Ask any Red Wings fan about impartial officiating, or how Bertuzzi is getting called on crap due to reputation, or the terrible terrible video replay reffing. The NHL and its refs are a comedy of errors this year.

Posted by FranzensMouthguard from Chicago, IL on 01/22/10 at 10:41 AM ET

That’s a very reasonable and balanced approach to the story. People kept missing the point with Burrows as the centre of attention.

Posted by Michal on 01/22/10 at 10:55 AM ET

I’d be curious to see a poll of fans in various sports leagues with how satisfied they are with the officiating of the sport. They could survey the NHL, NFL, NBA, MLB - and also college and minor leagues. I’d be willing to bet the NHL will get the lowest marks from fans.

Posted by redxblack from Akron Ohio on 01/22/10 at 11:04 AM ET

They’ve lost their legitimacy, pure and simple.  In other sports, this would be a massive scandal, and the sporting authorities would make an effort to clear their names.  The inaction by the NHL is worse.

Posted by CheG on 01/22/10 at 11:11 AM ET

NHL = NBA.

When faced with an obvious situation of referee impropriety, the NBA shoveled it under the rug as quickly as possible.

That’s where Bettman cut his teeth, working for David Stern.  It shows.

The NBA clearly is a star based rather than a team based league.  So is the NHL.
The NBA’s officials clearly give preferential treatment to it’s stars.  So does the NHL.

Because of those two things, the obvious conclusion is that the NBA consciously ‘massages’ it’s games and playoffs in order to maximize the likelihood that it’s chosen stars are as prominent as possible.

Ditto the NHL.

Posted by HockeyinHD on 01/22/10 at 11:28 AM ET

There is a huge gulf between a dispute between personalities and wide spread corruption and incompetence.

We all are armchair experts on player infractions with the benefit of instant replays and multiple camera positions, and can find many instances where the refs got it wrong. But if we, too, were down on the ice, at speed, with only one look at the play, we might have a very different opinion about those calls, and likely a lot more sympathy.

A number of people protest a “double standard” in officiating where some players have a greater latitude than others. That standard does indeed exist, but not in the manner some may think. Refereeing is a judgment call, and a component of that judgment is based on a player’s track record. In borderline situations, players with a more positive track record may get the benefit of the doubt. Similarly, players with a reputation of falling down easy may not get a legitimate tripping call in their favour. To do otherwise—to call everything that looks like a penalty—invites more diving and fabrication.

To those who claim Auger cost Vancouver the hockey game, consider: Nashville was called for a penalty 36 seconds into the game. Not only did Vancouver fail to score on the powerplay, but Nashville scored a shorthanded goal against them.

And to those of a more conspiratorial bent wishing to believe the NHL brass is massaging games from on high, consider this: The big story of the weekend was the Vancouver fan’s green laser in Miikka Kiprusoff’s eyes. The next Canucks home game, Burrows makes his claims and suddenly this laser story evaporates. Overnight, Vancouver turns from “cheaters” (albeit due to a rogue fan) to “victims” of a mean, biased ref out for revenge. This is something we used to do all the time in my former profession; it’s called this “managing the news cycle”. It at very least suggests a motive for Burrows’ statements, regardless of whether or not they are true.

Burrows made some very serious charges, but that is all they are: charges. Auger should be presumed innocent until there is sufficient evidence of guilt. Personally, having viewed the replays and taking into account positioning, I do not think the penalties are “at best extraordinary bad calls” (to use Benjamin’s phrase). Then again, I don’t write a blog entitled CanucksCorner.com, so my viewpoint is no doubt slightly less partisan.

Looking at the facts—Auger skated three laps with Burrows during warm-up and discussed something; Burrows got called for 16 minutes of penalties in the third period (although 12 minutes were received after the game was out of reach)—Auger at the very least put himself in harm’s way, regardless of whether or not Burrows’ claims are true. While officials talking to players during pre-game warm-ups in not uncommon, the duration of that coversation and the resulting amount of penalties assess to that same player is not the norm.

One would hope that an official with over 500 NHL games of experience should be more aware that perception can become reality.

Posted by Matthew McCallum from Redding, California on 01/22/10 at 01:04 PM ET

Posted by Matthew McCallum from Redding, California on 01/22/10 at 01:04 PM ET

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=1839352

If this happened in a) a sport that got covered or b) now, it would be a gigantic story.

Crooked NHL refs is not remotely a new story.  It’s just that there are only a handful of legitimate journalists who cover the NHL, and exactly none of them have any real motivation to try and chase down stories like this.

Posted by HockeyinHD on 01/22/10 at 02:18 PM ET

HockeyInHD,

The Van Hellemond story did get a fair amount of play and ultimately ran out of steam. As they say, “that dog didn’t hunt.”

A lot of people leapt to immediately conclusions—the money was for a drug problem, gambling debts, kickbacks for assignments, etc.—without any evidence to support their conjecture. You can be certain in a hockey mad culture like Canada that story would have been rooted out if it was there. The ‘old boy hush-up’ network of friendly media just doesn’t exist anymore.

Moreover, in the Van Hellemond situation there was no evidence of any on-ice interference, unlike the Pete Rose or Tim Donaghy scandals. I’m not excusing Van Hellemond’s actions. They were improper and worthy of resignation from his position of trust. But let’s not blow them up into something more than what they were.

Posted by Matthew McCallum from Redding, California on 01/22/10 at 03:29 PM ET

Matthew

When you state that Auger should be presumed innocent until there is sufficient evidence of guilt.   you are taking a standard that exists in a court and applying it to everyday life.  That standard is out of place (for example in everyday conversation I would assume the OJ Simpson is a double murderer despite a court finding him not guilty).

The other problem with this statement is that there is no court of law to look at things.  The NHL swept it under the rug.  They hope to stop discussion on the topic instead of investigate it to try to find the truth.  There is a strong circumstantial case against Auger.  The facts are best fit by the assumption that what happened is similar to Burrows explanation of the events.  Therefore I will (provisionally) accept that as reality.  Should there be any further evidence to the contrary, I would possibly change my opinion.  The NHL (and associated media) is busy covering things up and attacking Alexandre Burrows character - that is exactly what one would expect to be the result if there was no legitimate defence and Auger did what is claimed.

The correct responce in my opinion is to suspend Auger for a while.  It must be a sufficiently long suspension to make it clear that other officials know to officiate only what happened in this game as impartially as they can and not plan to right what they consider to be past wrongs with calls or non-calls in this game.

It is important that officials do not consciously decide to show a bias toward or against certain teams or players.

Posted by PuckStopsHere on 01/22/10 at 03:56 PM ET

lot of people leapt to immediately conclusions—the money was for a drug problem, gambling debts, kickbacks for assignments, etc.—without any evidence to support their conjecture. You can be certain in a hockey mad culture like Canada that story would have been rooted out if it was there.

Yeah, because the media in Canada really catches all the big stories?

Who, exactly, would be the luminaries doing all the legwork on that one?

Moreover, in the Van Hellemond situation there was no evidence of any on-ice interference, unlike the Pete Rose or Tim Donaghy scandals.

Depends on what you will need to see before ‘leaping’ to a conclusion.  If you’re waiting on signed affidavits from 10 independent witness each with three sources of corroboration… well, good luck.

A Director of Officiating in the NHL was borrowing significant sums of money, or trying to borrow significant sums of money, from other refs, player agents, and players.  As far as I am aware, none of those are points of dispute.  What we don’t know is why he was borrowing all that money.

Of course, we likely never will know.

Maybe he just really liked Hot Wheels and was constantly on Ebay for collectors pieces?

The point is, it’s not in the league’s best interest to pursue these topics with any degree of intensity, and as the NBA has illustrated, it’s more than possible to have a ref openly allege cheating amongst other officials and sweep it under the rug.

Given that, why try and fix things?

Posted by HockeyinHD on 01/22/10 at 04:24 PM ET

TPSH

I’m not applying a legal standard but a moral and an intellectual standard. Those who make an assertion are obligated to support and prove their assertion, whether it be calling someone’s personal integrity into question, or alleging corruption in a large enterprise, or merely proving a debating point in a blog. Otherwise, disputes become reduced to “I say you’re guilty: Prove otherwise.”

You bring up O.J. Simpson. In that case there WAS sufficient evidence of guilt. That’s WHY there was a trial. Otherwise, a grand jury, upon reviewing the evidence pre-trial, would not have let the case proceed to court. Similarly, you can take the Duke Lacrosse case. Again, in that case there was sufficient evidence of guilt to proceed to trial (fabricated though that evidence may have been).

Now, there is a HIGHER different standard for suffiicient evidence to CONVICT in a legal setting. And, indeed, the same evidence that acquitted Simpson of capital murder convicted him of civil damages for wrongful death. Again, there are different standards and threshholds are in play. (And that doesn’t begin to discourse on technicalities, or the informed jury movement, or dozens of other elements that influence a verdict beyond the actual evidence in the case.)

Returning to Auger, I completely disagree with any suspension at this point. What are the grounds to suspend the referee? You have a claim of impropriety made by a hockey player with a known history of trash talk and meddling who (some may feel) gassed a hockey game with his ill-timed penalty. Rather than being the goat, he deflects blame to the mean old ref who he says is out to get him. That is as plausible a scenario as what Burrows claims.

If Burrows could corroborate his story, if he had skated back to the bench and said “Coach, ref has it out for me tonight, he’s looking for any excuse to call a penalty”, that would signficantly reduce the benefit of the doubt that I afford Auger. But Burrows did not do that, and it does beg the question “why not?” Why not before the game? If he was concerned about being overheard on the bench, then why not during the two intermissions in the confines of the dressing room?

Before issuing punishment to Auger, we have to consider the source of the charge and the circumstances surrounding it. Given the available evidence, I find both lacking.

Posted by Matthew McCallum from Redding, California on 01/22/10 at 04:56 PM ET

HockeyInHD,

Do you REALLY want to be trashing the Canadian media?! You do realize that a lot of the top reporters in the United States are Canadian-born journalists, and that isn’t just because there are places on the planet that are easier to journey to with a Canadian passport. And the fact that Canadians are among the most informed people on the planet has much to do with a vigourous and professional media.

More importantly, while you were quick to provide that ESPN link, did you bother to look up which newspapers ESPN sourced? I think you’ll find them located north of the 49th parallel…

As for evidence of what activities Van Hellemond was engaged in, how about we start with an eyewitness? Perhaps a bookie, a pusher, a referee who failed to get a plumb assignment because he didn’t pony up dough, a guy at the racetrack who saw Van Hellemend putting everything on “Three Blind Mice” in the 5th race. Heck, even an eBay vendor who could confirm all the Hot Wheels or Beanie Babies that AVH was picking up at premium prices would be a start. Anyone engaged in questionable activities doesn’t do so in a vacuum, and there are plenty of people who’ll roll over to provide information once you start looking.

But without any evidence—be it a physical betting slip or a used needle, and a former associate willing to rat AVH out—then you are engaged in speculation as to why he was borrowing those funds.

Consider this, HiHD: Any journalist who could report even TODAY evidence of AVH engaged in gambling, or drug use, or kickbacks while with the NHL has a MAJOR scoop on his/her hands. I have no doubt there was active digging while the story was fresh and the lack of evidence turned up is telling.

Posted by Matthew McCallum from Redding, California on 01/22/10 at 05:25 PM ET