I think they are but I don't think they have put value in this sort of player. I also tend to think too much of the staff and perhaps the owners are too "turn the other cheek" and they don't seek out on-ice violence. Not that we haven't seen this problem with them before and the measures taken by previous regimes usually involved a singular or perhaps a duo of players... which is just not enough.
Amen.
The majority of modern hockey - GMs, coaches, owners, fans - no longer values or even recognizes what it means to be violent on the ice. It's nasty, vicious, hyper-masculine stuff and it's still baked into the hockey's DNA despite the efforts of the powers that be. Society as a whole is less violent today, which is good of course, but it's left many unable to understand violence in its legitimate contexts.
Yes, it's dangerous and for that reason problematic to a degree, but it's also what makes all the skill that players achieve in the face of it so entertaining and worth paying to watch. The balance is what makes the game special.
To this point, there is a chasm of difference between a guy like Sam Bennett and a guy like Peyton Krebs. One is a mean and strong middleweight brute and one is a lilliputian shit-starter who can't physically back up his attitude.
We need to add the real thing this summer, whether it's Bennett, Carrier, Joshua, etc. Lindy should help some overall, I'd still want him on my side in a bar fight at 64.