Blind dart: NHL safety Jets miss another one with Dillon

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This isn't your average old man yelling at a cloud or local reporter wearing a homer hat.

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This is more of a request. Or maybe it's just someone raising their hands in the air, waving a white flag, and yelling “Uncle.”

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One can imagine Brenden Dillon doing just that on Wednesday, when the NHL Department of Player Safety issued a three-game suspension against him for illegally checking Pittsburgh Penguins forward Noel Acciari during Tuesday's 3-0 loss to Winnipeg.

Dillon tries to drop a hard tackle on a guy coming through the neutral zone with his head down. Unfortunately, he missed his shoulder and grabbed his chin.

Acciari has a concussion and nobody wants to see a player hurt.

Dillon has yet to speak on the matter, but he probably didn't expect to walk away from Wednesday's wiretap unscathed.

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But three games with no intention of getting injured?

Last month, the same player safety suspended Arizona's Jason Zucker for three games, except for a hit that happened in front of him.

Moments later, Zucker was strong in numbers, and Nick Cousins ​​was up against the boards as he responded. Brutal scrutiny followed.

By all accounts, the hit was several times worse than Dillon's hit on Tuesday. Dillon's shot was fouled. Are you careless? Certainly. Zucker, on the other hand, seems born out of anger.

Both players, who have no history of suspensions, received the same punishment.

Why?

This is a great question with no reasonable way to find an answer.

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The head of player safety and former NHL defenseman George Parros (who once sold a line of hockey apparel—Mr. Violent, including a MAGA-themed hat with the slogan)—can't be called. Make hockey violent again).

The videos produced by the department should make a statement.

They sometimes miss the mark, like Dillon's shot.

This is the problem with journalists trying to explain controversial refereeing decisions.

Simply put, we can't.

This leaves very little faith in a system designed to protect players from gross acts of violence or to absolve them, partially or fully, of any wrongdoing.

The players are in the dark, as are the journalists.

And it's not just that they don't understand the decisions themselves, but some of the elements that led them to listen.

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One former player told me on Wednesday that the game was so fast that the players had no choice but to keep their heads up.

They said that they could not expect to fly through the neutral zone without the ability to communicate.

While that player agreed that Dillon should own his part of the deal, namely the head contact, they didn't blame him for trying to make a “hard, clean check.”

Besides, they thought none of this would happen if Acciari turned his head.

They also added that everyone should know when certain physical players are on the ice.

Dillon is known for his physicality, the player said. A lot of people think of it as a guy like Tom Wilson or Ryan Reeves hanging around.

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Heading down in today's game is like turning your back at the last millisecond before a shot.

Who is to blame and who is to blame in such cases?

Parros' job is not easy.

No two violations are the same. In many cases there are aggravating and mitigating factors.

But you can't tell me that Dillon's hitting was on par with Zucker's. There was no heat between the Jets and Penguins at this point and the game was 1-0 when the shot came.

Note: Vegas' Brett Howden received just two games earlier this season for an illegal hit on Seattle's Brandon Tanev.

And Buffalo's Connor Clifton got two for the same thing on New Jersey's Nico Hischier.

Howden and Clifton had no previous history. Dillon? Suspended for one game for slashing in December 2017. Did Dillon get an extra game because of this?

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Obviously, after six years, it's a spit in the bucket.

Parros' explanation indicated that wasn't a factor, saying the video itself didn't have Dillon's “relevant history” when it came to the suspension.

Montreal's Brenden Gallagher didn't have much of a history when he turned New York Islanders defenseman Adam Pelech into a chicken wing earlier this season, but he got five.

Gallagher's hit was ugly, but it only cost him two more games.

All of this begs the question of how the DoPS can properly stop violence on the ice if it is inconsistent with how it uses it.

It makes many people feel as though the big thinkers who decide such things are blindfolded as they try to hit the dart board.

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X: @scottbilleck

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