Hockey Sticks and Stones May Break Bones, But Words Will Never Hurt
While I’m no fan of the Flames, obviously, I do join the hockey community in giving a great big HUH? to the NHL for the suspension of Andre Roy. Apparently he was suspended one game and fined $2,500 for initiating contact with Hawks’ defenseman Aaron Johnson in the pre-game warm-up of Wednesday night’s game 4 match-up between the Hawks and the Flames.
Others and myself lambasted the Flames for whining about there supposedly being too much trash talking from the Hawks in this quarterfinal series. So how can we also not question the NHL for Roy’s suspension for merely trash talking before the game?
Puck Daddy calls the NHL’s “supplemental discipline system” “bizarre” and “inconsistent.” So true. Penalties have been wildly inconsistent. So one must ask how closely are they going to scrutinize the game and its players? For instance, did you know players can be assessed a penalty for swearing on the ice? Sounds absurd, but if they’re going to nail players for trash talk, is the next step penalties for dropping the ‘F’ bomb? (If that were true in real life, I would spend my entire existence in a plexiglass box.) It’s this excessive scrutinization of the game that is ruining it!
It’s odd too that none of the guys involved in the tussle on April 20th — Dustin Byfuglien, Matt Walker, Ben Eager, Rene Bourque, Jarome Iginla, and Dion Phaneuf — was suspended for instigating, but Roy is suspended an entire game for trash talking before a game. Again, I’m not defending Roy or the Flames, but like others, I’m using this incident to point out the absurd inconsistencies in the way games are called and the way penalties are assessed. As I’ve said in prior posts, it’s this kind of stuff that pansies up hockey and makes it much less enjoyable. Let the boys talk trash. Let them fight. Let boys be boys!