Puck Soup - Babcock Gobbled

Episode Date: November 21, 2019

The boys discuss all the angles of the Toronto Maple Leafs' firing of Mike Babcock this week, including what's next for him and the team. Plus, a debate about hockey spitting and changing the rulebook; a round of "Hell Yes or B.S." on the Islanders, Jets, Coyotes and David Pastrnak; some thoughts on the Hockey Hall of Fame Class of 2020; Steve Simmons steps in it again; and Baby Yoda. Sponsored by Seat Geek

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons We've got sportly commentary to whatever commute But we also cover movies, TV shows, it's in tunes It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense Poggy and Nancet Uh You know, got uh, got fired this week Uh, did not have enough grit

Did not have enough jam Out of a job of ESPN. I don't have an impression to do when I'm Ryan Lambert from Yahoo. That's crazy that we got Babcock to come in and do that this week. Wow. Sean McHenckerman, the athletic. I gave my statement to Pierre LeBron. I told him I appreciated everybody in the organization.

Okay, stop doing that. Two notable exceptions. Except for Sandy. I want to take the janitor. would I take popcorn vendor? Um, dismissing anybody? Nope.

Wait, Mark Hunter. Want to think Mark Hunter too. Uh, yeah, so, um, it's good to have a podcast where I can talk about the Babcock firing because that shit happened two hours after I finished ESPN on ice yesterday. Oh, that's fun. The entire,

the entire first segment was about Babcock and it gets fucking fired two hours later. Stupid ass. That, that really is the fucking worst where you're, like, that happened to me yesterday. where I was, you know, I'm writing about the flames. They're going to trade Johnny Goddrow and why obviously they shouldn't do that and all that stuff. And then click send four minutes later. Mike Bedcock fired.

Oh, okay. Yeah. Okay. But, you know, also. The story, the story I always tell people is that the most famous case of that and the history of this podcast is when I was in Nashville and doing the podcast remotely with Lozo. Who? And, you know, that guy. I think he's writing for Cady Nolan now.

It doesn't ring a bell. Yeah, never heard of him. So he... I didn't know he had a podcast since crazy. Yeah, well, I mean, I think it was actually, it was like a minute-by-minute recap of Friends episodes. It wasn't very good. Okay.

So anyways, so we get done with the podcast, and then like, like, no joke, fucking a minute after the thing processed, word comes down that Gordy Howe died. And so I got to call up this guy and be like, I know you're leaving your apartment in Hoboken or whatever right now, but we have to do a fucking Gordy Howe thing or else is we're going to look like a bunch of assholes. So it wasn't like we did a fucking bid or anything on Gordy Howe. It just was like, you know. I hope not. Jesus.

Yeah. So we're just dunking on poor dead Gordy Howe. I like, like, Loza, we have to scrap the 10 ways Gordy How might die, uh, countdown. That seems like one of those things where, much like how the New York Times has an obituary ready to go for every celebrity over the age of 50, you just should have had that in the bank. Like, okay, Corey Howe's going to die any minute now. In Memorium, yeah. Anyways, Mike Babcock got fired. And he got fired on the road after the second game of like a six-game road trip, which I can't remember the last time that shit happened.

Shelton Keeves, the new head coach, and Mike Babcock lasted parts of four seasons into an eight-year contract in his journey to bring a cup to Trana as an Ontario boy, and now he's gone. Yeah, good chat. Okay. So under the – Well, okay. First of all, first of all, should they have waited for him to get a couple of games with – the Trinity all healthy at the same time before doing this? Or was it pretty apparent that you're-

So by that time, you're digging yourself too big of a hole. If it doesn't go well, yeah. I think what happened here, I'm, I was surprised that it happened. I was surprised by the timing. I thought as a worst case, he would get the rest of the road trip. Yeah. Which has got four games left on it. But it did feel like things.

had kind of shifted in the last few weeks where maybe without even realizing it, the conversation around the team, and I'm guessing maybe internally inside the team as well, sort of shifted from do we make this move to when do we make this move? Like when's the right time to make the change? And at a certain point, if you've already moved on to when is the right time, maybe just now is the right time rather than trying to finesse it and this and that. And I think that the road trip had just started, but the Saturday night game against Pittsburgh was... That was it.

That was the... That was the... That was the six-one final. That very much could have been 10-1. Like, I tweeted out at the time. That game really did remind me of, and it's going back a long time, but back when the Leifes in the early Cliff Lecher era went into Pittsburgh again and got beat 12 to 1 and then pulled off the 10 player Gilmore trade a week later because it was just

like enough. You see something like that. You can't let that stand and move on from it. And I don't know if there was a feeling of let's give them just one more game or if it was maybe a sense of, you know what, it's the Hall of Fame weekend. We don't want to be the biggest story. I don't know. I don't know if that would factor in or not. But yeah, once the Vegas, they play better in Vegas. And if Mark Andre Fleury doesn't make the save of the season, maybe they get at least a point. And I don't know if that buys them time or not. But I think it had clearly reached a point for them where it was feeling inevitable. And at that point, you know what, pull the trigger and move on.

It's there's no point dragging it out for another few weeks or months or whatever it is. Yeah, I mean, the writing was on the wall like last summer. You know, that's the real issue here is that we all figured it was coming at some point if they didn't. You know, everybody, I guess, would have said, well, you know, you got to wait until they get to the playoffs and inevitably lose to the Boston Bruins before they make a change. But, you know, you keep slipping further and further below 500. You know, you can't go, well, let's just see how this life reserver works when we're 40 feet underwater. Yeah. Because that was always the feeling with the Leafs was it was going to come down to how they did in the playoffs.

And if they had to make it out of the first round, if they didn't, Babcock was going to be gone for sure. And if they had a longer run, then maybe they'd, maybe he would stick around. But it was always based on the assumption that, of course, they're going to make the playoffs. That was the floor for this team. And they're under the floor right now. So that's that. So I guess, yeah. Again, I'm, I can't say that, like, I was, I was pretty shocked when I saw it come across the,

the news feed. I didn't think it was going to happen this this imminently, but I'm not, I'm not stunned that it did, uh, given where, where things were pretty clearly headed. Do you buy into the idea that they did it on November 20th because the blues fired Mike Yo on November 20th? No. They, they did it on November 20th because they had lost on November 19th. and that's how long it took to get Brennan Shanahan to fly out to where they were and meet the team and do what needed to happen. There's there's no need to go digging for symbolism in it other than this is the time of year. This does guarantee them the Stanley Cup. Yes.

Yeah, correct. I think the issue for me is that like, you know, they clearly tuned him out. Like they just did not give a fuck about Babcock anymore. quit on them. And, you know, they, part, part of the reason why this team is so defensively porous, part of, one, one part of it is the system that Babcock played, which in, in two years running has been defensively porous. The other issue is the fact that they were a bunch of individuals all trying to do different shit. Like, they were, they were, I saw a lot of people referenced this in the last few weeks, and I completely agree having watched a few Leafs games,

It was a very bad team to watch. The games were just putrid. Lack of effort, lack of execution, nobody knowing what the fuck to do from play to play. It was just really bad hockey to watch. Yeah, and that's the thing. I mean, the lack of effort thing, you can always find that when things are going bad,

and it always looks like the efforts there when things are going good. But the thing with the Leafs this year, the story is that the narrative around this team for the, last couple years is they want to play running gun. They want to try to beat you six to five, and that doesn't work in the playoffs. That's not going to beat the Bruins in a game seven in Boston. You've got to be willing to grind it out, play a Mike Babcock game, win two to one. And this year, they're still not playing the grinded out game. They're still not being the defensively sound team that he wants, but now the offense is gone too. Now they're not running

gun anymore either. Now they're just, there's just nothing. They're not, they're not scoring and they're not looking dynamic and dangerous. They're just throwing pucks at the net from a distance. So even that element of it has gone. So, I mean, it's, it, they're, they're not even a team that tries to beat you 6'5 anymore. Now they're a team that loses to you 5 to 2 because both halves of the game are, are gone. And it was, yeah, I mean, it, it, it's not a good team right now.

That's really the, the bottom line. And, and I'll say this. I've seen a lot of takes that have basically been the standard take that we always get when a coach gets fired, which is now the spotlight goes on the GM. And yeah, absolutely. When you're a new GM, you tend to get a pass until you get to hire your own coach. And now Kyle Dubas has hired, not only hired his coach, but like his coach, the guy that we all knew he was going to hire for years and years and years. Basically a guy he grew in a test tube to become a coach.

Pretty close. Like to the point where there's been remarkably little debate and discussion over whether Sheldon Keith is the right guy for the job, because it's just been assumed for so long that he, of course, would be the next guy that it felt pointless to say, like, is it the right choice to have a guy with no NHL experience? Step into this situation. And, you know, and I guess we'll see. But I'll just say this. Like, yes, absolutely, Kyle Dubas is now, his seat gets hotter, his spotlight gets brighter. don't underestimate how much of that pressure, though, now goes on to the players and goes on to specifically the Matthews, Marners, I mean, Nealander's already getting killed all of that,

but like these guys, because now the feeling is going to be in Toronto, all right, you know what, guys? You didn't like the coach with the Stanley Cop ring who wanted you to play defense. You wanted a player's coach. Now you got your players coach. You all wanted your nice big contracts, which you should want, and every player should. should try to get, but you squeezed every dollar you could. Now the cap is, now we're up against the cap. We can't make trades.

We can't make moves. It's got to be you guys now. And that can sometimes be motivating. And sometimes that can end up being very unfair because you get, I mean, there's only so much one individual player can do. And suddenly the narratives take hold and everybody's, oh, you know, Austin Matthews didn't backcheck or Mitch Martin didn't do this or that. It can get very ugly. So it's, it's, I'm not saying it's fair.

saying it's right, but don't, don't assume if you're outside the Toronto market that this is now going to become Kyle Dubas on the hot seat. It's going to be that. Plus, I think you're going to see the pressure ratcheted up on the young players in a way that, let's be honest, has not happened yet in the time that they've been here. That's true. And I guess the question then becomes one of, It's the classic hockey debate. Was it coaching or construction? And I agree with the people that say that, like, taking Babcock out of the equation is going to, you know,

you know, rip the hood off the car so you can finally see the engine. You know what I mean? Like, we're going to learn pretty quickly whether or not it was Babcock not playing the right guys, you know, enough or the system itself or, you know, a lack of connection with the players. Keep in mind this. Like, already in the 24 hours since this happened, there's been at least 157 reports in the Toronto media about how much everybody fucking hated Mike Babcock.

Now, where this stuff was 48 hours ago, I don't know. Yeah, but maybe, okay, but maybe nobody want to talk about it until it's gone. So yeah, no big surprise that when Mike Babcock was still with the team, that sources weren't opening up about this stuff. And there has been some of that. I mean, we, do we not remember the whole Mike Babcock goes to Eric, Arizona to meet with Austin Matthews and what does that mean situation? I mean, I think it shouldn't be surprising anyone to hear that this guy wasn't necessarily popular in the room.

I mean, partly just look at his history and his demeanor. But there have been reports and conversations about this going on in Toronto going back a little while now. Yeah, and the thing is to, you know, when it comes to construction specifically, you know, Obviously, they didn't have guys who Babcock wanted to play, and they spent a good chunk of the summer getting rid of the guys that Babcock did want to play. And so on some level, you go, well, you know, Cody Cici always seemed like the kind of perfect Babcock guy where his underlying numbers aren't particularly good, but he presents as defensively steady. And that's why he was out there every time the Maple Leafs had a lead, that kind of thing. but I also, you know, I have to say like, you know, the moves this team made in the summer, like to bring in Cody C.C. When they could have done anything with him besides have him on the roster.

Yeah. And have an extra $4 million in cap space that could have got to Jake Gardner or whoever else. Yep. And, you know, the other thing to say is the moves they made over the summer to. fire all the Babcock's assistants and bring in guys like Dave fucking Hacksdoll to fix the offense. Like, you know, I don't know that it's necessarily getting a lot of discussion outside of Toronto, but like their special teams have been horrible this year. And guess who's in charge of those things?

The penalty kill is just awful. Unwatchable. And who's in charge of those things, the assistant coaches? So two guys that Kyle Dubus brought in. are doing, I would say, an objectively bad job. And, you know, hexagon-Berry trade has been awful as well. Yeah, and I do wonder how much of that is back to Babcock and usage, right? Because, you know, it's a situation where even in Colorado, what do you use Tyson-Berry for?

He's your second-payer guy who is on your first power play unit. You're not going to put him on the first power play unit over Morgan Riley or whatever, you know. So like that's a usage thing and B, you know, I guess, you know, Kyle Dubus needed to get a defenseman back. And that was a guy he could get who's got some value in theory, but in actual practice it hasn't worked out. And part of that definitely is. They just can't, they physically can't put him in a position to succeed that like, you know, has historically worked. out for him, if that makes sense. Right.

Yeah. And in terms of the coaching versus construction, at the end of the day, the construction is always going to, is always going to win. The GM gets to build the team. And the big question in the offseason, because remember when the Leafs lost in the playoffs to the Bruins last year, and then Kyle Dubas at his press conference was asked like, hey, Mike Babcock safe and he was kind of noncommittal. Yeah, kind of punted. Yeah, and that set off a lot of discussion. And when it became clear that Mike Backcock was going to stay, the big storyline was, okay, maybe that was a warning shot.

Maybe, you know, and plus the fact that they then ship out a bunch of his favorites, and it was kind of, okay, can Mike Babcock adjust? Is he going to adjust and change and become more like the type of coach that the Leaf seemed to want him to be? And we know the answer to that. And the answer is always going to be no. He did not change at all remotely. Like there's not a single adjustment you can really point to and say like this is what, in anything, in, in how the lineup was used, in the tactics, in just the comments that and, and his what he, what he said publicly, it was all just like he was Mike Babcock right up until the end. He didn't change at all. And when that happens and, you know, there's been some good.

It's not like James Myrtle had a good piece today where he basically said, look, the players below him didn't like him, and he didn't do himself any favors with the people above him in the front office. And when you don't have allies above or below and things aren't going well, it's not hard to figure out what's going to happen next. I also think that there's, look, Mike, I've mentioned this before on the podcast. I think Mike Babcock is extraordinarily overrated. One great J.S. Jaggerr performance in 2003. The benefit of having a Red Wings team that still had the championship pixie dust of previous teams. Lidstrom, Datsuk, Zetterberg as your foundation for a cup champion and then your foundation for a second conference championship.

And then after that, you know, you have Lidstrom for a team where you're, years and the wheels fall off. I mean, I find it, I find it to be funny. Like, if it was coach X and not the guy who, and I believe it was you Lambert that said a well-trained parrot could stand behind the team Canada bench and win two gold battles. Yeah, all he just has to remember to say is, okay, said, you're up. If it was just coach X and not that guy who coached a team for parts of five seasons and missed the playoffs, obviously, in a tank year, but then didn't get out of the first round

from three consecutive playoffs, and then the team played as poorly as it has this season, that coach is gone without a second thought, and it's not causing a seismic shift. And I think the reason it caused a seismic shift is one because of the contract that he has, which has got a few more years left on it. I think he's owed like $23 million or some,

such. And the other thing is that he's got this reputation for being a super genius coach. And why, why is it that we look at some coaches around this guy's age and freely say, well, the game has sort of passed them by because the game in 2019 is not the game of 2011 or 2012 or 2014 even? You know, we look at a lot of guys and say, you know, they're, they have to changed stylistically in order to be relevant. And it never seemed to apply to Babcock. He always just seemed like we were just assuming that Super Genius

was going to be able to figure shit out even though it was clear that the Leafs had systemic problems. And he had no desire. I mean, every fucking game they lost, he would go, what, we'd just go to work harder? And it's like, Mike, that can't be the answer at a certain point. You know what I mean?

Like, he didn't whether it was an unwillingness to change or an inability to change. Either way, it's a situation where he did not have an answer for what the problem was that was going to work. Right. And his usage was poor, as we've talked about. The team was, I think, in like the bottom five or six and expected goals against in consecutive seasons. So again, is it a personnel issue? I mean, you can't completely ignore the makeup of the team

potentially being a problem, but it sure is shit was a system's problem without question. Yeah, and as far as why he doesn't come in for that criticism, I think he will. Like starting now, you're going to hear a lot of that

and wherever he ends up going next. I mean, I... Yeah, he has had his best success coaching very, very talented teams. I do, I think you guys are being too dismissive of what he did in Detroit, of what he did with Team Canada. I mean, those were teams that were the favorites, but this wasn't like a U.S. 92 dream team situation where it was an easy path to just roll over everyone else.

Both of those teams that he won gold with went into those tournaments as the favorite in the sense of being the most likely team to win, but not they were underdog. to the field still. I mean, they were considered by by the odds makers. Oh my God. Oh, my God. Ladies and gentlemen, breaking news, Mount Lambert is about to blow.

Oh, my God. Please evacuate your homes. Right. You can blow up as much as you want. You look up the odds. Like, literally look at what the odds makers had. Oh, boy. Canada was not an overwhelming favorite. Oh, these lunch pale underdog, they were one-to-one in 2010. They were two to one. They were two to one underdogs in two 2014. That's just a reality. I mean, if you're smarter than the people who have millions of dollars on the line, then okay. But that's, I'm just telling you what the odds were before the tournament's begin. Yeah, in part because they were like, oh, well, we're going to take the greatest collection of talent ever assembled in hockey, and we're going to try to win a bunch of fucking three to two games with it. Like, hey, you know, we could, we could have a P.K. Subin on the third line back when P.K. Subin was still an elite.

at least offensive defensemen, or on the third pair, rather. Instead, we're going to get this guy who sucks because I think he's good defensively. I'll give fucking ridiculous. I'll give Babcock credit for this. The goalie change in 2010. That was a pretty bold move. I'll give him credit for that. It's not, I mean, he clearly had the best team.

But again, you know, Mark Crawford had the best team in 982, and that doesn't guarantee anything. There is still something to be said for having a steady hand. on the wheel. And no, I don't think any coach could have won back-to-back gold with those teams. And I think he deserves some credit for it. Yeah, a bunch of Americans couldn't. Some Russians couldn't, I bet. But a lot of Canadian coaches could have won with, well, never know. But, you know, the point is he did win. And it wasn't the obvious slam dunk that it gets made out to be in hindsight. And if the teams were so dominant that it looks that way looking back at it, then I think he should get some

credit for that. And the same with Detroit. I mean, those were stacked teams, obviously, built to win right now. But we've seen lots of stack teams that are built to win right now that don't win. And so what he did at the time, I think he should get credit for while at the same time acknowledging that after that Stanley Cup and after that run back to the final in 2009, the results weren't there. And they, haven't been there for a while at the NHL level. Outside of the Jaguaria year, he's never advanced past the first round of the playoffs without having Nick Lidsstrom on his team in an 82 game season.

I want to put that out there. Okay, but that's like, but that's like, that's the vast majority of his coaching career. I mean, that's, you know, you can, you can do that with a lot of guys. Well, I mean, except from 2013 to now, which is the time that he did not have Nick Lidstrom. Right. In an 82 game season. and then he never got made it past the first round of playoffs. But listen, here's what I want to say about Babcock, though.

I'll give him this. The man has Cahones the size of Jupiter to bet on himself the way he did and do what literally no one else does, which is become a free agent as a guy from Ontario and take the challenge to go to Toronto and try to bring a cup to the Leafs. Like, I will forever respect. Like, granted, yeah. Yeah, he got paid an exorbitant amount of money, given a huge contract to do so.

But he still made the decision to take up that challenge. And the challenge is either you're going to leave a disgrace, which he is, or they're going to build the statute of your honor because he won the cup. I will forever credit him with taking on what might be the greatest challenge in the NHL. I will forever credit him for that. And from an entertainment standpoint, too, like, you got to respect that he was like, yeah, fuck it, I'll go. like that's cool totally

yeah he could have I mean there's there's some dispute as to how much Detroit wanted to keep him but I'm sure if he had said this is my home I don't want to go anywhere that he probably I don't know if he'd still be the coach now but he would have stuck around and he made the big leap and the team he would have coached is the one that is convinced to had him had him under contract before he signed with the Leafs

which is the Sabres that was the other option and that you know what that would have been a big leap too but yeah, no, and look, the 2015-16, like what happened those first two years in Toronto was absolutely what needed to happen on both ends of the scale. And credit to him for that. But yeah, it's sort of ironic because when he was hired to get back to some of what you guys were saying about his track record, the question in Toronto was, okay, is this a guy for a rebuilding team?

We know he can win when he's stacked with talent, but is this a guy who can get a bad team there. And he kind of did that. And then when everybody was looking at the Leafs going, now they're contenders, he couldn't get them over that hump, which is kind of the opposite of how you would have expected it to work. What do we say of Sheldon Keefe? I have no fucking idea.

And I think that's the point, right? Like, we just straight up don't know. The Toronto Marley's look good, like, look really good on a pretty consistent basis. But of course the problem is that the Toronto Maple Leafs can afford to pay a lot of money to a lot of really good AHL veterans in addition to developing talent. And so that's always going to help you look good. And they can invest in their AHA team in a way that a lot of teams can't. And so, yeah, like Sheldon Keefe has done a great job in a position where, you know, a lot of good coaches would do a great job. Yeah.

Yeah, it's like I said, it's strange. It's been, this has been this succession plan for so long that it's like nobody has really done the sort of dive where, you know, if this had happened in the off season and they were interviewing guys, there'd be all sorts of debate over what's the right direction. Do you need a veteran voice? Do you need somebody who's won? Do you need this or that? But because, especially because it happened in the middle of the season, of course, it was going to be Sheldon Keefe. It had to be. So people are just sort of skipping the whole, is this the right call debate? Because it was. it was already set in stone. I'll just say this. Everything I've heard about him as an HL coach has been positive. And in fact, some of it's been extremely positive. People just sing the praises of this guy. I think you could maybe even make a case that he was considered the best coach

outside the NHL as far as guys who would be next in line. A real Dallas Eakins. Yeah, well, yeah. Here's the thing. He's never coached in the NHL, not as a head coach, not as an assistant. So there is a risk factor here because, you know what, every great coach starts somewhere. You know, every great coach has the first head coaching job. So there have been guys with a Sheldon Keith type of background who have come to the NHL and had success and gone on to long, fantastic careers.

There have also been a lot of guys who were good in the minor leagues who came to the NHL and just did. didn't cut it for whatever reason. And it's, it is far as, as flawed as Mike Babcock was and as, uh, as good as Sheldon Keith's track record has been over the years as he's, as he's built up to this.

There is no guarantee that Sheldon Keith is a better NHL coach right now than Mike Babcock. And from a Leaf's perspective, I mean, if, if this guy, if you just take a step back and forget that, you know, you said coach X for Babcock,

If you take the name away, like, if you take away the fact that we all knew this guy was coming in, and this is just the Leafs hiring coach X, you've got a franchise that is capped out, built up to be a Stanley Cup contender, on pace to miss the playoffs, and they're bringing in somebody who's never coached in the NHL before. Like, there is a significant risk factor here that this will not work, because it doesn't just have to work. It has to work really well to get this team back on track. And it might, you know, again, I'm, I'm optimistic.

I think he's probably the best choice that certainly would be available to him right now. He's coached most of these players. He's got good relationships with them. A lot of this is going to be on the players now. You know, when you don't like the mean coach and you want them to bring in the nice coach, do you then reward them for that? Or then do you sit there and go, oh, we got our way. Cool.

We're running this place. there's a lot of ways this can go. And it is, yeah, I mean, this might be the start of a brilliant coaching career. This guy could come in. He could come in and turn the Leafs around. I mean, we could be talking about the guy who's going to win the Jack Adams this year because he comes in, he unlocks all this talent, the Leifes play the way we thought they'd play, and everyone goes, he turned it around.

He's the best coach in the league, blah, blah, blah. This could also be Dave Cameron 2.0. We just got to see. And it's anyone who tells you it. locked in one way or another is wrong. The two things he has going for him just by showing up are one, he's younger, which I think is a huge benefit for this team. And two, look, there's a, there's a toxicity that sees through an organization when it's

clear that the coaching staff and management aren't on the same page. And it was fucking crystal clear. That was the case in Toronto. So at the very least, that gets cleaned up. And now they're super on the same page. Yeah, it's an extension of Kyle Dubus, basically. So, like, from that perspective, I think that's only a positive, too, you know, to end whatever tension convention was happening behind the scenes between Mike Babcock and Caldubas. Yeah.

So what do we think now for Babcock? I mean, he's just going to sit on his ass and collect some money for the next few years or Seattle or what? So it's funny. I read two things about it on The Athletic this morning. One by Pierre LeBron, who said, you know, I wouldn't be surprised. if he takes a couple of years off and won by James Myrtle who said, I wouldn't be surprised if he

gets a job next week. So your guess is fucking as good as mine, but I would, not knowing anything, I bet you just run out this year, collect the rest of your, whatever, half of $8 million,

and you, you know, see what's what this summer, because you don't want to leave that money on the table unless you have another very good head coaching job lined up. And I don't know that a lot of teams are in a position in the middle of a season to be like, yeah, we can bring you aboard for eight-millop. That's fine.

Yeah. Well, I mean, but they don't have to, right? They have to bring him in at something and then the Leafs still have to cover the rest of it. So he's not losing any money by taking a job somewhere else. But he's also not losing any money by just going skiing or whatever it is that he wants to do. And yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if he did that. But the reality is there's going to be other opportunities. There's definitely going to be other teams that are willing to make Mike Babcock the next coach.

Oh, yeah. The question is going to be, does he want to? What's the right fit? Is this a Joel Quemble's situation where he just kind of waits and what teams do come knocking? Because I know, like, Greg, as soon as this happened, I saw people going like, is this, did the devil's now fire John Hines and hire Mike Babcock? But the question is like when you just saw what happened in Toronto, is this, is this the guy you want to bring in, you know, if he got partially pushed out the door because Austin Matthews and friends were sick of him, is this the guy you want to bring in for Jack Hughes? Versus, is there a team

out there that's maybe a more veteran team that feels like it's one change away from pushing the team over the top and going and chasing a Stanley Cup that potentially wants to bring this guy in? I don't know. There are some. We'll see. You just slot him into that sort of like everybody we mentioned with regard to Joel Quenville kind of spot. You know, like if Tampa falters and Cooper gets fired, Babcock's that guy. Nashville. If LaVille.

San Jose is. Like, there's definitely some. Yeah, but I, you know, if I'm Babcock, honestly,

dude, like sit on my ass, go skiing, collect that dough. Go do Seattle. Like, fucking, if I had three years left on a huge contract and I got let go,

but they still had to pay me, I promise you, you are not going to see my ass for three years. Absolutely not, dude. You are on the store. You can hit refresh on my website as much as you want. There's nothing new coming until... But remember when Balsam got fired and, like, he started showing up on a national network just to kind of get his reps in?

Like, you can totally do that. Yeah, stay in the public eye, sure. If I was Babcock and Seattle wanted me, I'd do that in a millisecond. Like, you just did Detroit and Toronto. fucking go to Seattle where the bar isn't even set yet. They don't even have a bar yet. They haven't even constructed the bar yet. Go there and just do your thing.

Make some money. Go there with assistant coaches, Cesaro and Seamus. That's right. They're the bar. The bar, exactly. And just go and be where the expectations are non-existent. Like, do that.

You've already accomplished a lot, much to my chagrin. Yeah. I mean, the answer. is he's going to do whatever he wants to do because the opportunity to do whatever he wants to do is absolutely going to be there. In the words of Mike Commodore, hey, Mike Babcock, simply put your players quit on you. They quit on you because you are a terrible human being. You are an average coach with an extremely oversized ego. You finally got exactly what you deserve. You selfish prick. The hockey world is ecstatic. Pack your shit. Obviously, Mike

Commodore. I saw so many people saying how hilarious that was, and I kept scrolling, waiting for something that was funny and not just an angry guy yelling on Twitter. And I guess I... Yeah, I just... I can't imagine being mad at my boss from, like, nine jobs ago. Yeah. He's just... He's just a former player happy to see, you know, fucking Mike Babcock get his ticket punched out of town.

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It's the place to get tickets. maybe if you're at an NHL game having used your sneaky gap you may want to dress like you're going to a Gallagher concert and drench yourself in plastic tarps for you may get spat on by an NHL player as we saw recently with Garnett Hathaway spitting on Eric Goodde Branson and getting an attractive. Prociously egregious three-game suspension for it from Colin Campbell. Unless I'm wrong. I know that Lambert thought it was stupid. Yeah. Sean, did you think it was stupid too, or did you think three games was good for a spit? I don't, I mean, don't spit on guys.

That's always been a thing. I don't know where it slots in on the suspension flow chart next to, like, punching guys or licking guys or saying inappropriate things. but I think it's something that's people shouldn't do and should be heavily discouraged and there really isn't an excuse for it. So I don't fully understand the thought process behind the suspension, but I don't have any issue with it. Before you get into it, Lambert, I want to give Ken Campbell credit because Ken Campbell was the guy who asked Colin Campbell, so what's the difference between? fucking lick and a fucking spit.

Well, I mean, there's a very obvious answer to that question, right? Like, they're just, there's not a rule in the, much like Airbud. There is no rule in the NHL that you can't have, you can't be licking people because why would you feel like it needs to write that? One is a ranged attack and one is a melee attack. Yes, that's correct. Very different category. Isn't the spitting about like the officials and not player to player?

Isn't that the rulebook thing? I think so, but now that you say that, I guess I don't remember off the top of my head. But here's a point. Like, I thought Ken's question, like, Colin Campbell kind of like laughed it off, but I mean, like, it's just a matter of a different form of delivery, right? Like, it's either you're sending it with the force of wind or you're putting it on your tongue and delivering it in a more intimate fashion. Either way, it's just fucking spit in saliva and shit getting on somebody's face. But let's also... Brad Marchand didn't get suspended for licking a guy because the first time he did it was in the playoffs.

And there was no way they were going to suspend a first, the first line player. Because then they, because he hadn't been suspended the first time. So like that was it. Then he was that precedent. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, man. Like, here's who I feel really bad for in this situation.

I really feel bad for the Department of Player's Safety. because one, everybody thinks they're the one that suspended a guy for spitting, and they're not the ones that handle these matters. It's Colin Campbell. And two, Colin Campbell, giving this guy three games for spitting on somebody, makes life exponentially harder for George Peros and Patrick Burke and all those guys. Because now they might actually have to work instead of pretending that they... I know, but like even now it's like if they hand it.

out three games for an elbow to the face. It's like, what, a fucking elbow is as much as a fucking split? Yeah, no, that's exactly right. Like, that, that's the problem. But that is not there. That's, the league is right that suspension should be longer. But player safety would never enforce that kind of thing because they go, well, we, you know, that, that's just part of the game. And I, you know, Colin Campbell, another, you know, obviously, like, jock guy who just, like, you know, he, He saw it as this is something you do not do in hockey. The problem is that it's, he's right. You don't do it anywhere, but you don't do it in hockey, I guess, in particular,

because it's for tough guys and all that shit. But, you know, it's a situation where, yeah, like, player safety should be criticized. If three games, if you get three games for spitting on someone, why do you only get two for, you know, pushing a guy's face at 40 miles an hour into the boards? And it's like, right, no, yeah, I guess that is fucked up, that you only get two games for that when it should be way more than that. And if, you know, player safety actually wanted to start doing that, that I think would be a positive for the entire league. Yeah, but we can do that with like any non-department of player safety suspension is always that. Like, why is it, how come insulting someone's girlfriend is six games and how come taking a bad supplement is 20 games?

Well, because that's what it is. And the reason that it's only one game for elbowing a guy in the head is because every GM screams and yells about any suspension that's longer than one game. So I'm sure the Department of Player Safety, as much as they're stocked with a bunch of kind of very old school types, would be more than happy to be suspending guys for two and three and five games, a pop, if they didn't all know that they'd probably be out of work at the end of the year because the GMs would rise up and get rid of them. It's a bigger problem. Like, I'm with you.

It's just a bigger problem than George Peros or whoever else is sitting around the table with them. With the thing, you know, like we all run into these issues sometimes with the nonbelievers, with people that may not necessarily be big hockey fans. and I thought about them this week with the situation because if Hathaway had turned around and punched Good Branson in the face, he probably gets a misconduct but maybe only gets two minutes.

And like explaining that to a non-believer and they're going to be like, oh, you spit on a guy that's gross. What did he get? Oh, three games. Well, what if he had just punched him in the face? He probably just would have gotten a penalty. for it. But, yeah, but my point is, along those same lines, what he should have done is

taken a number and just cross-checked him in the face the next time, like, you know, full speed, just take it, take his head off his fucking shoulders. And the league would have been like, that's one. That's definitely a fine. Yeah. So, fucking, right. So it goes back to some bastard-od version of the code. Yes. Correct. Oh, you know, spit on a guy that's over the line there. Do the traditional hockey things. Put a stick in his, mouth, spear him in the groin, punch him in the back of the head. But also, so tell that non-believer, be like, you know what, the next time you're at a bar and, you know, go mouth off to some dude and see if that dude gets mad enough and he punches you and see how you feel

versus if he turns around and spits right in your face in front of everyone you know, because, you know, it's a national televised game, and see how you feel about that. Like, I do think people understand it. It's a bit of a different, a heat in the moment punch versus somebody spitting right in your face in front of all your coworkers. But you're misrepresenting the situation. He spit in his face because he had just been punched. Like he already received the sucker punch. That's the reason I didn't think he was going to get suspended is because in the grand

NHL tradition, he was reacting to something that happened to him. Yeah, but you don't. I mean, the grand NHL tradition is you always catch the second. You catch the retaliation. That's definitely true. That's very true. Not the initial punch, but the Lugie that followed. Matt Calvert was bleeding on the ice recently, and the play was allowed to continue around him.

And when asked about it, Director of Officials Stephen Walkham said it's because the referees didn't have a good sight line on him bleeding out on the ice. Right. Were you surprised at all that the GMs didn't try to change this rule a little bit? I'm glad they didn't, because, I mean, we kind of had this discussion with, you remember Ben Bishop? in the playoffs, I think it was, took one in the collarbone. And as I said then, I'll say it again here, because I've seen a lot of people say that they should change the rule. And it should say, if somebody's hurt, you stop the game. It's player safety. Of course, if somebody's hurt, you just stop the game no matter what's happening, as opposed to what the rule is now,

which is that if somebody's hurt, you don't stop the game until their team has the puck, unless it looks like a life-threatening or a significant injury situation. And this, and this, There's a lot of people who argue that, no, it should be any injury. If a guy's hurt, stop the play. And as soon as you do that, there's going to be a lot of guys getting hurt in the defensive zone when the other team is pressing. You know, every guy, I'm not saying people are going to just randomly fake stuff, but every guy who blocks a shot is going to stay down holding his knee until the whistle blows and then pop back up and go, oh, wait, I guess I'm okay. So you can't just, the rule that they have now is right.

They've got the rule pretty much exactly right. You don't stop the play unless it looks like a serious situation. The problem is they blew it here because it clearly was a serious situation. A guy got hit in the head. Somebody getting hit in the head and dropping to the ice, putting aside the fact that he's bleeding is clearly a serious situation and they should have said. Whether it was because they didn't have the sight lines or was a bad judgment or whatever, like they blew the call.

Everybody was right to be mad about it. But I'm glad that at least so far, knock on wood, we're not overreacting by changing the rule into a bad rule that everyone will hate pretty much immediately once they see what it inevitably leads to. What about you, Lambert? Were you surprised they didn't change the rule? A little bit because I thought what Nathan, I think it was Nathan McKinnon said was the correct take on it. If you watch the NBA and a guy like very clearly gets hurt and not even hit in the head because if they're going to say both refs and both linesmen somehow missed the,

a guy taking a puck in the head. You know, if that happens to LeBron James where he gets a, he gets hit in the head or lands awkwardly and very obviously twists his knee, you don't think they're going to stop the game? Like, it doesn't, and it shouldn't have to be LeBron James either. There's not only five baskets a game in the, in the NBA. That's, that's the difference. Like, in the NBA, you can take away a scoring chance from a team because they're, they're going to score 50 times in that game.

Yeah, I think I can't more about a guy bleeding on the ice than a fucking Los Angeles King's scoring chance. And you should. You should. That's why they should have called it here. But also, like I said, if every guy who blocks a shot can immediately turn to the ref and go, my leg, and the ref has to blow the whistle dead. Okay, so then head injuries, like obvious head injuries.

That could be a way to do it. You just say, like, anything to the head is, like, I don't think they need the change of rule. Maybe what they need is to remind the officials, hey, if somebody gets hit in the head with a puck, that's a serious injury. Like there's no, don't feel like you have to think it through any further than that, blow the play dead. And again, if it's a case where they didn't see it somehow, I don't know how, but if they didn't see it, then I get, there's no rule you can pass that's going to work in situations where nobody sees what happened. Yeah. But I think they've got the rule right.

And actually, yeah, they do have a rule right. They just have to call it better and they blew it this time. I actually agree with Colin Campbell that like I do think that this is a thing that can be used for nefarious purposes if you make a kind of a blanket stop play thing. I think there is there is embellishment that happens. We see embellishment to get minor penalties all the time. So why wouldn't we see it when there's 30 seconds left and the other two and it's six on five and the other team's pressing in, you know, one goal game? Like it's it's naive to think that we're not going to see one of two things. things. Either guys selling injuries to get a stoppage, in which case everyone will be furious,

or guys selling injury and not getting a stoppage, in which case fans of the team that gets scored on are going to be like, wait a second, that guy over there looked like he was limping or something. Like, how come you didn't stop it then? Like, it's, it just takes you down this road that we don't want to go down. They've got the right rule. It doesn't matter how good the rules are. If the refs screwed up, which is what happened here, then, then it's screwed up. It used to happen so often in the NFL that they actually created that rule where there's like a runoff the clock if one of your guys gets hurt in the last minute of the game. We put a stupid rule in the rule book because we were convinced that players were intentionally

shooting the puck over the glass to stop play. You don't think when it's even easier that they're not going to turn to the ref and be like, I just got slashed on the hand. I'm hurt. You got to stop. Like if you don't think that's going to happen, I guess you're more trusting of the situational integrity of NHL players than I'm willing to be. A little Hall of Fame reaction. The speeches were boring except for Wickenhizers, and now the focus turns in 2020. Again, was in, obviously.

Well, I mean, as long as he agrees to show up on Friday, we can put him in. All right. Let's pause on that. I went off on this already on ESPN and ICE. but the Steve Simmons, Jerry York's an idiot for not showing up to two of the four fucking days of induction celebrations and does show up and give a speech on the day of the induction. I mean, I know the hot dog is always going to be the citizen can of Steve Simmons shitty takes, but this one's fucking close. This is third man then. I mean, like, arguably the better movie. Yeah, like, it's fucking incredible.

And you know what? What's his name? Matheson in Edmonton echoed those sentiments. But with Matheson, it's like, you know what? This is like getting mad at a golden retriever. He's not, he just doesn't seem like he's a bright guy. I'm pretty sure. I'm pretty sure that no one can convince me that's not a parody account.

Like no one can convince me that like the two guys that are behind. the Iron Sheik account, having taken on the Jim Matheson account after he left Twitter and retired several years ago. Yeah, it's like, I couldn't be mad at him because I just see him and I go, okay, I mean, this is like the Larry King Twitter feed where it's like, you ever see the American president? What a film. And you're like, I mean, okay, sure. That's fine, Larry. I'm glad you're enjoying whatever you're up to these days. but with Steve he was pissed off at Jerry York for not for not showing up for a fucking picture

like that's the thing that he had to go do on that party of the game he probably had to do was talk to Steve Simmons after the game or whatever like if he had to be in the scrum and then that's not like it's not like he didn't go because he had like tickets to go see joker he didn't go because he was doing the thing that got him out of the fucking whole thing and that was my other thing with it is it's like most people who get put into the Hall of Fame are they do that because, you know, they've been long retired. You know, they've been out of the game for a few years at least. With Jerry York, this fucking guy's so good at being a college hockey coach that they had to get, they had to put him in the Hall of Fame three years before he retired. Yeah. It's like,

it's like going into the Medical Hall of Fame and being like, I can't go to the first day of the four days celebration because I'm doing heart surgery. And they're like, fuck you. Piece of shit. Why can't you show up for your Hall of Fame, you piece of shit? Yeah. And by the way, Simmons also shaded college hockey, too. Oh, no shit.

Oh, no shit. And that's all part of it. Because if this guy was, you know, the greatest CHL coach of all time and there's not even a close second, do you think Steve Simmons has the fucking balls to say, you know, Gary Stevenson from the, from the, Oswald Generals, the greatest college. you know, or the greatest junior coach of all time, but, you know, they were at Niagara tonight, and who wouldn't put this guy over for, you know,

being behind the bench, because that's what got in there. Of course not. Because Steve Simmons wouldn't, you know, it's just, it's not only a dumb guy, but like a guy who's mad that he's so dumb, as opposed to Matheson. So what Gidla gets in, Yeah, of course.

Does Marion Hosa get in before Alfredson? He should. Yeah, I've written about Marion Hosa's Hall of Fame case and why I don't. My take is that I don't understand why we've all agreed that Marion Hosa is a slam dunk first ballot. No questions. Don't even need to have the discussion Hall of Fame candidate. But we certainly seem to have agreed that. So I think Hosa gets in next year.

and I mean, that's two spots. Is there another obvious one? I don't think so. So that does leave room for Alpherson and then cleaning up. I think McGilney gets in. Yeah, that's the one that a lot of people were talking. Especially with Big Ned getting in with basically the same kind of backstory of, you know, defecting from Jackson, Slovakia and McGilney, not only having the offensive numbers,

but also, you know, being. an incredible example of hockey history, the embodiment of it by being the first Soviet to defect. I heard his name enough to think that he's going to get in. I'll tell you one name that I thought was interesting. I didn't get a chance to write about this this week, but we were talking during the Hall of Fame episode on Patreon about how like coaches get dicked over. GMs get dicted over too. And one name, I asked Chuck Fletcher, like, if there's a GM that can go in the Hall of Fame,

who'd you put in? if they weren't there already. And he said, Brian Murray. I'm like, that's a really good choice. I was going to say that. Brian Murray is one of those guys that I think it surprises people that he's not in. He should be in, absolutely. Without question.

I'm not, you know, I'm surprised he's not in already. And I'll just leave it at that. And yes, as a builder, absolutely. Coach, GM, many, many teams, very, very long career. Put them in. Put him in, exactly. And by the way, thanks to all the people who celebrated Lambert's reaction to hearing that Victor Tickinoff was not in the hall of thing. Oh, shit.

It's fucking nonsense. Apoplectic on the Patreon episode about finding that out. It was a fantastic moment. One of my favorite ones. Yeah, I would say if I had to guess, Aginla, Alfredson, McGilney next year would be my guess. You think hosts of their going to second ballot? I don't know, man. He's everything they want.

He's everything they want in a player. It's hard for me to believe he'd be first ballot based on some of the other guys that have been passed over. We should point out that there doesn't seem to be any evidence that they actually, they being the committee, puts a lot of stock in the concept of first ballot versus second ballot versus like that there. I think, you know, if he's going to be and he's going to be in. And I think it'll be in a year like this year.

where there aren't, there's the, a Ginla as what should be a slam dunk first ballot, or first, sorry, first year candidate. And then him, because the other main one is Shane Dohn, who I don't think should get in, and I'd be disappointed if he did. At no point in his life should Shane, or after, should Shane Done be put into the Hall of Fame? So that's, that's two guys.

And lately they've been, they've been really trying to get three or even four of the men's players in. So I wouldn't be surprised if they cleaned up a, a couple of those, whether it's Daniel Overson, whether it's McGilney, whether it's any of the long list of other guys, or whether it's some random guy that we all forgot 22 years ago that apparently just has been lurking under the surface and gets in that none of us are even thinking about. Yeah, it'll be interesting. I do agree with you, though. I don't think that they pay much mine to first ballot, second ballot kind of bullshit.

They should, but they don't. Real quick. a little bit of hell yes or BS on a few NHL topics. Are the Islanders for real? Hell yes, BS. I love on the first one that I have to go, they're kind of in the middle, but they're kind of in the middle.

I hate myself for having to do that and other reasons. But. I'm hedging. Heading. No, well, like, insofar as they're good to maybe even very good, but they're also not this good. Yeah, I'll save my in the middle for something else, and I'll say, yeah, hell, hell yes, they're good.

I'm done fighting it. Are they the very bestest team that ever did team, the way that some I Learn fans will apparently not be happy until everybody unanimously agrees? No, but they're really good, and they could win a cup, for sure. I'm kind of with you on the fact that I feel sort of defeated by it all, Like, I just feel like I should just, you know, genuflect at the altar of Barry Trots at this point and just say,

hell yes. See, I don't feel defeated. I'm fighting the urge to turn into like a contrarian hot take guy who just goes down swinging on this because I'm so sick of Islander fans being. Islander fans have a really good team. And they're also really bad at arguing on the internet. So, like, I really kind of want to keep on this. But I'm not.

I get to just say, hater. Isn't a well-argued point? That's interesting. Yes. But the team's good. So I'm going to not hold the opinions of the loudest and dumbest, whatever percent of Islander fans against the fact that the rest of them are watching a really good team. Are the senators good, hell yes or BS? They're not good.

Obviously, B, yes. Come on. They're better than we thought. But not good. They're not one of the worst teams of, like, the absolute, like, three worst teams of the cap era. Yeah. But that's what I thought. Which may or may not be good for what their ultimate goal is.

Their ultimate goal is. But, yeah, no, I mean, they're better than I thought they were going to be. Yeah. And they're headed in the right direction as far as the rebuild. And I think if you're a sense fan, there's a lot. lot of positives you take out of the start. They're not good yet, no. Are the Winnipeg Jets good, hell yes, or BS?

No. Does it BS then? Yeah, they're, you know. Your third in their division with a negative four goal differential, but they've always sort of just been in a playoff spot this year. It's weird. Is that a function of the central underachieving? I think it's a function of having a 930 goalie.

Again, their own line is 4. team with a 930 goalie to be like third in their division. This is not going to last. This is where I'll kind of use my... Hold on. Let me skip to the last one. Connor HeliBuck for Vezna, hell yes, or B.S. So far, yeah. Yeah, might be. Okay. But you're going to use your in the middle for the jets. Yeah, because they're like I was like a lot of people, I looked at what was happening with the blue line and everything and I went, oh, this is going to be disaster. Like, they're going to crash and burn, and they haven't. They've hung right in there. And in terms of their record, they've been better than any of us thought they were going to be.

But I'm not ready to move them into the contenders column, if that's what we're asking. Hell, yes. I've been impressed with them being able to hang around this long. The good news is there's only 60 games left, so they're... believer in the Jets as a bubble team Hell yes or BS the coyotes who used to be the Jets I think there's some debate about whether that's true

Still are Still are as far as I've been told So Hmm I'm going to say Hell yes I think they are Legitimately good but not

Again as good as the record says But I think they're You know they have have enough talent. And I guess I would say I believe it more with the goal tending this year, because, again, it's just kind of holding up. So. Yeah. I'm going to say, I'll say, hell yes. Not in quite the same way, but they kind of are given off a bit of a last year's hurricanes vibe to me where it's, it's like, well, because they had been out of the playoffs for so long that you're just sort of like, oh, they'll, they'll,

but you're kind of looking at going, no, you know, this might be the year they get in. And once they do get in, they're not high on my list of cup contenders, but I wouldn't necessarily want my team playing them. I'm going to go BS in the sense that I can't imagine they're going to keep up a 930 save percentage. I mean, so far, so good, but that's like, that's six percentage points better than like Boston and the Islanders. It's a little, a little hot.

Yeah, again, they're not this good, but they are good. They're playing, let me put it this way. They are playing better in front of their goal. than Winnipeg is playing in front of theirs. And so, you know, even though you have to, again, say, like, 9.30 is not going to last. Could 920 last? Yeah. Finally, Helliester BS.

David Pastranaq to win the Rocket Richard. What's he up to right now? I don't remember up the top of my head. I'm going to find out for you real quick. He has, as we do this show right now, 19 goals. that's a lot. The next highest guy has 16. It's dry-sidal.

Yeah, I mean, between those two, that's definitely the race. So I'm going to say hell yes, though, because he scored it like a 50-gold pace thereabouts last year, too, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah, I mean, he's four-ahead of Ovechkin. He's back in him. Matthews, you know, that can be one strong week for those guys. Matthews, I want to see an 80-game season before I start putting him as a legit. Richard Richard contender. But, yeah, I mean, he's been great so far.

That line is fantastic. Yeah, put me down as a yes on David Pasternak. I'll go BS only because you mentioned an 80 game season and Pasternak's had only one of those. So I get a little bit concerned about... That's true. Well, I think the goal scoring pace is for real. The stability worries me a little bit.

Great point. All right. Finally, any thoughts on baby Yoda? He's cool. We love the baby Yoda. No. Do you have any problem with it being called baby Yoda? Well, no, I think they said they're going to say what his name is eventually or something like that.

But, yeah, I mean, he's baby Yoda. Because officially, we don't know the name of that race, and it is often referred to as the Yoda race. That's canon. Is that right? Yeah. Oh. So, yeah. Yaddle was a member of the Yoda race?

Canonically, that is true, yes. Wow. Or I think probably now that Yaddle's been introduced now, I mean, that movie came out quite a few years ago at this point. But now that Yaddle's been introduced, I think the race is unknown, but for a very, very long time, it was canonically the Yoda race. I agree with everything Ryan just said. That's smart. If Baby Yoda married a porg, Would the offspring be the cutest thing that ever existed?

Can't get cuter than baby Yoda. Sorry. It's not going to happen. So not by mixing its DNA with porg. I understood the premise of the question. It's just not going to happen. Baby Yoda. It may not even be impossible anatomically.

We stand. We stand. We stand in baby Yoda. All right. Well, that's puck soup for this week. Thanks to nobody, except for Seekek. but also the Leafs, obviously, for giving us our first, you know, like 45 minutes of the show. It's always nice of them.

My other podcast is ESPN on ICE. You can read all my stuff at ESPN.com. Sign up for the Puck Soup newsletter. This week we're going to do an episode to Stick to Sports with me and Sean Gentilly in lieu of a traditional newsletter, but people probably want that anyway. So it's three bucks a month if you already get all the other Puck Soup Patreon stuff. So check it out. There you go.

You can find me on The Athletic. This week I did a piece that was kind of fun that I've been meaning to do for a while, which is I went through all the teams and I answered the question, which hockey Hall of Famer played the fewest games for each team? And it unlocks some interesting stories and some weird quirks. And Adam Oates shows up way too many times. So that was just if you're into kind of fun history stuff with no action, actual nutritional value, but just stuff to argue about.

Check that out. And on Friday, I'll have my Friday grab bag, which is my spies have collected the list of top Toronto Maple Leaf excuses for how the season has gone so far. So that's going to be major breaking. Always good. Check that out. Nice. All right, everybody.

That's Pucks here for this week. On the Patreon, Supulte is going to drop very soon. And it's a long-ass list of the worst gambols in hockey history. I think you'll like it. And there you go. We'll talk to you soon. Bye. See you.

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