Hey Olympians don't get hurt.

I saw this posted by Alan Walsh on Twitter last night and I couldn't believe it when I first read it. The NHL is stopping its season to play the Olympics; why in the hell would they do this? The NHLPA doesn't want its players skating in the camps because there isn't adequate insurance coverage for their elephantine contracts. Personally, I think there would be more injuries from the compacted season then there is from the Olympic games.

I don’t know if there is any way around this; the countries participating in the Olympics are going to need to have some kind of an evaluation camp so they can decided which players are going to be the best fits for their countries’ Olympic team. This is just shameful. Maybe the Olympics needs to go back to having amateurs play in the Olympic Games.

So the NHLPA has told players not to participate in any on-ice drills at the upcoming orientation camps for the Olympics. Apparently the NHL has now also sent out a memo that dissuades player involvement as well, as the memo apparently states that the league will not honour NHL contracts for a player injured at a summer camp.

Call me crazy, but wasn't it the NHL and the NHLPA that agreed to participate in the Olympics? [Shaune Vetter, Hockey Buzz]