Can someone explain the all star game to me?

The 59th National Hockey League All-Star Game, (also known as the 2012 Tim Hortons NHL All-Star Game) is scheduled for January 29, 2012 at Scotiabank Place in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. This edition of the All-Star Game will feature the "fantasy draft" format first seen in the previous 2011 NHL All-Star Game. The participating players voted for team captains, selecting Daniel Alfredsson of the All-Star host Ottawa Senators and Zdeno Chara of the defending Stanley Cup champions Boston Bruins.

This is the first time that Ottawa will have hosted the NHL All-Star Game. Ottawa has hosted two drafts, a Stanley Cup Final, and the World Junior Championships all in the past five years. It will mark the 20th anniversary of the Ottawa Senators joining the NHL. It will be the second All-Star Game that Canada has hosted in the past three years, as the Montreal Canadiens hosted it in 2009.

Voting for NHL all-star players started on November 14, 2011. Online voting requires fans to register with the NHL.com web site. Votes are limited to 30 votes per "platform", i.e. desktop computer, web-enabled mobile devices and SMS text. Fans are presented a list of 127 players, sub-divided into Forwards, Defence and Goaltending. Three forwards, two defence and one goaltender are to be selected from the league-wide list of players. The selection of league-wide list of players was done in 2011, which used the "fantasy team" format.

After voting closed Erik Karlsson was the leading vote-getter with 939,951. Senators fans voted in force, electing not only Karlsson but all three forwards as well (Daniel Alfredsson, Jason Spezza, and Milan Michalek). The only skater not coming from the home town Senators was Toronto Maple Leafs defenceman, Dion Phaneuf. Phaneuf beat out Senators defenceman Sergei Gonchar by only 11,305 votes. Reigning Vezina and Conn Smythe Trophy winner, Tim Thomas, was elected as the fan-voted goaltender.

After naming the remaining All-Stars, the participating players voted for team captains, selecting Daniel Alfredsson of the All-Star host Ottawa Senators and Zdeno Chara of the defending Stanley Cup champions Boston Bruins. Alfredsson's team will wear white, while Team Chara will wear blue. The NHL named the coaches: head coach Claude Julien, and assistants Doug Houda, Doug Jarvis and Geoff Ward of the Boston Bruins for Team Chara; and John Tortorella of the New York Rangers and Todd McLellan of the San Jose Sharks as co-coaches for Team Alfredsson.

The draft of the players took place on January 26, 2012 from 8:00 pm to 9:30 pm, Eastern time. It was held at the Théâtre du Casino du Lac-Leamy, in Gatineau, Quebec. Team Chara won the puck flip and selected first.

The all star game used to be a pre season game between the all star team and the Stanley Cup winning team. With expansion the game became an East>West or Wales>Campbell game. In time the skills display was added and a rookie and old timers game. Last year the fantasy draft was added and the media (?) day was added to stretch a charity game to aid injured players into a week long extravaganza. Now 90% of the players get to spend a week in mid season getting fat and drunk in the Caribbean while 10% get fat and drunk in Ottawa. Next week the season will resume and only those players who take the game seriously will still be in mid season shape.

So for a week of diversion the game suffers. But after all this is what the fans want. "Bread and Circuses."

I believe that the NHL All-Star Fantasy Draft started last year or the year before. I was a way to make the All-Star game more exciting and just having East vs. West. It was also a way to make the competition more even.

Yes, it's the teams from the fantasy draft. This only started last year, before that it wsd east vs west