It was Rodney Dangerfield who once said "I went to a fight the other night and a hockey game broke out."
This highlights one of the most famous and unique aspects of North American hockey, fighting.  Fighting is not
just two meatheads throwing poorly executed jabs and crosses at an oppenent.  It can be a game changer,
a motivator, and a message sender all in one.  No one is exactly how fighting got so ingrained in hockey
some theories credit it to the creation of the blue lines which divied the rink into thirds and created a more
phyiscal game.  Some believe it devloped out of a need to protect the more skilled offenseive players (i.e. Wayne
Gretzky).  There are two main types of fighters in hockey the "enforcer" is a player who is usually a bigger
 player who might be the best overall player but can hit with force and the less common "goon" who is esentially
useless on for anything besides fighting.  In the early days of professional hockey fighting was very brutal
players didnt fight to help teammates but to instead make sure they kept a spot on the roster.  So during the
 expansion period from the 60s to the 80s the need to protect star players increased which made the need for 
enforcers go up.  These were some of the most violent times in professional hockey with fights per game rising to
1.0 in 1980.