It's too much for the refs. They can't ref the game and manage the penalized players too. That's why the league has box officials. The refs assign the penalty, the box official looks after releasing them back into play.
That's all we need is Brett Hull skating out onto the ice for a breakaway pass to win game seven in OT for the Dallas Stars, only to have a replay on TV during Bettman's Stanley Cup speech show that he jumped out a full 0.8 seconds before his penalty was over. Mind you, at least then no one would ever talk about his foot in the crease again.
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