Karl, recently I met with your wife re teacher cert. where I learned that she was married to one of the authors of The Hockey Compendium. Small world, eh? I am writing a story for publication on the state of the game addressing issues on how to improve the game and studying the history of significant rule changes. Prior to 1929-30 I have not found any reference to off side rules in the NHL. When was the blue line offside rule first implemented and how was that rule worded? Thanks for your assistance.
Oh ho, yet another male stranger of my wife's acquaintance. Lest the world look at this askance, lemme mention to the audience that her job entails evaluating and certifying teacher credentials, which is why she's met so many people. At least that's what she tells me. Why this requires leaving the house at midnight to go to work in a mini with fishnet stockings, she's never explained.
Anyway, the blue lines and offsides. Not a simple question. Since the Patrick Brothers first intoduced the blue lines in the PCHA for the 1913-14 season, offside rules have been tinkered with, either broadly or subtly, almost annually ever since. I don't have the precise actual wording immediately at hand, but when first instituted in the PCHA, forward passing, previously illegal anywhere, became allowable between the blue lines. Presumably this was meant to, and did, faciliate the transition game and end-to-end play. The blue lines were adopted by the NHL in their second season of play, 1918-19, creating a 40-foot centre-ice zone in which forward passing and kicking the puck were made legal. Forward passing across either blue line was still illegal. A lot of heavy tinkering was done to the offside rules in the late 1920s and early '30s, which variously allowed goal-hanging, installed awkward "anti-defence" rules, and so on -- but if you're asking when the blue line as we now know it was first implemented, it was 1943-44 and the introduction of the centre ice red line in the NHL that first saw forward passing from the defensive zone into the neutral zone permitted. Again, the rules governing the blue lines and offsides, and the placement of the blue lines on the rink, have been tweaked often since then. There's a year-by-year overview in the appendix of our "Hockey Compendium"
[ http://members.aol.com/SportInfRe/IXcomp01.htm ], but I'd also recommend "Total Hockey," and especially James Duplacey's authoritative "The Annotated Rules of Hockey" -- both available, like our book, at amazon.com -- for a more thorough look at the rules' evolution.
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
Replying to:
Karl, recently I met with your wife re teacher cert. where I learned that she was married to one of the authors of The Hockey Compendium. Small world, eh? I am writing a story for publication on the state of the game addressing issues on how to improve the game and studying the history of significant rule changes. Prior to 1929-30 I have not found any reference to off side rules in the NHL. When was the blue line offside rule first implemented and how was that rule worded? Thanks for your assistance.
