Def should have got a 1 game penalty for the Bastian hit. I vaguely remember him seeming to leep into a leaf too, but I never saw the replay.
The Bastin hit, yea he was low but he seemed low the whole time, and a big hit was not even remotely necessary in that moment. I can see Rempe conceivably not “targeting” the head there but the drastic risk should have been extremely obvious.
It’s about having respect for your opponents.
It reminds me of Tom Wilson. He was rushed to the NHL because he was too big for juniors and they did t want him to cheat offensively, but the stupid AHL rule made 5 minutes per NHL game the only option.
The only thing he brought anywhere near an NHL level was physicality, and his coaches told him to use it and defended him publicly too like here.
I said then and I’ll say now, I didn’t necessarily believe Wilson was trying to injure players. He was trying to be physical and contribute. Lots of the “extra” stuff you’d see from Cooke and Marchand was largely absent from his game.
There’s players like Orlov who have a number of huge hits, but only as the opportunity presents. He doesn’t hunt them. Then you have guys like these trying to make an impact who are fishing for big hits. That will lead to trouble if you’re too eager.
Wilson got away with a lot because there were conceivable arguments that he was going for a clean hit at a risky moment and had unfortunate results. Height was brought up (by me too lol. I was a lot younger I don’t fully agree with all my old arguments)
Aside from the elbow which is so blatant, and I’m still curious about the apparent jump… but I see Rempe also basically taking runs every game even aside from the mentioned hits.
He’s arguably playing more over the line than on the line. As with the Wilson saga, you can argue they should have stepped in sooner to tame him. Ultimately they still failed to prevent a preventable injury but at least they seem to be ready to act sooner.. or maybe it’s just the elbow.
