Uh, that’s the point.
Bertuzzi’s incident was treated differently because:
1) attitudes toward this sort of thing were starting to change.
2) Colorado and Moore did everything in their power to stoke this into a media circus.
And it ended up crossing out of hockey into the mainstream with the ‘Won’t someone think of the children!’ crowd pushing for criminal charges.
As has been noted, that so many Canuck fans (and I’ve been as guilty of this as anyone) who are like ‘Ha, remember when Bure hunted down that dirty opposing player miles away from the play and knocked him out cold? That was awesome!’ will also claim ‘Ugh, remember when Bertuzzi hunted down that dirty opposing player miles away from the play and knocked him out cold? That was terrible!’ is ever-so-slightly hypocritical.
i don't think that's a great comparison. but let's consider how we feel about a wider spectrum:
- bure on churla, flying elbow to the head. optics: good. bure is small, churla is big and was already harassing him.
- moore on naslund, predatory elbow to the head. optics: bad. star player reaching for the puck gets headhunted by fringe player on divisional rival in a matchup with playoff implications.
- messier on linden, hitting him when he's already down when the game is basically already over. optics: bad. totally unnecessary and cheap af. luckily for that bald pos no one outside of MSG that night has actually seen this. but man, when i hear robson calling it, i imagine messier taking out a tire iron then sprinting off the ice to jump into jeff gillooly's getaway car.
- bertuzzi on moore, moore refuses to fight, tries to skate away, bertuzzi punches him in the head from behind, ensuing dogpile causes significant injury. optics: terrible. bertuzzi is enormous, brad may iirc threatened moore on camera already.
- mcsorley on brashear, donald refuses to fight, mcsorley whacks him in the head with his stick. optics: even worse. weapon was involved, plus the sight of a white player in a 99% white sport taking a swing like that at one of the few black players looks horrific.