Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Locked On Penguins 2/27-Chad comes back on for more heat!

Episode Date: February 28, 2020

In this episode of Locked On Penguins, Chad (madchad412 on Twitter) joins the podcast again and he brings the heat even more from last time! They touch on Jack Johnson's struggles and what needs to happen, plus how more people need to call him out for how bad he's been, plus they discuss the teams struggles and if it's getting close to panic time. 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.

Hello, welcome to this episode of the Locked on Penguins podcast. I'm your host Hunter Hodes. Follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Follow the show's Twitter at L0 underscore Penguins. Tonight we have a guest on the podcast. Chad, Mad Chad 412 from Penguins, Twitter returns. Chad, how you doing today, man? I mean, it's cold, but I'm doing well with the news that we got today from Penguins practice.

So thanks for having me on again. Yeah, of course. Yeah, great news that we got after that. Bad game last night against the Kings where the Penguins lost 2-1. Nick Buxtad is alive. I thought he was not around the team anymore, but yes, he indeed is alive, more than 11. He was back at practice today, no contact. John Moreno and Brian Dumlin, full contact.

That's really good news. They need them back in the worst way, man. Of course, Jared McCann is back at practice full contact as well. I hope I play tomorrow, I think. Yeah, chat, just great news all around, and especially for Duman and Moreno, man, they can't come back soon enough. I guess we'll just get right into it. I'm trying to be nice as I can about Jack Johnson.

I don't really know how else to say it, but I just can't watch another game of him playing on this team, especially after the mistakes last night. And for you people that still defend him out there, sorry, you're weird. What do you think, Chad? I'm more than happy to be the bad guy if you don't want to be. Go ahead. So we've reached a really weird point in this fan base, and it's kind of like a media a little bit versus, like, media versus bloggers,

and then like fans versus other weird fans that don't want to... Here's what it comes down to me. It comes down to the fact that there's a certain portion of his fan base and a media that just don't want to admit they were wrong. In today's world, we're so worried about retweets and likes and our reputation. And Lord knows I've been guilty of that in the past. But the fact is, when the penguin signed Jack Johnson, there was a large portion of the fan base, including myself, and bloggers and guys that said,

this is not a good sign. He's old. He's slow. He doesn't fit the system. and his metrics are terrible. And then there was, like, guys like Mark Madden, and all the lead writers and some of the guys and I'm even friends with, like Josh Joey,

and they were like, oh, well, you got to give him a chance. Jim Motherford knows what he's doing. He's won two Stanley Cups. So they did one season, and last year he was terrible. And even one of those guys will actually say, yeah, he wasn't great, but once he got moved to the left side, he wasn't as bad. They still won't say he's good, but he wasn't as bad.

Okay, and then he gets scratched No playoffs, and they get swept, and then he comes back here too. Now, this year, I will admit to you, the first half of the season, he was not killing them like he was last year. Absolutely. Why? Why, though?

Because he was playing very sheltered minutes and situations. Mike Sullivan was doing a great job of making sure that he was on the ice mostly against the other team's weaker forwards, their bottom six fours. He wasn't out there against Anzay Kopitar and Nathan McKinnon and stuff like that

because he can't be because he just doesn't have a skill set. And so his metrics went up a little bit. They were actually hovering around 49% corsi, 51% Fenwick, almost possible for like a legit, every night defenseman. Then, Doomlin got hurt, and we lost Schultz. And now we lost Lerina recently, and we've forced Jack Johnson to be in the top pairing

and guess what? He's been exposed. He cannot play against these elite type players. Latang can't. Duma one can't. Jack Johnson's not built for that. So what is the problem with saying, hey,

you got, you know, Jack Johnson's not playing well. He needs to play left. Instead of, there's this, like, toxicity where it's like, I,

you hate the penguins. If you don't think Jack John, you guys hate Jack Johnson. I don't hate Jack Johnson. I don't know who. I didn't never met Jack Johnson. I don't care. It's not like I wish that he gets like coronavirus. I don't, I don't wish that upon him.

Like, I don't wish bad things on him. I don't have a voodoo doll of Jack Johnson in my pocket. I don't. Like, I don't care about that dude personally. Like, I hope he has a great life. I'm looking at this as I want my freaking hockey team to win games. And right now, he is hurting the Pittsburgh Penguins. The more he plays, the harder it is for them to win.

And that has shown in this four game losing. yeah absolutely I agree and especially last night I think was honestly the worst of the games during this four game losing a streak for jack the penguin I remember it was the first or second period they were cycling in the zone really guys shift and then the puck goes jack johnson oh he shoots in a new defender and then the kings are off the run to the races and it's like come on and then of course with the trevor lewis goal less than a minute remaining one-nothing lead for the king's like okay you just get to intermission. You're down one. You'll probably score at least one in the third period like they did. But no,

Jack Johnson can't even play his man in Trevor freaking Lewis, who I'm sorry, is not good. He's a bottom six board on a really bad team. The Kings are a really bad possession team. And he gets turned around. Jari makes the first save. And then Jack Johnson is not there for the rebound. And he just posts it right by him because he had no Jari had no chance on it. And it's just like, it was laughable. I couldn't believe that.

I think late in the third period, he basically had a pass to right to a King's player, and he almost had a breakaway out of it. I just couldn't believe what I was watching. Right. And so, you know, I mean, that's a great, you made a great point because you're actually describing plays. Because what we see is, you know, we sit out there and we do. We throw charts out of people, and we throw numbers. Look at Latang's metrics versus, you know, when he's on the ice with Johnson versus when he's not.

Look at Crosby's metrics when he's on the ice with Johnson. That's not. Those are just metrics. We don't care about those. We actually watched the game. So last night, I didn't have my son last night. I was watching the game. I mean, myself, other people on Twitter,

are showing actual video footage and photos of Johnson being terrible. And it's still not enough because narrative. Like, people are just so worried about, oh, my God, I can't admit that Jack Johnson's not good. I can't admit that he messed up. Look, I defend Matt Murray all the time. when he plays like shit, I say he plays like shit. Absolutely.

I mean, what is so hard about it? Just let it go. I mean, is it what's worth more? Like, is your dignity and pride worth more than just be like, well, you know what, man? This Penguin's team, man, they've won four games. We're competing for first play. You know what? I kind of feel like Mike Sullivan might need to make a change and maybe, you know, use a recola or maybe

get peters in the top pairing minutes. Instead, and thank God now we're getting these guys. eyes back couldn't come in a better time but jack i mean and they you can see they kind of admit it they'll go well he's playing too much that is equal to he is not built to be a top four pairing and so that so say that don't but don't try to tell me that something is what it isn't because there's visual proof and then there's data that shows that he's bad so you're telling me that both are wrong it's reached to the point where it's almost kind of like insanity and then we have to beat a dead horse

because we still keep getting articles about how well Jack Johnson doesn't care what the fans think and Jim Brotherford still believes in Jack Johnson and you know what it is it's not journalism it's PR yeah you hit the nail on the head there and that's what I was gonna get to like you know what I saw this morning Brian Wilson put some really good stuff like he writes for hockey buzz

put some really good stuff you know because course he fan with Jack Johnston and the O's without Jack Johnson. And, you know, I've disagreed with Ryan over many things in the past, but, you know, for this instance, he's dead on right here. It's like, you look at this chart and, oh, my God, like, Jack is, without Jack Johnson and now, Cindy Crosby's line, functions insanely good. And then, with it, minus seven, he's minus seven right now. Last year, they were talking about Crosby being a Selke candidate because he was so good defensively. And now he's minus seven.

And then when you flip that, Malkin was minus 21 last year, but he's freaking what, plus 14 this year? I wonder why. Because guess who he's not on the ice with all the time anymore? Yeah, it's staggering. It's weird to me that, you know, I'm a massive fan of Mike Sullivan. I think he's a top five coach in hockey. I think you can make the argument that he is the best coach in hockey. I don't think there's many more that I've done more with the team, obviously.

but what I just it's a big head scratcher why during this stretch you know ever since Doolin got hurt a couple months ago why he has not like gotten away from Johnson with Lattang I don't know what it is I don't know if maybe Jim Rutherford is

you know telling him to keep doing it but something is in his ear but here's where here's where I think that decision comes I think it's just I think that he knew that okay Dumelan is coming back sooner than

later. I think this was all about treading water. In one way, I can't say that he's, you know, all Mike Sullivan's an idiot. I can't believe he's playing Jack Johnson's team. I understand it because Jack Johnson, there is, he is a veteran. The guys do like him. He's like, he probably, I mean, he probably leaves the team and hugs and handshakes per 60s. I mean, he's everybody's buddy.

The media love him. I mean, that dude is a, he probably have a beer with everybody, he's that guy. So there is a comfortability with him. And, you know, personally, if I were coaching a team, which I'm never going to, but if I were in a world,

I would play with Kola because of the metrics showing that he had a better quality of teammate, the results would be better. Yeah, but he doesn't. So, but he's just treading water.

And I can't say that, but to me, it's coaching scared. And that's the term I would use because he's afraid of trusting, you know, a younger, more inexperienced guy. And he's just trying to, you know, okay, if the penguins, as long as we don't go too far behind, you know, my horses are coming back and then we'll be okay. But, man, it has absolutely cost his team some precious points. Yeah. And I was reading, you know, what Adam.

Gretz was saying last night, you know, I echo the same sentiment. They've played their asses off these past couple games. And the fact that they got no points out of it, that stings because, like, they, I thought they all played Washington. I know they barfed all over themselves in the defensive zone. Marcus Pedersen was probably, you know, the victim of two of those goals against Washington. And then, of course, last night they came into the King's zone at will. But, you know, just some defensive issues with Jack Johnson and everything else. And it just, like you said, it's cost the team points.

And it just, it stinks. That's the worst thing about it, though, with Johnson is. though you hear about how well because I got you know he missed that wide open net and then you got guys that will come out and like well he's a defenseman he's not expected to score a goal

but it's not like he's just great you know it's not like he's this amazing guy in his own zone I mean the other team scores lots of goals when he's on the ice so it's not like he's just a stalworth in the defense zone and in today's NHL you are expected to play at both

sides of the ring when they're having a great possession and the puck goes back to the Johnson and he fumbles and they go to the zone and Crosby just spend a minute I mean that's a wasted shift. Yeah. You just wasted a shift who said me Crosby

and a chance to score the game. You are expected to get the puck out of the zone and keep it in the zone. And I mean, I don't care how much you like that, Josh, you can't tell me that he does any of those things, particularly what? Yeah, I absolutely agree. It was more than probably two or three

to four times last night where the puck went from Latangian. Johnson or from whatever forward to Johnson, fumbles the puck, shoots it into a defender, so once it led to a breakaway where he barely survived it and then of course with the Trevor Lewis incident and it's just

I almost feel, I don't like feel bad for him, but like it just it sucks that, you know, that he's costing the team points. And another thing that I've also found interesting, Chad, is, you know, I did see last night, Taylor, I'm going to mispronounce her

last name, Hase from D.K. Pittsburgh's board. She put that out that article about that Jack Johnson. And, you know, Chad, I wish more media members would write about Jack Johnson like that. There was Angie. She, I think, writes for inside hockey. She's credential for the penguin. She had a great tweet

about it. It's great. I just, I wish more with the beat reporters, which is, you know, hope that's good. That's my, I mean, that's my dream job once I graduate from Virginia Tech. You know, I just wish more of them would, you know, ask Sullivan about it or, like, write about it as to opposed to, like, you know, not talking about it as much.

Sometimes it just puzzles me a little bit as someone who's in this field and, like, like, it's just, it puzzles me a little bit, I think. Yeah, and again, I mean, I'm, I'm friends with some of those guys and I have respect for some of those guys and, you know, and I had credentials at one point in my life, so, you know, that was something that I really wanted to pursue and do. But that shows me right there that I'm not cut out for that because I would have been right up in there and said, hey, Mike, have you ever? you know, considering the last couple games

and seeing Johnson's struggle, have you ever considered maybe using someone else on the top pair with or paying? I just want to, I just want, I'm not even trying to like antagonize Mike Sullivan. I personally just want to know what the reason. Have you thought about it? And if not, why not?

And we can't even get that. And it sucks to say, but those guys care about those relationships. They don't want to piss Mike Sullivan off. They don't want to Piss Jim Rutherford off. They don't want to piss Jack Johnson off because guess what? Then they might not get the same power of access. Yeah, that's also true. And, you know, I've read plenty of places how, you know, friendly Jim Rutherford is with the media. And apparently, you know, he returns the calls basically at will. I mean, I mean, I mean, to me, that sounds like a reporter's dream. I mean, I personally, I absolutely love that if a GM was that candid with someone. But no, I definitely understand where you're coming from. To move away from that, a little bit, chat, Are you, I'm trying to like phrase this question, right? Are you concerned with the penguins, you know, play it all recently?

I know they've played better as of late these past couple of games. They're on a four-game losing streak. Of course, some of the fan base on Twitter is, you know, oh, it's panic time. The flyers are one point behind the penguins. The penguins are four points behind the capitals. Oh my God, the penguins are four points away from being in the second wildcard. Are you like any concerned at all, even with the injured players coming back soon?

Yes, yeah, no. I mean, I still think they're playing well. It's not like they're just terrible and they're just, you know, getting blown out and stuff like that. But, I mean, anytime, like, so, for example, like, I don't, losing a close game to Washington, hey, that is what it is. That's that rivalry. Those are two good teams. You're going to lose a couple of those guys every once in a while. You know, I don't sweat that.

Losing five to two at home to Buffalo? Yeah, that, I mean, it's hard for me to just. be like, well, we're just going to dismiss this and not talk about this guys? Because that's a really shitty team. You just lost two, five, and two. And then you factor in, you lost to the Kings two to one. So you got outscored seven to three by probably two of the, like, nine worst teams in the league. And you had, supposedly, your better goaltender doing that,

Tristan Jarre, I mean, it wasn't his fault last night. I mean, he did what he had to do. Absolutely. You know, so, yeah, there is some concern if they lose to Anaheim, you know. But here's a thing. If Doomlin's back, and hopefully he is, and Marino is back, and hopefully he is, and they have the same results with those guys, then I'm hitting the panic button. Yeah, but if they come back and, you know, I expect that, you know, the flood just to open up, because they've had scoring chance. I mean, they had bad with Clausney should have scored a goal last.

It just didn't go over the line. I mean, things happen. But if they have the same results for the next couple games with those guys back in the lineup, yeah, I'll join the panic button. team on that one. Yeah, no, I absolutely agree. I really hope they come back tomorrow night because, God, God,

I need someone else besides Crystal Tang to be able to make a breakout pass to a forward because it really is hard to watch anyone that's not Chris Lentan, be able to do that way. You can see that he's not comfortable. You can see that he knows that he, you know, he has a partner that's limited and isn't fast. You can see the frustration.

And honestly, I think you've started to, and you have people with talks about Crosby being Jack John. He's best friend and that. Listen, I think Sidney Crosby cares way, way more about winning that he does about his friendship with Jack Johnson. And Crosby's looks, he broke a stick with on Sunday. I mean, he's lost frustrated. He's minus seven with Jack Johnson on the ice.

I mean, he probably is as well. So, yeah, those guys are, they're feeling it, man. When those parts aren't going in and you're losing games and you have a chance win a division, those guys are feeling it. So, I mean, it could not come at a better time with these guys coming back. And literally, it's the perfect time. No, I absolutely agree. And with the schedule, these next four games, I mean, you know, these next four games, they're against four of the really, really bad teams in the league.

And hopefully that leads to a nice four-game winning streak, you know, going into the really big schedule in March. I play almost all their games against metropolitan teams starting in March. It's going to get ugly and pretty serious, very quick. But, yeah, you know, you have the Anaheim game. They're really bad. The sharks are banged up and bad. Then you have Ottawa. They're really, really.

bad. It just traded Pajot, of course. And then you have Buffalo again, who you just lost to, and you don't really want to get this season swept by the savers. I think that would be pretty embarrassing. So the schedule is there for the penguins to bank some points here. Go get eight out of eight points. I think that, of course, everyone would want that, but it's there for the taking with how it's set up.

Yeah, I mean, those are games. You have good teams win the games. They're supposed to win. And this year, up until this point, that's actually been, you know, one of their strengths. In the past, it was always a bugaboo where we would, you know, the Penguins would beat Washington and Philly and, you know, and Boston three games, oh, then come home and lose like Florida, like four to two. That would always be like their trademark. This year it's been different up until recently. That's what I'm saying, you know, if those guys come back this weekend and they lose two of these next three games,

then at that point, I'm going to be honest, man. my mood's probably going to change. And it sucks. It does suck, though, because if we still jump back for a second and go, okay, let's review this season again, they probably shouldn't be where they are in the standings anyway. So in the way, we're acting a little ungrateful. But life changes and expectations change. And the Crosby's healthy and Malcolm's healthy, Latang's healthy, and they got Zucker.

And, you know, then Russ is having a great season. So, yeah, expectations have changed fair or not. now you've got two of your top four coming back. So I expect this team at the bare minimum to be playing in the second round of the playoffs this year. I think anything, Pat, you know, if they get swept in the first round again, I mean, I think that would be a disaster. Yeah, it would be completely unacceptable if they got us swept in the first round. They're going to have, I think, a favorable matchup in the first round of the playoffs anyway. I don't care if it's Carolina.

I know Carolina is probably improved this year as opposed to last year. I think they can beat Carolina in the seven-game series, even with. They're a really good defenseman, of course, the breakout. I wish we could trade blue lines with them. Yeah, their blue line is pretty nice. Sebastian Ajo is awesome. May not trust their goal-tending enough. They're pretty banged up, even with their little emergency goalie there.

But, yeah, you hit the nail on that also. You know, up until, you know, the Buffalo and the Kings games, the Penguins have, they've beaten a lot of the bad teams this year. And, you know, hopefully they start to get back to that tomorrow night against the docks. I know Pittsburgh native John Yves. Gibson is probably going to be a net. I know how good he is, but also the ducks are just basically a mess in the defensive zone. And, you know, they're not nearly as good as they used to be.

He's also been, he's been terrible against the Penguins in his career. I'm pretty sure his goals against his average is over three against them. So, I mean, he might be the perfect candidate because it's always one of those stories of, oh, it's the Pittsburgh guy. And then, you know, they go in and score five or six goals because, like I said, I mean, they should have probably scored about three or more goals in the last couple games. So one of these games, it's just going to, it's just going to, it's just going to, all happen at once and go in.

So, yeah, I mean, if it's going to turn around, yeah, I'm looking for them to put four or five to pass the ducks tomorrow. Yeah, yeah, they should have had, I thought, three to four last night on, what's his name, Cal Peterson, I barely. I can't even remember a third string goalie's name off the top of my head. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, I couldn't believe that. I think I tweeted last night, too. It was basically like a make-a-name goalie standing on his head against the penguins, and, you know, I would expect nothing less as that has happened a lot. Also, chat, you know, finally, before we let you go for this episode, It seems the Murray-Jari thing is it's kind of cooled down, I would say, a little bit lately, though. I have noticed that, you know, when Jari sometimes gives up some bad goals, you know, there's sometimes a little bit of crickets.

You know, Murray does the same thing. I see some pitchforks coming out for him, and that's with Matt Murray having a really, really good run of games as of late. But what are your thoughts on that? I think Sullivan is waiting for one of them to really separate, because if you look at their stats, like December 22nd, right when Matt came back and started, you know, being the Matt Murray that we're accustomed to. I mean, their stats are like within, you know, four percentage points of each other. So I think Sullivan, of all people, everybody keeps saying, well, Sullivan has to pick a guy. I think he wants to.

And I think he wants to be Murray. But, I mean, Murray just had a game where he had under a 900 save percentage. And Jari just had a game where he had under a 900% of percentage. I think he, of all people, is waiting for one of these guys to be like, hey, I need. need one of you guys to show me, you know, that you're going to be the guy. I still think Murray will be the starter come playoff time for game one. That said, if this defense does not change it's the way it plays, I don't think it matters which guys in because, like I said, you know, this weekend, this past weekend was perfect because Jari lit up five goals on 26 shots

against Buffalo. And then, you know, Murray didn't have the greatest game either. But if you watch the games, you could see, well, dude, it's the defense. They're bad. They're letting up, you know, very, very great. Just look at the Marcus Pedersen situation with what he did. So I think now with Dumlin coming back, Marino coming back, you settle things, you know, down on the back end, I think Sullivan is truly, truly, that's why he keeps playing these guys, because I think whoever's playing better, you know, if there's a big difference, if Jari can, you know,

get like eight or nine points in the same percentage department above Murray like in the next couple weeks I think maybe he has a chance but if they're still even I think Sullivan might honestly just keep rotating them until one of them starts stealing games yeah that's what I think it's most likely gonna happen to and I was all I've been saying this on the last few episodes too of locked on penguins if you were to put a gun to my head right now and who starts I think it's Murray for game one that's always been Sullivan's guy he's obviously been so good in the playoffs in most of the years. I mean, two cups to prove it, obviously. Yeah, but you really can't go wrong with either one.

They're both playing so fantastic right now. I just think Murray would be the favorite. But overall, Chad, thank you so much for coming on.

A lot of really good insight about the Jack Johnson situation and how the media sometimes, you know, does their thing with him and not really like

to criticize him and thoughts with everything else. I really appreciate it. Yeah, dude, man. Keep up the good work. I listen to the podcast all the time, and I'll make sure, you know, people continue to tune in for you. And anytime you want to have you on again, so let me know. Yeah, that sounds good.

We're definitely going to have you on probably in the next couple weeks, I'm sure, you know, as the game start to get even more serious. So thank you guys so much for listening to this episode. I'll probably, I'll have another one coming tomorrow. Probably won't be after the game since it's at 10.30 against the Ducks. But, yeah, thank you guys so much for listening, and we will talk to you guys tomorrow.