Down Goes Brown Grab Bag: All Star Voting, Sebastian Bach's Brother, and Junior

(Editor's note: Welcome to Sean McIndoe's weekly grab bag, where he writes on a variety of NHL topics. You can follow him on Twitter.)

The third star: Leftover Halloween costumes—We covered some good ones last week, but with Halloween falling on a Monday we still had several NHL costumers trickling in over the weekend that are worth mentioning. Jonathan Huberdeau as Elliott from E.T. Robert Luongo as Phil Kessel's prom date. And, of course, this:

Favourite holiday of the year — P.K. Subban (@PKSubban1)October 30, 2016

You can find a full roundup of the entire league's efforts here.

The second star: This Jeremy Roenick story—It's from 2008, but we only found out about it this week. It involves nudity, vampires, and cannibalism, and ends with Roenick dead and one of his teammates jumping out of a window. You really need to read the whole thing.

The first star: Ryan McDonagh—Concussions are awful and nobody should laugh at them. But McDonagh was cleared to return to action later in the game, so… I think it's OK? I'm pretty sure it's OK.

oh dear, i hope McDonagh is ok :( — Stephanie (@myregularface)November 1, 2016

If we find out he really was hurt then I'm sneaking back to delete this and replacing it with some quote I'll make up and attribute to Ilya Bryzgalov.

The issue: This week, reports surfaced that the league would be keeping essentially the same all-star voting process as last year, meaning we could get a repeat of the John Scott fiasco. But then we found out that they'd limit voting to "bona fide NHL players".

The outrage: Why does the NHL ruin everything fun?

Is it justified: I have two kids. They're both pretty funny. They like to tell me jokes, and sometimes those jokes make me laugh. When this happens, do you know what my kids do? The same thing every kid does when they realize they've said something funny: They say it again. And again. And again. And you know what? It gets a lot less funny every time.

Stuffing the ballot box for John Scott turned out to be funny. How funny might depend on your perspective, and not everyone enjoyed the joke. But it all worked out well in the end, with the sort of only-in-Hollywood finale that even the harshest cynic had to appreciate.

And because the joke worked, we're going to have to hear it again this year. And probably every year, for a long time. And like my kids and their knock-knock jokes, it will get less entertaining every time.

The NHL could have prevented that this year, but apparently they won't. That means we're going to get a ton of attempted John Scott copycats. Most will be ignored, but a few will probably gain some traction, and we'll do the whole thing over again. Chances are that it won't end well, and even if it does, it will feel like a reheated sequel to a movie we've already seen.

The good news is that we found out that the league might at least limit voting to "bona fide NHL players". That made some fans angry, since it sounds like the NHL is going to try to declare that some players aren't real players. But it sounds like it's far more likely that this is a case of the league using at least some small shred of common sense, leaving themselves an out in case fans decide to elect somebody who's in the minor leagues, or retired, on injured reserve or worse. Chris Pronger would be hilarious, right? Maybe Bobby Orr. How about the Hanson brothers?

Give the NHL credit for leaving themselves some room to maneuver here. But it would have been better to just scrap the whole system, or at least modify it so that only certain players could earn votes. And sure, the NHL all-star game is already terrible, so there's not a lot of integrity to defend here. But that's still no reason for the league to feel the need to play along with a joke that's clearly being made at their expense. Especially when it's one we've already heard before.

One of my responsibilities as a journalist is correct the record when I screw up. Earlier this week, I made an unforgivable mistake, and I want to address it now.

On Wednesday, I wrote about NHL teams through history that had used too many goaltenders. It was meant to be a fun post, one that was packed with obscure player candidates. But in that post, I briefly and dismissively referred to Zac Bierk as a guy "you've never heard of". As it turns out, I was missing something extremely important. So let's fix that by making Bierk this week's obscure player.

Bierk was taken by the Lightning in the ninth round of the 1995 draft, 11 picks ahead of lovable insane person Danny Markov. Two years later, he made the Lightning, and spent three seasons playing part-time while the team madly cycled through goaltenders. He was claimed by the Wild in the 2000 expansion draft but played only one game for the team; he'd eventually sign with the Coyotes and spend parts of two seasons there backing up. His last big league season was 2003-04, and he left the NHL having played 47 games and recording nine wins. Today, he's the goaltending consultant for the Oshawa Generals.

Here's a fun hockey fact about Zac Bierk: He had one career shutout, which came in a 0-0 duel against Michael Leighton and was apparently the first time in NHL history that two goalies recorded their first career shutout in the same game.

Here's a way more fun non-hockey fact about Zac Bierk: He has one of the most interesting families in NHL history. His father David was a well-known artist. Four of his brothers also became artists. His sister went into acting. But it's his brother Sebastian who you'll probably recognize. He became a singer, although he changed names along the way, dropping the Bierk for something that sounded similar but had more of a musical ring to it.

Yes, Zac Bierk's brother is Sebastian Freaking Bach.

How the hell did I not know this? I have no excuse. I've seen this guy in concert, I cover hockey for a living, I pretty much write exclusively about minor trivia and historical oddities, and I had no idea that Sebastien Bach's brother was an NHL player.

I apologize unreservedly to Zac, Sebastian, and all my readers. I will do better.

This was the week when hockey fans started hearing a lot about young players being sent back to junior. That's due to an important roster rule that isn't especially well understood.

Basically, players who still have junior eligibility left can play nine NHL games before burning a year of their standard entry-level contract. It's become common for prospects to get a nine-game tryout at the start of the NHL season before a team has to decide whether or not to keep them. Sometimes the choice is obvious—believe it or not, Connor McDavid is sticking around—but other times it's a closer call.

Note that there's no rule preventing a team from returning a kid to junior later in the season, and that does occasionally happen. But any player who sticks around long enough to play a tenth game is one year closer to needing a new contract.

Here's where some of that confusion comes in. The nine-game mark doesn't impact a player's years of service for the purpose of determining when he reaches unrestricted free agency. That's a different threshold, one that comes at forty games, and it's far more important. Burning a year of a player's ELC could work out well for a team, since it gives him one less year to build his resume before needing a few contract. But bringing a player one year closer to UFA status is a much bigger deal.

To make things even more confusing, the nine-game rule counts games that a player actually dresses for, while the 40-game mark is looking at time spent on the roster. Bob McKenzie had a good explainer on all this earlier this week, which also included a look at some of this year's closer calls.

But it all leads to a question that's coming up more often every year we go through this: Why can't these guys just go to the AHL instead? If they're not ready for the NHL, why not send them down to the minors like anyone else?

You might assume that the answer has to do with safety, and not wanting teenagers playing against grizzled veterans down in the AHL. But that doesn't hold up. For one, if we're willing to allow these guys to play in the NHL, then the AHL shouldn't be a concern. And more importantly, the rules only apply to players drafted out of junior. A kid who came over from Europe or from the NCAA can play in the AHL with no problem, regardless of their age.

So what's the deal? It basically comes down to the junior leagues protecting their turf. And you can see where they're coming from. If they've put the time and effort into developing a kid, the thinking goes, then they should get first dibs on him if he's not ready for the big leagues.

It makes a certain amount of sense. But it puts some players, and their NHL teams, in a bad spot. Somebody like Arizona's Dylan Strome might not be ready for the NHL yet, but he's already dominated junior. Sending him back down to league he's already too good for doesn't help him. Learning the pro game in the AHL would.

There's a solution to all of this, and it's a relatively simple one. As NHL agent Allan Walsh has suggested, NHL teams could be given an exemption to send one junior-eligible player down to the AHL per year.

That feels like a smart compromise. Teams would only use the exemption for exceptional circumstances, and the junior ranks wouldn't be starved for talent. And more importantly, it would be better for the long-term outlook of the players involved.

It's not a quick fix—this is all tied up in agreements between the leagues, so it's not like the NHL could just unilaterally make this change tomorrow. But be it resolved that it should happen eventually. Here's hoping it's sooner than later.

So yeah, all-star voting. Everyone knows the John Scott story. But as you might remember, he wasn't the first time this sort of ballot-stuffing campaign took place. Fans originally tried it for the 2007 game, which is where we'll travel back for this week's YouTube clip.

• This clip is from the CBC and is only a few years old, so if you're a Canadian you may have already watched it when it first aired. But I still wanted to use it, because Americans readers have probably never seen it, and I thought they'd enjoy it. Ready, America? Let's watch together!

• After a quick introduction, our story begins with a hockey blogger sitting at this computer. As per sportswriter bylaws, I have to make a joke here about this being his mother's basement. No, I don't know why he has floor-to-ceiling windows in a basement. He just does.

• We're introduced to Canucks blogger J.J. Guerrero, one of the fans driving a campaign to elect Vancouver defenseman Rory Fitzpatrick to the game. Fitzpatrick was a lunch pail defenseman, one that was generally well-liked and respected but would never come close to an all-star roster under ordinary circumstances. Guerrero wants to change that, and he's been casting write-in votes for the blueliner for weeks.

• Can we just point out that it's not really a "write-in" vote if you can choose it from a dropdown list? The NHL could have solved all its problems by just forcing fans to physically write their votes in. By the time Canucks fans figured out that wasn't possible on a web site, they'd have crayon marks all over their monitors and the game would have already started.

• Also, I like that the random captcha word is "crease". A little ironic foreshadowing for future all-star related Canuck fan karmic payback.

• Next up is Guerrero demonstrating a move that would become standard trope during the Scott affair: Pretending that there's some larger point to all of this besides making fun of the bad player. As usual, nobody is buying it.

• We get a screen showing the current vote totals, which reminds us all that there was a time when Dion Phaneuf was good. Fitzpatrick isn't winning, but he's a lot closer than anyone thought he'd ever be, and with just days left in voting, the whole thing doesn't really feel like a joke anymore. Interesting situation, wouldn't you say, American readers? Ha ha. Sports can be so weird.

• Next up is Fitzpatrick himself, with another standard trope from the Scott saga: The guy at the center of it having to pretend he's cool with it even though he knows he's being made fun of. He clearly wants the whole thing to go away, and it's hard not to feel kind of bad for him. Man, I hope nobody goes on national TV and rips him over all this.

• Oh hey, it's Don Cherry, who spends a segment ripping Fitzpatrick over this. Wait, does he have a Pokeball on his tie? I can't tell. Because it's Cherry, I can't honestly rule it out either.

• Next up is an attack ad. We don't really get any context, but these were real things and they were pretty funny. You can watch them here and here and here.

• Our reporter makes sure to remind us that this is an internet-based campaign. Man, that wacky internet. It sure can get behind some weirdly inappropriate candidates, am I right?

• Anyhow, we go back to Cherry, because over-the-top TV personalities who yell a lot are always entertaining and harmless. That leads into some thoughts from Roberto Luongo, who's very serious and boring here because Twitter hasn't become a thing yet.

• We close out by meeting the creator of the Rory movement, a New York resident named Steve Schmid. He makes it clear that the whole thing isn't a joke at all, at least not to him. It was meant all along as a way for him to register a protest against the all-star game itself, which Schmid describes as "worthless" and "a joke". And if he annoys a lot of people in the process of making his point? He's apparently fine with that.

• And that's the end of our clip. The epilogue here is that Fitzpatrick narrowly lost out in a vote that was closer than it probably should have been. Some claimed that the results were rigged, but that would never happen, and we all just moved on.

• So really, American friends, the lesson we all learned from this whole unfortunate episode was a simple one: It's OK to think the system is screwed up, and to be bothered by that. It's maybe even a little bit noble. But that doesn't mean you should lash out by picking the worst possible candidate and voting for him instead, spoiling it for everyone else and putting somebody into a role they're completely unqualified for and don't even seem to want, just because you're having a tantrum.

• I mean, that would be crazy, right?

• Cool, glad you agree. See you next week, America. (I hope.)

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at nhlgrabbag@gmail.com.