Late last night, Alex Ovechkin (via the Caps) put out a statement about the 2018 Winter Olympics. The statement was pure Ovi, right down to the double exclamation points, and spoke about, among other things, his family’s history and connection to the Olympics and his personal disappointment at the NHL not allowing him to be asked to represent his country.
In it he sums up perfectly just how unfair it has been to the players (emphasis added):
It is that last line that is both particularly poignant and 100% correct. Wherever the blame lies, whether you think it’s the NHL’s fault or the IIHF’s fault or both, the way it played out really put the players in a bad spot.
Most of them, as Ovechkin notes, have never had to pit their NHL job against their love of playing for their country – and as the NHL began slamming the door shut on the Olympic option, players who spoke out against it were seen as the bad guys who selfishly valued two weeks of Olympic “glory” over what they were paid to do during the rest of the season.
Now, finally, there seems to be some resolution that takes the burden off of the players’ collective shoulders – and in that there is, oddly enough, a bit of relief.
Even if (as Ovechkin also succinctly says)… it sucks.
Because it is no longer about whether a player chooses to defy the NHL’s order and go to the Olympics if asked; they’re simply not allowed to be asked. It closed the loopholes, ended the discussion – and ultimately forced Alex Ovechkin to concede defeat in his brutally honest (and at times heartbreaking) statement.
It also, to some extent, took the burden off of us as fans. Before this agreement was reached, and before this statement came out, there was still a very good chance that Ovechkin (and perhaps others) would defy the NHL. If that happened, it would set off an unknown chain of consequences, all of which would be miserable to experience as a fan – anything from punishments that could handed down by the League, to millions of columns and thinkpieces dedicated to bashing Ovechkin, to the possibility of tension between him and his Caps teammates.
It would pit our loyalty to the team and the sport we love against a personal affection for the face of the franchise. And while the logical part of the brain knows that removing Ovechkin from the lineup for that long would be tough to overcome, or at the very least not ideal, it was hard not to want this for him. While team loyalty usually supplants loyalty to an individual… for many of us it’s a bit more difficult when the individual in question is Alex Ovechkin.
So yes, the NHL and the IIHF have made it official, and so has Ovechkin. Ultimately all three probably made the “right” choice (if such a thing exists), no matter how convoluted, roundabout, and downright annoying the journey was to get there.
Still, it’s hard not to feel a little heartbroken for Alex Ovechkin, to appreciate just how difficult that statement was for him to write… and to hope that he will get another shot at that Olympic gold medal someday.
Here’s Ovechkin’s full statement: