Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Back on track...at a cost

Episode Date: March 25, 2021

The Pittsburgh Penguins got back on track on Wednesday night with a 5-2 win against the Buffalo Sabres. Hunter recaps the game as Pittsburgh also got to 13-2-1 on home ice this season and starts with some Frederick Gaudreau love. Should he be a regular in the lineup once this team gets healthy? He also touches on Crosby's goal and which goal throughout his career that it reminded him of. After that, Hunter goes into a rant about the league's officiating and why it shouldn't stop there with Tim Peel before finishing with thoughts on Brian Burke's comments to Josh Yohe earlier in the day.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you.IndeedWant your QUALITY short-list FAST? You need Indeed. RIGHT NOW, our listeners get a FREE SEVENTY-FIVE DOLLAR CREDIT to upgrade your job post at Indeed.com/LockedOn Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Your Locked-on Penguins. Your daily podcast on the Pittsburgh Penguins. Part of the Locked-on Podcast Network. Your team every day. Hey, everyone, welcome to this very, very late night episode on Wednesday night of the Locked on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Follow me on Twitter, excuse me, at Hunter Hodes. Follow the show's Twitter at L.O. underscore Penguins on.

I am I am not used to recording this late. So if I stumble across or just stumble on my words, I really do apologize on that. Today's episode is brought to you by Locker Room. You can download the app and join me this week. I think I'm going to do it tomorrow night on Thursday to get in on the action. Locker Room changing the way we talk sports. So the Penguins get that 5 to 2 win over the Buffalo Sabres tonight. They get to 3-0 against the Sabres on the year.

That is their 20th win. They are now 13 and 2 and 1 on whole mice as well. And the Penguins are now also 8. points up on the Philadelphia Flyers. The Flyers have, I think, two, three in games in hand. I believe it's two games in hand on Pittsburgh. But with that, even if they win those two games, there's still four points behind them. The Penguins just got to keep taking care of business, and that's exactly what they did tonight.

Also another stat out there for you through 12 games of the 24 against the bottom three teams in this East Division. The Penguins are nine and two and one, so they've gotten a point in 10 of those 12 games. So out of 24 possible points, the Penguins have earned 19 of those 24 points against the bottom three teams. So they're doing what they're supposed to do. And that's big. You know, the first period, they came out looking really good. It's almost like, wow, everyone, this team is not playing five games in seven days.

They're not looking like how they did the last 30 minutes on Sunday against the Devils. It's almost like the team needs a little bit of rest at times, and they'll come out flying. And, you know, the first line, set the tone, I think, for this game, that first shift of the game, I think they had a couple shots. Then the Aston Reese, Janke, Ashton-Ca-Captain-Captain line came out. They did their thing. Frederick Goodro. We're going to get to him in a bit. His line was doing their thing, and they were just putting the pressure on Buffalo.

Right from the get-go, it got them the game's first two opening goals. The first one, of course. Evan Rodriguez gets his third goal of the season. What a pass from Sam Lafferty on that two-on-one. I know I've been dogging on Sam Lafferty. a lot lately and rightfully so he's not been good for basically any of this season but i will give him credit to here um for that that was one hell of a saucer pass and Rodriguez was able to bury that in that half empty net to make it one nothing and then shortly after that chris la tang is able to make

it two to nothing um on a great play i think sydney crosby was the one um that got the pass to him if i'm not mistaken i think he has the primary system on he either has the primary one or the secondary one i'll have to go and double check that but um lang has another Great game, I believe is now 23 points on the season for the Tang and what is it now, 31, 32 games. He is almost at a point per game pace. It has been so much better after those 7 to 8 games. He has really turned it on after that slow start to the regular season and playing by the Crystal Tang that we all know and have been accustomed to throughout his tenure here in Pittsburgh.

So as long as he's going and as long as Brian Dumlin is there with him, he's just going to continue to chug along and rack up points. I know he was being a couple times tonight on some breakaways. There was one, I think it was, I don't think, it wasn't the Victor Olofson one. I think it was the one with Casey Milestat. For some reason, the ref did not call a penalty shot there. Then they called the one when I think Matheson was playing defense late in the third period on Victor Olosson, which was weird.

I thought that play should have just been a regular penalty, but the other one 100% should have been a penalty of a shot. So, you know, even after the league fired Tim Peel this morning, and we'll get to that later as well. They still do not know what a penalty shot is, and I don't think they ever will. But, you know, getting away from that, the Sabres obviously cut it to 2 to 1.

That goal was weird. You know, I know it was only one of two goals that the Sabres score, but I'm going to talk about that one a lot more. The penalty shot is whatever the game was over at that point. That one was just a bit odd. Usually that's one that Jari saves, and I even tweeted it out that he has to have that. Excuse me, just because, you know,

you don't need the Sabres somehow tying the game shortly after or sometime in the second period where it was still a one-go game, because then if that happens, you know, some doubts start to creep in. It's like, okay, you know, while, you know, we're playing a team that's lost 14 in a row, they have nothing to lose. Let's start playing, like, actual good hockey because they were being a little bit sloppy. But, no, if you watch the puck there, it almost looks like it does like a curveball, like you see in baseball, you know, I don't think it hit Evan Rodriguez on the way in.

I know he got down and tried to block it, but it seemed, it just, it knuckled, curved, whatever the hell it did. Like I said, I think it was sort of like a curveball puck that I guess fool jari a little bit, like I said, still should have been a save. And I think that was Ross Ms. Donnellin's first point in seven games. And speaking of Rossmus Donlein, I guess we'll just get to him being schooled by Frederick Goodrow. What a play he had on that short-handed goal where he was just able to basically knife around him with one hand on his stick in a mini breakaway, was basically almost like penalized on the play, then was able to have a gorgeous pass to Zach Aston Reese to make it. 4 to 1, not 3 to 1, Marino had the one to make it 3 to 1, but 4 to 1 and basically put the game away going into the third period.

I'll say it now, I know a lot of people have been saying it. Frederick Goodro needs to get a long look as either this team's fourth-line center or honestly as the team's 12th forward. I mean, he's playing a lot better right now. I've been selling like Mark Jankelski, Sam Lafferty, Anthony Angelo, whoever else you want to loop into the Penguins' Bottom 6. He is the real deal these last three to four games. I've really liked what he's brought to this team.

He's fast. He's tenacious. He's good defensively. Like I said, you saw that play on the penalty kill with that short-handed goal, that past Astridis and the way he was able to fool Dustin Tocarski on the breakaway a little bit. Yeah, he needs to stay in the lineup if anyone is going to argue against that. I honestly just don't know what team you're watching right now, to be honest with y'all. But I was really impressed with his performance tonight.

And yes, folks, the Penguins had another injury tonight. Yes, Kisbury Cap. and was hurt. Originally, I think a shot went off his ankle, if I'm not mistaken, toughened it out for a little bit, but then went down the tunnel during the second period,

did not return to the third period. But honestly, can you blame Kappan? The game was scored or one at that point. I don't think the Penguins wanted to risk him hurting himself even more. Probably a smart move to have in the locker room. He didn't seem to be laboring too much

after going down the room the second time. The first time, he was kind of just like laying on the ground a little bit, excuse me, just like kind of trying to stretch the ankle out, stayed on the bench, played a few more, shifts and then, you know, just went down the tunnel, you know, sort of similar to what happened

with they, Benny Malkin, but hopefully at this point, it's not like a week-to-week injury, as we've seen with Malkin, and then obviously Teddy Blugher is also out longer term as well. So hoping the best for Kisperi Cappany, because there are not many more forwards this team can keep playing. I guess Zohorna would probably come in for Kappan if he's hurt, but, you know, that'll basically be if he's out, that will be five top nine forwards that this team will be playing with that right now. It'll basically just be Cindy Crosby, Jake Gensel, Brian Rust, Zach Ashton Reese and Jared McCann and a bunch of no ones. So hopefully it does not get to that point.

I did see in today's article from Brian Burke based talking to Josh Yoey from the Athletic. He said TANF is going to be back soon. So great news on that. And also, Jason Zulker, he said they are very optimistic about his progress right now. And he's a lot closer than where they thought he'd be at this time. So it looks like Zulker and Tanef are getting really close to returning to the lineup, which is huge news. we'll get to other stuff pertaining to what Brian Burke said in that article later on in this episode. But, you know, just to close out this segment, I do want to touch on the Sabres a little bit.

That's now, what, 15 in a row now? And yes, everyone, I mean 15 losses in a row. They are approaching almost, I think, what, an NHL record at this point? Or getting close to it is probably the best way to describe it. They'll go for 16 in a row tomorrow when these two teams will face off again. And just watching the Sabres, even after firing Ralph Krueger, and that was coming, one. You know, if you weren't paying attention to the Sabres this season, you're probably just living under a rock. But that was coming. I was surprised it took that long to fire him. But just

even after the coaching change, this team is just ready to be golfing at this point. I mean, I feel bad for players like Eric Stahl, Sam Reinhardt. You know, even Jeff Skinner, who has been, struggled very much this season to say the least. Ross and Stalin, I mean, like I said, how he was burned by Frederick Goodrow on that shorthanded goal was pathetic. That is not the number one pick that I saw there. He's honestly playing like a bottom pairing defenseman right now. I know the Sabers aren't going to trade him and rightly so. You probably just need like a good culture and a good coach to work with him to get him out of this rut. But he is not playing like the number one pick that we thought he would be just a few years ago when he was picked at number one. He was supposed to be

that franchise defenseman, but he has been anything but that right now for the Sabers. But there's no loyalty in their game. There's no heart. There's no energy. There's no spirit. They just, they look like they don't give two shits out there. And I mean, can you blame them? They lost 15 in a row. They're waiting for Kevin Adams to make a trade. There's 19 days. I'm sure when you guys listen to this,

it'll be 18 days until the trade deadline. That is a broken, rotten hockey team right now. And there's no short-term fix inside. I know Bob McKenzie talked about it. Excuse me. In the first intermission, apparently Jason Carmanos is going to be interviewed tomorrow by Kevin Adams for the assistant general manager job.

And according to Lance Lysoski of the Buffalo news. He is the top candidate or the favorite to get that job. So old friend Jason Kermonis of the Penguins will probably be going to Buffalo. And, you know, I think that's a good landing spot for him. You know, maybe he can teach Kevin Adams a few things and, you know, especially going into the straight deadline because there's going to be a lot of good players up for sale there. And we're going to see how serious they are at moving some of these pieces. But yeah, I mean, this is just a bad hockey team. The Penguins get to 3-0. They take care of business. And we have a lot more to get to about this game. But I just, I had to talk.

about the savers there for a second just because of how bad they are and you know they're almost must-watch TV as Pete Blackburn said just because of how bad they are this season and me I think one of my followers said to me I would love to see them go up against the Detroit Red Wings from last year honestly those games would have been pretty damn good I think the Red Wings would have won over if that were an eight game series between those two teams I legit think the Red Wings would win four to five of those games even though they were one of the worst teams of the salary cap era last year. And I apologize for the Discord notifications. I ended up turning that off. So apologies

on that. But okay, before we do get to the next segment, it is time to talk about locker room. It's the perfect place to start or join conversation about the NHL. You'll find fans just like you on Locker Room for watch parties, debates, post-game breakdowns, and of course, reacting to big news or rumors you'll have a chance to chat with me and might even have a chance to be featured on the Locked on Penguins podcast, excuse me, throughout our locker room conversations. Be sure to join me this week. Like I said, I think I'm doing it tomorrow night after the game. I'll be hosting a room probably around 930, 10, then I'll be recording the episode. You can go download the free locker room app now. Currently available on all iOS devices is not on Android, but they are working

on an app for Android. Be sure to create a profile. Then link your Twitter and join the NHL group for the latest league updates. Follow me at Fronter Hodes. We're notified when my room goes live. I know you won't want to miss it and I can't wait to join you all on the app. I'll be sure to let you know once the Locked On Penguin's room is live. Download the locker room app today. Locker room changing the way we talk sports. And finally, we cannot forget about Bill Pard madness. We've been telling you about Bill Pard,

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Follow the shows Twitter at L-O-U-U-U-Skwinners. So other thoughts on the game tonight. Cindy Crosby, again, was spectacular. I think that is now, what, six goals in his last 10 games, if I'm not mistaken. That goal that he scored tonight to make it 5 to 1. I don't know if any of you all noticed this, but I did right away.

The angle in which Sid scored that looked very, very similar to the one. Game 2, 2016 Eastern Conference Final against Tampa Bay on Andre Vassel. Gilevsky. I know Ross was the one that made the pass to him, but you just, you look at the angle, you look exactly where he was on the ice. It just, the puck curved almost in the exact same way and went in the exact same way and was like, well, you know, basically a carbon copy of that goal from five years ago. And yes, it's hard to believe that that goal happened almost five years ago. So yeah, great game from Sidney Crosby. Jankensel was all over the ice again. He was a

menace against the sabres. He probably could have had three or four goals tonight. And the same goes with Evan Rodriguez, he had probably, what, five to six shots on net, plenty of high dangerous scoring chances. He probably could have had three or four goals to sit in it as well. I think this was easily his best game in the season, and yes, he got his first goal against his former team. That had to have felt very good. And I cannot forget about John Marino gets his,

I think this was his first goal on the season, if I'm not mistaken. And I've really liked his game lately. He's obviously struggled a lot offensively this season. that part of his game has not transferred over to his sophomore season. But, you know, Adam Gretz wrote a great article the other day about his defensive impact this year. And while he's not playing with Mike Matheson, his results are basically the same as they were his rookie year because he's much more comfortable playing with Marcus Pedersen. You know, Marino's kind of player that wants the puck on his stick a lot. Pedersen's kind of the guy that can do the defensive work.

You know, Matheson and Marino, they don't work well together because they both want the puck on their stick 100 times out of 100. Matheson is basically a forward at this point. Marino's obviously never going to be like that, but Matheson, I think, is better at joining the rush. And honestly, I would rather have the puck on Matheson stick anyway on that period just because I think he creates offense at a higher level than John Marino. But Marino is obviously the better defenseman, especially in his own end. But that's just why Pedersen and Marino work much better together

because Marino likes to have the puck on his stick a lot more, and then Peders can do the defensive work in his own end. But also, Marino was a lead at suppression. shots last year, excuse me. So, yeah, he's pretty damn good defensively himself. Cody Cici, again, another good game from him. There's nothing bad to say about his game right now. He did have a little stumble, I think, in the third period,

which led to a Buffalo chance, but there was nothing to really just talk about with his game. He was just totally fine, in my opinion. Brian Ross had another strong game. He could have had a goal or two tonight with the chances that he was having. It was great to see Ashton Reese get that goal. He seemed a little upset after Matheson basically hit the podcast, with the high stick.

Just a few minutes before that, you just saw his face on the bench. He was almost just looking at Madison. Like, really, man, like, you had to do that because that would have made the game three to one at that point, but it didn't really matter because the Penguins would score. Three straight goals after that disallowed goal

to make a 5-1 and then win the game 5 to 2. Goaltending-wise, Trishanjari, again, very stellar. I didn't like that first goal, but after that he settled down that second goal by Oloff Sim. That's just a nice shot. I mean, a lot of goalies aren't going to make that save. And I think in his last 11,

12 stars or something like that. Jari's 927, almost 9.30. So, you know, he's playing at an elite level right now, and so is Casey DeSmith. And yes, Casey DeSmith will very likely, I'm not going to, actually, I won't say very likely, he will 110% be the starting goaltender on Thursday against the savers. They're not going to play Jari back-to-back, especially being with the Islanders coming to town Saturday and Monday. And before I do get to the next segment, we're going to talk on some other, just a whole bunch of other stuff, including the Brian Burke article and the Tim peel stuff. I didn't want to touch on this. This was funny. The Penguins fans, you know, nature is healing because there's a whole lot of wooing in the crowds. Now, you know, the woo, woo,

yes, I had to do it for everyone in case you will while we're not hearing that on TV. Anyone that does that at the games, I tweeted this out. If you did not see it, I'll just say it for you here. Anyone who does that at games should have your season tickets revoked. It is terrible. It is almost as worse as the wave at baseball games. Yes, I am a huge anti- wave person. If you do a wave, if you do the wave at a baseball game, you should probably be kicked out because that is one of the worst things to do at a sporting event. And, you know, especially with only 2,800 fans at the game, the wooers definitely stand out. I'll say that. They stand out like a sore thumb. So I had to have my little mini rant about wooers. Please stop wooing. And I hope at some point, you know,

later in the gear, we can have close to full capacity. So we don't have to hear all those wooers at the game again. But, okay, before we do get to the next. segment. It is time to talk about bedonline.A.G. It's the fastest and easiest way to bet on all your sports action. Football might be over, but the NBA, college basketball, and NHL are in full swing. Bet Online even covers awards, TV shows and reality TV. You can get real-time updated odds and props on almost anything you can imagine. Ben online has you covered for all the news, scores, and odds. It's the best way to place your bets and it's sweet to sign up for. You can head to the website, betonline.org, or use your mobile device to set up today and receive a 50% off welcome

bonus on your first deposit. That's bet online, your online sportsbook experts with a promo code locked on. All right, welcome back to this episode of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Remember to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow these shows Twitter at L-O-U-U-U-Square-Penuins. So I do want to start with the Tim Peel stuff. So in case anyone did not see, Tim Peel was fired, you know, retire early,

whatever you want to call it this morning by the NHL, for admitting to something that we all have known for years now. If you guys watch a lot of hockey, and I'm sure all of you that listen to this podcast do, you will know that refs, they refs to the score in quotation marks. They do these makeup calls when a team is down to nothing or something like that, just because the team that's losing is taking too many penalties and they want to reward that team with a power play

to try to get them back in the game in quotation marks. And basically Tim Peel admitted to that in a game, I think was between Nashville and Detroit on Tuesday night saying, you know, I wanted to get a penalty on Nashville just as a makeup call. And it's like, this is the problem with NHL officiating. It is a garbage product. It's run by the old boys club. They never want to admit it.

But we all know what's happening here. They ref to the score. They love make-up calls and they won't call penalties for the sake of not calling penalties. I saw a great story from Josh Yewee on Wednesday morning where he put out in a tweet and I quote, one time a decade ago, according to a former player that told me this, the Penguins were winning five to one in the third period. Crosby was pulled down, no penalty. Dan Bilesma politely asked why. The ref responded because you're winning five to one.

so shut the fuck up. So, I mean, that is the NHL officiating that has been in the league for so many years now. It's trash. It's dog shit. It's whatever bad word you want to call it. And it needs fix. A great fix to this.

Make the officials available to the media after the game so they can answer for the disgrace that it happens every single night with these terrible calls and this terrible mismanaging of games, especially in the playoffs. You know, they'll always, you know, they'll try to call these perfect games That was that other tweet from Josh Yeli.

He said a retired ref was talking to a group of broadcasters and told a 90s story, said he was calling a perfect game, no penalties, and then Mario got pulled down on a breakaway in the third period, no call. And basically, his reasoning was, I couldn't lose a perfect game and not calling any penalties. I mean, that is just such bullshit. The arrogance of these NHL officials is such at an all-time high. It's going to continue to be like this if the league doesn't give a shit.

And I don't really think the league does give a shit because I think Bob McKenman Kenzie reported tonight that they're not really going to make any changes to the officiating. So, yeah, I mean, they don't care that it's a trash product. You know, I think a lot of these refs also like to think that they're there to watch them. You see them in the face off circle, waving people out, taking 15 years to drop the puck. It's like, oh, my God, just drop the puck already. No one gives a shit. And, you know, I saw some people shilling for NHL officials on Twitter this morning.

Oh, my God, makeup calls happen all the times. Sometimes they need to happen. Oh, my God, this, oh, my God, that. It's just like, please shut the hell up. I don't know what you all are talking about. Please stop shilling for NHL officials. There are stuff that you can chill for in this world, but dying on the hail of NHL refs and shilling for them,

that is not it, fellas. I mean, that is just not it at all. And they just need a top-down, huge change to the officiating of this league. Everyone always asks, you know, why is in the NHL more popular in the United States? You know, the officiating is a huge reason why, and it's the number one reason as to why some of the games are just trash.

You know, it's not the number one, you know, big issue with the sport overall. You know, the hockey culture is obviously really toxic with a whole bunch of other shit. But in terms of like in-game stuff, the officiating is the worst part about it. And it's never going to change as long as these reps continue to do these makeup calls.

You know, what we saw this last night in that game, that was basically confirmed all these years. The refs know that they did it. You know, Josh Yoey had those stories from, you know, Dan Bilesma and, you know, that Mario Lemieux story. There's been evidence of this going back 20, 30 years, and it's always been like this, but the league does not give a shit.

You know, Colin Campbell, he sucks. He never cares. And sadly, it's never going to change. You know, I saw Jeff Latang Colt or Teddy Blugher now on Twitter basically said, you know, if the bad in-in-chal reps aren't going to do their jobs, fire them and promote AHA refs and see how they do. And that's a great idea as well. But, you know, make also make the reps available after the games.

The NFL does it to do a degree. you saw, I think a couple years ago when the Saints got screwed by officiating on their way to potentially going to the Super Bowl, Sean Payton literally talked to the refs after the game, and they said, yeah, we blew the call, we know that was the reason you guys lost the game. But you know, you're never going to get that transparency from NHL refs because the league doesn't like it and they don't make the refs available to the media and available to some coaches after the game. It's just not how it's worked and it's not ever going to work like that. But I thought I would rant a little bit about that. I'm going into this last thing here. Brian Burke talked to Josh Yoey today in a phone interview.

He said, you know, we have an agreement with ownership, and part of that agreement is to see how much we can help this group win right now. He said, apparently Ron Hextall is working the phones quite a bit right now. Hextall did an interview today as well with Scott Burnside and Pierre LeBron on their podcast, and he dropped a big nugget that he is in the market for a center, probably a third, fourth line, and center. Obviously, Teddy Bluger, when he comes back, is going to center his line with Aston Reese and Brandon Tannett.

but if you can get someone else to center the other line, such as an Eric Stahl. Honestly, after Thursday night's game, just leave Eric Stahl in Pittsburgh. You don't even have to trade him there. Just leave him there and have them switch sweaters for the remainder of the season. Hopefully no one would notice.

Now, I'm just kidding. People obviously would notice, but I think it would be awesome if that happened. And Eric Stahl did become a penguin because they could really roll four lines at that point if this team ever does get healthy. And he also thinks the market is going to heat up. I maybe disagree a little bit with Brian.

just because we haven't really seen any action yet. I know there's a little mini trade between Tampa Bay and Anaheim tonight, but there's basically 18 days to go until the deadline. Usually by now you have a pretty good couple of trades that have happened already in a normal year, but with COVID-19 and owners don't want to take on money for obvious reasons, I think this deadline's going to be a lot quieter than normal. But Brian, like I said, he confirmed we're looking to do something very much.

Hexie is working the phones right now. He says we like our group. We like to make it better. Here's the thing. We don't have a lot of picks. yet left. This was the big quote that I saw. We are not putting Sam Poulin and Nathan Ligary in play for any trades, so we don't

have certain things to offer that other teams do. The things we can offer, though, are a little different than other teams maybe, but if we can add, we are going to add, put it that way. So, I'm excited about that. He also did say he wants the team to be a bit bigger. I think that's fine as long as you're not putting in a

plug in there, like freaking Eric Good Branson or something like that. If you want to put in a player, like Matthew Kach, a player similar to that, obviously you're not going to get Matthew Kachukch from the flames, even though the flames are stinking right now. Shout out to Jess Belmost who have locked on flames. I am so sorry that you have to watch that dumpster fire every night

as they are just awful right now. They lost to Ottawa again. But anyways, you know, if you want to get a player like that, who's physical, a bit bigger of the player, I don't think anyone would mind that, but just I don't want plugs in the lineup that have to try to deter, you know, a player like Tom Wilson from throwing his head around or something like that. I just don't think that's necessary.

But, you know, that's what Brian Burke has liked in the past. but, you know, I think with Ron Hextall and someone like Patrick Alvin and San Brensure there, I don't think they're going to add that useless plug that has happened in the past. You know, Burke also said, you know, we're built to beat you with speed and our power play and our scale. Our power play isn't good, but we have a lot of good players. If we can get better, though, we will. My teams are usually hostile teams. Good players over the years and you need those, but I like toughness and hostile players.

So, yeah, I don't mind, you know, toughness. But as long as the player is good, can contribute to the even strength, can contribute on the power play, the penalty killed. Like I said, just no stupid plugs, Brian. That's all I think the fan base wants out of this. You don't want to be like Jim Rutherford and trade for someone like Ryan Reeves or something like that. And yes, Brian, thank you for agreeing

that the Brandon Tenev ejection from last week was dog shit because, yes, it was pretty freaking bad. I think that would do it for this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I appreciate always all of you listening to this podcast. It is so much fun to do it. We will be back tomorrow night, Thursday evening, after the game with another episode and I think I will have an episode

after I do the locker room so I'll probably do a locker room at around 930 or honestly I might do a locker room during the game so you all can watch the game with me and we can just chat about it and then I think I might do an episode right after the game but in any case there will be another episode tomorrow evening look for that then and until then I will talk to you all

next time