He gave it all his heart, until his heart gave out on him.
"You can't do something for as long as he has done it _ and as well as he does it _ without having a great heart and passion for what you do," Blues general manager Doug Armstrong said Wednesday. "That's the way Jay plays the game _ with passion and emotion and consistency.
"You can't be half-hearted playing in the NHL for this long."
Heart.
It epitomized the way Jay Bouwmeester played hockey for 17 NHL seasons.
It could be the reason we've seen the last of him playing hockey.
On Wednesday, the Blues' Bouwmeester held his first news conference since the incident. Since the night he suffered a cardiac episode on the Blues' bench during a Feb. 11 game. Since he had an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) placed in his chest _ in efforts to monitor and control his heartbeat.
The defenseman didn't definitively announce his future plans _ "There are some things I'm definitely going to have to evaluate," he said of summertime _ but he definitely won't play the rest of this season or postseason.
And that news is heart-wrenching. But it's not heartbreaking. In perspective, at least he's alive. At least he survived. At least he's about as back to normal as he can be right now. At least he's already experienced a lifetime worth of hockey accomplishments, from 1,240 games to an Olympic gold medal to his long last name forever etched into history upon the Stanley Cup.
At least he doesn't need one more shift to prove anything (or here's hoping he doesn't think that).
At least he should be able to give up hockey without any regrets.
"It's tough (not playing), but quite honestly, hockey hasn't really been at the front of my mind the past couple of weeks ..." the 36-year-old Bouwmeester said. "So as much as I'd like to play hockey _ yeah, sure, you'd like to be out there _ but when you put everything in perspective, it's OK to just take a step back right now. ... Just being around my family. That's the most important thing _ any time you go through something like this or your family goes through things with different people, it's always what you realize. Family and the things that are close to you. Sometimes you just lose sight of things like that, when life gets busy, but it puts things in perspective."
Now, it's all about the heart that gives love. Feels love. Love for his wife. Love for his daughters. We've learned a lot about heart this month, the month of Valentine's Day, the month of unexpected perspective and introspection. We experienced it that night of Feb. 11, as we thought of his family, his loved ones. If we were scared, imagine how they felt? We thought about how "Jay Bouwmeester, defenseman" meant nothing to his little girls, and that "Jay Bouwmeester, daddy" meant everything.
And this month, as the sports world continues to mourn the death of a basketball superstar we knew so well, we only now, poignantly, learn of a different side of him _ the father. The unshared stories of Kobe Bryant are so beautiful, this man who poured his heart into parenting, who wanted to be the "Kobe Bryant" of dads. In death, he is a role model for how to live life as a parent.
As "Hair Love" director Matthew Cherry said of Bryant in his Oscars acceptance speech: "May we all have a second act as great as his was."
For Bouwmeester, he's felt reciprocal love from loved ones and those who love the Blues.
"The outreach, the support of the people shown," he said, "has been pretty overwhelming. ... It's been pretty humbling and it goes to show you the hockey community and how people really do care about each other, and it's a small world. I'm very appreciative."
He's been hanging around the rink. Watched a couple games. Armstrong anticipates the veteran defenseman to be around even more in the coming weeks, while the Blues, best in the West, continue their surge.
"You get back involved with the team here and, you know, you might not be able to play but you can still try to help them," said Bouwmeester, a two-time All-Star. "I have some good relationships with guys on the team."
We think about what Bouwmeester meant to St. Louis last season. How he had a career resurgence and how valuable he was at dissecting offenses and playing with poise in the playoffs. His heart pumped blue. As Carl Gunnarsson described the defensive pairing of Bouwmeester and Colton Parayko: "They're animals."
Undeniable heart.
When the Blues won the Stanley Cup in 2019, the first player captain Alex Pietrangelo handed the Cup to was Bouwmeester, the teammate who had played the most games without ever winning the chalice.
Here's thinking, if they win the Cup in 2020, Bouwmeester again will be the first player handed the Cup.
