Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - A Penguins holiday mailbag edition of Locked On Penguins!

Episode Date: December 26, 2024

We asked for your questions and you answered so now we answer those questions! On a special mailbag edition of Locked On Penguins, Patrick and Hunter answer your questions about the Pittsburgh Penguins. In this episode, they take questions about players the Penguins could target in a trade, what the return for certain Penguins players should be, what to do in Pittsburgh when visiting for a game, some of the best goals in the Sidney Crosby era, and more! Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Select QuoteGet the right life insurance for YOU, for LESS, at SelectQuote.com/LOCKEDONNHL. Bilt RewardsStart earning points on rent you’re already paying by going to joinbilt.com/LOCKEDONNHL.PrizePicksDownload the app or go to https://prizepicks.onelink.me/LME0/LOCKEDONNHL to get $50 instantly after you play your first $5 lineup. GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONNHL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelYou can start the season with a big return on FanDuel. New customers can place a FIVE DOLLAR bet and you’ll get started with ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS - if you win your first FIVE DOLLAR BET ! Visit FANDUEL.COM to get started. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

It's the holiday season. So Hunter and I figured what better time than now to open up the mailbag and answer some of your questions. And we're going to do that right after this on an all new Locked on Penguins. You're Locked on Penguins, your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Hello and welcome back to another edition of the Locked On Penguins podcast. I'm one of your host, Patrick Damp. You can follow me across all social media platforms at Synonym 4WET. Joined as always by my holly jolly co-host, the one and only Hunter Hodes.

You can follow him on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. You can give our shows Twitter a follow at L.O. underscore Penguins. And of course, we appreciate you making us part of your daily routine. Don't forget that we are free and available wherever you get your podcasts as well as YouTube. And if you're following us on YouTube, don't forget to hit the notification button. That way, you'll be among the first to know when we drop our daily Monday through Friday episodes. Before we get into your questions, today's episode is brought to you by Fandul. You can start the season with a big return on Fandul.

New customers can place a $5 bet and get $250 in bonus bets if you win your first $5 bet. Visit Fandul.com to get started. So it's the day after Christmas. we hope you have all had an absolutely awesome holiday with friends, family, loved ones, or however you choose to celebrate your holiday. But with that in mind and the NHL, currently in the middle of its winter break, Hunter and I decided it was time to open up the mailbag and answer all of your questions. But I should put an asterisk on all of your questions.

As you guys are always apt to do, we put the call out for questions. you respond and we got a ton of them across YouTube, Twitter, Blue Sky, you name it. We got a bunch of questions. So apologies if we don't get to all of them, but we are going to try to get to as many of them as we can. And let's jump right into it. We're going to start with a question from Twitter from Harrison Baldwin. And in this first segment, we're going to focus a little bit more on trades, roster moves, and everything like that.

So we'll start with this one from Harrison. Capo Caco obviously has been traded to the Seattle Cracken, so he is off the board for now. We'll see how the Seattle Cracken do. But how do you guys feel about another name on the New York Rangers, Zach Jones? I'll kick this off and say, this one feels like a little bit of a reach.

Still very young, late round pick, hasn't played a ton, but he's played nearly a hundred games in his career. and the stats are not very promising. He's played 94 career games, four goals, 21 assists, 25 points. If you can get him for next to nothing, I won't say no, but I'm not going to go out of my way to get this guy.

Right. I think it's, if you want to maybe go get him for cheap, but again, that's kind of difficult a little bit just because you're going to have to pay a little bit of Metro tax when you're trading with the Rangers. I mean,

we saw that with Riley Smith during the deadline. I'm sure the penguins probably called on Capocaca. but assuming what Chris Drury was asking for back, especially with the Metro rival, it was probably too much for Kyle Dubas. So I think with this, yeah, I think it's okay as long as you get them for pretty cheap because next year, obviously Patterson's not going to be there.

I don't think Grizzlick is going to be there. So there's going to be openings, but I'd rather use them on, you know, just other players who I think are a bit better at this point in their careers rather than Jones. It fits the mold of a type of player that Dubus would go after, But just looking at his number so far this year, you know, he's played in 25 games, almost 400 minutes of five on five ice time. Only 48% of the shot attempts, 14 goals, 411 goals against, that's fine.

But still, only really 48% of the expected goal share, 45% of the scoring chance. He's not really driving offense that well this year. And I guess I'm just a little concerned, even though, you know, the sample size isn't that big. It's still also not that small either. So I think for me, I would kind of pass on that one. Yeah, and there's also a couple of defensive prospects in the system already that I think you can use internally. I don't think you have to go get an external candidate. But again, if you can get them for a low cost and it doesn't really pull away from your prospect pool

or significantly dip into the amount of draft picks that they have in the next three years, I will not complain about taking a chance on a player like that. but again, it's not somebody that I'm going to go out of my way to try to get. So moving on here, again, this is going to be a lot of roster move, trade type of questions here in the first segment from The Hankster on Twitter. He asks, assuming Pedersen is back and playing all right in the next few weeks, what type of return should they be able to get for him when he is inevitably traded? Now, this is a little difficult to answer because, one, we have to be able to get.

have to assume he does come back in plays to his level, which I don't think is out of the question, but we do know he had a pretty rough start to the season. And when you suffer an injury as a defenseman, we've seen it with Eric Carlson. We've seen it throughout the years with Chris LaTang. You see it pretty much everywhere in the NHL. Defensemen coming back from injury and in a bit of an extended absence, it takes a little while to get back up to speed. So this makes this a little bit of a challenging question. I think it also depends upon what the market is come the trade deadline and what happens in the couple of weeks leading up to it.

What kind of defensemen get moved? What is the cost for those defensemen? I do think though right now, like a lot of the trades we have seen over the last year and a half, you're probably on its face going to be disappointed. I don't think you're going to get a King's ransom for Marcus Pedersen. You might get a second round pick. You might get a B or C tier prospect. I don't think there's going to be a lot of teams that open the vault for Marcus

Pedersen. But Hunter, I could be wrong. What do you think? Just to push back maybe a little bit, I do think Marcus Pedersen is going to be the top rental defensemen available at the deadline. So you do have to take that into account. There's already been reports out there. The Canucks are interested, which no surprise, your mother for Patrick Alvina there.

There's also the reports that the Oilers are interested. I would not be surprised also if the Rangers are interested just because their defensive group is a total mess right now. If you can create a so-called bidding war for him, I think you can get a sucker to potentially overpay, maybe give you a late first, something like that, maybe with a prospect or roster player. I think you're going to get two assets back, a pick and either a prospect or a young roster player. I would prefer the roster player over the prospect, someone that can maybe come in here,

play third line minutes, a younger player who maybe isn't working out on that team that can maybe come in here and give this team some youth and some energy, at least to end the season here. But that's what I'm thinking. And if you are able to get a late first, this is something we may talk about a little bit later because there's also other questions about this. If you're able to get a late first, you'll have another first for this year. You can maybe package that and go get a really good young piece that can really be here for the next to five to six years, someone who, again, also isn't working out on his team, but has a lot of a

really good track record in the NHL. So that could be something to monitor maybe this summer where Kyle Dubas also looks to maybe transition this team over a little bit more. Obviously, the core pieces will still be intact, but that's something you can also monitor. So for me, I think it's going to be a first or a second round pick, plus either a prospect or a player, but I think that's probably what you're looking at right now. That has to be the starting point for a Marcus Pedersen trade. You need a first second or at the very least second and third round pick as well as some kind of young player, whether it's roster or prospect. And I know a lot of people are probably shaking their heads right now.

But when you have what you described Hunter as the top rental, likely top rental defenseman on the trade market coming at the deadline, you have to put it out there that you want a worthwhile return for a player like that. We're going to end the segment here with this last question. It's been asked by a bunch of people. So I'm going to shout out two different people, both from YouTube as well as Twitter, Penn 68 on YouTube, and Kyle slash Man Advantage on Twitter. I'm going to kind of reword this just to get the general sense of it. but basically they're asking if the penguins continue their strong play over the next few weeks,

should they continue their rebuild slash retool on the fly or should they look to buy? I'm going to say this. I think you make it a little bit of both and it kind of builds off what you were just saying about the Marcus Pedersen trade. What you would want to look for going into that deadline is not a rental, not an establishment, name, but you should go for Kyle should go for younger talented players who might not be working out with their current franchise. If you have to part with a pick or a B tier prospect to get that and this team is right in the thick of the playoff race, I can live with that. So long as it's a

younger player that's under control and is going to be here for multiple years, one, two, three, four years, I can live with them taking that risk and maybe pulling out of the prospect pool or the draft pick pool to maybe see if this team can go on a little bit of an unexpected energetic run, but don't stray too far from the plan. It doesn't mean you have to start trading off first round picks or prospects to get big names in here. But if you're in the thick of it and you can get younger talented players in, absolutely go for it. But overall stick to the because if you want to get where this team wants to go in the next three to four years, you can't take a trade deadline detour.

No, I mean, this is not going to be a deadline where you've seen in years past where they just throw it a bunch of picks out there for rentals or anything like that. That's not going to happen. They are going to sell at this deadline unless they are very comfortably in a playoff spot. And when I say comfortably, Pat, I'm talking eight to ten points clear with a cushion. with how they play this year, that's not going to happen. They may be in a playoff spot at that point, but it would only be, I think, by a point or two or maybe just tied.

And that's, I think, the best case scenario, I think no matter what they're going to sell. You could see a situation where you saw with Washington last year, right, where they sold the deadline, but they still were able to make the playoffs. And then they made more retool moves over the summer. They actually spent some money in free agency. They made some really good trades in local Washington is now. That's what I think the penguins could be doing potentially.

as soon as next summer. But I think right now you have to stick to the plan. You try to get as many of those pending UFAs out as possible. So Matt Grislyke, I assume he will be gone. Anthony Bavillier, Marcus Pedersen, maybe someone else that has maybe a year left on their contract. I could see that as well. Like for example, Alex Nadelcovich, for example,

Noel Chari maybe. Also, of course, Matt Nietto, I could see him getting dealt as well. Maybe yes, he'll be if they want to keep scratching him, which I hope not because I want to see him get more minutes. but you have to stick to the plan. I don't really see a world in which they buy unless, again, unless they are comfortably in a playoff spot. So that's what I think.

Right there with you. You got to stick to the plan. And I think that Capp's example is the perfect one where even if you are still sticking around in the race, whether you're a couple points up or a couple points back, there's no need to deviate from this plan just yet. this team isn't a contender. They're not going to go on a Stanley Cup run.

I'll gladly eat my words on that if they do. But as presently constructed in the middle of the winter break and the roster freeze, I am still highly skeptical. But that's going to do it for our first segment. When we come back, we're going to keep the mailbag questions rolling. We're going to have some fun ones about going to Penguins games, as well as keep this trade roster construction and coaching discussion going. But before we do that, we're going to tell you,

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Again, create an account and redeem code L-O-C-O-N-HL for $20 off. Download game time today. What time is it? It's game time. All right. Welcome back to a special mailbag edition of Locked on Penguins. I'm one of your host, Patrick Damp, joined as always by Hunter Hodes. And again, thank you guys so much for responding to the call. We know how engaged our community is and our appreciation of you guys knows no bounds. We love that you guys are so engaged with us asking questions, leaving comments. talking to us on social media. It makes doing this so much more fun. So let's jump right back into it. And we got to hit this comment from TK on YouTube.

He asks a question we've been asked before, but it's very fun to go over this one. TK says, I'm going to Pittsburgh soon. What is the ideal time to get to a game and what are some fun things to do in Pittsburgh Hunter? I've been yapping since the commercial break. you go ahead and kick this one off. Well, if this is your first game, I would honestly recommend getting there right when the doors open. So if it's a 7 o'clock game, I would get there right at 6 o'clock.

You know, get yourself fully acquainted with the arena, walk around the 100 level a few times. Check out the different types of food. Same thing on the 200 level if you want to do that. And then you can go down for warm-ups at 630. Those usually last, well, you know, 10, 15 minutes, and then you just go to your seat. So that's what I would recommend.

And as for things to do in Pittsburgh, honestly, they're endless. You know, if you want to go to Mount Washington and get a picture right at the overlook, I would very much recommend that. If you want to go down to Point State Park by the fountain and just, it'll be down there by the rivers. I would recommend that, especially if the weather is a bit nicer. If it's cold, you're going to be a bit cold, so bundle up. But so it's all very, very good to do that.

And then you have the North Shore. There's a lot of really cool restaurants and bars around there if you're into that type of scene. There's also some really good restaurants downtown as well. You know, the Heinz History Center. If you're into that type of stuff, that's also. a ton of fun. So those are just a few things that I would recommend in terms of the city. Pat, what say you? I'm going to pull out my Pittsburgh native card here and I'm going to push back on Hunter. Yes, if you have never been to Pittsburgh, absolutely check out Mount Washington. But Mount Washington,

that's where the tourists go. You want to see the absolute best view of the city. Go to the West End Overlook Park. the West End Overlook Park, especially if you go at night when all of the lights are on all the buildings, and especially if it's a clear night, breathtaking view of the three rivers as well as the city. It's one of my favorite places in the entire city. But yeah, Hunter kind of nailed the rest of that. Pittsburgh has a ton of really fun neighborhoods for you to check out. I would absolutely recommend Lawrenceville. That's right by where I live. It's a great little spot,

a ton of awesome restaurants and bars, just like the North Shore, if that's what you're looking for. North Shore, same thing, especially if you've never seen, obviously you're not going to be able to get in this time of year, but if you've never seen Heinz Field, if you've never seen PNC Park,

you can get a look at those. But a ton of stuff to do, Heinz History Center, undefeated Carnegie Science Center if it's open while you're around also a really fun place to check out really awesome stuff to do but I echo everything he said about getting to the game I'm a huge mark for wanting to see the intro video and the anthems so I'm always in my seat for those I love those they're one of my favorite parts to go into a game but let's keep it moving here and let's get back to some penguins related questions and not just penguins in

Pittsburgh related questions. I'm going to go with this one from Twitter from my pal Blake V. He asks, what volumes does it speak when Graves is out of the lineup and POJ is immediately inserted in after being acquired for nothing? I'll say this. I think we're finally getting to a point where management and coaching staff have soured on Ryan Graves. His ice time has continued to decline.

he's obviously been scratched multiple times this year. It wouldn't shock me if he gets the Jari treatment here sometime soon, where they wave him and try to send him to the American League in hopes that somebody claims him. But overall, I mean, I think you can tell they have a little bit more trust in POJ than they do Ryan Graves. I think so. I also think, you know, it's POJ's first game.

They want to get a look to see how he's playing. this year. So I totally get Ryan Graves coming out of the line, but they also just taking out Ryan Chey and kept Greaves in, right? So I do think they are souring on him a little bit. He has been better this year compared to last year, but the bar was literally on the floor heading into this year, considering how bad he was both on the top pair last year and on the second pair last year. So I do think there's going to be a time, I think, this summer where you might see a rumor or two suggesting that the Penguins are maybe looking at the to giving out of this grave steel just because it's obvious.

The steel has not worked out the way they thought it would. And I think at this point, after the season, we're going to be two years into this. I think what you have seen so far is probably what you're going to get at this point. So I do think they're going to look for as many ways as possible to try and get out of this contract. I don't think they're going to do a buyout because that's going to be, you know, too many years down the line when they're just paying money to not be on a team. I know the Penguins really usually don't like doing buyouts unless absolutely necessary.

So I do think they're going to try to figure out a trade at some point. But I also do think P.O. Joseph right now is a better defenseman than Ryan Graves. And that's really what it comes down to. Yeah. Part of it is they are souring, I think, on Graves. But P.O. Joseph, I do think, is a better defenseman than him as well. Yeah, you're bang on with that. POJ definitely, I would say, is better than Ryan Graves at this.

present moment. So that's kind of where we stand on that. We'll end this second segment with this question, because I know the two of us will have plenty of takes on this. This is from Ace 80 on Twitter asking what does your ideal lineup look like now, assuming that the penguins are fully healthy. I'll take the first part of this hunter and I'm going to do it with the defense and then I'll let you cook on the offense and add whatever you feel you need to add. My top pair would stay the same. It would be Chris LaTang and Owen Pickery. On the second pair, I'm going Eric Carlson and Marcus Pedersen once he's healthy.

And then my bottom pair in an ideal world, it's going to be POJ and Jack St. Ivany once he's healthy and he can find that level he had to end last season. and the only other thing I'll add for that is, and I think we're getting to a point of this a little bit now with the penguins starting to find their game, I would like to see a little bit of a 50-50 split between Tristan Jari and Alex Nadelcovich moving forward. If for no other reason to figure out which one of them is going to bounce back and take the starters net, I think right now, given the way the last few weeks have gone, it's trending towards Tristan Jari, but I would like to see that be a little bit more of an open competition at this point. I agree with you about the defensive group.

And if St. Ivany is not up here and say he's playing in Wilkesbury, I would still do everything else, P.O.J. in the bottom pairing with probably Matt Grizzlick until he gets dealt before the trade deadline. I honestly, to God, forgot about Grizzlick because he has been. so underwhelming. But yeah, I would, yeah, I'm with you on that. Yeah, if Grizzlick is here and Jackson Iveney is not even when he's healthy, it's Grizzlic with P.O. Joseph. But if Grizzlic and St. Ivney are here, I am still putting St. Ivony in with

P.O. Joseph to see if St. Ivany can recapture the magic that he had to end last season. I agree with you about the top two pairs. Ford wise. There's a lot that I like here. You know, Raquel, Crosby, Rust. Yes. Malkin with Bunting with Cody Glass. Sure.

Beauvilliers O'Connor Tomasino, okay, whatever. There's, I would take one of these two forwards out, and that is Noachari or Matt Nietto. I would take Matt Nietto out, and I would put Yes, He Pull Yardy in. You can say either one for Niyado or Achari. I would probably go Niyado coming out over O'Chari right now, but you're really just splitting hairs. It continues to be coaching malpractice that Yipu Yardv is not why. I'm going to keep saying it. He has been a bright spot for this team this year.

it's crazy to me that he is still being scratched. You want to argue for some other younger pieces to come in, like a Valterra Houston, for example. You know, I'll hear that oversalm like Achari or even Bovillia, because Bovillier's gone a little bit cold as of late, and I think he's probably going to get dealt before the deadline anyway. But I do think, when I look at who's up right now, who are these in, yeah, it was out.

Otherwise, I'm fine with the lineup for the most part until, you know, we start seeing some trades. For sure. And one thing I would like to see, especially once we get back into action here, I want to see more of Philip Tomasino up on the second line with the Gainmolk, and they showed some good chemistry. I want to see them continue to explore that because early returns were pretty solid. So I want to see more of that.

I understand that they're working this guy into the lineup. They're going to probably fluctuate him up and down between the second and third line. because they also want to see what they have in Cody Glass, which is totally understandable. But I really liked what Tomicino and Gino were starting to build. I'd like to let that cook for a little bit longer. But that is going to do it for our second segment. When we come back, a lot of fun questions left. Most of them are a little bit more high concept, so to speak.

So we'll have some fun with those to close out the show. But before we do that, we got to tell you. about our last sponsor, and that is Fandul. The NFL playoffs, they're almost here, but it's not too late to get in on the regular season action with Fandul, America's number one sportsbook. Right now, new customers can finish the season strong with $250 in bonus bets if your first $5 bet wins. Fandul, so many ways for you to pick up with W,

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at $250 in bonus bets. Make every moment more with Fandul, an official sports book partner of the NFL. All right, welcome back to the final segment of a special mailbag edition of Locked-on Penguins. I'm Patrick Damp. That's Hunter Hodes.

And let's jump right back into it. And by jumping right back into it, we're going to take a little trip down memory lane from our pal, Theodore Belmont. asks, what is your favorite goal from the Sydney Crosby era? I'm going back and forth on so many in my head because there's a lot of really good ones, man. You know, either the Max Talbot goals, Evgeny Malcon slap shot the total biggest FU goal in existence after getting hit behind the net.

He's definitely cherry picking. And he's like, you know what? I'm going to blast this right past you. And there's nothing you can do about it. But for me, I'm going to go, Crystal Tang's game-winning goal, 2016, Stanley Cup final against the Sharks. That was the shift for Crystal Tang. He was dowsing along the blue line, cuts down low. Crosby's able to get him the puck right after he's just taking everyone for a ride in the offensive zone.

And he finishes that one off with just a beautiful shot. And that entire run to this day still is the best hockey I've ever seen Chris Lantan play. He was a top five defenseman throughout that run. I feel like he was a top five defenseman in the league during that season. You could have made a real argument that Lattang could have been a finalist for the Norris that year. He was that good. But that's still, I think when I look at every single goal from this era, it's still my favorite one because Lattang was just like, you know what? I'm going to keep the puck on my stick.

You're not stopping me. I'm going to then cut to the net, be right in a perfect goal scoring position, and I'm going to win this Stanley Cup basically by myself with that goal. Just textbook. Awesome. I'll never forget where I was when I watched it because I was finishing my high graduation. I was in the car heading home to watch the third period

and I was watching it on my phone. So just an awesome goal. This is going to, my answer is going to show the disparity between our ages here because I'm going even further back. And just like you, Theodore, thank you for this question,

man. This is, I love these kind of questions, but I've been thinking about this one all afternoon since it came in. And the one I settled on was a 2012 goal by Evgeny Malkin against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Where he walks through all five players on the ice for Tampa. Bay and then beats Roll Us in five hole. And that goal to me, you were saying you watched a Chris LaTang goal during the 2016 run

as you were getting out of high school. You want to know where I watched that of Gennie Malkin, Tampa Bay goal. I watched it at a bar in college. And we were day drinking for that goal because it was a Sunday noon game. and we had that Monday off of classes. So as college students are apt to do, we had ourselves a little bit of a Sunday fun day. And I just remember,

I was always animated when I was at IUP at bars and restaurants for Penguins games because for some reason that school's demographic was 50, 50, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh. So always a good time to talk about how great the Penguins were that goal that that was my reaction speechless i had nothing it was incredible and it was so ifgeny malkin of that time it was unreal if you've never seen it just a youtube of malkin goal versus tampa bay it'll be probably the first result so good and he put the team on his back that year because that was when sid was still battling the concussion stuff so

it was of guinea malkin's team and he absolutely ran with it. But let's keep this going. We got two more questions to go here. And this is a great one from a longtime member of Penguin's Twitter and now Penguins Blue Sky. And that is Matt Cause. He asks us, I would ask you guys about how you watch the game. What are you watching to give your analysis? Even though I've been watching hockey for 30 plus years, I have a hard time seeing plays developer understanding how things happen. Unlike football where a play ends and then there's a long break with replays, it's a little bit more difficult with hockey.

So this is a difficult one to answer simply because it's like as, and I, this is going to be such a loose comparison, so bear with me. It's like asking top talent players how they, they do what they do. I have just been watching, playing, coaching, analyzing hockey for pretty much all of my life. So it's to the point where it's just almost second nature for me. But I'll say this, a really great resource if you've never read it is Greg Wasinski's first book, take your eye off the puck. Because it breaks down the game in a way that's different from, say, okay, this guy has the puck, watch what he does, and tells you what to look for away from that.

So for me, my biggest thing that I try to watch, it's not so much in the moment as day after or in the following days, is watching replays, watching clips and highlights because you'll get different camera angles and you can start to see trends in how things develop. So because I've been doing that for so long, again, I hate tooting my own horn, but I've learned to look for certain things in certain aspects, players in certain positions. So that's what helps me out.

But if you're looking for a resource to check out, absolutely suggest Wyshinsky's book, take your eye off the puck. Yeah, for me, like with a resource, I will go a step further and say hockey tactics by Jack Han. He is fantastic. Like every time he releases one of those, I pick it up immediately. I'm on his email list as well.

He does a tremendous job breaking down the game. He looks at different players, you know, play styles. He looks at different teams the way they play or how structured they are and all that stuff. So I recommend that for me, though. I kind of dabble in everything. You know, I look to see, okay, is the goalie on his angle here, for example? Is he too far out? Is he playing too far in?

Is he flopping around like a fish? you know, not, again, just looking at his movement. Is it quick side to side, all that stuff? I'm also looking at how a team breaks the puck out. Is it, you know, lethargic or is it simple, concise and all that? And also I look at, especially with the Penguins and how their neutral zone play has been a pretty constant thing this year. No, it's either been really good or, you know, a lot of times really bad. I look to see, okay, are they being simple with it or are they being too aggressive?

You know, that leads to eye man rush opportunities. I also always want to look at pinching, for example. You know, we talked a lot about that on the show this year, how they've been too aggressive with their pinches. They're picking the wrong situations to pinch in leading two chances off the rush. So that's something I always look for as well. Obviously, always looking to see, you know, what penalties are called and all that stuff. So for example, if I missed something that I didn't see that I maybe disagree with in the moment, I can, you know, they'll show the replay. I was definitely a bit wrong there as well.

So those are just a few things that I look for. while I'm watching the game. And I could probably go on about this for 10 to 15 minutes, Pat, but I know we don't have that kind of time for a taste episode. But that's just a few things that at least I look for, you know, when I look at analysis and on all that stuff. Yeah, this could be an entire episode in and of itself. And Matt, I'll add this last one and you know this because,

and this is me addressing Matt, not you, Hunter, is you and I have followed one another on social media for years now. if you got questions, man, just ask them. And that goes for everybody. Hunter and I are very active on social media during Penguins games and in the time before and after. If you got questions about what we saw or how we came to a certain conclusion, don't hesitate to ask, man.

We're always up for having conversations about hockey. God knows if this wall behind me could talk back, I would talk hockey to it. So we're going to finish up with a really fun question to end. end the episode from Angela 9915 on YouTube. If you were commissioner of the National Hockey League, what would you do better to sell the game and attract more fans? Just like Matt's question, this could be an entire episode by itself. I'm going to start with a quick answer on this one.

And it's simply be innovative for once and make the game more. accessible to everybody. Whether it's launching your own streaming service, finding an agreement with ESPN and Hulu that makes every game available, or finding another party that can make that happen, you're at the best, the fourth most popular league in North America. You don't got time for exclusivity. Make this game watchable, findable, indigestable to the most amount of people ever start bringing in new fans. And once you do that, maybe you can start being a little more exclusive about where people can watch it. Agreed. Also, please get rid of these stupid blackout restrictions. I hate them. I've always hated them. I think they're really stupid. Another thing is,

and they've started to do this a little bit, Pat, but please keep giving us more best-on-best competitions for international hockey. Yeah, it's nice. We're getting a good tease for Four Nations face off, but it should not have taken us this long to get best-on-best, international competition. Set your petty grievances aside with each other, you know, and the IHF and all that stuff. And just keep giving us this because last time before this, we're about to be in 2025, was the World Cup of hockey almost a decade ago. How was that possible?

It's just a total black mark, I feel like, on Gary Bettman and Bill Daly. That's another thing at least I would do. And this isn't really towards me, maybe growing up. the game and my dog was of course barking a little bit here as we end the episode but this is just for I guess rule purposes again I would really look to fixing this offside issue while getting rid of these stupid little replays for millimeters offside in that kind of stuff again the rule I think was put in place because of situations like Danny Breyer so that's another thing that I would look at as well but yeah I mean again those are really just two things that I

would do um one more question here actually before we end this and this is just a quick hitter. Someone asked, I believe this is Jonathan Boyven on Twitter. If you have one, which team is your second favorite when there's no Penguins game on that night? Who would you turn into watch? Vancouver for me, always. I'm turning into watch the Vancouver Canucks with Elias Pedersen, J.T. Miller, Quinn Hughes, et cetera. Pat knows that. I love watching the Canucks anytime I can. Yes, there's a bunch of former Penguins in that organization, but they are just such a fun team to watch and their fans are hilarious. So, yeah, Vancouver. I have to add a caveat or a qualifier to this.

Are we ask, and Hunter, this can be your designation. It doesn't have to be the person asking the question. Are we talking your second favorite team or just a team that when they're on, you're going to turn them on? He basically asked both. So like, which team is your second favorite? And then added, like, when there's no penguins on that night, who would you tune in to watch if they're playing?

So I said Vancouver, of course. Oh, then I'm going to go Colorado. That's good. It's a toss up between Colorado and Toronto. Just two teams that have obscene amounts of skill play a very exciting brand of hockey. And if the penguins aren't on, I will go out of my way to watch those two. And I'm going to add one last thing from Angela's question real quick to end the show. Keep doing this Amazon series, face off.

Listen, I understand in the 80s, 90s, and even a little bit in the 2000s, you had a brand where you could sell rivalries and you could sell basically hate. That era of hockey is behind us. Focus on personalities. Get people attracted to these big time personalities and the teams that they're on. And they will follow that player. They will follow the team they play for. They will go wherever they go. and you will get fans of that all the time.

It's what the NBA has done. It's what the NFL is done. Even to an extent, it's what the MLB has done. And you got to be personality driven now, and they're starting to take steps toward that. But that is going to do it for a special mailbag edition of the Locked on Penguins podcast. We appreciate you guys tuning in for this one.

Hunter will be back on Friday to get you set for the back-to-back, against the New York Islanders. I will be somewhere in the United States because as Hunter has joked with me, I'm apparently becoming an international traveler this year. So I will unfortunately be unavailable for that episode. But Hunter will be back tomorrow to get you set for the weekend. But until then...

And we'll have a part two of the mailbag as well. There's a lot of really good questions that we didn't get to. For example, I love answering, you know, when did we get into hockey? Some person said it was the 2017, can send like a final. I could talk about that for days because I know exactly where I was when I sat down to watch my first hockey game. It was actually in Pittsburgh where I was visiting my grandparents. So we're going to dive into that and a few others that we didn't get to for a part

to probably sometime in the new year, January, February, when the Penguins have a pretty light week. So we're going to save a lot of these questions because there's a lot of really good ones. Four nations face off will probably be our next mailbag. But again, thank you as always for tuning in for Hunter Hodes. I'm Patrick Damp. Have a great rest of your holiday and we will be back with a new episode in your podcast feeds on Friday.