Fans are the most important element of professional sports leagues. Without fans, there would be no one to fill the stands or buy the merchandise and, generally, no reason for professional sports to even exist. Therefore, a majority of sports leagues like to include their fans in a number of different events and activities throughout the year. However, things don’t always run smoothly when professional sports leagues interact with their fans, and the National Hockey League learned that lesson the hard way.
Every year, the NHL hosts an event referred to as the All-Star Game, where fans choose the best players from around the league to compete in a tournament and display their skills in a number of different contests. The players chosen are typically some of the highest-scoring forwards and defensemen in the league; it’s an honor for most players to even make the cut to be a nominee.
The 2016 All-Star Game featured a new format in which there would be three 20-minute games of three-on-three hockey. With the new format, there would be four teams competing in the All-Star Game, one to represent each of the league’s four divisions: Atlantic, Metropolitan, Central and Pacific. The league was thrilled about the event’s upgrade and stated that they wanted to have complete control of the event’s roster, so the NHL allowed fans to nominate any player in the league to compete at the All-Star Game.
As with tradition, the NHL opened their fan vote for the All-Star Game on Dec. 1. This online vote allowed NHL fans to nominate and vote for the players who would participate in the All-Star Game on Jan. 31. The NHL has been doing a fan vote to fill the roster for the All-Star for year, but, this year, things didn’t go exactly as planned. A large number of fans voted John Scott, a player only known for fighting and frequent suspensions, into the All-Star Game — widely as a joke. Scott earned so many votes that not only would the 33-year-old compete in the All-Star Game for the first time in his nine year NHL career, but he would also serve as the captain for the Pacific division team.
The NHL believed that allowing an enforcer like Scott to compete in an event that is held in such high regard would be an embarrassment to the league. The other main concern was that including Scott in the festivities would hurt ticket sales. The All-Star Game is typically reserved for the superstars of the league, and Scott is less than super. Throughout his entire career, he had only earned five goals and a total of 11 points. Therefore, the NHL went and made their first of many mistakes by forcing the Arizona Coyotes to trade Scott to the Montreal Canadiens.
Since the Canadiens are in the Atlantic division, the league deemed Scott ineligible to play for the Pacific division team and, ultimately, removed him from the All-Star Game. Scott, along with his two young children and pregnant wife, had to move to Montreal simply because the NHL didn’t agree with what fans wanted.
The NHL undermined the decision of the fans and proved that they were much more concerned with the profits from the game than the experience of fans. The league shouldn’t have offered to give the fans the option of voting if they weren’t planning on respecting it at the end of the day.
In the end, after boycotts and social media backlash, the NHL finally gave fans what they wanted; they allowed Scott to compete in the games and even named him the tournament’s MVP. However, it shouldn’t have taken threats and thousands of angry tweets to accomplish this.
All sports leagues need to understand that they can’t exploit or disrespect their fans on a regular basis. Fans are the entire reason the professional sports exist, and, without them, sports would be completely irrelevant.
