Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Tampa Bay Game 6 flashbacks for tonight?

Episode Date: May 26, 2021

Here we are again: The Pittsburgh Penguins face elimination against the New York Islanders. Pittsburgh will try to win their first elimination game in three years tonight, at their house of horrors: The Nassau Coliseum. In honor of this game, Hunter brings on Mad Chad from the 412 Sports Talk podcast to preview the game and to talk everything about this series. Is it really just down to goaltending for this series? Has this been Kris Letang's best play since the 2016 playoffs? If they bow out here or on Friday, should they go get a veteran goaltender in the offseason? The two also touch on what the Pens need to do tonight to extend this series back to Pittsburgh, and a whole lot more.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.Lucy.CoGo to Lucy.co and use Promo Code LOCKEDONNHL to get20% off all products on your first order, including gum or lozenges.  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 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. Hello, On Score Penguins. This episode is brought to you by Lockroom. Download on the app and join me this week. I'm not sure what day and time it's going to be. yet just because the last couple weeks I've just been so swamped with the podcast and other stuff. But I'll let you guys know as soon as I can. Lockroom changing the way we talks for us.

So today we have a special guest joining us on the Locked-on Penguins podcast. He's come on here a couple of times. He actually came on here during the playoff series last year. The game before the Penguins got eliminated, hopefully history does not repeat itself tonight. And that is Mad Chad of the 412 sports talk. Him and Eddie do an outstanding job overall with their podcast. I mean, they just had Bob Grove on there, for God's sake, just last week, and that was a great conversation. So please check them out and all their content.

But, Chad, how are you doing today, man? I'm chilling, to be honest, like, I don't have the sense of dread that I had last year or the year before, because I think this Penguins team is much better, you know, and I know we're going to talk about that, but I don't have that sense of dread. I can easily, if they play the same exact game or close to it, I can easily see them bringing us back for game seven. Yeah, you know, they're obviously probably not going to play nearly as bad as they did in game four in that building. But, you know, maybe it won't be as good as it was in game five.

But even if it's close to the game one or game two level, that should be good enough to bring it back to Pittsburgh, where I'm sure they're going to bump their capacity as the Coliseum did. For tonight, there's going to be 9,000 fans there packed into the vaccinated section and then for the unvaccinated section, I think it's going to be more spread out. But this series is so weird, Chad. You know, just we'll preview game six a bit tonight,

but it really just comes down to a couple of things. I don't really know why people are going at the numbers and the analytics of it. I mean, if you go to stat trick and stuff, Penguins are top five in basically every statistical category among all playoff teams. It's really just come down to one goalie is Yarslav halocking them from 2010, and the other one is kind of playing like Mark Andre Fleury a bit that year

with giving up all the goals. And then you couple that with the penguins not finishing any of their high danger chances, which is just a total 180 from what they were doing during the regular season. And this is what you get. It's more random than luck, I think, than anything else with this series. As far as the metrics go, part of that's frustration. You look at, you know, if you're looking at stats, you know, people are basically what I'm getting at is, I don't want to hear about the stats, just win the game.

And that's an emotional reaction. And when your team is, when you're, when you're, and I know that they can see what this, the thing about the metrics are, all they are is just to back up what we see. So you watch a game and you go, I think that guy played good and go looking and like, yeah, he did play good. Because we, you know, none of us are like Hawkeye out there where we can see every single thing and how it all plays out. We have to go back and watch replays and stuff like that. The metrics are always going to be an issue because what people can do right now is say, see, yeah, look, the penguins are leading in course. horse side, but they're losing the series. But it's like, well, no, that's just one metric. We're looking at the whole pitcher, and, you know, they came up with goals saved above average, which is taking shot quality and, you know, everything into play as far as,

you know, should a shot go in, should it not go in? Was it a high danger chance? Was it not? And right now, the biggest, and if you can't see it, I can't help you, is the islanders are getting elite gullending and the penguins are getting below average. goaltending and that's why they're trailing three two i hate to simplify it that much but that's really how simple it is no yeah you're 100% right i mean i i saw this um taking abram greta's article this morning which you shared on twitter great article yeah they've went they've ran into this

has happened so many times for this team in the playoffs they run into god or dominic hasick playing goal you know when carrie price who was so bad last year goes on a 940 heater in the bubble Robin Lennar, who was a Vezna finalist, I think, in 2019. You know, he's on a heater, even though the Penguins' defensive issues were, I think the main reason why they lost that series, I'm not going to really put the blame on Matt Murray. It also doesn't help when you run into a hot goal. You, of course, have Tuka Rasque, 95 in 2013 when Tomas Vocoon was 933.

It's just, you know, even when the Penguins have had good goaltending in a series, it's just been amplified by the other team having even better goaltending. I think that's where a lot of frustration has been. for the sit-in-geno era. And, you know, of course, what people are going to be like, well, you know, just score, just score. And it's like,

what do you think they're trying to do? They put 50 shots up in a little over four periods of play. I mean, that is just ridiculous. I mean, the last game, game five, yeah, last game,

they threw every, I mean, they, they did everything they could. And two, two, not to make Shiroka, not to be a god,

the penguin, he did get lucky. a couple of times. There was some shots that he did not see whatsoever and it's just, you know, that's the way it's going right now. The Freddie Goodro one when he tipped that, that's going five hole any other time. Yeah. We're going home with a three, two, eight.

That was a great. He just stood there because he didn't even see it. His eyes didn't even move to the puck and it just hit his pad. If that's an inch to the right, that arena goes bonkers and then we're going up three to two going to the Coliseum. So, again, a lot of it is luck. I mean, you saw Chris LaTang's huge chance in overtime. I think even Josh Yoie in his article from his vantage point,

that looked like it was going in, and then he gets a blocker on that. But it's just been unfortunate, and, you know, this has not been the last two years of what you've seen from this team, how they've gone out with a whimper. They're definitely not going to go out with a winthrop. I don't think tonight,

they're really going to give it everything they have to try to send this series back to Pittsburgh because they have been the better team. But, I mean, obviously the big thing for tonight, you know, before we do get to a commercial baking in a few minutes, I mean, you got to have the goal-tending play at least average for one game. I mean, Tristan Jari has shown an ability to bounce back from bad performances.

You know, say what you want about him. You know, he's definitely been inconsistent this year. In my opinion, I think he's been overall more good than bad, though we're just seeing in this series him revert to the bad that you saw in the first month of this season. I don't think that's, you know, arguable. But if he can, you know, bounce back like you saw in game two, or after that six-goal period against the devils, he allowed one goal and then

next two games. I feel like a broken record after saying that, if you can just bounce back for that one game, that'll just do so much for his confidence in. I mean, the Penguins are playing well in front of them, too. Like, that's the biggest thing. They're just, whenever the Islanders get one singular chance, it's in the back of their net. And they just, they got to get good goal to any night if they're going to send this back.

Yeah, I mean, and that's what I'm, like, it's weird because when, when Murray was here, I felt like there was a lot of people that were ready to. to blame him. The puck could have got deflected and three times and people were like, oh, you got to make a save. And you've got to make a save. Like even the first goal, which right away everybody wanted to blame Latang for, which is just, I'm sorry for listening to this and you blame Chris LaTang for the first

goal. You're wrong. I'm sorry. I don't know anyone else to say that. But, you know, there was a lot that went wrong on that play. Gensel played like some of the weirdest defense I've ever seen in my entire life. Brian Dumlin also had a bad pinch. But at the end of the day, when you go back and watch that first goal,

It was an unscreened shot from the left side on a right-handed shot, and he had two guys back-checking so he wasn't going to be able to make any kind of move. I mean, you got, make a save. I mean, it's okay to make a save. And Tristan Jarre has not made the kind of big saves that you need this time of year. Yeah, and, you know, especially after how dominant that first period was, those first 19 minutes, that should have been at least a 3-0 game going into that intermission. And who knows if he does make that save, who knows what happens for the rest of that game.

Obviously, you know what happened with his blunderer was just one of the worst things I think I've ever seen before we do. Honestly, took him back to game four of 2014 against the Blue Jackets where Mark Andre Fleury came out of his net and then just gave it away. I think it was to Brayne and Dubinsky if my memory serves me right. But, yeah, you can make a save. You're 100% right. And they just, it's been a problem for a lot of this season. it didn't come up as much during the end of it, but they just haven't been able to get a timely save from either of their two

goaltenders. Honestly, you probably could argue that Casey DeSmith has made more of a timely save when he's been playing than Tristan Jari. And it does stink that DeSmith is not healthy because I think Sullivan may have already have turned to him already. I mean, I did see some takes coming after the last game, Chad. Oh, they should start the third string goalie.

And, you know, they're not going to. do that here. I mean, they nor should they. I mean, but that's the thing is, you know, and we were talking about this off there, they went in to this season saying Tristan Jari is our number one goalie. And

I questioned that from the beginning because even last year, the first half of the season he was great, but then he did tail off and you, when you go look at his metrics and Jayfresh was, or no, actually Jeff from Penn's blog was

sharing it out where it looks like this. It's a roller coaster. It's really good, really bad. And again, that does. That reminds me of Matt Murray, and that reminds me of a young Mark Andre Fleury. And Tristan Jarre is a young goalie. This is his first year as a first starter. And they went all in with him. And I said, I don't know about that. Because here's a thing, even if you have a guy that you think is your number one goalie, I think today in the modern NHO, you have to have a 1B. It's 1A1B. I don't think it's number 1 and number 2 anymore. Because look at the Dallas Stars last year. They had Ben Bishop and Houdobin.

I think now, and look at the, as great as Flurry is right now, I still wouldn't be surprised if you see Robin Lennar at one point this playoffs, because that's been the M.O. on Flurias, he's either a god or he sucks. And I think nowadays you need someone that can come in at the moment's notice. And maybe Casey DeSmith was that guy, but I still thought goaltending was something that Rutherford should have looked at. Yeah, and you definitely think, you know, as Hextall is also a former goalie, I mean, a better goalie than Rutherford.

And he mismanaged the Carter Hart situation, which was why he lost his job, so I'm starting looking at the goalie situation closely. Yeah, I think he's probably learned some lessons from that. There's also a lot of good goalies hitting the market this year. Philip Grubauer from Colorado is hitting it. Linus Olmark, I'll probably touch on that. I'm either later in the episode or after this season,

whenever it ends. If it ends tonight, maybe I'll touch on that on the Thursday or Friday episode. but also I saw something from Seth Rawa. They have invested a lot into Trish and Jari. They drafted him, what, eight years ago? They apparently they've gotten him a lot of coaches over the years. They've changed it out. They said that he was going to be the heir apparent to Flurry before Flurry left.

They then chose him over Matt Murray when, honestly, you could have flipped a coin on it and just picked one of the two. I know Murray was a bit older and was seeking more of the payday, but, I mean, it was just heads or tails on which goalie was going to be better. even though just the age one's a bit older, but it's really not by much. But we still have a bit more to get to for this episode of Locked on Penguins podcast.

We're actually going to fully preview game six coming up in the next segment and what the Penguins will really have to do to send this back to Pittsburgh. I mean, it's pretty straightforward, I think at least. But before we do that, it's time to talk about. A couple things, one of them being, Lockroom, it's the perfect place to start

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Remember to follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes, follow the shows Twitter at L.O underscore Penguins. Chad, this just seems like a game tonight where, you know, I think two of the three core players really go off. I've kind of sick and tired of people going after of Gennie Malkin and Chris Lattang. I think Lattang has enjoyed his finest playoff series since 2016. I think he's been their best player. He's been remarkable.

And this guy's only, he's 34 years old, for Christ's sake. I mean, he was in 2016, he was 29, and that was the best I've ever seen Chris Lank play. And he's basically rivaling that right now. I think you're going to see him have another really good game. It looked like he didn't even break a sweat as that game went. and to double overtime. And for Evgeny Malkin, you know, I understand it. You know, there's this anti-Russian bias that people like to hold on to.

And, well, you know, he's just, he's lazy. He does all this stuff. But he also scored in the last game. And he looked like he was galloping like he was in old times. I think he will see a big game from him tonight. And I think that's going to be hopefully the big reason why Pittsburgh sends this back to PVG. Yeah, I've been beating the drum about, like, I don't know what this. anti-Evgeny malcon stuff is about it's very weird because he's he's never had off the ace

issues he's to me one of the three or four best players of his generation uh hands down future hall of fame or i would say he's one of the 25 best players of all time and i don't know how exactly he's lazy i don't know how you can be lazy and be one of the most consistent players when a con smyth mvp two scoring titles he's helped this team win three chance He was instrumental in the 2009. He was the Kahn Smythe winner, and he was in top, the top three and points in both of the other two cups as well. There was probably arguments we made in 2017 that he could have been the Kahn Smyth over Crosby, because he had more points. I don't understand this. He got off to a really rough start to this season, but a lot of guys did. Half this team got off to a rough start in this season. They really didn't start turning it around until February.

he's been fine all his metrics look good I thought that he definitely had to get like he had to get going and the islanders have definitely been going after his knee I shared some videos of that but I think he's been fine

and Chris Latang I mean listen I'll tell this is what I always say to people if I'm out right if I'm out at a bar or restaurant and hockey hockey comes up I'll bring I'll purposely bring Chris LaTang's name

up because that's that will allow me to gauge someone's hockey IQ, uh, right then and there. Um, I don't know what people are watching. Uh, he had, he's only, he hasn't even really had a ton of the miscue's, the only miscue he really had was when he pushed a player into his own goalie and everybody rightfully said, hey, what are you doing? You know, and that, and that's actually not even a Latang thing. For some reason, that happens all the time in the NHL. I don't know why, but that's the only like big time miscue I can think of. Other than that, I think, I think, I think there's an argument to be made that he's been their best overall player through, like consistently through this series outside of game four.

Yeah, I mean, he has been. I mean, he's been playing, what, 25, 30 minutes a night, basically. He played over, I think, 35 minutes in the last game. And he looked like, like I said, he didn't even break a sweat because he's just so well-conditioned. And you're right. Yeah, I mean, I've also said what you've said on the podcast, you know, if you're going to, if you, your opinion of Crystal Tang will tell me how much you truly know about hockey. and if you think he's bad or something like that or should be traded,

I'm just probably not going to take you serious. Outside of that, Chad, and just, you know, the need to obviously get to Sorokan and get good goaltending, what else are you looking for from the Penguins tonight if they want to send this back to Pittsburgh for a seventh game? I'm hoping that Sullivan showed them the tape from Game 5, and what they did, the one thing I'll agree with about the metrics before Game 5 was, and even Jesse Marshall showed this out,

And they have those heat maps showing where all of our chances are coming from. They weren't getting to his front office a lot. They needed to get the net. But the last game, they did that. And we can go back and watch the game. I can show you multiple shifts where they were creating utter chaos. And even in the third period in overtime. And again, we pointed out that a lot of it was kind of blind luck by, you know, the puck.

The puck would hit Sorokin. He wasn't even looking. And they were creating chaos. So if I'm Sullivan, I'm saying, look, guys. I promise you if we just do the same thing, eventually, like, they're like, mathematically, mathematically there's no chance of it like not going in eventually.

Jake Gensel, I can't imagine how frustrated that guy must be right now because he played his butt off game five. He had a great play on his off wing where he swooped in. And he's just getting, it's just unlucky right now. They're doing everything they can. They're going to have to try to draw some penalties too.

I'm not saying go out there and embellish, but listen, if someone, if someone trips you up, he got to go down because they got to find a way to get a power play. The lack of power plays has really even this series up for the Islanders, because the penguins are the better team five on five, but the penguins aren't getting these extra chances. So they got to find ways to get power plays. And how do you do that?

You outskate them. You out effort them. And you do everything necessary. Also, thing I would like to do. If this game is another close game with so, I would like to maybe see Malkin and Crosby out there

together for a shift or two. It's been a week, some Penn's fans talk about this a lot, but like back, if you go back to 2007, 8, 9, 10, they used to do that. Like they used to go out like if they needed to end of the second period and they would just throw those two out there

and they create so much. I'd like to see that. I'd like to see Brandon Tanav get a lot of playing time. I thought that he was fantastic in the tone setter. And I wasn't even a huge fan of when they signed him, but I'm eating crow because he has been fantastic. So I'd like to see Brandon Tannav maybe, like last game I was looking,

Jason Zucker led all forwards in Ice Time and I was kind of scratching my head at that. Give Tana of that ice time. Give Jeff Carter that ice time instead. I'd like to see these guys that are really bringing it, you know, as the game goes on, get those chances. Yeah, and I especially feel bad for someone such as Jason

Zulker. I mean, you're probably going to see him moved in the off season. But he's actually played his ass off in this series, too. And that one chance I go back to, I think it was in the second period. They're up two to one. And he just, he waits and looks like Sorokin's out of his net. And then he, like, pass the puck. And it's like just the total byproduct of overthinking it. I do agree with also doubling up Sid and Gino.

For some reason, Mike Sullivan has not been keen on it throughout his coaching tenure here. Say what you will about Dan Baalzma. everybody thought he was that good of a coach, to be honest with you. At least he would actually double up, Sid and Gino when needed. And you saw it work with that Brian Rush's goal from 55 feet down. And it's funny how Sorokin will give that up. But then he'll save all the, I think for this series I saw someone tweeted. I think he faced 36 high danger chances and he's only led in two goals high danger-wise.

So it's just... I mean, that's Dominic-Cassic Patrick Wall stuff right there. But, you know, you're obviously going to, yeah, I mean, I agree with you with the powerplay stuff as well. You're going to have to buy some calls, you know, so what if these mouth-breathing snobs on Long Island don't are going to boo about it? You know, that's just, they haven't seen the cup since the first week. I think the islanders have have embellished a ton of their penalties. Oh, yeah. I thought Cal Palm Mary, I swear he literally dove on one of the, on one of the tripping calls they called.

It was, it was, it was all they did, they had the sticks, they were battling, and then his stick goes out. He literally like went like he, he jumped. You know, you got to do what you got to do. I will say, I think, you know, you got to get in front of Sorokin. Yeah. The more, the less he sees, the better, because they're getting legit chances. You know, it's one thing that possess the puck, but a lot of the series has been all perimeter play for the penguins.

They come in and the islanders are so, they are so well coach. Barry Tross is a great coach, and they know what they're doing is, they're like, you guys don't have a puck all game. We're going to, we're going to bottle up the front of the day. net, good luck. That's fine. Last game, they started to break the code a little bit. Continue doing that. You have to skate, you have to, you have to, you have to, you have to move the puck once you have you have possession of it. I want to see a cycle going, but I want to see guys, Crosby, everybody. I want to see them going to the net. That's how goals are going to be scored against this guy.

If he's seeing the puck, this guy's dialed in right now. He's going to stop it. It's going to be the same thing. Yeah. And they just, they have that basically that box that they put, it's almost like a square where they have four guys protecting the net and one guy usually pressuring the puck carrier when the hanglings are in the zone and it's a hard code to crack just because of like you said how well coached they are in just going back to the powerplay stuff I think the penguins have only had eight power plays in this series usually um it's a lot higher than that three six games but it's a byproduct of how the league likes the game to be officiated you know I hate it I saw dama's piece in the athletic yesterday it's a joke they need us to call them

more penalties and that has swung in the islander's favor because the penguins have not had the ability to change the game with their power play and you know vice versa the penguins pk has not really had a chance to swing the game in their favor just because the penguins pk has not really been out there much at all so the special team's play has just been completely thrown into the garbage because it's really just not been a factor but we still have a little more to get to before i do let chad go here but before we do that it's time to talk about. One thing, bet online, it's the fastest and easiest way to bet on all your sports action. Baseball season is in full swing and you can track all the action at Ben Online. Get all the latest

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Follow this show's Twitter at LO underscore Penguins. I'm hoping that this is the last game overall at the Coliseum, not just for the Penguins, because obviously this will be the last game for Pittsburgh there. But it will be hopefully the last game at the Coliseum there before. It hopefully shifts back to Pittsburgh. but if this is the last game of the season though you're going to hear all these takes chat oh yeah I mean they got to go get tougher

they got to go get bigger Brian Burke Truculins and all this stuff oh the stars were not good enough and you know all this other stuff but if you look at the metrics and you see what Sidney Crosby I mean he's been you know Peter McGuire can say whatever the hell he wants on NBCSN

talks about analytic equations I've been calling Adam Pelick a spider in case you all in Pittsburgh have not been hearing that. Sid's been on the ice for way more chances than chances against when he's, Chappellick's been on there and same with high danger. It's just the goalie has been really good. But you're going to hear all these talking points.

When in reality, man, even if the Penguins lose the series, I get it. It's three first-run exits in a row. That's unacceptable for how deep this team is. The reality is, in my opinion, you can bring back almost the same team next year. Just go out, make a couple trades. I mean, I obviously know one of, someone's going to take, Seattle's going to take someone in expansion. If you want to go out and trade Pedersen to put P-OJ in,

you want to trade Jason Zulker and get a package back, and then really just go get a goalie, and you can really just go back with the same group almost next year, and that's what I would do if I was Ron Hextall. Yeah, I mean, I'm hoping that Zucker is who Seattle takes. Yeah, me too. That is a guy that if I'm looking at the team, that's probably the guy I would look to move.

He has a huge hat, cap hit of over $5 million. As for them getting tougher, listen, the thing about this stuff is, okay, I'm with you in sense. I actually said that hey, I wouldn't mind having a big,

talented forward in the top six. Give me a name because these guys are expensive. Can we go get Matthew Kachuk? Is that what you're asking? Well, we're probably going to have to give up a like, I don't think of. Like a Brian Ross, basically. I don't think people understand that these guys that you want them to go get are going to be extremely expensive because they're rare. Name me some top six forwards that can skate with Crosby, but that are also over six foot tall and are physical.

There's not a lot of them. And the guys that are there, these teams aren't going to be like, yeah, sure, take our, you know, one of the rare big giant forwards that also have the ability to play. I always say about Tom Wilson. Listen, Tom Wilson's a goon, and that's actually the problem is that he's actually not a bad player. And if he just played hockey and used his size as a normal human being, I would probably be a huge fan of him, but he's a dirty, cheap shot artist. But again, even someone like that, you think Washington's going to be like, yeah, sure, we know that you hate playing against Tom Mosen, but we'll give them to you for whatever. Like, to me, I'm looking like, okay, if we can't get someone like that, you can't go out and get a Matthew Kachuk, right? okay, then the next thing to do would be, I like Brandon Tanniv's game.

I think that he is a nice blend of physical speed, skill. He doesn't have a lot of high-end skill, but he has enough to make a difference. If you can go find another guy like that, I'm all for it. Otherwise, I'm just looking at who is the best player that we can to get. I do think they can, I think they can find an upgrade over Jason Zucker in that top six role. And yeah, they need a goalie. They need someone. If you're still going to be dedicated to Tristan Jari,

which I'm not 100% opposed to because he is young and he has shown the ability, but they need to bring someone in. You mentioned Allmark, just someone that. There's a ton of veteran goalies out there if you're on cap friendly that are just like consistently decent goaltenders. And that's really all you need. That way if Jari has his downs, then you bring him in for a little bit.

And it also allows you to push Tristan Jari. Look what happened to Matt Murray. Sometimes these young goalies, when it's all on them, being a goal, I would not want to be a goalie. Psychologically, Mark Andre Fleury had to go see as sports psychologist. This is one of the toughest positions to play in sports. And it's also one of the toughest positions to analyze. Even Jesse Marshall will tell you, like,

he hates analyzing goalies because a lot of it is mental. And we don't have the ability to know what they're thinking or seeing. So, yeah, I just want someone, a veteran backup, Peter Marazix, another name I brought up, and then an upgrade over Jason Zucker. Otherwise, I'm loving this team. Letang, Dumlin, Pedersen, Marino. I'm cool with that as the top four. I'm not moving.

Jake, I saw someone say that they should trade Jake Gensel. Oh, please. Why? Because he's going through a scoring slump. Again, go look up Jayfresh. He'll show you that all of the, unless you're Connor McDavid, all of these guys in the NHL go through scoring slumps. It's just that you're a Penns fan,

so you're only looking at it through a Penn's point of view. He has the most shots and shot attempts of any player. And high dangerous scoring chances. So he's even going to the areas that we're talking about. It's just not going in. It happens. All these guys go through slumps. So, yeah, I think the team is fine.

And Ron Hextal is not known to blow things up. He's patient. He also has a very good track record when it comes to trades. And if anything, what's going to be funny is, Ron Hextall has actually shown that he likes, like, skill. And he actually is a, he, in Philadelphia, he acquired a ton of European players. So it's going to be interesting because he's going to have Brian Burke in his ear saying we need trucculence, but his track record is speed and skill. Again, I just want good players. I don't care if they're six foot four or five, ten. Like, Blake Coleman's another name. I'm looking at the

free agency list. To me, I would love Blake Coleman. And he's 511, but he doesn't play like he's 5-11. That's some truculence right there. I mean, that fits what Brian Burke would want. But he has top nine skills. You know what I'm saying? Like, that's fine. That's who I want. I mean, if they want to pay him, he'll cost a lot to come

here. It'll be more than just a six-year, three and a half million dollar term to get him. You know, you take Jason Zucker out and you put Blake Coleman in and you take Casey to Smith out and you put this goalie in and maybe you look for a maybe another bottom if you put P.O. Joseph in and you

move Pedersen's contract out. I mean, it's doable. I mean, and then obviously like you said, Seattle is going to take a player. You have to factor that into two. And yeah, I mean, Hextel is also a very patient GM. From what I've read, he looks like he incorporates analytics in there.

From what I've read, at least from a couple beat reporters, I think he apparently talks to Sam and they just hired that Katarina Wu person as well. So that'll be, I think, really big for this offseason as well. That being said, man, I'm not really sure how this is going to go tonight. I have bad vibes just because this has been the Penguins' House of Horrors for years.

At first it was the Philadelphia Spectrum, right? You had an entire huge losing streak that happened well before I was born. Now you have this where they've lost 11, I think, of the last 16 playoff games they've been in there. And it's against the team that has given them fits in the playoffs. I mean, you know, I've seen people comparing this series to 93. wouldn't go that far just yet. I mean, I wasn't alive for that, but I know the history,

and I know how good that team was, and we all know what happened there. But do you have a gut feeling about tonight, Chad? I said on my live stream the other night that I think they're going to lose, but all of a sudden, like today, I woke up and I was like, I don't know, man. I wouldn't be surprised if they brought this thing back to game seven.

If they bring it back to game seven, I think they will win the series. I don't have a prediction because I'm terrible at predicting penguins games because I think too much emotionally. My prediction that is if they lose, it's going to be in another horrendous. Like, they're either going to get blown out or they're going to have another like flute like Jerry like Jari like play. But I think we'll know the first 10 minutes of this game how it's going to go. The vibe check. The vibe check.

Jesse Marshall vibe check. If the penguins come out and they're flying and they're four checking and they're and it's the same thing. I think they'll win the game. So I think, I know that's a cop-out answer. My gut does tell me that they're going to win tonight. And I'm probably going to be very wrong about that.

Me too. But my, for some reason, I don't know, man. I don't think Sorokin can keep this up. I know he was a high prospect, but I mean he's a young goalie I would be shocked if he goes out there and throws another 980 save percentage out so I think they win and if they do win they'll win the series and if they lose tonight it's going to be they might have just either packed it in or again the bad luck's going to continue yeah I think I saw a tweet there this morning from someone it's like it's either it's going to be game six 2016 against Tampa where they play their best game of the series or they're going to have like a goal score on them in the first five

10 minutes of the game and they're just going to get blown the hell out. So we'll have to see, you know, I woke up this morning with a bad, with a bad, bad vibes are just a sixth stonic just because, like I said, like it's the House of Horrors that's going to be rocking up there. I don't know the last time they've ever clinched a series in the Colisee. And you've got to go probably back 30 years considering they haven't won a cup since the first Reagan administration. But as the day has gone on, I've gotten a little more comfortable, but, you know, I still

think they're going to lose. Hopefully I am wrong. I eat crow after this. But thank you so much for coming on before the game. I very much appreciate it. And hopefully we are doing this again if the team does move on and wins this game and then wins game seven to set up a rematch with Boston that is eight years in the making that I really do want to see. Yeah, man, thanks for having me on. And we'll probably reach out to you at some point to have, you know, do a crossover again. But I really appreciate it. Yes, of course. I'll just give you. just plug in your podcast and everyone can follow you and stuff.

Yeah, Matt Chad, 412 on Twitter, and then YouTube 412 Sports Talk, Spotify, 412 Sports Talk. We stream after every game. I'll be live tonight. And then we have a weekly recorded podcast, usually with a weekly guest for either Steelers or Penguins Talk. Yes, please go check out their content. Like I said, they had Bob Frickon Grove on last week. They've had the former mayor on. They've had Bob Pompey any on and so much more.

So please go check out their content. Him and Eddie do a great job. Again, Chad, thank you so much. And if this is the last episode of the season, thank you to everyone who has listened for the second season of this podcast. It has been a lot of fun, but hopefully Penguins find a way tonight

and send this series back to Pittsburgh where I think you'll see 75% capacity at least on Friday for games at. But we'll see what happens. Again, thank you all so much for listening, and I'll talk to you all tomorrow.