NHL has head shot problem
DaLLaS — You think the NFL has a rules problem? It seems even worse in the NHL.
For all the talk of trying to eliminate dangerous head shots from the sport, there are players having their heads smashed with insufficient deterrents, and there were two examples in a span of 20 seconds of game time in Nashville Saturday night, when the Rangers’ Marc Staal and Jimmy Vesey both were on the receiving end of vicious blows to the head.
On both occasions, no penalty was called. Filip Forsberg, whose late elbow to Vesey bloodied Vesey’s mouth — this after Vesey earlier this season had teeth knocked out by a skate — had a phone hearing Sunday and was suspended three games by the league’s Department of Player Safety.
No such hearing was announced for alexei Emelin, who bashed Staal’s head into the boards, particularly worrying because Staal has had multiple concussions in his career, including one last season. There was some pushing and shoving after Emelin’s hit. Brady Skjei fought Ryan Johansen after Forsberg’s hit. aside from that there wasn’t much of a response. Ex-Predator cody McLeod didn’t drop the gloves, did lay out austin Watson in the third but then took a big, clean hit by Emelin a few minutes later. Words were chosen carefully after the game as well, because nobody seems to know under what rules they’re operating. “In my opinion, it’s very hard to figure certain things out from gameto-game. I’m just gonna leave it at that, otherwise I think I’d get myself in trouble,” alain Vigneault said.
and forget about goaltender interference. Officials continue to look clueless as there is no consistency whatsoever on the enforcement of the rule. another goalie interference controversy came when there was no penalty on a goal by Florida’s Jonathan Huberdeau with 7.7 seconds left, which dealt the Red Wings a 3-2 loss, despite contact by Huberdeau on Petr Mrazek. “The inconsistency in this league right now, if it’s the refs or it’s the guys in Toronto or if it’s the suspensions or if it’s the fines, it’s hard for us as players to know what rules we are playing under,” Red Wings veteran Henrik Zetterberg said afterward, via the Detroit Free Press. “You see it over and over again. Losing a game like this that is really important, the points are really important, on a call that yesterday could have been goalie interference and tonight it’s not. Probably tomorrow that will be goalie interference again. That’s what’s frustrating for us. They have to find a way to deal with this.”