海角大神

As the Velvet Revolution raged in Czechoslovakia against communist one-party rule in 1989, famed hockey goalie Dominik Hasek and teammates squeezed into a Skoda to join pro-independence protests in Prague.

When Washington Capitals left-winger Alex Ovechkin, a Russian, took a far more nuanced stance about his country鈥檚 invasion of Ukraine, Mr. Hasek squared up on Twitter.

He labeled the star puck-handler an 鈥渁libist鈥� for refusing to denounce President Vladimir Putin鈥檚 claims of a defensive attack, and called for the National Hockey League to expand a growing umbrella of sports sanctions by suspending Russian player contracts.聽

Mr. Ovechkin, in particular, is in a vise, not least of which is that he plays at a rink just a stroll down Pennsylvania Avenue from the U.S. Capitol. For one, his decision to call for peace may have put him at odds with new crackdowns on speech back home. Yet he also counts Mr. Putin as a friend 鈥� and his Instagram page still boasts a picture of the two men.

Growing sports sanctions underscore the tension between fairness to an individual and a need for collective action in the face of atrocities like the kind occurring in Ukraine, where a children鈥檚 and maternity hospital was bombed Wednesday.

鈥淗ere we have athletes 鈥� including Russian Paralympians 鈥� paying the consequences, and that feels atrocious on some level, even immoral,鈥� says Sergey Radchenko, author of 鈥淭wo Suns in the Heavens: the Sino-Soviet Struggle for Supremacy.鈥� 鈥淏ut on the other hand, Russia has pursued a brutal, immoral war, and so then do you host Russian athletes like nothing is happening? It鈥檚 a clash of moralities that鈥檚 very hard to reconcile.鈥�

Pressure is growing for leagues to sanction not just Russia, but individual players. Russian athletes have been barred this year from both the Paralympics and the World Cup. The Russian owner of an English Premier League team has seen the club鈥檚 sale frozen 鈥� and no new tickets can be sold. An international cat association even banned Russian cats.

鈥淚 think international hockey should say, 鈥榃e鈥檙e not gonna let [Russians] play in the world junior hockey tournament鈥欌�� this summer, Canadian hockey great Wayne Gretzky said last week in a TNT interview.

George Orwell once called sports 鈥渨ar minus the shooting.鈥� Hockey offers a particularly mythic backdrop. The underdog victory of the U.S. Olympic men鈥檚 hockey team against the Soviets at Lake Placid in 1980, after all, is known as the Miracle on Ice.

The NHL features players from the Arctic hockey halo, from Toronto to Kyiv. It has cut business ties to Russian firms. But it has defended its Russian players, adding extra protection because of what the league calls verbal threats and attacks on them.

As the war grinds on in Ukraine, tensions on the ice are mounting. After someone displayed a Ukrainian flag at last Thursday鈥檚 Capitals home game, the team banned fans from carrying Ukrainian or Russian flags in the stands. On Wednesday, it issued a statement condemning the Russian invasion and 鈥渓oss of innocent life.鈥� It also offered its 鈥渇ull support of our Russian players and their families overseas.鈥�

So far, the 41 Russian players in the NHL have remained muted about Russia invading its neighbor. One posted a 鈥淣o War鈥� poster, with the caption 鈥淪top it!鈥� Carolina Hurricanes forward Andrei Svechnikov toyed with making a public statement, but decided to take more time to think about it. That was last week.

And while Mr. Hasek found Mr. Ovechkin鈥檚 comments mealy-mouthed, the younger hockey star did publicly call for peace.聽

鈥淣obody likes the war,鈥� says Daniel Milstein, a Ukrainian-born sports agent who has become a key conduit of Russian and Ukrainian talent into the NHL. It鈥檚 not right, he says, to discriminate against an individual player because of their nationality. 鈥淭heir lives,鈥� he says, 鈥渁re being threatened.鈥澛�

But the case of Mr. Ovechkin is particularly fraught.

While he has argued he is just an athlete with pride of country, Mr. Ovechkin has publicly stumped for Mr. Putin.

In 2017, he started the 鈥淧utin Team鈥� ahead of the Russian elections. When he got married, Mr. Putin sent congratulations that were read on Mr. Ovechkin鈥檚 wedding day.

That puts Mr. Ovechkin under more pressure to speak out, especially given concerns about players鈥� families back home in Russia.

鈥淚n some ways Ovechkin, precisely because of his ... being such a Putin buddy, has a greater form of freedom here, a greater space of activity, of action,鈥� says Andrei Markovits, co-author of 鈥淕aming the World.鈥�

Sports and stature

Analysts say Mr. Putin sees athletic endeavor as symbolic of Russia鈥檚 stature and ambition.

The fall of the Soviet Union hit its sports community hard. In the mid-1990s, an American sports promoter found the remnants of the Red Army team playing in a dingy night club.聽

Mr. Putin has worked to resurrect the glory days, using Russian hockey players as backdrops.聽

In 2019, he suited up for an 鈥渁ll-star鈥� game featuring former NHL stars Pavel Bure and Slava Fetisov. Mr. Putin reportedly scored eight goals. The Kremlin issued a correction the next day. It claimed Mr. Putin had actually scored 10 goals.

He joins other authoritarian leaders who have come to understand that 鈥渢he Olympics [and other global sports events] become a form of nationalistic orgy, because it鈥檚 such an aphrodisiac, such an unbelievable drug,鈥� says Mr. Markovits, a sociologist at the University of Michigan, in Ann Arbor.

But that is also what sports organizations are aiming for as they join a global sanctions movement aimed at undermining support for the Ukraine conflict on Russian streets from Novosibirsk to Nizhny Novgorod.

Sports sanctions can work. When South Africans were polled ahead of a 1992 referendum to end apartheid, several questions focused on the country鈥檚 athletes being barred from world sports bodies because of their government鈥檚 support of a racist system.聽

The sanctions created an environment where, as Nelson Mandela once said, South Africa became 鈥渢he skunk of the world.鈥澛�

But this is a different dynamic, says Stuart Kaufman, a political scientist at the University of Delaware in Newark.

鈥淭he problem with these kinds of measures is that it wouldn鈥檛 affect the awareness of the Russian people very much,鈥� says Mr. Kaufman, author of 鈥淢odern Hatreds.鈥� They could also backfire, he says.

Sanctions, he adds, 鈥渁re potentially relevant as far as building a broader movement, but the only thing that is going to hit Russian public opinion would be if the 2026 Olympics don鈥檛 have a Russian hockey team at all. That鈥檚 the kind of blunt force symbolic measure that would be needed.鈥�

At least one Russian, however, says that sanctions against Russian athletes 鈥渕ay change the calculus鈥� of how Russians perceive the war 鈥� and their support for it.

鈥淚 am in deep opposition to Putin, but at the same time, as a Russian, I realize that sanctions are applied to all of Russia, so I then reap the consequences of the government鈥檚 actions,鈥� says Mr. Radchenko, in a phone interview from London. 鈥淲hether it鈥檚 fair or not, it鈥檚 hard to avoid.鈥澛�