Quote:
Originally Posted by Textcritic
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.
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I agree with most of this, which sounds like I'm backtracking - but I'm not. I still think that Wideman didn't act intentionally, and should have gotten no suspension at all.
But - if the league rules that he did act intentionally, which they must have done, they pretty much have to impose a huge penalty. I think I said yesterday, their intellectually honest choice was either no games or a huge suspension. They went with the latter.
Of course, there is plenty of room for the cynical view that they went high expecting an appeal to lower the penalty, in which case they can wash their hands of it with respect to the public, the officials and the media.