NHL All-Star Game

The NHL has been known as the joke of all professional sports leagues in the US, other than soccer. Americans have been unable to connect with the sport as our northern friends in Canada have, but fortunately, this trend of being a joke is changing. In order to bring some attention and change, the NHL announced that it would be changing the format of its All-Star Game, which is to be held in Raleigh this year.

In years past, the All-Star Game has had two sides, Western verses Eastern. Fans voted on the players that they wanted from each conference and the players with the most votes made the roster. This year, in an attempt to bring in more viewers, the NHL is drastically changing this traditional format. In this edition of the All-Star Game, fans will vote for all the different players, regardless of conference, and thus make a pool of players that are set to be participating. Then, the two players with the most votes will be declared captains and these two players will draft their teams from the pool of players. No more Eastern verses Western. Now, it will be just a head-on-head with all the greatest hockey players in the world.

In its own way, this idea is somewhat of a throwback. Brandon Shanahan, the man who is responsible for this change, says that the All-Star Game is just taking hockey players back to their beginning. It will be just like the days back when kids gathered together in the neighborhood and picked teams. The idea is to allow the players to have fun and enjoy the process and that this will translate to fun and thrilling moments for the fans.

This new Fantasy Draft idea is brilliant and will hopefully show to be successful come January 28 of next year, the official beginning of the All-Star Weekend. This format should bring in lots of new fans and peak the interest for people who have always been somewhat skeptical of the NHL. It makes for lots of hype, which the NHL can always use. It will be interesting to see if other leagues take on this draft style as well in years to come and hopefully bring forth success for this very under appreciated sport.