Kaleta Being the Rat that He Is

As initially argued up by TSN's James Duthie on Wednesday night, Buffalo Sabre Patrick Kaleta is quite the hypocrite. If you caught his interview following Chicago Blackhawk Niklas Hjalmarsson's hit from behind on Jason Pominville on Monday, along with some apparent b.s. on respecting one another in the NHL, he had this to say: "We're a team here and it will get taken care of either with the league or I think we play them Saturday, so we'll make a point that you can't be taking hits like that against one of our leaders and one of our better players on our team."

Now, before this somewhat veiled threat was uttered, Kaleta was a lot of things... a pest, a rat, maybe just one or two rungs below New York Ranger Sean Avery and Ottawa Senator Jarkko Ruutu on the NHL's most-hated scale. But a hypocrite? Due to a lack of evidence, no one in their right minds could make such a claim out of fear of being sued, because, as much as I hate to admit it, being among the league's least-skilled players can still earn someone a pretty penny to pay for some pretty expensive legal help. But here is the indisputable proof ladies and gentlemen: Kaleta's antics on Wednesday night against the New Jersey Devils:

Hell, forget Wednesday night... take your pick of any of Kaleta's numerous indiscretions over the years, like this one hit on the Philadelphia Flyers' Jared Ross that led to a suspension last season:

There's little use defending Hjalmarsson's hit on Pominville as it wasn't exactly clean. As mentioned in an earlier post, the two-game ban he received seems about right. But there's even less use in ever again defending Kaleta, whether it be through words as a blogger or on the ice as one of his teammates, because as he has proven so beautifully this past week he'll bring you down along with him as he makes a fool out of himself.

The Sabres do indeed play the Blackhawks on Saturday, but Kaleta had better circle the next Saturday instead, because that's the date (October 23) that the Sabres play the Devils again. I'm not saying it will happen, but if he's put in a position where he's forced into making a decision as to whether or not to drop the gloves, there should be no hesitation on his part. If he can stand up for himself and face the music then, only then will the one iota of respect he deserves be restored.