Hockey Tough: Florida Panthers' Captain Aleksander Barkov Split Open The Palm of His Hand in Game 1, Had Stitches Torn Out Multiple Times, Didn't Miss A Game

Fuckin' hockey players man. Nothing gets the Hockey Tough crowd going like a gruesome injury being revealed after a hard fought series. Barkov didn't light the world on fire with goals in this year's Stanley Cup. But he shut down McDavid on defense all series long. This is the second year in a row Barkov has won the Stanley Cup, and the Selke Trophy for best defensive forward.

And despite not scoring a goal in the series, Barkov still finished with 5 assists, all coming in the final 3 games, which was good for the 6th leading scorer of the entire series. All with a right hand that looked like it was ready to unhinge and fold backwards at the knuckles at any moment. Which apparently did happen twice, as the stitches in his palm were repeatedly torn out and the doctors ended up having to glue his hand together. It doesn't get much more Hockey Tough than that.

Although there's one thing I gotta point out, and I'm going to come off as a hater saying it. But Barkov is a lefty. Meaning that's the top hand on his stick (see masterpiece below).

I was reading the replies a tweet about his hand, and based on the replies, the general consensus seems to be that the cut being on Barkov's top hand made playing through this injury significantly more impressive than if he'd had 9-stitches in the palm of his bottom hand. 

I get that your top hand is always holding your stick. Your bottom hand is at least gets a break for about half the time you're on the ice. You spend a lot of time skating with only one hand on the stick. But based on my hockey playing experience, I would WAY rather have a cut like that on my top hand than my bottom one. If that cut was on Barkov's bottom hand, then every time he leans on his stick, every time he catches a pass, every time he takes a shot, his lower palm is absorbing that pressure. Taking a slap shot with that cut on your bottom hand would be excruciating. Just imagine you're holding a hockey stick. Now imagine slamming the blade of that stick on the ground. It's your bottom hand that's taking the brunt of that. I don't mean to belittle how brutal it must have been to play through that injury. And idk, maybe I'm wrong, but I saw all the replies being like "Oh my god AND it was his TOP hand!?!", and that just didn't add up to me. If that cut were on his bottom hand, I'm not sure he even could have played. 

Regardless, LeBron James would kill a hooker to have a receipt like that to present to the world at the podium after an NBA Finals. LeBron always had a hell of a time convincing the world he just played 4 to 7 games of basketball on "basically one leg" (or whatever injury LeBron was claiming that series). Fans can't exactly see what's going on with LeBron's ligaments. But if LeBron had a 9-stitches worthy gash anywhere on his body, even if were on his left ass cheek, we would still be hearing about it to this day. Barkov on the other hand… by tomorrow we'll probably forget this cut even existed. Barkov himself has probably already forgot he even has it.

Bold move by Barkov walking around a Florida neighborhood knocking on doors with the Stanley Cup at 5am, just assuming all his neighbors actually know what the Stanley Cup is. Hopefully he knew the doors he was knocking on, because if he was just knocking on any random house, then there's at least one neighbor who called the cops on his drunk Stanley Cup-wielding ass.