I keep asking this and no one seems to want to answer.
Should Reinbacher have to fight Reaves for shoving Minten into the boards from behind?
If he doesn't want to, should Reaves throw him to the ice and punch him in the back of the head?
Normally someone from that person's weight class tries to fight them...
I can’t give an answer on that one because I didn’t see the incident. No idea what the dynamics are.
What I saw in the Pare/Xhekaj incident was Pare getting about 2 seconds to react after being grabbed from behind, and choosing to turtle instead of try to fight a guy who had the jump on him. That’s fair enough, if he has to answer the bell he should at least have the opportunity to square up. But I don’t think he “owed” a fight, because he didn’t do anything wrong.
I also recognize that the players on the ice didn’t get the benefit of endless replays and debate about the Laine collision, all they knew is that their guy went down hard and Pare was at the scene of the crime. So they’re gonna go after him whether he was at fault or not. That’s all fair play and typical hockey stuff.
I’m a little surprised that Pare didn’t get his gloves off and find a dancing partner once he had a chance to collect himself. That would have put an end to the thing. For whatever reason, there’s this new thing where players seem afraid to drop their gloves in these situations and it comes off as dodging the bell.
Did Perry owe the Leafs a fight after the Tavares injury in the playoffs? Because they came knocking, twice if I remember correctly. And he answered the bell. Hockey code.
I don’t think he actually owed them one, but like last night that was also a situation where the players on the ice hadn’t even had an intermission to find out what had happened. All they knew was Perry was involved so they went straight at him, and he obliged rather than make it a long running thing. One thing we can’t know is whether Pare was offered the chance for a staged fight like Perry and Foligno.