We just added a worse version of Tom Wilson. After two years of proving to the NHL that players like that and playing like that are useless against Pens' hockey. Series after series teams got out of position trying to make the big hit and by game three completely abandoned that play but already were too deep in the hole. He would be beyond useless in the playoffs when it counts. Regular season? Decapitate Ovechkin and Dubinsky every game we play them for all I care, regular season is meaningless. You could call Sestito up to do that if you want. It will not stop a single cheap shot on Sid or Malkin, it simply will turn the games into clown shows.
Worse we have players who have had discipline issues in the past. Starting with Malkin. You introduce that element into the game you encourage slippage among that group.
The price is not a big deal, I just don't get the point of him. He isn't going to stop a single cheap hit and if you are not going to become a hitting team trying to wear the other team down he will come on the ice, knowing his role will do something stupid, and be gone after six or seven minutes of play and I would bet dimes to dollars doesn't prevent anything. In fact his antics will provoke retaliation if anything.
Cheap shots to star players is a massive problem, agreed. The NHL massively dropped the ball and will pay in the ongoing lawsuit. This move however will do nothing to help the star players on this team, zero, nothing. Just watch this year and see. You are going to be massively disappointed when the number of cheap shots to our stars does not diminish at all, Reaves comes out and retaliates, teams have a couple of side show fights and then he gets tossed and you wonder what the point was in bringing him here.
I hated the move yesterday and hate it more today.