Lurker here usually, but had to join to respond to some of the posts that I think are really off-base in this thread.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/givani-smith-racism-post-season-1.4653588
He received racial slurs from the crowd and death threats and had to have a police escort. Fans verified seeing a player on the other team making "monkey" gestures toward him. And they talk about him experiencing similar incidents throughout the year.
You can read this from Gemel Smith (written last year) about him and his brother being frequent targets for racist comments while in the OHL.
https://theupsetsports.com/for-gemel-smith-mental-strength-goes-a-long-way-when-dealing-with-racism-in-hockey/
Really disappointing to see the reaction is to doubt the victim before anything else - and with no basis for doing so. You should know that racism is a problem within the hockey community since there's plenty examples we've seen to glimpse that in the resent past. For another incident involving the Greyhounds - John Vanbiesbrouck stepped down as GM after calling Trevor Daley, then his own team's captain, a N-----
Other public incidents:
- whether it's the banana thrown at Wayne Simmons in London, On.
- During the lockout, Czech fans also chanted "monkey" at Wayne Simmonds
- Kevin Weekes also had a banana thrown at him.
- Sean Avery supposedly yelling a racist epithet at George Laraque
- Blackhawks fans banned for life for heckling Devante Smith-Pelly with racial slurs
- If you only believe video, you can search and find Subban having the N word (bleeped) thrown at him an being told to go back to Africa by a Bruins fan. Also, there was that twitter-hate storm against him that was much publicized during that series.
- Krys Barch suspended for making a racist comment at Subban
- Maybe you'll trust Joel Ward's mom when she said he grew up with that after an incident where he was flooded with online hate https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puiLRJWn1jo
- Such Twitter hate storms and death threats were also aimed at J.T Brown when he kneeled for the national anthem.
There's enough of these public incidents to glimpse what most black NHLers surely go through it at some point. I'm mean, there are only about 30 black NHL players in the league and of incidents I listed 7 involve current NHL players - so that's about a quarter of black NHLers involved publicized incidents of racism and I'm sure there's more if you want to search - not to mention which doesn't get picked up on camera or audio or not reported - in juniors especially it is reported as a bigger problem. All examples that should lead one to give Smith's claim credence.
And, yes, sure some people might make false claims, but against the Everest sized problem of racism, it's a molehill. And where's the examples of that would lead you to think that likely? Has an OHL or NHL player ever done that?
And why would he do that? He was suspended for the game. It's wasn't a lessened punishment.
