He is a captain without a team.
He is a leader who, through no fault of his own, is not allowed to lead.
He is recovering from a medical condition whose treatment leaves him feeling no different than when he was playing at the peak of his powers.
He is a man in limbo. Here, but not here. Ready, but not ready.
For an athlete such as Tampa Bay Lightning captain Steven Stamkos, it is perhaps the worst possible place to be as his team plays in its second straight Eastern Conference finals. Game 3 is in Tampa, Wednesday night, 8 p.m. ET.
"There's a line," Stamkos said during a recent conversation at his dressing-room stall in the visitors locker room at Consol Energy Center in Pittsburgh. "Especially on game days, you don't want to cross that line and become a distraction. People say, 'Well, Stammer you're the captain, it's OK.' But guys have to focus and do their thing. I'm obviously watching the games very closely, so if there's anything that I see or can help out with after the game, I talk to the guys about it, for sure. I've done that and will continue to do that."
The "but" hangs unspoken. But until doctors clear Stamkos to play, he's still in that netherworld between being a player and ... something, if not less, then certainly different.
In his battle to return from April 4 surgery to remove a blood clot discovered in his right collarbone area, Stamkos has gone from not traveling with the team to being on the road and now to skating with the Lightning while wearing a regular jersey.
He is getting closer to returning. And he talks optimistically about playing in this conference final series. But he also knows the steps forward are not to be taken for granted and do not follow an obvious schedule, so he accepts what he cannot control and enjoys what he can enjoy.
"It's just great to be around the guys," he said. "Ask any injured player. As soon as you can start skating with the guys again or be on the road with them, in the hotel, having team dinners ... it's just a great feeling. But it is a fine line between being a distraction and a help. I've just tried to find that line and stay within it."
It is reflective of Stamkos' inquisitive nature that he actually helped diagnose the blood-clot issue.
He was working out after a game in Montreal late in the regular season when he noticed some pain in his right arm -- as though he'd overdone an exercise.
"It was getting tight and swelling a little bit," Stamkos recalled. "There was a little bit of tingling in my fingers, and I said, 'Wow, that's kind of weird.'"
Maybe it's because he's the captain -- or perhaps it's just in his nature -- but Stamkos always follows what other players are doing when they're recovering from injury. Treatment, routines, symptoms, all of that goes into his memory bank. And so when his arm did not get better immediately, he realized that he was experiencing something very similar to what backup goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy went through earlier in the season when he was discovered to have a blood clot.
"That's when it clicked in," Stamkos said. "I went straight to our doctors. We kind of knew right away that might be the case, and I went in to see the vascular surgeon the next morning."
Stamkos is just 26, but he has been playing NHL hockey since Tampa Bay made him the first-overall pick in 2008. And he has known more than his fair share of heartbreak and disappointment.
In November 2013, he broke his right tibia in a grisly collision with the goalpost that cost him a berth on Canada's Olympic team at the Sochi Games.
Now he has been confronted by another separate challenge that is no less daunting: watching his team try to advance to a second consecutive Stanley Cup finals -- and perhaps the team's first championship since 2004 -- from the sidelines.
You might imagine a person feeling somewhat frustrated, bitter even, at such misfortune.
Why me? Why indeed.
You will find none of that with Stamkos.
"You know what? For whatever reason, I don't know why, when I've been in those situations I'm pretty calm," Stamkos said. "I try to stay as even-keeled as possible. I'm always asking questions with regard to the process. 'What do we have to do?' I think I've come to terms with the fact that there's nothing we can do about it now. I was kind of glad we caught it at that time. Things always happen for a reason."
Lightning coach Jon Cooper believes that, as difficult as the leg injury was to deal with, it has helped prepare Stamkos for this setback.
"I think the one big difference is that [the leg] was early in the year," Cooper said. "This is during the playoffs. You play for this, to be playing this time [of year]."
The Lightning wouldn't have made the playoffs without Stamkos' contributions, Cooper said, and now their captain is doing his best to put himself in a position to help his team at the most critical juncture of the season.
"He's a pro," Cooper said. "He's a great kid. You just feel bad for him that he has to go through this."
Stamkos looks for positives in the situation. Maybe he'll be fresher when he returns.
"When I broke my leg, things were going so well that year. Having to miss the Olympics and stuff, that was tough," Stamkos said. "But I learned a lot about myself mentally and how to go on from that. I think it was the same in this situation. I felt like I was playing my best hockey of the year coming down the stretch and getting ready for another run with a team that I knew could be here. And then that happens."
There is something somehow reaffirming about all of this, that this setback seems not to have diminished one of the game's brightest stars.
And it's possible that Stamkos will be even better when he returns -- and not just because, as he likes to joke, he's stopped drinking beer because of the blood thinners that are part of his rehabilitation.
One thing he knows for sure -- playing will always be easier than watching.
"Honestly, watching it is way worse," Stamkos said. "I'm jumping up and down and screaming and yelling. If you had a camera in the room and watched us guys watch a game, it's hilarious. Now I understand what parents going through when they're watching their kids. It is tough."