The NHL may be missing a trick if they don’t have the Boston Bruins’ Brad Marchand as one of the Atlantic Division captain at the All-Star Game in January.
Granted, Brad Marchand faces competition, both from his Boston Bruins teammates, David Pastrnak, Tuukka Rask and Patrice Bergeron (who all appear on the NHL.com voting page), as well as other worthy rivals in the Atlantic Division.
Among those he’s contesting with are; reigning Hart and Art Ross Trophy holder, Nikita Kucherov of the Tampa Bay Lightning, last season’s Atlantic Division captain Auston Matthews and his Toronto Maple Leafs teammates, Mitch Marner and John Tavares, Jack Eichel or Rasmus Dahlin of the Buffalo Sabres and the Florida Panthers’ current holder of the Lady Byng Trophy, Aleksander Barkov.
Safe to say, it’s an elite field that he’s competing with but he trumps them in more than one area. Namely, personality; an area that the NHL needs to highlight in order to sell its’ product. Too often the All-Star Game and hockey players, in general, are seen as boring – Brad Marchand is the perfect player to help push a more commercial agenda.
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Now don’t get me wrong, the reason Boston Bruins fans love Brad Marchand is the reason so many other fan bases genuinely hate him. He’s a bit of a weasel on the ice, he stirs players up and has landed, over the years, a few questionable hits and slashes!
However, it’s the fact that he embraces this ‘rat’ persona that makes him the marketing gold. At the 2018 NHL All-Star Game in Tampa, he absolutely embraced the boos that rained down upon him in an Atlantic Division rink. He realises that it’s part of not only being a Boston Bruins player, but playing with the edge he does.
What’s more is that unlike former personalities that made it to the All-Star Game; John Scott (no offense to him) comes to mind – he is a personality that actually can back up his antics with elite on-ice production too.
This season, only Nathan MacKinnon, Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl (at the time of writing) have scored more points than his 46. He is managing this with the best shooting percentage out of anyone (23.4%) in the top 50 point-scorers.
If that’s not an advert for the perfect Shooting Accuracy contestant at the All-Star Game, I don’t know what is. Add in the fact that he plays in one of the bigger markets in the division and you’re onto a winner.
Outside of Toronto and Montreal, it’s a fair argument to say that Boston is the next biggest hockey market. In fact, looking at the Forbes ‘Business of Hockey’ valuations; they are the only Atlantic Division rivals above us with the Detroit Red Wings next best.
Given the seasons all three of the aforementioned teams are having, it’d be a travesty if the Atlantic Division’s All-Star Game team captain doesn’t come from the Boston Bruins and with all due respect to Pastrnak; Brad Marchand is the better choice.
It’s up to us as Boston Bruins fans to make it happen by getting on the NHL app and website to vote; let’s make the rest of the Atlantic Division hate us that little bit more!!