Player suspended 18 games
Grimaldi’s latest series of penalties may be his last, at least in the E.I.H.L. as not only was he suspended by the league for 18 games for his actions on the ice last weekend but his team, the Edinburgh Capitals, released him the following day.
In the game against the Nottingham Panthers, a team Grimaldi played for last season, the defenseman nailed a guy in the head with an elbow, now verboten in virtually any hockey league on the planet. Maxime Langelier-Parent of Nottingham did what teammates tend to do when something like that happens, he went after Grimaldi to fight him for laying out his player with a dirty hit.
But the 28-year-old Grimaldi, from New York, wanted nothing to do with a fair fight and tried to prevent Langelier-Parent from getting close to him by spearing him in the stomach. Following hitting in the head, that is probably the most uncool thing to do in the game.
Determined to avenge his teammate, Langelier-Parent kept coming, looking for that fair fight that is part of hockey’s code. Next, in an action that isn’t on the list of unacceptable behaviours in hockey because it’s rarely, if ever, done, Grimaldi took off his helmet and threw it at the Nottingham forward. As Langelier-Parent was reacting, Grimaldi punched him in the face.
Grimaldi out of hockey work
At the time of his multiple infractions, Grimaldi was given a two-minute minor and a 10-minute misconduct for the initial hit to the Panthers’ a player’s head, a major and game misconduct for spearing and a major and game misconduct for fighting.
The league’s ruling on the suspension said that the infractions were “reckless actions, with an attempt to injure, and have no regards for the opposition player’s safety” and they were “not in anyway a hockey play and bring the game into disrepute.”
It’s not like the Nottingham Panthers would have been surprised by Grimaldi’s actions as last year when he played for them he appeared in just 6 games but was assessed 83 penalty minutes.
The Panthers won last weekend’s game at Nottingham’s National Ice Centre over Edinburgh, 6-1, with over 5,200 fans on hand to witness Grimaldi’s rampage.
