All posts in LVP

Wah wah wah.

So let me get this straight.

Mario Lemieux is the guy who employs Matt Cooke. Matt Cooke is the guy who got away scot-free after giving a guy a two-month concussion by intentionally nailing him in the head. Matt Cooke is also the guy that singlehandedly caused the NHL to change the way they deal with intentional hits to the head.

So when Mario made a statement yesterday about the way the NHL handled the aftermath of the Penguin-Islanders melee on Friday night, really, he should have chosen his words better. Because after reading the entire thing, all I could remember it saying was something like this:

WAH!

WAH!

WAAAAH!

I’M GOING TO TAKE MY TOYS AND GO HOME!

WAAAAAAAAAAH!

God, Mario. Seriously. You may have had a point in that the game went beyond an “entertaining hockey fight” to sheer absurdity. I’ll give you that. But in an atmosphere where whenever the players drop the gloves, the fans cheer just as loudly as they do for goals, in an atmosphere where players are employed specifically for their scrappiness, it’s not shocking in the least that a game gets out of hand occasionally. You think hockey fights like this are shameful? Fine. Then ban all fights. You cannot say that it’s okay to punch someone in the face once during a game, but not fifteen times. You cannot say it’s okay to punch someone in the face as long as you don’t really mean it. Because every 7-year-old watching that game cannot tell the difference, I guarantee you.

You also may have had a point in saying the league needs to handle intentional hits – especially those causing injury – better. I will also give you that.  But you might want to be careful walking around that Matt-Cooke-decorated-glass-house, is all I’m saying.

So threatening to take your toys and go home? Oh please, Mario. What are you gonna do? Sell off your cash cow because the Islanders didn’t get enough suspensions? Claim moral superiority after your goalie broke Matt DiPietro’s face in the first place?

Your words smack of nothing except high horsemanship. And given which team leads the league in penalties, it’s all pretty rich.