In case you missed it with all the football happening this week, Saturday night saw a midnight premiere of NHL Lockout III: Return of the Lockout. So far, it's been the most-despised new release since Heaven's Gate. And we've officially taken this movie metaphor as far as we can.
Anyway, it was always an open secret that Capitals captain Alex Ovechkin had a place waiting for him on a KHL roster when the (lack of a ) deal went down. Dmitry Chesnokov of Yahoo Sports' Puck Daddy blog says that Ovechkin's likely destination is HC CSKA Moscow (CSKA for short), which is currently run by his former teammate Sergei Fedorov.
And what would any good labor war be without saber-rattling? Ovechkin seems to have thrown down his personal gauntlet in an interview with SovSport, saying -- according to Chesnokov's translation:
If the League [NHL] continues to insist on their [demands], then it will take a full year. That's because we are not going to cave in. Then I will spend the entire season in the KHL. It's an absolute reality.
As others have pointed out, this is an easy thing to say when you've made $9 million in each of the previous four years. The real question is, how many others share Ovechkin's resolve?