Different, But Not Necessarily Tougher

Fancier and more sophisticated, sure.

But the beginning of a tough new era in NHL justice? Not so fast.

For starters, let's be clear; Brendan Shanahan did not hand out five- and 10-game suspensions on Wednesday to Pierre-Luc Letourneau-Leblond and Jody Shelley, respectively, for their blatant and dangerous hitting-from-behind infractions.

Letourneau-Leblond's was for one plus a few exhibition games in which he doesn't get paid and may not have played. Shelley's was for five plus the exhibitions, and he won't lose a minute's sleep for missing those.

Now you tell me; given that Shelley was twice suspended last year, both for two games, and has been a multiple offender over the course of his 18-goal NHL career, one which has shown him to be the absolute definition of a hockey goon, will missing the first five games of the season really change his behaviour?

Not a chance.

Will it make a single other player in the league take notice? Not a chance. Ditto for Letourneau-Leblond's one-gamer plus the games that don't matter, another slap on the wrist for another player whose only role in the sport is to accumulate fighting majors and penalty minutes.

What was new and different was the manner in which Shanahan, the NHL's new minister of justice, delivered his verdicts on the two enforcers. Instead of a conference call or individual chats with reporters, he posted his decisions and the reasoning for them on NHL.com, a good way to drive traffic to the NHL's web site and a novel way to articulate his decisions.

In both cases, the fouls were obvious and barely debatable, even by the most ardent Calgary or Philadelphia fans, and even by critics concerned about the "pansification" of the sport or worried about taking hitting out of the game. This was low hanging fruit, and if Shanahan's predecessor, Colin Campbell, wouldn't have given suspensions quite as severe, it wouldn't have been much less.

Folks, if this was a league that was really worried about brain injuries and really wanted to take hitting from behind out of the sport, the suspensions would have been much longer. Morever, at a time when the role of fighting and of enforcers is under more scrutiny than ever after a terrible summer, it does make you shake your head that once more, it's the "policemen" committing the crimes.

These bans look tough on the surface. But in his rulings, Shanahan didn't come anywhere close to the standard set by Mike Murphy, standing in for Campbell during the Stanley Cup final, when he suspended Vancouver's Aaron Rome for the reminder of the series after his vicious head shot on Nathan Horton of the Bruins in Game 3.

So maybe tougher than Campbell, but not as tough as Murphy. Really, what Shanahan's first suspensions suggest is that it's going to be another season of one suspension after another because there is no real resolve within the Bettman adminstration to commit to a disciplinary system that has deterrence as the central principle.

Give Shelley 20 games and Letourneau-Leblond 10 games, and those bans would resonate across the league in such a way as to essentially take hitting from behind out of the game.

These suspensions? Meh. Nothing we haven't seen before, nothing out of the ordinary. We won't even notice that either player is missing.

Shanahan is, however, to be commended for the way in which he communicated the decisions. Campbell did a terrific job given the parameters under which he worked. People kept wanting him to make decisions he wasn't authorized to make by the league's board of governors. He was so often criticized as though he acted alone when every decision he made included at the very least the league's hockey operations staff and often members of the NHL executive, including Gary Bettman himself. His failing was often an inability to communicate his most controversial decisions to the public. Probably the greatest example was the dirty Matt Cooke hit on Marc Savard. Campbell stuck to his guns, saying that since there was nothing in the rule book that covered the hit he couldn't very well make one up, but he was unable to deliver that message in a way that cooled the controversy.

By comparison, Wednesday's NHL.com video explanations seemed methodical and detailed. That approach is useful, but it won't make a great deal of difference when higher profile players are involved or when the fouls committed aren't quite so obvious as these. You think a video chat would have cooled the over-the-top reaction to the decision not to suspend Zdeno Chara for riding Max Pacioretty into the ill-positioned stanchion in Montreal?

There's also the question raised on my Twitter account today as to whether video explanations will be forthcoming when no suspension is handed out, as in the Chara-Pacioretty incident. In rhw past, general practice has been that the league essentially says nothing when the player is not forced to sit out games.

So give Shanahan "A" for style, "C" for substance. Tougher decisions lie ahead, and unless he's prepared to ramp up the length of future bans, he'd better be prepared to spend a lot of time in front of the video camera this season.

 

 

 

Comments

[im]

What exactly was "terrific" about the job Campbell did?

[KD]

You can't say the exhibition games don't count. Shelley's was a 10-game suspension. Period. I'd like to think that if it happened in November, it would still have been a 10-game suspension. Shanahan sent a message with the length of the suspension - is it his fault that the exhibition games are unpaid? Is it even relevant. People were calling for a significant suspension, and they got one.

[Arthur Bailey]

Jody Shelley is just doing his job. He has no skill, as you pointed out by deriding his low goal total for his career, so he works hard filling a niche role that his team (and other teams) require to make his pay cheque.

So somewhat got hurt, and could have been hurt much worse, on a dangerous, illegal play. When Shelley's suspension is up, he'll be lacing the skates up again, and being sent back out on the ice to fill the same niche.

The fault is with the teams themselves. I would love to see a team discipline their own player. Like the Flyers telling Shelley to take the bus to the farm team for most of the season. That will never happen (especially with the Flyers, the dirtiest team in the league).

I'm not actually defending Shelley. I used to work with his cousin, who is a jackass, and I am sure it runs in the family. But he is only doing what he is asked to do, and gets paid well to do (Well compared to most of us, not compared to most NHL players).

I wonder if comments in the news about his lack of skill will ever lead to his suicide.

[Victor]

Comto get on Damien. 10 Games is 10 games. That is a huge message. Maybe Shannahan is not differentiating between pre sason and regular season and come regular season that is till 10 games. Will that satisfy you? Give the guy a chance before coming down on him.

[Rob]

Cambell gave Steve Downie a 20 game suspension a few years ago, and that has really slowed down the amount of cheap head shots. Until they suspend the player for the rest of the year, then any suspension they give these goons is a slap on the wrist. Face it, these goons would be working on a construction site or factory for $20 and hour if they couldn't fight their way into the nhl, so what if they only make $400,000 instead of 5, it's still gravy for them.

[Mike]

Cox was on the Fan590 last night screaming 'give Shelley 10 games to send a message'. That's what he gets and this morning that's not enough - he now wants 20 games?
.
Why don't you tell us your true goal - the complete elimination of all physical aspects of the game.

[Scott]

Nice point about the "policemen" being the offenders. Takes a bit of air out of that argument for goons.

[dolphantasy]

For the life of me, I still don't understand why the NHL cannot or will not produce a standard list of offenses and associated penalties. You can still adjust these based on mitigating circumstances. Repeat offenders would get a compounding effect until they are either out for the season, or out for good. And don't tell me there are too many mitigating circumstance or it's too complicated to set a standard. We have an entire criminal court system that has standards in place and while it may not work perfectly, it's easy to tell that murder is more serious than assault and carries a stiffer penalty (i.e. the RESULTS of the actions carry weight in terms of punishment)

Try these minimum penalties on: Headshots: 20 games; hitting from behind 10 games, use of the stick to intentionally injure (and we KNOW when someone intends to use their stick to hurt, it's obvious 99% of the time) 10 games.

[hoofheartz]

Cox, you seem to have the answer for everything, why don't you apply for the job of league disciplinarian?

[Jim Schaefer]

One recall the Wayne and Shuster bit:
"The man was beaten, stabbed and dismembered!"
"Good Heavens! That's worth 2 minutes in the NHL"

[billy]

Enough already.
It was a cheap shot. The guy got a penalty plus this suspension.
What more do you want to do Damien?
Its a fast game and things happen fast.
I mean in American football a quarterback was hit so hard he punctured his lung.
Yet where's the outrage over that?
Its only hockey that is the horrible game?
Enough of the constant crying whenever a player gets hurt.
Its a tough game.
Unless you have robots playing out there, injuries will happen.
Regardless if you threaten to execute the offender at centre ice!

[Jeff Prince]

Wow Damien settle down. He got ten games for a hit that 3 years ago is a 2 minute penalty.

Let me guess...you wrote this article back in June

[Herb Pearen]

i blame the union for not protecting their members !

[Chuck]

So from what Cox is saying, Shanahan's reason for a "C" grade was because it was an easy suspension.I don't think I can keep reading the Star with these types of blog posts...

[Chris]

I don't see how anyone can say this was a 10 game suspension, just look at the NHL math to see that it wasn't a 10 game suspension. NHL people like to talk about how playoff games are worth 2 regular season games so obviously an exhibition game must be worth at most 0.5 a regular season game and probably even less for veteran players that aren't even likely to play every game. At most the suspension can be considered 7-8 games and in reality it's a 5+ with very little emphasis on the plus.

[moe green]

What a bunch of stupid comments. I for one wish that Damien was the league disciplinarian. Things would right themselves quickly. IF a message was to be set he (a repeat offender) would have been given 20 regular season games. There is no attempt by the league to change anything. If you guys want the violence so badly - go watch cage fighting!

[moe green]

I have a bone to pick with those who say that Campbell "did a good job" or "had a tough job." That is patently ridiculous. Campbell had the easiest job in the league. Anyone would take that job and it's huge salary any day of the week. Campbell, Shanahan and the entire Bettman administration is to blame for not rectifying the situation. Time is now for change. Funny, but we don't seem to need fighting and associated goonery in the Olympics, international play. Why is it so important to the NHL. It's called ticket sales and it's just another example of corporation pandering to the lowest common denominator to make even bigger bucks. I am sick of it, especially the BS about the league caring. Enough.

[Mark]

Isn't it sad how some sports, like baseball, can give out 100 game suspensions for drug use, an activity that hurts nobody exept the user of the drug, and then hockey gives suspensions of a handful of games for physical assaults that possibly end the careers of other players.

[Basshat]

10 games is ten games: What a load of crap. Anyone who thinks the exhibition games are meaningful to players who are expected to be on the roster this season is deluding themselves. Damian is absolutely correct: These are 1 and 5 game suspensions.

[Bob Holden]

Probably the most effective suspension would be to shorten the bench. In other words, whena player is suspended, hios team dresses one less player for the lenght of the suspension.

[Ron Gillespie]

Preseason games do count. Players like this are 'bubble' players and if they miss games in the preseason, it's very possible they could lose their job to younger and cheaper versions of themselves. So these are significant penalties. It could cost a player his job.

[Ron]

Well Damien, here we go again. A new NHL season and the same old, same old. Never will change until someone gets killed then maybe just maybe the Bettman administration will finally take some real action against this crap. But it will be with a lot of kicking and screaming. Sad for the sport and sad for those who watch tournaments like the World Juniors where there is great action and hitting but no tolerence for shots to the head or from behind. As the NHL moto must be "to hell with logic and safety let's sell those tickets".