As the London Knights continue to battle and win the Ontario Hockey League (OHL) Finals, they’ve been without center (and St. Louis Blues prospect) Landon Sim since Game 6 of the OHL Conference Finals. He received a five-game suspension after an “on-ice incident.” The Knights are up 3-0 in the finals against the Oshawa Generals and Sim won’t return unless a Game 5 is forced. There’s a lot of back-and-forth discussion about what happened, but it seems the OHL offices only want to take one side of the story into account.
Let’s get into why this is a rough decision from the OHL that has sparked controversy throughout the sport.
Sim’s Words on the Ice Lead to Suspension
This alleged incident took place in a series against the Saginaw Spirit in the conference finals. Sim’s agent, Andrew Maloney alleges that a Spirit defenseman threatened to break Sim’s shoulder (an injured shoulder) after he made contact with a forward during warm-ups. This led to an alleged response from Sim, saying “No you won’t; you’re too much of a p—y to do that.”
The Spirit defenseman went over to referee Joe Monette and repeated what Sim had allegedly said. After conferring with a linesman, the decision was made to give Sim a game misconduct for unsportsmanlike conduct. Next up was the OHL handing out a five-game suspension to Sim, citing the league’s “diversity, maltreatment, and bullying” policy. With the suspension being fewer than 10 games, there was no avenue to appeal it. It’s a really interesting incident and it’s hard to understand why the OHL would go to this length and set a precedent like this.
OHL Sets a Bad Precedent With This Suspension
It comes down to this – these types of conversations between opponents deserve a proper amount of context and suspending a player over a word that wasn’t intended to mean anything other than calling the opponent “soft” is the wrong call in my view. It wasn’t a racial slur and it wasn’t intended to be anything more than a response. Without ample proof, it’s tough to see how the OHL can justify going to this length. This sets a precedent that things said on the ice before, during, or after the heat of battle can be sternly punished. I understand that it’s junior hockey, but there’s no video evidence, and there are always two sides to a story. It’s hard to understand why Sim gets a five-game suspension if what his agent alleged happened is true.
Related: Blues’ 2022 Draft Deep Dive: Landon Sim
With how dominant the Knights have been in the finals, there’s a good chance that Sim won’t be able to suit up and win a championship with his team. At 19 years old, he’s played three seasons for the Knights and was drafted by the St. Louis Blues in the sixth round of the 2022 NHL Entry Draft. He’s a hard-nosed player who plays with a lot of passion.
It’s an incident that is tough to handle. For a young player, he can learn plenty from it, as can the OHL. They might want to think about their policies moving forward and how to handle incidents like this. Again, if he had said something racist or homophobic, it would be entirely unacceptable and a suspension would be warranted. I’m also not saying it’s “ok” to use derogatory language like Sim did, but context and intentions must be taken into account here. According to his side of the story, he was responding to an alleged threat from a player on the Spirit. The rules need to be re-addressed and the power of the league’s commissioner’s office needs to be re-evaluated given the fact that a suspension under 10 games can’t even be reviewed or re-assessed.
Overall, I don’t think that was handled properly by the league, and it’s an excessive punishment for Sim. Of course, it’s my opinion and everyone is welcome to their own, but it’s tough to believe this incident was handled properly by the OHL.
