The No-Tuck Rule

So the NHL has a tradition of extremely stupid rules. From the trapezoid rule (behind the net goalies can only play the puck in the trapezoid) to shooting the puck over the glass from you defensive zone, the league gives delay of game penalties for some pretty dumb things. Now there's a new one: tucking in your jersey. That's right, if you tuck in your jersey and the refs catch you, you get a warning. After that, it's a two minute delay of game penalty. Other potential punishments - a ten minute misconduct and possibly a game misconduct if you continue to tuck your jersey in. Yes, it's as idiotic as it sounds. And as ridiculous as this:

And what’s the logic in this? How many eye injuries did it take until visors were grandfathered to be mandatory this summer? How many injuries on icing races will it take until touch icing is eliminated? How many lockouts will it be until the NHL realizes it just makes people hate you? And we have a rule saying you can’t tuck your jersey in? What the hell is the league thinking? One argument is so the refs can see the player’s number clearly. It’s on the back of the jersey and it is quite large. It is also on the sleeves and both the front and back of the helmet. Yeah, I don’t think the refs have a hard time seeing numbers.

Obviously, it’s not a popular rule. Alex Ovechkin ranted against it, calling it “stupid”. Remember, a certain hockey player that holds most of the league’s records, cough, Wayne Gretzky, was famous for tucking his jersey in. When I played I tucked my jersey in. If I didn’t it would fall down to my knees. During the course of the game, jerseys can get unintentionally tucked in. And what is now the result of that? You have to kill a penalty.

And we now have the first victim. Alex Semin of the Carolina Hurricanes was given the jersey-tuck delay of game penalty in last night’s preseason game. Carolina lost this game, with Columbus scoring shortly after the penalty expired. As it is, it’s just a preseason game and doesn’t really mean much. But what if the penalty resulted in a goal in a meaningful game? Columbus only missed the playoffs by virtue of losing a tiebreaker last year, that’s how close everything is now. And now teams are getting power plays because jerseys are tucked in. Imagine if this happened in a playoff game. An overtime. Imagine the outcry. And we thought the puck-over-the-glass was a dumb penalty.