The NHL recently outlined a new anti-diving policy which is designed to punish skaters for embellishing. This new punishment system consists of a warning for the first offense, a $1,000 fine for the second offense, $2,000 for the third offense and so on until the player reaches a cap of $5,000 per dive. The interesting wrinkle here is that the head coach starts being fined as well beginning with the player’s fourth incident.
While most seemed fairly pleased with the new anti-diving policy, questions remained. Will players be fined for dives which aren’t called during the game? Will the punishments be announced or will they take place behind the scenes?
A quick excerpt from the New York Daily News sheds some light on the topic, but it looks like the league is still undecided on how their own policy will work.
Daly, the NHL’s deputy commissioner, told the Daily News via email on Friday that the NHL’s new fines for players and coaches for excessive diving will be determined after each game by video review, regardless of the call on the ice. In other words, just because a player isn’t called for embellishment in a game doesn’t mean the league can’t charge him for it later. The NHL hasn’t determined whether it will publicize its decisions, Daly said.
There you have it. Fans should be relieved to see/hear that the NHL will be reviewing all plays and not just the ones the officials call on the ice. For the most part, the officials rarely call even the most obvious dives, so it’s important that the league reviews each game and punishes the offenders who escaped discipline during the game.
We’ll have to wait and see how the league handles publicizing their fines, but we hope they’ll be made public. We imagine the information will leak anyway, so you might as well release it and shame the repeat offenders.
