As fighting becomes less and less commonplace in the NHL, the league's agitators are assuming more prominent positions among the pure fighters on the list of players who have accumulated the most penalty minutes.
After the total number of fights took a sharp dip two years ago, the trend continued last season, according to HockeyFights.com. The number of regular-season games with fights dropped from 29.8 percent to 26.9 percent, and the total number of fights dropped from 469 to 391—the lowest level since the website started keeping fighting statistics in 2000-01.
The NHL's top penalty-minute man last season incurred more punishment than his counterpart from the year before, but not due to his fight totals.