Ryan Reaves Breaks Hand In Fight With Brenden Dillon; Out For Four Weeks

Last night's game was a good one - fun to watch, lots of goals, a couple of scraps... but that last part may have cost the Blues through the month of December.

Ryan Reaves checked the Stars young gun Valeri Nichushkin into and over the boards in a clean hit with around eight minutes left in the first period. Brenden Dillon took exception to the clean check and challenged Reaver to this fight, which cost the Blues bruiser a tooth, a cut, and a hand:

Nichushkin was laughing after the hit, clearly not injured on the play, and yet Dillon had to go protect the young kid. I get it. I do. If someone places a big but clean hit on Vladimir Tarasenko, I fully expect a player on the Blues to take exception to it. It's part of the game.

Unfortunately, what's part of the game is also dangerous and unnecessary. Fighting because of a clean check is so commonplace that it's worked its way into EA Sports' NHL 14. It's everywhere. And thanks to this fact the Blues are out a guy with a busted hand - a guy who did nothing wrong.

Players need to do a better job of trying to "prove a point." The game wasn't a blowout yet, so this probably wasn't a fight to rally the troops. This was a "you checked my young teammate so I'm coming after you" fight.

If this is going to keep happening, why not just go the extra step and wrap the kids in bubble wrap, wipe their asses, and cut their meat for them? Learn that shit like this happens in the NHL.

Also, while you're at it, get the fuck off of my lawn.