The Courier Post notes how Kimmo Timonen’s appearance at a players’ practice Wednesday was his first in two weeks. The 37-year-old blueliner grew bored in recent months working out for a season that might never happen. He recently took some time off to be a hockey dad to his 13-year-old son, who is playing for an area youth team coached by former Flyers defenseman Derian Hatcher.

“I’ve got to be honest, there were a lot of weekends where I didn’t miss hockey at all,” Timonen said. “Following my son, going to tournaments … we drove to a tournament in Canada last week … I’ve been having a good time with those guys.”

The time off probably has been good for Timonen, who had surgery last May to remove a disc fragment from his lower back. But he’s not thrilled knowing a settlement will create a crammed 48-game regular season that would start around Jan. 19 and end in early May.

“That’s going to be probably four or five games a week sometimes,” Timonen said. “That’s way less than [the usual] 82 games, but 48 in a short period might be even worse for me. But we’ll see.”