The NHL SuperSkills Shootout Needs To Kick The Bucket ASAP

1/26/2015

Goddamn it NHL. I praise you for the all the good you did with the incredible GoPro video and you show me your appreciation by giving me another underwhelming year of the trick shot shootout. While that video showcased all aspects of what make NHL players phenomenal athletes, this snooze worthy portion of the skills competition was such an obviously attempt at pandering to a wider audience. An absolutely awful attempt might I add. You could have basically put any old schmuck who has every played hockey in his life and he would have had a chance at winning. Alexander Ovechkin was three sheets to the wind (I'm pretty sure he used the fourth sheet to clean up his puke in the locker room) and didn't look out of place while wildly swinging his stick at an airborne puck and missing by about 10 feet. Let's put it in perspective. The most impressive shot taken during the event came at the hands of a 7 year old and only entertaining portion was Johnny Gaudreau giving his best impersonation of a 7 year old. I was watching some of the most talented players the NHL has to offer and the only thing I was in awe of was the absurdity and pointlessness of it all. Show me NHL players doing NHL player things. I don't need trick shots to enjoy the vast amount of skills that these athletes possess. Especially when they overdo it and rarely complete the move to begin with.

God, I still can't get the bad taste out of my mouth. I feel like a drank a vat of moonshine. That put the 'icky' in gimmicky. You can't take a skills competition, where players are hardly trying as is, and devote an entire event to them trying less. In the official description of the Honda Shootout Challenge it says that style, creativity, and flair are encouraged. It's All-Star weekend. Shouldn't style, creativity, and flair be encouraged and embraced in the regular breakaway competition? The trick shot challenge is basically the NHL's version of the dunk contest, and it's no coincidence that the NBA's biggest stars no longer compete in it. At least in the dunk contest, the players are required to complete the dunk to win. At least that is a real competition. At least dunks are part of the job description of a professional basketball player. I know it was just for fun and to get a laugh or two, but it really just felt like a waste of time and talent. Being billed and branded as the most scintillating portion of the skills comperetion, it has fallen about 1,000 yards short of that on an annual basis. Much like prop comedy, prop shootouts feel more forced and unnecessary than blood and gore in a Tarantino film.

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