How the Toronto Maple Leafs and NHL Can Improve All-Star Events
By Jeff Borsuk
4. Chirping the Refs
The coaches don’t get to compete in any skills challenges to show off their individual talents.
In a Chirping the Refs competition, they would each be given one minute to demonstrate their best attempts to make a referee cry. The first coach to get a zebra to shed a tear wins. This would be the first time that most fans get to see someone like Sheldon Keefe get mean.
3. Strip Hockey
This event wouldn’t need to take place late at night once the kids are all in bed. This game of strip hockey wouldn’t have a player or coach lose articles of clothing when goals are scored. Instead, a member of the losing team of each 3-on-3 game would be stripped of their facial hair.
If this was a stipulation this year it could have played out as follows:
When the Atlantic Division lost to the Pacific, the final horn would have signaled off-ice officials to wheel out a barber chair. Matthews, decked out in his turtleneck, would then have been seated in the chair. The crowd would roar in appreciation when Brett Hull walked out with an electric razor in hand. The Golden Brett then would have then shaved off Matthews’s greasy mustache to the delight of all in attendance.
2. Busting Out the Beer Leaguers
It’s the dream of many fans to get the opportunity to play on an NHL ice surface with professional players. There would be no bigger stage to get that chance than at the All-Star Game.
This event’s set-up would be the same as the current 3-on-3 tournament, only with one additional team. That group would be a high-level beer league team. They would not just get to have their whole squad out to play, but instead of putting just three players on the ice at once, they would get to double it and skate six at a time.
The beer league team would get to choose one of the four teams that they wanted to challenge. They would play against that group for one five-minute period and if they won, they’d earn the opportunity to play again.
That followup game would be to challenge the champion of the All-Star tournament for their crown. Even with double the number of skaters, there is a far better chance that the beer leagues get embarrassed than them even scoring a single goal.