The Toronto Maple Leafs lost game 1 of their first round series versus Montreal 2-1 on Thursday night. Yet for a game that featured two of the games most iconic franchises meeting in the playoffs for the first time since 1979, Friday morning’s sports world banter had very little to do with the final score.
That’s because Maple Leafs captain John Tavares suffered a scary concussion when he took an inadvertent knee to the head from Corey Perry with 9:31 remaining in the first period. The injury occurred when Canadiens defenceman Ben Chiarot laid out Tavares at the blue line. Then, while falling to the ice, Corey Perry’s knee made contact square to the Leaf’s captain’s head, resulting in him going in and out of consciousness for the next few minutes as concerned teammates looked on.
We won’t post the highlight of the hit here, because it’s already made the rounds of social media, morning highlight shows and, in a classic case of trying to sell papers via shock value, splattered across the front page of the Toronto Sun & Journal de Montreal:
So instead of talking about the game itself, which by the way was a heck of a hockey game, the water cooler talk the next day circled around two items in particular: 1) Did the papers cross a line putting those images on the front page? And 2) Was it truly necessary for Leaf’s forward Nick Foligno to drop the gloves with Perry to make things right vis a vis the “hockey code”?
If we start with the papers, the answer is simple, no they didn’t have to do what they did. They could have just as easily shown a picture of Tavares giving the thumbs up after being taken off the ice. Unfortunately the slow devolution of certain newspapers into tabloids masquerading as journalism is right on brand with more than a few of Postmedia’s daily publications of late. Instead they elected to roll with the old adage of “nothing sells like sex and violence” and plastered an image of a bleeding, semi-conscious father of two with a tongue in cheek caption for maximum impact.
Same thing with the Journal de Montreal. For a team who every Sportsnet Analyst (including the ones whose entire jobs revolve around covering the Habs) picked to lose the series, one would think you would want to talk about your team earning a hard fought victory. Not a play which ultimately had little to no impact on the outcome of the game itself. Carey Price, fresh off an injury which cost him numerous games down the stretch was brilliant in goal stopping 35 of 36 shots to earn the win. Maybe focus on that rather than the YouTube clickbait style image of a downed player getting kneed in the face. Glad to see “newspapers” are taking pages out of the Jake & Logan Paul marketing playbooks.
Reaction to the front pages was swift and fairly one sided in terms of people condemning the choice of photos the next morning. Ultimately, both publications got exactly what they wanted as “Toronto Sun” and “Journal de Montreal” were both trending on Twitter which likely led to more sales, and further reinforces the logic in using such images in the first place.
But there was another incident in the game which overshadowed anything that would appear on the scoreboard that occurred shortly after Tavares was removed from the game. Perry, who admittedly doesn’t come with a squeaky clean reputation, was forced to answer the bell against Nick Foligno to seemingly “atone for his sins” per the hockey code the very next shift.
For those who may not be familiar with “the code” in hockey, you may be asking yourself why moments after seeing their captain stretchered off the ice with a concussion, Foligno would then immediately want to have a bare knuckle fight, on a hard slippery surface, on 3mm wide blades. And you would be completely justified in asking yourself that. Hell, half the audience who grew up watching old school hockey was asking themselves that same thing.
To his credit, Perry didn’t complain, which he would have had every right to do as anyone watching the injury in real time could see what a bang/bang play it was. There was absolutely zero intent behind it, and Foligno even admitted as much afterwards in a quote to Lance Hornby saying “Our captain is laying on the ice. They would have done the same if [it was] their captain, [The hit] wasn’t malicious. [The fight] takes away any gray [area]. Perry’s a big boy. It just allows everyone to go back and play.” Foligno’s logic is that the fight snaps everyone out of the daze they’re in and reminds them there’s a hockey game still to be played, while making sure there isn’t any silliness later on. And whether you agree with that logic or not, it’s something that’s been groomed into hockey players since their days in Peewee, and likely isn’t going anywhere soon.
Ironically, more than a few fans likely gained more respect for Perry than Foligno following this exchange (perhaps not career wise, but at least under the microscope of last night) as he took his lumps for no other reason than to ensure that both rosters could put the matter behind them. Lost in the shuffle of the injury and the justification for the fight, seems to be that Corey Perry, who has both 3 inches on Foligno and more career fights to his credit, didn’t throw a punch in their exchange. Don’t believe me? Watch for yourself:
Again, you may be asking yourself what the point of the fight was, if one combatant wasn’t planning on actually throwing fists. The answer is actually quite simple. It’s a lose/lose situation for Perry. If he lands a haymaker, or the two even just slip and Foligno hits his head on the ice, suddenly Perry has taken out two Leaf players (albeit inadvertently), and he’s a marked man for the rest of the series. He’s also putting his teammates at risk as Toronto would then be looking for an extra pound of flesh in return. So he has no choice but to let Foligno throw away, try to avoid taking much damage himself, and when the fight has gone an adequate length, go to the ice and be done with it.
Is it stupid? Yes, 100%. However it’s in place because like it or not, it’s the best system available when you’ve got 40 alpha males flying around the ice, hitting each other 17% harder than an All-Pro NFL linebacker on average. If anyone has any better suggestions as to how to “police the game” I’m all ears. If the solution were that simple, even a league that evolves at a glacial pace like the NHL likely would have implemented it by now.
So whether you’re a fan of his game or not, ask anyone who’s ever played with him and they’ll tell you Corey Perry is a world class teammate. And those within the Maple Leafs organization will likely say the same of Foligno in his limited time in a blue and white jersey. They took care of business so that their teams could re-focus on the task at hand. Game 1 is in the books, and hopefully both franchises can get back to playing hockey for Game 2.
Yet for all the mud slinging, debating, and social media engagement that took place last night, the most important tweet of all happened earlier this afternoon:
We’re all hoping for a speedy recovery for John Tavares.
-Kyle Skinner
Twitter: @JKyleSkinner