'NICE TOUCH': Spot where ex-NHL enforcer Nick Tarnasky pounded loudmouth gets commemorative marker

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A golfer with a sense of humour has marked the spot where former NHL player Nick Tarnasky flung a fellow golfer into a pond at the Alberta Springs Golf Resort.

Shared by the Shooter McGavin X account, a brief video shows the exact location where Tarnasky pounded the instigator with a series of punches that were punctuated with him exclaiming, “Bang!” after each strike.

“A very nice touch to add a sign where the hockey player tossed the amateur golfer into the pond,” the post read.

The makeshift marker sees a handwritten flag that reads, “R.I.P.” along with the words “F—ing Cry About it” and “Bang! Bang! Bang!”

“Make it a permanent historical marker! That is sacred ground!” one person commented, with another adding, “Needs a bronze plaque with a QR code to the video and audio.”

Viral video that surfaced this week showed Tarnasky getting involved in a fight at the golf course just outside of Red Deer after an argument about a group’s slow play.

Tarnasky was seen telling two other golfers in front of him to either hurry up or let him and his friends play ahead.

“They’ve been sitting there for 23 f—ing minutes,” one golfer could be heard saying at the beginning of the two-and-a-half-minute exchange, which was first posted to Reddit by user YEGG35.

The man on the receiving end of Tarnasky’s fists was seen yelling back: “Well, cry about it! F—in’ cry about it! F—in’ cry about it!”

The bearded golfer, who was inexplicably wearing a Hawaiian shirt, continued to taunt Tarnasky, calling him a “p—y.”

When one of the men said, “You’re not scaring anybody,” the victim became more agitated, hurling his sunglasses on the ground, ripping off his gloves and yelling, “Let’s f—in’ go, man. Ho, ho, ho,” before charging at Tarnasky.

Tarnasky sent him flying into the nearby pond, which should have been the end of it. But the now-soaked windbag came charging out of the water and tried to square up with the ex-NHL enforcer again only to be laid out by five punches to the noggin.

“Enough! Enough! Get out!” Tarnasky, who coaches for the U17 AAA North Stars, screamed as he chucked the dazed gasbag into the grass a final time.

“The Bangs were straight out of the WWE and the guy was warned. Mess with the bull you get the horns!” one aficionado commented on the fight.

“Throwing him in the lake was the warning shot and dude just couldn’t walk away,” another added on Reddit.

Hawaiian shirt guy stumbled away, not quite realizing what he had run up against. During his 13 years as a pro hockey player, which included 245 NHL games with Tampa and Florida, Tarnasky racked up 297 penalty minutes fighting tough guys like Tanner Glass, Aaron Asham, Zenon Konopka and Milan Lucic.

“He wasn’t a hockey player who fought occasionally. He was a fighter who sometimes managed to play ice hockey,” Jordie Demcher of Barstool Sports said of Tarnasky, according to the Edmonton Journal. “He was bashing dudes skulls open while he was skating on a sheet of ice. Do you really think he was even going to break a sweat having to beat the s— out of some nerd while standing on foot? So let this be a lesson to all the guys out there who have a short fuse, and have had too much to drink – if you’re going to challenge a guy to a fight, maybe do your homework first.

“At least figure out his name and do a quick Google search. You might think you’re just fighting some random massive mutant who was going to kick your ass anyway. But next thing you know, you’re dealing with a guy who was legitimately a professional ass kicker. Check the game notes, bud.”

In the wake of the fight, the man allegedly involved in the viral beatdown has since shared a selfie of himself.

“Just a tiny lil black eye,” the man wrote over the pic with his tongue sticking out. “That’s it, that’s all, boys.”

Red Deer Minor Hockey is conducting an investigation into the video, but police confirmed on Wednesday that Tarnasky is not a subject of further police investigation.

“It appears to be a consensual fight,” RCMP Const. Cory Riggs told the Red Deer Advocate.

We’ll hear more from Tarnasky when he appears on Paul Bissonnette’s Spittin’ Chiclets podcast later this week.

mdaniell@postmedia.com