But when the bill came, the team choked on it. They discovered they managed to eat and drink $18,000 worth of the restaurant’s fine fare.

The team threw a fit and refused to pay the entire bill, claiming that, by their math, it should only have come to approximately $12,000. The owner, Maurizio Terrigno, claims that the team even tried to pull the “do you know who we are” line when he insisted they pay the bill, fair and square.

Yeah, cause that kind of comment always results in instant respect. Ahem.

After going through the glass, the guy falls on his knees and then tries to get up. Poor guy just weakly falls back onto the ice.

After a call works against him and his team, Sapergia throws a little temper tantrum – along with every piece of equipment he could get his hands on. All ends up out on the ice in front of his team’s box.

This tantrum served quite nicely to get Sapergia suspended indefinitely.

It happened in Canada last week when news broke that players on two teams — the Calgary Flames and the Toronto Maple Leafs — jumped to the front of the line to be vaccinated against swine flu.

The news came as lineups reserved for high-risk groups stretched around city blocks. That meant that highly paid athletes had jumped ahead of pregnant women, children below the age of 6, and people with chronic illnesses, many of whom had waited up to seven hours at immunization clinics. The preferential treatment also came as some clinics were forced to shut down because they ran out of vaccine. (Also last week, in Ukraine, which is gripped by a swine flu pandemic and in the throes of election leadup, H1N1 became fodder for the biggest political football match to date.) (Global Post)

That’s just a little outrageous. The players claimed that they were at high risk and needed preferential treatment because of the fact that they travel a lot. Their thought was that, due to the exposure of many cities as they traveled from game to game, they should be in the front of the line for the vaccines.

Hmmm…thinking high of ourselves a little much?

While in some ways the players are right about their high chance for exposure, it’s not like there is any national crisis that makes hockey games a necessity. This kind of defense makes sense when you are talking about national leaders who have to travel, or perhaps military personnel. You know..people who actually make a difference when running and protecting a country?

It’s just hockey. I’m sure the public will live if a few games have to be canceled.

With his team up 2-0 eight minuted into the second period, Fanelli skated the puck behind his own net. As Michael Liambas of the Erie Otters came bearing down on him, the Rangers defenseman attempted to reverse the flow by playing the puck back to his partner, but that didn’t stop him from receiving a vicious hit to the head, which sent his helmet flying into the air and knocked him to the ice where he lay unconscious for the next 40 minutes.

The Kitchener players began a prayer circle as trainers attended to Fanelli, who lay motionless beside a pool of blood created from a cut he sustained on his head. His mom, who was in attendance with some otherfamily members, reportedly fainted from the sight of her injured son and had to be revived.

Fanelli would eventually be taken off the ice and airlifted to the hospital where he remained in critical but stable condition. He was diagnosed by doctors at the Grand River Hospital as having sustained a fractured skull and orbital bone, as well as facial lacerations, but has been making progress.

The latest news coming on Sunday states that he remains in intensive care, in critical but stable condition. Our thought and prayers go out to Fanelli, his family, and friends during this tough time.

Liambas received an indefinite suspension for his nasty role in this incident.

In a time period of what pretty much amounts to Frost’s entire hockey coaching/agent career, Frost has been accused of sexually exploiting, molesting, or just plain creeping out his junior hockey players, Danton among them. In fact, Frost seemed to go an extra creepy mile with Danton, which perhaps later led to the mentally imbalanced decision to have Frost killed.

It was clear that the relationship between Danton and Frost was not a normal player-agent arrangement. It turned out that Frost had exercised complete control of Danton’s life, going back to the days when Frost coached him on the Quinte team. Danton and other players who bought into Frost’s program were the closest thing to a cult as you’d find in hockey; but because Danton pleaded guilty, the background to that story was buried. (ESPN)

There were many accusations thrown at Frost over these sexual exploits supposedly going on behind closed hotel doors, mainly heard from the girlfriends of the players.

…two former girlfriends of Quinte players told police investigators about group sex at the apartment that Frost, then in his late 20s, shared with three of the teenaged Hawks in Deseronto, Ontario.At Frost’s trial a few weeks ago, they told Griffin that Frost had not only ordered his players to have sex with the girls, but watched them have sex; that he instructed them on how to have sex as if he was diagramming plays in the locker room; and that at times, he was even more directly involved. One woman said her former boyfriend could only have sex with her if Frost did, too — or the player had to get permission from Frost to have sex with her alone.

It was troubling testimony, and they gave it, even though Griffin denied a prosecution motion to protect their identities. (ESPN)

In the end the whole case was dismissed. Because the girls waited so long to say anything, suspicion arose as to exactly how truthful they were. With so little evidence for for the alleged sexual deviance, there was no way to prove that the actions had occurred. It was his word against theirs. However, his creepy behaviour with underage boys didn’t stop there. And this time there were photos.

In the summer of 2000, Mike’s younger brother Tom Jefferson, then 13, was allowed to take part in a weekend retreat at Frost’s cottage in Kingston, attended also by his older brother Mike and other young hockey players. Upon returning home, Tom was sullen and withdrawn. In June 2001, the parents provided Dr. Brian Shaw, a psychologist with the National Hockey League Players’ Association, with photographs that had been taken that weekend, including one of Tom naked and bound to a bed with duct tape, and another with Frost pointing a rifle at the child.^[4] Shaw, as obligated by law, presented the evidence of child abuse to authorities, and an investigation ensued.

Further details of that weekend emerged, including allegations that Tom was forced to eat pancakes that were spat on by Frost; he was shot at with a BB gun while hanging from a tree branch; and that he was ordered to dance naked atop a table for hours. Frost and five other witnesses dismissed the entire incident as a hazing ritual that had been young Tom’s idea to start with, and the investigation was closed. (Wikipedia)

There is a lot of talk that hockey tends to have this darker side when related to player hazing, but as a coach, that just doesn’t give you the right to act like a total jerk. And I’m sorry, there are appropriate activities to engage in with 13 year old kids, and then there’s this. This definitely falls under the category of “inappropriate”. Actually, go ahead and look up inappropriate in your dictionary. You’ll find a picture of David Frost.

Off the ice:

2004 – Former NHL enforcer Bob Probert is back in jail.He was arrested Friday in Delray Beach after a scuffle with Florida police that led to Probert being shocked with a Taser gun.

Charged with battery on a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest with violence and disorderly conduct, Probert was held without bail at the Palm Beach County jail.
While playing for the Detroit Red Wings in the 1980s and early ’90s, Probert served a prison term when he was caught trying to carry cocaine into the United States from Canada. He also had an alchohol problem and was charged with numerous driving offences.
Probert was placed on inactive status for the 1994-95 season after he was involved in a motorcycle accident and tests showed alcohol and cocaine in his system.

Delray Beach police officers first spotted Probert on Friday as he parked his white BMW sport utility vehicle the wrong way on a downtown side street and began hanging out of his window to yell at several men just before 1 a.m., officers said.

Four officers intervened when Probert, a native of Windsor, Ont., got out of the car and tried to start a fight with one of the men, according to a report. He then fought with the officers and refused their orders to drop to the ground, the report said.

As two of the officers struggled to handcuff Probert, officer Thomas Tolbert shot him with a Taser gun and he fell backward. But Probert resisted their efforts when they tried to handcuff him, so Tolbert used the Taser to stun Probert several more times.

The gun shoots barbed probes that give the recipient a usually non-lethal but incapacitating shock.

After Probert was shocked, officers handcuffed him and took him into custody.

“He was so combative in our jail that we didn’t take a booking photo of him because we didn’t want to struggle with him again out of handcuffs,” police spokesman Jeff Messer said. (source)

On the ice:

• Two long fights with Craig Coxe of the Vancouver Canucks in the mid-1980s.
• A career-spanning series of battles with Tie Domi of the New York Rangers, Winnipeg Jets, and Toronto Maple Leafs. One of Probert’s memorable confrontations was also the genesis of Tie Domi’s now-infamous belt gesture, where he guestured to the crowd as if he had a heavyweight title belt around his waist. Fights afterwards between Domi and Probert were seen in the eyes of many as Probert “getting his title back” from Domi. Also Probert had a series of about 13 fights with enforcer Stu Grimson.
• A memorable fight on December 17, 1993 with former teammate Joe Kocur of the Rangers, during a brawl involving several players from both teams. Probert and Kocur had grabbed the nearest opposing player without realizing who it was, and continued trading punches even after they identified each other. Later on in Probert’s Career, he would face Kocur a couple more times when he was with the Chicago Blackhawks.
• A fight on February 4, 1994, against Marty McSorley, then of the Pittsburgh Penguins, lasting nearly 100 seconds.
• A fight on December 11, 1993 in the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim’s first ever game at the Joe Louis Arena against the Wings, Probert and Stu Grimson fought 6 seconds into the game. This is notable as many children were in attendance due to the popularity of the Mighty Ducks franchise thanks to the Mighty Ducks movie series.

Wikipedia

Now I know hockey has a reputation for on-ice fighting (and quite frankly, who would watch it if it didn’t?), but Probert pushes that envelope just a tad too far. There’s being entertaining, and then there’s just being a jerk.

I would maybe let this guy off the hook for a one time deal of temper misplacement. But only a few months later, Simon lets loose the two year-old within and stomps on Jarkko Ruutu leg with his skate. Nothing says suspension like a blade to the back of the leg.

On December 15, 2007, at 14:06 of the third period of a home game against Pittsburgh, Tim Jackman and Jarkko Ruutu had some words between the teams’ benches during a stoppage of play. Simon skated in behind Ruutu and pulled Ruutu’s leg back with his own. When Ruutu fell to his knees, Simon stepped on the back of Ruutu’s right leg with his skate and then went to the bench. Simon was given a match penalty for attempt to injure and ejected from the game.

The following Monday, Simon agreed to go on indefinite paid leave from the team, saying there was “no excuse” for his actions and that he needed some time away from hockey.^[8] The next day, Simon was suspended for 30 games, the second-longest suspension for an on-ice incident in modern NHL history behind a one-year suspension handed down to Marty McSorley in 1999–2000. League disciplinarian Colin Campbell said that in his opinion, Simon had “repeatedly evidence(d) the lack of ability to control his actions,” and also stressed that this was his eighth disciplinary hearing.^[9]

Yeah, I’d say he needed some time away from the game. Something about the man seeing red and losing all higher mental functions (such as the ability not to be a total dick) does say “early retirement” to me.