Halford & Brough in the Morning - Woodley Talks Canucks + What We Learned

Episode Date: November 4, 2024

In hour three, Mike & Jason chat the latest Canucks news with NHL.com & In Goal Magazine's Kevin Woodley (2:50) ahead of tomorrow's road clash versus Anaheim, plus the boys tell us what they learned (27:00). This podcast is produced by Andy Cole and Greg Balloch. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

8.02 on a Monday. Happy Monday, everybody. Halford Brough, Sportsnet 650. Halford and Brough in the morning is brought to you by Vancouver Honda, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything you're looking for. Sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in hour three of the program.

Hour three is brought to you by Campbell & Pound Real Estate Appraisers. Trust the expertise of Campbell and 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. Soar feet. What are you waiting for?

Kintec. Kevin Woodley is in the process of joining us. I don't think he picked up on the first try here. Okay. I want to ask Lad try here. Okay. I want to ask Laddie something. Okay. How good is Cameron Schmidt for the Vancouver Giants? He now has 17 goals in 15 games.

Yep. He's not a big guy. Listed at 5'7", 156 pounds, but just 17 years old from Prince George. Cameron Schmidt is ripping up the WHL again as a 17-year-old. Another hat trick. His first of the year, but he's had multi-goal games all over the place. His third goal was actually kind of funny.

He was like a two-on-one developing, and he was waiting for the guy to catch up, but he was just so fast that he was like, I'm just going to shoot it, and he ripped it glove side for the hat trick. And then the best play of the game, you mentioned his size, he's 5'7", but he absolutely bowled over one of the defensemen, the 6'2", defenseman Wojtek Port, just laid him out in the corner. 5'7 guy doing this.

I think he's playing with a little bit of a chip on his shoulder, guys. This is a draft year, right? Yes. Okay, so what are people, is he going to be one of these, like, guys that people debate all season long about where he should go? And you get some people that say he's a top five pick and others are like, take him in the third round. He has top 10 skill, but because he's 5'7", he's in that conversation for mid first round. So some basement dwelling team is going to pass on him because of size concerns.

And he's going to make them pay five, six years down the road when they see how good he is because yes he's five seven but he is amazing he's got the shot he's got the speed he's the whole package and he's what he does and he's got the intensity apparently he's hitting guys what he does without the puck is is amazing as well so he's he's going to be a player despite the size concerns and yeah some some poor sad sack team is going to pass on him and their fans are going to be very upset. And they'll be like, here's Cameron Schmidt for the Dallas Stars. Got another one. Unbelievable.

Okay, our next guest, I got this note that just came through. He went a perfect 3-0 for Team Sportsnet at this weekend's Canucks Autism Network Pro-Am. He's also a presentation of White Rock Hyundai. It is Kevin Woodley here on the Halford & Brough Show on Sportsnet 650. What up, Kev? Not much. I was going to cheer Brough for not being

a part of this event this weekend, but then I remembered the last time he played for Team Sportsnet, we were 0-3. I'm bad in the room. And on the ice. Yeah, not particularly good on the ice either. So that's awesome. Kev, who is your NHL pro? I was Megan Augusta, actually.

We went with winners, gold medals. We wanted that winning attitude in the room. So we got that. She was amazing, both on the ice and in the room. And then we topped it off with a W in the All-Star game as well. So a perfect 4-0, which doesn't happen to me ever. And the best part, the best part, and I will for sure let him know this, is that Eddie Lack, who told me all weekend he was going to light me up

in the All-Star game, did not light me up. He was out there as a skater? He was out there as a skater, yeah. And telling us to check his live barn highlights from Beer League and all this kind of stuff. So it was a fun weekend. We did play one game against Kessler to start the second period. Somehow negotiations were made I was unaware of

where everybody just basically stopped on the initial draw and he skated in on a breakaway. And I'm still not sure if my glove has moved as he's put it top shelf. So that was a little humbling. But a great cause, great people that do great work, and a great weekend put on by them, and a lot of money raised. Well over a million dollars. Don't have the final total, but for Canucks Autism Network.

So good on everyone. And good to see guys that hadn't been back in a long time, like Matt Cook. Got a chance to chat with him and he was he just received a massive warm welcome for a guy that hadn't been back in the market for a long time and i think probably good for some of those guys to remember just how much and how warmly this market embraces them as well uh congrats to you for not only your performance but raising money for a good cause uh let's talk about the Vancouver Canucks here. I guess we'll start with, I want to start with Demko.

It's November 4th now. Some of us were hoping that November would be when Thatcher Demko returned to the lineup. Do you think it will be, or are you still just in guessing mode? I think everybody's in guessing mode, although Rick Dollywell's been pretty spot on on a lot of his reporting. So if he's saying he's here in two to three weeks, that's good.

I think the challenge here is in terms of the uncertainty is that. So I thought maybe late October based on well, things appear to be going in training camp and because we haven't sort of we don't get to see him right like they do a really good job of keeping him away from our eyes especially when they're at home they can't on the road which is why the video emerged over the weekend but if there was a setback where he stopped skating at any point we have no idea so um i think that's the biggest thing i don't't care, frankly, whether it's November or December, as long as it's back and back for good and that they're confident in that or as confident as they can be with this injury versus,

I mean, let's be honest, this whole thing happened because they rushed him back. Like, this injury does not occur to a healthy joint, especially on a move innocuous as that. So rushing him back for the playoffs is ultimately what led to this possibility. And so don't do it again. And, yeah.

It's a unique injury. Yes. So do they have, do they feel like they have the expertise to make that call on when he should go back in there? Because maybe this is just going to be the way it is but i don't particularly want to watch every canucks game with demko in there and just be sitting on pins and needles waiting for something bad to happen yeah you know and

here's the thing like even though um we know which which part of the knee it is. We don't know the extent, right? Like, is this a muscle tear? Is this a muscle torn off the bone? In which case, I would think you would have surgery, but we keep hearing, but I just have to learn to play with it. At the end of the day, we don't know. They haven't told us. And so without that knowledge, I don't think, like,

that's just the way it's going to be, right like we're just going to be guessing a little bit here uh and so yeah yeah sorry i cut you off again uh kevin lankanen um how much can they play this guy can they play the wheels off of them or do you have to be concerned about fatigue for him just because the Demko situation still has that ring of uncertainty around it? I think you do have to be a little bit careful, and it's not specific to Kevin Lankan. The reality is, not to add uncertainty to uncertainty, but we don't know because he hasn't played a lot at any other point in his career.

He hasn't been asked to. So you'd have to go back to probably American League days to sort of, you know, see the last time he racked up a lot of games played. And even when he's overseas, like they don't play an NHL style schedule

or anything that rigorous. So there's uncertainty there as well. And I think that's one that comes down to the relationship between the goalie and the goalie coach in the medical department and keeping an eye on where all his levels are at and how he feels physically but I would be you know in an era where nobody plays a ton I would be a little bit wary of you know getting this guy into 60 games when, you know, the quick check of his hockey DB, I think even the most he's ever played in a single season is 42 in Finland.

And, you know, that's, there's just even that year in Chicago, it was 37. So if you're going to start to get into the 60s at a time when almost nobody gets into the 60s, I don't know if that's necessarily a great recipe. So what do they do with Seelovs? It's a good question. I think for starters, maybe put him behind an environment that isn't the fourth hardest in the NHL.

I know the numbers aren't good, but his expected save percentage is 854 right now. That's the fourth lowest in the National Hockey League. So that's weighting the quality of shots he's faced relative to what you would expect an average goalie to stop relative to the rest of the NHL. Only three goalies have had a harder environment.

That said, you can outplay a hard environment, and he has underperformed it by a significant margin. He's 67th in the NHL in adjusted save percentage. You know, anytime you're down there with Alexander Georgiev and Fedotov and Vili Huso at this point in the season, it's not good. But it's also such a tiny sample, and it's the 854. He does not require waivers. And we had this discussion in the past. As long as you've got that and you've got your farm team down the road,

if you know you're not starting him on the weekend and he can go play a couple of games, get him some minutes. I see that as potentially an option. I don't know why it wouldn't be unless you're worried about shattering confidence by sending him down.

The one challenge here, a little bit, is he may be best served working with Marco Terranes, who knows his game, knows the system that he's come up with. Don't forget, Archer, she loves, is an Ian Clark guy in terms of drafting, development, and the belief that Ian has in him. I know there are other times earlier in Archer's career where other people in the organization, because they said it to me

from a scouting side, were like, they don't see it. But Ian did, so they stuck with it. So I think even as a goalie, when you know the guy that has all the confidence in the world in you, the guy who said start him ahead of Casey DeSmith in the playoffs last year, isn't around, I wonder how much harder that is. And honestly, if Ian was in a development role, he could go down and meet him in the American Hockey League for those games, even if he's not on the ice because of the injuries,

to be there to supervise. The challenge right now is I've heard all kinds of great things about Justin Pogge as a goalie coach, but he hasn't had an opportunity to learn the system that Artur has come up playing. And so Marco has. And so that's where that challenge gets a little more complicated. If you're sending him down there just to play games, that's fine.

But if you're sending him down there to work on your game, you're sending him down there with a goalie coach who may not understand his game quite to the level that Marco does. And so that might create a little bit of trepidation. Like I said, like with Ian just being a scout, he's not going to Abbotsford to meet them to have eyes on that. So it's kind of one of the downsides I thought of not keeping him as a director, but we'll see how this goes and see what decision they make.

At the very least, you can get him some games down there on a weekend when he's not going to start anyways. Other teams have done it in the past, and we've talked about it in past years. It's a good way to operate. Kev, can you tell us a bit more about the defensive environment that the Canucks are putting their goalies in? Because Rick Tuckett himself said that as much as he was pleased with the effort and the win against San Jose on Saturday,

he noted that they still got to do a better job cutting down the odd man rushes. Yeah, they've slipped defensively on odd man rushes and the thing is it hasn't been like they're not getting them they're not creating off the rush at the expense of giving up off the rush um i think the devil's game skews things quite a bit because they got killed off the rush there even carolina the way carolina just sort of sort of picked passes off in the neutral zone and they just came at them in waves with speed like there's a lot of quality there until right now at five on five high danger chances which are the ones that matter off the rush they're 27th in the national hockey league right now overall high

danger five on five against 19th in the nhl in zone defending has gotten a little tighter the mistakes in their own end that were had them near the bottom of the league you know uh coming off that road trip they're up to eight that's gotten better pks pk is actually really good the underlying numbers on the pk are actually first in the nhl right now um but those five on five numbers those are the ones that matter in the playoffs you heard me talk a lot about it last year going to the playoffs why i was confident they had a chance to be a good playoff team was not giving up high danger especially off the run those are the freebies high danger chances off the rush those are where you just give away goals like they did against the new jersey devils

on the home on the two-game homestand and there's been way too much of that this season and so you hope that it's just a learning like that balance because they were a team that just would you know they would it wouldn't take chances offensively. They were content to sort of grind it out and defend by having the puck in the offensive zone. They're taking more chances. They're trying to create more. And in-zone offense, actually, that's the interesting thing. They haven't created off the rush, but they're third in the league in in-zone five-on-five high danger four.

So they're creating more dangerous offense when they're settled in zone play this year than they did last year but you can make mistakes dangerous plays risky plays in zone that lead to rush the other way as well and so i think we've seen a little bit of that and that's where you know i think you have to give them the benefit of the doubt and time to sort of settle into it they've opened things up like they sort of shut it down last year and you just weren't allowed to take those chances no almost nobody did um you know low high passes that had a risk of being picked off cross seam passes from low to high that could lead to odd man numbers the other way they're trying more of that and finding that balance on when and what to try.

It's probably just going to take some time. But hopefully by the end of the year, that high danger against has come way down because I don't care. Like I heard you guys earlier say, you're not panicking some concern. And I would agree. We can sort of know that the DNA of Rick Talkett as a coach and of this group based on last year will be to tighten those things up.

You don't worry that they're this loose this early. But if they don't tighten up and there are nights where it looks like it's just work ethic because quite often that's what defensive stuff is. If it doesn't tighten up then I wouldn't be nearly as bullish on them in the playoffs as I was last year

because those metrics really don't lie. They have been a very strong indicator of playoff success in years past. So tons of time to do it, but it's something that needs to start happening for this group because I don't care if they create more offense. If it's at the expense of the defensive identity that they had last year, then I don't like their chances once we get to the part of the season that, let's face it, for this group now really matters.

I'm wondering if the Canucks might get lucky tomorrow in Anaheim and see James Reimer instead of Lucas Dostal. Dostal was in the net for, I think, the last three Ducks games. Yesterday allowed four goals and a loss to the Chicago Blackhawks. Regardless of who they see, tell us a bit about Lucas Dostal because I guess he's one of the best young goalies in the NHL. I'm one of the best goalies in the NHL to start this season. He's top 10 in adjusted save percentage. I don't have the numbers after last night.

I didn't pull him up this morning. But he was up there in the top five heading into the weekend. So he's had a hell of a season. And, you know, finally getting an opportunity with Gibson out. And this is the thing, like, the Ducks are bad again. And it's interesting because Gibson's done this a couple of times and inevitably the wheels come off a little bit and people start looking at the goaltending.

The reality is the goaltending tends to bail them out quite often. They just seem to be the same team. We talk about defensively and bad environments. Like, that's the Ducks, and it hasn't really changed under the new coaching staff. It hasn't changed to start this season. They are leaning so heavily on DeStall, and he's been so good. You can only, like,

if you give up this many chances, eventually the dam bursts. And so he gives up four the other day. You're right, it'll be interesting. You can give Reimer another start. I know he keeps on skating, and so he can't be that far away. And then Reimer, quite frankly, could end up on waivers. And, you know, a team can pick him. I don't know.

I'm assuming if everything's good with Demko, then the Canucks wouldn't, but you want to talk about more of a reliable veteran tandem, you could add him to the mix with Lankan and let Seelovs go down and work out his game for long term. I kind of doubt they're considering that given the positive feedback we've had on Demko of late I'd be really worried if they did do that I'd be worried if they did that would not send a good signal no it wouldn't but uh wouldn't send a good signal to Archer Seelov's either but you know I'm just

saying like that that time is coming for Reimer with Gibson coming close coming back and I know his numbers aren't necessarily pretty don't have them in front of me. But I know his first start was really good against Vegas. He lost the game, but was the only reason they were in it. His second one, the numbers weren't great, but I heard good things about how he's playing. So don't count on it. It is a break compared to how Dustall's been going. But if they get Reimer, it doesn't mean it's an easy night.

He's actually had two really good starts for them. Kev, this was great. As always, thank you very much for taking the time to do this. Enjoy the rest of the day, and congrats again on the weekend. Thanks, guys. Kevin Woodley on Sportsnet 650 is a presentation of White Rock Hyundai. Visit the showroom on King George in White Rock or whiterockhyundai.com. So hot right now.

You're a big fan. Yeah. He might be the best and, quite frankly, only thing the Ducks have going for them. Well, it's been goalies, right? Gibson was the only reason to go for a little while now. Isn't this always the way it happens with Anaheim? I don't know. I never pay attention to them.

Their goalies stand on their heads for the first, like third or half of the season. And then the goalies just get exhausted. Just wear out. They just, it's like, I can't do this anymore. That's when Zegras is going to start picking it up, right? That's when he comes in. Has anyone's stock fallen further than Trevor Zegras?

Wasn't he on the cover of some, one of those video games? One of them vidya games. One of them vidya games. NHL vidya game. He was on the cover of Pitfall, wasn't he? Yes. Yeah, the newest, the remake. Well, that's this year.

He's on the cover. Oregon Trail. Okay. I'll give, if anyone can name me the top five leading scorers on the Anaheim Ducks without looking it up, I will buy you a coffee for our very next show. I'll buy you a coffee every day for the rest of the week. Is Troy Terry one of them? Troy Terry is one of them.

That's all I got. Okay. Radko Gudis. Not Radko Gudis. Damn. Here's a fun fact. Is Cam Fowler still on the Ducks? Yes. Okay. He is also not one of them. Here's a fun fact. Is Cam Fowler still on the Ducks? Yes.

Okay. He is also not one of them. Here's a fun fact. Two assists. Ryan Getsliff. Please stop. One of their leading scorers this year does not have a single goal, yet he's fifth on the team in points.

That's sad. Scott Indermeyer. Nope. Chris Pronger. No. This is close. Well, Leo Carlson is going to be one of them. Troy Terry is number one.

Leo Carlson is number two. Mason McTavish is number three. Ryan Strom is number four. Their fifth leading scorer with zero goals and four points. Again, their fifth leading scorer, Cutter Gauthier. Oh, yeah. He's my next guess. Yeah.

So the Canucks, look, they'll be favored again, as they were heading into San Jose. I do wonder if they'll get James Reimer, if the Ducks will look at Lucas Dostel and say, well, this guy's pretty young. Let's not totally run him out of gas early on. I'd just like to see a confident Canucks blowout win. Is that too much to ask? No.

Can I just see one of those, please? It'd be nice to have a blowout win. Let's just see him just destroy him. I agree. It would be nice to see. I will say this. It'd be nice to see. I will say this. There's been enough blowouts in the National Hockey League through the first five weeks of the season

that the Canucks are more than capable of hanging one on somebody because we've seen countless other teams do it. I mean, just that one night alone last week, Seattle went in and put eight on Montreal. That same night it was, who else did it? Was it Columbus? Columbus put eight on Montreal that same night. It was, who else did it? Was it Columbus? Columbus put one on Toronto. Yeah.

Columbus has blown out a few teams this year. So there have been a lot of lopsided scores. You know, Friedgen, what's his face? Kyle, we're talking about that on 32 Thoughts the other day. What's his face? Was it Gas at our show a few times? You know, I'm trying to work with what I got here. I couldn't remember his name off the top of my head.

They were saying that they've really noticed. And I don't know if it has to do with the fact that there wasn't a lot of pushback from the teams getting their butts kicked or whatever. But a lot of these teams weren't letting their foot off the gas when the scores were getting out of hand. And I automatically jumped to Wednesday night because it was 4-0. And that game was comfortably 4-0. The Canucks had nothing going.

But New Jersey kept going and made it 5. I didn't have any problem with that. The Canucks were so bad, I was like, good. I don't have a problem with it. I just noticed it. Loaded up devils. Yeah. Just keep rolling.

They deserve it. Get 8. Let's do a little quick what we learned before we get into the Dunbar Lumber Techs line in the final segment. Real quick what we learned, and I'm sure Halford was very, very emotional over the weekend when they officially retired Vince Carter's number in Toronto. And Masai Ujiri went up there and said, he taught us how to fly.

And then quit on your team. It's been so interesting to see that entire week, how it's played out. He taught us how to fly. What a quote. Did everyone's eyes roll right out of their heads. Pretty close. He got emotional.

I know he got emotional. He was crying on the podium. I know he did. Probably because he didn't expect to be celebrated by the franchise he once openly sabotaged. Man, the Raptors really flew with him with that one playoff series victory taught them how to

right can we talk about the talk them how to fly i'm trying to ignore this story and actually focus on the other raptor story from the weekend we all know we're you know everyone know what happened everyone aware of this so demar de rosen uh now a member of the sacramento kings was in town for that game, obviously playing, and not for the Vince Jersey retirement night. But DeMar was back, another franchise legend. And Drake was also there. Now, Drake and DeMar have beef stemming from Kendrick Lamar's

Not Like Us, right? What does DeMar have to do with this? He's from Compton. Him and Kendrick Lamar is not like us, right? What does Damar have to do with this? He's from Compton. Him and Kendrick are friends. Okay. So he was part of the video, part of the very, very- Oh, he was part of the video. Yeah.

Oh, I didn't know that. Part of the very, very specific Drake diss track. He was involved. I'm still at the Source the source awards right in my knowledge no no this is no let's get caught up so in 2013 as we did drake was named a global ambassador for the raptors now synonymous with the raptors so it's funny because drake has a certain cachet with the organization obviously so too does DeMar because of his legacy there. Of course.

But Drake doesn't like that. He actually said during the broadcast that if you ever put a DeRozan banner up, I'll go down there. DeMar, in tonight's broadcast, Drake said if you ever put a DeRozan banner up, I'll go up there and put it down myself. What's your reaction to that? Well, you're going to have a long way to climb to take it down. So I tell him good luck. Thanks, everyone. Isn't Drake, doesn't he get like a little embarrassed talking smack with professional athletes like he is one of them?

You'd think so, but he doesn't seem to. Like I know he's famous. I know he's more famous than these athletes. He's famous. I get it. I understand it. But he kind of talks to them like he's on the team.

He's not though. Have you seen him on the sidelines? He definitely thinks he's part of the team. I know, but he's not on the team. I haven't seen him make one bucket for the team. His defensive play is not great. Trip one guy on the sidelines. There's definitely a Spike Lee at Knicks element to it. It's just, it's different.

It just seems different. Yeah, it is different. Because Drake is lame? Yeah. Might have something to do with it? Kind of. I mean, his public persona has taken a beating over the last little bit, and this isn't helping, right?

Let's put it lightly, I think, yeah. Yeah, like if you have a personal beef with DeMar, that's one thing. But for what he is as a Raptor, that's a totally different thing. And when you start to blur those lines as a global ambassador, which is all he is, global ambassador and guy that sits on the sidelines.

Anyway, that was the more interesting story for the Raps for me. I kind of glossed over the whole let's retire a noted trader's jersey. Mook how all that. Way up against it for time. Let's duck out real quick. We'll come back.

We'll do humanoid what we learned. Maybe we'll do some of ours as well. And we'll announce who won the $100 gift card to Mucho Burrito. You're listening to the Halford & Brough Show on Sportsnet 650. It's Canucks Central with Dan Riccio and Satyar Shah, your destination for everything Canucks.

Exclusive interviews, inside info, and even the postgame show. Listen 4 to 6 p.m. weekdays and on demand through your favorite podcast app. Now for my favorite part of the show.

What'd I say? Talk to the audience. Oh, God, this is always dead. It's what we learn time. It's what we learn time. It's what we learn time. On the show. 8.35 on a Monday.

Happy Monday, everybody. Halford Brough, Sportsnet 650. Halford Brough for the morning is brought to you by Vancouver Honda, Vancouver's premier destination for Honda customers. They have a friendly, knowledgeable staff that can help with anything you're looking for, sales, financing, service, or parts. We are in Hour 3 of the program. It is What We Learn time.

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. Okay, we got some What We Learns and some business to attend to. Andy Learned, who won today's $100 gift card to Mucho Burrito. We're giving away a $100 gift card to Mucho Burrito every day of the week. I can buy you Mucho Burritos. It's Mucho Mucho Burritos.

Or one really big $100 burrito the size of your human body. This torso burrito. That'd be cool. That should be a thing on a menu. The world This torso burrito. That'd be cool. That should be a thing on a menu. The world's biggest burrito? Yeah, you could spend $100 and you get your body weight's worth of burrito, but like the size of you. I am intrigued by your ideas. I'd like to subscribe to your newsletter.

Sounds delicious. Go ahead. Anyways, my What We Learned is the winner is Gunner from Kelowna. Dang. Congrats to Gunner. You're going to Mucho Burrito with $100 in your pocket. Nice. Let's do What We learned, bruv.

Okay. Yeah, I'll start. Yeah. Adam Gaudet, I kind of already mentioned this, but Adam Gaudet has six goals for the Ottawa Senators. Are you talking about the same Adam Gaudet? Yeah, six goals in 10 games for the Sens. Now his shooting percentage is 35%,

so that may not last. Pretty sustainable. Pretty sustainable. Travis Green is his coach in Ottawa, and Greener knows Gaudet pretty well, and he was asked about him recently, and Green just said, well, he's older. When we were together in Vancouver,

he was a young guy coming out of college who had always scored at every level he'd been at. Like a lot of young players, you don't understand the other side of the puck as well. He tried then, and I liked him then as a player, and I like him now. He's matured a little bit. So, you know, Adam Gaudet, six goals for the Ottawa Senators, who are off to, would you describe it as like a so-so start? Yeah, fine.

For the Sens? Like they haven't buried themselves. They missed mark they've been doing they did miss all mark for a bit uh they score a lot of goals they surrender a fair amount of goals and they haven't sunk themselves i think that's the best thing because uh that would have been real tough for the start to greener's tenure was if all the old ghosts of Ottawa Senators teams past crept up. I think when All-Mart gets back and can provide them some stable goaltending, I do think that they're a fun team to watch.

Yeah. They're energetic. They're feisty because Kachuk's the emotional heartbeat of that team. You know the three hopefuls in that division? We talk about them all the time. Ottawa, Detroit, and Buffalo. Is that the way you'd power rank them?

Ottawa, Detroit, then Buffalo? Yes, but it should be Buffalo, Ottawa, Detroit, and Buffalo. Is that the way you'd power rank them? Ottawa, Detroit, then Buffalo? Yes, but it should be Buffalo, Ottawa, Detroit. It should be Buffalo. Based on talent? Based on talent. It should be Buffalo. Yeah, Buffalo is what, four and seven or something like that?

And you've got every number one overall pick. You should be better. Two of them are playing defense for you regularly. God, poor Sabres fans, man. Like, I don't know. It's hard for me to feel sorry for a team that got to pick, of all the players, them are playing defense for you regularly god poor sabers fans man like i don't know it's it's hard for me to feel sorry for a team that got to pick of all the players first like we get to take whatever one we want and what's more they took high-end talented defensemen which are the hardest

guys to find and they still stink i can't feel sorry for them give Give us a mookow on that. I was doing a lot of digging during the break about Dennis Allen, the recently fired head coach of the New Orleans Saints. So there are some that are making the assessment that he's one of the worst coaches of, let's call it the last 20 years because we need to put a time frame on this. So it's funny when you go down the list in the nfl there's two different types of worst coaches ever the first type is the ones that get that one bite at the apple and are so horrible that they're unemployable for the rest of time there's a and those ones jump to mind right away like urban meyer yeah right he's never going to

coach again in the nfl never uh bobby petrino never gonna coach again in the nfl i would say nathaniel hackett that one year in denver ruled him out to ever be a head coach again probably right so there's those guys then unless aaron rogers buys a team one even then even then it seems like a stretch a rod you'll be like i don't know about this guy. Another one to remember, because I watched the Giants play yesterday. Remember the unfortunately named Joe Judge? Yes, yes. Judge Judy's husband.

Who went from special teams coordinator to head coach to, actually, I do think it's Judge Judy's husband now. That's it. Anyway. Isn't Judge Joe Brown, isn't it? No, this is Joe Judge. Oh. He was terrible.

So there's those guys. Then there's the other guys that for reasons unexplained are terrible their first time around but get hired again. And that's where Dennis Allen comes in because in his first stint with Oakland, he went 4-12, then came back the next year and went 4-12. And then he was like, you know what?

I can outdo myself. The next year, he started the season 0-4, and the Raiders were like, this is too bad even for us. We have to fire you. And the Saints were like, that's the guy for us. Because you know what? Didn't work out great for Bill Belichick in his first head coaching job. Didn't work out great for Pete Carroll and his first head coaching job.

So those ones are more intriguing to me because you have to take a huge leap of faith to be like, no, that first awful head coaching job you did was just an anomaly. We think you're going to turn it around because when it happens again, like the Saints have no excuses now when they have to explain why they hired him and then fired him two and a half years into his tenure, they're going to have to say, well, we thought that terrible performance he had as the Raiders head coach was just a one-off, but it's actually who he is as a coach. So I learned a lot about Dennis Allen today, one of the worst head coaches over the last 12 years.

A winning percentage over six seasons in charge of 329. Happy trails. So what was like, were there any details over six seasons in charge of 329. Happy trails. So what was like, were there any details when you were doing digging about what went wrong with him? In New Orleans? In New Orleans, yeah. Because mid-season coaching firings are fairly rare in the NFL. Seven in a row was the killer and getting swept by the Panthers.

You can't do that. You can't lose to the Panthers that many times. It's not good. I, he did have an excuse at the ready because car got knocked out of the lineup for an extended period of time, but then he came back on the weekend and I was watching the game at the end because it was close.

And the biggest complaint with them was that offensively, they never threw the ball deep. They just refused to do it. So when trying to make a late game drive to get into field goal range, they got to fourth down and four. And instead of doing what they did all game, which was throw these little dink and dunk passes or hand the ball up, they finally decided to go deep.

How did it go? It was incomplete. And I can't remember, I don't remember who the announcer was at the time, but he was like, well, there's an

interesting call. They haven't thrown the ball deep all game and now on fourth and four they decide to do it. But they were playing the long con. That was Dennis Allen's

last play call. He was fired hours after that. Anyway, Mukami. Laddie, you got a little major league baseball free agency. So, okay,. Laddie, you got a little Major League Baseball

free agency. So, okay, it starts today. Starts today, two o'clock our time. Soto, biggest fish.

Soto's the big name. Probably not going to sign today. I just put that out there. If you're expecting a Soto contract. It's not like July 1 in the NHL. And Garrett Cole's out there now too, right?

He opted out. I think there's still some contract negotiation going on where they can bring him back for a year. So I don't think it's official yet. A lot of that has to be decided in the next week or so. Did I see a report out there that the Jays are going to go after Juan Soto because

I'm not going to do this again. Nice. Track the plane. I'm not. Well, I saw a good point. I saw a good point online and with the Otani negotiation, he had a lot of factors, right? He wanted to be on the West Coast. He wanted all these things.

Juan Soto cares about one thing, getting the highest dollar. Whoever pays him the most money is where he's going to go. So I think the Jays might have a chance if they're willing to loosen the purse strings. I like Soto's honesty there. I don't care which uniform I wear.

I want the money. I respect it. So that gives me hope that the Jays may be able to take part in the negotiation for Juan Soto. I'm not predicting he's going to go there, but they have a need in the outfield. He would be a perfect fit. I would love to see Juan Soto in a Jays uniform.

But a lot of good names out there. Corbin Burns, Blake Snell is a free agent again, former Cy Young winner. Alex Bregman is leaving the Houston Astros. Anthony Santander, I think he had 40 plus homers last year. Pete Alonso. So there's some big names out on the free agent

market this year. Just to go back a second. Isn't Corbin Bernson a little bit old now? He's 70 years old. Yeah. He was good at third base in Major League, right? Yeah. Was he Dorn?

He was Dorn. He was Dorn. Yeah, he was Dorn. Just so we circle back, the Soto money is expected to be in Otani territory, $700 million. Yes. Correct? Yeah. If not more, like 10 years, $500 million, I think, is what they're bandying.

But with multiple teams going in on it, it might even get pushed higher than that. This is, once again, a friendly reminder for all of you overzealous sports parents out there. Direct your child to baseball. Aggressively. Soto's still only 26. Yeah, if he or she has any athletic prowess whatsoever, baseball's the way to go.

Mook, how about that? Okay, let's fire up the matrix. Print out some humanoid submissions for what we learned. Jason, go ahead. Dylan with an early what we learned. This came in at 5.54 a.m. Dylan was so excited about the fact that he went to his first Whitecaps game in years. He's a former season ticket holder and was shocked by the quality of play the Whitecaps put on last night.

A thrilling 3-0 win over LAFC. Ryan Gould is an exceptional player to watch, and Vancouver got the game we had been wishing for in the playoffs. Let's cheer the lads on for Game 3 in LA. Okay. Here's what I had written earlier, and I'm trying to be as excited and, dare I say, naive as possible and just ignore the past, just focus on the future,

but also pragmatic and realistic and, you know, Halford and Brough. We're not always glass super full, right? Gauld is putting forth a performance at a level in that league that is MVP caliber worthy. I don't think you could argue it any way, right? Of the big name guys that are the high paid guys outside of messy, probably he's in that conversation of elite superstar game changing ability. And that's just backed up by the numbers that he's put forth.

I mentioned them earlier. They've scored nine goals across three playoff matches. He scored five and goal contributions in eight. So he is doing everything for this team, and he's doing it at the most important moments, right? Season on the line, road match in Portland, another one on Sunday night, season on the line, home match. He's doing it across the board.

It's probably one of, if not the best performances in the MLS era for the Whitecaps. I know they've had prolific scorers before. I know they've had talented guys. They don't have a real noteworthy playoff history to draw from. Amazingly, this playoff, which is muted and might be over real quick,

this might be the best playoff that they've ever had, and it's all because of him. A couple more Ryan Gould what we learned. Ryan Gould is the leading scorer for the Whitecaps in the playoffs. Second is own goal, both of which were caused by Ryan Gould, what we learned. What we learned, Ryan Gould is the leading scorer for the Whitecaps in the playoffs. Second is own goal, both of which were caused by Ryan Gould crosses. Yep. I was laughing last night because I saw the Apple announcer called Ryan Gould.

Well, it was the second goal for the Whitecaps. It was an own goal by LAFC. And it was a vicious cross that he put in there. And it was a tough defensive play, but it was an own goal. And the announcer goes, there is nothing LAFC could do about that. And my first thought was, how about not shooting it into your own net? I could think of one thing.

Not scoring on yourself is a huge part of it. Yeah, that was something they could have at least discussed. Talked about it. Bubble Matthew with what we learned. If Ryan Gould keeps playing like this, Messi will have to start being referred to as at least discussed talked about it uh bubble matthew with what we learned if ryan gold keeps playing like this messy will have to start being referred to as the argentinian gold i like that i am very very much hoping that miami crashes out in this opening round because it would ruin mls totally they would they might just fold the league yeah if if if inter miami and messy

lose in the first round apple's share price takes a huge hit they just fold the league. Yeah. If Inter-Miami and Messi lose in the first round. Apple's share price takes a huge hit. They just canceled the season. They're like, that's it. Sorry, Ryan Gold and the Whitecaps. We're not even doing the game. It's over. Inside what we learned, Jake DeBrus can shoot.

He fooled me and the goalie on that shot, making it look like he was going blocker side. Instead, he rolled his wrists and went high glove. Impressive deception. Yeah, that was like, you know, if you're going to score your first after not scoring in the first few games, do it like that. That was an impressive finish by Jake DeBrasque. Really nice pass.

Also by Quinn Hughes, finding him in the slot. But Jake DeBrasque, you know, he found the soft area on the ice. There's usually quite a few soft areas against the San Jose Sharks, but he found one of them, and he ripped it home, and it was good to see. And, you know, we've heard so much about, oh, he's a streaky player, he's a streaky player, you won't notice him for three weeks, and then all of a sudden he'll go off. So go off, Jake DeBrus.

Please. Please. Nick in the Ridge, hashtag WWL, what we learned. I learned that the Canucks players will all be sending the schedule makers a bottle and a thank you card for gifting them two days off on a road trip in California in November. Have you seen the weather outside? Nick in the Ridge is right. We are lucky if the boys don't put all the trade requests in after getting a taste of days off in cali yeah it's sunny and warm and in la right now i looked at it 24 celsius

whatever the past instances where the canucks have complained about the schedule like we get hard done by by the nhl yeah this has been the most low-key relaxed easy start to a season that i think they've ever had they've played 10 games so. There haven't been any back-to-backs, nor are there going to be any back-to-backs for the next two weeks. They play two games in sunny California. They get a bunch of days off in between them. Then they come back home for another stretch.

Like the first six or seven weeks of the season are chef's kiss for the Canucks. They need to take advantage. Austin and Langley, what we learned, media athlete relations got heated in Philly with the Embiid story. Yeah. Embiid for the 76ers shoved a reporter who

wrote some stuff about his family that Embiid didn't appreciate. So now Philly fans, and I think there's a large chunk of them that don't exactly love mb although he has been mvp and he's a very good player i don't know if he's a philly type of guy so now they're left being like ah do i support mb or do i support the media i'm a tough one for me right now so the the philadelphia inquirer columnist in question, Marcus Hayes, I thought went way, way, way over the line. So he mentioned Embiid's late brother, Arthur, who I have now, I think he passed away in 2013.

I have to double check on it. It was a while ago and then mb'd son also named arthur in a column questioning mb'd's professionalism and effort and not being in shape now hayes i read the article hayes did it in a very sort of historical philly sports context like iverson would never do this he left his heart and soul on the floor for the Sixers and trying to appeal to the fans that remember players who didn't take the second of back-to-backs off. If he had stopped there, I think he might have been okay. Yeah.

But when you go and start talking about someone's deceased brother and child in that context, I don't know how you think you're not crossing a line. Yeah. It boggles the mind that he thought. He basically said like, you've always said you want to play well for these guys and yet you're not in shape.

Yeah. That was the crux of the argument, correct? Sorry, yeah. And Embiid's brother passed away in 2014 at the age of 13 when he was hit by a truck. Like there's certain things that you don't bring up that would be right at the top of the list. So put it this way, though, a bad situation just got worse

because now it's really toxic and it's very divisive. And I don't know how this is going to play out because it's all really unprecedented, especially with the acknowledgement that he's not going to do back-to-backs. He's only going to play probably 50 to 60 games. Tyrese Maxey is like, look at me, I'm a pretty good player. Yeah, I would just duck under some coats, be like, I don't want to do it, just get me out there on the

floor. Joven with what we learned, the NFL trade deadline and U.S. election day are both tomorrow, so don't be surprised if Adam Schefter accidentally tweets Donald Trump to the Detroit Lions for a 2025 third round pick. Yeah.

Is the NFL trade deadline going to be interesting at all? I think the DK Metcalf rumors of. Is anything going to be interesting tomorrow aside from the election? Oh my God. Like, is there any way, is there any way tomorrow is not going to be a complete shoot show? No. Is there any way? Play the music.

No. Every result. Every result is like, oh, this could happen. Oh, this is... It's not even a state on, like, politics. It's just the state of the country. It's just going to be not pleasant

tomorrow, but we'll try and make it as fun as we can. We're going to be in here bright and early, all happy. We got a game to look forward to between the Canucks and the Ducks we can. We're going to be in here bright and early, all happy. We've got a game to look forward to between the Canucks and the Ducks. Wednesday morning we're going to be like, Lucas Dostal was good. There'll be a lot of deflecting on Wednesday morning. You just wait for it.

We've got to get out of here for now, though. That's what the music means. Thank you all for listening. Once again, thank you all for contributing. Congrats to our winner of the $100 gift card to Mucho Burrito. We've got to get out of here for now, though. Signing off, I have been Mike Halford. He's been Jason Brough.

He's been A-Dog. He's been Laddie. He's been Intern Ethan. This has been the Halford & Brough Show on Sportsnet 650.