While we're not sure how Jonathan Roy's pleading guilty to an assault charge today will affect his street cred in the R&B business, we're thinking it's probably good for hockey not to have fighting on trial in a highly-publicized legal case.

Please recall that Roy, 20, beat the stuffing out of goalie Bobby Nadeau during a Quebec Remparts game in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League back in 2008. He was suspended seven games, his coach/father received five games and the incident sparked a national outrage in Canada. Jonathan didn't help matters when it seemed as though he had more regret about flipping the crowd the double-bird than attacking another player who didn't want to fight.

Nadeau wasn't injured, but Roy was still charged with assault.

He was out of options, quite frankly. His lawyers made arguments to dismiss the case on both procedural (the laws about the legal ramifications of hockey fights were changed after the incident) and personal (he's a victim of his famous lineage) grounds. The Court rejected them, and Roy was stuck with either entering a plea or facing an assault trial that was set to begin this week.

In his plea, Roy has offered to make a $5,000 charitable donation while his lawyers are asking for "an absolute discharge." No word if that charity is some sort of medical plan for opposing goalies beaten up by members of the Roy family, like the one we imagine Chris Osgood considered starting.

Hopefully he can put this behind him and focus on his fascinating music career, in the sense that he's attempting to become the first soul singer with a complete lack of soul since Sisqo.

Happy trails, Roy. YouTube is forever indebted to you for this:

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