It didn't take long for a conspiracy theory to emerge from the ashes of the failed 'Vote for Rory' campaign.
A variety of message boards and bloggers picked up yesterday on some rather glaring irregularities on the fan voting totals for the NHL's all-star game starters, changes that began to show up in the fifth week of the NHL's six-week vote reporting period.
Above, there's a look at the voting trends among Western Conference defencemen, which is the group where Rory Fitzpatrick was added by thousands of voters as a write-in candidate.
Fitzpatrick's vote totals curiously fell off right around the time the publicity for the Vancouver Canucks defenceman's all-star charge was at its peak — but that's not what has the 'net's number junkies up in arms.
What they point to is a change in the number of votes for Western Conference defencemen in Week 5, when Fitzpatrick's pace lessened, that indicates more than 100,000 votes are either missing or were voided by the league. That, perhaps, shouldn't come as a surprise given the use of automated voting was reportedly widespread, but what is curious is that apparently no votes were voided for either forwards or goaltenders, leaving a disparity between the votes for different positions.
Making the situation all the more fishy is the fact Fitzpatrick himself received close to 160,000 votes in Week 4 and only 58,000 in Week 5.
It's a drop that is almost identical to the amount of 'missing' ballots.
UPDATE National Hockey League Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly said via email this afternoon that measures were taken in the beginning to ensure against tampering with the all-star balloting system:
"There were no changes made to the vote counting process at any point in time from the start of the voting to the end," Daly said. "But there were procedures and safeguards in place from the start to prevent automated or other fraudulent voting methods."
