The NHL All Star Game : Why I like it

The NHL All Star Game is this weekend with the skill competition taking place tonight in Nashville.

Unlike a lot of people, who find the All Star Game to be a complete waste of time, I actually enjoy the All Star Game. I can also see why people do not like the All Star Game: the quality of hockey is brutal. It’s slow. It’s a glorified scrimmage.

Yet, I watch the festivities year in year out. There’s a few reasons for this.

I remember the First NHL All Star Game I watched. It was in Boston back in 1996. You had Ray Bourque being the captain of the Eastern Conference team. The FoxTrax Puck being used (as a kid I thought it was so cool) And those jerseys! Those jerseys were and still are, my favorite All Star Game jerseys of all time. They were so good, that the Dallas Stars took the template and used it for their homes and aways for years before the RBK Edge was introduced in 2007.

A year later, the NHL All Star game would be set up in San Jose and had my most memorable memory of the game: Owen Nolan’s Called Shot to complete his hat trick on Dominik Hasek. What a cool play to see as a kid.

I think the biggest reason why I watch the NHL All Star game is that it reminds me of when I was a kid. I love seeing the Players being candid and mic’d up. I love seeing the players looking like they are having a blast on the ice. There’s something innocent there. I find it sad when the biggest names out there bow out of the All Star game year in and year out, this year including Jonathan Toews and Alex Ovechkin skipping the game. I feel really for the kids who get robbed seeing the biggest stars in the game.

Still, I’m excited to watch it this year. There’s a couple changes and a huge headline going in:

Changes to the Game

The NHL Fantasy Draft is gone. After a few years of having designated captains choose their team out of a pool of players, this year’s format has been switched to a tournament style: each division within the two conferences will play each other, with the winners moving onto the finals. There’s also a sweet 1 million dollar incentive going to the winning team.

Another big change to this year’s events: It’s purely 3v3. Sure, there are some groans but I love 3v3 Overtime. It’s so fast paced, you’re on the edge of your seat the entire time. Having the league’s best playing all together should be fun.

For our Edmonton Oilers, Taylor Hall represents the team in his first NHL All Star Game appearance. Tonight he will be participating in three events: Fastest Skater, Relay challenge as a passer and of course the shootout. It’s great to see Hall representing the Oilers because he is having one of his best season’s to date. He’s healthy and the best Edmonton Oiler this season.

John Scott

John Scott is playing in the NHL All Star Game. He was voted in (via fan vote) as the captain of the Pacific Division. He was placed on waivers from Arizona and then later traded to Montreal and assigned to St. John. It looked really slimy from the NHL stand point and sparked outrage for John not being able to play in the All Star Game.

At this point, I felt pretty bad for John Scott. He didn’t ask to be part of this fan vote. He didn’t ask to be humiliated.I felt for the guy. I think it was a joke and to his expense.

However, John Scott has been rightfully allowed to play in the All Star Game. People have been saying that they will be tuning in, to see how he will play.

Best yet, was his Player’s Tribune Article that explained his point of view on the All Star Game and I really recommend everyone to read that. It’s great to see that he’s doing this for his family and that it’s a once in the life time opportunity for John Scott.

I hope it’s a great one for him. Even though the Fan vote had not the best intentions (I think it should be scrapped after this), he deserves his time in the spot light.