Puck Soup - A Surprising Sweep

Episode Date: May 25, 2022

Sean and Ryan talk about every series happening right now, where the Panthers go next, new contracts, coaching changes, and more.   Sponsored by Athletic Greens (athleticgreens.com/puck) and Sunday Lawn (getsunday.com/puck)

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes. It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense. I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I'm Sean McIndoo from The Athletic. And Mike Smith led in a 700-foot goal, and it didn't matter in the Battle of Alberta last night.

Yeah. And it was funny. It was extremely funny. The best part of that goal, to me, is he throws his hands up, like, where are you guys doing out there? Well, Mike, you just gave up 140-foot goal. That's what it looked like.

He said afterwards that he just totally lost the puck, and so it was more of a, like, what the heck just happened. But it did look like he was, like, blaming his defense, man. You gotta stop, though. You can't give up those kind of scoring. That's your guy. You're doing it.

Yeah, it was. That was a wild game, though. And it was funny because it was deeply funny, but now also it can be super funny for Oilers fans as well, because it was probably not funny at the time when they were leading 3-0. Calgary comes back. That goal ties at 3-3, and you're just sitting there going, this is, this is the play that you will remember forever if they lose this game and go on to lose the series.

And instead, that didn't happen, so we can just all point and laugh at Mike Smith. Yeah, Jacob Markstrom was like, I'll do you one better. I'll give up a way worse goal than that tonight. And then one that's almost as bad. Yeah. So that is my question to you. Is it worse to just hand Ryan Nugent Hopkins the puck two feet from the net, one second into the game? Or to give up 140 foot goal.

I mean, it's 140 foot goal, but, I mean, if he doesn't see the puck, then that's just, I mean, it's more of a fluky bad luck thing than going out of your net and saying, oh, that guy in blue over there looks like he wants the puck. I'll just hand it to him. And then they score. No, I mean, that was worse. And this is the story of this series, is that Jacob Markstrom, who has been a very good goalie all year long. Vesda finalist. Has decided to see what it would feel like to stink for a week. And it feels bad.

And it's the, you know, I guess we're always, we're always like struggling when it comes to, especially the playoffs, to think of ways to analyze a series beyond just goaltending. But if you're Calgary, and like this is the week that Markstrom chooses to have his cold streak that every goal he goes through, but he's going through it right now, you're kind of screwed? Yeah. Aren't you? Yeah, you're not going to get by. I think the stat I saw last night is their save percentages around 8-10 at 5-on-5.

That's not going to get it done. That feels like not good enough. It feels like it should be high. But the funny thing about Markstrom is that, like, I was looking this up because I'm like, isn't there a thing of like, if he gets tired, he turns into complete dog shit? Okay. And there was a Thomas Strand's article from back when he, obviously back when he was in Vancouver that looked like, oh, you know, what does it look like when this guy plays a bunch of games in a row? And it's like he starts making insane decisions. he overplays his angles, all that kind of stuff.

And so this is a problem that you looked at, what, three, four years ago now, maybe. And the Calgary Flames go out and sign him. They make him the eighth, at the time he was, I think, the seventh paid highest goalie in the, highest paid goalie in the league. And now he's, like, tied for eighth with Jordan Bennington. And, you know, like I said, obviously he was a Vesma finalist this year

but if it's like oh this guy can't play more than 62 games or the wheels completely fall off you know that that becomes a thing of oh is it worth like it's great to have a nice regular season but if he's just going to completely implode once the playoffs start

well yeah and I mean it's not like they don't have a decent backup But they play, yeah, I mean, they played them 63 games this year. Yeah. That's high if you're looking for a deep playoff race or a run and you think that this guy has the potential to, whether it's get tired, you know, who knows. Now, I mean, it's hockey. Mike Smith was absolutely laughably terrible in game one, as was every other.

goalie, and he's kind of snap back to being decent. Good enough, certainly, for this team. So the same could happen with Calgary. They've still got two of the next three at home. I think it was, I can't remember who it was on Twitter, but someone was like, yeah, the way this series is going,

you can still absolutely see Calgary winning in seven. It feels like there's more twists and turns left to give in this, but at the same time, I mean, if you're Calgary, You go into a game and they say, hey, Connor McDavid is going to have a quiet game and Mike Smith is going to give you a freebie goal. You've got to win that game. A hundred percent.

This is, I don't know, we're one game away from a very, very disappointing end to what has been a phenomenal season for Calgary. And it's going to be tough for them to look at this and say, like, we, man, we had a real beatable team. team in front of us and they just beat us at their game for the most part, not Calgary's game, but Edmonton's game. Yeah. And, you know, there is certainly an aspect of it of like, well, what's Marksner supposed to do? The best player in the world is playing like he's twice as good as he was in the regular

season. You know, he's putting up two, three points a night every single game, every game. Yep. And what are you supposed to do to that? And like, I understand that. But like even that Van der Kaine goal last night was awful. A floater from like 40 feet out. Like a goalie's going to stop that.

And so if you give up two, you give up two, again, understanding the whole McDavid thing, but you give up two softies and you're the and you're like, oh, am we got to stop McDavid? Well, yeah, what's he supposed to do on the power play goal? He's not really in a like in a position to make the save as everybody's crashing the net on the fourth goal. I get sure. But like you can't spot anybody to goals in any game If it's fucking October 5th You can't just be like here's two free goals

Have fun yep You're not gonna win But with that having Go ahead Would you make a change if you're Daryl Sutter Do you I would have made a change After maybe the second goal last night I can't you can't go to Dan Vlodar as your starter now

you can't be like, hey, go out and start this elimination game at home. Yeah, kind of have to go down with the ship. You played 40 minutes the last, or whatever, 20 minutes in the last like two months. So, yeah, you're going to ride or die with Markstrom, but the way he's playing these days, seems like die. Yeah, that does feel like the option. And it's, you know, he wasn't much last night, but, I mean, the, Connor McDavid show has been spectacular.

And we've been saying this for a while that, like, at what point is McDavid? And Dracel's been very, very good as well. But like, at what point does McDavid just say, you know, it's screw this? I will drag this team on a, on a playoff run. And everybody always says, well, you can't do that. This isn't the NBA. One player, you know, can only do so much in his 20 minutes a night. And it's not just.

one guy, but man, this is, I've never seen one guy be this dominant above and beyond anyone else on his team, because, like, Ducydel's great and he's getting the points, but Draciel's also hurt, so it's, you know. Very obviously hurt, yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, I've seen, like, you know, the Mario years, I've seen the Gretsky years. I've never seen it where it was just like, I mean, literally, like, if you're such a You can just be going in there going, if we shut this guy down, we probably win.

And the team is like, that's great. We can't. Great idea. We have no answer. How about we isolate him one on four? Yeah, we've tried that, coach. It's not helping. One of him is still better than four of us, and there's just nothing we can do about it.

Yeah, it's so funny. You go, oh, yeah, he, you know, he wasn't great last night. He had two primary assists. Sure, one of them was on an empty netter, but it's like even in a game where, you know, he's not, he's not playing super well. You're like, but we are definitely going to give up two goals when he's on the ice. So, I mean, what do you want me to do? Yeah, I just, you watch these games and you're like, no, I mean, the, the power play goal is a perfect example, right?

Because the way he watches that play develop and like pivots his, but they showed this on the, on the ESPN broadcast last night. but just the way he pivots his body so that he can receive a pass and immediately make a decision and survey the ice. It's fucking incredible. Like this guy's playing on a level that like, you know, Joe Thornton and his prime was playing at. But also he's the fastest player in the world. You know what I mean? Like just in terms of he's seeing everything out there. And he makes it look fucking easy.

We've always had the kind of almost cliche that you talked about with guys like Gretzky and. and Mario and others where it's like they see the game in slow motion. Yeah. And I think there's probably some truth to that. I think if you could put yourself in their head, it would probably feel like that. The thing with McDavid is he sees the game in slow motion, but he turns the game into fast motion for everyone else. Like, he speeds the game up while in his head it seems to slow down. You know, we've made the point a hundred times.

but the fact that McDavid does everything at full speed, I've never seen that before. He never has to slow down to process or to make a player to gather a puck or to just take two steps to get to full speed. He's just there always. It's crazy and I love it. I mean, if you're any kind of hockey fan,

okay, other than the Flames fan, right this moment. Like, this is phenomenal. And even if you're a Flames fan, Like, how do you not watch this and go, this is the fucking greatest thing I've ever seen in my life? Yeah. You know what I mean? I mean, you're getting beat other than last night by the very best of this generation.

And then, you know, we can go from there on how much further that conversation goes at this point. Because it's really something else. It's amazing. Yeah. I guess the other two things we got it. You mentioned it. Drys idle obviously injured. The flames obviously, you know, targeting them like hyenas, basically.

Just like any time he's near the puck, they're putting a body on him and that kind of thing. Doesn't seem to be helping them. But, you know, the thing that I thought about with dry sightal, where again, they're like, he can't even shoot the puck. It's crazy. And it's like, yeah, no, he just is instead using all the other tools he has at his disposal. Like, he's, you know, like, a sloth. slightly poorer man's Austin Matthews or it's like, oh, he does a lot of stuff.

He's not just a guy who puts the puck in the net. You know what I mean? Like, he's not Austin Matthews good, but he's fucking really good. And he's still hurting the flames most nights in this series. What did you think of the clip going around of

like three different flames just going up and hacking him in the ankle? You know, that's, I don't like that kind of shit, obviously. Like, I, you know, I want the best players to be able to play, and I want refs to call these kinds of things. But, like, that is kind of playoff hockey, unfortunately. And it's, it's, the frustrating part is it's led to at least a few takes that I've seen and people saying, like, this is why we have to do the upper body, lower body thing.

This is why we can't tell you what injuries are. We have to be so secretive about it because this is. And, you know, frankly, that's always been the argument is, you know, players will target. And you kind of go, yeah, but would they? And then you see this and you go, oh, okay. I still think the solution is you put actual information out there. And then you say, okay, if we all know where someone's hurt and we see something like that,

there will be actual consequences for the, you know, we will treat it differently. If you go and slash a guy's left ankle that we have put on an injury report is, is hurt. But I think it also kind of shows the ridiculousness of lower body injury. Pretty clearly everyone on the flames knows what the injury is. Right. That's, yeah, I was going to say that is, you know, if you go, oh, this guy has an upper body injury. Like, if you're watching the game closely enough, you can go, oh, his shoulders messed up or whatever.

You know what I mean? And then, like, you don't think the players on the ice know when a guy's knee is hurt versus when a guy's ankle is hurt? Yep. Like, it's not, it's, that's, that's the thing that always makes me laugh about this upper body injury shit where it's like, oh, it could be anything. And it's like everybody fucking knows. Like, everybody on the ice knows. Yeah. So like who, who's the, who's the obfuscation for at the end of the day?

And, and, you know, the problem is that if you, if you say that and, you know, clearly somebody's, uh, you know, favoring an ankle. and then somebody goes and hacks him in the ankle and you go, well, suspend that guy. Like, you know, do something. And that guy go, well, it's a lower body injury. I didn't know it was his ankle. Whereas if you put, I mean, the thing is for me is always, look, hockey is a very, very physical sport. We all get it. So is football.

And, you know, and football, if anything, has more opportunity to target people's injuries because you're actually going at them and knowing you're going to have contact with them on every, every play and the amount of contact that's allowed is much more significant than what you can do at high speed and hockey. And yet, they manage it. So I would rather say, tell us what the injuries are. And then if you see something like what we saw, find the team, like drop a, you know, drop a fine on the team, drop a fine on the coach. Do whatever. But, you know, it's not a reason not to include the information. I wouldn't think. I wouldn't think so either. One last. One, last thing from this series is

there was a big hullabaloo over Luchich running into Mike Smith Nothing came of it suspension-wise Luchich got thrown out of the game kind of did the flames of favor I think he's been kind of shitty in this series and it was one of those like it was what was the score in the game

at the time? Yeah it was like four to one or something yeah like if it was two to one they wouldn't have thrown him out of the game but the game was close to over and so yeah and And that was, everybody made this point. But it was just a thing of like, if Smith doesn't decide he's going to go to his backhand or whatever and like just kind of pivot a little bit, Loojeech doesn't run into him at all. Like, so I know everybody, you know, I think, I think Luchich put it exactly right.

Like if I had wanted to charge him, he'd be in the hospital and I'd be suspended or whatever he said. Yeah. I got to say, I hate it when people say that. when there's like, you know, something and some of, if I wanted to hurt him, I would have really. And it's like, shut up. Like that stupid caveman, that stuff drives me crazy. But in this case, he was 100% right.

Like, that was absolutely like. Milan Luchy's full head of steam, hits Mike Smith from behind, near the boards. They're putting them on a stretcher. I mean, we saw him do it to Ryan Miller, you know, 10 years ago. Like, this guy, he did let up. I get why it's five minutes. It's one of those. It's kind of like the Joe Pavellski thing from a few years ago with the Knights where if it's not a three-gold gap, you probably don't call it five.

But, you know, you don't. And also you don't want the game to go nuts and all that stuff. I get it. But that was one of the few times that I see people calling for suspensions. And I was like, no, no way. And even though, like, I had a lot of people, because we said last week on the show, we made a joke about how long before Luchich does something. dumb and a lot of people were like ah you called it and I'm kind of like I don't know that he really did something all that dumb I aren't believe who here like who who is more of a

suspend everybody for anything that's even remotely suspendable than me it's your thing right um this was one where I was like I saw the guy turn you it's so usually when it's like oh he hit him from behind yeah but he turned it the last And you're like, he turned like three minutes before that hit. I don't know. In this case, Luchich is like at the, you know, the goal line or whatever. And Smith turns behind the net. And it's like, yeah, I don't know what Luchich is supposed to do there.

Like you say, five or, yeah, five in a game or whatever it was. He didn't get a match penalty. It was just a misconduct, right? Even five in a game was too much for what he did. But I totally get it. And I think it. think it makes sense from a game management. I hate saying that.

But it makes perfect sense from a game management point of view, you know. So yeah, I don't know. Like, if it turns the, like, it didn't seem like it turned the temperature up in the series at all. I think everybody on the, like, this wasn't exactly a Nazim Khadri. We'll get to all that shit in a minute. But, like, this wasn't a Nazim Khadri situation where everybody on the Oilers was like, he definitely tried to kill Mike Smith. Yeah.

And when you can get that to happen in the playoffs, it's not a thing. You know? And it's, but it's been a great series so far. Yeah, this has been fun. This has been really, really fun. A lot of goals. I'm not convinced that it's over, although obviously it's looking bleak for Calgary. But I, like I say, I still hope.

there's a few twists and turns left in this because I'm I waited 30 years for this and I'm enjoying the hell out of it and let's keep it going. Yeah, I will say I'm not really holding my breath for a game seven or anything. I really

it's tough for me to see the flames winning two in a row just again with the way McDavid is playing like where are you going to do? And Christ, Van der Kaine's having a hell of a series for himself as well. Yeah, he is. Which.

You got to, you got to, you got to, in this case, you do have to hand it to him on the ice. Do you? He is having a, he is doing what they brought him in to do. Yeah. Be a guy who can keep up with Connor McDavid and then be standing alone in front of the net when McDavid draws three defenders to him. That's it. Mm-hmm. Amazing that they couldn't find that guy before this, right?

like, and they try. Well, it's, yeah, they tried. It's just, I guess. They're like, what if we go get Andreas at the end of see you? He's so fast. That would be great. And then it's like,

they're like, we need a legit 30-goal guy who's available for nothing and we'll sign an incredibly discounted contract because of reasons dot, dot, dot, that we won't actually think too hard about. Yeah. Oh, look, here's one. Yeah.

great job by the front office and scouting department on jumping on that one. Yeah, somebody asked for, I can't remember if this was on Twitter or on the Patreon, but someone was like, isn't it so funny that like Ken Holland is going to get credit for like Duncan Keith and Mike Smith? Because they haven't been like horrible in this series. When it's just like, no, Evander Kane was just, you know, you put him on a line with Tricytel and McDavid and that's the best line in hockey. It's like, yeah, that's...

Zach Hyman's been good too. He has been. Absolutely. And I've had a few people come at me like as a Leaf fan. They're like, yeah, you guys must be kicking yourselves about Zach. No, like Zach Heiman was going to make five or six million bucks and the Leafs couldn't afford him. But I'm thrilled to see him having success somewhere else.

Good player, fun player, like a good player. Did everything the Leafs could have asked him to do? And then when it was time to go get paid, he went and got paid and found a good landing spot. And he's earning that pay. So it's pretty great all along. He's an easy guy to root for. All right. Let's do Canes Rangers.

I don't have a ton to say about this series. I think the better team has won every single game so far. What do you think is going on with Carolina with the home and a war? way thing that you know everyone's seen by now they're six and oh at home oh and five on the road in the playoffs is this just a fluke or is it yeah nobody's gonna like that my answer is nothing in particular okay you know like um i i will say they like uh they're just not executing especially on the power play again we'll talk about the florida series in a minute too um but like they can't put the puck in the net on the power play and they're playing a goalie who

I'm just going to look this up at five on five his save percentage is 961 right now I don't you know what are you supposed to do with that that seems better than the than the flames one yeah a little bit and and but like that if that's really what it is like egos chisercin's a 950 960 goalie yeah you're going to lose most games I don't know what you want me to Like natural stat trick at 5 on 5 Has the Carolina Hurricanes at 54% expected goals And in all situations it's 54 and a half percent

And yeah they didn't play Super well in game 4 I thought There were stretches where they were They looked like exactly what you think Carolina looks like but couldn't get, I guess you would say, a timely save from Antirano, who I think has been good in this series. You know, he unquestionably has had a nice series for himself, but he's getting outduled by a guy who is currently the best goalie in the world.

Do you think about going to Freddie Anderson if he's available? Now that he's back practicing, we feel like we can at least ask that question. Yeah, he's their number one goalie, obviously. and and and Ranta, you know here's the thing I guess is can you reasonably expect Freddie Anderson to do better than Ranta has?

I don't know I don't know that he changes the complexion of the game so much that you're like we gotta put him back in there if he's at 80%, 85, 90%, you know? Like unless he's 100% healthy, I don't do it.

And even then, I'm like, hmm, well, even then you still, because I mean, there's still the rust factor. Yeah, exactly. Yeah,

he hasn't played in weeks. So, yeah, it's a tough one. It's been an interesting series. Yeah, there was the kind of side show stuff with Galant

and DiAngelo and that, but that's, yeah, and that's still, that still happened to, it flared up at the end of the game. It wasn't with him. It was with Domi,

but they're both, you know. Yeah. What did you think of the hit, I guess? That's the other thing we need to talk about is the... Of D'Omi getting the Truba hit. Looking at in real time, like he had just absolutely destroyed the guy, and then you kind of see it after. And Domi was already on the way down, which both messed up the positioning of the hit and also made it look like the bigger contact.

He killed them. Yeah. I haven't seen anything about... any sort of player safety, but there was no penalty on the play. So I don't... Yeah, and... I can't imagine we're looking at anything. No, I can't imagine.

You know, that's one of the classic hits of like, you know, if you get high-sticked in the face and it's because your face is three inches, like, you know, three inches off the ice or whatever. Yeah. They'll get, and it draws blood or whatever you want to say, they'll give a penalty. for that, you know? But if your head is there, oh, go fuck yourself. You shouldn't have had it there. You know what I mean? Like, if you get checked in the head, that's, that's fine. But if you get high sticked in the head while you're falling, like, that's not fine. I don't, I don't

really understand. But there is, you know, the flip side to that is, like, what the hell is Jacob Truba is supposed to do on that hit? Like, yeah, Truba is a guy who, boy, he threw out a lot of borderline hits this season, let's say. Yeah. And you could certainly argue that hit was late. Yes. But I'm just saying on the hit itself, like it's one thing to control the blade of your stick where you've got two hands on and can move around.

It's another thing to be like my hip is going to suddenly teleport passes, dude. I don't know. I get it all. But like, again, it's me. So take this with the. understanding that I don't want any head contact in the sport or any hitting at all, quite frankly. I think, like, eventually the sport is going to get there.

So, like, where are we waiting for? But anyway, that's just one of those things where it's like, oh, they got to, they got to figure out a way to not have hits like that in the sport. And I don't know how you do it, honestly, with the way the game is. But I don't like, I just, I guess I don't like seeing a guy get hit in the head. and then everybody's like, shouldn't have had his head there. Where are you going to do? Yep.

That's fair. But yeah, other than that, not a ton to say, like I said, the Carolina power play is, it's been not very good. And, you know, like in this series, I just pulled this up, in this series, 1.6 expected goals. and they obviously haven't scored one. But like 1.6, and they're also not drawing a ton of penalties. Like, they got to be more dangerous. I don't know, I don't know how else to put it. Like, they're just...

And part of that is Andrei Svetchenikov, no points in the series. Yeah, Hajo didn't have a point in the series until he had the one assist last night. So, like, the big players just aren't kind of stepping up in the Rangers. You know, it's funny. I was about to say the Rangers are. I don't know that... Panarin hasn't done much. I was going to say, I don't know that Panarin's done anything in the series, really.

Fox has been really good. He has two first assists. Fox is unbelievable. What a player. Oh, my God. playing 25 minutes a night or whatever, just fantastic. What a fucking, you know, like this is a classic situation

where we have so many good defensemen in the league right now where the guy who won the Norris last year, you're like, and had a great season this year, you're like, well, he couldn't possibly be a Norris finalist. Like he'll get votes or whatever, but it's like, no, there's no way. I could never give him a top three Norris vote. I mean, somebody will, but you know what I mean? That's crazy that, like, Adam Fox isn't just, like, universally considered definitely one of the three best defensemen in the league every single year.

Wow. Yeah. You know who else been great? His little friend, Keandre Miller. Been really, really good. He is? So, yeah. I mean, where are you going to do?

And Zabandad finally having a couple of big games for himself. You know, like you say, I think it was maybe Liam McHugh last night tweeted out, like you never hear. teams at this time of year saying we needed our worst players to be our worst players and they did it, you know? But that's what's happening with the Rangers. Their best players are being their best players with the exception of Panarin. Yeah, which is what makes you a little nervous if you're Carolina, right? Because you're sitting there going, man, this guy has one of his games. Then we might really be in some trouble. All right. Let's take a break and let's talk about the games or the series that are going to be played tonight.

Well, I guess we're only down to one now, so I shouldn't have put it that way. But you know what I mean. The other night in series, we'll be right back. This week's episode of Puck Soup is brought to you by Athletic Greens. And folks, you've heard me say it once. You've heard me say it a million times. I started taking Athletic Greens because they sent it to me.

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Panthers have been eliminated from the playoff. Breaking news. They're out. Bad apologies to any Panthers fans who have been T-vote all the games and are waiting to get. They're going to binge them. Yeah. Just sit down and watch four heartbreaking losses back to back to back to back. Yeah.

They're sitting down at the end going, oh, what the hell? I tried to record the whole series, but it looks like I only got four games. Uh-oh. That's not a good son. Oh, no, buddy. Yes. So what do you think happened to the Florida Panthers in this one? Well, I mean, first things first, they ran into an incredibly good lightning team that I think it's now safe to say was playing a little bit of possum during the season.

Not intentionally so much, but was in that kind of like, yeah, we don't have to hit the gas at all times. you know that that's a big part of it and then from there you know we just have to get into all that well maybe they didn't know how to I don't know I don't know how this works did the Panthers learn how to win against the capitals and then forget against the lightning or right um but they they stop scoring is what happens which is stunning yeah so that that is my theory is that they shot under 2%

in the series. Okay. Mm-hmm. That's it. I don't have any other theory beyond that. They shot under 2% in the series. Yeah. They had three goals and one of them was scored by Itou-Louis-Drayerian, which...

Yes. You know, I don't feel like he should be producing a third of your offense. Probably not. But, yeah, a 981 save percentage. Yeah. For Vasilevsky. Yeah. Vasilevsky is now in full-on Vasilevsky mode.

He was not for the first six games of the first round, which makes it even more frustrating that the lightning are still around after that. But he is now in scary mode. I mean, God, if they play the Rangers in the conference final, there might not be a goal in that series. Oh, my God. Forget about it. Yeah.

Oh, my God. Yeah, it's crazy. Like, here's the thing is, That, you know, you can look at it any number of ways. And it's just like, yeah, Tampa, like, very slightly outplayed Florida that entire series and gave up three goals. That's basically how it goes. Like, I would not, first of all, I certainly didn't see a sweep coming in this. No, I don't think anybody.

I would love for someone to show me that on their Stanley Cup bracket. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, I figured it out. But, I mean, if I had, I, you know, you'd said, well, you know, gold-handing was a big story. I would have been like, okay, well, there it is. So, Bobrovsky, you know, crap the bed and he was no good. He was fine.

He was, he was not great, but it wouldn't have mattered if he was great. He had to be literally unbeatable. And because he wasn't that, you know, that wasn't the story. So that is the other thing, is Tampa or Florida couldn't kill a penalty in this series. Sergei Bavarovsky 932 at 5 on 5 Barovsky 867 on the PK It's not going to get it done

No And look obviously Tampa has a fucking galaxy Of like superstar players Like just the most talented players in the You know How many of the most talented players in the world Like top 50 do you think they have But six and not even

It's crazy. Yeah, but Brayden Point, not even playing in the series. I was just going to say that, yeah. Wow. But, I mean, that's part of the story is like with Brain, you know, with Brain Point missing, you kind of thought, oh, that's going to make it tough. It was like, Nikita Kuchera was like, all right, I'll go full, I'll go full power for the series. Yeah, MVP mode, Kutraub, he's back.

I'll just, I'll be me and Braden for, for this series. So, yeah, I mean, I know, like, I know with, because they beat the Leafs, the first round and, you know, everyone had to do the whole, oh, what does Toronto do now? There were a lot of people going like, hey, can we not talk about the lightning here? Like, do we not, maybe the Leafs just lost to an incredibly good team. And, oh, I see what they just did to the Panthers. That's, uh, that, that certainly feels like, uh, what's going on here. And it's going to be very, very interesting to see now what Florida does. Like, do they, not to go back to this whole thing, but do they, do you, you just, you just,

stay the course and go, hey, man, we got an amazing team. Or do you start saying, like, there are, man, three goals and we average four goals a game during the season, and we can't even score four goals in an entire playoff series? Is there something about the postseason, blah, blah, blah. Which obviously bums me out. I mean, I was banging the drum on the Panthers as

the team to kind of root for, not just because they were fun to watch, but because they might inspire other teams to be fun to watch, and then that clearly is not how it's gone. I mean, it's not like the lightning aren't fun to watch. But to your point about do they, that basically they're in a position where they can, they have to bring back everybody, basically.

A ton of their guys have movement protection, um, of some kind. A bunch of guys are just, you know, signed through for two more seasons after this one that's still ongoing. Um, and like,

that includes every, big name with the exception of like Hubert O will need a new contract for 2023, you know, that kind of thing. And Wegar, I believe that's true of as well. But yeah,

I just wrote about this. Like they're in a situation where they're going to have to keep everybody. Obviously it would be nice to be able to deal like Patrick Hornfist, who perfectly good season from him, but he's not a five plus million dollar player.

anymore. But he does have some kind of mover. I don't remember off the top of my head. But he has some kind of movement protection. And this is the year that like Barcov's new contract kicks in and Verhege's new contract kicks in. And so they're just in a situation where like they're kind, and they have a bunch of dead cap space from the Yandel buyout as well. So they're just kind of in a situation where it's like, yeah, I don't know that apart from

maybe tinkering around the edges, trying to. to get Claude Giroux to take a to take a Mark Gerdano style contract. I don't know that they're going to make a lot happen for themselves. That will be interesting to see if anything happens with with Cheru because clearly there was, well, there was few. There are people thinking he's going to go back to Philadelphia. Obviously state.

Oh, do they? I didn't see this. Well, I mean, anytime a guy like that gets traded at the line, there's always people saying he's going to come back. I know there was an awful lot of talk here in Ottawa. because he's a kind of local guy that certainly if he won the Stanley Cup, he may then feel like, you know, I'll go home for the help with the rebuild. That feels less likely now if he really is in Stanley Cup chasing mode, although who knows.

But yeah, that's going to be an interesting one to see because it, you know, didn't have any impact on this series, but then again, pretty much none of the Panther skaters did. Right. Yeah, like I say, like they're just kind of like, yeah, I just pulled up their cat-friendly page. This is who they have coming back for next year, like signed, sealed, everybody's locked in. Reinhardt, Barkov, Hubertow, Hornfist, Bennett, Duclair, Verheagie, Lundell up front. Echblad, Montour, Uygar, Forsling, Goudis on defense, and then obviously, Blavrovsky and Knight in Net.

You'd love to be able to convince Sergei Pavrovsky to retire or whatever. Like obviously, you know, $10 million for like, again, he wasn't bad in the series at all, but like perfectly okay goal tending. Yeah.

When you have Spencer Knight kicking around is not ideal. Although Spencer Knight maybe wasn't so good this year. So like, yep. Maybe you say you do need a veteran there and I totally get that,

but again, you don't want to pay 10 million bucks for them. But other than that, like the real question, I guess they got to ask is, what do you do behind the bench? Yep. Because Andrew Brunette is a Jack Adams finalist, and we'll get to that later as well. And deservedly so.

Absolutely deserves took over in an impossible situation, won a President's Trophy, blah, blah, blah. All that makes perfect sense to me. But also, like we said, they completely shit their pants against their cross-state rival. Now, do you say that cross-state rival also happened to win the last two Stanley Cups? And so maybe it's kind of a write-off. I can see that argument as well. But just with the sheer volume of great coaches that are potentially going to be available this summer, you at least got to think about it.

Well, that's it. And, you know, I don't, I don't even know that I would, I've seen any attempts to build the narrative that they got out-coached. And even if they did, you got out-coached against arguably the best coach in the league. The only argument, I think, that you might have is to say, like, we got a team that just put up 120 some odd points. We've got a team that is built. And good enough, we think, to win the Stanley Cup right now. Do we want to trust that team to a guy who will be a, not a rookie head coach, but in his first full season, when there are, you know, the buried trotses and whoever else is the world out there?

Like, do we make what would be a very cold-hearted decision and make that move? probably not would be my gut but it's I'm sure it's at least in the back of their mind and obviously

it's a very you know it's a situation where I mean do you fire the guy and then assume you can get something better

do you kind of go through back channels and try to talk to Barry Trots and go hey is this something you're interested in yeah

I and then you know if that leaks out you're you look awful it's It's not an easy situation. So the thing with Brunette is as far as I can tell,

he doesn't have a contract for next season. So it's not about firing the guy. Okay. All right. Did they ever, was he interim the whole way? I think he's been interim this whole time, yes. Okay. So I mean, in theory, they could go to him and say, you know,

okay, we're going to put you back as the assistant or whatever. But that's a real tough win. That's a tough sell for a Jack Adams finalist, for sure. Sure. Yeah. Guy who probably should, do I think he should win? We'll get to that in a minute. One last thing about the Panthers.

The President's trophy curse, do you know about this? Oh my gosh. The President's trophy curse is real. Yeah. You're not a fan. You've got to be the stupidest fucking person alive to think the President's trophy curses. This is a real thing.

I look this up, okay? of the teams with the best records in like the history of the NFL, you know, less than half have won the Super Bowl. Like basically everybody who's ever won 14 games, like, or more, less than half have won the Super Bowl. In the NBA, since 1990, 12 teams with the best record in the NBA have gone on to win the NBA championship. in Major League Baseball. Oh, I just had this in front of me. Since 1969, only 12 teams have claimed baseball's best record and gone on to win the World Series. And that might actually, now that I see that, this is from 2018.

So, hell, it could be as high as, what, 16 now since 1969. These are all really low numbers. You know why? Because playoffs are kind of random. even in a sport like the NBA where like the best team wins 80% of the time on average. That's the one that surprised me. The NBA I would have thought would have been the one where, you know, you go, oh yeah, everyone knows the Bulls are winning this year.

So, you know, the Warriors or wherever there isn't really an equivalent right now. But yeah. Now, granted, the NBA, it's twice as frequent as the NHL. The NHL since like 1990, it's only six teams. You know what that sounds like to me. Half occurs. Half occurs, sure. But yeah, it's just like, no, it's like, are people just figuring out that an elimination

playoff system is not the best way to determine who the best team is in a given sport? Yeah. Or, you know, at the very least, if you are one of those people who thinks, no, no, this is the best way to determine. And, you know, this is the playoffs are the. pressure that makes the diamond of, you know, whatever. Yeah. Then, okay, then the regular season isn't. We shouldn't be surprised that sometimes it turns out to be right.

Especially in this era of parody and, you know, how many of these president's trophy winners were, you know, more than a few points ahead of whoever was second and, you know, more than 10 points ahead of who was served and, you know, on down the list. It's teams are close. there's lots of randomness and or uncertainty. Guys get hurt. Yep. Guys get hurt. Goleys get hot.

Goleys get cold. Yeah, that's, that is it. So yeah, no, I'm with you. It's a silly near. I mean, at least it's less silly than arguing about touching trophies or that kind of thing. But it's pretty ridiculous. Yeah. It just, you know.

It's an interesting observation that. the first place team wins so rarely in the NHL, that then, you know, people have to get silly with, to try to build it into something it isn't. I do kind of wonder, it, do you,

this is something I guess I could have looked up and just didn't. But, um, I wonder if being like finishing first, when winning the president's trophy, whatever, does have the highest percentage of when on to win the Stanley Cup of, every other, you know, two through 16.

Yeah, that would be, yeah, that would be an interesting thing. And I'm going to do that? No, I'm not going to look it up. Absolutely. Somebody should. Somebody should do that. And then tell me. Somebody get on that.

No, I remember there being something where, I feel like this goes back to the 2011 Canucks, where I don't know if they crunch the numbers or maybe it was based on the odds makers in Vegas or wherever, but. it, you know, that 2011 Canucks team was a phenomenal team, won the president's trophy. They were amazing. And I, it, when the playoffs started, somebody said that they had like a 30% chance of winning the Stanley Cup. And somebody asked Elaine Vino that. And they're like, what's, you know, you only have 30% chance.

Are you shocked? Are you disappointed? He was like, no, 30%'s amazing. There's 16 teams. Like, that's phenomenal. Like, what do you, you know, yes, it is. overwhelmingly likely that we will not win. He didn't put it that way, but that's, that's way it is for, for everybody.

And yeah, that's, uh, that's just the math. That's just how it goes. Um, the other thing I wanted to say about this series is that kind of like offhandedly, uh, on, on the TNT broadcast or maybe whatever, the Turner broadcast. Uh, Rick Tocke, uh, was like, oh, I think Andre Vasselowski is in the Mount Rushmore goaltending. Yeah. And they were like,

and they were like, well, who else? You said Mount Rushmore, you gotta say the other three guys. And he's like, ah, I don't know, you know.

And then eventually they controlled out of him the classic three, Prodor, Haschik, wah. Okay. So nobody from before.

Yeah. And, and, you know, I feel like several, maybe two years ago, like definitely during the pandemic, you, me,

and I think this guy's name was like George or something. Yeah. Did a bonus episode where we did the Mount Rushmore of every position. Okay. And we had it. Those three guys, the classic three, and I talked everybody into, what's his name? Shit. My mind's going blank.

The Soviet guy. Trecha. Yeah, Trety. I talked everybody into Tretyiac. You know, at any point in the 70s or 80s would have been the best goalie in the NHL, probably. That kind of thing was my reasoning. But I got to say, Andre Vasselowski, to have the career he's had consistently strong numbers. Like, I don't think he's there yet.

But I think by the time he's done, I think it's going to be irrefutable. you could put him there. Like you could put him on track. You don't put him there now. That's kind of, that's a little hot takey. But yeah, he could be on track. Now lots and lots of guys have been on track to be all-time grades through the first eight years of their career or whatever it is and don't get there.

But yeah, especially if he gets another, if he gets a third cup. And I know I never like when we start cherry peck. picking stats and, you know, this guy on, you know, Tuesdays, he's, he played, but his numbers in elimination games. It's outrageous. Are freakish. Like, you know, all the shutouts is just. Yeah, what, how many saves did he make the other night?

49, I just looked it up, 49. Yeah, I mean, we can talk about, you know, Panthers are no offense, but they have 49 shots. In regulation. In regulation. In regulation. Over time. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, like he's not, I think he's not a Vezna finalist. This is the first time since 2017. He wasn't a Ves of top three, Vesna guy. Only has one, but he also won a Kahn Smyth. I think there's a very cogent argument that by the time he's like 33, everybody's like absolutely one of the four best goals. He's in the history of hockey.

And you know what will be kind of interesting is just the fact that he was a first round pick. And it has been conventional wisdom for a while now that you don't draft goalies high. They're just too hard to predict. They're too, you know, it's not good use of resources. And to have a guy like that, not necessarily prove it wrong, but at least to have to serve as a counter example, I wonder.

I wonder if you'll start to see teams make, make those moves a little earlier than they otherwise normally would. Yeah, Jake Ottinger's another example of that. He was a first round pick. I don't believe Chisurkin was. No, Schisturkin that he's the other side. He was like a fourth rounder from, God, eight years ago or whatever, and he's just now established himself.

So, like, he's the reason why you don't take a, a guy early because you can find and it takes so long to develop. But, you know, Kerry Price would be obviously the other one. And there have been a couple of, we had a couple of, uh, Jack Campbell was the first round pick, obviously. Yeah. Yep. So I mean, we had, we've, we had a couple of recently, recent years, like Nashville took the, the Russian kid, didn't they? Yep. They did. Um, so. Like, it's like anything else. You take a guy, you know, like just fewer goalies get taken in the first round. But I, I would bet that. that there's a fairly similar hit rate at this point.

Like, we're, we've gotten a lot better at, like, eyeballing goaltending talent in the last 15 years is my kind of my guess. Mm-hmm. Um, and so, like, I think it's going to be, like, you know, fucking half the, half the goalies in the league 10 years ago, it was like, oh, he was a ninth round pick, you know, like, just whatever. Like, you, you were just like, okay, well, I, I guess that's. I guess like Henrik Lunkwist was like a sixth or seventh round pick I want to say.

So it's just one of those things where it's like like anything else, it's a crapshoot. But with goaltenders, they used to be really bad at evaluating whether a goalie was good. And now they're better at it. It really could be that simple to me. And I do wonder if part of this is that even if you can evaluate them well, and we know goaltending is the most important position on so many nights, Even if you can't evaluate, it takes five years typically. Yeah, absolutely.

So if I'm a GM, I'm sitting there going, I can have a forward who's in my lineup on opening night in three months. Yeah. Or I can draft this goalie that's going to make the guy who replaces me look like a genius. Yeah, you know what? I'm taking the forward every time. Sure. All right. Let's get to the Colorado St. Louis series.

and I guess the only thing you can really talk about right now is all the stuff going on with Nazim Kodry. I don't think that we need to say that it's bad to racially abuse players who you feel like did something mean to your team. I feel like, but I'm going to say it, don't do that. Yeah. You know what, don't racially abuse players for any reason. I'm not even going to qualify it. And even, you know, don't certainly don't get ratio. Don't reach out to players, period.

You don't need to be DMing people. That's a great way to just go through life. Don't DM people. Don't do any of that stuff. Like just you can watch the game and not feel like they're, oh, this is my friend from TV. Yeah. Mm-hmm. It's really awful.

It's been an awful situation. it's been it that certainly was one of the all-time great FU games that we saw from Cadry and I know a lot of people are saying like but please don't shoehorn this all into some redemption narrative that you know he has overcome adversity and all that and we don't want to do that but at the same time knowing what was going on and knowing that you know the the St. Louis Blues certainly felt like he took their goalie out

and they were gunning for him to go into that building and score a hatrick. And like somebody said, you know, we all know Cadry's history with playoff suspensions. Like he got almost the entire Blues team playing the way that he used to play in the playoffs. David Perron tried to kill him three different times in the game. David Perron was just, I mean, he had a nice game. David Perron also had a good game. But David Peron was out of his mind every time Cadre was on the ice, chasing him around.

and was inches away from a Dale Hunter moment after one of the Cadbury goals. And, you know, because he missed, everyone goes, oh, that was funny. But that was almost not funny. And that was almost the end of David Perron's playoff run. And probably a lot more than that, he should be thanking the hockey gods that he missed. If you haven't seen the play, like after one of Cadre's goals, Peron comes by and tries to deliver a leaping elbow in his head. Yeah.

Like just absolutely, you know, well after the play, you know, just, oh, this guy just scored and I'm going to elbow him in the head. You know, Dale Hunter style may be more comparable to Ty Gomi on Scott Niedermeyermeier, but like that sort of play. Yeah. But he missed. And he got fined for, but not for that. He got fined for the cross-checking incident where the blue.

gave Colorado a five on three, but no, nothing for the, for the elbow attempt. So again, if you try to hurt somebody, but you don't, eh, I guess it's fine. Yeah, they don't, they don't give a Nobel Prize for attempted chemistry. Thank you, Sego Bob. You know, like, it really, like, but man, that was just so obviously his intent that, like, I don't know how he doesn't get a game for, like, in soccer they'll give a guy a yellow card for persistent

fouling you know where it's like nothing you did really rose to the level of a yellow card individually but you're playing like a real shithead out there

here's a yellow card for you yeah yeah and that's it you should have got a game for that like if you're going to find him for the other thing and then be like well you know what he almost got that guy so it's actually fine he didn't actually

get them. Like that, that to me is kind of crazy. There was no, you know, there was no way to excuse it. Like, there was no way you could look at that and be like, oh, maybe he thought the play, maybe he was trying. There's, there's nothing you could do. And it was very obviously a premeditated attempt to injure a guy that that whole team was trying to injure. So I feel like we are now safe, like swing your stick baseball bat style at somebody. And if they duck, then you're, fine, I guess, but I don't know. What about the actual collision with Biddington?

What did you think? Did you think St. Louis et al had a case on being a dirty hit or a reckless hit or whatever, I guess? No, you know, I think everybody, like, I hate any time there's a controversial play or whatever you want to say, where you got to go like, Now, if I make a GIF where I look at the trajectory of both players, like, you can watch the game with the clear understanding. Like, because, okay, let me put it, let me start with this. If you had said coming into this series, give me, give me like your one sentence summary of Nazim Khadry. Very talented player, kind of a shithead on the ice. Right?

Yeah. everybody would agree with that. And I, again, I said it, I said it about Truba earlier. I don't think he's a guy who's earned the benefit of the doubt in a lot of cases. But with that having been said, I've, we've seen that play a thousand times where a guy bumps into another guy and they go crashing into the goalie. And the goalie doesn't get hurt and it's not anything. Nobody, everybody's kind of like mad about it. but nobody's like stewing about it for three nights or whatever it's been.

Like they're going to be talking about it during the night's game. So. And I get why, I mean, your starting goalie gets taken out on a play. Yeah, you're going to be mad about that. And again, Cadre has not earned the benefit of the doubt for sure. Yeah. But I think. And if they're watching the Battle of Alberta, like if you're Craig Baroobee and you're watching

the Battle of Alberta. Exact same play happens with Milan Luchich and some Edmonton defenseman. Cody Sisi. Exact same play happens. Exact same injury result. Craig Barubi's like, that's hockey. But because it's his goal, he obviously, he's going to be more mad about it. And like the no comment thing, that's bullshit.

Like everybody is correct to say that's bullshit. It's bullshit. But it's just like, again, like, you know, I understand being mad about it. I understand not thinking, uh, cadre is by default innocent in a way that you might think about that for a lot of other players. 100% understandable, but just watch the fucking play. Yep.

It like, Craig Burbh, they ran a few goalies in his day. Yeah. So maybe he's thinking of it from that perspective. I do think that Cadry's going hard to the net, knowing that what happened is a possible outcome of that. But the puck's there. The puck's there. That's his right.

That's his fucking job. And there's the two players collide. That's, you know, he's willing to go. And, you know, with that, hey, there's a chance that Cadre gets hurt on that play too. And he's, you know, he's going hard to the net. No, I didn't have an issue with it. understand why blues, fans, players, coaches would. But, yeah, I don't, even for a guy who, as you say, doesn't have the benefit of the doubt,

that's a hockey play, as we like to say. Yeah. So the other thing that's going on in the series is the Blues are getting a shit kicked out of them. Yeah, I mean. Like, that's, I know you can say, well, if they had Bennington in net, blah, blah, blah, everything would be different. I'm not super, I'm not super convinced to that. Yeah.

I mean, this is just, again, a little bit like we said with the Panthers, they are facing an extraordinarily good team. Yeah. And yeah, this is, you need everything going your way to beat this Colorado team, at least the way they're playing right now. and that's not what is happening for St. Louis right now. Yeah. Like Colorado, five on five, 57.5% of the expected goals, 63% of the shots. Like you can go down to 60% of the, or a shot of time. Shots 4 is 60%.

Scoring chances, 62%. Go down the list. The abs are just a comprehensively better team than the St. Louis Blues. Now, would these games have been like 5-2 and 6-3? if Bennington doesn't get hurt? Maybe not. But that's just at five on five. Then you put the Colorado Avalanche on the power play,

and they're going to look even better. And honestly, the Blues have had more powerplay time. They've scored more power play goals in the series. But like Colorado, like, you give them an inch. They're going to take a fucking mile because that's their talent level, you know? and I would say Darcy Kemper hasn't even been good this series honestly but we've always said with him like he doesn't have to be

no absolutely not he needs to be not bad right and and I would say he's been bordering on bad like on the whole to give up this many goals as many goals as he has and blah blah blah but you know I just I look at this and you know it's just a situation

where it's like, yeah, you guys are running into a fucking buzzsaw here, man. I don't, you know, you, the blues, the blues haven't even played that badly. Colorado is just so dangerous and so good at keeping the puck when they have it and all that kind of thing. What are you supposed to do against these guys? No, that's it. And I mean, it's really that simple. And the blues kind of, you know, did it for the first couple of games.

It took them to overtime, you know, a game where the ice was tilted, and they won game too. And it's, I know blues fans are, we've been hearing from them for three or four weeks now about how disrespected they are and everyone's sleeping on them. I'm not sleeping on them. It's just that the avalanche are just not anywhere near. Nobody is as good as the Colorado avalanche. That's the thing. Like if you said, again, like going into the season. What's the Stanley Cup final?

Tampa and Colorado. Florida and Colorado? Something like that. Sure looks that way. You know, like sometimes, you know, talk about the President's Trophy Curse all you want, but sometimes like the team that's really good and obviously really good,

turns out they're really fucking good. They have 103 scoring chances at five on five in this series in four games against a good team. What do you say to that? Yeah. Sometimes you just run into a, better team. And that seems to be what is happening. And I, series is not over, but, you know, when we're talking about Calgary, Edmonton,

and I was like, you know, I wouldn't shock me if there were more, you know, more to this story. I'm not feeling it in this, which, God, if we're sitting here a week from now and the blues have come back, I know every, you know, every blues fan, go ahead and tweet of me or whatever, but I just, I don't see this. So that's the thing, right, is the blues absolutely have the talent. to win tonight. They can even force a game seven. I'd be a little surprised if they forced a game seven. But like I wouldn't,

I wouldn't be surprised at all if they, if they went tonight going back to Colorado and all that kind of thing. Like they played, well, not in the first game, but in the second game, they played really well and they won. But, you know,

the odds that you're going to hold the avalanche to like one goal in any given game are, is extremely small. And if they get two, the odds that they're going to give up more than two is extremely small. So I don't, you know, it's just one of those things.

Like you can't solve this puzzle. Sorry, it's unsolvable. Yep. So, I mean, at this point, if you're the Blues, play your absolute best game that you're capable of playing, get a few bounces, and then hope.

Yeah. Because that's, about what you need. They just look so fucking good. They just like that I can't. And that can all change, right? I mean, like God, God knows it. We'll be sitting here next week going.

Right. Ask Carolina. Right. Yeah. We sit here next week going. The Oilers are up to two nothing on the avalanche and wow, what's happening? And that's, that's hockey. But right now, boy, Colorado looks unbeatable.

Yeah. Yeah. Again, like, I'm just looking at the numbers. They have almost a hundred more shot attempts at five on five than. the blues do, 99 more in four games. They're outscoring them two to one. Every number is just like, oh, I can't believe how good these numbers are. This is outrageous.

So it's tough because, you know, again, the blues had a good team. And like, you know, I saw people going, oh, this is a tough spot for whoso to come in. And obviously that's true. You don't want to have, you know, he didn't think he was going to be. getting a ton of minutes this series, I'm sure. And part of his job, of course, is to be ready in case something happens to Jordan Bennington, whether it's an injury or he just doesn't play well or whatever. Like, you've got to be ready to get up and go.

I don't even think he's been that bad. But also, like, the thing with him is, like, there's a reason he's like a 26-year-old playing for pretty close to the league minimum, right? Like, he had a great regular season, especially, given his history in the NHL or whatever. But also, like, sometimes the guy that you think a guy is until he's 25, that's who he is at the end of the day. Any goal he can get hot for four months.

Any goal he can get hot for 12, you know? So. Yeah. But it isn't a situation where you're, I mean, this isn't like if Asolevsky or Scherker and got hurt and you'd be like, well, okay, now there's a huge drop off. Right. St. Louis has got a guy. So you keep going.

I mean, the other thing I said, you know, kind of tongue and cheek, play great and get lucky. The other thing is you got to let the cadre thing go. A hundred percent. You ran after him. You chased him around. Not only did you not scare him, he kicked you back. So now it's time to let it go and play hockey. So we'll see from there.

Yep, we sure will. Let's take another break. We'll be right back. Today's show is brought to you by Sunday. You know, everybody wants that beautiful lawn, best-looking one in the neighborhood, but none of us want harsh chemicals, and for a long time it always kind of felt like you had to pick one or the other. Well, this year, you could use Sunday. Sunday is a product that is made with ingredients that you can actually pronounce,

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and he'll keep going to work for us. It's worked. It's worked pretty well. Yeah. I know, you know, it's one of those kind of running jokes with Leaf fans and fans who have opinions about the Leafs is this idea that, oh, Leaf fans think every, player wants to go to Toronto.

Everyone from Ontario wants to play with the Leafs. But a lot of them do. And March Jordan- at the latest. It finally starts coming together for you. Well, I mean, Mark Giordano is a guy that I got to say. Oh, no, for sure. I, you know, even when they trade it for him and certainly after he played well,

and you heard like, oh, maybe they can keep him. Maybe he'll take a discount. There's taking a discount. And then there's... And then there's taking as close to league minimum as you reasonably can. Yes. I mean, that was, I was stunned when that came out. And I mean, obviously, from the Leif's perspective, it's an absolute total no-brainer. The worst possible scenario here is Mark Giordano gets old and stinks and he bury his contract in the minors and it doesn't count against your cap at all. And he was really good last year. And is he going to be that good for two years? Honestly, probably not. But yeah. It's, uh, that was a very easy call, I'm sure for, for Kyle Dubas when he found out that that number would be acceptable.

Yeah, that, I mean, that's, that's low even. Like, I would have said like one, two. Wow, what a deal, you know? Yeah. But he was like, what about 0.8? How's that sound? When I saw it, I saw it two years 1.6 and I went, that 1.6 cap hit. That's not bad.

Works for me. Yeah. And then you find out that, no, no. It's so, yeah, real, real good. He's a guy who had such an interesting career, you know, he doesn't become an NHL regular till he, like, he went to the KHL for a year at 24 years old. And then came back and he was like, no, I'm actually one of, you know, like a top 25, top 50 defensemen in the NHL. And then like at age, whatever, 30 starts being like, I'm like a Norris kind of a guy. Yeah.

What? Mm-hmm. And then, yeah, he wins, he won two, three years ago, something like that. He won a Norris. He deserved it. He was fucking awesome. Yep. What a player.

Like a guy who totally, like a Dan Boyle type, an undrafted defenseman who just like, in his late 20s, early 30s is like, no, I'm one of the like 15 best defensemen alive. It's crazy. Yep. Oh, it's awesome. I was, as a least fan, I was pretty thrilled with that. Yeah, he's cool. The other big contract this week, Brian Roth's sticking in Pittsburgh.

I'm a little surprised by that as well, just because I figured he'd want more than he signed for. Now I forget what the exact number was, but it's like five and change. Yeah, yeah, 5.125 for six years. Now, the trick with that is he is 30. So, you know, they're paying him until he's 20 or he's 36 and that's that's right around the time when you start maybe like 34 is around the time when you start being like he comes back tomorrow. He's done. Yeah. You know?

But no, at least according to Kath Friendly, no signing bonuses, no. Yeah. You know, the salary dips the last couple of gears. So it's not. No move protection. the first three years. Right, yeah. Which are the years that he's going to be at his most valuable for it.

So there's definitely an exit on this. I think what was interesting here is that this got done before Malcon and Latang. And even got done before it seems like there's any serious progress on Malcolm and Latang, which makes you wonder, we all kind of looked at this and went, can they bring back all three guys? is, and you sort of assumed Rust would be the odd man out if one of them had to be. So now that's off the table. Yeah, it's interesting now that I think about Rust having the no-move protection for three years,

that's the term left on Crosby's contract, and that's the term they wanted Malkin and Lattang to sign for at like $5 million a piece or whatever it was. So clearly they're saying We'll get to the end of the Crosby contract And then all bets are off Yep Right And now can they get Malkin and Latang to Maybe they can get one of those guys for those three years

But if those guys both balked Somewhat understandably At 5 million bucks a year At you know age 35 for three years I get why they would say no thanks to that And I also get why the penguins would say, like, well, that's a totally reasonable contract for a 35-year-old. Yeah.

I mean, it's especially with Malcolm, where you're talking like easy Hall of Fame guy, MVP, three cups with you, Kahn Smyth, you know. Hasn't played 82 games in like, oh, my God. Like, he hasn't played even 70 games in a season. since 2018. Now granted, they didn't play. But before that, 2012 was the last time he played more than 70 games in the season. And even like the lockout, okay, well, you know, there was a lockout year.

He played 31 of their 48 games. He missed like a quarter of that season. More than that. So, and then last year, 56 games. He played 33 games. This is a guy who can't stay healthy. When he's healthy, he's great. He's unbelievable.

But, like, I don't think it's outrageous that they would be like, I don't know if we want to commit to this guy who can't stay healthy until he's, like, 40 at $6 million a year or whatever. It's not outrageous. It's going to be very interesting to see how they manage it, though. Like, how do you not make it look like you're low-balling a franchise legend? A guy whose number you retire the second he's done. Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. And, you know, the Tang to some degree doesn't, you know, to me doesn't rise to quite the same category. But to some extent does. I mean, there would there will be some fans who have feelings about that too. So yeah, it's a tough situation. We knew it would be. Yeah. Fascinating to see how it all plays out just because, you know, as everybody is,

pointed out, like, they're under new ownership and that ownership has a pretty clear philosophy and a level of inflexibility about that philosophy that makes it, I don't know, kind of a tough sell or whatever. It'll be interesting. It will be really interesting. Coaches, Rick Bonas, since last we spoke, has stepped away from the Dallas Star. is not something he wants to come back from. And I think we all saw that one coming a mile away.

And this feels pretty clearly like the Dallas stars are fine with this decision, let's just say. If not that it was their decision and, you know, out of respect for a guy like bonus, you know, you phrase it as his call or, you know, mutual thing, whatever. but yeah, not a huge surprise and probably the right call for them. It's interesting that there was talk of him staying in the organization, but apparently he wants to see what else is out there. I don't think there will be much else out there. I wish him the best of luck with that. Yeah.

You never know. I mean, you never know. No, for sure. He might not, maybe he doesn't even want to bother coaching in the NHL anymore. It sounds like he does. I mean, but yeah, no. Nobody's been behind an NHL bench as much as this guy. So certainly if he decided, you know what, I'm going to just go fish or whatever, then I don't think anyone would have fish.

And, yeah, and everybody would be like, you earned it, brother. Yep. You've been in the NHL for a billion years. So, of course, go for it. Obviously, the name everybody, oh, a coach quit or was not brought back or whatever you want to say. What about what if they got Barry Trots? Hmm. What about if they got Barry Trots?

Have you thought about the Dallas Stars, Jim Nill? Have you called Barry Trots about your job opening yet? It's probably occurred to them. Oh, all right. There you go. Yeah, no, like the Trots saga is ongoing. I saw there was an article on the Athletic by the Winnipeg Beat writer who was like, Barry Trots would be really smart if he chose the Winnipeg Jets.

Huh. Gosh. What are the odds that you would come up with that take in Winnipeg? Yeah. Now, again, we talked about it last week. This seems like a team where he doesn't even need to turn a like a perfectly okay goalie into a world-class goal. That's it. Like, can you imagine Barry Trots taking over with Jake Ottinger?

Hey, Jake, what if you were like 12% better at goal 10? I'd never allow a goal again. Yeah, pretty much, yeah. But again, now we figure out if it's, was this the Barry Trots magic or was it the Mitch Corn magic? So we will see. Yeah. So, yeah, that's, I think, the only progress anybody's made coaching-wise.

Like, I think we've heard that Barry Trots has talked to two-thirds of the team that don't have a coach right now. Yeah. And like we've said, it's going to be Barry Trots' call. Yeah, 100%. Nobody's interviewing him,

he's interviewing them. And then we'll see. So yeah, Philadelphia, I guess, you know, oh, that's the other thing I wanted to say is apparently, I think this is, Elliot has been saying this

for the last little while is Dallas was very interested in Rick Tocke. Yeah. For the last little while. Should have put Jake on? you're on that Mount Rushmore, buddy.

He's pissed. He's like, you never hire that guy. That'd be interesting to me. I don't know that I'm super encouraged by his work in Arizona, but also, who could do a good job there. Yeah. He's been a reasonably good coach over the years in a couple of tough situations. You know, we've certainly never seen him. I mean, I think they made the playoffs once, and that was in the COVID year. Right.

Didn't do much with the Tampa Bay Lightning in between their cups, but those were not great teams either. So I think it's fair to say he is not shown the ability to take a bad team and lift them up into a good team, but let's see what he can do with an actual good team or at least a team that's not a mess. Yeah, I mean, and he's, look, he's on TV, he's a well-known player, he's got a million connections.

We know how this works. Now, okay, I have a pitch. Let me hear it. Talk it to Dallas, Wayne Gretzky to Arizona. We're just taking all the TNT guys. We're putting them behind the bench. I feel like we tried that one,

but yeah. I don't remember that. Wayne Gretzky was the coached the Phoenix Coyotes at some point? Yeah. Are you sure? Yeah, it was, I think he was very highly paid too. Huh. Yeah, I guess he would be.

He's Wayne Gretzky. Yeah, exactly. He's probably great at coaching. He understands the game so well. How could he not do well coaching it? Yeah, that's right. All right, let's get to the Jack Adams nominations here. Darryl Sutter, Andrew Brunette, and then this guy, Gerard Galant.

Have you heard about that guy? I have. Pretty good coaching, they say. Pretty good. He's, yeah. If you had to pick, which I agree. Darryl Sutter is my pick. I think it's, you know, both in the traditional Jack Adams vibe of somebody whose team was

unexpectedly good, but also, you know, and this, this is a guy who he molds teams into kind of his identity and did it very quickly here. And yet, you know, not, did not just turn the flames into some boring defense first, second, and third. Yeah, he scored a million goals this year. Yeah. So I, I would go, I would go Daryl Sutter. Uh, yeah, I agree. It's so funny to me that, because I think Sutter was like, well, Gerard Galant should win it. Because, you know, no coach has ever like, yeah, I think definitely I should win this award.

And maybe the guy who would at least say that kind of thing is Darryl Sutter. But it was really funny that Gerard Galant kind of got that love from Daryl Sutter just because it was like, oh, how did he get nominated for it last time? Otherworldly goaltending, a bunch of guys shot like 29%. Yep. This is like a formula for him. It works for a little while. Yeah, it's a good one.

Maybe you can do it. It works. Yeah. You know, this is a guy who I think has solved Corsi. You know what I mean? That's right. The things that Gerard Gallant teams do well in the first year, lead to a 104 PDO, blah, blah, blah.

One last thing is apparently, I think it's June 6th. second, the Arizona Coyotes arena plan will be discussed by the city council there. Oh, okay. Now, which arena plan? Is this like the new arena? Yeah, the Tempe one. Yeah. Okay. Yep. Like the, you know, not just the arena, but like the

whole complex that they would build up around the arena next to the airport, etc. It'll be interesting. But I don't, you know, at this point, can you have any kind of confidence that things are going to work out the way the Arizona Coyotes want them to? No, I don't. Well, although I do think since last week, didn't we hear that they actually are going to get to put their logo on center ice? They just have to share it with the... Yeah, I think we talked about it.

I think we talked about it on last week's episode of like they're going to have one logo on one side of the red line and the other logo on the other side. And that's how it should be. Like the idea that they were going to play with just a, um, a, uh, uh, sun devil's logo. That always felt a little bit much to me. Yeah. Um, like, again, I totally get the, the desire to laugh at what a joke, uh, this franchise has because. I totally get it. But they were never going to let that happen.

They still have some pull here. They're building the $20 million field house or whatever so they can be golf carted back and forth between periods. But yeah, I just never thought that that was going to be a thing. But the thing I wanted to say about the city council thing is remember how much fun we had like 2012 or whatever watching the Glendale City Council meetings

guys getting up there being like nah I may just be an old cow name but for me we do have to give this team $180 million or whatever it was

yeah burn down the library for all I care well yeah and it yeah it all worked out fantastic it worked out great nobody nobody's mad about that in retrospect

respect. No. All right, Sean, plugs. I'm, find me on the athletic.

I'm writing stuff about the playoffs. I think I'm going to have a quiz later this week. Bring out those back. Those are always fun.

And listen to me on the athletic hockey show podcast with maybe Ian Mendes. We'll see. Ian has, is going on a

week with no power right now in terms of electricity, not his status within the athletic. So, yeah, we will see. It might be, I don't know, might be me on my own, might be a game. What are you doing tomorrow? You want to come join the athletic?

You have to read a post. You have to do a whole thing. No, thanks. They want to cut me a check, though. I guess I'm not doing anything tomorrow. Yeah. And then for me, of course, E.P.Rinkside.com, sign up for an annual subscription, and you will get one extra quarter of hockey, three months for free with the code.

I love EP, all one word. And yeah, you know, I'm writing all my normal stuff. I just wrote what are the Florida Panthers going to do this summer. Dmitri and Jay Fresh are doing series wrapups and previews as teams get eliminated. next round begins, that kind of thing. A whole lot of good content, especially because, you know, we're coming up on all the kind of prospecty stuff that you would expect from a site called elite prospects. And if you want to know who your team is going to pick ninth overall or whatever, we probably

have a whole big article on that guy. So check it all out. And also check out the Puck'sup Patreon where we're doing a million bonus episodes this week. There's so much stuff from doing the wrestling podcast. We're doing the listener voted bonus episode. We're doing Stick to Sports. We're doing

Top Chef Recaps, all that and more. Patreon.com slash Puck Suit. Check it all out. And thank you for the support. Thank you for listening. That's it. We're done. Bye-bye.

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