All-Star voting joke.



Have a look at the scoring lines for the sets of three players at the current halfway point of the 2011/12 NHL season (G-A-Pts-Plus/Minus).

Group A

10-27-37 +7
11-15-26 +9
13-10-23 +3



Group B

14-26-40 -3

12-16-28 -1

19-7-26 -6


Do any of these look like the numbers of All-Star game starters? Hardly. However,if push came to shove which three would you have start the All-Star game? Doesn't matter really, they're just a collection of mediocre half-season numbers. There has to be dozens of players more deserving to start. Personally between these two groups I'd go with Group A even though they trail the bottom three by 9 points in total, their plus/minus is +19 compared to -10.


The first set of numbers (Group A) belong to the bottom three vote getters in NHL Forwards All-Star voting; Jamie Benn, David Backes and Mike Richards. Group B are the numbers of the voted starters; Jason Spezza, Daniel Alfredsson and Milan Michalek. The Ottawa Senators fans have succeeded in making a mockery of the voting process and it could have been worse. Sergei Gonchar and his 2 goals and -1 rating missed out on second place by only 11,000 votes (or about 50 Ottawa fans worth of ballot-box stuffing).


I'm amazed that Sens goalie Craig Anderson finished a distant 15th in voting. At least they got something right.

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