Here are your starters as voted in by the fans:



East
C Sidney Crosby, PIT
C Evgeni Malkin, PIT
RW Alexei Kovalev, MON
D Andrei Markov, MON
D Mike Komisarek, MON
G Carey Price, MON

West
RW Patrick Kane, CHI
C Jonathan Toews, CHI
C Ryan Getzlaf, ANA
D Brian Campbell, CHI
D Scott Niedermayer, ANA
G Jean-Sebastien Giguere, ANA

So basically, 4 teams still have a legit fanbase.

Apparently 4 cities completely dominated the voting.

Last year's MVP and the second leading scorer (Ovechkin) is not in. Neither are 3 of the 4 top scorers in the West.

I guess I can understand Kane (tied for 5th in the west) and Getlzaf (3rd in West), but what is with Toews? The Wings have 5 people with more points than him (and a better record). The top two scorers (Thorton and Iginla) 15+ more points than him. Not to mention the Wings, Sharks and Flames are all leading their divisions.

Campbell and Neidermayer are in the top 15 in D scoring, but Rafalski is #1 and Lidstrom is 7th.

What a retarded concept all star voting has become.

I consider myself pretty well knowledged in the NHL, but I`ve never heard of Mike Komisarek.

Was he their replacement for Mark Streit?

Apparently 4 cities completely dominated the voting.

Last year's MVP and the second leading scorer (Ovechkin) is not in. Neither are 3 of the 4 top scorers in the West.

I guess I can understand Kane (tied for 5th in the west) and Getlzaf (3rd in West), but what is with Toews? The Wings have 5 people with more points than him (and a better record). The top two scorers (Thorton and Iginla) 15+ more points than him. Not to mention the Wings, Sharks and Flames are all leading their divisions.

Campbell and Neidermayer are in the top 15 in D scoring, but Rafalski is #1 and Lidstrom is 7th.

What a retarded concept all star voting has become.

:cogent:

To me this is even worse than the NBA crap. Yeah, some of their starters have been a little less deserving than another player (when Yao made it over a better Shaq for example). But, this is ridiculous to have players that aren't even in the top 20 in scoring in their league making all star games as starters.

I'm pretty sure I know who 5 of those guys are.

To me this is even worse than the NBA crap. Yeah, some of their starters have been a little less deserving than another player (when Yao made it over a better Shaq for example). But, this is ridiculous to have players that aren't even in the top 20 in scoring in their league making all star games as starters.

I bet the GM's are pissed they have to pay those role players all star bonus money ^_^

Its a total crock of shit, just trying to bring in more fans by saying "vote for your favorites". Fan voting should be counted as part of the equation along with player voting, coach voting, and front office voting.

Way too much voting. Just have some dude pick. One dude. Baggins.

Way too much voting. Just have some dude pick. One dude. Baggins.

I agree with this. He should also be in charge of all the other All-Star games, pick the NCAA Tourney teams, decide who poses for playboy and elect the President for every country.

Nicklas Lidstrom, Pavel Datsyuk named to All-Star team

by Ansar Khan Wednesday January 07, 2009, 11:59 AM


Red Wings defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom and center Pavel Datsyuk were named as reserves on the Western Conference All-Star team, the NHL announced. The Jan. 25 All-Star Game in Montreal will be the 11th for Lidstrom, whose streak of eight straight starts was snapped this season when Chicago's Brian Campbell and Anaheim's Scott Niedermayer were voted in by on-line balloting. It will be the third All-Star appearance for Datsyuk.

The other Western reserves are:
Goalies -- Niklas Backstrom, Minnesota; Roberto Luongo, Vancouver.
Defensemen -- Sheldon Souray, Edmonton; Shea Weber, Nashville; Dan Boyle, San Jose.
Forwards -- Jarome Iginla, Calgary; Milan Hejduk, Colorado; Rick Nash, Columbus; Mike Modano, Dallas; Dustin Brown, Los Angeles; Shane Doan, Phoneix; Keith Tkachuk, St. Louis; Joe Thornton, San Jose.
The starting goalie is Jean-Sebastien Giguere of Anaheim and the starting forwards are Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews of Chicago and Ryan Getzlaf of Anaheim.
The Eastern reserves will be announced on Thursday.


Rafalski, Hossa and Z get the shaft here.

Hejduk, Tkachuk, Brown and Modano all have 27 points or less. Hossa and Z have 37 and 36, and are on a team doing much better. Tkcachuk is a minus 11, Hejduk a minus 8, Modano a plus 1, and Brown a minus 6 (compared to Hossa and Z at plus 13 and plus 11). Rafalski has 31 points and is a plus 12. The 3 they selected are all within a couple points of him but have lower +/-. This one is ok with me, but I don't get how those forwards were chosen. In fact in most of those cases the players are being outplayed by 1 or more teammates.

Tkachuk? Really? Five years ago maybe. Fuck this all-star game.

It's beyond ridiculous. There is not one area, not a single one (real good breakdown BTW Chris), where you can say those four forwards were better than Hossa and Z. You can't do the whole "statistics don't tell the whole story" argument either since neither of those four have been more dominant than Z this year and don't even come close to being as dominant on the ice as Hossa's been. You can't even do the reward the player for what he did in the playoffs last year since Hossa at times was the Penguins best player in the Finals and Z, well, we know how well he did. The picking of this All-Star team is beyond stupid; it's Matt Millen level moronic.

And it's not just the Wings either. Marleau has 42 points and is on the top team. No invite. Sedin has 41 points. No invite. yet Tkachuk makes it on a last place team with far less numbers.

Giguere is 11-9 and has a 2.96 GAA and starting this thing.

Better numbers:
Khabibulin is 12-2 with a 2.39 GAA
Mason is 13-9 with a 1.81 GAA
Conklin is 14-5 with a 2.38 GAA
Osgood is 13-2 with a 3.12 GAA

Shit, Giguere's backup deserves it more:
Hiller is 10-6 with a 2.06 GAA

I can ALMOST understand Bulin not getting the nod because he's only played 14 games, but those are still amazing numbers. There is no way Mason shouldn't be getting in over Giguere.

Got my question answered:


Chris (Denver): The all star starters are a complete joke, but the flawed system allows this. What I don't get is the West reserves. How do guys on a first place team like Hossa and Zetterberg get beat out by players with 10 or more less points. I might be ok with it if they were being rewarded for exceptional defense, but Hossa and Zetterberg are exceptional two way players (Hossa since going to Detroit). They have a plus 11 and 13, while the players who made it are -11, -8, -6 and +1. There are a half dozen worthy all stars on this team and the rest is a complete joke.

http://a.espncdn.com/i/sn2.gif Pierre LeBrun: The NHL has a tough job every year with this. They like to have all 30 teams represented. Nabokov and Kirprusoff should be on the West team as well but were overlooked. It's not easy to fill it out and take care of everybody

Fuck representing everyone. If you deserve to be in the All-Star game you should be an all-star caliber player. Its like baseball having Tigers' players on the all-star team back when we were repeatedly sending Tony Clark and Robert Fitch. They were not all-star caliber, and they should not be at the game.

Its like baseball having Tigers' players on the all-star team back when we were repeatedly sending Tony Clark and Robert Fitch.

Abercrombie usually put up better numbers...



Maybe Robert Fick?

That's how big of a star he was, I didn't even get his last name right?