What punishment did Stars’ Mason Marchment deserve for tapping official with his stick?
During Game 3 of the Stanley Cup playoffs matchup between the Dallas Stars and Winnipeg Jets, Stars’ forward Mason Marchment tapped an official with his stick following a missed call that had Marchment emotional.
Today on Daily Faceoff Live, Frank Seravalli and Tyler Yaremchuk discuss whether Marchment should receive punishment for abuse of an official.
Tyler Yaremchuk: What is the proper discipline in hockey? Will Mason Marchment avoid discipline? Graham Skilliter is saying that his slash wasn’t quite an abuse of an official. What do you make of this whole mess? Can you shed some light on why Marchment isn’t getting suspended for this?
Frank Seravalli: I really can’t, because I think it deserves one, but I think there’s also this part where the NHL needs to figure out, what is the proper scale here? It can’t just be 10 games for abuse of an official or nothing. I think that this is worthy of one game. You’re frustrated, you’re angry, you think that you missed it all. Tapping him on the shin pad as lightly as it is, the officials shouldn’t be contacted in any way. I think both Mason Marchment and you see Tomas Hertl over the weekend as well, with his slash crosscheck to the face, whatever you want to call it, ridiculous attack on the bench that ends up walloping their trainer in Vegas in the head with a stick is unacceptable. You guys are professionals. I know that emotions and tensions run high in the playoffs and there’s a lot on the line, but grow up. You’re supposed to also set an example, and I think the tough part for watching uh, you know, NHL coaches get fined repeatedly $25,000 for berating officials, this to be goes to another level than that, but it always seems like the NHL reserves the hammer for people that they can control, like coaches.
Frank Seravalli: They don’t have the same control over players, and I think they should. I don’t know why they seem to defer. Oh, what happens if the NHLPA gets involved? I think both of those states are ugly marks, and we shouldn’t be seeing stuff like that.
Tyler Yaremchuk: Yeah, and I like the comment we got here from Josh, who says, you’re opening officials to more of this and like it or not, you can’t have unprotected people out there getting abused. That’s the thing. Like, even Graham Skillite going, “No, it wasn’t all that bad, whatever”. But now all you’re doing is putting the next official who’s in that spot in a terrible spot, cause they’re gonna sit there and be like, “Okay, am I gonna look soft? If I say this is bad?”