This is disgusting.
Here's the thing, and I'm sure many fans will rush to try and dispute this but I've watched literally every game Tom Wilson has played in the NHL, Tom Wilson makes bad hits.... but they're attempts at hockey.
I will not sit here and tell you Tom Wilson has never made a bad hit. TW43 regularly in his career has made dangerous and reckless hits that have cause injury to his opponents. I'm also not going to sit here and act like the guy should not alter his game, in the games he's played since he returned he has been amazing when his nose is kept clean. All of that said, there is no doubt in my mind, Tom Wilson doesn't hit to injure, he hits to hurt. I know that statement sounds stupid, but hear me out. In football I played defensive line and I remember distinctly my coach explaining this concept to me. Getting hit hurts, pads barely do anything for the pain. If you hit your opponent hard it will hurt more. Over time a mentally weaker opponent will avoid you and that will make the rest of your job easier, Tom Wilson does this. The idea of hitting to hurt is the entire basis of contact sports, it's a mental test. Wilson is so good at hitting to hurt it opens the ice up for Ovechkin and Kuznetsov because opponents panic. At the end of the day though getting hurt is again 90% mental and you hope your opponent will be able to walk off the field no worse for the wear.
Now, hitting to injure? That's a different thing, that's intentionally going out of your way to try cause some sort of potential dangerous health event for your opponent. It's disrespectful, it's unethical, and it's got no place in sport.
I believe that Tom Wilson has crossed the line on many occasion and injured his opponent, at no point given his reaction and break down of hits he has made did I ever believe his intent was to injure. The way Wilson defends his hits you can tell there is an analytical approach and justification that took place in his own mind as to why the play was "a hockey play".
During the VGK game I was willing to accept this argument from Reaves, he was hitting to hurt Wilson, he wanted to throw Tommy off his game and make him panic when he was on the ice. A tip of the cap to Reaves I thought. Everything that has happened since then has changed my mind. The open relishing of Wilson's injury, the joking/flexing to the press about the hit, the signing merchandise with the hit on it, etc. To me I'm starting to believe that Reaves got on the ice that night with the intention of injuring Tom Wilson.
I know to many posters it will seem like I'm splitting hairs here, but honestly for every bad Tom Wilson play there is an explanation from him that supports the idea that he believed he was making a hockey play. And for every bad Wilson hit the worst you can really find is that he didn't reach out to the guy he hit after the fact. This Reaves relishing the moment thing is about 100 yards out of bounds.