MN Wild 2016-17 – Official thread.

A rash of dangerous and dirty plays going on around the league now.

By the way, you’d think Canadian announcers would be more knowledgable.

Rule 62 – Spearing
62.1 Spearing – Spearing shall mean stabbing an opponent with the point
of the stick blade, whether contact is made or not.

62.2 Double-minor Penalty – A double-minor penalty will be imposed on a
player who spears an opponent and does not make contact.

62.3 Major Penalty – A major penalty shall be imposed on a player who spears an opponent (see 62.5).

62.4 Match Penalty – A match penalty shall be imposed on a player who injures an opponent as a result of a spear.

62.5 Game Misconduct Penalty – Whenever a major penalty is assessed for spearing, a game misconduct penalty must also be imposed.

62.6 Fines and Suspensions – There are no specified fines or
suspensions for spearing, however, supplementary discipline can be
applied by the Commissioner at his discretion (refer to Rule 28).

mplspug wrote:

A rash of dangerous and dirty plays going on around the league now.

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WOW. What a bush league move.

Nyquist gets 6 games and forfeits almost $160k in salary for spearing Spurgeon in the face. At least the league actually did something this time.

Grouse

I saw that. They were saying this was a first offense or it would have been much worse.

Vermette got 10 games on the pine for his ref slashing…

sticker wrote:

I saw that. They were saying this was a first offense or it would have been much worse.

Vermette got 10 games on the pine for his ref slashing…

To me there are multiple reasons the league got this punishment wrong.
1) they said it was “high sticking”. No, by definition it was clearly spearing. If you look up the definition of spearing it is EXACTLY what Nyquist did.
2) Prior offenses should have no merit in this case. This was an intentional act.
I am not going to completely whine about it but they also got the call wrong on the ice. It should have been a 5:00 major and game misconduct.
The league will soon realize that if they want to take fighting out of the game, they had better tightly control these types of plays.
Excerpt from the NHL Rule on Spearing:
“Spearing shall mean stabbing an opponent with the point of the stick blade, whether contact is made or not.

Double-minor Penalty – A double-minor penalty will be imposed on a player who spears an opponent and does not make contact.

Major Penalty – A major penalty shall be imposed on a player who spears an opponent.

Match Penalty – A match penalty shall be imposed on a player who injures an opponent as a result of a spear.

Game Misconduct Penalty – Whenever a major penalty is assessed for spearing, a game misconduct penalty must also be imposed.

Fines and Suspensions – There are no specified fines or suspensions for spearing, however, supplementary discipline can be applied by the Commissioner at his discretion.”

After reviewing the player safety video and listening to Gustov’s interview, I think the 6 games is fair.

Before the player safety video, I didn’t understand what the “My stick gets caught” part. What he is saying gets lost in translation with his English. He also mentioned in the interview he was trying to get body position, which I had no idea what the heck he was saying.

Basically, when he got up his intention was to turn around and get body position on Spurgeon to cross check him back in retaliation. In rotating his body, his stick “get’s caught” hitting spurgeon in the face.

I may be in the minority, but taking everything into consideration all the evidence, I believe this is what happened and it was an accident. In light of that, I think 6 games is appropriate.

Couple things that struck me immediately after it happened, he slumped apologetically over Spurgeon. And for a guy with no history of this sort of thing, a poke to the face seemed like a very extreme overreaction to something that happens all the time with board battles.

I think 6 games for Nyquist is fair and, to be honest, the way the league has treated the Wild with past incidents against our players, it’s more than I was expecting.

I agree with Captain, the call on the ice was dazed and confused. How can spearing in the face NOT be a major? You spear someone in the face, I can’t see how you can claim there’s no intent to injure. Any spearing in the face is GOING to injure so the intent is 100% there.

Another blown call and in this case I thought it was especially bad because this happened right were 4 sets of officiating eyes should have been looking.

Grouse

I have a real hard time viewing that as not intentional, BUT, I did see what you are saying about him slumping over Spurg, like he was sorry that he did it. I see that more as a reaction to what happened as if “well that was maybe too much”. Everything about just seems to deliberate for it to be accident, but I agree he had remorse.

I agree though, 6 games is fair for a guy with no record of this kind of behavior.

Did anyone else notice that the Vermette incident could have been racially motivated? We shouldn’t assume that but I hope it’s taken into consideration.

biggill wrote:

Did anyone else notice that the Vermette incident could have been racially motivated? We shouldn’t assume that but I hope it’s taken into consideration.

I didn’t notice, but was the official a “minority”. I certainly would hope that wouldn’t come into play. If it did he should be suspended for the rest of the season if not longer. No place for that at all.

Pug, I do see your point about the stick getting caught and when I initially heard that I was like, yeah, it got caught in his FACE!
Then, after watching the one angle it appears his hand at the butt end of the stick is on the dasher of the boards. This would not allow him to raise the stick and turn his body to “get position” as you suggest. So I certainly can see that aspect of it.

My problem with the whole thing is calling it “high sticking” and the fact that Spurgeon is basically OK, Nyquist had no prior history was considered in the punishment. To me, an impulsive act like this should wipe out anything like that. Regardless of intent, you are to have 100% control of your stick and it was certainly an intentional act, you could argue hitting him in the face may not have been the intentional part of it, but he was sizing him up to strike him somewhere.

OK, enough about that. On to the next game.

Looks like “Kumps” (Boudreau nickname for Kuemper) will be in net tonight.
What’s the over-under on “disrespecting” the Stars comments from Roenick? LOL

biggill wrote:

Did anyone else notice that the Vermette incident could have been racially motivated? We shouldn’t assume that but I hope it’s taken into consideration.

I guess you did.

Do as I say, not as I do.

We aren’t the only dolts who yell shoot.

7 hockey traditions

Guys, as a long time hockey fan I am getting frustrated with all of the after whistle stuff? #14 for the Stars is a hack! Did you notice after the Haula goal he skated by and hit him? What about the after whistle cross check on Coyle? I know that a win is a better than taking a dumb penalty and giving them a chance to get back into the game but he does it every time we play him and know one calls him out on it. I don’t know what “the code” is in hockey but all it will take is for someone to push him around and let him know that he isn’t going to get away with that anymore.

Yeah, that’s Jamie Benn, he’s the greatest thing to happen to hockey, just ask any announcer. You are right, he is a hack and a cheap SOB. There were plenty more cheap shots just like that in the game. Ryan Kesler of the ducks is the same way. It’s total BS hockey if you ask me!

That penalty on Niederreiter was total BS too. He was leg swiped to knock him off balance then he accidentally ran into another player. The 5 minute major didn’t cost them the game,luckily, but I sure hope they can review and overturn the game misconduct. Another seriously blown call like the Spurgeon call.

The Wild sure started out slow again. I sure hope this isn’t the game plan from here on out. Dallas hasn’t won a road game since Christ was a child! They should have pounded them, but it looked like the Stars dominated the game for all of the first and part of the second. They got the win which is great, wasn’t pretty, but it worked.

I hope they keep Schroeder up and playing every game. He was impressive last night. He looks like a young Parise to me. Guy is always going 100 miles an hour and getting chances to score. On to the Preds Saturday

It’s hard to believe that Benn is the captain, all his whiney little shots after the whistle. Keumper had a good game, always nice to beat the Stars.
The Wild have only lost back to back games once this season, very impressive. Who could beat this team in a series?

Let me preface by saying I think Benn is a complete tool, which is sad because he’s a hell of a player and their captain….but in regards to the Haula punch, if you watch the goal again, Haula just stands right in front of the goalie’s face with his arms up after he scores, making no attempt to get out of the way, kind of showing him up, so I can see the reason for the punch…

On Coyle’s goalie interference and Benn’s cross-check, If you see a goalie hit at that speed in any game in the NHL, you’ll see players stick up for him and take shots at the offender, I think the only reason he got a penalty for it was because his stick broke…

Now I agree there were like 5 other instances when Benn was an idiot last night, but the 2 situations I mentioned above I was fine with what he did…

4th line was great last night and even Tuch looked to be at a higher level speed wise, if we can win the next 2 games before our 5 day bye week, we’ll be sitting pretty with a month and change left in the season…

belletaine wrote:

The Wild have only lost back to back games once this season, very impressive. Who could beat this team in a series?

Chicago…we need to hope they get picked off in a 1st or 2nd round upset…Playoffs are all about bigtime players, making bigtime plays and when Chicago can put out Kane, Toews, Panarin, Seabrook and Keith for 3-4 powerplay’s a game, it’s pretty hard to stop as we’ve seen…

we’ll see them in the conf finals, hopefully this is our year!

We can not play Chicago in the conference finals. We will be playing them in the semis. If both of us make it. If the standings stay like it is. We would play the Wild Card #2 in the first round and play the winner of the 2 and 3rd place team in our division.

JoeMX1825 wrote:

Chicago…we need to hope they get picked off in a 1st or 2nd round upset…

I honestly will be severely disappointed if we don’t play Chicago in the playoffs. We’ve got a deeper team that’s going to give Quinnville fits with our 4th line.

What’ll be more gratifying than beating Chicago in the playoffs? Oh yeah, a cup.

I think it is funny when Benn does that crap. That stuff happens all the time and it is basically signalling that you are in their heads. Benn comes off as a Crosbyesque baby, which I find comical. But I also recognize some of that is frustration of a highly competitive person, which I respect.

Benn probably needs to find a new twig manufacturer. His seem to break easy.

I thought Tuch and Stall showed a little progress to getting their games. Not a giant step, but somewhat encouraging. What happened to Staal’s speed and those breakaways?

As for the call on Nino, I can see how a ref missed Nino getting clipped first and in real time I was like, WTF are you going after a player like that for no reason Nino?

Vermette suspended 10 games and forfeits 97,000 in salary for slashing an official. What a moron.

The officiating blown calls at Wild games just keep on coming. I’m not just being a homer here, I watch a LOT of other games and I just cannot understand where these refs are looking such that they are missing calls like this. jj

As with the face spearing incident on Spurgeon, the Nino situation last night happened right by the puck where all officials should have been looking. A 5 minute major???????? What the … I hope Fletcher complains to the league and gets someone to tell the officials that they need to pull their heads our of thier @sses at Wild games. We could have had a player’s career ended and the call on the ice was a minor? This is really, really bad.

The Stars last night continued to be the head case underperformers that they’ve been all season. This is a classic case of a little success getting in the heads of guys that can’t handle it and they’ve been in a tailspin ever since. They’ve got some talent, but with huge attitude problems look where it gets them.

Yes, Benn is a total tool and he’s going to be sitting at home watching the playoffs. Like Detoilet, the Wild did what they needed to do. Sent them packing without getting dragged down by a team that doesn’t matter.

But it wasn’t all taking on the Wild’s end last night. Some Dallas palyers got freaking punished. A couple of Dallas players evidently thought Spurgeon wouldn’t hit anyone and they paid the price.

Bring on the Preads.

Grouse

So can the Wild appeal the Nino one game suspension or is that said and done?

sticker wrote:

So can the Wild appeal the Nino one game suspension or is that said and done?

I don’t think he was suspended. Game misconduct is only for the remainder of that game.

sticker wrote:

So can the Wild appeal the Nino one game suspension or is that said and done?

Does a major/game misconduct automatically bring about a 1 game suspension?

I don’t see any news about this and I’d think that Wild would be all over an appeal given how badly the deaf/dumb/blind refs blew this call.

I would agree that even in the case of a collision causing the interference that it’s a 50/50 judgement whether or not an on-the-ice ref in real time should call that as a minor.

But calling that a major is absolutely amateur hour. That shows to me that the official making the call completely missed the play and was looking elsewhere when the play developed.

What he THOUGHT he saw was Nino taking a run at Sharp, but if you’re going to officiate in the NHL, you have to perform at the level where you operate on what you SEE. Otherwise it’s called “making sh!t up” and you should be officiating at the youth hockey level until you gain some experience.

Grouse

biggill wrote:

<div class=”d4p-bbt-quote-title”>sticker wrote:</div>
So can the Wild appeal the Nino one game suspension or is that said and done?

I don’t think he was suspended. Game misconduct is only for the remainder of that game.

Oh, I hope that’s correct! I thought he got the major and another one game suspension. My bad.

I have to admit, it’d be pretty funny to see a guy get a game suspension for interference.

If you watch the play in real time Nino does appear to take a run at and throwing his hip out on Sharp who goes arse over tea kettle. They could have called a double minor, it would have had the same effect with less than 2 minutes left. I can also speculate. I say if the refs had the benefit of replay, they would have overturned it.

56.4 Major Penalty – The Referee, at his discretion, may assess a major
penalty, based on the degree of violence, to a player guilty of
interfering with an opponent (see 56.5).

56.5 Game Misconduct Penalty – When a major penalty is imposed
under this rule for a foul resulting

I believe the Wild will appeal the major penalty/game misconduct part of it because I think that kind of thing gets documented in the Dept of Player Safety and in the future it could cost him if he were to do something really stupid.
I don’t think he is facing any additional suspensions or anything because of it, more or less just a paper trail type of thing.

I don’t really have a problem with him getting a penalty because I think they would have been on a collision course regardless, but without that other dude sticking his skate our Nino wouldn’t have been put in a bad position to upend Sharp like that.

We’ve got a real opportunity here with Nashville and Chicago coming to town. We need to beat Chicago and put ourselves up 9 points or more. It would be very entertaining for the Wild to contribute to forcing a race between Chicago and the resurgent Blues and Chicago.

Keep that 4th line together for the Wild! Man that Schroeder can motor. And they have that added X factor. When you have a dangerous 4th line, how does an opponent try to match you? As an opposing coach, I’d feel like I’d have to put my #2 D pairing against these guys right now. But then look who that would leave my other pairings to cover!

You can talk about all the “#1 centers” and “pure goal scorers” that the Wild don’t have, all you want, but when you’ve got 4 dangerous lines, and the #4 line is probably the second MOST dangerous of the 4 right now, I mean that makes the Wild very tough to play against.

Also, the fact of the matter is, our D and netminders are going to keep scoring to a pretty damn low level. So taking the averages, you’ve got to score at least 3, while holding the wild to 2 or less. Ummmm, whatever you do, don’t look at the Wild’s goal diff if that’s your game plan. Just go with it.

The thing I’m really interested in now is what’s the Caps path like to the finals. I’m glad the East is as competitive as it is now so nobody on that side gets an easy path forward while the West has to duke it out.

Grouse