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Now, thanks to the Todd Bertuzzi suckerpunch on Avalanche forward Steve Moore, thousands of sportswriters across America who haven't watched a single hockey game all year are suddenly pretending that they are hockey experts.
But If you take a step back and look at the larger picture, you'd see that there is a cause and effect relationship in all these incidents. I'm not condoning what Bertuzzi did--he took it way too far--but this is merely a symptom of a larger problem in the game, namely:
The officiating sucks.
This has been by far, THE WORST season in the history of the National Hockey League with regards to refereeing. There is absolutely no consistency, no accountability, and no rhyme or reason to the calls whatsoever anymore. Refs seem to make calls now just for the hell of it. They miss blatant hooking, clutching and grabbing all game long, and then ding the player who breathes on the goaltender for interference. What the hell they are looking at, I have no idea.
The league had a chance to stamp this out when Steve Moore took out Markus Naslund--at the time the HIGHEST SCORING PLAYER IN THE LEAGUE--last month. But they did nothing. No penalty. No suspension. No call. They decided protecting the stars of the game wasn't really a priority, and that the best course of action is to let the animosity brood into full-on vigilanti justice. The Canucks had to either suck it in that the best player in the league had just been concussed with a late hit, or take the law into their own hands. They chose the latter. Why? Because the officiating is not reliable. No one can depend on the refs to keep order and control of the game anymore. No one even knows what the hell they call half the time. It's like they make their decisions by pulling infractions out of a hat. And you think the Bertuzzi incident is going to fix things? That's going after the symptom, not the cause.
Martin Havlat crosschecking Mark Recchi in the face. Bryan Berard losing an eye. Take a look at the injury list....it's longer than the god damn Wall of Vietnam. No team can expect their entire squad to stay healthy for the entire season. What kind of sport is it where it's pretty much a given that you WILL get hurt at some point during the season?
I'll tell you what the problem is: it's the god damn instigator rule. As soon as they installed that rule and tried to tone down the game's violence so cheesecake-eating soccer mom housewives living in buttfuck Kentucky could enjoy it, that's when the game went to shit. Because now players--especially the euro pansies--have no fear of retribution. They hook, they prod, they pull, they highstick and take cheap shots, and they don't care. Because they're not afraid. Whoever tries to go after them gets a suspension, so what do they have to worry about. Inattentive sticks make baby jebus want to kick you in the nuts.
And now Betuzzi: the death of the power forward. Last year he had 46 goals. This year he had 17. Why? Because the league doesn't like loud, violent players. I can't count how many times Bertuzzi got whacked in the face and there was no call, and then if he so much as touched a defensemen in front of the net, he'd get the sin bin. This happens time and time again with the game's elite power forwards. Peter Forsberg is so sick of it he hardly plays anymore. Other players want to go home to Europe or to other leagues because the NHL is such a chippy, pussy league.
The last great power forward was Cam Neely. Why? Because he was the toughest motherfucker in the league. If you tried to slash his wrist or hook his arm, or if you tried to put your stick between his legs and give him the canopener, you know what he'd do? He's fucking turn around and cold-cock you right in the face. No one fucked with Neely. And now power forwards can't do that anymore. They can't use their intimidation and brute force to terrorize opponents, because in Bettman's new wussy nicey-nice rainbow unicorn gumdrop fairy fucktard league it's not allowed. He's trying to squeeze all tough guy behavior out of the game, and this oppression is frustrating the game's stronger players, until they take their transgressions out on whoever they can, which takes us back to.......Bertuzzi.
Is he at fault? Most certainly. But if the league doesn't change the way things are and restore some accountability to the players on the ice (ie: be careful what you do, or there WILL be consequences through a well-timed fist to the face) this will not be the last. It will keep escalating, until it will be just one massive anarchic free-for-all.
And boy, won't that be fun.
* for those confused by the title: the Lady Byng is the trophy given out every year to the NHL's Most Gentlemanly Player
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