Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - This day in Penguins history, plus answers to mailbag questions, and more franchise "what if's!"

Episode Date: May 9, 2020

The mailbag is back! Hear Hunter talk about what kind of cereal compares to some of the Penguins players, plus a question about guitars, and about Sidney Crosby's antics back in the day (don't worry it's a good one). Hunter also discusses some more franchise "what if"s for the Penguins, including the 1996 series against the Florida Panthers and that infamous 1993 series against the New York Islanders. Finally, we have the "This day in Penguins history" back again and there's a couple good ones! 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 Friday evening 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 L-O-U-U-U-Square. As I said, happy Friday to you all. Of course, this show is brought to you by Biltbar. There's still a $10 coupon for if you go to Lockdown, Code Lockdown at Billbbar.com. You can get $10 off in order.

So please keep that of mind. But, you know, as well, like I said, happy Friday to you all. We've made it to another weekend during this pandemic. I hope you all are staying safe and all that good stuff. Today on the show, we'll be doing some mailbag questions. We'll be looking at this date in Penguins history. As the perfect world, we'd be in the Stanley Cup playoffs right now so we can look to see if there were some good moments on this May 8th.

I know, like I said, on the May 10th, there are some very, very good Penguins moments in history because, of course, they eliminated the capitals. And we'll also be doing a little more franchise what-ifs, and we'll be continuing that next week as well. So with that said, so today in Penguin's history, 2001, May 8th, Marty Straca scores the overtime goal to give Pittsburgh a three to two win in game six of the second round against the Sabres. And we all know what happens in Game 7, baby, with Darius Casperitis. I've probably watched that goal more times than I can remember.

But here to play this, I'm going to play this goal now, the Marty Straca overtime goal against the Sabres. You know, you forget, you know, Lemieux actually was able to tie the game to send it to overtime. late in the third period, but I will play the game-winning goal right here for you all. Oh, my God. Those penguins jerseys are just absolutely and utterly beautiful. I want the penguins to bring those back in the worst way. That, the robo penguin, I would love the diagonal jersey to come back to. I know people who are like to say, oh my God, you know, that diagonal jersey, it's like the rangers.

It's just a rip-off, you know. Is it, yeah, a little bit, but you know what? I think it looks better. You know, I'm going to put that out there. But, you know, this jersey, the penguins are wearing, you know, the complete black and gold. You have the logo up top of the helmet. That penguin logo is just, oh, it's so good. You know, I think it's honestly, it's better than the one they have right now.

The one that I liked the most is, I'm trying to picture it. I know it was the one that they had during the 91 and 92 cups. I think it's that one. I think the penguin logo with that one is better. You know, I like the one they have now, but that one, you know, if the penguins ever bring back a logo, you know, that or the robo penguin would be, you know, my top two choices. And then, of course, for jersey-wise, I would do the diagonal Pittsburgh.

There's been, there have been rumors that I think they might be potentially doing that next season. They might be getting rid of the third jersey that they have right now. That would be pretty good. I would love that. But, yeah, that overtime goal, you know, just massive, you know, and then the next game, you know, with the same Darias, Casp, Riot is to send the Penguins to the conference file. I think they played New Jersey that year. If my memory serves me correct.

Yeah, yeah, no, no, I think. Yeah, yeah, it's the Devils, yeah. Jeez, I almost mess that up, everyone, which makes me just look like a complete and utter fool. So, yes, they went on to play the Devils, and then, of course, lost the Devils, because, you know, the Devils were still doing their thing called Trapping. Other stuff for today in Penguins history. Sydney Crosby is the featured national cover of Sports Illustrated. You know, he's been on that cover more times than I can remember.

97, the year I was born, Roger Marino officially joined the ownership group of the Penguins. He's not a name that we like around here, considering what happened in 99, where they almost left. It was, yeah, he's not a friendly name. And then this day in 1980, the Penguins fired head coach Johnny Wilson, who finished with a record of 240 and 91 in 105 and 44. It'd be better if they just cut out, like, some of that 105 and 44 stuff. So a 471 winning percentage. So not very good at all there. So that's some of the good stuff that happened in Penguin's history on the 8th of May.

Like I said, the Mari-Stalka goal is just absolutely awesome. And then, you know, hopefully we'll next time, like I said, we'll do the Darius Casperitis probably. We'll do the overtime goals against the Capitol since our next episode will be on Monday. And other news in Penguin Land today, Chris LaTang and his wife, Catherine, just, you know, the Penguins just continue to do this outstanding stuff during this pandemic. They've made monetary donations to provide meals to the students and families, food relief fund, and the Need Community Cafe in order to feed those in need during the COVID-19 pandemic. Just absolutely outstanding this organization and the players in it are just continue to be top-notch with what they're doing.

You know, we know we had Mike Sullivan this week and his wife help out people, senior citizens at the grocery store. we had Cindy Crosby donate meals and this was La Teng's quote today. As parents, my wife, Catherine, and I can't imagine the hardship of children going hungry. We knew that we wanted to give back to the Pittsburgh community during this difficult time in helping children secure a healthy meal and avoid hunger was the perfect fit for us.

So like I said, Chris LaTang, you are outstanding. Catherine LaFlam, you are outstanding. You know, we always will stand Chris LaTang on this show, no matter what. We will always stand the Penguins organization and the players in it for doing stuff like this and helping the people in need. that don't, you know, like some people that don't have food during this and whatnot.

It's just what an outstanding gesture for them. Also, I do want to take a minute and just say, the penguin, they did release this video this morning. It was a commencement address basically from Mike Sullivan himself, just congratulating all the 2020 high school seniors and college seniors. And, you know, I don't know why Mike Sullivan had to cut onions this morning because, you know, that almost made me cry. You know, I think if anyone who knows me knows I graduate from Virginia Tech University,

next Friday with my degree in multimedia journalism. That announcement just was really, yeah, it just felt special. You know, I know it's a virtual graduation. And, you know, I know Mike Solomon's not going to really be speaking in my graduation. But, you know, to hear that and just hear that commencement speech that he gave to everyone who's graduating across the country to all the Penguins fans and everyone. It was just, it warms my heart. It was a really great gesture of him to do that. You know, whenever he releases these, like, speeches, I guess, you know,

It almost sounds like it's Morgan, like Morgan Freeman in a way where I just want to sleep on a bed made of his voice. You know, I know that sounds kind of weird. I know it just sounds odd. But, you know, he just, he has that deep commanding voice that like, if you slept on a bed made of the voice, it would just be, it would just be awesome. It would just, it would really be really cool. Or just have him narrate anything that goes on in your life. Hell, like a sporting event, you know, a, you know, your dog's playing with other dogs. You're narrating ribs going on the wheel.

Who knows, you know. He just seems like a great person. have around when you um when you're just doing anything because his voice is just so like i said it's just so commanding it's so deep and you know like that just that commencement you know thing it just it really hit home for me and i really appreciated that the payments put that out there because they know that a lot of these graduations are just not the same you know there's no in-person graduations it's all virtual i know or some of them were pushed back to august so um yeah that was just it really made my heart happy and last been on least today happy 24th birthday to marcus peterson i know he had had a pretty decent

season before he was starting to struggle a bit before the pandemic, of course, hit. So happy 24th birthday. It's actually crazy that he's only like a year and a half older than I am. I'll be 23 in November. So that is definitely kind of weird. And on that note, everyone, it is time to talk about Bilt Bar. They are tasty. Like I said, they are a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar.

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They're high fiber. I've said it a lot of times this week. My favorite flavor from them that I actually got in the mail this past week. The peanut butter brownie. 20 grams of protein, 170 calories, three grams of sugar and three grams of nut cards. It really, really is a great protein bar. But we are having an offer. Go to Billbar.

dot com and use promo code locked on and you'll get $10 off your first order. And that's promo code locked on for $10 off your first order at www. www. dot billbar. All right. So we're back for this segment of the locked on penguins podcast and we are going to be doing a mini mailbag segment here. I put this out on my Twitter.

I put this out on the Locked on Penguins Twitter. We got some interesting responses. So locked on ducks. They actually wanted to ask him, this was a really good question. So he says, really anything. Okay, if you could compare some members of the penguins to your favorite breakfast cereal, how would that go?

Okay, so this is a pretty interesting question. So, Cindy Crosby, I think, is the honeynut Cheerios. That is one of my personal favorite cereals. It is so good. Just the taste in your mouth almost just melts you. Okay, that kind of sounds a little weird. But you know what I mean. It's really good.

I think it's one of the goats cereal. Cindy Crosby is one of the goats. That definitely fits in my opinion. Um, Evgeny Malkin is like the Rice Krispies. I won't die on the Rice Krispies Hill as being one of the top two best cereals in the world. Um, it is, I used to eat that cereal all the time before I would go to middle school and high school. I have not had that cereal in a while because, you know, I'm the kind of guy. I go to bed at one or two a.m. and I get up around 10.30. Yes.

Especially during this pandemic. I, I sleep in, folks. I sleep in very. very, very late. If you guys are like that, you know, please tell me it's a lot of fun. You know, it's not, it's not going to be like that since, you know, I'm going to have to go out and get a full-time job. Pretty soon once this pandemic goes away at some point. But, you know, that's the kind of guy I am. So I really haven't been able to eat a lot of these cereals in the morning, which is, you know, it's kind of funny. Then for Kellogg's Frosted Flakes, that's Chris LaTang.

Again, that's another one of the goat cereals. Chris LaTang is one of the best defensemen in the league. Krellas Fossiakes one of the best serials out there. We're going to have granola. That's going to be Jack Johnson because granola is trash. And Jack Johnson's also not that good. We're not going to call Jack Johnson trash on this podcast because I don't want

to be mean. But Jack Johnson is not a good hockey player and granola is not a very, very good cereal. So I think the shoe fits there. And then, you know, we have, okay, Captain Crunch, I feel like it's one of my more underrated serials.

We're going to go that to Brian Dune one, because I think Brian Duman's like really, really, really underrated. Just really, really good. I've always enjoyed Captain Crunch as a kid. I'm trying to think of others here. Oh, Fruit Loops. Always loved Fruit Loops as a kid.

I think it's almost one of my favorite cereals. That's Jake Gensel. Jake Gensel, of course, 40-goal score. I was on track to be a 50-goal score this year. We did get a Jake Gensel update, I think, this past week. I think Jim Rutherford spoke to the media. basically saying, yep, all reports are going good with Jake Gensel.

He has passed his four-month minimum for the surgery, folks. So that deserves a round of applause right there. He's probably well on track to ready if the season ever resumes. I'm trying to think of other ones. Man, I have not had cereal in so long. So this is honestly pretty hard. This is actually a lot harder than I thought, because the sad part is I cannot think of that much more cereal.

Lucky Charms, that maybe goes to, I don't know, actually like Lucky Charms as a kid. So that's going to go to maybe like John Marino. Again, underrated. Love, love John Marino, considering he's just getting started. Did I ever say Frosted Flakes during this? If I said Frosted Flakes, please sue me. But Frosted Flakes is another really, really, really, really good one. Frosted Flakes. Who is, Brian Ross. That's a good one. Brian Ross, you know, because he's, he's awesome and, you know, he was going to be a 30 goal score. So, you know, those are some of my picks if it had to be a cereal for a penguin flyer. You know, I hope you guys enjoyed my Jack Johnson one, because you all know, he is not that good.

And then, you know, locked on Red Wings and a little bit of a funny troll question. Hey, guys, long-time listeners, first-time mailbaggers, just a quick question. Do you all remember this or no? So it's a clip from the other day, March 22nd, 2000 when, 2010, yikes. What Cindy Crosby appears to throw a temper tantrum in quotation marks, and Jimmy Howard gives him the business. Yeah, I remember that because we all know as Penguins fans, as Cindy Crosby was not the always most, you know, mature times when he was a younger bit of a player. But, you know, I can also talk about that and talk about how Cindy Crosby raised the Stanley Cup in Detroit in 2009.

So, yeah, that happened. And then the Locked on Red Wings was able to clap back with the 2008 one. So, you know, that was fun. No, that was just, that was really fun to talk about. I love those couple of questions. And then we do have one more, a frequent questioner for this podcast. King Clarkie, Clark, how do I treat my guitar shopping addiction? Well, Clark, so for those of those that don't know, which is probably not many of you,

me and Clark, you know, we DM all the time on Twitter. We talk about just guitars because, you know, he's a big rock fan. He loves guitars. He loves rock music. I love rock music as well. It's my favorite kind of music. I can't believe it is it like that. but you know we go back and forth you know i love the nita stras from alice cooper's band

those that get a chance to go see alice cooper and needa stras in the band please go do it alice cooper is a really really good uh performer live and needa stras is one of the best guitars i've ever seen live but you know clark has been kind of like really wanting to get more guitars and you know he tells me he doesn't have the money to get it so carc you know just just save up man you know maybe buy one soon you know once you get some more uh cash in there from your job and then you'll be able to buy a guitar maybe uh nita's custom one i you like you said i know she's um coming out with a new one um pretty soon i think that's what he told me today so uh that's that's pretty cool so you know that's that's how i would do it you know just just keep browns

and keep looking maybe find one you like you know one of my favorite ones was the home suite home one from motley crew i think that mc mars had with the theater of pain logo that's honestly one that i want to get a that's like that theater of pain logo is something i honestly want to get tattooed, just get a tattoo of because Home Sweet Home is my favorite song of all time and I think that would be awesome. And just seeing that guitar is just badass too. I think another guitar I really like, I think I've sent it to you Clark is the Warrant guitar with the

filthy dirty smelling what's the album called? Dirty filthy, stinking rich Warren album and basically the guy is on it. I think that's a badass guitar too. I think if I didn't send it to you, I will. So thank you guys for asking those questions this week. That was a lot of fun to answer them, especially for Lockdown Red Wings. You know, we'll probably try to do an episode.

I think what would be really cool to do is talk about that game 7 of 2009 and talk about the game 6 to 2008. So, you know, we'll make each other happy. We don't have to make just one of the person sad. I don't want to make them just sad. You know, maybe you'll have to make me sad too. So that was really fun to do. And, you know, we'll be doing another mailbag coming in the future as well.

All right, so we're back here, you know, just real quick, you know, to end this episode, it'll be a little bit of a short one today since there's not as much to talk about. You know, like I said, we'll do more of a preview of the franchise what ifs today. You know, the biggest one, I teased about it yesterday, you know, with the 1999 series, you know, what if Yarmier-Dogger doesn't score that goal in game six? You know, what if the Penguins don't win that game seven against the Devils in New Jersey? And, you know, I really don't know if the penguins are here today, you know, just Mario Lemieux buy the team after that?

uh there's a lot of these i just i don't know you know it's it's a completely different reality that's one of the biggest series in penguins history you know it went really really far in the march madness bracket that we had you know went on my memory serves to me correct it went all the way to the final four that's just how important people put it up there and it's just how big of a series it was and how it just changed penguins history for the better and you know it's why i cannot wait for yarmier auger's retirement ceremony because i think a lot of people are ready to just give him the ovation that he deserves. We've seen it a couple of times in PPG Paints Arena where he just,

he's almost brought to tears. It's come out of him a couple times, and it's going to come out of him hardcore when this crowd gives him an ovation that he has never seen before, probably since back, you know, since 99, but before that maybe, he's just, he's just an important part of this franchise history. You know, he's on the franchise Mount Rushmore of the top four players in the franchise history he always will be you know he's writing at two or three

spot belowest i think for me is three i have you know of course it's lemieux crosbie yager um and then malkin you know but you can honestly potentially flip yager uh and malkin by the time it's all set and done you know me personally i would have yager over malcon no matter what but um yeah that's just that was just so important you know what about you know the in the 92 93 series you know what if the penguins beat the islanders that year you know there's there's the real chance the penguins, they go all the way. And, you know, we had Josh Yoey and Chad from Penguins, Twitter, on to talk about that series.

And just how good that 92, 93 team was and how the, excuse me, the city just fell in love with them, you know, just because of how good they were, you know, you had a prime Lemieux, you had Kevin Stevens talk it and Marty Strachah, Yager, the list goes on and on and on. And, you know, a lot for like Josh, and I know like Josh and Chad both said this, you know, they looked unstoppable.

That was the dream team. Then, of course, we all know what happened in that playoff series. And, you know, if David Voie doesn't score that goal in Game 7 and the Penguins win that game, there's probably people out there that would make the argument that they go all the way.

They definitely maybe go at least to the Stanley Cup final and perhaps win it, like I said. So those are two big ones as well. And then the 96 series, which is, I know a bit about that series. You know, that was the year I was, I was not alive for it as well as the year before I was born. I know the Panthers just trapped the living shit out of the penguins.

I went back and watched those highlights. It's actually crazy that the Penguins did not win that series. It's nuts. The Panthers were not good, but, you know, they went full, you know, basically devils on them. And, you know, they were to win that series. But, you know, what happens that, you know, that series, that the Penguins don't get trapped down and it may be the Panthers? You know, do they go all the way that year?

You know, just when you get another cup? You know, all these questions, when are that game? goes to the Stanley Cup final. So like I said, I think the Penguins probably win at all that year. If they don't get stopped by the Panthers in that game 7, you know, we forget that the Penguins were up three games, two in that series, and then drop game 6 and then, of course, lost game 7, 3 to 1 to Florida. So, you know, we're going to have more of these franchise what-ifs next week.

I'm going to hopefully have some more people on to talk about them because, you know, it's a lot of fun to talk about, you know, and just how the franchise could look. It would be a lot different today in a lot of these situations, basically all of them. Thank you guys so much for listening to this episode of Locked-on Penguins. I know it's a bit late at night. I know maybe you guys will be listening to it this weekend. But if you're listening late at night, thank you.

I always think just thank you to everyone who listens to this in general and just takes the time out of your day to really just download and listen to this. Podcasts about me blabbering to myself. It really does mean a lot. And, you know, hopefully while hockey back here, at some point here in the feature, if the results, if we see a downward trend in this pandemic. But continue to stay safe, social, distance and everything. And I will talk to you all next week. So follow me on Twitter at Hunter

Hodes. Follow the show's Twitter at L.O. underscore Penguins. And we will see you all soon.