Kuklas Korner

Kuklas Korner:

“The big thing Rory, if you’re watching, they’re not laughing with you, they’re laughing at you,” said Cherry.

Cherry’s co-host Ron MacLean defended the campaign, saying it made for a cute story. He said fans are simply voicing their appreciation for Fitzpatrick, a concept Cherry strongly refuted.

“They never saw him play, how could they say he’s an all-star?” asked Cherry.

One of the things really pissing me off right now — the smug self-righteousness of the media ripping on the fans over selections of the all-star game. I feel bad for Rory Fitzpatrick. It’s not exactly like he asked for this. Some fans did this FOR him, or perhaps TO him, and yet — Fitzpatrick’s taking the largest load of crap from the “we’re the experts, and you folks are idiots” crowd.

Let me ask Don Cherry a question? Given the NHL lets fans vote for both Eastern AND Western conferences, how many games do you think the typical New York Rangers fan has seen Joe Thornton play this season before casing a ballot for him? For that matter, how many games has CHERRY watched Thornton this year? I’m just curious. Remember, in the current schedule, fans in a given arena only see a team from the other conference every three years, and most West coast fans are still at work when Eastern teams go to work at 4:30, and most East Coast fans (and media) still believe no real hockey happens to go on out west and go to sleep before the 10:30 start time.

So lets get off this might horse and be done with it.

If you want the players who are playing the best this season at the All Star game, then have the coaches and GMs vote for the team (and don’t let them vote for anyone on their own teams).

But we don’t do that. This is the Fan’s game. It’s the fan’s choice — that’s what they keep telling us. And evidently it’s okay for the fans to keep voting for Gaborik in Minnesota (games played this season: 4, votes 115K and ahead of McDonald, Hejduk, and Michalek, to name jsut three well-qualified all-star capable players), but not okay to vote for Rory Fiztpatrick (486K votes).

Every year, teams put out press releases encouraging their fans to vote for the team’s candidates — not the most qualified ones. Every year, team-sponsored booster-club outings mass-punch ballots to try to get their team’s players in the game (well, not this year, since there’s no paper ballots). THAT is evidently okay.

It’s okay for a hundred thousand voters to vote for a guy who’s been on injured reserve all season, it’s okay for the sharks to tell the boosters and fans to vote for Cheechoo, even though he’s clearly taken a step back from his season last year. But of course, the media pundits will rationalize the first that Gaborik is a name, and therefore, that’s okay (sort of, and besides, being hurt, he won’t really play), and the latter will be rationalized away that Cheech is being honored for what he did last year, too — and I’ll actually buy into that to some degree.

So — it’s okay for fans to vote for unqualified people – if the media agrees with them. Bring in a player they don’t agree with, and suddenly, you have this massive character assassination of a guy and all the media ripping their shirts and declaring the end of civilization over this.

Reality check: THE ALL STAR GAME IS AN EXHIBITION GAME.

In other words, CHILL THE FRACK OUT. People are taking this way to freaking seriously. Most of the media (starting with Cherry) are mostly showing themselves to be humourless boobs that have no sense of humor OR perspective.

If you give the fans the right to vote — then the people they vote in are the right people to be there. There’s none of this “… but only if the media approves of the choices” anywhere in the rules I can find. So either accept the results as they are — the will of the people — or change the rules and give the vote to the pros. (hint: I have NO problem giving the vote to the pros, but the fan voting is a way to generate interest in the game and get people excited. Except, of course, when the media band together to piss and crap on the thing and make everyone feel sour and grumpy about it. Gee, thanks, Don. You’ve really made me look forward to the game, no matter WHO is skating… Great way to promote the sport you keep bitching at Bettman needs your help to succeed and grow…..)

go take a look at the news. Everyone’s talking about the All-Star game in the media — but it’s not about the game. It’s about The Controversy. Great for the media, rotten for hockey.

the media has, once again, taken what is at worst a minor bit of quickly forgotten trivia (and one the fans have actually done on their own. gee, fan interest and involvement, we HAVE to stomp that; bad for the game) and ramped it up into a major controversy, mostly by trying to set up the media as the people qualified to judge whether or not the fans are capable of making proper choices — and, of course, the media is once again standing up and declaring their viewers and readers TOO STUPID to be allowed to make choices like this. (instead, give it to the (ahem) media).

This sucks. And then the media will rip on Bettman over why there’s so much negative media on the NHL….

Reality: Fitzpatrick isn’t an All-Star. Neither is Gaborik, but lots of people are voting for him. Neither is Cheechoo this year, but lots of folks are voting for him, too. Every year, there’s an argument over some player or another that “deserves” to be there or “shouldn’t have been voted in” — think back the last ten years, and ask yourself if ANY year there wasn’t some player fans and media were bitching about.

Nope. Every year. just like clockwork. And it doesn’t matter. Not now, now last year, not ten years ago when the NHL started online balloting and the Sharks fans made it their goal to get Andrei Nazarov into the All-Star game (hey, back then, the NHL simply threw the votes out. no idea why they finally decided this year to treat this like a real election and count the fitzpatrick campaign; they have a long track record of ignoring or invalidating stuff they find inconvenient,a nd all of us involved with the “50,000 votes for Nazzy” campaigns (which may actually still be happening, I’ve lots touch) have known since year 1 that the vote was fixed (because none of our votes ever were counted, even when we followed the rules. WE won’t even get into the mid-campaign rule changes the NHL threw in to block us the first few years…..)

So my suggestion: GET OVER IT. the media’s trying to screw up the NHL’s party over a piece of trivia, one they conveniently ignore in other cases throughout the years, but this year, for some reason, they got this hair up their butt.

And then, the media will complain about how this all ruined what should be a fun atmosphere at the All-Star game — and blame the league and Bettman for it. STart to understand why Bettman doesn’t exactly consider many of the league beat writers friends?

How is this helping the league, anyway? Not that the media has to shill for the league — but can it simply try to not actively destroy it over trivia? Is that too much to ask? (hmm. reading the last five years of Al Strachan columns. Evidently, yes….)

Just get over it. All of you. Starting with Don. It’s the all-star game.

Quick question: name the starting teams for the last all-star game. Name the six goalies that played.

I see you all cheating on google. See? proves my point. The only reason this is a controversy is because the media felt like making it one, not because it has any real importance.

My real question, listening to the pundits on TV and reading the newspapers across the web: why do so many of the professional press have such a negative attitude towards the league this year? And if that’s THEIR bad attitude, why are they blaming the league for it and trying to tear down all of the positive improvements that came with the league last year?

What’s wrong with letting the fans do what they feel like doing, sitting down with the family and watching the All-Star game, where we can complain about the lack of checking and gripe about the 10-8 score with a smile, and then forget it happened two or three days later? That is, after all, about what the All-Star game is worth, and how important it is in the grand scheme of the game.

you’d never know it from how guys like cherry are carrying on though.

sigh. And here I am, talking about this instead of a damn good sharks/ducks game last night.

That’s ALSO the media’s fault….

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