Puck Soup - Are You Ready?

Episode Date: October 8, 2024

Sean and Ryan talk about the Jeremy Swayman contract, the Sabres, the first coach to be fired, and more. Sponsored by AGI (drinkag1.com/puck) and Factor (factormeals.com/puck50)

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I'm Sean McIndoo from The Athletic. And folks, it's opening night of the NHL season, as long as you ignore the two games they already had. Tonight. Which we all seem to be doing, by the way. Well, at least one team did. But tonight, we opened the season in a city that might be flooded by a hurricane

hitting the other side of the state, where the Stanley Cup champions take on the team they beat. in the second round only. You're not really hyped to me up here, man. But first, it's a matchup between two teams that missed the playoffs last season and won't be good this year. And then in the nightcap, it's two teams that also miss the playoffs. And we're really hoping you don't notice one of them as the coyotes.

Yeah, let's fucking go. All right. But at least that first game, like that's, I'm assuming that's happening in like prime time or something. We can all like just sit down. They didn't put it in the middle of the afternoon. No, no, no. They would never put the first game of the NHL regular season that you don't have in Europe.

They would never put that at 4.30 p.m. Cool. All right. Especially if that game was at, let's say, 1.30 local time. Mm-hmm. Is this like one of your weird American holidays or is there? You know, I was reminded this week that Monday is one of our weird American holidays. Like this coming Monday is Columbus slash Indigenous People's Day, depending on where you are living.

And in some states, I think it's still probably not a holiday at all. That certainly was the case when I was a kid. They didn't – we had Columbus Day when I was a kid, but over the border in New Hampshire, they didn't celebrate it, I think. Or am I thinking of Martin Luther came – one of those ones where they were like, not every state celebrates it. But that's next Monday. I don't know what they think is going on on Tuesday. Yeah. Maybe it's just a holiday whenever the Cracken Play.

Like, are they... They're just that big. Yeah, I mean, that's why they had all those articles last year about if we don't support this team, they're going to leave. Yeah. So it's a very exciting start to the NHL season. But let's start with this. This was the big breaking news yesterday, I guess it was, right? Or Sunday.

It was Sunday. I don't know what day it is. One of the teams that's playing at 7 o'clock tonight in a game that may or may not actually be played signed their goalie, Jeremy Swayman, eight years, eight and a quarter million bucks Aavvy ending a, what, month-long standoff? Yes. Something like that you said standoff and not hold out. Good attention to detail by you.

Well, you know, it was a, what do they call it, a Mexican standoff? And they say that in, uh, Inglorious bastards where they're just like both pointing their guns at each other and going like, now what? Yep. No, you shoot first, you know, that kind of thing. But what's interesting is Jeremy Swayman's agent, Louis Gross. He said that all that stuff, Cam Neely said, about 64 million reasons to play. He's like, that actually worked. That made us negotiate again.

Good old Cam. Got it going. He's seeing through the game. X-ray vision, Cam Neal. Or D-Chess, baby. Literally, the quote was like, that brought us back to the table. It forced our hand, both ways, kind of.

Like, now that there's a number out there, we have to do it. And the number came in more like 66 million reasons, of course. Which makes you kind of say, is like the $300,000 a year they were fighting over? Like, was it really worth all this? I mean, is it possible that we should just take everyone at their word and that this is, this was the first time that Swayman's group had heard 64 million? Well, I think. Because nobody seemed to buy that a week ago, but then the way this resolved, maybe.

Yeah, I think that. You know, someone, someone said it was more like, you know, like 63 in a quarter or whatever. You know, like it was, they had offered him like 7.85 million. And then I think we said it last week. Like, that's technically not 64 million. So, and they expected Cam Neely to, you know, do the math in his head on the fly, you know. So, so I think, I think that we were getting into the like technicalities, portion of the discussion.

But, you know, now it comes in at $66 million. And it's like, yeah, that doesn't sound like a lot, but it is $2 million. You know? I'd love if my agent could get me $2 million. First of all, I'd love to have an agent. Second of all, I'd love if he could get me an extra $2 million over the next eight years. Because I could get pretty good at hockey first. It's going to be tough for me.

I'm 41 years old. I feel like you can still do it. Don't count yourself out. So where are we at on the deal itself? Putting aside the drama it took to get there. Totally fine, I think. It's not crazy. You know, there was talk that he wanted like nine and a half or something like that.

And again, just I can't remember who he talked to with the athletic, maybe Pierre. He was like, well, the ruins were pretty firm that. You know, we weren't going to get that kind of money because that kind of money goes to guys who they're buying all UFA years. And with Swamen, they were still buying two RFA years. So that's why the number is lower than we would have wanted it to be. And he's like, and it made sense to us when, you know, when they said that, that checked out. But that's just, you know, another hill we had to climb or whatever. Yeah.

So I have no problem with eight and a quarter for him. That feels about right. Yeah, it didn't reset the market the way that there was some talk of them aiming to do. It is a very big chunk of money for a goaltender. It's a huge chunk of years for a goaltender. But as you and I have discussed, if you're going to give eight years to a goalie, have it be a guy in his mid-20s. Yeah, this contract ends when he's like 33, 34 years old.

Yeah. I don't, I don't, I don't think there's anybody that has a huge problem with that. You know, there are a lot of goalies these days who are still extremely effective at that age. And Swamen as a guy who, I guess you could say, doesn't have a ton of miles on him. He's not playing 50, 60 games a year, you know? Maybe that help. I think he's probably about to. That becomes the question, right?

We have never seen him do that. Right. So, but it's. It is, it makes sense, right? I mean, you're, it's, it's all well and good to say, geez, you know, you'd like to mitigate the risk, go a little shorter, go a little, this takes two sides to negotiate, you know. Jeremy Swinman wasn't going to happily take like a four-year deal and, and then touch base again down the line and do this all over again. So, when do you think we see him?

Game two probably that... You get that quick game? I mean, he's been working out this whole time. He was working out at BU. So it's not like, you know, he didn't put pads on or anything like that this whole time. He was working out, he was playing hockey. He just wasn't doing it with the Bruins.

It would have been very funny if he hadn't worked out at all. Okay, well, okay. He just shows up 70 pounds overweight. Like, hey guys, what's up? The Milan Luzon. each lockout plan. Remember that? But I have a quick story about that.

In college hockey over the weekend, Merrimack College played Stonehill in their season opener on Sunday. And due to two eligibility issues and an injury, their fourth string goalie was forced to start the game and be the only dressed goalie in the game, Merrimack's. Now you're like, oh, college hockey teams carry fourth string goleys.

They do not. Okay. It's going to ask. What happened is their first string goalie, like I said, hurt. Their second string goalie was, or second and third string goleys were sitting out due to eligibility issues from what I understand. I don't know what those were, but, you know, regardless, they just weren't able to play in that game. And so their fourth string goalie, quote unquote, was the kid who's just like their intern. equipment manager or team manager, I mean.

And he is a kid who last played goalie in any kind of a competitive way in Maine high school hockey four years ago. And who hadn't put, like, who hadn't skated in nine months. I love it. How do you do? I'm pulling up the box score now. He somehow beat the Toronto Maple Leafs. He stopped. I can't find it really quickly at the tip of my fingers here, but they lost three to in overtime.

And he stopped, let's say, whatever, 22 of 25, something like that. Not bad at all. So you know what? Maybe I can become a decent NHL player. Just give me like six months or something, you know? The reason I'm asking about game two is when did they announce Corpusallo as the starter for game one? The same day the $64 million thing happened. So it was like a week ago.

So unless you view that just purely as a negotiating tactic, the implication was it's going to take more than the week from the moment he gets in here to get ready. And that was with a week of camp. Like, is he going to come in and just play? I guess it probably depends largely on how game one goes. if there even, as you say, is a game one. Yeah. It doesn't look like Hurricane Milton is going to make any kind of direct hit on the Miami area.

It's all Tampa is going to get freaking crushed, unfortunately. But it, you know, there will certainly be, like I said, there's like a flood watch or something for Miami-Dade County on all that. So that's not looking great, but yeah, I think, you know, they already announced the starter for game one. So it's not going to be swaying. It's already announced. You know, as long as they're keeping K-Fave anyway. You know, maybe they could just be like, he's good to go, whatever. But I don't know, you can't have them start any later than game three, can you?

I think you start him when he's ready, but... Sure. Yeah, I mean, you're not paying him $8 million to take his time and relax about it. And I'm sure he understands that going into it. Yeah. Maybe game two or three is about right. And I think that's when's the Bruins game two? Let's see if we can find this very quickly here.

The Bruins game two is Saturday, it looks like. Nope, Thursday. They're hosting the Canadians. Montreal. You heard of them? So, yeah, looks like Thursday would be game two. Maybe that's a little quick of a turnaround, but I guess we'll see. Anything else on old Jeremy Swimming in the Boston Bruins?

I guess the only other thing that is worth pointing out is our buddy Gerg at ESPN pointed out this morning that the timing of the whole thing. thing was very fun with the threat of you know we're gonna we're gonna go away for a couple of days and think about our next options which was very ominous followed immediately by the Amazon

series coming out where Jeremy Swamon is like I never ever ever want to be anywhere but playing for the Boston Bruins. Yeah we'll talk about that the Amazon show which I have watched and Sean has not we'll talk about that after

after the break in a little while here. But it is funny how much they just like, we're like, oh, this is where this guy lives, by the way. A lot of real, like, revealing skyline shots from where, from where Quinn Hughes lives in Vancouver. And, like, Jeremy Swamen literally lives in the building across the street from TD Garden and all that kind of stuff. It made me laugh.

But, you know, maybe that's not a secret to other people, you know? But yeah The funny thing about Jeremy Swayman's apartment Is if you live in Boston You've seen one billion apartments That look exactly the same Okay It's crazy how same same everything is

This is obviously bigger than anyone I ever lived in He makes a lot more money than I do As I mentioned earlier But like I was just like Oh yeah all the same fixtures All the same countertouchers all this all like saying countertops. I've been in this apartment a million times.

Okay, great. Very funny. He could upgrade it now, though. Yeah? You can, look, he can afford to buy, I think, at this point. Even in a crazy city like Boston. You know, it costs like more than New York in some parts of Boston? Really?

Yeah. To live in Boston. I'm from there. I don't care about that, you know? But anyway. I guess the other like big news contract that got signed this week is Nils Hoaglander three years, three million bucks. You got any big thoughts on that? Not really to be honest.

Yeah, no, he's a good player. That one sort of didn't get, didn't steal the headlines away from. No, it certainly wouldn't have. I guess I could hit you with Esper Walsat too, but who cares? You know, that's just one of those things where it's like, oh, yeah, okay, great, good for him. Yeah, I mean, 23-year-old, crack 20 goals. Yeah, he's a good, he's a very good young player. You take that and you, if you're the player, you probably don't completely mind going a little bit short on it.

Although you're an NHL player, so you probably would have rather have gotten eight years and signed away your entire future. Yeah, makes sense for both sides. Sure does. Jacob Verona made the caps. We excited about that. That's fun. That's cool. Super excited.

Yep. And your friend Max Fatscher-Ready is on the Toronto Maple Leafs until he gets hurt again. With a deal that apparently, I can't remember who reported it, but was agreed to before he ever showed up. But they did it as a PTO so that they could squeeze every. everything under the cap. You got to give the leaves some respect for coming in $1 under the cap. Yep. One dollar. If you've seen the headlines. I think someone said it's like 40 cents, honestly. Yeah. If if like I saw the headline a few times and my brain just like turned $1 $1 million before I realized, no, it's actually $1. But you have to keep in mind that that dollar

is going to be worth like $1.45 at the trade deadline. So there's. And with the conversion rate. I mean, but then you got a factor in the taxes. Oh, for the taxes. I'm always hearing about this. Oh, and Kevin LeBank with Columbus. Now, that was one where he, where was he on a New Jersey PTO, which is something that we do tend to forget this time of year. When you're on a PTO with a team, you can sign anywhere at any time.

You're just trying out. Any other team could call you up and be like, hey, come sign with us and you can go do it. You owe nothing to the team you're doing the PTO with, but we almost never see it. Yeah. Either because there's only one team that wants the guy or because there's sort of a wink and a nod that guy's planning to sign there. But in this case. Yeah.

But obviously Columbus needed another NHL forward. Yeah. And much better opportunity for him as far as. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And, you know, the hope, like, he had a good preseason with New Jersey, right? So, like, the hope is he's back on track a little bit now, and they're going to be able to put him in a position to succeed a little bit. And so, like, it's just a good fit for all involved.

Like, you can't be mad at that. That's great. I can be mad at whatever I want to be mad at. You know what? I retract my statement. You're right. Oh, and it says here, I didn't even see this, but it says here, Kyler Yamamoto

league minimum in Utah. Okay. Yep, there you have it, folks. Hey, why not? You know, there's still some upside there, it feels like. What's this, his ninth NHL team already, though? Something like that. Ninth time's the charm.

It's the pure Luke Boblin. You know, he was with Seattle all last year. I thought he got traded somewhere. Okay, this is what I was thinking of. He got traded to Detroit who bought out contract. Oh, okay. And then he signed with Seattle.

That's what I was thinking of. Okay. All right. There you go. Hey, we mentioned it earlier. They already played two games in the NHL. Now, they made them as difficult to watch as possible. They put them on the NHL network at like 10 in the morning.

Sure. Yeah, I did not watch either game. I watched both, and I planned to keep up my... I plan to keep up my streak of watching every second of every NHL game all season. Wow. So nobody can come to you with a, if you actually watch my team. All 82, baby, let's do it. Yeah.

So you didn't watch them. I'm sure you saw the headlines, and I'm sure you can guess what people's takeaway from these games was. Well, Sheldon Keith. Sheldon Keith is the greatest coach in the history of the NHL. Well, it goes without saying. regular season only. Yeah, and the, it's things not off to a great start in Buffalo. Now, I mentioned this in something I wrote that may or may not have even been published yet.

Do you remember the last time that Lindy Rough started a season 0 and 2? Yeah, it was the fire Linda year. Yeah, and they then won 16 of their next 17 games and finished with 112. Some reason I don't see the savers pulling that one off. I'm just saying the numbers are what the numbers are, Ryan. Yeah, I understand. The savers are currently on pace for 112 points. Look, I, speaking of Gerg, I saw that he predicted the savers would make the playoffs,

but also was like, okay, I did that prediction before the Europe games. So you can't be mad at me. First of all, if you thought the Sabers were making it, before the Europe games, I still don't know what to say to you about that, you know? When I was putting together what we learned this week, I clicked on a Sabres blog that was like, let's talk about all the storylines going into the season. And they had predictions in there. And all four of the people who write for the blog were like, oh, they're making the playoffs this year.

And so one of them had them making it to like 105 points or something. And it's like, look, you know, you want to be optimistic about your team. I get it. But like, you don't want to be living. like Fantasyland saying the Buffalo Sabres are going to be a hundred and five point team this year. What did they have last year? 84 or something like that? They were 84 points last year, yeah.

A 21 point improvement? Look, I like Jason Zucker. It has happened. And they are a young team. I like Jason Zucker, you know, but I don't 21 points like them. Yeah. Well, I mean, the hope would have been get the office. offense clicking and that the young-ish goaltending would be a significant improvement,

even though it's the same guys as last year that they get better season. Two games in, they've scored two goals, they gave up what, seven? Yeah, I got to say, watching those games, goaltending wasn't the problem. No. Devin Levi on, I guess it would have been Saturday in particular. You were like, oh, looks like he's Devin Levi now. You know, he looked really, really good. I can't fall to go Bechalukinan for too many of the goals that he conceded in the first game.

But, like, I don't know, man. That's still the table. That's not good, right? I mean, when you give up seven goals and you're like, the goaltending wasn't the issue. Well, no, of course. It's, okay, what was the issue? And the issue was they got outplayed bad by a New Jersey team that a lot of people are picking us cup. Cup contenders.

So, I mean, you talk about a team that's got to improve 21 points. That's the Devils, too, but they feel a lot more likely to do it. So, I mean, let's just, you know, obviously it's two games. But did these two games tell us more about the Devils or the Sabres? I think, well, frankly, it told us nothing about either team. Sure. Other than they either banked four points or failed to bank any points, right? Like that's really, like, when I wrote about this on Sunday, I was like, look, you don't want to draw conclusions from, from, whether it's two games in the preseason, which a lot of people were like, oh, the vibes around the Sabres are good because they had a good preseason.

Okay, sure. You know, two games in the free season, two games in October, two games in January, two games in the Stanley Cup final. You shouldn't be making any grand pronouncements about what this means for how good or bad a team is, right? Like, it's just the word sample size gets thrown around a lot these days, but like that's, you don't want to get into that. But with the Sabres in particular, you're just kind of like, right, these guys are losers. They didn't improve the team. I mean, they entered the year with, I think the number was 6.1 million in cap space, according to Puckpedia. Kevin Adams was surprisingly conservative in the off season, let's just say.

That's the nicest way I can put it. Yeah, and like, you don't know why he was conservative, right? Like, he wants to be able to make moves later, but is that just spin for the owner didn't want me spending to the cap this year? We, you know, we can make our guesses about that. Which then leads to, like, this is, you know, this is. When you step back and just look at the scenario of the team, everything about this screams GM on the hot seat. Of course. But is this a GM on the hot seat or is this a GM doing exactly what the owner wants?

And so he's going to be totally fine while the owner focuses more on his football team and whether what to do with that side of things. Well, so, you know, we saw people say kind of during the summer and then again at the beginning, like before, these games started. Like, you know, we've heard all along that if the, if the sabres aren't more competitive and don't take a step or whatever, like, there will be consequences for this. What could the consequences be for a team that is, what, they haven't made the playoffs since like 2014, I think it's been 11 years? It's longer than that.

I think you were right to first 2011. I think 2011. 2011. They made it. Even better. Let's talk through this Because I straight up don't know what the consequences could be The GM gets fired

Okay, well, like, what's the next guy going to do? You know? Who's the next guy going to be? Who's lining up to go? No, I don't know if you heard this Sean. There's only 32 of these damn jumps. Is that how many there are? Well, currently.

One of these days they're going to add third and 34th. I mean, in theory, it's an attractive job if it ever opens up because it's a young team low expectations, not low expectations, but you're not coming in following what the bar has been

the limbo bar has been dropped on the floor and now it's covered in cobwebs and stuff like that. Yeah. But, you know, the situation of going in and well, I guess I guess we'll see

if it doesn't turn around. I mean, at what point, you know, you said you can't really learn anything from two games, and I would agree with that. How many games does it take before you hit a panic button on a team like the Sabres

given what they're facing coming into the year? I mean, I'm panicking now, because... But you would have been panicking before the season then based on... Yeah, they didn't meaningfully improve in the offseason,

and they sucked. At what point does your panic rise based on the results that you've seen? I don't know, eight, ten games, like, you know, it's the November 1st thing, right? It's, like, if you're four points out of the playoffs by November 1st, you might as well just fucking call it in the season.

You know, like the rarity of team, and I'm going to go out on a limb and guess without having the list in front of me, that if you're one of these teams that is, like bucking that trend, you were supposed to be good all along and the bounces just started going. Like the Oilers last year, for example, where like they were weirdly bad to start the year, but everybody was like, well, that probably isn't going to last. And they made changes, obviously.

But I think that's kind of what you're expecting. And do you put the Sabres in the 20, 23, 24 Edmonton Oilers? I'm going to nudge them just down a little bit. Okay, that makes sense. Yeah. You know what's even worse for, I'm not even saying for the Sabres, for Sabres fans. Yeah, that's all you really, I mean, who gives a shit if the Sabres make it other than it would be good for, like, okay, they make the playoffs. And, you know, like, they get fucking Stan Hansen clotheslined out of the, out of the first round.

If they make the playoffs as a wild card, and they play the Leafs in the first round, they will win that series. I have been doing this long enough to know exactly how that goes. But you know what the rough thing is? It's bad enough to start 0 and 2, but because the games are in Europe, then you have to wait like a week for your next game.

Because of the travel and getting readjusted and all of that, which is almost like the worst way to do it, right? like just you think you'd want to just get back out there. But no, we get to sit around. And, you know, the result is people like us are talking crap about the Sabres three days after their last game because we still can. You know, then they go out there in their next game and they win and we go, okay, they're fine. And we move on to the next team that's 0.1-2. But I mean, again, it's just like, how could you ever, if you're a person,

that watches this league, how could you ever sit there and be optimistic about the Buffalo Sabres at this point? You know what I mean? Like, it really is that simple to me of just like, yeah, no, like they're the Sabres, though. Like, I don't, that's what I keep coming back to, people being surprised that this happened or whatever. It's like, you're surprised that the Sabres are bad? Yeah, I don't think, I hope not too many people are surprised other than the Diehard

Sabers fans where, like, yes, you get to be irrational and weird about your own team. Even still. Everyone else is kind of, hey, I'll believe it when I see it. And, yeah, I haven't seen it yet so far. And the devils look good. The devils looked really good. Yeah. Now, do you think there's anything to the fact that they played the coach that they just fired?

Yeah. Probably not, but do you mean in terms? terms of knowing what he was going to do or in terms of like let's well knowing what he was going to do as in sort of deal oh no I was kind of taking a third path knowing what he's going to do in terms of well it is Lindy Ruff you know this doesn't this doesn't strike me as a guy with a lot of answers behind the bench yeah um but yeah I like I said I I've seen people being like oh you know safe They could make the playoffs, and it's just like, like you said, you're not going to believe it when you see it with these guys.

You're just going to go on blind faith that the year Tage Thompson shot 58% or whatever. That was like the baseline that you should be operating from. Is that the number he shot? Man, that's a good year by him. It was something like that. Yeah. Well, you know. No, but like that year that he scored all of his goals a couple years ago and they missed the playoffs by two points or whatever it was.

Like, that was just like a weird year for them. And everybody was like, well, that's what, he had 94 points that year. He scored 47 goals. And you were like, okay, well, that's what the Sabres are. They're young and stuff, you know. 94 points. And people thought that was like the jumping off point for them. Listen to this.

Sabers. He shot 16. I don't like talking about the Sabres. Yeah. He shot 16%. Jeff Skinner shot 14.5. he's not with the team anymore. Alex sucks shot 16 and a half.

Dylan Cousin shot 15. You can go down the list, you know? And they miss the playoffs doing that. They should do that again. Well, again, Jeff Skittner probably will shoot 15% this year. You play next to the under eyesight, a little big dog. One of the best passers alive is going to be feeding you the puck. How's that sound?

He's like, oh, well, my linemate in Buffalo was like Jack Quinn or whatever. So I guess that sounds pretty good. So, yeah. Like you say, I don't have any big devil's takes, except I do want to say this really quickly. Looks like getting those two goalies this summer worked out pretty well for them. So far so good. Yeah. Those guys seem like they haven't figured out a little bit.

Who could have seen that coming? Yeah. Who knew that significantly improving the most important position? could improve your team. Hey, speaking of goalies, did you see Kevin Weeks just tweeted out about Igor Shasturkin? No, I didn't see this. Rejected an 11-year $88 million, or sorry, an 8-year $88 million, so an 11 million A-A-V offer by the Rangers and Kevin Weeks says that he is told it was rejected.

So what would have been the highest goal of contract in NHL history turned down? Is that true? No, Carrie Price was 10.5. Carrie Price was 10.5. Yeah. That's crazy. I mean, I don't think it is crazy in that best goal in the league in his prime probably should surpass a deal that was signed five years ago or whatever it was. but that's a big number.

That is a big number to leave sitting. Right. Well, I mean, you know, you say in his prime, that would have been his age 29 to 36 seasons. Yeah. So, you know, that's probably roughly equivalent to that last Henrik Lunkwist contract. Remember that one that that was a huge contract when it got what was it like eight and a half seven or eight years ago probably more than maybe a decade ago now. Eight and a half is like more than Jeremy Swimming makes now, right? Like for, you know, all the ways the cap has gone up or whatever.

But man, like you want to talk about resetting the market. Like he's he's trying to say I should be making like whatever. Connor McDavid money. Mm-hmm. Which, again, as you say, one of the best goalies alive, et cetera. But it's just surprising, I guess, that 11 wasn't enough to get it done.

It's wild. So again, he is in the last year of his contract, so none of this affects him playing, unlike Swayman, but very, very. interesting one to watch. Totally. Yeah. All right.

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This week's episode of Puck Soup is brought to you by Factor. And folks, I say this once fall rolls around every single year. Busy, busy, busy time for, I feel like most people, right? You know, whether you're going to take your kids to soccer games and parties and, you know, Halloween's right around the corner. You know, you've got to go to these costume parties. I've got to go to a lot of hockey games. It's not always easy to eat, right? and that's where Factor comes in for me and you and everybody you know.

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Is that fair to say? Zero seconds other than the previews and trailers and stuff that went around. They very kindly offered me a screener like a few hours before the thing launched. And I did not stay up all night to watch it just so that I could tweet about it 30 seconds before everyone else watched it. Yeah, that was kind of my experience with it where like the people who got screeners, it seemed like a day or three in advance, were like, look, no spoilers. but here's a word for word transcription of everything that happens in the last 30 minutes of the final episode. Yeah. That was...

It sounds, to me, it sounded good, but I'm very eager to hear your take and for you to guide me on whether I should... I shouldn't be carving out time to watch this thing. So I've never watched one of those like... the it's by the same people who do the f1 drive to survive show and so i've never seen a second of any of those i can't be one of these people who's like waking up at 3 30 in the morning on a saturday to tweet like mclaren in the mud right now or whatever like that's that's psychotic behavior to me yeah um so like i just have no um no familiarity with like the style of those shows so i'm going in relatively uh you know, clueless as to what the format is.

And it turns out the format is very similar to like, you know, NHL 24-7 for the people who remember that. And the various other behind-the-scenes shows like that, including the Amazon Leafs one. Although, obviously, that was different because it was only focused on one team. But basically the format is every episode is about two different hockey players. many of whom end up meeting at some point in the playoffs. So it's like David Pasternak and Willie Neelander are, is episode one. And, you know, it leads into the playoffs. And then it's mostly about the opening round playoff.

And did you know those guys are like best friends from playing back in Sweden when they were teenagers? I feel like we did know that. I did. And now we really know it. Yeah. This is news that had, if I knew it at one. point escaped my brain. Well, I mean, I just assume all Swedish people know each other.

Well, David Pasternak's famously not Swedish. He's a, he's Czech. I just assume all Swedish slash Czech people know each other. Mm-hmm. That's right. But like, you know, not a ton going on in, uh, in, what do you want to call? Like the first two episodes probably? I'm trying to remember.

Frankly, I don't even really remember who is in episode two. Well, I'll tell you episode two, because I'm looking at the description, it features, I'll give you this hint. And then you'll just instantly, two of the toughest players in the league. Yeah, no, I remember. So everybody is like, oh, okay, so Jack Eichol and Philip Forsberg, clearly the two, the two tough guys. I remember, well, someone pointed out that in the, that like one of the, that, like, one of the, highlights of the episode is you drive to the rink with these guys and they tell you

how they're feeling as they go to the rink and that kind of thing. And someone, I can't remember if it was on Twitter or the Discord, pointed out that Philip Foresberg drives a Maserati and you're like, okay, that checks out with a cracked windshield. And it's like, hey man, you got him enough money

to get that fixed, huh? Didn't feel like getting that fixed before the Amazon crew showed up? Nah, fuck it, man. He had a kid on the way, so he was, you know, understandably, a little occupied. But yeah, so that episode was like kind of forgettable. Not, you know, like, it's just two teams that didn't go very far in the playoffs, or you're like, okay, who cares?

Vegas and Nashville. Now, if they're following Nashville this year, that's a different story. Episode three is the infamous Jeremy Swayman episode. where he says he never wants to leave the Bruins and all this kind of stuff. Don't you think his agent is like, dude, if you had just lied and said, you know what? I love it in Boston, but if they don't, if the contract gets nasty, I'll go somewhere else. Yeah, he was trying to get Jeff Bezos on the phone.

Pull that episode, quick. Yeah, get it out of there. But that was interesting, A, because, You know, it's about the Kachucks, and we know that they go deep in the playoffs. But B, you know, both Kachuk and Swamen were miced up, and they were talking a lot of shit to each other during that series. Okay. Which made it entertaining. That also featured one of my favorite quotes from the whole thing where they're talking to Brady about what it was like growing up with Matthew was the older brother.

And he's like, yeah, you know, most families, I feel like. Like, you know, the older brother would kind of give the younger brother a break and, you know, and like let him win sometimes and that kind of thing. And not Matthew. No. And it included they were like while Keith was grilling up some food, they were playing like a kind of mini golf thing on a putting green that, that Matthew has in his backyard in Florida.

And they were really, they were getting extremely competitive. that was kind of fun to watch. Meanwhile, it was like Jeremy Swim and playing the guitar and eating dinner was what he was getting up to, you know? That would be fun because I know that like anytime my kids started getting overly competitive over something, like you could, I would show up and be like, guys, settle it down. And I feel like Keith Kachuk probably wasn't doing a lot of that. No, he was probably like coming in off the top roll to.

Yeah, basically. And then there was a point where after he made the food on the grill, he ate some. And Matthew was busting his balls like, oh, yeah, the athletes don't get to eat first when you're around, huh? It was fun. They had a really good family dynamic. So that was a lot of fun. As you might imagine, just knowing that they are like fun, funny people on TV or whatever, from TV, I mean. episode four was about

Quinn Hughes, Jacob Truba and Gabriel Landisog and Landisog was interesting just because he hasn't played in years and years and like he, it was watching him watch his team. Okay. Jacob Truba was about

how it's actually not fair that people think he's a dirty player when he's actually a really nice guy. That's good to know. And then Quinn Hughes was just like walking around Vancouver and people recognizing him and him signing autographs and stuff. Another, you don't need to really watch this one, but the Landisog stuff was really good. And then five and six was just the cup final with McDavid and Matt Kachuk again.

So, you know, there's so much drama inherently built into any cup final, but let alone one that one of the guys you're following is the best player on earth and his team goes down 03 and then comes back and he has a fiery speech um etc etc i don't want to you know you know how the games went which again that does kind of

um how do you want to say it just like sap some of the uh the drama from it where you're like oh i know how this one is well and i feel like i know how the fiery speeches and all that go too because they've they've all put that out there Well, right.

He's put a lot of it out there. Yeah, I guess that is interesting. Like, how do you think this show would play with someone who wasn't a hockey fan? Because, I mean, that's the Formula One thing, right? Is that it's taking people that aren't into the sport, getting them into it. This isn't for me, yes. Is there any possibility that this does that from a hockey perspective? I think I saw Jackie Redmond, who's one of the talking heads throughout the show.

I want to say the talking heads are Paul Bisson, P.K. Suban, Pete Blackburn, Jackie Redmond, and maybe one other person I'm forgetting. Where they just, like, kind of cut to them to provide a little bit of context for things. So I think Jackie Redmond tweeted last night that it's the number one show in Canada on Amazon, which makes sense. And I think number four in the U.S. or something like that. So more than just hockey fans are watching this. You can be sure about that. Okay. But that feels good if you're the NHL, I think.

Oh, by the way, I just saw Cam Robinson, who works with me at EP. He tweeted piggybacking off Kevin Weeks' post on Shisterkin, I was told recently he, the player may be more keen on a shorter-term deal, parentheses, five years, question mark. If NYR wanted eight years, they'd have to seriously break the bank. That's interesting. That is extremely interesting given Shastrican is 28. Yeah. You would think he would want the 8-year deal.

He'll be 29 when the new deal starts. Yep. Or the 2-year deal and then you let the cap go up and reset and maybe somebody else. But if you feel like you have the Rangers backed up against a wall. If you're telling me, if I'm the Rangers and you're telling me that you'll do five years instead of 8 for a smaller cap hit. That's the deal I want. Yeah, I'm not, I'll, I'll leave your age 33 through 36 years on the table. That's someone else's problem, yeah.

Yeah. I'm with you. Huh, okay. So, yeah, that's, that's interesting. Yep. So overall, give me, give me like a grade on the Amazon thing. It's like a solid B. again, there were just a couple of skippable episodes

and that sort of thing. And, you know, I say skippable. If you like the Nashville Predators or whatever, maybe not. All right. Maybe I'll check up the first one. Yeah, like I said, if you only watch episodes like three, five, and six, you're getting the best of the experience, but, you know, maybe you want to be a, it's only, it's under six hours for the whole show.

So, like, if you want to just do that, that's fine, too. Speaking of NHL marketing, did you see this ad that's going around this morning? Yes, I did. Where it's like golden generation. Yeah. What were your thoughts on that? People seemed to like it. Yeah, it was good.

Yeah. A rare marketing win by the NHL. Yeah, hey, look, I can't be mad at them for, I don't have a ton to say about it. But I can't be mad at them for doing the, for doing like a good ad for once. That's fine. Yep. Now here's the thing. It's going to make the boomers furious.

Well, what's really going to happen is it's going to make me furious when it's on every commercial break on the, on the ESPN Plus app. That's true. Until fucking January. That is so true. Enjoy it this morning when you're seeing it for the first. And I'm just like, shut the fuck up, said. Hey, here's some news that came out, I think, yesterday. Seems like Thatcher Demko and Dakota Joshua are only going to be out three to four weeks with their injuries.

Well, that moves the needle for me for Vancouver. That's great news for Vancouver, but it's the Demko stuff has been so weird all, not even all summer. Like, stretching back to the end of the last regular season. And then, of course, in the playoffs. Will he come back or won't he? Again, believe it when I see it category there. Great news that they're even talking about that because, you know, obviously if they were mentioning longer numbers,

then that's the direction you assume it's going in. But I don't know. I'm going to wait and see because this whole thing is weird. Yeah, and again, like, I can't remember who had the report, but it was like the way they were talking about it in Vancouver. kind of behind the scenes was that like Demko will have to kind of fundamentally change the way he approaches the position, which isn't good. No, I don't like that.

Like he, I don't know if you people know this. He's actually really good at playing hockey as it stands currently. So if he has to relearn, that might not, you know, there might be like a period of some difficulty associated with that. But, you know, if he can come back and be. mostly what he is now. I really like what that does for the for the Canucks playoff chances, or not even playoff chances,

opportunity to make a deep run into the playoffs via a strong standings position, you know? He's really fucking good. He is. And I think when we were talking about this a couple weeks ago, and we were saying like the only reason to be a little iffy on Vancouver is we don't know the timeline on Demco, who's their number one goalie,

a decent margin, you know. It's not a 1A, 1B situation with him and Artur C-Lovs. Let's say that. But... Do you think that's the only reason to be iffy on him, though? Is that... No, obviously, they're not going to shoot 12%

or whatever they did last year. But, you know, they have a lot of offensive talent. They've improved the blue line, I think I would say a little bit. And so... And I think Quinn Hughes last year was like an MVP campaign. candidate style player and if he can even approach that level again, I'm not like super worried about them being like, what did they end with last year?

Like 108 points or something like that, 105. And, you know, I think they can be around 100 again for sure. But that's, again, with the understanding of Demko's back in a month and he's going to be roughly what we think of Thatcher Demko being. If he's not, then that's a different story. Of course, yeah. But, you know, they were going out and signing Kevin Lankin in a couple weeks ago. So why wouldn't I have been nervous about that for them, you know?

But yeah, they're going to be a good team this year. Just maybe not a great one. We'll see. I guess the other big news here, fresh off, not fresh, I guess, but with six years remaining on his deal. The New York Islanders waived Pierre Engval. Is that good to do? I feel like he's probably going to clear. Yeah. I mean, there were people being like, oh, someone might, you know, like, I think I saw someone saying like, oh, Columbus might claim him just because they need to reach the cap floor and, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah. They don't need that. Not for six years,

no. No. But yeah, that's an interesting situation. I don't know what to make of the Islanders. I think I can't remember if I had them in the playoffs. I think they'll probably be right around the bubble just because I like the goaltending there. But that you don't want to be putting a guy making $3 million in the minors for the next six years or whatever, you know? You do not. And sometimes with this stuff...

Andy has a 16 team no trade list. Yeah. You can be hoping he gets traded, or sorry, it gets picked. You can be hoping that maybe this opens the phone lines to somebody. Maybe the fact that he's on waivers convinces him to loosen up that no trade clause a little bit, especially if you can just ditch him in the minors.

But yeah, not a great contract. was at one point one of their one of their red arrows i don't know if he still is but yeah he well they don't do red i i use puckpedia they don't do red arrows they just kind of show you when the last year of the deal is and if it's beyond the next four years it's uh it's just like a red block instead of a red arrow okay but it's the same gimmick they just you know they didn't i feel like they didn't want to rip off cap friendly like gimmick infringement snow yeah That's exactly right. Yeah.

Yeah, there was some interesting ones because there was that. There was Justin Hull got put on waivers by Detroit. Yes. Which I knew because the combination of him and Pierre Engval being on waivers had Kyle Dubas trending in Canada. And what was the other? Sebastian Ajo, not the good one, the other one. Yeah, the one from Pittsburgh. Waved by Pittsburgh.

Well, interesting there only because they signed him in. the off season to a multi-year deal. Right. And then waived him before opening night, which is rare. Sure. Yeah. But, you know, just knowing the player involved, like, you know, that's, I don't know that they necessarily, like, what was his AAB?

Do you remember off the top of here? I can pull this. Not high. Yeah. So I think they were just kind of like it doesn't really affect us. too strongly one way or the other. Let's see. Ajo placed on waivers.

Yes, let me see what his cap hit is. Oh, he's making the league minimum. Yeah. So, you know, it literally costs them nothing apart from the money to send him to the miners. Mm-hmm. And I'm trying to see if it's probably not a two-way. Yeah, it's not a two-way. So he's making that money regardless, but, and it's only two years.

It's not like they signed him for four or something. but I'm not surprised by it, let's say, that he didn't make the penguins out of camp. Ryan, we got some breaking news from Utah. What's that? And it's not good. I don't like this at one bit. Okay.

The Utah team without a name has named Lawson Krause associate captain. And Chris Johnson says this is the first time I recall hearing that designation assigned by an NHO. team. Do they not know its assistant? Is that the question? Dudes who get mad when you say assistant captain.

Mm-hmm. And they get like all huffy about, oh, it's alternate captain, actually. If you really watch hockey, you would know. Now we have to deal with this. Right. Now we officially have got an ass captain in the NHL. I don't. They just do things a little freaking differently in Utah, and you're just going to have to get used to that.

Oh, God, that's 100% it, isn't it? They just actually, they actually do it a little differently. They think different down there. Yeah, one of the things they do different is they make it so you can't see one of the fucking goals if you pay, if you buy a ticket. Yeah. They do all sorts of different stuff. They pay their bills. They, uh, a lot of teams.

think that you need to have a name and they don't, uh, they think different about that too. I don't like that, man. Get it out of there. I did not approve associate captains. Yeah. Whatever. You know, like, that's one of those things where, uh, doesn't really matter who gives a shit.

It still starts with an A, you know, they're not changed. If they, if, you know, if it was like, uh, whatever, like, like deputy captain and they put a D on his shirt instead, that would be something. different, you know. But if they're not changed in the letter, I guess I don't have to care or ever think about this. So, why would they do this? Yeah, I mean. Is associate above or below assistant? Like I would say it's above. I would say it's above. You see it a lot, especially in college with like assistant coaches who have been around a long time where they're like to keep you will give you a raise above what you were already making and also say to justify. that raise that you're not just an assistant coach or the associate head coach or whatever.

So it's not like assistant to the captain. It's a different thing. I hate it. Yeah. Look. Again, now it's just another thing for people to mess up like I did when I said assistant captain just now. That's right. You know, now it's adding a third A.

So let's just keep adding a A word. in front of captain, you know? Okay. What's the next one? Asshole. I think I know a few of those. Hey, speaking of college hockey, I hate to keep hammering.

I don't actually hate to keep hammering it, but I will keep hammering it. It seems like that CHL rule that we've been talking about off and on for the last year or so, seems like that's going to go away like today or tomorrow basically. For those who didn't see, I think it was over the, I think it was Friday, the various conference like commissioners sent out a memo to like staff and coaches and all that kind of stuff that said,

hey, just so you know, the NCAA Division I Rules Committee or something like that, they are getting together for a normal meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday. So today and tomorrow as we're recording this. And they are going to have what's called an emergency vote on the issue of like, can CHL players play college hockey? And it's only an emergency vote on a technicality is basically how it works. like there's a normal period when rule changes are made at the NCAA level and this is outside that period.

And so that's why it's an emergency. It's not like they were like, you know, the day before the season starts, oh, fuck, we got to change. We forgot to change that, you know? Uh-huh. Yeah. So it's not that kind of an emergency. It's just like a technical term that they have to use or whatever.

But basically, because they're voting on it now, the feeling is, you know, the feeling is, that that means this is going to change like within the next 24 hours basically that this will allow CHL players to play college hockey and there's some question as to whether that would go into effect immediately just to get in front of any potential lawsuits

or whatever or that would go into effect for next season or at some point in the future after that. I think everybody kind of is of the opinion that it will mostly affect next season and not this year, even if they do make it like, this goes into effect immediately.

Like college player, or CHL players would have had to have been on campus for the start of the season, and obviously they can't be. Right. Yeah, this will change the sport of hockey forever, basically. Not to be hyperbolic, but... No, not at all.

I mean, it does fundamentally change the development ladder in hockey forever, basically, right? Because, you know, if a kid can, if it becomes... Oh, who was it? Some high pick was just like, I'm demanding a trade for my OHS. team last night. Did you see this? I'd seen a couple over the weekend, I thought. There was, there's, uh, oh, Quentin Mustie from the Sudbury Wolves, um, demanded a trade.

And he's in a situation where a lot of people say he's too good to be in the CHL and, and, uh, he should, he should be in the AHL, but because of the CH, the CHL, the CHL, NHL transfer rule, he can't be. He has to play for Sudbury or some other team in the CHL. Right. And, you know, what this would basically do is

guys like Quentin Musty could just go, fuck you, I'm going college hockey then. I, you know, if you're not letting me play in the AHL and I need to level up my, my competition, college hockey would exist to do that. Basically, what this would do is this would, in my opinion, put the CHL and the USHL kind of on equivalent levels as far as being development leagues go, where they would be, they would just essentially become feeder systems for college hockey, which becomes a feeder system for the AHL and the NHL.

That's it. Okay. And so, like, this is like a seismic change in the world of hockey. We've talked about this before. Like, when this happens, I think, first of all, like, let's say the, they announced this at 5 p.m. today. This change is going into effect. I think by the end of the week, you see multiple OHL players committing to colleges for next season. Wow. Oh, so it'll happen that quickly, that far?

I really think so, yeah. You know, you talk to people in college hockey and obviously, shit, I can't remember, Braxton Whitehead committed. He plays in the WHL right now and he committed to Arizona State already publicly. But if you talk to people in college hockey, there's a really strong belief that there are players who have committed to college hockey. programs privately that with the expectation that this rule would change this season at some point, um, that when the rule change is announced, these will come,

their commitments to various programs will come out within the next several days. Okay. Um, so it's, this is a huge deal. It'll change college hockey forever. It'll change the CHL forever. It'll change the NHL. NHL to a lesser degree forever.

But the only thing that we need to say about this is that there has been reports that this might get, like basically this meeting will happen today and they'll say, we're actually going to table this for a few extra months. But the expectation is that, again, by the end of this season, this NHL season, this change will be in place. The only reason to table it is because. there might need to be more time to like get input from the various hockey schools on this issue. But also because this would kind of require the NHL and the CHL to get together to rework that transfer agreement I was talking about.

And I don't think that would be the reason why they do it because I don't think the NCAA has any reason to give a shit about how this affects the CHL and the NHL on some level, you know? Sure. So yeah, you know, it's all kind of wait and see, but it seems like we'll be seeing, again, within the next, like, 36 hours.

It's crazy. Cool. Yeah. It's an interesting thing. Yeah. One last thing, I guess, we wanted to talk about on the show this week. As, you know, there's not a time. going on in the NHL right now. Everybody's just kind of solidifying their rosters.

I did get the stats from our old friend Jimmy Shapiro on, you know, odds of the next NHL coach being fired. And I got these before the Sabres lost two games in a row. Which is why when I say that Lindy Ruff is tied for second least likely to be fired, that's why. Mm-hmm. I feel like the odds might have shifted in the last several days here. Yeah.

But Jimmy, Jimmy doesn't send me stuff anymore. I feel like when he switched over the summer, he lost my address. Well, here's the thing. People tend to do. I didn't used to get the Jimmy Shapiro emails. There you go. And then when he switched over, I started getting them.

I used to get him from a guy named Josh, I want to say. But there you go. Our old friend Jimmy Shapiro. Jimmy made his choice. He did. He chose wisely. I was going to say the opposite. I think he fucked up.

The first NHL head coach fired odds. Number one with a bullet. Let me think about this because I haven't seen them and I was talking on the other show about how I'm really struggling with my first coach fired picks this year because everyone is so new or so locked in it would seem. Like, who, I've seen lists where there are guys listed as first coach fired who just got hired in the last year, which seems ridiculous. Like, Travis Green's not going to be the first coach fired. I don't care how. I'll tell you, Travis Green on this list is 50 to 1, way down near the bottom. Yeah.

All right. So without telling me the name, what's, what are the odds for the top guy? Three to one. Is it Mike Sullivan? It is. Okay. One of the few guys who fits into that, he's been around a few years and his team isn't necessarily good. So I guess that makes sense.

Every time for the last two years I've ever mentioned the possibility of him being fired, Penguin fans flood into my mentions to say it'll never happen for reasons. Well, the reason is he has like eight years left on his deal or whatever, right? Like, they just 30, 40 times over the last five years have been like, we're attacking two more years on. Yeah. Okay. I don't think you will ever get number two. This is an insane. I can't.

Well, it's not insane. It makes a little bit of sense if you think about it. But to see him at number two at four to one and the next closest guy is eight to one. Okay. Oh, wow. You'd be like, oh, that's weird. So they're saying this guy and Sullivan are the. Which conference?

Western conference. Okay. I will scan in my head through, but, geez, I am not thinking of anybody that feels to me like they are... Central Division. Central Division, okay. Not Luke Richardson. No.

Luke Richardson is 40 to 1, same odds at. as Chris Novelaq for some reason. Okay, so one of the good teams, no, Winnipeg, St. Louis, got new guys. Minnesota's got a new guy. It wouldn't be Utah, right? It is Utah. Andre Turini is 4-1.

Okay. Yeah, I mean, I actually, I feel like I've got, the same reaction you did, which is that doesn't make any sense. And then I go, well, I, you know, not only how often do we say, well, it's a new GM? It's a new owner. Yeah. Well, the thing I was thinking about with this is, yeah, if they, like, there might be expectations around this team.

I personally don't think there should be. But like, I get why people are picking them as like a long shot to make the playoffs or whatever, right? But then I'm thinking about it. I'm like, they actually freaking do things a little differently in you. Utah. And isn't that why they would fire the coach, even though they shouldn't really think they're going to be any good this year? I think during you, you know, like makes, makes them hard to play against or whatever. And the issue is always a really good coach. Yeah, I think he's kind of been saying for a few years that we're surprised at how much he was able to ring out of that Arizona team.

Yeah. And like, obviously, you're not sitting there going, well, he's the fucking problem in Arizona. You're sitting there saying, like, they're getting to 78 points and they should be like a 67 point team or whatever. And like, is that just him getting, like squeezing a ton of juice out of a roster that doesn't seem like it should have any? Yeah, I think it kind of is. But also, I don't know if the new owners seem them that way, because they actually do things a little differently out there. They do. Can I ask you about two guys in particular? You can ask me about the other 30 guys.

I don't care. Martin Saint-Louis Martin-S-Louis is kind of in the upper middle he's 25 to 1 this is not a numbered list so 1-2-3 45 to 1 is reasonably safe

okay but the speed with which you get to 20 to 1 is actually pretty impressive so beyond that Derek Lalonde in Detroit okay makes sense Ryan Huska in Calgary that's a little surprising just because I don't think there are any

fucking expectations there this year. Jim Montgomery 10 to 1. Montgomery is a name you hear a little bit because apparently he's in the final year of his deal. Right. Jared Bednar 12 to 1. I'd be shocked if Jared Bednar would find.

So since we're talking about the show, I don't see Bedner on the hot seat, but this is the name I threw out on the other show. And when it doesn't have happen, we will never speak of it again. Okay. I'm listening. John Cooper. John Cooper is 33 to 1 right after Bruce Cassidy.

Okay. I mean, I wouldn't put anyone in Vegas very high on any list of safe jobs, first of all. So you're right. Here's my thought on Cooper. Obviously, he's been there forever. You have your coach by a lot. You have the team that has had a lot of success but has not won a playoff round in two years. Has made some major changes this offseason. Clearly are still in kind of a win now mode. Which they have to be.

A lot of us look at that rostering. And it's not that you look at the roster and say they're not good, but we just know that sometimes when the window, closes, it closes faster than you think. And despite all of that, you would sit there and go, yeah, but even if they got out to a terrible start, and even if they thought John Cooper was the problem, surely there's got to be some loyalty to a guy who has done everything for that team. Look at the Stephen Samco's.

There's no loyalty in Tampa. Very clearly. Yeah. They are taking, embracing the Vegas cutthroat method, which is probably the right way to go. but you can't imagine them say, you know, Tampa getting off to a slow start and suddenly. Yeah, there is. I think it's fair to say that that roster's losing a little zip on the fastball, you know.

What do you do if you're Julian Breezebaugh and they start off, you know, they're one of those four points back of the playoffs on November 1st teams. You just did the big gunsel for Stamco's swap. I don't know. Yeah, no, I totally see what you're saying. And I don't, I, I can't disagree with what you're saying at all. Bruce Cassidy's interesting because didn't Jesse Granger just have an article like yesterday about like, is this the end of the golden era for Vegas? Okay, I didn't see that, but maybe he did.

I'll Google that just to make sure it was Jesse. Well, so, you know, it was one of those things where the headline on the article. is a little different on the preview than when you click on it. Okay. So I had just seen, is the Golden Knights Golden Era ending question mark? And then it says, not so fast with a quote, we still expect to win. Okay, well, that's a little different. They did.

First of all, they got me. But second of all, that's a little different. Expect to win is not, you know, like the St. Louis Blues probably would say they expect to win. you know. Every team would say they expect it. That's what I'm getting at, yeah. This feels like two years, this is from Bruce Cassidy, this feels like two years ago where we're coming back and maybe there's doubt around

the league about where this team is at, even though we know in the room there's a winning team and a winning culture that's been created. So there you go. So yeah, you know, I could see Vegas going either way because like you said, they'll fucking fire anybody for any reason. They don't give a shit. Yeah. know. Oh, I guess we didn't talk about people getting mad that Robin Lennar, he's not going to count on Vegas's books this year.

Yeah, which... I can't get too worked up about it knowing, you know, this is a guy who's had a lot of difficulties in his personal... We don't know the exact situation. Yeah, but again, like, it seems like this is a thing where, like, everybody knew in advance what the issue was and they're handling. it and the league was just like, yeah, this is a unique situation that kind of dictates unique circumstances. Yeah, and the NHLPA signed off on it as well, which implies that whatever the scenario is, that it doesn't sound like there was a lot of pushback from anyone on getting this figured

out. That's exactly right. So let's keep going down the list here. John Tortorella, 14 to 1. I'd be a little surprised by that, quite frankly. And then here's one at 22 to 1, where I'm like, I could see it. Greg Cronin. Mm-hmm.

That's a little interesting. How do you like Craig Barubi 35 to 1? Is he the first of the new guys that show up on the list? Let me, unless you're counting Patrick Waugh as a new guy, where he obviously took over mid-season last year. Yeah. Um, he's 20 to 1. Uh, but the, after that, yes, Craig Barubi is the, the sole new guy. Okay.

Uh, I mean, it's, he's, he's, if you're going to pick a new guy, it's going to be a new guy on a team that's supposed to contend right away. Right. A bunch of the other new guys are just like, we're going to slap 40 to 1 on it and call it a day. Uh, Drew, Drew Bannister, Jim Hiller, John Hines, Chris Knoblock. Who's the lowest? Who's the most untouchable guy? Paul Maurice, as you might imagine. Okay.

I'm assuming Brindamore up there too. Brindamore, Lindy Ruff, and Rick Tockett tied at 66 to 1 as the second least likely. Okay. I mean, talk it. Can I talk you into this 50 to 1 pick? Peter DeBore. Uh-huh. I could see that.

Like you say, if they go like 2, 6 and 1 to start. the year? Well, that's any guys like that where you go, well, that wouldn't happen because they're good. Right. It's like, right. So what if they're not good? This is the, right? Because nobody would have said Jay Woodcroft last year.

A million percent, man. Yeah. Nobody would have said Lindy after, you know, that first like two games of the season. Yeah. He got fucking canned. Obviously that was in the summer, but, you know. He got canned during the season, did? Oh, that's right.

You're right about that. You're like he did. Yeah, I think you're right. late in the season, but... Yeah. But yeah. I just love the idea of the sharks at 40 to, like 40 to 1 of the times, you know, just being like, you know what, this Rorsowski things and I'll fucking work it out.

See you later. Yeah, I mean, if he can't win with this roster, what are we doing here? It's really funny. Maybe they fire him. Maybe they start 3 in 0 when he gets fired. Maybe that's the way. That would be a big problem for them, I feel like. Um, I think that's about it.

Unless there's, oh, the other thing, I forgot to say this. Cam Robinson followed up his tweet about the five-year thing and said, that's him speculating. He doesn't know what the actual term, for all he knows, it could be two years that, that, uh, that Schisturkin is looking for. Now, that would be, that would get you into the, the conversation you were talking about earlier, right? Mm-hmm. Where, where it's like, he's trying to really reset the market when it's, It's, you know, when the cap's $100 million instead of 90 or whatever, you know. Yeah, two years from a player's perspective makes way more sense to me than five.

Absolutely. Two years and eight years both make way, way more sense. Five to me is almost the sweet spot of what I wouldn't want. But by the way, you mentioned what was trending on Twitter earlier. Okay. It says here, death to Canada. What do you think that's all about? Yeah, that's, uh,

Yeah, that's happening up here. I think it was just Gary Bettman's most recent press conference. It's a joke, folks, but don't actually click on it because you don't want to know. I don't know what's going on with that, but I also will never find out. Why don't you hit him with the plugs and we'll get the hell out of here. Find me at the athletic. Get the athletic hockey show tomorrow with Pulitzer Sean, as well as Frankie Crotto is joining us every week now. He was sort of a regular on and off again guests last year, but he's been given an increased role.

We're going to, we're going to just can't get enough of stabbing me in the back. Send him out there and see what he can do on a full-time basis. And you can find my stuff. I had the, my oddly specific predictions dropped today. That's one of my favorite pieces of the year. chance to look at it yet, but I am greatly looking forward to. Spoiler warning, because I feel like this is the year I go 32 for 32. Let's go.

And I'm going to have my all intrigue roster is coming up in a couple of days where I pick the players I am most interested in over the course of the season. So, yeah, find all that stuff and more to come, I'm sure. We are learning, by the way, more breaking news that Ryan Ellis used to be. the associate captain in Nashville. Wow. Okay. So there we go. They actually do things a little different in Nashville, it turns out, too. They do things a little different down south.

In fact, you know what they're kind of saying to the traditionalists right now? What's that? Death to Canada. For me, head over to E.P.Rinkside.com and you will see a whole shitload of articles I wrote about college hockey in the last. a little while, and I will surely have to write more in the next day or two here. So keep an eye out for that. I did my annual, or not annual, I guess my annual preseason power feelings,

which we talked about on the show last week or the week before, but, you know, you can read my full takes on every single team there, and if you get mad at me about anything I wrote on there, You owe me $50. And that's real. I will send you a Venmo request. If you criticize the power feelings in any way, that's the RL promise. The other thing you can do is head on over to the Patreon.

Patreon.com slash puck soup. And you will be able to hear all kinds of bonus episodes in the next little while here, including we did our quarterly call-in show where we take face. fans questions and play some game shows and things like that. And I'll say this. Really high stakes, dramatic turn of events in one of the game shows last night. Yeah, check all that out.

Patreon.com slash Puck Soup. Thank you for listening to the show and enjoy the games tonight as best you can. I know one of them is a coyotes blackhawks game. They do things different. All right, thanks so much, everyone. See you. Bye-bye.