Claimed:Marquis Hyvarinen in the All-Star Game? [Reviewed]

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Marquis Hyvarinen in the All-Star Game?

The new All-Star Game format in the VHL is a welcome, yet relatively insignificant, change. Rather than holding the game after the conclusion of the Continental Cup Finals, it has been changed to a mid-season contest. In fact, this type of brief respite during the season is more aligned with the original intent for the exhibition match. It was due to logistical issues that the original All-Star Game occurred during the off-season, and after that it just stuck that way for 46 seasons. The format has also changed from "North America vs Europe" to a battle of captains. The participants of the game are selected, and that pool is divided into teams by two captains. For the first iteration of new design, the captains, Phil and Jeff Hamilton, were selected behind closed doors due to time constraints; for Season 48 and beyond, the captains will be selected by a public poll.

 

With the Season 48 All-Star Game approaching, we have gotten more of a look at what this poll entails. Although it is no longer a battle of conferences, there will be one captain from each conference, decided by two separate polls. Further, the eligible players for these polls are going to be the captains and alternates from all teams, with the apparent exception of anyone who has already captained an All-Star team. (This is an assumption based on the fact that the Phil and Jeff Hamilton were not on the polls; it is also possible that this could mean there will be no consecutive captains, making the Hamiltons eligible again next season.)

 

Please ignore the obvious fact that this is a poor visual representation of the Hamiltons.

 

Although we did manage to avoid a Cleganebowl, the results of the first set of votes do raise an interesting question. What if a player undeserving of making the All-Star Game is voted as captain? This is what happened with the North American representative, as Wranglers captain Marquis Hyvarinen was elected to lead a team. (Over in Europe, a much-deserving Lord Karnage was voted to captain the other team.)

 

Hyvarinen being voted in this way could result in a more deserving player missing out on the game, but this is not necessarily the case. While the Hamiltons may have been automatically placed on their respective teams last season, they had both earned their spots in the game. It is not yet known what will be done with Hyvarinen this season, or any potential All-Star captains who would otherwise not make the cut. It's very possible that the higher-ups didn't plan for something like this.

 

This is definitely Marquis Hyvarinen though.

 

The solution shouldn't be too difficult to make. If they decide to allow Hyvarinen to take someone else's spot in the game, then that's that and the draft will run the same as last season (with the exception of one captain selecting too many forwards). If we simply want to allow Hyvarinen to be captain but not actually play in the game, we just need to add a 25th pick to the draft so he can pick his last defenseman. Personally, I think this is the better solution; let Hyvarinen lead the team, but don't recognize him as the All-Star he isn't.

 

But I'll leave you with a better question: why do we have six All-Star goalies?

[Will 4,660]

A last minute vote from Devise changed the name in NA, but with Ruutu's player not having a great season the predicament remains. As you suggested, we'll just give Ruutu an extra pick to even out the teams. It might even be fair to give his squad 1st OA since Karnage is a pretty valuable player, rather doing a virtual coin toss like last year. That's TBD though. 

 

Also your assumption about Phil and Jeff Hamilton being ineligible was correct. They'll be eligible again next season. I was actually unsure about how we were going to pick the captains and thought about doing different things from year to year (VHL captains once year, let people apply one year, etc etc) but I think I like that it adds some more meaning to captains rather than simply appearing on the top leader ballot. 

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1 hour ago, Draper said:

but with Ruutu's player not having a great season the predicament remains.

tbh I didn't even really think of this when it looked like Hyvarinen would win, but the league voting for someone who won't make the All-Star Game isn't actually that farfetched considering there are more captains than All-Star spots, plus then all the non-captains who will make the ASG.

[Victor 10,832]

It doesn't necessarily have to be captains and alternates going forward. Could or maybe even should do the BOG vote first, before letting the public pick a captain from those who made along with voting for the last spots. Maybe increase the amount of players voted in by the public.

 

Alternatively, could select captains without a public vote, like last season. Hamiltons made sense on a couple levels, I still think Cleganebowl would be a wonderful occasion, and like NHL sometimes does captains based on where it's hosted (e.g. Alfredsson in Ottawa) so maybe every now and then do a public vote for a venue instead and go from there. Kind of like we used to have polls for ASG location, they just were pointless.

 

Basically keep it fresh.

[CowboyinAmerica 2,842]

Could always just do a quasi MLB thing - have the captains be one non-GM player from each of the European and North American conference champions the previous season, selected by either public or team vote. (So would probably be, like, Ruutu and Smarch this year or something.)

[CowboyinAmerica 2,842]

Claimed

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Review:

reviewing old articles. I'm assuming you didn't like John Scott in the All-Star game either haha. I like the new poll, I think it should be open to all! I think CIA's suggestion is also a good one, though. And very good point with the goalies! Statistically speaking, if we put 6 goalies in the all-star game, and there's only 10 teams, then were calling a below average goalie an All-Star caliber player.

 

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