Intent?

[Rylant]

With the recent Lucic ruling, I would like to ask what people think about Shannahan taking "intent" into consideration when deciding on suspensions. My thoughts are, this isn't a court of law and it is very difficult to prove or disprove "intent". Unless it is a McSorley on Brashear or Bertuzzi on Moore type of incident, how can Shannahan think that he might be able to figure out the offender's intent?

Aren't there more reliable things to take into consideration? How blatant was the infraction? Is there a past history of suspensions? Was there an injury sustained on the play?

So far I have been exceptionally impressed with Shannahan's hard-nosed approach, but the Lucic ruling took him down a notch for me. I think that he needs to leave "intent" out of it unless it is blatantly obvious. Oh, and as far as asking the offender what the intent was? That is ridiculous...

Rylant

[Ross The Boss Palmer]

I don't like it. It's like saying "I didn't intend to crash my car, I just wasn't paying attention and drove it into the ditch".

[bigbabybuda]

Scott Stevens say's what

[Bomm Bastic]

'd like to answer that question with another, if I may. In all of Shanahan's video explanations re player suspensions, are there any in which he states his justification of additional punishment is in-part based on him not liking a players explanation?

[Flyer Fan]

The biggest problem I have with including "intent" in the decision making process is that in the absence of a confession, it's pretty much unprovable by the video evidence by anything short of the player turning towards the camera and winking before he commits the infraction.

It ALWAYS involves some form of projection.

I think it would make more sense to assume that the intention WAS there, and use the player statements and video to attempt to disprove it.

I know, it's a "guilty until proven innocent" statement, ...but realistically these are the best players in the world, If I have to make a projection or assumption, I think it's more reasonable to assume that they were in control of their actions than it is to assume that they weren't.

In a beer league, it's a different story, ...but at the NHL level, I have a much harder time believing that a player didn't know where he was on the ice, or that he was unable to react in time.

But either way, it's still comes down to an assumption or a projection of intent.

IMHO maybe a better a solution is to make the intent semi-irrelevent, and focus instead on the results and the outcome.

Still not perfect, but it seems counter-productive to purposely disconnect from the reality of whether or not an injury occurred when determining the appropriate length of a suspension.

Not saying that an injury should be the cause of the suspension, just that it should be a major factor in determining length once one is warranted.

Likewise, the absence of an injury occurring shouldn't be used to minimize a suspensions length, (I'm saying Kronwell's returning for the second period doesn't make Stewart's play any less dangerous, ...but Kronwell's having suffered an injury on the play would warrant a more severe suspension, and the more serious the injury, the lengthier the suspension)

But getting back to your orignal question the determination of intent is just too subjective/elusive to be given considerable weight one way or the other.

It just serves to further muddy what are already some pretty murky waters.

[VintageVibe]

Can't wait to hear what Cherry has to say about this. If I remember correctly he has already thrown a montage together of "unintended" hits to the head that were clearly intentional (Steckel on Crosby, Neil on whoever, etc.)... intent was clearly on Lucic's mind with this one.

[Ballsakic]

Shanny better get used to the abuse .

[Flyer Fan]

Shanny better get used to the abuse .

Shanny can stop the abuse anytime he wants by making a simply adding the phrase:

"...but, perhaps you'ld pefer to hear Colin Campbell's thoughts on this matter?"

to the end of each statement.

[ericdaoust]

I find it odd that people pick their spots when saying they can or cannot judge someone's intent.

Example: Lucic - runs over Miller, some people have said you can't prove intent.

But in other incidents (Sutton, Rome, etc) they can prove intent?

[Loch]

Intent is easy to prove...

If you're camping and it starts to rain do you:

... stay dry? In tent
or
... get wet? No in tent

I swear this is not rocket science kids...


(Edit: Say the 'no in tent' with using the voice of Consuela the maid from Family Guy... )

[ericdaoust]

Intent is easy to prove...

If you're camping and it starts to rain do you:

... stay dry? In tent
or
... get wet? No in tent

I swear this is not rocket science kids...

Wow you just solved the mystery!