Georges Laraque and two fans pose boxing-weigh-in-style
I’m going to come right out and say it: I like Georges Laraque.
When I found out last year that the Canadiens had signed him as a free agent basically as an enforcer to intimidate opposing teams and get into fights, I was disappointed. I’m not a fan of fighting in hockey, and I’m not crazy about goons.
Laraque is still a goon. He’s a fighter, an enforcer, a guy who’s there more for his size and the strength of his fists than the accuracy of his slapshot. But, for better or for worse he lives by a strict, unwritten code that supposedly uses one-on-one fighting to self-regulate against cheap shots that would otherwise target small superstars. And he’s always smiling when he fights, which I found incredibly odd. He finds it amusing when some guy from the other team thinks he can take on Big Georges Laraque. There’s clearly a big difference between Laraque and someone like Chris Pronger or Todd Bertuzzi.