Does it really matter if a hit was clean or not?
Dirty hits are retaliated on because it could cause an injury, and teammates will stick up for one another.
Big, devastating hits can also cause injury, and I would therefore expect players to retaliate on those too. It never made sense to me how a player could crush someone with a hit, and then put his hands up claiming innocence. He may not have broken any rules, but he certainly meant that hit to hurt. You have to expect retaliation.
It never really made sense to me any other way, even if you ignore the very valid point above that Alberta Beef made.
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