Healthy Scratches - Spitting Game
Featuring Jordie and Nick/Booze from Heartland.
Bonus thoughts that you don’t have to care about if you don’t want to, but have been discussed further in the office/internet today that I thought were interesting:
1) Playoff hockey is a war and every player is doing whatever they can to win 4 games before the other team does. Mentally, physically, and even politically with the media/refs. You see it all the time with coaches advocating for their players on both sides of a contentious hit, there’s a lot of politics at play. Tom Wilson is currently a problem for the Penguins. However big or small a problem, he has injured guys in back to back games, and they might be more comfortable with a real ballistic missile traveling around the ice for 30-45 seconds at a time. When you look from the Capitals perspective, you have to love him on your team. The guy has space in their heads whether they admit it or not. There is no way you don’t have the idea of him putting his shoulder through your orbital bone in the back of your head when you come through the middle. Anyone who has played hockey growing up remembers guys you played against that you kept track of on the ice at all times. Even if the difference is a slight hesitation or Pens D-men “hearing footsteps”, it is beneficial to the Capitals.
The Penguins have every right to not be fans of his actions and should all want revenge, but the only solution is to either police it themselves, do the same thing back to the Capitals, or be at the mercy of the refs/league. The Penguins are back to back champions because they focus on outskilling teams and winning on the scoreboard. Big hits and slewfoots are extremely frustrating when you’re losing, but nothing more than a sideshow when you win and move on while the other team is golfing. The Pens winning games is the only foolproof cure to Tom Wilson.
2) If you think Sidney Crosby spit in a player’s face in the most watched and popular playoff series and it wasn’t the biggest scandal in the hockey world you might be loco. Ovechkin was clearly horse collaring his head back and forth while he was talking shit to Kuznetsov in the scrum. Someone takes a half second with no context, spins it for the Twitter news agencies and next thing you know its just the NHL covering up for their golden boy again.
I know maybe the most mainstream trope of any (non-penguins) hockey fan is to hate Sid The Kid, but anyone who doesn’t admit that it would be a WAY bigger story is just trolling for attention. Its a funny thing to pretend react to, and the way that video clip is cut/edited certainly makes it seem like it at first glance, but there’s no chance he spit in Kuznetsov’s face. My Dad taught be at an early age that spitting in someone’s face is the most disrespectful thing someone can do and I have trouble believing anyone thinks Sidney Crosby of all people thinks he could get away with that on National TV.