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Steve Montador: ‘I think Zee knew what he was doing’ 03.09.11 at 7:00 pm ET
By DJ Bean

Everybody has an opinion on Zdeno Chara after his hit on Canadiens forward Max Pacioretty Tuesday, and a former teammate weighed in the big blueliner Wednesday.

Steve Montador, who played 13 games for the Bruins in the 2008-09 season after being acquired at the trade deadline, appeared on WGR 550 Sports Radio in Buffalo Wednesday (audio), opening his appearance with fascinating talk about the B’s captain.

Montador, who said he was “pretty scared and pretty shocked” when he saw the hit, went into detail in describing Chara’s character and what he thinks of himself.

“He has this — and I say this in a good way — a complex that he’s the biggest, strongest guy in the league, and for the most part he probably is,” Montador said. “I think that he uses that just because he feels that mentality.

“One thing about Zee that I recall when he and I and Mark Recchi were talking was that he had a lot of respect for Mark. When [Recchi] got traded there, [Chara] was talking to him saying, ‘I remember one game when you came after me and kept hitting me,’ and here’s [Recchi], who at the time would have been 40 years old, and he’s going after Zdeno Chara and kept going and kept going.

“He had a lot of respect for that, because I think he thought, ‘Hey, I’m Zdeno Chara. I’m the biggest guy in the league,’ and Mark Recchi, although he’s a really thick and strong guy — he’s not the tallest guy — here is coming after him, and [Chara] was kind of wondering, ‘What’s this guy, is he on something or whatever? He keeps coming after me.’ The only reason I tell that story is to just give a sense of how he thinks about himself.”

Montador said that he has never found Chara to be “overly dirty,” but said that “he’s certainly somebody that in some instance you don’t want to be going into the corner with.”

He added that he thought Chara would be suspended for one or two games, and was slightly surprised by the league’s ruling to not suspend the 6-foot-9 defenseman. He also noted that he doesn’t completely buy the idea that Chara didn’t know that Pacioretty’s head could have hit the partition on the play.

“It’s easy for me from this side to speculate, but that part of the rink in Montreal, where the benches are, I’d like to think that everybody, unless it’s their first game there on the first shift — they might not be 100 percent aware of it — but having played against Montreal a bunch with Boston and with Buffalo … you’re pretty familiar with the ice,” he said.

“I got a sense that Zee meant to hit him in the way that he did, but I don’t think in any way that he wanted the outcome to be the way that it did. The puck had already been chipped past Zee. Maybe just the emotion of that game and from games previous [led to it].

“I think Zee knew what he was doing there, but like I said, in no way would I think that he’d want to hurt him like that.”

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  • http://www.johnbatorplumbing.com John Bator

    FIRST OF ALL. I WATCHED THE GAME AND MY FIRST, SECOND, THIRD, AND EVEN 50TH OPINION IS THAT IT WAS A CLEAN HIT THAT HAD A DEVASTATING RESULT. IVE SEEN THE REPLAY OVER AND OVER AGAIN. IF I THOUGHT IT WAS A BAD HIT I WOULD SAY SO. YES I AM A BRUINS FAN, BUT IM ALSO A BELIEVER IN GOOD SPORTMANSHIP.
    AS FAR AS THIS STORY GOES. I THINK ANYBODY WOULD REPLY, “WHATS UP WITH THIS GUY”, IF SOMEBODY WAS RELENTLESLY HITTING YOU. BIG DEAL. IT DOESNT SHOW INTENT TO WANT TO HURT ANYBODY. I DONT PLAY HOCKEY BUT I DID AS A KID. EVERYONE CHECKS, EVEN IF YOU JUST GOT RID OF THE PUCK. I DONT RECALL THE HIT BEING A LATE ONE.
    NOW I AM READING ON ANOTHER STORY THAT THE POLICE ARE INVESTIGATING. WHAT A JOKE. THEY SHOULD START LOOKING AT TAPES FROM THIER OWN CANADIAN TEAM FIRST. IM SURE THERES PLENTY OF QUESTIONABLE HITS THE CANADIANS HAVE MADE!
    I HOPE THIS GUY CAN RECOVER AND EVEN GET BETTER ENOUGH TO PLAY AGAIN. I ALSO HOPE PEOPLE CAN SEE THAT THIS IS A CONTACT SPORT AND STUFF HAPPENS. I CAN LIVE WITH THAT AS LONG AS WE DONT HAVE PEOPLE PURPOSLEY SLAMMING, OR BOARDING PLAYERS.

  • jeremy

    wow, next time comment in all caps please. it would get your point across better

  • Jeff

    Master Bator

    Your opinion is exactly that. Just like Montador’s is his opinion.

    When you talk you should think first…
    1. Detail your proof don’t just say you are sure (Habs have other questionable hits), that’s just lazy. I could say i’m sure you’re a moron but that wouldn’t necessarily be true.
    2. Other questionable hits are irrelevant to what happened here so why mention them? It’s about THIS HIT not others that are in question.
    3. The police only got involved because fans are outraged at the lack of discipline at league level. As a result they have to treat it seriously even though nothing will likely come of it. They are choosing to draw attention negative attention to the powers that be in the league who tried to sweep this under the rug.
    4. If Montador a former teammate thinks that Chara knew what he was doing then that lends credibility. Better than some guy like you or me writing our comments on a blog.

    P.S. MY OPINION, Chara knew what he was doing, just didn’t expect the result, still punishable.

    If you are walking on the sidewalk and i push you onto the grass, maybe everyone laughs and we say it was a joke. Now if I push you into oncoming traffic what’s the difference? There are still consequences as a result and that’s what should have happened here. Chara should have been suspended for reckless behaviour.

  • Don

    I, like John have watched the replay of the video over and over again, looked at the stills of Chara’s left arm guiding Pacioretty’s head into the stanchion. I, unlike John, know that;
    a) Chara knew exactly who was chasing the puck. The faceoff was in Montreal’s end and Chara stood not 15 feet from Max.
    b) Chara intended to get his pound of flesh from Max for the push Max gave him back on Jan 8. He tried several times before, in the previous game and it didn’t come to fruition so now was his chance, finally.
    c) Chara gives Max an extra shove, guiding his head into the glass just prior to the hit. He KNEW the glass was there and he knew what he was doing.
    d) Chara DID NOT mean nor anticipate the result of a severe concussion, nor a fractured vertebrae in Max’s neck but he did set out to crush him
    e) Chara has a history of crushing players, big, small, doesn’t matter the size and he also has a history of getting even. Don’t think he has a mean streak? Check out Youtube….you’ll be amazed.
    f) The puck was already down in the Bruins end when Chara run him into the stanchion. Max beat him to the puck, poked it ahead of him and was chasing it. Chara interfered with him and then drove his head into the stanchion

    I am a diehard Habs fan, have been for over 50 years and support them through thick and thin. I remember tough, rough hockey at it’s finest but never in my 50 years of watching hockey have I ever seen the level of head hunting and intent to injure that is going on in today’s game. The police have no involvement in this matter, it’s ridiculous but IF the league would have done the proper thing and given Chara a suspension, it would never have come to this.

    When Ovechkin was suspended for pushing Brian Campbell into the boards, Colin Campbell said “If you cause a player to be injured, then you have to be responsible for the play that you’re involved in, if there’s any carelessness or recklessness in it” so why didn’t that same logic apply here?

    Are the Canadien’s angels? No, of course not but that’s not the issue.

    The NHL missed another opportunity to set the league back on the straight and narrow path of what is right and what is wrong. By doing nothing, they have condoned Chara’s style of ‘finishing the check’ and have now left themselves wide open for the next one.

    This style of play has to stop and it has to stop quickly. Someone has to be made responsible and in a big way for the fact that some of the leagues star players are allowed to be head hunted with little or no consequence. Ask yourself this. What if Hal Gill had run Bergeron into the stanchion like that? Would you quietly sit back and say “well, that’s hockey?” If you say yes, then you are a bold faced liar!

  • HH

    You know that writing a complete tirade, a few poorly punctuated paragraphs at that, in CAPS LOCKS is the Internet equivalent of writing in crayons.

    The game is faster, today than before. There is no red line now, the athletes are in better shape, they wear body armour, obstruction has been eliminated.

    There is also a disregard for actions on the ice because there are no consequences. Thank you instigator rule.

    If the league does not want to bring back the red line and widen the surface they should hand out suspensions for any illegal hit that produces a concussion at the very least or any game losing injury at best.

    Not clean hits. I am talking elbows and shoulders to the head, boarding, knee on knee collisions, any stick work, whatever. A few days off for a cooling period. Increase the penalty for repeat offenders.

    Do this and the number of injuries and concussions will greatly diminish.

    Nobody wants to take away hitting from the game. I love intense crash and bang hockey. What I am seeing today is a disgrace to the game. The NHL is to blame because they wont admit that they have set the conditions for the spate of concussions with their inaction.

    Too many players are writhing around on the ice because of plays which are increasingly looking more and more like intent to injure. It’s carnage and anything but clean hockey plays.

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