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USA Today Sports Media Group
USA Today Sports Media Group
Sport
Robert Zeglinski

The NHL shamelessly reinstated disgraced ex-Blackhawks leaders right at the start of free agency

After being banned for more than two years for their roles in the Chicago Blackhawks’ sexual assault scandal with former player Kyle Beach, the NHL made the puzzling decision to reinstate ex-Chicago general manager Stan Bowman and ex-head coach Joel Quenneville to full league service on Monday afternoon.

Both are eligible to work again starting on July 10 after the NHL published a milquetoast press release citing how they’ve “demonstrated sincere remorse.”

Letting Bowman and Quenneville work in hockey in any capacity again is disgusting enough. Given their respective roles in poorly addressing a sexual assault on their own team — to say the least — they are two people who should probably never step foot near any ice rink again.

The kicker is that the NHL dropped the official announcement of Bowman and Quenneville’s reinstatement on a late Monday afternoon of an exciting start to the 2024 free agency period. Why, it’s almost as if the league wanted as little attention as possible on letting two alleged monsters work in pro hockey once more:

Every time you think the NHL has turned a corner, it goes and willingly steps on a rake like this. It is not a stretch to imagine that the league knew people would rightfully frown upon Bowman and Quenneville’s reinstatement. Because in no way, shape, or form is a two-year ban sufficient for what these two men were reportedly responsible for. Most would likely agree that their NHL bans should have been permanent.

So, rather than have a zero-tolerance policy regarding even any partial enabling of sexual assault, the NHL seemingly tried to drop the news of Bowman and Quenneville’s reinstatement right as they thought everyone who follows their animated carcass of a league would be drooling over player acquisition news.

It’s transparently awful. NHL leaders who green-lighted both the reinstatements and the timing of the Bowman and Quenneville news should be ashamed.

NHL fans ripped the league’s decision and timing of Stan Bowman and Joel Quenneville’s reinstatement

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