Former NHLer taking on seven drunk golfers in an Arizona bar fight is a terrible look for golfers

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When the news hit social media that former NHL enforcer Paul Bissonnette had been reportedly assaulted by six men at a restaurant on Sunday evening in Scottsdale, Az., everyone’s first thought, including ours, was to hope and pray nothing too serious had happened. Bissonnette, who is now an analyst on the NHL on TNT pregame show and the co-host of the popular Spittin’ Chiclets podcast for Barstool Sports, can handle himself in a 1v1 fight on skates. But 1v6 in street clothes is another story.

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The first signal that Bissonnette was doing just fine came from Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy, who tweeted out a hilarious text exchange between he and the former Arizona Coyote as the story was making the rounds. Turns out it was seven guys, not six:

“Took some but gave more.” If that isn’t on every NHL enforcer’s tombstone some day, what are we even doing here?

Bissonnette appeared to be underselling how much he must have gave after he posted a video explaining the whole situation. The man looked like left the donnybrook without a scratch. He began the message by telling his followers he was at a restaurant he frequents in Scottsdale, Houston’s, where a “ruckus” was taking place in the bar area Sunday night. 

“It was a bunch of drunk golfers,” Bissonnette said. “Things obviously continued to escalate. They asked one guy to leave, and then one guy kept getting in the manager’s face and put his hands on him. That went on for about 30, 45 seconds.”

Bissonnette went on to explain how it’s a family restaurant type atmosphere at Houston’s, and he didn’t feel there was anyone in the establishment who could help out the staff and diffuse the situation. So the man who fought well over 100 times on the ice in his professional hockey career decided to step in. Then all hell broke loose. 

“If you assault the staff, we’re going to have problems. And then, they just started chucking,” he said. 

Bissonnette said he believes it was seven guys in total. The fight spilled over into the parking lot and then to a nearby CVS. “Got taken down a couple times,” he said. “I got bootf—ed in the head, three times by the CVS. Luckily, didn’t get knocked out.”

Bissonnette said he did have to go to the hospital, but if you watch the video to the very end, you’ll see the damage was minimal. A few tiny scratches on each side of his face. Seven golfers against one former NHL mitt-dropper. An absolutely brutal look for our beloved sport, and our “golfers are athletes argument.” When seven golfers flexing their beer muscles can barely leave a dent in a pro hockey player, you realize just how weak sauce our sport is. All kidding aside, we’re very glad Bissonnette, our Warner Brothers Discovery colleague, is OK. Here’s hoping those guys’ names do get out so they can suffer further embarrassment and shame. 

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This article was originally published on golfdigest.com