Comments on: NHL investigation says human error caused L.A.’s clock problem in February

By: ray2013

ray2013 — Fri, 27 Jul 2012 09:10:51 +0000

I understand that officials miss calls and that over a season or two, it all basically evens out. And I realize that most fans consider Howson an idiot who does not deserve to be a GM.

But Howson made a serious allegation when it happened; either the clock was broken or it was stopped deliberately. So we know:

1) the clock was fine
2) someone from the NHL started it, paused it and then re-started it to give the Kings enough time to score.

If someone screwed up the handling of the clock, were they disciplined for making such a major error or was it done intentionally/deliberately? And if it was done intentionally or deliberately, was there a lot of action on the game in LV books?

You can’t just have a GM of an NHL franchise make a serious allegation like that and try to give an answer that doesn’t clarify much of anything. I also remember Tom Renney accusing the officials of blatant favoritism for the LA Kings; “they must want Hollywood in the playoffs”.

Those are serious allegations, and they should be dealt with seriously, not with vague, non-committal answers. Who do they think they are, politicians?

By: Brian

Brian — Fri, 27 Jul 2012 01:08:25 +0000

This makes Lombardi’s baffling explanation using coloumbs even more hilarious. Honestly, did he just completely pull that out of his butt?

By: wenzel0232

wenzel0232 — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 23:17:00 +0000

To the CBJ fan (singular) it may not have mattered after last season, but if it did it sure as heck doesn’t matter after this off season.

By: bigpappi

bigpappi — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 21:19:04 +0000

why even speculate such a thing. Thing happen through the course of the season. For instance the kings had a 2 on 1 when a shark player knocked a puck away with stick while sitting on the bench, it was missed. Could have been the difference from being 3rd seed to 8th seed. No one cares such is the nature of sports .

By: govtminion

govtminion — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 20:14:44 +0000

From a CBJ point of view, you’re right, it was pretty irrelevant. But… one can only wonder if that difference in the standings could have meant the difference between that 8th seed for the Kings, or being out of the playoffs completely. No way to know, of course, but such small details can have big effects later.

By: masalaswag

masalaswag — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 18:28:46 +0000

The situation wasn’t that the clock didn’t start on time as is written here. The issue was that as the clock was counting down in the final seconds, it stopped momentarily, seemingly adding the milliseconds allowing the Kings to score. Play was not dead. Unless a human stopped and started the clock, there was either a malfunction or we are to believe Lombardi’s “calibration” argument.

Either way, I would expect a more accurate depiction of what actually happened from NBC. These are the types of gaffes I expect from ESPN.

By: hockeyfan1701

hockeyfan1701 — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 18:06:03 +0000

I say this as a CBJ fan. After watching this season does it really matter.