NHL Blows Discipline Again

When Stephane Quintal took over the NHL Department of Player Safety there was a part of me that hoped we would see an improvement in not just the harshness of discipline for players throwing illegal hits but in the consistency in which the discipline was delivered.  I know one of his first attempts was with serial offender Matt Cooke and it was not met kindly, to put it mildly (http://espn.go.com/nhl/playoffs/2014/story/_/id/10830404/matt-cooke-minnesota-wild-suspended-7-games-hit-tyson-barrie).  Quintal was relatively new to his position and I felt compelled to give him a pass as he took over heading into the Stanley Cup Playoffs, a notoriously “put your whistles away” time of year.  And if you are only calling felonies on the ice my expectations for supplemental discipline needed to be tempered.

But now Quintal has had an offseason to evaluate, to collaborate, to prepare for the start of his first full season on the job in which he can make his mark.  He can separate himself from past “Shanabans” that, while the videos were often educational, insightful and borderline entertaining, but did little to instill any confidence in terms of execution.  That can all change now with the change in leadership at the top of the house.  This is the time for the NHL to really crack down and protect its players.

Upon further review, I couldn’t have been more wrong.

As reported on multiple outlets and discussed here by Patrick Helper (https://puckprose.com/2014/10/05/bad-hits-backthanks-mikael-backlund-video/) Mikael Backlund turned Tobias Enstrom into a human missile from about five feet away from the boards, launching him head first and ending the only way a hit like this could.  The hit actually begins at the icing/goal line and carries with the play to the five foot distance from which Enstrom was launched.  Enstrom was quite fortunate that he was able to skate off, with assistance, and of course did not return due to the dreaded “upper body injury.”.  Backlund received two minutes for “poor life choice”.

And it won’t wind up being anything more than that.  According to this article from ProHockeyTalk, there will be no additional discipline handed down upon Backlund.  No in-person hearing, no telephone conversation, no fine.  Nothing.    In the article written on this site and linked above, my colleague deduces that the ultimate verdict should have been three games.  I quietly disagreed, holding out a sliver of hope that the league would drop the hammer here as this is EXACTLY the type of hit you are trying to eradicate from the game.  The video above should be titled “How Not To Hit A Player 101”.  It shouldn’t matter that there isn’t a history of transgressions as there is with Cooke or another recipient of frequent parking validations at the league office, Patrick Kaleta.

I can’t help but wonder what Quintal would have done if Enstrom, a top four defensemen for the Jets, would have been stretchered off with a collar on.  Would he have received ten games or could it have been reduced to seven if, as he were to be wheeled off the ice, Enstrom was able to extend his hand and give a “thumbs up”?

It’s got to stop.  The players have proven over the last several years that they are becoming more and more unable to police themselves. Is that a function of bigger, stronger and more protective equipment?  Is part of the problem the elimination of the traditional enforcer/fighter role?  Or is it that the players know damn well they aren’t going to miss any significant time and if they can get a player out of the lineup – as may be done with Enstrom and was certainly done to Tyson Barrie in the Cooke incident – you can gain a 2-4 point edge in the standings or an extra game in a tight playoff series?

Regardless of his past history, this should have been an in person hearing with Quintal.  The league needs to stop looking in the rear view mirror at what they have given in the past for similar hits in similar situations with similar players because the results have been flawed for years.  I personally would have had an in person hearing and landed on six games.

With the changing of the guard Quintal had an opportunity to take a more progressive, forward thinking approach to player discipline.  He is the primary person at the league level responsible for protecting the greatest asset the league has.  The opportunity exists now to change course and make it clear that the league is not going to wait for a player to become paralyzed or die on the ice to deliver stiffer penalties.

And someone needs to ask him why he is refusing to take it.