Here is the West roster submitted by Nick (he's traveling and can't post on the boards for the moment). I'll have to move Demitra to C and move one of the C's to wing (Allison?) for the game, which will be played TONIGHT RW X – Pavol Demitra (Col)) X - Daniel Alfredsson (StL) (voted starter but also RW) Milan Hejduk (Cal) Alexei Kovalev (Chic) LW X – Vaclav Prospal (Cal) Alex Tanguay (Chi) Martin Havlat (Edm) Patrick Elias (SJS) C Peter Forsberg (SJ) Joe Thornton (StL) Jason Allison (Col) Brind’Amour (StL) D X – Brian McCabe (Dal) X – T .Kaberle (Van) L. Visnovsky (Col) Scott Neidermeyer (SJS) Niklas Lidstrom (Det) Zdeno Chara (StL) G X-Sean Burke (Ana) Marty Turco (StL) J. Labarbera (Cal)
Nice to see 3 Colorado players, but how wasn't Boucher picked? He should be the no.4 defenseman in West as has done better than Niedermayer, Lidström and Chara this season.
Only speculating here ... I suspect it had more to do with Nick trying to have representatives from as many teams involved as possible and so Lidstrom probably got his spot. Dion did the same with the East and I know in my own All-Star voting I try and look for achievers from as many teams as possible (I think there was only one team I gave more than one vote to this year) vs. just voting for the guy with the highest point total EDIT: I take that back, just noticed there are 5 Blues players in there but only one from each of his closest rivals the Wings and the Ducks
I do the same. I never vote for 2 players from the same team for the All-stars. Looking at the other stats than just points, Boucher has a great +/- (2nd on the team with a +21) and has a lot of hits as well(team leading 151). But considering that there are 5 StL guys, the argument to have Boucher in the all star game instead of Chara is more than valid.
Well Nick was voted in by everyone else to pick the All-Star Team, so he has the right to choose who he wants. There were some odd omissions from the NHL All-Star team this year, and this is no different. Just the way things work out...
Drew, I am sure Blues players need this game because they will not be in the playoffs for more than one round.
I know, just giving Nick the gears as usual. I'm sure he expects nothing less from me In his defence, since he's travelling, it's quite possible he didn't have time to look long at who to pick.
When I put tgether the rosters for the Young Stars I went out of my way to ensure that every team in the West had at least one player. But it was very, very difficult to do. 23 players may seem like a lot, but there were at least 9 defenceman deserving of a spot... and I even had to drop Rick Nash (Sorry Tony) to make way for a player perhaps not as deserving but ensured that no team went unrepresented. I even cut two Flames defenceman who were deserving and didn't have any Flames on the roster... Turns out alright since the West won - and its good that all GM's had an interest... but it was an almost impossible thing to do.
Who says the HFNHL doesn't emulate the real thing. I'm ammused that we're actully debating who should have been in and the process for selecting guys to the All-Star game. Fortunately it's all in good humour. Love the passion guys but Nick has full discression on who he picks, there's no rules or guidelines on how he should pick the rest of the roster it's not like there's any financial impact aside from those voted in.
Maybe that explains it. Nick in his travels was incommunicato (yeah I probably spelt that wrong) and so didn't receive any bribes
Well, you know I lost Bourque to you in a coin toss, yet, I'm still a fan. .. buts what's worse is that Tony won't trade me Nash without Polski being part of it.
ouch to each their own, the right to pick this team is earned for all the right reasons but 1/3 of the western conference not represented in the All-Star game.. (Columbus, Nashville, Minnesota, Phoenix, Los Angeles
The only guy I have who would deserve to go (Shanahan) is behind several more deserving RWs. I'm not complaining - just another sign of this lamentable waste of a season.
talked to rick about that and he said, he'll never consider playing for calgary after being kicked off the youngstars roster. i personally would take polski as compensation for rick being knocked off...
Personally, I don't think Nash deserved to be in the Western Conference team period. Because he played a majority in the East with the Sabres. That was the reason I didn't chose Naslund for my team. He scored most of his points for Vancouver.
Ugh, I knew I should have paid more than a cursory glance at the picks, but I was travelling and lucky to set aside the few minutes I did. That said, if I had to do it over again, the only change I'd likely make is simply swapping Visnovski for Boucher, given the +/- factor, which I didn't notice. As to Lidstrom and Chara, Z leads the Western conference with a +33 and also is close to leading d-men in points, as is Lidstrom. Boucher and Jovanovski were both right there in terms of being considered in the top 6. Pronger was also left off, despite solid numbers comparable to Chara. For the forwards, it was simply based on production that the top 12 was put together, which seemed the fairest way. Same for the goalies, although Labarbera's limited games played made it tough to choose him, but given all the other top goalies SVG was so poor, it was a case of Labarbera simply being the best third option. Admittedly, I didn't pay any attention to which teams were represented the most or the least and didn't really care one way or another, which is the way it should be to be honest.
