(5) Philadelphia Flyers vs (4) Pittsburgh Penguins Round 1: There will be blood

[Forty_Sixand2]

I look forward to reading through this thread tonight!

 

[Dacks]

i strongly disagree about the first hit, but that's fine, you're entitled to your opinion.. i mean just think about who you'd hit if you were neal.. couturier has been up your line's ass all series rendering them mostly useless.. and if you had any doubt that neal is 'too good of a guy' to do something like that, in the same shift he tries to take giroux's head off..

if for no other reason than to prevent another game like today, the NHL has to suspend neal.. i mean just look what happened when the refs botched the situation and made him skate across the ice instead of go to the dressing room.. 3 more fights and another questionable act (adams hair pulling)

I tend to be pretty forgiving on certain plays, whether it's the Pens or not. Just statistically speaking, every once in a while you're going to see a play that looks brutal but was just accidental. Like Steckel on Crosby - lots of Pens fans and others thought it was intentional, but I just think it was bad luck.

Just think back to your own experiences playing sports. Was there never a time when you accidentally bowled someobdy over, or elbowed someone, that wouldn't look absolutely brutal in a slow-mo replay? Shit happens.

That said, I was a bit confused when he subsequently went after Giroux. So I could be wrong. Again, only saw the plays live.

 

[awaz]

You also can't cut guys for one incident, because then you've got cap issues.

Asham won't be back next year. Adams will be. This is out of character for Adams and he's a valuable penalty killer.

Neal will obviously be back next year, but I imagine Danny B is going to tell him to reel it in.

this one i have a hard time believing.. bylsma was freakin arguing that neal shouldn't have gotten a penalty for his attempted beheading.. bylsma is just as much to blame as the scumbag players.. you're supposed to have control of your team, maybe he's part of the problem the pens have had this past week or so

 

[SLY]

I need to see the third period of this game dammit

 

[TheRobotDevil]

At the same time, you can't just throw your players under the bus. The appropriate thing to say would be something simple like

"I do not condone the behaviour on ice today, and support any disciplinarian decisions enforced by the league."

If he defended his players, he'd be a hypocrite. But expecting him to suspend his own players is a bit insane.

You can make a statment without throwing your players under the bus Lou Lams has done it on more than one occasion.Mario has lost A lot of respect

 

[Dacks]

What I don't understand is this: the team that made the playoffs last year with all those injuries, the one who let up 22 goals in a 7 game series last year without some of their big players, has played like this. It's astounding. How does that happen?

I don't know. It's really like players just completely forgot how to play defense. That OT goal in game 1. Jagr to Giroux today. Pretty much every goal, guys just standing around, watching the puck, losing assignments.

And Christ, were the Pens ever soft on the puck today. I can think of at least three goals today that all resulted from a Pen either not getting the puck out, or not getting it deep. Pathetic.

Just crazy to think how far we made it with Eaton, Scuderi and Gill, and we can't defend for our lives with this team.

MAF has taken a huge step back too. Horrible game 7 against the Habs, some bad games against Tampa, and horrendous this series. Don't know what to say.

 

[pixburgher66]

"Sid on smacking away Voracek's glove as he went to pick it up: What did you want me to do, pick it up and hand it to him?"

Seriously, where's Crosby? This can't be Sidney Crosby.

 

[awaz]

I tend to be pretty forgiving on certain plays, whether it's the Pens or not. Just statistically speaking, every once in a while you're going to see a play that looks brutal but was just accidental. Like Steckel on Crosby - lots of Pens fans and others thought it was intentional, but I just think it was bad luck.

Just think back to your own experiences playing sports. Was there never a time when you accidentally bowled someobdy over, or elbowed someone, that wouldn't look absolutely brutal in a slow-mo replay? Shit happens.

That said, I was a bit confused when he subsequently went after Giroux. So I could be wrong. Again, only saw the plays live.

it might've been accidental, but it REALLY looked intentional to me.. and the classless move right after confirms to me that he was out there to try and hurt people at the end of the game.. skilled or not the NHL cant let players run around trying to hurt people.. if it was just one of the incidents i could rationalize no suspension.. but two in the same shift.. you gotta send a message

 

[flyersfan4706]

"Sid on smacking away Voracek's glove as he went to pick it up: What did you want me to do, pick it up and hand it to him?"

Seriously, where's Crosby? This can't be Sidney Crosby.

 

[pixburgher66]

this one i have a hard time believing.. bylsma was freakin arguing that neal shouldn't have gotten a penalty for his attempted beheading.. bylsma is just as much to blame as the scumbag players.. you're supposed to have control of your team, maybe he's part of the problem the pens have had this past week or so

A lot of fans are calling for Dan's head...I'd disagree with that. HOWEVER, being a player's coach may be catching up to him a bit.

 

[pixburgher66]

Also, in regards to the possible suspensions, I pretty much agree that NHL screwed themselves with the Weber thing...because most of the time you look at these hits and try to judge intent, and sometimes it gets a bit cloudy, but there was no clearer intent than that incident, and ignoring it for the most part led to some of this crap.

 

[Darkstone42]

this one i have a hard time believing.. bylsma was freakin arguing that neal shouldn't have gotten a penalty for his attempted beheading.. bylsma is just as much to blame as the scumbag players.. you're supposed to have control of your team, maybe he's part of the problem the pens have had this past week or so

Dan's always been about just playing fundamental hockey. He wouldn't even talk about Asham when Pierre interviewed him during the game.

I think from his angle, the Neal hit just looked like a defensive play. If he sees another angle later on that shows that Neal was headhunting, I don't think he'll be okay with that.

 

[Darkstone42]

He also had that, "This is not the way I coached this team to play" look on his face most of the game.

 

[Darkstone42]

In any case, I'm off to buy milk, since I forgot to yesterday. After that, I will do nothing but spectroscopy.

See you guys again sometime. This week is going to be rough, so I might not post much.

 

[Forty_Sixand2]

Match penalty is almost an automatic suspension, right? I have not seen any ofthe game yet though.

 

[Dacks]

Alright, I'm out!

Congrats Flyers.

Holding out hope for a miraculous, no-cheap-shot comeback for the Pens, but the way the Flyers seem to score at will, not a lot of hope.

See you guys Wednesday.

 

[awaz]

Dan's always been about just playing fundamental hockey. He wouldn't even talk about Asham when Pierre interviewed him during the game.

I think from his angle, the Neal hit just looked like a defensive play. If he sees another angle later on that shows that Neal was headhunting, I don't think he'll be okay with that.

i dont think neal was called for the couturier one, i think the charge was on the giroux incident.. maybe i'm wrong and have the times mixed up.. but i dont think they called the couturier one, which, i'll agree, from bylsma's angle might've looked alright.. but the giroux one, regardless of which angle you're looking at, is a nasty freakin hit

granato too.. no wonder the pens were out of control, their coaches needed held back from the refs

really just an ugly display from the pens today, even if you dont look at the scoreboard

 

[awaz]

later DS and dacks.. see ya wednesday

 

[SLY]

LET THERE BE BLOOD!

 

[flyersfan4706]