Hey, did you you hear? I went to a fight and a hockey game broke out.

Don’t believe me?

I don’t blame you. If you’ve been watching the same Quebec Major Junior Hockey League nonsense we all have this season, there’s no reason for you to lend any credence to the old adage.

Thank you, Patrick Roy. Your Hall of Fame playing career aside, your gesture in a playoff game against Chicoutimi has forever changed the game of hockey in the Province of Quebec, and it has not been for the better.

Let’s back up and start from the beginning, shall we?

The NHL lockout in 2004 precipitated some serious — and necessary — game changes across the board in the sport of hockey. The game was getting too slow. Skating wasn’t rewarded in the same way as size, and clutching and grabbing slowed everything down.

A new emphasis on obstruction penalties at the highest level of North American pro hockey slowly trickled through the minor and collegiate leagues over the next couple of years, and all of a sudden, a 5-foot, 4-inch speedster named Nathan Gerbe has a legitimate chance to make an impact, not only in college, but in the AHL with the Portland Pirates and, eventually, the NHL with the Buffalo Sabres. Pre-lockout, he might have gotten a look, but nowhere near the hype.

These were good changes. Games went more smoothly after a bit of a transition period. Hooking, holding and interference penalties have dwindled as teams have readjusted to conform with the new rule emphasis.

The Lewiston Maineiacs have based two years’ worth of draft strategy on the new rule emphasis, too, opting for speed and skill over size up front. Steeven Jacques, Billy Lacasse, Pier-Olivier Morin and even defenseman Garrett Clarke and prototypical players in this new system.

But there was still a need to protect these players.

There’s a reason Triston Manson was such a big piece of the Maineiacs’ run to the President’s Cup title in 2007: No one went near any of the team’s skill players, for fear of retribution. Manson was big, and he could beat the living daylights out of 95 percent of the rest of the league’s players.

Not that he would just for the sake of doing it, though.

Then along came Roy.

In the playoffs to cap the 2007-08 season, the goaltender-about-to-be-knocked-out-of-the-NHL-record-book-by Martin-Brodeur, now the GM and coach of the Quebec Remparts, saw a line brawl develop on the ice in front of him during a playoff game against bitter rival Chicoutimi.

His son, a goaltender on the team, started to dance at center ice, inviting the Sags’ netminder, Bobby Nadeau, to join him for a good old fashioned goalie fight.

Nadeau didn’t budge.

The younger Roy looked to the bench, and Daddy gave him the go-ahead, caught on video as he motioned for his son to proceed to the other side of the rink. And it wasn’t to invite Nadeau out for a cold one after the game.

Jonathan Roy pounded the daylights out of Nadeau, creating a video clip that has lived in infamy on YouTube, but, more importantly, got the attention of some of the highest-ranking political officials in Quebec.

Then, the league’s chain of command became visible for the hockey world to see. Only in Quebec is the province’s top hockey league technically administered by a quasi-governmental agency. The QMJHL is subject top government approval, apparently.

After the bigwigs in public office had their say, ranting and raving about gratuitous violence, a resolution made its way through the chain of command, aimed at eliminating fighting in hockey.

The resolution has since been called an attempt to “end gratuitous violence” in the sport.

But all it’s done is make the QMJHL a laughing stock of a league.

The parade of players this season to the commissioners office to receive suspensions has been unbelievable, and the ease with which game misconduct penalties are handed out is deplorable. Now, when a captain attempts to stand up for a teammate who’s been cheap-shotted, the likely scenario is that the captain will get thrown out of the game, while the original cheap shot will go unpenalized or, at worst, evoke a two-minute minor.

Not being able to stand up for your teammates in the game of hockey is going to destroy this game. Incidents of cheap shots will climb, because there won’t be any more Triston Mansons in the league to hold offenders accountable.

The WHL and OHL, meanwhile, have seen a slight drop in fighting majors, which is to be expected as the trickle-down effect from the sleeker, speedier NHL reaches these lower levels.

But there is still fighting. Plenty of it. Not gratuitous violence, but fighting with a purpose.

For honor, and for respect.

Come to think of it, those are two words among many that people stopped using to describe the QMJHL a long time ago, anyway.

Ow, OK, that might have been a cheap shot.

But what are they going to do? Beat me up?