I'm sure you have seen this happen countless times in recent years: A player skates up the ice and gets ever-so-slightly hooked, held or interfered with by someone on the other team. Trying to "buy" a call from the referee, the player significantly embellishes how much he was impeded, flopping theatrically and banging his stick on the ice. The referee's arm goes up.
What happens next? In today's NHL and other leagues, what happens all too often is one of two things.
Often, the referee calls offsetting minor penalties -- the obstruction-relation infraction on the opponent and an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on the diver -- and the teams skate four aside for the next two minutes. Alternatively, the diver gets away with it and only the opponent gets penalized. Only rarely is it the diver who goes off alone.
Quite frankly, I think it stinks. Today's NHL rulebook is a manifestation of political correctness. It has been legislated into trying to be all things to all people and winds up being unwieldy and ineffective in dealing with the problems it's attempting to solve. Diving is a prime example of this.
When I was playing, there were not many players who dared to dive. For one thing, doing it usually meant the referees around the league were not going to give the player the benefit of the doubt on anything once they caught on and word spread about his tendency to embellish. For another thing, when a guy on one side would dive, he'd usually have to answer for it with his fists or at least in terms of legitimately getting knocked hard on the seat of his pants -- no embellishment necessary -- every shift thereafter. To top it off, his own teammates and coach would usually tell the guy he deserved it.
When I was refereeing, I carried over that same approach. Diving disgusted me, and I let the guilty parties and their coaches know it. Maybe the guy could fool me once, but I caught on quickly.
Once I caught on to him, he could forget about getting the benefit of a borderline call from me. Think of it as the Boy Who Cried Wolf effect. More than that, though, it forced me to put a stop to the behavior.
Sometimes I did it with humor. For example, I used to ask Theoren Fleury, "Theo, are we having some problems with gravity tonight?" I once told Claude Lemieux, "The name on your jersey should be Otis, 'cause you're like an Otis elevator. You're up, you're down. You're up, you're down."
Sometimes I did it more sternly. One time when Claude persisted in his diving, I skated over to Pat Burns and said, "You'd better start coaching this guy, Pat. If not, I'm going to ditch him."
If the player didn't get smart and cut out the diving, I'd give him a misconduct penalty and tell him to get out of my sight. He would also be made aware for future reference that he'd cried wolf one too many times in my book.
What about if it was a player who did not characteristically dive? In that instance, I might cut the guy a little extra one-time slack.
For example, Joe Mullen was a player with whom I had a good relationship, and was usually someone I could trust not to embellish. One time, however, I saw him do just that.
"Are you OK there, Joe?" I asked. "It looks like you flipped yourself."
"No, Stewy," he protested. "You know I'd never do that to you."
"OK, just checking," I said.
That was the one and only time I ever had a suspicion about Mullen.
Anyway, returning to the way diving gets handled nowadays, I detest the offsetting minor penalties. If it's a hook, the other team should get a power play. If it's a dive, that guy should be dispatched. Want to know how to handle it, instead of a four-on-four? Give a minor penalty for the initial infraction, and give the embellisher a 10-minute misconduct.
In the bigger picture, there's been a major -- and unfortunate -- shift in the hockey culture since my playing days and the earlier part of my refereeing career. Coaches and players pay lip service to wanting diving stamped out. In reality, all they want is for the OTHER side not to dive. It's fine when it's their own guy.
What happens in today's hockey when a guy gets away with diving and a penalty gets called on the other side? The coach gives him a pat on the back for creating a power play opportunity for the team. Teammates congratulate him. The keepers of those boutique statistics put a notch in the guy's "penalties drawn" column. The only real risk for the diver is a four-on-four rather a power play for his team.
What does all this leave the referees to do? Since the push from the powers that be has been for offsetting penalties rather than a misconduct -- a severe punishment that removes the player from the game for at least half a period, yet doesn't make his team to play shorthanded -- we end up with those cop-out, let's-punish-both-sides-equally-rather-than-dealing-with-the-problem calls by the ref.
It is all part of what has been a refereeing culture of avoiding making the tough calls and leagues taking a lot of the discretion away from even the most experienced referees who know what is actually going on in the course of a game. It's an abomination.
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Recent Blogs by Paul Stewart
The 'Montreal Factor' and Refereeing
Communicate, Communicate, Communicate
A Little Reffing Psychology Goes a Long Way
A Ref's View: Exuberance vs. Showboating
Jump in the Fire: My NHL Reffing Debut
Tales from the End of the Bench
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Paul Stewart holds the distinction of being the first U.S.-born person to make it to the NHL as both a player and referee. On March 15, 2003, he became the only American-born referee to officiate in 1,000 NHL games.
Today, Stewart is a judicial and league discipline consultant for the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) and serves as director of hockey officiating for the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC).
The longtime referee heads Officiating by Stewart, a consulting, training and evaluation service for officials, while also maintaining a busy schedule as a public speaker, fund raiser and master-of-ceremonies for a host of private, corporate and public events. As a non-hockey venture, he is the owner of Lest We Forget.
Stewart is currently working with a co-author on an autobiography. 
Blogger •Former NHL Referee • 
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