TheAthletic- “I didn’t hit him in the face,” Malkin explained. “If I had touched him in the face, for sure, I would get suspended. It’s a high stick, but it’s not like I broke his face. I think I won’t get suspended.”
"It was a little bit dangerous,” Malkin admitted. “But it was nothing real bad, I didn’t think. It’s my fault, for sure. The refs thought it was dangerous. Next time, I need to play smarter.” “I think if they give me five minutes, he should have gotten two,” Malkin said. “It was a dirty play, too. I was surprised.” “I just touched his shoulder,” Malkin said. “No bleeding. I’m not trying to hit his face. But I didn’t play smart. It was my fault, for sure.” ------- To clarify, for those that are in disbelief, the play that Evgeni Malkin is referring to was, indeed, the same one in which he took a Spartan-like swing at the skull of an opponent. I know you may have been thrown off by him calling it "nothing really bad", but - as it turns out - using your stick as a sword is only considered a little bit dangerous in certain cultures. Speaking so casually of the intent to leave Michael Raffl blindly feeling around the ice for his severed head may be tough pill for some to swallow, but apparently Russia is a very results-oriented country. Therefore, we can consider the referee's determination that Evgeni Malkin's audition for ISIS was worthy of a 5 minute major and a game misconduct to be lost in translation. In all seriousness, if Evgeni Malkin isn't handed down a multiple-game suspension then whatever small shred of trust I had in the Department of Player Safety's decision making will have been dealt a death blow. Trying to use his blade as a razor in slitting someone's throat is very, very bad, but - given the fortunate result - basically spitting in just about every objective person's eyeballs by talking about the incident like it was merely a bump in the hallway might actually be worse. As hesitant as I am to consider the player who rabbit-punched a player returning from injury in the back of the head (before selling a stick to the face so shamelessly you'd think he was pushing fake purses for premium prices) to be an innocent victim, the league absolutely has to come down hard on the guy that violently and verbally assumed the role of the villain. After all, I wasn't even aware it was possible to be less apologetic than Tom Wilson until an NHL superstar tried to justify his Gladiator-esque actions under his own personal 'no blood, no foul' clause. Reading through the reactions to a play that featured two idiots engaging in high variance jackassery leads me to believe it would make for an excellent case study in the subjective stupidity of fandom. That said, Evgeni Malkin recklessly using his stick as a a goddamn axe in trying to chop through an opponent somehow did the impossible in giving Flyers' fans the moral high ground. If only for that, he must be punished in way that strongly sends the message that not succeeding isn't an excuse for using equipment in attempted murders.
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