caught Reirdens post game on the way home. He didn’t call out the officials but did say the call on Willy was bad, with emotion. Which is something this team has not had in the OV era. He said enough to not get fined by the league. With past coaches the question about bad calls was never asked, like the press was told don’t even ask.
I know in this thread I mentioned that he'll likely get suspended but now I'm really curious if he will. I've seen just enough of a mixed bag of emotions regarding this, not just from the supposed "bias" of each fans side, but also just kind of league wide. I've seen some call it sneaky dirty, which I think is a somewhat fair argument. Consider the Steckel hit to Crosby at the Winter Classic. He's just stepping through him right, he's not looking at him, he's barely paying attention. But he gets close enough to him before contact is made when he didn't have to, and there was clearly room not to do that. The more I looked at that Steckel contact, especially given it was basically after a whistle? The more to me, it was at least a missed penalty call in the game.
That is not all to different to a situation with the Wilson call here. Except for of course Wilson was ejected from the game after a perceived injury, and the player later came back in the game. But when I watch the play more and see it develop, Wilson had 2 or 3 other better angles to the where the puck was going to go. And since it was clearly interference, Wilson did have a good chunk of time to make the best decision. Now whether he wanted to bump him and spin him around just to stay physical on his man? I don't know. Maybe he was just trying to take lane on him to the puck and overestimated how close he was to the player, and that he wouldn't just scoot by him once he moved his arm/leg. The thing is, and this is the thing that I can totally see why there is some outrage. It's easy to take the other lane on this and say instead of it being him trying to be clean and bump into him, he was trying to be dirty but undersell it by making it look like his intention was to avoid contact. Again, not that different than the Steckel play.
The reality for me though is that even after you get past intentions, how "dirty" a play is determined is generally by not just the consequences of the ice but what is happening, and if it can be argued to be in the spirit of play. It's why making note that this isn't a headshot is vitally important. Because it not being a headshot means that Wilson hitting him like that, even late, is still in the spirit of blocking a lane and preventing someone from getting to the lane to getting the puck. Which is to me what makes it a penalty in the contest, and not worthy of suspension. Sadly, because of the match penalty, it's probably going to make this whole thing worse. Regardless of how the league rules either. I think the best chance the league has of trying to mitigate some of the damage is to fine Wilson with no suspension, as that would leave both sides equally unhappy. But if they rule outright no suspension, or throw the book at him, it's going to throw fire on the long running debate of hitting versus no hitting in this game. It really feels like the modern games major issue, with the consistency of not just penalty calling but what is determined the allowed level of physicality of the sport and what is crossing the edge.
I'm never going to defend Wilson for the hit in the pre-season against St Louis. It was ugly. There was no excuse for it in really any context, the fact that it's pre-season, it was a headshot, etc. But to be honest that was really the only Wilson hit I ever outright "hated". I thought others were on the edge, but Wilson plays a heavy game and until that pre-season headshot I honestly never overly viewed him as dirty. Young and reckless? Yes. But seeing him transition his play since returning from suspension this season, it was funny because until the controversy tonight I'm sure most of us would probably argue Wilson looked exceptionally contained. Honestly the best word I'd use for his actual hockey play this season would of been mature. Which is a bummer why this has to come up again, and like I said pour fuel on this. But it's an issue that is clearly bigger than just Wilson. Any player who has the capacity to play even slightly over the edge is getting put under a microscope as the contigent of people who want to see the value of hitting lessened is just high. I know DC talks it all the time, but there is that group and it's getting larger, of people who want to see the game more about skill. More about the players making plays, etc.
Obviously I'm not on that side of things. But I do think Wilson happens to have a few hits in his history that are examples of hits that still cross the line, even in a league that I'd consider more physical. So yeah, I guess I'll ramble on here, sorry. Ultimately I'm really eager to see the leagues response to this, and how this narrative goes forward. It'd be nice to see this issue put to bed, and ideally the league take a good strong stance on allowing a safe, contained, physical brand of hockey. For as much as we've seen some bad hits, in general the last 4-5 seasons have seen a upward trend in intense hockey without cheap shots. Wilson got a couple of whatevers in the playoffs but playoff hockey still has been competitive and physical without seeming too aggressive or dirty.
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