Nicklas Backstrom speaks out against NHL's decision to not attend Olympics

In case you missed the news earlier today, the NHL and NHLPA jointly announced that they will NOT be participating in the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, China as had been speculated for weeks now.

The league is citing the need to make up for last time with so many postponed regular season games, rather than COVID-19 concerns or human rights violations concerns for their decision to not attend the games.

As you might imagine, there are quite a few of the players who do NOT agree with this decision and there are early reports of dissension in the ranks.

“There’s definitely some major division within the PA ranks right now,” an anonymous NHL player agent told insider Jimmy Murphy. “Some feel that with how hard the union fought to play in these Olympics that others capitulated like they always seem to do with the league. I think we all get the gravity of COVID and health concerns but are the players going if we had lightened protocol?”

Honestly, I can understand the frustration. It seems like every time there's a disagreement between the NHL and the NHLPA, it's always the league that ends up getting what they want. Now, this particular decision is a little more complicated but again I can understand where the players are coming from.

Washington Capitals forward Nicklas Backstrom didn't shy away from his feelings on the subject when asked by Swedish tabloid Aftobladet.

Here's what Backstrom had to say (translated from Swedish):

"It is a joke, I have been looking forward to this for eight years"

- Nicklas Backstrom

Suffice it to say that I don't think Backstrom is the only player who feels this way...