Ross has 28 goals. . . . Everett G Kent Simpson set a single-game franchise record with 55 saves. The previous record (53) was held by Leland Irving from a game against the Spokane Chiefs four years ago. . . . Portland G Brendan Burke stopped 30 shots. Everett F Josh Birkholz was unsuccessful on a late second-period penalty shot with the score 1-1. . . . Portland F Ty Rattie, the WHL scoring leader, had two assists. He now has 71 points. . . . Everett D Ryan Murray was back from a stint with the Canadian team at the WJC. . . . Portland F Sven Bartschi sat this one out. He played for Switzerland at the WJC and suffered a concussion. . . . Everett was without D Brennan Yadlowski, who sat out a one-game suspension for a match penalty he incurred on Wednesday night. . . .

In Kennewick, Wash., F Patrick Holland had two goals and two assists, while F Adam Hughesman had two goals and an assist, as the Tri-City Americans beat the Seattle Thunderbirds, 7-3. . . . The Americans have won 12 in a row. . . . Holland has three straight four-point games. On the season, he has 55 points in 38 games. . . . In fact, in his last six games, he has gone 3, 3, 1, 4, 4, 4. That’s 19 points over six games. . . . Since Dec. 2, Holland has 28 points in 12 games. He has been blanked once, has one oe-point game, three two-pointers and three three-pointers. . . . Interestingly, he went 2-2-0-2-3-0-3-3-1-4-4-4. . . . And we should mention that Holland turns 19 today. . . . Hughesman has 65 points, including 25 goals, in 38 games this season. He has 299 points in 304 career games. . . . The Americans led 5-0 when Holland got his first goal, his 16th, at 8:34 of the second. . . . Tri-City G Eric Comrie stopped 20 shots. He wasn’t able to stop F Colin Jacobs on a second-period penalty shot that put Seattle on the board. . . . Comrie is 13-3-0. . . . Seattle G Daniel Cotton stopped 38 shots in his fourth career start. . . . F Brendan Shinnimin added a goal and two helpers for the Americans, while F Brian Williams had three assists. . . . Seattle has lost 19 in a row at the Toyota Center. . . . This one drew 6,064 fans, the third-largest crowd in the facility’s history. . . . There was an interesting moment in this one. It came with the Americans leading 5-2. From Dan Mulhausen’s Americans news release: “Early into the third period, Seattle thought it had pulled to within two, but rookie Connor Honey had his goal erased following a video review of a shot by Holland.  Nearly a minute earlier, Holland had ripped a shot from the point that appeared to go in the net, but the puck hit the back boards and went into the far corner.  After Honey’s goal finally stopped the clock, the video goal judge determined that Holland’s shot in fact had gone through the net, negating the goal by Honey and putting Tri-City on top 6-2.” . . . Hey, when you’re hot, you’re hot! And when you’re not, you’re not. . . .

In Prince George, G Cole Cheveldave stopped 32 shots as the Kamloops Blazers beat the Cougars, 2-0. . . . Cheveldave, an 18-year-old freshman from Calgary, has three shutouts, all of them against the Cougars. He blanked them 5-0 on Sunday, which was the last game for both teams prior to last night. They will play again tonight in P.G. . . . Cheveldave is 19-5-3. . . . Kamloops D Bronson Maschmeyer got the winner at 1:01 of the second period. F Colin Smith added his 20th at 13:16 of the third. . . . Prince George G Drew Owsley stopped 41 shots. . . . Kamloops D Marek Hrbas (Czech Republic) and Prince George D Martin Marincin (Slovakia) both played after performing at the WJC. . . .

In Spokane, the Chiefs erased a 1-0 deficit with four straight goals and went on to beat the Moose Jaw Warriors, 5-2. . . . D Corbin Baldwin had a goal and an assist and was plus-4 for the Chiefs. . . . Spokane G Mac Engel stopped 24 shots, 11 fewer than Moose Jaw’s Spencer Tremblay. . . . The Warriors went 1-3-1 in their U.S. Division swing. They wrap up the road swing tonight against the Kootenay Ice. . . . The Chiefs are 6-0 against East Division teams. . . . F Dominik Uher, in his return from playing for the Czech Republic at the WJC, scored for the Chiefs. . . . Spokane head coach Don Nachbaur now has 497 WHL victories. . . . Moose Jaw F Quinton Howden rejoined his club after playing for Canada at the WJC. . . .

In Victoria, D Myles Bell had two goals and an assist to help the Kelowna Rockets to a 5-2 victory over the Royals. . . . Bell has seven goals this season. . . . Kelowna G Adam Brown stopped 36 shots. . . . Bell broke a 2-2 tie at 1:04 of the third period. . . . The Royals hae lost eight in a row. . . . The teams play in Victoria again tonight.
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FRIDAY’S CHECKING-FROM-BEHIND COUNT:
F Jamie Crooks, Victoria.

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