Flames defenseman says the vast majority of response he's received has been positive
Backlash? Not yet for Nikita Zadorov.
The Calgary Flames defenseman is expecting to eventually hear plenty from those who oppose his view after he vocally came out against his country’s invasion of Ukraine during a lengthy YouTube interview and added more thoughts during a one-on-one session with The Hockey News on Thursday.
“So far it’s been good,” Zadorov, who hails from Moscow, said on Friday. “The past two days I’ve got a lot of DMs, a lot of messages from Russian people, Ukrainian people, people from the Czech Republic, Finland, Sweden, all over Europe. People have been showing great support. I’d say in my Instagram, there’s like 99.9 percent of the messages are positive. I know Russia has a bot system, and it takes them two-three days to give some negative reviews, so I’m expecting them to come to my page, too.”
Zadorov, who knows his stance means he will not be allowed to return to his homeland “until (Vladimir) Putin isn’t the president or that regime is still there”, wouldn’t divulge the response he has received from fellow Russian players on both sides of the debate.
“Every person has a different view,” he said. “I think 99 percent of the players overall, Canadians, Americans, Swedes, they’re more focused on hockey, their own life, families and everything. I don’t think many guys go into politics. It’s something interesting for me. I like it, I’m reading a lot about that, watch a lot of people speaking about it, a lot of experts. I think I was just more educated to speak out.”
Russia's annexation of Crimea in 2014 first sparked Zadorov's interest in the situation. The invasion in February 2022 has resulted in a war that has resulted in an estimated more than a half-million soldier casualties and nearly 10,000 civilian deaths.
Whether Zadorov’s willingness to speak out sparks others around the league to do the same remains to be seen. Instead of worrying about that, though, he will just focus on his beliefs.
“I feel it’s really important for me. If you probably asked me last year, I would say the same thing, but nobody asked me, probably because you guys didn’t want to put me in a bad situation,” he said. “I think it’s important for me to speak, personally. Hopefully I can change something in this world. It just sucks what’s going on over there right now. It’s important to be vocal.”
