It’s going to be kind of a test tube season, isn’t it? Divisional play only within a 56-game schedule played predominantly in empty buildings, which should make the Puddy Tats of Sunrise and the Senators of Canada’s capital city feel quite at home wherever they travel. 

There was an absence of exhibition games for everyone to overemphasize, so instead the intrasquad scrimmages grew into supersized events in which context was sublimely missing. Six or seven practice sessions per team and away they go. 

Will the season be legit? Probably the most pertinent question is: Will the league be able to pull off a season that is commencing in the teeth of a pandemic? But baseball (primarily an outdoor game played through warm-weather months) and football managed to complete their seasons despite some disruptions. 

Never let it be said that MLB and the NFL have ever had anything on Sixth Avenue when it comes to bullheadedness, but the NHL will have to be nimble in dealing with outbreaks and multiple COVID-19 positives. A lot of it won’t necessarily be fair, but fairness is a concept not recognized by the virus. 

The Post’s Rangers podcast, “Up In The Blue Seats,” returns with its season premiere on Thursday.

There is this, though: Every league that has operated during the pandemic (including the professional NCAA football consortium), whether inside or outside a bubble, has produced maybe an off-the-wall playoff team or two, but an unassailable legitimate champion. Unprecedented does not equate to unworthy. 

So, will the exclusive divisional competition stoke rivalries across the next four months, or will they promote same-old, same-old boredom? Will the format lead to playoff-type intensity from the get-go, or will the calendar still dictate the tempo and urgency? Probably the latter. Teams are not built to grind for four months — or six, extending to the playoffs — and those that do often are wheezing at the finish line. 

Lopping 26 games off the schedule puts us essentially at an early December starting line. So while there will be urgency to bank points early, there will still be time to overcome, say, a 2-6-1 start, because every game could be a four-point game. 

Into the unknown the NHL goes, for the second time in five months. 

The Ne’er-Do-Wells 

Here’s the thing. Lousy teams are able to operate for years under the cover of the rebuilding that has come into vogue since the Rangers issued The Letter. Don’t get me wrong, there were always teams perpetually rebuilding — such as the Islanders of the aughts — but now organizations appear to be empowered by letting everyone know not to expect too much too soon. 

So in this group of clubs with little chance to make the playoffs, we come to organizations that are in different stages of rebuilding, some dragged into it kicking and screaming, others welcoming the process with a warm embrace. 

Are the BLACKHAWK$ kidding with their cost-savings measures and goaltending depth chart of Malcolm Subban, Collin Delia and Kevin Lankinen that could be mistaken for a taxi-squad roll call? Or are they just waiting to see what it will take to acquire Alexandar Georgiev? 

The RED WINGS’ horrid 2019-20 got them no better than the fourth-overall pick in the draft, which certainly put a crimp in the rebuilding by GM Steve Yzerman, who this time around can’t sell the weather and state-tax exempt status as he did in Tampa Bay. 

Only a few more years before the SENATORS, who are stocking up with big-time prospects, are in position for self-interested owner Eugene Melnyk to sabotage the organization’s effort as a contender. 

So the KINGS and DUCKS resisted the rebuilding impulse for years before giving it the full embrace, and now they’re on the road, but with Los Angeles still stuck in half-measures land with Jonathan Quick and Anze Kopitar still playing primary roles for the club and Anaheim attempting to figure out whether now is too soon for Trevor Zegras and Jamie Drysdale. 

Better Than That 

The DEVILS have sort of dipped their toes in the rebuilding ocean, but seem to be caught philosophically in between, needing the kind of bounce-back year from P.K. Subban that may be beyond No. 76’s reach. Jack Hughes has to make more of an impact — an impact, anyway — but will the team attempt to keep pending free agent Kyle Palmieri or wheel him as a deadline rental? That answer probably will define the club’s path. 

So here are the COYOTES, inhaling and exhaling at the same time, unable or unwilling to keep Taylor Hall, shedding salary in Derek Stepan, keeping an $8.75 million Darcy Kuemper/Antti Raanta goaltending tandem and always just less than the sum of their parts even following a qualifying-round victory under the bubble. 

Joel Quenneville alone couldn’t pull the persistently disappointing PANTHERS into the playoffs. A bounce-back year from Sergei Bobrovsky would help this club, which hired a new GM in Bill Zito, who thus far has essentially shuffled the deck. 

OK, so Kirill Kaprizov has finally joined the WILD, who were ready to send Zach Parise to the Island at the deadline before cap matters sent the deal down in flames. Better than that, but not good enough would be a pretty good encapsulation of the franchise’s history, no? 

The PREDATORS kind of did the Henrik Lundqvist thing to franchise flag-bearer Pekka Rinne last year, except the guy for whom the Finn was overthrown is named Juuse Saros, not Igor Shesterkin. 

The BLUE JACKETS may have good enough goaltending, discipline and structure to paper over the recent talent drain, but if their best and brightest want out of Columbus, the franchise faces an existential problem. 

A second mention of Taylor Hall, whose one-year, $9 million signing by the SABRES had better work out more swimmingly than the acquisition of Jeff Skinner before the 2018-19 season or the playoff drought will reach 10 years. Chances are it will, anyway. 

The SHARKS improved their goaltending by adding Devan Dubnyk —just sticking a shooter tutor in nets might have increased their save percentage — but the club will be too dependent upon the defensive pair of Erik Karlsson and Marc-Edouard Vlasic, which seems well along on the back nine. 

A step up from that 

You have to figure that the FLAMES will get increased production from the Johnny Gaudreau-Sean Monahan combination while Jacob Markstrom signals an improvement in goal. 

And there’s the rub with the CANUCKS: Bustling young elite talent and all that, and JT Miller, too, but how much, if any, decline in nets will result from Braden Holtby replacing Markstrom? 

When Patrik Laine is a JET, he’s a Jet, but for how long remains to be seen. 

The OILERS somehow did not pingpong their way into Alexis Lafreniere following their qualifying-round collapse against Chicago, so the team tries again to make the playoffs for the second time in the sixth year of the Connor McDavid era. 

The CANADIENS somehow took a flat cap and wheeled and dealed like it was the good old days, adding a staggering contract commitment to Josh Anderson in the process. They will be watched. 

The time is not yet now for the RANGERS, but they are far more likely to take a step up rather than a step back. 

It was all-in and a double down for the PENGUINS, who somehow may line up with Evan Rodrigues on Sidney Crosby’s right side and someone will have to provide an explanation for that. 

The truncated schedule should serve the ISLANDERS well, for they will have 26 fewer games in which to grind and attempt to camouflage their lack of firepower. 

Contenders 

Talent, structure, physicality galore, but doesn’t it seem that the HURRICANES are a little light in the goaltending department with the Petr Mrazek-James Reimer tandem to be a serious Cup contender? 

The FLYERS seem set for a while here, but Carter Hart’s 2019-20 numbers weren’t as good as Mackenzie Blackwood’s, though you’d never know it from the hype. 

The BLUES won’t have Vladimir Tarasenko for the long haul and though they will have Mike Hoffman and Torey Krug, they won’t have Alex Pietrangelo or Jay Bouwmeester at all, which adds up to an equation of subtraction by subtraction. 

So it is Zdeno Chara, rather than the recuperating Henrik Lundqvist, who becomes the larger-than-life pending Hall of Famer to give it a Joe Montana-to-the-Chiefs whirl for the CAPITALS. 

No more excuses, no more being young, no more being blocked by divisional rivals from Boston and Tampa Bay for the MAPLE LEAFS, who somehow still have not won a playoff round during the post Brian Burke/Dave Nonis revival. 

Was it a last gasp for the Jamie Benn STARS in the 2020 bubble final, or was it the introduction of the Miro Heiskanen Dallas squad that is banking on Anton Khudobin as the late-in-life real deal? 

Chara and Krug both exited, both pushed out the door by a BRUINS management attempting to keep it open for another year or two of contention behind a fraying group. 

Steady was the course followed by the LIGHTNING, who never tore down the house in face of postseason disappointment but instead addressed the critical margins. 

The AVALANCHE are both loaded and are sure the trendy pick to win the Cup, but that means you believe in Philipp Grubauer-Pavel Francouz goaltending tandem, too. 

The Alex Pietrangelo free-agent signing should represent the missing piece for the GOLDEN KNIGHTS, who may have one too many pieces in nets with Marc-Andre Fleury around as the backup to Robin Lehner.