Quote:
Originally Posted by CaptainYooh
I think this is a horrible decision by the officials in a clearly unfortunate accident with a patently non-violent, compliant and respectful player. The message they are sending is... I can't even phrase their message, really. What would that be?
- We don't care if it was accidental;
- We don't care if an official was at a wrong place at a wrong time (high collision area during change);
- We don't care if there were ANY mitigating circumstances occurring at the game immediately prior to the collision (huge hit on a player);
- We don't care if there was no history of prior carelessness.
- YOU SHALT PAY!
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The NHL obviously does not agree that this was an unfortunate accident, or that this was a simple collision between a player and an official who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. From the decision, we should safely conclude that they do not deem this an incident of Wideman's recklessness.
I get that people are upset, and I understand that there are still people who are convinced this was nothing more than an unfortunate accident. But people are pretending that the NHL made an incredulous decision here in clear contradiction of the evidence. This is quite simply not true. The hearing was over 90 mins in length, in which the league heard and carefully examined multiple sides of what happened. They listened to multiple testimonies regarding the incident, and quite obviously have determined from all of this—to which none of us is privy—that Wideman's actions constitute deliberate behaviour.
Yes, it is your prerogative to disagree, but can we please stop ignoring the fact that the League's interpretation of the event is an entirely reasonable one—especially given their access to evidence and testimony that none of the rest of us has seen or heard.