Tim Stutzle's latest dive is a masterpiece of pathetic
It's not exactly a secret at this point that Ottawa Senators forward Tim Stutzle has earned a reputation for embellishment and diving over the course of his young NHL career. You don't have to look too hard to find examples, but last night's game against the Seattle Kraken may have contained the most egregious example yet.
Early in the 2nd period with the Senators up 1-0 over the Kraken, Matty Beniers was cutting in behind his own defenseman, Justin Schultz, in the Kraken's zone, attempting to wind up and send play up through the neutral zone, heading towards Ottawa's end of the ice. As he carved around Schultz, who had stopped up in the defensive zone, Stutzle briefly applied the brakes before jumping and launching himself back-first into Schultz, who was not happy when the arm went up for interference. Here are a couple of clips of the play:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but if Michael Bunting had done this in a Leafs sweater last season, he would certainly not have drew the penalty call. He may have even earned himself a penalty as a result of the play.
Stutzle has definitely crossed the line of deserving the benefit of the doubt to his behaviour becoming downright embarrassing. His diving makes the Sens look bad, makes fools out of the officials and, obviously, makes himself look like a complete weasel.
We have, in the past, seen players and their teams slapped with fines as a result of embellishment. I can't see Stutzle and the Sens being too far away from that at this point. But, more importantly, he's arriving at the point where he will no longer get the benefit of the doubt with the officials, which could end up being far more costly than the money he'd be out from a fine.
| POLL | ||
DECEMBRE 3 | 585 ANSWERS Tim Stutzle's latest dive is a masterpiece of pathetic Should the NHL step in and deliver some supplemental discipline to Stutzle for all of the diving and embellishment? | ||
| Yes - it's long past due | 436 | 74.5 % |
| No, just let him blow up his reputation | 93 | 15.9 % |
| I didn't think it was that bad | 56 | 9.6 % |
| List of polls | ||
