Golden Knights captain Mark Stone plays the game with intensity and passion. Whether he scores the game-winning goal or stands on the bench while a teammate leads his team to victory, Stone’s reaction is the same and it’s always fun to watch.
Due to a nagging back injury, Stone has spent more time this season in the press box watching hockey than he has played. the famous expressive The Winnipeg native sat above the rink with unease on his face, staring helplessly at his teammates.
The back injury dates back to at least the 2020-21 playoffs and has held Stone through 45 games this season. And although Vegas has suffered a litany of injuries this year, none have hurt the club more than Stone’s.
The scariest part for the Golden Knights is that it may not be over.
Stone said Tuesday he would spend the start of his offseason doing more testing and research to determine the appropriate course of action moving forward. When asked if he was confident the back wouldn’t be a problem in the future, Stone replied: “I’m confident, now it’s just up to me to find the right advice, to find the right plan and heal it so it doesn’t happen again.”
Stone did not release details of the injury and said he still does not know if it will require surgery.
“I’m always on the lookout for everything,” Stone said. “I don’t want just one guy giving his opinion. I want to talk to five or six guys, and see where we go from here. And not just doctors. I want to talk to players who have been through similar situations and hear their story and see where I can go from there. I don’t want to make a rash decision and do a procedure that won’t help. I want to make sure that I do something that will benefit me not only for next year, but for the five years I have left on my contract, and I hope to sign a few more after that.
Stone’s injury is troubling for several reasons, including the longevity of the problem, his inability to identify the problem and the fact that back injuries have cut short the careers of many players. Top players such as Mike Bossy and Wayne Gretzky have suffered from back problems and more recently Tampa Bay Lightning winger Ryan Callahan’s career ended early due to degenerative disc disease. in the lower back. He played the last two seasons of his career battling that pain before finally retiring in 2019.
To be clear, Stone’s back injury could be a much more minor issue than those mentioned above. There have also been plenty of NHL players who suffered back injuries to end long and successful careers. Stone apparently reached out to several of them.
“I’ve spoken to a few players in the league who have gone through similar situations to me,” Stone said Tuesday. “Some are still playing at 37 or 38, and they were sitting on their couch at 30 thinking they were going to retire.”
At only 29 years old, Stone is at the height of his career. Prior to this season, he was leading a seven-year streak of at least 20 goals and exceeded 60 points in six of those seven seasons. He is also one of the best defensive forwards in the NHL, leading the league with 597 takeouts since the 2015-16 season (116 ahead of the next closest player).
If Stone is unable to regain that form, it would be devastating for the Golden Knights to say the least. This season was a small sample of what life without a sound Vegas rock is like, and the results have been disheartening.
The Golden Knights aren’t an old team, but they certainly aren’t young. They’re also already squeezed as tightly as possible to the salary cap cap, and Stone still has five years left on his $9.5 million per season contract. At full strength, he’s worth it – and maybe more given his leadership off the ice – but after multiple failed attempts at rehabilitation, that’s no guarantee.
Stone’s adoration and obsession with hockey fueled his rise from a sixth-round pick in 2010 to one of the most complete forwards in the NHL, but those attributes may have been a detriment this season. .
“It’s never easy to recover from an injury during the season,” Stone said. “You always want to try to rush back, and I think I made a few mistakes throughout the season trying to come back too quickly.”
Stone’s back bothered him in the 2020-21 playoffs, and he didn’t look himself in the Conference Finals series against Montreal, when he didn’t score a single point in six games. After a short offseason, his back problems continued into training camp last September.
“He was compromised and limited during training camp and pre-season,” general manager Kelly McCrimmon revealed on Feb. 14.
Stone’s back jammed midway through the second game of the season, Oct. 14 in Los Angeles, when he needed help from his teammates just to get off the ice.
Mark Stone is helped into the locker room with what appears to be a lower body injury. pic.twitter.com/5FZtqRxCGA
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) October 15, 2021
He missed almost exactly a month of action before returning on November 13. But even after that, Stone was sidelined for the second night in a row. The only time he played two games on consecutive days was on December 16 and 17 in New Jersey and New York, and he was ejected from the following game against the Islanders. After that, Stone returned to the lineup in the next game against the Lightning, but was pulled from the contest midway through the second period.
“It’s hard to define exactly what the problem is,” McCrimmon said in February. “I think it’s been very frustrating for Mark, and yet those are the kinds of things that we have to try to get to the bottom of, and that’s going to take time.”
Stone saw six specialists across North America undergo “10 or 12 rounds of diagnostic exams,” according to McCrimmon.
“Backs are tricky,” McCrimmon said in February. “I wouldn’t be able to tell you how it got passed on to me other than to say they’re still working on these things to figure out exactly what it is. It’s not a one-time issue, there’s has overlapping challenges, and it will hopefully overcome it all.
Stone played in the NHL All-Star Game just before his last long absence, but said it had nothing to do with the injury.
“I think it would end up going anyway,” he said. “Playing NHL hockey games is tough. There’s contact, you try to play 18 to 20 minutes a night, you can’t cheat.
Stone missed more than two months in February and March, only returning for the final nine games of the Golden Knights season. He registered just one goal and one assist in those games, and while he said his back felt good during that time, he didn’t play with the same intensity that is usually evident. .
“I obviously wanted to at least try and help this team qualify (for the playoffs), and I couldn’t do that, but it’s definitely disappointing,” Stone said Tuesday. “I felt good. (I will) definitely take positives from a negative season, and I will have time to heal.
Vegas is set for the longest offseason in club history, and no player can use the free time more than Stone.
Without the specifics of the diagnosis, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly how concerning Stone’s back is, but his full recovery could be the most important factor in the Golden Knights’ window of victory.
Stone is determined to raise the bar, then put his team on it to get them back to the playoffs in 2022-23.
“Watching yesterday’s (playoff) games, it kills you to watch them,” he said. “You know you should be in there. We think we should be in there. And next year we have to go back and remember the feeling of that day in St. Louis when the game really meant absolutely nothing.
(Photo by Mark Stone: Ethan Miller/Getty Images)
