The best part about this suspension is that Shanahan applied a "bright-line" ruling regarding launching before the hit. If you jump, any questions of intent or whether the other guy slightly altered his position go out the window. If the NHL is serious about changing the behavior of players, more black & white guidelines like this are the way to go.

Is it me or he is pronouncing it 'me-hall-ick'

At least it isn't as bad as some guy on the NHL network pronouncing Evengi as U-Gen-ey

Shanahan got one right and one wrong. Ovechkin got what he deserved but Michalek should have been called for boarding and given a game suspension and fine.

No, if you suspend Michalek, then you'll have every player who wants to play the puck without getting hit curling up practically into a fetal position and putting their heads down when going to the back boards to draw penalties.

Then you wind up with MORE injuries. You have to have those on a case by case basis. But when you're driving to the board hard to get a puck you HAVE to know a defender will be coming to fight for it. That kind of play almost always ends up in an explosive check to the boards.

If reducing injuries is what we're going for, they have to work on both sides of every hit.. Players need to keep their heads up as much as possible, too.

I love this comment attributed to Ovechkin on NHL.com:
"Ovechkin said he was not targeting Michalek's head on the play, and that had the defenseman stood up and tried to hit him back it would have been a shoulder-to-shoulder hit."

I'm sure there's logic there somewhere...

I finally had a chance review the 2 hits. OV launched, no doubt, hard to argue with Shanny's call. But I'm with Seth, I can't understand how the league can say it is targeting hits to the head and not tag Michalek for a game. His forearm appeared deliberately applied directly at the base of Hendrick's head, and driven deliberately and forcefully through the conttact with the glass. Shanny said even though OV didn't target the head, he was responsible for what followed once he left his feet. But Michalek deliberately targets the head, and nothing? That's BS.