Luiz Valente writes:
Tony is only partly right. Steve Martins was an exceptionally skilled
player, and as such he didn't, of course, need to resort to dirty tactics.
Unfortunately, he DID resort to dirty tactics. This is why he spent
so much time in the penalty box, thus, in the end hurting his own team.
[end of quoted material]
 
True, Martins did take a lot of dumb penalties which may have wound up
hurting his team.  But, as David Griffel pointed out, the vast majority of
those penalties were retaliatory.  The Crimson's opponents knew that
Martins had a short fuse, so they would take cheap shots at him in order
to goad him into retaliating.  More often than not, the official wouldn't
call the initial rough stuff and send Martins off for his retaliatory
strike.  However, like David, I'm not condoning Martins' actions.  A
penalty is a penalty is a penalty.  I never said that Martins' didn't
commit penalties.  All I said was that he didn't make a habit of running
goalies.
 
Tony
 
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