lavalarva wrote:

Remember when the NHL said they would ban hits to the head? Well, that was a load of bullshit. Not like it's surprising, the NHL will wait until 1 or 2 players die before doing anything. CHARA GOT NO FUCKING SUSPENSION OR FINE WHATSOEVER FOR THIS HIT.

This bullshit needs to end.

Hockey is a dangerous sport and will always be a dangerous sport. It is dangerous from the moment you strap razors to your feet through the moment that you slap a heavy rubber disk with a wooden stick at 100mph.

If you play by the rules, the game is still not safe.

In this case Chara's focus was on the player and the lower boards. His head never raised to see that he would be hitting Pacioretty into a spot where the glass ended and there was a post. The event was very fast and if you watch it from start to finish you can see that it was a standard, legal hockey play. If the post were not there, Pacioretty would be fine.

If Chara had any indication that his hit would place Pacioretty's face into the post, it would have been a boarding major with a game misconduct. If you watch the video repeatedly, you can see that he never had that intent or positioned himself to make that type of hit. The real problem here is that this should have been a 2 minute minor, but by making it a 5 minute major, they opened Pandora's box since all 5 minute major boarding calls are supposed to be game misconduct penalties.

I really do hope that Pacioretty is ok and that he recovers swiftly.

I also really hope that this baby bullshit ends. Hockey is not a safe fucking sport. Every player knows that and agrees to play with that understanding.

Watch Chara's body, there was nothing wrong with the actual check (not roughing, high sticking, etc...). It was a bad check because he didn't have good spacial awareness (that makes it a Minor Boarding penalty). If you watch though, the check came within a reasonable amount of time from when the puck was in that area.

I would like to point out that most NHL All Star players would not be caught by that check in that way. Pacioretty could have skated harder before and after the puck was in his possession, and if you watch a player like Wayne Gretzky, he always did to avoid being hit.

Like I said, I feel bad because no one wants to see an injury like this. However, there really isn't anything cheap about this play. It was an accident, not an intentional attack and one that there is a clear penalty for.