Time To End All-Star Games?

With two All-Star games this Sunday, the NFL's Pro Bowl in Hawaii and the NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina, we need to discuss the fact that these games (in all four major pro sports) are pretty much irrelevant.

Too many players back out because of minor injuries or other reasons, so that the "best" players aren't in the game. The rosters don't always include the "best" at any rate because fan voting either decides the starters or plays a part in the decision, and there are always undeserving players who are voted in because they're popular or well-known. And with the NFL moving the Pro Bowl to the week before the Super Bowl instead of the week after, the two Super Bowl teams' players are automatically off the Pro Bowl rosters.

As much as baseball likes to tout that their game "counts" because the league that wins gets 4 of 7 home games in the World Series, the game is a shell of its former self. The rosters are now bloated thanks to expansion and the need for enough pitchers to try and ensure that another debacle like the tie game in 2002 never happens again.

The NBA game doesn't interest me anyway, but at least they used to have a fun slam-dunk contest.

Flyers Make History -- You Can't Make This Stuff Up

When it comes to sports, everybody -- athletes, coaches, fans, media -- likes to make predictions. Whether it's about a particular game or a playoff series or an entire season, people feel they know enough to project how things will go down. Often those predictions don't come true. Sometimes they do. And sometimes they come true in inexplicable fashion.

Case in point: the Philadelphia Flyers. Lots of people thought, prior to the season, that the Flyers were serious Stanley Cup contenders. The Hockey News outright predicted the Flyers would win the Cup. Sure enough, after tonight's 4-3 win over the Boston Bruins, winning their Eastern Conference semifinal series 4-3 after trailing 3-0, the Flyers still have a chance. But how they got to this point -- that's the inexplicable part.

The Flyers got off to a quick start and then fell into a morass of inconsistency that led to a coaching change. Injuries caused a goaltending carousel -- 7 different goalies dressed for a game, 5 of those 7 actually got into at least one game. They had to defeat the New York Rangers in the final game of the season just to get into the playoffs. After three periods and a five-minute overtime, they got that win in the shootout, where the Flyers have historically sucked.

Flyers: The Best/Worst Way To Make The Playoffs

I don't like the NHL's shootout rule for regular-season games. Besides the fact that most teams have higher point totals because of it (there are 11 teams with over 100 points this season -- 11!), I don't think it's particularly exciting, at least not on TV. And it's a horrible way to decide a winner. Imagine a home run-hitting contest deciding a baseball game. I've said many times that if the NHL ever implements the shootout in the Stanley Cup playoffs, I will never watch it again. I stand by that promise. I hope it never happens.

So how strange it was to see the Flyers get into the playoffs because they won a shootout. How awful must the New York Rangers and their fans feel? In a winner-take-all game, they missed out on the postseason because of something that, outside of international play such as the Olympics, used to be seen only during All-Star skills competitions.

But it's the Rangers' own fault they were in that position. I saw a lot of the game, and over the last two periods I felt the Flyers carried the play and earned the victory, something that couldn't be said often enough during this inconsistent slog of a season. They were down 1-0 until Matt Carle (really? Not Richards or Gagne or...) tied the game in the third period. When the five-minute overtime ended with the game still 1-1, I didn't hold out much hope. Yet Danny Briere and Claude Giroux scored shootout goals while Brian Boucher only allowed one Ranger to put the puck past him. The Flyers have been unbelievably awful in shootouts since the rule was put in place, so for them to win this one was just shocking.

Amazingly enough, the Flyers will now face the New Jersey Devils in the opening playoff round. The Flyers were 5-1-0 against the Devils this season. This is the one opponent that, despite their disparity in records and in goal, the Flyers actually have a puncher's chance of beating. Certainly this is much better and hopefully more entertaining than a series against the Washington Capitals.