Attempt to injure in mens league

[hyprlte 0]

2 weeks ago i was playing in a lower end mens league game. Not to sound cocky or anything but i am much, much better than the level i was playing at. I just went out to help a friend who was short on guys.

I was playing defence and there was a 1 on 1. I stopped the guy from shooting and the puck went behind the net. We both went for the puck from either side of the net and bumped into each other. After the initial contact the guy proceeded to look at me and then cross check me in the throat. Completely knocked the wind out of me.. couldnt breathe for about 30 seconds or so it seemed (very frightening).

After i finally was able to take some air in, i was told to stay on the ice as the ambulance was called. As i was lying down the ref skated over to me and yelled "get up". The other ref told him that i was instructed to stay on the ice. After hearing that, the ref shook his head and skated away. The paramedics looked at me but i was able to undress myself and leave the rink.

After a week, the conviener said there will be a 5 game suspension to the guy who crosschecked me. I think that the call was unacceptable, and he should be gone for the year. Fighting is an automatic ejection from the league and i think that this deliberate attempt to injure is worse than fighting.

The conviener said he has to go on what the ref reported.. The guy was trying to "protected himself" and was not assest a gross misconduct. How can a ref who witnesses this not make sure this guy is tossed from the league? G-d forbit something sever happened and i passed out or worse....

I am so infuriated with how this ended. I want to go back out and punch the guys head off. That being said, i wont actually do that. I want to do something about this incident because i know that this isn't the first time this has happened and unfortunately this wont be the last.

[Law Goalie 147]

What league was this?

Some of the DTHL refs are pretty lenient about 'fencing off' and having a good scrum after the play, but I've never seen a deliberate cross-check anywhere near the neck or head go without an ejection.

Did you mention the confusion between the two refs to the league? Presumably the ref who issued the game report was the same one who thought it would be a good idea to try to move a player who had suffered a neck injury; I wonder what the league's insurance provider would say about that.

[raganblink 82]

people dont really care anymore abiut intent to injure in rec leagues. there was a game where this guy constantly was slashing my stick, and i was pissed about it so i said "hey asshole stop slashing me", apparently this is grounds to go after someone. I stole puck away from him and went behind net carrying puck, and then i get slashed between the neck and the numbers and go down. I'm down for like 3 minutes and i finally can get up, i was injured for two weeks. Funniest damn thing; i got two minutes because when i got hit i said "WTF is your problem asshole?". He wasn't going to get anything, than one ref finally said, you're out of game, intent to injure. The other team was like WTF that isn't even a penalty for what he did, you can't throw him out. Anyways, he got suspended for one game. I missed a week. We came back at the same time....totally not right.

IMO, intent to injure, in any league, deserves a 20 game minimum suspension, and then every game that injured player is out, carries over to their suspension. So, Avery Intent to injures Crosby, Crosby out for 8 games because of injury, Avery suspended 28 games.

[fawn111 0]

I'd go directly to the manager of the League, or the owner of the rink.

Incidents like that are terible for their business and if they have even the least bit of integrity they will take appropriate action. Problem is is that it;s tough to tell a guy that he paid $300-$500 for the season that he is suspended for the duration of it. Maybe they can give him a partial refund.

Point is is that if incidents like that happen they will eventually see a drop in players, or even worse an escalation of retaliation and then they will realy have a problem on their hands.

[automorph 0]

some leagues dont care what you do......(ahem cough ASHL) they see players as $$$..... also late games refs just want to go home or if they call majors there is alot of paperwork involved

[hyprlte 0]

it happened in the Pavilion hockey league, just north of toronto.

Apparently this ref (the one who told me to get up) was the only one who saw the crosscheck. This ref has gotten numerous complaints from this team about how he treats the games i.e. very lazy, even insults the team, and overall is unprofessional.

I want to threaten legal action because I dont need to worry about some idiot going after my throat in a low level league. I dont know how far it would go though or what i would have to do.

The manager told me the situation sucks but he cannot warrant more than a 5 game suspension because he was "defenting himself" and he MUST go with what the refs report. This guy was 5'8 max and im 6'2. Clearly an upward crosscheck cannot be called "defence"

[eric42434224 1]

Had an adult game Sunday against a hyper aggressive and chippy team. They were the team that was a beginner team that never won, and since them have brought in ringers and now think they are great. This was our second meeting, and we already beat them once. We were beating them again, but it was very chippy. Pushing, shoving, slashing, cross checking, mild fights.

Then one of the refs in another game gets injured and one of our refs left to cover, leaving the one ref. Then things started to get really out of hand....the look of fear on that refs face as he realized it was probably a bad idea to do this particular game alone...priceless.

[sickwilly 37]

Perhaps you could check with the manager to see if there is a protocol for repeat offenders. Maybe if this guy pulls any more BS like this, he could get booted for a lot longer. If there isn't a rule like this set up for your league, maybe some of the team reps and the rink staff could get together and come up with something to deal with this situation (or situations like this) in the future. It's not like it hasn't happened before or won't happen again.

It'd be tempting to flatten him with a clean hit, but I think that would only make matters worse with that kind of player.

Our league made some rules to deal with crap like this and it has helped quite a bit. They even started charging a fine (40 bucks) to reinstate guys after a suspension for fighting .... It seems like the 40 bucks may be stopping some of the real boneheads more than the suspensions did.

[hyprlte 0]

Perhaps you could check with the manager to see if there is a protocol for repeat offenders. Maybe if this guy pulls any more BS like this, he could get booted for a lot longer. If there isn't a rule like this set up for your league, maybe some of the team reps and the rink staff could get together and come up with something to deal with this situation (or situations like this) in the future. It's not like it hasn't happened before or won't happen again.

It'd be tempting to flatten him with a clean hit, but I think that would only make matters worse with that kind of player.

Our league made some rules to deal with crap like this and it has helped quite a bit. They even started charging a fine (40 bucks) to reinstate guys after a suspension for fighting .... It seems like the 40 bucks may be stopping some of the real boneheads more than the suspensions did.

i would plan on hitting him, but apparently he has been suspended for the remainder of the games when his team faces ours. Overall ive been very disappointed with the outcome of this situation. Extremely unprofessional and dangerous. Id also like to see that ref tossed from the league. How can you not call a crosscheck to the throat not a deliberate attempt to injure??

[furlanitalia 1]

The mindset in Men's league is very upsetting. I play in a higher division where things get competitive but to me it is all about having fun still. When players start using their sticks and bodies over aggressively that's one thing, but they better be able to take it.

Once last year I had a player run into me, fall over, and proceed to try and fight me with three punches to my head. Also been elbowed in the face, and as I fell on my back my skates hit the player in front of me who tried to attack me because I tried to slew foot him. Then there was the opposite where a player tried to slew foot me and because he had tied my arm up and and fell back with my arm up, he tried to fight me because I "elbowed him in the face". Just morons out there sometimes.

[raganblink 82]

The mindset in Men's league is very upsetting. I play in a higher division where things get competitive but to me it is all about having fun still. When players start using their sticks and bodies over aggressively that's one thing, but they better be able to take it.

Once last year I had a player run into me, fall over, and proceed to try and fight me with three punches to my head. Also been elbowed in the face, and as I fell on my back my skates hit the player in front of me who tried to attack me because I tried to slew foot him. Then there was the opposite where a player tried to slew foot me and because he had tied my arm up and and fell back with my arm up, he tried to fight me because I "elbowed him in the face". Just morons out there sometimes.

I play high level too.... most of them still think they are playing in their glory days, HS or if they were really good, they made it to single A. :P

[furlanitalia 1]

The best was the game earlier this week when one guy asked me to fight (was dangling his mitts at the faceoff). We're winning 6-4, and they were being moved down two divisions after the game. But yah, a lot of guys still think it is junior hockey where their tough guy role still applies.

[hyprlte 0]

i actually find that in my higher divisions there is no crap. Everybody's good enough to be there and its fast and clean.

[B-Nads 0]

Me too - I am probably one of the weaker players in our upper level, but the lower levels I've played in the last few years were just too dirty...intentionally and unintentionally. There are some @ssholes in there who think it's a good idea to try and decapitate people who take the puck from them, and there are the guys who couldn't avoid a collision if their lives depended on it, and don't knwo any better but to control their sticks. The last straw for me was a friendly game where me and two defensement were sparring off a little in front of the net (the goalie had just covered up). One of the D-men and the goalie were friends of mine and we were foolin' around more than anything. All the sudden, some idiot comes crashing into my back, sending me sprawling into the crossbar face-first and then down on top of the goalie. Me and the goalie get up and look for the guy (I think the goalie wanted him more than me if possible), but he had mosied on back to his bench. I narrowly missed loosing all of my teeth and possibly worse, the goalie hurt his knee, and the guy got off scott-free. I played against him in a ball game the summer after - he appologized, but he finished the full hockey season.

What this guy did to you is completely classless and reckless - he should have been kicked out of the league.

[Blueandgold26 1]

If I were you I would go to the league management and explain your points. A crosscheck to the throat is definetley somthing that deserves a year suspension or more it could easily kill somone if done hard enough.

[Machinehead2k5 32]

Last season I got tangled up with a player who hipchecked me into the boards (it's a non-check league) and I fell down to the ice and he was on the ice as well. As he was getting up and I was getting up our feet got tangled together and i fell back down. He apparently thought I was trying to slew foot him and he proceeded to punt me in the ribs with his skate. The refs saw this and gave him a match penalty (30 days pending board review).

The board reviewed the case and he was suspended from the league permanently and can reapply for reinstatement in 5 years after another board meeting.

[furlanitalia 1]

Just remembered another incident from my summer league: We were slaughtering a fairly dirty team who was just brutal (not running up the score but just out playing and shooting them) when they decided they'd had enough. Clean checks were now fair game to them to start a fight or throw elbows, and the best part came when their captain skated from our zone to his blueline where our player was floating so that he could kick his feet out. Fastest he'd hustled all game, with his leg beginning to wind up at centre ice. Never seen anything like it. Ref's were oblivious to it all so that didn't help one bit.

[farhanshak 1]

hmmmm automorph ASHL hasnt been to kind to me either. the refs pretty much suck in that league.

perfect example, we only had 5 guys and a goalie show up, the other team was stacked and should have been playing B or maybe even A (this was C, i wanted some extra ice time so signed up low). ref says play on 5 guys can do. so we played against the other team who had 15 guys.

one guy on the other team starts lining up guys for hip checks at center ice. caught 2 of our players, we let it go, ref didnt call anything .

then as i am skating out the zone with the puck(playing D) i feel a hook to slow me down, right as i skated out of the hook and looked up, one of thier D men was coming at me full speed, lunged himself and took out his own player as i ducked out of the way (guy hooking me had his head down)NO CALL!!!! WTF!!! guy hooking me crawled to the bench.

then later on in the game, the other guy who was hip checking everyone, tries to line me up , second i got close to him and he put his hip out, i stopped, dropped my gloves, and proceeded to kick the crap out of him :D

i didnt get a suspension, league manager saw everything, but refused to suspend anyone. this is a "non contact league" people.

but yah needless to say, ASHL sucks ballz.

also, ive been cross checked head first into the boards (boarding/hit from behind) during a power skating scrimmage at....ASHL

honestly man, talk to the league manager, and if you can afford to pursue legal action, DO IT!!!

i am sure once insurance finds out what the refs let fly, they wont be too happy with the league as another member here said.

hope everything works out for you and that you made a full recovery.

ive seen alot of fights break out at mens league including all out line brawls where even fans have gotten involved (family), there used to be one almost every week. its always one idiot who starts it and he is usually the idiot who doesnt belong in mens league and should have been kicked out along time ago.

[Law Goalie 147]

You don't need to threaten anything other than a letter to the insurance company.

Find out who the provider, and what your league's policy number and policy rep are; draft a letter detailing the level of officiating and league-imposed discipline as it relates to your injury, as a 'concerned player', and forward the draft to the league manager asking him if there's anything he'd like to add before you send it off.

You don't need to be argumentative, just explain clearly and simply what happened, and why it concerns you. Odds are the commissioner will shit a brick, figure out how much his insurance could go up, and do what he should have: fire the ref and ban the player, because they're both enormous financial liabilities. Right now, those two guys are worth more to the league than you are: as players, you both pay the same fees, and the ref's cheap, keeps the games on time, and keeps his mouth shut. Make them worth less, you win.

I completely agree about this kind of crap not happening as frequently at higher levels. Apart from greater parity and respect for the game itself, really good hockey players know how to fuck you up bad. You don't get chippy in a strong game and escape unscathed yourself: mutually-assured destruction.

[automorph 0]

wow suprisingly this happened at Pavallion League, they were always stressing "clean fun hockey"

I played in that league for a summer, wasnt bad and wasnt even close to ashl dirty

Does Art still run that league?

[nickyb13 9]

Our game last week the same guy speared me in the chest and then proceded to hit one of my teammates in the side of his head with the blade of his stick... he got a game suspension from the league and his team suspended him for 3 games

[BlackIce 1]

Wow, that's crazy. This type of thing needs to be stopped before people really get hurt. I find that this crap is the result of bad refs who can't take control of the game. You definitely need to write a letter to the commissioner of the league. Unfortunately when some guys take to the ice they take on the personality of a goon.

[RecLeagueHero 0]

The truth of the matter is 90% of beer league refs are just there to get their 40 bucks a game and try to do it with the least amount of hassel possible. The only way an insurance provider is going to be interested is if you can demonstrate a pattern of non-action on dangerous play that would actually create legal liability. The league took action, a five game suspension is action. I'll certainly agree with you that in the context provided it should have been treated more seriously. But that's from a player's point of view, and not one of what constitutes legally reasonable action.

Reason 87,461 why I stay clear of beer league hockey.

[yrhmblnr8r 69]

I play C1 at a rink with A (guys with junior, college, semi-pro and pro hockey experience), B1-4, C1-C6.5, D1-2 (benders), and O40 leagues.

The suspension list is online and it always seems to skew towards the upper and lower levels. Four games into the current season there are 3 suspensions in B1, 1 in C2, 7 in C4 or lower.

I've seen high-level guys playing like they think they should be in the show. The attitude is almost like they're above this. The guys in the low-level leagues play like they see on TV (minus the skills) and think dropping the gloves is a part of the game.

Any time I've played in a lower level game the hacking and stickwork has been more pronounced. This guy in your game took it to a whole other level, but I'm not surprised that this happened in a lower-level game.

[furlanitalia 1]

I've seen high-level guys playing like they think they should be in the show. The attitude is almost like they're above this. The guys in the low-level leagues play like they see on TV (minus the skills) and think dropping the gloves is a part of the game.

That's the problem, they think they're better then everyone else so when they get checked they get overly upset about it and throw a hissy fit. Sad to see.