Halford & Brough in the Morning - Can Foote Help Petey?

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

In hour one, Mike & Jason look back a the previous day in sports, they break down the comments from Adam Foote & Jim Rutherford yesterday (3:00), plus they get the latest from the PGA Championship as Sportsnet golf analyst Adam Stanley (28:04) joins the show.  This podcast is produced by Andy Cole and Greg Balloch. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

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And Ladi, good morning to you as well. Hello, hello. Halford and Breath of the Morning is brought to you by Sands and Associates, BC's first and trusted choice for debt help with over 3 five-star reviews visit them online at sans trustee.com We are in our one of the program our one is brought to you by North Star metal recycling Vancouver's premier metal recycler pays the highest prices on scrap metal Nor star metal recycling they recycle you get paid visit them at 1170 pile Street in Vancouver

We are coming to you live from the kintex studio. Kintec footwear and orthotics working together with you in step. Big show on a Friday. The rundown is huge today. I got so many things we need to get into. Guest list today begins at 630. Sportsnet golf analyst Adam Stanley is gonna join the program.

He will join us live from the 2025 PGA Championship from Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, North Carolina. Your leader after the first round, Johnny Vegas, one of my favorites. Johnny Vegas goes 700. Taylor Pendreth, the low Canadian, after round one at 200. So we'll talk to Adam Stanley about all that. I'm gonna talk to him about mud balls, mud balls. Mud balls were a big topic of conversation yesterday. What's his name?

Scottie Scheffler was very irate about mud balls yesterday. Should ask what his thoughts are on the Happy Gilmore crocodile dying. Yeah, that's tough too. There is a lot to get into. Taking up the golf world. There is a lot to get into with Adam Stanley. They nearly canceled the tournament.

Seven o'clock, AJ from AJ's Pizza is gonna join the program. That's a reminder that it's Ask Us Anything Friday on the show. The winner of Ask Us Anything Friday gets a $100 gift card to AJ's Pizza on East Broadway. What's more, here's a tease for you. AJ has some big news to announce at seven o'clock this morning right here on the Halford and Bref Show on Sportsnet 650. After AJ at 7.05, Adnan Virk from MLB Network is going to join the program.

Our Thursday regular move to Friday in light of all the Canucks news that happened yesterday, get into all the major stories around baseball with our MLB insider. I do want to ask him about the active crime scene that is the Colorado Rockies. So we'll talk to Adnan about that at seven o'clock seven 30. It's the Moge. Yes, it's the Moge up in Kamloops for BC Lions training camps. So we're going to go to North Carolina. We're going to go to Kamloops, all the hotspots. Lots of reporting up there on what the Lions are doing

ahead of their season opener. I heard that Moj played a big, big role in bringing Snoop to BC place for the concert kickoff series. So we'll talk to him about that. We can also talk to him about Adam Foote. He wrote an article for Black Press yesterday about Adam Foote's hires, Canucks head coach.

That's at 7.30. That's with the Moj. Eight o'clock it's Rick Dollywall. I'll throw it over to Jason, our resident Rick Dollywall handler. Yeah, the Foote hiring, how it affects Pedersen trades in UFA guys and how the Willander deal was done.

That's what we're going to talk to Rick with. What a powerhouse hit. Okay. Also during the Dollywall hit today at eight o'clock at 8.15, we're giving away our final pair of tickets to see the who that Rogers arena on September 23rd, uh, tickets do go on sale today at 10 AM. So at 8 15 this morning,

it's your last chance to win tickets from the Haliford and Bruff show caller number five at eight 15, the number six Oh four two eight Oh zero six 50. That number again, six Oh four two eight Oh zero six 50 pair tickets to see the who at Rogers Arena on September 23rd. It's a big show. There's a lot to get into. So without further ado, laddie, let's tell everybody what happened. Hey, did you guys see the game last night? No. What happened? I missed all the action because I was. We know how busy your life can be. What happened? You missed that? We know how busy your life can be. What happened?

You missed that? What happened? What happened is brought to you by the BC Construction Safety Alliance. Making safety simpler by giving construction companies the best in tools, resources, and safety training. Visit them online at bccsa.ca. Thursday was another busy day in Canucksland. First, the Vancouver Canucks and their general manager Patrick Alve, introduced the club's new head coach, Adam Foote. He met with the media for the first time since being named the club's bench boss on Wednesday.

Yeah, I thought Adam Foote came off very well. He didn't seem nervous for the moment. And we've seen that before from general managers and coaches, especially ones that have never been general managers or head coaches in the NHL. But I thought Adam Fo foot struck a good balance between a guy who's serious about his job and serious about the things that he has to get done.

But also a guy who can joke about himself. Um, I really, really liked his answer when he was asked about, um, being painted as a defensive coach, because he was a defensive defenseman, uh, when he was in the NHL, uh, he comes to the Vancouver Canucks on Rick Tuckett's bench and he is, um, in charge of the defenseman and he's developed really good

relationships with the likes of Quinn Hughes. And, but now he's's gonna be in charge of the entire team and it's a team that needs to score more goals. So how is he going to help a team, being a defensive defenseman, how is he gonna help the team score more goals? And I thought his answer was a pretty good one. I didn't like the role I got early in my career.

Mark Crawford really threw it on me and I had a great conversation with Mark about a month ago and every player wants to play on the power play. We all come from our minor league teams and we're all probably a power play guy, every defenseman. And I did not like my role because I wanted to play on the power play. I wanted to score goals. Who doesn't want to score goals? But I remember my dad said to me, listen, you got

the feet, you got the size, you can skate with them and, you know, if you can really dial it in, you can be do something new and you can win. And I accepted that role. And when you have that role, you get to play against the best players in the world. Paul Korea, how do I shut down his A game, his A game speed. If I'm playing against a sack, his A game is that shot. I'm not letting them have that shot. I approached it like, you know, if they're going to beat me, they're beating me with their C game, not their A, not their B. I knew what that was. You study the game, you use the people around you to help

you and understand what offense is coming at you. And I knew what I was uncomfortable defending against. I knew what worked, what put me or my partner or our goaltender in a tough spot. And I did that for a living for 20 years. Very fortunate, very lucky. And I think that's a big part of it for me. I think, like I said, you can pay me with whatever brush you like. I'm a big guy. I'm a big boy. But I'm going to surround myself with the right people, too. And we're going to have that deep discussion.

We've got some great people here with the Sidneys. And we're going to continue to keep getting better. But I would say I'm very fortunate that I had to play against those top players and shut them down and, and it was a fun job. And so we've got lots of ideas how to make that offense better. So basically what he's saying is like, Hey, I was one of the best defensive defensemen in the NHL and I went out against the best players in the world. I know what they can do to make it hard on a defenseman. Sure.

I've seen good offense. I had to defend it. Yeah, exactly. Now they're going to bring other people in for sure. And it'll be interesting to see how he fills out his staff. They need, and this is Adam Foote saying this, they need an offensive guy and a defensive guy. He actually said like, I'd love to still run the

defense, but I don't think it works like that. No. Anymore. And. You're hitting the big time now, Adam. Yeah. Perhaps one of those two guys has been a head coach in the NHL before to add some experience to

the bench because that's another thing that he got asked about. But Foote didn't really make it sound like he was worried about the experience factor. He just said he just wants the best fit. Whether that person has three years experience, five years, 15 years experience. Now I'm sure he's already got a few guys in mind.

So maybe he's prepping for that. So I thought Adam Footote did really well. Any thoughts on it? Yeah, that was the most detailed answer that he gave of the day. I think it was easy to pick that one as the most interesting one in illuminating because oftentimes, and he did lean back on these,

when you're asked about the specifics about what you wanna do as a coach, in order to answer the question without really answering the question, you'll say stuff like, we want to win, hard to play against, this is a classic. Anytime you want to give a real stock answer about what you want to just say hard to play against, everyone's like, ooh, that is good, right? And wanting to win is also good. Those are two very good things. I think, I think in reality, like a lot of the planning has still, they still got to do it. Right? I mean,

I think that's part of the reason why there was low on details and high on platitudes. Because you have to hire your offensive defensive coordinators for lack of a better phrase for both. Like he needs to do that. You gotta remember, this is still an organization that is adjusting on the fly to the talk at Exodus. Yep. You know?

Adam Foote, I'd say up until three weeks ago, was probably not being bandied about as the head coach of this team. They're still entirely focused on talk it. So when you pivot off that, not only do you have to elevate your assistant coach to the big boy chair, you have to find someone to replace him as well. And those guys are going to be critically important because I think foot one thing foot in knowledge yesterday is being a head coach means you don't get to dial down on the minutia that you normally would as an assistant coach, right? You, you have to have a bigger picture and you have to have a more

macro view of everything. That's your job. Delegate the details. And the other part of it is you have to have relationships with all your players now. Like you're not just running the blue liners. You have to worry about everybody now and you have to develop and forge independent relationships with everybody. Uh, as for Jim Rutherford, he was on with, uh,

Canucks Central and he was, well, he was Jim Rutherford. He was predictably forthright. Uh, like when he was asked about potentially trading a defenseman for help upfront, Rutherford isn't afraid to state the obvious. Never has been. And I think that's why he brought up, you know,

Quinn Hughes wanting to maybe go play with his, his brothers and he was asked about that and he was like, well yeah, isn't that what everyone is talking about? I often say on the show is like, the things we're discussing, they're discussing the same things. Maybe not the Ask Us Anything Friday stuff,

but the rest of it, they're definitely. No, they are. They're definitely addressing most of the Kinex related things. Yeah, and they're having the same kind of wild conversations that we have. You know, for example, people have texted in, it's like, well, maybe the Canucks could get the Hughes brothers instead of Quinn going to New Jersey. What about we bring them there?

And I'm like, okay, well, I don't know, that's not super realistic because Quinn's a couple of years away from unrestricted free agency and he's the oldest of them. But they've had those conversations too. The only major difference is that we don't get accused of tampering. Yeah. We just get accused of being idiots.

Yeah, which is fine. We can live with that. Yeah. So again, Rutherford isn't afraid to state the obvious in these interviews, even if some people might see it as showing his cards, which it isn't, because everyone sees that stuff. Like it's, if it's available to you, then it's available to the

general managers around the league. Um, and the defense is an area of relative surplus for the Canucks. Note that I use the word relative because that's important. They have a surplus of defensemen relative to what they've got upfront. It's not like, oh, we got so many defensemen, we don't know what to do with them all. It's too many defensemen. Um, and, uh, here's what he said about, uh, the possibility of trading a defenseman for help upfront.

Yes. Teams are aware that we have depth on defense. Patrick gets calls on them. We would be very careful if we're to what defensemen we may trade, if any. We have them prioritized, of course, like all teams do, but that is an area where we could possibly, um, move somebody to improve our forwards.

Um, now you can agree or disagree with the plan of action this off season. Uh, maybe the Canucks should not chase immediate improvement. Maybe they should keep all their young guys, just accept that Quinn Hughes is going to leave and start building for a future that's years away. Maybe they should do that. Maybe in hindsight, in a few years we'll look back and be like, they should have done that.

But here's the thing. They're not going to do that. And that's what Rutherford is telling us. They are going to be aggressive and you can pretty much guarantee that the connects are going to trade some picks and, or some of these prospects that they've got this off season. Well, we'll be aggressive. Um, uh, we're, we're certainly not going to be desperate. Uh, the organization has done a good job in building up the pipeline.

Now we have more younger players here over the last couple of years. We feel good about the young defense. We have more younger players here over the last couple of years. We feel good about the young defensemen we have coming. We have some young forwards coming. But if we can make a deal and do whatever we need to do to improve our team, we're going to do it. We're not going to end up trading all our young guys or all our draft picks or things like that. But we're going to be open to all options to make this team better. Aggressive, but not desperate. Facebook dating profile there. Yeah, I don't, uh, I, I, I don't mind.

I really don't mind that. Um, I don't mind that Jim Rutherford is as transparent and is open and candid. And you use the word forthright, which is another one as well as he is. I don't think there's any point in trying to dance around what everyone is pretty sure is going to happen anyway. Yeah, the notion of showing his cards or whatever other sort of descriptor you want to put on it. That's fine if you feel that way. But the reality is, is everyone knows what cards he's holding anyway, whether he shows them or not. Every other general manager in the NHL is pretty aware of what's going on in Vancouver.

If you want to talk about this being the antithesis of quieting the noise, I have time for that, for sure. But at the same time, you can quiet the noise by beating everyone to the punch and saying what everyone is going to say anyway. There's no real secret recipe about what the Canucks think they need to cook up this off season. They need to rob whatever cupboards that they have that have something in them to fill a cupboard that has nothing in it. And that's how it's going to be.

They're not going to bother addressing an entirely different approach because it's not even in like the recipe book going to bother addressing an entirely different approach because it's not even in like the recipe book. The idea of taking a different approach isn't there. They're going to be aggressive. They're going to go out and make moves and they're going to try and have an immediate improvement. Now, where it gets interesting is what part of the identity of this team they lean into.

Because we were talking about this with Sat yesterday and I keep coming back to it is it's great to say that you want to be aggressive. But the reality is, is the level of aggression that you put forth is entirely dictated by the rest of the market. They're the way, if you're going to make a trade, you need a dance partner and a dance partner is

going to have a big say in how aggressive you're going to be on said dance floor. Yeah. And, uh, this is something else that Rutherford acknowledged. Most teams have cap space now. Uh, this is no longer the flat cap of the last, I don't know, four or five years. And, um, that's going to make it harder to land free agents. Sure.

And the Canucks are, they don't want to be in a position of overpaying guys in free agency. And some teams might, like I think we're going to see a wild free agency this off season. I think there's going to be a lot of cash thrown around, a lot of cash. And the question I have is what kind of trades are we going to see? Because there seem to be a lot of teams that want to be aggressive. You know, whether you're a contender right now and you want to remain a contender, maybe you're just outside of being a contender, you want to add that piece that helps put you over the top. And then there are teams like, I think about Anaheim, they want to be aggressive

this off season because they want to take that step. You know, Chicago, Chicago needs players, man. Like they can't just keep rolling like this with Badaard there. They need they need to do something. Philadelphia. We talked to Jordan Hall yesterday and he said that of the when the three year plan began, Danny Breyer targeted 25, 26 is the year where they get back to the playoffs. Well, guess what year is coming up for them? There's a lot of teams that want to do this.

It also makes trying to mine other organizations for their uncut gems or diamonds in the rough or guys that are buried in the depth chart or being blocked. It makes it harder to get those guys because those organizations can spend a little bit more money just to keep them around, you know? Just see if the guys got a shot.

So the other thing that a lot of people noted was a different tone that was said around Elias Pedersen from Adam Foote, but also from Jim Rutherford. And we're going to play you a Jim Rutherford clip. And I already put this out on social media after ridiculously arguing online yesterday. That's good. I will never learn my lesson. You? No, you won't. I will never learn my lesson.

No. He's a big dumb animal, folks. Yeah. If I've got five minutes free, I'm going to make my life worse. Ha, ha, ha. Here's Jim Rutherford talking about Elias Pedersen. And I'm not going to go too far down it, but people acted like this was like, whoa, what a way different tone that the organization is striking about Elias Pedersen.

And I kind of said, I don't know, it sounds like the same tone they've had for the last little while. You decide for yourself. Here's Jim Rutherford on Annelias Pedersen. Well, preparation is going to be the biggest thing. I mean, preparation is the biggest thing to success in anything you do. But with Petey, he didn't have a good off season. Now, he was dealing with a couple of physical things where he didn't feel he could work as hard as he as he normally would and he's learned from that you know it it bit him this year he had an offseason and he didn't have the strength and the preparation so

we're gonna check on him on a regular, but he stayed in town a week to 10 days before he left town after our last game. And he was in here working out almost every day. So it was a very encouraging sign. I do feel his injuries are behind him. So that's not going to be an excuse for the offseason. And if he has a good offseason, there's no doubt that he's going to bounce back to be the player that he's capable of being. Oh my God, he admitted. What did you think when you heard that? What was the tone that you took from

Jim Rutherford's comments? I think they've acknowledged that Pedersen felt that he had some things that were keeping him from training last off season. But listen to the way that Rutherford said it. He didn't say the word injury until the end. And I think he might have been talking about the injuries that Pettersson suffered at the end of the season that kept him out of the lineup.

But I think he basically said he was experiencing some physical things and I think there was just a disconnect on that and they want to make sure that that disconnect doesn't happen anymore. You heard them say we're going to keep an eye on them and I think they've said all these things before. They've said, they've acknowledged that he said that there were some things that kept him from training and And you know, whether there was, I think if there was anything that happened yesterday, I will, I will acknowledge that maybe there was a turning of the page and a willingness to be like, okay,

the season's over. Maybe not start with a fresh slate because I think that's impossible, but let's try and strike an encouraging tone. Um, you know, he started with some praise, said Elias Pettersson has been, when he stayed in Vancouver, he, he was in Rogers Arena working out almost every day.

Yeah. Um, and you know, and then he said, you know, if he has a good off season, there's no doubt in my mind that he'll come back and be the player that we know he can be. So let's see how it goes, I guess. Well, okay, so I thought about this a lot yesterday in light of, when you parse through the entire media availability, and we started out by saying,

Jim Rutherford is very forthright and direct and blunt and honest in his assessment. And I know that You said they've said this before about Pedersen But I kind of feel like they've more intimated or hinted or talked around it as opposed to just directly Identifying what happened and in that instance, I'm kind of saying like why did it take everyone this long to get to this point? This should have been the conversation right away and they should have nipped this entire thing in the bud. And what should have happened was they should have said, look,

the player did not arrive at the start of the season in the shape that was going to make him be as effective in NHL players. He's been in the past. I think what wouldn't have been a bad idea was if they had gone, I mean, Dakota Joshua's medical situation was entirely different, but there was still an understanding that it was going to take Joshua a long time to find his form if he was going to find it this year. Right now, you can't compare that to that. It's apples and oranges, but what could have been done instead of trying to cattle prod the guy at the

beginning of the year to get into shape that you kind of inherently knew he wasn't going to get to was address it and be open and forthright with it right away. Because what's happened now is, um, the Miller divorce, this played a role in it for sure. Right? I think it was the main catalyst for it. Let's just put it that way. Yeah. Right? So you're talking about a season that your

president of hockey offices said went off the rails because of this schism in the room and this schism in the room happened because the player wasn't ready to play at the beginning of the season. And they were mad about that. The organization was mad about that. The fact that all of this is like sort of being finalized

in terms of a narrative on May 16th. It feels like an entirely wasted season for an organization that at times has the president of a hockey up speaking freely about everything else, right? Conducting interviews with Gary Mason in the middle of the season to prep everybody for a JT Miller trade.

It's a very, very weird way about going about your business. I think- Very weird way. I think one of the other frustrations though, is that they, like us, have been a little bit, I kind of guess confused by all of it because they've offered, I think one of their frustrations about last off season wasn't just that Pedersen didn't

train, it's that he didn't, and he doesn't reach out for help. Right. You know, and he does things his own way. He's like, I'll handle it by myself, right? Which is fine when you're playing really well. You know, there are some players in the NHL, you know, Craig Berubi said it about Nylander, he's

like, I just leave the guy alone. And some guys, that's fine, right? You know, they're so good that you're like, okay, well, you do your thing, right? Um, but when it doesn't work, then it becomes a problem and the other things that you can hear over the last few months is the word resources come up.

Yep. We've got the resources to help, which is basically them saying like, we are offering help, but it's up to the player to accept that help. And yesterday we had that conversation about trying to control people and how, in some cases it's, it's a fool's errand. Yeah. You know, and, uh, I keep coming back to the same thing. If anyone wants to fix Leas Pettersson, it's going to be Pettersson making that decision to do it himself

with the help of the Vancouver Canucks. Okay. We've got a lot more to get to on the Halferd and Breff show on Sportsnet 650. Coming up, we are going to go down to North Carolina, Charlotte specifically, quail hollow clubs specifically. Adam Stanley is going to join us. Sportsnet golf analysts live from the 20, 25 PGA championship. After we talked to Adam, we will get into both Stanley Cup playoff games from last night. The Washington capital season is over. The Canes are moving on to the Eastern conference final and the Jets stayed alive,

which helps my hot takeout seven o'clock. We're going to talk to AJ and we're going to talk to Adnan Burke seven 30 it's Moj eight o'clock. It's Dolly wall. And don't forget to get your what we learns in Dunbar lumber text message in basket is six 50, six 50. You are listening to the Halford and breath show on sports net six 50 it's Canuck central with Dan Rachel and Satya R. Shaw, your destination for everything Canucks exclusive interviews,

inside info, and even the post game show. Listen four to six p.m. weekdays and on demand through your favorite podcast app. ["Sports Net 650"] 6.33 a.m. Friday. It's a Fiesta Friday here on the Halif and Bref show on Sportsnet 650. Halford and Bref of the morning is brought to you by Sands and Associates. BC's first and Trusted Choice for Debt Help with over 3,000 five-star reviews. Visit them online at sands-trustee.com.

We are in hour one of the program. Hour one is brought to you by North Star Metal Recycling. Vancouver's premier metal recycler pays the highest prices on scrap metal. North Star Metal Recycling, they recycle, you get paid. Visit them at 1170 Powell Street. Our next guest comes courtesy of the hotline powered by Power West Industries. He joins us from the soulless Kardashian of golf courses. It is of course Adam Stanley, Sportsnet Golf Analyst here on the Halford and Rough Show on Sportsnet 650.

Good morning, Adam. How are you? Good morning. Yeah, I'm doing, I'm doing allalyst here on the Halford & Ruff Show on Sportsnet 650. Good morning, Adam. How are you? Good morning. Yeah, I'm doing, I'm doing all right. It's Fiesta Friday. Goodness gracious. I was wondering about the musical introduction here guys, but now, now I just feel super excited.

I'm ready to go. Well, I'm wondering about the leaderboard because it does not look great right now. I got to be honest with you with all due respect to Johnny Vegas, which is the coolest name in golf. Um, I think people were coming into this tournament going, I wonder what we're going to see from Rory or can Jordan Spieth get the career of Grand Slam?

Uh, even Scotty Scheffler, uh, had his issues around the course yesterday. And I want to start there because he was very upset about the issue of mud balls. Adam, explain to listeners what a mud ball is. Yeah, well specifically here at Quail Hollow, it is exactly what it sounds like. It's like when mud gets on your ball and the reason why the guys were upset yesterday, it has been so wet, so rainy here in Charlotte over the last four days from

Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday on Monday when I arrived, the weather network suggested that at one point they were going to have quote soaking rain. I've never seen that in my life. So the reason why the guys were upset is because the PGA of America, who obviously runs the PGA championship said that they were going to play the ball down yesterday. So even if you hit the ball in the middle of the fairway, a perfect shot, um, and it lands in some mud, uh, because of how wet it's been, you're not allowed to pick it up, wipe it off,

and then place it right back down again. So the reason why Scotty was so upset and Zander Schauffelei said the same thing, uh, and basically anybody that you talked to yesterday, uh, why they were upset is because they hit a perfect drive 350 yards down the middle of the fairway and the ball gets caked in mud and you can't pick it up and wipe it off and then you have to, it impacts the direction of the shot with your irons for the next one. You are quite literally being punished for hitting a perfect shot and that's why the guys were upset. I feel like I should whisper this, but it

was also an issue at Augusta. Like I know you're not supposed to criticize Augusta national at all, but like. You say organic matter. You don't say mud. You say organic matter at Augusta national. Do you think this is going to lead to some, some, maybe some policy changes?

Um, I know that Augusta would be like, we don't need lift clean in place said Augusta. It's pristine. And if you look at Quail Hollow, it's like, wow, it's a well manicured course. But they did have that crazy rain, which if they had made a ruling, I don't think it would have made Quail Hollow look bad or anything.

But, um, do you think this is something that, that, that might have some legs? Yeah, like ish, you know, the, the PGA tour does this pretty much week in and week out. You know, obviously this is not a PGA tour event, right? The PGA of America runs it, just so happens to be part of the PGA tour schedule.

So, you know, they're the ones that at the end of the day can make the decision to have the guys play the ball up or just have to play it as it lays. So, yeah, I mean, I think the thing was, you know, it's a major championship. They're trying to treat it as such. The PGA of America got, you know, just absolutely hammered at the beginning of the week

from everybody, from Rory to Justin Thomas to Scotty Scheffler about this golf course, right? It's a really, really good championship venue. It's a great place to host a championship. But as far as a championship golf course, the guys are like, yeah, it's one dimensional. You pull out your driver, you get as far as you can. You find it, life goes on. So I think what they've tried to do is just say, hey, no, this is a major, we're here and you guys are going to have to, you know, figure it out and, and play the ball as it lays. And that's what we're going to do. So yeah, everybody had to go through it yesterday. Everyone said that they got a few, some people were more impacted

by others. I can absolutely see Scotty's point. Um, you know, these guys work, work hard at their craft and they're the best in the world. If they hit the ball absolutely perfectly and then they get punished for that, it's certainly pretty disappointing. But at the end of the day, it is a major championship and the PGA of America decided this is what they were going to do. And it obviously didn't impact the scoring of a lot of the guys all that much. Scottie still came in with a 200 par score. He wasn't all that far back at the lead. Johnny Vegas, you know,

makes three birdies in a row to finish in the, in the dark, basically yesterday. 700 par, you know, he's, he's not out there complaining about mud balls, even though he confirmed that he had a few yesterday afternoon as well. What are the members, how do the members react when they're, when they're club, they're, they're, they're great club that they, they paid, you know, probably hundreds of thousand dollars to join. They're like, we're hosting the PGA and then the golfers come and they're like, we hate this course.

Yeah. It's funny because I don't think anybody actually hates the golf course. They just are like, it's kind of boring, right? It's like boring in air quotes, it's one dimensional. Like I said, you have a very linear strategy to play here. Now there are some pretty cool holes, certainly on the back nine. 14 is a great risk reward. Part four, 16, 17, 18 out here long been the hardest kind of stretch of holes on the PGA tour. But that's the thing, right? It's like Rory McIlroy, I think he summed it up perfectly. He was like, I thought it was gonna feel different

because it's a major, but I came out on Tuesday and played nine holes and it felt the exact same as it does every year when we're here for the truest championship. So I think the members, like come Sunday, if we've got a little drama and the tournament itself turns out to be really, really good, the members are not going to care all that much.

The best players in the world said that their golf course was one dimensional. You know, if we have a stinker, then I mean, they're probably going to be like, Oh shoot, that, that wasn't great. Um, but like I mentioned a few minutes ago, this place, quail hollow club as an actual venue, as a host facility for big tournaments like this, it's like like it's absolutely perfect. Taylor Pendreth the top Canadian in round one he's at two under through five so far today. Is the course set up nicely for him?

Out of the five Canadians who started the week I thought that this golf course fit his game 10 out of 10. He as a golfer and with respect to his skill set this golf course fit his game 10 and a 10. He as a golfer and with respect to his skill set this golf course just completely aligns with him. So I wasn't all that surprised to see him play as well as he did yesterday. Obviously dunking it from the fairway for an eagle helps matters significantly. The only two bogeys he made yesterday were on the two hardest holes so kind of shrug your shoulders and you say, yep, all right, that's fine, makes total sense. So yeah, staying very steady today. If he stays in red figures by the time he finishes, he's going to be just fine heading

into the weekend. If he can put up another two under par score today and get to four under heading into the weekend, I would say he wouldn't just be in the mix. I'd say he'd be firmly in the mix. But yeah, Taylor has always been known as one of the longest hitters on the tour certainly one of the longest out of all these Canadians ball striking has been very solid the one thing that has held him back this year which is almost like completely confusing the dude was fifth on the PGA tour in

strokes game putting last year this year he he's 135th in the exact same statistics. So it's a, it's a jarring drop off on the, on the putting side of things. So if he can just kind of put average at a place like this, which is kind of what he did yesterday, um, you know, you're going to see some very solid scores from him. So, uh, you know, certainly not the best of years on the green, but when we're talking about a golf course that fits an individual skill set, Taylor Pendrith was, you know, like I mentioned, 10 out of 10 for him for this week.

Pendrith threw, I wanna say six already today. Still at even, I'm just updating the leaderboard here. So yeah, his second round is well underway. Adam, I know you're gonna cover Taylor and a whole bunch of others, things at the tournament. So go, enjoy the rest of the day. Thank you very much for doing this today. We appreciate you taking the time.

No worries guys. Thanks. Looking forward to chatting soon. Yeah, thanks. Appreciate it. That's Adam Stanley, Sportsnet Golf Analyst here on the Haliford and Bruff Show on Sportsnet 650. Mudball Stevie.

That's what Tiger would always yell cause he'd be frustrated. Mudball Stevie. Mudball. Yeah. It's a good excuse too. Like if you had a bad shot, you're like, ah, mud ball. It's like, there's no mud on the course.

It's dry. It's rained in months. Your jets, let's talk about your jets. Yeah, Winnipeg Jets. So two games yesterday in the Stanley Cup playoffs. We will begin with the second of the two. Connor Halabuck, 22 saves for the shutout. Another four nothing shutout victory

for the Winnipeg Jets, who avoided elimination against the Dallas Stars in Game five of their second round series in Winnipeg. Hell, but very good to start the game. Thirteen or start and the game. Thirteen saves in the third period. It was a pretty dominant performance from the Jets. I know Connor Halliburke is the lead in large part because of all the struggles that he's had. And yes, he did have a shadow.

Yes, his second shadow to the series. But this was about the very thorough and dominant performance that the, the jets put on in game five to stave off elimination. Shifeley was good. He had a goal and an assist. I think we had the Nemesnikov goal in the intro.

So, I mean. It's two pretty good games in a row for the jets, even though they lost the last one. This has kind of been the story of the Dallas, the story of the Dallas Stars playoff so far has been Miko Rantan has been unbelievable and has carried the team at times. But in terms of, and I know Ray Ferraro hates this term,

the full 60 minute performances, they haven't had an awful lot of them. They didn't really outplay Colorado in many long stretches in that opening series. You remember the first couple of games, I think they they led for a grand total of like 60 seconds or something like that, but they found a way. Tough opponent, but they found a way to this is a tough opponent to. Yeah. Dallas in this series has had the benefit of playing Winnipeg

in Dallas because Winnipeg can't win on the road. Winnipeg is not, Winnipeg is not. They could play in Conor Hellebuck on the road. Winnipeg has not won a road playoff game since 2023. They've lost nine straight. Now, obviously, given that they are staving off elimination, they can't afford to do that anymore. When I throw out my hot take during the David Amber hit,

two days ago, that Winnipeg trailing 3-1 in the series at the time was going to come back and win it. It was predicated on two things. One, I thought Winnipeg had played well enough that they didn't deserve to be 3-1 down in the series. But the other part of it was the law of averages suggests that eventually, eventually the Winnipeg Jets will win a playoff game on the road. It has to happen eventually. You can't go for the rest of time losing every single road playoff. So was Hellebuck trying to pull a Luongo here because he's got two

shutouts at home in this series. They laughed at me when I made this comparison on the internet. But on the road, all playoffs long, it's been problematic and I mean, I'd hate to put it this way, but like, if they can just get that win in Dallas. It's all they need. It's all they need.

They, they need to get a win in Dallas. That's the thing is they've shown zero ability to win on the road. And this goes back to the St. Louis series. Now, what's compounding this and what also makes the Luongo analogy and comparison so intriguing is that the other end of the ice, you've got an American goalie who is playing phenomenally well to lose that game for nothing yesterday,

to have the kind of performance that Jake Odinger put forth. Underscore is how flat Dallas was on the night. Odinger was really, really good. He finished with 31 saves. There was an empty net goal in there, so he allowed three. But Odinger's, and Odinger's been really good in this series. So especially when the games have been in Dallas,

you have this, you know, it's not just that your goalie is struggling. It's at the other end of the ice, you've got a goalie that's putting up some really good performances. So they're good. I mean, the, the narrative is written. You have to exercise these demons on the road. If you're the Winnipeg Jets, you have to be able to go into Dallas and win a hockey game. You have to be able to get out of the friendly confines of Canada Life Center

and go win a game. Because if they do, and if they go back for game seven in Winnipeg, you want to talk about momentum not existing in the playoffs, wrong. It will exist in that series, and the Jets will win that series if it goes to seven. Washington and Carolina is over. Mercifully, Carolina was the perfect antidote for whatever the Washington capital brought

to these playoffs, which was, I mean, let's be honest, it was high octane, high scoring, high offense. And the Washington capitals had a nightmare of a time. Now everyone will point to the goal total, seven goals, and everyone will point to the low shot totals. But if you want to go like take a deeper look at it, they couldn't even get the offensive zone. Like they could not fight through Carolina's tight checking system.

And Spencer Carberry mentioned this in game one, and then he mentioned it throughout the series. He's like, we are working so incredibly hard just to get set up in the offensive zone to do what we want to do. Nevermind trying to beat Freddie Anderson or trying to muster shots on goal. Like they just couldn't get set up. Um, Alexander Ovech, after a very productive first round against Montreal, was kind of an afterthought in this series.

If you look at his time on ice, there was a couple games where it was relatively low for the NHL's all-time leading goal scorer. At the end of the day, their style ran up against the defensive system that they just couldn't break. The Carolina Hurricanes have won nine playoff series in the last seven years. This is what they do. It's pretty impressive, man. This is their third conference final in the last seven years, but they still haven't gotten

over the hump. And it looks like there's still a chance Leafs fans, but it looks like they're going to get Florida. But Florida's played a lot of hockey in the last few years. I mean, Carolina has too, but not as much as Florida. Florida has been back to back Stanley Cup finals. And so I was thinking, if Carolina gets to the Stanley Cup final, you could have some pretty interesting storylines there, even though it

will be Carolina in the Stanley Cup final. Because if they face the Oilers, I think the storyline is not so much like it's a rematch of the Stanley Cup final in 2006, but it's defense, offense. Yep. You know, I know Conor, I don't want to get Conor McDavid upset because he was a little

upset the other day when someone questioned the Oilers defensive ability, but, and they can't check when they want. But I think when you look at the Oilers, you're like, that's a crazy offense. And when you look at Carolina, you go, that's a crazy stifling system, defensive system. Well, Washington just found out.

Yeah. Now the other entertaining storyline could be Carolina versus Dallas in the Stanley cup final. And if it's Carolina, Winnipeg, it would be ratings poison for ESPN. Say all the network executives. There is a game tonight, by the way, the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Florida Panthers and I bring this up because I want to turn

everyone's attention to an article that our good buddy Justin Bourne, you see him on the broadcast, Fan 590, real Kipper and Bourne. One of the most accurate and thought provoking pieces on the Marner Matthews discussion that I've ever read. And I like reading born stuff in particular, because he's got that playing and coaching

background, but he also grew up in the, uh, the blogging era like you and I did. So his writing style is very good writer. Um, and it talks about Marner and Matthews and the absence of greatness in big games. And it really gets down to the crux of you're going to have two players, one of whom's legacy might be defined tonight in Marner because he, this might be the last game that he plays for the Leafs. And it's going gonna be defined by

uncanny ability to go into big games and always be flat. Always be second best. Not occasionally, always. And he brings up this great point that this Florida series isn't really the barometer for these guys because Florida is a really good team and you could make the argument the floor is just flat out better than the Leafs and that's what's happening right now is the better team is beating an inferior team so he brings up sorry just to come to that point he brings up the time that they got beat by Philip Deneau or the time that they

couldn't beat Eunice Corpusalo or the time that Pierre-Luc Dubois dominated them. And it's those moments where it's like the moment required greatness. And the frustrating part is they know greatness is in them because we've seen it during the regular season. But in those moments where you need to summon it and you can't wait for it, they're never able to summon it. It's a really good piece. Go check it out. It's up at sportsnet.ca. So all of this is amidst rumors and reports. I know Chris Johnston wrote in the athletic that there's a growing sense that Mitch Marner would

like a fresh start with a different team this off season. And you're kind of like, it's the series is still going on. He... You know? So here's, I've set up what would be the best way for this series to end. OK.

Toronto goes into Florida, has the best game of the core four era. They beat Florida and then they come home and lose game seven. So. Get shut out at home in game seven. Yeah, imagine. Oh, it'd be delicious. How awesome that would be.

Glorious. Yeah, I think it'd be great. It would make my year. It would be a very befitting end to that particular era because, you know, we had Sam McKee on the show the other day, and he was talking about the Marner trajectory when he entered the league and it wasn't just the the talent and the type of player it was that London Knights Toronto

kid the organization screaming out for we need you know we want someone that was born and raised here and wanted to be a leaf and you know grew up in front of our eyes and there is a talent level that only a handful of players can touch at Marner has. Let's just we all acknowledge this, right? There's things that he can do on the ice that put him in a very rarefied air in terms of talent. And he's delivered during the regular season for this team, including this year, where he had one hundred and five points.

And yet he is generally disliked by a large section of their fan base. And what's more, in this era where everyone bends over to backwards to keep their superstars and do whatever they can to keep them, it seems as though that both sides are like, it's okay if this ends with you walking. Because it doesn't seem as though the Leafs, and I know they tried to trade them at the deadline, which was another huge sign to me about where they were at in terms of Marner's impact and legacy. If it does, I would love to see it end in a game seven collapse on home ice.

That would be beautiful. It'd be delicious. Be fattening. It would be. Especially if they play really well tonight. Um, did born and get into any ideas about why. Yeah. I mean, why does it happen?

Uh, a lot of it is. Okay. So here's one of the paragraphs right now. It's clear that in the big moments, when it's time to go nose to nose and say, you're best against my best, no gloves, no rules, hockey, Matthews and Marner simply aren't able to be in command of big games. They cannot summon a dominant level against a truly great or even good playoff team on command. The on command is the big one. That's what I keep coming back to. And I brought

this up yesterday in a playoff series. You don't have the luxury to wait for your game to click. If you're not feeling it or you're, you know, it's just not going right and it's not going your way, you don't have the luxury of time for it to snap back in. You have seven games. That's the way the sport was designed. That's the way the playoffs were built. And it's not changing.

They're not gonna make it a best of nine or best of 11 so that you can figure it out. Sports always comes down to moments. Right. And it's why, you know, there's there's an entire analytical drive that's largely predicated on bigger, larger sample sizes. And that's great, because over the course of 82 games, which does constitute the regular season, you need that. Would you say that the whole analytical movement?

One of the first questions that they were trying to answer is, does clutch exist? Like if you go back to Bill James. Probably, probably had somebody to do with it. Yeah. You know? And they kind of, I mean, at the time, the idea was everyone thought clutch exists. And then they're like, well, actually look at the numbers. It doesn't really.

But I think what- It's more timeliness. But what does exist is choking. Choking exists. And I think clutch, I've come to define clutch as being able to dominate in big games just like you can dominate in smaller games. Like not falling off. Sure. It's more like not, it's not raising your level. It's maintaining

your level in big games. Because I think a lot of people's understanding of clutch is that when there's a big moment needed, like Bourne said, you can summon it. And the analytical idea of clutch would be like, clutch is just simply timing. Like you just got what the probabilities we're going to give you at that moment. No, I think what clutch, what people think clutches is actually raising your level. So what I'm saying is like, it's not so much raising your level, it's maintaining your level. Yeah. You know, and some people might push back and say like, well, then why does, you know, why was it, it was Sydney Crosby who

scored the big goal for Canada in 2010. And it was Connor McDavid that scored the big goal at the four nations. Like, why did those guys always have their moments? It's like, well, those guys play, you know, well, Connor McDavid, that was actually his first real, well, no, he played in the Stanley Cup final. But like those guys playing a lot of big games. So they don't score the big goal in all those games, but you can expect that they'll do it sometimes.

And I think that's the thing with Marner and Matthews, they scored or assisted on a lot of goals in Leaf's history. But you're like, and I think it was, who was it? I think it was Sam McKee was like, they don't have like their imprint on a game, you know, where you're like, oh yeah, that was the game. You know, from a Canucks memory, I'm kind of like, you know, like when Ryan Kessler dominated Nashville. That one comes to mind, like when Ryan Kessler dominated Nashville. Yep. Like that one comes to mind.

That was the Kessler series. Yep. Do Marner and Matthews have one of those? No, and Marner probably won't in his entire Leafs career. Okay. Uh, we got to go to break when we come back. AJ, Adnan Virk and Moj, that's the seven o'clock hour. You're listening to the Haliford and Brev show on Sportsnet.

650. It has been so wet. It's like when mud gets on your ball.