In the seminal Wayne Knight film, Space Jam (1996, directed by Michael Jackson music video director Joe Pytka and written by at least four dudes), the Looney Tunes cartoons must defend the earth from hostile aliens by winning a basketball game. Asked to pick his team, Bugs Bunny went immediately for the greatest of all time, Michael Jordan. Should the same situation occur in the realm of hockey– and you freaking know it will– Alex Ovechkin knows who he’d want on his team.

Jonathan Toews

Sidney Crosby

Anze Kopitar

Vladimir Putin

Oh. Okay. Well, here we go again.

Ovechkin was asked the question at a press conference on behalf of a SovSport.ru reader who I can only assume is Russia’s version of Ian Oland. As reported by SovSport and translated by Igor Kleyner:

Q: If you had to rescue our planet from an extraterrestrial threat, and everything depended on one hockey game, and you are the captain – who would you pick for your team? A: Definitely Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. He would be my captain. He scored 8 goals in the last game.

If you’re curious why the President of Russia was on Ovi’s mind, here what the presser looked like, via @DgcMr:

If your eyes got stuck at the top right of the pic, you are not alone.

Regarding Ovi’s assertion that Putin scored eight goals in a game, that is actually true. Or at least as true as anything that gets published on Russia Today.

It was just one among Putin’s many, many, super manly photo ops.

And so continues Ovechkin’s ongoing friendship with a world leader. Add this to the Putin shirt, the photo op, the is party now, the late-night chats, and the propaganda. They sure are a cute couple.

But if Ovi’s choice of a 5′ 7″, 62 year old forward is frightening to you, please rest easy knowing that when the aliens come– and they freaking will– they will probably ask a good old Canadian boy to pick the teams. Probably Crosby.



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