Halford & Brough in the Morning - The Best Of Halford And Brough 5/30/24

Episode Date: May 30, 2024

Mike & Jason look back at the previous day in sports, they talk Canucks with The Athletic Vancouver's Thomas Drance, plus the boys tell us what they learned. 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. You're listening to Halford and Brough. He gets to the rink and he has to meet with the Edmonton meat. That's what I call the media. There's a raw dad and dom. What are some of the keys to stopping it a little sooner than the other game? Playing hard. Thanks, guys. Love you, too.

Why are you so pissy? Good morning, Vancouver 601 on a Thursday. Happy Thursday, everybody. It's Halford and his brother at Sportsnet 650. We are coming to you live from the Kintec Studios in 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 Brother of the Morning is brought to you by the Dilawri family of Accurate Dealers. Experience the Dilawri difference today by visiting your nearest Dilawri Accurate Dealer today. 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. So, Rafi, what are you waiting for?

Kintec, that's what you're waiting for. The guest list today begins at 7 o'clock, which means you get an entire hour of uninterrupted half room breath from 6 to 7. Adnan Virk from MLB Network is going to join us at 7 o'clock. 730, Adam Stanley's going to join us at seven o'clock, 730. Adam Stanley's going to join us. I forgot it's a Canadian Open this week.

Canadian Open Week golf analyst from Sportsnet, Adam Stanley, is going to join us at 730. Eight o'clock, Thomas Drance from The Athletic, Vancouver, and Canucks Talk right here on Sportsnet 650. He's going to join us on the heels of a wild take, which caught the internet by storm yesterday. I'm not sure he did enough research on the career arcs of Simon and or Garfunkel, but he tried.

And then he cooked up a take in the Drance lab yesterday, threw it out there, and got ethered on the internet. And rightfully so. I don't know. We'll get into it later. It all had to do with Hughes and Hronik. And apparently Hughes is Paul Simon and Hronik is Garfunkel. Yep. And you would think if you heard that, you'd be like,

oh, that's kind of disrespectful to Hironic. No. No. This is the opposite. I'm still trying to really process exactly what he was thinking. I've heard it like six times. I don't want to start beef with Drance at 6.03 in the morning. He's probably not even up.

He's listening to the dulcet tones of Art Garfunkel somewhere, I would imagine. His solo stuff. Yeah. I love his solo work.03 in the morning. He's probably not even up. He's listening to the dulcet tones of Art Garfunkel somewhere, I would imagine. His solo stuff. Yeah, I love his solo work. Some of my favorite. Anyway, we'll get into all that later. Drance is going to join us at 8. Adam Stanley at 7.30. Adnan Virk at 7. We have one big game to get into, so without further ado, Laddie, let's

tell everybody what happened. Hey, did you guys see the game last night? No. What happened? I missed all the action because I was... We know how busy your life can be. What happened? You missed that? You missed that?

What happened? What Happened is brought to you by the B.C. Construction Safety Alliance. Making safety simpler by giving construction companies the best in tools, resources, and safety training. Visit them online at bccsa.ca. The back-and-forth, topsy-turvy, dare I say zigzagging Western Conference Final took another zag yesterday as the Edmonton Oilers rallied with five, five unanswered goals to defeat the Dallas Stars 5-2 in Game 4 of the Western Conference Final at Rogers Place on Wednesday. Now, I had a hard time trying to pick what goal we should play

to accentuate this Oilers comeback, but we're going to go with the shorty and eventual game-winning goal, Matthias Janmark, down a man. Not the leader of Janpro, as Laddie tried to shoehorn in there earlier. Here's Matthias Janmark with a shorty, eventual game-winning goal last night to pace the Edmonton Oilers to a win over the Dallas Stars. The Dallas Stars, Harley will shoot that. Locked in front, grounds for a kick.

Possible three-on-one. News skipping. In front. Score! Short-handed. Matisse. The end mark. So there are a few stories from last night's game,

and Edmonton's PK was one of them, and it's been a story all playoffs. In fact, special teams for the Oilers has been a big story for them. A lot of people thought, okay, well, if we're going to talk about special teams with the Edmonton Oilers the entire playoffs, we're going to be talking about their power play and whether or not they're going to get the calls, whether or not they're going to score on the power play in the playoffs if things are different. Well, yeah, that was a story against the LA Kings,

and it was a story against the Vancouver Canucks to a certain extent, but their PK has perhaps been a bigger story than their power play. They just look incredibly good on the PK right now. I don't know how many in a row they've killed, 22 or something along those lines. They've set a franchise record by allowing zero power play goals in eight straight playoff games. Right. So dating back to the Vancouver series, obviously.

And I guess that is credit to an Oilers team that a lot of people didn't think was all that good defensively. And we have seen some defensive issues from the Oilers at times at 5-on-5 in these playoffs. But credit to the Oilers because their PK has been one of their main strengths in these playoffs. And Dallas's, we all know Vancouver's power play, had trouble even just getting set up against the Edmonton Oilers. And we thought that was mostly on the Canucks. And, you know, it's not like you're going to say none of it was on the Canucks.

A lot of it was on the Canucks. The Dallas Stars power play is having trouble against the Oilers as well. The other big story from last night was that Edmonton coach Chris Knobloch, he took some risks. He made three lineup changes. Defenseman Phillip Broberg drew into the lineup along with Ryan McLeod and Corey Perry, Vincent Darnay, Warren Fogle, one of my favorite names, and Sam Carrick were sitting last night,

and Ryan McLeod scored the first goal for the Edmonton Oilers to make it 2-1 for Dallas because Dallas, like Edmonton the game before, had totally controlled the first period, and then it flipped in the second period, and it started with Ryan McLeod's goal, which just so happened to be assisted by Corey Perry and Darnell Nurse. Yeah, he was a big story yesterday, and a little bit of sweet revenge, I suppose, for Darnell Nurse,

who was hearing it from the media pregame. I believe Connor Brown said everyone and their dog was all over the meat. Darnel Nurse. The meat. Yeah, not the media. The meat, which we can get into later as well. We'll get into the meat later. So, okay, some takeaways here.

You threw a lot out there. One, Darnel Nurse also had a playoff high 12 hits yesterday. Chris Knobloch called it Nurse's best game of the playoffs, and all the teammates felt very good for Darnell Nurse, so that's great. There's a couple things here, unfortunately, that I didn't want to give the Oilers credit for that I'm begrudgingly going to have to. Now, the first one is the aforementioned penalty kill

because in the series against Vancouver, after it was all done, I was listening to the postgame show on that fateful Monday night when the Canucks lost to the Oilers in Game 7, and Brett Festerling, who we had on the show, came in on Monday night and said he thought that the Oilers' PK was the MVP of that second-round series.

And I reiterated that on our show the next morning, and actually got some pushback into the Dunbar-Lumber text message in Basket. A lot of people were like, come on. Of all the things that were MVPs in that series, that that was it I think a lot of people were upset because they felt like it was the Canucks uh lack of ability on the power play as opposed to a really good penalty kill Brett came on the show reiterated what he said it was very obvious that the former NHLer had far more insight than all of us combined because that penalty kill has been really good

and to do what they've done in the postseason over the course of and we're not just talking had far more insight than all of us combined because that penalty kill has been really good. And to do what they've done in the postseason over the course of, and we're not just talking about an opening round series, like they did this at the tail end of a second round, where remember, they had no margin for error because they were down 3-2 to the Canucks. So to lock it down there and then continue that into this second round against the Stars, it's a very impressive thing.

So that's one. You know when a power play gets going and it's just feeling it, and it just feels like every time they're out on the ice, they're going to at the very least get some great chances, if not score. Edmonton's power play sometimes. Yeah, Edmonton's power play quite often, actually. PKs can have that too. You're going to have that feeling like you're getting over the boards,

and it's fun. Because you're frustrating the other team's best players. Yeah. And I think the Oilers started to get that vibe against the Canucks. I don't know how their PK was against the Kings. I know their power play was very good, but I think they got it. It was 100% against the Kings. Was it?

Yeah. Right. That's incredible. Yeah. It's really incredible and uh so maybe they carried that into the series with the canucks and just like the canucks i mean we were we were focused 100 on the canucks i'm like how are what these zone entries like what is going on you're giving it to guys that are standing still. And, but like, once you start to get some, um, chemistry on the PK, it became, it becomes almost enjoyable to go out there and frustrate the other team. And what it does is it actually creates momentum for your team because especially for the Oilers, because correct me if I'm wrong here, but McDavid doesn't penalty kill. And I don't, I don't know if Dreisaitl does, but I don't think he does.

So most of the time, if, you know, if you kill those penalties off, um, I don't think they do. So you don't, I don't know. You don't have to check it, but if you kill those penalties off, then McDavid and Dreisaitl are going to head over the boards right after that penalty's over. Yeah. And you know, you're going to get momentum that way. And, uh, you also get momentum if you,

you know, score shorthanded like Matias Janmark did against the Dallas stars. And that just held up as the winner. So that was the biggest goal of the game. Okay. So the one thing that I was begrudgingly ready to give the Oilers credit for was the penalty kill. The other one, this one hurts because I had a nice tidy tidy narrative I wanted to work out here, and it didn't work out. Chris Knobloch has done a really, really, really good job behind the bench for them. I thought, especially in the Vancouver series, that maybe his lack of, two things, lack of coaching experience and then the lack of having to deal with adversity may play into the Canucks favor. But I mean,

he made maybe the biggest decision of the playoffs and that series with the Calvin Pickard move, because I, I mean, when they, when, when we heard in that series that they were going to Pickard, I was like,

this is the worst possible thing that can happen to the Canucks right now. I wanted Stuart Skinner to stay in. I want Stuart Skinner to fight through all of his problems on the ice, in the goal, while the Canucks were shooting on him. Because through the first half of that series, he was one of the biggest reasons that the Canucks were able to counterpunch as effectively as they were. And were able to rattle the Oilers as effectively as they did. So Knobloch made the decision. He made two big decisions in that series actually he made the decision to go to Pickard and then with their

backs up against the wall he made the decision to go back to Skinner right when they were it was 3-2 so I give him a lot of credit because that was almost a bigger decision than going to Skinner in the first place 100% or going to Pickard in the first place 100% because it was like well now we're gonna go on real bad, now we're trusting the guy that needs to put it together here. And I think it was, honestly, if you look back on it in retrospect and having some time to digest the move, it was very clearly a move to the guys in front of Skinner, I think,

as opposed to the goalie himself. Because he didn't have to do that much, Stuart Skinner, that is, in Game 6 and Game 7 against Vancouver. Unfortunately, he did not. Yeah, they gave up no shots. Unfortunately, he did not. Yeah, they gave up no shots. The shots at one point in Game 7 were 22-4 in favor of Edmonton. They played better in front of them. And they've carried that over at times into this Dallas series.

And then you mentioned the changes last night. Knobloch, again, you give him a lot of credit. Three lineup changes. That's a lot of changes. Especially when you're not forced to. When it's not injuries, when you're actually making a decision to bring guys in and sit guys as healthy scratches. No suspensions, no injuries.

You're not down or you're not facing elimination yet. It was 2-1 in the series. And they worked. All of it worked. I know a lot of the meat from Edmonton, that's the media, the meat from Edmonton, were praising the Broberg insertion in the lineup.

They thought he did a nice job moving the puck on the blue line. So, again... It didn't start out well, though, did it? No, they were terrible to start, which is, that's the zigging and the zagging part of this whole thing. They gave up a goal 58 seconds in

and then they were down 2-0 six minutes into the game. It was the inverse of the previous game where Edmonton got off to a hot start and then Dallas came back. This time Dallas got off to the hot start and then Edmonton came back. Tony, the electrician, texts in and says the biggest impact to that game was Tanev leaving. Yeah, that's a problem. I don't know if it was the biggest impact to that game, but it could be a big impact going forward. So it looks like he blocked a shot, right? And it's... He blocked with his right foot and he left and didn't return.

His right foot must have fallen off if Tanev left the game. The first thing that popped to mind was the Chris Tanev Memorial walking boot, which he wore pretty much for the duration of his career in Vancouver. And then we made the joke that whenever he was

healthy and done with it, he would just pass it on to the next injured player. It was like a bronze boot. Made it very hard to get on and off, but the symbolism behind it was important. But if they don't have to... The numbers on Tanev in terms of him playing in a shutdown role in the first round

was matched up often against Jack Eichel, and in the second round, he saw a lot of the Nathan McKinnon line and did a pretty good job on them. They said he's really, like, I always use this, the rug that tied the room together, the Lebowski factor. He was the Lebowski factor for that blue line because he balanced it out, made them better, obviously, defensively, but also gave them better pairings,

which is why they were so effective in the first two rounds. So if Tanev loses, Tanev's gone for any length of time. Dallas is in serious trouble here because while they have home ice now. Yeah, so who do you think, actually, that's a good question. Who do you think is the favorite right now? Edmonton. Yeah, I kind of agree here. See, going into this, I had a different outlook than you.

I think you, and part of this was you wanting it. You wanted Dallas to blow the doors off of Edmonton, right? Yes. Because you wanted it to be like, ah, if the Canucks had gotten past Edmonton in Game 7, they would have been all tired and beat up, and they would have run up against a juggernaut Stars team that was destined for the Stanley Cup. Yeah. So at the end

of the day, it didn't really matter that they lost Game 7. My line of thinking for going into this series was Edmonton just got over a lot of mental and emotional hurdles in the Canucks series. And that they were well suited to go up against a Dallas team that, again, had a very impressive resume going into the Western Conference Final. You take care of the defending Stanley Cup champs in round one. You take care of another Stanley Cup champion recently in Colorado in the second. But the Oilers had, I thought the Oilers had a lot of momentum coming out of that Vancouver series. They overcame the Stuart Skinner implosion.

They fought down twice from being like that gate, that elimination game, right? They were down three, two in that series and they fought twice. They won on the road in game seven is momentum. The right way to put it though, or just confidence. I think it was confidence. I mean, I don't know momentum. I don't you said momentum. Yeah. And momentum I'm with you. Cause I don't think momentum really exists from game to game. I do think that the vibes were high and the things had gone their way and they were feeling good about themselves. You bring up vibes every day. Vibes are important, man.

If you got bad vibes, it just won't work. Halford's vibe check, daily vibe check, is an important factor. It is important, though. The Oilers' PK vibe check is very high right now. They're like, good, we get to kill a penalty. Now, the game tonight that we're going to see between the Rangers and the Panthers, I did a vibe check on the Rangers following the two games in Florida, and the vibes are low

because they are all completely cognizant of the fact that they're playing defense all game. Do vibe checks go game to game? Vibe checks are throughout the playoffs. You have a vibe. Now, it can go up and down, not unlike momentum. But sometimes when the good times are rolling, everything clicks. So the vibes will transfer from game to game.

Oh, look. Knoblox coaching changes last night. Could have totally gone up. But can't vibes give momentum to a team? Therefore, the momentum also. Momentum is a game-to-game thing. Yeah, but ADOG is suggesting that there's a positive correlation between vibes and momentum.

Vibes create momentum. Therefore, momentum must transfer game to game if vibes do. Vibes are just vibes. You just feel good about yourself. It doesn't translate to anything. There's some holes in your logic here. I think there's some holes in your logic, Halford. No.

Just trust me on this one. No. Sources. Sources. Trust me. Halford says trust me. You know what? Just trust me on the vibe check.

Absolutely not. I've done a lot of research into this, and I got a couple patents pending on the vibe check, so just trust me on this one. It'll be interesting to see if Tanev is back for the Dallas Stars. That's a bad vibe. Yeah. Losing Tanev is a bad vibe.

Well, everyone made the same joke last night, but it's worth repeating. You know it's serious if Tanev can't return to the game, right? Like, he is, you know, and there was, I know there's, you know, Miro Heiskanen is obviously a very good defenseman, but there are some people that thought that the Stars blue line beyond Heiskanen and beyond Tanev was a little,

eh, you know? He tied the whole thing together. They had decent pieces. People liked Harley. Suter's pretty over the hill. Issa Lindell kind of is what he is. Tanev came in and just made everything work, which is kind of what he does.

He's not flashy, as we all know. He's not a super high profile jumps off the screen kind of guy, but he allows everyone else to do their thing because you know you've got the safety trusty reliable rear guard back there but it's also he goes out of business in a quiet nature and plays through everything like he's

one of those ones you can count on he's always going to be there until he potentially breaks his foot in game four of the Western Conference final we got a bunch of texts in Dan from North Van texts in. Part of the reason I'm rooting against the Oilers is because it's Edmonton, but also because

of how much I dislike Dreisaitl. I used to like the guy, but these playoffs have changed my outlook. What a pissy diver he is. That's from Dan from North Van. Why are you so pissy? It is

kind of funny that Rick Tockett must have obviously been on to something when he started talking about embellishing. Because embellishing has been one of the stories of the playoffs. Has it not? Oh, yeah. I mean, it's the head snapping. Yeah. Right?

I mean, that's what Tockett was specifically focused? I mean, that's what Talkit was specifically focused on. Remember, going into the Edmonton series, he wanted to have that out there. And it was... It didn't... Like, I didn't find the embellishment in that series to, like, be a huge talking point. Well, I think...

I found the missed calls to be more of a talking point when we got to officiate i think you i think it was in nashville and he was and he was thinking yeah forsberg the faker uh and and i think he was he was just kind of setting the table for all right well i don't want the others to get a lot of power plays because it's the Oilers' power play. So maybe he was thinking and he was using some of the goodwill that he generated with officials. And at the end of the day,

I mean, it's not like the Oilers were on the power play a whole lot. Well, that's what I was saying. The disparity wasn't as great as it was in the first round. The first round was heavily slanted towards Nashville. And Nashville got a lot of power play opportunities in that opening round. Your stupid soccer sport is creeping into hockey now.

Yeah, I know. It's bad. And actually, it's funny. You know what? It's funny because... Before, back in the day, the game would police itself. I know. And if you were out there faking,

you'd get a punch in the face. Now you've brought up an interesting point. This is good. Because soccer has done, I would say, a decent... They've tried to combat embellishing. They've still got a long way to go. Yeah, they do. Through two things.

One, VAR, and then two, very quick to the pocketbook for simulation for yellow cards, right? Now, the NHL has gone down the road before of trying to out embellishing and diving remember the rather infamous divers list that they put out a few years ago where they were going to make the punishments publicly available but it just seems like it never really took off as this i think that they thought the public shaming was going to deter guys from doing it but it really hasn't if anything i think more players have caught on to the fact of let's be honest there's incredible value in trying to draw penalties yeah i mean that's what it is at the end of the day you could say it's um you know it sullies the the sport and simulation and play

acting is beneath the warriors that are out on the ice but the reality of it is is if you can and there's a reality of it i just hope it doesn't get to the point where it does that it does in soccer, where the referees are almost like in on it. You know what I mean? Like they just play along with it. You can, you can feel a foul in soccer and the guy just goes down so easily.

And in some ways there's not even a complaint. It's just the way things are done. Like it depends where the foul occurs on the pitch, what the situation is, and I hope that doesn't happen in hockey. Keith and Langley, you guys are hilarious. Dallas wins and the Oilers are finished. Oilers win and the Stars are finished.

Keith and Langley, that's completely wrong. All we said yesterday was this is a huge game for the Oilers. And we said this was their biggest game since 2006 in the Stanley Cup final against the Carolina Hurricanes. And we said, yeah, the game seven against Vancouver was big. But, you know, this is the conference finals. And the Oilers went to the conference finals a few years ago and got swept by the abs. So I don't think you thought maybe outside of game one, that was, you know, a big game.

That was, all we said was the Oilers better show up in game four or they're probably finished. And they did show up. They did show up. And, you know, I think it actually bothered me watching it. Cause I'm like, damn it. The Oilers are showing some backbone here because they had a terrible start, but they hung in there. They pulled themselves together and it was basically the reverse of game three. You know, when you're killing penalties and scoring shorthanded and you're shaking off bad starts and you're staying in it. And they took that game over from the Dallas Stars.

And we're certainly not suggesting that Dallas is finished in this. We're just wondering if the Oilers now, especially with Kristanov being, I don't know, we don't know if he's going to play for game five or the rest of the series. All of a sudden now, I'm not saying Dallas is finished, but if we had to pick someone, if we had to pick someone, right now I think I'd pick the Oilers.

Because overall, I think the Oilers have been the better team in these playoffs. They could have easily been up 3-0, but they kind of had these momentum, not momentum, they just had these momentum they not momentum they just had these lags you know there's the 10 minutes in the third in the second period of game three where they just kind of fell apart um they overcame their bad start yesterday and i don't like it but it is what it is and i think the oilers are the favorites in this series i'm also trying to manifest the Stanley Cup final that I want. You got to remember this,

right? Like that's, that's the key. Again, Edmonton, New York, Stanley Cup final. Everything else is going to be a distant second in terms of intrigue and

drama and storylines and narrative. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough. And what we just have to call Thomas Grant's erotica. Thomas Grant's erotica. Course. Thomas Grant's erotica. Expected Goals

Thomas Grant's Erotica Dog Model Thomas Grant's Erotica Redression Thomas Grant's Erotica PDO Thomas Grant's Erotica Thomas Duranica. P.D.O. Thomas Duranica. 802 on a Thursday.

Happy Thursday, everybody. Halford Brough, Sportsnet 650. Halford Brough of the Morning is brought to you by Pacific Honda. Pacific Honda is North Vancouver's premier destination for Honda vehicle sales and service. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything you're looking for. Sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in Hour 3

of the program. Thomas Drance, music aficionado as well as an analyst here on Sportsnet 650 and a writer for The Athletic. He's going to join us in just a moment here. the highlight of Hour 3. Hour 3 is brought to you by Campbell & Pound Real Estate Appraisers. Trust the expertise of Campbell & Pound.

Visit them on the internet at campbell-pound.com today. We are coming to you live from the Kintec studio. Kintec, Canada's favorite orthotics provider, powered by thousands of five-star Google reviews. So, Orfite, what are you waiting for? Kintec, that's what you're waiting for. To the phone lines we go. Thomas Drance joins us now on the Halford & Brough Show

on Sportsnet 650. Good morning, Drancer. What's up? Good morning. I like when you can tell that Brough is angry in his reads, like that he's got a bone to pick. Not at all. My dress is coming to you live from the Kintec studio.

Yeah, no, I know. I can tell when you're getting through it because you're like, I've got carving you on the menu I actually don't because I don't have the energy for a fight with you I just that's how I win most of my fights I know

I'm just so tired most people are just like alright I don't care and then they go outside do you I'm still arguing yeah you forgot that part of it yeah um do you really think that haronic haronic elevates quinn hughes to the point where it's worth paying him seven million dollars a season yes yeah i mean and look i don't think it's i think the way of looking at it is not that heronic elevates quinn hughes i think hughes elevates heronic more than

the opposite but you know we've been through now a whole bunch of different quinn hughes partners during his you know five six year nhL career and you know we've seen the Tanev experience we've seen the Luke Shen experience those two experiences look pretty similar we know what it looks like when Quinn Hughes plays with a defensively oriented guy and it's pretty good but also you cross the blue line and for the most part those types of players you know they're they're disciplined about putting the puck low or going D to D when it's really safe to do so. Whereas Hironix able to do a little bit more in terms of, you know, running some of those switches, those interchanges up high with Hughes in terms of attacking downhill himself and finding Hughes through scenes.

There's there's more going on that I think elevates what this team is able to do in terms of manufacturing offense above what you get when Hughes is played with Jordy Ben or Tucker Pullman or Shen or Tanev or Noah Juleson. The other guy who had a similar impact was Ethan Baer, but there's a huge difference in terms of, A, the rate at which this team actually won games when they were playing Ethan bear, but there's a huge difference in terms of a, the, the rate at which this team actually won games when they were playing Hughes of bear and B the fact that even when bear was playing with

Hughes in the five on five numbers looked really good because, Hey, guess what? You put Hughes with more of a dynamic puck mover in his own right. And it opens up a variety of things for him. He just has more of the puck, you know that looked good with bear playing 16 and a half 17 minutes um with heronic you're talking about 23 in the regular season you know you're talking about a guy who can legitimately fill a top of the lineup uh role at a premium spot that's like extraordinarily difficult to replace now

do i think a seven million dollar per year valuation on five or six years is like an efficient contract like a like a win for the canucks i don't i don't but i think it's roughly fair value for a piece that's very difficult to replace extremely extremely hard to acquire, and who has unique value alongside Hughes. It's like the analogy that I keep coming back to is Zach Hyman, right? It's like, can Zach Hyman drive his own line? Like, no, who cares? Like, I don't care about that. No, there is value in complementary players, for sure.

Yeah, what I care about is that he helps, you know, the guy who's clearly the driver, the elite player, you know, have this excellent elite bottom line. Like, Hughes is going to win the Norris. I like that. I'd be protective of that environment, even if it's clearly Hughes that makes that environment. Even if it's true that you could probably find a value replacement for Hronik, who could do 80% of the job or 85% of the job by the way very much like Toronto did plugging in bunting for 900k as opposed to signing Hyman for 5.5 million but like that extra 15% matters especially if you're a team with designs on doing something

meaningful and ambitious next season doesn't the extra cap space matter though that you could save if you um like okay so let me start here it does but do you think heronic could drive a pair by himself do you think he could drive the second pair i i do yeah i think in in lower usage with another credible top four guy i think he could but you know that's not something this team has tended to have right i mean you look at this defense core and and you know i think's not something this team is tended to have. Right. I mean, you look at this defense core and, and, you know, I think there's a bunch of guys who, if we're being generous, we describe as like four or fives. Right.

And then there's Hughes and Heronic. Right. But I, but I think you, I see Heronic as a guy who could be, you know, like sort of the primary, I mean, puck mover is the wrong term, but kind of the more two way oriented defender on defender on a second pair with second pair deployment. I don't think you'd want him in tufts with a player that's not Quinn Hughes. I don't think you'd. So, you know, but yeah, I mean, I think he's a totally credible on his own top four defense. So I guess it begs the question of how do you fill out the other two

pairs and are you comfortable with what you can do if you give a lot of money to harona can you have what potentially 50 is tied up in your first pair yeah i mean i have no problem with having 15 million tied up in the first pair when they outscored the opposition by 30 at 5-on-5 this year, right? I mean, it's not like I'm not getting elite. You know, like, I would hate to pay $15 million to a first pair if my first pair was, like, you know, Morgan, Riley, and Ilya Labushkin. But I have no problem paying $15 million to a top pair if it's Bouchard-Eckholm, if it's Hughes-Haronik, if it's Makar-Taves, if it's bouchard echo if it's hughes haronic if it's

macar taves if it's harley hayes you know like that's no problem that that's what you want like what the canucks get from their top pair is what you want there's you know almost no amount that you can pay you know your top pair rd your top pair ld provided that they're elite, that's like truly inefficient, right? Like what kills you is the other stuff. What kills you is the stuff at the margins. And, you know, I just think we need to kind of look at the Canucks offseason in terms of being like a set of like almost like a maze where every door you step through, other avenues close, right?

I mean, that's kind of what you're looking at. But the Canucks have a lot of avenues this offseason, which is very different from some of the previous years. It's not like, well, if you spend here, you're really screwed. The Canucks can afford multiple big-ticket items and still have $10 million, $12 million, $13 million to flesh out their depth along similar lines of what they did last offseason following the Oliver Ekman-Larsen buyout.

Like, you can bring in, you know, probably a five or a six or a $7 million forward and extend Hironic at market price and still have what you need to sort of build out your third line and your fourth, or sorry, your third pair, especially if, you know, that sort of is being built out with guys like, you know, I don't know, Brendan Dillon and Tyler Myers and guys who actually really want to be in Vancouver, right? I mean, that there's ways to sort of go about having enough depth.

I do think this team still needs, you know, a top of the lineup, like another top of the lineup defenseman in addition to Philip Hronick. Like, I don't think they have enough on the back end. Like I said, I think... How can they get that? Do you think it's possible to get that this offseason? I mean, you know, I actually think the Hronick example is kind of instructive. Like, how do you get that?

You pay for it. And you pay a price that sucks to pay. And you pay a price that sucks to pay, it and you pay a price that sucks to pay and you pay a price that sucks to pay and then you pay another price that sucks to pay right i mean right not not only was heronic expensive to acquire but because he was arbitration eligible and it's not like this is a new point this is something i was saying at the time while carving the deal and being incorrect because it worked from a hockey perspective for like the 99th percentile but the you know heronic was only available because if he was good for one more year his arbitration case was going to make his third contract you know extremely unpalatable like it was going to make

for a necessarily inefficient third contract that's where the knucks are um that's why he was available and he still cost an arm and a leg and he's going to cost an arm and a leg again and you know I don't know like I if you're a 26 year old it's not like he's 30 right he's 26 he's right-handed like these are for me anyway sort of the the pieces that you know if you're a team like the Canucks in sort of a finishing stage you won the division you had 109 points you know, if you're a team like the Canucks in sort of a finishing stage, you won the division, you had 109 points. You know, these are the prices that I don't think you can bulk at when you're talking about pieces,

you know, this premium that play at the top of the lineup. Like that's it. And there's no other one of Vancouver's pending, you know, free agents, unrestricted or restricted, who come close in my mind to sort of hitting that level. Now I have a follow-up question to that. Do you really think that Paul Simon had no good songs after him and Art Garfunkel broke up?

No, I don't. But I, more than anything, Graceland was a masterpiece. Okay. Let's not get carried away. I think the... I mean, it was intentionally selected, right? In that we all know who was primarily responsible for driving that there, right?

And we know that he could succeed afterwards. But at the end of the day, he did his best work when paired with Garfunkel. And I just don't think that's super controversial. Is it? Like, there's nothing on Graceland that approaches Sound of Silence, for example, that approaches some of the timeless ones. Hello, Darkness, right? Like, on and on.

Like, come on. That's the... I think there are some. I think there are. I think there's some, I think, I think there are. I think there's, I mean, it all depends. And it's just a question of, would you give Art Garfunkel seven by seven? You know? All right.

Heck yeah. Heck yeah, I would. I mean, the thing is, is like, yes, provided that he was of a reasonable enough age. Right. If Art, but if Art. There's not much downside risk and because I'm really confident, I'm really confident that the premium price paid, like the premium price paid to create an environment where Hughes can perform

like the best on the planet. I mean, that's essential. That's essential. And, um, you know, I,

again, I don't think Heronix primarily responsible for driving that necessarily so much as I do believe that, you know, there's something additive there. There is a unique fit that I would prioritize. Just like, you know, I think a record label would prioritize getting another Simon & Garfunkel album over getting another Graceland. I like Graceland. I just don't want to pay the premium for that. Okay. We're going to move on here.'t want to pay the premium for that. Okay, we're going to move on here. Premium for the graduate soundtrack.

I'm going to hit you with a stat here. Here are the top six Canucks in terms of shorthanded time on ice in the playoffs. Let me tell you, see if you can come up with the theme here. Yeah, they're all depth guys. Ian Cole, Wendell. No, no, no, hold on. Hold on here. Hold on. Don up with the theme here. Yeah, they're all depth guys. Ian Cole, Lindholm. No, no, no.

Hold on. Hold on here. Hold on. Don't jump to conclusions here. Ian Cole, Teddy Bluger, Elias Lindholm, Tyler Myers, Nikita Zdorov, Dakota Joshua. What do all those guys have in common? All expiring, baby. Yeah.

I mean, we're watching the Oilers PK and realizing how important the PK is in the playoffs. And there are some people that think the PK is more important than the power play in the playoffs. And I don't know. I don't want to debate that now. But the PK, they've just amicably parted ways with Mike Yeo, who's in charge of the PK. And I think we can all agree, even if the PK wasn't elite during the regular season, it was very much improved, and it was elite at times, I thought, in the playoffs. It was incredible in the playoffs.

Is this something that we need to be mindful of, is not only some of these guys that people just want to keep because they want to keep them, but we've seen the PK struggle. We've seen the PK bury the Canucks quite recently, actually. Do you have any thoughts on Mike Yeo being let go

or what they do to make sure that the PK doesn't fall back to what it was a few years ago? I definitely think it's too bad to be losing Mike Yo given all of those departures. And I'd add this, like the Canucks opened the season playing Hirona, Confused, and JT Miller a ton on the PK. And as the year went on, adjusted. And they adjusted specifically by upping the amount of minutes spent four on five by depth

guys. That's not an easy conversation necessarily to have in a room right like that requires some weight to be like hey you know what the solution is less of our most important players right less of our guys who are most likely to talk talk to me about it you know um i think that's sort of where the departure of yo is an interesting one because you know i think he i think he had that weight i think he was able to go through that process and you know i'm not saying it was acrimonious behind the scenes i just i you know knowing the dynamics of nhl

locker rooms that's not nothing um you know in terms of all the expiring guys i mean one thing when you look at like you brought up the oilers pk um you know it's not not as if it's their most expensive players driving the bus for Edmonton either right four on five right like it's Yanmark and Connor Brown and Derek Ryan and uh Warren Fogle and on and on so you know I mean I think the way to be mindful of it is to make sure that you're bringing in depth players doing the job and prioritizing that just like they did last offseason as opposed to sort of overpaying for X guy because of their PK utility. Aside from Lindholm, I wouldn't say Vancouver had a guy who I looked at and saw and thought, man, that guy's elite four on five.

Right. Like Lindholm would kind of be the exception. I thought Joshua at times played really well, but it wasn't consistent. Yeah. Well, he also he also had potential. Like he wasn't always first over the board. It's like by the playoffs, Lindholm and Bluger. You know what I mean? Yeah. And so like I really weight that in terms of, if you're going to be an elite PK guy,

you have to be first over the board, in my mind. So, you know, I mean, look, it's complicated. They're definitely going to have to be creative in filling that out. I do think the combination of all of those guys being on expiring deals plus the departure of Yo is a challenge for sure uh for this canucks team no question about that but you know it's not something that would keep me up at night because again pk value um often isn't the most expensive thing there's you know always a guy like a travis boyd or whomever right on in free agency who can who can get it done um but you know it is something to be mindful of and prioritize when fleshing out sort of the depth of this roster i just think again you have

to be ruthless in how you prioritize things and i think we're seeing in this playoff you know like what what's most important right like what's more important for these teams that are still advancing and it's like the engine at the top of the it's, like, the engine at the top of the lineup, right? Like, that's the engine at the top of the lineup that the Oilers have is probably the most powerful in the league. And it's what matters so much more than all the obvious flaws, right, in terms of their defense, in terms of their goaltending, in terms of, you know, their, like, you know,

complete flakiness when holding a lead. You know, likewise with teams like the rangers and on and on like the canucks the dallas stars had nothing last night and still had more shots than the canucks had in either game six or seven right like it's like the canucks just couldn't get it going at a high enough clip um with their top of the top end on the ice at five on five and you know so for me it's yes, you have to worry about the PK, but fundamentally this team needs, and this is for Mike Martinago since I'm in his neighborhood at the moment,

it needs more nitrous in their engine. You need more. Yeah. You need more of that push. You need that like high end forward. Right. I think a star level winger. And in my mind, you have to be protective of Veronica. like you have to start there and then you have to be mindful of the hockey fit and fleshing out the roster and that includes things like guys with four and five ability um who also cost a reasonable amount and that's kind of just like the the hierarchy the order of sort of operations that i think this offseason looks like like it starts for me with finding a resolution with veronic if. If you can find another top pair quality guy, frankly.

Not just a guy for your top four, like a top pair quality guy who you can play behind Hughes and Hronik, great. And then a top six forward, probably a star, like a star level forward. To me, those are sort of where this offseason kind of begins and ends, and then the rest of it is filling the pieces in around it. And luckily, that's something that this management group's excelled at. So, you know, that's why my focus, my eyes are trained firmly on what's at the top. Whoa, that was awesome.

What a well-timed bark. That was like the moo cow, but it was like a bark. It was like, grab it up. Francis trained him. He's like, I got to get out of here. Points to his dog. Bark. Before we let you go and the dog, with Mike Yeo's departure,

do you have any insight as to what the Canucks might do to replace him or if they'll replace him? Yeah, I mean, I would assume they would replace him because they only have one full-time assistant coach now, right, in Adam Foote. So you've got to have another one, I would think. You know, it was clear that Rick Tockett, like, Sergei Gonchar left the bench during the playoffs.

So, you know, I do think you can have too many bodies. You know, one of the twins or Sergei Gonchar to full-time or bringing in someone from the outside. I do think two assistants, like two full-time assistants, even that's like operating lean by contemporary nhl standards but but i think that's kind of like a bare minimum um you know and even then even then right we've had things like target running the power play does that really make sense given the demands of being a head coach in the bank of the market so i would i would strongly expect

that you'd add an assistant and then you know i i just think it's interesting to to note sort of the organization's overall positioning with both Yo and Jeremy Collin moving on. You know, I saw Rick Dollywall report it was a one-year extension offer for Mike Yo. You know, that's not really an example of, like, a team making a huge effort, right, to retain their staff. Maybe that says something about how the organization viewed the work,

but I'd be mindful, too, of the fact that one thing about cap space, especially these days, is it's not just the money you have to fit onto your roster. It's often space that you're going to use with front-loaded signing bonuses, like lump-sum payments right off the bat. The Canucks are probably going to spend in the order of $30-plus million in upfront costs just over the next six months.

It's probably more than that, given that Miller and Pedersen's new deals, I think between them, there's something like $17 million in signing bonus payments due this summer. So, you know, I do think, I do sort of look at Colleton and Yo and just kind of thinking about it and thinking through it based on what I'm hearing around those situations.

You know, I do think there's a bit of budget consciousness going on in terms of how the Canucks are fleshing out their coaching staff, which I think is curious. It's pretty interesting, you know, especially given sort of the emphasis that the club has put on things like player development, right, things like teaching, hockey teaching

over the course of the past year. You know, we'll see if it works out as they sort of, you know, replace Colleton with a head coach in Manny Malhotra, who I know has a high, big profile in British Columbia, but also has never been a head coach

at the pro level. And then I'll be curious to see if they bring in like a really experienced veteran guy i mean yo's been a head coach at multiple stops on the way or if we see something similar where whether whether there's another like developmental type coach who comes in to replace him uh those are the sorts of tells that this organization, you know, while they tend to spend to the cap, non-cap spending, some of that other stuff, you know, that's been areas where this organization has at least somewhat frequently

been willing to cut corners. So I'll be curious to see if that applies to the coaching staff over the breadth of this entire offseason. Drancer, people say you're crazy, but you've got diamonds on the soles of your shoes. And we love you. And we'll keep chatting once in a while, I suppose. Have a good one, buddy.

Cheers, bye. Thomas Drance from The Athletic Vancouver and Canucks Talk right here on Sportsnet 650. It's time now for What We Learned. And part of the, I'm not going to lie, part of the reason why I asked Drance that last question about Mike Yeo is it's a segue to my what we learned, which is apparently Mike Yeo

is not going to be out of work for long. He has interviewed for a job with the Ottawa Senators and also apparently is in the running to replace Manny Malhotra on the bench in Toronto because of his ties to Craig Brubin. You're listening to the best of Halford and Brough.