It was not an attempt to injure hit, despite how Ken "It's alright for our
players to go smashing other players with cheap hits, but god forbid anyone
touch one of our players" Hitchcock tries to paint it.(I think one of my
favourite moments of the whole thing was when in the middle of one of
Hitchcock's indignant speeches about the "dirty" ducks and these supposed
hitting from behind hit squads being iced, a reporter asked him about Derien
Hatcher shattering Roenick's jaw and other cheap shots the Stars squad
delivered last year which shut him up quickly and he said they shouldn't get
into it.) and I saw the hit when it happened and in the 8 billion replays,
that's not to say it wasn't a stupid thing for Salei to do, and that the
other events that occured in that game weren't also uncalled for, but what
happened is that in the heat of the game, Salei pushed Modano, but Modano was
off balance at the time so he went into the boards awkwardly making the
potential for serious injury worse, Salei made a dumb decision he shouldn't
have pushed Modano, and he got his time for it, but he was not trying to
seriously injure Mike. What really cheeses me off about the whole debacle of
that night is that while Salei got the worst rap and the worst suspension out
of the incidents, he was the least at fault, why did he deserve I believe it
was 10 games (Hatcher only got 7), when McKenzie only got 4 for repeatedly
pounding a down, turtling and not retaliting Sydor's face into the ice,
fracturing his eye socket when McKenzie was the one clearly trying to injure
someone and not just making the wrong choice like Salei? Because Modano is a
super star and Sydor isn't, I do have a lot of respect for Modano making his
teammates see that stupid dangerous retaliation is not the answer, though he
should have done that before Derien Hatcher decided to shatter Roenick's jaw
in three places last year.I have a problem with the way suspensions are being
handed out, yes the players should be held accountable to an extent for their
on ice actions, but the length and assignment of those suspensions shouldn't
be detirmined by the tax bracket and name of the injured player. if you hurt
a guy you hurt a guy, and if you wouldn't hand out a huge suspension to the
perpatrator if the injured party was joe schmo you shouldn't hand it out if
it's Mr. Big Star. and as far as the Stars soapboxing goes if your team has
a history of cheap shotting other players you shouldn't start playing martyr
when someone does it to you, Coaches need to crack down on it too, Ken didn't
seem to have a problem with hitting from behind when it was Richard Matvichuk
boarding first Milan Hejduk, breaking his collarbone and then Peter Forsberg,
putting him out for the fisrt 23 games of this season with a shoulder injury
that needed surgery, if the coaches don't put it across to their players that
crap like that won't be tolerated then when's it going to start? When someone
gets killed from the lack of respect?, the real shame is that it's usually
the relatively clean or skilled players who get hurt.
--JB
> this October Salei checked Modano into the boards from behind giving him a
> concussion and severe neck strain bordering on immobilizing — Salei got a
> game misconduct. A week later, Modano threatened retirement. I read it
was
> a
> vicious, intent to harm hit. When these kinds of illegal, or intent to
> harm
> behaviors are used to win games, it's like disposing of preparation and
> skill
> for cheating. These violent behaviors are being coached to win games on
> all
> levels of the sport. When behavior crosses the line and becomes a criminal
> offense, on the ice, in the box, it should be enforced as such. Violence
in
> life or as part of a game strategy, in general, SHOULD NOT make one a
winner.
>
> Citizenship both on and off the ice. Players themselves say, respect or
> concern for other players has become a dinosaur.
>
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