The NHL has spoken and Patrick Kaleta has been suspended for 5 games.
I felt that he'd get 4-5 games.
This suspension should come as no surprise in light of the seriousness of Kaleta's hit on Brad Richards on Sunday night.
Kaleta is a repeat offender having been suspended four games last season for head butting Jake Voracek of the Flyers.
He receives the maximum penalty for over the phone hearing. Perhaps the NHL may have given him more than five games had they called him in to the league offices for a live, in person hearing.
Kaleta is considered a repeat offender under the terms of the Collective Bargaining Agreement. Based on his average annual salary, he will forfeit $76,219.25. The money goes to the Players' Emergency Assistance Fund.
I've known Kaleta for a while now. I've seen the evolution of his game as he has gotten older and matured. Contrary to what his haters in the court of public opinion say, Kaleta has taken great pains to change the way he plays the game. Lindy Ruff invested countless hours helping Kaleta to tone down the antics and to amp-up his intensity inside shifts. Kaleta's game has shown growth in the past two seasons. He's watched hundreds of hours of game tape, and has worked extremely hard on his penalty killing and has become one of Buffalo's more reliable PKers.
He'll be a better player for having gone through this disciplinary process. Kaleta wasn't trying to hurt Richards. He was just playing hard hockey.
Knowing Kaleta the way that I do, I'm confident that PK36 will learn a valuable lesson from the Richards incident. He'll use this as fuel to shut the mouths of his biggest critics.
Thomas Vanek will most likely take Kaleta's place in the Buffalo lineup on Tuesday night in Raleigh. Vanek has missed Buffalo's past two games with an upper body ailment.
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