Continuing adventures of Tim Peel, Terrible NHL Referee

Tim Peel is a National Hockey League official. He’s abjectly terrible. Let’s find out what he’s been up to, shall we?

San Jose Sharks at Anaheim Ducks, Oct. 26, 2014

As you’re no doubt aware, the National Hockey League is taking an aggressive stance against diving and embellishment this season, seeking to curb this scourge on the game’s integrity.

Perhaps feeling that the NHL rules don’t go far enough to prevent diving, referee/vigilante Tim Peel decided to apply his own unique brand of embellishment prevention to Anaheim Ducks defenseman Sami Vatanen on Sunday night in a against the Sharks.

It’s really a game-changer, people: Calling diving penalties on players that haven’t taken a dive.

Here’s the amazing true story of Sami Vatanen’s phantom dive and the eagle-eyed Tim Peel’s decision to conjure it into reality:

God, this is so great.

It begins with Tim Peel’s microphone malfunctioning as he announces a blown call, if symbolism’s your thing.

The Ducks announcers remind fans that these plays happen fast, in real time, and that although the replays reveal the crime we’re always left to wonder how “players can be so aggressive with their stick.”

And then they notice Sami Vatanen is discussing the penalty with Tim Peel, leading to the announcers’ awestruck “are they giving him an embellishment penalty?” lament.

Bruce Boudreau noticed this too.

He wasn’t happy.

Super angry.

Super mega angry.

Like, he went the full Angry Chipmunk.

And we thought that part where he started brandishing a giant cartoon telescope to mock Peel’s vision wasn’t cool.

Marc-Edouard Vlasic scored on the ensuing 4-on-4 to give the Sharks a 3-0 lead.

Otherwise, Tim Peel and his crew called a stellar game. Oh wait no actually they lost control 2:16 into the first period and the game ended up with a combined 165 penalty minutes and six game misconducts.

But hey, that’s the sidebar to the main story, which is that Tim Peel has apparently developed some sort of “Minority Report”-like pre-crime technology, because the only logical reason for calling a dive on Vatanen here was that he was penalizing some dive that happens in some other game in the future, because it sure as hell didn’t happen Sunday against the Sharks.

This one gets the coveted four Mario Kart peels:

Vancouver Canucks at Dallas Stars, Oct. 21, 2014

Dallas got a Peeling in the Stars vs. Canucks game last week.

Alas, there’s not a lot of video evidence, just eyewitness accounts of goalie interference confusion and suspicions of bias and general incompetence.

Perhaps this tweet captures the spirit of the thing:

Is “ass donkey” redundant?

We're going to give this performance two Mario Kart peels, sight unseen.

Vancouver Canucks at Calgary Flames, Oct. 8, 2014

Tim Peel. Helmet cam.

Yes, it happened.

In Peel’s defense, Radim Vrbata’s body blocks him from seeing exactly where his stick strikes the puck to deflect it into the net.

But to the suprirse of no one, the call was overturned.

The NHL War Room correctly ruled that this was a good goal, despite it being waved off on the ice. Which is Tim Peel’s default setting.

But he did look really awesome in that helmet cam.

The helmet alone gets three Mario Kart peels: