Transcript, Tuesday afternoon session

Therapist: So. How are you feeling about tonight?

Player: I mean, "healthy" scratch. That's the term, right? Healthy. I've never felt less healthy in my life.

Therapist: Tell me more about that.

Player: I've played every single game since I was eight years old. Recitals, funerals, one time a kidney stone. I played through a kidney stone. And now I'm sitting up top in a suit because the coach wants to "see some different looks."

Therapist: How does that sit with you?

Player: It sits fine. I'm fine. I'm just going to go home tonight and watch the tape of every shift I've had in the last two weeks and find the exact moment this all went wrong.

Therapist: That sounds like the opposite of fine.

Player: Okay, it's not fine. But it's not not fine either. It's a gray area. Like a neutral zone turnover, but for my whole identity.

Therapist: Let's sit with that image for a second. A neutral zone turnover.

Player: It's when you think you have possession and then you very suddenly do not.

Therapist: And is that how this feels?

Player: That's exactly how this feels. Nobody warns you. One day you're a full time NHL player and the next you're a guy in a suit trying to look supportive on the bench while internally recalculating your entire sense of self-worth.

Therapist: Have you talked to the coach about the decision?

Player: He said it's "not a demotion, it's a chance to reset." Which is a thing you say to someone right before you demote them.

Therapist: How did that conversation make you feel?

Player: Motivated. Furious. Both, somehow. I want to be so good in practice tomorrow that he has no choice but to put me back in. But also I want to just sit in this exact chair for the rest of the week and not talk to anyone.

Therapist: Those can both be true.

Player: Can they though? Because my agent already texted me "stay ready," which is the least comforting phrase in the English language. Stay ready for what. Ready implies I have some control here, and I do not have any control here.

Therapist: What would it look like to sit with that lack of control, instead of fighting it?

Player: Honestly? Terrible. It would look terrible. I don't do well with sitting. I have never once in my career "sat with" a feeling. I usually just hit someone until the feeling goes away.

Therapist: That's not an option tonight.

Player: No. Tonight the feeling just has to live in me. Fully formed. No outlet. Just me, a suit, and nineteen guys who get to actually do the thing I've done my entire life.

Therapist: We're almost out of time, but I want to leave you with one question. What would you tell a teammate going through exactly this?

Player: I'd tell him it's one game. It doesn't define him. It's the coach sending a message, not a referendum on his entire career.

Therapist: Do you believe that when you say it to him?

Player: Completely.

Therapist: And when you say it to yourself?

Player: ...We should probably book a follow-up.

Bookmark The Hockey News Edmonton Oilers team site to never miss the latest news, game-day coverage, and more. Add us to your Google News favourites, and never miss a story.