Weise hit on Holzer (UPD: suspended 3 games)

[kylbaz]

I hope you aren't suggesting that was the case with Holzer. He didn't crouch. His knees bent because he was stopping. That's standard. You need a good knee bend when you stop, because you're driving 200 lbs of your weight into your legs.

All Weise had to do to make a clean hit was not jump into it.

No, I'm suggesting if a player is crouching whether on purporse or not, the NHL doesn't let you hit him anymore. Seriously, you guys are agruing that because he came off the ice it's the difference maker. He was getting hit in the head whether he left the ice or not. Skate with your head down, you're going to get hit. It's a joke hits like these are penalties now.

 

[Rebels57]

No, I'm suggesting if a player is crouching whether on purporse or not, the NHL doesn't let you hit him anymore. Seriously, you guys are agruing that because he came off the ice it's the difference maker. He was getting hit in the head whether he left the ice or not. Skate with your head down, you're going to get hit. It's a joke hits like these are penalties now.

What makes it hard is that it's almost impossible to line a guy up and hit them straight through the chest without catching SOME head in the process. The Weise and Gudas hits were perfect examples of that (although the Gudas hit was a little bit late, but thats a separate issue). Both hits were square through the center of the chest and caught head at the same time. How are you supposed to hit? From the side into the shoulder only?

 

[BernieParent]

Beyond my presently biased way (relative to the particular focus on suspending Flyers players), there are two things I find hair-pullingly frustrating with the DoPS.

The first, as has been stated several times in this thread, is the inconsistency. This is where most of our (Flyers') problem with this ruling is derived.

The second is their absolute marriage of punishment with injury. Egregious, dangerous plays where the recipient is lucky to escape without injury are dismissed. And we know that injuries can happen on completely legal plays.

 

[Spazkat]

What makes it hard is that it's almost impossible to line a guy up and hit them straight through the chest without catching SOME head in the process. The Weise and Gudas hits were perfect examples of that (although the Gudas hit was a little bit late, but thats a separate issue). Both hits were square through the center of the chest and caught head at the same time. How are you supposed to hit? From the side into the shoulder only?

This isn't incidental head contact in the process of a clean body hit. They clearly point that out as one of the determining factors in the video explanation. It's that the head is the main point of contact and that Holzer doesn't change his position just prior to the hit.

Also, agree with previous poster re: the absurdity of tying injury status to punishment. A suspension shouldn't be lighter because a player got really lucky and was not hurt- same with the reverse.

 

[HanSolo]

What makes it hard is that it's almost impossible to line a guy up and hit them straight through the chest without catching SOME head in the process. The Weise and Gudas hits were perfect examples of that (although the Gudas hit was a little bit late, but thats a separate issue). Both hits were square through the center of the chest and caught head at the same time. How are you supposed to hit? From the side into the shoulder only?

What? The very picture you quoted shows his entire shoulder caught all of Holzer's face. The only thing around his chest is Wiese's elbow which was not used for the hit.

 

[Ducks DVM]

The lack of consistency.

When the same hit gets nothing one day, or something similarly dangerous that isn't even an attempted hockey play like a slew foot or smashing someones head into the boards gets nothing..there's a problem.

That's accurate, but the proper reaction isn't to lobby for this type of hit to get less punishment, it's to raise enough of a PR stink that it becomes an economic issue for the league to not discipline the other bad behavior.

Head trauma is bad. Anyone who actually enjoys the sport should try to do what they can to make sure the players playing it can continue to do so. Above and beyond the concept of common decency and just not wanting people to die early due to CTE.

 

[Sojourn]

No, I'm suggesting if a player is crouching whether on purporse or not, the NHL doesn't let you hit him anymore. Seriously, you guys are agruing that because he came off the ice it's the difference maker. He was getting hit in the head whether he left the ice or not. Skate with your head down, you're going to get hit. It's a joke hits like these are penalties now.

I feel like you're describing a different hit than the one that took place here.

 

[Sojourn]

What makes it hard is that it's almost impossible to line a guy up and hit them straight through the chest without catching SOME head in the process. The Weise and Gudas hits were perfect examples of that (although the Gudas hit was a little bit late, but thats a separate issue). Both hits were square through the center of the chest and caught head at the same time. How are you supposed to hit? From the side into the shoulder only?

And you're just not being accurate with your description at all. Weise didn't get him square to the chest. He got him square to the head. The chest contact looked more incidental than the head contact. If this was a perfect example of a player hitting a player straight through the chest, and catching some head, your definition of those explanations varies greatly from mine.

I'm not one to say a player should be punished for catching a bit of head in an otherwise clean bit, but that isn't at all what happened here. How about Weise keeps his feet on the ice? Maybe he should try that. He isn't as likely to drill Holzer in the head if he doesn't leap into the hit, and what head contact there is is very likely less.

The NHL doesn't suspend every player who makes head contact. They've actually made a point of trying not to, so long as the player isn't getting mostly the head. You need to make an effort to, you know, not knock a player's head off.

 

[HanSolo]

Yeah I don't see how anyone can say the principal point of contact was the chest on that hit. It very clearly wasn't. And Holzer's face didn't get busted up on an incidental clipping of the face off a chest check.

 

[Tripod]

But when you look at the picture, Weise has his right skate on the ice. Look at the shadow to the right of the skate....no gap. So Weise is standing at his natural height at contact...meanwhile Holzer is smaller because his knees are bent when attempting to stop...a natural occur act when stopping.

So the only way that Weise could have hit him in the chest, is to crouch way down AND to assume Holzer would do the same. When Holzer did it first, there was never going to be enough time for Weise to react.

Shockingly, Holzer is listed as 6'3.....Weise is 6'2. The hitting of the head occurred because Holzer started to stop, thus crouching down. At that point, Weise was hitting him in the head. Based on the picture, you would swear Dale was 6'3 and Holzer was 5'10.