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Throw the book
at Simon
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(UNIONDALE, NY)
-- To know how serious Chris Simon's stick swing on Ryan
Hollweg was, all you had to do is hear what was not said
after the Rangers 2-1 win over the Islanders. |
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Simon and both coaches spoke like they were advised by
lawyers, and essentially gave 'no comments' to the media.
But some of the Rangers felt differently.
"That was disgusting," Sean Avery said afterwards. "It looked
worse than when [Marty] McSorley hit [Donald] Brashear [back
in 2000]. I think he shouldn't play another game the rest of
the year. To hit a guy in the face, you can't. The league made
statements about head shots, so let’s see if they back it up."
Avery may get his wish, since Simon was suspended indefinitely
on Friday, pending a hearing. The league, though, has to make
an example of the Islanders forward. Not because Simon is a
bad person, but that type of attack could have caused serious
injury to Hollweg and possibly ended the young forward's life.
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Think
I'm overreacting? Well look at it this way, if Simon
connected one inch lower on Hollweg, he could have
collapsed Hollweg's esophagus, ending his life. Today,
we wouldn't be talking about how long the suspension
would be, but rather recalling Hollweg's life, while
the Nassau County DA charges Simon with manslaughter.
The NHL needs to suspend Simon for the rest of the
season, including the playoffs. That's the only way
the message will sink into the rest of the league.
Retaliatory stick work has no place in the game, no
matter how clean of an image the player has before the
incident. One mistake by a person with a clean record
sends him or her to jail, why should this be any
different? |
And it doesn't matter that Hollweg is ok, won't miss any time
and joked about getting the two points last night, because
next time, the he may not be as fortunate.
When Henrik Lundqvist skated over and was franticly waving to
Rangers trainer Jim Ramsey, Hollweg laid motionless on the ice
for almost a minute.
"It surprised me," Lundqvist said. "It looked really bad. I
was just thankful Hollweg wasn't hurt really badly. It looked
pretty hard."
Thankfully he got up, but if he didn't, the capacity crowd in
Nassau Coliseum wouldn't have had anything to cheer about.
And that's why Avery, who isn't always clean in his play, was
adamant last night.
"Hopefully, Mr. Campbell was watching the game and will figure
it out in the morning," he said.
Today's ruling is just the first step, not Campbell has to
step up and do the right thing.
Joe
McDonald covers the New York Rangers for TheFourthPeriod.com.
He is also the publisher of NYSportsDay.com and managing
editor of NY Sportscene Magazine.
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