Remember my rant from the other day regarding the CBJ vs. Wild game? Well, last night I happened to be watching the Wings/Ducks game and nearly the IDENTICAL scenario played out in OT of their game. The puck was batted out of mid air, the on-ice official signaled it was a goal, the review from Toronto was inconclusive: "...therefore the on-ice call of goal stands, it's a goal". I was LIVID. How can the exact same scenario breed two dramatically different results?I wanted answers so I started scouring the internet for the NHL headquarters so I could write a letter to Gary Bettman (NHL Commisioner) himself. I did find the mailing address, but not the email address then it occurred to me: Bettman has a weekly radio show on XM Satellite radio so I would address my letter to him there, better yet, why not just call in and ask him?
I woke up this morning still seething from the failed call in Minnesota so I drafted a letter stating my issue and sent it off to Home Ice. Meanwhile, in the back of my mind, I wanted to be sure that I got through to him so I waited until 4 pm when his show started and called in.
Initially while on hold, I was quite nervous, but after 45 minutes and a pretty drab segment with Bob Gainey (sorry Bob I think you are great, but I couldn't pay attention to what you were on about) my nerves had bascially subsided. Finally I hear: "Corina from Columbus, welcome to XM NHL 204."
I felt a surge of nerves again, but nothing serious. I proceeded to ask the Commisioner about the protocol of the review system and whether or not I had it right. The only problem is, he was ready for me. He clearly had read my email and wa told me that I was, in fact, correct but there was a caveat...of course there is, because how else would you be able to explain the blantant failure of the system on October 25th.
He claimed that the officials in Minnesota made the right call and that protocol had been followed properly. Of course, at this point they have disconnected your call and you cannot interject and challenge his explaination. I intended to bring up the exact scenario in Anaheim last night and how an extra meeting didn't occur with the officials like it did in Minny that night, but I wasn't given the chance. In the end he just spewed out some silly rhetoric that covered his officials and the leagues asses and basically blew it off.
Did I truly expect anything more? Not really, but I wonder what his answer would have been had I not sent the email that essentially provided him with a heads up.
2 comments:
go sisty go!!!
I believe the diffence they are trying to sell you is that, supposedly, the offials gathered and the other 3 overturned the original call. At that point the war room had to find conclusive evidence that it was, indeed a goal.
The problem with that is that the on-ice official did not reflect that when he announced it to the crowd. You then had a VP who was totally clueless. We know he was clueless because his intial statement was idiotic. Something on the lines of "Because it wasn't a conclusive goal, it was overturned". Which is crap. It's a fundemental lack of understanding of a basic law of review.
As far as Bettman he's an idiot. It's cool you tried to call him to the carpet. I just don't know if the NHL is ever going to clean up their officiating issues. It's the worst of all the pro sports (well N/A pro sports that I watch).
I repect that it's a harder to game to call, but they miss (ignore really) obvious calls right in front of them. I won't really get into the elite team bias that exists with some crews.
When all is said and done, 95%+ of the time that is a goal.
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