Los Angeles’ Tanner Pearson will have a hearing for an illegal check to the head on Edmonton’s Brandon Davidson. Date and time TBD.
— NHL Player Safety (@NHLPlayerSafety) October 3, 2016
The NHL’s Department of Player Safety announced Monday that Tanner Pearson will have a hearing for his illegal check to the head of Oilers defenseman Brandon Davidson.
During last night’s win over the Los Angeles Kings, there was a scary moment just over halfway through the second period when Davidson got shouldered in the chin thanks to a late hit by Kings forward Tanner Pearson.
Tyler Toffoli was in the neutral zone when he threw the puck towards Davidson who was along the right side of the Oilers defensive blue line. Pearson charged towards Davidson and ended up catching the Oilers blueliner in the chin with his shoulder.
Davidson went down on the play and was on the ice for a few minutes getting looked at by Oilers’ trainers. He was clearly shaken up and did not return to the ice. Last night, Todd McLellan said that Davidson was “day-to-day.”
Here is the play in question:
Last night, the Oilers also lost Iiro Pakarinen to a knee injury after he was hauled down awkwardly by Matt Greene behind the net. The two players went into the corner and Pakarinen’s leg twisted awkwardly as he fell. Pakarinen remained on the ice for severals minutes until he was helped off by trainers and teammates.
Davidson 2nd Oiler to leave game with injury. Earlier, Pakarinen hurt when he fell awkwardly pic.twitter.com/iLnmJR7L6d
— Stephanie (@myregularface) October 3, 2016
McLellan also said that Pakarinen would be out for “at least a month.” With the injury to Pakarinen, it now opens up the bottom-six a little bit more for players like Drake Caggiula, Kris Versteeg, Jesse Puljujarvi and maybe even Anton Slepyshev.
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It was a scary hit…especially the way he spun..could of been alot worse. Iro’s injury was bad too but not dirty just unfortunate!!
If the league doesn’t do something, we’ll have to use our fists!
Can’t we do both?
Dirty Play – totally unnecessary in preseason and regular season.
Hope Davidson is back soon – very solid third line D who can move up the depth chart as required.
His real punishment will come the next time he faces the Oilers. Nurse, Lucic, Maroon, Hendricks, Kassian. He can’t duck them all.
Lucic and Nurse were both on the ice when the hit happened and nothing was done, doesn’t seem like he’ll need to do much ducking.
The refs were in there real fast to make sure too and kicked him out to avoid further altercations. Trust me, they have his number now.
It always comes later don’t worry it will happen.
Lucic and Nurse were right in there after. They weren’t skating away checking out the clock to see how much time was left. They were front and center in Pearson’s face.
And yes, names and numbers have been noted.
It was Kraft hockeyville in front of a bunch of kids and families not really the time or place to make a big violent retaliation. Next reg season Kings game Pearson will pay im pretty sure.
Just reading the list would make me want to run and hide. Glad it is not me waiting for the payback, “putting on the foil”.
I don’t really have a lot of faith in the group of ex-nhl-thugs that run the player safety department, to assign an appropriate penalty/suspension. We’ll see what the hearing reveals about the character of this year’s group.
Seriously, are we tired of this crap yet? Intentional or not, the NHL could learn something from the NFL. Doesn’t surprise me though considering Bettman’s pathetic stance because owners might have to look after their players.
Rant over…
There should be extra penalty assigned to Pearson for pulling this type of garbage in a meaningless preseason game. Ridiculous. He’s probably lucky he was ejected from the game.
I 100% agree with this statement.
Anything stupid in the preseason players will be suspended for the rest of the preseason and their suspension begins once the regular season begins.
On top of that the NHL should handicap a team with suspended players. Tanner Pearson is suspended fine. The Kings play with 22 players. Some AHLer wants to make a name for himself with a stupid play tomorrow night. Fine. Now it’s 21.
Teams would be VERY quick to start policing this crap on their own teams
That is a great idea.
I also live this idea. I just wish stuff like this would actually become reality
You’ve got my vote for NHL commissioner … when can you start? This is absolutely what is needed in this league – until it starts hurting a offending player’s team, no one cares at all. You can be damn sure players will start having a word with their careless teammates if it costs them some wins while the team is shorthanded.
Thanks man.
Obviously there might be some added rules like a limit. Maybe minimum roster size can he is 21 but that’s about it.
I can start on the 17th. Important I give my current employer the respectable two weeks notice.
Very cool of you. So much better than Bettman already.
Hopefully he gets suspended for the rest of the preseason.
That’ll show em, eh Gary???
I’m still extremely angry inside about that hit – it was such an unnecessary hit – a predatory hit – so dangerous.
Sure, suspend Pearson, he absolutely deserves it but I’m more concerned about Davidson’s health and the impact this could have on the Oilers.
I know he’s stated as day-to-day but that was the “diagnosis” right after the game and the full extent of concussions are generally not know right away.
I don’t believe they practiced today as there was no media avail with McLellan and therefore no update.
I’m anxious to hear the update tomorrow and I really hope he won’t miss any regular season time – his ability to play the right side is integral to this team’s success early in the season.
Sure, suspend Pearson, great, but that doesn’t take away Davidson’s concussion.
Why can’t we have nice things?!
I’m positive that his number was taken..
Filed away for reference for a future date.
I’m also positive they didn’t want any blood on the ice at a Kraft Hockeyville game.
The hit was shabby… Looch gripping and ripping… while fun to watch…would have been a black moment..
Come on. Lucic bloodying Pearson to stick up for his team mate would have made it the greatest hockeyville game of all time.
So much for “harder to play against!Henbdericks is the only guy on the team that would have done something about it, if he was in the line up.
Gryba.Lucic,Nurse, where were you…. oh ya joining the cup cake parade.
Aside from the hit on Davidson, the entire team played like a bunch softies.
Top notch analysis. /s
In defence of Nurse, he turned his head to watch his man (toffoli) right before the hit happened.
I’m sure he didn’t want another Polak incident to happen where he beats the ever loving piss out of a guy who really was kind of innocent and didn’t do anything wrong.
10 games. Cheap shot.
I get that everyone is frustrated with the head shot AND the lack of response on the ice but anyone remember Messier? When he did stuff like that nobody here shed tears for guys like Berezan or Kovin. I think Oiler fans are just fed up with losing and are quick to lash out at everything, from mgmt.’s moves and non-moves to ref’s calls and Drew Remenda. No fan base is more in need of a winning team. Except maybe Toronto where soon there will only be a handful of living fans who witnessed their last cup. Like when they trot out the last 100 year old WW2 vet on Remembrance Day, Hockey Night in Canada will interview some grizzled popcorn vendor from Maple Leaf Gardens about how great George Armstrong was.
I hope Davidson is ok.
Yes you are right ,messier did take care of himself and their were many more on that oiler team that could take care of the Gretzky’s and kurris
Yes oilersfans are tired of having a team that rolls over, I don’t mind watching the oilers lose as long as they lose right and show some fight,effort and
It can’t just be lucid,Hendrix,nurse,maroon,kassian and gryba when the game gets rough, guys like draissityl Larson,klefbom who have some size gotta get nasty As well
The oilers better set the tone early, I’m getting sick of teams like low Angela’s getting away with obstruction and dirty hits
There are no excuses for the oilers if teams start playing them rough with Hendrix,kassian,maroon,lucid,nurse and if Gryba signs this is what these guys are supposed to do go out hit clean and hit hard and if teams like LA want to come in and start crashing our guys well we’re going to crash back if it results in broken bones so be it as long as its clean ,
These teams will start to think twice if their strategy is to scare the oilers out of the game and the refs are going to have to start reffing consistently
Nothing says “Bettman’s NHL” more than having a young guy beat cancer to play at the highest level of hockey, only to have that jeopardized by a headhunter who took full advantage of a vulnerable player during a meaningless pre-season game.
It’s part of teams like the kings strategy against teams like the oilers over the last 8 years, it’s so systemic in their game plan that they resort to this game plan automatically not to mention their bench boss , you know that’s the game plan,nothing wrong with it if it’s clean hitting
It sure would be nice to have one more guy like bygflien on the oilers blue line but as is the team should look alot better against the bigger rough teams in the league this year and it opens the game up alot more for guys like Eberle,Hopkins,and mcdavid.
The league is still way, way too soft on this stuff. They do the minimum for legal purposes, to avoid accusations that they don’t care about head injuries, but do not treat such plays as harshly as they deserve because they think rough, tough and dirty sells tickets, and because the owners don’t like seeing their players suspended.
I expect Pearson will get the rest of the pre-season off, and with a bit of luck, maybe the first regular season game off, but probably not. So the Kings lose nothing and we may lose a key player for the season opener. NHL justice.
I still prefer the idea that 1) Players like Pearson who do this in the pre-season get suspended only for NHL games, and that 2) As compensation for the team whose player is injured the first two games of the suspension be served by the player in the next 2 games against the injured player’s team. If there no further games that season between the two teams than it could be served in the normal way, and if they have one game left he should miss the next game as well as the remaining one against the injured player’s team.
I don’t think the owners like seeing their players out with injuries either so that is kind of a wash.
If Hjalmarsson was banned one game for charging and the remainder of the preseason, I’d think Pearson gets at least that.
They should just revert back to older/smaller/softer upper pads that make most players think twice about taking out guys like that as it would most likely hurt them too.
How many games do you guys think Pearson will get?
Hits like this are exactly why I hate to see our Star players play in the preseason. There are more then a few careers AHL guys out there for no other reason to to get a cup of coffee in the bugs before heading back down to the AHL for the rest of their lives and try to make a statement anyway they can out of desperation. I like the idea posted above about losing the roster spot when a guy is suspended.
Blindside hit, first contact was directly to the head, elevated when giving the hit. Text book suspension. The only thing that might save Pearson is the fact that he kept his elbow down. Should be 10 games but betcha its less then 5 and 3 of them are preseason.