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A tale of two stompings

Filed under: NHL

The 8-game suspension handed down to Anaheim's Chris Pronger for stomping Vancouver's Ryan Kesler is being questioned by those who remember the 30-game suspension for a similar incident involving Wild winger Chris Simon.

First, here's a video of Pronger's actions:

Initially, the NHL wasn't going to penalize Pronger at all. That came as a shock considering how similar it was to an incident three months ago, before Simon joined the Wild, when he was given an unheard-of 30-game suspension for stomping Jarkko Ruutu. Here's the footage:

But then the NHL saw a new camera angle and scheduled a phone hearing with Pronger yesterday. Go to about :35 to see the new angle:

In response to the new footage, Pronger has been handed an 8-game suspension for the stomp. Not only is that 22 games short of Simon's punishment, the NHL actually went out of its way to try to justify Pronger's actions:

"In attempting to free himself, Pronger carelessly and recklessly brought his foot down," Colin Campbell, the NHL's director of hockey operations, said in a statement.

Go back and look at that new angle. Does that look like Pronger was just trying to free his skate? Looks a lot more like an old fashioned boot party to me. What do you think?