The Two-Line Pass

The Lead

We were given a whole slew of reasons to think the Ducks are the most revolting franchise in the NHL tonight.

As though we needed more.

Tonight, of course, saw James Wisniewski up and run Brent Seabrook, a former teammate, in retaliation for an innocuous hit on Corey Perry who, let’s face it, deserves any hit he takes.

Now, before all you Ducks fans start crying about it being a headshot and boo hoo Corey Perry’s just playin hard out there, let’s keep two things in mind. First, it could only technically a headshot because Perry put his head down around crossbar height (and even then, his arm got in the way of the Seabrook hit) and second, Seabrook had already committed to the hit but Perry turned at the last second and it otherwise would have just been your standard shoulder-to-shoulder check.

So Wisniewski doesn’t like the high hit on his teammate — who would? — and his response is “I’m going to charge the absolute crap out of this guy by taking like nine strides, then leave my feet, then get my hands up so I can more effectively smash the back of his head into the glass like a monkey trying to crack open a coconut.” The hit was brutal and premeditated and designed to cause an injury, so mission accomplished because Seabrook was out on his feet.

And now the second revolting part of this: the NHL Network had picked up the Ducks broadcast of the game, and upon seeing a replay of the hit, color man Brian Hayward speculated that perhaps Seabrook was “selling it.” Now, people don’t often sell getting run at 50 miles an hour and then having their head bounce off the glass, so if Seabrook was able to do it, then start engraving his freakin’ Oscar for Best Actor in a Serious Head Injury, because god damn, I was sold.

And the best part is Wisniewski got two minutes for charging. And that’s IT!

Then there were a couple dustups after the Ducks’ two third-period goals, both of which involved either Perry or Wisniewski, but I’m sure that’s some sort of coincidence.

And also the Ducks won, which in and of itself is a revolting sight.

Elsewhere…

New Jersey 5, Pittsburgh 2

Surely terrified by those hideous Christmas Tree sweaters, Marc-Andre Fleury gave up four goals on 13 shots. That’s gotta inspire confidence in the kid down the stretch, eh? Not like the Devs are going to be hanging around in the playoffs or they took over first place in the division with this W right here.

Calgary 3, Colorado 2

So today I’m goofin off on Twitter (shocking I know!) and I see “Vesa Toskala to start for Flames vs. Colorado” and I’m like “What an odd way to spell Miikka Kiprusoff’s name.” Vesa Toskala stinks on ice! Like, he’s really awful! And granted Kipper hasn’t exactly been awash in success against Colorado this year but Vesa Toskala, really? Was Andy Chiodo not available? Anyway Toskala made 32 saves and got the win and was spectacular just like I knew he would be.

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 18th, 2010 at 1:07 am and is filed under Good night. 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.