Either suspend Dennis Wideman for 25 games or none

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You should never root for a player to beconcu sed. Never. Never ever.But, with regards toDennis Wideman, it’d make things much, much simpler if we all knew something Kevin King Jersey went wrong in his brain directly before his, uh, on Wednesday night.MORE: |That disorientation, lack of spatial awarene s, , whatever would help su sthings out. The other explanation is even le s pleasantfor Wideman and the league; in that world, he’d have taken a calculated, purposeful run at an official for mi sing a call, andwould deserve a 25-game-ish suspension.(Listen to the replay of that hit, by the way; Sportsnet said Wideman “misjudged (Henderson’s) path” on the way to the bench. We’re not singling them out; there were manymedia members and even morefans on Twitter whose immediate reaction was “what a terrible accident.” It’d be great if they gave that degree of benefit of the doubt to everyone in their lives. That is probably Green Bay Packers Jackets not the case.)What’s muddying things up here, as tends to be the case with hockey players, is that Wideman isn’t copping to any sort of post-hit confusion. “I was kindadazed and thoughthe was a Predator,” would’ve worked just fine.One po sible reason he didn’t do that:He never left the game. No concu sion protocol for him, even though he was clearly rattled on the bench. Whoops.So, rather than talking himself and the Flames staff into a different problem,this is what we got: “I was just trying to get off the ice.And, at the last second, I looked up and saw him, I couldnt avoid it. I didnt know where to go or how to get out of the way of him. Throughout my career I think I’ve treated every official with the utmost respect and I’d never try to intentionally hit a linesman or ref.”All due respect to Wideman anddeservedly good reputation, but that, at face value, is not Brett Favre Hoodies Sweatshirts a good explanation. Once he’s up, he’s staring directly at Henderson’s back for several seconds and a handful of deliberatestrides. If he was in his right mind, he saw him. The two rational explanations areeither that he was concu sed, or that he momentarily lost his mind anddid it on purpose. Not a great choice.The NHL’s guidelines for dealing with this sort of situation doesn’t help, but the league has time on its side.This will all play out over the next few days. Given that we’re already at the All-Star Green Bay Packers Home Office Break, it’s tough to imagine hearing anything before Monday.The NHL has three types of suspensions for abuse of officials. Sure seems like Wideman’s looking at ten games here. Down Goes Brown (@DownGoesBrown) Does it seem like he’s looking at 10 games, though? Intent is the difference between 10 and a minimum 20 games.Is a cro s-check to a referee’supper backdesigned to do anything other than injure?All this will be moot if Wideman takes the “yep, I was concu sed and out of it” route. It’d be a valid explanation. It’s also one that, publicly, he opted not to make. Maybe he argues that when push comes to shove over the next few days. If he doesn’t, and if a suspension is dealt out, it needs to be long. He waseither not responsible for his actions or did something Malik Taylor Jersey really, really stupid.The problem with the all-or-nothing thing if you’re the NHL, though, is that it’d nece sitate choosing between 1) blowing an obvious concu sion diagnosis, which would be a disaster for a bunch of reasons and2) acknowledging a pretty legitimate a sault on an official. That’s the exact sort of action the league likes to portray its players as morally incapable of taking.The money is on them doing neither. Put your money on a baby-splitting six-game ban and a whole bunch of cro sed fingers.

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