This sounds cool! I remember when I came upon HURLING (the sport) late one evening and it was absolutely incredible. A bunch of guys with no helmets running around bouncing a baseball on the end of a short hockey stick, and then slamming that ball across the field.. I thought surely someone was about to get beaned. Incredible sport.
Hurling should be played with helmets. If it's just a group of friends in a park casually passing the sliotar (ball) to each other and taking practice shots then okay, but not if they were playing a proper game.
You need to wear a helmet with it. Years ago a colleague played in the local team and one weekend took a hurley (the stick with the metal band at the end) to the face and had his jaw broken. Never forgot his helmet again.
Any serious hurling game since at least the early nineties is always played with helmets (as a legal requirement, but also just common sense). Sure, you might have a friendly knockaround without them, but not a real match.
German names are Klootschießen and Boßeln.