Puck Soup - All The Teams Are Here

Episode Date: October 22, 2024

Sean and Ryan talk about the Frozen Frenzy, what to do with struggling teams, and play a few rounds of 20 Kesstions in honor of Tyler Myers. Sponsored by Gametime (download the Gametime app and use code PUCK for $20 off)

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I am Sean McIndoo from The Athletic. And, well, it's a big night in the NHL tonight. I guess we'll say that right off the bat. All 32 teams play tonight. And if you try to go to NHL.com right now, it doesn't work. Oh, okay. That's fun.

Oh, you know what? I said that. That last time I tried was probably half an hour ago. It is working now. But I was getting a 503. Go boys. The night of the frozen. In fact.

We boot those servers, man. Yeah, you gotta, I'll love it. Plug it back in. Yeah. So, you got the, you got the list of games in front of you here? I do. Okay, what are some, let's say, give me like three or four. You're really looking forward to it.

Well, hold it. Before we do that, I think we're legally obligated to point out that they have staggered the starts of every game. Big fucking salute a game every 50s. 15 to 30 minutes until about 9, 30, 10 o'clock, yeah. All you freaks out there is you finally got it. You finally got what you want it. Because it wasn't like, if I remember right last year, they did this as well. But there were like two games that they had started at the same time, which almost felt like a troll.

It almost felt like, all right, you little weirdos, we're going to give you almost exactly what you. That's right. Yeah. But then they, this time they went. all the way. I want to say also shout out to King's Golden Knights 11 p.m. Puck drop. This one's for the real freaks. This one's for the

sickos. Also, that's one of my three games. I'm really excited to watch. That's going to be a good one tonight. Dude, if you're still watching hockey at 11 o'clock. Spoiler alert. I've seen 100% of every minute of every NHL game. This is

my promise this season. I'm going to do it. My promise is I'm going to watch five minutes of each team. at some point. And it's going to be the worst five minutes, and I'm going to form my opinion based on that. I think that's just a good way of doing business, yeah. All right.

I'll give you three that I'm looking forward to. Let's start with Stars Sabres. I love a good dueling narrative of a really, really good team. In fact, I think the best team in the league right now, Dallas going into Buffalo, a market that is kind of on edge of right now. now. We are all expecting Dallas to win that game 7-0, so it's going to be 2-1 savers. Yeah, I was going to say 4-1 with an empty-netter. Yep, that sounds good, right.

Absolutely. The best of the bunch is, like, it's a weirdly, I guess the Bruins Predator kind of has the same energy, but it's a weirdly lacking night in terms of like two heavyweight contenders going at it. But Carolina, Edmonton, even though neither one has a, winning record right now. Yeah, that just feels like a big game. Legit. On paper.

Stanley Cup preview energy. Yeah, I agree. Or vibes at least. You would have said that a week ago at least or two weeks ago maybe, yeah. The other one that could be a lot of fun, a little bit of a sneaky pick. Senators at Utah. Utah has been so far the most entertaining team in terms of like high scoring games.

and the senators, while Linus Allmark has not been there, are basically just like, all right, I guess we just win six to five. We're not going to get any saves at all. So screw it. We're just going to go 1980s. So that one feels like the most likely to drop like a 9 to 6 game on us. Now, of course, now that I've said that,

it's going to be 1-0. But in theory, at least, that one should be fun. for all of you, the distinct minority of fans that enjoy offense. It has been explained to me. You can actually have really entertaining two-one games. The beauty of a noble zero-zero-zero game is apparently lost on me because I don't watch enough hockey. There was just a zero-zero game in college hockey the other night. And was it amazing?

I didn't see a chess match of... Here's the thing. I can't remember. It was Merrimack and somebody, and it's like, you know what? Like, as it was becoming a parent, it was going to be a scoreless draw. I was like, yeah, I'm not tuning in to see a Merrimack 0-0 tie. I'm just not going to do it. Makes sense.

Yeah. There were a lot of good college hockey game. Okay. People are already making fun of me for the college hockey thing. I'll stop. So some games I'm looking forward to is, I mentioned that King's Golden Knights game. I think that's going to be really fun. I like the call on saver stars.

I like any time. Anytime there's, you know, the narrative could really move into, are we doing the fire Lindy chants in this one, you know? I think it's Kevin Adams who's getting the firing chance in Buffalo. You know, it doesn't have to be mutually exclusive, I'd say. That's true. I mean, it kind of does if you're chanting. You sort of have to pick one or else.

Well, you know. You watch a wrestling show, and somebody will be like, you know, MJF, and some people will be like, Adam Cole. So they could be fire, Lindy, Kevin, too. You know, they could do that. Dude. If we got any listeners in Buffalo, this could happen. Yeah, hey, unfortunately, I have it on good authority.

We don't. Oh, that's too bad. Because you're going to talk good about teams to get people to listen to, like, or the teams that people like to get them to listen to your podcast. We're just not going to do that about the sabres. That's the puck soup guarantee. Yep.

I would have said I'm exciting for devil's lightning, but the lightning are coming off back to back, so that's tougher to be enthused about. The other game I'm really interested in, you mentioned it earlier, Bruins Predators, and we'll talk about the Bruins in a bit. But two teams where it seems like, we're like, especially with the Bruins, it seems like we're weirdly approaching nightmare status. And then the Predators, obviously,

oh, and five, these guys stink, you know? Yeah. So you could really, you want to talk about narratives, you could really kick in a Bruin's narrative into overdrive if they are the first team to lose to the Predators. That's, it is getting to that point. Like last year with the sharks, remember it was like, who is going to be the first team?

Yeah, absolutely. To actually lose to these guys. Different scenario, obviously, as far as expectations. but you don't want some other team to come in and like get off the Schneide as they say. They do they still say that. I'm not sure if they have said that in 30 years, but against you. So yeah, that's a good one. So yeah, look, there's plenty of good matchups here tonight.

Like Avalanche Cracken could be good. You know, Cracking, they're starting off the season pretty hot. and obviously the abs have their own thing going on. Sharks, ducks, like, not that the sharks are any good, but, like, the ducks are weirdly hot. They could go above 500 here. Hot, I guess, is not the best way to describe a two, two, and one team, but, you know. Penn's Flames, flames, only have the one overtime loss. Like, there aren't too many stinkers here, which is interesting, given...

It is... It is... The only one where it's like, yeah, okay, I guess I don't need to watch that, is Rangers have. and maybe wild Panthers, but even the Wilder 3-0 and 2. I mean,

you got the Panthers and the Rangers are arguably the two best teams in the east. This whole schedule reminds me very much of,

and I know you're not an NFL fan, but when you sit down on a Sunday and you're like, hell yeah, let's go, Sunday football.

And then you look at the matchups and you're like, how is there not a single matchup between two good teams? Like, How does that work? Sure. That doesn't feel mathematically possible.

And we're not quite there, but... No. But all this to say, you know, if we're starting off the night feeling good, 6 o'clock puck drop and caps, flyers, all that kind of thing. Oh, yeah, it's NBA opening night. Celtics at 730, Lakers at 10. Okay, so that's a different league. Is that league popular? Is that...

I'm hearing that the NHL is hot and the NBA is not. Okay, good. Is that like, did they finally get around to making a men's version of the WNBA? Is that what? That's exactly right. Well, that's cool. The Liberty, they cheated. You see about this.

I love this. You got to give Gary Bettman credit. He's done a lot of things that I didn't agree with, but he has never worn a dress to the Stanley Cup presentation that had like Golden Knights logo on it or whatever. Well, I was just talking about the Minnesota links coach being like, we got fucked here. There's no two ways about it. Awesome. I love it. And then everybody was like, come on, man.

The league doesn't cheer for one team. And then the commissioner showed up wearing a New York outfit to the trophy. And everybody was like, okay, you know what? Put a pin in that one. They're allowed to break whatever rules they want. No problems here. Okay. So look, we mentioned a couple of the team.

Well, we mentioned just about everything. team in the league just now. But the first team I want to talk about is the Pittsburgh Penguins. Talk about in-depth. Is Mike Sullivan about to get fired because they can't get a save with whatever, three years left on his contract? How does Mike Sullivan have three years left on his contract every year? He signed like a five-year extension two years ago, three years ago.

He's been on the hot seat and people are like, yeah, but he's, he's, Every summer he signs an extension for like two additional years. That's just good business. He's just dropping a Fibonacci sequence on us. Let's see. I'm going to look up. He got a three-year deal in 2022. So that runs through 26, 27.

Because it kicked in at the end of last season. So that's before Kyle Dubis shows up. Correct. That's Ron Heck. Hexstall announced the extension on August 30th, 2020. Dude, I forgot Ron Haxdell was the GM. Penguins are trying to every day. So you're...

I remember the Flyers and the Kings, and then I was like, that's probably it for him. Well, I mean, you run the flyers so well, why wouldn't you get another job, you know? You got to get that cross-state rival. Yeah. This guy's a real Pascal Dupuis. Was he the guy that did that? Went from the, the Penguins. to the flyers?

I feel like you might be thinking to Yarm or Yager. But they're very similar. Max Lopierre. I think it was Max Lopierre did it. Maybe that's who I'm thinking of. Anyway. Miscellaneous French Pennsylvania hockey player.

That's exactly it. So yeah, the penguins, this seems like a problem, in my opinion. Here's the thing, though. They can't, it's not, well, obviously they can't get a save, but they, also can't get anybody to play defense on that team.

Seems to be the issue for me. Yeah. They've given up 242 shots in seven games. Is that good? They are, they rank 32nd in goals against. Yeah. And I feel like there's 32 teams in the league. So I don't think you.

That's roughly correct, yeah. Yeah, I don't think, you know, and they played a few games, of course, because it's the NHL, we have to already have like gaps of three games played. There was, last week, there was a point where Carolina had played two and whoever had played, like New Jersey or Buffalo, one of the two Europe teams, had played like seven. And they had the one game canceled, but yeah. That goes with, yeah. Look, if I'm Mike Sullivan, I'm sitting down, I'm looking at the results so far.

And I'm saying, guys, this isn't that complicated. When we score six goals Or unstoppable When we do not score six goals We do not win Therefore I'm going to suggest Score six goals guys Yeah

Seven if you want to We don't know what would happen then But give it a try Do you want to hear a crazy stat Tristan Jari has an 836 Save percentage And only And he's one in one

and three appearances. The Penguins have actually gone two in one in games started by Tristan Jari. Yeah. At least he's locked in, speaking of extensions. Yeah, I mean, you got him. What do you do if you're Kyle Dubas? And it's like you're very clearly in the mode that we're going to keep trying to win while Sid's here. That seems to be the commitment.

Yeah, of course. So, that was the idea. I guess firing the, I'm not even saying firing the coach is a good idea, but you got to do something. If you got to do something. Well, I say you got to is in the way it's being talked about locally and all that kind of thing. This isn't acceptable because, again, you're trying to win with Crosby and Malkin and Latang. And you can't, you can't fire the players.

no one's taking a bunch of these contracts, right? Like, yeah, that's the thing. Like, any sort of shakeup trade is not looking for. And, like, they took on the Kevin Hayes contract this summer, right? They've signed Anthony Bovilliers, like, guys where it's like, yeah, he's pretty good, but, like, his other team didn't really want to keep him around, you know? Mack Rizlick, for example. And it's like, this is it really all?

just because Malkin wouldn't let them let Crosby walk or the other way around. Crosby wouldn't let Malkin walk? Is it really that's not that Malkin's having a bad season or anything like that? Yeah, he's he leads the league in points, I believe, with 11, something like that. But I'll, now that I pull it up, he does have 11 points. Malkin has 11, Crosby's next on the team with six, tied with Crosby, Lars Eller. That's where we're at with the Pittsburgh Penguin. folks.

I'm going to read from, this is Joshua's piece yesterday, I believe. This is his scouting report on three players. And maybe if we read this, we can piece together the whole leading the league and goals a loud thing. Tristan Jari, I don't even know if he's playable right now. Chris LaTang, he was terrible late last season and unfortunately has carried into this season. That's not good. Eric Carlson, if possible, has been even worse than LaTang. Okay.

Those are too low-paid defensemen. You don't really need to worry about $20 million worth of players I just mentioned. It's brutal, man. I don't know what you do. That's the thing. Okay, you fire the coach. Is he going to get more out of Chris LaTang at age 52 or whatever, you know? Make a note to myself to double check on Chris LaTang's age.

He's around there. It feels like. Give or take. I think you might be off by a couple, but yeah. Yeah. So here's an interesting stat. Five on five, Eric Carlson, 52% of the XGs. That's not bad.

He'll take that. Chris LaTang, 45%. That's a different problem. But, you know, I wonder how much of it, the, the, oh, this guy hasn't been good enough. That guy hasn't been good enough. It's just like, when he's on the ice, the puck goes in because the goalie can't stop more than 83% of the shots he's face.

You know, it could be that simple. You don't want to be in a situation where Joel Blomquist is your best goalie by a mile. And yet here we are. Certainly does not. The fact that they're only three and four or whatever is kind of incredible when you just look at they're getting 880 goaltending as a team. but yeah, that's my point, though, is I don't know how to fix this. Like, you just look at this roster, it's old, it has Lars Eller's tie for seconded points. Like, and is this?

Yeah, first in goals. Nobody on the team has more goals than Lars Eller. Ricard, Raquel, and Drew O'Connor and Kevin Hayes are next with three. That's not the, that's not the, let me put it this way. If I had come to you and said, like, two years ago, you know who leads the Arizona Coyotes and goals? Is Larzella, Rick Carter, Rekarkell, Drew O'Connor, and Kevin Hayes? You'd have been like, I didn't remember those guys being on that team. But it makes sense that all of them would be leading that team in points because they don't have anybody better to put on the ice at a, you know, on the power play or whatever, you know?

Mm-hmm. It's tough. You don't want to see a franchise. go down like this. You know what I mean? Like, you don't want to you don't want to be living in the, in the world where, like, you just have to accept that at some point Crosby's going to want the Ray Bork trade.

Maybe, you know? But... I still can't see it. I mean, I still... I agree. But also, it's trending in that direction. Yeah. It's tough, man. Look, maybe there's a bunch of people out there who are like, yeah, fuck the penguins, blah, blah, blah. I get it.

That's fine. You know, you got sick of them for whatever, 15 years. I get that. But this feels like a rather ignominious end to the whole era, doesn't it? Malkin's 38, Crosby's 37, Latang's 37, Lars Eller's 35. It's, like, if you didn't have the Crosby dynamic. This would be such an obvious rebuild. Absolutely.

And would have been like two years ago, right? You would have been moving guys like Latang when there was value. Yeah, Crosby was like Mika Zabanajad. Yeah. And didn't have the, you know, the greatest player, arguably the greatest player in franchise history besides Mario. Second best player in the history of your franchise, arguably a five player all time.

One, you three Stanley Cups. I get that 31 other fan bases are like, oh, that's, that's heartbreaking. What a terrible problem. Oh, tough bonds. Yeah, of course. Gosh. Lucky that's not us. But as far as right now today, it's tough.

I would not want to be Kyle Dupus. No. It does not sound fun. He's just showing up every day with progressively thicker glasses so everyone thinks he's still really smart. That's right. But like, you know, Again, what was he supposed to do? He takes this job and it's like, okay, you're the steward of the decline Crosby and Malkin years.

You know? Like, I don't want to say it was like fully a sinking ship or whatever, but they were like, okay, you're, you know, you're the captain now. There's a bunch of holes in the bottom of this one, you know? We have some hull integrity issues here. I don't know. Like I said, I don't know what the answer is now. I don't know what the answer was two years ago. but I do know that if Yassupuya Yarvey is fourth on your team in scoring, you have a big fucking problem.

Oh, man. And by points per game, it's probably even higher than that because he actually missed one and he's got five points. So this is tough, man. I don't know what else is. Now, look, here's the thing. We were talking about like, oh, Jari's in 830 or whatever. There are plenty of goalies where it's like, oh, he, weirdly sucks.

We'll talk about Colorado in a minute, too. Like, taking big statistical takeaways from 7, 10, 12, 15 games, whatever you want to say. Like, there are like four or five goalies in the league right now who are like north of 950. So, you know, it's all over the place. Nobody's saying, like, oh, Winnipeg, how good are they really? Because you take the fucking saves, you know? But it gets late early and all that kind of stuff We're a little more than a week away from November 1st

And these guys aren't going to be in the playoff run or race You know all in all likelihood And so you just got to ask the fucking What changes here? Questions And I don't know what the answer is It's tough It is

What would you do in Nashville? What would I do in wait it out? Yeah, I think you just got to ride it out. Like, what other choice do you have? It's, I mean, that's a much, much more viable option in Nashville than. Oh, absolutely. I mean, the other choice.

Well, they don't have a choice, I think. A coaching change there, I think, would be the choice. No, I don't. They just hired him a year and a half, two years ago, right? I think this last year was his first year there. Oh, yeah. Okay. Which makes him, like, the third longest tenured coach in the league right now.

Sure. But, like, I don't know, like, there just aren't guys you can trade on this roster. Like Dante Fabro and Gus and Gus Nyquist are the only two pending UFAs. Literally, like, not even Scott Wedgwood is a pending UFA. So you don't trade any of those guys. You don't trade any, you know, your Luke Evangelistas and your Phil Tomasinos. Like, you don't trade those guys. Yeah.

And you're not looking to throw in the towel and. No. You want it to click together. The only thing that I agree with you that firing a coach after a year and a bit feels extreme. But first of all, they made the playoffs last year. They made the playoffs last year. But then you look at what they did in the summer. This is the sort of start that gets coaches fired.

Maybe not 0.15. But 0.8, 0.10. Like at some point, what are you doing? And what do we always say when we're talking about firing a coach? Is there anyone out there who's actually better, who's available? Well, who's the GM in Nashville? Oh, I like this. One of the most successful coaches of all time.

Barry Trott's standing up from his chair. Yeah, I guess I'll get down there. And let's see. You know, he's stretching. Mm-hmm. Just saying. I'm not saying. I'm just saying.

It would be awesome if he went Lamarillo mode. Like if that was just the thing, like he got the same reputation as Lou where it's just like every once in a while I'm going to fire a coach for like a half decent reason at best. And yeah, I guess I'll climb back behind there. Yes, it's me. Yeah. But I mean, we haven't had it. What was the last coach GM that we had for like an extended period? An extended period I couldn't tell you off the top of my head.

I remember like. Darrell Sutter. Didn't like Bob Murray go behind the bench for like a season or something, but Terrell Sutter, maybe, yeah. That's the only guy I think who did it for like multiple years. We'll put it that way. But yeah, it's what did they spend this summer? Like $900 million or something like that? Yeah, about that. And or, you know, committed to spending, I guess is a way to put that. But yeah, I mean.

I mean, part of it is, once again, Saros is 875 right now. Mm-hmm. And I think there's a perfectly valid case to be made that, like, that's your problem right there. He's a good goalie. Even Patrick Waugh or Dominic Hasick occasionally had three or four bad games in a row. Yeah.

It'll be fine once your superstar goaltender gets back on track. well the thing is he wasn't great last year he signed him forever and traded away the future goalie so yeah but he was only 906 last year too so they might have bought at the exact wrong time i don't think that's true but like there's there's an argument to be made that maybe they uh they jumped into that one a little early and you know i i'm always cautioning against this when your summer is like oh yeah we went out and added like the best 30 and 33 year olds available to us. That's not like good necessarily. I'm not worried about Nashville in the sense that I think this turns around.

And I think three months from now we're looking back on, hey, remember when Nashville was 0.15 and dumb people were talking about Barry Trots taking over this coast. Sure. Yeah. I think that happens. So I'm not worried in that sense. But if this doesn't work, they're kind of screwed because they have walked into this version. This isn't something where you can say, all right, you know what, we tried something, didn't work, we back off.

And I mean, they are pot committed, as they might say. Well, it's funny because like, you know, the movie and the book Moneyball? Yeah, heard of it. So, you know how the book kind of aligns? Oh, and they had like the best rotation. in baseball and that kind of thing. They were like, no, it's Scott Haddeburg getting on base 22% more often than the guy he replaced, you know, Jeremy Giambi or whatever.

Or was it, it must have been Jason Giambi, huh? It was the book kind of, right? Because they went from one brother to the other. Yeah, maybe. I can't remember the timeline now. But the other thing that they kind of make hay out of a little bit in the book, and especially the movie is that big long winning streak they have in the middle of the season that takes them from whatever like 25 games out to to you know barely you know barely out of the wild card and then they

make the playoffs and all that whatever you know whatever the sequence of events is and it's like that's completely antithetical to money ball in a lot of ways where it's like yeah you can't bank on well we're just going to win 22 in a row and it's not going to be a fucking problem for us right how much of that is the predators like the post U2 trip kind of remember the islanders did that they they won like 12 in a row and had points in like 17 straight or whatever you know several years ago now how much of that is the is the predators just buying into like well that post you two trip that's the real me you know yeah that one stretch because don't forget like you mentioned this team was in the playoffs last year which they were they lost to a team with a third string goalie

A team that a lot of people didn't believe in all that much with their first string goalie. And then guys got hurt and they still couldn't beat the Canucks. So yeah, maybe there is a little bit of that going on. To be clear, though, I think that Stam Kose and Marcia Soe and Brady Shea, like, I think getting those guys is more of a, we're going to make the results a bit more. sustainable, if that makes sense, as opposed to like, we're going to take off here. You know, I think they're still on paper, whatever, like the third or fourth best team in their own division, right? But they just made where we can, like, they're going to spread the wins that they had in the post-U2 debacle. Like, they're going to spread that out over however many games and it's going to be less of a problem.

The other thing you've got to say is currently as a team, they are shooting 5.6%. Don't do that. Yeah, you're going to want to get that number. Shoot higher than that, guys. You know, score effects and all that kind of thing, but they're plus 40 in shots on goal right now. So they should be fine, but also if they're not, like you said, it feels like that's a problem. And you never want to start in an 0 and 5 hole, especially in that division. That division, the top of it is just, you know, even if we're allowing for the avalanche are really also struggling, you know, like Winnipeg, Dallas, and now you've got a leapfrog, Colorado, okay, Chicago, fine, a weirdly hot St. Louis and a Minnesota team that hasn't lost in regulation, and a Utah team that's four one in one.

Right? Like, it's just, it's just, the climb is really, really difficult on October 22nd. It's not that they can't do it. It's that it's really fucking hard. Yeah. So that's, uh, that's something. Oh, I wanted to talk about this. This is something that I feel like you might be interested in here, Sean.

So, uh, last week we talked about it, Malkin did score his 500th career goal. He is the fourth active player. to score 500 career goals. Steven Stamco's of the National Predators is another one, then Crosby and obviously Alex Ovechkin. Those are the only guys. Patrick Kane is currently 29 away. John Tavares is 42 away.

Corey Perry is 70 away. Anse Copatar, 78 away. Brad Marshand, 99 away. You know, we can go down the list. I think it's, Malkin was the 48th guy to score 500 goals. Do we think one of Kane and Tavares becomes the 50th, given that they have the smallest gap to make up?

Or does Austin Matthews, only 129 goals away, which is two seasons for him, basically, like two and a half maybe, not even? Does Austin Matthews pass either of those guys on his way to five? He's getting to 500 career goals unless something goes down. disastrously wrong. We can all agree. But do you think Tavares and Kane have the juice to get 29 and 42 goals before Matthews gets, like I said, $1209? I think they probably do both of those guys that you're looking at middle of next year.

Yeah. At their current pace, right? Kane has been a 20-goal guy for the last few years. So he's unlikely to get to 29 today, this year. He hasn't scored 29 in like four or five years. And he doesn't have a goal yet so far this year. Tough. Tavares really in that diminishing stage of his career,

but still a guy that you would figure 25 goals is doable. Yeah, 20 sounds about right for him for sure. So I say both of those guys get there before. him, but could be close. It's crazy that it's close, though. It is my point. That is absolutely wild that Austin Matthews, a guy who, oh, I was going to say got drafted 10 years after Patrick Kane.

It was nine. But, and, you know, Patrick Kane's more of a set up guy than a goal score. But still, that is pretty wild for a couple of American first overall picks. Yeah, I think it was Travis Yost had an article a couple of weeks ago. that was just like, don't be surprised if after Ovechkin passes Gretzky, which I guess he was taking as a given, probably, if Matthews eventually passes Ovechkin. If he's scoring 60, 70 goals a year, it's extremely within the realm of possibility.

You know, the era effects come into play. It's a little bit higher scoring these days, so it could happen. Yeah. Pretty wild. He's two regular Austin Matthews seasons away from 500 before he plays in his 10th season of NHL hockey. Two of which were shortened, by the way. Like, he scored 41 and 52.

Like, what the fuck are we talking about here? This is crazy. He's very likely to, well, he is well on pace to hit 500 goals before he turns 30. Yeah. Nobody fucking does that. That's crazy. How old was Ovechkin when he hit 500? Obviously, Gretzky did it, you know, Lemieux guys in the 80s.

So his 500th goal would have come in the 2015-16 season. So he would have been right around 30. That is what I'm looking at an article. It was January 10th, 2000. 2016. So he would have been. He's a September birthday. Yeah, that's right.

So that's wild. That, you know, everybody thought the, the Gretzky record was unassailable. Along comes Alex Ovechkin. Suddenly it's not unassailable. And now it's looking like he's pretty locked. He's only got the one goal so far this year, but still, it just feels like a, you know, he's one of these guys where he's going to score eight goals. in one week and we're going to go, okay, no problem, thanks.

I hope so. As I've said before, if he breaks the record, cool. If he doesn't break the record, I'm a good Canadian boy. I'll be all right with Wayne Gretzky still holding it. The one thing I don't want to see is like Ovechkin crawling over the finish line. You know, getting 22 goals this year and then next year it's 14 and then like, you know, he's just out there trying to try to get those last eight or ten goals in his Brett Hall as a coyote era.

Yeah. That's what I don't want to see. No, I agree with you, obviously. I'd love to see him. Like I said, I never thought he was going to do it this year. Happy to be proven wrong, but I just, you know, 25 goals this year, 20 something the next year, we're all set. We're locked in, you know.

But, yeah. anyway. Mentioned Colorado. They're another team, goaltending. I don't think Jared Bednar's got a hot seat in Colorado, but I do think that, you know,

another week or three of this, and it's a different conversation maybe. Just, I mean, I guess just the longevity that he's had there. And again, it's kind of weird to be talking about him. And he won a cop and,

yeah, of course. Longest serving coach. But it's, boy. I mean, Bedner is one of those guys where he gets fired, that potentially shifts some other team, right? Like, I don't think you're, if you've got a coach on the hot seat,

you're not getting the text saying Andrew Burnett just hit the market and going, all right, now we know what we have to do. Right. Jared Bednar, you might. No, I agree. But again, it's, I can't get a save. Like, nobody's looking at that trying to. And so many people are hurt.

Like, obviously Landisoggi hasn't been there in two years. Nchuschen, he's eligible to return, I want to say, November 13th. Yeah, and we don't know what would happen there. If they'll take him back what he would look like when he's back and there's no, can't assume that he's going to be ready to go as soon as he's eligible. All foe. He's back in North America. He returned.

in North America this week, yep. But like Devon Taves is hurt, Arturie Lekinen is hurt, Jonathan Druin is hurt. Like, everybody's hurt and our goalie sticks doesn't really feel like a coach issue to me. That's, well, that's what I mean. But if it takes another two, three weeks of we can't get a say. And also, Cochanan hasn't played for them yet. They're working on getting him ready to play for them. So, you know, it's, it's kind of.

kind of one of those things. At least they got the two wins. They're not Nashville, like Ofer, you know. But again, there's just a lot of teams they're looking up at right now. I don't think anybody's sitting here going, the Colorado Avalanche are finished, you know. But it is a real, when Nathan McKinnon's off the ice, everyone's saying, where's Nathan McKinnon? Yep.

You know, I don't, it's a pretty appreciable drop off from the top three or four scorers on the team. Macar, Rantan, and McKinnon are the top three. Then it drops to Ross Colton with seven, then Casey Middlestat with five, and then Sam Gerard and Josh Manson with three apiece. And after that, everybody has won. And so it's a real, if you can stop McKinnon, you can win this and you don't even really need to stop McKinon that bad. And every year, almost every year, there is a team that we all go, they're going to be fine. They will figure it out. and then look out in the playoffs. And then it just never happens.

And sometimes they just miss, like, Vegas a few years ago, and sometimes it's more like New Jersey last year where it just never gets off the ground. But we sit there and say they're going to be fine, look out in the playoffs right up until suddenly you see the little X next to their name. That having been said, Colorado is going to be fine and look out in the playoffs. Yeah, I think that's the right.

assessment with them. It's just they're not like playing super well and part of that of course is just like they don't have they don't have taves and they don't have Drew and Lekinen and all this but you know

you want to guess what their power play percentage is right now? Considering how many good players they have 20% maybe? Ooh, 38 is the correct answer. Oh wow. Okay. Eight of their 21 goal, that's exactly right. Eight of their 21 goals are on the power play.

Okay. I don't want to tell you their PK percentage. It'll make you sad. No. It's 68. But yeah, that's, they're a team that, like, you got a, their must watch, I guess, because you just, you're hoping for their sake. Maybe you're not.

Maybe you're saying, fuck the avalanche. That's fine, you know. But I'm hoping for. their sake, they can turn it around. They're just a fun team to watch, good organization, all that kind of thing. But why don't we take our little break here, and then we'll come back and we'll talk about some other teams. This week's episode is brought to you by our friends at game time. Have you made it out to a NHL game yet? Seeing any live hockey yet this year? Maybe you have. Maybe you haven't. But it's always a good time. Hockey is one of those sports where

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But you don't take my word for it as far as what a great view it would be. That's where my favorite feature on the app comes in, which is where they show you the view from the seat. No surprises. We've all been there at some point where you think you got great tickets. Turns out you don't. Not going to happen with game time because you're going to know exactly what your view is going to look like. and you're going to know how much it's going to cost you because you're going to get the all in pricing, the lowest price guarantee, and they even have game time ticket coverage. So your purchase is covered with the most flexible customer service policy in the ticketing industry. Take the guesswork out of buying tickets with game time picks. Download the game time app, create an account. Use code Puck for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Again, create an account and redeem code PUCK. Puck for $20 off. Download game time today. What time is it? It's game time. All right, we're back. And I guess there's one more team that it feels like they're in a little bit of trouble that I did want to talk about here.

Just because, like, my friends who cover the team are talking about them like they're fucking taking on water and it's like a huge problem. The three, two and one Boston Bruins suck, apparently. Yeah. Three, two and one, you say. That's the record. Because that first number is higher than the other numbers. that? Well, so if you look at basically every underlying number, they're like 30th to 30 second in the league. Okay.

Which, in my opinion, is bad for them. Um, so like they, they are, but it is kind of just like, Brad Marshan turned the puck over in that, in that Utah game. And, and Jim Montgomery yelled at him and it's like fucking all hands on deck. Like, that's right. Sirens going on or alarms going off and that kind of thing. Like, is the, The Jim Montgomery thing was quite weird. It was. That we heard, I feel like multiple times in the summer I heard that he was going in the year without an extension. Yeah, no contract in place right now.

And look, I am on record as saying, I think this whole thing that as a coach you have to have an extension or else you're a lame duck and the players don't listen to you is total nonsense. Right. I've had to hear that in Toronto multiple times. And it's ridiculous to me. Like players don't get to stop playing just because they're in a contract year. They don't just get to go sit and sulk like your coach, go do your job.

Yeah. But a guy who had won the Jack Adams. Did he win the Jack Adams two years ago? Yeah, he did. Yeah. That seems like you would want to lock him up not because of lame duck this or that, but just because you go, yeah, this guy's a good coach.

He's our guy. And they didn't do it. that. They certainly didn't. I guess it's a situation where it's maybe a little tenuous. Obviously, Sweetie's been there forever. Cam Neely's been there forever. Who knows how high up the chain there might be some concern.

But this team's two years removed from President's trophy. Like, I don't know. Yeah. I can't remember what they did in the playoffs last year, but it was probably okay. It's a little bit just the thing. of like they lost to Utah in a way that was not good, right? And the only other team they've lost to is the Florida Panthers, right? Those are their only two regulation losses are to Florida.

And they got a point against Utah in the loss. But you don't want a situation where, I don't know if you saw this footage, like Montgomery was yelling at Marshan for turning the puck over in the Utah game. what would have been the game winner except they called it back because it was offside. But it was a really bad turnover. When they announced that, did he immediately stop yelling at him? I don't think that's what happened.

Is it like when a goal, he gives up a terrible goal and is about to get pulled, but then the goal doesn't count. So you're like, okay, it's fine. We're good here, yeah. You're playing great. No, like, so he not only was yelling at him, but he like pushed his shoulder a little bit in the way that you would be like,

hey, get your shit together. Yeah. And then, you know. And Marchand immediately dove to the ice and rolled around. No, he didn't, he didn't fucking react to it at all. But like, you don't want, you know, it opens up the thing of like, oh, is he getting physical with the players or, you know, that kind of thing. Yeah. I don't know that we need to.

It didn't seem like Marchand took it all that egregiously. And that's, you know, Jim Montgomery, not afraid to call out his stars if you watch the, uh, the Amazon documentary. like he called out Mar or Posternak during that during the playoffs against Florida, right? And then like they showed the conversation they had where he was like, yeah, you're basically Osternak was like, yeah, no, I get it. That's fine, you know, because people are, people get weird when you call it your star players. But like, it was a really fucking bad turnover for Marchant. So like that's the kind of, you know, I know he's a captain now or whatever, but.

He should get yelled at for a turnover like that. Again, maybe you don't shove the guy or push him on his shoulder, however you want to phrase it. But it does really boil down to they're winning, but they're not playing or they're getting points, but they're not playing well. You know. Right. Anybody can beat the Colorado. It's been fine. Yeah.

Not great, but fine. Corpus Al has been terrible, which nobody could have seen coming. No. Oh, that's crazy that that happened. Marchand has a scored yet. Right. I feel like, I mean... So do you want a crazy stat?

Yeah. At five on five, this is Boston's goal scoring leaders. Cole Kepke has three. That leads the team. Yeah. He's also their leading score overall, and I just had to click on him to look up how to pronounce his name in case I had to say it because I was like,

who is this guy? Yeah, that's right. College hockey guy, of course. We all know that about Cole Keppke. Sure. But, yeah, after that, Mark Castellick has two. And that's like five out of one, two, three, four, five, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen. So five out of their 13 goals at five on five are from Cole Kevke and Mark Castellick.

That's not good. Marshan 0, coil zero, Poetra zero, Geeky zero, Zaka zero. Seems like a problem. Now again, I can pull it up really quickly. I don't know what they're shooting at five on five. I'm assuming the number's pretty low. But it's actually not.

It's actually they're, they have the fifth highest five-on-five shooting percentage in the league. Okay, this is a problem. what I was saying earlier. Yeah, 43% of the expected goals at 5 on 5. It's not good enough. I don't know what you do there. Like, as you say, you fire Jim Montgomery, who are you getting out there that's better?

Jared Bender? Well, you know, again, you got to wait for a domino or two to drop before that happens. It does feel like we're in the Jay Woodcroft PR. that's a great don't forget that I exist sort of which is to say he's done like a couple of interviews

but well he wasn't doing him last year you know he was being quiet so just something to think about if you're most coaches in the league I guess

but yeah it seems like there's something wrong with the Bruins I think we can you know to some extent say that this wasn't just one bad game either. Like they, I think they've only outshot their opponent twice so far this season or out attempted maybe.

I can't remember. I looked this up yesterday and now I can't remember exactly which stat. They've done good in two games out of seven. But it's interesting. I don't know what you, again, I don't know what you do. They just spent all this money in the offseason on the guys from Vancouver. big track record on those guys, you know? Anyway.

Yeah, Elias Lindholm's like, he was one of those guys that when I sat down to do the preview stuff in September, I was like, right. Boston. He's been okay. He's been okay. But he hasn't been like, oh, now they have that number one center that they've been missing. Right. And the thing is, I guess now can be a time when we talk about the Sam Bennett extension. When Elliot broke the news on Saturday night that, like, that was, those talks were now happening, Sam Bennett and Florida, you know, extension talks.

He was like, one of the things the people talking about this to me have said is like they know he's like a really good number two center. And they have their number one guy and having a really solid, like one two punch down the middle that they can believe in. that's how that's how they feel like they can keep winning championships or at least competing for them or however he phrased it and it's like for the Bruins they got that kind of a guy in Elias Lindholm but they were also like and you have to be the number one center and that's the fucking problem right they never replaced Bergeron and Creachie is basically what it boils down to it didn't super matter last year because they had elite goaltending or pretty close to it and they do have elite players at multiple positions you know, center's just not one of them, and it happens to be the second most important position on the ice. I don't know how you fix it. That's the, yeah, and it's a good, I like the way, like it's a good situation of being with Bennett as from the Panthers perspective.

Obviously, first and foremost, because you have a guy in Barkov who is such a stud. Yeah, he's awesome. But, yeah, like this is, you're not signing a guy going like, yeah, but oh, maybe if this, you're a number one, but maybe if, like, you know the role. And then you just got to say, hey, man, do you like living in Florida on a championship caliber team?

I don't know what the tax situation is down there, but it's never been discussed. Yeah, it doesn't come up, but, yeah, I'm going to keep chugging along and probably do another seven or eight-year deal that five years from now might be someone else, problem, but flags fly forever. They certainly do.

So, yeah, I guess that's my Sam Bennett talk. How about, we talked about all the teams that are struggling. Let's talk about the teams that are doing ever so well. Let's talk about the undefeated, the last team standing doesn't have a loss, doesn't have any kind of a blemish on the record. I almost said the New York Jets. They have a couple of losses. They have a few blemishes.

Yeah. The Winnipeg Jets. Pretty good. I don't know what else you can say about a team that's outscored opponent's 24 to 8 across five games. Great goal tending, but unlike a lot of teams, you don't just look at it and go, somebody got hot for a week, big deal. Right. Somebody did get hot for a week, but that somebody is one of the best goals in the world.

Right. Connor Hellebuck being 952 isn't sustainable, but it's, way more sustainable than any of the other guys that are 950 goalies right now. Yes. Which is, which honestly, if you look, it's a pretty funny list.

Let me, let me pull this up really quickly. But yeah, it's not, this is the other thing. It's not just that Connor Hellebuck is standing on his head. They're out shooting their opponents pretty consistently out attempting them. You know,

basically all the underlying numbers are like solid to good. And if you can do that and have elite goaltending and, and you have some guys who can score, which they do. Maybe, you know, again, not enough guys that can score to really make you think, oh, this is an unbelievable team or anything. But like, you know, there's a lot of believability with these guys. If Hellebuck isn't, you know, like outright subpar for what he's supposed to be. Nick Eelers seems like he's maybe breaking out finally at age 20.

28. He looks really, really good. Yeah. I think what happened there is they said, we tried to trade you, and it didn't work out. There wasn't enough interest. And he was like, so if I play better, I get traded. Got it. Right. Yeah.

He's a UF.A. Correct? I believe he is a contracting UFA. So that's going to be an interesting one. If he gets, you get to midway through the season, and they certainly look like a playoff team, if not much more than that. That whole, do we let him walk for another? Because, I mean, you have to assume if he gets to free agency,

you're not keeping him. No, you wouldn't think so. Or that you're overpaying to do it. So, yeah, I don't. And the other thing is, and I just saw a story in this go across my timeline, that attendance, not great, not terrible. but they're not selling out their smallish building. So the pressure on this team to win.

Yeah. It was the smallest in the NHL for quite a while. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, this is like there is some pressure to win here in right now. Now here's the thing. If I'm a Winnipeg Jets fan, I'm looking at it and I'm going, oh, maybe I want to go see the Winnipeg Jets, the undefeated team. You know?

I'm not sitting on the couch maybe. Maybe not. And it's one of the best places to go see a game. I mean, if you ever get a chance, I can't recommend it enough. But, well, there's just certain realities of the size of the market and all of that. So it could be a situation. You know, Kevin Shevoldeoff normally would say, you know, we should move the sealer's guy. We should think about the future.

ownership might be like, we're thinking about a playoff run this year. And look, I'll be honest. I didn't, I didn't have the Jets very high up my list coming into this year, despite the fact that they were like a 110 point team last year. Right. I mean, I would say defensible in that I agree with you, and so I will defend my position on that one, you know? But like, it was just like, okay, well, they were 110 point team getting the best goalie in the league, you know? Like that's the, or the best goal tending in the league. But not getting the best goaltending in the league from, like, this wasn't like one of those like Camp Talbot gets hot for a year things.

Like, right. So, yeah, maybe, maybe we should have. I had the Jets 14th coming into the season. Okay. they didn't really add in the in the in the in the in the off season like too much I don't think right and and so just naturally I'm sitting there saying to myself well you know Connor Hellabuck that that's maybe the best goaltender in the world but he should have gotten more MVP consideration than he did last year and it's really just for any goalie it's hard to be at that level two years in a row yeah he can be around the Vesner conversation but he he was like the runaway Vesno winner last year. So the idea that you need that to get to 110 points maybe bumps you down to an expectation of 98.

And then it's in that division, it's a little dicey whether 98's enough to get you into the playoffs. So that was, I think, both of our thinking, not to speak for you, but that was certainly my thinking. But yeah, he looks fucking sick.

again. What can you say? By the way, the other goalies that are that are 950 through any reasonable number of games here is Ottinger. Makes perfect sense. No problem there. Kevin Lankinin, of course. Everybody had him. 950. Philip Gustafson. Everybody thought he, and he had a goalie goal. We didn't even fucking talk about this. This guy is a dual threat. It's the Shohei Otani of the NHL. That's right, man. Look out. He's got more, he's got more, oh, I think was his technically a power play goal. Am I right about this? It was. Because he had that hilarious line where he was like, I want to go to the power play meetings now. So, yeah, I mean, he's got more goals this year than Brad Marchand. Does. And a 950 save percentage. Brad Marchand is probably not that good. I had the pleasure on the Wednesday podcast of breaking the news. to an actual NHL player

that he had just been passed by a goalie for career power play goals. I don't feel like he enjoyed the information, but I enjoyed the conversation. Jake Allen's running at 974, but he's only played two games, and Ilya Seroca also only two games, 9.53. Other guys up around there,

Dustin Wolf's 940-something, Casey DeSmith's 940-something, Alex Lyon, Anthony Stollars, Freddie Anderson, John Quick, Igor Shisterkin, Jonas Johansson, Sam Montembo, Joel Hoffer, Ilya Samsonov, Lucas Dostel, all north of 930. So it's early, I guess is my point. I don't expect many of those numbers to hold up personally. But hey, if they do, look out.

We've got a new Vezna winner in town. There you go. So, yeah, I like what the Jets are doing here, you know? Hard not to. But it does seem more sustainable than I would have thought. So big hats off to them. Now, Sean, do you know the other three teams that haven't lost in regulation yet? I know Calgary is one of them.

Yep, that's right. 4.0 and 1. Another team with the same record, expected to be quite good this year. Expect it to be quite good in New Jersey? Is it the, have the Rangers lost in regulation? The Rangers are also 4.0. And then there's a team. I mentioned it earlier in passing.

They're 3.0 and 2. I wasn't listening. That's smart. Is that Minnesota, though? That's Minnesota, yeah. Okay. And yeah, I mean, it's interesting because there was just an article, I can't remember if it was Sportsnet or the Athletic, that was like, look, we all know how the flames have started. This is great for them, obviously.

They're actually playing really well at five on five. They're one of the better five-on-five teams in the league right now by expected goals at least. But the plan is the plan, and they're not going to deviate from it just because they're winning a bunch of games that nobody thought they would win. And I think that's the right frame of mind here. This is a perfect opportunity for them to do a pump and dump on various veterans that otherwise might have not maybe fetch too much on the open market, you know? Mm-hmm. So pretty cool for them. And then the wild, I didn't see this coming.

Tell you that. I thought they'd be fine, and that's about it. Yeah, and they're three and two, which is fine. I guess that's true. But, you know, it's about banking points at any time of year. Sure. November 1st is coming right up. And, you know, right now they got to be feeling pretty good.

good about this start in terms of like, uh, um, just where, where it's going to put them, they have an 800 regulation points percentage that you take that every time. I know they lost both of the games that went to overtime, but you take 800 in regulation every single time,

period. You want to know a funny stat though, by the way? Mm-hmm. You know, you know how, uh, Utah, they're,

they're four one and one. You know, guess how many of their games have gone to overtime or, None of them have gone to a shootout. So how many of their games have gone to overtime, would you say? Well, I'm going to say at least one. That's correct. Let's go four.

Four is the exact correct number. Four out of their six games have gone to overtime. They're three in one in overtime. The only team they've beaten in regulation is Chicago on opening night. I don't know what to make of these fucking guys. I don't think they're that good. They're fun, but we can't be sitting here saying, and of course, they're also good. You know?

Yeah. Honestly, I think at this point, six games into the season, you've got the right take, which is we don't know what to make of these guys. Yeah. They're better than Arizona. I don't know why I'm mentioning the coyotes. They have nothing to do with Utah franchise, this brand new team. Yeah, I don't think Utah or Arizona's won a single game this year.

Nope. No, they haven't. It's pretty crazy. But yeah, I mean. We were all looking forward to seeing this team and seeing what they do without all that stuff hanging over them. So far, so good. Yeah.

Clayton Keller looks great. Dylan Gunther doesn't seem like he's going to run away with the Rocket Richard anymore, but he looks really good. It was nice that he's letting everyone else catch up. Yeah, that's exactly right. Did you see Kutrov has seven fucking goals already? That's not even a guy I think of. There's a guy scores a lot, you know?

He's just fill in the net. Again, he's doing the Connor McDavid thing. Like, all right. Do a hundred. What did I do? Last year I did 100. All right. This year, I'm going to...

No problem. Let's go 100 goals. Why not? He should do it. He should score 100 goals this year. Can't wait to do all that and finish fourth in the MVP voting again. That's exactly right, brother. So, yeah, there's a lot of fun teams out there that are performing quite well.

Again, we're a little more than a week away from November 1st, and all you're going to do is kind of getting that conversation on November 1st. and usually you'll be there until the end or, you know, pretty close to it. So that's all you're really looking for. With Minnesota, though, you know, once Gustafson stops being a 950 goalie, you know, stopping 19 out of 20 shots he sees. Yeah. That's a different conversation, but yeah. So he's a 950 goalie. Correct.

And he scored a goal. Does that mean his personal PDO is one? 95 right now. Okay. I mean... Let me look this up really quickly. Like, personal? Yeah, I guess that's how the... I'm just going on his own shooting percentage.

Yeah, I guess that's how it would work. And his own save percentage. Like, this is 19-fifth? Okay. Sustainable? Hard to say. I think the things Philip Gustafson does. That's it. Exactly. Okay.

I'm going to see if I can actually look up what his on-ice. PDO is. I think I can. Where the fuck would that be? Okay, here it is. When he's on the ice, it's a 103. Pretty good. Not bad. In fact, it's actually kind of bad because that means, and this is at five on five, obviously. But when he's on the ice and it's 103, that means they're shooting only six and a half percent.

Come on, guys. Well, I mean, you get a guy out there, goal-scoring talent like this. It's 104.6 is all situations, PDO. That's going to be one of the higher ones in the league. Good for him. He rocks. One bit of news here. There's just not a ton of news at this point in the season.

Elliot also said on Saturday night, no more award show, at least not this year. Yeah. Sad. Yeah. I mean, who's going to have the end? insanely bad magic tricks that don't work now. You know, where am I going to go to see that?

Well, yeah, that's a fair question. Look, I'm devastated by this. I probably love the award show more than anyone. And I'm very sad and grumpy that they might be taking it away. And I hope that we bring it back someday. And that's all I have to say on that. Yeah, I guess my thing with it is don't let the door hit you where the Good Lawyers split you, of course, to the award show.

But also, like, it makes sense that they're not doing it because they don't have a fucking centralized draft anymore. Yeah. So why would they have an award show? Part of the problem is that, like, the Stanley Cup final ends and 25 minutes later, like, Anaheim's going to be walking up to be like, okay, with the first overall pick from Boston College, James Hagen. Like, that's just how it's going to go this year because that's, you know, they want to build in that like week off between the conference final and the cup final and all this kind of stuff. So they just don't want to have it be so packed and it makes perfect sense and now's the perfect time to do it. But also, you know, the idea that basically what Elliot said is there's two ideas that seem to be kicking around. One is that you do it like the NBA does where

Before, you know, your team has a home playoff game You just go, oh, Connor McDavid won the MVP. Let's hand him the trophy. Like before game won. And people in the NBA love that shit. That does, you know, it is a little bit fun. My thing is, of course, if you're doing that awards presentation

before game one of the playoffs, seems like it's really more about you and not the team. You're a me first guy. That's right. I guarantee somebody's going to not skate out and accept the Norris trophy because their team's down to nothing in the series. That's exactly. And they will have a clip of them being like,

yeah, you couldn't pay me a million dollars to go out there. And everyone will be like leadership. Yeah. We're honestly going to have don't touch the trophy discourse about the freaking art trophy. About the Rocket Richard. You objectively just scored the most goals. Doesn't matter.

That was the regular season. That's not the trophy I'm here for. That's right. Okay. Cool, man. But the other idea is that they want to have a viral moment, which is like maybe they just bring it to the guy's house. And surprise him.

Yeah. Can you imagine like just you just break in a Connor McDavid's house and like middle of the night. You're going sort of Strickland mode on him. Grab him outside of beer store. Like, no. No. He doesn't get harassed enough about outside the beer store these days.

I can tell you, man. Anybody who's done marketing knows that the first step towards creating those viral moments is to just put, create viral moments in a PowerPoint. And then everyone just slaps their head and goes, that's a great idea. Well, this is the league where, uh, The coach of the year is always the guy who told his goalie to be 950, you know? So it maybe is just how it works around here. It's that simple.

But yeah, I can't, I can't condone doing an Ashtoncuchin-coucher-punk-style prank to give, to give Sasha Barkov the Selky. He gets, he gets freaking, he says, They ask him what award he thinks he wins. And he goes, I don't know. And they drop a bunch of slime on him and then hand him a trophy, you know. That's a reference for all the 48-year-olds out there. Now I want to see this. You just know, everyone would be like those, the guys getting called into the coach's office to be told he made the team.

Like one football team did that once. And everybody was like, this is our new thing. So it's going to be like, yeah. You imagine when they call like Connor McDavid into the coach's office and they're like, guess what? And he's like, what? First of all, why is there a pointy thing on your desk with a tarp over it? They're like, because you won the Art Ross. And he's like, yeah, I know.

That's like a statistical award. I've known that for weeks now. And they're like, oh. Do you have surprised at all? The one funny take of that I saw was that it'll be funny when Macklin Celebrini wins the Calder and Joe Thornton answers the door shirt off like with a towel. Yeah. Around his waist. Yeah.

So. That would be pretty good. Yep. I'm looking forward to. I'm in. Yeah. Why don't we end the show this week, in honor of Tyler Myers reaching his 1,000th career game with. a round of the classic game

20 questions, the game about guys who have played a thousand games. The boys were talking. The boys are talking. So let me pull up the list of a thousand games players and then the

random number generator here. Okay, there are with Tyler Myers entering the club. That means there are, Keep scrolling, keep scrolling. Here we go. 398 maybe? Or that might not include.

Hold on. Let me see if that list includes because that... Yeah, I need to know this. Like, if it's going to throw off my calculations. Yeah, $399 would be Myers, I'm pretty sure. So he didn't get added to the list yet. You hate to see this. So let me just...

Okay, let me see. see who the number that just came up is. And if we have done him before, I don't think we have. But there's only one way to find out. Nope, you're good. We did it. So you may now ask me a yes or no question about this player. Is he Canadian?

No. Did he play in the 1990s? Yes. Did he play in the 1980s? I'm pretty sure, but let me triple check that. No, he did not. Oh. Yes, he did.

His first season was 89.90, so I got a little turned around on that one. All right. Forward. Yes. Winger? No. American. Yes.

All right. So this guy is an American center who started in 89. Hmm. Any major awards? Uh, let's see here. No. Hall of Famer? Uh, yes.

Did he ever play for a Canadian team? No. Did he ever score 50 goals? Let me look. Yep, you sure did. Has he ever written the forward of a book for anybody? No, he hasn't. It's not him?

Oh, come on. You know what? I guess I should Google this guy and forward, but it's not the guy who you're thinking. For like the last four questions, I thought I was absolutely drilling it down, and I thought I was just dragging it out for everybody. Oh, man. It does not appear as though he has ever written the foreword of a book. book. Jeremy Ronick was the guy to explain to anyone who's new or confused. And of course,

wrote the intro to one of Greg's books. That's right. And I think that's what got him in the Hall of Fame. But now, okay, so now I got to think of a 50-goal scoring American Center who's in the Hall of Fame. I'm thrown off. I thought, because I think I even, I think the rookie year is even right for Roanick. Okay. Did he play for the Detroit Red Wings? He did. Yeah. Is it Mike Madano?

It is Mike Madano. Okay. The other guy. The other one. Yeah, he had the 150 goal season. And he came in second in the Calder voting, obviously his rookie year in 8990. Ever appear with Basil McCray in a major motion picture? He certainly did.

Okay. I mean, that's almost as good as right enough. I mean, it's kind of the equivalent. Also, Madonna, the year he lost the Calder was to Sergei Makarov when he was 31 years old. So it's a little, a little trickier. But yeah, that was an easy, breezy one for you. I'll give you one more here and then maybe you can shoot me one and we'll get out of here. All right.

Let me scroll down. Let me just check really quickly that this guy is not Nope, he's not So you may begin asking questions now Canadian Let me pull up actually his His page because I don't know The fact that he is to think about it

Well this is just a player I'm not familiar with Yeah, he is Canadian All right Did he play in the 90s? He did. Did he play in the 80s? Yes, he did. Was he a forward?

Yep, he was. Was he a winger? No, he was not. All right. I won't ask about the Hall of Fame because you're not sure who he is. Yeah, that's right. I'm always giving little hints. You are.

You're dropping like little helpers. Did he have a thousand points? No, yep, he did. He did. Oh, yeah there, okay. Hmm. Did he ever win a cup? Let me scroll down a little bit here.

Yes, he did. Did he play for three or more teams? No. No. Okay. Did he play for a Canadian team? Yes. Did he play for the Toronto Maple Leafs?

No. Did he play for the Vancouver Canucks? No. Do one more. Montreal? Yes. Okay. So he's played for Montreal and one other team.

Mm-hmm. He is a center with a thousand points. He's Canadian. and Ryan was not super familiar with him, which doesn't necessarily narrow it way, way down. But he played for only... Well, actually, we didn't... Did he play for...

Okay, did he play for only Montreal? No. Okay. That was probably a... Koevoo's not Canadian. Damnfuss played for... I also know who Saku Koebu is. Yeah, you would have known who Saku Koi is.

Yeah, that's... That is true. Did this guy ever get Selky votes? Selky votes, yes. Did he have over 1,200 points? No. Okay. And by my count, that's my 15th question, I believe.

So, and he didn't win a cup. No, he did win a cup. He won. He did win a cup? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I do. I have a little, yeah.

Did he win a cup? with Montreal then? Yes. Okay. So that narrows it down to 86 and 93. Did Brian Scridland? Is it Brian Scruidland? No, it is not.

I don't even know if he got to either a thousand points or a thousand games, but I am throwing the guesses on out there. Thousand points. Brian Bellows wasn't a center. And I feel like you would know Brian Bellows. I would. from the from the bride trotche clip and also his son played for b you of course well and i only know that because well i i saw him play but also uh he got drafted by the islanders and they asked him

on his draft day like hey your your dad is in a famous video featuring the islanders do you know about this and he was like yeah it's funny okay yeah he was like yeah no my my male friends have not sent that clip to me. Thousands of times. Thank you for that. All right. Ah, boy, I got to bear down here. So centers, I mean, you would know,

I mean, Carbono didn't get anywhere close to a thousand points. Ganey's not a center. Who are the centers on that team? Kirk Muller, you would know. So I'm thinking it's got to be the 86 team. Is it, oh, no, you know, okay. Was this guy a, was this guy the first overall pick in a draft? Yes, he was.

It's Bobby Smith. That's correct. All right, yep, there we go. Calder winner, his rookie year, he had 1,036 career points in 1777 career games played. The other team he played for, the Minnesota North Stars, who drafted him first overall in the 1778. draft. Yep. And I believe he started and finished his career there.

Correct. Yeah, he went back in the early 90s. 86 to win the cup with Montreal? Okay, that's a good one. All right, you want one? Yeah, sure. All right, let me find somebody who's played a lot of games. Yeah, let's go with this guy.

Okay. Let's go. I am ready. Is he Canadian? No. Is he European? Yes. Okay.

Is he a forward? Yes. Did he play in the 2000s? He did. Okay. A forward played in the 2000s. European. Played a ton of games.

Any major awards? Was a second team all-star one time. Okay. I wouldn't call that a major award, but thank you. Is he an active player? No. Interesting. European forward.

I'll narrow down the country a little more. Is he Swedish? Nope. Okay, he's not Swedish. Um, did he ever play for a Canadian team? Yes. Yes, he did. Okay.

Eastern Conference? The Canadian team that he played for? Yes. You mean? Uh, yes. Okay. And he played in the 2000s, and he's not Swedish. I was circling Matt Sundeen for a minute there, but...

Well, heck, I guess it's not Nick Baxter either, is it? Speaking of guys who aren't active, um, did he only play for, no, hold on. One, oh,

and Matt Sundy, probably would have had more than just the one, second team all-star anyway. Um, not active. Would you say, uh, this is a guy who,

uh, played in the 2010s? He did. Okay. Okay. So this is still more my speed, I guess you would say. You would know this guy. Yeah, of course. If you played in the 2010s, there's no way I didn't.

Hmm. Eastern Canadian team. He's European. He's a forward. One second team All-Star played in the 2010s. Not active. The not active is going to fuck me up, I feel like. Did he play for three or more teams?

Yes, he did. Okay. Did he ever win a Stanley Cup? He did. Okay. That was your 12th question. Okay. The guy, hmm.

Yeah, I guess he would have finished. Okay. I will guess Mary. Gary and Gabrik. No. Ooh. Okay. Because he played for a bunch of teams.

He won a cup with the Kings, I believe. Mm-hmm. Played in Ottawa to end his career. Played in the 2000s and the 2010s. European forward. Um. Hmm. This is...

And if he's... If he was a second team all-star, he would have represented his country at some point. Did he... Is he a leaf? No. Okay. So, Ottawa or... Ottawa or Montreal.

Hmm. I'm just trying to think of, like, pretty good European players of the last several years here. Well, I'm going to give you a free hint. Okay. He... did play in the 2000s and the 2010s. He won his Stanley Cup in the 90s. Oh, shit.

Okay. Well, I was barking up the complete rung tree there. Yeah, so this is played. His career spanned three decades. Right. Actually, a big chunk of the 90s, obviously all of the 2000s and then into the 2010s. Yeah, I was just barking up the wrong.

Well, I'm glad you intervened and kept me from humiliating myself. Um, one in the 90s. Okay, let me think about 90s Stanley Cup winners, winning teams, I guess I should say. I think if, oh no, that's a defenseman. Never mind. I was going to say Sergey Gonchar, but that's a defenseman.

That's not a forward at all. And, yeah, anyway, geez, would you say he, Well, obviously he didn't. Well, I guess he could have won his Stanley Cup with Montreal in the early 90s as a younger player. But I can't think of anybody. Well, I'll tell you, without telling you anything about who he won his cup with, he debuted in the 92-93 season. Okay. This guy played forever.

It certainly sounds like it, yeah. Oh, my God. Is it fucking Yarmier Yager? No. Oh, yeah, I guess he never played for, for, like, Montreal or... He never did make it to Eastern Canada. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

Sheesh. I believe that puts you to 15 questions. Oh, that's not good news to hear. Jesus. Nope, incorrect. Yep, that's right. He tried out for the Canadians, Couldn't get over the hump.

That was, that's a tough group to break into. Jesus, if he played that long, there can't be that many Europeans who just played whatever, like 1,400 games, right? I wouldn't think there's, there's, now I'm going to kind of sneakily look up the list. There's, I mean, there's a handful of European players who did. outlasts this guy, including Sundane you've mentioned, Deager you've mentioned, but the list isn't super long. Interesting.

I'm going to give you one more hint to just nudge you along. No, that's okay. Let me think about this. Not active, played. Look at this. I'm throwing the chair into the ring and he's kicking it back out to the outside. Yeah, I'm doing the, I'm doing the Will Osprey thing. Do I want to go there, you know?

Okay. So he probably, Montreal and Ottawa, won a Stanley Cup, played forever, European, like 1,400 career games played forward. Not Swedish, that's what led me to Yager, partly. They debuted in the early 90s. Is he Russian? Yes, he is. I think it's Alexei Kovalev then. It sure is.

Okay. Look at that, guys. He pulled it out. And that was going to be the hint that he was Russian. And he found it. He actually played for both Montreal and Ottawa. Right. No recollection of him in Ottawa.

Yeah, I was going to say that's one of those things where I only know it because I, anytime I see it, I'm like, that can't be right. Yeah. One is Cup with the Rangers in 94. Yes, that's right. Also played for Pittsburgh, Montreal, Ottawa, and 14 games with Florida that I simply do not acknowledge. And had a year off in between.

Did he like go to go home and then come back? I think he must have. Yeah. Yeah. So there you go. There you have. Nicely done by you. Thanks.

Yeah, why don't you hit him with the plugs and let's get the hell out of here? I was just writing Alexei Kovalev's name on the list of players that we've done for 20 questions. Alexi Kovilov, click, click. You just made the list. That's right. We're already on the list. I don't have the list.

We are up to 33 players we have done for. So they're turning them out faster than we can get them. You know what I should have done? I should have gone Tyler Myers on you. Just. I think I would have gotten it. I think I could have figured that one out pretty quickly. Okay.

Would have been fun. Calling a shot for next time. Yeah. Well, don't do it next time now. I might. You'll never. Okay. Reverse psychology.

Find me at the Athletic Hockey Show. I'm on the Athletic Hockey Show with Sean Gentile and Frankie Carrado, neither of whom have more power play goals and Philip Gustafson. I have got my weekend rankings running again. I am going to run a piece tomorrow-ish, maybe Thursday,

where I'm going to go through every team and think back on a time that they had a lousy start to a season. And it didn't matter, because they were actually good all along. This is my little piece of optimism for all you Nashville and other fans out there. Colorado. Colorado and what have you.

So, yep, check me out there. And that's it. And then for me, EPRinkside.com, use the code, I love EP, all one word, all capital letters. When you sign up for an annual subscription, they'll tack three months on to the end. That's 15 months for the price. at 12. What a bargain. I got all kinds of stuff going on over there. NHL coverage, NCAA coverage, which we're ramping up this year.

People seem to really like it, so that's good. And then, yeah, Patreon.com slash puck soup. All kinds of bonus episodes. Me, Sean, Sean, Greg, Adam. We're all over there. We're all doing it. So, yeah, check it out. And we'll catch you next week.

Bye, bye. Bye, bye.