You might remember the following excerpt from a blog about a month ago - "[Vladimir] Tarasenko made 16 year-year old Blues fan Brendan Buehler's year earlier today. Before practice, Tarasenko met him face to face and gave him one of his sticks. Tarasenko's recollection of the meeting shows how much he cares: "It's a really different feeling when you can see that he's crying when he shakes your hand. When I saw he was crying, and he was like, dream come true, it makes me feel more responsible for my job and more responsible for what I'm doing on the ice because there is maybe more kids like this who are just looking forward to meet me, and it makes me work even harder to stay their hero." What a great quote, especially from a guy who didn't speak much English not that long ago. Tarasenko sure appears to be an athlete who gets it and is likely a PR department's model athlete."
Hopefully many of you saw the twitter post I made or from the Blues regarding young fan Noah Kleinlehrer's generous act. You had to be at the arena or carefully watching the broadcast to see what unfolded as the Blues three stars left the ice. Luckily the gesture was caught on video as can be seen here.
From that act of kindness, it was clear that at least one of Tarasenko's young fans get it as well. Noah's own recounting of it is priceless. "I thought 'Wow! He actually did that" but then I went down and saw a little boy who I saw earlier in the game. I overheard his father say it was his first game, so I wwent down to give him a good memory." What a great statement and sentiment from an 11 year old boy. Thank you Noah for giving us all a good memory and thank you to Noah's parents for helping raise such a thoughtful young man.
The Blues were able to pay it forward and thank Noah for showing the generosity of Blues nation by inviting him and his parents to see Tuesday's game against the Avalanche up close and personal in glass seats. After the game, the family was able to meet with Vladimir, captain David Backes and owner Tom Stillman. This time Tarasenko presented Noah with a signed, game-used stick.
Maybe the Blues generosity will bring some positive karma to the injury front. From various reports, it looks like Steve Ott is close to returning and will likely take Ryan Reaves spot on the 4th line. He will not be in the lineup on Friday. Robby Fabbri is out and is day to day. It looks like Magnus Paajarvi of Dimitri Jaskin will take his spot over the next few games. The team is hopeful that Fabbri, Carl Gunnarsson and Jay Bouwmeester will be skating "in a day or so".