Chicago, IL- So Sam Karim will miss the rest of the season and perhaps longer after he was suspended indefinitely pending a hearing scheduled for September 19^th 2011. His alleged infraction? Threatening an Official. But while it’ll go down in the books as being a suspension for a threat, it’s really a lengthy suspension because Karim is the perfect fall boy for this kind of incident.

Think about it. This is a very long suspension for a he said she said. For all the haymakers, elbows, slashes, cross-checks, hits-from-behind, bites and other illegal infractions that have dotted the league, this was deemed most heinous.

As Seth Meyers and Amy Poehler used to say on Saturday Night Live: Really!?

What Sam Karim is actually getting suspended for is the fact he’s a depth - and not a top-line - winger. It would be difficult for anyone to convince me Peter Katowicz or Joe Koehler would have received this suspension for this so called abuse of an official. Heck, it would have been surprising if either got even gotten tossed from the game in the same scenario.

The league is rightly trying to curb abuse on officials and while that is a noble cause we can’t be handing out lengthy suspensions for very borderline exchange between a player and an on ice official.

At the press conference today, Chicago Bulldogs President Alex Martinez had this to say: “We understand and respect the League’s decision today regarding Sam Karim. While this game is played with passion and intensity, the safety of all of our fans and players is of the utmost importance at all times. Throughout his career Sam has been well respected by his teammates, coaches, fellow players and our community. Sam is a valued member of our organization and we will continue to support him and all of his teammates to ensure incidents like this do not happen in the future.”

It may be curious to some, but in fact, when you strap two sharpened blades onto the feet of 10 men who skate around a fixed ice surface hitting each other at 100 miles per hour and carry large pieces of taped-up lumber, injuries are bound to happen. Players should be suspended (and for a long time) for egregious acts of violence, you know, like taking one of those pieces of lumber and cracking a guy over the skull. Players should be suspended for hits from behind and fist-flying charges - plays that are not designed to get the puck or force the opponent to pay a physical toll, but instead can only result in injury or are a great risk of one.

But did Sam Karim do any of this?  Nope, all he did was piss off a sensitive referee who is of my opinion abusing his power over a player.

Hearing is set for September 19^th 2011 at 7:30pm in front of the AHAI Board.

Stay tuned...