What a Stupid Series
Yes, I like to be controversial, I like to get things heat up, and so I am going to start of with this.
Two Canada junior players in the “Super” Series should be ashamed and the Canadian mass hockey media sickened me.Hello hockey fans, welcome to the month of September where we may see things get a bit more interesting. Training camps start in a bit over a week, pre-season games in over two weeks, and teams will see what else they could do to their teams before the season starts. Excited? So am I.
But, let’s get on with it.
This Super Series idea was stupid in the first place. I could not care less about it, only Canadians and Russians are involved, but what does this “super series” prove anyway? Nothing. It means nothing, and it does nothing. It’s only a small competition that most of the hockey world cares less about. It does not make anyone the best or the worst either. All I cared about was cheering on for Canada to beat the Russians, but if not oh well. Who cares? But now, I DO CARE. Why do I care? Here is why.
Young Sutter and Mr. Gillies took unnecessary actions that injured two very good players. These two youngsters are Anisimov and Cherepanov. Coincidence? Both are Rangers prospects and two highly ranked forwards in their farm system. Anisimov took a knee-on-knee hit, by Gillies, and Cherepanov was torpedo’ed by Sutter. When I saw these two incidents I said to myself, what the hell were they thinking? Cherepanov did a bit of a cheap shot on Sutter by tripping him, but Sutter went from the blueline all the way down to the opposite side, charging at Cherepanov with intent to injure. Horrible retalliation, and pathetic to say the least. My respect on this young guy is none now and I hope he gets roughed up in the NHL. If Cherepanov did not cut across, it would have been a hit from behind. The hit itself was dirty, cheap, and premeditated. It could have injured Cherepanov’s neck as well and neck injuries are seriously dangerous. Sutter’s lucky that Cherepanov just got a concussion, it could have been worse. If you retaliate from such a silly play that an opponent tripped you then you have no place in the NHL. I can understand if something horrible was done by Cherepanov, but not in this case. Sutter should be ashamed of himself and should not even be playing the rest of the series with intent to injure a player, which he did.
Gillies is not as bad as Sutter as he tried to hip check, but it was careless because even if the hip was there to knock down Anisimov, it would have busted Anisimov’s leg anyway. Anisimov has been well touted by the Rangers, he was signed, he was going to have a shot to make the NHL this year as a 19-year-old, and a careless play sidelined him indefinitely. Will this guy ever be the same? I hope so. It was careless, stupid, and unnecessary. These players should know better than to risk a young guy’s career, and they should be ashamed of themselves.
What is worse is that these two incidents have been barely talked about by TSN and Sportsnet. It sickened me. Let’s change the situation here, shall we? Let’s make it that two Russians did this to two Canadians. Let’s say that a Russian did the same exact thing on Tavares by giving a concussion, with intent to injure, and let’s say that another Russian did a knee-on-knee on…say….Turris. And, make these two Canadians Toronto Maple Leafs prospects. It would be all over the Canadian media, the Russians would have been blasted with critcism and it would be such a big deal. It sickens me because one, I know that to be truly certain, and two, it should not even matter which team/nation and which player. Even if it was Finland and Slovakia, who cares. Those plays were cheap and stupid, and one was very dirty. I don’t really care who it was, I just care about the dirtiness of the play. Yet, it was all “hush hush” by TSN and Sportsnet, it was just mentioned as mainly a side note or a “by the way”, with a media theme of “we’re proud of our boys”. Media bias at its best and it sickened me because it excuses Sutter and ignores the players that got the injuries. Unprofessional and biased.
So, that is my rant and I may get a bunch of heat for it but bring it on!!! I am not slamming the Canadians, I am slamming two players, and the media. I was cheering for Canada, even though I really did not care, but I have to say that I’d like to see Sutter watch his team get humiliated at home, because now I do care. A Super Series? It Super Sucked.