The Two-Line Pass

Because the entire world can’t stop talking about Sean Avery’s “sloppy seconds” comment (I have friends who haven’t seen a hockey game in their lives texting me about it), the story goes on and on and on. But at least one guy in the hockey world is sick of it.

Darryl Sutter was asked about it at a press conference and provided the most pointed criticism of anyone. Except Sutter directed it at the media.

“You know what? Put it to bed. You guys cover hockey. It’s supposed to be the sports page. If you guys want to cover that stuff, go ahead. It’s been pretty disgusting for three days, actually. The Dallas Stars come to town . . . two of the best spokesmen in the league, other than a couple of our guys, are Mike Modano and Marty Turco, and I didn’t see their picture or hear a story about them.

“So you guys aren’t really covering hockey.”

Attaboy, Darryl. The whole thing is, and has been, silly from the get-go, and while Avery clearly planned this whole thing, the media certainly did its part to drum up interest ahead of the Dallas/Calgary game two nights ago. While it’s impossible to say if Avery would have made the comment had the media not been working so hard to talk to him about the “Jarome Iginla is boring” thing (and I’d say he probably would’ve because, hey, he’s Sean Avery), it certainly can’t have helped him to avoid the desire to turn the game into another sideshow act.

Andre Roy, who called Avery a “dum-dum,” also had a suggestion for how the media should deal with Avery in the future:

“But maybe you can stop talking (to Avery), even if he gets a hat trick. Just leave him in the corner and don’t even mention him. That would be the right thing to do with this guy because he definitely needs attention. That’s what he’s looking for.’”

But then Scott Cruickshank, who’s usually a pretty damn good writer, went waaaaaaaaaaay off the reservation.

Is his conduct as bad as drilling someone head-first into the boards? …Or is it worse?

Actual question being posed: Is calling someone a name “as bad as” or “worse” than potentially putting someone’s life in jeopardy? Hmmm that IS a noodle-scratcher. I mean, on the one hand words HURT! On the other hand, so does a crushed vertebrae. Unfortunately, science has yet to quantify which injury is more severe and damaging in the long-term.

Think of it this way. Todd Bertuzzi almost crippled someone for life and might end up serving fewer games than Sean Avery, who said a mean thing about an ex-girlfriend.

Yeah, that makes tons of sense.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 4th, 2008 at 1:46 pm and is filed under Opinions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.