For some players, missing the 2015 NHL All-Star Game amounts to receiving a one-week vacation from NHL action. Not every sidelined player feels that way, however.
Sergei Bobrovsky wasn’t that far away from representing the Columbus Blue Jackets in the event in Columbus, yet a groin injury scuttled those plans. The Columbus Dispatch captures his disappointment, not to mention an updated prognosis that he’ll be out for at least one month.
“It is sad, really sad,” Bobrovsky said. “I wanted to play in front of my fans, with my teammates (Ryan Johansen and Nick Foligno). It’s the first time (as an) All-Star for me. It was the first time for my city. It was so special, and I am so disappointed right now.”
Unfortunately, it’s just been that kind of season for Bobrovsky, 26, and the Blue Jackets. Hosting the All-Star Game serves as one of the few bright spots (another one being the play of Foligno and Johansen) for a team rattled by injuries and bad luck.
Looking ahead a month or so seems grim in its own right, yet with his father in town from Siberia with initial plans to see him play in his first All-Star Game, Bobrovsky’s disappointed enough merely by how this weekend shaped up.