I'm proud to say that there is SOMEONE at ESPN who sees through the NHL Front Office smokescreen that is their PR campaign and sees the light when it comes to the professional ranks of the sport in general. What did he do?
He sees the league as more than just Pittsburgh and Washington. AND he's not afraid to tell the Pens to go stuff it.
Recently, there was a kerfuffle (as Paul Allen of Vikings and KFAN fame would often say) between the Islanders and the Penguins in which one Pen (Godard) and 2 Isles (Martin and Gillies) were each suspended as a result. The Islanders were even fined.
I didn't watch the game so I'm not going to sit here and say that what happened was right but... Mario Lemieux is a crybaby. And Burnside called him on it. I like this guy.
Lemieux issued a statement contending that the league was too soft and did not send a clear enough message... yet the league suspended two guys a combined 13 games and one Penguin 10 games AND fined the Islanders $100,000.
Burnside alleges, and I concur wholeheartedly, that Lemieux's stance comes from the same stance that has me so derisive towards Sidney Crosby: Since the League makes such a big deal of the Pens/Crosby, they should take extra care to protect us. Like they're something special and the rest of the league is not.
Here's a small blurb I find extremely awesome:
Lemieux apparently didn't mind the state of the game so much when Matt Cooke, a player his Penguins signed to a new contract this past summer, put Marc Savard's career in jeopardy last season with a blindside check a thousand times worse than the one that recently felled Pittsburgh captain Sidney Crosby.I agree. 1 million percent. And what's worse, some of their fans even feel the same way as Lemieux!
And Lemieux must have been too busy working on his short game last week to defend the game he loves when Cooke was suspended again, this time for four games, for drilling Columbus defenseman Fedor Tyutin headfirst into the boards.
Nope, Lemieux was pretty much silent on that one, too. Funny.
Lemieux goes on to talk about how the league needs to do a better job stating that the integrity of the game must be upheld and that hostile actions should not be tolerated.
Sure, I agree... and the league did take action. But what about the Penguins? Burnside enlightened me on some interesting statistics:
The Penguins lead the NHL in major penalties assessed as well as penalties per game!
Yet the only embarrassment that really happened that night was the score. A down and out, talentless Islanders team dropped 9 goals on the awesome Penguins!
Look, the points Lemieux made weren't exactly awful, but they did, as Burnside stated, come across as that of a spoiled little boy who didn't get what he wanted. The fact is, Lemieux is a hall of famer and when he speaks, people listen. This is not how you treat a league who bailed out your team and basically got you where you are today.
If you want those problems fixed then do two things:
1. Propose solutions and present them in the proper channels
2. Call out everyone... INCLUDING players like Matt Cooke, who deserve a hellova lot worse than a stupid 4 game ban.
In any case, read the article. It's DEFINITELY worth reading if you want to understand where I come from on the Penguins and Sidney Crosby.
VIVA the League, baby... NOT just the Penguins.
