Simon’s end shows it’s time to stop fighting

Known best in his NHL days as both a fearless fighter and kind, caring teammate, Chris Simon succumbed to his fight within this past Monday, taking his own life at age 52.

According to reports throughout the week, members of Simon’s family contend that it was the former Stanley Cup champion’s struggle with CTE (chronic traumatic encephalopathy), presumably triggered by blows to the head in his years as an enforcer/pugilist, that led to his suicide.

“The family strongly believes and witnessed firsthand, that Chris struggled immensely from CTE, which unfortunately resulted in his death,” read the family’s statement. “We are grieving with the loss of our son, brother, father, partner, teammate, and friend.”

A believable and understandable contention, considering the scientific research studies around CTE, including extensive work based here in Boston, over the last couple of decades. One important caveat: As of today, a CTE diagnosis only can be confirmed via autopsy. Science continues to evolve, though, and researchers increasingly make a strong case that blows to the head — including those that are subconcussive — cause the neurodegenerative disorder.

None of that is an attempt to discredit the Simon family’s belief, nor does it assuage the pain and grief of anyone who loved Simon. Yet it’s a reminder that we first should let the science — and presumed autopsy — play out. Also, if Simon did have CTE, the fact remains science has yet to discern why some athletes who take similar poundings, many over the course of years, don’t develop or possibly remain impervious to the disease.

The NHL has clung to that latter point in part as a means to deflect culpability or negligence in these cases. No surprise. It is trying to protect a growing, multibillion-dollar enterprise, and for now it has the inconclusive science on its side. If one day the science reaches the beyond-the-shadow-of-a-doubt stage, the bet here is that NHL owners already have crafted a more refined response to fend off litigation. They’ve had a long time to think about it.

“On all these matters,” said NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, after first offering his condolences regarding Simon, “we wait to see what the medical experts tell us.”

To your faithful puck chronicler, the league on this matter sounds like a bunch of climate-change deniers in tailored suits, but I readily acknowledge that someone who has chosen, of own free will and mind, to spend decades chronicling Zambonis going in circles may not be your No. 1 go-to guy for legal or scientific opinion. When put on the spot, I can come up with a precise explanation of two-line offside, most days without having to use my hands. Not a lot of docs or lawyers can do that.

History has shown that ex-NHL tough guys Derek Boogaard and Bob Probert were CTE-positive. Boogaard, 28, died via suicide in 2011. Probert,

45, died in 2010, suffering a heart attack while boating on a hot summer day. Per hockeyfights.com, Boogaard had 184 fights in the NHL seasons spanning 1999-2011, while Probert, perhaps the most menacing fighter in league history, dropped mitts 242 times, 1985-2002.

Simon, again per hockeyfights.com, fought 111 times in the NHL (19932008), then 10 more times across his five-season farewell tour in the Russiabased KHL. He put down his gloves and stick for good in 2013 at age 41, and only four years later, back living yearround in Ontario, filed for bankruptcy.

Per reports around his May 2017 bankruptcy proceedings, Simon, then 45, had been married twice and had five children. He claimed to be broke (despite an estimated $15 million in career earnings), reported some $500,000 in debt (much of it in delinquent child support payments), and said he suffered CTE-related anxiety and depression.

It already was a stark, sad picture for Simon, who grew up in Wawa, Ontario, a native North American of Ojibwe heritage. Chosen No. 25 by the Flyers in the 1990 draft, he was dealt two years later, following his final junior season, to the Nordiques as part of the legendary Eric Lindros trade.

The hulking (6 feet 3 inches, 230 pounds), long-haired winger made his NHL debut with the Nordiques in 199293, and on March 20 of that season took on New Jersey’s Claude Lemieux in his first fight. The frame was in place, the picture to develop over time. One hundred and 10 rounds later, his final NHL fight was with Flames defenseman Jim Vandermeer, March 22, 2008.

If Simon is confirmed to have had CTE, it’s an easy leap of faith, one that admittedly may be impossible to prove, that a decades-long career full of punches to the head addled his brain and induced the disease. It was fighting, in part, that made him a valued prospect out of junior hockey. It was his well-chronicled “enforcer” reputation that landed him at age 36 in Russia, where, by the way, he rolled up a career high of 263 penalty minutes in his first season with Vityaz Chekhov. Wherever he played, Simon entered swinging, It was his bread, butter, and being.

All the science and the legal mumbojumbo aside, perhaps we could agree that Simon fought too much, especially by the game’s more sensible 2024 standards. Other than the shooting comet that is rookie Rangers tough guy Matt Rempe, we don’t see his like any longer in the NHL. That’s good. It could be better.

Obviously, there are still guys who can fight. The Bruins, in fact, at the trade deadline added Pat Maroon. Across his NHL and minor pro days, the Big Rig has fought 143 times. A well-timed fight can be an effective tool for a coach, though its overall importance remains vastly overestimated.

Simon had, shall we say, his undignified moments in the arena. In his days as an Islander, he was suspended once for 30 games, after using a skate to stomp down on the foot of the Penguins’ Jarkko Ruutu, and also for 25 games for his gruesome two-hander to the face of Ranger Ryan Hollweg. Times were different, yes, but those were nasty, deliberate attempts to injure that were an insult to the game.

Simon’s best days came on the Colorado team that won the Cup in 1996. He will be remembered as the once-fierce, worn-out warrior who sadly took his own life. We likely never will know with certainty what part fighting played in his decision.

A better way to remember him, in context to prior lost souls such as Boogaard and Probert, would be for the NHL finally to ban the fight game. As a league, it has tolerated it now for more than a century. In the Original Six era, it promoted and glorified it.

Now, with 32 teams and a product that doesn’t need spilled blood and chaos to draw fans, and science closing in from behind, it’s time to end it for good.