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Do You Want Your Players In The Olympics?
by Mike Chen on 12/18/09 at 12:31 PM ET
Comments (4)
With everyone caught up in Olympic-team discussion these days, I find myself torn between wanting to watch peaking players in a best-on-best tournament and—selfishly, yeah—not wanting to see key players on my favorite team involved in what will be a physical and intense tournament. As a Sharks fan, I’m facing the potential of eight guys involved in the tournament: Patrick Marleau, Dan Boyle, Joe Thornton, and Dany Heatley for Canada; Joe Pavelski for Team USA; Douglas Murray for Sweden; Evgeni Nabokov for Russia; and backup goaltender Thomas Greiss for Germany.
That’s almost half of the roster, and almost all of the critical guys. I can’t be in this boat along—teams like Detroit, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and others will have a good chunk of their guys hopping on a plane to get to Vancouver. I’m sure fans of teams like these have debated this back and forth, and it brings up the question: is the magnificent competition of the Olympic tournament worth putting your players at risk?
I think anyone watching Olympic hockey can marvel at just how fantastic the games are. The skill level is undeniably higher, and the pace is faster and more intense than you’ll find just about anywhere. Every game is like a playoff game—hell, every elimination game is like a Game 7 between ultra-talented teams. It’s a joy to watch, and some of the best games I’ve ever seen as have stemmed from NHL involvement in the Olympics.
That being said, are there any NHL benefits to dropping out and playing mid-season? You hear stories stemming from the old Canada Cup days, where Mario Lemieux talked about how playing on the 1987 team with Wayne Gretzky helped him elevate his game for the rest of his career. How much of that happens during these tournaments? Will a player like Steven Stamkos accelerate his maturation by being involved on a team like this, or will it simply open him up for injury as Tampa Bay fights for a playoff spot?
In 2002, Salt Lake City witnessed Team Canada and Team USA battle it out for the gold medal. Several months later, the Detroit Red Wings hoisted the Stanley Cup with a host of Olympians on the roster: Steve Yzerman, Brenden Shanahan, Brett Hull, Sergei Fedorov, Pavel Datsyuk, Nicklas Lidstrom, Igor Larionov, Chris Chelios, and Dominik Hasek. Obviously, the extra grind didn’t hurt the Red Wings that year. In 2006, the Turin games saw Sweden beat Finland for the gold medal while the Carolina Hurricanes won the Stanley Cup. That Hurricanes team wasn’t quite as involved with the Olympics: Frantisek Kaberle played on the bronze-winning Czech team; Erik Cole and Doug Weight skated for Team USA (didn’t medal); Martin Gerber played for the Swiss team (didn’t medal); and Eric Staal was an alternate for Team Canada (didn’t medal).
Looking at this, there’s probably not a direct link between fatigue and winning a Stanley Cup. However, every time you step on the ice, you open yourself up to injury, whether that’s in practice or the Olympics or the pre-season. If it’s the best players on your team being involved in a physical and intense tournament, bumps and bruises are almost certain while major injuries remain a possibility.
That’s a lot of risk for teams mid-season, and the more I think about it, the more I hope the Sharks players somehow stay at home during the break. Ultimately, this makes me think that the notion of moving Olympic Ice Hockey (as they like to call it) over to the summer games is the best solution, as it would allow NHL participation while minimizing long-term ripple effects into the playoffs. I’m sure that’s a tough sell for the IOC (“Ice? In summer?”), and the league has to decide if it even wants to participate past the 2010 Olympics. When they get to that discussion stage, though, I hope it’s something that at least is talked about.
Filed in: NHL | Mike Chen's Hockey Blog | Permalink
Tags: Olympics,
Comments
If your team is a Cup contender then it would probably be best if your top players get some rest, if you’re a bottom feeder it would be great to get your best players into some meaningful games to see how they compete when the stakes are higher. Unfortunately this theory has little practical application since the teams with the best players should be the ones with the playres most likely to be selected.
Personally ,I want to see entertaining hockey so I’d like to see all of the best players go even if it means sending my team’s best. If your team is a Cup contender than you should be able to ease their work load throughout the year and you’re in no worse a situation than other teams that have high profile players. I don’t think anyone is picking the Sharks or Pens to miss the playoffs because they will be well represented in the Olympics. By the same token resting Kessel in Toronto or giving Markov more time to heal in Montreal is going to bring the Cup back to Canada.
Posted by Hockey1919 from Montreal on 12/18/09 at 02:17 PM ET
I am all for NHL participation in the Olympics, it makes for some great games and they really don’t play all that many games in the Olympics (if I remember right, the most you can play is six). I’m afraid your idea of moving hockey to the summer olympics is good in theory, but will never happen due to logistical reasons. It cuts down on the number of possible cities that can host because a lot of summer olympics type cities probably don’t have ice rinks and would be unable to have good ice, so the ice would more than likely be terrible, potentially leading to…more injuries.
Posted by Mike from Idaho on 12/18/09 at 02:56 PM ET
I can definitely see both sides of the coin on this issue. However, I have to say that I would personally enjoy seeing my players on their respective Olympic team. Being a San Jose native, I’m in the same boat as you and am rooting for Marleau, Boyle, Thornton, Heatley, Little Joe, Murray and Nabby to make the teams.
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Posted by GirlsWearingMyJersey from San Jose, CA on 12/20/09 at 03:44 PM ET
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I’m split on this. Yes, we can see our NHLers play a different style of game and be impressed with them all over again. You also see line combos that you might not see otherwise. Kovalchuk-Datsyuk-Ovechkin. Yikes and wow at the same time.
On the other hand, we all remember what happened to Ottawa’s playoff hopes and dreams after Hasek went down with a groin injury during the Olympics. Many had picked the Senators to get into the finals, then, ooopppssss.
Suppose Luongo goes down with a season ending groin tweak. Yeah, Raycroft has shown little flashes of brilliance, but let’s face it. The Nucks would be hosed.
If Kovalchuk goes down with anything that lasts more than two days Atlanta is done.
Red Wings are already beat up. Imagine if even more of their guys go down in the Olympics.
Posted by AvsRock from My timeshare in insanity... on 12/18/09 at 02:13 PM ET