Food for thought?

Three cheers for Brent Parker, the general manager of the Regina Pats.
Parker, never afraid to speak his mind, is speaking out about the grueling schedule that hockey’s pooh-bahs are inflicting on teenage players.
Yes, Parker is both complicit and somewhat biased in all of this, what with two of his players — RW Jordan Eberle and C Colten Teubert — involved. But good on Parker for at least poking the elephant that is in major junior hockey’s room.
Eberle and Teubert looked like whipped puppies in the second half of an 8-5 loss to the Blazers in Regina on Nov. 28. Gee, I wonder why! They had played for a WHL team against a touring Russian side in Swift Current on Nov. 26 and then done the same thing the next night in Prince Albert. They then had traveled all day Nov. 28 to get to Kamloops to play that night. On Nov. 29, after riding the bus most of the night, they played the Cougars in Prince George.
Add it all up, reports Greg Harder of the Regina Leader-Post, and you get 10 road games in 17 days, including four in four nights.
“To me it’s insane . . . it’s too much,” Parker said in a conversation with Harder. “It’s unfortunate the timing of it with the world junior camp and when we have to travel because of our schedule. We do tax these kids with a lot of these events. There’s no question it’s hard on them. It’s something I’ve been vocal on in the past. I’m very supportive of the world junior and Hockey Canada program. Obviously it’s a tremendous thing for our country and for these kids. We would never ever do anything to jeopardize their opportunity to play in this event, but I worry about them. I worry about how much we’re putting them through.”
The players, of course, aren’t at all concerned. But would they speak out if they were?
“Every time you get a chance to play, you just have to embrace it,” Teubert told Harder. “It’s tough on the body but with me and (Eberle) this year, we’re kind of used to it. We’ve been training up for it so we should be OK, I think.”
Consider, too, that these players now go at it pretty much for 12 months of the year.
As Harder noted, they “represented Canada at the under-18 level on two occasions last year. That was followed by summer-long obligations leading up to the NHL entry draft, after which they took part in their first NHL training camps. Through it all, they’ve continued to play at a high level for the Pats.”
“I don’t think it affects us much anymore,” Eberle told Harder before playing against the touring Russian side in late November. “It might be a little daunting but we both love to play hockey. Every kid watches the world juniors at Christmas and would love to get an opportunity to play in that. I think we’ll be more excited than anything and our energy level will probably just run off that excitement. The more we can play the better.”
With all of this activity, you begin to wonder just how much a young body can take. And now Eberle finds himself hurting. He left a weekend game with a wonky hip and now is believed to have a strained hip flexor. He will be re-evaluated in Ottawa later this week when he arrives at the national junior team‚s selection camp.
And should Eberle and Teubert make the Canadian roster, Parker says both will be given ample time off when the tournament is over.
“We have a lot invested in these guys,” Parker points out. “At what point in time does it start affecting their ability to contribute for our team? That’s something we have to be mindful of as well. Where does it end? But it is what it is. We’ll be supportive and do everything we can to make sure those kids are healthy and ready to contribute and hopefully be a part of the program this year and next.”
And, of course, forgotten in all of this is the WHL fan who pays his/her hard-earned dollars to support their hometown team.
Let’s use the Pats as an example for this little exercise. Should Eberle and Teubert make the Canadian team, they will miss at least nine WHL games, with five of those being home games. In the 10 days immediately following the tournament, the Pats are scheduled to play three games, all at home.
So should they make the team and should Parker choose to give the two 10 days off after the tournament, they would miss 12 WHL games, including eight home games. That folks, is 16.7 per cent of the Pats’ 72-game schedule and 22.2 per cent of their home schedule.
Perhaps, then, WHL teams should look at offering up a refund to season-ticket holders if their favourite team ends up donating players to Hockey Canada’s cause. Or perhaps Hockey Canada, its coffers flush with World Junior Championship cash, should look at compensating major junior hockey fans.
Of course, the WHL, of which Parker is part and parcel, has to be careful about being critical of anyone’s schedule. After all, this is a league that this season had the Edmonton Oil Kings go, in order, Seattle-Kelowna-Everett-Portland-Chilliwack, playing five games in seven nights.
The Lethbridge Hurricanes, right now, are in a stretch of playing nine games in 15 days. Gotta think those boys will be ready to go home and sleep at Christmas time. Merry Christmas, Mom . . . Dad. . . . Z-z-z-z-z-z-z.
But, in all seriousness, considering the way players from all levels train in the offseason, with little downtime, you really do wonder just how much of this the body can take.
And perhaps it’s time that the adults who set the agendas for these players took stock of these things and started cutting someone some slack.
(I have spoken with one WHL head coach who says his players — remember that we’re talking about 16-to-20-year-olds — have to focus so much on nutrition, off-ice workouts, fitness, weight-room workouts and such that he wonders how they have energy left to focus on school and playing the game.)
Or maybe major junior owners, if they are going to continue to support Hockey Canada’s Christmas cash cow, need to take a serious look at suspending operations from, say, Dec. 15 through Jan. 8.