Halford & Brough in the Morning - Is The Book Out On Silovs?

Episode Date: October 10, 2024

In hour one, Mike & Jason look back at the previous day in sports (3:00), they talk yesterday's season opening loss to the Flames (6:00), plus the boys get some reaction from the listeners and look elsewhere around the NHL (27:00). 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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Good morning, Vancouver. Six o'clock on a Thursday. Happy Thursday, everybody. It is Halford. It is Brough. It is Sportsnet 650. We are coming to you live from the Kintex Studios, the beautiful Fairview Slopes in Vancouver. Jason, good morning.

Good morning. Hey, dawg. Good morning to you. Good morning. Laddie, good morning to you as well. Hello, hello. Halford and Brough in the morning is brought to you by Vancouver Honda, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers.

They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything you're looking for. Sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in hour one of the program. Hour one is brought to you by Northstar Metal Recycling. Vancouver's premier metal recycler pays the highest prices on scrap metal. Northstar Metal Recycling, they recycle, you get paid. Visit them at 1170 Powell Street in Vancouver.

We are coming to you live from the Kintec studio. Kintec, Canada's favorite orthotics provider, powered by thousands of five-star Google reviews, sore feet. What are you waiting for? Kintec. We've got so much to get into on today's show. For those of you

mourning, waking up this morning, in mourning, because the Canucks lost a hockey game. Fear not. Sports is going to get you through today. We got a very, very nice sports day on the horizon. There are nine hockey games. There are two playoff baseball games and Thursday night football.

When whatever is left of the Seattle Seahawks defense is going to take on the San Francisco 49ers. So that's nice. Nature is healing. They got some injuries still? They got a lot of injuries on defense. Yeah. It's like, I think maybe you and I are going to be starting at safety. Let's go get them tonight, bud.

I think people still want to talk about the Canucks game last night, with all due respect to, let's put it behind us and watch the Seahawks. No, no. Not put it behind us. Just understand nature is healingks. No, no, not put it behind us. Just understand. We have so many texts into the Dunbar lumber text line, six 50, six 50.

I almost don't want to share the number. Don't do it. It's too many numbers. Too late. Uh, text in on the Dunbar lumber text line, the bridge street, Dunbar lumber and Ladner has moved to progress way in Tilbury's industrial

park. More room, more product, more awesome details at Dun DunbarLumber.com. We've got the whole first hour to talk about last night's game. An entire hour. So we'll share our thoughts.

We'll share some audio from Rick Tockett and maybe some of the players, but we'll also read your text. Adnan's going to join us at 7. Talk a little baseball. Nick Shook at 7.30. We talk about the Seahawks game tonight against the 49ers and also what happened with Aaron Rodgers.

Well, he said he didn't have anything to do with it. And I believe him. Robert Sala. I never know how to say his name. Sala? Sala? Sala? Salad?

He's gone. He's not the head coach of the New York Jets anymore. Robert, you don't work here anymore. And then not the head coach of the New York Jets anymore. It's Robert. You don't work here anymore. And then Thomas Drance will join us at 8 o'clock. I just did the guest rundown, and now we're going to do What Happened. Hey, did you guys see the game last night?

No. What happened? I missed all the action because I was busy. We know how busy your life can be. What happened? You missed that? What happened? You missed that? 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. For 20 minutes, everything was going great for the Vancouver Canucks yesterday in their season opener against the Calgary Flames. But then the second and third periods in overtime happened. And in overtime, it was Conor Zari. You can only hope to contain Conor Zari. 133 into overtime. He's a good little player. Not bad.

No, he is a good little player. Conor Zari scored with just 90 seconds gone in overtime. Calgary storms back from deficits of 3-0 and 4-1 to win 6-5 in their season opener in Vancouver on Wednesday night at Rogers Arena. Yeah, like you were saying, it looked great after 20 minutes. We were all crowing about the Alberta teams getting crushed. Well, the Winnipeg Jets kept up their end of the bargain and did crush the Edmonton Oilers. I think it was 6-0 the final. The Canucks were leading 4-1 at the end of the first period and had outshot the Flames 15-5.

It looked like the Flames were more interested in getting back at JT Miller than they were at playing hockey, and the Canucks took advantage. But then the Canucks took their foot off the gas. The Flames got their fight out of JT Miller. And the Flames started playing hockey. Four straight goals later. And it was 5-4.

Was Seeloff's good, some of you may ask? He was not. Was it all his fault? It was not. It was a team effort where they just stopped playing hockey. And Rick Tockett said it looked like a year and a half ago hockey. And that is the type of hockey where they blew a bunch of leads. To their credit, I suppose the Canucks did tie it late and forced overtime.

But as mentioned, that's when Connor Zeri undressed Philip Hronik and slipped it past Seelovs for the win. Let's just go through a list of players that we need to discuss. And I think it starts with the goalie, Archer Seelovs. I mean, the guy allowed, what, six goals on 25 shots. That's not good. The worst one was Wieger's point shot that tied it at four. We are obviously going to see Kevin Lankanen on Friday when the Canucks host the Philadelphia Flyers,

but that was a concerning performance by Seelovs. Now, before anyone texts in and says, yeah, but the Canucks weren't very good in front of them, in front of them, no, they weren't. On the fifth goal, there's like two flames in the crease and nobody pushing any of the flames out of the way. You know, Soucy did not battle Huberto hard

enough. Nope. And in the crease, in those areas, didn't box out and boxing out is one of the things that the Canucks were working on. Soucy just more or less allows Huberto to gain position right on top of Seelovs, and he bangs it home. I'm not going to put that on Seelovs.

I'm going to put that on the guys in front of him. But Seelovs, the things that concerned us about him in the playoffs last year, despite the fact that we were all very impressed with him in the playoffs last year, the long point shots, there is clearly a book on Silas, and that is, I don't know, shoot from far away on him? I don't know. Shoot from distance.

The one that Wieger beat him on was, was i mean it was crazy because it wasn't even like a big time screen or anything like he just i don't know he just i don't know if he lost his net on it he just further away the flames shoot the more yeah yeah it's it was their expected goals goes up like they'll be at their own red line next time and see loves be like oh my lord yeah farsighted or yeah i i don't. I don't know what you saw in that one, Laddie, but it was just like, I didn't think he was screened. It's not like, you know, we've been talking about how he sometimes has trouble finding the puck and looking the right way around defenders and the traffic in front of him.

There was really none of that. It just beat him clean. Yeah. The stuff you're talking about is stuff that usually takes a little bit of time to develop where you're using landmarks on the ice to know where to look and when to look at certain times but this wasn't that this was completely it's like you just didn't track it at all and it just went in and it just like laser beamed past yeah just diluted them it was uh it good. And then, so sometimes I think we have to take a step back and think about what would have been best for Seelovs this season

if Demko was still healthy. Now, a lot of people would have said, well, he'd be the backup to Demko. I don't know if that was entirely the plan. Maybe it was going to be Lankanen all along. Well, maybe it was going to be Patera and Seelov sharing that job, or maybe they were going to bring in another guy like they brought in to Smith last season.

You know, Seelov does not require waivers and he hasn't played many games in the NHL. Right. Like he just, he's not old. It's not like you're looking at his age and going, well, it's now or never NHL. Right. Like he just, he's not old. It's not like you're looking at his age and going, well, it's now or never for him. Right. He's still a very young goalie and there's a

goalie's progress is not always linear and he still had some things to work on as we saw in the playoffs. The Canucks ideally might've wanted him to see him like play a bunch of games in the AHL this season but they aren't in the position where they can do that with Thatcher Demko being out right now and they're not gonna rush Thatcher

Demko back hopefully and Kevin Lankanen will hopefully provide them with something and Seeloffs can bounce back it's one it's one game the team wasn't good but I don't think that was a very auspicious, a good word to use that. It was inauspicious. It was inauspicious.

It was his 10th regular season game, which matches the amount of playoff games that he appeared in last year, which is kind of an interesting stat. I don't know whether it says too much or not. That, to me, was the most concerning of everything that happened last night. Cause I feel like you can clean up a lot of the stuff. Rick talk. It alluded to this multiple times in his post game remarks.

You can clean up a lot of the coverage and the D zone stuff. And worst comes to worst, you can always just fall back on being a real low event team and make it low event hockey. And you can clean up exciting. Yeah. Right. But you can clean up the X's and O's and where you want guys to be on the ice the biggest issue with silavs right now is the problem that he had

in the past tracking pucks is still the problem that he has in the present tracking pugs like that's i don't know if it's his achilles heel or the book is out or it's his weakness but it's obviously something that he's got problems with because he's not, I mean, if he didn't have that problem, he would have been a higher, more elite-level goalie. Well, yeah, if he doesn't figure this out, then that severely limits what his ceiling could be as a goaltender. Or you don't figure it out, and that's just who you are as a goalie. Like, I've got a weak spot, and the weak spots are shots from 35 feet or deeper.

Let's talk a little bit about JT Miller. He had a very busy night and a very busy first period with a big hit on Kevin Rooney that hurt Kevin Rooney, unfortunately. He also had a bad giveaway that led directly to a flame shorthanded goal. He had a nice assist on a Brock Besser power play goal. And finally, he had a fight because of that hit on Kevin Rooney. It was textbook JT Miller, gunslinging JT Miller out there. Another textbook moment in the third when it looked like his reckless cross-ice pass would lead to a Calgary empty netter. But Quinn Hughes was there to save the day.

Quinn Hughes had another incredible game. And Miller made up for his mistake with that booming slapper to tie the game at five. And the JT Miller chance rang out at Rogers Arena, this time at a good time. Not when Kevin Rooney was hurt. That was a tough look. That was a tough look.

But it was a classic JT Miller night. He was in it. He was prominent. The Flames really wanted to, they were like mad at him right away. And really so. He had the Flames unglued for the first time. And Miller, there was nothing dirty about it, but you know, that's called, honestly, that's playing through

people. And that's exactly what he did. And Kevin Rooney was in an awkward position and I hope he's okay. And JT Miller said afterwards, he's a good guy. I hope he's okay. That's high collision hockey when JT Miller's out on the ice. That's what happens. Things happen when JT Miller's out on the ice. Most of them have been good. Some of them not so good. There were some loose passes. And I think loose is just the best way to describe the way the Canucks played.

And I'm sure Rick Talkett is thinking thinking have I asked them to do too much? Have I asked them to change their game too much? Because we've talked about this the natural progression of the Canucks under Talkett. He came in under Bruce Boudreau and he said listen we got to clean a lot of stuff up. He calls it river hockey. We don't want to be playing river hockey out there. So you remember that first practice he came in or one of the first practices, he's moving them around like they're eight-year-olds out there who have no idea where to be on the ice,

blows his whistle. All right, make a pass. Okay, all right, good, good. Now is everyone in the right position? I mean, it was interesting to watch, but then the Canucks structure saved the day. And it was a big reason why they had such success last season, but they get into the playoffs and they realize, okay, we need more than structure and we need to attack more and we need to move the puck more aggressively up the ice.

So that's what they work on in training camp. And the whole time we're like, don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. Yeah. And the baby got thrown out with the bath water last night. So they got to dial it back a little bit. So the Miller thing. Yeah. Like you pointed out a couple of times that the turnover on the man, the goal, the breakaway

that made it three, one, I actually didn't hate the idea the pass because the power play, I think it was the deflected pass that fell to Miller and he was trying to get it back to Hughes so that Hughes could get a point shot through, right? The problem was that the pass went to Anthony Mantha. Yeah, because he was coming out of the box. Right. It was a nice play, but

it was a beautiful goal by Mantha. Yeah, and I didn't hate the idea of trying to get it back to Hughes because that's a good guy to get the puck to. Yeah, but you've got to be aware of guys coming out of the box. But I think maybe it was a microcosm of the sort of loose hockey that they were playing, and they've developed new terminology. It's not river hockey anymore. Now it's summer hockey.

Oh, right, right, right. Summer hockey. We've got the audio from JT Miller talking about how they played too loose and how they had too much summer hockey last night. Here was a very busy individual, JT Miller, following a 6-5 overtime loss to the Flames on Wednesday. We don't win any battles. We just play loose, like summer hockey.

And this is good for us. At the end of the day, it's game one. Last year we won 8-1, and we're going to say the same thing going into the next game. We've got to turn the page. But we need to learn and raise our intensity. That's a team over there that wanted to win more than we did today. And without the power play, you know, they all played us.

So I also want to focus on, one, when you're talking about Talk It, and, you know, have we strayed too far from our principles? And have we moved too far off our landmarks? And, you know, is it too loose? Are we playing too much summer hockey and not enough autumn hockey? He mentioned something last night and he called it,

all these like phrases. You mentioned it already. He called it year and a half ago hockey. And I thought that was very telling for a variety of reasons. Because one, Bruce is like, hey, that game, okay, you know what? That game last night was a Boudreaux game. Total Boudreaux game. It was like telling for a variety of reasons. Because one. Bruce is like, hey. Okay, you know what?

That game last night was a Boudreaux game. Total Boudreaux game. It was like last four wins. It was 6-5, 7-6, whatever. It also featured another staple of the Boudreaux era, lousy goaltending. That was another part of it. I know that the Canucks didn't play well last night. I know that structurally it was weak.

And you're right to call out Soucy for not covering on the Huberto goal, and I think a lot of people rightly complained about the Forbort and Desjardins pairing. All that said, I'm not 100% sure that the Canucks in front of C. Loves were six goals against Calgary bad. Do you know what I mean? Like, you can play poorly, but letting a pretty mediocre Calgary team score six times.

I just think a lot of that falls on goaltending because if you look at where the shots were coming from, I didn't, when I was watching that game, I'm like Calgary scores, Calgary scores, Calgary scores. And then quietly to myself,

cause I was watching by myself. I said, these don't feel like high danger chances. It doesn't feel like Calgary's either tilted the ice or is getting great A's or anything like that. They're kind of grinding away and they're getting pucks on that, but it wasn't awful. My major concern right now is the goalie position.

And I know it's one game, and yes, he can bounce back, but I think maybe we were all pretty comfortable saying things are going to be fine without Demko because Seeloff's had such a very impressive playoff. What we were saying yesterday. We barely even talked about the goaltending. Right. And, you know, it's funny because I went back and looked at some of the stuff we were saying prior to last season. Like, what are the big differences from last season to this season? One of them was this team goes as far as Demko takes them.

There's a reason that he's Vezna caliber. There's a reason that he's so good and so valuable. And I think part of it might be is that maybe it's the saves you take for granted. And maybe it's the saves that he makes that either he makes look easy or just aren't a concern. So I, again, I don't want to overreact one game in either. Nobody's going to overreact on this show. Someone just told us to relax. I'm like, we are as relaxed as it gets.

How do you feel about the defense outside of Hughes' line? I mean, I think those things can be corrected. Here's the thing. Goaltending for head coaches oftentimes is, eh, let the goalie coach figure it out. They don't know what to do, right? Kaka doesn't know what to do with Seelovs. He's got Marco Terranius there.

Marco Terranius right now is probably like, pfft. I don't know, man. But Adog, I think it's worth monitoring. The defense worries me almost as much as the goaltending, if I'm being honest. Like, outside of the Hughes pairing, I don't know,

pairs two and three are a little rough. Yeah, Soucy did not have a good night last night. He needs to be better. And then the bottom pair, you can say that they're good penalty killers, Darnay and Forbert, but there was a reason Darnay was scratched out of the playoffs at times last year for the Oilers. Sometimes it gets a little fast for him. To answer your question.

He's a project, though. He's a project, though, but not all projects work out, right? You know, we'll see. This might be something that the Canucks have to address with all this cap space that they're accruing. I'm sure it will be. But it's, but, but, but, you know, I do want to talk about some other players here. Brock Besser, two goals in the first, both essentially on the power play. The power play just ran out on one of them. Well on his way to 50. I loved the second one, especially when he helped keep possession

before heading to the net to shovel home Miller's pass. Keeping pucks alive is such an underrated part on the power play because if you're not keeping pucks alive, you're going to be one and done way too many times on the power play. First one wasn't bad either because they actually worked it down low. Petey worked it down low to DeBrusque who fed Besser for the one-timer in the slot and he finished it off. Besser had a good chance in overtime too.

Yep. Could have made the hattie, hat trick to win the game. We would have been feeling pretty different about the game this morning. Connor Garland, I absolutely loved his goal to make it 3-0. Took a big hit to start the rush and get the puck out of the Canucks end. I think he told his D partner, not his D partner, but the D man out there. He's like, don't worry. I'm okay.

It's hockey. Sometimes you get hit. He picked himself up, got down the ice to bang home a loose puck. Terrific play. And then at that point I was like, well, it's going to be a blow out of the flames. It's three nothing. Party time.

Daniel Sprong, the most interesting player in the world, according to Mike Halford. I love Daniel Sprong. Scored the game opener. We got a real Daniel Sprung experience last night. He scored the game opener with a second left in the power play. Nice little snipe, which is kind of what he does. The second unit might actually be a factor this season,

but Sprung, whose line looked a little bit lost in their own end on Calgary's second goal, also got replaced by Sherwood in the third with the Canucks protecting a one goal lead. Yeah, Sherwood got the old double shift there. So it was kind of the full Daniel Sprong story on Wednesday where you like the fact that he can score and he's got a great shot, but Tuck doesn't trust him.

Not yet. Not yet. And I think he only got three or four shifts in the third period. A lot of text in about Petey. And believe me, I'm never loathe to talk about him, but. Yeah, when are you going to talk about Petey,

man? I didn't think he was really close to the number one story last night. He picked up an assist. He drew a penalty, stuck up for DeBrusque. Overall, he wasn't that effective. I'm not saying he had a good game. He didn't. He was far from dominant.

I just don't look at him and be like, that game was his fault. But I understand. I understand the people that were kind of hoping, okay, he's had the summer. He's healthy. He's able to reset himself. And he's going to come firing out of the gates. He's going to be back to dominant PD.

He wasn't. He didn't look that different from the PD we saw down the stretch into the playoffs. Yeah, it just wasn't the... I'm honestly not going to spend much time talking about it. Because it wasn't one of the storylines from last night, right? He played 23 minutes. He got an assist.

He's on pace for 82 points. And he was just sort of there, right? Now, again, I think the same thing applies to last season if we start seeing this over the course of five games 10 games month of october then it's like okay now like houston we have a problem because remember he was out there uh with the line mates and i know that sprung got moved off late but um he was out there in all the situations that you would expect. Petey played a ton. Yeah, he played a ton.

He played like 23 minutes or something. Yeah, he was almost up around 24. I think the only guy that played more was Quinn Hughes. Yeah, I mean, he played a lot. He was out there a lot. But if you're looking for storylines from last night, there are a lot that we just put at the top of the ledger that weren't Elias Pettersson. So we're just about coming in on the top of the ledger that weren't alias petterson uh so we're

just about coming in on the close of the first half hour of the show uh second half hour i suppose we can wade into the abyss that is the dunbar lumber text message in basket i you know what i shouldn't i shouldn't talk ill i should not speak ill because it's 6 23 in the morning and people are texting like crazy. Like, you guys are passionate. You want to talk about this. You've been waiting all summer and the early parts of the fall for the start of hockey season. It's here.

And it was a very eventful game. 6-5 in overtime. There's a lot of talking points. So we will weigh in on some of your talking points on the other side. We can go through some of the other players. Still got a couple talk clips that I want to get through. And we'll maybe touch on some of the other games from last night because comparatively speaking when you talk about potential stanley cup contenders the canucks had a fine night compared to edmonton and colorado they were fine compared to how bad it got for

edmonton and colorado how do you think sid is feeling about his contract extension after game one like just that was a real tough start. That was in Pittsburgh, too, wasn't it? Yep. It was. We suck. We're bad. They lost.

Where's Gensel? Oh, God. 6-0 to the New York Rangers yesterday in their opener. He's got a good backup plan. And I hope it involves Vancouver. So, obviously, we've got a lot to get into. Tons more Canucks talk to come. Thomas Drance is going to join us at 8 to talk about it as well.

Lots of hockey talk. We are right in the thick of the best time of the year. Sports and hockey. Vancouver Canucks talk coming up next on the Alfred and Brough Show on Sportsnet 650. It's Canucks Central with Dan Riccio and Satyar Shah, your destination for everything Canucks. Exclusive interviews, inside info,

and even the postgame show. Listen 4-6 p.m. weekdays and on demand through your favorite podcast app. Kadri wins it to Wieger. High slot quick shot. He scores! McKenzie Wieger with the wrister right off the faceoff. Ties the game at four. Kadri didn't give up.

Put their work boots on, and that's when you've got to do the same. So, am I surprised? No. I mean, you know, they worked hard. We just didn't match their effort. Like I said, it's one game. 631 on a Thursday. Happy Thursday

everybody. Halford Brough, Sportsnet 650. That was Rick Totkin. In the wake, the aftermath of Vancouver's 6-5 loss in overtime to the Calgary Flames in both teams' season opener Wednesday night at Rogers Arena. You are listening to the Halford and Brough Show

on Sportsnet 650. Halford and Brough in the morning is brought to you by Vancouver Honda, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything you're looking for, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff

that can help with anything you're looking for, sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in hour one of the program. It's an hour of uninterrupted Halford and Brough. No guests, no jumping around subjects. It's Halford, Brough, Canucks, first hour. Hour one of this program 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. 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 in Vancouver. So the Canucks have only played one game of their 82-game schedule. There are 81 more to go. That's the math. Next one is on Friday against the Philadelphia Flyers at Rogers Arena.

And then they head out to Florida, which could be interesting. Terrible damage from the hurricane. I know there were concerns about the water supply out there. They're supposed to be in Tampa on Tuesday. Hopefully they can make this trip. Hopefully they can play these games because that means that Tampa's able to clean up in that time. But we'll have to keep monitoring that.

I don't know all the ins and outs of all the hurricane damage, so I'm not going to speak on that today. But I think that's just something to keep in mind, that they're supposed to play the Tampa Bay Lightning in Tampa on Tuesday but let's talk about this um Flyers game on Friday because I think we will see some changes I think we could possibly well I think we will definitely see Kevin Lankanen in goal and um Rick Talk it kind of said that after the first two games which were expected to be split between Seelabs and Lankanen, after that it's whoever plays better is going to get the lion's share of the games.

Yeah, which is the right way to go about it. Yeah. So this is an opportunity for Kevin Lankanen to come in, calm down the market a little bit, calm down his team, make some good saves. I thought he looked good in the preseason. I know Rick Tockett was impressed with him overall. So that is definitely a change that we're going to see. I wonder if there might be another change. I wonder if we might see a guy like Noah Juleson come into the lineup for the Vancouver Canucks. He's the extra defenseman. Mark Friedman, of course,

was sent down to Abbotsford. So they'd have to call him back up if they wanted to put him into the lineup. Atu Ratu didn't play much last night, and I think if Pugh Suter is ready to go, I think they kept him out of the lineup last night because he wasn't quite 100%, even though he was practicing in a regular contact jersey, etc., etc. I wouldn't be surprised if Suter is back in the lineup. More of a veteran presence, good, reliable player. Get him into the lineup. I don't know if there'd be any other changes. I know he mentioned the possibility of calling up Baines

and putting him into the lineup, but I think the guy you'd probably take out is Nils Amon. I don't think Nils Amon played badly yesterday, and he's a part of the penalty kill. So I would guess that there would be two changes, Lankan in goal, Suter in for Ratu, and then maybe one on the back end. But I also think that they want to make these six work,

and they'll give them the chance to come back and play better against the Philadelphia Flyers. Yeah. I mean, you have to fit the jewels. It's funny. I laughed when he was saying that time about calming things down and then putting Noah Jules. Yeah,

true. Those things don't work at all. I don't know. I don't know if the outside of the shades you suggested. Yes. Outside of that, I think't know. I don't know if outside of the chase you suggested. Yes. Outside of that, I think talk it. If his postgame remarks were truthful and accurate, he's going to sit the team down and they're going to just clean stuff up.

Right. And there was a lot of things that you can point to net front stuff. He said, he said guys are basically five feet out of position all night, like wherever they needed to be. They were too far off. And that's the reason that Calgary was afforded the time and space to do the things that they wanted to do. He mentioned about the wingers needing to get out to the points quicker to

shut down point point shots, which I think was the closest thing that he had to a direct shot at what he loves was dealing with last night. Cause when he was asked specifically about see loves talk it and this is why Rick talk it's the coach of the year and a smart man if you don't ever want

to talk about something in a postgame presser just say you haven't seen it yet right questionable hits sky goes knee-on-knee goalie looks like trash just say I got to go look at

the tape I haven't seen it yet or a guy gets hurt and you know that he's injured but you don't want to say anything I got to go look at the tape. I haven't seen it yet. Or a guy gets hurt and you know that he's injured, but you don't want to say anything. I got to go talk to the trainers, right? It's the easiest way. Easiest one with goalies is, I don't know goalies. I don't even understand.

I don't understand. I have to talk to the goalie. Yeah, I got to talk to the goalie coach. For example. It's like, this is like, I know English. I'm sorry. Yeah, that's what you do. I have to talk to my translator.

Okay. This is what, so this is, translator. Okay? Basically what goalie coaches are, we're translators for goalie speak. For the sake of everyone, just so you can hear it, Rick Tockett was asked a question about RDC loves following the 6-5 loss to Calgary last night. Prior

to this, Tockett did say, hey, we gave up six goals, that's a lot of goals, and he did say the thing about the point shots. But he was asked specifically about his goalie. This is how you handle goalie questions, folks. Rick Tuckett on RDC Loves. Yeah, I got to look at some of the goals. We'll talk to Marco.

Yeah. You know, that's something that you just continue to work on. You know, we'll work on that sort of stuff. I got to look at the goals. If, you know, he saw it, I can't right now know that. I can't. I just can't. The easiest joke is when Tuckett says, I got to look at the goals if he saw it. I can't right now know that. I can't. I just can't. The easiest joke here is when Target says,

I got to look at the goals. I'm like, yes, so does Seelov's. Womp. Womp. Come on. You all laughed at it before the show. You jerks. We just wanted to bury you.

You jerks. Okay, let's dive into the Dunbar-London text line. Okay, let's go. Let's go. Okay. So-London text line. Okay. Let's go. Because it is. Let's go. Okay. So I'm going to read two texts. Yep.

And they are both seemingly coming from a different point, but I also think they're both correct. Okay. It's about Petey, just so you're prepared. Let's go. The fact that Petey isn't a storyline after last night's game is the exact problem. Almost a $12 million player franchise center in a 6-5 home opener after playing 23 minutes should have more than one shot on goal.

He should be a factor. The problem is I didn't see him. Him being not noticeable is a problem. That's one. Okay. This is from Scott. Now it's what we learned, but I'll allow it. People who think Petey was the issue last night

want to complain about him. I think both things are true. Are both things true? I feel like both things are true. Both things are true. I think there's a lot of people waiting for game one of the season, and if Petey didn't perform at a super high level, his highest level, that they were going to jump all over him.

A lot of people probably thought it would be me. You know what? This is a good exercise that you're doing right now. This is important. He has become a very polarizing player. And like we see in politics, social media, there are tribes and there are camps. There is a protect PD at all costs camp. And there is also a bury this guy and get him out of the market camp.

Okay. And there is also a bury this guy and get him out of the market camp. Okay, so what's happened is last season and the way the second half of the year when the playoffs went for Petey, rightly or wrongly, has set the narrative tone for this season. You can't divorce what happened last season from this season. You can't. It's impossible, right? Because everything that he does now is predicated on bouncing back from how invisible he was at times last season. You can't. It's impossible, right? Because everything that he does now is predicated on bouncing back from how invisible he was at times last season. That's fair, right?

That's a fair and accurate assessment. Even Josephine, who hates our show now, can't argue with that. That's good sound logic. Oh, we lost Josephine? She might come back. We lost her again. Yeah.

Now, for example... Just flipped the radio on right now. They're talking about Petey again. It's unbelievable. Here's the thing. If you want to look at someone else that had a highly paid, very talented player that had an awful night last night, Connor McDavid had no shots and was minus two in 20 minutes

and a six nothing loss to Winnipeg. No one is going to call Connor McDavid to the carpet. And rightly so. Because he didn't have a three and a half month long prolonged funk last season right but with that in pd's past and in his history it makes the narrative arc i'll be dead honest it's really confusing at times because when brough was putting together the notes i don't think it was a conscious effort to have pd fifth or sixth on the list of things to talk about if i watched that game and that game existed in a vacuum that's where i would have put

him too but we've got countless people texting in this morning and being like uh-oh it's last year's pd it's playoff pd it's all that and i'm hesitant to do it i'm hesitant because i'm so i would be say the same thing you know it's it's one or whatever. But I'm also the guy that's saying, well, we saw all of Artie Seelov's warts on display in game one, and that's a concern. If I'm going to apply that logic to him, I would apply it to Pettersson. But I think when you say, if you come out and say on Pettersson, well, it's one game, it's not really true, is it? Because of what happened last season. Yeah. I don't know.

I don't know. I'm not looking forward to doing this every... I hope he can... Selfishly, I hope he can step up. Like, I agree he wasn't the story last night, but also a single Pedersen goal might have been the difference between a win and a loss, right?

So Petey just steps up his game for even five minutes, dominates for a few minutes, a shift even. Maybe it produces a goal. Maybe the Canucks get the win. This is what we talk about when we talk about highly paid players is when highly paid players underperform, the number that gets thrown out is their AAV,

and it's like that's what $11.6 million is getting you. That's never going to change. It'll always be like that. Here's the thing. There's something about him that some people just don't like, too. There's something about his style of play, his personality, that some people just don't like. And on the other hand, there's something about his style of play and his personality that some people just don't like. And on the other hand, there's something about his style

of play and his personality that people really like. He's an introvert. It's almost like he's polarizing. And some people relate to him, I think. Sure. But this isn't... And other people are just like, you don't win the cup with guys like that. This isn't a hell of a lot different than what Marner goes through

in Toronto, though. No. Every postseason. Exactly. 10.9 million for that? 10. Toronto, though. No. Every postseason. Exactly. $10.9 million for that? $10.9, $10.9. Now he's going to want even more when his next contract's coming up. It's the same thing. This is just... Doesn't show up in the playoffs. Yeah.

It's the... And there's something about Marner's personality, I think, that rubs certain people the wrong way. Yeah. I mean, it's just part of the deal when you become one of, if not the highest paid player on your team. It's like, well, who's going to pull us out of this? The guy that makes close to $12 million. Who's going to score the decisive goal?

The guy that makes all the money. But is that a fair expectation? It seems like a fair expectation to me. Probably not on a nightly basis, which is why guys like McDavid and Drysaddle was also like hot garbage last night. They get a pass. But I think there is

reason. I don't know if it's like, you know, it might be overstepping a little bit, but there is reason to be concerned because Pettersson finished last year in a funk and you want him out of that funk. It's not an uptown funk. So you mentioned the Oilers' performance against the Winnipeg Jets.

Final score was what? Winnipeg 6, Edmonton nothing? Yeah, so in their last two season openers, the Edmonton Oilers, who were like a goal away from winning the Stanley Cup last year, have been outscored 14-1. I don't know what it is with them in season openers. Maybe they just don't like it.

Well, we talked about them too. There was concern about their play during the preseason. They looked not interested. And a lot of their stars played a fair amount in the preseason. There was a story that Mark Spector wrote that Connor McDavid wanted to play. And we wondered if there would be a bit of a Stanley Cup final hangover for this team because I think it's really hard to go from the intensity of playing in the Stanley Cup final, especially at game seven,

which you cannot get a bigger game in the NHL than game seven for the Cup. And then you go back and you're like, oh, we've got to do all this again. We've got to go through the preseason and this is blah, blah, blah. And then regular season, game one, we're so far away from the playoffs. And, you know, it's a short summer too. You know, a guy like McDavid got married, lots happening for him in his life. And then, you know, you got to come back

and you got to get back to work. And it's like Rick Talkett says, like it doesn't get easier. It doesn't get easier for the Edmonton Oilers because they made it to the Stanley Cup final. In fact, it gets hard because now you've got an even bigger target on your head and you got to get to work.

And I think that's what the Canucks learned last night in the second and third period. Brock Besser said, we got too comfortable. Maybe the Oilers went into this game too comfortable. They're like, everyone's picking us to win the cup. And maybe the Canucks were thinking, wow. And a lot of people are basically saying like,

we're shooing to make the playoffs. We're up 4-1 on the Flames. We're dominating these guys. We're almost toying with them. They're all mad at JT Miller running around like a bunch of idiots out there. We're going to blow these guys out of the water. Well, you know, the other team has pretty good hockey players too.

And the Winnipeg Jets and the Calgary Flames, say what you will about the Flames, they are in a rebuild, but they got some good players. And some of those guys played really well. I mean, we made fun of the fact that they've got like, I was like, isn't he a tennis player? Like he looked pretty good last night. Good forehand.

He did have that 200 backhand, too. The biggest difference, so we mentioned this off the hop, like two other teams that have not just playoff aspirations, but cup aspirations, the Edmonton Oilers and the Colorado Avalanche had terrible nights last night, and the goalie red flag went up right away. Skinner got pulled for the Oilers. Calvin Pickard. Calvin Pickard. Calvin Pickard's sole purpose in life now, I think,

is to come in and give Stuart Skinner mental breaks. That's what he's all about. It's not to be the backup goalie. It's to come in so Stu can do a reset. Like Calvin Pickard is a human reset button. That's what he is. He's going to be playing in Bakersfield in a couple months, I think. You know?

And then in Colorado, Vegas, it was, I love that Alexander Georgiev's nickname is Forgiev. Forgiev. Because he lets in four goals a night. Yeah. But last night it was five. That's a great nickname.

That's the new red light rascal. Yeah, did himself. Oh, I remember that guy. Yeah. Now it's five. He went above and beyond yesterday. They lost 8-4 to Vegas. Now the only difference

between those two is that the Canucks had a subpar performance against a Calgary team that, let's be real, is not going to be in the playoffs at the end of the season. I'm sure I'll be eating crow on that one in February. But Edmonton got beat by a pretty good Winnipeg team that was 50 wins and 110 points last year. And Colorado got beat by, I don't think it's going to be a good Vegas team, but a by i don't think it's going to be a good vegas team but a lot of other people think it's going to be a good vegas team so similarities yes but also some differences as well and i think at the end of the day the canucks will say and you know what i want to play this audio again actually uh the rick talking audio where he talks about

year and a half ago hockey can we play that again This is off a Drance question where he said, hey, first 20 minutes of the game, it looks great. You guys are dominant in every facet. JT Miller has gotten so far under the flame skin that they spent the entire period trying to exact revenge, and you guys got a bunch of power plays. If you wrote up the first 20 minutes perfectly, the last 40 minutes were the exact opposite of that.

Here's what Rick Talkocant had to say talking about a year and a half ago hockey. Yeah, I mean, I'm not going to overact the first game. I mean, we were heavy in training camp of a lot of transitional and stuff. And I was a little worried about this because we got away from our identity.

I didn't think we won. The play without the puck was not good. I mean, that's a year and a half ago hockey. So, you know, it's only one game. Our identity, we got to be careful here because we are a good team without the puck was not good. I mean, that's a year and a half go hockey. So, you know, it's only one game. Our identity, we got to be careful here because we are a good team without the puck. And I thought we didn't protect the guts of the ice. Guys were swinging. You know, things like that does not win.

So, but like I said, it's the first game, you know, and, you know, and I, you know, I got to take a little bit of the blame because I was really heavy this year in training camp of the transitional and that. We did D-Zone drills, but not as much as we did last year. Now, like I said, it's one game. So I'm not going to – players know. They got to be in certain spots. They weren't – you know, if it's a trend for four or five games,

I'd be worried, but it's one game. And, you know, we'll sharpen up tomorrow. Picturing Taka going into the dressing room like, sorry, guys, guess it's my fault. four or five games, I'd be worried, but it's one game. We'll sharpen up tomorrow. Picturing Taka going into the dressing room like, sorry guys, I guess it's my fault. Should I practice a little more? Defense in training camp. How about Bruce Boudreau catching some straights? Wait a minute, a year and a half ago, hockey.

You're chanting my name in the stands. But yeah, it's exactly what it was. Last night, it was a Boudreau-era game. Did you watch the Leafs-Hab games? Yeah. That was actually for a 1- era game. Did you watch the Leafs have games? Yeah. That was, that was, that was actually a, for a one nothing game. It was quite entertaining.

Sam Montembeau standing on his head, shutting out the Leafs for the first time in a long time. I think the last time they were shut out was 2021. Yeah. Regular season and playoffs. The Leafs, the Leafs actually played pretty well, but my hot take is off to a better start than your hot take because my hot take is that the Leafs are in danger of missing the playoffs.

Yours was Vegas, and Vegas got a big win over Colorado. Not off to a good start. Although that's only results. I actually did think that Toronto played pretty well. Montembeau stood on his head. Actually, Stoller's played really well for the Leafs as well. It was a goaltending duel.

Goaltending is finally not the Leafs' problem. Now they can't score. Now it's back to our other problem, scoring when we need goals. Darn it. And we mentioned this off the top as we go around some of the other scores from last night.

If there's one team that should be freaking out about how their season is starting, it's the Pittsburgh Penguins, right? I mean, I know that everyone's going to say the same thing after one game. It's one game. And in Buffalo, it's two games and they were in Prague. They barely count.

But even though Buffalo's season got off to a bad start, the Pittsburgh Penguins losing 6-0 at home to the New York Rangers is not good in the slightest. There have got to be red flags all over Pittsburgh right now. I don't even, Mike Sullivan even tried to couch it a little bit. He's like, you know, it's one game and the result isn't what we wanted. But then he stopped, and he's like, but we are pretty disappointed with that.

To which I'm like, yeah, you lost 6-0 in your home opener. Like, it's not a good scene. It's not a good look. They're not a good team right now. I mean, losing, I know people were like, Rutger McGrory. He'll help them, but he's no Jake Hensel. No. He's no Jake Hensel.

He's Rutger McGroarty. And all these other guys, they're a year older. And even if we'll allow that, Sid is ageless. I don't think Gino is. I don't think Letang is, and I don't think Carlson is. I mean, you know, it was funny because we had Frank Cervalli, Vancouver's favorite Frank Cervalli, on the show yesterday. And we were going around asking about all these different teams

that were going to kick off the season last night. We asked about Pittsburgh. And he very astutely pointed out, he's like, they were slow last year. I don't know what metric he was pulling from, but they were in the bottom third of collective team speed. And then they went out in the offseason and seemingly might have gotten slower.

And I'm like, well, that's a rest. That's not a good recipe. And you look around and you see, like, the Canucks made efforts to get quicker. Teams, and you hear about people wanting to play at pace all the time. Like, we want to up the tempo. We want to play at pace. I just wonder if Pittsburgh is going to be unable to do it because so many of the guys that are eating up so much of the cap space are so old.

Yeah. And you just can't do it. Gino can't play at pace right now. No. Give me the puck. I'll hold on to it for a bit. Yeah, do a little meandering, right? The east-west stuff.

Kiss my breath. Yeah. I mean, I was reading a couple things from Penguin's Twitter last night. They were all over Letang for the way he was playing, too. And it's not their fault. These guys are old. But again, I don't want to overreact to any opening night scores,

but 6-0 at home to a team that you're trying to compete with to get back in the playoffs is a very bad scene for Pittsburgh. Mark at the office, did you hear Sullivan actually said the Penguins played year and a half ago Canucks hockey. Poor Bruce. He's catching strays from everywhere. Oh, man. and a half ago, Canucks hockey. Poor Bruce. He's catching strays from everywhere. Oh man.

Okay. We are going to take a few quick breaks from the hockey talk in the next hour. It'll just be a little quick breaks. We're going to talk to Adnan Virk about baseball. The New York Mets are off to the NLCS. Unbelievable, man. What an incredible turnaround for this team. And Mets-Yankees is still on the table.

It's a possibility the Mets are going to meet the winner of the Dodgers-Padres series, which is going to go to a fifth and final game. So we'll talk to Adnan a little bit about baseball. We can talk a little hockey with Adnan if we want as well. Nick Shook is going to join us at 7.30. Talk a little NFL. The Seahawks have a big game tonight.

Huge. Against the San Francisco 49ers. So if you thought you were going to get a night off the couch, get back on that couch. You'll watch that football game. The Seahawks still first place in the NFC West. Huge NFC West game tonight. They're 3-2. The Ninahawks still first place in the NFC West. Huge NFC West game tonight. They're three and two.

The Niners are two and three. So this is a big game for both teams. So we'll talk to Nick about that and also the New York Jets situation. But within that hour, after we talk to those guests, we will go into the Dunbar Lumber text line at 650-650 and read more of your texts, questions and comments about last night's Canucks game, a 6-5 OT loss to the Calgary

Flames at Rogers Arena. You're listening to the Halford & Brough Show on Sportsnet 650.