IIHF introduces controversial new rule ahead of World Juniors.

The International Ice Hockey Federationhas introduced a controversial new rule just days before arguably their biggest tournament of the calendar year.

In a new video published to social media the IIHF goes into great detail regarding one of their rules, rule 153, and how it pertains to what the IIHF has deemed are "late hits" in international hockey rules. The rule has sparked significant outraged in the hockey community as several fans have complained about the wussification of the game, while others simply feel that this is too harsh a crack down on what would otherwise be clean body checks.

According to the new rule any hit that meets one of the following criteria will now be considered a "late hit." 

A body check to a player who is in a vulnerable position. 

Opponent no longer has control or possession of the puck. 

Opponent can be aware or unaware of impending contact.

As you can see some of these rules really have nothing to do with whether or not the lit would be delivered late at all but instead appears to be a poorly veiled attempt at merely phasing out hitting entirely from the World Junior Championship as well as other international hockey tournaments moving forward. 

Additionally there seems to be very little confusion on the part of the IIHF who even went out of their way last week to showcase which type of hits would be disallowed in future IIHF tournaments. You will see in the video below that some of the hits that are now deemed illegal by the IIHF would otherwise have been perfectly legal body checks in these men's young career, and you can not help but wonder how much better/worse some teams would have done if the tournament had been played under the old rule system.

To make things even worse the punishments laid out under rule 153 by the IIHF are rather harsh and could also potentially have a big impact on the upcoming tournament. Any player who delivers a late hit, under this new rule, to an unsuspecting opponent will be subject to an automatic 5 minute major as well as an automatic game misconduct.

What do you think of this new rule?

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