LONDON, Ontario - Often as the only black player on his team, growing up in Scarborough, Ontario, Flyers forward Wayne Simmonds dealt with his fair share of racial slurs on the ice as he climbed the hockey ladder.
Few experiences could have prepared him for what happened on Thursday night, as a fan in the John Labatt Centre threw a banana peel at Simmonds as he skated in on a shootout attempt during a 4-3 loss to the Detroit Red Wings.
"I caught it from the side of my eye," Simmonds said. "It was a banana. Hopefully, that wasn't directed towards me being black.
"Because if it was, that's just somebody being ignorant."
The banana peel, thrown from the upper deck, landed directly in Simmonds path toward Red Wings goalie Jordan Pearce during the shootout.
After the banana was tossed onto the ice at the 9,000-seat Comcast-Spectacor-managed building, an announcement was made to have fans refrain from throwing things.
According to sources, the fan who threw the banana was not caught, with the incident happening so late in the game.
After the game, some of Simmonds' teammates quietly whispered inside the locker room, shaking their heads in disgust.
"I would have went and kicked that fan's ass myself," one teammate said, asking to remain nameless. "That's just not right."
Sadly, Simmonds said he has come to expect things like that - even in 2011.
"When you're a black man playing in a predominantly white man's sport, you've got to come to expect things like that," he said. "Over the past 23 years of my life, I've come to expect some things like that. But I'm older and more mature now, I kind of just left things roll off [my back]. I try not to think about stuff like that."
By the way, Simmonds scored on the attempt - just a reminder that no form of discrimination will keep him down. And he also scored a goal in regulation.
"You can't stop just because something is being thrown at you," Simmonds said. "Besides, my initial reaction was that I would get to shoot again if I didn't score. I didn't even need that."
Read more:
http://www.philly.com/philly/sports...na_peel_at_Flyers_Simmonds.html#ixzz1YkBvp7HZ
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