Loose Talk: The Editors’ Take
Zemgus Girgensons. You are all now asking yourselves, “Who is that?” Well, Girgensons was an NHL all-star this year. He represented the Buffalo Sabres at the All-Star game in Columbus over the weekend. He has 13 goals and nine assists for a grand total of 22 points this season. That places him tied for 171st in the league and tied for third to last for the All-Stars with rookies Jonathan Drouin and Jiri Sekac being the only players in Columbus with less points than Girgensons. He is not even a top line player on the Sabres. He is their second line center and their second leading scorer. Buffalo is also the worst team in the NHL this season, so he is far from being worthy of an All-Star appearance.
So how did Girgensons make it into the event? He led the fan voting for the game. He was carried by his home country of Latvia, a small Baltic nation of two million people. After starring for the Latvian national team at the Sochi Olympics, he was thrust in the national spotlight. The hockey-crazed country rewarded him with an appearance in this year’s All-Star game, albeit undeservingly.
This is not Latvia’s fault or Girgensons’. The NHL is solely to blame. They care more about involving fans in the selection process, which means more attention to the game itself, and henceforth more money flowing into the pockets of commissioner Gary Bettman and his cohorts. All four major North American sports leagues have a voting portion of their All-Star selection process. And they all do it for the same reason: money.
As a result of this greed, we routinely see less than stellar All-Stars in games across professional sports. A lot of times, they go to fan favorite players or aging stars whose fans want to see them for one last time before they ride off into the sunset.
The NBA All-Star starters were recently announced. The East All-Stars were Carmelo Anthony, LeBron James, Pau Gasol, John Wall and Kyle Lowry. Four of these choices I agree with. LeBron is bringing Cleveland back to relevance by doing LeBron things. Gasol has been a stud for the Bulls since coming over from the Lakers this offseason. Meanwhile, Lowry and Wall are continuing their surge to the elite point guard level. Carmelo is the outlier in this group. He is still a scoring machine, but his effective field goal percentage has dipped fifteen percent due to a dive of nearly 70 points in three point shooting. These are not All-Star numbers. Instead of Melo, either one of Al Horford or Paul Millsap of the Atlanta Hawks, the top team in the East, could have replaced him. While neither of their stats will blow you away, their defensive is outstanding and, in addition to their team’s record, should have put them in a starting slot for the East.
The Western Conference’s starters are even more egregious. While Stephen Curry, Anthony Davis and Marc Gasol are well deserving of their starting gigs, Kobe Bryant and Blake Griffin are not the best choices. Bryant has the double threat of being an aging star and a fan favorite, combining to give the Laker legend a spot on the roster.
While he will not start due to being out for the season with a torn rotator cuff, he never should have been on the team to begin with. James Harden, whom Grantland dubbed the future of the NBA, is not starting for the West squad. Some may say his defense is lackadaisical recalling his hilarious YouTube compilation of poor defense from last season, but he has improved on that side of the court this season while improving his scoring output. Needless to say, he earned a spot in the starting lineup, but the fans failed to realize this.
As for Griffin, he is clearly known by fans league-wide for his high-flying, powerful dunks. His dunking skills alone should not make him All-Star. It certainly helps to play in Los Angeles for a competitive team, but Tim Duncan has been better this season. Duncan is averaging a double-double this year while also being the best defensive this season in terms of plus-minus. That should scream “All-Star Starter,” but failed to because of the fans bias towards big dunks.
The system for All-Star selections needs to change. While fan votes are certainly important to league offices due to increased revenue, they should not be deciding who makes the starting lineups. Substitute fan voting for solely coach, front office and players choosing the All-Stars. If a fan vote is too important to completely discard, do what the MLB does with a last vote where the fans select a final player from each league to be at the game. By eliminating the fan vote, it would bring back the “Star” to All-Star games.