NHL fans call for consistency, believe officials are enabling dangerous play

Hockey fans are calling on the NHL to enforce consistent standards after Auston Matthews two-game suspension appeared out of step with how the Department of Player Safety has been enforcing off-ice rulings this season. On the latest episode of In the Mentions, Omar says that players and teams are being putting in difficult and dangerous positions when officiating and penalty calling isn't consistent.

Video Transcript

- Players and organizations and fans don't know what is a suspension and what isn't a suspension. Like everyone says, yeah, spinning the wheel. That's not a joke. It literally seems like as if any time something happens, a wheel is spun, and they cover their eyes and decide what the games are going to be. And that makes the game dangerous, when players don't know what they can and can't do.

You watch the Leafs play and you watch officiating, watch things take place, and then nothing is called. Going back to the Matthews incident-- yes, Matthews cross-checked Rasmus Dahlin in the neck. He should have gotten suspended. I watched the play. Full-on suspension. Rasmus Dahlin cross-checks him about two times beforehand, and you see the ref in the corner watching it. It is not until Matthews does what he does-- that's when the arm goes up.

Granted, fair. Absolutely call that. But if you call the cross-check on Dahlin, if you stop that from happening, does the play escalate? I don't think so.

Let's rewind the clock. Jason Spezza got suspended for taking a run at Neal Pionk. Absolutely should have been-- this should have been suspended. It was violent. It was a revenge hit. It was anger-fueled. There was intent to injure, 100%. Now, if Neal Pionk is called for kneeing before on Rasmus Sandin, does that happen?

I don't think so, because Jason Spezza was mad because the penalty wasn't called. So if you call that penalty, then things don't escalate. It's what people talk about all the time. Are we letting refs take control of the game, or are we going to put the teams in positions where they have to do it themselves? But don't call the Leafs soft and then when the Leafs do something to stand up for themselves, now we're whining.

No one's whining about the suspension. No one's whining that Matthews was the one who got nabbed. No one is saying, like, oh, well, now Matthews can't score his goals or win his Hart Trophy because of the suspension. No one is saying that. Or at least I'm not saying that. And from what I've seen on Twitter, a lot of you aren't saying that as well.

What we're seeing-- saying is that there is an issue in consistency. So, hopefully, what happens now is that this Matthews two-game suspension for cross-checking a player in the head and neck region-- make that the standard.

If I watch a game next week between Calgary and Arizona, and a player on Arizona cross-checks a player in the head and neck region, that should be a two-game suspension. And if it's not, then we're back to square one where we're literally spinning the wheel and no one knows what to do. That's all we're asking.

And if you're not a Leafs fan, just try to-- this applies to you as well because down the line, you will have a player who will do something. And then they'll get suspended, and then you'll think of all the evidence of another player that was not suspended. That's all we're asking. All we're asking is for a standard, for a level of consistency, because that makes the game safe, and that makes the game watchable.

It's frustrating to watch a game up until the third period and overtime, and the refs just decide, OK, cool, anything's allowed. Like, what are we doing here? If you're not going to have the refs talk and explain the decisions of calling something or not calling something, just make a standard.

And every year, the league says, oh, we're going to crunch down on this. Hey, we're going to crunch down on slashing. We're going to crunch down on tripping. Hey, this year, they're apparently crunching down on cross-checks. You could have fooled me.