NHL Player Safety Punishes Garnet Hathaway for Dangerous Elbow on Joel Eriksson Ek in Last Night's Game

During the Philadelphia Flyers vs. Minnesota Wild game on Saturday, both teams had different goals. The Flyers were trying to rebound from an atrocious start to the season as coach John Tortorella tries to keep himself off the hot seat. Meanwhile, Minnesota is riding a strong start to the season, only suffering two overtime losses so far, and is looking to make a big statement this season in a stacked Central Division.

So tensions were a bit high already but after the Flyers' Garnet Hathaway elbowed the Wild's Joel Eriksson Ek in the head, chaos ensued. Only getting a two-minute roughing penalty on the play, Hathaway had to suffer the wrath of the Player Safety Department afterward.

Hathaway was fined the maximum of $5K from the league for his actions, which could be seen as a slap on the wrist. We've already seen Oliver Ekman-Larsson fined $5K for a 'reverse hit' on Jake Guentzel, meanwhile Jacob Trouba specifically went headhunting on Justin Barron and received no punishment. It's frustrating that the NHL and NHLPA will not either a) increase the fine to an actual substantial amount in order to deter these actions or b) start practicing what you preach about safety and suspend those players; three strikes you're out for a year.

It's frankly abhorrent that the NHL has been so ignorant of these incidents. Sure, they haven't ignored hits, but they ignore the implications. It means that dirtier players who need to use underhanded means to keep their jobs can get away with paying essentially pennies to inflict possible serious injury on a player. It's stupid that Hathaway gets a two-minute minor for roughing (not even elbowing) and isn't assessed at least a double-minor and add unsportsmanlike conduct in there too. Let the teams suffer from their player's stupidity.

Garnet Hathaway gets to walk away with only a few thousand dollars less than what he had when he elbowed Eriksson Ek so callously in the head, and the league gets to have egg on its face again. It's time for the NHL to start getting serious before somebody gets seriously hurt.