Dave Hodge: Thumbs down to discipline disconnect

First, this article says what a lot of fans have been saying for a very long time, in all levels of hockey. I have begun to refer to this as blow the f'n whistle.

If you monitor social media this is a reoccurring theme, nightly. The refs aren't calling the game of hockey by the book. When fans say it, they're just blind homers.

That being said, someone needed to say it. What gives it credibility; someone from a major  sports channel in Canada put it to print. And now it's out there.

After the NHL lockout of 2004-05, the refs were calling stick penalties and the obstruction. Now, the refs have basically declined back to the days of the clutching and grabbing up and down the ice. No wonder Sidney Crosby can't score, he has two guys in his hockey pants.

Dave Hodge, TSN -- According to the league, the refs aren't making the proper calls.

Corrections made after the fact do nothing to satisfy the teams that deserved better during the game.

Where video review and coach challenges are concerned, it's all about transparency and getting the calls right, but that's not the case with penalty calls. It should be.

Apart from addressing the need to show that the refs and their overseers are working from the same rulebook, the NHL should treat all calls by officials the same way. If the legality of goals can be determined by video and not by the refs' eyes, if coaches can challenge the failure to call goalie interference and offside, hits such as those delivered by Sill and Johansson should be subject to review on the spot, and proper penalties and power plays awarded.

It's too late the following day. And it's too late to make the argument that the refs' judgment needs to be respected. It isn't anymore.

For those wondering who Dave Hodge is, he's been with TSN.CA since 1992.

Thumbs down from @TSNDaveHodge to the NHL's discipline disconnect. READ: https://t.co/rnzXRlfVUK pic.twitter.com/DyHbhQDcZD

— TSN Hockey (@TSNHockey) January 9, 2016

While we're on the subject of officials and off-ice officials. Zeke from the Hockey Writers also addresses the Department of Player Safety and their lack of consistency.

The NHL DPS comes out a loser. Whatever credibility they might have gained from going after Torres was short-lived. That credibility was lost by a failure, a chronic failure, to enforce player safety in a broader way with any real sense of diligence. For example, the opening night head-butt by Dustin Brown on Logan Couture in the video clip below drew nothing from the DPS. The list of offenses that DPS has managed to ignore is ridiculous. If someone attempted to compile a list of the top ten offenses the DPS ignored, they be swamped by the available material. The only player that needs to fear a harsh reaction from the DPS is Raffi Torres. That sort of hypocrisy not only hurts the game, it insures the DPS has no credibility in the eyes of the people it must be credible to – the players.