It Is Truly Despicable And Downright Cowardly That The NHL Does Not Allow Goals To Be Scored After Bouncing Off The Refs
There have been a few moments throughout the history of the NHL that could be viewed as a black eye on the sport. The Marty McSorley incident. The Todd Bertuzzi incident. Etc. Etc. However, those incidents all pale in comparison to what we saw last night in St. Louis after Robert Bortuzzo slung a puck off of NHL referee Tim Peel that ended up taking a crazy bounce off Peel’s dick and in the back of the net past Roberto Luongo.
It’s my understanding that the NHL wants more goals to be scored. So is it not incredibly counterintuitive to take a goal off the board after it crosses the goal line just because it takes a circus bounce off the zebras? And here’s the most sickening thing about this whole thing. Just think about all the times your favorite team has gotten boned by the refs being in horrible position. Think about all the times your favorite team was attempting to break out of their own zone but the pass deflected off a ref, directly to the other team and then they ended up scoring 5 seconds later. How come those goals aren’t wiped off the board? If the refs can interfere on those plays without a goal getting taken away then they sure as shit shouldn’t get to cop themselves out of a goal like this either. Or even less obvious moments like earlier in the season when a linesman set a pick on Shayne Gostisbehere that prevented him from getting to a loose puck that resulted in a goal for the Coyotes.
Refs are getting in the way all the damn time. But the only time they decide to take the goal off the board is when it’s your team scoring? Get out of here with that. Tim Peel has been with this league for a long time now. He should be able to see Bortuzzo step up to the blueline there and know where that puck is about to go. But he can’t get out of the way in time, ends up taking a puck off the dick and it ends up in the back of the net. If the refs want to act like they’re a part of the game, well then they’re a part of the game. That should be a good goal, end of discussion.
Luckily St. Louis would still go on to win 4-3 so that non-goal wasn’t a deciding factor or anything. But if they lost by 1 then St. Louis would be well in their rights to riot in the streets.
Now let’s run back a few Tim Peel highlights to bring this blog to an end.