from Roy MacGregor of the Globe and Mail,

Thursday evening, one of the Toronto Maple Leafs’ most exciting players, Joffrey Lupul, woozed and wobbled his way off the ice following a combination collision with two Philadelphia Flyers.

He did not look good. He did not return. He did not practise with the team on Friday. He did not leave with the team for New Jersey. He will not play against the Devils Saturday night.

Toronto head coach Randy Carlyle told the media right after Thursday’s game that Lupul “feels fine now.” The next morning, he saw Lupul again, following some testing on the player, and, according to Carlyle, “he didn’t look very good.” Lupul had just had drops put in his eyes.

That’s when the semantics scuffle really got weird. Asked if the injury to Lupul was a concussion, Carlyle chose to label the medical term “a bad word.”

It is fascinating how quickly the Pittsburgh Penguins put out the word that, despite the broken jaw that has likely ended Sidney Crosby’s spectacular regular season, the world needs to know he does not have a concussion. They don’t even want speculation, as it, too, comes with stigma, a strong sense that the next time hockey’s most important name is correctly tied to the word, his career may well be over.

more