Brashear takes a shot at Neil

Eric McErlain has a nice article on nbcsports.com about (start music) The Code (end music) and the instigator rule. Near the end he talks to Brashear:

"It's not the same (since the end of the lockout) and it makes it that much harder. ... Before that's how you would get your message across. If you do something wrong I could be coming the other way," Brashear said. But now, Brashear said, there are a number of physical players who are taking liberties with skill players that they wouldn't normally have in the past.

In particular, Brashear singled out Chris Neil of the Ottawa Senators as just one such player.

It's a little bit of a low blow in my opinion - not the first time for Brashear.
Neil suffers a bit from the perception that he's a heavyweight in this league and people continue to view him from this angle. I don't think he ever was. He played that role because he wanted to play on this team in this league and the team needed him to.
Neil plays on the 2nd or 3rd line regularly - averaging 14 min a game this year. He leads the NHL in hits. He's physical with the skill players because he's physical with everyone.

UPDATE: On a related topic, Eric links to a Vancouver Province vote on the best fighter in NHL history - it's a multi-round voting setup.
How much does effort count? Wendel gets a spot in the top 16 Leaf fans. Of course Tie is in there as well as fellow Leafs Tiger Williams, and Kordic. The Sens get some rep from Chara, and can I count Rob Ray as a Sen?