The story behind this Senators fan's massive Josh Norris tattoo

I have a tattoo related to hockey. So do a lot of other fans of the sport. But, as one typically does when considering what to permanently put on your body, I tried to think of it blending in and not being so obviously linked to a particular fandom.

Mason Kohne does not care about that. But he also wanted something in return for his hockey ink.

The 20-year-old from West Linn, Oregon is a massive fan of the Ottawa Senators, and after watching his favourite team suffer a 5-3 loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning this season in November, he decided to act on an impulse.

“I reached out to Josh Norris and I direct messaged him one night after a Sens game, and I said ‘If I get a life-sized tattoo of your face on my stomach, can I get an autographed jersey?’ He replied and said ‘Absolutely, it has to be a real tattoo though,’” Kohne told Yahoo Sports.

After receiving the message back from Norris six hours after the initial inquiry, Kohne booked an appointment to get the tattoo just two days later at a tattoo shop in Poland, where he is currently visiting. The 20-year-old even double-checked with the Senators forward to make sure that the deal was agreed to — mentioning the appointment — and says he received a message back saying that he was good to go through with the tattoo.

It all happened so fast, but it was an opportunity the fan couldn’t pass up.

“I honestly don’t know why I decided to get that tattoo, it was a very spur-of-the-moment thing,” Kohne said.

The whole process took just a few hours, with multiple artists working on the piece.

“I had to catch a train the same day, so they had two artists working on me at the same time, and they got it done in three hours,” Kohne said. “I couldn’t tell what the tattoo artists were saying, because there was a huge language barrier, where I couldn’t understand them, but they definitely loved it.”

After the tattoo was complete, and the hockey player’s headshot was permanently etched on Kohne’s stomach, he sent Norris photos and videos of the tattooing process at the shop, and apparently even got back to the newly inked fan, saying that he loved it. But that’s where the interaction stopped.

“He said he would send me the jersey and asked for my address, so I gave it to him,” he said. “I haven’t heard back from him since and I never got the jersey.”

Kohne says the last interaction he had with Norris was on Nov. 11.

“I was trying not to post it on the subreddit for a while,” he said, “because I had hoped I was going to get the jersey, or for him to respond. I didn’t want to look crazy, but it has been over two months and I have a giant tattoo of Josh Norris’s face on my stomach, so there’s not much more I can do to look more insane. So I posted it hoping someone could help me.”

So far, the post from Thursday has nothing but commenters questioning his decision to go through with the tattoo and wondering why he spent about $1,000 USD to get the face of Norris on his stomach.

For Kohne, he can still look on the bright side, even if he only receives backlash for his decision and doesn’t get the jersey.

“I’m a huge Sens fan, so I thought the worst case scenario from all of this would be that I have a tattoo of my favourite player on the team, on my stomach.”

Even if the fan is trying to stay optimistic, the least the Senators or Norris himself could do is throw a jersey – or even more – Kohne’s way. Especially since the club appears to be quite lucky to have such a dedicated fan after finishing near the bottom of the league for the last few seasons.

So are there any other hockey tattoos coming for Kohne, to maybe further show his dedication to the Senators? Well, they might have to do something on the ice first.

“When the Sens win the Cup, I’m going to get a tattoo of that. I’m going to get a sleeve and turn my left arm into a chicken wing in honour of my chicken Willy that died,” he said. “The only other hockey one I’ll get will be when the Sens win. I’ll get something insane unless I’m inspired to get another hockey tattoo.”

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