If you saw Tom Wilson's violent beatdown of New York Rangers forward Artemi Panarin on Monday night and wondered how the NHL decided not to suspend him, you might be less surprised after reading about George Parros' recent history.
Parros, the NHL's head of player safety since 2017, let Wilson off with a $5,000 fine from Monday's incident despite the Washington Capitals forward being a repeat offender in the dirty play department.
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Brandon Carlo was the victim of a dirty Wilson hit earlier this season when Wilson drilled the Boston Bruins defenseman in the head near the boards. Carlo missed nearly a month of action due to a concussion, and Wilson was suspended for seven games.
But Wilson's suspension may not have happened if NHL commissioner Gary Bettman didn't intervene, according to The Athletic's Rick Carpiniello.
"Parros, we’ve heard, didn’t even want to suspend Wilson for the brain-damaging assault on Boston’s Brandon Carlo, who suffered mood changes and blurry vision from his concussion after being hospitalized by Wilson in March," Carpiniello wrote.
"Bettman didn’t like the optics and ordered a suspension. So Wilson got seven games. Before that, he wasn’t even considered a repeat offender, because the (collective bargaining agreement) erases priors after a certain period of time transpires."
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Wilson clearly crossed the line with both Carlo and Panarin, but Parros apparently didn't think either incident warranted a suspension. Just as surprising is that Wilson has been suspended five times in his NHL career but prior to the Carlo hit wasn't even viewed as a "repeat offender" by the department of player safety.
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The Rangers made their opinion of Parros very clear in a statement Tuesday, calling his decision a "dereliction of duty" and declaring Parros "unfit to continue in his current role."
Had Wilson not been suspended for the Carlo hit, the Bruins might have co-signed that statement.