Continued: View on visors is evolving

Kurtis Foster knows his right eye was not a pretty sight. It was a revolting sight, but two weeks later, Foster is thankful he still has the sight to know this.

On Nov. 24 in Nashville, the Wild defenseman was struck by a rising, speeding J.P. Dumont slapshot. The puck missed Foster's right eye by half an inch.

"You open your eyes and you're like, 'Please God, let me see,'" Foster, 26, said. "I opened my eyes and I could see again, and you're like, 'OK, that's one relief.' Then you start thinking about the throbbing pain in your head. Then you see the blood, and wonder, 'How bad am I cut?'

"And then they get you off the ice and you realize, 'I just came a few millimeters from maybe losing my eye.'"

One day later, Foster looked like Derek Boogaard took him outside and used his head as a speed bag. Foster's eye was swollen shut. A fraction to the right, Foster was engraved by that 90-miles-per-hour puck.

A few days later, the right side of Foster's face had shades of purples, browns and yellows. In a few more days, Foster held pads on both sides of his eyelids at 15-minute intervals so he could force his eye to open a few centimeters at a time.

Two weeks later, Foster's still wearing a full facial cage to protect a broken bone and bloodshot eye.

Yet, Foster's lucky. He knows this: "Lesson learned," Foster said.

When Foster's healed, he plans to wear a visor the rest of his career. In junior hockey, visors are mandatory, but when Foster turned pro, he took it off because after all, in the NHL, he thought, you can't be a 6-5 defenseman with a visor.

"Peer pressure," Foster said.

Now, Foster's getting a different kind of "peer pressure."

"Everybody in my family -- my mother and father -- and everybody in my fiance's family are on me to put [a visor] on now," Foster said. "You don't wear a visor and you think you're fine, but when you're laying on the ice and you see blood everywhere, you realize it's important."

Visor use in NHL is way up

More players are getting the message that eyes are precious. Visor use (half shields) is at an all-time high. According to a Hockey News survey, 318 of 650 skaters (48.9 percent) are wearing visors compared to 2000-01 when 131 players (20 percent) wore visors.

Unfortunately, the Wild's Nick Schultz said, "It normally takes a scare like Fozzie's for someone to start wearing a visor. I took one just below the eye from one of the Sedins [Vancouver's Henrik or Daniel]. That's why I started wearing mine."

The most infamous NHL eye injury occurred in 2000 when Bryan Berard, playing for Toronto, was hit by Ottawa's Marian Hossa's follow through in the right eye. Berard's hockey career was thought to be over, but after seven operations and a missed season, Berard returned in 2001 with the Rangers.

Several top NHLers such as Hall of Famer Al MacInnis, soon-to-be Hall of Famer Steve Yzerman, Toronto's Mats Sundin and Ottawa's Dany Heatley sustained serious eye injuries in their careers. This season, New Jersey's Colin White suffered a serious eye injury.

The Wild's Branko Radivojevic wears a visor after almost getting his eye poked out during a fight with Edmonton's Patrick Thoresen last season. Sean Hill went to one after his cheekbone was shattered and he had to have eight hours of surgery and four titanium plates to fix his face. Stephane Veilleux, who broke his nose last season and his cheekbone this season, is temporarily wearing a visor. He hasn't decided if he'll make it permanent.

In 2001, Pavol Demitra nearly lost his right eye when he was high-sticked by Phoenix defenseman Radislav Suchy. Demitra, who began his career with a visor but removed it, wound up with a bruised retina.

"I remember at the time thinking, 'I wish I never took it off,'" Demitra said.

Is there a fading stigma?

Years ago, it wasn't considered macho to wear visors.

"When I came into the league [in 1994], it was not a thing to do," said Brian Rolston, 34, one of seven Wild players who don't wear a visor. "I think guys would take shots at you even more if you had a visor on. Not make fun of you. I mean, literally, take shots at your face.

"On some teams, guys wanted to wear visors, like the Blackhawks, where they were told, 'No one on our team wears visors. It's a no-no.' It was that whole mentality.

"Today, you see tough guys, gritty guys like Jarome Iginla that wear them. That stigma isn't attached to it as much anymore."

In fact, Rolston said, "after seeing how many of our guys have been injured, I'm thinking of throwing one on. My wife and kids have been telling me to throw one on for years. Maybe when you're older, you're wiser."

Recently acquired Wild bruiser Todd Fedoruk doesn't wear a visor despite a face that's been badly injured in the past.

"I'm old school," Fedoruk, 28, said. "If you're going to get hit, you're going to get hit. The visor will protect you, but limited. The unwritten rule is tough guys don't wear visors. If guys do scrap that wear a visor, that's their call, but I came in with guys like [Rick] Tocchet, [Craig] Berube, [Luke] Richardson. No visor if you're a tough guy."

Improving technology

Oftentimes, players complain about vision, but that doesn't seem like a valid excuse anymore.

"The visors today are a lot better than they were in the '70s," said Wild assistant coach Mario Tremblay, one of the first Canadiens players to wear a helmet. "In our day, they'd fog up. Today it's clear, and I recommend every player to play with a visor."

Mission-Itech, owned by Wild owner Bob Naegele, is renowned for visors. Sixty-four percent of NHL players who wear visors get their protection from Mission-Itech. The company uses an anti-fogging coating.

"Back when I played, the optics in it weren't what they are now," said John Kirk, the team services and athletes director for Mission-Itech. "Now, it's almost like looking through a pair of glasses. You have absolutely no vision problems looking out, they don't fog up and they're more protective than they ever have been."

Most players go through six to 12 a season. Some, Kirk says, such as St. Louis' Paul Kariya, goes through 30 a season because he likes visors replaced after any nick.

"The speed of the game, the fact that players are bigger, faster, stronger versus when I played pro in the early-'80s, I don't know how you don't play with a visor today," Kirk said.

Gretzky: Keep the visor on

With 97 percent of NHLers now using composite graphite sticks, pucks are flying with a greater velocity than ever.

Hall of Famer Wayne Gretzky, who won nine Hart Trophies and 10 Art Ross Trophies, said he'd never play in today's game without a visor, and this is a guy who never wore a visor in his storied career.

"As a kid, from the time they put on skates now, you're always wearing a visor, so there's no reason to take it off," Gretzky said. "It just doesn't make sense for a guy who's 20 years old who's played his whole life with a full mask or a visor to take it off."

Gretzky never wore a visor as a child and said he thinks players take their visors off after juniors and colleges because of pressure.

"When I came in pro at 17 in the WHA, players encouraged me to take my helmet off," Gretzky said. "I probably would have, but my dad didn't let me. "Eventually, I don't know how long down the road here, you're going to see very few guys not playing with visors -- if any."

NHL players still want choice

In 2006, the American Hockey League made it mandatory for all players to wear visors. The NHL says it's up to the NHL Players' Association whether visors become mandatory in the NHL. NHLPA Executive Director Paul Kelly said the union "strongly encourages" its players to use visors but polled its players and they "feel visor use should still be a matter of choice."

Schultz, the Wild's NHLPA rep, says maybe it's time for the union to consider grandfathering in visors the way helmets were in 1979.

"With all the injuries that have been going on, maybe it's something we should take a look at more seriously," Schultz said. "I mean, these kids wear visors all through juniors and then they come to the NHL and all of a sudden they take it off? It's kind of stupid."

Kelly said "grandfathering is a moot point," because, "My guess is in two years, nearly 90 percent of the players will wear visors. The young kids coming up are trained to wear them, so I think we'll see that visor use will go from 50 to 70 to 90 percent and it will become academic."

Keeping an eye on the future

Foster hopes so.

"Guys are realizing it's your eyes," Foster said. "You can't gamble with your eyes. You want to be able to see your grandkids and your kids. You want to live life normal when hockey's over."

Added Fedoruk, "You look at the game back in the day, you don't wear a visor, you're a tougher player. I don't necessarily think that's the case nowadays. Now it's like if you wear a visor, you're a smarter player."

After being crushed in Detroit, Wild edges Blue Jackets 2-1 C17