COLUMBUS — Remember the National Hockey League’s lockouts? When the league and the Players’ Association would go on about being “partners” and “growing the game?” Then they do their best to knife each other in the back at every turn?
Well, there has been progress.
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What this All-Star Weekend has shown us is that, if the league is going to hold this All-Star gala, it will succeed or fail on the backs of its partners — the players. There is nothing that Gary Bettman, the Board of Governors, or anyone else dressed in a business suit can do to make this weekend a success.
It’s up to Alex Ovechkin, Patrick Kane and the rest of hockey’s superstars.
“You can really see it,” Team Foligno captain Nick Foligno said. “You could see it at the draft, with guys chirping each other and the different comments that were made. We’re trying to let the fans see us in a different light, and guys are opening up. Hockey is a fun game, and that’s what we want the fans to see.”
Bettman and the league turned the weekend over to the players with Saturday’s Skills Event, and it was the players’ turn to entertain a packed house at Nationwide Arena. Same with the TV audience that tuned in Friday to watch the Fantasy Draft.
Give them credit — that’s exactly what they’ve done so far.
On Friday the players got a tad lubricated, and showed us another side of their personalities. Then, during Saturday’s Skills Competition, they tried all kinds of weird and wonderful moves, without fear of how they looked when those moves didn’t work.
It’s the new NHL player. They can laugh at themselves now.
“There are so many cameras following the guys around now, behind the scenes” said Nashville’s Shea Weber. “It opens up the world to the fans. Now they can see what players are like behind the scenes.”
Calgary Flames rookie Johnny Gaudreau wanted to light his stick on fire for his shootout attempts. The problem was, he asked Department of Player Safety Director Patrick Burke, and when Burke brought the notion to discussion, “every attorney in our offices had simultaneous heart attacks,” he tweeted.
“Me and Mark Giordano were talking about it on the bus a little bit earlier and thought it would be a good idea since we play for Flames,” he said. “I don’t think they were going to let me do it.”
Ovechkin swung a goalie stick at a puck lofted by countryman Vladimir Tarasenko — three times — and went down swinging. As one wag quipped, “Mickey Mantle never had a hard time making contact when HE was hung over,” a reference to Ovechkin’s antics the night before at the Draft Lottery.
The night began with Phil Kessel beating Tyler Seguin in a photo finish in the Fastest Skater event, one day after the two were dealt for each other in the only trade of the Draft Lottery. The two have been a running theme, since Brian Burke traded all those draft picks for Kessel back on Sept. 18, 2009. And they’re OK with it here in Columbus.
“I thought it was good, too,” Kane said of the Draft Lottery. “They told us just to have fun with it. Show off your personality and just kind of just roll with the show, and I think throughout the whole thing it wasn’t too serious, it was just kind of fun, and I think that’s the good thing about hockey players. You can have battles on the ice. Like you saw with Giordano and (Ryan) Getzlaf. They didn’t like each other too much last game and they were joking around about it. That’s the great thing about hockey.”
In the end Saturday, Team Toews made a valiant comeback attempt in the Breakaway Relay, but couldn’t climb all the way back. Team Foligno won the day by a 25-19 score.
• Tampa Bay’s Jonathan Drouin posted the fastest time in the Fastest Skater competition, buzzing around the rink in 13.103. For some perspective, the slowest of the eight skaters was St. Louis’ Vladimir Tarasenko (14.386), and that was only because he slipped out of the starting blocks.
• Ryan Johansen won the Breakaway Challenge, a winner chosen by a fan vote on Twitter. The Blue Jackets centreman won over Buckeyes Nation when he took off his Columbus jersey to reveal the Ohio State football jersey of Buckeyes quarterback Braxton Miller.
“I stopped at a Buckeyes store today, but couldn’t find a helmet that fit,” he said afterwards. “Must be too many brains.”
• Little surprise here: sharp-shooter Patrick Kane blasted the fastest in the Accuracy Shooting contest, knocking down four targets in 13.529 seconds. He bested his running mate in Chicago, Jonathan Toews, going head to head.
“I thought he’d do better than that (time), actually,” kidded Toews, who easily knocked off three targets in a row, then hit three consecutive posts before finishing the job. That time cost him the win over Kane. “The door was wide open,” he admitted. Foligno finished second, the only other shooter to post a sub-14 second time.
• Shea Weber came within a hair of setting a new record in the Hardest Shot competition, registering a speed of 108.5 mph with his second slapshot. The NHL record belongs to Boston defenceman Zdeno Chara at 108.8 mph. Weber missed the net in his first attempt. “Embarrassing,” he said.
