SERAVALLI: NHL projects 98% of players will be fully vaccinated this season

By Frank Seravalli

CHICAGO — The NHL is projecting at least 98 percent of its players will be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 prior to opening night next month, deputy commissioner Bill Daly told Daily Faceoff on Thursday at the NHL/NHLPA Player Media Tour in the Windy City.

That would make NHL players by far the most protected against the virus among the four major North American men’s professional sports leagues. The NFL is hovering around 93 percent vaccination rate, with the NBA projected at 90 percent, and approximately 85 percent of MLB players have been fully vaccinated, according to the New York Times.

Los Angeles Kings defenseman Drew Doughty said he wasn’t surprised hockey’s vaccination rate was so high.

“I think everyone just wants everyone to be as safe as they can, and it seems like that’s the way to do it,” Doughty said Thursday. “The rules we had last year were pretty strict and … it wasn’t that fun.”

“We’re very happy, I think, that the NHL communities embrace vaccination and understand that’s going to be important to the future of the league – and certainly the future of this season,” Daly said.

Daly said it’s possible fewer than 10 NHL players will remain unvaccinated when the puck drops on Oct. 12, among a total population of nearly 750 players on 32 teams. The exact number is difficult to pinpoint, Daly said, because it’s not possible now to accurately predict which players make opening rosters out of training camp.

“The last list I looked at indicated that the number of unvaccinated players by the start of the season should be less than 15. It may even be less than 10,” Daly said. “We’re going to be 98-99 percent vaccinated. And while the last couple months have shown that [vaccination] doesn’t preclude people from getting the infection, it does certainly raise the health level of everybody. People aren’t getting really sick if they’re fully vaccinated.”

The NHL is requiring all team personnel who have regular contact with players – including GMs, coaches, training and equipment staff and front office members – to be fully vaccinated. Two NHL coaches, including San Jose Sharks assistant Rocky Thompson and Columbus Blue Jackets assistant Sylvain Lefebvre, have left their posts because they are unvaccinated and thus unable to do their job.

The NHL and NHLPA are not mandating players to be fully vaccinated. However, unvaccinated players will be subject to significantly more stringent protocols for the upcoming season, including daily COVID-19 testing, and severe limitations while traveling.

Teams have the ability to suspend unvaccinated players without pay who are “unable to participate in club activities,” such as a player who would be required to miss games or practices because he is required to quarantine when crossing the Canadian/American border. Those players would forfeit the equivalent of one day’s pay for each day they are unable to participate in club activities.

It is still unclear whether a suspended unvaccinated player will count against his team’s salary cap during the suspension – and other COVID-related roster implications remain a work in progress.

“We’re optimistic that we can utilize the [normal] roster rules but we’ll adjust if we need to. We’re hoping to have enough available players that clubs will be able to fill as they need in the normal way,” Daly said. “Having said that, we’ve been in communication with our general managers, they were a little bit concerned about the issue. What we’ve said is let’s see how training camp goes. Let’s see where we are and let’s see how many players are getting infected, or [if] there is a breakthrough in infections.”

Feedback from NHL GMs indicated that they are most concerned about the availability of a third goaltender, should one of their team’s netminders gets sick or gets hurt.

“That would be the first area of concern that we’d look to address, possibly creating some kind of taxi squad for goaltenders,” Daly said. “Again, we’ll see how training camp plays out and what our experience is there and whether adjustments need to be made. One of the best things we’ve done is we’ve been very flexible and able to adapt to the circumstances that face us and we don’t make decisions too early. Sometimes, it’s excruciatingly slow, but part of that is making sure that we can gather to make important decisions, and I think we’ve been successful in doing that.”