‘I did everything I felt I could do to make it work’: Steven Stamkos pens farewell to Tampa Bay Lightning

Steven Stamkos said his final goodbye to the Tampa Bay Lightning in an essay written in The Players Tribune on Monday.

Stamkos, who signed with the Nashville Predators on July 1 after he and the Lightning were unable to agree to terms on a new contract, says while he never envisioned a scenario where he would leave Tampa, he had a sense of “how lucky” he was through his 16-year career.

“The very first time I walked into the rink it was for a press conference. I went in through the security entrance where we come in before practices, and I couldn’t believe it: There were hundreds of employees lined up all the way down the hall, clapping for me as I walked by,” Stamkos, 34, wrote. “I’ll always remember how that made me feel, how welcome I felt. That’s really stuck with me. I felt connected to the organization right away. And that connection never left me.”

The former Lightning captain, who through 16 seasons scored 555 goals and 582 assists for 1,137 points in 1,082 regular-season games, won the Maurice “Rocket” Richard Trophy for most goals in a regular season twice, and helped lead the club to four Stanley Cup Finals, winning back-to-back championships in 2020 and 2021.

In the essay, Stamkos shared his experience of winning his title through the COVID-19 pandemic, and the balance of dealing with injuries while the team continued advancing through the Stanley Cup Playoffs. He also recounted the tragedy he and his family went through at the time.

“Right before the Bubble, about a week before we left for Toronto, I tweaked the injury and our medical team was trying to figure out what we should do,” Stamkos said, adding the injury was his abdomen and that it wasn’t healing properly. After a phone call with his wife Sandra on the phone, who was pregnant at the time, indicated something was wrong with her and the baby.

“I just said, like honestly, F–k it … I’m going to be with my wife. Nothing else mattered. She was staying outside Toronto, so I drove to see her,” he said. “I got to her, and the next few days were the most difficult we’ve ever been through. We lost our child. I took the next few weeks to be with her, to be with our family. I barely paid attention to much else.”

Once Stamkos returned to the bubble, he said it was difficult navigating through rehabbing and hockey and his personal life. The Lightning reached the Stanley Cup Final, with Stamkos making his playoff debut in Game 3, hoping he could have an impact on the group.

“But on my second shift I got the puck and went past Lindell along the boards, and as I kind of dipped by him, I felt the muscle go. It completely tore,” he wrote. “I just tried to use my momentum and weight to get a shot off. I looked up and it was going top corner and adrenaline took over.

“It’s one of those plays where you just try to leave it all out there,” he continued. “I got back to the bench and I knew I was in tough shape. I think I did another shift and that was it. My series was done.”

The next time Stamkos saw the ice was Game 6 when Tampa won the Stanley Cup.

“I only played a couple shifts in those playoffs. There were no fans. We didn’t have all of our families with us. It wasn’t how I pictured it at all. It was just this completely unique experience,” he said. “But when I raised the Cup over my head … none of that stuff mattered. None of it. I looked up and I saw all the names on it, my reflection in it. And I felt this relief.”

Stamkos says all the stress and anxiety he carried went away, and that it was “awesome” to see the looks on the faces of teammates like Victor Hedman and Nikita Kucherov once they got to lift the Stanley Cup.

“Like I said, it wasn’t how I pictured it. But it was still perfect.”

But the 2008 No. 1 overall pick says the best part was less than a year later, when the team won its second of back-to-back championships in front of a sold-out arena, lifting the trophy in front of everyone, in a playoff run he got to be part of.

“It was exactly how I dreamt it,” he said. “Sharing it with you, Tampa. It was beyond words.”