Crosby nearly slashes Methot's finger off

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by habernac

Or the officials could just call the rule book. Period.

I never really got a straight answer as to why they abandoned this. After Bettman Lockout II, they came back and said, "okay, we're going to start calling penalties. All the penalties. We'll start slow and just ramp up on the hooking, holding and interference sort of penalties, but you're all on notice, because the rulebook now matters." Power plays went up, but so did even strength scoring, because people didn't want to take penalties.

That lasted about 18 months.

Why is this so difficult? The league pays officials, presumably it can tell them how to do their jobs. There are two of them on the ice. If they just don't see the penalty, that's one thing, but if they see it but don't call it because "game management" or some such nonsense, well, #### right off.

[habernac]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

I never really got a straight answer as to why they abandoned this. After Bettman Lockout II, they came back and said, "okay, we're going to start calling penalties. All the penalties. We'll start slow and just ramp up on the hooking, holding and interference sort of penalties, but you're all on notice, because the rulebook now matters." Power plays went up, but so did even strength scoring, because people didn't want to take penalties.

That lasted about 18 months.

Why is this so difficult? The league pays officials, presumably it can tell them how to do their jobs. There are two of them on the ice. If they just don't see the penalty, that's one thing, but if they see it but don't call it because "game management" or some such nonsense, well, #### right off.

It has never made any sense. Drives me crazy. Other sports don't do this. Refs don't throw out their whistles in the 4th quarter of football games. Holding is still holding. Pass interference is still called.

The funny thing is, lots of people want it this way. If they called all the penalties, people would whine that "they aren't letting them play." In fact, I think this is precisely what happened.

[undercoverbrother]

Originally Posted by habernac

You'd have 1000 hearings a year if they reviewed every slash like this.

Habernac, we all know that if the only thing that was different in this incident was that Methot clashed Crosby's finger off there would be further discipline.


That is what pisses people off, well me at least.


The down goes brown chart is really too close to real life.

[memphusk]

Crosby should slash Melnyk also.

[habernac]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

Habernac, we all know that if the only thing that was different in this incident was that Methot clashed Crosby's finger off there would be further discipline.


That is what pisses people off, well me at least.


The down goes brown chart is really too close to real life.

Well, due to the "Wheel of Justice" I'm not 100% sure they would do anything different. No one cared when Gaudreau's finger was broken. People pay good money to see that guy play, too.

[TheFlamesVan]

If anything this should result in a review by the Officials Association on how to crack down on dangerous slashing plays. Suspensions aren't the way to fix this problem. A 2 minute slashing penalty called on the spot is the solution.

[Backlunds_socks]

I think this is bannable.

[Hockeyguy15]

Melnyk is losing his mind about it.

http://www.tsn.ca/senators-owner-mel...ethot-1.705254

We all know who he is, the guy is just a whiner beyond belief and you do this kind of stuff, I don’t care who you are in the league, I don’t care if you’re the number one player in the league, you should sit out a long time for this kind of crap.

[sketchyt]

There's certain guys in this league who aren't necessarily known as being dirty players, but are total dirtbags when it comes to this sort of thing.

Shane Doan is one such guy. He's seen as the Jesus Christ of Arizona or something, but him and his head hunting elbows should've been given lengthy suspensions a long time ago. Drives me insane.

And yeah, Crosby is a dirty player. He's worse than Tkachuk IMO. He gets mad, he gets slashy. His elbows come up, he loves hitting the numbers on the back. Slew foots? Let's try those too.

As for the Methot situation. He knows exactly what he's doing. Maybe he didn't realize the result that would follow, but he wasn't using his stick to tickle Methot.

Here's an article about Crosby slashing the hell out of Giroux:

http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/puck-d...4352--nhl.html

I like Sidney Crosby. He's a dirty, dirty player.

[calgaryblood]

Originally Posted by Hockeyguy15

Melnyk is losing his mind about it.

http://www.tsn.ca/senators-owner-mel...ethot-1.705254

Maybe if Methot was Swedish the NHL would care.

[Lubicon]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

I never really got a straight answer as to why they abandoned this. After Bettman Lockout II, they came back and said, "okay, we're going to start calling penalties. All the penalties. We'll start slow and just ramp up on the hooking, holding and interference sort of penalties, but you're all on notice, because the rulebook now matters." Power plays went up, but so did even strength scoring, because people didn't want to take penalties.

That lasted about 18 months.

Why is this so difficult? The league pays officials, presumably it can tell them how to do their jobs. There are two of them on the ice. If they just don't see the penalty, that's one thing, but if they see it but don't call it because "game management" or some such nonsense, well, #### right off.

This is what I don't get either. For awhile after the lockout (s?) they were calling a crap ton of penalties, literally calling everything by the book it seemed. It seemed like a continual parade to the penalty box and games were taking longer to play. If I had to guess I was think the teams and league felt this was not good either and allowed/instructed the officials to back off a little on the calls. If they went back to actually enforcing the rules then yes there would be a lot of penalties (initially) but over time I think it would come down as players adjusted to it. And hey you never know, maybe the slashes, spears, elbows, head shots etc. might actually be reduced as well. I'd love to see the league tighten up the calls.

Was Crosby's slash dirty? Probably not, but it was definately a penalty and should have been called. Same with all the ones on Gaudreau when he had his fingers broken. Just call the damn rules already.

[powderjunkie]

There is no reason for this play to be in the game. The stick should be used for one purpose, and one purpose only: playing the puck. The game would be astronomically better if that was the case. It would be the closest thing to the 'free flowing' game of the 80's, but with the tremendous speed and skill of players in the league.

Start it exhibition game #1 next year and stay with it. Call every instance. If your stick is off the ice and hits another player it's a penalty. It may be game 5 of the regular season before we see any actual 5 on 5 action. But that's okay.

[Igottago]

Not surprising no action will be taken against it. What a joke.

Methot remained surprisingly calm after it happened. Crosby deserved a solid punch to the face at least.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Igottago

Not surprising no action will be taken against it. What a joke.

Methot remained surprisingly calm after it happened. Crosby deserved a solid punch to the face at least.

I'm sure the blinding pain of having a bone sticking out of your skin was enough to quell his anger.

[CGY12]

Regardless of it happening all the time, it is something that is against the rules. When it results in a severe injury, players need to be held responsible. Crosby should be suspended for it.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by MrMastodonFarm

I dunno maybe yeah probably.. but you end up slicing a guys finger in two it deserves something more. That's the way the world and the NHL has worked for a long time now.

Slashing is a penalty which means it's a play they don't want in the game. Crosby gave Methot a hard chop severing his finger tip off. It seems that league discipline for high hits are directly proportional to if the player gets his bell rung. If a player takes a high hit and gets right back up or even isn't fazed then there's no fine or suspension but if that same hit knocks him to the ice and has him dizzy someone is going to get suspended. In that respect you can make a good case that this should have resulted in some form of discipline even if it was a fine. The Senators are losing an important player for a long time because of a dirty play and there should be repercussions for the action here as it's not fair at all in their case.

[Roof-Daddy]

Haha.

A sick part of me kind of wants to see a Flame do the same thing in the next little bit here just to see how hard the league would come down on the poor bugger.

[Toonage]

Rob Tychkowski on Twitter joked something along the lines of Crosby letting the dept. of player safety off with a warning. This probably wasn't far from the truth.

[MRCboicgy]

To me, this is the NBA-ing of the NHL. I rarely watch basketball, but my friends who do talk about superstars get away with murder - fouls - which are already questionable - and traveling. Lebron needs to take 5 steps to the basket, let him, he puts butts in the seats.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by MRCboicgy

To me, this is the NBA-ing of the NHL. I rarely watch basketball, but my friends who do talk about superstars get away with murder - fouls - which are already questionable - and traveling. Lebron needs to take 5 steps to the basket, let him, he puts butts in the seats.

The NBA is terrible when it comes to how starts are treated like princes. I will say the NHL actually doesn't want to suspend Crosby because they want him on the ice showcasing the product. The NBA lets teams sit star players to rest all the time which is just ridiculous when you consider how much money fans are paying for tickets. That said the NBA is different from most professional sports leagues as it's not the game that sells it's the stars and the soap opera WWE style off court feuds and antics. The actual product isn't that great and not like real basketball where traveling, double dribble, etc are all legit fouls.