How Will The NHL Respond To Rypien Tomorrow?

Added on Oct 21, 2010 by J Merrill in

NHL

There are a variety of responses now coming out about Rick Rypien’s recent outburst. The one thing we all agree on is that you can’t touch a fan. What Rypien did was wrong. It doesn’t matter what was said by the fan, because you have to be professional in those situations.

I can understand it being hard to control yourself. Another man was just pushing you and shoving you on the ice, and you get tossed off the ice. Some guy is jawing you and wearing the exact same sweater as the guy who was just trying to thump you. Screaming fans, fellow teammates encouraging you, and a coach defending you to the ref; and then some guy diverts your attention to him. Thats a lot of self control, but thats why you get paid the big bucks Rick.

This is not the only thing that happened. Prior to the fan incident, Rick was on the ice and went at Brad Staubitz, and the referee tried to break it up. Behind the refs back, Rypien reached around and punched Brad right on the chin. The ref continued to push away Rypien, and from at least one of the views I saw, it looked like Rypien was shoving the ref a little bit. These are both things the NHL will also look at. Fighting another player is one thing, but pushing around the refs is another.

Chicago Blackhawk John Scott has made some comments. It was kind of strange. It looks like he kind of flipped a switch and grabbed the guy for no reason, because it didn’t look like the fan was saying anything. He just kind of grabbed him. He kind of came to after he grabbed him. He was like, ‘Oh, not the time or the place,’ and he let him go. But you can’t be doing that. You can’t be grabbing the fans out the stands.”

I disagree with Scott, as it looked like Rypien tried to pull him out of the stands. It also looked like the only reason he didn’t pull the fan out of the stands, was because his teammates and coach were trying to stop him and push him down the tunnel. Scott also said “I’ve never had the impulse to grab a fan, I don’t know. It doesn’t happen that often, so it must not be that hard. If I had a fan swing at me, then, yeah, sure. But they’re paying to come to the games and say whatever they want. As long as they’re just booing me, that’s fine with me.”

Former player Mathew Barnaby had a few comments to make on the situation as well. He was also in an incident with a fan, but the fan was much older. Barnaby said “I was just talking to my son and he said: ‘Dad, did he have a walker?’..He had his fists ready to go, which was pretty comical. That might have been the only fight I’d have ever won. I’d gotten into a fight with Peter Worrell and got beaten up pretty good by him. I came off and there was a fan, an older man, just yelling obscenities. And for that split second, I just lost my mind and tried to grab at his arm and pull him through [the railing]. Then I realized: ‘Oh, my god, I can’t do that.’ I went to the dressing room and it was like: What did I just do?”

Barnaby also feels as though the NHL has already made up its mind. “Any time you start defending yourself, it doesn’t help, You have to put the onus on yourself. If there’s anyway they could be more lenient, it’s if you put the onus on yourself. But I really, firmly believe the league has that [suspension] number going in. They’ve had a lot of time to think about it and I don’t think there’s anything you can say that would really change it. They’re going to get his side of the story just to hear him talk, but it’s a formality. The number is in their head.”

Barnaby, now an announcer and analyst, continued “It was four games for me and I think he’s going to get a lot more than that because it’s a different era 10 years later. I feel bad for him because I know the emotions he plays with and the emotions that go into the game. I know you can snap in a second. He didn’t mean anything by it and nobody got hurt. But at the end of the day, he lost his cool and he’s going to have to pay for it.”

I’m putting the over under number at seven games, and if I were a betting man, I would say over. The NHL doesn’t want to appear lenient about the fan incident, and they will also respond to the pushing of the linesman. This was a mistake by Rick Rypien, and he obviously wasn’t thinking when he did it. His best bet is to walk in their tomorrow, and say he would do anything to have those 3 minutes back, and take the suspension like a man. He should apologize publicly and personally to the fan, and try to learn from this mistake.