Get ready for a Malkin suspension

[Moses]

He changed his body position and leaned into Oshie's head. He saw him coming and took advantage of the angle and off-balance approach of Oshie.

Let me watch this again...

EDIT:

Watched it again... Oshie would have run into Malkin. I'm not saying Malkin didn't lean into him, but if someone is going to run into you.. what do you do? Oshie could have gone anywhere after Malkin passed the puck. He went straight into Malkin. Malkin knew exactly what he was doing, but I don't see him getting suspended over this one.

[agentzero]

Let me watch this again...

You can see it at 0:38 of the clip you posted, but it's missing one replay where the camera is facing Malkin's face as Oshie approaches, which they showed on the broadcast. He glances over at Oshie and then literally decides to smoke him in the head. You can actually see his eyes and body deciding.

[VincentVega]

I would be shocked if this is a suspension. Oshie skates into Malkin. Yes, Malkin lowers his shoulder but it's not like he skated into him on purpose. If Oshie had decided to avoid the impact, he could easily have done so.

[agentzero]

I would be shocked if this is a suspension. Oshie skates into Malkin. Yes, Malkin lowers his shoulder but it's not like he skated into him on purpose. If Oshie had decided to avoid the impact, he could easily have done so.

Just like Malkin, who saw Oshie coming and decided to lower his shoulder to hit his head.

Look, hockey is a contact sport and collisions happen, I agree with you there.. but contact in hockey is only legal if used to separate the puck carrier from the puck. This is not one of those moments, since Malkin has the puck. Oshie isn't trying to hit Malkin; his angle and balance definitely don't point to that. Malkin took advantage.

Just calling it how I see it, as are all of us of course.

[The Comish]

I watched as many videos of this as I could find and I can't see a suspension for this. Don't forget, Oshie likes to be a hitter, he's averaged 124 hits per 82 games over the 10 years hits have been recorded. Malkin literally just dished the puck and was maybe thinking Oshie was going to hit him (a little late?). Bracing for impact and being much taller than the 5-11 Oshie shouldn't net Malkin a suspension. Garbage if it does. The good news for Oshie fans is that he scored the winner with less than 2 minutes left in regulation.

[Bomm Bastic]

It was ****ing terrible. You can actually see Malkin look at Oshie and then he throws the elbow/shoulder into his head. What a dick. Malkin is crushing it for me in my main league too. Hope Oshie is ok. I like Gino as a player, but he did not have to hit Oshie like that. It wasn't as if Oshie was coming in to smash Gino there. I actually think he was trying to go behind him to get to the man on the puck. Terrible play and I think that he does deserve some sort of suspension. Its dirty.

Me too.

Not the headline I wanted to read this morning.

[Godin]

That's not going to be a suspension. Malkin looked like he braced himself for a hit from Oshie. No previous suspension history plus no clear dirty play = no suspension.

Agree.

[Eskimo Brother]

Here's my logic on the one game:
-Oshie was the one who went to initiate contact.
-Malkin braced himself (and is also just taller than Oshie).
-Where the script flips, is from the fact Malkin leans up into Oshie, and not down in a bracing position.
-Malkin not really a repeat offender.

Head contact like that is almost always a game now. But based on the rest of it, it seems like it won't be more.

[Godin]

I agree with AZ. I think it was intentional and predatoryon a player who was looking to go behind him.

I don't think so AW. Hard to call it predatory when he had just made a pass literally 1 second earlier. It was reactionary and I believe 100% of players would have done the same thing with the result varying due to size difference. In this case, the side of Malkin's elbow hit Oshies chest. The only reason it looked as bad as it did was because of the size difference and Oshie's reaction. He over reacted, just a little bit.

I find that this is getting so ridiculous, but unfortunately, it is a sign of the times. Seems like every hit, every close offside, every goal that was scored with an opposing player near the crease, every goal deflected where a stick was higher than the waist, etc, etc, etc.....has to be broken down by 1/1000th of a second. Why do we need 4 officials on the ice anymore? Let's just use video review for whether or not the puck crossed the line or get rid of 2 officials and make more room on the ice surface. Seriously!

[2014olympicgold]

I was listening on XM radio (broadcasts home team's broadcast) and they were so emotional about the hit that it sounded like he took his head off. I got home and watched the play...I think they might have even given him too much during the game.

Just because Malkin is solid and taller and wanted to not get hit to the ice (tenses up, leans into an oncoming hit) doesn't mean what he did was dirty. Whatever happened on the ice was more than enough. If he's suspended that's overkill.

Also Malkin is a star...they don't suspended stars too often.

[Pengwin7]

Man... replies are all across the spectrum on this one.
I was watching the game live - and watched the highlights they showed following.

I think the middle-of-all-opinions is probably the right eval.
1. Was it intentional? Yes. Malkin definitely saw him coming. He definitely leaned & raised his elbow into Oshie. It's about as much close-range impact as one can make. All Malkin had to work with was his shoulder/elbow - which did happen to be at the same height as Oshie's forward closing head. The speed of Oshie closing on Malkin made this bad. Pretty much a cyclist who swerves a bit into traffic and gets clipped by a truck. Is the truck driver in trouble - um, yes? Could it have been avoided by the cyclicst - well, probably yes, too.
2. Does it deserve a suspension? No/maybe. I don't think it was bad. Malkin wasn't coming after Oshie, rather it was vice-versa. The refs did throw Malkin out in a tight 1-1 game. I think that rest-of-game and 5min (!!!) penalty was a huge loss for PIT. They basically lost a full 1pt, maybe 2pts, because of this.

I could see it being no suspension... maybe 1-game if the league simply wants to make a point about headshots.
Actually, I think he'll get 1-game because "head shots" are such a crackdown these days.

The league doesn't want to come under scrutiny of:
a) Not penalizing a star BECAUSE he's a star
b) Not attending seriously to head shots.

But... the hit was definitely mid-way between OK and dirty... whatever the in-between of that range is.
I think anybody arguing that it was OK and anybody arguing that it was dirty are both kind of wrong.

[saucelife90]

How soft have we gotten as a league and society that anyone could argue this is dirty/suspendable.

BUT HIS EYES! HE LOOKED AT HIM!

Lets just take all contact out of hockey. If you touch another player AT ALL, suspended! Look at them wrong, 2 minutes for instigating.

[niconasr]

Man... replies are all across the spectrum on this one.
I was watching the game live - and watched the highlights they showed following.

I think the middle-of-all-opinions is probably the right eval.
1. Was it intentional? Yes. Malkin definitely saw him coming. He definitely leaned & raised his elbow into Oshie. It's about as much close-range impact as one can make. All Malkin had to work with was his shoulder/elbow - which did happen to be at the same height as Oshie's forward closing head. The speed of Oshie closing on Malkin made this bad. Pretty much a cyclist who swerves a bit into traffic and gets clipped by a truck. Is the truck driver in trouble - um, yes? Could it have been avoided by the cyclicst - well, probably yes, too.
2. Does it deserve a suspension? No/maybe. I don't think it was bad. Malkin wasn't coming after Oshie, rather it was vice-versa. The refs did throw Malkin out in a tight 1-1 game. I think that rest-of-game and 5min (!!!) penalty was a huge loss for PIT. They basically lost a full 1pt, maybe 2pts, because of this.

I could see it being no suspension... maybe 1-game if the league simply wants to make a point about headshots.
Actually, I think he'll get 1-game because "head shots" are such a crackdown these days.

The league doesn't want to come under scrutiny of:
a) Not penalizing a star BECAUSE he's a star
b) Not attending seriously to head shots.

But... the hit was definitely mid-way between OK and dirty... whatever the in-between of that range is.
I think anybody arguing that it was OK and anybody arguing that it was dirty are both kind of wrong.

This sums it up nicely. I agree with this. I don't mind a suspension but I also believe 5 and a game is already a pretty good punishment.

Didn't like the hit but it wasn't as vicious as many others we've seen.

[Brosive]

I can't see this being a suspension. Especially with that fact that Malkin already received a 5 and a game.
For those that are saying Malkin intended to hit Oshie in the head is ridiculous. Oshie was skating towards him, Malkin just finished passing off the puck and was getting ready for contact all within 1-2 seconds.
Of course he would brace and react before contact was made, who wouldn't. It's unfortunate that most of the contact ended up being towards Oshie's head (mostly because of the size difference), but this was not a vicious intent. The penalties that were already handed out are enough in my eyes.

[mounD]

I'm thinking he could probably get a single game suspension, just so the league can make its statement against head contact. Anything beyond that would surprise me. Malkin is a star player, no history, he didn't initiate the contact, there's a distinct height advantage, etc.