The NHL is still working through its preseason, and already we have a candidate for the worst penalty of the year, and possibly ever.
The Philadelphia Flyers hosted the Boston Bruins in their penultimate tune-up before their season-opener against their arch-rivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Now, the Broad Street Bullies came out on top in this one, 2-0, but that wasn’t the story. Instead, all of the talk after the game had to do with Flyers forward Trevor Zegras getting a minor for delay of game for “improperly wearing equipment.”
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Zegras hopped over the boards to take a faceoff with the back of his jersey tucked into his pants. Most of us wouldn’t think twice about it, but an official saw it and sent him to the sin bin.
That’s because this season, officials have been told to crack down on players not wearing equipment properly, and technically, he was.
But that doesn’t make it any less absurd.
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At the risk of sounding like a certain cartoon sports radio host, it used to be that tucking your sweater into your pants was the cool thing to do.
Well, not anymore.
According to The Athletic, Zegras confirmed after the game that he had been issued a warning before he was given the penalty, which is in line with the rulebook. Had he done it again, it would’ve been a game misconduct.
Head coach Rick Tocchet mentioned afterward that the league had given a heads-up about this push — which focuses on everything from visors to neck guards to, of course, jerseys — a few weeks earlier.
“They told us, in all fairness, two, three weeks ago,” Tocchet said. “I didn’t even think about it. … Obviously, can’t do it anymore. Regular season starts, we can’t have a penalty like that. I actually had to put (forward Matvei Michkov’s jersey) down on the bench.”
Hey, rules are rules… but nothing says preseason like the league picking a rule that never gets enforced to the point that most of us forgot it existed, and then dropping the hammer.
