It's no secret that the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Montreal Canadiens do not get along. It's also no secret that teams get chippy during one-sided blowouts, as the game between the two teams on Saturday night demonstrated in clear fashion. In a melee along the boards at about 11:30 into the third period, Max Pacioretty decided to put Mikhail Grabovski into a headlock. Fair enough. That happens all of the time in fights. However, the headlock happened to involve Pacioretty's un-gloved hand and forearm being draped right in front of Grabovski's mouth.
As one might expect, this happened:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=
X-YWQfuWpxU[/youtube]
Obviously, if you're silly enough to put bare skin practically into someone's mouth during a scrum, then you're inviting someone to — on purpose or not — take a taste. It's not clear from the video that Grabovski did in fact chomp down, but Pacioretty's making that face for a reason.
First off, biting is gross. Secondly, don't put body parts inside of someone's mouth and not expect this to happen. There's not really conclusive proof, so I'd be surprised if discipline czar Brendan Shanahan doles out punishment. As it stands, it's just another embarrassing aspect of a terrible loss by Montreal.
