2022-23 NHL Season

[Benz]

He is 23 and playing for the Mercyhurst Lakers . . . he is not going anywhere . . .

I hope he gets bounced off his team. Again.

[Chambokl]

I hope he gets bounced off his team. Again.

Would be completely in agreement with this . . . like threeputt said, it is not the first time . . .

Note: He never played for the Sun Devils . . . he was redshirt and they kicked him off the team . . . he gets a 2nd chance and this is what he does . . .

[4wedges]

I hope he gets bounced off his team. Again.

He has been suspended.

[4wedges]

Montreal is losing 7-3 to Florida. That’s after the 1st period!

[Pingeye2_fan]

Someone updated James Reiner’s wiki page after his statement.

[Arthur Dailey]

Cathal Kelly in the Globe and Mail on James Reimer and his statement.

Kelly begins his column by stating that in his experience Reimer is truly one of the 'good guys' in the NHL.

James Reimer’s statement succeeded in doing one thing – taking the heat off his bosses. He’s the bad guy so that the people who run hockey can be the all-things-to-all-people guys.

It started with the Philadelphia Flyers and Ivan Provorov

The NHL washed its hands not only of this problem, but of all future problems.

“Players are free to decide which [league] initiatives to support,” was the pivotal sentence (issued by the NHL).

Given that situation – an outreach program wherein the participants have no duty to do outreach – you’d think they’d get rid of the jersey program. Do the Pride night without directly involving the players.

If the goal here is proclaiming the league’s commitment to inclusion, the program is having the opposite effect. A couple of dozen Sharks players wore the Pride jerseys in warm-ups. What’s everyone talking about? The one guy who didn’t.

If you’re upset, yell at James Reimer. Also, remember to buy your commemorative jersey.

And Kelly goes on to address the Biblical requirements requiring an NHL player to believe that he should not wear a Pride jersey.

This “living Biblically” thing is a bit hard to buy from a guy making about US$2.25-million a year. How much of that money are you keeping? Because the Bible is clear about how difficult it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.

I hear you, man. I also live Biblically. I never wear clothes made of linen and wool combined (Leviticus 19:19) and only kill burglars at night (Exodus 22:2-3).

[Pingeye2_fan]

A lot of people who claim to follow Jesus seem to have paid shockingly little attention to basically every lesson that he taught.

[4wedges]

I have a lot of respect for Reimer. Whether you agree or disagree with his stance at least he has the courage of his convictions. He dealt with it the right way. And, sorry Arthur, what Cathal Kelly thinks is of no consequence in this matter.

[Ignatius Reilly]

I have a lot of respect for Reimer. Whether you agree or disagree with his stance at least he has the courage of his convictions. He dealt with it the right way. And, sorry Arthur, what Cathal Kelly thinks is of no consequence in this matter.

I agree. He had nothing to gain and plenty to lose with this and he followed his convictions. And he did it when his career was far from peaking.

IMO it was very unfair to label him a homophobe. His statement is clear:

"I have no hate in my heart for anyone, and I have always strived to treat everyone that I encounter with love and kindness".

"...I am choosing not to endorse something which is counter to my personal convictions..."

"I strongly believe that every person has value and worth, and that the LGBTQIA+ community, like all others, should be welcomed in all aspects of the game of hockey."

So... he loves everybody, doesn't hate anybody and welcomes the LGBTQIA+ community to hockey. BUT he won't endorse them by wearing a pride jersey because the bible condemns it and he can't endorse it.

He's doubled down a little and brought up his friendship with Kadri, a Muslim, to say he and Naz are great friends, but he wouldn't wear some sort of Muslim religious gear. It's a stretch, but I get what he's saying. And I think it's fine.

[Arthur Dailey]

I have a lot of respect for Reimer. Whether you agree or disagree with his stance at least he has the courage of his convictions. He dealt with it the right way. And, sorry Arthur, what Cathal Kelly thinks is of no consequence in this matter.

The Globe is English Canada's 'paper of record'.
It has a circulation of over 300,000 as of May 2022.

Cathal Kelly is their primary sports columnist.
Therefore his opinion cannot just be discounted. It is of course however just his opinion.

As noted he started his column by expressing his personal like 'like' for Reimer as one of the most 'genuine' people in the NHL.

What Kelly attempted to do was to expose the hypocrisy of:

• The NHL for 'throwing players under the bus'. Rather than taking a stand one way or the other on the issue.
• How many players focus on some aspects of their religion while disregarding others that are more uncomfortable for them. As in Matthew 19:21-24. That does not only pertain of course to athletes. Personally I admit to being guilty of it more than once. However athletes have a high public profile.

[Arthur Dailey]

Here are excerpts from Bruce Arthur's column on Sunday in The Star regarding James Reimer and his statement/decision.

https://www.thestar.com/sports/hockey/opinion/2023/03/19/the-lgbtq-community-and-brian-burke-deserved-better-from-james-reimer.html?li_source=LI&li_medium=thestar_sports

I feel bad for James Reimer. He was a sheltered evangelical Mennonite kid whose belief in Scripture was so profound that he would apologize to someone for saying unkind things about them in private; things that person would never have known about had Reimer not apologized.

I accept that Reimer is indeed someone who cares about other people, reaches out and asks what he can do to help.

Reimer told reporters. “When a guy gets traded to a team, often I’ll ask the people in charge, what’s their number? So I can send them a text. Welcome to the team, ask if they need anything. I don’t do that based off what they believe or what they identify with. I do that because I’m taught to love and to care for people. That’s who I am.

“But the counter side, or the other side, is I just can’t publicly or personally endorse something that goes against my beliefs. That’s kind of where I’m at so far.”

It was 13 years ago now that Burke marched in his first Pride parade in Toronto; he marched with his son Brendan, who had come out publicly as gay. That year, Blackhawks defenceman Brent Sopel took the Stanley Cup to the Chicago Pride parade to honour the Burkes. Burke marched again the next year, after Brendan’s death; he wore sunglasses to hide the tears, and had trouble talking. He still marches.

One of the goalies Burke had as general manager of the Leafs at the time, and for several years after, was Reimer. Boy, did Burke defend Reimer, in public and in private. He went to the wall for that kid.

It’s a shame partly because the current storm over LGBTQ rights in the United States is a full-blown moral panic, with conservatives howling about drag shows, outlawing medical therapy for trans kids and more or less accusing anyone who preaches gay-positive ideas of being a pedophile, a groomer. We’ve seen a little of that here in Canada, too.

As the writer and priest Michael Coren put it on a recent podcast about gay rights, “When did this become the test of my faith? It’s actually heretical. I don’t use that term very often, but it’s a form of heresy, to reduce Christianity to this question of: Where do you stand on this issue? And it’s an issue of love, so you should say: I stand with love, which is the teaching of Jesus.”

Jesus, of course, never mentioned homosexuality and preferred to hang out with society’s marginalized people

[bogey5]

I'm not a huge fan of Burke but he's one of the main drivers behind these initiatives and not a fan players sitting this out.

[Pingeye2_fan]

It should be as simple as this.

[Marty Canuck]

I agree. He had nothing to gain and plenty to lose with this and he followed his convictions. And he did it when his career was far from peaking.

IMO it was very unfair to label him a homophobe. His statement is clear:

"I have no hate in my heart for anyone, and I have always strived to treat everyone that I encounter with love and kindness".

"...I am choosing not to endorse something which is counter to my personal convictions..."

"I strongly believe that every person has value and worth, and that the LGBTQIA+ community, like all others, should be welcomed in all aspects of the game of hockey."

So... he loves everybody, doesn't hate anybody and welcomes the LGBTQIA+ community to hockey. BUT he won't endorse them by wearing a pride jersey because the bible condemns it and he can't endorse it.

He's doubled down a little and brought up his friendship with Kadri, a Muslim, to say he and Naz are great friends, but he wouldn't wear some sort of Muslim religious gear. It's a stretch, but I get what he's saying. And I think it's fine.

Except the “Pride” initiative at the NHL is not limited to sexual orientation. It also encompasses people of colour, etc. I work with the people at Pride Tape and I feel really badly for them about this negative press

[4wedges]

The Globe is English Canada's 'paper of record'.
It has a circulation of over 300,000 as of May 2022.

Cathal Kelly is their primary sports columnist.
Therefore his opinion cannot just be discounted. It is of course however just his opinion.

As noted he started his column by expressing his personal like 'like' for Reimer as one of the most 'genuine' people in the NHL.

What Kelly attempted to do was to expose the hypocrisy of:

• The NHL for 'throwing players under the bus'. Rather than taking a stand one way or the other on the issue.
• How many players focus on some aspects of their religion while disregarding others that are more uncomfortable for them. As in Matthew 19:21-24. That does not only pertain of course to athletes. Personally I admit to being guilty of it more than once. However athletes have a high public profile.

Just because Kelly, or anyone, is the Globe's "primary" journalist doesn't mean his opinion counts any more than anyone else's. He is entitled to , and paid for his opinion...good for him. But to me, it is worth no more than, say anyone on TGN.