Connor McDavid’s win, Nikita Kucherov’s no-show and more from the revamped Skills Competition

The NHL fixed the skills competition, and all it took was the right reward.

Specifically, it took $1,000,000, which was the prize offered to the winner of tonight’s 12-man showdown. There was also an additional $100,000 available to the top goalie. And that, along with the various format changes, seem to have made the difference. The players seemed engaged. They actually tried. Well, almost all of them, but we'll get to that.

The bottom line is that apparently, these guys respond to the promise of the right reward. OK then, I’m in. Let’s hand out a few more.

Since today’s generation of player wants to be bribed rewarded for their hard work, let’s keep the good vibes going. I can’t offer another million because I spent it all on buying one souvenir hat for my kids, but I can get creative. Let’s give out 15 awards for the best and worst of all-star weekend so far, based on some of the event's previous memorable moments.

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The 10 players that no NHL fan can hate (except for all the ones that do)

We’re into holiday mode, where everything is supposed to be about peace and goodwill. Love thy neighbor and that sort of thing.

That’s nice and all, but it can be tough for hockey fans, who are preconditioned to be mad at just about everything. Pretty soon we’ll hit the Christmas trade freeze, meaning we can’t even sit around and imagine that bum who’s clogging up our team’s salary cap being traded for a ransom of picks and prospects. Now you want us to be nice to the jerks on the other teams too? It’s a rough time of year when you’re a diehard hockey fan who hates everyone.

Well, almost everyone. Because at any given time, there are always a few players who just about everyone seems to like. It’s been a rough few years for that crowd, as we’ve said goodbye to guys like Roberto Luongo, Pavel Datsyuk, Teemu Selanne and Jarome Iginla. But that just creates some extra room on the nice list.

Today, let’s get into the holiday spirit with a list of the ten players in the NHL that nobody can hate. (And then the reasons why maybe you can hate them just a little.)

Connor McDavid

Why almost everyone loves him: First of all, he’s the best player in the league, with maybe the most pure skill since Mario Lemieux. Even in a league with more dominant young talent than ever before, McDavid still occasionally does things that you’ve never seen, or ever thought possible. He’s one of the rare players who’d be worth paying full price just to watch on his own and brings back that pre-Dead Puck Era feeling of excitement you used to get whenever a star player had the puck on his stick.

Second of all, he’s signed long-term in Edmonton, so the sympathy factor is off the charts.

The one group that still kind of hates him: Flames fans get a pass, as they do for any Oiler. Beyond that, nobody really dislikes him, although you get the sense that there’s an undercurrent of aggravation from other fan bases who keep waiting for him to stomp out of Edmonton and demand a trade. Come on, they’re terrible, and he looked vaguely sad at his draft lottery. Surely he wants to play somewhere else. Specifically, for my favorite team. Come on Connor, blink twice if you want us to send in a chopper to airlift you out.

Patrick Marleau

Why almost everyone loves him: He’s been around forever, his speed means he’s been fun to watch over the years and he always seems disturbingly happy. He became the team father figure in Toronto – literally – and then headed home to San Jose to finish out his career. Plus he’s still chasing that elusive Stanley Cup, and everybody loves a good OGWAC story. Uh, please don’t check the standings to see how that quest is going for him.

The one group that still kind of hates him: Nobody right now, although we’ll save a spot for Leaf fans when they miss the playoffs and end up having to send the 11th overall pick to the Hurricanes for getting out of the last year of his contract. Also, it’s going to be kind of weird if he sticks around next year and ends up breaking Gordie Howe’s all-time games played record. See, you didn’t realize that was going to happen, and now you feel just a little conflicted, right?

Marc-Andre Fleury

Why almost everyone loves him: He’s a former first overall pick who’s smiled his way through a very good NHL career, without ever being so dominating that you resented him. He was part of three Cup winners in Pittsburgh, then handled what could have been a tricky Matt Murray situation and eventual exit with class and good humor. That was supposed to lead to him spending his last few years getting shelled for the expansion Knights, but instead, he’s played some of the best hockey of his career while leaning hard into his likable personality to sell the game in a new market.

The one group that still kind of hates him: Man, I’m not even sure. That Sharks/Knights rivalry is pretty solid, so maybe you allow San Jose fans to sneer at him just a bit. Beyond that, his only natural enemy at this point are Canadians who still aren’t over how the 2004 World Juniors ended and Hall of Fame sticklers who’ll be mad when he makes it in on the first ballot.

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Grab Bag: The problem with letting the players police the game

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- If you want players to police the game, be honest about what that means
- I have suggestions to improve the only good page on the NHL web site
- An obscure player from maybe the greatest stat spoiler I've ever seen.
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a look back at a wild 1998 line brawl and goalie fight

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Friday Grab Bag: An important word about the 2020 lockout (plus 50% off The Athletic)

In the Grab Bag:
- Gary Bettman says he doesn't want a lockout this time. Should we believe him?
- None of the Americans are around this week so lets talk trash about their hockey teams
- An obscure player with a long name and short career
- The week's three comedy stars include an insane mascot and a crotch grab
- And a look back at the poor reporter who had to pretend that the 1985 Calder Trophy race was a tough call

And today, you can get the Grab Bag plus everything else on The Athletic for a pretty ridiculous price. They're running a one-day Black Friday sale that gets you everything on the site for just $2.49 USD or $2.99 CAD per month, and you get a free t-shirt. It's the best offer of the year, so if you've been on the fence today's a good day to make the jump. You'll find the offer at the bottom of today's post.

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Which early-season success story could be on this year's Senators?

We’re​ halfway into November,​ which​ means​ the​ NHL​ is​ settling into​ that mid-season grind.​ Teams have largely​ started​ sorting themselves out,​​ and we have a pretty solid idea which ones are good and which are bad, at least in general terms. There’s still lots of hockey left, and plenty of twists and turns for various stories to take. But for the most part, by this point on the calendar we usually know where most teams stand.

But not always.

One year ago today, the Ottawa Senators had just returned to North America after a two-game series against the Avalanche in Sweden. They’d won both of those games, running their record to 8-3-5. They were third in their division and comfortably in a playoff spot with multiple games in hand. Even better, they’d just pulled off a blockbuster trade to add Matt Duchene to the lineup. And remember, they were still just a few months removed from a dramatic playoff run that left them one goal shy of a trip to the Stanley Cup final.

Things were good. And then, almost overnight, they weren’t. As we all know, last year’s Senators were about to fall off a cliff. They’d lose their next seven straight and end up finishing with the second-worst record in the league. Mix in off-ice scandals that dragged into a relentlessly bizarre offseason, and the last 12 months have been a nightmare.

We can hope that no team is about to embark on a similar year, at least in terms of off-ice drama – the Senators feel like a once-in-a-generation outlier there. But in terms of wins and losses, is it possible that any teams that are feeling good about themselves right now might have a cliff of their own looming just around the corner?

Let’s see if we can figure that out. We’ll skip over the team that are already in crisis mode (like the ‘Hawks, Devils, Ducks, Oilers and seemingly half the rest of the league). Instead, we’ll look for five teams that roughly match that 2017-18 Senators profile – over .500, in the playoffs or close to it and generally feeling good like the season is going well. And then we’ll try to ruin those good vibes by figuring out whether it could all go wrong.

Montreal Canadiens

Where they’re at: At 9-5-3, the Canadiens are holding strong in the Eastern wild-card race, not to mention staying within range of the Bruins and Leafs for a top-three spot in the Atlantic. They haven’t gone back-to-back games without a point all season, and the offense has hovered around the top five.

And as an added bonus, the season’s first month has felt like at least a small redemption for the much-maligned Marc Bergevin. The team’s top three scorers are Max Domi, Tomas Tatar and Jonathan Drouin – all players he recently acquired in trades that many of us questioned.

How it could all go wrong: To some extent, maybe it’s already started to. If you ignore the loser point, they’ve lost almost as many as they’ve won, and they haven’t managed consecutive wins since the season was two weeks old.

Beyond that, they’re currently shooting 10 per cent across all situations, which seems on the high side given the talent level on the roster. Considering how much they give up, it wouldn’t take much of a drop in scoring for the Canadiens to go from decidedly average to something south of that.

And if that happens, Montreal is the kind of town where a losing streak can spiral into a crisis. We’ve seen it before, with many of these same players and coaches involved.

Why it won’t: The weird thing about this year’s Habs is that this is the sort of exercise where we’d normally be saying something like “They’re doing it on the back of Carey Price, so if he gets cold then look out.” But they’re not. In fact, Price hasn’t been good at all this year, and wasn’t all that good last year either.

On the one hand, that’s a terrifying red flag; his eight-year extension just kicked in this year, and if they find themselves paying $84 million for sub-.900 goaltending, they’re pretty much screwed. But in terms of right now, you can twist it into a reason for optimism. This is Carey Price, after all. The guy is good. So if they’re already winning when he’s getting lit up, how good will they be if he settles back into looking like a Vezina contender?

As an added bonus, we could point out that Shea Weber will be back at some point over the next month or so, which should give the team a big boost. And with the Panthers, Wings and Senators all struggling, a playoff spot in the Atlantic is there for the taking.

Odds that they’re this year’s Senators: There’s certainly a bit of that vibe, if only based on recent history. But preseason consensus aside, there isn’t all that much telling us that the Canadiens are a bad team right now.

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