32 Thoughts: The Podcast - Tage Five

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

Let the debate begin! The guys discuss the 5-goal game from Tage Thompson and Jeff wonders if he should have played more in the 3rd period to have a chance to break Joe Malone’s 102-year-old record (6:00). But before they get into that, they chat about the comments made by Zdeno Chara on the Games with Names podcast regarding the 2011 Vancouver Canucks (0:10).They also get to the Columbus Blue Jackets (19:00), Calgary calling up Matthew Phillips (23:40), the latest on Brock Boeser (26:40) and Luke Schenn (28:10), the Kings and Trevor Moore (30:50), Cam York gets the call to Philadelphia (31:25), the comments made by Jesse Puljujärvi (32:40), Mitch Marner extends the point streak to 21 games (36:00), Elliotte also addresses the latest on Adam Pelech (39:00) and Patrick Kane (no) trade talk (40:00), and Kelly Hrudey drops by to share his perspective of Wayne Gretzky’s underappreciated slap shot (43:00).This podcast was produced and mixed by Amil Delic, and hosted by Jeff Marek and Elliotte Friedman.GET YOUR 32 THOUGHTS MERCH HEREMusic Outro: AUGUSTA - Little BirdsFind the full track HEREFollow the band HEREEmail the podcast at [e-mail] or call The Thought Line at 1-833-311-3232 and leave us a voicemailAudio Credits: CBC, Columbus Blue Jackets Radio Network, Games with Names podcast, TNT and Sportsnet.The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Sports & Media or any affiliates.

Stuff like after losing two games in Vancouver, we saw players from Vancouver coming on the ice in the garden. And they were actually practicing how they would be lifting the cup and handing off the cup to each other. And we found out about these things, and we were like, fuck this. We are not going to allow this to happen. Oh boy, so there's a lot right there. Welcome to 32 Thoughts, the podcast,

presented by GMC and the new Sierra AT4X. Merrick, Friedman, Delich, and Elliot, who I suspect is on a fainting couch right now because that was his hero Zdeno Chara talking to another podcast appearing on games with names,

Elliot Friedman. First of all, congratulations to games with names for getting him. Zdeno, I'm heartbroken. How could you cheat on me like this with

another podcast? You've just been giving this guy foot rubs for a couple of decades. My heart aches right now, Jeff. I am barely capable of doing this show. Barely capable. We all play hurt, Elliot. We all play hurt.

You can soldier through. Okay, I'm going to make it. Now, Kevin Bieksa has indicated to you that he will address this on Saturday night. As a matter of fact, I think he is being ordered into full media blackout until Saturday night. And what I'm going to do when I get there on Saturday night is I'm going to go up to kelly or ron or jennifer or producer brian spear or associate producer kathy broderick and while kevin's there i'm gonna pretend that i'm handing off the stanley cup to each and every one of them so i can rile him up even more for the show that night should do that on the panel like the opening the show, just handing the cup off to one another.

You know what? I think Kevin's so hot. He may take all the intermissions. Like, I don't think 32 is going to go on Saturday. I think we can just put our feet up in the second intermission for each. I think he's, he's going to be so hot.

He'll want every single moment of air. There'll be, there'll be no oxygen left in the studio. Once Kevin BX is, is done addressing this on Saturday. It could be epic. There's no question about it. And the one thing I would like to say is I never make fun of a player

for not winning the Stanley Cup because it's a hard thing to do. It's a hard thing to do. And I know how hard everybody competes for it, including Kevin. I know how hard he competed for that. But when somebody accuses you of this i think it's perfectly acceptable people can tweet in if they disagree but i think it's perfectly acceptable to mimic practicing handing off the stanley cup listen saturday is going to be really cool saturday is calgary toronto yeah like this is marquee matchup i'm going to talk

about the flames here in a couple of moments, but this is a huge Saturday for Hockey Night in Canada. And Elliot, it just got spicier. It just got spicier with all of this. So man, Hockey Night Saturday is going to be fun. I'm looking forward to this one as always am, but this one looks like it's going to be, well, bring your boxing gloves, folks.

Bring your boxing gloves. A spicy dish. Now, I want to tell you a story from 2007. Okay. In 2007, Stanley Cup final was Ottawa-Anaheim. Yeah. We go back to Anaheim, and Ottawa's down 3-1, and the Ducks have a chance to win the Stanley Cup that night.

And there was a sheet on the table outside the Ducks dressing room, and players were walking down and writing their names on it and putting a number. And I couldn't see what the sheet was. I assumed it was the ticket allocation, like people writing their names and how many tickets they needed.

But someone, and I won't say who it was but they were around the senators at the time they said they looked at the piece of paper and it was the players writing down their ring sizes the ducks players and of course you think oh that's juicy if that's yeah really happening so i went over and i looked at it and who was the gm of the ducks at the time uh brian burke sir brian burke and he sees me and he goes what are you doing with that like that's none of your business why do you have that and i said this is what i heard and i was just checking and he lost it i've totally forgot about this story i didn't even remember until i just heard this tonight he lost it he was like do you think i would let that happen like not on my watch and he started waving the sheet at me it's the ticket

allocation it's the ticket allocation maybe this is a similar miscommunication i have no idea well we'll find out come saturday we're uh we're hyping this one big for each tune in to saturday for the you better be good kevin bx of retort we Rhetoric. You better be good, Kevin. We're building this up. You better be good. Bring your A game for a change. Because the hockey game will be great, Calgary and Toronto. So bring your A game to Kevin BXA. By the way, I hope listening to this,

I want to shout out Cole, Kevin's son, a frequent listener of the podcast. I always mean to do it, but I always forget. And now I want to do it because i hope his dad is so riled up for the show on saturday night okay kevin says the coal makes me better by the way well then i take it back well uh listen talking about a games how about tage thompson and the only two shots during the sabers power play have been shorthanded by Columbus. Thompson scores, and it's a hat trick. And that is 100-mile-an-hour one-timer.

It only takes him 12 minutes and 22 seconds of game time for Tage Thompson to score three. Wow. I mean, when you see this play off the board, Dylan... Tage Thompson on Wednesday night, the Buffalo Sabres and the Columbus Blue Jackets, like, look, Columbus is...

And we're going to get to them in a second here. Columbus is having a real tough season. Last in the East, decimated with injuries. The goaltending's nowhere close to where they want it to be, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. So Tage Thompson ends the night with five goals and one assist on the left side here's tage thompson and he buries it oh my goodness just when you're talking about getting back into the

game tage thompson fires one into the upper right hand corner from the left wing circle and he has are you ready his fifth goal of the game now he's got the five goals going into the third period and i was pretty animated about this the more that i think about it the more i'm still hot about it i'm still pissed you are reanimated i am reanimated once again i am like that aha video all of a sudden i've i've come to animation that he only gets five shifts in the third period three minutes and 55 seconds normally he plays around 18 come to animation that he only gets five shifts in the third period, three minutes and 55 seconds. Normally he plays around 18 and a half minutes. He only played 13 and change on the Wednesday night. He's two goals away from Joe Malone. So Joe Malone holds the

record in the NHL for most goals in a game with seven. Happened in 1920. Now, Joe Malone, for those that don't know, I'm going to bore people with some history here, Elliot, is one of the most important people in the history of hockey. Joe Malone was involved in hockey games on the very first day of the NHL. December 19, 1917, there were two games. There was Montreal and Ottawa, and there was Montreal and Toronto. So one of them was the Wanderers, and one of them was the Canadians. And Joe Malone, it was believed for a while, scored the first goal ever in NHL history.

Turns out the other game started earlier, the Wanderers game. Dave Ritchie, who was a defenseman for the Wanderers, scored technically before Joe Malone. So he holds the record for the first goal ever scored. But Joe Malone holds a record for most goals. And this has stood since 1920. This is a significant record. And you're Donnie Granato. You have a player who could come closer to maybe equal and maybe if everything goes right,

two, maybe equal, and maybe if everything goes right, beat Joel Malone's record, and he only gets three minutes and 55 seconds in the third period. I understand about not wanting to embarrass a team, but this isn't like you're beating a team eight to one, and you're throwing out your first unit power play. This is a player who's chasing a huge piece of history, and you say, nah, we're just going to give you around four minutes of ice time. We don't want to embarrass Columbus. This really doesn't sit well with me. Like, I think you owe it to hockey, capital H hockey, that if you're close, you chase

that record. You got to give it a shot when you're that close. Five goals after 40 minutes. If it's Miefrid, you got to do it. goals after 40 minutes if it's me fridge you gotta do it i have to tell you as i'm listening to this i am hoping that this becomes a thing at the sabers on friday and people just trash you i i really hope it happens on some level i understand where you're coming from here's the problem and as one of those elliott friedman bingo squares. I can only judge others as I judge myself,

and I wouldn't want to do it. If you were Don Granato or Tage Thompson? If I was Tage Thompson, I wouldn't want to do it. Why? Like, if it was a 9-7 game, that's something else entirely,

but it wouldn't be that important to me. It just wouldn't. So, Alex Ovechkin should pull up one goal short of beating Wayne Gretzky? No. Oh no oh 893 out of respect to gretzky i'm pulling up here no no first of all first of all i need that twitter meme of i like waffles and where the guy says it's got nothing to do with i hate pancakes what are you talking about

that's a completely different sentence i don't like those false equivalencies i don't think one of them has anything to do with the other first of all alex ovachkin he's going for that he's made a point he's going for that and i'm totally fine with that if i would lasted long enough that i could score 894 goals yeah yeah to me that's something different i don't even think that's in the same realm of significance i'm just saying if it's a nine to one game or whatever it was nine to two at the time and i've got five goals i'm not interested i personally am not interested in making it 11 to one with two more goals that's not me and i'll give you one that's not a false equivalency then okay if you're daryl sitler 1976 against the

boston bruins and dave reese are you just dumping the puck in the corner are you shooting on net but this is different like it's not the same it's still a false equivalency because they weren't putting them on the ice this isn't about tage thompson this is about don granato did you see his comments post game he was happy but he's like on the next thing of course but he's that close to smashing an nhl record that stood for over 100 years if tage thompson went to don granato and said i want to do this he would have put him out there i will need some clarification from both people on this thing this is so unbelievable to me what's? That they win this game nine to four. The guy's got five goals

and you want the storyline to be, wait a second, how come you didn't put him back up there and score six more? Hang on, hang on a second here. Let me call you out on something. He scores five goals. What's the tweet you put out?

The record is seven. Well, I think you have to. You have to give people context. Right. So hang on, hang on, hang on. So everyone's thinking is, hang on, this guy's got a shot at the record. Yes, I thought that too. And that's what everybody is thinking.

That's what they're thinking on TNT. Can this guy actually do this? This record has stood for 100 years and this guy's got a shot at it. Instead, he barely gets four minutes of ice. I cannot believe we're having this serious an argument about this. Yes, we are. Connor McDavid had a game against Colorado a couple years ago where it was six two after two and he had six points and he took four shifts in the third period now Connor McDavid you know what I think he is

I think he's a killer and I say that in a good way to me Connor McDavid is a killer in the sense that he wants to win every game that's why i think he's going to win a stanley cup someday because that's all he cares about do you think any less of mcdavid or the oilers that he only took four shifts in the third period of that game here's what i think I think that the mentality of hockey is such that we're actually having conversations like this. In any other sport, it's all about smash the records of those that came before.

You have a chance. You want to be a killer. You don't care about what happened previous. You want to smash all those records and i hope that it changes because the game will grow with it the more records in history that you smash we have this sort of polite mentality about history as if we don't want to offend anybody oh heaven forbid run up the score on columbus the door of the columbus dressing room is going to be closed for half an hour whether it's's 9 to 4 or 12 to 4.

It doesn't matter. Honestly, I think you owe it to hockey. I think you owe it to TNT. I think you owe it to Tate Thompson. I think you owe it to Buffalo Sabres fans. I think you owe it to everybody. Give that guy a shot. It's an excitement moment.

It's an exciting moment. Smash a record that stood for 100 years? Am I crazy? You're not crazy, but the point I'm trying to make is that I only judge others, I judge myself. I don't think in that moment I'd want to do that. Okay. I don't think you're wrong to say what you're saying,

and I bet you there are people in the NHL thinking, go for it. I think everyone in the NHL would. His choice. Maybe just because I'm so hung up on hockey history. And part of my hang up on hockey history is I want all these records smashed. I want them all broken. That's growth of the game to me. That's part of it. I remember growing up thinking, oh yeah, no one's going to touch

Sawchuck's record for shutouts. Boom. Okay, that gets blown up. Gretzky goals. No one's touching that boom 99 away for alex ovechkin the other thing someone said to me today is that they listened to the segment and they said the other reason that you don't care about this and they said to me why i don't care about this is that you don't care about legacy or you don't care about yesterday a lot which is true in my case like i've had people say to me before like i've had journalism students say to me before you know like what do you think your legacy will be and

i i've said i don't care like i'm when i gone, the next person will replace me and that'll be it. I genuinely do think that way. So maybe I'm in the minority. To me, I put myself in that situation. I don't know if I would think that would be a big deal. The thing that I just can't wrap my head around is somehow on a night where a team won nine to four and a guy scored five goals and there has to be a controversy like that's the question we should be asking okay get coach granato ready for his interrogation maybe i should have prefaced this by five goals is awesome that's

a lot of goals like there's the denny brothers that scored more sid how red baronson daryl sittler and the aforementioned joe malone and a bunch of other people have scored five as well but that's a list that is a major accomplishment congratulations tage thompson but that's how i should have started this but he had a chance to smash the record you know what you know what part of it is too for me elliot what's that I'm forever fascinated by the first day of the NHL for a few reasons. One, there's the Joe Malone factor and how the Ottawa game,

the Montreal-Ottawa game, was actually delayed by 15 minutes that allowed Dave Ritchie to become the first goal scorer in the NHL. You know why? Because of a contract dispute with a couple of Ottawa players. Like right away, there were contract disputes the NHL. You know why? Because of a contract dispute with a couple of Ottawa players. Like right away, there were contract disputes with NHL owners. And the first winning goaltender

for the Wanderers was Burt Lindsey, who yes, was the father of terrible Ted Lindsey. And Art Ross scored on that day. Art Ross, a venerable, like one of the most creative people. We look at the puck, we look at the net, we think of ross well maybe you think of art ross well that's how you think about art ross when you see it you think about the bruins you think about the puck and you think about the net when he scored his wait for it only goal and only point ever in the nhl yet the trophy that's awarded for most points in the nhl is in the name of someone who only had one point in his entire career. And was a defenseman, by the way. I'm so fascinated with the first day of the NHL.

It's not even funny. That's why, you know, when you sent that tweet out, I'm like, all right, I got Elliot on side. We're going to talk about Joe Malone finally. We're going to talk about Tate Thompson neither tying or beating his record. Anyway, welcome to my goofy life and welcome to the podcast once again. You know what I would say about Tate Thompson that I'm happiest for him? What's that? Is that people are starting to say, well, maybe that trade wasn't so lopsided.

100% true. And I'm happy for him as a person. You know how I think about it too, Elliot? I just don't think about it in terms of the Ryan O'Reilly deal. I also think about it in terms of the Jack Eichel deal. It is so hard to give away your franchise player, to trade away your franchise player. You know, what's

the old Sam Pollock line? Whoever gets the best player in the deal wins the trade. When you let go of Jack Eichel, it's really tough to win a trade. Now, I know Tate Thompson wasn't involved in that deal, but how many times do you get back-to-back franchise players? And maybe we're getting ahead of, I know Tate Thompson wasn't involved in that deal, but how many times do you get back-to-back

franchise players? And maybe we're getting ahead of ourselves talking about Tate Thompson like that, but man, he looks like a franchise player

right now for the Sabres team. All right, so there you go. There's the snappy intro. Snappy, friendly intro. We're going to come back and talk about

the Blue Jackets in a moment. Listen to 32 Thoughts, the podcast, ad-free on Amazon Music, included with Prime. Okay, so we've parked the Buffalo part of the conversation, Elliot. What about the Blue Jackets?

You know, last in the Eastern Conference, the goaltending hasn't been what they wanted or what they needed. Now, injuries are a big factor, and I know every team is rolling their eyes when they hear that. It's like, well, go tell Colorado that. But they've really been devastated themselves as well. As I mentioned, last place in the East, they've got a couple of expiring contracts,

Vladislav Gavrikov and Gustav Nyquist, and you've talked about them before. After that game, the doors were closed to the Blue Jackets dressing room for a long, long time. What happens here, Frej? The first thing I have to say, Jeff, is when I was watching that game and i

i saw what was happening i said to myself this is the kind of game where you wake up the next morning and say what's going to happen here what's going to be the consequence and i was actually kind of happy to see the answer was nothing at least Thursday. You cannot overreact to things like that. Now, if you're already going down a certain road where you're thinking of making some decisions, and that just is your final validation, that's one thing, but you should not be making emotional decisions after that.

I also thought of the Gord Stelic old line, if you're going to stink, stink on the road. And unfortunately, that one was at home. So the thing about the Blue Jackets is, what did they expect? Not this. And I know they signed Johnny Goudreau, and I know they hope this year would be better than it is

but if you really look at it honestly and you really think about where you are they weren't ready yet now that doesn't excuse this and it doesn't excuse too many performances like that but I think if the Blue Jackets are going to be honest about how they feel about this year, they should be honest about where they really were. And to me, the answer is they weren't yet ready and they still need pieces. Like, first of all, I can't imagine they're crazy enough to trade their first round pick. No way. I think what they should do is they should just collect the best pick. They can move the players that they have to move out. Gavrikov,

et cetera. I doubt they're going to be able to keep them. I don't think you can overreact to one game like that. Although I will say this, I think you get a certain amount of stinkers a year, Jeff. Yep. Maybe you get five,

especially now. Yeah. They have Maybe you get five. Especially now. Yeah. They have guys like Johnson and Sillinger. Like they're supposed to be the core of this team when they become good again. You cannot allow them or anybody around them to think like too many of these performances are acceptable. If you're going to lose, make it hard on people. And that to me is the number one thing

you can fix right now. If we're going to lose, people are going to leave here with welts. So Cam Robinson is with Elite Prospects. Yeah, he's a good writer. He's excellent. He's a great dude too. So he brought up an interesting point on Twitter.

He said, look, why not just throw in the towel and send Cole Sillinger to the World Juniors? He hasn't had that experience. He's still eligible. He's like Mason McTavish, although Mason McTavish has obviously had the World Junior experience. I know he's already played a full season, Elliot. He feels like an NHL-er because of it.

But would you look at sending Cole Sillinger to the World Juniors? It's miserable here. Go have a good experience. What does the kid want to do? I don't know. I would imagine the kid would say, look, I'm an NHL-er. I like NHL paychecks, and I want to stay here in the battle. My default on this one would be, no, he's an NHL-er.

He missed the World Juniors, got to an NHL or he missed the world. Juniors got to the NHL early. He's already had a full season under his belt. He's an NHL. But would there be any conversation or idea of saying, Hey man, you want to go have some fun for a few weeks? It's tough here right now.

I would ask him, what do you think? It'd be an interesting conversation. I mean, I would imagine though, he would say, yeah, I want to stay here. I'm an NHL. Even though, though, he would say, yeah, I want to stay here.

I'm an NHLer. Even though I've never had the World Junior experience, I want to stay here. I'm an NHLer. It's like I said for you a couple weeks ago with that whole Bedard conversation. Yeah. Let the adults make a case, present it to them,

and see what he says. I mentioned we're going to talk about the Calgary Flames, so let's do that. There is a certain segment of Calgary Flames fans that have been banging, like banging, the Matthew Phillips drum hard. And for good reason. Called up today, but previous to that, leading the American Hockey League in scoring. His story is not unlike, and I am not saying he's going to be Martin St. Louis, but the stories are similar. He's too small. He'll never do it. He can't produce. Did it in junior. I

remember covering one of his first games when he had to wear the full birdcage, this scrawny, small kid with the Victoria Royals, and started ripping up the Western Hockey League. Ditto with the American Hockey League. He finally gets the call up at a time, Elliot, where the Calgary Flames are playing some really good hockey. And some of the lines are really clicking. And we know that the Flames are eventually going to get back to Jacob Markstrom, but Dan Vladar right now is excellent. Outside of the early moments of the game on Wednesday

where it looked tough with those first couple of goals, Dan Vladar has been really good. Your thoughts on whether it's Phillips, whether it's the Calgary Flames, whether it's the Netminder, whether it's Blake Coleman and that great line with Backlund and Rzyczka. Your thoughts on the Flames, Rij?

First of all, I'd like to say that Blake Coleman's goal in the playoffs last year should have counted. I haven't given up on that one yet. I lost that argument, but I still think I was right. For me, the Phillips thing is the most interesting one because we had a conversation on your show earlier this week where I said, I don't know if I'd be calling up Phillips because of what Daryl Sutter said about him. The thing is, do you believe you're putting him in a situation to succeed? And what do they do? They call him up. So I think that's fascinating. They're basically saying, this guy, we want to see him play. And I don't think he's

the last one. I don't know if it's going to be Zahorna who plays with Phillips in Calgary with the Wranglers, or it's going to be Pelce or who it's going to be. But I've heard there's going to be more, that this isn't the last young player who's going to get a chance to play in Calgary. I don't know what the timeline is, whether it's immediate, near future, down the road. I've just heard it won't be the last one.

Would you call this Ruzicka effect? Because he's been outstanding, and it's always best when you grow your own. Well, I think there is some of that no question about it but also too like we all know calgary's looking for a forward right oh yeah well maybe the forwards there i don't know we don't know you you have to create a situation in your in your organization yeah where the players feel that they can have a reward for doing what they're supposed to do or performing to a high level, which is what has happened here with Phillips.

I think as an organization, you have an obligation to reward these players. And that's why I think it's important that he's getting the opportunity. All right. As we mentioned earlier, Flames and Maple Leafs, Hockey Night in Canada on Saturday and round one between BXA and Chara. More on that later. Vancouver Canucks. on Saturday and round one between BX and Chara more on that later, Vancouver Canucks. And,

you know, interesting. You write a 32 thoughts, a blog at sportsnet.ca about Brock Besser and muse openly about would Besser to Washington work specifically Anthony Mantha care to expand on that one. Yeah. It's my opinion.

I just wondered with moving Besser, they're trying to create cap space. And it's going to be a hard thing to do with two more years at six plus on the deal but if you look at Manta he's got one more year at five seven so they'll get a slight cap break and they'll also have a contract that comes off the year sooner the other thing about Manta and as one thing I did learn today is that there are Capitals fans who have very different opinions on this. There are some who are not fans of Mantha and there are others who are. They feel that he's a victim of not getting enough power play time. Whatever

the case is, it hasn't been 100% a fit. I do think the Capitals are one of the teams that have interest in Besser. There was someone from another team in the Capitals division who said to me today that they think that the Capitals have had interest in Besser before. He doesn't know if they would make that particular deal, but he thinks they do like the player. I mean, we'll see. Some people have said this is a complicated deal that will take time. We're going to see how this all works out. I mean, Vancouver is going to be a really fascinating team.

They've got, they got a lot of balls in the air. And people around the organization are making things spicy. Case in point, Ben Hankinson, agent. Case in point, Ben Hankinson, agent, Twitter. Commenting on a piece written about Luke Shen at CanucksArmy.com. Ben Hankinson tweets, Luke Shen at CanucksArmy.com Ben Hankinson tweets, Luke Shen, perfect deadline acquisition and then

rings off the virtues. Consistent pattern of top four quality play, versatility, play any pairing, plays low mistake hockey, physical and tough, kills penalties, vet leadership, winning personality, two-time Stanley Cup champion. Quickly then adding,

I thought this was an interesting read on Luke and his value, not, capitals, at all, promoting a trade he loves playing in Vancouver. How did you greet that one, Elliot? Why does everything on Twitter have to be a referendum? He's his agent. What do you think he's there for? He's there to promote his client. We should all be used to this from the early days of Alan Walsh promoting

Yaroslav Halak over Carey Price. Everything's a referendum, everything. But this is a protein shake for Vancouver sports media, sports radio, talk TV, all of it. You know what it is.

They don't need a protein shake out there. They just need like a Bic lighter. But it does hang on that. That is the other name that's, that's starting to circulate out here. And we've talked about how, you know, Luke Shen does bring an element that other defensemen don't.

And it's one that's becoming more and more valuable and valued all around the league. And he's on a very, very comfortable team-friendly deal. You ever thought on Luke Shen through all of this? I think I've said on your show a couple times this week, I'm a big Shen guy. It's an easy number to fit, 900K. He's got a lot of respect.

You know what someone actually said to me this week? If you really want to know what's going on in the league and i know there's some players who are kind of like the the google searches of the nhl in baseball they used to call i remember sports illustrated said that bob stanley a pitcher from the red socks his nickname was mr 411 because you can get information out of him very good well that's that's a really old reference so now you know i'm being hip and cool so the google search we started the podcast i'm with joe malone so don't worry we're good 1920 somebody told me that shen is one of the players who knows everything that's going on out there so we should hire him yeah he should he should be on the panel

now appearing on the second admission of hockey night in canada merrick gets the bump please welcome luke shen i i've heard I've heard he's one of the guys who's really plugged in he knows what's going on out there sticking with the West Coast then you write about Trevor Moore and the Los Angeles Kings we've wondered not so much if but more when how close is a deal here for each I

think it's getting close you know Rob Blake did come out publicly earlier this year. I think it was one of those interviews he does with John Hoven. I think, if I remember correctly, he said that he would like to get more extended, and I heard it's getting close. I was chatting with him briefly. He wouldn't talk about that. I was chatting with him briefly at the morning skate on Thursday.

No, he's been real good. Real nice hockey player. Philadelphia Flyers, meanwhile, this raised some eyebrows. Although I think the timeline is kind of right on it. I don't think we thought that Cam York was going to be in the American Hockey League

all season. But Cam York gets the call up from the Philadelphia Flyers and it sounds like this one is just, look, Philadelphia needs offense and they need offense quick. Well, they're last in the league in goals per game, right?

2.41. Yeah, worse than Chicago. And the other thing too is, I just think after the training camp the kid had, he got sent down. And I don't think it's like a public shaming or anything like that. But it happens publicly, right?

Everybody knows why he's sent down and everybody's aware of the reason. I do think unless he's doing really bad things in Lehigh Valley, if you're still counting on him to be a player for you and your year is going like this, you have to give him an opportunity to come back and show that it's going to be different this time. And I wonder how much of this too is the Philadelphia Flyers

because we've talked about what direction are they going to be different this time. And I wonder how much of this too is the Philadelphia Flyers. Cause we've talked about, you know, what direction are they going to start going in here? I wonder if this is more along the lines of let's really just play the kids. Yep. See what we have, play the kids. So I,

I see that news on Thursday and go, yeah, that makes sense for a couple of things, offense and play the kids. You have a thought on Yessi Pouliarvi? I do. And that interview, and maybe I don't have it, and the self-doubt.

Like defensively, he's still a really good player. He just can't seem to put the puck in the other team's net. First of all, those are really tough quotes to read. Oh, yeah. It's not just because he's really struggling, which is one thing, but also because it's not the first time right so if you'll remember a couple years ago when he went back to Finland I did an interview with Sean Heschka

and Sean Heschka is a Canadian player he's from Saskatchewan and he was playing overseas at that time with Carpat where Poole Yarvey went back to Heska by the way is still playing in Finland and he was gracious enough to do an interview with me about Poole Yarvey there and he just said when he came back like he was a broken guy and you could see the transformation as he regained his confidence. And look, I think we all know what's kind of been going on here, that I think at times, Poole Yarving and his representatives have said it might be better for us to go somewhere else. I think the Oilers have absolutely tried to do it. But you know how it goes, Jeff.

Teams are saying, well, this is what we think his production is and the others are saying well maybe but we think he's better than that we don't want to be embarrassed by trading this guy who breaks out somewhere else but i think now you're at a point where you're seeing those quotes and you're just saying if you're edmonton do you just say look you know we have to do this and maybe you don't accept like a seventh rounder form or anything like that they have to win you know edmonton's window is while mcdavid and dry sidler on these contracts like just think of what their next two contracts are going to be oh geez so you have to win right now and again i i think of this as to the question you asked kelly mccrimmon if you're taking a little

bit less on pulley rv to create room to go do something else yeah i think that's the way you have to look at it like he's struggling and i look at him and i see a guy who needs to start over in a place where it's a little quieter where if he struggles he can struggle a bit more in silence till he gets his confidence back because i think everybody's rooting for him you want him to do well you just reach points where it just doesn't work for you in a certain situation i really think that one of the one of the things here because i look around and like you know edmonton's looking for something like a second round pick for yessir paul yarvey and i look at a team like the anaheim ducks who have three

and say is there not something there and then I come back to the number, $3 million and he's arbitration eligible. I don't know that we can do that, even if we have multiple second round picks. Elliot, on a quick Toronto note as well, Mitch Marner's point streak continues to 21 after he makes a gorgeous pass to John Tavares from his butt behind the net, gets his own puck, and it is the return of the slap shot, Elliott Friedman, the return of the slap shot,

and Marner now has points in 21 straight. Marner holds, looks in front, stumbles and falls. The assassin in front. Oh, what a chance by Tavares. And Marner was sitting on the seat of his pants when he centered the puck. You almost think, did he do that on purpose? I don't know. Scores!

Never mind. Never mind. Mitch Marner blows it by quick. The streak is still on. You know you're on a heater when you score like that. First of all, you complete the pass from your ass, and then the puck ends up back on your stick the way it did to score. That's when you know you're going great.

I do want Justin Bieber's jacket, however, the Care Bear jacket he was wearing. I would like to wear that on the set while Kevin is complaining about Zedino Chara on Saturday night. It's fine. Do you know anything about Hailey Bieber, his wife? I do not.

I was reading about her. I would love to take a Haley Bieber business class. Oh yeah? I think she's one of the smartest business people out there. In what sense? I think she knows how to market herself. Yeah. You look at the amount of followers she has over social media, her brands are huge sellers. I actually, I was just talking about this with someone the other day, a friend of mine who's in the business world and he said that like she's got a reputation for being really good at picking her spots okay so here's it so i want the justin bieber jacket and the hayley bieber business school see here's the difference between you and me so marner scores that goal extends the

point streak to 21 you want to to talk about Bieber, his glasses, the jacket, Haley, business class. I just want to talk about Babe Di. Babe Di, you're never going to hear me complain about it again, Elliot. Mitch Marner has now officially,

and by that I mean, in my mind, and Hockey Night in Canada researchers stand to Rodka's mind, clenched it. With 21, he passes, Babe die. There is no question who owns the point streak with Toronto. It's Mitch Marner. How many games did Wayne Gretzky have a point in a row?

51, sir. That's the end of this conversation. That's a good point. Let's stop this one. All right, get it before it's gone. Visit the Sportsnet shop to get your 32 Thoughts merchandise. That's hoodies, that's tees, crewnecks, even a coffee mug that changes color when you fill it up with your go-to warm beverage. Visit www.shopsportsnet.store

to get your 32 gear today. www.shopsportsnet.store All right, a couple of other things here before we wrap up, and I want to get to a really interesting piece of audio from Kelly Rudy about Wayne Gretzky. But Adam Pellock, I know you've had some inquiries. People want to know what's happening with the Islanders defenseman

this after the Robert Bertuzzo hits. I got some tweets and some DMs from Islanders fans. You saw where Lane Lambert said it's an upper body injury and they called him day- day look i'm here to serve hockey fans but as we all know long island on long island is the land that information forgot it is impossible to get stuff out of there the best i can tell you is as lambert said it's not believed to be the leg injury where he fell you, so it sounds like it's a possibility of a concussion. You hope not.

The only thing I can tell you, I heard is that as of, we record this on Thursday night, they were hopeful. That's all I could get. I tried, but at 80 Lou Lamorello still terrifies everyone around. You also had something you want to mention, Elliot, about Patrick Kane.

Yeah, the thing about Patrick Kane is, so Emily Kaplan wrote a column this week about Kane on ESPN, and she talked about the possibility of him staying and not getting traded. So I had heard a similar rumor a couple weeks ago, and I looked into it, and I asked people who I think would be tighter with Kane and I asked people who I think would be tighter with Kane. I asked people who I think would be tired with the Blackhawks. I said, have you guys heard anything about this, that Kane might not want to be traded this year? And all I got from people was

he has not indicated that outwardly. Nobody I spoke to seemed to believe that in any official way had he made that decision. But the fact that it came up again this week in Emily's piece, which was either a week or a week and a half when I was looking into it, it just says to me that this theory is out there. Now, the one thing I could understand is Kane not wanting to move twice, once getting traded and once picking a new team next year. As somebody who hates moving, I really do understand that. But at this point in time, I would just say that that's not what anybody is operating. Like I asked other teams who I believe would have interest, and they said that hadn't been indicated to them either. So what it says to me is at this point in time,

while that may be a theory out there and could be a possibility, nobody's been informed that that's the case but we'll see like the fact that it's still coming up at least somebody out there believes it we'll see where it goes now one of the theories out there is he wants to break all of stan makita's records but the thing is if you look at it games played assists and points he's a bit far away from bobby hall on goals this is not something he can just do this year yeah if he wants that then he's gonna have to resign there and to this point there have been no conversations about that and nobody seems to know if anybody whether kane

or team wants that uh and his name will continue to come up as the uh the trade deadline uh approaches later on next year uh okay fan code of conduct at the board of governors this will be tabled freege yeah and this was all you you uh i don't know if banging the glass will be a part of it jeff i know how much you hate banging the glass automatic dismissal of any fan caught banging the glass season tickets revoked um i don't know if it'll be finished but i was told because you know you had talked about it that it's going to be discussed like they just know they can't have another night like that night in new jersey no way you can't have that i think there's actually someone said to me today there's actually two parts of this there's

the fan code of conduct and there's also a security protocol, like what NHL security is responsible for doing. Right. So I think both of those things are going to be discussed at the board of governors next week. And once again, a 32 thoughts PSA, don't be a glass banger.

Okay. Let's, uh, let's, let's move on to this. So this is a little piece that, uh, that Amal actually worked on Elliot behind our backs. So we had a little piece that Amal actually worked on, Elliot, behind our backs. So we had talked about slap shots on a previous podcast, and we'd come around to talking about Gretzky's slap shot and how I don't know that Gretzky got enough credit for having a real, like it wasn't the hardest slap shot. Like this guy wasn't, you know, not Al McInnes, but it was a really good, effective slap shot. And I still don't think that Wayne Gretzky, and I think you agreed, gets the respect that he deserves for having a great slap shot.

So Emil actually goes and does some work on that and asks his former teammate, Kelly Rudy. And so here he is, here's Kelly Rudy on Wayne Gretzky's slap shot. Wayne had the most unusual release with his slap shot the slap shot had been around for 80 90 years and we had never seen anything like it the way that he would take the stick back originally it always looked like he was going to sort of cup the puck with the blade of the stick when he was coming down to make contact. That would be the first tell that you would have. And then at some point, just before the blade of the stick would make contact with the puck, he could change the angle. And the one that was the most deceptive to me would be when at the exact moment that the puck and the stick blade made contact, he had opened up the toe of

the blade just a little bit and then that way he could go short side better than anybody now he was also great with the regular conventional slap shot but it was all in the deception and I played with Wayne for about eight years and I practiced with him for about eight years. And for the life of me, I could never figure out that release. It was the most unusual and unique thing I've ever seen in my life with that shot. Okay. So there's a couple of things there. First of all. First of all, that's a good job, Amal.

Nice job, bud. Really good. Second of all. And thank you, Kelly. Yeah, big time. Thanks, Kelly. And first of all, I'm geeking out on it because, you know, that's catnip for me, right? Like, I love that stuff.

Like, I can listen to Kelly talk about Wayne Gretzky's release on his slap shot all day long. I kind of thought Kelly was going to go along the, he had almost like a pause before he shot. Like, a lot of guys, like, as they wind up, like, the shot just just comes through smooth and easy and the stick comes up and the stick comes down. Wayne would kind of have his stick up there a little bit extra to freeze a goaltender before coming. Like we saw it with the Vernon goal. Like the Vernon goal is a classic Wayne Gretzky slap shot. Here he goes after the puck.

He's played all night. Wayne Gretzky in on goal. Just scores in overtime. Gretzky gets the winner. He leaves the stick up there a little bit extra longer to freeze the goaltender and then comes through with it. That's where I thought Kelly was going to go, but I've never heard him talk about that release off the toe and disguising it and making it look like he was going to cup the puck

and maybe it's maybe more blade down as the stick came down and then open the blade at the last moment. think this deserves a five-part series elliot i i think it's really cool i i do i don't know about a five-part series but i i think that's that's really good that's that's good work amal i'll tell you this It's better work than Amal did today You know who I met today Jeff Who'd you meet The Jack Eye parents Oh no way nice

Yes I met Jack and Simona Wonderful people Just wonderful wonderful people They must be thrilled with their young man right now Absolutely And that piece is being put together we did the interviews for today great and you know what you know what simona said to me she said you look a lot skinnier in person the camera really does add 10 pounds oh pucker up buttercup she was just

just what an introduction i have to say that's awesome's awesome. All right. Yeah, it was pretty fun. It's been a great week for you. First, an interview with, a sit down with Todd McClellan that'll come up soon here. Yeah, he was good. On the podcast. He was really excellent.

And then that. That's great. Okay, finishing off the podcast today. And thanks as always for joining us here and lending us your ears and your attention and your time. Taking us out, a new band on the scene. Augusta

is a seven-piece band from Toronto that have a big yet unique sound. You can check them out live at the legendary Horseshoe Tavern. Oh man, I used to love going to the shoe. On January 13th, 2023. These tickets, trust me folks, will go fast. With their latest single, here's Augusta with Little Birds on 32 Thoughts, the podcast. Enjoy. saving grace, but I just can't use it, seem to abuse it, gotta get out of it. Maybe I'm falling, cause baby you're always on my mind, and maybe I'm calling, I can't wait to see you all my life.