Do you think the NHL "manages" games with refs?

[BoredBrandonPridham]

Just to be clear, when saying "Game Management", I'm referring to referees not calling every infraction to the best of their abilities, but instead calling it where they think a team has played in a manner that they deserve more penalties than the other team, and the distribution of penalties is thus given in this way. And, that the league has instructed that a game should be called strictly or loosely.

I always thought it was just an open thing for the league and fans to know that NHL refs "manage the game", they don't just call the infractions they see. They are instructed by the league to call the game in a certain way (tightly, loosely, etc...) so that the game has a certain feel to it.

This Tim Peele incident has surprised me that:

a) A ref was taken off of games because he said something that made it clear game management was happening;
b) The NHL is claiming that his behaviour showed a lack of integrity in the game, when what his statement is doing is just an obvious side-effect of game management that I thought was obvious; and
c) There is a long mainboards thread with fans indicating that this incident has confirmed something, as though it wasn't already just confirmed general knowledge before, it's just been an obvious thing to me that I thought former players, coaches, etc... all openly talk about.

I honestly thought if someone were to ask Gary Bettman publicly "Do refs call everything they see or does the league tell them how to call each game, and they manage the game accordingly?", that Bettman would say "They manage the game in such a way that it achieves a certain pace and quality on the ice."

So I wonder how obvious is it really? Or is it really true that the refs do try and call a game honestly and Tim Peele is just a one-off case of this happening?

Please answer which of the options most applies for you to test how obvious this is to the general fanbase.

Click to read more...

 

[Trade]

Makeup calls wouldn’t be a thing if it hasn’t already been happening for so long

 

[GritGrinder]

I honestly don't believe in the concept of one ref or an officiating crew being directed to "manage a game". I do believe that in the course of a game a ref may miss a call or two or give a ticky-tack penalty and then want to make up for it later to correct or level what he did for one team, thats been happening in the NHL for 100 years. For all we know what Peel said was taken out of context and he did miss a call or two on the Preds early or maybe he thought they got away with a high stick or slash he didn't see that a coach or captain pointed out and wanted to give them a ticky-tack penalty to equalize things in terms of calls. I don't see it being any different than each umpire having a different strike zone and sometimes changing it from player to player or the way certain players get foul calls late in NBA games. Its human nature or call it officiating nature. If the league and a group of ref's were getting together in some grand conspiracy all these years to manage games for certain teams etc. there would have been a whistleblower or 2 by now. Especially since the inception of the 2 refs, so many ref's have come and gone since then that someone would have wrote a book or done an exclusive interview. Other than some wild fan conspiracy theories and some innuendo's from disgruntled former players, coaches and GM's there has literally been nothing concrete and even this hot mic of Peel's feels like nothing really and the NHL getting rid of him (even though he was retiring soon) sends a good message. If some ex-ref's start coming out of the word-work and dropping bombs then I'll start to believe but until then this is literally a fart in a windstorm compared to what players, teams and the league have gone through and are still going through this past year.

 

[Selyanin]

I honestly don't believe in the concept of one ref or an officiating crew being directed to "manage a game". I do believe that in the course of a game a ref may miss a call or two or give a ticky-tack penalty and then want to make up for it later to correct or level what he did for one team, thats been happening in the NHL for 100 years. For all we know what Peel said was taken out of context and he did miss a call or two on the Preds early or maybe he thought they got away with a high stick or slash he didn't see that a coach or captain pointed out and wanted to give them a ticky-tack penalty to equalize things in terms of calls. I don't see it being any different than each umpire having a different strike zone and sometimes changing it from player to player or the way certain players get foul calls late in NBA games. Its human nature or call it officiating nature. If the league and a group of ref's were getting together in some grand conspiracy all these years to manage games for certain teams etc. there would have been a whistleblower or 2 by now. Especially since the inception of the 2 refs, so many ref's have come and gone since then that someone would have wrote a book or done an exclusive interview. Other than some wild fan conspiracy theories and some innuendo's from disgruntled former players, coaches and GM's there has literally been nothing concrete and even this hot mic of Peel's feels like nothing really and the NHL getting rid of him (even though he was retiring soon) sends a good message. If some ex-ref's start coming out of the word-work and dropping bombs then I'll start to believe but until then this is literally a fart in a windstorm compared to what players, teams and the league have gone through and are still going through this past year.

I don't think most people think they are managing for certain teams. It's more managing to keep games close even when they shouldn't be. Giving weak penalties to leading teams, not giving 5vs3s except for delay of game. Not giving consecutive penalties etc.

 

[MikeyMike01]

Talk about biased poll options.

 

[McVespa99]

Duh

 

[Zuluss]

Maybe that's a soccer fan in me speaking, but I always thought the game was managed in hockey too and I never thought it is a bad thing (unless it is biased in favor of a team or against a certain team).

In soccer, the ref shows a yellow card as a warning; the second yellow is a red card and a dismissal, which leaves the team shorthanded for the rest of the game - soccer is 10 on 10, not 5 on 5, but playing shorthanded still is a big deal.
While there are soccer fouls that definitely deserve a yellow card (like pulling someone to the ground to prevent a developing odd-man rush), in many cases a player would get yellow carded for a series of fouls, neither of which is worthy of a yellow card, but the player is kind of asking for one. On the other hand, soccer refs use yellow cards sparingly in the first third of the game, because once you have cautioned a player, you have to send him off for the next serious foul, and that is a big decision that will impact the game. If a soccer ref throws the book at the players and sends off a couple, most people would say that the ref made the game to be about him or lost control of it - even if in each episode taken separately the ref was just following the rules to a t.

So I think a similar thing is happening in hockey: the refs do not want a game to be a series of powerplays, so not everything is called. But then something may be called if a player or a team is "asking for it" - the ref lets it slide once or twice to let the players play, but then the third time a player gets a minor even if the previous, not called fouls were worse than the current one. If a ref misses a foul and then "makes up for it", that also seems kind of fair.

What I do not like and what I think is happening is when the refs are trying to even up PP time - if a team gets, say, three PPs in a row, then it is held to a higher standard and a penalty against it becomes more likely.

 

[Hunter368]

Closed