Versteeg Suspension
By now everyone knows Kris Versteeg was suspended a game and Quenneville fined $10,000 because Versteeg supposedly instigated a fight in the dwindling seconds of Sunday night’s game against the Coyotes. My question is, when did Wayne Gretzky become such a wuss?
According to Yahoo Sports, Gretzky is reported as having said, “I am not happy to see a 19-year old kid (Turris) get pulled out of a pile in the last five seconds of a 7-1 hockey game and take a beating (by Versteeg)…There is no room for that and I don’t think I have seen that before. We will see what happens the next time we play them.”
First of all, does anyone believe Gretzky hasn’t seen that before? Really?? It’s called hockey Wayne. Perhaps you remember it? Second, did he just make a veiled threat? Is he now going to sic his Coyotes on our Hawks in the next match-up? Hey, why wait? Why not have a rumble in the parking lot, Jets/Sharks style?
Third, it’s hard for me to believe that Gretzky, one of the best hockey players of all time, is that offended by Versteeg’s actions. What, nobody every got a bloody nose in hockey before? I have a great 8×10 of Bobby Hull’s nose all bloodied in a very famous photograph hanging on my office wall. It’s one of my favorites because it reminds me of how great hockey used to be before everyone turned into a bunch of pansies (and yes my experience is relegated to old highlight reels, but those are some highlights!).
And while Versteeg is credited with having delivered the first blow, it is believed that Turris is actually the one that instigated the row. My original sixth sense tells me that Versteeg’s penalty wouldn’t have been quite so severe had Gretzky not thrown an Oscar-worthy hissy fit; that the refs would have decided, appropriately, that Turris was just as guilty, if not more so (He started it!), than Versteeg. And speaking purely as a fan, this kind of nanny hockey crap is ruining the game!