The Puck Stops Here
Ovechkin and Artyukhin’s Slew Foots
by PuckStopsHere on 10/24/09 at 01:25 PM ET
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On Thursday, the NHL suspended Evgeni Artyukhin of the Anaheim Ducks for three games for his slew footing of Matt Niskanen of the Dallas Stars. Niskanen injured his head (probably a concussion) on the play. He has not played since the Wednesday 4-2 Dallas victory where the incident occurred and is not expected to play tonight vs. St Louis. On the night of the three game suspension, Alexander Ovechkin slew footed Rich Peverley of the Atlanta Thrashers. This happened in the final minute of the Capitals 5-4 victory. Peverley was not injured on the play, but it still looked like something that merits a suspension from the NHL.
Artyukhin was suspended for three games and forfeits almost $35,000 in salary for his transgression. Ovechkin was not suspended to his. He was fined an undisclosed amount by the NHL (which under the current CBA is limited to $2500).
If the Ovechkin slew foot was 1/3 as bad as the Artyukhin one, shouldn’t it be worth a one game suspension and a fine greater than 1/14th of Artyukhin’s? This is yet another example of the inconsistent NHL suspensions policy where star players who sell tickets do not receive the same punishments as lesser players.
NHL vice president and director of hockey affairs Colin Campbell argues that one significant difference between the players is that Ovechkin is not a repeat offender. This is a false situation that exists only because the NHL has looked the other was on Ovechkin’s past transgressions. They are using the precedent of letting Ovechkin off light in the past as a reason to let him off light today.
In last year’s playoffs, Ovechkin was not suspended for a knee-on-knee hit that hurt Sergei Gonchar of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Last season, Ovechkin was not suspended for a vicious hit from behind on Jamie Heward of the Tampa Bay Lightning. Heward suffered a concussion from the hit and has not played an NHL game since. His career is likely over. In 2007, Ovechkin had a late hit of Daniel Briere (then a Buffalo Sabre) that resulted in a $1000 fine. The only reason Ovechkin is not a repeat offender is that the NHL looks the other way in his prior offences.
Evgeni Artyukhin is a repeat offender as well. Last season, he had a two game suspension for a kneeing incident with Ville Peltonen of the Florida Panthers. Apparently, he was also fined for a slew-footing incident in pre-season (though I cannot find details of the suspension when it occurred or which team and player were involved - if you know please leave a comment - edit to add: it was Dustin Brown of the los Angeles Kings). The pre-season slew-footing incident is so low profile that it slipped below my radar and that of the mainstream media (at least until Colin Campbell uses it to justify the current suspension). There may be Ovechkin incidents that slipped below the radar as well that are not under discussion here, they will forever be forgotten because Ovechkin is too good a player to be suspended, while Artyukhin is not.
The Evgeni Artyukhin slew-foot was worse than the Alexander Ovechkin one, but not so much worse that it justifies a 3 game suspension while the other is unsuspended and justifies 14 times the fine. It is an example of the favoritism to NHL stars when suspensions are considered. Worse, they use past favoritism to justify the current favoritism, by claiming Ovechkin is not a repeat offender, when clearly he should be one.
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Tags: Alexander+Ovechkin, Anaheim+Ducks, Evgeni+Artyukhin, Washington+Capitals,
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