Puck Soup - Early Season Panic!

Episode Date: October 21, 2021

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slapshots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes. It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense. Part two. Hi, everybody. I'm Greg Gwischinski of the SPN, your worldwide leader in sports and also hockey. And also women's hockey and also the KHL and also what men's and women's and women's NCAA hockey? My God, it's like we have all the hockey except for Canadian Junior, which I'm

sure we don't really want days away from announcing an OHL contract or something. I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects, E.P.Ringside.com. I'm Sean McIndoo from The Athletic. You're in Puck Soup, and we're a week into the season, and already, already there are things happening. There are, there are panics to be had. I think that at least one third of the Puck Soup family has been very excited about the happenings in Chicago to start this season. Excited, I don't know. I think the word is vindicated, Greg.

Once again. So the Blackhawks are, as we do this podcast, they are not good. They are 03 and 1 in their first four games, a negative 9 goal differential. coming off a loss on whole mice. Their first full capacity crowd in 587 days, and they absolutely shit the bet against the Islanders. Never a good sign when your head coach is doing the, well, we're looking for small victories within the loss kind of shit,

four games into the season. As I said, many times this podcast, I let Jeremy Colleton was going to be the first coach fired. There is nothing that has happened in the first four games to dissuade before. from that. Lambert, your assessment of America's team, the part of Blackhawks. Yeah, I guess the big one is that, you know,

I think we all kind of thought they weren't going to be, uh, let's say solid defensively or anything like that. I think the big surprise is Mark Andre Fleury has an 840 safe percent. That's not good. That dude should have retired. He should have been like, you know what, I am staying home. Jonathan Taves, no points after we were all assured. Oh, he's looked so good in training camp, blah, blah, blah.

Seth Jones has been... Well, he looked... He was really good against the Devils, actually, that game that they lost in overtime. He looked maybe like the best player on the ice, quite frankly. But he's been bad overall. You know, they always say, like, don't put stock in plus-minus, but let's just go down the list here. get minus six, Patrick Kane minus five, Tyler Johnson minus five, Seth Jones minus four,

Connor Murphy minus six, Calvin DeHan minus four. Could we pause for a second? Thanks. Here's the thing. Really bad. I completely agree with you that we shouldn't put too much stock into plus minus. But can we all admit that it's just really fun? Like isn't plus minus still fun to point at somebody and say this guy's minus 36?

Well, you know, it's funny because, you know, it's only, it's only, it's only, it's only, I only used it because it's the stats I had in front of me at the time. But it is illustrative of something, but we all know that it's a faulty stat. But, Sean, you were about to chime in on plus. No, I just, I mean, I honestly think if we fixed it as far as the flaws around special teams play and especially empty net play at the end of the game, and we just made it like a strict five-on-five. Five-on-five, yeah, of course.

It would actually be a marginally useful stat. Yeah, I think it would be very good. Especially over big sample sizes. You know, it's, uh, but, yeah, no, it's, it is fun to occasionally use it and, like, add up all the plus minuses for one line and make people in. Yeah, I mean, like I, you know, it's just always the thing of your, you're, you're always just using it to reinforce your point and you've got to go, well, look, obviously it's a flawed stat, but dot, dot, um, but yeah, I just,

pulled up their five on five plus minus, De Brinket minus, like a bunch of guys minus six minus five minus four. Like, let's put it this way. The only guy who has a positive goal difference at five on five is Kirby Doc, and he's plus one. Should Mark Andre Fleury have retired? Yeah, I just said that. Okay. Yeah.

That's rough. And it's like Ryan said, he listed those three guys, right? Jones, Taves were the three additions to the team. Tyler Johnson, too. He's looked like shit. Yeah. But I mean, those were the three guys. And, you know, obviously, Taves, not an acquisition, but didn't play last year.

Those are the three guys that you looked at and said, they're adding all three of those guys, that will make them better than they were last year when they were not a very good team. And so far, all three of those guys look bad. And if all three of those guys are bad, then you're, you're. not a better team because Tyler Johnson isn't moving the needle. So, yeah, it starts to feel like the coaching change has to be the next play because I don't, what are you going to do otherwise? So the name that people like to throw out there for this job, because in hockey logic, what you do

is if your team can't defend, you get the defensive coach to come in so now they can defend would be Claude Julian. Oh, Greg, I don't know if you've seen this. Chicago fans really getting the hashtag higher torts going. Wow. I'm not just like that. I made like I jokingly like screenshot that was a comment. And Mark Lazarus is like game three.

Oh boy. Call them. Well, that's exciting because, you know, I was wondering how can the Chicago Blackhawks become more of a. USA Hockey Circle Jerk, and that would be one way, is to hire John Torterilla. Is Dan Balsma busy? But yeah, so I, like, screenshot it, and Lazarus was like, no, the number of people who have said to me, when are they going to hire Torrella is, like, through the roof right now. Yeah.

Well, next time I see him in the ESPN Commissary, I'll ask him. Are you interested in coaching Chicago? He should take a cue from Mark Andre Fleury and be like, no, thank you. All set. imagine being Seth Jones and years under Tororella. I don't even know if he liked him or not as a coach, but I mean, that's got to wear on you even if you kind of generally like the dude and you get four whole games away from him.

Who would shit his pants the most? Would it be Seth Jones with Torts getting hired by Chicago or Pierre-Luc Dubois with Torts getting hired by Winnipeg? PLD for sure. That would be it, yeah. All right, Chicago sucks, unfortunately. but let's see if they get good when they finally get a coach that knows his way around her defensive system. They are not the only winless wonder as we do this podcast this week.

Big Shocker, Arizona, didn't that win yet? They're going to have to try harder that. They do have a point. Yeah, that must have been, that was frustrating for that. That hurts. They had to hate that. Calgary is winless, but they only played two games as we do the podcast. They've also...

Go ahead. I mean, like, the problem with Calgary is every question you might have had, like, the goaltending hasn't looked good, the defense hasn't looked that good. Like, at times, I guess you would say, but like, I was looking, I was writing the power feelings earlier and their underlying numbers are unbelievable and it's like, oh, right, because they hired Terrell Sutter. Terrall Sutter, right, yeah. Like, they can't do anything right apart from have the puck the whole game, which,

Hey, that's not nothing, I guess, but yeah. I was shocked. I want to get to Winnipeg and the Habs in a second, but I do want to pause and talk about the Pacific Division while we're visiting the lovely West Coast and the western part of Canada, I guess, too. So I think most of us thought that Vegas and Edmonton were playoff teams. Obviously, Vegas is in a weird place right now

with the injuries to Stone and Patchy Ready. They haven't looked like themselves necessarily. That's fine. it's fixable. Edmonton, once again, it looks like a team that's going to score their way out of any fucking problem that they have this season. I mean,

it's incredible. Like, that's why you had to cement them into the playoffs, because Leon and Connor were just going to, like, fucking drag whatever iteration of this team. Yeah, they call penalties in the regular season. So they're going to be fine. Right.

And, like, as we do the podcast, I'm not sure what Mike Smith's health situation is going forward, but, like, they could fucking sign Mike Vernon and they're still going to be a playoff team because of Connor and Leon. Yeah. So those two But here's the rest of the division It's kind of weird

Like Anaheim I thought was going to be better They do look better That looks like we are going to have that Sweet spot of infusion of youth And veteran guys that all of a sudden Give a shit again They're going to be bad but fun If the first few games are any indication

Like I don't think anybody's looking at this roster going You know Playoffs not outside realm of possible But like They're scoring a bunch of goals And they look like they're having fun doing it, which like, that's what you should do when you're tanking, right? Like, just go, who gives a shit?

None of this matters. Let's try lacrosse goals. Fuck it. But the thing, but the thing is, is they're not tanking. Like, this is the thing that, I, I, I don't think I'm going to be very, no, I don't. Wow. Show me the evidence that they're tanking. Who have they traded from that team?

That's the thing. We've always complained about Bob Murray not tanking. Like, he should be tanking. I guess that's true. Like, Gibson should be on another team. Lindholm should be on another team. Fucking Raquel and Silverberg should be. get another team. They're all still there. And my worst nightmare is that Anaheim is a

playoff team, and we have to go back and apologize for three years of Paul and Bob Murray and a fucking idiot for not trading these guys. Yeah, even if they're a playoff team, this is still the wrong way to go about things, right? Like, like, for real, this is just not and, you know, again, like, let's wait until they're not shooting like 11% or whatever the number is. I completely, it's four games into the season. I completely agree. Yeah. How about the Sam Steele currently shooting 100% it says here. It's pretty good. Well, you, I mean, you also miss 100% of the shots you don't take, but in Sam Seals' case,

you make 100% of the shots that you do take. Wow. You have to change the dry raceboard. Vancouver, I don't know. L.A., I mean, they lost in Nashville last night as you did the podcast, but, I mean, they're going to be better. And then you come to the Cracken. We're fine.

Well, okay, San Jose is 2 and O, but come on. The Cracken have played five games. They're one, three, and one. And I watched them against the Devils last night. And they're just kind of an amorphous blob of a team right now. Like, I don't know what they're supposed to be. And to have given up 19 goals and five games is not what I thought they'd be. I thought they'd be pretty stout defensively.

I don't know, man. What do you make at the Cracken so far, Sean? I'm willing to hold off until they get a home game, which is their next game. The first five, they've all started on the road. But, yeah, at this point, if you're looking for any indication, forget about the Vegas comparison, but just some indication that this is a good team,

as in playoff bubble, you haven't really seen it. Yeah, I guess the burst against the Golden Knights when they came back from the 3-0, that maybe got some excitement. but no, they haven't looked great. And, I mean, the thing with Seattle, we kind of said all along is, you know, they hire Ron Francis, okay. They hire Dave Haxill. Everyone goes, oh, all right.

They don't make any trades for the expansion draft. We're all wondering what was up with that. The draft comes and goes. We look at the roster and go, you know, they're not bad, but it doesn't look great. And we're all so gun-shy because so much of the save stuff went on. with Vegas and of course they, you know, they made us all look dumb. I think people have been kind of hesitant in Kids Glove with Seattle to look at them and say, this might not be a very good team.

And you know what? If they're not, that's okay. They're an expansion team. Expansion teams aren't supposed to be good. But it's like Vegas screwed up all the expectations so much that we all kind of want to tiptoe around the fact that Seattle just might be bad for a year. I think what threw us off, though, is like some of the moves they made. like bringing in the Jaden Schwartz would to me mean a now kind of move.

Gru Bauer. I mean, I guess you could look at Gru Bauer kind of like what the Devils did with Ducky Hamilton and what the Rangers did with our Tammy Panera and with them saying, well, we're not going to have a chance to sign a guy like Gruberauer when we need them. And then they sign them. But the Gruberauer thing is the one that really threw me, that they were trying to contend to more than they are. They're clearly trying to be decent, which you know, you probably want to do in a new market.

I think we've seen examples where teams have coming in stunk for three years, and then they go, oh, weird, we're having trouble getting a fan base. So it was the right decision. And, you know, again, like the expectations, I'm not sure what they should have been. But even, you know, some of the models had them as like a 95-point team. And they got a ways to go to get there. It's not working yet. But again, they haven't even been home.

They haven't even had a chance to feed off that energy of the new fans. And, you know, you compare it to VIII. Vegas, you know, different circumstances, but that first night in Vegas, it felt like that was what fed everything that came after it. And they haven't had that yet. So let's, let's, let's, let's, let's, let's give them a little bit. It'd be fascinating to see if they could thread the needle with being a competitive team that doesn't make the playoffs and then somehow they have Shane Wright and Maddie Baneers as they're like two centers of the next fucking 15 years. Yeah, that wouldn't be too bad for them, I feel. I think that'd be a pretty good plan if you

could pull that one off. Um, yeah, I don't know what the, with the cracken are supposed to be, though. I know that they should definitely get more scoring from their D, which hasn't really happened all that much yet. Winnipeg, O2 and 1. Paul Maurice Watch? You know, it should have happened like 15 times in the last few years anyway, so like I don't want to be like,

because he just feels like a coach that's never going to get fired. Like the owners love him, that kind of shit. But with that having been said, boy do they look bad and after everything they added the summer that everybody was like hey they might actually be good defensively paul maurice was like let me remind you i coach this team and it's like all right yeah no i guess i guess we should have thought of that part too um well i think part of the problem is that like they added uh you know some players to their defense but they didn't realize that uh uh Superman punching was legal in the nchel uh which is kind of

a problem yeah did you see that last night Sean oh yeah with Felino and Brenda Dillon? We saw that. I mean, I guess I liked, was it shifely after the game was like, yeah, if you're in a fight, the other guy's probably going to try to punch you in the face. You've got to be ready for it. I don't, I got to be honest. I don't, like, BXA used to do this move every now and then.

I don't fully, I'm certainly not an MMA guy, so I don't even understand whether it's a smart move there. But I feel like jumping into the air when you have. skates on your feet is probably not a great strategic move unless you're a hundred percent sure you're going to catch the other guy off guard. And even then, like, I mean, it looked kind of cool, but he missed the punch. So it's, you know, kind of. My context for this is not MMA because I'm a real normie. It's Roman Raines. Yeah. Am I wrong in that? Marcus Molino wants to be the head of the table. And, yeah, it is, you know.

Who does that make the USOs in the Minnesota wild context? And they got to bring Mike in for Nick and... I was going to say Joel Erickson-Eck is one of them, for sure. Like, call me when somebody spears somebody during a fight. Then we've really got something. Yeah, it was... You know, it's funny. I completely forgot that BXA was doing that shit for a while in fights.

I remember him doing it maybe once or twice, yeah. Why don't we see more finishing moves in fights? explain that to me could you get suspended if you gave someone a stunner like at the end of a fight? I feel like the answer to this question is yes

well I mean we found out this week that the classic wrestling headbut is a 50-50 chance that's right that you're going to get in trouble so I don't know I feel like a good

you know you drop a DDT I feel like it really depends if you if you signal it first you do the spinning finger and same with the stunner. I feel like the stunner's okay, but the kick to the stomach to proceed it would be frowned upon. So the kick to the stomach would be frowned upon definitely with skates on. And also, you'd probably get yourself a nice $2,500 fine if you gave someone double birds before you kicked on the stunter.

You'd have to be like early ringmaster, like pre-kick stunner. And then I think maybe you'd be okay. So you're saying that there's a chance that you might not get to spend it if you slapped on the million dollar dream. That's right. You see that in half the scrums, like, you know, like there's a big hit. But everybody gathers up the last guy in, just comes in and slaps the cobra clutch on. They teach the linesman how to put on the million dollar dream at officials camp to end the scrum.

What if it's the diamond cutter instead of the stunner? Is there any nuance there? Is one more devastating than the other? Well, the RKO is, you know, what... It comes out of nowhere, is the problem with that, yeah. The RKO's got to be like in the penalty box or something. Post-game interview, something like that. Austin Matthews is hanging over the side of the bench at the end of a long shift.

Come in. Bam. It's kind of amazing that Matthew Kuch hasn't attempted an RKO at some point. He would be the guy at this point, right? That would be most likely to deliver an RKO during an act. of game. Yeah, for sure. Now that Marsha-Anne's cleaned up his act.

That's right. I think so, yeah. So, yeah, Winnipeg's in trouble. Montreal, my God. So you have a team that can't score, even though nobody offensively of significance was injured. And in fact, they got Joanne back. But then you also have the, you know, knocked off its access losses of

Shea Weber to injury and Carrie Price to the player assistance program. and then hanging over all of this is apparently a dude who just wants to go work with his friend in Los Angeles and not be the GM of the Habs anymore. Like, what the fuck is going on? Yeah, where did that come from? Because I saw that. Larry Brooks. Oh, really? I didn't see.

Well, and the fact that it came from liar Brooks tells me that it probably came from Bergevan and it probably meant like it could easily just be a negotiating tactic. Sure. But the idea that like here's the thing. Like, if he went to L.A., I imagine it's some sort of, like, president of hockey ops above the fray kind of position, right? And if you're Rob Blake, you're like, what the fuck? I've just meticulously built this team and now there's another GM working. Yeah, and plus, you know, of all the GMs where you could say he earned the chance to go to another team and move up the ladder, the guy who, like, has basically managed the habs into the ground. But then accidentally made a cup final.

like that that's the guy you're going to hire okay i don't blame him for trying to leave montreal it seems like a really tough gig and then also like if you sign a new contract you are definitely getting fired during that next contract 100% let's not fucking you know stand on ceremony here um but yeah the habs look everyone not everyone let me rephrase that most non-habs fans knew that this team was was punching well above its weight for two months last season and um And I didn't think they were a playoff team. I didn't think they'd be this bad. But again, like, you take two guys that have, you know, say what you will about

Shay Weber and say what you will about Carrie Price in the regular season. But, like, those guys are stabilizing presences. And, like, when shit starts spiraling out of control, you look to those guys to kind of anchor the team and not being there as a problem. You don't even have to get into, like, the identity thing or leadership or whatever. You can just say, well, they played over the last two seasons, they played at like an 81 point pace or something like that. and then they got worse this summer, right? Like, that's really all you need to say. I don't think you need to overthink it that much.

It's the run to the final, like, changed all the perceptions. But if you had gone back to, I don't know, end of April when the regular season was ending and they were going down the wire with the flames for the last playoff spot, and you said, oh, by the way, next year, they're not going to have Shea Weber. They're not going to have Kerry Price at the start of the year. They're going to lose Philippe Dino. free agency. They're going to, you know, other guys will come in and out.

But, but no Weber, no price, this team, what do you think? People would go, oh, they're going to be bad. And they, they are. And it's, you know, it's four games. But, like, it's already to the point where they're, you know, the pace that they have to play at the rest of the way. Like, they need to win five games in a row. Yeah, they need to win five games in a row to get back to playoff pace.

And then we go from there. and it's it's tough. Now, the other piece of this is Suzuki and Caulfield aren't doing anything. And that's something that you look at and say, okay, that's not going to continue. We expect that those guys will flip it around. You know, in a weird way, the Kockenemi game can't really come soon enough because that's the sort of game where it's just going to be such a weird game and the building is going to be in such a strange place and everything. if they win that one, that feels like it could be something

that actually feels like a turning point as opposed to just some random win over the whoever that doesn't mean anything the next game out. Let's see how that goes. And of course, if they lose that game, then it potentially spirals even more.

So, yeah, I mean, it's not good in Montreal and, you know, there could be trouble brewing. Speaking of brewing, Today's episode of Puck Soup is sponsored by nothing. No? That's fine. It's fine.

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That's drinktrade.com slash puck promo code puck for your first bag free and $5 off a yabundle. Are the habs actually bad? That was a question we just answered. Are the sabres actually good? Is a question that no one can really know.

I mean, I don't know about you guys, but I have never seen the saber start a season this good. Yeah. Craig, you're not allowed to say that. Let people enjoy things. things, they're actually, we all know they're bad, but if you say that they aren't good, that's being rude. It's being rude. So we're not allowed to point out that the Sabres, I was thinking about this earlier.

I think I wrote the same story three years in a row for the Sabres where they came to town and I talked to Jack Geichol and we had a good conversation. I'm like, is this going to be the year where you keep it going? He's like, I don't know, maybe. and then it never were like by the third week of the month or like in last place and like ikel's sad again well the question we now have to ask is they've never done it straight out of the gate like this and so we have to simply ask if when it comes to ickel or maybe rasmus ristelanen uh were the vibes off the whole time and that was the issue you in theory you in theory yeah you take him out of the lineup and everybody plays harder and better and obviously the problem was ikel i thought you were going to

with the other thing that I started to see now that the Sabres are a juggernaut, which is, what if they keep winning and challenge for the Stanley Cup and Eichl decides he wants to stay? I've seen that all of a sudden now, three or four games into the season. Hey, remember when all those Sabres fans were like, it's actually good that we're losing all these fucking games at rocks. We love cheering when we lose the shootout to Arizona. Like, what happened to those people? Those people were right. Shane right.

They had the correct view of how to look at a team like this. Yeah, I know. You know, let people enjoy things. Maybe the issue was that the Sabres needed to play in front of less than 10,000 fans. More than zero fans, less than 10,000 fans is the sweet spot. And they're 3 in O at home. Sean, it's the Sabres world. We're only living in it.

What's your reaction to the Buffalo dominance early in the season? I think it's great. I think it's... Great for a fan base that was told repeatedly that they probably wouldn't win a game all year. And they may not win a game the rest of the year, but I'm enjoying this partly because I get to be, I made one of those preseason predictions that isn't really a prediction. Like you don't put your neck out and say something's going to happen, but you just kind of flag the possibility and still get credit for it.

because I pointed out in some preview piece that I wrote that the Sabre's schedule, like the first 10 or 11 games, is really bad. Like, in terms of they play garbage teams. Yeah, I think they have like, you know, they open, they had Montreal. They opened, they have like maybe Boston shows up. And other than that, I think Boston and Tampa like in back to back games or maybe two out of three games and something like that. I was just looking at it.

then they play like Chicago, I think six times in a row or something like that. It's really grim. And so I said like, you know, if they could start like seven and four, and if that happens, then everybody suddenly starts right in the same. Like, oh, wow, what's happening here in Buffalo? And they get to, yeah, nobody believed in us, us against the world, blah, blah, blah. And you can get some momentum out of that. Now, it's not going to take them to the playoffs.

I mean, they're still going to be a bottom five team. But they'll be a bottom five team with some fight in the. and maybe that's fun to watch. And, you know, it's weird. I don't think I've ever seen an arena where it felt like the lack of fans help the atmosphere. Like, but the fact that that first game was like 8,000 fans, but it was 8,000, like, diehards, just created this kind of cool energy to it. I don't know.

Like, it's not going to last. But yeah, do enjoy it. Enjoy it while you can. And, you know, it's a credit. to the players because, you know, and the coach and everything like that, because this on paper could have, should have been another Arizona situation where they're just getting their doors blown off and you're sitting there going, man, we got 79 more games of this. This sucks.

I want to, hold on, hold on, I do want to call, hold on, I do want to call bullshit on Sean's prediction because they did have to play Arizona twice. So there was impossible they'd go winless. Yeah. I do want to also point out that it's not like they've just, you know, like when they won 10 or whatever games it was in a row and it was like, well, they're shooting 24% and getting 960 goal tending and then getting outshot 48 to 2 every night. They're playing really well at 5 on 5 and I don't think they've allowed a power play goal.

They're playing defense. Like, they're really playing some defenses. Get Rist Aligning out of there and look what happened. Not to get all like, you know, gooey about this, but I really kind of feel good for Don Granato. You talk about a guy that was put in a thankless position last year, and then the only job you could get was coaching what looked like a total piece of shit team this season. And like he's got him playing well. And I'm really happy about that.

I don't know how long it's going to last, but I like when guys seemingly make the most out of their opportunity. And it looks like he might be one of those guys. Ikel watch. So where we are in Eichel Watch, I guess, is that teams are hoping the Sabres retain salary, which they won't. Elliot Frieden reported that Colorado was sniffing around Eichael, but then when it became apparent that the Sabres weren't going to retain salary, that situation kind of felt hard. Colorado, man.

I wrote that Joe Sackick was going to maybe do something, and people are like, no, no, no. Colorado's set. They're fine. Stay the course. Can you imagine? I mean, I can't imagine how they get around the salary cap implications. Like how much money would they have had to keep? Well, I mean, if Buffalo retains half the salary, then, I mean, all you have to do is throw in like one depth defenseman and you're already pretty close.

But Buffalo is right to say no. But what do you do to have Buffalo keep $5 million of dead cap space through the net? That's it. That's it. And that's, and to be clear, just because... You promised the baguola is a new super yacht. Yeah, that might be it. That's...

The conversation starts with Byron. You can just drill another well, though, right? Allegedly, that's what, that's what I've heard. If you put New Hook and Byram in the deal, maybe they retain $3 million a year. That's it, right? It's got to be one of the defensemen or even, you know, I... Just so that people are aware, when it comes to retaining salary, it's all or nothing. You have to retain for the full length of the deal.

You can't, for example, Buffalo couldn't say we'll retain half this year and a quarter next year and then you're on your own. Like, that would be ideal. And Buffalo probably would be willing to do that, but you can't put yourself on the hook three years into the future on a huge chunk of salary. So they're right to say no to that. It's kind of a fun idea, though, to allow a attention. Yeah, I'm sitting here going, shouldn't they, though? Can that be allowed? That'd be kind of nice.

Again, like, I feel like we need to do more to loosen up the trade market, don't we? Like, I understand the salary cap is Sanker Sank and we never want to violate it and all that bullshit that we have to talk about because we didn't, because the players didn't fight for a luxury tax. But it does seem like a fair amount of tweaking to the system should be allowed and should be encouraged. And that would seem like a logical move. Well, I think the NHL would say, look, we already tweak the system. There's no such thing as CAPR capture anymore. You're welcome, except unless, you know, you're the Vancouver Canucks, in which case, go back to yourself. But hey.

But hey. Yeah, so that's Eichael. He's still Saber. He's apparently looking and asking a bunch of doctors, hey, give me more support about how this is a supernour. normal surgery and I don't know. I still think, I still think there's a 50-50 chance this ends up in court or he ends up on another team this season. Like, I'm not convinced that there's going to be a trade, which would be a really shitty

way for this whole thing to play out. Yep. Speaking of former Sabers, hey, Evander Cain, what's up? Fake vaccination card, 21 games suspension by the NHL. This felt like one of those suspensions that the NFL does occasionally where it's like the sum total of bullshit. Yeah. And then like you give you give them a suspension for something. I was talking to, I was talking to Ray Shiro actually the other day for a story that's coming out this week.

And we were reminiscing about suspensions of your and how like, you know, occasionally you have to get Capone on tax evasion. Right. You might hit him really hard for tax evasion, but you got to get him on tax evasion. And this feels like we got him on something concrete. We're kind of like iffy on the rest of the shit. But we're going to hit him on this one. It's a 21 game suspension. Sean, I'll start with you.

Do you think he ever plays another game with San Jose? Because they're not getting rid of his contract, apparently. Yeah, no, I can't imagine that they do. And, I mean, we've been over this a million times. NHL teams will forgive a lot of stuff. If you can play, they'll forgive all sorts of things that they probably shouldn't. But the thing that makes this different is the very loud and clear signals coming out of the players that they don't want them back. That, you know, for whatever reason, in the room, this is just not a guy who's going to be welcome back.

So they can't get out of the deal. I think that what happens is, you know, after 21 games, if, if, you know, something hasn't been worked out, they will just tell him to stay home. They'll pay him and they'll buy him out in the offseason. And then we see if, see where it goes from there. I mean, he can, as long as they're paying him, his options are very limited. You know, if they try to get out of paying him, then obviously the players union becomes involved as they should and what But if, you know, he can want to play, but there's nothing in his contract that says that they have to welcome him back as long as they're paying him. And I think that's where this goes. I think that, you know, yes, there's, there's, there could be injuries. There could be this or that. And they may decide. And maybe he really somehow convinces the important people in San Jose that, you know, he's, it's going to be different this time. I don't see that happening. I think he's, we don't see him. play it all this year and he gets bought out in the offseason. They don't save much money from

doing that. They save a little, but it's probably their best out. They get them out. Yeah, they get them out. Or, I mean, the other thing is you could just terminate the deal, in which case you're paying everything, but, you know, you're paying it all up front. They may die. I don't know what the buyout looks like as far as future years if they feel like they'd rather just eat it all now. But, Yeah, it's, I can't imagine unless something remarkable changes that we're going to see him in San Jose again. And how quickly does Carolina sign him? Yeah. Yeah, that's, you know, it used to be the kings were like that team.

You know, maybe because they had Raiders colors. And then for a while it was Nashville. Remember when they were like the home for wayward players like Mike Roberto? now I feel like after the DeAngelo's signing it's like all bets are off for Carolina to be a team so yeah it's it's such an embarrassment and like I said in the podcast

the day just the idea that he's pulling this shit in Santa Clara County where everyone's just gone through hell for the last year and a half to try to get this thing under control and he's just pulling this bullshit it's just I don't know it was added an extra layer of beyond the paleness to me about the whole situation

but there you go his his uh we should mentioned his statement was very interesting that he put out through the NHLPA. As many pointed out, it had sort of a template feel. He said, during my suspension, I will continue to participate in counseling to help me make better decisions in the future. What counselor do you see about the fake vaccination card being passed your employer? Like, what course of...

Dr. Freaking-Faulci, right? Remember? Dr. Fauci? So he says when my suspension is over, I plan to return to the ice with great effort, determination, and love for the game of hockey. That's nice. As many people pointed out, no one, he didn't mention who he would return to play for. You know. Yeah.

I mean, the thing you got to remember with him also is with his many ongoing legal problems, including the bankruptcy. like he probably in some ways has to say certain things to you know it's it's not even like he could just say yeah you know what I'm out I quit I'll walk away he's got creditors who might say no you can't do that you've got to make sure you do legally you do everything you can to protect the rest of this contract and so some of that may may be reflected here so I mean we we always already put zero stock in statements that players issue and that's a good policy here too, I think. Yeah.

Nikita Kuturoff is injured. Yeah, I can't believe they faked another injury by having him play the first few games and then... That's right. And then start limping during a shift and leave the game. Like, what a setup. It was the overworked Twitter joke of the week to say. I mean, that's the other podcast, but yeah, it was pretty...

I mean, everybody ran for the Kuturoff jokes. John Cooper said he's not He's like not going to miss 56 games That's nice thanks John Appreciate it back on this So like I guess take solace in that But He's going to miss 55 and John Cooper's like well I told you

The lightning are still hell of good Even though they took it on the chin from Florida I think they'll still be okay But it just sucks man I was really looking forward to seeing Kuchraf for a full 82 this year to see what that point total looks like, and it looks like he's going to be out for a bit. Yeah, and, you know, like they played in a weak division last year, and that is kind of what helped them avoid the whole, you know,

like the negative effects of missing one of the best players on the planet, right? Like maybe the best power play player outside of Edmonton in the league. It didn't matter so much because you were like, Like, well, the whole division stinks, so, you know, who cares? This year, the division is good. And, you know, that's not even getting into how terrifying the sabers look all of a sudden, you know. And so I do wonder, like, you know, because we said all along, the top three in that division is really interesting because there are four really good teams in it. Now is it maybe three in a wild card team, you know?

that's the question you have to ask because you know Boston somehow only played one game so far but they they took Dallas to the cleaners to the point where their coach was like listen if we don't get it's game two and their coach is like if we don't get going here soon I'm going to be fucking pissed it's like wait wait wait like you lost two games and one of them was to the Boston Bruins

a really good team but like that's how good the Bruins were in that one game. So, you know. Their only game. How fucking weird is it that, like, the Bruins have played a game and it's like we're over a weekend of the season? The Boston Red Sox have played like four playoff games since the Bruins last game. Like, what's going on?

But, yeah, like I said, you know, the, I think we mentioned earlier, the Panthers look really fucking good. Yeah. And, you know, the Leafs are the Leafs, I guess you want to say. but they only have one regulation loss from four games, and we're not going to mention who it's against. What's the current status of the Leafs, Sean? I haven't been paying attention.

What are we worried about? Marner? Marner is the only answer, yeah. Well, yeah, he hasn't done anything. Nick Ritchie looks like a real dud. Huh, who could have seen that coming? Crazy. And then obviously Matthews missed the first three games,

came back in game four, looked great, didn't score. it's I mean the status of the least is the same it's going to be all regular season long who cares nothing as long as they make the playoffs none of it matters uh there's really no point talking about them they will win in the playoffs or lose and then that will be how the season is remembered and morazic got hurt right another thing no one could have been yeah he did and then they had to dress a university student as the back of goalie which led to many very weird think pieces about how this was either a huge problem or a huge indictment of the Maple Leafs and how they managed. Where do you fall on that? Huge problem or huge indictment?

Neither. Neither. That's right. Yeah. You spend up to the cap. You inherit certain risk. It was a unique situation in that, you know, the only way this could have happened is if they lost a goalie and other players simultaneously, which they did because Justin Hall couldn't play. They had the option of sending down one of their defensemen who was waivers exempt, but then they would have had to play a man short on the blue line. They would have had to use five defensemen, but they could have brought up Michael Hutchinson as the backup goalie, and they decided to roll the dice and say, you know what,

backup goalies almost never play, so let's hope that Jack Campbell doesn't get hurt during the game, and we'll put this kid on, and that's, it worked. And now, because of that, you have to, you have to be short a player for one game before you can use emergency recall. So that was their one game.

Now Hutchinson's up and it's fine. I don't see a pro. I think the Leafs probably made the right call. And they're in a situation of their own choosing because they're spending right up against the cap, which teams probably should do if they can. But you take a risk. And sometimes you get bit.

And that doesn't, mean that there's a problem with the system and we got to change things. I'm more sympathetic on Colorado because there you had like the COVID tie in. I do think there's an argument to be made that, okay, for COVID, we should maybe treat it differently and something like that. But for the Leafs, no, they, you know, they rolled the dice. They lost, but it didn't cost them anything. Everyone move on. Yeah, my only thing with it is like maybe they should have, because, you know,

again with with Colorado like that's a fully vaccinated team and there was still a COVID problem within within the club and so should there have been uh you know like smaller maybe temporary taxi squats to start the year until everybody you know got it more a little more under control maybe I don't know I kind of uh I kind of have a little sympathy for that is maybe again maybe not with the Leafs, but certainly for Colorado. It's like, yeah, they didn't do anything wrong and they're, like, missing Nathan McKinnon for multiple games and blah, blah, blah. Should there have been a taxi squad?

I kind of feel like there should have been, you know, with the benefit of hindsight or whatever. But I get one to say that I'm high, and I'm not. As Bain one said, speaking of freaking Colorado, right, folks? Sean, Are you surprised that we haven't gotten to the point in the NHL where we have players that can be like a forward but also a goalie? Let me use a football example.

Like you have guys that play in the NFL that were quarterbacks in high school, right, or whatever. And then they get switched to wide. Yeah, it's true. Now, see, I've never heard about that. Anytime a guy who did that, it never comes up on a broadcast. Yeah. It comes up once or twice. So, by the way, you claim you've never watched football.

Yeah, I mean, I don't really watch football. Okay. But this is a little difficult to ignore it, which is the whole point of what I'm. So they talk about how, like, a guy played quarterback in high school, then gets switched wide receiver. And then, like, if they need him to do something quarterbacky, he does it. Like, they'll do like, you know, an option pass. Oh, he used to play quarterback. It's a guy who hasn't thrown a football in 15 years.

Still got it. Yeah. You're like, look at that great throw, and it's just one. Are you surprised that in situations like this, like when you have to go get a university goalie to be your backup, that there hasn't been the innovation in the NHL where like your depth, your fourth line depth forward is also a guy who played goalie. It could do both. No. No, because it's just such a different skill set. Like in the NFL, like guys, there's lots of guys who play quarterback through high school because they're the best athlete their town has ever had.

and then they get to college and it's like, you get to be the second string tight end, and they work their way up. Baseball, the same thing. You can be a hitter end of pitcher, and then you start to specialize later. Hockey, I mean, you're, by the time you're seven years old,

you know if you're a goalie or a skater. So it's exactly. So, I mean, there's just no, no crossover at all. So I'm, I guess I'm not surprised. You know, there are some guys who are, there's always the one crazy guy on each team who like wants to put the pads on and he's well there's also the whole thing like the thing of like you know sidney crosbie plays goalie and

ball hockey so he could he could be a goalie yeah okay sure fucking absolutely um i just i just i mean like i guess the end of the day what you're saying is that a fourth line forward that doesn't practice being a goalie is not all that much of an improvement over a play a goalie from university the or like the team videographer who puts on the pads in practice. Pretty much. Yeah. Okay. That makes sense.

It's, it's just so, so different. By the way, shout out to the senator fans out there who I'm sure there were at least a few of them. They were kind of like holding their breath like two years of David Ayers, Zamboni jokes. And then,

uh-oh. The Leafs have got like an ex, you know, some accounting intern sitting on the bench, but, you know, not to be. let's talk about a couple of positive surprises

or not positive really surprises necessarily but it starts Minnesota is 3 and O that insane rally against the Jets which I touched on that and yeah on a very cheesy offside call

that it was I don't know I was I was watching the game and it was and it was like they showed one angle where you could see the skate over the line but not the puck and it's like that doesn't help us and they're like wow, we need a clear and odd.

We need a, it needs to be clear and obvious. And then they went to the overhead view, like from the upper scoreboard. And they're like, oh, okay, here you can see. And it was like, it was like a quarter of an inch. And you're like, from the overhead. Yeah, that's, that's clear and obvious. Absolutely. I'm glad we nailed that one.

And also, let's not forget, Joel Erick's neck had a hat trick, which I think seals his Canada C for the Selke. If memory serves how that award works. Yep. Now that he's chipping in offensively, he can finally be the best defensive forward. Penguins are 2-0-2, a good start for them. But the one start that we should probably talk about is fucking capitals. Holy shit.

Not only, you know, like dismantling the Colorado Avalanche in McKinnon's first game of the season, but like playing really well all around and defensively playing extraordinarily well, shot suppression has been off the charts in the early part of the season. I did not think they'll make the playoffs if they convinced you otherwise that they're going to be a playoff team? Yeah, I mean, I think we said it a bunch of like, I'm not going to fully count them out.

But, you know, the interesting thing to me, I guess, to say, is that Alasovetian is scoring a million fucking goals. He's got four through three games. You know, again, we were all pretty skeptical that they could get them to the Gretzky number and like my big takeaway is he might get the like you know if it like if he gets if he gets like 40 or 50 goals this year fucking forget about it right like you know i've said it before but i think the the the contract

they signed him to this summer basically signals we only care like as a franchise we only care about getting ovechkin pass gretzky and so far that's working i think all other results are kind of secondary to anything else they're trying to do. It's fun to watch. I hope that they can stay healthy, but I've been really impressed with the Capitol so far. If Ganyi Kuznetsov, kind of like the classic, oh, right, they still have that guy, guy, where you're, and he's good. When he's not annoying the hell out of them off the ice, he's pretty good on the ice. So, we've been saying for years of the Capitals, like, the fall is going to happen. It's probably going to be

sudden. It's probably going to be ugly, but we just don't know if this is the year or if it's going to be next year. I've been saying that for three years now. So far, it doesn't seem like this is going to be the year. That period lobby, that's a pretty good coach, too. Yep. They're in good shape. All right. Today's episode

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I think we covered all the bases. Yeah. Yeah, I can't think of anything. Did you see Bond? Yeah, sure did. Loved it. Yeah, really good. And I don't usually like a Bond movie very much.

I mean, obviously a little bit long, as these Bond movies tend to be. I mean, I don't want to get into spoiler territory. Maybe we'll do our own podcast, talk about spoiler territory. But I found it to be very good. I found the biggest problem with the movie to be that they did what movies can't do, which is show me a movie I'd rather be watching, which is the Anna DeArmas and Daniel Craig are secret agent buddies going on missions together in Cuba movie.

Yeah, that was by far the most fun part of the movie. The problem is that it happens in like the first hour of the film, right? kind of and like you're just looking at it and you're like oh fuck this would be so much more fun but it was fun have you prepared your loins for Dune I'm seeing it Thursday night I can't

fucking wait but you know it let's put it this way even Hideo Kojima the guy created Metal Gear Solid is like yeah I'm not sure this is like a super satisfying

single movie narrative I'm like uh oh because this guy knows a lot about not satisfying narratives. Let's put it that way. Sean, do they have dunes in Canada? No. No, we have, it's called drift up here. It's not as good.

You mean like drift racing? No, it's a snow drift. So just, that's it. For you as a young, Sean, did you? Drift racing is called out-of-control skid racing up here. Glad you Skidoo. As a young Sean, did you read Dune? Were you a sci-fi reading guy?

No, I never did. As I've said before, I was never a sci-fi guy as a kid. I was uncool, but just not in the sci-fi way. So I never got into any of that stuff. Gotcha. Dune Rocks. You should read it. It's fucking really good.

Yeah, I have heard that. I might, I don't know. I might check it out. Lots of great made-up words. Can I just watch the movie without reading the book, is it going to be one of those things where I should... Well, so the thing is this. So the movie is not like the first 40% of the book, I guess.

Yes. Something like that. So you're going to walk out of that movie going, much like when I saw a Fellowship of the Ring without having seen or having read any of the Lord of the Rings books, going, wait a minute. The movie is over? Nothing happened.

That one guy died and that's it. That one was planned to be a... trilogy, and this one is different because it's like, we're going to make this one. It's like 40% of the book. And hopefully it'll let us make the rest of it. Yeah. And it's like guaranteed. So the good news is for the people who were worried about that, it's already made like

$150 million overseas before it ever gets to the U.S. So they're going to make the sequel for sure. Like it would take something like, let's put it this one. Like the last duel or many Saints of Newark making like $5 million, which isn't going to happen, obviously. Right. So, yeah, like they're going to make the sequel. If you haven't read the book to answer your question, I might wait another like three years for the sequel before you watch the first one. Just because you're going to be like, oh, so who's Gurney Halleck again?

Like, what's happening here? Oh, I don't. Just so I'm clear, at the end, by the end of the second movie, we'll understand how Paul Atreides got the candy factory. That's right. Or am I mixing up my films. It's going to be a strange experience, I think, for anybody who's never seen it. Because I, you know, the thing I've always said about Dune is it's, like, not fun. And the first 40% of the book is very slow.

So, like, the idea that they are making a movie. that isn't fun and the first 40, and it's only the first 40% of the book, which is to say the slow part, I don't know what this movie's going to be. I'm going to love it because I love Dune, but. Definitely something for the poster, though. Very slow and not fun.

Dune. Sean, you send me a note that said you will not pretend to care about pregame dress codes. What does that mean? That means I don't. care. I don't care that the Leafs have relaxed their dress code. I don't care that Arizona got rid of it. I don't care that other teams are allowed to do it. And I don't, I'm happy that other people are interested in this. I've seen some of the rankings and that kind of thing. But I have no,

anyone who's ever met me and seen how I dress will not be surprised that I have no insight to add to to this. And especially just because it involves the Leafs, my ambivalence towards this regular season extends to like, ha ha, did you see the funny hat that William Nealander wore? No, I didn't, and I don't want to. We should mention that. Get into playoffs and win a game and then I'll care how Austin Matthews styled his hair.

With the exception, of course, of Patrick Klein. And I can't get enough of his continuing descent into supervillain. Stats. We should mention the athletic is going to start doing player fit rankings. Sarah Civian and Adam Vingen are going to collaborate. I'm sure those will be good. I'm not knocking it. I'm just saying that me personally...

He's pissed off. He hates it. Just saying if you let me do it, it would just be the one guy wearing jeans in a t-shirt. I'd be like, yeah, that's it. I think that you and Gentile should have collaborated to do the fit rankings to have, two paragones of fashion.

Fashion icons, yeah. Gentilly's going, he's not wearing a Lawrence Arms tea. He's out. I mean, I'm excited. I've always thought that, you know, it's another entry point into hockey to have the fits of these guys

walking into the arena become a thing or what they were in the post game. So I'm off of it. The only time I ever enjoyed in sports, I don't care about pregame. I do kind of like it in, especially in the NFL, post game for some reason. Either

when you get like a Ryan Fitzpatrick last year where he was just like he dressed all crazy after because they had won or when you get like some Cam Newton type who has like the very cool fit to start but then they lose and he's got to sit there dressed like the Joker and the whole vibe is just like you can tell he's sitting there going I should have just worn a suit because I got it like what did you see on the third interception the guy's wearing like a neon green bow tie and you're just like, no, it's... I always thought it was kind of a dangerous thing, though,

for hockey fans to be like, let the players wear what they want to wear and not realizing that means, you know, 60% of them will wear barstool t-shirts, their post-game breast conferences, and the other 40% will wear MAGA hats. Exactly.

You know, at some point, we're just going to have to be careful we wish. I mean, those numbers feel low and the idea that there's not an overlap there is, seems optimistic. Oh, that's true. It gets it would, yeah, it wouldn't be like...

That Venn diagram. 40% yeah yeah speaking of wearing shit uh Nathan Herbert has come up with our overrated underrated favorite least favorite for the week um obviously we had an epic bonus episode involving candy for Halloween Halloween fast approaching so Nathan wants to know overrated underrated favorite least favorite Halloween costumes Halloween costumes the things that you wear on Halloween mean, overrated for me is seasonal memes. I know that you could get a good chuckle

out of somebody dressing like I'm a coronavirus and she's a syringe kind of shit. I don't know if you guys know this. I went fucking four years in a row as the freaking left shark. That's my point exactly. Not only does it has become instantly dated. Look, this is coming from somebody who dressed up his dog

is pizza rat one year, which again. Again, extraordinarily endearing and sneakers looked great. But for the adults out there, don't dress like, it'll be salty. Just don't. Don't have to do it. Overrated meme costumes. Yeah, that's a good one. I don't know.

I don't really have any opinions on these sorts of things. I don't care. Wear whatever you want. My only overrated would be anything. that is a pun that you have to explain? Because it's almost always like a low, like your buddy Mark shows up and he just has like a

check pin to his shirt and you're like, what are you? And he's like, I'm a check mark. And you're like, oh. And then they're just like awkward silence. And then somebody else comes up, what are you? And it's like, we're not doing this. The whole get out.

I had one pun costume I always wanted to do, but I wanted to do it at Comic-Con. I wanted to have a bunch of like wires coming off. of me with neckties tied to them okay and then I wanted to wear boxing gloves and I was going to be a tie fighter would that have passed muster no that have been good that's uh that's a good that's a good that's a good illustration of what I was talking about that's yeah that's yeah underrated vampire vampire costumes are always awesome people look awesome when they're vampires vampires sexy as fuck.

And it's like an easy costume to do. You just need a black cape and some fucking fangs and shit. And being a vampire, being really cool were it not for having to be a vampire, you know, and like drink blood and kill people and shit. So, uh, a vampire underrated costume. I love a hobo costume. Anytime you're wearing a hobo costume,

I feel like that rocks. Um, complete with the little, the little bag on a pole. Yeah. A little crazy bag. Perfect for carrying your candy. You get your little bindle. But you also are going to do like the face paint stubble, you know, like all that stuff.

Again, speaking of low effort costumes, you just walk into a goodwill or whatever in it. Dude, I just need the bag in the stick and I'm already there. Especially when it's a little kid doing it. I just remember thinking any time I saw a little kid dress like that, I'm laughing. I'm having a grand old time. And, you know, they'll, they can also let you know if a dishonest man lives in a house. That's right for the hobo code. Yeah.

Right. Sean, underrated costume. You know, I don't have an underrated costume, but I will say an underrated aspect of costumes is I get way too much joy out of the photos of costumes that are like either on the package or if you go on like a website. Like, it's just nothing but like people wearing dumb looking costumes and having to like look like they just walked into the room and got a big reaction. Like that's always the, you know, like, you're like, dressed as a taco, but you got like your arms out like, hey, like, oh my God, it's a taco. And you're like just hearing that.

It just cracks me up. That entire genre of photos of that are just terrible of these awful costumes. I want to meet the dude who's like, I'm assuming there's one photographer who handles all the Halloween costume shots. And I want to, that'd be an amazing gig in a good interview. I'd read that. Exactly. Like you just like, what's my motivation? Okay, you just walked into the room.

You're a breathalyzer and the tube is coming out of your crotch and like you're pointing at it. It's like, all right, I can do that. Jesus. Favorite costume. This is tough. I know what my least favorite is. I think my favorite might be anything involving a wound. I always like it when people put in the extra effort to go to like the costume shop and get the, what's the word I'm looking for?

Not aesthetic. Prostatic. There it is. like you get those wounds that you can kind of like attach and glue to your body and then use makeup to like make it look like you've actually been sliced in the neck. Anything involving a super awesome gooey wound is my favorite. Maybe because of my affinity for massive head wound hairy from S&L. But yes, a wound. Any wound is my favorite costume.

I like whenever they just like when you're a kid and your parents just like slap a sports. jersey and then a hat of that and you're like I'm a guy from the freaking Oakland athletics I'm an athletic again yeah that that you know and maybe if you are a baseball player you get the the eye black under your eyes but that's about it that's that's all the effort you need to put in and everybody totally accepts it I was that kid I was a met one year when I was a kid yeah could never hold on to the candy it was very sad always just drops to the ground. Yeah.

Favorite costume. That's a solid costume. I mean, I respect any like homemade costume that actually works, just partly because I have no ability to like make or do anything in general, but especially clothing wise. So that I always respect that. My personal favorite, and I go back and forth on whether this was a good idea, but about 20 years ago, my then-girl-fathers,

friend and I were, we went to a party and I went like, I was all like bloody and I had like a big carved up neck and everything. We did it up really like not quite zombie, but I, you know, fresh horror victim sort of thing. And people like that. And she went as like this, this beautiful like white tiger with like the stripes and everything and people like that and they thought it was cool. And then they realized that we were together and we were going as Roy from Siegfried and Roy and and the tiger and people got mad and they were like we got a few like two soons because it was like a week after it happened whatever that it was just fun to see people like oh look at that and then like they're not to get oh no okay so that was that was i i know i don't recommend it now

but you know if if you got two little ones and they're looking for costumes for the school dance yeah i know i shot on memes but i'll allow it was good least favorite look this is for the ladies in the audience. I love you. I love you. You're all wonderful at making costumes and you look fantastic on Halloween. I appreciate effort. It's my favorite, you know, looking like you have a gaping wound and requiring prosthetics and makeup and shit like that. Buying a pair of cat ears at CVS and putting little black whiskers on your face with like the makeup you already own, it's not effort. Yeah. Not effort. Yeah. That's true. That's not a costume. That's, that's, you're going to a club. That's my least favorite costume.

Yeah, this is bad news for that guy from the last season of The Bachelorette. Exactly. Thank you. For the Bachelorette fans in the audience. That's right. Didn't watch last night's season premiere. Didn't watch it either. You never need to watch the season premiere of The Bachelorette or The Bachelorette.

Oh, no, you do, because you have to see the gimmicks when they arrive. Those gimmicks are the worst, no, that's the worst part of the season, objectively, every single time. I saw on the preview for the episode that a guy, drove up in a fire engine and he asked the bachelor to hold his hose, which is... Yeah, and somebody, uh, like, was a teacher or something and he was like, are we, are I going to give you an A or am I going to give you a D? And she was like, get the fuck away from me.

Uh, that rocked. Um, what do you think? I, I just had a good one and then... I, I, I do, I realize. Oh, no, it's, it's those, uh, those, I don't think they really exist anymore, but those costumes that were definitely around when we were a kid. where it's like, I'm Spider-Man, and it comes with a little mask that's only like the front half of your face. And then like a little plastic smock. Plastic eye that always just has a little, a bunch of little pictures of Spider-Man on it. And it's like, Spider-Man doesn't wear a shirt with him on it. You know, like that's not what you wear.

Or the worst were the ones where it was like Superman. And so you're wearing just a mask of like a guy with dark hair. That's right. I'm a guy. Why do I have to get cuts all over my face from this razor sharp mask? I had the razor sharp plastic mask with the little plastic band for Chewbacca. I was Chewbacca one year and had that mask. Chewbacca Grig. Yeah, why not?

All right. Least favorite, Sean. For me, any costume in Canada that you have to, your mom either makes you wear your winter coat over it or under it. I'm not even sure which one is worse. It is always minus 20 degrees here in Halloween. And you can either be like a stormtrooper where it's like you just have to take my word on it because I'm wearing a green coat over it. Or you can be like in this super puffy, you know. Just every kid in Canada that goes as a sumo wrestler every Halloween. Exactly.

The only good news is now we just pull on a hockey jersey and we just go. as a goaltender. And it's like, yeah, that looks right. That looks exactly. You nailed it. You were J.S.G. Gere in 2003. Nicely done. Or you try to convince people there was a Hudson Bay on the Death Star. I guess one of the two. That's right.

All right. Well, there you go. Happy Halloween, everybody, or whatever. That's Puck Soup for this week. Thanks for joining us. You can read my stuff at ESPN.com. My column coming out on Thursday. I have a big feature story coming out. I believe it's Friday. So look out for that.

And yeah, it's about it going on to my life right now, outside of unpacking boxes and carrying them to the side of the road to get picked up. That's my life right now is that. And also finding out what drains don't work in the new place. That's also an exciting time. That's good advice for people who are buying houses. Check which sinks work. Well, I thought I did in the kitchen.

And then lo and behold, first of all, the sink sucks. It's like there's a little part, a little part of the sink where the drain works. And then the big part of the sink that's not really all that big. It can't even fit a pot inside of it where the drain doesn't work. So I certainly don't know shit about dick, about plumbing. So we're in a pickle. Any good plovers out there that want to come to the house? We were not going to use you.

We'll use somebody else. But thanks for your service. You can check my shout out at E.P.Rinkside.com if you want to sign up for an annual subscription. The code is I love E.P. All one word. And yeah, I feel like that's about it. I got a lot of good stuff over there. Oh, and I also, I just remembered that when we were talking about the Canadians earlier, I meant to say Habana syndrome.

Is that anything? Oh, okay. That might be the problem. Workshop that one. Yeah. Trademark that. Yep. So yeah, that's it.

I love EP at EPRRinkside.com. You get all of my takes on college, hockey, and the NHL. And Greg isn't allowed to say the thing. Don't say the thing. I'm at the athletic. No. I will be writing. Off and on for the next little while.

Kind of a bit of a reduced schedule, but you will still be able to find my stuff, including the weekend rankings, which are back for another year. And I believe that today, Thursday, is actually the last day of our current 50% off offer. So as much as I know that we'd like to joke about the athletic doing lots of discounts in that, this one is ending. And I don't know if there's going to be another one for a little while. So if you have been on the fence, jump in now. Last chance.

Yeah. Exactly. And shout out to you, the person who pays full price for the athletic. We love you. You're our favorite person in the world. There are many of them. And it's worth every penny. I didn't say it wasn't.

I, for one, am looking forward to the fashion rankings, Sean. That's Puck Soup for this week. Thanks, everybody, for joining us. mailbag on the way on the Patreon and we'll talk to you soon bye see ya bye bye

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