New York Rangers star Artemi Panarin is a brave man for criticizing Vladimir Putin | Mike Sielski

Editor’s Note: This column was initially posted on Feb. 23, 2021

In mid-July 2019, nearly three weeks after he had signed a seven-year, $81.5 million free-agent contract with the New York Rangers, Artemi Panarin did a courageous thing, simply by speaking his mind in his homeland.

Panarin is a native of Korkino, a small mining town in the Ural Mountains, and he gave a YouTube interview to a Russian journalist in which he criticized Vladimir Putin, the country’s president/dictator. Russia, Panarin pointed out, had no rule of law, no freedom of speech. He had been listening to Alexei Navalny – the activist and opposition leader who was poisoned with a nerve agent last year and was arrested and jailed this year after returning to Moscow – and found him compelling and truthful. Putin, Panarin said, could no longer distinguish between right and wrong, and it was a mistake for the Russian people to think that there was no one better to govern them.

“There is still this belief in our society that you can’t say bad things about the government or you will be killed or poisoned,” Panarin said. “This should not be happening. [In America], a star or an athlete can directly bad-mouth the president, and nothing will happen. They can refuse to go to the White House. But here, it’s impossible. You will immediately be hit with a wave of negativity. But it’s your choice. Why should you do it if you don’t want?”

Last month, Panarin posted a photo of himself on Instagram with the hashtag “FreeNavalny.” Last week, he had an assist, a shootout goal, and eight shots on goal in a victory over the Flyers, then another two assists in a win at Washington, giving him 18 points in 14 games this season. But he will not be at the Wells Fargo Center when the Flyers and Rangers play again Wednesday night. His absence will speak loudly about the man he is and the risks that he has taken.

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One of the NHL’s best players – he was a finalist last season for the Hart Trophy as the league’s MVP – Panarin, 29, has taken a leave from the Rangers, following a strange, if not altogether surprising, development. Andrei Nazarov, who coached him in the Kontinental Hockey League, alleged in a Russian newspaper that Panarin beat up an 18-year-old woman in 2011. There is no evidence that he assaulted anyone, no police report, nothing other than the word of Nazarov – an avowed Putin toady – to suggest that Panarin did anything wrong. He would have been 20 years old or so at the time, and he was not, by any measure, a star prospect. No NHL team drafted him. So it strains logic and credibility to think that such an incident, had it happened, would have been covered up to protect him.

The Rangers published a strong statement Monday in support of Panarin: “Artemi vehemently and unequivocally denies any and all allegations in this fabricated story. This is clearly an intimidation tactic being used against him for being outspoken on recent political events. Artemi is obviously shaken and concerned and will take some time away from the team.” Beyond the damage to his good name, he has ample reason to worry. He has family members in Russia, and even if there was no Kremlin conspiracy to put the fear of God into him, even if Nazarov acted on his own, the accusation was enough to send Panarin a message, to remind him of the depth of Putin’s influence and the breadth of his reach.

“He’s such a good person and good teammate,” Rangers forward Ryan Strome said. “He’s been such a great role model for me and so many of the young guys in just his personality and attitude and the way he carries himself. …

“It feels like it’s par for the course a little bit, the way the world’s been going the last little while. It seems like it’s one crazy event after another. We do have a job to do, but at the end of the day, these are our friends and teammates and brothers. … We see him behind closed doors every day and the personality, the way he carries himself, his character, and his attitude. He’s just an all-around unbelievable person. For us, just give him his time. Give him his space. Whatever his timeline may be, we’ll welcome him back with more than open arms.”

» READ MORE: Rangers’ Artemi Panarin takes leave of absence following assault allegation in Russia, unlikely to play Flyers

Among the nearly 40 Russian-born players in the NHL, Panarin has been the most vocal critic of Putin, really the only critic. Capitals star Alexander Ovechkin has been so effusive in his public praise of Putin that, in 2017, he organized a social-media movement called “PutinTeam,” a gesture that earned him a laurel from Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. “Sasha is a very famous Russian and a very successful one,” Peskov told The Washington Post, “and we know how much he appreciates our president.”

The Penguins’ Evgeni Malkin also has said that he supports Putin, though in fairness to Ovechkin, Malkin, and any other current or former NHL player from Russia, the pressure to pay a tyrant lip service at the minimum and fealty at the maximum must be unimaginable. The issue is a fraught one, especially in a sport in which athletes are generally more reticent about socio-political issues than, say, those who play professional football or basketball. One of Panarin’s former teammates declined an interview request Monday with a text message: “I would like no part of this.” But that only makes Panarin’s stance more admirable, and more dangerous.

“People might say this, but I think you have to respect me somewhat because I have the money,” he said in that 2019 interview. “I have everything. I could just sit and be mum and happy that my ass is warm. But what I say, I say for the people, to make sure there are changes. I am not an American agent. I have just seen how things work in another country, and I want some things, like the rule of law, to be transplanted here. I want all people here to say what they think, to be able to build their small businesses without interference and so on.”

Here, we are rightfully lamenting, still, our inability last month to transfer power peacefully from one president to the next. In Russia, it would be an achievement to siphon any power at all from Vladimir Putin. Artemi Panarin has recognized that unforgiving truth and the cost of crossing a brutal, powerful figure. He is saying what he believes anyway, because feet aren’t just for skating. They’re for standing up. If you turn on the Flyers-Rangers game Wednesday night, don’t notice only who’s on the ice. Remember who isn’t, and why.