Frazer McLaren NHL Suspension Video

Photo courtesy thestar.com

Last night in Toronto, an incident occurred in a game between the Ottawa Senators and the Toronto Maple Leafs. Early in the first period, Frazer McLaren of the Maple Leafs and Dave Dziurzynski of the Senators dropped their gloves and exchanged blows, and before too long, McLaren struck Dziurzynski flush on the cheek, knocking the Senators player out.

This was a violation of Rule 46 - Fighting. McLaren was assessed a major penalty on the play.

Dziurzynski was injured on the play, suffering a serious concussion. McLaren targeted Dziurzynski's head on the play, striking him with a closed fist in a clear attempt to injure his opponent.

McLaren has a history as a repeat offender. Though he has not been suspended or fined during his NHL career, he has been assessed fighting majors on five other occasions this season.

The NHL Department of Player Safety has decided to suspend Frazer McLaren for zero games.

You won't be seeing Brendan Shanahan reading from this script today, or anytime soon. My apologies if you clicked on this link and actually thought this might be for real - and yes, the title of this post is intentionally deceptive.

But ask yourself: why is it that the NHL calls fighting a 'penalty' prohibited by the rules if it comes with special exemptions for supplementary discipline? Imagine you were told that a player on the Leafs had taken a major penalty on a play last night and knocked an opponent out cold. You'd immediately assume a suspension would be forthcoming. Why is it that the league says it's getting serious about 'player safety' when it has harsh penalties for hits that were formerly 'hockey plays' but allows carte blanche for fighting?

Like most fans, I enjoy seeing fights. It's thrilling, and even though I know staged fights (as last night's was) are a bit silly, I still find them entertaining the way I enjoyed watching pro wrestling when I was thirteen. But it's time to grow up. It's amazing that the NHL has made no moves to address this after what happened to Derek Boogaard and Rick Rypien, and what will happen to other players to come. Even if it's not another death, there will be plenty more players with brain damage in the coming years.

I realize, too, that fighting is important to the players, who like having tough guys on their team to discourage players on other teams from making cheap hits. I get that - and I realize eliminating fighting outright would be very hard to do.

But the NHL ought to do something, and the obvious step is to end the staged fights. If one arises naturally after a big hit, that's one thing. But when McLaren and Dziurzynski square off 26 seconds into a game to fight for little more than entertainment, that's a fight no one needs. The NHL should realize that these incidents are embarrassing - McLaren certainly did. After the fight, he didn't raise his arms, didn't salute the crowd, didn't pantomime as if he were putting on the prizefighter's belt. He looked ashamed of what he had done, embarrassed that he had hurt someone just so people could cheer. You can bet that's not what he imagined growing up with dreams of playing in the NHL.

You know, we ain't hockey players. We've been clowns.
We've been goons! We're the freaks in a fuckin' sideshow. We're nothing but a bunch of criminals. We oughta be in jail, that's all there is.... Yeah. Really ashamed of myself. See, Ned was right. Violence is killin' this sport. It's draggin' it through the mud. If things keep up the way they are, hockey players'll be nothing but actors, punks.
Well, I'm not playin' my last game that way.  ...Yeah. It's my last game, and I wanna play it straight. No more "Nail 'em." No more "Fuck with 'em." That's finished. I wanna win that championship tonight, but I wanna win it clean. Old-time hockey, like when I got started, you know? Jeez. Toe Blake, Dit Clapper, Eddie Shore, those guys were the greats.
I don't know what to say. Christ, it's up to you.

Follow Rory Johnston (@rnfjohnston) on twitter: twitter.com/rnfjohnston

‘Toronto Syndrome’ is Catching On in Vancouver

Canucks fans have a favourite habit of pitying the Maple Leafs from afar; it’s a happy distraction from the misadventures of the home team. Losing is easier to take so long as someone else is worse.

I’ve argued the position in recent years that the Maple Leafs are trapped in a self-sustaining state of mediocrity created by their need to compete each season. Toronto fans are notoriously demanding, and their high expectations have controlled the way the team is run. Unfortunately, the Leafs sit in an impossible position: they’re just good enough to compete for a playoff spot, but haven’t had the talent to be a serious Stanley Cup contender since they won the division in the 1999-2000 season. Since then, they’ve finished 8th, 4th, 6th, 4th, 9th, 9th and 12th last season.

Consistent middle-of-the-pack finishes have meant that the Leafs have missed out on top drafting positions for several years running, and they’ve also had to trade away several early-round picks to patch together a respectable lineup each year. While some teams (the Red Wings in particular) have managed to collect star talent in the late rounds, most of the NHL’s best players were drafted in the first five picks. Beyond that, it’s a lot of future second- and third-liners. In the salary cap era, stockpiling low-salaried young talent is the most reliable way of building a winner; the current editions of the Penguins and Blackhawks are prime examples of teams built in this way. Besides, the new NHL is a young man’s game. With the revised obstruction rules, speed is king and youth is served. Compare last season’s top ten scorers to the 1999-2000 season leaders:


Powerhouse lineups have their price, though; the Pens and Hawks both spent years in the basement while they collected draft picks. That would never fly in Toronto, hockey’s biggest market. Building a Cup contender through free agency is only possible with an already-present core of young talent.

As much as this Vancouverite likes to ridicule the Leafs, I’m starting to see this phenomenon afflicting my beloved Canucks. The Canucks haven’t picked in the top nine since 1999, the year they picked the Sedin twins. Since then, the team has held up reasonably well thanks to the lopsided trades that brought in legit front-line talent in Naslund, Bertuzzi, Luongo and Morrison. Even with the stars gond, expectations have remained high in Vancouver: fans want to see a team in playoff contention every year and aren’t willing to wait for rebuilding. With a lack of serious offensive talent on the team’s prospect list, the Canucks look like a team that will be putting up a string of mid-table finishes that will keep them squarely out of the Stanley Cup picture. Every year it happens will prolong the cycle; the Canucks have too much money to ever roster a bad team.

With the increasing likelihood that the Canucks will miss out on the Mats Sundin sweepstakes this year while other Western Conference powerhouses like Detroit, Anaheim and San Jose show no signs of slowing, the Canucks look like they’re headed for another season in the league’s also-ran middle class.