Part of the reason those in hockey media are so excited for the return of the NHL involvement at the Winter Olympics is the opportunity to TALK about the NHL's involvement at the Winter Olympics. And so, because it seems that NHL players travelling to Beijing seems like a 50-50 proposition at best at the moment with new variants popping up left and right, I'm going to do that talking — all week long — with a series of versions of Team Canada. It's probably best not to take these too seriously.
One complication with establishing a shortlist for the Canadian Olympic Team in conjunction with the NHL season for preparation reasons in this COVID-19 world is that it threatened to eliminate the possibility of breakthroughs.