Puck Soup - Coyote Ugly

Episode Date: February 17, 2021

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's in tunes. It's your weekly bowl of Hockey and Nonsense. I'm Greg Wyshinsky of ESPN, subsidiary of the Disney Corporation. Home to Joke Her, the Crewelle DeVille story. Yeah, I saw a tweet this morning That somebody was like

Women will shoot up theaters If they see this movie We can't We can't Anyway, I'm Ryan Lamber from Elite Prospects Uh, Sean McAnew from The Athletic Still getting used to the new intro You're in Puck Soup by the way

Sean, for if you don't know what we're talking about Emma Stone Is Corella DeVille in Cruella, the gritty origin story of a woman who wants to murder a large litter of puppies to make clothes. Yeah, I actually saw that trailer this morning. You can tell the movie's going to be good because it ends with one of the characters saying the name of the movie. Right before they show you the name of the movie, which is always just chef's kiss. Well, listen, I mean...

I mean, in fairness, I mean, I think they used the I'm Batman thing in the Batman 89 trailer, and that was an awesome movie. Yeah, and it was also 30 years ago, so. That's true. I watched the trailer with the sound down as soon as I woke up in bed, obviously. I'm very excited for the, the only other trailer that I'm more excited for is the Mortal Kombat trailer, which I haven't seen either. But the Cruella trailer, I watched with the sound down, did they use, and I'm, and I'm, Ironically slowed down pop song for the music in the trailer at all, or no? I think it was like 40s and 50s music, wasn't it?

Oh, was it? Yeah, so it was sort of like ironic, but for the time period, I guess. No, reappropriated female indie singer doing a cover of Who Let the Dogs Out? Or how much is that doggie in the window? Oh, that's absolutely what the, You know, you get great, like a bunch of really amazing shots of Emma Stone getting out of her big car with evil on the license plate, and you just hear in the background, How much is that dog in the window? Yeah, we got it.

And then she says something really mean. Like, I'm going to throw those puppies in an oven. Just a wistful version of the dog's barking at the beginning of been caught stealing. Actually, that's good, though. You could use bin-caught-stealing ironically because we're all gig as you stealing the puppies. I'm honestly amazed that they're saving that for trailer, too, I think. Clearly. Nothing has more cultural cachet in 2021 than Jane's Addiction.

The good band that everybody likes. Jane's Addiction has... Stinks. Oh. Three songs. they have been caught stealing, which is a banger. Jane says, which is overplayed. And the first 15 seconds of Mountain song,

the one where he's like, you know, it's got like a slow build. Then Perry's like, coming down the mountain. And then I don't care about the rest of the song. But that Polter for Pyro's song was good, though. The Pet Song? I like enjoyed that.

Does Perry Farrell get a pass because he invented Lollapalooza? like does it counterbalance the overratedness of Jane's addiction being Conserved a good band? Jane's addiction is terrible. Like, I don't know. Well, all right. Listen,

Jane's addiction gave us, I believe, Dave Navarro, so that's one plus side. Okay, another strike against them. All right, before we get going, I've been curious about this.

Who's your favorite chili pepper, Ryan? I, who, they're all the same guy. Well, No, Flea. No, you have Anthony Kedis. Back to the future.

I guess it's Flea. You have Flea. You have Will Ferrell, the drummer. And then you have a rotating group of guitarists like John Frasante and Dave Navarro. Do you have a... So is Flea your favorite? It has to be Flea? Because he's the one who's in, like, actually in movies and stuff.

Like, he's an actor, right? Well, Anthony Keats started out as an actor. But yes, you are correct that Flea has been in. things. Yeah. I'm going to look at his holography really quick. And also, I learned this recently

and it kind of blew my mind. You guys probably already knew it. Flea plays the base on Alanis's you ought to know. Yes, that's true. Yeah. Which surprised me, not least of all, because I didn't even know

there was any bass in that song and I had to go back and listen to it and be like, oh yeah. Yeah, he's in Big Loboski. He's in my own private Idaho. Not only is he in Big Loboski, he's one of the Nihilists in Big Loboski. Labowski. So it has to be flea. Yeah, no, I know that. Yeah, I'm looking at his IMDV now. Yeah, no, it has to be flea. You're right.

Vivalto money, LaBowski. So speaking of money, the Arizona Coyotes don't like paying it, apparently. Or when they get paid, they like to not talk about it and just use it for other things, apparently. Katie Strang, our good friend, friend of the pod, Katie Strang, put out a story that had the hockey world all abuzz her big expose on the Arizona Coyotes and owner Alex Morello and underling Alex Morello Jr., CEO Javier Gutierrez, and general manager Bill Armstrong. A lot of it was to be expected when a person who's owned casino properties and radio stations decides to own a hockey team, you know, talking down how much they owe vendors, Strong-arming people, nepotism, egotomania, that sort of thing.

But I guess the sum total of it was overwhelming. And, of course, the coyotes do absolutely every fucking thing they can to make it worse of themselves. From the Bill Armstrong, shaking down the best journalist in hockey part of the story, to the embarrassing statement that they put out. after the story was released, in which they end by threatening legal recourse against the athletic, after not participating in the story themselves. Ryan, Coyotes, go. You know, I was really shocked.

When I read the story, I was like, problems with Coyote's ownership? This must be a misprint. Yeah, I mean, you know, the details, I guess, were all individual. surprising, but I'm literally never going to be shocked when it's like, oh, this NHL team owner, yeah, they're actually doing bad at this. Yeah, no shit. That's like kind of what NHL owners do, like the vast majority of them. The real question for me is, is he now, like, is this whole deal making the coyotes better or worse off than the senators? Wow.

Boy. Ooh, geez. A challenger emerges. Right. I mean, okay, so let's go through the tenets of bad franchise. Ownership. Ottawa or Arizona, who wins for worst ownership? I don't know.

Does Eugene Melnick get mad when you don't call him Mr. Melnick? That is, by the way, the classic sign of someone who is a total asshole. On the one hand, Eugene Melnick. On the other hand, a guy who is spending his own money to own the Arizona Coyotes. I'm going to give it to... I guess I have to give it to Morello. Like, right, Sean, or is it still Melnick? I would say it's still Melnick.

This is like pro wrestling rules. Like, you've got to pin the champ. You've got to be the medal. Yeah. And it's, you know, this is, this is, you know, he's, he's throwing down the challenge right now, but Right. You got to, like, let's, let's see what Eugene's going to do to respond. Sorry, Mr. Melnick, let's see what he's going to do to respond.

We've got to give him a chance to get back in there. So Alex Morello just literally walked through the curtain. His music hit. He's standing on the top of the stage. He's pointing at the ring, but he's yet to wrestle for the belt. I like that. He just pointed at the great big. Bad owner mania sign hanging over the ring.

Okay. State of the franchise insofar as competitiveness and potential for winning championships. You've got to go with the worst team in Canada, baby. Like, they are way closer to being good. Right? I'm probably not the right guy to ask about the senators this week. So I'll vote present on this one. Yeah, I mean, they are a juggernaut in the third period.

I mean, I think you'd have to go senators here. I don't know if there's a Tim Stutzley on the Coyote's roster. I don't know if there's a Tim Stutzley on the senator's roster. Different pronunciation. Stutz lay, right? Like, you know, like the E is, it's like an exciting E at the end? Stutzel, I know, I'm just fucking with you. Also, Thomas Shabbat, Greater Than Sign?

Oliver Reckman Larson probably already for their career yeah so you got to go to the senators there also the coyotes have like all these problems with draft picks in the sense that they don't have many yeah the ones they do have all the draft picks right yeah Pierre Dorian or Bill Armstrong well Pierre Dorian never tried to tell all of the other general managers of the league how Katie Strang does her job in order to try to shame her so that's obviously a checkmark in his

category for being better. He's really good at trading away good players and getting a bunch of draft picks. Well, that's the other thing to say is the senators do have a history of having a lot of really good players play for them for four years and then one out of town. Right. Arizona doesn't have that part of it, like the first part of that nailed down. Arizona's best player wanted out of town after half a year last season.

So I would go, I actually kind of like crush on. on Pierre d'Orian a little bit. I find him to be really entertaining. Ever since the We Are a Team interview. Right, but that's... He didn't mean for that to be endearing or entertaining. He was dead serious. Right, but he's like the Iraqi information minister of hockey.

Like, that's how he's always felt about Peerodorian. Like, no matter how shitty things are, it's like... Because remember the Alex Burroughs trade? Yeah, of course I do. You know, when, like, he... They made the trade, and Dorian's interview afterwards was I walked into the locker room and the players just ran up to me

they started hugging me. They started saying thank you. Thank you. The best. The real thing here is that both you saw it a lot with with that obviously and also like the Arizona ownership

stuff where every rich guy is just turning into Trump now. Right. You know where it's like, oh it's all fake news actually. It's a harassment campaign And threat of legal recourse. Yeah. And they're all, they're coming up to me with tears in their eyes, the toughest men you've ever seen.

And they're saying, thank you, Mr. Dorian. Thank you for making the senators great again. Like, okay. Yeah, we get it. They were going up to me and saying, thank you, Alex. Thank you for making the desert relevant again. And I told them, no, it's Mr. Morello, actually. That's true.

All right. So I take Diori and over Bill Armstrong. I mean, Bill, I like Bill Armstrong a lot. Yeah, he seems great. No, I mean, listen, he did a very dumb fucking thing here. But as an executive to try to rebuild your team, I think he's good. I also think he's good in that, in trying to figure out what the fuck's going on behind the scenes there. Honestly, God, I thought Bill Armstrong was fine right up until we found out that he thought that he could scare Katie Stratt.

Like, that is honest to God for me, a firing offense, not for the ethics of it, but just the judgment that it shows. Right. Like, at some point, this guy's going to be sitting there, like, with his front office and be like, I don't know, guys, I thought it over and I think we should make this trade. And they're going to be like, yeah, but you thought it over and you thought you could intimidate Katie Strang. So why are you listening to you about anything ever? Yes. Like, I can't stop picturing him, like, sitting there, like, about to make the phone call being like, yeah, I'm going to be. pull this off. I'm going to get

to the wall on this one. I'm really going to get yeah, she's going to drop the story after I put on my scary big boy voice. Yeah. Wait till I tell Ronan Farrow that I'm going to tell all the other Harvey Weinstein's about him. Oh, he shouldn't be shaking his boots.

Maybe we shouldn't be making that comparison. But the other thing to say is he did the fucking Trump thing too of like, oh, someone must have stolen my computer to get on. Like, I'm have gotten hacked into the mainframe. Like, oh, okay, man, sure.

Yeah, did he try to... That part of the story was interesting. So Armstrong claimed that someone had hacked his computer and leaked out information about schedules or something or other. And it was kind of a quasi-wiki leaks thing of sort of like, you can't use this information because it was taken from us thing? Was that the... Well, no, he... It seemed, you know, in reading it, I think that what it seemed like was somebody forwarded Katie to email. Oh, that was hilarious.

Yeah, that was the paragraph right before the Bill Armstrong is going to tattle on all, up to you to all the other GMs part, was that the coyotes sent out a memo to their employees saying, no one is permitted to share information about the team, like with the media. And then someone sent that memo to Katie Strang. It's incredible. Yeah. Which she just slipped into the article. Yeah. You know, blah, blah. Anyone who shares this information will be immediately fired by the big scary GM according to an email obtained by the athletic.

Like, my God. What do you? Like, I'm sorry, man. When, if Katie calls you, it's like when you were a little kid and like your mom would question. Like, she already knows. You're just making it worse when you try to play games. Just admit what you did, pack up, you're done, wait for the article to come out. All right.

So we'll say, first of all, Bill Armstrong, my thing was I think he drafts well. As a leader of men, I agree with you, Sean, but specious. All right. So we're saying the coyotes, oh, we forgot one category in the coyotes versus senators, which is the possibility of relocation. Do the coyotes win that one too? Both strong, I think. I think they're both strong.

I think, would you agree, Sean, there's a better chance of Ottawa getting an arena than the coyotes? Yes. Yeah, I think a new arena in Ottawa is not imminent, but is going to happen in the near term. And that any judgments about the viability of the team will hold off until that's been in place for a little while. Right. Plus, Batman's like been in this. job forever now. He probably doesn't want the hassle of having to do one of these Canadian relocation things where an entire nation's angry at you or whatever. So I would say the coyotes

would be the one that would be most likely. So the coyotes are the worst franchise in hockey, I guess then, based on our metrics. Yeah, I mean, this did not help their case. They had a pretty strong one going into this and then all this. And let's put them over the top. Yeah. So you think this is a fireable offense, John, for Armstrong. Well, I mean, I was being a little tongue of cheek there just in terms of the judgment involved. No, I mean, Bill Armstrong came aboard after a lot of these problems, as the article points out, right? Like the John Chaka thing obviously was before him. The debacle with the draft and taking a kid that nobody else wanted was at least in theory before Bill Armstrong was allowed to be part of the decision.

decision-making process. We all know that sometimes that doesn't work out exactly the way that the rules say it's supposed to, but officially at least he hadn't joined the team yet. So, no, he deserves a chance to work through this mess. And apparently it's, it is a big mess. And I, you know, I don't know, I found interesting. I saw people tweeting and writing saying that, you know, the coyotes put out a statement refuting the article. Did they? No. They put out a statement saying why they think that they're wonderful, and it was very clearly a statement that sounded a lot like it was dictated by the owner. Like, this has had very strong Donald Trump dictates his own press releases. Stable genius vibes.

Right. And it was basically like how dare they write this article because here's all the wonderful things about us. And then not really anything specific that they said was wrong. and they said that they were exploring legal action. So we'll see where that goes. But I don't know. Like if I call up my lawyer and be like, I don't like something somebody wrote and the lawyer says,

well, was it true? And I go, yeah, it was all true. And my lawyer says that you can't do anything. That's exploring legal options. I have early explored my options. So, you know, I've already seen people writing stuff about, you know, the coyotes are suing. No, they're not.

They're exploring. Let's see where. it goes, let's see what they do. But at this point, they haven't actually refuted anything that was written about them that I've seen. Yeah. It's like a trade rumor where it's like, you know, the devils are having discussions with the Leafs about Damon Severson. And it's because Tom Fitzgerald called up Kyle Dubos and said, hey, how about Damon Severson? And Dubus is like, I'm not interested. And those are talks. Yeah. Happens all the time. But you're right. I mean, you know, clearly, Clearly, another facet of this is, you know, the casino owner guy is trying to fight back against the system and against the person that said ill about him.

Do you, I get, I talk to some people in the league, like front office he types, who honestly thought that this article might be worse than it ended up being, which I think is not only a tribute to Katie's reporting, on other matters, but also a tribute to what a mess the coyotes are. At the end of the day, Ryan, what happens, if anything, to the ownership group of this team? Nothing. Nothing. Well, here's the thing with that. As detailed and as revealing as the story was, there was one mystery component of the story, which is the fact that, the fact that, that there are apparently these lawyers who are interviewing people who work for the coyotes

and we're not completely sure at whose behest they're doing right right and elliott freedman in his 31 thoughts as a reaction to katy's piece this is thought one by the way thought one suggested that it that could be the league and that's you know it's it's not hard to connect the dots the the law firm that is that is named as doing this is the same law firm the NHL used to investigate Del Talon. So you would kind of look at that and say this could be leaked. Now, Elliot said in his piece that the NHL denies that there's any active or open investigation of the coyotes.

And yet he still put the speculation out there, which maybe suggests whether he, how firmly he believes that denial. So that is the piece that that I'm one. wondering about is, you know, what's the league going to do? It is at least possible. We don't know that the league is already looking into this and already has some questions and is gathering information. Somebody is. We're not sure who, but it would, it would certainly make sense if the NHL had some curiosity about some of the stuff that's going on. This is true. But they better watch out. It's going to be a fight. Alex Marillo, old school businessman.

It's ready to, in the words of the godfather, go to the mattresses. Speaking of mattresses, today's episode of Puck Soup is sponsored by Brooklinen. That's solid. Thank you. Yeah. All right. Doesn't really have a lot to do with mattress? Like, it's not a direct...

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Worked out great. Everybody involved was very happy with the outcome. It was fantastic. I'm so happy that he wasn't canceled, that he had a place to speak his truth. And I'm so happy that Larry Brooks afforded. the opportunity. I mean, who else will look out for disgraced white people, if not the New York Post? Our organization, the Professional Hockey Writers Association, got into a little hot water over this because they promoted this much maligned article on their Twitter feed. Probably shouldn't have done that. Hasn't really been any comment since then from the organization, which is a little bit

disappointing, but it's neither here nor there. Tony D. gets his moment, Ryan, where you, were you completely turned around by his impassioned plea for a second chance? Yeah, what I hadn't thought about is that he's nice, you know? So now that I know he's nice, you know, I can't criticize the guy anymore. He's nice. And also, the Rangers have lost four in a row without Tony D. Angelo is the other very funny thing about this. The thread, the thread that got pulled in the sweater unraveled, Tony DiAngelo. Sean, what did you think of the Tony D piece? Well, I mean, I'll say this.

It's, I think that his comments on the situation are newsworthy. Yes. You know, because I've seen people say like this, why are you even writing this? Why are we even hearing from this guy? No, I mean, if the guy, he's been essentially, blackballed from the team. He's been accused of a lot of things, some of which he may have done and some of which he may not have. He has a right to defend himself. He has a right to say, look, here's my side of the story. And I think that, you know, a media outlet that can get him on the record on that. It's a story. Of course it should be out there. Now it's, and it's a little bit like, a little bit like the Pierre LeBrun piece with Mike Babcock that a lot of people didn't like where, you know, sometimes, you know, sometimes. it's the best way to handle a situation like this is to just let the person in question talk and let their words stand as, you know, what you can then use to judge them or not, you know, and see if it moves the needle on your opinion.

And I think in both the case of Babcock and DiAngelo, they did more damage to their own case by what they said and didn't say than otherwise. Now, there were obviously certain parts of the article that I think were misfires, to put it lightly. Starting with the headline, which is not Larry Brooks's fault. But when you talk about, you know, the headline was something like Tony DiAngelo bears his soul or something. That was on the PHWA feed. It was Tony DeAngelo bears his soul. I think that's because that's the headline of the post article. Yeah.

And that implies, like when you talk about someone bearing their soul, it implies that they're being honest, right? implies that it's sincere and I don't think Tony DeAngelo has earned that level of the benefit of the doubt that we assume that this is sincere and not just a PR play. So I, you know, I didn't like that. And there's obviously some pieces in the article itself that I think came across poorly. But overall, like, yeah, I wanted to hear from Tony DeAngel. I want to hear what this kid has to say. I want to hear if there's anything he can say that makes me think that maybe he's learned anything. or whether he was just going to spout a bunch of PR stuff about, I'm not playing the victim card,

which very clearly was something that a bullet point that he was given, make sure you make this point clear before you then go on to play the victim card for the entire rest of the interview. Yeah, the real problem with both that and the Babcock story is that it came across as stenography, right? Like, it's just that they were like, hey, what's your... Right? Like, it's...

No, but like you give the guy, you let the guy talk and then you don't just go to all his friends who are like, yes, he's actually the nicest guy. You talk to other people. Like, you know, they talk to. There was no outreach to any victims in either case, like, at all. I mean, there sort of was with the Brooks thing because Keondre Miller's agent got quoted in it. But that, Keondry Miller's agent since the blog came out. Yeah.

It's not even, Sean, to your point, like, we are hearing from these people because they are going to places where they know they're not going to get pushback. I mean, all due respect to Pierre LeBron.

Like, they go to, he goes to Pierre LeBron a few days before he goes back on NBC to launder his reputation as best it can be laundered to try to put it aside because NBC didn't realize

they had to do it and then realized they had to do it and they did it a few days before he hit the air again. But, I mean, it goes there understanding that it's not going to be a situation where it is a, it's not Katie Strang

doing the fucking story. That's right. You're not going to get grilled. Yep. And in Brooks's, but in fairness, LeBron, Brooks's situation was fucking a thousand times worse because Pierre wrote a news story and Brooks wrote a column. And in the column, it's not simply just handing Tony DeAngel to Mike and saying,

hey, go. It was actively advocating on his behalf in the story. Like, it was, it was a, it was a, it was. hegemony. Like, it was not a straight news story. It was a column in which Brooks was building the case himself that this guy had been done wrong

and that he deserves a second chance. And, I mean, listen, there was nothing in the Babcock piece that approached the line where it's like the post can report that it wasn't a racial slur that Tony DeAngel used. It was an ethnic

one. I mean, there was absolutely, I mean, there's nothing in the I'm cockpista comes close to that fucking bullshit. Don't worry, folks. He's not a racist. He's just a horrible person who uses ethnic slurs. My God. Yeah.

And the best part is then you think back to when his dad was like, this is a word I say every day. And it's like, what is this word? What could this word just say what it is at this point? Like, is he mad about the Polacks again? Is that what he's saying? You know? I mean, I don't know, Ryan. A guy who retweets stories bemoaning the invisible hand of George Soros, corrupting the world.

I don't know. It's a tough one to figure out. Look, I think Tony DeAngelo should play in the league again. I mean, it's up to every team where they want it to take on this level of baggage and this level of backlash from their consumer base. But, you know, him being an asshole. and doing horrible things. I mean, look, I wouldn't have them on my team, but I don't think it's necessarily like...

And look, I wish he wasn't in the league, but I don't think any... I feel like the pushback from the DeAngelo camp to say that people are saying I should never play again. There might be some people saying that, but I just... There are definitely people saying that. But he can play again,

but there's now repercussions for your actions. Like, without fucking question. It's... The issue is, we said it when this all first happened, is like he is undoubtedly an NHL quality defenseman, but he's too big of a dickhead to be on an NHL team as it stands right now, is basically what the Rangers figured out. Now, some other team might go, you know what, he's not like, it can't be that bad, right? and they might give him a shot. And I think it's totally like, you know, if he is, you know, contrite and like understanding about like why things went bad in New York,

I don't think it's outrageous that a team would give him a shot, but also, yet you do have to consider the PR standpoint, and people are going to be mad if you sign Tony DeAngelo. Oh, without question. And the reasons they're going to be mad is his fault. Right. Like, no one's making him tweet all this shit or whatever. No one's making him say the thing to his goalie.

Sean, from what you were looking for in that story from DeAngelo, did you see any of it? No. No, it was, this was, you know, we've all been around long enough that we know when we sit down to read a piece like this, that you're probably going to get a well-co. approached PR act, and you hope that maybe you won't, and then maybe you'll get some sincerity, and maybe you'll get some sort of evidence of reflection and improvement and all of those things that we say we're looking for when somebody owns something and apologizes for it. And no, this was just PR rehearsed answers.

And yeah, so it didn't, I don't know that it made me think worse of the guy, it didn't move the needle at all. Right. All right. So Tony DeAngelo, reputation mending. Larry Brooks. Good stuff.

The other stuff that happened since we last talked to you were new COVID protocols were put in place after like five teams stopped playing games at the same time. It's a good reason to change them. Yeah.

Yeah, and also what has been sort of the Roswell crash of COVID for the NHL, which is the alleged in-game transmission between the Sabres and Devils, which caused a bit of a stir. It seems like some of this is pretty smart. Emily Kaplan and I wrote a story on Tuesday about all of it, and including a little bit more investigation of the oddest, protocol, which is the sit players that had COVID

next to players that didn't as a buffer, which sounded dystopian to me. But I talked to an epidemiologist and he said, this is a great idea. Like, they should very much do this. Yeah. Which is a good thing to hear. A big

bit of responsibility being put on people who live with hockey players to continue to hunker down, not do reckless things with regard to COVID that may get the person they live with infected. I do wonder about the conundrum where if a player's wife is like, I'm going out with my girls, and he's like, you can't because it's against the rules. And she's like, but I, we all bought tickets to be part of the 2000 fans at your game tonight.

What happens in that conundrum? But hey, listen, knock on wood, that's me knocking on wood. The numbers are trending in the right direction for the last few days. And I don't know if that's just luck or protocols or what. But maybe the in-season tweaking has made this a little bit better, Ryan. I mean, that would be the hope. You know, the thing that I was really amazed by was that the NHL had to say, like, hey, maybe don't like go hang out with all your friends at a crowded bar.

And NHL players were like, yeah, that does make it. Good point. Yeah, I hadn't thought of that. But, you know, otherwise, it's like it's just a situation where, you know, these are changes that probably should have been in place all along. Like I saw in the piece that Bill Daley was like, oh, we didn't think it was going to be this bad. And it's like, that seems like a failure of imagination. then. That doesn't like, you know, you also had a quote in there that was something along the lines of like, I'd say a player saying 75% of players are taking it seriously. But that's like five guys on every team, five plus guys on every team. So that's bad. It is bad. And the daily thing, I got to be honest to you, like, when we talk to daily, you never really know what the league's line is going to be on some of these topics. Yeah.

I actually was surprised by how Kennedy was that it's kind of like, hey, you know, this is kind of not as a little bit worse than we thought it was going to be, which is a thing I had heard sort of on background from other people, but I didn't expect him to address it as such. But I mean, at the same time, like you said, the minute you don't go to a bubble, you had to know this was going to be the thing. You had to know it was going to be the thing. Sean, what did you think of the protocols? We all said that we were going to see something like this. We didn't know exactly what it would look like, and we didn't know it was going to reach the level it's reached. But I don't think anyone's surprised. No, but I also think this, though, like, there was a perception, I think, in the last two weeks of the season kind of coming off the rails a little bit.

Because of the teams that were out on the sidelines, because of, you know, the devils having fucking, like, 19 people in their protocol. And that's at a point where you kind of wish if you're a hockey fan, they would differentiate between players on those lists. Like, who's in contract tracing? Who's, you know, positive? Who is in a travel quarantine? Because the numbers look overwhelming, like, at first glance. When you dig into them, you realize, oh, these are all people being grouped under the same umbrella. The NHL made the decision.

And it's in concert with the NHLPA, but it's the NHL's call not to separate out the players on those lists. And I think they'd be, I think they're doing themselves a disservice. I think, I think the perception of the season would be a lot different if they split up or made a parenthetical by the names as to why these guys are on the list. Yeah, but like the players didn't even want you to like during the bubble. They were like, it's not legal for you to say, like, it's a hippoval, all that shit about like if, if a guy had, like, had a broken leg or was in contact tracing. You know what I mean? Like, they weren't, they weren't allowed to differentiate that.

So the fact that they're also now not allowed to differentiate that, like, who could be surprised? Yeah. But, I mean, this is, this is what happens, right? This is when you don't put information out there, what doesn't happen is the fans and media and the whole audience doesn't go, oh, we're not allowed to think about. that. I would guess we just won't. What happens is people fill it in with their own best guesses, which are often wrong and which are often worse than, you know, and I get, look, the players, there is a right to privacy. I understand their concerns and they should push for their own interests and that's, that's fine. But yeah, this is what happens. When you leave

a vacuum of information, other stuff comes in to fill that and it's not necessarily stuff that helps you. Yeah, and I, to your, to that point, like, Marcus Felino, it was in the, I think he said this to the athletic, actually, mentioned that it's like a guilty feeling when you end up on that list. And I kind of feel like there's a bunch of people that are on these lists that, that shouldn't be there, like outside of having contact with somebody that are automatically just assumed to have COVID just because of how these lists work.

So I don't know. It's a bummer. But hey, things are maybe looking up with this COVID stuff. Who's to say? I did find it interesting, the scheduling part of things in the story, where despite the fact we've had 35 games postponed due to COVID, now even more than that due to the weather in Texas, they're not all that concerned about the inability to make up games. And in fact, I think only one game so far.

is in that buffer zone after the official end of the season. I thought it was up to two. Is it up to two now? I think one of the ones that got rearranged yesterday bumped it up to two. But okay, maybe we're up to two now. You know, the only reason I bring that up, that's twice as many. That's right. It's a huge increase.

So maybe one of the things I found interesting about the scheduling aspect was the idea that rescheduling these games is a hell of a lot easier than they thought it would be because all of the other entertainment ventures that would be competing for space inside these aren't doing anything either. Like the first concert coming to Madison Square Garden isn't until July. And even that seems real optimistic.

And even that seems real optimistic. You're exactly right. So I think they found this reshuffling of games to be a bit easier than expected. And the other thing, too, is the doesn't seem to be a lot of concern about everybody not getting to 56 games. You look at that central division and you say to yourself, okay, I mean, what's the possibility that all these teams actually play 56? I think that's the one that I look at and say, who knows? But they seem pretty confident that they're not going to have to come up with some formula for points percentage or anything like that, that everybody's going to play out the string.

Do you see that happen in Ryan or are you pessimistic? Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen. Like, I think that's going to happen if they go, and we will not have a single positive test the entire rest of the season. But that's not realistic, obviously. And so, you know, if we're pushing two into the window after the regular season was originally supposed to end now, where are we going to be three weeks from now? Yeah, you're right that, like, numbers are trending in the right direction, but that's right up until they're not. And that's only, and, you know, like you said, it's only two days of them trending in the right direction. Hopefully with these new, like, I would love to see all the teams get to 56 games.

But the other, like, in theory, but the other problem with that is like, oh, yeah, all the devils are going to have to do now is play 40 games in the last 30 days of the season. No problem. Yeah. Like, that's the other, like, I don't want it to be a thing where, well, like, four teams ended the season losing eight games in a, row because they just got ground into dust by like having the schedule overbooked. Right. I think that if you rearrange things so that you stop playing just, you know, oh, we're going to play at Madison Square Garden for two.

And instead it's more like, oh, we're going to play at Madison Square Garden for four, kind of like what they did with St. Louis and Arizona this week. And you just knock out a bunch of games that way, like, you know, four and six or four and eight or whatever it is, I think that makes it a lot more manageable than if you play two days, take three days off, play another two and three, that kind of thing. I think you can maybe rearrange it within the season even more as necessary, but how they actually do it will be very interesting, I guess, is my point. Right. Yeah. I also thought it was interesting. I heard from a player for the story about the idea that the players are cognizant that the season could be short

and are kind of like, look, you know, every game counts. You guys know that. And it could super, super count if, you know, we get to play Detroit eight times and someone else doesn't. Yeah, maybe the Sabres didn't get that memo, but otherwise. I don't know. It's, it's, it's, it's an art, but the NHL is kind of figuring itself out. The other COVID sort of schedule. fallout bit we wanted to talk about today was about the draft. So we're going to have, what, two drafts next year? Well, they haven't decided this, but this is apparently an idea that is being floated. They've been saying it for months, too. Yeah. This is something that it sounds like that the teams are kind of pushing for. And the argument is that because the various

leagues where they would be scouting prospects are all screwed up this year, they're not going to have the opportunity to scout as thoroughly as they normally would. And so instead of doing a draft this year, you basically postpone the 2020 draft until, or sorry, the 2021 draft until 2022. When you do two drafts next summer, the first of which would be this year's draft using this season's draft order, and then you do next season's draft using that different draft order. And there seems to be, I cannot get my head around this.

It does not make any sense to me. Yes, it's going to be hard to scout, but that affects all teams equally. And it's not like this, the hit rate on scouting is super great anyways. So the idea that you wouldn't, you know, that you would have prospects who are going to, potentially could play in the NHL next year who won't be there, that you're going to be doing a draft with a draft order that's a year old. and all this stuff, losing one of your marquee events, it makes absolutely no sense to me. The first time I heard the idea, I'm like,

well, this isn't going to go anywhere. And it sure sounds like it. It's the NHL, maybe. No idea is too dumb to at least talk about for weeks on end. My understanding is the NHL, like the league itself doesn't love the idea because the league itself wants to have this marquey event, let alone I'm sure the TV partners, remember we had to do the whole draft lottery weirdness.

last year because the TV partners almost got us to do the draft before the playoffs because they just wanted it so badly. So I can't imagine they're going to go for this. And there's some talk about, well, do you do one round? And, you know, so you at least get the elite prospects into the, whatever it is. Thanks for the plug. But yes. Yeah. But I, it's, once again, it's the GMs run this stupid league. This, this league is just a daycare where the kids get to vote on all the rules. And they're sitting there going, well, it's going to be too hard. You know, our crack scouting staff that has really been hitting it out of the park and often finds as many as two or three NHLers out of our seven or eight picks every year, they can't do that this year. So we have

to, the entire structure of the offseason has to change around us so that our jobs are easier. And you're right, this stupid league will probably go ahead and do it. Yeah. Because again, like, This is the league where for four years, Edmonton's like, we just get the first pick for the next decade. And then everybody's like, well, that's not fair. That's insane. Just because they're horrible and like objectively terribly run and keep finishing last because of how bad they are, that doesn't mean they should get the first pick, even though that's the way it's always worked. We got to change the rules.

And then the rules change. And they're like, well, look, I mean, it's not fair that the Detroit Red Wings, one of the worst teams ever, don't get to pick first. And it's like, this was your fucking idea. You create a system where you're like, okay, this team will only have a 5% chance of winning the lottery. And then inevitably that happens. And you're like, well, that wasn't supposed to happen. You gave them a 5% chance. Do you understand how odds work?

Like, do you understand it's maddening? And it's the same stuff as everything else, right? To be honest, like, this is just Tim Murray's fault. Like, let's be... Maybe. Because if... Jack Eichol. If the Sabres don't have all their fans cheer when they lose that game,

none of this happens. They don't make the changes to the rules. They don't make any of those things happen. The only thing that's different is maybe, you know, if you don't win the draft lottery, Because that's the real problem here is Detroit picked fourth. If it was just the thing where, oh, somebody won the first overall pick, Detroit's still picking second. Okay, well, then that's fine.

But they just decided that. But you can't do that because then you get a year like 2015 where there's two franchise players and the sabres and coyotes are shooting the puck into their own net and, you know, all that sort of stuff. It worked out great for the sabers, by the way. It did, yeah. It was perfect. So, I mean, I don't know. The whole lottery discussion, there's a million different ways you could do it. Everybody has their own opinion.

Weirdly, everyone's opinion just happens to be the one that would work best for their own team, even though they insist that they're just objectively coming up with a good system. But, I mean, that is this league in a nutshell, right? Like, create a system where something can happen, that thing happens, and then you go, oh, crap, that wasn't supposed to happen. and then you change the system to something where something else can happen. That you don't want to happen that inevitably happens three years from now. The unanticipated consequences of my actions.

I hate to sew. Or I love to sew and I hate to reap. That's what it boils down. This is great. What do you guys feel about the restriction on how many times a team can win the lottery? Even as a devil's fan, I think it's a good idea. Yes, they should have been doing this. They should have done this win.

the Oilers were getting top picks and it makes perfect sense. And they, I don't know why they haven't done it yet. Yeah. Like, I don't believe, you guys know I hate the fucking gold plan. I think this is a horrible idea. But I, but, you know, if you did want to do the concept of encouraging a team not to fucking suck in perpetuity to try to get the first overall pick all the time, then I think that's a reasonable rule change.

It's to restrict teams from getting it. It's not even to encourage teams not to suck because I mean that you're in a pro sports league. You should actually be trying to win, which is why the goal team is good, but we're not going to do. Let's skip that whole thing. You're wrong. I'm right.

It's settled. It's fine. The reason you don't, you know, you don't let teams win multiple times because if you have a lottery, it's coming down to luck. It's ping pong balls. We all agree that these prospects are crucially important. I mean, good Lord, to hear Red Wing fans tell it it's absolutely impossible to win in this league if you don't have a first overall pick on your roster. Which is crazy because their whole deal for a decade was nobody's better than picking ninth round picks than we are.

We get Hall of Famers in all that shit. And that's all these. But now, yeah, we actually are really bad at scout. And meanwhile, Colorado is one of the best teams in the league with a fourth overall. overall pick on the roster as one of their best players who they got after they lost to dread and all this stuff. But if we're all going to agree that this is absolutely what needs to happen and these bad teams have no hope at all of ever being good unless they get a first overall pick, then yeah,

you can't let the same team get it three years in a row. You've got to move it around a little bit or else you're just letting one team load up. You know, Oilers obviously be the exception, but they should have a fucking draft. This solves all the problems. In fairness to Detroit, they didn't realize the rest of the league would discover there was a place called Sweden. And so it really, it really fucked up for a while. I mean, I do have sympathy for the Red Wings GM because I'm sure, you know, Steve Eisenman understands that there are no good players who ever get drafted fourth overall. I mean, has there ever been a Hall of Fame or drafted fourth overall?

I'm pretty sure Steve Iserman knows the answer to that. By the way, the thing in the LeBron article, where, he's like, GMs are, you know, don't want to see a team like the Red Wings who are, they're not tanking on purpose. They're just bad. It's like, yeah. Did you see who they put on the ice last year? Yeah. They knew they were going to be bad and they fucking lean all the way into it.

They were trying so hard to win with Jimmy Howard playing 50 games. It's, but again, like this is, this league is run by the GMs and the GMs only care about making their own jobs as easy as possible. And one of the things you're sitting there as a GM going, uh-oh, what if I'm, despite the loser point, despite all this other stuff that I've put in place to make my job easy, what if I'm still so bad at my job that my team comes in last? Oh, I need to have a first overall pick to sell to my owner. I can tell them it was part of the plan. No, it's a rebuild. It's not that I'm terrible at this. This is a strategic long-term thinking.

So we need to have a system where the bad teams get the first picks and immediately get lifted up back to the rest of the pack. It's ridiculous. And if we had a real leader in this league and not just like somebody who is mostly a lackey to the GMs when it comes to this stuff, somebody would walk into the room and he'd say, you idiots, we're doing this this way because this is what's best for the league, not for you guys personally. And that's what the rule would be. But we don't have that. And so we get together and like I said, the kids in the daycare get to vote on what the rules look like. And surprise, surprise. The rules we get end up being garbage.

Surprise, surprise. Three different little hand trucks of chocolate milk get delivered to the classroom every day. Yeah, we all get to eat candy for lunch every day. Wow, what a surprise. I guess that's what's in the best interest of the daycare. Yeah, we just have to run around with underwear on our heads. Speaking of underwear, today's episode of Puck Soup is sponsored by Mack Weldon. A very, very comfortable line of clothing.

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Didn't Readon piece this week? Ken Dryden too long? That's, uh, no, this was, it was a really good piece. I, I, it didn't seem to make as many waves as I thought it would, maybe just because there were so many other big stories. Yeah, it was a busy day on Tuesday. It's an excellent piece. It's in the Atlantic, not the athletic.

It's in the Atlantic for some reason. but Ken Dreyne basically writes it's sort of a combination history of goal tending with an emphasis on the equipment, how the equipment has changed the way the positions played, and a lament for the lack of scoring today and the fact that goaltending, it's a lot of the same points that I've been making where goaltending is not just very, very good these days, but it's very, very dull to watch. He talks about how you no longer use your arms and legs, you just let the puck hit you in the chest, you're so perfectly positioned and you're so big and the equipment's so big and all this other stuff.

I found it very interesting. And it's, it ends with his suggestion is to make the nets bigger. And I understand that's a non-starter for a lot of hockey fans and they, you know, but this is coming from Kendryden. Like this is not just one of the smartest people in the hockey world, but one of the greatest goalies of all time. Like you would think if anybody would be saying, no, this is great.

Everybody's getting shutouts, two goals a game. This is perfect. This is how the league should go. You think it would be Ken Dryden. And yet he's sitting here going, we can't keep going like this. This is not an entertaining product. This is not what fast, fun, exciting hockey should be. It's a really good piece.

I recommend that people seek it out and read it. And it's Ken Dryden. So, you know, sometimes he won't say something in three words when he can do it in 10. But it's worth it because I thought it was a really interesting insight from a very smart guy who would know what he's talking about. I have always, you know, the widening the nets thing has always been a weird thing for me because I obviously don't want them to be too big. But I do have time for, I've always had time for the parentheses idea of bending the posts. So they look like parentheses.

You know what I'm talking about? That special goal that they've talked about. And I've always been the opposite. I don't like that. But. I think the number of goals it would actually create is so minimal that you're basically not doing anything. thing. I don't think so. I mean, if you make the nets, let's say, two inches bigger all the way around. And the reason I don't like the parentheses thing is because... No, that's what I'm saying

the parentheses thing. Every time you look at it. Yeah, okay. So every time you look at it, you're going to be like, those nets are different. And all the people who, all the people in the hockey world who don't like anything to be different will not be able to get over that. Versus if you make the nets one or two inches bigger all the way around, you will not be able to perceive that difference. It will look exactly the same on TV or when you're sitting at the ring. I can get down. I can get down at that point because you're right. It would get annoying.

And the thing is, as far as does it increase scoring, I mean, in theory at least, you just look at, okay, how many, if you make it that much bigger, basically what happens is every shot that hits the post today goes in the net now. So how many shots hit the post? And it's about won a game. So that's, in theory, what you're adding in terms of how many goals. goals you get, it would probably be more than that because right now when when Alexander Ovechkin or Austin Matthews hits the post, it's because they missed. If they knew that they got a

goal for hitting the post, they would hit the post a lot more often. So it would probably be more than that. But it's also the goalies though. I mean, like the part of the reason the changing the size of the net thing has never really taken off is goaltenders constantly complain about having to relearn their position. Good. Basically. If you change that that that, that's, but that makes it But that makes it a temporary thing. They'll just figure it out in a year and a half. And then we're back to where we want. But to your point, Sean, though, it's not simply just the pucks that go off the pipe.

It's also the goals that are created by goalies having to figure out how to, you know, cover the new areas of the net they have to cover. So I agree. I think it would have a ripple effect. And here's the thing. Because the objection that people have, well, I mean, the number one objection is different, bad, me hockey fan, no like. But the second, second, excitement in hockey. doesn't come just from goals being scored. Excitment in hockey comes from scoring chances.

And if you just make the nets bigger without changing anything else, you're not creating more scoring chances. Everything else looks the same. It's just that more of the shots go in. But that's what a scoring chance is. A scoring chance is a shot that has a chance to go in. Like, that's it. And if you make the nets bigger,

suddenly, like right now a scoring chance is like that little home plate section in front of the net. That's what we consider a scoring chance. And so for that reason, all the defense collapses there, there's no room at all, and there's nothing to shoot at, you make the nets a little bit bigger,

suddenly you can score from a few more areas, which spreads out the defense, which means suddenly, you know, I'm old enough to remember when a guy getting to wind up and take a slap shot from the point was a scoring chance, because those went in sometimes. They never go in anymore, not clean.

If it's a deflection or something, you might get a goal, but nobody ever beats a goalie from there. Nobody ever comes down and takes a shot from the top of the face-off circle and scores. And if they do, it's a terrible goal. And we got to get the goalie out of there and get someone in who can do the job. If you make the Nets a little bigger and suddenly some of those goals start going in, eventually our little hockey fan brains will get retrained to go,

wait a second, you can score from here. This suddenly starts feeling more dangerous. And you get more scoring chances. But again, the problem is, yeah, it'll change things for a little while. Then goalies and goalie coaches will figure it out. And then it will be right back to where we were in three years. I, you know, I'm not convinced. Yes, there would be some of that, but there's only so much that you can adjust to more net being behind a goaltender. I mean, you know, the goalies, the goalies aren't going to suddenly grow an extra inch to make up for it. They're probably going to try to get an extra inch on their pads, but the-

And that, to me, is the issue, right? Like, I don't think it's a problem of the nets are too small. I think it's the pads are too big. And we've said it before. And Dryden talks about that. a lot. Yeah, I haven't read the article. And he basically, and he calls BS on the whole, like, it's about safety thing. Like, he,

Oh, of course it. Of course it's a fucking bullshit thing. I know. But when you or I say it, people go, well, you've never played the so here's Ken Dryden going, like, come on, guys, this is. Yeah, no, it's, it's really, that's really what it is. I've said it on the show before, but, like, you know, they have Kevlar vests. And I understand that, like, Kevlar vests aren't, like, well, it doesn't hurt at all when a bullet hit you because you're wearing a cavalier. I understand that. But it's just, it's just like,

why don't we try a thing that everybody has acknowledged in the past? Like, goaltenders pads are too big. Like, look at, you know, look at a pair of leg pads from today versus what they looked like in the 80s. Like, yeah, goalies in the 80s were very bad at their jobs, obviously, in comparison with today's, uh, even worse goalie in the league would be the best goalie back then probably. Absolutely. But with that having been said, you know, look at just the size difference of their pads. Or, you know, the other thing is maybe you just make goalies like huff a bunch of paint before they go out on the ice.

And then all of a sudden, you're right. That point shot is a lot harder to pick up on the way in. I really recommend people read the piece because it's like a fascinating thought process of like, you know, events and then consequences. Like he says, look, it used to be that goalies, like goalie pads, like the leg pads, were these big, heavy things. They were made out of leather and deer hair. And it was heavy.

And it tired you out to drop down and then get back up again. So people played a stand-up style. And when you're playing a stand-up style, it doesn't matter if you're six-foot-seven or five-foot-seven, you're still covering up to the crossbar. And so you might as well have a smaller goaler who's going to be quicker and more agile. but once the pads get smaller, the pads get lighter, goalies learn how to drop down, the butterfly style takes over, now suddenly you can't be small anymore,

because when you drop down, you're not covering the top of the net, so the big guys come in, and the big guys, you know, who before would have had to wear this big giant heavy equipment, now they're wearing big giant light equipment, so they can play, and so now the goalies are all 6 foot 5 and 6 foot 7, and now there's, and plus the equipment's bigger, and the defense is better, and everyone's blocking shots, and there's just nowhere to shoot at.

And that's the thing that drives me crazy about this is when people go, well, we can't change. We don't want to change. There's this tradition. We can't change. If you don't think the game's changed, like, look at any photo of anybody taking a shot in the 80s and look at how much net they have to shoot at. And then look at what it looks like today. Like, it's amazing anybody is scoring at all. And that's why, like, I believe, like, Ovechkin and Matthews or wherever would have scored 100 goals back in the 80s.

Because they're shooting at this little tiny space when it used to be, For the rest of hockey history, this big space that you had to shoot at, I don't think we need the big space anymore, but let's at least give them something. Sorry, I've been lost since I started thinking about the concept of Martin Jones being the best goalie in hockey at 1987. He would have been. He would have been, he would have renamed the Vezna. The Martin Jones Award. He allows zero goals the entire season because he kind of... Because he can skate sideways.

is without fault. Yeah, like he just kind of knows how to stop a puck without just throwing his entire body at it. Martin Jones frantically buying up every Delorean in California, hoping that one has a time machine's dropped to it. That's what he's doing right now. He's not good, by the way, Martin Jones. Huh, isn't that weird? He's good in a shootout. Yeah, the problem is you've got to not give up enough goals to get there.

That is brilliant. Thank you. It's almost almost philosophical. All right. Lightning round. Here we go. Ready? Yes.

Predators rebuild. Should it start, Ryan? Should have started two years ago. They're terrible. All right. They're coach higher. Why, why, if you're like, okay, you know what? This roster stinks.

We got to get a new coach in here because that's the only change we can really make. Let's get the guy who drove the devils into the ground. Oh, yeah, that's a great idea. Wow, I can't believe that didn't fucking work out. Here's a fun. Fun fact, the Predators are 29th in the league right now in offense. You'll never guess where the devils were during the run of John Hines as their head coach where their offense was. Go ahead, take a while a guess.

That's right. Seven. 29th. Oh. Well, there was the, they're thinking probably that one Taylor Hall year, they were seventh. But overall, 20. I bet they even weren't then. That was the reason he won the MVP was because when he came off the ice, they looked like an AHL team.

I was on our friend Adam Vingen's podcast this week talking about the Predators. And to me, if you look at that roster, there are two guys that are untouchable. Roman Josie is untouchable because he has a no move. And I'm a Philip Forsberg fan. Like, I think he's good. I wouldn't move him either. I think everybody else is available, including Ryan Ellis, who I think could bring back a hell of a return. Well, by the time you get good again, how old is Philip Forsberg, though?

Right. He's, well, he's only 27 or 28 now, I want to say? Only? If they're bad, if they're bad for the next four years, three years, okay, now he's in his early 30s. And then you're going, oh, we should have traded him like two years ago. But Ryan Ellis is 30. So, like, as good as he is, and he's great, like, I feel like you can move him and get a really solid return back. You trade everybody.

You get everybody off this team. They all aren't good enough, period. Oh, man, Gary, Gary Oldman Giff, everyone. Yeah. Even, but you can't trade Roman Yose. I would. If he's going to waive the no-move clause, see you later. Absolutely get him out of there.

Total tear-down. So who's doing this total tear-down? Is it David Poyle? Craig, come on. Ryan, he's the winningest general manager in NHL history. Yeah, I just saw a stat the other day where Lou LaMerello is catching up, though. Era, I'm on your tail, and I have cup rings. All right, Alex Kelchanyuk.

I'm going to sit at an over-under of four. How many more teams will he play for in his NHL career? Under. Over. Because you don't think the career is going to last very long? That's right, yeah. I think he's off to the KHL pretty soon. That might be the right answer.

Interesting. He's already over halfway to the, Mike Sillinger trade record. Holy shit. Trade it five times. I mean, he's going to be, he'll get a shot with the leaves, but... I'll say it's the over.

I mean, I agree with Sean. Like, that 30-goal season on your resume means you're going to get employment. No matter, you know, if you want to stay in this league, you'll get employment in this league. If you've scored 30 goals once. I'll take the over. Is Victor had been the best player in the world?

That was my piece this week on ESPN that dropped. I talked to, I asked Hadbin about it. It was my favorite conversation I've had with a player in a long time. I'm just like, what if somebody said to you, you were the best player in the world? He'd say, I'd say they were incorrect. But it was, I think if you take, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're looking for the total package and Lex Lugar isn't available. And you want offense, defense, best at your position, ability to control a game. accolades.

There's a case to be made. It's Headman. What say you? I can't believe I'm going to say this because of how everything went last year. But I think you can make a legitimate fucking case for Leon Drysidal. He's not terrible defensively anymore. And he's not good.

But he's not terrible. Like he's not as bad as he was last year. And his offense has even taken another step. And that's like five on five, whatever you want to look at. Like he has taken, like, again, he was very good offensively last year, but he shouldn't have been the MVP because he was a black hole defensively. Now he's just like kind of not good defensively. And, you know, I think that's not helped by the fact that the team's best defenseman is

out for the year. and the offense is just on another level so far to start this year. So I think you can maybe make the case that Leon Dreisidel is legitimately a lot closer to being the MVP than he should have been last year. And, you know, obviously there are the other thing to say is that the goalie, the best goalie in the league is probably the best player because of how, much he matters. And if you want to say that's Connor Hellebuck or if you want to say that's John Gibson, I have time for that argument as well. But I think that, you know, if you're just looking at just like straight up value, like in terms of war or whatever, I think Leon Dreisitles right up there. Interesting. What about you, Sean? It's Connor McDavid.

I would say... What are we doing here? Conner McDavid is the best player in the league. That's... If you're not going to give it to Hedman, I think you give it to McDavid. Because honestly, Ryan, I've seen more analytic analysis of how much McDavid's game has improved versus dry sidles this season that I thought you might say it's McDavid. Yeah. I, you know, I do think he actually is, you know, improved defensively quite a bit. McDavid is. But I think so far this year, and I'm not, I'm not married to this opinion, obviously, but so far this year, I think Drys-Eidel has been a little bit more impressive offensively, personally. Now, you know, it's early the fact that they're, that they're playing only the

Ottawa senators 15 times this year, I think. You know, like that all definitely has to play into it. and then you can, you know, make your case for Austin Matthews and David Pasternak. But, like, I will reiterate the one thing I've been saying for quite a while, which is that this season is fake. So let's not get ourselves too worked up about any of this kind of stuff. Right. And then finally, in the lightning round, where will Taylor Hall play be playing after? the trade deadline. He has not been good this year. He's been pretty bad. So I don't know,

I don't know what, what they can legitimately ask for, right? Like, I mean, they're going to say first round pick or whatever, but who's, who's like, oh yeah, this guy who is coming, he was perceived, excuse me, perceived as having a bad year last year. And I don't know that that was totally the case. But this year, he's having like an objectively bad year. And maybe you say, well, he shouldn't have gone to Buffalo because that's all any. has in Buffalo. But yeah, I don't, give me, I think, I think he stays in that division. But like, I don't know if it's, if it's Philly or Boston or somebody just is going to be interested in a winger.

Yeah, I think. I'm looking at the teams with Cap Space. Yeah, there aren't any. The two that jump out is, is the Bruins, who we heard had interest. and don't, and they've got, they project to have room. And then the hurricanes would be the other interesting one. And good luck to, good luck to rookie GM, Kevin Adams, winning that trade. Right.

I think it's the Bruins. I think he fits snugly. They've been looking for a fucking left wing on that team for, what, four years? And I feel like he fits snugly on that line with Craichie. Well, the other thing. Maybe Colorado. They put in an offer. They did.

I don't know how the cap works. They don't have a lot of space. Right. Like they don't, although, you know, there's always for all the winding about, oh, the cap, this makes it so hard. I mean,

you trade somebody on your team with salary back the other way, and it all works at all. Yeah, I'm going to look really quick here. I mean, the only guy you would really say he makes a lot of money and they would want to get rid of him is Eric, Johnson right and he has a

no move and a limited no trade so he's not going to fucking but yeah and and he signed for a few three more years two more years after this one yeah good times all right let's end it with an overrated underrated this week

I have a few options and you guys tell me which one you want to do uh Stephen King not that one uh it suggests HBO shows I can't remember if we did that one or not I feel like it sounds familiar Chris, whose handle on Twitter is former Leafs fan.

I guess maybe he just joined this week. Yeah. Candy bars. We have Herb, who says, in honor of Texas sports teams from that state. And Cherbs Golden says sitcom apartments, which I thought was an interesting one. And then Matthew Stracell writes in Canadian and or American beers as well. Any of those strike you?

I can keep listing some if you'd like. I feel like we've done candy bars as well. I will say I have to veto the beer one because I don't drink beer. You don't drink the beer. It's gross to me. Sorry. People get mad. There's also Down Goes Brown articles.

punk rock bands um Leifes collapses Oh That might be the one That might be the one actually That's All right

Leaves Leaves collapses Uh Wow Overrated I gotta think of them all So the overrated It was 41

Yes That team sucked The Bruins were really good I'll tell you what Hold on So yours is the 41 So let me let me get my bearings series overrated, underrated, favorite,

favorite. All right, my overrated is a David Ayers game, and I'll tell you why. Because it was the team playing in front of David Ayers that beat the Leafs. It wasn't the Zamboanie driver. Sure. Yeah, that's my overrated one. But he was still just like, they might as well have picked

someone out of the fucking stance. They could have, the way they played defensively. Yeah, just point of order. We are counting that as a collapse, because they were down 4-1 in that game when when airs came in. We can still count that as a collapse. That's definitely a collapse.

They played against the Zamboni driver. My overrated is this week. You know, blowing a four-goal lead to the senators. I mean, the senators are bad, but there's a couple of blown four-goal leads every year. And people are acting like, I've seen people tweeting, yeah, by the Leafs. I've seen people like, this is the top three loss. time. It's like, is it, is it your first day here? Yeah, it's not even the worst Leafs loss of the last two years. So let's slow down. Not even the last, not even the last

calendar year. Yeah. This is, uh, you know, and I said that to somebody and they're like, a typical Leafs Homer. And I'm like, yeah, that's, that's me, the Leafs Homer going like, no, man, we have so many far worse losses. Yeah, we're way more embarrassing than that, dude. How dare you? So, yeah. So with the caveat that we don't know how this is going to play, Maybe this, like, starts some huge skid, and, you know, we point back and go, that was when the Leafs, whatever. But, no, like, blowing a four-goal lead, three goals in the third period, like, come on, man, this is, this is not new for this team. It's, it's recency bias is kicking in, and people are acting like this is an all-timer. No.

Underrated Leafs collapse. Jeez. I'll go first as the Leafs guy. Yeah. In the Pat Quinn year, like two, yeah, I want to say 2000, they blew a five-nothing lead against the blues all in the third period with 15 minutes left. So 50 minutes left, they're up five-nothing. This is the dead puck era. I mean, I mean, we're still pretty low scoring, but this is like the height of the nobody scores era.

And they blew that lead and lost in overtime. There were no shootouts back then either. So they could have at least, you know, got to a tie. But no, they lost in overtime. And nobody really remembers it because that team was good. And they went on and had a playoff run. And also it was 21 years ago. What does that have to do with it?

Yeah, right. It was relatively recent. That is a good point. It's not good point. But, I mean, seriously, that's why nobody remembers it. It was a regular season loss 21 years ago. That's right. Which is why this week's is not going to, like, resonate 20 years from now.

No, of course not. Yeah, I agree. Some of the other ones, yeah. So I will agree with you on underrated because it's really fucking hard to blow a 5-0 lead at any point in a game, let alone with 15 minutes left on the clock. So I will agree with that. I'll go underrated the 2013-14 season. Just the whole thing? Yeah, the PDO regression that then led to the –

really bad 14-15 season, which, of course, then led to getting Austin Man-dunes. The intentionally bad. The intentionally bad. The 2015-16 season, yeah. Right, exactly. So underrated in the sense that the regression after the disaster against the Bruins then eventually led to, you know, a pretty good collection of young players by the end of the decade. There is like an alternate history sort of argument that the 4-1 collapse was actually a good thing in the big picture because

they would have convinced, if they'd beat in the ruins, they would have convinced themselves like, we have learned, yes, dress two enforcers in the playoffs and be in your own zone and we're going to like triple down instead of doubling down, which is what they did. I don't necessarily buy that, but you could make the case. Favorite collapse in Leaves history. David Ayers game. Come on. Yeah.

I remember I was home that night. Like, it was, for whatever reason, I didn't go to a college hockey game. And it's, you know, it's just like everybody's like, holy, I wasn't watching the game at the time. But everybody was like, holy shit, like I was watching a different game. And everybody's like, holy shit, there's a Zamboni driver going into the Leafs game for Carolina. The Leafs are down. But, like, this looks all but assured that the Leafs are just going to pump 15 goals past this fucking guy. They're the Toronto Maple Leafs.

They have Austin Matthews. They have Mitch Marner. They have John Tavares. All that shit. And so I switched to the game out of Morvi curiosity. And the Leafs score two goals very fucking easily. Yes. And I'm like...

First two shots. Yeah. And I'm like, oh, but like they weren't even particularly good shots. Like he looked like a 42-year-old Zamboni driver playing against the Toronto Maple Leafs. And I'm like, ooh, maybe I'm going to shut this off. And I stuck with it. And there was that big hit. Right? I don't remember the details of who got hit and who, you know, whatever.

But there was a big hit and that seemed to like just really jolt the game to life and give it all this urgency that it didn't have. And then, yeah, just watching the Leafs not do it the entire rest of the way was incredible. What is your favorite collapse, Sean? No, Ryan's right. It's a David Harris game. That game was funny as hell. That's like not at the time, but just in hindsight. At the time also. Yes, for you at the time as well. For me, maybe not so much.

But even then, it was still, it was still pretty hilarious. That has to be the pick. Obviously, my favorite is the 4-1 game. I still remember watching the end of that game and just marveling at it. Just fucking marveling at it at the rally that was the Bruins in that game. And then, you know, listen. I understand that there's pushback whenever something like that becomes a meme, but it's still a joke that makes me laugh like years later when people reference it. Least favorite Leafs collapse, Ryan.

1967 to present. Don't like hearing about it anymore. We get it. It's been a long time. Who cares? Is it, but, okay, to further that point, is it a curse? Is there something supernatural that has affected the Leafs? I'm going to say no.

I'm going to say that I don't believe a witch is involved or anything like that. What about a warlock? Now we're getting more into the realm of reasonable theories. Very good. Sean, what's your least favorite leaves collapse? The 4-1 game for pretty much the same reasons that you like it. Yeah, that sucked. And it was a game seven of the playoffs,

some middle of the regular season type thing. So, yeah. Now, remind me, the Leafs had a three, two lead over the Kings of the Gretzky Kings in 93. In the series, yes. Glenn Anderson scored an overtime in game five. They went back to L.A. fell behind 4-1 in game six, came all the way back, Wendell Clark Hattrick with the goalie out, and then the high stick happens.

They go back to Toronto and lose game seven. I'll tell you sometime. And then they go back and lose game seven in Toronto in Gretzky's greatest game, according to him. I can't say that's my least favorite collapse because it did give us the Gretzky Kings and the cup final, which was awesome. So I'm going to say my least favorite collapse is a recent one. It's the collapse against the Blue Jackets last postseason in the bubble, if only because I remember watching that game, and they're up 3-0.

And then I went, I specifically remember this, we went to go get the Popeye's chicken sandwich. And we're very excited about that. We had to wait in a line to get it. And then I got back in the car and discovered that things had gone awry for the last. leaves. Yeah, that's a good one. And if they had lost game four, I think that would rank much higher and resonate with people. The fact that they had the crazy comeback in game four that was even crazier than the Blue Jackets comeback, sort of wiped a bit of it away. But yeah, that one should probably be considered higher than. Well, I get, like, the Senator's one isn't even in the top

two for the last year. Because you have the, it's not. It's not. The Zamboni and that one. My point is that I thought I was just going to be able to enjoy the rest of the day. I thought the leaves said put this thing to bed. But then when I got home, you know, not only do I have to, you know, rush to eat my chicken sandwich from Popeyes to be able to like write about this game that had gone off the rails. But my day wasn't over. So that's my least favorite. What about this if it's overrated, underrated, favorite, Leaf's favorite? Is that anything?

Jesus Christ. Yeah. No? Okay. Sounds good. I think we can do that. All right. The Leafs favorite collapse?

Oh, then it's clearly the year that allowed them to draft Austin Matthews. That's their favorite collapse. Yeah, they love that one. That one was their favorite. That one great. Hey, look, sometimes you, hey, guys, sometimes you just have a season where all your good players happen to get minor injuries that require them to go on LTIR for the rest of the year. And you have to play the Marleys for the last 20 games. That's just how it goes.

That's just, baby. Yeah. I mean, they were clearly trying to win as much as Detroit did. last year. Not a tank at all. They were, yeah, exactly. They were just trying very hard to win, and it just didn't work out. It didn't work out.

They ended with a nice 69 points in the standings. I remember that season 1516 because that was the year Corey Schneider decided to play the best goaltending of his life for the Devils down the stretch. He ended with a 924 save percentage in a season in which the Devils were trying for the first overall pick. So fucking great stuff right there. Thank you to him. Absolutely killer stuff. Amazing stuff.

All right. That's Puck Soup for this week. Thanks to Mack Weldon and Brooke Lennon for sponsoring the show. Thanks to all of you for listening. Thanks to everybody who subscribes to the Patreon. We'll be doing the mailbag in short order. Always a very good time, the mailbag and bonus episodes and such. If you've missed the latest bonus episode, it was a really good one.

It was the Hockey Hall of Fame of Hockey Things in which we picked different items and moments and people from hockey history and put them into our own hockey Hall of Fame, the inaugural class, as it were, of that Hall of Fame. You can find my stuff on ESPN.com. I wrote about Victor Hedman as the best player in the world. Emily and I collaborated on a NHL versus COVID thing. I will be writing about and going to the Lake Tahoe games this weekend.

I'm very excited about that. It's kind of weird that I've not been to a hockey game since March, and the first one I'll be going to is in Lake Tahoe games this weekend. is in Lake Tahoe. It's kind of fucked up. That's right. So, yeah, that's my stuff. And then obviously on Twitter at Wysinski,

and I was encouraged by my friend Arda O'Call to join Clubhouse this week, too. So I'm sure I'll be doing something there. Don't know what that is. That's like the new gimmick. I had to have art. I call artists like you should be on Clubhouse. And I said, I don't know what it is. I'll gladly do it if you can explain to me what it is.

And the long story short of it is it's like if you're at South by Southwest and you duck into different panel discussions, it's kind of like Clubhouse. Like at all times there are discussions going on between smart people and people that are in the room that are interacting with them and stuff. And also you're going to be on there. And also I'll be on there. And it's not like a thing where, you know, there are ways you can control the conversation by. by having people muted and stuff. But for the most part, it's just you're there and people talk to you. Sounds horrible.

It does sound horrible, but I'm going to try it out and see if I like it. But to your point, Ryan, I think I've said this on the podcast before. I'm not old, but I'm older. You know, I'm an internet old. And, you know, my greatest fear is that one day Pete Blackburn will walk up to me and be like, how's it going, Greg? I'm like, oh, it's good. I just wrote an article on Victor Headman.

He's like, you're doing articles? You're not doing Gleepglops? And I'm just like, oh, fuck, I don't know what that is. Just some zoomer's going to come up to you and give you the Anton Chigar cattle gun. That's it. Right, exactly. Right, right, right, right. That's right.

There is no country for this old man. And so I came close to having that moment when people started talking about Clubhouse because I could not understand what the fuck it was. But now I do. And so I'm not there yet. You don't have to put me out to pasture quite yet, but I came close this week with the clubhouse thing. I'm not going to sign up for that, but definitely you should sign up for elite prospects. Rinkside, we're doing all kinds of NHL coverage now. I'm going to pull it up right now and tell you what the top stories are.

I believe... You don't have it as your homepage on your browser that just comes up automatically? The tab I had open was Evolving Hockey No, evolving hockey's war page So once again very cool We have an article today from Dimitri, Philipovic

About how John Klingberg is really good We have some AHA coverage, we have Some stuff about Jordan Cairo From Mitch Brown I, me and Jay Fresh, who you might know from Twitter, worked a little bit together on Team USA for the 2022 Olympics, much like every other site has done.

What we learned is on there. Right after we're done recording here, I'm going to do my first of the monthly power feelings, which I know everybody loves so much. So I don't know how much it costs, but I'm sure it's affordable and check it out. Please and thanks. Find my stuff on the athletic. Get the usual pieces. The grab bag is making its return on Friday. And check out the athletic hockey show, Ian Mendes and I, on Thursday. We're actually hoping to have Katie Strang on to talk a little bit more about this coyote's debacle.

So fingers crossed, that happens. If not, and it's Justine and I, then you'll just have to make do with that. But, yeah, please check that out. It's a new show. and we would love to have you on board when you're done listening to all of the Puck Soot Soup for the week. There it is. All right, folks.

That's Puck Soup. Thanks, everybody for listening. We will talk to you next time. Take care. Bye. See you. Bye-bye. Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slapshots and goons.

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