Welcome home, johnny!
The first words out of Jonathan Toews’ mouth when he was introduced to the media in Winnipeg was “Hi mom.”
His mom, Andrée was sitting in the front row of this week’s news conference, and it wasn’t a surprise to anyone that she would be the first person to lock eyes with the best hockey player produced in Manitoba in a generation.
“Today, all the memories flooded back from my childhood,” Toews said, as he looked at his mother. “All the reasons why and when I first fell in love with the game of hockey.
“I always wanted to make my family and friends and the people I’ve grown up with proud and try and put on a show when I come back here, and I think it will be even more that way now.”
A few weeks ago, Toews signed a one-year, incentive-laden contract and officially became a member of the Winnipeg Jets. On Friday, Toews was re-introduced to the city of his birth, and the 37-year-old former Stanley Cup champion and Olympic gold medallist, could not have been happier.
“It really got to a point where I couldn't see myself wearing any other jersey,” Toews said. “To me it wasn't rational at all. It was more of an intuitive thing where it just felt right. You can go over the millions of reasons why, but I just knew in my heart that this is what I wanted to do. It felt good every step of the way. I'm really excited to be a part of it.”
Toews is excited and the city of Winnipeg is excited, but there was also a large dose of reality that had to be injected into Friday’s party at the Canada Life Centre.
On the one hand, Toews is one of the greatest players of the last two decades. He won three Stanley Cups with Chicago (2010, 2013, 2015), two Olympic gold medals (2010, 2014), a World Cup of Hockey gold medal (2016), two World Junior titles (2006, 2007) and a gold medal at the 2007 IIHF men’s World Championship. He won the 2010 Conn Smythe Trophy, he won the Best Forward Award at the 2010 Olympics, and the 2013 Selke Trophy as the NHL’s top defensive forward.
On the other hand, he has not played hockey for two full years. Chronic Immune Response Syndrome kept Toews on the sidelines for the entire 2020-21 season. After playing 71 games in 2021-22, he played just 53 games in 2022-23 -- out of the lineup from Feb. 21 through the end of March while dealing with the effects of long COVID-19. He returned on April 1, 2023 and played Chicago's final seven games, but his last game of professional hockey came on April 13, 2023. Right after that Blackhawks general manager Kyle Davidson said the team would not re-sign Toews for the 2023-24 campaign.
When he asked if he was concerned that Toews might not have what it takes to play at a high level in the best hockey league in the world, Jets head coach Scott Arniel was diplomatic, but said that of course he had concerns.
“Yeah, I’m a little concerned,” Arniel said. “But it’s all about him. He’s the one he has done the work and is excited to come back and come here to Winnipeg. He doesn’t know how it’s going to go and we don’t know how it’s going to go, but at the end of the day, he is one of the smartest guys in the game. In that room, we have about 10 guys who consider Jonathan their idol. We’re still growing as a team in the playoffs and he’s excelled in that area and anything we can learn, anything the leadership group can learn, anything I can learn, about how he handles himself and prepares for games, that’s the stuff we’re all going to watch and listen to and that’s the stuff we’re excited about.”
What Toews has done to get his body ready to return is commendable. This is not a lark or shot in the dark. He truly believes that he’s ready to have a solid season despite everything that’s happened.
“I’d gotten to a point where I pretty much needed to let myself get off a timeline to return,” he admitted. “So, in my mind, I’d kind of accepted in a way that I might not play again. I think that was a challenging thing to do, but also a healthy thing to do. I’d wake up every day and not think about where all this could be going.”
“But then, just through the course of working out, I decided that I wanted to keep myself in shape and with or without hockey I had this desire to take care of my body. That’s when I seemed to start getting stronger and stronger with each passing month and toward the end of 2024 and the start of 2025, things had improved to the point where I began to form ideas about what might lay ahead for hockey.”
Toews talked openly about the fact that he had travelled to India and underwent an Ayurvedic detox Panchakarma, a traditional Indian therapy that uses massage, herbs and diet to cleanse the body.
“That’s not something I would normally consider,” he said. “A guy I was working with had suggested it and for the longest time I wouldn’t even consider doing it. But I was in Europe to handle some commitments, and I had a free month and decided that after almost five years of searching for a way to heal the inflammatory and immune system issues that took me out of hockey, I would give it a try. At this point, I thought why not?”
"I ended up going out there, and I was really happy that I did. As soon as I started following that diet and some of the different herbs and tinctures and just supplements that complement the diet, things started changing really fast. I knew right away that there was something to it. I’d say these past five or six months, things have really trended in the right direction, since I started skating in February and March.
“There were moments when I thought OK, I still have the hands; the hands are there, the feet will catch up and things have slowly gotten better since then.”
The real test of course will occur when training camp begins in September. Until that time, one of the greatest players in the game’s history, a future Hall of Famer, will wear No 19 for the Winnipeg Jets.
“I watched a lot of hockey in the playoffs this year and there’s a lot of guys at my age that are still contributing in any way that they can, so that’s the outlook I’m coming into this with, too. I’ll do my best to bring that forward and help the team any way that I can.”
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