The Philadelphia Flyers have always brought out the best in Patrick Kaleta, that fountain of annoyance on the Buffalo Sabres.
On Wednesday night, he allegedly added to the love affair, according to the NHL:
Buffalo's Patrick Kaleta will face a hearing with Brendan Shanahan, NHL Senior Vice President, Player Safety and Hockey Operations, on Thursday to discuss his head-butt infraction against Philadelphia's Jakub Voracek in Wednesday night's game in Buffalo, a 3-2 victory for the Flyers.
We believe this is the play in question at 15:02 of the first period, as Kaleta drove up with his helmet and head-butted Voracek along the boards.
Yes, it's just been candy and roses between Kaleta and the Flyers.
There was his Nov. 2009 boarding penalty on Jared Ross that earned Kaleta a 2-game suspension from the NHL; a leaping shoulder block into the numbers as Ross played the puck on the end boards. There was that sneaky move where he opened the bench door for Nik Zherdev to fall through in the 2011 Stanley Cup Playoffs. There was his run at Mike Richards that resulted in Richards delivering a self-defense elbow in Game 4 of last postseason.
Oh, and let's not forget Kaleta talking smack about the divorces of Danny Briere and Scott Hartnell. Charmer that he is.
As we mentioned, he's faced the supplemental discipline jury before. Kaleta was suspended for a dangerous hit two years ago, but he was also fined last season by the NHL for an incident against Travis Zajac of the New Jersey Devils.
A headbutt, in fact:
After that fine, you'd figure Kaleta would have learned the NHL generally frowns upon going Johnny Rotten circa '77 Pistols show on an opponent. Jakub Voracek disagrees.
Now that Matt Cooke has found Hockey Jesus, is Pat Kaleta now the most hated man in hockey?
s/t NHL GameCenter Live for the video