Puck Soup - Awards Picks 2

Episode Date: October 1, 2024

Sean and Ryan talk about the Moritz Seider extension, Jeremy Swayman drama, injuries, awards picks, and more.

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I am Sean Maganue from The Athletic. And we're continuing our season preview episodes this week. Because am I wrong that the season starts on Friday? It's like the European games. Kind of does. Yeah. Nobody seems to really be counting that.

Well. But it is technically regular season hockey. Yeah. Counts in the standings and all that. It does. You see all this stuff about like, oh, people are expecting. big things out of the sabers. They're playing so well in the preseason, blah, blah, blah.

You see all this shit? I did not see that, but... This is the Buffalo Sabres, right? Yeah. You know? What could go wrong? Look, I don't think you can count anything the Sabres do before January is real at this point. Mm-hmm.

You know? Like, I think we talked about this recently. The hot runs that they have, every November. Oh, we won like eight in a row. Maybe we're good this year. And then, you know, by January 15th, it's like we're second last in the east again. Well, we tried.

Yep. I mean, who knew that the season was 80 games long? Yeah, it's tough. Impossible to. Anyway, I think the first thing we have to do on the show for real this week is do some old business of a contract that I had on the outline last week and then accidentally deleted and didn't notice until someone pointed it. out to me. We didn't talk about the Moritz cider extension in Detroit, seven years, 8.55 million, making him the 13th highest paid defenseman in the league this year by A.A.V. Your thoughts? Interesting deal. In all facets, I think, including timing, that it went that late and yet still

got done right after the Lucas Raymond deal. So clearly, you know, Steve Eiserman, had his number and was willing to to draw his line in the sand. I don't think it's... I like it for Detroit, but I do understand that this is a player where maybe even more so than some of the guys

who do second deals like this, there's still some question about what exactly he is. Is this truly the elite future Norris contentious, that he looked like after his rookie year or is he maybe a step down from that which is what he's looked at

like since then I think this this is a good deal in terms of mitigating a bit of that risk on both sides. I don't think the red wings are stuck with a miserable contract if he ends up being

a tier below that Norris list. Yeah. And clearly from the player's perspective he's getting a good chunk of money risk-free now for seven years. Right. Not eight. A little weird that they didn't go eight. Yeah.

Isn't he like 23? He probably wanted to go right up to his age 30 season. Yeah. I'm presuming that's a, yeah, I'm presuming that's a player-ask to go the seven. But so maybe that's. Maybe that was, you know, maybe Eisman had his firm line on what the AAV was going to look like, and that was the concession to chop a year off the end on the player's side. As I always mentioned with Moritzider, the fact that Claude Amuse's agent just amuses me greatly.

Very funny. I had been hoping that he would completely screw over the Red Wings. Yeah, twist the knife a little bit. Sure, why not? play that long game, but apparently not. But I don't, this seems like a reasonable deal to me with obviously the potential to be a bargain for the Red Wings if the player ends up hitting that closer to the ceiling of where he could go.

But I don't think that's quite as much of a lock as it seems on some of these other deals. He's an interesting player, because as you say, he kind of. comes in as a rookie, puts up 50 points. And you're like, damn, that's really hard to do when you're getting, you know, it says here he played 23 minutes a night as a rookie. And so to put up 50 points, you know, we talk about this all the time. If you put them on the top powerplay unit and you score a decent amount on the powerplay, guys are going to get points, right?

So that's why we always say points are maybe not the best indicator of things. you know, when he signed this deal and like, you know, the stats people looked at it and they were like, you know, he was actually horrible last year in a lot of ways. Obviously, he kept scoring. He had 42 points of career high, nine goals, that sort of thing. But like underlying numbers awful, right? On a team that seemed to have taken a step, we can talk about how fueled by PDO that was or whatever. But like the underlying numbers were awful. And then you look and you go, okay, he had literally some of the hardest minutes in the last, like, decade in the NHL, and he played with Ben Chirot. So what do you want from the guy?

That totally makes sense to me. But, like, I don't think that you are well served in assessing a player's quality when you go, well, you got to look at what he did two years ago. Because of how hard. Like, in much the same way that, like, you don't want, they stopped using, like, a, you don't want, they stopped using, like, a coursey close and all that kind of stuff, because it's like you don't want to take numbers out of the data set. You want to have as much data as you possibly can when you're assessing a player. And like taken as a whole, more at cider.

This is the stat that blew my mind, but also kind of make sense if you think about it. 185 defensemen have played at least 2,000 minutes at five on five over the last three seasons. what ranking or you know what what what place does morritz cider come in in expected goals four percentage oh boy is he is he in the bottom half yeah he's a hundred and sixty eighth wow okay and so again the team sucks he's playing 23 minutes a night or whatever it is basically the entire time he's in the NHL. His minutes actually dropped last season. He dropped from 23 to 22 and a half. And he's playing with guys who aren't particularly good. And certain, I'll rephrase. He's playing with guys who shouldn't be getting top pairing minutes, right, for basically that

entire time. And so there are extenuating circumstances that I'm acknowledging here. But at the same time, this thing of like, well, you got to pay more at Sider like, like eight and a half, nine million bucks. Yeah, like that was what everybody just kind of accepted this entire time. That's what he kind of comes in at. And if you look at the numbers, it's like, now hold on a minute. Do you though? You know what I mean?

Like, I think he's a good player. I don't know that it is automatic, like you said, uh, people look at this guy as a future norris guy when, um, when we ran at elite prospects like our, you know, mathematical, whatever, ranking of the top 20 defensemen. and cider wasn't in it because of how bad the underlines were last year, pretty much, I think. And all these people were commenting, no cider, no cider, not anywhere in the top 20. How many people do you think have put Moritz-Sider's name on their Norris ballot since he came into the league? So not counting the first year?

Including the first year. I would assume he got a sprinkling of votes. Maybe that, okay. Is it the number greater than zero? Nope. Wow. Sure isn't. And again, like, people love this fucking guy, right?

Again, the way people talk about him, this is a stud defenseman. You know, you got to throw out the, you're going to take into account all these negative things. But if you, if you really, if you watch the games, once you get into the, like, I've watched all the Red Wings games since you came into the league. And actually, when I see him out there, it's good. I think I don't have the number in front of me now. I think he's like minus 30 something at five on five when he's on the ice for his entire career. And there's no like one year where it's like, well, he was like minus 40 that year and then the other two years he's positive. Outscored every single year.

And again, I understand the team stinks. And like he's supposed to be this foundational piece that's going to take them to the next level. He needs to take himself to the next level, in my opinion, to really make me think, this guy's worth all that money. I think he's a really good defenseman. Are you concerned about this from a Detroit standpoint then? I think the cap's going up, which is always going to make guys look good closer to the end of their deals. You know what I mean?

And they have him for his entire 20, you know, age 20 through 30 season. They have him locked in for that now at this point, right? And so the idea that he's going to like tail off by the end, I don't think that's going to happen. He's going to be like 28, 29 years old when he's wrapping up this deal. But I don't look at this guy and think this is the 13th best defenseman in the league is basically what my assessment is. And could he get there? Yeah, he could. But I haven't, you know, taking it as a whole, looking at, you know, the big picture or whatever.

And again, accounting for they got to get someone better. to play next to him. Have they done that? Yeah. I'm, I hear you. You're talking me down on this a little bit. Now, again, I'm going to get the, this guy hates the Red Wings thing, right? Oh, I hate them.

Which you do. Oh, sure. But like, can I, can I read you the Red Wings defense for this year? Please do. Can I just read you the guys that are on this team? Mort Sider. Okay. Good player.

Ben Chirot, the guy who, people in Detroit are acting like he was the anchor here. Right? Yeah. He signed for two more years. Justin Hull. Seemed to remember that guy. Yeah. What do you think of him as a defenseman?

He's like pretty good. Solid third guy. Okay, great. Olimata. Remember him? Yeah. Still make that. Yeah.

Jeff Petrie, 36 years old. Eric Gustav. Gustafson. Now, Gustafsson's a guy, I think, is like a little underrated, quite frankly. The way people talk about him at the various stops, maybe a little unfair to him. I think he can provide value in certain situations, but also that means you can't look at everything he brings to the table and say, this guy's awesome. You know, I think, I think, like, Hall, like, if you use him the right way, whatever, he can be fine. but you're not you're not like looking at him and going this guy's going to help a mo's side or take the next step right right and then the other the other defenseman they have on the roster right now is simon edvinson who's like a 21 year old like oh he he should be a good prospect guy um i think he's probably a full-time NHLer this season um you know like he only yeah he only played 16 games for them last year

But yeah, it's, it's just we need cider to take a step if we're Detroit, right? Like if we're Red Wings fans, we want him to be, at least in the Norris conversation. And I don't see this group being able to support that. And I, you know, again, like the next, the first, the next Norris vote he gets will be his first, ever. Nobody's ever even had him fifth, you know? So, I don't know. Like I said, I think he can grow into this contract very easily, but the idea that he's, whatever, locked in, guaranteed, this guy's worth it,

he needs to show me a little more. That's all. Sounds fair. Yeah, well, you say that. I do. We'll see how other people feel about it later. Hey, speaking of big money contracts for RFAs, a little bit of news yesterday.

day, huh? Jeremy Swayman, not at the team media day. People are like, so what's the story with that? I feel like Don Swaney tried to be a little deferential and, you know, give the player room. And then Cam Neely was like, if I'm him, I have 64 million reasons why I want to play right now for difference. And people are like, whoa, that's negotiating in public. That's crazy. That's interesting. And then a few, a few, hours later, I feel like. Louis Gross, who represents Jeremy Swayman. This is a quote that they put out on his agency's Instagram. Normally, I do not release statements or discuss negotiations through the media. However, in this case, I feel I need to defend my client. At today's press conference, $64 million was referenced. This was the first time that number was discussed in our negotiations. Prior to the press conference, no offer was made reaching that level. We are extremely

disappointed. This was not fair to Jeremy. We will take a few days to discuss where we go from here. This is very interesting stuff on a couple of levels. And I say that, let's preemptively say, this probably just ends in a few days. They find a deal that ends up being in the ballpark of the number that Neely put out there and we all go happily along our way. But the fact, the fact that nearly chose to put that number out there was interesting. I don't think it was shocking necessarily. I think that, I mean, let's be honest, he didn't do anything that front offices don't do all the time as far as getting numbers out there into the media. He just did it publicly in front of cameras rather than by texting an insider or a local beat guy.

So on some level you could say, hey, it's a better, better that he's doing it. You know, he's being upfront and public about it. It's the response from Lewis Gross that really, I think, perked people up and made this go from an interesting story to something more than that. Yeah. It's interesting because he says at today's press conference, 64 million was referenced. This was the first time that number was discussed in our negotiations. Because he says prior to the press conference,

no offer was made reaching that level. And that's one of those, I mean, you can talk about a number without an offer being made. Sure. Those are very different things. An offer in this context is very often is like, here is the document, look it over. sign it if you accept our deal, or at least it's quite detailed to rise to the level of being a

formal offer, whereas just ballparking numbers is less than that. But according to the agent, this is, they haven't even ballparked it, is the way I read it. Obviously, the part people are jumping in on is that last paragraph, we are extremely disappointed. Not a good thing to hear. This is not fair to Jeremy. Okay. we will take a few days to discuss where we go from here. That's the ominous, I think, intentionally threatening part. Of course. If I'm a Bruins fan, I get worried because what does it mean that they're going to take a few days

to discuss where we go from here? Now, realistically, really where can they go? Short of coming back and saying, Jeremy Swam is never playing for the Bruins again, and you have to trade them. Yep. There really isn't anywhere for them to go. And I think it's extremely unlikely that that is where they go.

I think this is an agent seeing an opportunity to seize some leverage in the public mind and taking it and probably doing a good job of doing that for his client. Yeah. So I think that Sweeney might have mentioned it the other day or something like that yesterday

where it's like Jeremy Swayman has told us he wants to be a Bruin. And obviously it's a situation where they didn't want to take him to arbitration this year because of how acrimonious the arbitration process was last year. Jeremy Swamon's talked about that. On more than one occasion, I feel like, how he didn't enjoy that process and who would enjoy that process, right?

Like that, that makes perfect sense to me that you would want to avoid that after going through it once. That said, Lewis Gross, people might remember that name because he was, I believe, William Nealander's agent when Nealander sat out until whatever, November 30th or whatever the date was on that. Yep, I think it was minutes before the December 1st deadline. Right. So, like, this is a guy who is, you know, maybe you could ask William Nealander how he feels that all went, you know, like with the benefit of hindsight and all that sort of thing.

But this is an agent who is not afraid to have his clients sit out, I guess, is what I'm getting at here. Yeah. And whether that's good, it can be a different discussion, let's say. but to me it's just really you don't want to get into like it's not good to get into the thing of like when you're reading each individual word of an agent's statement and going okay what does this mean what does that mean you know where you're saying like okay what does the number 64 million was referenced that's the first time that number was discussed in our negotiations. Um, does that mean they talked about 62 and a half and that's not 64. So that counts to say that. Does it mean that they talked about an eight million cap hit and they talked about an eight year deal, but not both at the same time?

Right. Or, you know, like, uh, is it, is it a situation where, because I don't, I, I don't know Cam Neely. I've never talked to the guy, a day in my life. But like, has, do we think of Cam Neely is the kind of guy who would just like, like shout out a number in the middle of a press conference and people are like, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's not what the number we talked about was. You know what I mean?

Like, I don't. He's not. And yet he's also not presumably the guy directly handling the negotiations. Yeah. I mean, you would think that he would, he would know the number, let's say, given he is the team president. But you do you not wonder a little bit if this is the Bruins front office number to get to? that maybe they haven't gotten to yet in the negotiations. Maybe Cam Neely just blew it for them by revealing what their finish line looks like.

I don't think the guy is stupid. You know, like, I don't think he's definitely not, but he does seem like an emotional guy. That's absolutely fair. And he's probably, you know, at least mildly frustrated, let's just say, by this situation. Yeah, and like understandably so. again, like we've talked about, um, you neither player nor team, I feel like wanted to get to this point, but, you know, these things happen. It's not, uh, it's not unique to Boston. And I, I guess my point is I've seen people be like, oh, you know, somebody's lying here. And I don't,

again, because you can kind of parse things in such and such a way, you know, what if it, What if it was 63.5 million was the offer? Like we don't want to let him get to eight, but we'll give him 7.925743, you know, whatever. It's, yeah. Yep. I think the idea that somebody's lying is almost never the case in these situations. It's always more about parsing what was, you know, both sides can be saying something that is generally true and yet still be in disagreement over how it's being presented. I don't think that's unreasonable.

The Bruins have already said that Junis Corpus Sala was starting game one, which would appear to take some of the, in addition to be, well, he's looking at the HL against HLers in the preseason, I should say. Well, right. So this is kind of the other thing that I wanted to talk about with that is like, if you look at the history of Bruins' goaltending since Bob Asenza, the ex-N-HL or Boba Sensa, took over as the Bruins goaltending coach.

I got to look up the exact year here. But he is just like, oh, here's a bunch of like Vesno winners and Stanley Cup winners, all in a row, basically. He started with the Bruins as the goaltending coach in 2003-04. So let's just take it only as the like the capier or the advanced stats era, right? The Bruins team save percentage, I'm pulling this up now, in all situations since 2007-08, Whoops, I did not sum all the seasons.

The Bruins team save percentage is the best in the NHL at 917 in all situations. So, you know, we've said like, oh, Bruce Cassidy, there's a guy, Claude Julian, there's a guy, all these, like every one of these coaches, their system just makes it easy for goalies to excel. That's what we've been saying for years, right? But if you look at if you look at Bavisense's tenure with the team, that lines up pretty well with when their goalies started being insanely good. Yeah. Right. And so the Bruins can maybe say, yeah, we don't, we don't, Brandon Bussi, Junis Corpus Salo. It's not that the Bruins haven't had bad goleys in recent years, but almost every goalie the Bruins have had.

You know, Anton Hu Dobin, like their backups, their pure backups, whatever, too. Grasque, all the guys who backed him up, Tim Thomas before that. Every single one of these guys, with very few exceptions, you can just kind of go, well, lock him in for like 9-10 plus. Yep. It's going to happen. And again, multiple Vesna winners, all the, multiple trips to the Stanley Cup final. A cup win, obviously, although we're getting up on, what, 13 years ago that that happened. But like, the Bruins can.

Maybe make the argument that I'm pretty confident here, Ascenza and the head coach will come together. They'll get this guy to like 915. Okay. And Jeremy Swayman might be going, but I'm different than that. And they're going, we ran the numbers and maybe no, you're not, you know. That's what makes it fascinating because first of all, this would, this would appear to remove a presumed leverage point in these negotiations, in that you would have

thought that there would have been some point where the two sides would have thought, if we get a deal done by now, he doesn't miss any time during the season. Yeah. And clearly that time has already passed. Yep. So now it becomes, assuming that he does not sign between now and the start of the season, which feels like a pretty reasonable assumption. Yep.

It really becomes the Corpus Allo watch. Because if he starts off getting shelled, that makes a lot of money for Jeremy Sweman, potentially. Oh, yeah. And if he starts off, as you, as you're alluding to looking, looking good. Boy, I mean, that's... It feels like the first four or five games of the season

that Corpus Allo plays could determine millions of dollars of Jeremy Swamen's future earnings plus or minus. 100%. It's going to be fascinating to see that play out.

And I mean, fans in Ottawa and Columbus I think would be saying good luck with that. But you're right. The Bruins have a history here. It'll be really interesting. Yeah.

What would you do if you were the Bruins? What would your offer be to... Because, you know, Pierre had a good piece in the athletic about how teams just don't want to go long on goalies. They just don't feel like it's easy, like it's a predictable enough position. Well, yeah. So, if I'm...

there's one man in Boston who I think should be the most upset about all this Swayman Bruin stuff and that's Flutocinzawa of the Athletic who had to write four different articles about Jeremy Swayman yesterday. Yeah. Check the fucking tapes. The timeline is he has four sole bylines in the last 24 hours. And one of the things he pointed out in one of those articles, I can't remember which one now, was that, you know, the Bruins are more than willing to open the checkbook eventually, right?

David Pasternak is making whatever, 11 and a quarter. Charlie McAvoy is making nine and a half, you know. And what did both of those guys do before they got those big contracts? They signed like middle term, slightly underpaying them much. money. Like, I don't even want to call them bridge deals because I think Posternox was like five years or something like that. But they're like, we'll pay, you know, they'll do the Brad Marsh. Brad Marshan's another guy like this where it's like, we'll pay you what we think you're worth when you're like 27, 28, not when you're 22, 23.

And Swamen, you know, he's just a goalie who, you know, this is his, I think, or would be his fourth full year in the league. and he might have had like a cup of coffee before that. So he's 26 already. He's not exactly a spring chicken as far as these things go. But I think what the Bruins would probably like to do, again, based on the history, as Fluto pointed out, is get him to like a five-year deal at like $8 million maybe. And there was another quote Neely had that he was like, they kind of want to reset the market for what a, an RFA goalie gets from a team, which kind of implies like north of $9 million. So Flutus says in one of his pieces that, and he sources this to Sportsnet, that Swamen wants to be paid the same as Charlie McAvoy.

So that's 9.5. Okay, 9.5, which I think would tie him with Veselyevsky in terms of cap hit. And look, again, we know the cap's going up. That's what we hear all the time. But like the difference in like resume between Andre Vasilevsky when he signed his current deal and Jeremy Swayman is, I think you would have to say significant, right? And again, you know, when did that deal go into effect like four years ago, three years ago? Yeah. So if we're talking about.

percentage of the cap it is probably about the same, but like teams don't think about it that way. They just see the A-A-V and they say that's the number we're shooting for here. So I don't know. Like, I get why the Bruins wouldn't want to give a guy who's never played more than like whatever, 45 games in the league, Andre Vasselowski money. Because Andre Vasselovsky is a first ballot Hall of Fame or no fucking question about it. and Jeremy Swayman is, I've seen this guy play since he was in college, he's fucking awesome. But he also has to, I think, be able to show that he can play 55 plus games.

You cannot pay, I think if you're the Bruins, you can't pay a goalie that you're only going to give like 50-ish starts to a year, maybe less, $9.5 million. If you can get them to like 5560, that's a different conversation. Mm-hmm. But I think that's the Bruins mindset here. And of course, if you're Jeremy Swayman, you're looking at the numbers you put up so far and saying this is my, I want the big contract now. I'm not willing to do a shorter-term deal. Yeah. And again, he's 26.

Like the idea that five years from now, he's 31 and he's going to get like Connor Hellebuck money. You know, again, he would need. too shut, like, Connor Hellbuck, it's kind of the same idea, right, where he was a little underpaid for quite a while. And then they gave him huge money that will last for basically his entire 30s. Yep. And again, like, Jeremy Smehan wants to be in that group, you're going to show that you can be Connor Hallibuck or Andre Vasselowski. This really does feel indirectly. Like it's hand in hand with the Shisterkin negotiation.

And I say indirectly because it's UFA and RFA and, you know, one is not the precedent for the other. But it does feel like two guys trying to reset an element of the goalie market. And like, again, Schisturkin's got a fucking Vesna. Two? One? At least one. Uh, does Swayman? Has Swamon ever really even been in consideration for a Vesna?

No, he was, he backed up a Vesna. in a winner two years ago. Well, that's what I'm saying. That's, yeah. And so, I mean, I get it. I get why the teams are saying, we don't want to be patient zero for a reset on something. Because as I said last week, I think,

on the other show, this is where the Leafs got with Mitch Marner and those guys a few years ago. We're going to reset the market. Okay. market gets reset, except it doesn't, because the next guy's come along and they're not, they're not following the reset market. Now you're left with an outlier contract and that can really screw things up. I think it boils down to kind of what you said earlier about like this all depends on how it goes with Corpusallo. If Corpusallo is kind of what the Bruins can project based on all that Boba Senses stuff, like there's more pressure on Swamen to resign because,

you know, if they can make Junis Corpus Hall look good, who can't they make look good? You know? Yep. But if it gets into a situation where you want to say like they're even, they even decide they need to split time between Corpusallow and Brandon Bussie, who's like a backup who has never, I don't think he's played a second of NHL hockey. And like he, if I'm remembering right, he was pretty good in the H.L. last year. and he was a great college goalie. But if you're in a situation where you're even platooning those two, that shifts all the pressure back onto the Bruins, right?

Where it's like, fuck, we've got to get swayman locked in. Like, we're trying to compete for maybe not a Stanley Cup, but we're trying to be one of the top three teams in a very competitive division. Yeah, and keeping in mind that with goalies especially, it's not like you sign the contract and he just shows up tomorrow and he's in the lineup and good to go. who knows how long it's going to take. So it is, Corpuselho has got millions of dollars

of Jeremy Swamen's money. He really does, yeah. Riding on his next few starts. It's really fascinating because to a great start, that tips it one way. Like it doesn't, it feels like this seesaw has to tip one way or the other based on how the season starts.

It doesn't stay in the middle, but it's going to be a question of which, way it tips. Corpusallo being like 908 doesn't feel like it's a super likely outcome where it's like, yeah, he's fine. We can live with it. And the wins and losses is going to matter too. Oh, of course.

And 908 and 4 and 1 probably feels a lot different than 1 and 4. And both are possible with those sorts of numbers. Yep. Yeah. So I think at the end of the day, like this gets resolved, whatever, late October, early November. Like once both sides get a real picture of what the Bruins look like without Jeremy Swayman, that should, that should just like exert the pressure in one way or the other,

but I guess we'll see. Let's move on. Let's talk about some injuries that have happened in the last little while here. Most notably, I think you might say. Drew Doughty, fractured ankle, maybe some tendon or ligament damage along with it. He is month to month, I think is the official word. And that on paper seems like it's really bad for the Kings. Yes.

And yeah, go ahead. Kings team that I was having a lot of trouble getting excited about to start with, given that their big off-season win, so to speak, was getting rid of Pierre-Luc Dubois, which was a win in terms of the cap and future flexibility, but didn't make them necessarily any better on the ice. They were a 99-point team last year. Right. But they were a 99-point team that felt like zero threat

to do anything in the playoffs. and sure enough, didn't put up much of a fight to the Oilers. So with this, boy, I don't know. I am starting to feel like, are they a borderline playoff team, let alone any sort of threat to do damage? Well, I'm going to say this.

I think they were a borderline playoff team before this, right? Like they, yeah, they fit, like you said, They had 99 points last year. They finished ahead of Vegas. But they didn't necessarily get better in the summer. Like you say, you know, getting rid of Pierre-Luc Dubois, positive. That's good.

But their solution there was they, basically what it meant is they traded Darcy Kemper in for Cam Talbot out in net. And otherwise, their goaltending battery is the same with, with a big save Dave Ridditch and uh Phoenix Copley. And I don't think Dave Ridditch is going to be a 920 goalie again this year. That's just my, you know, my crazy, uh,

prediction for the season. Mm-hmm. But I look at the rest of the, what you might consider the West playoff bubble. Um, and I don't know that there are a ton of teams that are going to catch the Kings. Um, I think we,

You know, just to start off, the three division winners, most likely top three teams in both of the West divisions. Some order, probably Edmonton, Vegas, Vancouver, depending on Thatcher Demko's injury situation. Dallas, Colorado, Nashville, Winnipeg to pick three of those teams to finish in some order, depending on how good Connor Hallibuck is, I guess. And then you look at the teams that didn't make the playoffs last year, Calgary, Seattle, Anaheim, San Jose, St. Louis, Minnesota, Arizona, Chicago. How many of those can make up the whatever, 7 to 52 point gap between those teams and the Kings last season? Like, I think we were agreeing that the Kings are going to take a step back in terms of they're not getting to 99 points probably. Mm-hmm. but St. Louis has to make up seven points.

Minnesota would have to make up 12. Calgary and Seattle would have to both make up 18 apiece. That's tough. So, again, like, it's not unlikely that a team, you know, kind of makes up that gap. Somebody is a PDO team every year, that kind of thing. But I do think the most likely outcome is the Kings are probably on the right side of the playoff bubble at the end of the season, even without Drew Doughty for 40, 50, 60 games, right?

They feel like you can pretty strongly pencil them in fourth in the Pacific. And then the question is, does that get them a wild card? Or does the central take five spots? But as you were kind of alluding to earlier, you know, let's say they get into the playoffs. and I don't know. They could draw anybody, let's say it's the Edmonton Oilers, right? Doesn't it feel like the Oilers would just fucking kill them or the Canucks or the Knights or whoever wins the Central? Yes.

You know? Very much so. And I mean, with the Oilers, that's not even speculative. We've seen that. I guess I kind of arrive at what's the fucking point with these guys. Yeah. I don't feel like the Kings. Kings don't feel like a threat to me to do much other than.

make the playoffs. And what worries me if I'm a Kings fan is that I have been sort of singing the praises of this rebuild for a few years now, but sometimes you come out of a rebuild and you just, the ceiling just isn't there.

And that's a concern in Montreal right now. It's a concern potentially in Detroit right now. I think we're seeing it in L.A. as well. Yeah, I mean, I wrote about it this week. Like, I just don't see the point of, you know, the Kings rebuild hasn't really reached the heights that people maybe thought it could two, three years ago. And, you know, if you had said a decade ago, by the way, in 10 years, the two best, two of

the four best players on the Kings are still going to be Copatara and Doughty. You would have said, oh, that sounds like they had a rebuild that didn't go so good. Mm-hmm. And maybe that, maybe that's where we're at with these. guys now. I don't know. Sort of feels that way. Yeah. Let's let's move on to

the other horrifying injury over the weekend. Patrick Line A. Really, really scary knee injury went knee to knee. What was the guy? Paray from, who's like a Toronto minor leaguer. really, really, like one of those like,

I actually shouldn't have watched that injuries. Yeah. And we still, as of, as we're recording this, have not heard what the injury is. Right. I don't believe. But nobody seems to think it's good. If it is, if it's not an ACL or something that would be very close to season ending,

then that will feel like a pleasant surprise. because it was exactly that sort of looking play that we've seen before. And not, you know, I don't think a malicious play and not, you know, this guy's a minor leaguer, but he's, you know, he's not some goon up from the miners trying to make a name for himself in preseason by taking a run at a star, but a very sloppy, unfortunate hit. Yeah, he was just in over his head. playing against a player who's significantly better than him on the penalty kill. And so he's like, I can't let this guy, you know, gain the zone on me.

They'll send my ass to the miners post-haste. And because of that, like, that's kind of the resulting play of like, I got to get some part of my body in front of him. And like, instinctually, he sticks his leg out. Yep. as opposed to, I'm going to stick my leg out and try to take this guy's knee out, you know. Yeah. So it's just, you hate to see this kind of thing. Well, you hate to see it with anybody, but especially, you know, given what Patrick Lainty has been through.

Totally. Given the new start, the fact that it felt like potentially a good fit with Martins-S-Louis and Montreal. all. And now if the season is not a right off, it certainly feels like it's going to be close to that. So not great. Not great all around. Did you have any thoughts on the lack of suspension and all that kind of thing? No, because as I said, I didn't think it was intentional. It's sloppy more than anything. And honestly, this is a guy who's not going to be in the NHL anyways. That's exactly.

That was my take. To get a game or two, which is probably all you'd get from the Department of Player's Safety. I don't think it's, I don't think it's likely to happen. And, you know, obviously Montreal tried to take their own sort of payback later in the game, which not everyone loves, but is kind of how it's. done and so, you know. Yeah. I mean, there, there were people who were very upset about the jack eye thing.

And I, I get why, but like, you know, you look at the way the league is run and how players and GMs and the Department of Player Safety itself, like, wants the game to be run. There was never going to be a suspension for that. It was just never, ever, ever going to happen. And we, you know, we can have disagreements on should that be the way it is? I would say it shouldn't be the way it is, but like I'm also going to be realistic and say that's going to be the way it is.

You know, I don't have any, um, like I get why Jack I did it and I get why the league didn't suspend him. And it, you know, a fine feels about right for, for a play like that. Mm-hmm. Yeah, the fine is kind of your, you're shaking your finger at it saying we don't endorse. Yeah. And now, now he's, you know, If he does it again, he's a repeat offender and all that.

So that's the best you can kind of do in this, whatever, justice system or however you want to say it. John Gibson had an appendectomy over the weekend. He's out three to six weeks. Have you seen all the drama with the ducks? Like, kind of even beyond this, obviously, you know, you just wish a speed of recovery for John Gibson. and hopefully, you know, he can return to his pre the last five years form or whatever, but maybe not on this team. But like, it seems like Cam Fowler is going to get traded at some point in the near future.

It is the way people are kind of talking about it. Okay. And then maybe Trevor Zegras as well. Yeah, well, Zegris, I mean, he's been the big sexy name near the top of the board for about a year now. Yeah. And yet nothing. And Cam Fowler, I'm just going to assume, is still 23.

So... Give me a real guess as how old you think Cam Fowler is. 28. He's 32. Do you believe that? No, I don't. Doesn't that suck, man? Oh, boy.

Okay. Yeah, good young defenseman like that. I think some team will jump on him. Yeah, six and a half million, a four-team trade list this year and next. And yeah, he's signed for two more years. I would have thought Cam Fowler would have been coming up on UFA by now, but here we are. I don't know who's going to want him. He hasn't exactly stood out in a positive way the last little while. Can we say that?

So, but it's interesting. It just seems like something that's going to happen. And Ratgo-Gutus is the captain of the ducks now. I don't know if you knew that. I did know that. Yeah. I think the ducks might not be very good this year. You know what?

Must credit. It's a bold take, but I think it's defensible, let's say. Good, like, good for you for getting out there and saying it. But, you know, they did the kind of the kings and the Canadians and the Red Wings thing of like, well, that's enough rebuilding, we're going to go out and sign all the Radco Gudis's and, you know, Ryan Stromes in the league.

Alex Colon. Remember that Alex Collorn contract? Mm-hmm. Big salute to Alex Colorn for getting that one. But yeah, like they just did the accelerate the rebuild thing and uh-oh, that wasn't a good idea. Yeah.

Wonder if teams will ever learn their lesson about that. I'm going to go ahead and say probably not. Oh, interesting. I thought they would. Another injury on the blue line in Winnipeg wraps up our recent injury news. I didn't see exactly what it was, but Logan Stanley has a bad knee and will be out at least a month, it looks like. Which isn't the end of the world necessarily for them, except that also, as a lot.

At the same time, Vile Heinola is also, like, he has an infection in his ankle or something like that, and it doesn't seem like there's a timeline for him to return. So now they're already down to opening day defensemen in Winnipeg. Yeah. Is that good? Not ideal. Oh, okay. My mistake.

Not ideal. Having a great goaltender helps. Yeah. They better have a great goal. tender this year. They better get the good Connor, not playoff Connor. But you aren't kidding, brother. You're speaking the truth. It's it, you know, it's hard, it's hard to say what like Winnipeg's, uh, floor is. I think we can kind of ballpark their ceiling as what they did last year. Yeah. And the thing is, and this happens every year,

last year going into the season, they were not regarded as a, much of a playoff team even. There were a lot of people had them in that 80 to 90 point range and they ended up taking a run at a president's trophy which was, as always,

as it's playing out over a six-month season, you start to kind of get acclimatized to it and retcon it in your own head and look back and go, yeah, well, we always figured the Jets would be good if Hala Buck was good. I mean, that's true of every team, right? Like, if their goalies good, they're good.

But the thing is, last year, even knowing that Connor Hullabug was a very good goaltender, nobody had the Jets as a central powerhouse that they turned out to be, at least during the regular season. Right. Were they to fall back to the pack that might feel like a surprise, and yet it would only be bringing them back in line with where we all were 12 months ago. Yeah. Well, I mean, they made the coaching change, so maybe that's a positive for them. I really don't know.

But yeah, I guess we'll see. But I guess now we can finally an hour plus whatever we are into this contract. Ooh, just came across the wire here. David Reinbacker out five to six months following knee surgery. Oh, boy. Ouch. So, I mean, that hurts, you know, clearly it hurts Montreal to lose a player that they may have had in the lineup, but it's more the development. I mean, that's almost a write-off of a season player's development.

That's ugly. Brutal. That sucks, man. I'm going to go ahead and say, let's cancel all those tickets on the Montreal to make the playoffs. It's just another cursed season, unfortunately, seems like. This will just make, yeah, and boy, Ryan Bacher being out, that just is going to make every Matt B. Michkov highlight a little tougher to deal with for Montreal fans. You won't even be able to pull. Well, at least the guy we took instead is also.

It sucks, man. It's awful. Injuries are not fun in sports. In my opinion, they're part of the game. However, It sucks. Yeah, let's get into our, you know, last week we did a season preview involving the teams. Let's do the players this week vis-a-vis how we feel about the awards contenders.

I'm asking you for your top three for basically every award that they got, including the coaches one. And you know what? I'll even say the GM's one too. Why not? What's that? The Jim Gregory Award? That's what we call that? It is the Jim Gregory Award.

Isn't it funny that like we just always think of Jack Adams as like, oh, that's the Coach of the Year Award? Like if I say, you know, John Tortorelli, he's got like three Jack Adams. You're like, yeah, three coach of the year award, sure. But if I said, oh, so-and-so, he's got two Jim Gregory Awards. You're like, wait, what does that mean? Which one's out again? Is that for leadership and being a cool guy off the ice? Or is that?

Are we doing all those awards, by the way, because I have lots of picks for the... Yeah, no, I mean, you got to, right? King Clancy Leadership Masterton Award for Lady Bingness. Here's some trivia for you. There's two guys that have won two Jim Gregory Awards. Everybody else only has won since they introduced it in 09-10. both these GMs won their awards in consecutive years. Who are they?

Jim Nill? Yep, that's right. He was the last two years and Lou Lamarillo was the other one. Yep, that's exactly right. Famously an award voted on after two rounds of the playoffs. That's right. Which is why it's always three of the four finalists. That's right.

because a GM can only be good if their team goes deep into the playoffs. That's it. So what do we got? MVP? Do you want to start with? Yeah, let's start with the heart. Why not? Yeah, let's start with it.

Why not? I'm going to avoid as best I can here the temptation to just go with like the three favorites. But I will start my heartless with Connor McDavid. Yeah, you have to. It's just the law. We gave him a break of a year. now it's we pretended his insanely good like 150 point season actually kind of was the third best in the league for some reason sure yeah um jack hughes i kind of like uh i can see that for sure yeah he he looked like an MVP last year until he got hurt a month into the season yep uh and then the other guy that i'm going it is my long shot um oh i like this yeah a sure thing like a middle a middle like a dark horse and then a long shot let's do it And, you know, I don't know if it's that much of a long shot, but Connor Bedard,

both Sidney Crosby and Connor McDavid made the leap in year two to Art Ross and Hart Trophy. And I, it's a big ask given what he's got around him in Chicago. But I think if he gets the Blackhawks to the playoffs, I think he's the MVP. And I don't love his odds of that. Yeah. I love that. Enough to be a long shot, I'll take it.

All right. I will also go with McDavid as my favorite. You literally, you know, how could you bet against this guy a couple of years ago? Remember when he was just like, I think I want to win the rocket Richard? Yeah. He was like, he got mad because we all talked about Austin Matthews for summer. Yep. And so, and then last year he just decided to.

Who gives a fuck? Here's 64. Fuck you. Yeah. And then last year it was, I think I'll do 100 assists. And who knows what this year is going to be. this year both 65 goals 100 assists have a good one out there yeah see you later guys it's the same thing remember when Sydney Crosby everyone's like

oh Crosby's kind of bad at face-offs and so he's just like okay I'm gonna spend the whole summer being becoming the best face-off guy you've ever seen yep these guys I love absolute sickos and we enjoy it thoroughly that's right so yeah I'll go with that I think this might be the year of goalies actually in the top three. Okay. And I think it's going to be UC Soros. I think there's enough guys that like the predators can make that big leap into like comfortably the top three in the central. And it'll be, you know, obviously a fair bit of how they improved up front and on the blue line.

But Soros is, you know, I think has a really good shot to just finally be the best goalie in the world. And what was it coming out of the, out of COVID that like shortened season where he probably should have been the, the Vesna guy and didn't win. Am I right about this? That sounds right. But yeah, right. Okay. So each of the, this is his Vesna finish, the last. four seasons.

6.3, 4, 5. Predators take a step. He was 5th last year. He wasn't even that good. So predators take a step. He returns back to being like a 915, 920 goalie. And everybody's just like, we love this fucking guy.

This is a spoiler for my Vezina favorite, by the way. But that's my, that's my dark horse. And then my, Longshot, this is a bit of a tricky one. I really like that Connor Bedard pick. But, hmm,

give me, give me Quinn Hughes because he should have been in the MVP conversation last year. And with the, the Thatcher Demko injury, if they have success this year, which I expect that they will have a moderate amount of success.

They won't be as good as they were last year. But I think it will be kind of Quinn Hughes driving that bus. And again, I don't know that I would even put him in my top, like, six or eight heart trophy guys, but, like, he's a guy

where it's very much within the realm of possibility that he has an MVP-style season. They never give it to goalies. They never give it to defensemen. I'm trying to have a little fun with it. You know, I don't want to just say, uh, uh, David Posternock, you know? Yeah, that guy rocks. We all agree.

You know, that's fine. So I'm going a little bit off the board here. I like it. But, yeah. Um, why don't we move on to the Norris trophy? Again, uh, favorite, uh, I'll just, I'll just take Kilmacar. Yeah. Again, you kind of have to, right?

We gave him the year off, like you said. Yep. I will go for, does Merrill Heiskin count as a medium long shot? I think so, yeah. He finished 10th last year. Let me look at like his highest finish for the Norris here. Seventh is his highest ever, but he's gotten votes four of the last five years. So I like that.

That's a good solid one. I feel okay on that one. And then, well, I'll give you a long shot and then I'll give you a super long shot. I love this. Okay, great. Long shot, Dougie Hamilton. I feel like we've just kind of maybe forgotten a little bit about him after they're off. Great one as well, yeah.

And the one that I highlighted in a piece I wrote in the summer with Gentilly where we were looking at some of the long shots. Give me Thomas Harley from the stars. Two stars. Wow. Two stars. Wow. You know, Heiskenen would have to take a step back or get hurt. But Thomas Harley is right in that age range of guys where there have been guys in the Adam Fox type mold who have taken big, big steps forward and gone.

And unlike in previous years where you would sort of say, yeah, but the young guys have to wait their turn. That isn't the case anymore. So the voters are willing to vote for young guys. So that's my big time long shot. I think he's over 200 to 1 on the odds list. I love that. That's great thinking. For me, I'll agree with Makara as the favorite,

but I will leave Hughes out of the discussion because, A, he just won it last year, and they hate giving awards to guys two years in a row. But B, you know, there's a little wiggle room on whether he can reach that same form. So for my for my for my Dark Horse I'll go Evan Bouchard Remember how good that kid was in the playoffs last year?

That's the kind of run where they decide This guy should get the the regular award next season You know they did it with Nathan McKinnon last year They saw how good he was when when Colorado won the cup And they were like kind of independent of how he does Relative to other top players in the league that guy's the MVP and then it came to pass. Drew Dowdy, when he won his Norris a million years ago, same idea.

Where it's just like, we saw this guy do this crazy shit in the playoffs. We decided he's an award winner next year. So I think that's very much within the realm of possibility for Bouchard. And then for a long shot, he got a little bit of consideration last year, I feel like, and he's 24. 25 years old, something like that. Noah Dobson.

If the Islanders are back in the playoffs again and he takes a step, I think there can be some voters who talk themselves into that. I like a lot. There are a lot of, like, good options here. Like, I thought the Dougie Hamilton call was a really good one. If, you know, he returns to form. Pick one of the Carolina guys. Those guys are always in the conversation.

Brasmus Dalene, if the sabres are there. Like, that could happen. But I think the most likely of that group is Dobson, just because, again, like, sexy new name in the mix last season, kind of out of nowhere. And if he can replicate that, I think a lot of people will be like, this is legit. This is real. So let's move on to the Vesina. The Vesina. Vesna.

I'm kind of with you on the favorite of UC Soros. Yeah. Partly, for all the reasons you mentioned, as well as the fact that Nashville so clearly made their choice that he's the guy, that I could say, there's no reason for them to go easy on him as far as how often he plays. Yeah. He is, he's showing that he can be a 60-start guy. And, you know, we know that Vezina is still largely based on. on wins. So I will go with him as my favorite. And I'll go two more. I'm going to go two long shots here.

Okay. I'm going to skip over the middle one. How's this for a long shot? Junis Corpusallo. When Jeremy Swamen does not in fact get signed, Corpus Allo plays well enough. Does all the stuff we were talking about earlier. Does all the stuff we were talking about. And here's my question. Who votes on the Vesna Award again?

The GMs, baby. The GMs. Do you think the GMs might like to stick it to a guy like Jeremy Swayman who made life miserable for one of their own? And then the team, Sweeney rides with this guy instead and he wins the Vesna.

So that's my long shot. And then my super long shot, at least according to the odds that I'm looking at, I'll take Lucas Dostle With Gibson out Young guy, who knows He'd have to absolutely stand on his head To

To do anything for the ducks But considering right now He's next to Mackenzie Blackwood And Camp Talbot on the odds If I'm going to go for a huge swing I will go with the guy who is currently even with Jetgreaves at 250 to 1. So I obviously have to stick with Soros is my favorite.

I think that for the long shot, you want to talk about wins matter and that kind of thing? This is a guy who had 38 wins last season. he had a 897 save percentage and he got to 38 wins. Okay. His name is Alexander Georgiev. Not bad. If he gets to 40 wins next year and he's like 915 or whatever, like that combination, like 915 gets him to 40 wins.

He played 63 games last year. He played 62 the year before. If he can be what he was two years ago when he was seventh in Bezna voting, I think that there's a real chance that he at least gets in the conversation. I don't think it's likely, but I think it's possible. And then my long shot, and I feel like when I thought of this one, I was like, man, who's smarter than me? But you kind of skunked me a little bit.

All right. You kind of skunked me a little bit with the Corpus Allo thing. I'm going to say Linus Olmark. Yeah. senators get back into the playoffs, he's going to be the reason why. Correct. And if he's the reason why,

and like you said, he kind of proves that it's not just Boba Sensa. It's just Linus Allmark is fucking sick, actually. Which he, you know, has been.

If he does it again, I think a lot of GMs will be like, you got to give him credit. He got the fucking senators into the playoffs. So there's my dark course. I like that. What do you got for the Calder?

So let's see, Calder. I mean, Michkov's probably the favorite. I am just looking to see. I don't think they actually have the Calder listed on the, oh yes, they do. Mitchcov's the favorite. I would take him ahead of Celebrini, sure.

Okay, yeah, makes perfect sense. Mitchkov, two points a game in the preseason so far. And then I will, for my sort of medium and long shots, I'm going to go a couple of goalies. I'm going to go Dustin Wolf and Jasper Walshsted. Yeah, that makes sense. Guys who just, you know, in theory, most important position, you come in, get 25 wins,

which I think Wolf's got a real shot at is kind of the, to win that full-on start a shot. You get the three-headed thing in Minnesota makes it a little tougher. Yeah, and especially it's Mark Andre Fleury like farewell tour. Yeah. So I don't know how many starts they're going to be, regardless of how well he plays. I think they're going to give him its starts. So that's why I didn't have Walsett on my list here.

I'll go, I'll agree. You know what, just to be a little different, I'll say Celebrini. But like him and Mitch Kov are neck and neck for me. I will say for my dark horse, I'm going to go with Cutter Gautier. Yep. Guy scored a million goals in college last year. The Ducks will need him to score a million goals for them this year if they're going to be any good at all.

And for my dark horse, I'll go with Dustin Wolf. Like you said, that's a much easier job to win. And, you know, I don't think Calgary is going to be any good this year. But, like, if you start enough games, you can win 20. pretty easily, you know, like. One more that I do like, and this was, I think, I can't remember if it was Gentilly or Dom that made this case, but Josh Donne is quite a long shot right now, odds-wise, but he's there.

And you know who else is still called her eligible if you want to get in on, because I know you're a big fan. Matt Rempe is. Wow. Okay. The other guy, yeah, the other guy who kind of like falls in between. there's two, I guess, is Logan Stankoven and Lane Hudson are kind of fall in between the like favorite and long shot

or Dark Horse, I mean. And those are two guys who, like if they're in the top three at the end of the year, who no one on Earth would be surprised. So, yeah. The Rocket Richard Trophy. Okay. You ever hear about these guys? The guys score all the goals?

I have heard about it. You know what? I'm going to go Pasturnack is my favorite. I'm going to snub Austin Matthews. And boy, from there, do I like any of these other guys? Interesting that Sam Reinhardt is way down the list. Yeah, you should be, man. He fucking...

Well, he's even... He's 60 to 1. I think that's incredibly reasonable. And what interests me is Zach Hyman's at 20 to 1. And you would think those two would maybe be in a similar spot. I think, look, I just looked it up. Do you want to guess what Sam Reinhardt shot last year, like shooting percentage was? Oh, God.

Was he around 16%? 24.5, brother. Wow. I'm going to go ahead. I'm going to go out on the limb and say he doesn't score on roughly one in every four shots he takes this year. Probably a good call. 27 goals on the power play led the league. It's probably not going to happen again.

That's a really good player. I like that player a lot. But like that's a 30 goal player and not a nearly 60 goal player for me. That is fair. That's so many fucking goals, man. 57? Holy shit. Some guys just know how to score.

You're not wrong about that. For my favorite, I'll take Austin Matthews. Guy almost had 70 last year. Little reason to expect he wouldn't do it again. For my dark horse, look, I know we were just talking about Carmar McDavid that year, decided I'm going to score 60 plus. No, we haven't heard from on the goal scoring front in a minute. Leon Drysidal. There's a former rocket guy, right?

He scored 52 years in a row. And then last year he quote unquote only had 41. So him getting back to 50 plus Absolutely wouldn't surprise me at all I don't think it's You know Gonna be enough to get him all the way into the winds the rocket But like

Very easy for me to see that he's Top 3 in Goals Next year And finally For my like dark horse guy Hey look Stephen Stamco's He's not He's not on that lightning power

play anymore, you know, who still is is Braden Point. Okay. Not a bad pick. I'll go, my medium guy, give me Miko Renton, and for my long shot, for the same reasons I explained earlier, Connor Bedard. Love it. Yeah, Braden Point, 97 goals over the last two seasons. Pretty good. Yeah.

Pretty, pretty good. The Selke. Now keep in mind, this is going to be awarded based on how a player played defensively three years ago. That's right. Yeah. Oh, God. I don't even know if I. Barkov is my favorite.

He just won it, though. They hate giving it to guys two years in a row, unless they're Patrice Berser. I'm just, I'm scrolling down this list of, all right, sure. Yeah. All right. You want me to hit you with the favorite for me? Let me know. guy who I don't think has ever won the award before

and boy they're trying to give this guy every award they fucking can at this point in his life Sydney Crosby yep yeah that that that's the right pick for where is he I'm looking on the odds he that would fall into the long shot category really on the list I'm looking at he is the 12th name listed interesting well okay do you want me to switch it up then and just say Austin Matthews hey we fucked you last year you know Is Hyshire won one? Nico Hesher? I don't think he had, I'm 99.9% certain he has without pulling up the all-time loss.

But let's see here. Last year was only Matthews' first time being like higher than 10th in the Selby voting. He hasn't paid his dues yet on that. No, he hasn't. So like, yeah, I guess that's a better pick than Crosby. But I just feel like they're going to be like, you know, you know who needs a Selky? is this guy who's already widely considered like one of the four best forwards

to ever put on a pair of skates. We just don't honor this guy enough. Well, and here's the thing. If, yeah, because that gets Crosby into the Steve Eisenman, Ron Francis, late career, Selky, lifetime achievement.

Yeah. Oh, I think that's, I think that's a good pick. Give me a dark horse. Give me one that. Yeah, super long shot. You know what? give me Bo Horvett for the Islanders.

I like that. I could just see them. Again, we're running out of reasons to explain why the islanders make the playoffs, even though we all pick them to miss the playoffs. We've done the goaltending thing. We've done the underrated blue liners. Maybe now somebody early in the season writes a story about Bo Horvatt being a great underrated defensive forward.

and then our fear of Lula Amarillo drives us all to vote for him. I'm going to go with a guy. He's been top 10 in Selke voting each of the last four years. Now, his position has dropped from fourth to seventh to ninth to tenth in that span. But I think if the Minnesota Wilder back into the playoffs, Joel Erick Sineck probably has a really good year for them. He's a guy he has 60 points each of his last two years, 60 plus. points each of his last two years. And he's a really good defensive player.

I think if he can turn some heads with the wild this year, maybe score 25 goals, something like that, and keep playing extremely good defense. He's a guy that can get at least into the conversation. Okay. I like that. Jack Adams. And again, keep in mind, this isn't who you think is the best coach.

You think this is the coach of the team that is unexpectedly good. Yes. I like, even though my instinct is to go with a, not a rookie head coach, but a first year on a new team head coach, I am going to instead go with Andre Tournier as my favorite. Sure. Yeah. That's. I think he's done a real good job in Arizona as an underrated guy. And I could see Utah taking a step forward. So he'll be my favorite. Uh, my middle of the pack guy will be Patrick Waugh. Sure. And I don't even, a guy I don't even see on this list anywhere unless I am, you know, he's got to be, they've got everyone on here. Oh, there he is. Okay. Well, he's actually tied with Patrick Waugh, so maybe not as big a long shot. Give me Dean Eveson of the Blue Jackets.

We don't really have a great press. for how a team reacts to the sort of horrific offseason that the Blue Jackets had. Yeah. And I think all of us would understand if they just had a total right off of a season, especially given the talent level. I mean, the roster is bad, unfortunately, for them, yeah. But I am reminded a little bit of under obviously different circumstances, but the Golden Knights when they debuted with the team,

nobody thought was any good. Remember, there had been the tragic shooting, and they sort of built on that. And it just kind of became an identity of like, hey, it's, you know, we're all together on this. I'm not saying it would happen in Columbus, but I feel like under the circumstances, if they even stay near a playoff race,

typically you have to make the playoffs to win at Jack Adams, but I could see a lot of this, yeah. I can see a lot of people saying, like, the job Dean Eveson did to keep everyone, focused and United and all of that. I could see him being the guy that the, and of course he fits the first year, the description of the first year coach on a team no one's expecting to do well. Right.

I just, I don't even think Columbus needs to make the playoffs. I think if they're playing meaningful hockey into February, you're going to start seeing a lot of Dean Eveson love out there. Yeah, I think, I think that's all, I think that's all correct. for me, I think Favorite? Hear me out. This is maybe going to sound like a silly pick,

but I'm going to say this is finally the year John Cooper wins his Jackdx Award. Yeah. The Lightning lost even Stamcoast. They lost Mikhail Surgachev, right? Like they aren't better than they were last season on paper. And yet, I think they'll be quite good. or at least, you know, good enough to make the playoffs and be like a hundred plus point team,

which isn't maybe, did they get to 100 last year? Tampa? I think Tampa was high 90s last year. 98, it says here, 98. So, you know, if they're back in the playoffs and they get up to 100 points again, which is very much possible, you know, Vasilevsky wasn't great last year. I don't know if people remember this. Like he was roughly average, I'd say, maybe even a little worse.

And so if they lose some prominent players and continue to be as good as we think they are, and, you know, John Cooper gets the thing of like, can you believe this guy never fucking won a Jack Adams Award? I think it's very easy to talk yourself into, they'll just give it to him like kind of a lifetime achievement award kind of a thing. But he's fucking, he's such a good coach. You know? Like, I just, I feel like that's a pretty likely outcome.

For a dark horse, or I'm sorry, a long shot, give me, give me Andrew Brunette. I don't know that he's going to get a ton of credit for, for Nashville being better just because of how their offseason went, you know? But like, once again, it's just very easy to talk yourself into like, you know, they take a big step this year. And he's got to be seen as part of the reason why, right? That's fair. Especially if they do it, if they're an offensive.

wagon because that's kind of his reputation as an offensive coach that I could see people getting behind that. Right. And also, I just think it's very within, again, like they were, they were a playoff team, 100 point team or whatever they were last year with Saros not being good. Right. So if he, again, turns into the guy that I'm saying could be the MVP of the league. And that gets them to like 110, 100.

Like that gets them into the President's Trophy conversation. And so to go from, we're thinking about rebuilding to where a President's Trophy team in two years, like that's an easy narrative to stitch together. You know what I mean? So, yeah, that's why I think he's at least like a long shot. And then I'm going to go with, hmm. Do I want to say John Tortarella here? I mean, is that dark horsey enough for people? Do you see what I'm asking?

I think it could, especially since a lot of us, you know, myself included, are expecting the Flyers to take a big step back. Maybe this is, if it was another way. I got it. I got it. Okay. Lindy Ruff. Mm-hmm. If the savers do what people are pretending the savers are capable of doing, everybody will say Lindy Ruff.

is the guy behind the bench, right? Has to be. He does or does not have a... He must have a Jack Adams in his... In his... I feel like he probably does. Won it in 06, it says here.

Okay, wow. So, you know, they'd love to give this to the old boy, you know? Why not? But, you know, I don't think the team's going to be good, so whatever. give me your GM of the year. Okay, so I don't have any odds available.

That makes sense. Again, this is something nobody thinks about. I mean, it's just pick your, pick your final four. Oh, God. Once again, I'll lead us off here. Barry Trott seems like he's going to be the favorite, right? Like, if they're good, they were, he was so active this summer. He didn't get cleaned out on the Escarov thing.

Like, he actually did pretty well for himself. They have three first round picks, and so he's going to probably use those in the regular season to improve the team even more. There's just a lot of reason, like a lot of runway for the Barry Trott's GM of the Year award. And everybody wants to fucking love the guy too. So I'll go for my favorite. Let me have, let me go.

with Bill Zito just because he probably should have won the last couple years. Yep. I will take as a medium long shot Tom Fitzgerald. Love that. Yep. Absolutely. I mean, completely remade the devil's

goaltending situation, made a coaching change, added a couple other pieces. There's a lot of reason to like that. Yeah, I'll actually go with you on that. I'll meet your. enthusiasm there. This is voted on by the GMs, right? It is. They wouldn't be stubborn enough to throw a Stan Bowman nomination, even if the Oilers are in the final four, right? Like, they would be able to read the room enough to know that, wouldn't they? Yeah, he's, hmm, I just wonder

how much credit he could, Stan Bowman could possibly get for, for this team. Yeah. Well, you know what? You know what probably works against him more than all the things that should work against him is the fact that it would feel disrespectful to Ken Holland, too. Yeah. So for my long shot, but let me put down Don Sweeney again. Just. I was going to do the same thing. Okay. I was going to do the same thing. I would see the GM's wanting to kind of give him a pat on the back. Yeah, I love that. That's a great pick. So I guess that's it for a war. I might forget. I'm not. I'm not, you know, I'm not trying to get you to say, who's going to win the damn Lady Bing? Who cares? Nobody.

I'll tell you who's going to win the Masterton if he comes back is Gabe Landiscock. Yes. I think that's probably a pretty decent bet. All right. One last thing here. We do this every year. Stole it from inside the NBA. It's who he play for.

I'm going to give you, how many guys did I write down? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. guys, all you need to do, all you need to do, Sean. Actually, you know what? I'll find a tenth. I'll find a tenth and circle back on this one. But I need you to get to six out of ten. Oh, boy.

And I think, I'm confident that you can do it. You all, you know, we both do a lot of preseason thinking and writing and that kind of thing. Yeah. And I see guys and I go, I got to remember that for who we play for. And I don't. Right. Okay, so I'll start you out with a relatively easy one. Matt Roy, X of the Los Angeles Kings.

Oh, God, if he's the easy one, where did he go? Did he go to Colorado? He went to Washington. Son of him. Oh, boy. Ofer is on the table, guys. I'm saying this right now. I'll hit you with a trickier one.

now. James Reimer, still in the league. Yes, James Reimer is in Buffalo. Okay. So that was, I think I teased this a few weeks ago. That was the one where I was like, zero recollection of that. That sounds made up. Yep. That's who I started my list with.

I saw it somewhere in, and probably because it's an ex-leaf, it stuck more than most of these other guys. I hope you got some more X-leafs in there. I do have an, an, other ex-leaf. How about Zach Bogosian? Oh, that doesn't count as an ex. So all of these guys are still in the league? Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'm not going to

be like... Say, Loose Blues. Minnesota Wild. Those are the same team. I should get a point for... I'm not going to hit you with like, this guy, he used to be in the NHL, now he's playing for Schleftail, or in the Swedish league. Now, I'm not going to do that to you. Thanks. So,

it's simply my pleasure. Brendan Dylan. Rangers. So close and yet so far, the New Jersey Devils. Tavo Terra Vinen. Thank God for James Reimer. Where'd Turbo end up? That's exactly right.

Yeah. Yep. Anthony Bovillier. Oh, man. San Jose. Pittsburgh. He's a Pittsburgh penguin now, if you can fucking believe that. Cannot.

Okay. Calvin DeHan. Remember him? He's still... No, barely. Holy smokes. Okay, he wound up with the Flyers. Colorado Avalanche. Brian Dumlin. I think I'm two for seven, so I'm already... You're fine.

Yep. Brian Dumolin. He wound up with the Panthers. The Anaheim Ducks. Do you guys like how I'm saying this confidently enough? If I get it right, it sounds like... Maybe you want to start doing the inside the NBA thing of like the Guangdong Tigers, you know? Danton Heinen, the great Dantan.

Seattle. Vancouver, you were very close. Geographically, that's as close as you can get. That's right. And finally, Thomas Nosek. See, the sad thing is I feel like we could also play a game of who do you play for last year and I would do just as poorly a lot of these guys.

Vegas. Florida. Another one of these no tax teams. No Shook used to play for Vegas, of course. Of course.

Well, you know, you heard the Tehrvinan reunion in Chicago when you were like, it was just in the air this song. Exactly. That's it. So that's it. Why don't you hit them with the plugs and we'll get the hell out of here?

I've got my season predictions is coming probably tomorrow. And the prediction contest returns. Friday is the target date for that. So you got the weekend to get your votes in. Let's see how we do. Let's see. For me, I have been writing about college hockey

like a crazy person the last little while here. And all that stuff is going to start dropping today, I believe. I think I've written five or six articles so far, and I still have one or two more to go. So lots of college hockey preview stuff, if that's the kind of thing you're into, there's a lot of really good draft eligible players this year. There's a number of first round picks from this past draft who will be in college hockey this season. So basically, if your team has a prospect pool at all, there are guys in college hockey that you're going to want to be in, formed about and I'm the guy to do it, I guess.

So head over to elite prospects. epiringside.com, use the code I love EP. When you sign up for an annual subscription, it will be 15 months for the price of 12. And then also the Puck Soup Patreon, we just did a bunch of stuff. The most recent bonus episode, me and Sean and Greg did, was about what if you flipped the results of the last 10 Stanley Cup final? that went to a game seven. So like Boston loses in 2011.

Edmonton wins last year, that kind of thing. And we just talked about the what-ifs of it all. There's some pretty interesting stuff, including one, Sean, that I wanted to bring up on this. One thing we didn't mention is when the ducks lose in 03, they're still the mighty ducks. And they rebrand shortly thereafter. Do they rebrand if they have a recent standard?

You know what? That's a good one. I don't think they do. I think we still have the mighty ducks. Pretty cool. Pretty pretty cool. Look what they took from us. And again, like they don't, they don't rebuild probably in the same way that they did between 03 and 07. So maybe don't Brian Burke. Yeah. Pretty interesting. So we talk about all that sort of stuff. That's just a little preview, I guess. For the last 10 cup final, I think that goes back to 87 or 84 or something like that. So, yeah, check all that out. That's over at patreon.com slash puck soup.

Thank you for listening to the main show this week. And, hey, by the time we talk to you next week, there are going to be a bunch of regular season hockey games played. Do you believe that? It's exciting. It rocks. Let's go. Another season. College hockey starts this weekend, I forgot to say.

on the fourth. I'm going down to Yukon to see them play Colgate, and then I'm going to be you to see them play Holy Cross on Saturday. So I'm really excited about all that shit. Thanks for listening. Have a good one, folks. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.