Halford & Brough in the Morning - The Best Of Halford And Brough 10/21/24

Episode Date: October 21, 2024

Mike & Jason look back at a busy weekend of sports, the boys chat about the Canucks D and if they'll keep going with Brannstrom on the third pair, plus they talk a big shutout road win over the Flyers on Saturday with NHL.com & In Goal Magazine's Kevin Woodley. 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.

You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. Whoa, wait a minute. Huh? Hold up. What? Oh, okay. Did we just lose the f***ing Canucks? You're listening to Halford & Brough.

And Vancouver picks up a second straight win. Kevin Lankanen stops all 26 Flyers shots for his fourth career shutout. Soto sends this one to center. That sends Thomas back. Still going back. He's at the wall. It's out of here. Juan Soto stops and celebrates in front of the Yankee dugout.

Let's take a look at this one. Oh, hit him in the butt. It hit him in the butt. Good morning, Vancouver. 6-0-1 on a Monday. Happy Monday, everybody. It is Alfred at his brough. It is Sportsnet 650. And we are coming to you live from the Kintec Studios

in beautiful Fairview Slopes in Vancouver. Jason, good morning. Good morning. Adog, good morning to you. Good morning. Laddy, good morning to you as well. Hello, hello.

Alfred and bruv of 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, be it sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in hour 1 of this program. Hour 1 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 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. Sorfy, what are you waiting for? Kintec. We got a lot to get into on the show today. Very busy weekend in the world of sports. Guest list begins at 6.30. Kyle Bukoskis is going to join us. Sportsnet NHL host, 32 Thoughts co-host.

Him and Freed get a couple of Canucks-related nuggets in the latest podcast that dropped early this morning. A lengthy bit about Elias Pettersson. We're going to play that in the first half hour of the program. Also, they go into a deep dive review on Freed's interview with Philip Hronik, not necessarily a media guy. Hronik sat down with Freed,

I believe it was during the European tour earlier this fall. So we'll talk to Kyle Bukowskis about all that at 6.30. 7 o'clock, Mike Tan here, our NFL insider from the two deep zone sub stack. We'll get into all this. There's only one undefeated team left in the NFL now. And I don't know how the Kansas City Chiefs are still undefeated. You know who's an undefeated quarterback? Big Russ.

Russell Wilson didn't start out too well. Started out awful. Mike pointed out very astutely in his article this week that he wrote overnight, obviously, that back in 2014, the Packers played the Seahawks in the NFC Championship. Remember that? Yeah, Aaron Rodgers versus Russell Wilson. If you had told me 10 years later

that they would be playing one another on Sunday night football for the Jets and the Steelers. But I'm like, what happened? Anyway. Does this annoy you,

Bruff, or are you happy for him now? No, it didn't annoy me. I think it's a good story. Okay.

I don't dislike the Steelers either. I think they've got some, I think it would be complicated if it came down to the Steelers are in

the Super Bowl with Russell Wilson. Then it would be a little complicated, down to the Steelers are in the Super Bowl with Russell Wilson then it would be a little complicated but no it doesn't. Complicated is a plain way of saying Ruff would be miserable. Complicated I mean I hate it. Russell's been humbled. Or at least he should have been.

Humbled in the way that he can be. He went through a lot and I feel like I won the breakup. Why does he wear his uniform all the time now? I don't know. He wears it when he's injured and not playing. He wears it at the podium. It's always game day.

He's an odd duck. Mr. Unlimited. 8 o'clock, Kevin Woodley, NHL.com, Ingle Magazine. We'll talk a bunch of Canucks with Kev and our new superstar goalie, Kevin. I call him Blankinen. Eh? Eh? I said he did there.

That's why you stole it from me. No, you had a worse one. Yes, you invented that, eh, Doug? You both stole it from a thousand people on the internet. It's actually from NHL.com. I think they used Blankinen. Anyway, Kevin Woodley, NHL.com. Here's a fun thing we're going to do all week.

We're giving away $100 White Spot gift cards all week. And what we're going to do at 8.30, get this, we're going to do callers. What? Not live on the air. Just in the show. And I can't actually see what the phone number is here because I've never used it. No, still can't see it. What is the phone number here? It's 60... Well, it looks like we have

our first caller. And I mean never because this is not a call-in show. It's 604 280 0650 280 0650 because this is not a call-in show. It's 604-280-0650. 280-0650. This is hilarious. And it's a 604 number. I've never had to even look up the number before.

You've got to blow dust off the receiver because it's never been picked up. Okay, so that's going to happen at 8.30. We'll shout it out throughout the show when we're going to do it. But very important. Andy's very adamant in mentioning that you can't have won anything from this station over the last 90 days. Correct.

That's more important than everything we've got on the show today. All the Canucks stuff. So don't call in if you've won in the last 90 days. Yes. Anyway, we're going to do that at 8.30. Dog, have you ever driven over the speed limit? Like, ever? A few kilometers. What, the wind blew you over the speed limit? Like, ever? A few kilometers.

What, the wind blew you over the speed kilometer? You're like, oh, God, and then you turned yourself in? Sorry that I wouldn't have followed the rules. Oh, my God. So, of course, we have a big show today, which features rules and regulations for a very, very minor contest we're doing at 8.30. We got a lot of other stuff to get to, though.

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?

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. Kevin Lankan had made 26 saves on 26 shots for the Vancouver Canucks in a 3-0 win against the Philadelphia Flyers at the good old Wells Fargo Center on Saturday for the Canucks' second straight victory in their second victory of the year.

As mentioned, it was Lankan's first shutout of the season, his fourth in the NHL, and earned him the new nickname, Kevin Blankman. Yeah, a really solid performance by the Canucks. It wasn't perfect. A couple sloppy moments. Lankanen had to make some saves, and they needed a little bit of luck too. But you know you're playing a good road game when the crowd starts booing the home team.

The Flyers, that was their season opener at home. It was their home opener. And the Flyers crowd was on the Flyers, that was their season opener at home. It was their home opener. And the Flyers crowd was on the Flyers pretty early, especially when the Canucks were killing penalties. The Flyers' power play did not look good. And that power play had actually been improved so far this season. And the Canucks' PK continues to play pretty well. Again, the Flyers fans weren't happy, and it was the way the Canucks were continues to play pretty well. Again, the Flyers fans weren't happy

and it was the way the Canucks were shutting down Philly's attack that had a lot to do with it. They played a few shifts in Philly's zone and they just like passing it around and killing time off the clock. So the Canucks, two wins in a row now and they'll hope to finish their four game road trip on a high Tuesday in Chicago.

Let's go through some players here because we should start with Tyler Myers. He played his thousandth game in the NHL. And he picked up a kind of pretty neat assist on Brock Besser's goal in the process. He goes behind his back to Besser, who scores again. It looked, remember, a couple games, like Myers would miss significant time with an injury, but the Canucks, to put it in Rick Tockett's words, dodged a bullet with that, and thank goodness for that. Myers also logged a team high 22-30 on the night with almost four minutes on a PK that went three for three. Myers is one of a handful of Canucks who've gone from a real

target for criticism to practically like an indispensable member of the team under this coaching staff. We're all worried when Myers looked like he would be lost for a few weeks. I don't know what happened on that. It looked like he hyperextended his leg, but I guess there was no damage done and he was just able to come back and miss a few days, get back to practice and get back to work. And now he's leading the connection in his time. Now, I don't know if this is,

I don't think it's ideal that Myers plays 22, 30 every night. I think one of the keys for Myers under this coaching staff is that, well, two, there's number one, they've simplified his game and he needed his game to be simplified. And also they've kept his ice time down, but that game against the Flyers was an exception because the Canucks had built a multi-goal lead. And by the end of it, it was kind of like, all right, time to give Quinn Hughes a bit of a break because he doesn't need to be playing 27, 28 minutes every night. So they were able to rest him a little bit.

And I just thought it was an overall solid performance for Tyler Myers in his 1,000th game, and you could tell how popular he was in the room based on the way that people talked about him. They made funny shirts for him. And, yeah, he was the star of the day. Also, I do want to carve out a moment here to talk about the piece that Ian McIntyre wrote about Tyler Myers over the weekend.

And I'm not sure a lot of people know the story about the very difficult childbirth involving his son, Tristan, who was part of the video that they played prior to Tyler Myers 1000's game I don't really want to spoil the article or try and like paraphrase it on the radio I would mostly encourage all of you to go to sportsnet.ca and check it out

iMac did a great job with it it really sort of underscores this very emotional story that Tyler Myers has but also you get the sense of as you were just saying like how beloved he is by his teammates he's one of those guys, right? He wanted to be here.

That's why he signed the extension. The guys really appreciate what he brings to the table, I think especially from a physical standpoint and especially in the playoffs. He's a veteran. He's extremely well-liked, and that was a very good performance by him on Saturday in Philadelphia. Kevin Lankanen, arguably the Canucks MVP so far.

I would say so. He could make a case for Quinn Hughes as well. JT Miller scored some big goals, but Lankanen is 2-0-1 with a 9.53 save percentage. I don't think you'd expect any better from Thatcher Demko. If Thatcher Demko gave you 2-0-1 with a 9.53 save percentage in his first three starts, he'd be like, yeah, he's one of the best. That's

what he does. It's a small sample size with Lankanen, especially with the Canucks, but he's been incredible. And we're going to talk to Kevin Woodley later in the show, and Kev was talking him up all summer. And he was saying like, this is a guy that's a good goalie, and he doesn't have a home right now, and the Canucks eventually waited him out, and we're finding out that Kevin Lankanen is indeed a pretty good goalie.

I'd be shocked if he didn't start Tuesday in Chicago. I know Rick Tockett has wanted to go back and forth with his goalies a little bit, but the Canucks should be noted, don't have a back-to-back until mid-November, at which point we should have some more news on Thatcher Demko, either good or bad. I realize that Tuckett won't want Artie Silovs to sit on the bench for too long. That's not ideal for him, but Lankanen has clearly outplayed Sileloff so far. And if we're talking about the need to get some wins, you've got to give Lankanen – you don't want to overplay them,

but they won't. I mean, Sunday was a day off. Today is – they don't have a game today, so two days rest between games. I can't see why they wouldn't go back to Lankanen against Chicago to try and finish this four-game road trip off on a high. So after the Philadelphia game, Tockett was asked about who's going to start the next game,

and he obviously played coy about it. I think the more interesting post-game remarks from Tockett about his goaltending were how much praise he had for Lankanen compared to the remarks he had for Seelovs after the first two games. He didn't try and sugarcoat what happened to Seelovs, especially after the Calgary game. But even after the Tampa game,

I noticed that it was just sort of like, he's fine. I don't think he loved the second goal that Seelovs gave up. Remember, it was a drop pass from Gensel to Braden Point. The whole Canucks team was backing up, but that also included Seelovs, who looked like he was backing up into his goal there. Well, more about what, and that's true. That's exactly what it looked like.

And that is interesting because I think Talkett is more about, like, vibes and eye test when it comes to goalies, as opposed to the individual movements and everything. Just kind of said, like, Lankanen's just more steady when we're running around on our end, as opposed to Seeloff's. Here's what he had to say in full.

Rick Talkett following the Flyers game on Saturday. Listen, you know, we got good goaltending here, but it's still early and he's put three good games for it together and he just looks really solid. Even when we were panicking, I shouldn't say

we were panicking, but even when we were running around a little bit he was in his net. He looked big in his net. He looked big in his net. Like he wasn't flip-flopping all over. You know, he was just really steady. Laddie loves that. He looked big, Laddie. He was playing big.

He wasn't just flopping around everywhere. He was looking good. You know exactly what he's saying. He's like, he was backing up. He looked small. He's flopping around. Not this guy. Yeah.

That was the problem with Seelov's on that second goal. Too much flipping. Small in his net. So one thing to watch for today when the Canucks practice in Chicago is whether or not JT Miller will be there. Don't panic if he's not. I don't expect him to be there because Miller hurt himself on the opening faceoff. Actually went down the hallway

and looked like he was going to the room right off the opening face-off. Actually went down the hallway and looked like he was going to the room right off the opening face-off. I'm not exactly sure what he did, if he jammed one of his wrists or something, but he came back into the game and he continued to play, but he wasn't taking any face-offs. So you know he's dealing with something there.

So obviously something to monitor. There's been no indication that he's going to miss Tuesday's game against the Chicago Blackhawks, but just something to monitor there. Elias Pettersson picked up his second point of the season after setting up Nils Hoeglander for a tap-in. Connor Garland, as he does, did some good work down low to get Petey the puck in the first place. I don't know what the Flyers were doing defensively there,

but they left Petey wide open. They also left Nils Hoaglander wide open for Petey to feed him a pretty easy pass, but it was good that Petey had his head up and made that pass. It feels like those three, Hoaglander, Garland, and Petey had his head up and made that pass. It feels like those three, Hoaglander, Garland, and Petey will get some run together going forward. Petey also made some nice defensive plays, so the progress continues for him.

That's two decent games in a row for him. The Lions, if you missed it. DeBrusque, no longer with Petey. He's with Miller and Besser now. Petey again was between Hoaglander and Garland. The third line, a couple of newcomers, Sherwood and Heinen were on the wings with Teddy Bluger. Sherwood has been hitting everything in sight lately and Bluger has had a has been hitting everything in sight lately, and Bluger has had a really strong start to the season. Heinen was kind of trying to find his spot,

and maybe he's found his spot on this third line. Sherwood scored his first goal with the Canucks as well. Yeah. Daniel Sprong was back in the lineup in a fourth-line role with Nils Amon and Pugh Suter. Again, I just thought it was a solid performance by the Canucks to go into Philly and really frustrate the Flyers team and the Flyers crowd. It wasn't perfect. There's still some things that they need to clean up. Games rarely are perfect though. Kevin Lankanen

is providing them with good goaltending right now. It's making us feel a little bit better about waiting for Thatcher Demko. I do want to play a little bit of audio right now. And this is just, we'll get to some of the other local teams in just a bit, but Kyle Bukoskis is going to join us in about 15 minutes. And he is the co-host of the 32 Thoughts podcast with Elliot Freeman. And Freed was essentially given an assignment. He was given an assignment to find out what's going on with Elias Pettersson.

And I guess he made some calls. He did some digging. And if you want to listen to the podcast in full, please do that. Here is a snippet of what Elliott Friedman had to say about Elias Pettersson. I think Pettersson is one of those guys that he reads everything or he's aware of everything that's said about him. And honestly, Kyle, I think that's one thing that he's going to have to move past.

Because I think in moments like this when you're struggling and you know hey i always say about markets like vancouver the rewards are high but the risks are high right yeah and so when it's going bad like like one of the best stories i ever heard was jamie baker the former nhler now in media he you're in ottawa told yes he told me a great story of when he got traded to the toronto may police wendell clark pulled him aside and said understand this you're never as good as they say you are and you're never as bad as they say you are, and you're never as bad as they say you are. You've got to ride a flat line as much as you can.

You can't go up and down. It can't be peaks and valleys. You've got to ride the flat line. And I think, and I suspect, this is my opinion, because I think Patterson is well aware of everything that is said about him, I think he rides the peaks and valleys. And I think that that is the thing that he has to get out of his system.

When he's struggling and it's not going well, I think it's something he's really aware of what's being said about him, and he has to stop that. And that's my constructive criticism for Patterson. You know, Kyle, one thing about players is players used to say, like you guys in the media, we don't understand. You don't know what it's like to have 16,000 or 20,000 people

or if you're playing football, like 80,000 to 100,000 people booing you. But you can't use that line anymore because now in the social media age, if people are mad at us or people don't like us, we hear it. Like it comes right at us. We get the same vitriol athletes do. Everybody does. So I know what that's like to go through that, and I understand how you have to start to block it out

and the techniques you have to start to block it out and the techniques you have to use to block it out because if you let everything get to you if you get every tweet or every x post or every instagram comment get to you you're gonna go insane and i think you get healthier as you learn those kyle i know everyone loves you so you never get this hate but as someone who's been on the end of it beforehand i understand how you have to learn to weed it out there's a difference between constructive criticism which we all need and just pure savage savagery right so um i think that's one thing i think petterson's gonna have to get better at is, is blocking that out.

And I think it'll really help him. So this is what Petey signed up for in Vancouver when he signed that eight year deal. There's going to be criticism. Sometimes it's going to be brutal criticism and you can sit there, either Petey can, or you can sit there at home and think all the attention he gets is unfair or even insane at some points. And you might be right. You can call the market toxic or whatever. And at some points you might be right. But here's the thing. The market is not going to change. Canucks Twitter is not going to change. It's like wishing you didn't have a crazy family and we all have crazy

families, right? It's not something that can be controlled or solved. Obviously, it's a lot easier said than done to say, oh, just ignore what's being said about you. But there are techniques, as Elliot Friedman says, to do it. And it's on Elias Pettersson and the Canucks, frankly, to work together and figure out if this is a problem. And from what Elliot's reporting, I don't think he's just coming up with this off the top of his head

to figure it out. Staying off your phone is usually a good start. Let's move on to some of the other local teams because the big news yesterday with the BC Lions was that Vernon Adams was going to start against the Montreal Alouettes. And we wondered on this show, well, how's that going to go? A little late, isn't it? This is the last game of the season.

They're going to change quarterbacks right now? Well, Vernon Adams put up a pretty good performance against the Montreal Alouettes. Now he's going to be the starting quarterback for the BC Lions when they go into the playoffs in a couple of weeks. 393 yards and two touchdowns with two interceptions. 27-3 victory for the Lions over the Owls at BC Place. So it's the season finale

for the Lions who finished their 2024 campaign at 9-9. It is not the finale for the CFL though because they have one more week left. So the Lions have punched their ticket to the West Semifinal. The West Semifinal is going to be on Saturday, November the 2nd. That is 12 days away.

So they have 12 days now to sit and wait and practice and get ready to go. They don't know who they're going to play yet. That'll be decided in the final week of the season. There were some very telling quotes that came out of that game from some of Vernon Adams' teammates, Keon Hatcher was saying, you know, I just feel like it was VA's team. And I think you could tell that and sense that tonight. He said, you know, Nathan Rourke,

Nate's a great quarterback, he's a great person, but I just think this year it was Vernon's team. So the narrative, if you're following, is that Vernon Adams gets off to a great start to the season. The Lions are what, five and one? Gets hurt. He does have a couple of tough games before he gets hurt, but he gets hurt. The Lions bring back Nathan Rourke. And some of the Lions are probably thinking, wait a minute, Nathan Rourke left us. He left this team. He left the BC Lions for the NFL. And we don't begrudge him, but he did leave. And Vernon Adams was here and he's going to be the starting quarterback because VA got hurt and he was available, I think there were some hard feelings. And then it's not that they disliked Nathan Rourke,

but it really does sound like they felt like VA, Vernon Adams, got a raw deal on this. And now Vernon Adams was back, and lo and behold, looked like a better effort against the Montreal Alouettes. So after the game, Rick Campbell did indicate that Adams is going to start in the West Division semifinal in 12 days' time. Farhan got the quote. It was, quote, I want to give him a chance to finish what he started.

So you could expect over the next 12 days, there will be a fair amount of media wanting to pin down an answer. And once they get it, all eyes are going to be moving forward to a game which now gets a lot more interesting. I'm not going to lie. Because if Vernon Adams had gone out and just had a pedestrian effort against the Montreal team, let's be clear, had nothing to play for. But whatever.

If he had had a pedestrian effort, then there would have been a question about what you do going into the playoffs. Now, Rick Campbell got a win there in a lot of different ways because now he can confidently say we're going to go with the guy that threw for nearly 400 yards and two touchdowns in the season finale. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. With Tyler Myers, this is the guy that has been through all sorts of ups and downs in his career. It's been so long ago. Tyler Meyer's been in the league for a long time, played 1,000 games,

that people forget he was the Rookie of the Year. And he was pretty darn good for Winnipeg. I know there might have been, or sorry, for Buffalo. And I know there might have been some, you know, red flags with his game when he was a rookie. But he was this guy, he was this giant of a player that was mobile. He was making plays. And then things got a little bit hard. And I think his confidence waned a little bit. Plus he was with the Sabres.

Yep. And they're having struggles. He goes to Winnipeg. Um, and I think throughout his career, and that includes when he came to Vancouver, everyone trying to find the right fit for Tyler Myers. Like how many minutes do you play a game?

If you get into the 20s, does that become problematic? And I think what's happened in Vancouver is that, number one, I said this earlier in the show, the coach simplified his game. And he said, we want you to do this, and that's it. And I don't think he had that guidance under previous coaching staffs. And they also limited his minutes. And I do think that's important. I know he was the minutes leader against the Flyers and played very well. He played over 22 minutes. I don't think that's ideal. They have to be cognizant of that number. And that's why this third pair is so important because you don't have to play the hell out of your top two pairs.

If you trust your third pair a little bit more, and I still don't know how much they're going to trust a pair of either Brandstrom and Day-Arne or Forbort and Day-Arne or Forbort and Juleson, that's the one area where I'm kind of like, it's not just about the third pair. It's about the trickle-on effect of having a third pair that you don't really trust. I hope that something can emerge on that third pair where you can trust these guys to go out and play 17, 18 minutes a night because then you don't have to

overplay the top two pairs. It's funny because of their connection together, but every time I think about where Tyler Myers is at in his career arc and how he's kind of changed and altered his perceptions in his game. I always think about Luke Shen, right? You remember the Luke Shen path.

Like, I think a lot of people forget, like, he was almost out of the league. Yeah. He was toiling in the American. He spent time in three consecutive seasons in San Diego, Utica, and Syracuse. And this is when he's in his late 20s, early 30s. And he figured out, and whether it was through some coaching or understanding that some things needed to change in his game, he figured out how to be effective later in his career,

like almost a second chapter. I think there's some parallels there with him and Meyer. I mean, there were teammates together back in Kelowna, right? I just know that in the playoffs, Myers played a nasty, nasty game. Yeah. And he hasn't always played as nasty as his size suggests he could.

Sure. But in the playoffs, when a puck went into a corner and he was going after it, I felt sorry for the guy on the other team because he went in there just like almost recklessly. Yeah.

It was very, very impressive. And that's the way Rick Talkett wants that bottom four, especially to play. And that's why they all have size. Now, whether or not that plan holds up, we'll have to wait and see because you have to all play well in order to play those guys. So when the Canucks lose guys like Zdorov and they lose a guy like Ian Cole, that's taking a lot of size and toughness out of your lineup.

Now they tried to replace him with Forbort and De'Aaron A, and so far the results have been mixed. Another thing to watch for, by the way, is when Derek Forbort will be back from his absence from the team for been mixed. Another thing to watch for, by the way, is when Derek Forbart will be back from his absence from the team for personal reasons. We obviously don't talk about that much, but it's a factor.

A few things to watch for in practice today as the Canucks do practice in Chicago in a couple of hours. Number one, JT Miller. Will he be there? Don't be shocked if he's not because Rick Tock had suggested he might need a few days off after injuring himself in Philly. Dakota Joshua is on the road trip and it'll be interesting to see when he starts

getting full practices with the team again. Skated in Philly. Yeah. So will he, I mean, he's got to be close. He's got to be close to returning to the lineup. We'll see when he's an active member of the actual practice. And then the Derek Forbort thing too, like he left for personal reasons.

Hopefully everything's okay in his life. But, you know, I think Forbort is definitely back in the lineup as soon as he's ready to go. The question is then is how do you arrange the pairs? Would you go Forbort and Danae, or would you say, actually, we like what Brandstrom has brought to the lineup in terms of puck moving, but then you'd have a lefty-lefty pair if you go Forbboard and Branstrom.

I'd still rather that. One idea I was thinking of, and I don't think the Canucks are ready to do this yet, but could you put Eric Branstrom with Philip Peronik? Or is that just something you don't want to do because you don't want to break up the pair? And then there's no obvious guy for Quinn Hughes to skate with. But you could try

I don't know. I don't know if you would. You could try Hughes with Darren A. Lefty righty. I don't think they're going to mess with it because Hughes doesn't want to be split from Hronik. Yeah, no, I don't think they will either. They're comfortable with Branson playing on the

right though. Or he's comfortable with it. Like he does it. I don't know if it either They're comfortable with Branson playing on the right though Or he's comfortable with it Like he does it I don't know if it's super I don't know how comfortable the Canucks are Branson's forward isn't bad He can do it I know, but it's not bad Have you seen it, do you know?

Well, give it a try I like your optimism, Andy You really have a hate on for Darnay Hate is a strong word I just don't. You really have a hate on for De'Arne. Hate is a strong word. I just don't see him as a. I don't think he should be a mainstay in the lineup. I just think he's garbage. I just don't think he should be a mainstay in the lineup.

I think give four board. However you want to do it. But four board, Branstrom, whatever. But I think you need to give Branstrom more of a look. We got a text into the Dunbar Lumber text line. They will upgrade the third pair for now. They deal with it. Yeah, I think if there was one move that they're going to make,

it's going to be to bring in another defenseman for the third pair. I just think you want to try and get those guys as many minutes as you're comfortable with. I realize the Canucks have been, I don't want to say in desperation mode, but when they started the season winless, they were kind of like, yeah, we need some wins here. And Quinn Hughes, by the way,

if you look at the analytics to start the season, Quinn Hughes has been incredible for the Canucks. Yep. The amount that the Canucks are dominating when he's on the ice is truly remarkable. And when he's off the ice, it is somewhat concerning. So on the bright side, the Canucks have Quinn Hughes. And when he's playing, you can feel pretty good about what's happening on the ice.

But when he leaves, you're a little bit worried. Could he play 60 minutes a game? Oh, it's in the cards. The possibility remains. I think that the blueprint will follow very, in terms of rounding out your blue line, very similar to what they did last year. They will, maybe, I don't think it'll be as early

because I think the Zdorov trade happened a little earlier than it will this year. I think they're probably going to have to tread water with the guys that they've got a little bit longer. But the blueprint's there. You go and you make an upgrade maybe January, maybe sometime earlier than the deadline because this is a Rutherford team.

All due respect to Alvin. I think this is how it's going to go. I'm just hoping that Darren A could come along a little bit. I knew that he was going to be a project. I don't understand why you're so... I'm not that concerned with Darren. I didn't expect him to come out of the shoot looking like the greatest defenseman on the planet.

I expected there to be some struggles because it took him a while to work his way through the Edmonton system. And then even in the playoffs, like, you pointed this out. Yeah, he's healthy scratched. Yeah, like, I had, I know, I know we had Jason Greger on the show and he was like, I think he could be

a top-dope forward defenseman. I was like, that's nice. To me, he's just like a Juleson. Like, he's like, you plug him in once in a while when he needs his size, but. I think there's more untapped potential because he hasn't played as much. He's a late bloomer, too. He's also a giant. He's a from Wilson. I think there's more untapped potential because he hasn't played as much. He's a late bloomer, too.

He's also a giant. He's a giant. Yeah. He's a giant. I think Shorty got him mixed up with Tyler Myers a few times in the broadcast because they're just like two giant right-shot defensemen. So the dream basically is that you would have in your bottom four on the right side, you've got Tyler Myers with his wingspan and Darren A below

him with his wingspan. And then it makes it very difficult to get to the net against the Vancouver Canucks once the playoffs start. What up, Kev? Not much, guys. Not much. Survived the river of water. And out here in White Rock, we got a little less. So, yeah, looking forward to a normal week. And the team coming back.

There have already been a few people in the Dunbar Lumber text message in basket who said, this Kevin Woodley character, he really does know goaltending. Because you said early on in this process that Kevin Lankanen was a good goalie. And Kev, Kevin Lankanen's a pretty good goalie. Yeah, and I'll be honest with you. It's not like I'm a genius. I just have numbers that showed me he was ready to pop. And those same numbers from Clearside Analytics have kind of helped predict

things like Charlie Lindgren being ready to pop and Connor Ingram being a good waiver claim for the arrows and the coyotes and I again when you look at the value the Canucks are getting out of Kevin Lankanen I would sort of ask why uh why isn't every team looking at these numbers like he's I said this in on July 1st this guy's better than half the backups in the league there are a lot of teams that double down on their incumbent that is just they're just nowhere near as good as this guy he's better than some of the starters again statistically has been for the last couple years but because he wasn't getting into the net um in nashville behind uc sorrows despite last year on a per shot basis outperforming him he sits waiting for a contract because he wanted close to two million

i get that but when i look at how some teams are struggling with their goaltender it's like if you'd spent another million on your backup this is what you could have had um you know i guess the argument it's not so much for patting myself on the back it's for why aren't more teams using this if i man i can tell you if i go through some of the mistakes that have been made signing goaltenders on July 1st, that these numbers clearly indicated shouldn't have been done, it's an absolute no-brainer. So I'll turn this into a sales pitch for them because they give me the fuel to make predictions like that.

And the Canucks are the ones reaping the rewards of not enough other teams, frankly, subscribing. Tell us one mistake well i think the most glaring one would have been the jack campbell one and i think a lot of people could for other reasons could have could have said that was a mistake but when he was posting 920s or 919s or whatever the hell it was in toronto the adjusted numbers said that he was he was more than those were all top five say percentage numbers in the league the adjusted number said that was all environment and that he was in the 30s in both years so when your best two years in

the league rank in the 30s that doesn't scream five times five right it's just it's not rocket science it's just properly weighting environment and individual performance relative to it and so i'll give you another one um not so much a mistake but uh an eyebrow raise and that ties into the the recent trend of 8.25 for all elite goaltenders and this one i think will work out but the numbers at least gave gave you a little bit of pause jake ottinger's numbers in the last two years adjusted for the quality of that environment it's a pretty friendly environment in dallas or has been have been closer to league average as opposed to elite

and so they're they're off the charts good right now and i think he figured a few things out late last season talking to him um that sort of helped him get over that hump of what was happening and so you feel better about the bet but statistically you're thinking twice because they're they're not for the past two years where lena salmark has been even last year everybody looked at it as a down year. His adjusted numbers were just fine. They're not where Jeremy Swayman has been. And so it just gives you the tools to evaluate goalies relative to environment. And it can help predict guys that are ready to pop in small samples too.

Like Joel Hofer is off to an excellent start with St. Louis. Not surprised. He was excellent last year in a small sample. There's lots of little examples like that and there's lots of other camp. Talbot in Detroit is one I'm watching closely because the numbers were fantastic in LA, but he had the highest expected, say, percentage in the league camps, a really good veteran goalie that can maybe give a presence, the Red Wings need.

But they gave him two years and $5 million and the adjusted numbers last year. And this is a guy who was an all-star based on the raw numbers, and the adjusted numbers were close to the 60s. Would you give Lankanen a bit of a run here, or do you need to keep Seelovs active? Well, this is the question, and it's a two-parter, right? Like, is that one of the reasons nobody was investing more heavily

is they didn't believe he could play more games in a row? I'd be tempted, at the end of the day. And I said this when Ian Clark was here and I'll say it when Mark, Marco Terranious is running the goalie department, you are goalie coaching. You need that relationship to tell you. And it shows you not just in terms of the open and honest discussions about how he's feeling and it's early in the season.

So I'd imagine he's feeling great and you can keep rolling them them out there but what you see in practice as the games pile up do the practice habits slip to some of the technical excellence uh the precision the sort of power the the back and forth movement the recoveries does that start to wane as the games play go up and then you have to make a decision at this point early in the, I can't see any reason why you wouldn't play him more other than, like you said, not wanting Arturs to gather too much rust. Arturs was, what was that? Time is a flat circle for me. So what was that, like a Tuesday last week, his last start?

Try and keep it to a week to 10 days at the max. And if you go, whether it's three out of every four or two out of every three in this tandem, I think you can safely do that unless the gap starts to separate i mean lincoln's fifth in the entire nhl right now and adjusted say percentage and yet we're probably having a different conversation if the flyers don't hit four posts so um you know grain of salt on everything. He's been excellent so far. The numbers said he was really good. Um, I would roll him out again and see how it goes. And, and like I said, week to 10 days before you want Archer, she loves in there before

you start to worry about losing him. So it's October 21st today. Um, when do you think we can expect anything new on Thatcher Demko? Are most people just saying, saying okay we'll get into November and then then we'll start wondering a little bit more uh radio silence on that one I really don't know and and the team I was a little bit surprised because they were on the road and sort of lost control lose control of the rank and access and things like that that's usually where you'll start to see the guys that are traveling obviously actually there wasn't anyone traveling in in the florida stretch understandably given the weather

that had gone through there um but that's usually where you start to see like you don't have control over the ice so it's harder to sort of hide guys yeah since since training camp like i don't think anybody's had eyes on him skating um i wouldn't be surprised maybe if someone is at a practice early. I mean, if he's on the trip, he's skating, you would assume. So unless they're going to the extremes of renting extra ice, it's usually in an environment where the media is in there. So other than that, though, we just haven't seen, right? Like I was told, and I said this at the time,

and we're coming right up on eight weeks. Eight weeks ago, I was told eight weeks would be the earliest he played a game. So we're into that window, but with the lack of sort of eyes on and the lack of sort of real updates from anyone, your guess is as good as mine whether the schedule has been maintained or there's been any type of setback in the way he feels about it that would delay this into November. I know it's early in the season, and the numbers have to be taken with a grain of salt,

but have you looked at the Vancouver Canucks in terms of the numbers that you have access to? I'm wondering what their defensive environment has been like, because they have had a number of changes to the lineup, both up front and on the back end. We've been talking about the third pair on defense. And, you know, if you get a few more minutes out of them, then you wouldn't have to play Quinn Hughes quite as much. You wouldn't have to play a guy like Tyler Myers quite as much. But right now, I don't know how much trust the coaching staff has in the third pair. Yeah, I mean mean not specific to the third pair although i think you know we know how how good the the top one is and i thought the second pair has had some

moments although philly certainly wasn't one of them some moments where they've given up more than you expect um the numbers the numbers started to swing in the right direction in that last game a little bit defensively. They're not where you would expect this team to be based on last year. Like in a five-on-five expected goals against, they're 24th. The rush numbers got a little bit better for and against in the last couple of games. But, you know, 21st five-on- five rush creation and 15th against um d zone is where it's been a real challenge and that's where the numbers take a hit sort of sorting things out in their own end guys chasing defensemen chasing into the corners forwards not backfilling for that

chase that frankly isn't supposed to happen in the first place done settled play in their own end. They're 26 in the NHL, five on five expected goals against. And even more sort of, not troubling, because I think actually the personnel and the focus of talk, it tells you this won't last, but in the early going, certainly unexpected, they're dead last in the league in that front defense, even after that Philly game. From the dots down to the net, 29th and east-west in their own end, and probably a lot of this was that first Philly game where the Flyers were basically cutting across the top of the crease unimpeded with the puck on a far too regular basis, 30 seconds. So their defense in front of their own net in settled defensive zone play is nowhere near what it was last year.

They've asked the goalies to do a little more in that regard. It is uncharacteristic, but it's way too early to call it troubling because you know what they've built. Like they've built this big, you know, this big reaching defense that's supposed to be able to take away that stuff. So far they haven't,

but you trust with the focus of talk and the personnel they've built. And maybe, maybe it's fair to question the third pairing, but even So far they haven't, but you trust with the focus of Tuckett and the personnel they've built. Maybe it's fair to question the third pairing, but even there, they're big, they have reach. This is what they're supposed to prevent, and this is maybe the most surprising thing to me is that so far early on they haven't. Is that partly on the centermen as well? It's always more than just the defensemen, right?

And I think as much as the focus has been on, oh, they added two new people to the third pair, like I said, the Myers and Soucy haven't had all great games either on the second pair. The reality is there's a new forward on pretty much every line. And so when one guy does something wrong, whether everybody else stays where they're supposed to be or you start chasing around a little bit.

We've seen those breakdowns in the defensive end. It's not always the center. Cause quite often that F1 is the first forward back is as opposed to just quote unquote, the center and sort of sorting that all out. Right. And they just, like I said,

it hasn't been as clean and talk it before they went on this road trip. Like, yeah, this is like a week ago now and they're two games into it. But like he said, like the focus and and we all saw it in training camp, and we all heard about it, you know, transition offense, which, by the way, hasn't really been there so far. But the focus wasn't on the defensive end of the rink.

And I think you can learn two things. One, like I said, is more than just the defensemen, the forwards being in the right spot is such a crucial part to that, right? We know this from all the years of them not being. Hell, we know this from all the years of them not being in the same zone as they were being attacked and how much they used to give up and how heavily they used to rely on their goaltenders. We know that the forwards are a part of good defending.

But then the other part of it is that this isn't baked into their DNA yet. It was a lot better last year. It was a constant focus last year, and it improved, but just expecting to show up last year and it would all be there and in place hasn't really been the case. And so Target talked about making that more of a focus as they went away on this trip. And like I said, the numbers have gotten slightly better.

Maybe not the net front, maybe not the east-west in front of the net, but that's because they were so bad off a couple of games. They have gotten better as this trip has gone on. So you sort of trust that process that it will get better now that they're focusing on it. But at the same time, you recognize this isn't inherent in this group yet. This isn't who they are on an every night basis. It needs to be drilled down on and perhaps harped on a little bit still.

Yeah, I wonder if that's why Tuckett, even after the win in Florida and even after the win in Philly, it's not like he was critical of the group, but he wasn't glowing with praise. He was not effusive. No, and I wonder if that's... No, and that's the group, but he wasn't glowing with praise. He was not effusive. No, and I wonder if that's true. And that's the thing, right? Again, even that Flyers game, Lankanen made some good saves, but four posts, right?

They gave up looks, right? They gave up looks. The Flyers were not quite three goals expected. They have a hell of a performance. That's basically a stolen win for Kevin Lankanen. Still gave up eight high danger. Not terrible. I guess I thought in Philly they trended more towards the team

they were last year defensively, and that's a sign. But when it's a sign of something that's just starting and you're the coach, I think he's realized now that you can't just sort of, okay, we're back, right? You have to keep drilling down on this stuff. So I'm looking at just the publicly available stats for team save percentage.

The bottom three teams in the NHL, Nashville, winless Nashville with a save percentage of.864. Edmonton, 2-4-0, 8-5-1 is their save percentage of.864. Edmonton, 2-4-0. 8-5-1 is their save percentage. And then Colorado, man, six games, their save percentage, team save percentage, and a lot of this is on Forgiev, I mean Georgiev, 8-32. I had a question about Colorado, actually.

Hey, can I just loop this back around to the first one before you ask your question about Colorado, actually. Hey, can I just loop this back around to the first one before you ask your question about Colorado? Go. Who are the three teams that one actually had and let go of or could have had Kevin Lankanen as an upgrade? Like the Avs. Really? Really?

Florida. I mean, Nashville let them go because they wanted to go cheap on the backup because of what they were paying Soros. And Edmonton doubled down on Calvin Picard who had a slightly above expected. He was pretty good for them in terms of what you'd expect. Plus 0.3%

adjusted save percentage. And a great guy in the room and everybody loved him so they doubled down. I understand that. Lincoln is top 12 in adjusted save percentage last year. And none of these teams that had goaltending issues last year thought maybe, hey, this guy might help. And the irony is one of the teams had him

and just wasn't willing to pay for it, and where are they now? You're listening to the best of Halford & Brough.