Puck Soup - He Did It

Episode Date: April 8, 2025

Sean and Ryan talk about 895, a slew of injuries across the league, and more. Sponsored by Mint Mobile (mintmobile.com/puck)

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I am Sean McNew from The Athletic. And folks, he did it. He passed the guy. We have to now never speak of Wayne Gretzky. I'm sorry. He's just never going to come up in hockey forever. It's crazy that Wayne Gretzky doesn't hold any records anymore.

Yeah. Tough break for him. It really is. You know, he's just... His whole legacy was built on this one record, and here comes Alex Ovechkin. well. Now he can... Abliterated it.

He can just relax and hang out with all his cool friends. I actually did see... There was a headline somewhere that was like Alex Oveskin shatters the record. I'm like, he beat it by one. Yeah. Hold on. We do get a little too... A little too active with that verb, I think.

He might shatter it by the end. I mean, yeah, by the end, it will have... have been shattered because he's going to end like, you know, 65 goals above it or whatever. No, it would be very funny if he just stopped scoring goals. Like, kept playing, but played like next year and only scored seven goals. Yeah. Seven goals and 80 assists. Yeah.

No, yeah, he's doing the Steve Eiserman thing. If he wanted to, he could have been doing this the whole time. Yeah. But he actually didn't want to. He only wanted to score. Okay. Let's start with this. It rocks that he did it in the exact same number of games as Gretzky played.

That was very cool. That's so awesome. Maybe my number one favorite thing about it. Like, it would have been funny to break it in fewer games, but I think actually tying it in the same, in fewer games, and then beating it in the same number is as poetic, I guess you would say, as it gets. Yep. I ran the goals per game.

and on the ninth decimal place, Oveckin wins. Is that right? Is it, I don't know what it would be. I haven't run any numbers on anything ever. I just make it up. Yeah.

Why would you? Yeah. That's some geek's job, you know? Yeah, I'm not Dom over here. I don't know. I'm not going to build a whole model just to divide. Yeah. I'm not getting into spreadsheets about that kind of thing for sure.

I watched the games, Ryan. I don't know if you're aware of that. That's an option. Well, I'll say this. Got a lot of people watching an Islanders game. First time in a while for me. Sunday afternoon Islanders, baby. So, okay, let's go back to Friday, because I feel like that's when everyone was like, okay, we're going to start watching every Capitol's game.

This feels within reach, especially because it's against Chicago. Were you watching live? I was. You had to be. And, um. I don't know if I, I wasn't watching this. start of the game. But like once he he got the first goal, it was like,

I feel like, yeah, I probably wasn't seeking out a Chicago game on a Friday night. You're right about that. But yeah, once he scored one, it's like, okay, this is happening. And then he scored two. I thought it was happening Friday night. That's what I mean. And that just speaks to

what a great goal score of this guy is, is that once there was like the one drop of blood in the water, I was like, well, I mean, this is, this guy's going to, this guy's breaking the record tonight. Yep. And especially, it was at home. It would have been cooler if he had done it at home. Yeah, of course.

But, but yeah. He gave us two great games instead of, instead of one. Well, I mean, I watched that Islanders game. Two great moments instead of two great, two games that had great moments. Hats off to you. You got there, you know. But yeah, so I want to talk about. the end of the Chicago game because

like you said, blood in the fucking water. He was shooting from everywhere. And, like, dangerous shots, like, considering that he was just like, oh, if the puck's within eight feet of me, I'm in my windup mode. You know, like, he was ready to go.

And, uh, he, have you ever seen a goalie get booed for stopping? A shot like that. Everybody was just like, fuck you, Spencer Knight. Honestly, I,

Spencer Knight may have come out of this, like, as big a winner as almost anyone. Because he got, he gets in the history books for giving up the tying goal. And yet, no one's going to give a shit about that. Yeah. I mean, honestly, if you had a chance to ruin the day for like 18,000 people. I mean, I guess that's a podcast. You got to play for something if you're on Chicago. You know what I mean?

Sure do. You know, I did find it a little weird that they all had to like shake his hand. afterwards. But, ah, well, I'm not, you know what? No,

I'm not doing this. I'm not doing the cranky, old man thing. I'm going to just celebrate a cool thing that happened in hockey. Yeah, it's nice that they did it at home

considering just the sheer volume of road games. To do like anything at home in the final days of the chase or whatever, the great chase with the aid and, you know, to do anything at home is like,

cool and good like that and that's as good as we're going to get that's fine you know um but yeah i think everybody was right to immediately go into their little apps and be like okay i got to get islanders tickets here's seven thousand dollars you know yeah speaking of winners islander fans who wanted to sell one pair of tickets and kind of make back their money for big chunk of the season tickets. No kidding, man. Not a bad night. No.

Not bad. Would you have sold? I wouldn't have because I would want to be there for the history. Yeah. I think if you sold, you're a fucking weirdo. I really... Okay, but here's the thing. Imagine you don't sell and then you go to the game and he doesn't score.

I get it, but that's... Well, I mean, first of all, he's playing the Islander. He's scoring that goal, you know? Like, that was kind of my attitude about it. of like, look, I don't want to watch an Islander's 1230 on a Sunday game, you know. I want to ease into the hockey schedule of the day. I think it was a triple header on TNT. I didn't watch all of it, but, you know, I wouldn't be like super enthused, but, you know,

I guess you could just lie and say you didn't sell, you know, like afterward, oh, yeah, it was crazy. What a game, you know, but you got to go. You got to go. I was, there was a small part of me wondering going into Sunday if we were going to get like full on Ovechkin or if he was going to be kind of holding back a little bit, knowing that he was going to get the record this year, like was he really going to gear it up to do it at home? And what made me think that was the whole thing on Friday night where there was some suggestion that he didn't want to be on the ice with the empty net. Right. Because, you know, which, okay, that tells you he's thinking about what this moment is going to look like. He's thinking about what he does and doesn't want it to be.

Is it possible that, you know, we're going to get three-quarter speed Ovechkin against the Islanders? And it was very clear that wasn't the case. Like, he was on the hunt. He was. Yeah, I think he just wanted to get it over with. There's probably part of that, yeah. It probably, you know, especially, okay, so, I saw a quote last night where it was like,

Ted Leonces was like, oh, they asked Ovechkin to be on all the talk shows. And he was like, no, I just want to like be with the team as we get ready for the playoffs and blah, blah, blah. And it's like he just didn't want to meet Jimmy Fallon,

who can blame him, you know? Yeah. But, uh, no, like, I feel like there,

there's a lot of that going on where he's just like, I can't keep doing this. Every fucking game I got to be like, oh, yeah, no, the next one's going to be crazy, you know?

I totally see him just being like, yeah, I got to say, man, I got to say he can obviously do whatever he wants, but isn't that the most hockey thing that like for the, I guess the second time in, in a few months, but also like the second time in years, people outside of hockey are interested in hockey and the guy at the center of it is like, nah,

even though I'm one of the few guys with the personality, I'm not going to do it because I have to just focus. He didn't want to play the guess who drinking game with fucking the roots. You know what I mean? Like, we're not... Ovechkin seems like he would enjoy that, though. Well, the drinking game aspect of it, for sure.

Which is the one where he has to lip sync and do that stuff? Unfortunately, the great James Corden doesn't have a talk show anymore. Oh, no. It's too bad. Like, I was such an entertainer, you know? Yeah. But, yeah, like, that... I just, look, again, the most Ovechkin-y thing about all

of it is, you know, I'm sure you saw the video of him walking into the restaurant in D.C. when he got back. And they immediately turn on that band's maker dance and hand him two beers. Uh-huh. Powerful. What's cooler, you know? Everything about him when he's playing hockey and that is immediately hockey adjacent is super cool. Yep.

Um, but yeah. So Sunday, like I say, every. one's tuning in it happens the goal he wasn't standing still but him just absolutely yacking one like a thousand miles an hour top of the left circle on the power play it's like yeah that's that's what it's all about man that's we did it from got it from his spot no review no confusion well i mean did you see the refs immediately go into the into the the the uh penalty box to it looked like they were reviewing it. Okay, I didn't see that.

I wonder if I wonder if they were just checking to make sure it didn't hit Chichurn on the way in because that's the part that scared me. Chickren like goes across the net and there's like one replay where you see like how close he is to the shot. And I was like, don't show that replay again. Don't go go long. That's right.

It's like a wrestling match when there's blood. Like go to go to the far camera. and just we're going to we're going to make sure because imagine that like you just get a note from NHL PR like an hour later scoring change in Washington game well I mean you know you talk about like the hawkiness of it Jacob Chickren would be like I wasn't even on the ice for that I don't know what you're talking about you know like he would he would deny it up and down yeah oh yeah he could be like you know he could be bleeding from where the fuck hit him that's right no I cut myself shaving it's crazy Yeah. But yeah, awesome. I screamed when it happened because it was just like, man, every time he was on the ice,

you were just like watching them try to be like, okay, let's force feed this to him, you know? I got to tell you, there is nothing in sports like, like a hockey player being one goal away from a record and just what it's like to watch that game. Like the closest thing would be, like baseball with a home run record.

But then you're like, okay, when's, you know, when's he up? Oh, he's not up this inning. Okay, he's going to be, all right, we can sit tight. Like hockey, you're just on the edge of your seat waiting. And then it's, it's so weird because we know how hard it is to score in the NHL. We know that, you know, even the very, very, very best score in like maybe half the games in a year. But when you're watching a guy to do it, you're like, oh, he's definitely going to score. Like, he's, he's all around it.

Look at this guy. And I do have to say the one thing I wondered when I turned the game on was like, especially given how there could be some people watching who weren't necessarily hockey fans, like how much time would they spend telling us like, Ovechkin's on the ice again, hey, there he is, you know, let's keep an eye on him, all that stuff. Would they have a special graphic or anything? Like, you didn't need any of that. You could just tell by the crowd whether he was on Rockies.

Yeah, it was so awesome. It was so cool. just like cranked so, like, it was like, you just, you just knew whether he was, like, they could be in their own zone. There was a totally different crowd noise when he was on the ice to what he was. Yeah. Awesome. So I wanted to talk to you about the little ceremony they did.

Okay. Which I think they took like 20 something minutes, I think somebody said, 18 minutes, something like that. Which was longer than they said they would. think a good chunk of that was waiting for everybody to get down to ice level. Yeah, there was a little bit of set up time. Yeah. But I thought it was, I thought it was a really nice little ceremony. Gary Betman gets booed and he's kind of like, yeah, I get it.

You know, like, he was, he was living the gimmick a little. I enjoyed that. I thought Wayne gave a really nice speech. Mm-hmm. I really liked the line about like, and hey, just so you know, Ted, when I did it, the Kings bought me a Rolls Royce. Yep. I thought that was really funny. It was weird that he thanked the refs.

Well. As a Leafs fan, would you like to hear my story about that? Yeah, you know. The refs? You know, I get it. Everybody immediately skips 45 minutes ahead in the podcast. pod. God, he's still going. And then you would believe this guy carry free. Okay, skip ahead, 45 more.

Glenn Anderson and the Target ad on the board. Nope, okay, there he is. But I thought, I also thought, Ovechkin gave like a nice little speech. Yes, and Ovechkin, like, they basically gave him a mic and let him like just kind of skate around, cutting a promo. And he did well. I honestly, and I say this with no small amount of remorse, I thought the ceremony was just fine. As somebody who, like, when they started that, I'm like, all right, here we go, baby, cringe it up,

give me ammo for 20 columns I'm going to write over the remainder. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This, how weird and, and, no, it was fine. Even Betman was short and sweet, got in, got out, Gretzky was fine got a little bit weird with the whole like let's make our wives

give each other gifts thing I thought that was nice though like the like he said it was like the the you know carrying on the tradition of what Gordyhow's wife did I like that you could tell that with Gretzky

he wanted like Gordy Howe to be involved he had the number nine pin on I don't know if people notice that but like it really wanted to sort of include that. So even that was fine. No scrapbook.

They didn't bring out like a homemade scrapbook like they did for when Gretzky broke the record. So that was that was a shame. Yeah, overall. I mean, and it was like you said, 20 minutes, including, you know, getting set up. And like it wasn't a ridiculous amount. It was an appropriate time. I miss this because we, for you kids out there, this used to happen a lot when somebody would break a record,

they would just stop the game and do a whole thing. And you almost never see that anymore. Yeah. Unless it's a really, really big deal. So, and obviously this, this was pretty much as big a deal as they're going to come in the regular season. So I thought they kind of nailed it. I'll say this, though.

The painting was weird. What was with that painting? So somebody was telling us, me apparently that's like it he collects paintings by that artist Ovechkin does? Yeah. Okay. So it'd be like if we got like your favorite band to record a song about you.

And like gave that to you as a gift. They should do that. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I just feel like you know like how they used to like have a medieval lord would pay some

painter to like paint his wife, you know? Yeah. It's kind of like that. That's strange. I feel like that's a little weird. And then for it to be a surprise, too. Oh, I got this guy to paint you. Oh, okay, man.

Sure. And then like they pull it out and it's like the George Costanza, you know. That's right. Yeah. It could have been, I get, yeah, that's right. The painting is in this kind of uncanny, like, if you told me they, they got it at the, you know, weird store that sells like old sports jerseys in the mall.

I'd be like, yeah, that looks like that's exactly where that's from. So I guess I got to look into this artist, see what else he's done. Oh, here's what, here's one of, uh, Albert Bell from, from the, from the Orioles. Oh, okay. You know. Oh, Orioles version. Yuck. Yeah, well, I mean, you know, we got, we got to keep it in the, in the DMV.

area. Well, that's true. You know, that's a good, good poll. Anyway, what was the other thing? Oh, I wanted to bring up as well that, like, already people are doing the, who's going to pass them, though? Which is fun and funny, and, you know, why not? I get it. But having looked at it recently, it feels like the answer is not anyone who's in the league,

currently. Matthews could do it if he could stay healthy. And it's like, well, okay, we've run into our first problem. Well, that's the thing. Like, even setting aside guys being healthy now, like, it's, I've seen some things where it's like, you know, well, here's, Matthews is actually on a goals per game basis. He's actually ahead of Ovechkin. Right.

Yeah. Sure he is. Of course. Yeah, he is in his prime. But he's got to do it for like 15 more years. years, or I guess with Matthews, it's probably done, 10, 10 more years of consistent 50 goal pace, almost never get hurt, all of that stuff. It's just so, like, I wonder how many guys have at some point in their career been on pace

to get to around this number. Right. If they played until they were 40 and stayed at nobody does. I saw people talking about, like, we got to mention Mike Bossy and all this. maybe the greatest goal, like pure goal scorer of all time, blah, blah, blah. And it's like, yeah, man, Mike Blassey played for like nine years. Yeah. That's why I know.

Because he, but also because like his career got cut short by something that doesn't cut career short anymore. Oh, for sure. No, but like. It's like, ah, but you're right. Like, it's the same thing with Bobby Orr, though, where it's like, same, like, you know, if Bobby Orr played in the 80s, he would know. And productive.

But, like, just be in the lineup was. is like probably his most underrated skill. The goal scoring touch, you know, that obviously is the prime skill, but the fact that he's still doing it. It's the being there at 39 and scoring at a 50 goal pace. It's ridiculous. Like, I mean, the guy broke his leg earlier this year, and he missed, like, what, three games or whatever?

Literally, I mean, he broke his leg and he missed five weeks. Yeah. That's insane. At 39. You know, you break your leg. At 23, maybe there's a little bit more of like the Wolverine healing factor, but he was like, no, no, no. It's, I'm coming back earlier than anybody should. And also, it's totally fine.

And also, you know, I have like gray hair. Like, what the fuck? Yep. And that is the superpower to me. It's not just the goal scoring. It's the goal scoring deep into his third. Like, he's almost 40. And, and, you know, he's going to be bad.

next season and there's there's been some talk about like can he get to a thousand and it's like the only thing that makes me think no is the fact that his contract is up next year right otherwise i'd be like if he had three more years on his deal i'd be sitting here going yeah he probably fucking will i'm i'm i'm out of the business of trying to like manually age adjust Alexander Rovetchkin. Like, I'm out of the business of if he, if he signed a two-year extension this summer, so he's going to play for three more years,

I'm not going to sit there and go, well, okay, if it's 40 and then 30 and then 20, you know what, let's just assume it's 40 every year. Yeah. Until he shows us otherwise. That's exactly right. And it's funny. Like, I think they play on 32 thoughts,

they played a clip of him talking to Elliot at the All-Star game or something, like six or seven years ago. And he's like, and Elliot says to him, like, you think you can pass Gretzky? And he's like, no, man, I don't think so. Like, I'd have to, he goes, I'd have to score like 50 goals a year for the next six years. I'm not going to be able to do it. Like, like, he clearly had thought about it.

And he was like, I don't think it's possible. And then he was just like, actually, you know what, it's totally fine. No problem for me. But I'll say this. Speaking of old clips, I think they played it on. the TNT broadcast the day he he scored 895 of he's in a room I don't remember who's interviewing him but he's in the room with John Carlson and like it's clearly one of those preseason like media tour things and they're like if you break Gretzky's record like what do

what do you think you would do and he goes right off the ice you never see me again and I'm I'm mad that he's stuck at out for the rest of the... Like, it would have been the coolest, cool guy move ever to just be like, no, fuck you. I said, I'm out of here. I'm out of here. That's it. Adios.

Oh, he's leaving. He's probably going to get something for the ceremony or whatever. Yeah, he's getting in his car, driving back to watch. There's a convertible being driven down the highway. That's right. He's still got his skates on. He's just... The end of whichever Fast and Furious movie, Paul Walker died in, he's...

We're getting the helicopter shot of the car, you know? Yep. There he goes. Greatest school score, whoever lived. Yeah, man, it rocks that he did this. I get why people are like, okay, we get it, you know, of that chin off the ice stuff. All that makes sense to me.

I understand. But it's like, yeah, man, unbreakable record, broken. And again, you know, he still has like 2,000 points to pass Gretzky or whatever the number is. So, you know, there are more unbreakable records. to come. That is the crazy part about Gretzky is that he held the goal scoring record for 30 years. We felt like it was unbreakable. That was his second skill.

Yep. That was like a distant second on the Wayne Gretzky skill chart. Yeah, this is the way I always frame it. It is like Wayne Gretzky until Sunday had scored more goals than anyone in NHL history. And if he didn't have a single goal in his entire career, he would have a single goal in his entire career, he would have been the highest scoring player in the history of the NHL. Yep. It's wild.

It's unbelievable. So we need Connor McDavid to really pick it up here. Yep. Let's go, Connor. Come on. Anytime you're ready, Big Dog. Speaking of staying healthy, right? But I guess that's it.

Do you got anything else you want to say about this whole gimmick? Not really. Condolences to Capitol fans who bought tickets for the next game. I know, right? That hurts. Yeah. Tough. Now you're going to watch a Columbus game.

But shout out to the ones who got tickets for the Islanders and got out there. Like, I feel like seeing that in a road arena would actually be pretty cool. Yeah. I've been to that rink. It's not a bad building, you know? And I don't know. Like, I think someone on the Puck Soup Discord, or maybe I saw this on Twitter, I don't remember, but someone was like, I'm in Grand Central Station right now or whatever it was. And it's all Capitol's jerseys.

That's going to be, that's going to be a cool feeling. You're hopping the L-I-R and just all your buddies are there, you know? That's pretty cool. But, yeah, why don't we, why don't we take a break here? And speaking of injuries, boy, there have been a lot of them lately. We'll talk about a good number of them. when we come back. This week's episode is brought to you by our friends at MintMobil.

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and, you know, it's funny. I made a joke about this on Sunday morning when I was writing what we learned about all the guys Florida was holding out of a game in, who are they playing on Sunday? I don't remember, whoever it was. And I was like, these guys are just duck in Tampa in the first round. You know, two hours later, everybody in the sport was like, no, I think they actually are them.

Yeah. That's the influence you have. I guess. A thing that doesn't even get published. I just think it and everybody, everybody. So here's the thing. First of all, I don't think that's what the Panthers are doing. Right? I'll just put that out there right now.

I don't think the Panthers are like, we don't want to play Tampa in the first round. The second thing I want to say is, fucking why would they? You know, like if you had a choice, oh, who do I want to play in the first round? The Maple Leafs or the Tampa Bay Lightning, oh, this is a tough one. It's not that hard, folks. They should want to do it. They should want to, like, if all these guys are banged up and I have a list of all the, like, players who are currently injured on major, like, you know, putative cup contender teams.

Yeah. It's a lot. There's a ton right now. Like, why wouldn't the Panthers just be like, fucking, we got to rest all these guys. We're going to be the walking wounded the day the playoffs start if we're, like, trying to grind out three more points out of the season. Mm-hmm. So to me, everybody's like, oh, you know, this is, here's a crazy conspiracy theory.

It's like, no, you should want this. And Tampa shouldn't want to play Florida either, quite frankly. Yeah. Oh, who would I rather play? The Panthers are the Ottawa senators. Come on, folks. Mm-hmm. And I don't even know who the Leafs would rather play.

I'm not sure it matters a ton. The Montreal Canadians, right? Yeah, well. Yeah, there's that too. But the Panthers do get the Leafs tonight, which will be interesting. Yeah. Because they, and I believe the senators have got the blue jackets tonight. So a good chance that that two-point gap disappears.

Now, the Panthers would still hold the tiebreaker. But, yeah, this could absolutely wind up with, uh, Florida, Toronto, Tampa, Ottawa, Tampa Ottawa would be okay. Florida, Toronto would be fun. Yeah, of course it would. Finally, we don't have to deal with Brad Marshall. Oh, right. Fuck.

Hey, guys. It's me again. Waves walking in the door. What's up? Hello. But yeah, like, what'll be interesting, I guess, is if it's, you know, if it's Panthers Maple Leafs or if it's like Charlotte Checkers Maple Leafs tonight, you know what I mean? Yep.

They just have like 14 guys out there. By the way, I have the NHL standings page open now. I can't believe this stat. You know, the little goal difference column. Mm-hmm. Toronto plus 29, Florida plus 29, checks out. Ottawa plus seven, habs minus 20. Okay, well, you know, we've got to pretend this is a playoff team.

Tampa Bay plus 74. It's crazy. What did that happen? Yeah. I guess, I guess part of it. of it is last night. Did you watch this fucking Rangers game? Oh my God.

Those guys are fit. Those guys are like, we're done here. We're not, we don't care. We're trying to get everybody fired now. Yeah. It's unbelievable. That was bad. And no, I did not watch very much of it.

I was excited. I was like, oh, maybe the Rangers will give them a fight. The Rangers were like, no, we're not. We're, we're waving a white flag. We declined. Yeah. Yeah. It was brutal, man.

But yeah, the Lightning have the second best goal difference in the league right now. Washington's not even that close. Anyway, I mentioned all the injuries. I just went through like the injuries list and looked at only teams with like, again, like a semi real chance to win a cup or at least, you know, get to a cup final, whatever you want to say. And just on those like 10 teams or so, and not counting guys who were like, you know, fringe contributors, I counted like 25 players on like good teams that are hurt right now. It's, yeah, it's a big list.

I was surprised. And even given that, yeah, some of these guys are probably like, yeah, they could play if they had to. And we always say there's different levels of hockey hurt. But missed games recently because of injury to some extent or another. We'll start with Florida. They're actually one of the less injured, like, top cup teams here. Barkov, Matthew Kachuk, Sam Reinhart, all missing games nowish, although there's some talk that like Barkov's back in the lineup tonight, whatever. Like, I don't know.

We'll see, I guess. But on top of that, they're still dealing with the Eckblank. suspension, which I think last through the first round. Something like that. Something like that. Or, you know, a certain number of games into the first round. I don't remember how it plays out off the top of my head here. But, like, that's, those are, in my opinion, three pretty good players for them.

Yeah. He would miss the first two games of the playoffs. First two. Okay. That's what it is. So, yeah, it's just like, wow, that's crazy. Those three guys are hurt. Like, people are like.

Oh, they're trying. I don't know. I feel like if you have those three guys out of your lineup, your team's markedly worse. Mm-hmm. And again, maybe they're all like, oh, yeah, you know, my back's killing me. Ooh, can't get out of bed today. I got the, I got a bit of a cough. You know, maybe they're doing that.

But also, we know that, like, Matt Kachuk isn't because he hasn't played in months. Yeah, that's it. Like, Matt, Kachuk is the big one in the sense that he did something at Four Nations. really. Yeah, it's his groin, isn't it? Yeah. Is that what, I can't remember if that was him or Brady. Sometimes they, they can get a little cute with

Yeah. Lower body, that's a core injuries, but that's not good. And obviously, especially in, for the sort of game, they're going to want to play in the playoffs, he is the he's kind of the motor there. Not their best player with Barkov,

but. Feels like what? Maybe they're most important. I was going to say, if not one, then two, most important, capital M, capital I, you know. But they're not even close to the most banged up, like, legitimate cup contender. Because these are the guys who have missed games for the Edmonton Oilers lately. Drysidal, McDavid, Eckholm, Frederick, Klingberg, Skinner. That's a pretty good chunk of a team's roster there.

Yeah. Every time I see that list anywhere, I'm always like, wow, that's a lot of guys. eyes. And then also, right, they do have John Clenberg. I completely forget that. That fact enters and exits my brain several times a week. Yeah, no. Do you buy, let me just ask on the Oilers, right? Because they've been okay lately, but lost to the ducks last night, which shouldn't happen. Can't be losing to the ducks. Are you, do you buy this idea that their series against the Kings is a totally different series based on who has home? ice?

Given that the Totally no. I... ...the best home record in the league and now look like they're going to have home ice, which would be the change, right? It'll be the fourth year in a row they play, but this will be the first time the Kings have home ice.

Yeah, I just... I don't know. I... I feel like the gap between them has only gotten bigger as those series have... You know... Yep. You weren't like super confident in the Oilers, maybe year one, year two, you were like, okay, those guys are definitely the favorites.

Year three, oh, shouldn't these guys like nuke the Kings? And then year four, it's like, I'll go back a little bit to like, oh, the Oilers should win that series on paper. But, and look, the Kings are playing great right now. That, man, that goal last night, did you see this? Which the Byfield goal was insane. It was cool as hell and also, like, that should not have counted. But it was cool as hell. So I believe we have passed the rule that if something is cool enough, we allow it to happen.

Which apparently is now the NHL rule because you're not allowed to have two different sticks in your hands as you score a goal. I feel like that's fine. You don't what amazed me about that goal beyond just that it was cool as hell was. the defenseman whose stick he was blatantly holding, like, didn't complain at all. Like, in a league where... Sometimes you got to hand it to him. In it... Well, he kind of did, yeah.

In a league where, like, if you brush up against my stick, I immediately drop my stick and wave my hands in the air and, you know... Yeah, absolutely. Go cry to the ref. Like, this guy was just like, oh, yeah, that guy just blatantly grab my stick out of my hand. Hey, then's the brakes. Good goal. If you didn't want...

If you wanted that goal to not... count, maybe you should have stopped him from doing the second coolest goal of all time. Yeah. I saw people legitimately debating. Is that the coolest goal since the Ovechkin, like, barrel roll goal? Really? Yeah. I don't.

Look, you see a lot of goals out there where it's like, that's the goal of the year. That's the goal of the year. I think this is the goal of the year. I'd be happy to call it the goal of the decade. I'd have to think about it. the Ovechkin because like the one I always say

was actually better than the Ovechkin one is the Rick Nash goal against Phoenix. Yep. I think that's the crazyest goal I've ever seen. This byfield was right up there,

man. Yep. And I should say as someone who has gone on the record multiple times is saying we make way too big a deal

out of players batting the puck out of the air. like a guy will be standing in front of the goalie and the goalie will make a save and the puck will bounce two feet into the air and the guy swatted in the net and people are like oh my god that's crazy the hand eye and it's like people can hit something out of the air in every sport like that's a pretty base compared to everything else the hockey players have to do that's like the least impressive thing for them to do but in this case I mean, this, go watch it if you haven't watched it. I don't know I can describe it. I have watched it. I'm going to go watch it again. Holy smokes.

It's, uh, guys, yeah, that's, poor, poor Seattle. Well, at least Seattle now has a reason to have played this season. We gave up the sickest goal in the league in like 15 years, absolutely. But yeah, it's just. tough because with dry sidle and and frederick those guys were hurt they came back and then they almost immediately were like we're actually back on the sidelines here you don't want to be in that situation you don't want you don't know if it's like re-aggravated or what or at least i don't know if it's re-agravated or what but like if you're the oilers what are you playing for at this

point you're locked into a playoff spot basically like you can't you're playing to avoid having to start on the road against the best home team in the league. I get it. But I don't know, man. I wouldn't be, if it, maybe, maybe Trent Frederick, you're like, you know what? Yeah, we traded for him. We gave up something to get him this year. Sure.

But to me, I just, I'm not like, hey, Leon, we need you back out there, Big Hoss. We need you, we need you going crazy out there. I'm avoiding that if I'm the Oilers. You know what I mean? Like I'm making sure he's 108% for every game, you know. I think at this point, well, there are four points back, four and a half, really, because Kings would have the tiebreaker, five games left. They're pretty close to where you concede and you just kind of shut it down.

Yeah. And they're in, I mean, I guess the other thing is six points up on the flames, in theory, they're not locked in the playoffs. Like they haven't clinched the spot. Yeah, the flames would need six points in five games. And you don't. And they would need seven points in five games. To gain that.

And so, I mean, I don't think you ever start slowing down until you've got the little X next to your name that you've clinched. But they've... They're locked in. Yeah. Yeah. I certainly, like, if Connor McDavid limps into my office as the, as the coach and says, you know, I'm 80% tonight.

Well, have a seat. Have 100% of a seat because... Yeah. Although they're saying McDavid might play tonight. I haven't seen an update on that, but that was... They have said all along that the injuries were not, like, with McDavid and dry saddle, it was always said that, like, these aren't expected to impact the playoffs,

as opposed to, like, a Matthew Chook where there was some question. Yeah, and, um, Speaking of that, let's talk about the St. Louis Blues, I guess, because it seems like now... Losers. Yeah, they finally chunked it here. Now, again, I just wrote about them the other day, and this is my big thing on the blues, is if you need a, like, the best winning streak in the history of your franchise that's been around for like 60 years or whatever, to get to 93 points from 79 games and in a wild card spot, that's probably doesn't speak super well to how good your team has been in this season.

You know what I mean? But here we are. They did it. You know, good for them. Nobody had them in the playoffs this year. There was also a point where, like, I don't know if you got there, where you're starting to look at it going, all right, if they go into the playoffs on like a 16-game win streak,

at what point do you, like, we've said in the past that being hot or cold heading into the playoffs doesn't matter as much as people would like to believe. For sure. But if they, like, if they're unbeatable heading into the playoffs, what are we doing here? Right. But, hey, full credit to the Jets, right?

Like, that was kind of a, you know, we love slapping narratives on things, but it wasn't that hard to look at that and go like, hey, we're the best team in the league, you're the hottest team in the league, you're coming into our building. This is a potential first round playoff matchup. Let's go.

We want to win this game and send a message. And they sort of did, like, I watched most of that game. And it was, they just wore them down. Like Scott Arnail said, like they just won every, they just like slightly won every shift. Yeah, they big brothered them a little bit

where it's just like, yeah. Okay. We're winning the 50-50 battles here, just so you guys know. But it looks like Dylan Holloway is going to miss the first round, which is too bad. He's having a great year. You know, totally vindicated the offer sheets and all that, you know. But also Colton Perrako's been out for a while and, you know, who knows?

This is the crazy part for me with them. is you look at who's on their blue line and healthy right now, and you're like, this team won 12 games in a row? Yep. Ryan Souter's playing big minutes, that can't be right. Unfortunately, it is. So that seems like a problem for the blues, though. Like they definitely does.

You know, basically, you know, we can all agree they're good, how good is good in that scenario is kind of my question. question with them and they can't afford to be. Is Vegas any headaches good? Right. It seems like it'll be the matchup. Yeah. And to me, I just kind of think to myself like, I think they're pretty good.

I don't think they're, you know, I don't think they're a cup contender. Although I've said that about a kind of not very good St. Louis Blues team before and here we are. And plus, it feels like this year you go down, you end up saying that like about 13 to the 16, playoff team. That's exactly right. And you're like, wait a second. And like two of the teams that do feel like cup contenders are playing each other in the first round. So. Right. Yes. That, of course, being Toronto and Ottawa. Um, well, hey, speaking, those are like two of the only particularly healthy teams. Brady Kachuk is the only guy from either team that's like a, you know, a name brand contributor guy. And he, he's another one where it's, it's getting a little weird because it's been like,

oh, he'll probably play next game for like three games now. Yeah. But it's also nobody seems to be ringing any alarm bells about him missing playoff time. Yeah. And again, like, they're in. What? Are the, are the Red Wings going to pass? The Red Wings are 11 points back.

They're locked in. I believe the senators have not clinched mathematically, but they are 100% in the models. Yeah. Like, they're in. They would have. If I'm doing the math correctly here, they would have to lose every game in regulation, and the Red Wings would have to win every game in regulation. Well, I guess it wouldn't matter unless they played the Senators between now and then, which I don't know. But the Red Wings would have to win basically every game, the rest of the way, to pass them.

And then they would still need Montreal to pass them as well. So, and I guess if they lose every game, that would probably happen. But the senators are, they don't have the, I think with like one point tonight, the X would be next to their name. But I don't know. Whatever. But yeah, you don't want to, you don't want to be in a situation where there's some question about whether Brady Kachuk's good to go, but also they might just be doing the,

we don't need to play this guy. Like, why rush it thing? Which is the right attitude. Hey, we were just talking about the Jets. They got, they're, uh, Nick Eilers, Rassus Kupari, Neil Pionk, Gabe Valardi, all, uh, TBD on when they're going to play next. Although it seems like Eelers is maybe the, the most likely to be back first, if that makes sense, if I'm phrasing that correctly.

Mm-hmm. Um, again, three, with Eilers especially, like, a lot of their offenses run through him this year. So, yikes. Uh, you, you, you, uh, you, You need that guy good to go for the playoffs for sure. Yep. But again, what are they playing for?

Fucking take your time, Nick. No problem from us. That's it. Really nothing. I mean, especially in a league where nobody cares about the president's trophy. Yeah. And hey, speaking of, Lexi Proto's week to week, I think I saw. Oof.

That sucks. He's having an unbelievable year. Mm-hmm. In that I literally don't believe how good it is. And then you look and it's like, well, he's shooting 75%. So that's why. Oh, okay. Fair enough.

And then Logan Thompson, kind of more day-to-day, but hasn't played in a minute. So that's not good. That's the guy that they're saying that he should get to meet Connor Hellibuck for the Vesna ceremony. That's right. Yeah. He should get to head his little picture. Shake the hand that shook the world, big dog. There he is.

Yeah. Is he going to, is there going to be a ceremony or is he just going to get, is he going to get pranked with like, hey. Oh, the prank's going to be, the prank's going to be, hey, remember when people pretended that you were, that you were in the running for this one? April fools, brother. That's, there wasn't a fucking chance. Remember that time we got you to sign autographs in the draft and then we told you you were traded? Got you. You weren't.

You're still on the Golden Knights. It's fine. Capitals are like, wait a minute. Who's that guy? What, oh, hey, speaking to Vegas, hurdle. That's the only guy for them, but that's kind of a big name. I think he's expected to be back relatively soon, if I'm remembering, right? And everyone is very happy that that's the only Vegas injury that we have to.

That's right. Yeah, the one time. everybody's like they're not working the system. Yeah. Drew Dowdy. Hey, he's back injured. That's crazy. Who would I guess?

Guys, 60 years old. He's got, he's going to start, get on the Alex Ovechkin workout. Anytime he walks into a restaurant, they hand him two beers. Feel like,

might already be there, but, all right. And finally, another team with a, a big, a big number here. Marty Natchez, Jonathan Drew and Josh Manson for, for Colorado. Mm-hmm.

Those are some, those are some big names that you want back. But that is not, by far, not the injury news in, in Colorado these days. Gabe Landisgog back? Question mark. Yeah. Would be super cool if he, if he could make it back. I don't, I'm trying to think, is there any. precedent.

I mean, not even hockey in like recent sports history. If somebody missing this much time with injury and then coming back without like a retirement right in the middle of it like me like Merrill Lemieux and that we remember those situations guys retiring going like I'm done and then they get the itch again. But like a guy who's always kind of been like no, he's he's not done. He might come back someday to do it after. like two years, two plus years, I believe. Oh, yeah.

Been a long time. It's wild. We should point out the ads have another team with nothing to play for. They're not catching Dallas. They're not going to get caught by St. Louis, presumably. And even if they were, so you play Vegas instead of Dallas, I don't think you're too worried about that swap. Would you rather play Vegas instead of Dallas? Check back with me when we know on Mira Heiskenen. Well, okay, actually, you know what, I didn't...

I'd rather play Vegas without... I'd rather play Vegas than Dallas with a healthy enough, Miro Heiskin. You're right. I neglected to write that down. So everybody's like, oh, Leah Hextall reported during the game on, I think, Friday or Saturday. I can't remember when. I wasn't watching the game, but I just saw people tweeting about it.

She's reporting Miro Heiskenens out for the first round. And I'm like, didn't we fucking know that? I think we'd, we knew. that it was a it was possible. So basically it was like, like you say, it was possible. And then the update was maybe not. And then the update to the update was no definitely yes. But also maybe not.

And it's like, okay, I, I don't know like what this like merry go around. We just hopped on was. But we arrived back to where we started. Looks like Miro Heiskenin likely to miss the first round of the playoffs, which is tough for Dallas. obviously, but, hey, they're getting Tyler Sagan back, you know, game one, you know, in theory. So obviously you'd rather have Heiskenen than Sagan at this point in their respective careers. But, you know, I was a little befuddled by that where I was like, I thought we knew all this.

And we should point out Dallas keeps winning. They do at Heiskenen. Yep. Good team. They're still rolling. Yeah, they only have eight regular. losses at home this year. So it's probably good that they're locked into that second in the division spot

that guarantees them a couple of home games in the first, a couple extra home games in the first round, probably. So, yeah, it's interesting. But to circle back to the Landisog thing, he practiced on the first line the other day for a couple of minutes, I think it was. the report I read. I think it was Corey in the, in the Denver Post.

Yeah, here it is. Skating between Nchuskin and Lekinen on the top line for a few drills because McKinnon had the off day. He had also skated with the Colorado Eagles while the Avs were out of town over the weekend. And that started a lot of speculation. Maybe he's got some HL games in his future. and this is the quote from Jared Bednar. We'll see he's ramped up his days on the ice, the workload in those days.

Then we just wait for the next day and reevaluate and see how he responds. Then we make a plan from there. No timeline for when he might try to return when pressed for a further idea of potentially playing in a game for the Eagles before trying to return to the Avs lineup. This is Bednar's quote. Yeah, if he gets there, yeah. Thanks, coach. Yeah. But yeah, he hasn't played.

since May 2023, so we're coming up on two years. And there is a, interestingly, you know, this is where my conspiracy brain kind of gets going a little bit. There's a documentary about his attempted comeback here called Clean Sheet that, you know, kind of makes me go, maybe we're just getting some extra footage. Ah, is he coming back, you know? But that's, yeah I mean, it would be cool as hell, man. That would be fucking awesome. But let's see.

And I mean, if he does come back, he's not going to be first line Landisg right away. I wouldn't think so. And maybe not at all. I also wouldn't think so. Still the captain. Yeah.

It did just feel like always just like one of those things of like, remember was it last year? They're like, he's holding a press conference and everyone's like, yeah, to say he's retired because of how bad, how much time he's missing.

And they were like, he's actually holding a press conference to say he's not retiring. It's like Leonardo DiCaprio in that one scene in Wolf of Wall Street. I'm not fucking leaving. Right? But yeah, I mean that,

I know. never thought we'd see even the suggestion. I honestly thought that, like, they were pretending for, for quite a while. And at the end of it, they'd just be like, it's not going to happen. And everyone would go, yeah, no shit. He's missed almost two years. But here we are. He's practicing.

The fact that he's practicing and, like, you know, real practices, I never even thought we'd get that far. So that's pretty cool. I'd still. Whether it's this, I just, I hope he makes it back at some point, even if it's just enough to say, all right, I got there and now I can't do it, but I at least got to the finish line. You know, you know what it? You know what it feels like, honestly?

Remember when Stephen Stamcoast took the one shift, scored a goal, and was like, okay, I'm done. That's it. Yep. Just give him one of those. Maybe. Put him out there for an empty netter. Oh, you know, I forgot to say this earlier. You know who's having the fucking best week that you could possibly have in the NHL is Ryan Leonard?

Yeah. It's true. NHL debut. Mm-hmm. Second game scores his first goal. Wayne Gretzky's like, hey, congratulations, kid. That's pretty cool. And then front row seat for the Ovechkin record-breaking goal.

He's like, wow, guys, NHL crowds are super loud. It's like, wow. It kicks ass being in the NHL. Wow. Every game feels so big. Damn, this is wild. Yeah, he's, yeah, he's had a fun one. Getting that goal on Friday was very, very fun timing.

You know, and it's funny because he wears number nine and half the time when I like kind of catch him out of the corner of my eye, be like, oh, there's old big number eight. Oh, wait a second, that's a different guy. This is bullshit. Get off the ice. Gentilly tweeted at one point that like, Chickren wears eight, uh, wears six.

Yep. And it kind of looks like an eight. And, you know, he's got the, like, the name kind of, he squint. And he's like, and, you know, because he plays the point, he's in the Ovechkin spot a lot. Yeah. He's like, people are falling for it every time. I get it. There was a point on, on, I think it was in the Friday game where they had a late power play.

And Ovechkin already had two. And Chikrin shot it from the point, like, into somebody's skates. You know, one of the classic things of like, there's a guy five feet from him. We tried to shoot it through him. and it just hit the guy in the skates. And I was just like, fuck off, man. I was so mad at Jacob Chikrin in that moment. I was just like, get a fucking grip.

Nobody wants to see you do this. This game is over. Anyway, we got a little bit of news. We got some breaking news while we were recording the podcast here. From John Orrand of Puck, hey, that's what the thing is in hockey. But it's a different, it's not a hockey news site. And I got tricked by that. a couple of times in the early days here.

The 26 All-Star game, originally set to take place on Long Island, will not be held to ensure players arrive in Milan for the Winter Olympics on time. So you got your little event, Long Island. Congratulations. It was the Ovechkin game. That's it.

Yeah, that's right. Once they got that, it was like, all right, you've had enough. We don't know at this point, what, if anything, it's being replaced. Right. There had been talk about doing some sort of skills competition or whatever, but now it doesn't even really sound like that. But they're just scrapping the whole thing.

I like how they just make it sound like, we just got to get to the airport early. Like, you know, when dad wants to get to the airport three hours? Yeah, that's right. Do you have to? Yeah, sorry. Old man Sid wants everyone to get there so that he can get his Tim Hortons and go through security.

Yeah, he, you know, whatever, Drew Doughty's in the back goofing off. Crossby's like, don't make me turn this charter around. I'll take your ass back to Long Island so fast it'll make your head spin. But this is so funny to me because they scheduled this, knowing that they were going to go to the Winter Olympics. And nobody thought, hey, doesn't it seem like these are awful close together? It didn't occur to anybody. Oh, yeah, no, definitely. You built a nice rink out on Long Island.

Yeah, you can have the All-Star game. Is anybody actually going to be, well, I mean, no. We're not like sending any players there, but you can have it. Hey, maybe they'll do a nice meet and greet. All your kids can take pictures with Car MacDavit. This is what they're saying of the season ticket holders. You know, it's just like, and yet it is somehow, not the most NHL, like, dumb event idea news of the week.

It's a, you couldn't make it up with any other league. Nobody would believe it if it was any other league. But the new plan as reported by Elliot Friedman on hockey night in Canada. Well, it's not even a plan. It's an idea that's been advanced is, hey, look, we fucked up with the decentralized. drafting. I don't know what we were thinking. Everybody's like, yeah, we said that was a bad idea from day one. What are you doing? You know?

So now the idea is, why don't we do it so that the awards, the draft, and free agency are all held in one city, kind of like the way baseball does winter meetings. Right. It's like, oh, wait a minute, we should have been doing this. 20 fucking years already. This makes perfect sense. Everybody has to get on a plane, fly to fucking Winnipeg or wherever they're having the draft this year. Well, fly to the hottest possible location because they put the All-Star game in February in the cold location.

Right. And then they never went down to like, we're going to go to friggin Mexico City July for the draft. Oh, this one's being held in Death Valley. Hmm, interesting. Okay. But yeah, so I don't know, what's your take on this, on this whole gimmick? Sure, that would be, I guess that would be neat. It would be, I mean, we're already so close with the draft and free agency.

Being like four days apart, might as well. Yeah, didn't the Leafs just, or I can't remember, it was somebody just stayed in Vegas and was like, why fly back? Yeah, I think there were a couple teams that did that. So, yeah, go ahead. That would be, I'm like everybody else. I like the centralized draft. I thought it was cool. And I was annoyed when these, I don't know,

whoever it was that had this idea, because apparently, like nobody stands up and owns it. Nobody's like, no, this is why we need to do this. Just a bunch of people whined to Gary Batman, and he rubber-stamped it. Sure. Let's do it this way. Why not?

It could be fun. Give it to the islanders make up for their lost All-Star game. Yeah, that's great. And especially if you do it on Long Island, sorry to say in Long Island. I know that's a wrong thing to say. If you do it on Long Island,

everybody just sets up in Manhattan or whatever, you know? Let's do it at the NHL store. Who gives a shit? Everybody's got their little tables in there? Perfect. But yeah, I just think, like, if everybody's mad about the way the draft works and that's why we're doing the decentralized draft

in a cool, good city... It's not like it's like, oh, yeah, look, we got it... I don't want to truck my ass all the way to, like, Calgary or Winnipeg or, you know, Ottawa. where it's like, there's not like a ton going on there. They're like, Los Angeles.

I don't want to go there. That's crazy to me. You know, it's like, one of the cities where like there's cool, fun stuff to do all the time? Oh, okay.

Strange to me. But like, if you want to pivot this way, I think this is a great pivot. I think this is, instead of just going back to the way it was, like, I think,

I think what I'm taking from this is. They didn't like what it used to be. Then they're like, let's try something different. Oh, the thing that is different sucks even worse. Let's try it. Like, not going back to the original thing, I think, is the only way to do it. And so to go to a third thing that they know works because someone else already does it, my hat's off to them. They did it, you know?

They, uh, It's not really outside the box thinking because, again, this was someone else's idea. But, you know... We're always saying, go ahead and copy the ideas that work in other places. That's exactly right. Yeah. Oh, they're doing something cool? We are too now.

There's nothing wrong with that. Nobody... Remember how everybody hated the NBA All-Star game this year? Because they were like, oh, the NBA All-Star game sucks. let's try to mix up how they do. They just tried to rip off the NHL's like three on three like round robin tournament thing or whatever, you know? And I guess it's not round robin.

Single elimination and, you know, whatever. But and everybody was like, oh, that sucked. At least they tried it. You know? Because they were like, the old way wasn't working. Let's do one that does kind of work, which is how the NHL started doing it however long ago that was. and then that didn't work either

okay we'll try a third thing I don't know if they know what their third thing is yet but I'm sure it'll be great happy to give these guys the benefit of the doubt I'm talking about the NBA

with the All-Star game you know I don't think you can do anything with the NBA All-Stra game I don't think you can do anything with the concept of the All-Star game period like the reason the All-Star game exists

is back in like the 50s or whatever you would just like if you're like a a new york yankees fan you just don't get to watch the la dodgers or the you know like you and especially because they didn't have interleague play back then you would just hear about like willie maize or whatever and be like what's going on with that yeah what this guy's hitting the ball like that i i can't even picture in baseball but football has completely abandoned it Football, like, does not bother doing an actual game. They do, like, flag football. Yeah, the reason it works in baseball is, like, the defense controls how the ball is played. Yes, yep. And, like, a pitcher's not going to be like, nah, I'm just going to, like, underhand it to fucking Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Yeah.

I'm going to let Shohay Otani fucking yak one on me. It's not going to happen, man. And also, like, when they hit the ball, like, into the gap, the centerfielder is and, like, well, I can't run. to try to catch this because that would like, I'd look like I was trying and then it's like, that's just uncool. So I'm just going to let the ball roll around. Yeah,

every, every hits and inside the park home run. But like, you couldn't do it. Except the runner stops at third because they don't want to score because then it's like, no. Yeah, no,

everybody, everybody like takes a real leisurely stroll to first page. Like, you know, people get mad in baseball when guys don't like run out grounders or whatever. Oh, you know, it could be an air,

okay, sure. But like you just kind of, at some point there is a, there is a, you would still have to try to go to first base. Yeah. You have to amble in that general direction, you know? So, like, that's why it works in baseball and doesn't work in other sports is, is, and always will.

A guy's just, you know, maybe a guy's not hitting 103 on the gun, but he's not going to go below like 96. Yeah. So, you know, they're trying out there. We've fixed the NBA and NHL All-Star Games. Just play baseball. softball tournament. Honestly, you know, like NBA versus NHL softball tournament. This actually would be sick because remember, remember the thing about like

Sidney Crosby hitting home runs at Pirates batting practice? Yeah. I know all these. Look, I've played in college like, you know, Division 1 college hockey players went to my school. And I played softball against those guys in like the intramural softball leagues. Guess who won every year is the hockey team. Because all those guys can hit the ball of fucking 100 miles. Yeah.

I do feel like I want to see Cotter Bedard, like, serve up an 85-mile-an-hour fastball that LeBron James hits 700 feet. Yeah, maybe you got to mix in a pitching machine. You know, we're putting it 85 miles an hour and no movement right down the middle. You don't do. You do it the way, like, the little kid softball works around here. You have the parents pitch. We love the dad road trip, the mom and dad road trips. That's right.

here you go here comes here comes papa Kachuk out to lob a few to Matthew and or Brady talking insane shit the whole time yep anyway just talking crap to like Kevin Garnett just like who is this yeah who's the basketball player that's a that's Matthew Kach's buddy oh Jason Tatum they went to they went to junior high together or whatever we're on to something here this is honestly not the worst idea this is honestly not the worst idea this I feel like that's the one way you're going to get some competition. Oh, for sure. And you do it in Phoenix.

It's like nice out in the winter. You're not freezing your ass off. I just realized what type of hockey fans would get the most worked up about this. I don't want to do it anymore. Yeah. Never mind. Yeah, P.K. Suban, for example. Katie, delete the entire thing.

You know what, why don't we just delete the whole episode here by ending it? why you give us a plug and we'll move on. You can find me at the athletic. I will be on with Sean tomorrow. No, Thursday actually. We are switching the schedule up so that Sean and I and Frankie can all be back together for the first time in a while. And something fun to announce that I sort of teased last week,

but we can now talk about. We are launching at the Athletic. a hockey newsletter twice a week, and it's going to be me and James Myrtle who are going to be putting this thing together. So me and Myrtle, in your mailbox a couple of times a week. I will be tweeting out how to sign up for that, but keep an eye out for that. And please sign up for it and read it, but even if you're not going to read it, sign up anyway, so that it, you know, makes us look good. That would help. Yeah, well, with that, my understanding, I guess I don't super know how this works. But my understanding is you have to like not just sign up for it, but then like

open it, scroll to the bottom, close it. Yeah. Click on a few links. It'll, it'll take you like 20 minutes a day. It's fine. It's not a big deal. But you don't have to read it. You don't have to read it at all. But you do have to interact with it in in meaningful ways for an extended period of time and then forward it to all your friends. I have a good idea for this, by the way. You can pitch this to the overlords at the New York Times. I will. what if there's like at the bottom of it there's like a yellow guy a blue guy and a green guy okay all right what kind of facial expressions do they have are they all you're not going to believe it you're not going to believe it are any of them wearing hats i think i think one of them is

yeah we don't have that anymore it's no i know bombs us out man i what my but when this is a long time ago now but every once in a while if if someone at the athletic wrote a particularly good article. I would just tell them on Twitter, green guy for you. You never once tweeted that at me. I got to tell you, Sean. That's to be expected for you.

This is a tough way to find out. It's to be expected for you. That's the baseline. If you wrote a bad one, I would be like, unfortunately, I can only go blue for this one, man. But.

Drop a me on me. That's. I can, wasn't, wasn't it, wasn't blue the middle one? I think it might have been. Yeah. I can't see you doing a yellow one, man.

I used to love it when people would tell me they clicked on the wrong one. I thought it was good, but I accidentally clicked. Like, what do you want me to do with that information, man? Forward that on to my editor. Hey, man, can you adjust the numbers here? Thanks. For me, you can head over to Elite Prospects.com, sign up. There's the annual thing that I think it's 33.

percent off an annual sub right now. Don't quote me on that. I don't have to sign up, so I don't, I'm not always keeping up. You know what I mean? They just, they just make it so I get all the, the features for free. How'd you, how'd you swing that? It's all about who you know. It really is.

It really is. And also who you provide hours and hours of labor for. You know what? Speaking of the Frozen Four is this week, I will have the, I, look, look, you You will not find a more in-depth preview of the Frozen Four than what I write every year. It's just not going to happen. I have stats that few other people have. I put a lot of work into this.

And I also put a lot of work into breaking down who should win the Hobie Baker for most outstanding player in college hockey. The Mike Richter for the best goalie. And the Tim Taylor for the best freshman rookie, however you want to phrase it. and I'll just say this. I wrote a take so good for the Hobie Baker article that I talked myself out of who I thought should win the Hobie Baker. Wow. Those are the best takes. I'm changing my own mind right now.

I'll put it this way. It doesn't happen very often, but every once in a while. I could tell you, like I could sit here and give you a list of like the times I did that over the course of the last decade or whatever. where like by the end of the article, I just go like, you know what? I'm going to go back to the top of this and revise some things because I don't feel that way anymore. And I'll say, can I say this? I talk myself from the guy I thought should be number one to I actually think that guy should be number three. Damn, tough break for that guy.

It really is. Yeah. I read about it now. So, so Frozen Four is, uh, third. Thursday, Hobie Baker, Mike Richter, Tim Taylor Awards Friday, National Championship game Saturday. This is what it's all about, folks. And you know what, sign up for EP also, because we're getting to the end of the season, guys are signing with their pro teams. We have all kinds of in-depth breakdowns of basically everybody who's going to sign with their pro teams.

And then, you know, start gearing up for draft season. Never been a better time than right now. That's what I always say. And then once you're done signing up for that, sign up for patreon.com slash puck soup. All kinds of bonus episodes coming your way in the next little while here, especially now that my college hockey obligations are finally winding down. Really, I feel like I'm going to have too much free time. But me and Sean, I believe tomorrow we'll be recording an episode based on a question we got in our mailbag that I said,

this question was so good. This does not, this supersedes mailbag status. This gets a full bonus episode dedicated to it. Yep. So this is the kind of heat they're bringing over in the mailbag, which, hey, we're going to go record one of those right now. So thanks for listening. And we'll talk to you next week. Have a good one.

Bye bye. Bye bye.