Sharks' Vlasic considered playing in Olympics despite potential arrest, contract termination


San Jose Sharks defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic was not happy with the NHL's decision to prevent its players from participating in the 2018 Winter Olympics.

The 30-year-old Montreal native, who won gold with Canada at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, was so determined to play in Pyeongchang that he considered risking arrest and the termination of his eight-year, $56 million contract extension with the Sharks to go to South Korea, according to a San Francisco Chronicle report.

“Do you want to do that?" Vlasic said of facing potential legal action. "You're getting pretty far into the legal department there."

When the league announced last April that it would not send its players to the Olympics for the first time since the 1994 Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway, Vlasic's initial plan was to go no matter what. That changed after speaking with his lawyers, who informed him he could face a lawsuit for skipping out on the Sharks if it negatively affected the team's product on the ice. Vlasic would also have to defy a court order and could have been arrested for doing so if he took the ice in Pyeongchang.

“I don’t think it would have gone that far, but it’s a possibility,” Vlasic told the Chronicle.

The threat of punishment from the NHL hasn't stopped Vlasic from displaying signs of frustration, though. He threw a jab at the league on social media more than five months after the decision was made.
Beautiful, right? @NHL https://t.co/QsQ3wfa59P
— Marc-Édouard Vlasic (@Vlasic44) September 21, 2017
Vlasic and other NHL players, most notably Washington Capitals star Alexander Ovechkin, have been outspoken about wanting to return to Olympic competition as as soon as the 2022 Winter Games in Beijing.

“I would love to (play) in 2022,” Vlasic told the Chronicle. “I'm fighting not only for myself in '22, but for every other player who gets a chance to do it in 2026, '30, '34 and down the road. I'm not just thinking of myself, I'm thinking about all the players who deserve to go.”
As for watching the 2018 Olympic hockey tournament, Vlasic has other plans.

"I'll probably see the highlights," he told the Chronicle. "I won’t sit down and watch it.