The NHL will announce the Lady Byng Trophy finalists today, given annually to the player who exemplifies gentlemanly play.
Patrick Kaleta of the Buffalo Sabres will not be one of them, but that was obvious well before he opened the bench door in order for Philadelphia Flyers forward Nikolai Zherdev to fall through it in last night's Game 4 win for Buffalo:
What's the old line about how it's only cheating if you get caught? Sneaky, dirty move by a sneaky, dirty player. Though not the worst example of a player using the bench door to try and cause some damage on a foe this season — nothing is topping this clip from the Swedish Elite League and the sinister mischief of goalie Niklas Svedberg.
From Flyers Goal Scored By, which originally brought the Kaleta play to our attention:
Kaleta: I'm feeding it right now but won't be after I type this, and hope you got it out of your system last night. The guy is like a feral unicorn. And you know what it eats? Attention. If you want it to stop then it's up to you - stop feeding it. The sum of the parts makes the whole and talking about the guy just makes you angrier. To tell the truth, neither accomplishes anything anyway, so play it cool and let it go.
Translation: The pest did his thing in Game 4, and did it well.
To paraphrase an ancient Chris Rock line about OJ Simpson: Now, we're not saying Patrick Kaleta deserved to get elbowed in the face by Mike Richards after seeing this bench door malarkey … but we can understand.
Of course, there's always guilt to be passed around ... like this Kimmo Timonen, er, stick check on Nathan Gerbe (via Die By The Blade):