Lazlow
OzCardTrader
As part of the NHL All Star game, the NHL conducts an online fan vote to select the captains - for this years edition there would be 4.
As with most online polls there were a few outliers, candidates put forward purely to mess with the establishment, clearly undeserving of the tag "All Star".
One such name this year was John Scott.
Scott had played 285 games over 8 years with 6 different teams. He was a fourth line enforcer, a goon, an antiquated role in modern Ice Hockey. He punches faces and lays questionable hits. His current team, Arizona, had only dressed him for 11 games this season, with only 69 minutes of ice time.
And it was these very reasons an online campaign was seeing him race up the leader board to NHL All Star Captaincy.
For the All Star game isn't taken very seriously these days. Its an irrelevant score fest, played at half speed, without a recorded hit since 2003. State of Origin it is not. Last year's edition saw 96 shots on goal.
So why not mess with these deluded notions of integrity but electing the most unworthy of captains.
While the online campaigns gained momentum, and the hashtags numerous, most expected the NHL to step in and fudge the numbers. After all, this is not without precedent. In 2007 fans tried to vote in little known Canucks defensemen Rory Fitzpatrick, and just as it looked like it was going to be a success, Rory suddenly dropped down the rankings to 3rd for defensemen, and wasn't a selection.
But for whatever reason this year the NHL wasn't as observant this year. Maybe because they were distancing themselves from the fan vote - while they pledged to honour the votes they certainly stopped promoting it - or maybe people just didn't give a s--t this year and votes were fewer. Whatever the reason, finally the online fans had their win.
John Scott was voted in to be captain of the Pacific Division.
And it is here where things start to get messy. See the NHL were now made to look foolish, their All Star game the literal joke everyone says it is. The NHL were had, and unfortunately John Scott was about to pay the price.
It initially started with a simple request; the NHL contacted John Scott and simply asked him to drop out of the game. The Coyotes apparently asked the same. What follows is John Scott's account of an conversation between him and the NHL:
You see John Scott didn't ask for this, in actual fact during the voting process he implored fans to vote from his more deserving teammates instead. They didn't listen. But now that the NHL was using his kids, trying to emotionally blackmail him out of the All Star game, it became a matter of principle. He refused to budge.
Unfortunately he was a movable object in the way of an unstoppable force. The Coyotes traded him (in a 3 team deal) to Montreal, who then promptly shipped him off to their AHL affiliate, never to see NHL ice again.
When asked about the trade Montreal GM Marc Bergevin literally said they "can't really tell you why he had to make that trade". Nothing about adding "toughness" to their defense, nothing about adding 4th line depth. Just... nothing.
And it is this bizarre set of circumstances that has lead to strong speculation that the NHL orchestrated the trade, to essentially boot John Scott out of the NHL and out of their All Star game. A man with a young family was suddenly being uprooted from Arizona to Newfoundland.
Cue fan backlash. The NHL's pettiness was laid bare for all to see. But with this muscle flexing the league ironically proved the fans right and reinforced the whole point of the joke; their votes don't matter.
With the whole situation now a pathetic mess, a public relations disaster, the NHL were left with no choice but to relent to growing pressure and reinstate John Scott as the Pacific Division captain.
All Star Weekend was the John Scott Show. The public had their champion and the anti-hero had his one day in the spotlight. He Pacific Division teammates rallied around him. Despite their disparate skill levels, they were all cut from the same cloth. They were all hockey players that held the same dreams and aspirations.
John Scott would pick up the Pacific Division MVP, scoring two goals and recording the first hit in 13 years.
(As an aside, the NHL did do at least one thing right. The move to a 4 team 3-on-3 tournament made for one of the most entertaining All Star games in a long while).
As with most online polls there were a few outliers, candidates put forward purely to mess with the establishment, clearly undeserving of the tag "All Star".
One such name this year was John Scott.
Scott had played 285 games over 8 years with 6 different teams. He was a fourth line enforcer, a goon, an antiquated role in modern Ice Hockey. He punches faces and lays questionable hits. His current team, Arizona, had only dressed him for 11 games this season, with only 69 minutes of ice time.
And it was these very reasons an online campaign was seeing him race up the leader board to NHL All Star Captaincy.
For the All Star game isn't taken very seriously these days. Its an irrelevant score fest, played at half speed, without a recorded hit since 2003. State of Origin it is not. Last year's edition saw 96 shots on goal.
So why not mess with these deluded notions of integrity but electing the most unworthy of captains.
While the online campaigns gained momentum, and the hashtags numerous, most expected the NHL to step in and fudge the numbers. After all, this is not without precedent. In 2007 fans tried to vote in little known Canucks defensemen Rory Fitzpatrick, and just as it looked like it was going to be a success, Rory suddenly dropped down the rankings to 3rd for defensemen, and wasn't a selection.
But for whatever reason this year the NHL wasn't as observant this year. Maybe because they were distancing themselves from the fan vote - while they pledged to honour the votes they certainly stopped promoting it - or maybe people just didn't give a s--t this year and votes were fewer. Whatever the reason, finally the online fans had their win.
John Scott was voted in to be captain of the Pacific Division.
And it is here where things start to get messy. See the NHL were now made to look foolish, their All Star game the literal joke everyone says it is. The NHL were had, and unfortunately John Scott was about to pay the price.
It initially started with a simple request; the NHL contacted John Scott and simply asked him to drop out of the game. The Coyotes apparently asked the same. What follows is John Scott's account of an conversation between him and the NHL:
You see John Scott didn't ask for this, in actual fact during the voting process he implored fans to vote from his more deserving teammates instead. They didn't listen. But now that the NHL was using his kids, trying to emotionally blackmail him out of the All Star game, it became a matter of principle. He refused to budge.
Unfortunately he was a movable object in the way of an unstoppable force. The Coyotes traded him (in a 3 team deal) to Montreal, who then promptly shipped him off to their AHL affiliate, never to see NHL ice again.
When asked about the trade Montreal GM Marc Bergevin literally said they "can't really tell you why he had to make that trade". Nothing about adding "toughness" to their defense, nothing about adding 4th line depth. Just... nothing.
And it is this bizarre set of circumstances that has lead to strong speculation that the NHL orchestrated the trade, to essentially boot John Scott out of the NHL and out of their All Star game. A man with a young family was suddenly being uprooted from Arizona to Newfoundland.
Cue fan backlash. The NHL's pettiness was laid bare for all to see. But with this muscle flexing the league ironically proved the fans right and reinforced the whole point of the joke; their votes don't matter.
With the whole situation now a pathetic mess, a public relations disaster, the NHL were left with no choice but to relent to growing pressure and reinstate John Scott as the Pacific Division captain.
All Star Weekend was the John Scott Show. The public had their champion and the anti-hero had his one day in the spotlight. He Pacific Division teammates rallied around him. Despite their disparate skill levels, they were all cut from the same cloth. They were all hockey players that held the same dreams and aspirations.
John Scott would pick up the Pacific Division MVP, scoring two goals and recording the first hit in 13 years.
(As an aside, the NHL did do at least one thing right. The move to a 4 team 3-on-3 tournament made for one of the most entertaining All Star games in a long while).
