Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Expect a bounce-back from the Penguins tomorrow? Nick Zararis discusses

Episode Date: April 7, 2021

It's been almost 24 hours since the Pittsburgh Penguins got embarrassed by the New York Rangers but the content doesn't stop there. Hunter is joined again by Nick Zararis to break down the game a bit more and what his thoughts were after watching it all. He brings up the point that teams tend to go away from their game after giving up the first goal just a minute into a game as after that, a snowball effect occurred. They then get into Adam Fox for the Norris as Nick tries to convince the listeners why he should win the award over Makar and McAvoy. Finally, Nick gives his thoughts on whether the Penguins get come out of the East Division and what they should add at the deadline.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. 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. Hello, welcome to this Wednesday afternoon edition of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the shows Twitter at L-O-U- underscore Penguins.

So as I said yesterday, we have a very special guest joining the podcast. It is Nick Zerrara's of Gotham Sports Network, also does the Upper Bowl GM podcast, which I'm actually going to be recording with him right after this is done. So basically a double whammy today, as I've been doing with a couple other people throughout the last couple of weeks. Remember today's show is brought to you by Lockroom. You can download the app and join me this week.

I believe it's going to be tomorrow against the Rangers to get in on the action, probably be after the game. Lockroom changing the way we talk sports. So with that being said, Nick, how you do you do? doing today on this absolute gorgeous spring day around here? I'm very upset. I'm not in college and there's a pandemic going on because if I wasn't if I was in college right now, I'd probably be outside skipping class and enjoying the nice weather with my friends. But there's a pandemic going on and I'm 24. So we're here

talking about hockey instead. Yes. I think what I would be doing right now, if grandpa Mike was still on the radio, I was sitting on my balcony listening to him drinking a corona. So that is the life right there during college, especially as you're like skipping class and watching the baseball games as the nationals are playing right now. And as I check the score, I believe they were down 7 to 5 after walking off Atlanta yesterday. So they also play again, I think, at around 6, 7 o'clock. So I have the double header today. But this is a hockey podcast.

Of course, we are here to talk about the game yesterday. I recapt it on my Tuesday evening episode just by myself. But I wanted to have you here to talk about it as well for more from a ranger's perspective. Nick, this was a really odd game. If you look at the 5E5 numbers from Statrick, the Penguins had 65% of the shot attempts for Corsi, 26 to 16 in favor of scoring chances for, scoring chances against, 13 to 9 and high danger chances for,

the expected goals for 5E5, 2.48 for Pittsburgh, 1.65 for the Rangers. Nick, why is this sport so damn stupid? It's the most high-variant sport there is. It's why the most talented team doesn't always win. It's why the playoffs are so extremely difficult to predict ahead of time. All it takes is a goalie playing really well, a flaky bounce. I mean, the first goal of the night set the tone for the entire game. Blackwell tried to center a pass across the crease to, I think it was lingering coming down.

And it deflected it off of a penguin's defenseman. It went through Yari's legs. And that set the tone for the evening. When you give up a goal like that, it's really easy to let that snowball on you. And the penguins, for as experienced a team, as well coached a team as they are, you could tell that right away, ah, damn, we let in a crappy one. We got, all right, we got to get it going here. And then the second one where Sid got caught on a back check because Latang pinched up way too far on a zone entry, which was weird to see. He didn't have a chance.

Buccirovich went around him and he got it through the middle, a mediocre initial scoring chance, but deflected off a Yari's pad. Zabinajad comes in, backhanded through the five hole, and from there, the races were open. And that's one of the weird things about this Rangers team is when they're in these open-ended shooting gallery kind of games, they typically do pretty well because of the high-end talent they have. The guys like Zabinajad, the guys like Panarin, they can dictate the flow of the game when there's a lot of space to operate. But in games where there isn't a lot of space to operate, the Rangers have a hard time creating offense. Last night, lots of space, lots of room. the penguins were taking chances trying to create offense to get back into the game, and the Rangers had their way. They did not play particularly great game, but they scored more than the penguins didn't.

Last time I checked, that's how you win hockey games. That is what matters most when it comes to hockey. You know, you win on the scoreboard, you know, sometimes the process is not there. 14 like the penguins, like I said, who controlled 62% of the shot attempts last night. and allowed only an expected goals against it just 1.4A and they still give the other goals. So that's probably a game. If you replay it 99 more times, that does not happen just because that is how the sport is. But, you know, the Rangers took full advantage of it.

And as you said, you know, it's kind of snowballed after that first goal. I touched on it last night. Cindy Crossey probably had the worst shift of his career, passing the puck to no one in particular. And then the Rangers were off to the race as just a couple minutes after that. Did all he could playing defense. But, you know, then they basically left out Jari to dry there. You know, not a good game from him coming back after being sadly injured for those last couple games. Honestly, it begs the question of who's going to start on Thursday just because both goalies, I think, have not looked so good.

The last couple of starts, it's a far cry from what we've seen in the last 6 to 7 weeks with this team as they were first in all situations. Team save percentage, I think, in the league. And I think Casey DeSmith was a top 10 goalie in goals save above expected. So, yeah, they better get that cleaned up as well as, you know, their defensive. defensive problems. I mean, you saw Jared McCann talk about it after the game. You know, we kind of feel like we're lost right now. Not playing for each other. Brian Russ basically said the same thing. We're going to, we're not going to run from this. We're going to take it head on.

We're going to watch the video correct our mistakes. There were some injury updates. I'll get to that later. But, you know, Nick, I guess I'll get to this next. I've seen some, I was listening to the game on NBC yesterday. Well, watching the game on NBC. Excuse me. You know, they're still harping it up. Oh, well, you know, the Rangers still have that chance to make the playoffs. And, you know, as I currently look at the standings, I think there are five points back of Boston because they're starting to win a little bit more.

I know both of their goalies are out. One has COVID. The other one is hurt. Of course, that's Tuka Rask because he's always hurt. Is there an actual chance for this team to make the playoffs? Or is it just basically a fool's errand and you would have to have almost every team collapse or at least most Boston collapse? You would need the Bruins to completely capitulate, which, to be fair, the Bruins have looked objectively bad. for about two weeks now.

They are really having a hard time scoring at five on five. Their power play is not playing particularly well. They are starting basically four below replacement level defensemen, Charlie McAvoy and Macroslick every night. It wouldn't be totally impossible for the Bruins to implode, but I just don't think the Rangers are consistent enough. They still have some difficult opponents ahead of them, whereas the Bruins get to play Buffalo.

I think it's four more times. The Rangers have, I believe, four with the Islanders, which will basically be the measuring stick of if the Rangers are actually making progress or not because the Islanders are the type of team the Rangers have a brutal time against because the Islanders control that valuable part of the ice, that center area where the Rangers

like to get cross-crease passes going and create those high danger chances that the Rangers have done a decent job of doing but against a pretty disciplined team like the Islanders, it just doesn't work. And when the Rangers haven't been able to create offense through those cross-crease passes, they can't create offense at all.

It becomes a very stagnant guys standing around. There's not a lot of cycling. There's not a lot of board play. But circling back around to answer your question, I mean, most of the public models have them below 15% chance to make the playoffs. I think the most generous money puck has them like 16, 17%, but everyone else has them below 10%. So it's not impossible, but it's not likely.

It's a good talking point. They're an exciting hockey team to the casual observer for NBC. this is a team with the first overall pick and the second overall pick, a top 10 player in the league, a top 10 defenseman in the league, two point per game forwards, Mika Zabinajad. There's a lot of tantalizing pieces here that to the casual observer, who's not watching the Rangers every night, you could say maybe this team gets really hot and makes a run,

but it doesn't really matter to me this year because this year was never about making the playoffs. It was about making sure the younger players are making progress. and getting opportunities to improve. So to answer your question, no. It's not a realistic possibility, but it's not totally impossible, which is why it keeps getting brought up. Yeah, you know, the math is still kind of there,

but, you know, I think it's basically the same as the Philadelphia Flyers, who also lost last night to Boston. They are now tied with you all in points. You know, what a brutal march that was. Carter Hart was basically bottom, like third in the league and goals saved above, expected and goal save above average. That basically just killed their playoff hopes. Yeah, I don't foresee either of those teams making a run here in the last five to six weeks.

I think you have your four playoff teams. It's just a matter of who is seed wear. Yeah, like who is seed to where? Is Boston going to catch Pittsburgh? It looks pretty realistic right now with how the Penguins have played the last couple of games and they're still banged up. And, you know, I honestly wouldn't even mind of that because the Penguins would be at Washington potentially in the first round. And I think Pittsburgh can beat them in a best of seven series. But we still have a lot more to get to for this episode, including you convinced

the listeners why everyone should be voting for Adam Fox to be the Norris Trophy winner over Charlie McAvoy. But before we do that, it is time to talk about, well, firstly, it's Bill-Barr, it's a candy bar, well, protein bar, excuse me, that tastes like a candy bar. We just finished up. Built Bar madness, you want to check out the winner. Go to Billet Bar.com and check that out. There's still 18 amazing flavors, six new flavors.

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That has promo code Locked 15 for 15% off at Billbar.com. And also, we cannot forget about Lockroom. Remember, I'm going to be live on the Lockroom app after Tomorrow Night's game against New York Rangers. I believe that game is on 18T Sports Network. It is not on NBC Sports Network this time. It's a perfect place to start or join conversation. about the league. You'll find fans just like you on locker room for watch parties, debates,

post-game breakdowns, and of course, reacting to big news and rumors. Reminder tomorrow night after the game I'll be hosting a room around probably 930, 945 Eastern Time and go download the free locker room app right now. It's on all iOS devices. There's still not one for Android just yet, but they are working on that. Be sure to create a profile, link in Twitter, and join the NHL group for the latest league updates. Follow me at Hunter Hodes to be notified when my room goes live. I know you won't want to miss it. And I'll see you there. Lockroom, changing the way we talk sports. 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 the show's Twitter at L.O.

on a sport penguin. So as I was watching that game last night, Nick, you know, I hadn't watched Adam Fox in a full game for quite a bit now. I've been seeing, you know, the highlights and the glimpses of him. People need to stop putting up this little Drew Downey nonsense of him being the Norris trophy finalist. When you have a player like Adam Fox, who's producing one of the best offensive seasons that we've seen from a defenseman in the last couple of years, to be honest with you all, you know, look at his history, drafted by Calgary, didn't want to play there, went to Carolina, didn't want to play there, and he got his wish and got to go to the Rangers where he always wanted to

play, and he's been their franchise defensive that they've been needing ever since they traded Ryan McDonough to the Tampa Bay Lightning, and of course, you know, a couple other players. left as well. But Nick, for me, it's Fox or McAvoy for the Norris. I think you should try to convince everyone. Why should we vote for Adam Fox to be the Norris Trophy winner? Let's start here. Number one, I'd also add Cal McCar to that discussion. I know the boomer hockey writers are going to insist that headman is part of that discussion because he's on a very good team. He scores points. He's second in defenseman points. Fox passed him last night. Actually, wait, no, incorrect. They tied last night. But Foxes.

played one fewer game than Hedman, because Fox missed that one game where they thought he was COVID positive, but it turned out to be a false positive. But starting there, I think the discussion is McAvoy, Macar, Fox. To differentiate him a little bit, McCar has the most ideal situation of the three. He's on the best team of the three. He's an ideal defensive partner. He's playing with elite forwards. They control possession. They control the flow of the game. McCar is a special, special talent on the back end, but I think this is similar to the Calder discussion last year between Hughes, Fox, and McCar. Fox is the hardest job. Fox is playing the most minutes.

He has to quarterback a power play, which is pretty stagnant, which goes to really bad dry spells. He's on the worst of the three teams, so he has an increased responsibility. I mean, he's played 30 minutes in a game, I think three times this year, because Quinn just doesn't trust the third defensive pair, which he shouldn't. That Smith, Hayek pairs, bottom five in the entire league by most metrics. But Fox just, whenever he is on the ice, he's going to get the puck at least two or three times in a cycle. If you watch him play, he's not the most physically imposing guy. He's not the strongest. He's not the fastest.

He's probably the smartest. I know for a lot of people, you think of, well, that's just good positioning. That's good coaching. But I don't know if you read what Jack Hahn wrote a couple of weeks ago about Adam Fox about the way he plays where he uses body faints. He uses redirects. He uses reverses. He uses really fundamental things that you would think are kind of like, I don't want to say beneath. But yeah, beneath an elite NHL defenseman where he'll just reverse the puck behind the net to his partner if he's getting pressured.

He doesn't want to turn the puck over. He's going to make the high IQ play. If he's walking the blue line, he's going to body fain to beat a forward to come. up to pressure him. So that creates an opening for someone else to get to where that player was just coming from. And it's such a cerebral way of playing hockey that I don't want to say McAvoy doesn't deserve it because he's been thrown to the wolves this year. He's played an ungodly number of minutes. He's gotten hurt a couple of times. But he's played with bad defensive partners all year, whereas Fox has had the luxury of playing with Lingren. I won't say Lingren is amazing, but he's

an effective partner. He can skate reasonably well. He's got decent hands. He can pass. He can't finish to save his life. He's a tense of bad bounces. He sounds like a lesser Brian Dumwin. Yeah, that's a good way to, that's a good way of describing the arc for Ryan Lingren, where he's

a defensive, he's responsible defensively, he's not going to pinch too much. He covers for Foxwell. He allows Fox to freelance a little bit, but at the same time, you're never really worried about Fox freelancing because he always makes the right play. It's very rare in the offensive zone you see Fox make the wrong play where he turns it over without

the clear idea of what he was trying to do or a puck getting to the net because that's basically what it comes down to. Fox gets the puck towards the net and gives his guys a chance to score. He doesn't shoot a ton, which again, that kind of hurts him because the traditional Norris voter likes to see the counting stats, but he's got the points. He's at 36 points in 37 games, 31 an assist. That's a really good rate. I mean, it's basically a point of game, and that's, you know, he missed a game, and the team started

out abysmal. You got to remember. The Rangers could not score the first month of the season, and the Rangers haven't improved a ton since that first month, but they're at least scoring goals now, and Fox is putting up the counting stats to match that. Yeah, he's been light-sal. Like I said,

that Lingren Fox pairing is eerily similar to a Dumlin Latang pairing, where Dumlin will come cover a lot if Chris Lattang makes a mistake. I mean, you know, Chris Lentang is that franchise defenseman. And, you know, he will make, you know, quite a few mistakes. And obviously, Adam Vox, I think, is on his way to being the franchise defenseman for New York Rangers, which is why I'm making that comparison. And then, you know, a player like Lindgren is just like

Duman, you know, good defense in his own zone, skates well. Dumlin is also someone that can't finish. He had his first goal of the season last night. It's usually a big game when he scores a goal. But last night, obviously, it was probably like the first time in his career where he scored a goal, but it didn't mean anything. He's just, he's had a knack of scoring goals. In big games, you know, game six against San Jose, scored in game five against Tampa, scored a couple, I think, against St. Louis or something like that,

like a year or two ago. Usually it's just a big playoff game is where he gets that lone goal that you haven't seen him score in 40-50 games. I always, like I say, it was just it was really fun watching that pairing. I mean, it's nice to seize a vantage ad, too, really come into his own after that. really a rough story was like, wow, are the Rangers actually going to pay him, you know, 10 million per, especially after-

I still don't think they're going to, by the way. I do think that they have to move him. He has a limited no movement. They cannot. Because if they were to give him that extension, you would have the Toronto team, though. You would have four guys making about $35, $40 million and still have to pay Sirkin, which it's going to be difficult to pay him because he only has, you know, 50-ish NHL starts. They're going to have to pay Fox in a year, which is he's going to command at least $8, 9 million

right out of the box. And then you're giving Truba. So they have Truba, Kreider, Panarin, and Truba Crider, Panarin, and who am I forgetting? That's the other big ticket guy. Why can't, why? I'm trying to blank on it, too. Kreider, Truba. Is it Bukhnevich, or do he get signed?

That's another guy. He's an RFA this summer to pay him really quickly. you could be looking at a very top-heavy roster build, which could work for one or two years, but I don't think that would make sense based on where their young guys are. If this were a Toronto-like situation where Matthews popped right away,

Marner popped right away, okay, maybe you can afford to give Zavindich out a big bag right now, give Bucenevich a big bag right now, go to the two years with Lafranier and Kako on those entry-level deals, and maybe you make a run in one of those two years, and you win a cop. But that's not realistic right now.

So I don't think Zabinajad or Strom, for that matter, will be on the team long term. I don't know what they're going to do at center. It's the biggest toll on the team right now, even though they're getting decent production from Strom and Zabinajad now, I still don't think either of those guys is on the Rangers if they win a Stanley Cup anytime soon. Yeah. And remember you have the expansion draft coming up, so you're going to lose someone no matter what. Every team is, of course.

So we'll have a lot more to get to. In the next segment, we're going to preview the game on Thursday, probably touch on some deadline stuff as well. Before we do that, it's time to talk about Bet Online. The fastest and easiest way to bet on all your sports section. Football might be over, but the NBA and the NHL are in full swing. Better Online even covers awards, TV shows, and reality TV. You can get real-time updated odds and props on almost anything you can imagine.

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I'm your host, Hon. Haudies. Remember to follow me on Twitter at Honohodes. Follow this show's Twitter at L.O. underscore Penguins. So real quick, Nick, these teams will play again for the final time this season. I don't foresee them playing in the playoffs. But this will be the final time these two teams will play until the fall. Penguins will try to get to six and two on the season against the Rangers. That would match their record against the Islanders,

so that would be 12 and 4 against the two New York teams that the Penguins can get the revenge on Thursday. I'd like to think the Penguins will come out playing a lot better after allowing 15 goals in the last five periods. This was a Penguins team. I was telling you this yesterday. They handled out more than three goals in a game, dating back to their last 16 games prior to Saturday.

It was locked down defense at its finest. Maybe they were playing a bit above their level, considering they have four, five regulars out of their lineup and potentially John Marino might not play tomorrow because his face slammed on the ice pretty hard. There was no really update today from Sullivan, but they might be getting back Teddy Bluger.

He's still not officially clear, but he practiced again. And that would be nice. And again, Malkin officially started skating today. So his return gets a little closer. You know, when you look at this game, you sent me this today, you said the Rangers players got their vaccine today. Some of them did, yeah.

Yeah, which is great news. I hope a lot more sports players overall, and just everyone, honestly, overall in this country and around the world continue to get vaccinated so we can get back to normal as soon as possible. What do you see for this game going into tomorrow? Well, the Rangers got the Johnson and Johnson vaccine today. So most of the guys who got it

are going to feel like shit tomorrow for the most part. So I would expect, I would guess at least a couple of guys can't go just based on logic. I mean, obviously your body building that immune response, you're going to have the reaction. I mean, I got my first dose of a two-doser on one day. And yesterday, I felt it. I was in bed, curled up in a ball watching the game. And I could not imagine having to play in a professional hockey game.

So I can imagine energy is going to be an issue. I can imagine a starter or two probably won't be able to play, even though that's not a guarantee. That's just, you know, I would guess that happens. otherwise I don't think they'll go Shasturkin a fifth game in a row it's every other day now the rest of the way the rangers play every other day the rest of the season so it could be your give it could be Kincaid I really doubt they go Shostirken a fifth game in a row he does need to rest at some point here he's too important to burn out trying to chase a playoff spot right now we know goaltending is very fickle but the result you have seen from him this year are highly encouraging he's top-tied in the league and goal saved above expected and goals saved above average. So he's tracking well through his first 60-70 NHL game. But you've got to be mindful of that. You got to manage that.

You got to give him opportunities to rest. As far as mentality, the Rangers have a very hard time playing well after they win a game. They get too high on themselves. They get a little too eager beaver, if you want to call it that. But, yeah, I would be very surprised if the Penguins did not win on Thursday. Very, very surprised. especially considering how badly they lost and just the type of coach Mike Sullivan is where he gets through to his guys and they'll respond to getting embarrassed like they do. Yeah, I absolutely think so as well.

You know, then after that game, they'll play, they'll go to New Jersey, I think, and play their final two games there before I think playing the devil's three more times in Pittsburgh on this month. I mean, the schedule is pretty soft for the Penguins. I mean, if they can win that game, they would get to 11 and 3 and 1 against the bottom. So, well, against the, well, beforehand, it was the red ones. Rangers, Devils, and the Sabres that were the bottom three teams. And now with the Rangers leapfrogging them. So it would still be 11, 3, and 1 against the Rangers, Devils and Sabres this year, which is, you know,

what you need to do to make the playoffs. You know, that's one of the biggest reasons I think why the Penguins want to make the playoffs because, you know, they've done well against the Rangers. They are four and no against Sabres, and they still have five more left against New Jersey. And, you know, I'm sure Ron Hex saw all who to get through the DEM as well, come down from the press box with how he was in his playing days.

But just two more things to get to before we'll call it. episode, the trade deadline. Five days away. Easily the most quiet trade deadline I can remember for as long as I've been following this sport, Nick. Usually you have quite a few trades done by now in a normal year. Obviously with a flat cap and with COVID-19, teams don't want to add money. It's understandable. Do you see the Rangers doing anything at the deadline or do you think they're going to stand pat and, you know, what do you think Pittsburgh is going to do? Because they've been talking about getting a big physical forward. You know, my only hope is that he can actually play, you know, a la Dustin Brown,

who's having a pretty good year despite a high shooting percentage, or, you know, someone such as Elliot Freeman said, Scott Lawton from Philadelphia, which, you know, unlikely, but would be an interesting ad for the team. Rangers, we know they've actively been shopping Ryan Strom. They tried to trade him last winter before this season. They didn't get any takers. He's got a point per game this season.

He's not going to be on the team long term, at least we don't think he could get you a decent return he could probably get you a second and a third round pick but it doesn't seem like they're going to trade him Which Nevich is a restricted free agent but he's an important contributor

I wouldn't think he's on the block I think the only player the Rangers could realistically be shopping is Brendan Smith third player lefty he's responsible he's boring he doesn't really turn the puck over but to a good team he could be worth a fourth round pick

as a low, upside, high floor, third pair left defensemen. He won't kill you. The Rangers can retain half of his salary, even though with only 20-ish games to go of $4 million. You know, it's not a ton of money that the Rangers would be retaining to make that deal any sweeter. But yeah, the Rangers won't be busy if they make a move at all. I suppose they could try and trade Colin Blackwell,

who's having a really nice season as their facsimile. Asper Foss playing up and down the lineup, getting some goals, some high-end guys, but I don't think the Rangers do anything. Penguins, they don't have their first round pick this year because they traded for Capitan, so I don't see Pittsburgh going for anything crazy. I forget. I think I was, yeah, when I talked to J. Fresh hockey the other day, I'd said, if you didn't

give your first round pickup for Capitin, I would say Taylor Hall would make a ton of sense, but you don't have that asset to give up. And you couldn't fit him in, you'd have that Buffalo retain half, and you'd probably have to give something to them back to send money back out. So I don't think that would work. I like Lawton's game. He's pretty good. He can play up and down the lineup,

but I really doubt the Flyers and Penguin can facilitate a trade. You don't trade within your own division. You just don't do it. I'm thinking of who else is out there. Freeway trade. Yeah. There just isn't a ton out there because the teams that you thought were going to be selling, like Nashville,

they got it together and they're in a playoff. spot now. So at home is probably not available. Forzburg probably not available anymore because Nashville wants to make a playoff spot. Get those extra games and sell some tickets for two or three for three home games if you can get that far. I think we're going to get a pretty dull deadline. I think Taylor Hall goes somewhere. Kyle Palmary maybe goes somewhere for something. That's a guy. I mean, I don't think the penguins could make that work if the devils would be willing to trade within division. Palmary is not expensive. He's an expensive. He's an expiring contract. You could plug him into your top six, or he could be a plus third line guy

where if the penguins are fully healthy and Kyle Palmerie is your third line right wing, that's pretty good. That's a pretty deep forward group. If I were the penguins, that's the kind of guy I'd be looking for, is a plus guy who's good along the board, who's a compliment to your high-end guys who can occasionally contribute on your power play, kill penalties. But as far as getting an extra body, just to throw themselves right, You guys already have Evan Rodriguez, who's a decent version of what an energy checking forward is. Once the lineup is healthy, he goes back down to your third line, he's not playing second line. That's fine.

You don't need another grinder type. Rodriguez is a hot. It's fine. I don't understand. Tell that to Brian. Tell that to Brian Burke. You know, this is Brian Burke hockey at its finest. You know, Hax Dogg would say they want a big physical board.

You know, I've been on this podcast saying so many times. I don't care if you get that. a lot of players that fit that are not available. Matthew Gucke, are the flames that are going to trade him? No, and that would be hilarious if they did trade him to Pittsburgh because I think that would piss every Metro team off, well, East Division team off right now at least. You know, Tom Wilson, when he's not playing dirty,

again, another power forward that would make sense. Obviously, that would don't think a lot of Penguins fans, myself included want him on the team. And then, you know, of others as well. So, you know, Dustin Brown makes sense. He probably wouldn't have a lot. cost to acquire, excuse me, would not be a lot. But, you know, there's a player that Hextall, especially has some history with

because he won the Stanley Cup with Los Angeles all those years ago. Finally, I make, before I do let you go, just a couple more minutes. Do you see this Penguins team as a contender as we get close to the playoffs? Because in my mind, when this team is fully healthy, and as you saw it for the last six to seven weeks, I think they can beat any team in this division in the seven-game series. I think they can 100% get to the final four. after that, don't really know if they can beat Tampa Best of Seven.

Vegas, Colorado, the team from the north. I mean, I think they can beat Toronto in a Best of Seven. But, you know, the other three, not too sure. What do you think? Yeah, that's exactly what I was going to say. I was going to say, whoever wins the East Division in the playoffs is going to be so battered and beat up by the time you get to that Final Four. I mean, your path probably goes through the Islanders and then Washington.

that's a really brutal two best of sevens just to get to the final four and then when you get there your reward is a date with Vegas, Colorado, Tampa, Carolina or Toronto. That's a really tall order just to get there alone. And then to play a team that's, I think the problem the East Division has is all of these teams are relatively close to each other in terms of talent and performance. So they beat up on each other a lot. They all hang with each other relatively tightly. But when you compare the talent of even the best teams in this division of the Pittsburghs of the Washington,

Carolina's got more talent, Vegas has more talent, Tampa. I would say Toronto, it depends on which team in the East. But talent-wise, it'd be an uphill battle. And Pittsburgh would really need their goaltending to come around. It's been way too inconsistent this year. I think that's probably your biggest factor of if you want to judge a team as a serious contender or not. Can your goal to get hot and play out of his mind if the team in front of him isn't playing one? Tampa Bay right now has Vasaleski playing out of his mind.

When Grubauer's been healthy for Colorado, he has excellent numbers. Toronto doesn't have goaltending right now. That's why I'm a little less more inclined to believe in them. Vegas, they could go flurry or later. I think Pittsburgh very well could get to that final floor. That wouldn't surprise me at all. But beyond that would be surprising, yes, just because the other teams are more talented. And that's not a knock.

The Penguins are a good team. It's just the other teams have more. more guys. Yeah. That's just the way hockey is. Absolutely. I mean, Colorado is deeper. Vegas is deeper. They can basically run two super lines on their team. Colorado has a super wine that rivals Marshawn, Bergeron, Posternock

when they're rolling. And I think Colorado has like 114th of their last 16 games. So, you know, hopefully get nine games of Colorado, Vegas in the West Division final. But yeah, I mean, that's basically I think where I'm at with this team. We've seen the goal tending be really good these last six, seven

weeks. Casey DeSmith, like I said, was basically over 930 in the month of March. Honestly, in his last 9 to 10 starts, going back to early February, he was around 9, 28, 930. Tristan Jari going into last night, his last 9-30. So the goal-tending was playing really damn good,

but these last couple of games, it's obviously fallen off a little bit. I can't afford to go back to early season for him just because the Penguins were winning games and staying in it, despite their goalies playing so bad. But you don't have late-era Matt Murray walking through that door,

I don't think, you know, for as good as Matt Murray was for those few years. The goaltending, I don't think, is going to be as bad as that. But I think that would do it for this episode of Locked on Penguins podcast. Nick, where can everyone find you on Twitter and your work? All right. So Twitter is at Nick. And then my last name is Z, A-R-A-R-I-S.

Tweet, produce a lot of content. It should have an Islander's blog about why they're so effective at 5-on-5 going up either today or tomorrow, wrote something, yesterday about the Rangers management of their young players and giving out ice time. And then the podcast, Upper Bowl GM, pretty much every day, aside from the random times where there's not really anything in particular, I feel like I could talk about for 40 minutes. I don't just talk to talk. I like to record an episode when I have a point yesterday, recording an episode dealing with

just the Rangers management of their roster, giving opportunities to guys who won't be on the team long term, that kind of thing. Monday's episode was kind of just catching up on all the crazy stuff that happened over the weekends, the Final Four, that kind of thing. Looking forward to this weekend, the Masters, I'll talk a little bit about on, I'll talk a little bit about that at some point, probably on the show I'm recording tomorrow. Have a good friend from Twitter dropping by. We're going to talk about the Nashville Predators and what it's like being a hockey fan in the non-traditional market. That'll be up on Friday.

So lots of stuff going on. This is a great time of year to be a sports fan. And for content creators like Hunter, like myself, there's a surplus of ideas right now. So by all means, please check me out. I've put a lot of work into my work, pouring over as much data as I possibly can. I wake up every day, have a cup of coffee, make my eggs. And then I spend a solid hour, hour and a half on the natural satric evolving wild money book. Just trying to piece together where the NHL is on this specific day.

so I have an understanding of what's going on out there. Yeah, and the playoffs are now only five to six days, five to six weeks away. Excuse me, and I think the North Division is going to start a little later just because of what's going on in Canada with COVID. The U.S.-based ones will start a bit earlier. But, you know, it's probably going to be a lot more rampant with spending a lot more time on Static as we get closer and closer to the playoffs. And almost just feels like the playoffs will start.

And actually with how warm the weather has gotten. But that will do it for this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'll have another episode tomorrow after the game. And then Friday, I will have another one previewing the game against New Jersey this weekend. So that would do it for this one. Hope you all liked it. And I'll be back tomorrow.