Jim Rutherford says NHL, "will go back to where we were in the '70s" if it doesn't start protecting star players.

What a load of tripe.

Lots of people had a nice little chuckle when Mike Hoffman of the Ottawa Senators sprayed Crosby with water from the bench, a move that made the NHL look like a beer league. No penalty, no fine and no recriminations to a player who embarrassed himself and his league.

Yeah that's an embarrassment to the league. Not a lot of players penchants for nut shots or embellishments, or cocaine use, or assault, or fighting, or the leagues concussion stance, or the suicides, or the ludicrous way it hands out discipline (more on that later), or the officiating, or having Bobby fucking Hull as an ambassador for the sport. No, it's Mike Hoffman squirting someone with a water bottle. Hold on while I eye roll myself out of my chair.

And you can probably expect more of the same, at least in terms of a physical going over, from the Nashville Predators when the Stanley Cup final begins Monday night. Why? Because they can. The NHL will allow them to do it.

...Because the Penguins would never take liberties on another teams players. I'm sure Forsberg, Subban, Rinne, and Fisher (among others) are just going to get a pass too right?

The Penguins play the same way any other team does. You don't make it easy on the other guys, you play them hard, you finish your hits and make them regret coming to the rink that day. It's a mindset that's instilled in hockey players (or rugby, or football, or any contact sport for that matter) since they are old enough to hit and is echoed time and again in both fans and pundits praise for the sports toughness. It's part of what makes hockey, and in particular the playoffs, so endearing to fans. The brutal physical demand the game places on its players. It's why the Stanley Cup is one of the greatest trophy's in sport.

Somewhere along the line, the NHL became comfortable with the notion that star players – the ones with more natural skill, more drive and more of a willingness to sacrifice – could be neutralized by inferior players who stepped outside the confines of the NHL rulebook.

This is asinine to the point of being insulting. Not only do star players actually get a huge amount of preferential treatment compared to their journeymen counterparts, especially when it comes to discipline, but categorically stating that a non-star player doesn't have the same drive or willingness to sacrifice is incredibly disrespectful.

Fortunately there is a really simple solution to this; go non-contact, or have every teams star players play 60 minutes a night, or go back to a 6 team league where there are only star players.

There are simply not enough "star players" to fill out the rosters of 31 teams, so you can go out there and just be worse than guys like Crosby or Ovi, or whoever, or you can find a way to neutralize their skill. You have to remember professional sports are only half business, the other half is a group of some of the most ruthlessly competitive people in the world desperately trying to achieve something they have set their whole life towards doing. Lambasting "inferior players" for pushing the envelop in pursuit of their life's work demonstrates not only a lack of understanding of the sport of hockey, but a lack of understanding of the competitive drive in all athletes.

As Rutherford pointed out, Wayne Gretzky did not have to deal with that kind of abuse, perhaps in part because he had Dave Semenko watching over him.

Yes, I'm sure Dave "Cement head" was part of the reason, the other part was Marty fucking Mcsorely. I'm just baffled that Rutherford is all high and mighty about the abuse that Crosby takes and then references a player watched over by two of the most notorious enforcers in NHL history. If Rutherford or the author wants to only see star power, and only star power, in action then they should tune in to some NBA and watch two teams steamroll their way to the finals almost undefeated.

you watch a game where Johnny Gaudreau takes 20 slashes to his hand before the 21st breaks his finger and you wonder why the league allows it.

Which is legitimately total bullshit, and the Flames and fans have a right to be pissed. That is a situation where the League needs to step in and say "this is unacceptable". I can't possibly imagine why they wouldn't.

In all seriousness though if you want a more safety oriented, or "clean" take on the game maybe the inmates shouldn't be running the asylum.

“In other leagues, they protect star players. In basketball, they don’t let their top players get abused. And in our league, well the thing I keep hearing is, ‘That’s hockey. That’s hockey,’ No, it’s not.”

Well the NBA and MLB are also sort of non-contact (or at least non-collision) sports, and the NFL is the laughing stock of player safety so those are not the greatest comparable.

/rant

Look, all the sarcasm and snide comments aside, if you watch the NHL and it just gets your goat that the best players aren't free to show off their flash night in and night out then you need to understand that two things;

  1. Eliminating the physicality and tenaciousness of some 2/3rds of the NHL's players would so fundamental alter the sport that it would destroy the very essence of what many fans love about hockey.

  2. The World Cup, World Championship, Olympics, and All-Star game are probably more your bag.

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