The Washington vs Rangers incident began when Tom Wilson found himself in a scrum, kneeling over Pavel Buchnevich. Wilson punched Buchnevich while he was face down on the ice. The punch was to the shoulder, but in real time looked a lot like a sucker punch to the head. When this happened, Buchnevich's teammate, Artemi Panarin, jumped on Wilson's back to pull him off. This is what any good teammate would do. Imagine someone sucker punching your friend while they were face down on the ground and you were two feet away.
Wilson, who is one of the toughest players in the league today, engaged Panarin. A wrestling match ensued which would not be catagorized as a hockey fight. A hockey fight involves the dropping of gloves and that didn't happen. What did happen, though, was Wilson mauled Panarin, slamming him to the ice violently. Panarin was injured in the incident and will miss the rest of the Rangers' games this season, which at the time was only three. He narrowly avoided having his head, which was not protected by his helmet as it had fallen off, slam into the ice.
Tom Wilson was fined $5,000 for his part in this incident. The only player to be disciplined beyond a simple in-game penalty. However, many thought that Wilson should receive a suspension based on several factors.
- Wilson is a repeat offender having been suspended five times previously
- This was not a hockey play, this was after the play was dead
- Wilson, who has reputation for being a thug, should have showed some restraint
- Panarin was hurt in the incident
Now, if it had been another player, the fine is probably enough. If that's Ovechkin that does that, you can fine the player and it's probably going to be okay. But, Tom Wilson is the biggest thug in the NHL today, with a long history of going over the line. If Panarin hits his head on the ice and misses a month, or a year, or dies, Wilson is gone indefinitely, and the leauge has a PR nightmare (they still do) on their hands.
There's also this to consider. The Rangers watched one of their players who is not a fighter or even in the ballpark of tough, get manhandled by one of the toughest players in the league, suffer an injury, and the league fined Tom Wilson the equivalent of you or I being fined $1. If they don't react, it's a bad look on them.
Being that we're in the middle of a weird NHL season, many teams play each other two or three times in a row to restrict travel. The Rangers and Capitals were scheduled to play again two nights later. When the puck dropped, three fights broke out instantly. Before the halfway point of the first period was reached, there had been six fights. Pavel Buchnevich crosschecked a player in the face with his stick and got a 1 game suspension. Tom Wilson fought, as is customary after you take out someone's star player. Casual fans and those who don't know anything about hockey took to social media to express the disgust. They are the ones who will eventually get fighting taken out of the game, and it's on the NHL to avoid giving them more shots at it than is necessary. The NHL failed to protect not only Panarin, but also itself.
Try this scenario. After the initial scrum where Wilson manhandles Panarin, he gets a one-game suspension. Tom Wilson misses the next game, which was again the Capitals versus the Rangers. There is no Tom Wilson to get revenge on, and Tom Wilson doesn't meet the Rangers again until next season. Do we still have six fights? Almost certainly not. What happens is Tom Wilson has to fight someone next season to answer for this, and then it's over. A one-game suspension and the league avoids loads of negative attention. A one-game suspension to a player who has been suspended five times, once for 20 games. Hell, he was suspended for seven games this year!
Bad situations happen in hockey, and generally hockey players will sort things out between each other. The thing is, the degree of response depends entirely on the league. If the league acts appropriately teams won't feel the need send such a strong message. The brawl between the Rangers and Capitals wasn't because Tom Wilson was acting like Tom Wilson, it was because the Rangers were attacked, the league failed to properly respond, and they were left with no option but to take matters into their own hands.
