How the Toronto Maple Leafs and NHL Can Improve All-Star Events

The Toronto Maple Leafs looked great this weekend at the NHL All-Star festivities. The events themselves, however, could use a little improvement.

The NHL has done a good job reinventing the All-Star Game over the years. This year’s skills competition included the Shooting Stars challenge. The Toronto Maple Leafs were represented on the ice at the festivities by Frederik Andersen and Mitch Marner.

Though Auston Matthews was voted in, a wrist injury kept him from participating. As much fun as it was to watch the Leafs players perform, they could still have made things more interesting.

The 3-on-3 tournament has been the most exciting iteration of an exhibition game that has taken on many forms over the years. The NHL keeps readjusting to make the game more watchable and the same is true about the skills competition.

There is no better evidence than this year’s addition of the Shooting Stars competition. It is a contest that looked like an in-arena golfing range using hockey pucks.

Marner finished as the runner-up to Patrick Kane in the inaugural running of the event. With the NHL trying to mix things up, there’s clearly room to get creative and ensure that all the festivities are gripping television.

The All-Star Game and its surrounding fanfare is never a time to take hockey seriously. From Owen Nolan calling his shot in the 1997 game to Alexander Ovechkin competing in the 2009 breakaway challenge with two sticks and a Canadian flag poking out of a hat, it’s been more about entertainment than anything else.

With this in mind, we put entertainment ahead of the hockey for our list. And with entertainment in mind, we break from the Josh Manson-Maple Leafs trade rumours to focus on improving the All-Star festivities.

Though Toronto Maple Leafs fans are conditioned to dislike the Boston Bruins and their players, it’s hard not to recognize David Pastrnak’s stellar All-Star Game MVP performance. As such, In recognition of #88’s great night at the rink, we have compiled our top eight ridiculous suggestions to ensure that future All-Star festivities become a must-watch.

7. Off-Ice Skills Challenges

Fans of the game get to see their favourite players compete in only one athletic competition, playing hockey. At the NHL All-Star Skills Competition, each conference would nominate two players. One of each group’s nominees would then challenge another squad’s player to one of the preset options of off-ice skills.

Those skills could be almost anything. A player can challenge another to an eating contest, a wrestling match, a showdown to see who can type more words correctly in two minutes, a physical education style rope climbing contest, a spelling bee, etc.

Viewers would still get their fill of hockey, but part of the evening would break away from it so that Andersen and a teammate of his choice could obliterate Braden Holtby and his partner in a game of charades.

6. Survivor Hockey

Survivor Hockey would take place during a 5-on-5 game. Each time a goal is scored during the match, it eliminates someone from the opposing team. At first, each goal would knock someone off the bench beginning with the coaches. (Taking out the coaches first allows all players to get their touches.)

As the puck fills the nets, the benches would begin to thin. Eventually, when a team is no longer able to ice five skaters, they’d drop down to four on the ice.

The game would continue at five-on-four until the next goal is scored, which would either even things up at four or give one group a five-on-three advantage. Things would continue like this until there was just one skater remaining for a team. Once he is scored on, the game would be decided.

5. Sticks in the Middle

Instead of dividing teams based on the division in which they play, instead, they would create rosters the same way that it happens at shinny. Every All-Star would enter onto the ice for their introduction and then immediately drop their stick at the center dot.

Once every player’s stick is lying on the ice, an alumnus of the game would come out to be honoured. For example, if the game were in Toronto, Wendel Clark would be welcomed to center ice to throw all the sticks in four directions, building a random group of four teams.

The goalie sticks are easily recognizable, which would allow them to be separated on different squads, but there is no guarantee a team would be evenly made up of both forwards and defensemen.

Creating a squad full of a single position would add even more interest in the competition. How might a team comprised solely of defensemen fare?

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.