The Penguins, hockey and more, by Seth Rorabaugh.
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Penguins forward Tyler Kennedy (right) was suspened by the NHL for one game for his fight with Toronto defenseman Luke Schenn Saturday. Kennedy had the fight during a stoppage and violated Rule 70.2 which states: “A player who has entered the game on a legal line change... who starts an altercation may be subject to discipline ...”
With Kennedy unavailable, the team recalled forward Luca Caputi from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton of the AHL. He has 35 points (13 goals, 22 assists) in 46 games with the AHL Penguins this season and is considered the organization's top prospect. Caputi was the team's fourth-round draft pick in 2007.
EN Says: No one can argue with Kennedy's punishment. Frankly we're surprised it wasn't in the five game range. But this is the same league which suspened Sean Avery six games for simply being a vulgar pig. So trying to make sense its system of justice is a futile pursuit.
We're eager to see Caputi. While he's a modest 6-foot-2, 184 pounds, he plays a power forward's game. He scores goals from in front of the net and isn't afraid to take abuse. He is not a terribly gifted skater.
Caputi will drop the gloves too.
Here's a brawl from his junior days:
(Photo: Oliver Morin/AFP/Getty Images)
I don't have a problem with a one game suspension for Kennedy, clearly the NHL had to do something. On the other hand had Kennedy even posed a threat to Shenn int he fight the suspension might have been longer.
On an unrelated note, I just watched the shoot out between St. Louis and Detroit and the impression I'm left with is that Versus actually wants to drive away viewers. The cameras they showed during the shoot out were horrible and made it unwatchable.
JC65, I watched that myself. Considering Versus is a Comcast property, we should be lucky they didn't switch over to porn during the shootout.
www.post-gazette.com/.../946421-100.stm
1: One game for Kennedy is perfectly fair. The intent of that rule is to prevent a player from charging off the bench and immediately jumping somebody. Kennedy's altercation with Schenn started with just talk, then escalated. The letter of the law calls for a suspension, and a one-game sentence is within the spirit of the incident itself.
2: Can we let the Sean Avery suspension go?! The NFL fined LaMarr Woodley $10K throwing Jason Campell down on his head, and Wes Welker $10K for making a snow angel. Both the NFL and NHL have a problem with capricious and arbitrary punishments, so why the double standard where we complain about football but damn hockey?
Now that Luca's up, I think we're running very short on players here in WBS that have not been summoned for temporary assignments.
It'll be interesting to see, as always, how Luca plays at the top level (provided, of course, he gets a legitimate shot...see Pesonen, Janne), but the question remains...why not a Jeffrey re-summoning? Or perhaps taking back Bissonnette, who was just sent down?
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