The offseason gives hockey players much-needed rest, but it also builds up aggression in some that only the start of the season can release. Witness the Columbus Blue Jackets’ Jared Boll and the Dallas Stars’ Krys Barch going toe to toe last night, in a rematch of their brawl in January.

 According to the COLUMBUS DISPATCH:

Boll wasn’t able to fight during the preseason because of a broken right hand he suffered playing shinny in the summer, and the feisty Blue Jackets forward struggled with it mentally.

Now that’s a man’s man’s man. (Video of the fight is after the jump.)

I’m not sure if they’re arguing over who has the least masculine first name, or whose city is least appropriate for hosting an NHL team. Whatever the quarrel, hockey fans should thank them for the best fight since the lockout, and hockey’s best chance to make your local news since the last brutal fight.

If you’re keeping score at home, that’s:

• +5 points for the fact that Barch got only 3:19 of ice time, and spent almost as much time fighting.

• +10 points for the announcer referring to Barch’s overhand roundhouse punches as “sneaky lefts.”

• +20 points to the Dallas music director for playing the music from “Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!!”

Watching this three-minute clip is probably two minutes of hockey more than you’ll see all year, thanks to ESPN’s decree that hockey isn’t as important a sport as poker, the WNBA, competitive eating, and the X Games. And while most cable packages do have Versus, you probably don’t know what channel it is and are too embarrassed about calling a network “Versus” to ask.

And by the way, the Blue Jackets won 5-4, which is more scoring than you’ll see in any Browns or Bengals games this year.