Puck Soup - Letter Rip

Episode Date: January 20, 2026

Sean and Ryan talk about The Letter 2, trades for Vegas and San Jose, buyers and sellers, and more.

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I'm Sean McAnew from The Athletic. And, all right, there's, why is fighting like a big thing all of a sudden in hockey? So it's like going away, it's going away. And then in the last like week and a half or whatever, we're back, baby. You got the little kids beating the shit out of each other down there in Nashville. Yeah. Anybody ever get in trouble for that, by the way?

I saw that they were going to like, they were talking about we're going to get someone in trouble for this. I think they are still figuring out who to get in trouble. I've not seen any follow-ups. Yeah, me neither. Next game between those two teams are going to be crazy, though. Oh, boy. Right off the opening face off, I'm calling it. That's right.

So then there was a fight in a college game on Friday night between BU and UMass Lowell. And did you see these highlights, Sean? I saw the fight. Yeah. So what happens is... I didn't see how the fight started. I just saw, like, once they got going. Yes.

So how did the helmets come off? So they were serving, matching, like, roughing or hitting after... I think it was roughing, hitting after the whistle, maybe. And clearly during the serving those two minutes, they said to each other, all right, once these penalties are over, we're going to step out of the box.

We're going to take our helmets and gloves off and we're going to punch each other in the head really hard. Like it was agreed upon, obviously. So there's a face-off in like, I think it was the BU zone. And one second left in the penalties. Whistle blows, doors open, these guys skate to the far into the ice to get as far away from the officials as possible

and start just bombing on each other. Wow. Yeah. Did they come out of the box without the helmets or did they do the helmet toss? You know, I have not seen that angle, honestly. I, uh, like they, the, the, there's not, you know, a million cameras at college games like there is the NHL. And so the camera, the main camera was understandably focused on the face off and then like whips over, you know, as soon as everybody kind of realizes what's going on. Got it.

But, um, I will say this. I was at a college game that night with a bunch of media people there. And I was like asking around. You guys ever seen anything of like in college two guys, helmets off, gloves off, let's punch each other? I've never seen it. I've been to easily over a thousand college games. I've never seen it. Yeah.

It was crazy. Automatic ejection and suspension in college. And the fact that everyone's wearing full face masks, I think is even a bigger factor. Well, yeah, so I've seen plenty of guys get the, get the ejection for fighting. No gloves or elements ever come off. They're just swinging on each other. I've seen that rarely. It happens maybe once a season, maybe twice.

But usually everybody just gets like a five and a ten for hitting after the whistle and, you know, you're right back to it. I've never seen something like that. I'm sure back in the 70s this happened or whatever, you know, but never. like this. It was wild. Now, were there like further suspensions? Yes. So when you get kicked out for fighting in a college game, you get what's called

the game disqualification, which is like a non-negotiable one-game suspension. And then the conference, Hockey East, was like, an additional two will be added on to that. So that's three games those guys are missing out of whatever,

like a 37, 38, 40 game season, depending on how deep you get into the playoffs. So that's a pretty chunky, it would be like getting almost, like seven or eight games, basically in the NHL. Because you're just not allowed to do this,

and the extremity of it was such that, like, they felt like they had to go above and beyond just the normal one gamer. It was a wild one. Yeah. Then you get a fight in the PWHL, sort of. It was more of the thing I'm talking about, of, like, helmets on, punches, like glove punches, all that.

But, you don't know, often see that in the PWHL. That was pretty cool, I guess. And then last night, goalie fight. Like a full-on actual, both goalies take all their shit off and punch each other fight. Yep. First time

in... Five years, I think. 5 years, I think so... Coming up on 6. Yeah. Crazy. Who was the last one? I'm not remembering this one. Mike Smith and Cam Talbot. Likely for Mike. Mike Smith

had like four career fights, didn't he? Three or four? I don't know, but he is one of now five guys, goaltenders to have the career Gordyhow Hattrick. Because he did also score a goal. Oh, and that was the other thing. One of the guys in that Lul B.U fight had scored earlier in the game and ended up an assist away from like an actual,

and I've got to think the number of guys with an actual gorty how hat trick in a college game is extremely small. But yeah, I watched that last night. I was like, holy fuck, man. Mike Smith, it looks like three fights in the NHL, maybe. Wow. Okay. Two.

Two, and then a couple in, hmm. A couple in the, the HL as well. So, yeah, it was interesting because somebody asked me on social somewhere. they said, like, what is more common a goalie goal or a goalie fight? And the reality is it's changed in the last decade. It used to be the goalie fight was not common, but every couple of years, maybe more if Patrick Waugh was in the league. And then the goalie goal was super rare.

And in the last few years, like, we've been having, if we had a goalie goal yet this year? I don't think so. Yeah, we had a few last year. We did. I mean, it's become an almost annual thing, and the goalie fight had all but disappeared. So, kudos to Sergey Bavrovsky, the only good Florida Panther for

getting down there. Kudos to the officials for... You got to let it go, yeah. I'm just going to go ahead and say not realizing he was coming down because they were otherwise occupied by a hit from behind. Ten guys can be wailing on each other. And if a goalie comes a little far out, all four officials

immediately wet their pants and then sprint towards the goalie to tackle them. Yep. But not this time. So, yeah, they had a good little scrap. I don't think it's an all-timer for the goalies, but it was pretty good. Yeah, I mean, they look like two guys

who don't fight very much. You know, that's fine. Yep. For Brost, yeah, falls down immediately, but they did a good job holding each other up, making it Now, I'll say this. I'm not watching that fight going, you know, this is Ali Frazier. You know, this is fine.

This is, it's whatever. As goalie fights go, it's barely, you know, it's kind of on the lower tier, I feel like. But the reaction from the Sharks bench that they showed. Yep. It's what it's all about, man. That's why goalies fight. That's why they got up for it was to get the boys excited. It was funny.

It was funny for sure. The other thing about the Panthers, though, Matthew Kachuk comes back last night. Hasn't played all season. He gets fucking rocked. Was it, was it Darnay? Oh, yeah, I don't even know. I have watched the clip a few times.

He got, and like that's one of those ones where, like, usually you're like, oh, you know, keep your head up there. I don't think I've ever seen someone get hit. exactly that way, you know? Like, just the way the puck came to him and, like, there was no, like, a guy, I feel, I think it was Day Arna, was like skating in that direction already. And so he was just like, oh, I guess I can explode through Vinny Day Arna's a big boy, you know?

So he's like, I guess I can blow this guy up, no problem. So that was fun. Welcome back. Welcome back. He said he said he wouldn't come back until he was 100% ready to hit the ground running. And he came back and inspired his team to get their doors kicked in by the San Jose Sharks. They got rock.

On home up. How about those damn sharks? On team. They really are. We'll talk about the trade they made in a bit. Let me say this first, though, regarding the San Jose Sharks. So I mentioned, or I forgot to mention on the show last week, for all the real heads out there, all the New Jersey Michaels fans, Their pick a NHL winner game is back.

And I've been, what's great about it is when you go into the app, it shows you not what the team's record is, but what the team's record is since they started doing the contest. I love that. And so, like, I've just been kind of picking the sharks a lot, honestly, and they're three and two since starting that. You're the new NHL standings, man. I'm sorry. Absolutely right. Sorry Colorado fans. The ducks are four and two.

The Canucks are 0 and 7. There's no, there's no, you know, no loser point. I don't get half a point for the sub. Somebody made that joke already, but if they lose an overtime. The Bruins are 6 in O. I have picked them against the Dallas Stars tonight. And you can call me Vim Vendors because I'm having a bunch of perfect days picking my four, NHL.

Now, how many do you have to get right to get a sub? Oh, you're going to get, I believe it is, if I'm remembering right, it's 48 for a small, 72 for a medium, 144 for a large. That's a lot. And so it's a lot, but it's adding up very quickly. I've gotten, just in like the last week, I've gotten 22 from the NHL pickum game. So it's a good chunk of my. It's not bad.

Yeah. I got to stop forgetting to do it before games start, though. Yeah. That's the key with gambling, man. You can't. I said it on the bonus episode last week. I'm going to start adding, you know, like Quinn Hughes on Instagram when the wild lose to be like, you owe me one seventy second of a medium sub, you piece of shit. I'm going to fucking lose my mind here. You owe me a bite of a sub. even a bite I mean I I take big bites yeah

you're a nibble of a sub yeah you know do the math if Quinn Hughes has to start sending out you know

Venmo payments for like two cents or whatever one seventy second of a sub is I feel like he can swing that

probably well that would I mean that'll motivate him he'll get going on mm-hmm not being

such an embarrassment anymore yeah um you see Luke Hughes got hurt last night? Yeah, and they're not

sure as to the severity, but that could change a few things. Finally, the devils are having some injury problems. I've been saying this team's too healthy. It's tough. Now, here's my question. If Luke Hughes is injured, does that

make them more likely to move Dougie Hamilton or less? Because obviously that puts Hamilton higher up the lineup, but also, like, you're done. You're not making the playoffs this year. Probably. So. Not great for them. No.

In my opinion. My opinion, it's gone badly. But let's stay in the New York metro area here. Let's talk about the letter two, which, you know, people are saying electric boogaloo. The one I came up with is I still don't know what I did last summer. That was, yes. I like that better.

I got to be honest with you. Yeah. Well, I just feel like electric boogaloo is a little. I don't feel like that is a timely reference anymore with the, that's like a little old for you even. Oh, well, I mean, what it really is with that is like, I got to tell you, I don't think there, I know a single person who's ever seen breaking the first one.

Sure. Let alone the sequel, but a sequel title so good that it completely supersedes the entire franchise as the thing people know about it. It's just a breakdancing movie. Hell, it's two of them. But, yeah, anyway, the letter two, which is Chris Drury putting it out there, don't say in the paper, this is a rebuild. It's not.

In fact, it specifically says in this letter, this isn't a rebuild. And why would it be? No. We just have a bunch of 36-year-olds who are on expiring contracts. Well, but the thing that you have to keep. mine, Ryan, that I learned from the letter is they can't really

rebuild because that would be unfair to their fans who are the bestest, most special fans in the whole world. They're so good, you fans. We love you so much. It's funny.

I've been to Bruins games, right? And they say the Bruins fans have the best fan. Oh, really? The best fans. Yeah. Isn't that weird? Yeah, that's strange. I thought it was You know, maybe it changes over the years. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's true.

Must be it. Well, we'll have to wait to the playoffs and figure out which team that wasn't, that hasn't been in the playoffs in a while, turns out to actually have the loudest fans in the league. Probably Detroit this year. Maybe San Jose. It's got to be San Jose. But yeah, they write a three-paragraph letter and they mention how great their fans are like nine times. Which is that not, like, if you're a fan of an original.

original system. Are you not feeling a little patronized right now? Well, it's really... I mean, I don't think that that Rangers fans were receiving this letter with like, you know what? I was going to be bad, but he did say how good I was at being a fan. What they mean when they say that, by the way, folks, is you guys are the biggest suckers on the planet.

They're going to buy this. bullshit, right? Yep, no problem, dog. Let's, let's just run through, you know, like, it's fine, whatever. So, let's let's talk about this. The Rangers, they're, they're gonna sell some guys this year. Is this like,

did I miss a memo that this is like, this should be somehow unacceptable? The way people were talking about it, I can't believe they're fucking, you can't believe it? That was my initial reaction, you know, like. See, that's interesting, because the only one that I saw to that effect was, are Tami Panarin being

completely flabbergasted. Yeah. His flabber got so gasted by this. He never saw this coming on his last place team full of super old guys. Where he's explicitly told him, by the way, I do want to resign with you

and no, I won't be taking a discount. Yeah. And that was the interesting that I'm not directly from the letter, but the news that came out at the same time was that they are, they have said they are not offering him a contract. And they shouldn't. I mean, they shouldn't.

But that, in theory, plays into whether he waives his full, no trade protection. Yes. Which he has. Um, so he can say, no, there's, there's no list or anything. He can say no period, I'm not going anywhere, which he might be tempted to do if he thinks there's an extension. at some point down the road. But by saying no, there isn't. In theory, at least,

he now has to accept a deal to a contender, A, to try to win a cup, but maybe more importantly, from his perspective, to boost his market value heading into off season. So that's your new biggest name at the top of the trade board.

Oh, I don't even know that there's a close set. Yeah, I was going to say. enjoyed your three months of everyone pretending you're a superstar. It's really, okay, let's talk about it this way. The Rangers write the letter one in February 2018 when, you know, things are going a little sideways. And I, you know, again, like I've seen people going like, oh, what went wrong with their rebuild, blah, blah, blah. what do you think went wrong, Sean? What do you think?

Like, how did we get here if we're the Rangers? I think they didn't, they didn't necessarily go the full-on rebuild. They locked into a couple of older guys who's played diminished, mecca Zabanajad in particular. I think that the fact that they whiffed on a first overall pick and a second overall pick which, I mean, you can argue that not fully on them, because LaFrenier was the consensus number one that year. Yeah, and Kako was the consensus too that year.

He was, yeah, I guess so, yeah. So now, development. So I wouldn't say WIFT, but that's exactly right. Did they have the coach? Did they have the, you know, now, I don't know. I mean, both guys have been so disappointing that I'm not sure that there was a legitimate franchise star in there waiting to be developed out. Totally.

No, I think all of that is basically correct. I think the original sin here, and like it's hard to blame the Rangers is that like Adam Fox and Artemey Panarin around this time, we're like, you know, what we'd love to play for is the New York Rangers. And they were like, we don't have to do anything. They're like, well, you've got to pay me, but that's it. And they were like, okay, great, we'll see you out there, you know. And also they, you know, they had one of the best goalies in the world who was covering up a lot of the, how long have I been saying this team's a power play and a goalie?

And that's all they needed, right? Mm-hmm. To have a ton of regular season success. I saw people saying the rebuild failed. I don't know, man. They won a president's trophy and went to two conference finals. Yeah. Like, I don't think there are many teams that have.

had a better last five or six years overall than the Rangers, you know, before last season, I suppose you'd say. That's fair, yeah. And so, like, I'm, I think they gave it their best shot. I think that having an elite goalie covers up for a lot of deficiencies with your organization. Look at the Winnipeg Jets, you know? And I think that if you take the lesson of we can score very easily on the power play, and we have an elite goalie to its natural extreme,

you're like, well, we don't have to, like, really do anything to improve the team that much. And you add in the thing that you're saying about, like, they didn't develop their two top two picks all that well. And frankly, even before that, they weren't doing, you know, you can go back, I just looked at this. So, like, you can say they started the rebuild in 2018. That's just when they sent the letter.

They picked seventh overall the year before that. These are their first round picks, okay? From 2017 to, let's say, two years ago, three years ago maybe. Leas Anderson, Philip Heedel. Anderson, not really an NHL player, it turns out. Heedle, a good player, but can't stay healthy. You know, that's his big problem. Next year, Kravtsov, whiff, chunked it, tough stuff.

Keandre Miller, good player, not on their team anymore. and Mills Lundquist also not on their team anymore. He got, God, what trade was he in, Mills Lundquist? That was Dallas, didn't they got a first for him, I believe. Yeah, but was there also a player involved? Nope, just a first round pick. Huh, okay, great. Anyway, so you move on from that year, then you get Cabo caco.

Oops, again, not really their fault, I got to say, you know, it was just not a good draft that. certainly didn't go off the board. No. And I think, frankly, again, I'm not one to defend the Rangers here. But, like, I think if you're picking in the top two going off the board is like something that will probably get you in big trouble. Yeah. Or even, but it's not even like it was, oh, who was the defenseman that Canucks took like fifth when Kachuk and other guys? Yes, yes, yes.

Like, even at the time, people, oh, I don't know. Like, I don't remember a lot of that with the Rangers. Right. No, for sure. Partly because that just was not a very good draft year. Correct. The next year, Lafrenier and Braden Schneider, Schneider's a decent player. But they got him with the 90th. I'll say that.

He was the 19th overall pick, about as good as of a 19th overall pick as you're going to get most years. Braden Schneider. The next year, Brennan Offman, then they traded their first round pick, then Gabe Perrault. who, you know, TBD on that, that gets you to 2023. Like, definitely they, they blew it with some forward development there, but also, like, I don't see anything where you're like, what were they fucking thinking? You know what I mean? They just, and then this is the other thing, and we said this about Lafranier and Kako and Heedle,

even a few times over the years. They had so many good forwards already in the lineup that, like, it was. hard to justify putting LaFrenier on on the on on PPP one when P P P P P P1's scoring on 32% or whatever it was you know what I mean? Yep. So all of that comes together in a not great way for them. But coaching hires big problem. Did anybody like the Gerard?

Was anybody like head over heels with the Gerard Glant thing? What about I, you know, like Gleon a lot as a coach, but is he your coach for the, I mean, at that point, rebuild's probably not the right word, but ascending with young players. Maybe not. Right. Yeah.

No, they, what they, I guess, I guess my thing is, ultimately what it boils down to is that the, the Panarin thing in particular made them throw the handbrake on what was probably supposed to be like a four or five year rebuild. Because then they had the superstar forward.

They had an elite goaltender. they had a really, I don't think they knew, they had any right to know how good Adam Fox was, but like, you know, Adam Fox instantly like a high level defense, and now he's a bummed that we all hate him. But, you know, at the time, we were like, this guy's one of the best defensemen in the league. And it was kind of hard to argue that, you know.

So, yeah, I, ultimately, I'm just not really sure that they were ever going to have, this incredible amount of success that I think a lot of people were expecting. But President's Trophy, two conference finals, again, how many teams can say that over the last five years or whatever it is? It's interesting. I don't know. You're right. The other one that's interesting is the fact that they went and got J.T. Miller last year.

Well, at that point, they're in panic mode. Well, they're in panic mode, but they're already halfway through a bad season. That's the one that you could point to. Like, I don't, to me, if a guy, an all-world player like Rettemian says, I want to come play for your team. Yeah, the cap, it was high, but I get why you would change. Like, every team should have a plan, but you've got to be able to adjust the plan. circumstances change.

So I don't mind that. But going and getting a guy, Miller's age, his contract, that was a roll of the dice. And that is very hard to square with less than a year later completely running up the white flag. Well, again, I just think that, you know, once things started going sideways and they're like, okay, let's trade our captain, who we overvalued and let's trade this guy. let's trade that guy. I think at a certain point, if you're doing that a lot, like you got,

you just have much bigger problems. You know what I mean? Like, that's, they were, they were, as soon as it like the bottom dropped out on the goal tending,

like a little bit. Again, this is what we were saying all along, power play and a goalie. If the power play slows down a little bit and the goalie slows down a little bit, suddenly you suck, you know?

Yep. And they, they just did. didn't understand, I think, fundamentally that that was a potential outcome and even a vaguely likely outcome. Like, I don't, I think any team can have a weirdly bad season. Look at the time Tampa, like, missed the playoffs after, you know, being extremely good for, for many years and then went basically right back to being extremely good. That can happen. but I don't know that the Rangers

like had any idea that could happen to them that's something that happens to somebody else so I I'll say that again I don't know that people are super happy with it but look let's let's start it this way you you heard the fans chant fire drury and like two days later they were like

here's a letter explaining exactly what the future I say it all the time you don't like something Buy a tick and fucking get a chant going about fire the coach, fire the GM, sell the team, whatever it is, you'll get something to fucking happen. You might not like what it is, but like it'll be different. It'll be different that day. It is different, but the fact that the letter was signed and sealed by Chris Durry,

him being the guy who was going to clearly get the reins on this is maybe not what some Ranger fans were hoping. for. But at least you get, you're getting the rebuild. You're certainly getting the rebuild. Sorry, retool. Yeah. I mean, and look, like,

people, you know, people were making fun of, oh, they said retool, it's not a rebuild, you know, whatever. They kind of can't, like, fully rebuild because of all the bad contracts

Christ Rory has given out, which is probably why they were chanting about him, you know? But, Yeah, I'm surprised at the And this is happening in a few places Where there are retools happening

The How much I've seen like a lot of things talking about Well, you know, there'll be someone out there who wants me Because of Badajet And it's like, will there be Is that true? Willer?

Like are we sure? Oh, interesting. You think so? We're just gonna like Like, and I mean that And I'm not even saying he's a bad player Because he's having a better year year this year, but you look at the age and contract in that. And I just, I go to the test, man. You

throw that guy on waivers right now. Are we 100% sure he gets claimed? And if the answer is no, but, you know, you can do things with taking bad contracts back. Okay, but then, you know, what value are you actually bringing in? There's ways to do it, but it's, I don't know. Trocheque, I think they can move. Panarin, obviously. It's not too late for Shisterc in Edmonton. You know, I said this, I said this last year when the Trubitrade

happened, one of my friends who's a, who's a Rangers fan, a big Rangers fan, a season ticket holder, in fact, uh, was like,

they should just trade Igor. I mean, what are, you know, like it's over. It's over. We're done here, you know? And,

you can, you can make the argument that my friend Dave was right. You could. Especially, A, what you could get for them. And B, Well, what are you doing with him the next three, four, five years, whatever it is?

And in theory, at least. In theory, there may never be a team more desperate for goaltending than the Oilers. I say in theory, because Jari's back, had a shutout the other night. They'll probably talk themselves into just rolling the dice with what they've got. They probably have to. Yeah, they probably do. But that Miller contract, that's tough. Trochec signed for four more years with trade protection,

the front of year through 2032, Adam Fox, Gavrikov. He was supposed to solidify things. He hasn't done that at all. He's been good. What? Yeah, but like, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. But remember the Will Borgon contract?

He had like three good. weeks after they traded for him. Yeah, well, now he's signed through 2030. Oops. I don't know what you do with your, if you're the Rangers, other than try to just slowly chip away at this roster. I was saying this the other night. Here's honestly what I would do if I was Chris Drury.

You send the, you know, the, the, all 32 GM group chat or whatever they, you know, whatever you want to call it. I am trading four players. I don't care which ones they are. Everybody on my roster is available. The first, like first come first serve, you make me an offer that I want to trade. That's one of, we're down to three. And you can, I feel like maybe you can chum up some interest that way.

And then you can stick to, well, it's a retool. It's not a rebuilt. We didn't trade everybody. We didn't rip it down to the studs. We still have guys like Vincent Trocheck. That guy's going to the Olympics. He signed only for four more years. He signed for four more years.

Well, three after this one, yeah. Okay. He's only 32. Why don't he? Hey, come on. The youngest player in the league. Yeah, that's exactly right. But yeah, I'm just like, I'll trade anybody.

I don't care. You want to make, you want Igor? Give me a call. You want Artemi? You know, phone lines are open. Call me now. You know, like, Adam Fox, you can have them.

There's a guy signed for four more years. Till he's 31, 32. Maybe I'd be picking up the phone if I was in NHLGM. But nobody's off limits. That all makes perfect sense to me. But we'll see what they do with it. Oh, apparently with Panair in Colorado and Washington are the team's kind of sniffing around.

Okay. Yeah, I saw that in the athletic. this morning. Yeah, that, both of those make some sense. Because Colorado, you might prefer a center,

but I don't know, man, do you want, do you want a center who's going to play behind Brock Nelson, or do you want a winger who? Well,

ideally, I think you would get a center to play in front of Brock Nelson, but yes. But none of those guys are out there, right? That's right. No, yeah, Washington makes some sense.

Oh, for sure. It's sort of a, you know, one last, let's, one last swing of the Ovecunera, maybe. That's not currently in a playoff position, though. Yeah. Carolina's always seems to be in on guys like this. Dallas, if, if they had the cap room. The interesting one that I saw was, was Florida.

Because they, in theory, would have the cap room if they put Barcove on season-ending injury reserve. Right. But the argument is if you're going to put Barcov on season-ending injury reserve, what's even the point of? Yeah, at that point you would need an elite center, not a winger who maybe was elite two years ago. I mean, I think at that point you just say that if we don't have Barcove,

we're not winning the gun. Yeah, I think that's true, for sure. Now, the flip side is you've won two flags fly forever. You only get so many shots at a three-peed, whatever. So maybe. Yep. And of course, Vegas, too. Because never...

They always find a way. It's going to be very funny when they call Mitch Martin in the office, and they're like, you're going to New York. He's like, I have a no trade, and they're like, you're going. Sorry. What about your going? Did you not understand? Yeah.

He's like, but aren't we treated like gods? No. Nah, Mitch. That's somewhere else. I think they, uh, yeah, Vegas would see. team tough, but cap-wise and everything, but they're always in. Yeah. Well, how about this?

Why don't we take a quick break and we'll come back and we'll talk about those dastardly Vegas Golden Knights making another trade that people just can't believe. Can't wait. Okay. All right, we're back. And as promised, let's talk about Vegas. They trade for Rasmus Anderson after, I feel like six months of people saying, you know, he wants to play for Vegas. Yeah. And they give up Zach White Cloud a 2027 first round pick, a 227 second round pick that becomes a 2028 first round pick if Vegas wins the cup.

And a defenseman at the University of North Dakota named Abram Weeb, who, you know. Is he any good or is he a 50-man contract? A classic B-p prospect guy for sure. All right. What did you think? I mean, I know I've seen a few takes saying the flames didn't get enough. I don't necessarily know that I feel that way. They got four assets for a guy that everybody knew they were trading.

Well, everyone knew they were trading. A guy who is, like, he's a good defenseman. Who? Anderson. Anderson? Oh, he's a good defenseman having a very good year is what I would say. But also, like, this is a guy, he's, he's been in the NHL for 10 years. He has never received a single Norris vote.

Yeah. I mean, he's good. Yeah, good player. I feel like this is one of those things that happens every year where because there is so little movement during the season, certain guys who appear likely to be moved get maybe overanalyzed. and either become better assets just from having their name out there so long, or in some cases it goes the other way in somebody who's a good, like a very good player gets nitpicked to death. Yes.

So, like, this is, like, Erasmus Anderson is not Ben Chirot. He's not, you know, they're not doing that deal with him, but. For sure. I mean, he's a good defenseman. They got a first, potentially two firsts for him. Well, I mean, let's... In a situation where, and this is important, he had apparently definitively said,

I will not talk extension with any team I get traded to. That's exactly right. Until the trade is done. Which it sounds like scared off just about everyone other than Vegas, because Vegas is like, as soon, you know, everyone loves to. What do we give a shit about that? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I, well, I think he's a, I think,

he's a good player, like I said. I think giving up four assets for, again, a guy that everybody was like, oh, traded tomorrow. Yeah, that's happening. Like, don't worry about it. You know, that only makes perfect sense to me that they would kind of land on that. But I'm, I don't know. Were you at all surprised with some of the other teams that were apparently in on?

Like Boston was mentioned. Yeah, I saw that. And I was like, Boston needed a middle pairing defenseman who's having a pretty good season. Like, that's what they thought they needed. That's something else to me. I mean, they're in the mix. And I guess that must have been, to me, that's one of the teams that as soon as he says no extension, they go, okay, you know what? We're out.

Bye-bye. Yeah, absolutely. I agree with that. And if that's what it was, then sure, that makes sense. Um, but yeah, I just, I'm kind of in the same boat boat with Vegas where I'm like, this is the guy they thought they absolutely fucking needed. Really? Okay. Like, that's not the guy.

Again, I think he's a good player. That's maybe not the, if I'm Vegas, that's not the guy I'm like dying to give up four assets for. But I'll say this. I think, uh, white cloud has. been pretty bad the last couple of last this year and last year. I know he doesn't real like, you know, a nothing cap hit. It's like two and a quarter or something like that. So that's fine.

That's basically not anything in the NHL anymore. But yeah, man, I just, I don't know why Vegas is like, I got to get my hands on Rasmus. Anderson. But that's fine. I think it's just as simple as there's a good player available and we're Vegas and... Yeah, I do think that's kind of what it is, except, like you say, to potentially, not that they give a shit about first round pits in Vegas, obviously, but it seems like that could be a

problem for them. Let me throw this at you. Do you think the Rangers get more or less for our Temi Panarin than the Flamist's got more more yes yeah okay um it well not in terms of like total assets but in terms of overall value of those assets yeah yeah yes because and this is the thing was oh they gave up two first round pick yeah a pick that's going to be well potentially two and one is a pick that's going to be like 27th overall and the other one if it happens is guaranteed to be 32nd overall so like that's just That's just not a ton of value.

Like, you might as well, again, we talk about this sometimes. The way that draft valuation works is we might as well be talking about two second round picks once you get out of the top 12, 15, 18, whatever you want to say, you know. So I don't think, what does Vegas care about draft picks? They never have. They never will. They probably shouldn't, given how their roster is constructed. So. Yep. Agreed. But with that having been said, I do want to say from the flame side, nice to get four assets, isn't it?

It's not bad. You know what I mean? I saw, I think it was Ken Campbell. I gave it like a glowing review. I don't know if I would. I think I think people are still thinking about Zach White Cloud from like two, three years ago. Maybe. Is what it kind of seems like it must be, honestly. And again, I, you know, I think for the, for the money, he's probably roughly worth that, but he's not much more than that to me at this point.

And the other thing I would say is, and I think this is an accident of circumstances, because Vegas doesn't have, if I'm, if I'm correct, they don't have their first round pick this year. that, no, they just traded the flames. That was the 27 first round pick. Oh, right. So what I was going to say is I don't mind. You're right. If you're going to get a first round pick from a contender, I don't mind booting it down a year and then see what happens.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I can change in a year, right? Maybe that. For sure. Most GMs don't think that way because they want to pick now. They want to open their presence now. Yep. They don't want to wait another day.

So, but, you know, if I was a GM with some job security, I don't mind kicking that down the road a bit because could end up being, you know, in a perfect world, Vegas wins the cup this year and then falls apart next year. Unlike. Sure. But. Yes. That's right. Yeah, no, they're, they're an interesting team going forward, Vegas, or Calgary, I mean, because they, they, they're, they're an interesting team going forward. Vegas or Calgary I mean because they it makes you go do they think they are sellers or was this a thing where everybody knew this trade was happening three months ago.

So like the captain of the team said it. You know what I mean? Like that's kind of what it boils down to for me is the captain of the team was like, oh yeah. No, everybody knows that guy's getting traded for sure. So I'm, uh, I'm curious to see what, where they go from here. But even if the, even if this is kind of more of a one-off, I can't sit here and be like, and it's bad that the Calgary Flames just got four assets for somebody that. Well, that's it, right?

I mean, they're clearly a rebuild team. And that's, that's the other thing that I think is interesting is we're finally starting to see that separation of buyers and sellers. Mm-hmm. between the Rangers, the Flames, the Canucks, who we'll talk about. I think in the fact that now some of the selling has begun, it puts pressure on, you know, maybe, I don't know, a Columbus, a New Jersey, teams like that to go, okay,

time to make a decision because we can't sit on the fence until the deadline because who knows what the market looks like that. By the way, there's a trade freeze over the last. Olympics, February 4th, I believe. So you've got like a mini trade deadline this year. Yes. And then the real thing afterwards. And you can't trade during the Olympics, but you can talk.

So that'll be interesting to me is because I, and if, if I remember right, the freeze gets lifted, I thought it was like at midnight. Yeah, the final horn of the Olympics, they're like, okay, you can make all the trades. It was an 1159, and now I'm kind of doubting, I'm like, did they put it at noon? But like, are we going to get like midnight news drops of trades happening? But that's down the line. I would guess no. I think that just from a PR standpoint, teams would like to be like, well, I mean, the buyers would like to keep that under wraps.

Maybe the sellers are like, if we, if we announce this at 4.30 in the morning local time, maybe people won't be so mad at us. That's true. Yeah. announced it during the gold medal game. Yeah, this is the craziest thing. You're not going to believe this. Everybody's like, yeah, and it's, you know, well, I was going to say it's U.S. Canada.

I don't think the U.S. is going to make it that far, but that's fine. All right, let's talk about the San Jose Sharks. Speaking of kind of surprising buyers, they trade four Kiefer Sherwood, two second round picks, and a rather expensive NHL or AHL defenseman named Cole Clayton.

So the key here for both sides, I guess, is no first round pick. Yep. Which I think the Canucks have been hoping for. Yeah, they've got to be a little disappointed, but that was just what the market was going to. If you're the sharks, given where you are, you can't be trading a first. No, for sure. So I'd be willing to bet there was a fun game of chicken going on in the background with, with Mike Greer and

yeah uh Jim Rutherford for the last little while about San Jose's first round pick but ultimately okay two seconds not bad seconds that could be you know could be in the

in the top half all right yeah for a guy that you know half of us had never even heard of heading into this year that's that's not awful it I do think they're I look at this return for Vancouver I don't hate it

I think it'll hold up fine. Yeah. More so than Anderson, I feel a little bit like I wonder, I wonder what the market looks like if you wait a month. Or if you wait as long as possible and see what shakes free. Because Sherwood's a guy that, I mean, the value could go up, but maybe it also goes the other way. Maybe he was cold for three weeks and then.

Yeah, I mean, he's currently on IR, which is not good, obviously. but I'm just going to read you his goals by month and you tell me if the value is going up or down here. Nine in October, three in November, four in December, one so far in January. Value going up or down. Well, I'm going to focus on that November to December jump in. I'm going to say, soaring. That's 33% more goals. Right there.

You keep doing that. You do the fucking bath, you know. Six years from now. Look out. I just Instagram served to me like a clip of Futurama where they're like, oh, Fry realizes he should go to the bank and see if they still have his account on file and they go. Yeah, your last deposit brought your balance to 93 cents, but with interest it's like $4.8 billion now because it's a thousand years later. That's what could happen with Kiefer Sherwood. and roll it out.

So yeah, I think this is like a nice depth add, you know, on the wing there. And if that costs you two seconds and you're and you're the shark, I don't know. Okay, let me ask you this. Do you think the sharks are done buying now that they've used two second round picks? I mean, they've got to be done buying on short-ish term stuff, right? Yeah, Sherwood's contract. is up this summer. So there's that.

And I mean, I'm guessing they feel confident getting him signed, right? It sounds like he's a guy that he wants like five times five. Well, I was going to say, do you want that? Like, if you're the sharks, are you like, I hope we can get this guy to sign an extension. If I'm the sharks and I just gave up two seconds for him, I probably do think that. You know what I mean? I get what you're saying. I get up the two seconds if I didn't.

I think they'd rather go four by four. Sure, yeah. Somewhere in the middle. Keep her short what's 30 years old. Where does this time go, man? Yeah. I watch this kid playing college, and it doesn't feel like it was that long ago,

and yet here we are. But yeah, I get it from the Sharks' point of view. I just, I feel like I'd be like, okay, that was our addition. You know, we brought in some help. You can be Whatever you want to say like underwhelmed by it But look at all the goals he's got this year That's nice, right?

It's almost got 20 already Yep I wonder how many guys on the sharks have that many goals already Because he's at he's at 17 And guys on the sharks with you know Because this is one of those One of those years where Macklin Celebrini's like I have 8,000 points

the next closest guy on my team has 12, you know? Oh, my God. Macklin Celebrini is the only guy on the team with 17 goals. I guess I hadn't looked at this in a minute. Do you know how many points of a gap there is between Celebrini and second on the team and scoring Alex Venberg? I do not, no. Would you believe the number is 39?

That's impressive. 72 for Celebrini in 48 games. Venberg, 33. That is crazy. That's fucking wild. I know it was bad. I didn't think it was that bad. That's fine.

Taylor Hall sitting there going, holy shit, man. Really? Because he's like, I want to fucking MVP by having a lot more points than the next closest guy on my team. That's the MVP talk is. It's going to come. It's happening already.

Yeah, of course it is. A fair amount of it. Got a case. If they make the playoffs. If they, I mean, if they make the playoffs, he's easily a finalist. I feel very comfortable saying that. But that's wild, man. Holy shit.

72 points. This gets good, my opinion. I'm going to go out on a limb here, say McClintell's green. I need to see a little bit more, but. I get it. You're just an optimist by. At ours. You know me, maybe.

Let's say this about the Canucks, too. There are some very great quotes from, from this article is from this morning. So this is how fresh this is. Headline from the Canadian press. Canucks coach foot calls out team for lingering, quote, defeated feeling. I wonder why that would be. I can't believe it. These guys on the Vancouver Canucks, they can't stop thinking.

They're fucking losers. My kids who haven't eaten in a month are walking around with a hungry feeling. Losers. Adam Foote has seen enough. I'm just going to read this article rocks. Adam Foote has seen enough. The Vancouver Canucks coach is tired of his players getting frustrated and letting their play slip. Yes, the team is mired in an extended losing skit, but the Stanley Cup winning defenseman

knows a defeatist attitude won't help things. I've been watching this for too long, Futsed Monday after the Canucks fell 4-3 to the New York Islanders. We've got to stop burning ourselves by getting frustrated. We've got to stay within the plan. The plan's working. Citation needed on that one, I think. Yeah, I think.

And it's our vets. They've got to hang in there. The problem has plagued the team for years, he said. Even before he became, or even before he came to Vancouver as an assistant coach to Rick Tocket, There's a bad call or the opponent scores first, and players begin slamming the gate to the bench, making bad changes, or over-complicating their game. It's something we've got to get out of our culture. It just gets us off our game and allows other teams to just get a little bit of energy and come back in the game. It's something we've got to stop.

Calling out the vets there is, I mean, on the one hand, more than fair. All these guys have been with the Vancouver Canucks for a long time, for the most part, you know? And it's not getting better. But this is a little bit to me the thing of like, we tried nothing and we're all out of ideas. Because it says, oh, this was a problem even before I got there. How long ago did you get there, Big Dog? It spent like three, four years, hasn't it? Am I crazy?

Has he been there that long? I thought, well, now let's pull up the elite for this year. Let's pull up the old elite prospects page. It says I last visited this eight days ago, so it's going great over there. He joined the Canucks in 22, 23. Okay. So this is part way through the season, but so two full years and a partial year as an assistant, and now he's the head coach for half a season.

and he's sitting there going the culture is a huge problem and it's like well I agree with that who's been in charge of the culture for the last however many years and he goes could be anybody it's probably these nasty veterans I will say that

from what anytime I see something like this I kind of go hunting for reactions from the fan base and got to be careful with that because you see you know two or three people yelling and suddenly go, oh, you know, all Canucks fans think this. I'm not seeing a lot of Canucks fans who are upset that the coach said this.

It would be hard to say he's wrong. Yeah, I'm not seeing anyone say he's wrong, put it that way. There may be a little like, oh, is this, I mean, if you got a bunch of quitters on the team already, is this going to help. But, yeah, I will say that this is not. This doesn't seem to be landing as a shock to Canucks fans who watch this team. No, yeah. I mean, they're not good.

And I'll say this. When I Google Adam Foote in Google news, first thing that comes up from Canucks Army, how much longer can the Canucks employ Adam Foote? This was 23 hours ago. And then this article where he's like, it's not me. It's these quitter players. Yeah. That was three hours ago.

So what happened in those 20 hours? Well, this is the headline from NHL.com. Foot receives support as Canucks coach from GM despite struggles. Struggles. They've lost 11 games in a row. Quote, I do trust the coaching staff and Adam Foote. There are pockets and stretches where we're playing well. There was a stretch of seven weeks in late November to early January.

when our penalty kill was really good. But that was based on you have your goalie and you're fairly healthy. That being said, I don't want to use excuses. Our job is to win hockey games and we need to get better, all of us. Love it. And I know the coaches are working on the solutions and working with the players to perform better and we need to. The solution is these guys are losers. And I'm saying this in the media.

When our, as long as we're healthy and our goaltending is good. And you let me carve a very specific section of the schedule out. And only highlight that during that time. There's one element of our game that was okay, that was pretty good. So I think they're all set. You know, look, it is difficult. They're at home, by the way, for the rest of the month. So this could get.

It's difficult for me to get like too worked up about like, you're not going to believe this. The Canucks stink. Yeah, no shit, man. Right. But also the, it's just like, what did you expect? You hired a guy specifically because he was like the preferred coach of the defenseman you just traded. Mm-hmm. And it doesn't seem like at any point, he's had a ton of answers for what's going on over there.

Now, I'm not saying there's anybody that would have had good answers here. and maybe he's right that all these that all the veterans are you know the second something goes bad they're just like well fuck it man he's clearly talking about peterson right i would think so yeah and among other guys yeah maybe this is because i live through the phil cassel era in toronto but i'm i just instinctively kind of recoil a little bit when people start talking about body language sure yeah of course but also So, like, Adam Foot, who played in the league for a long time, is not completely wrong that when other teams do see that. And there probably is a point where other teams are going, guys, we got them. Look at them. They're packing it in. We got them through a little adversity their way. They're done.

I mean, their season was over in, like, November, though. You know what I mean? Like, I don't... It's a tough message. Let me put it this. And I think it's a message that works better coming from Adam Foote, who looks like he got hit in the face with a tire iron this morning. You know, when he's like, oh, okay. And that was just the Canucks Media, right?

Yeah, it was Drans. A little tire and iron drans. Yeah. I mean, I think he's got a point. It's always interesting to see how something like this plays out. The thing is, if you watch the clip, like, he's, this isn't a guy who's, like, fired up and, like, it feels like a little more calculated of, okay, like, we're going to try to light a fuse here. But we'll see if it works.

Well, the other thing is, this is the headline from a week ago, General manager Patrick Alvin announced today that goalie Thatcher Demko has been placed on injured reserve retroactive January 10th. So part of the thing that you're saying about like, oh, this is why they have a defeated statitude. And, you know, we were actually good at one point this year, blah, blah, blah. It's like, yeah, man, you were counting on Thatcher Demko staying healthy as part of your, like, brilliant game plan. And it's, what evidence do we have at any point? And like, you know, I'm not knocking the guy. Like, you can't stay healthy.

can't stay healthy, but like, you didn't have a fucking backup plan. Like, I mean, literally, kind of. Like, you were like, oh, and Kevin Lankin, there's a guy that's going to be good forever. Oh, that didn't happen? Crazy. Who could have seen that coming, you know? And I don't know. To me, if you're, again, if your big plan is, all we need is,

Elias Pedersen to not start moping the second that we go down a goal and Thatcher Demcoe to stay healthy and for Quinn Hughes to want to play. play here. None of that was ever going to happen. Not one of those things was ever going to happen, unfortunately. I think the Pedersen thing you could, like, and again, not that him moping is the difference between this team being good and not, but I do think there's an element of it where it's like, look, man, you sulked your way through the last couple years.

We traded the guy, yeah, for sure. You made us pick between you and another guy. we picked you, we traded that guy. At some point, you make $11 million a year. Can you be a professional, please? Sure. And knock this off. You are the leader of this team, whether you're the captain or not,

whether you're the star player, can you not look like you want to cry every minute of every game, please? And his answer might be, no, I cannot, because I'm a Vancouver Canuck, man. You think there's any chance he gets traded? Who wants them? Like, would Vancouver be willing to eat salary? And would Vancouver be willing to take what would be, even with salary eating involved, a very diminished return at this point? Because here's the other thing.

You can say all this? From the 100 point guy he was when he was 22? I mean, that guy's gone. No, no, no. I'm saying like. What, okay, what I guess I'm saying is, in theory, they could have picked J.T. Miller overly as Pedersen and traded Pedersen. I think that if they had done that, they probably get a better return than what they got for J.T. Miller. Yes. I would agree with that.

Now, I don't think that they're any good this year, even with J.T. Miller. How's it going for the Rangers, right? No. Yeah, that's it. Miller's magical leadership, which as best I can tell, seems to just be him being a dick with the media. Like, that's his fiery leadership, which... Hey, maybe some guys appreciate it. Good being. But, yeah, I mean, I guess my point is, like, diminished from, like, what you would have gotten if you would traded him a year ago instead of Miller.

Yeah. Because at the time, you could say change of scenery. What if versus trading him a year from now? Right. Because if a year from now, you're looking back going, should have traded him at the 2026 deadline. Then, you know, it's like the cliche, right? The best time to do it was back then. Yesterday.

Yeah. Second best time would be now if you can pull it off. And you're right. Maybe you can. And they did say rebuild. They said it. So, you know, I feel like that's a kind of tacit permission to a certain extent. Like, yeah, you can explore trading all these guys.

If we can trade, if we can trade Quinn Hughes, we can trade anybody, which I think they should. But, you know, again, like, can they, given all the unmovable contracts and, like, no moves and all this kind of stuff? I don't know. But I got a, I got a fun trivia question for him. Okay. Somebody posted this in Comment section Of my piece yesterday

I used it in today's newsletter So some of you have Have already heard it But I know I know my buddy Ryan Has told me before He always saves the newsletter For the afternoon

I don't read it on show days Just in I don't want to like With his reading glasses With his bifocals And he prints it out Prints it out And takes it to the Takes it to the work bathroom

Which is just the bathroom at my house. Can you name who the, this season's leading score among everyone who is on the Vancouver Canucks payroll this year? On the payroll as in. In any way. Okay. Like if you were to go to their Puckpedia page.

Right. Which you cannot do because that would be cheating. Uh-huh. And I will give a hint. which is that they did not retain on the Quinn Hughes trade. I knew that already. I knew it wasn't Quinn Hughes. The answer.

Okay. So obviously this is someone they retained on. There's no way someone who is currently playing for the Canucks leads the team. Well, Elias Pedersen, just to set the bar, is the leading player on their current roster with 29. 28 points? 29. I was close. Okay, great.

Bronick has 28 and then Kiefer Sherwood and Quinn Hughes tied with 23. Okay. So aren't there anymore. I was going to say Kiefer Sherwood, another guy they didn't retain on. So that takes him out of the mix as well. Who have they retained on then? Let me think about this. Well, I'm going to give you one more hint.

Okay. It's not a retained salary. Okay. So it's someone they bought out. The only guy I can think of that they bought out is Oliver Ekman-Larson. It is Oliver Eckman-Lars. It is Oliver Ekman Larson. Yes, man.

Who has 31 points. Does he really? I was shocked. Yeah. Heading into last night. I don't know if they lost to the wild last night. I don't know if he got any points. But, um.

Yeah, you really held my hand with that just because, again, I knew that it couldn't be a guy currently on the team. Well, that's it, right? Like, I wouldn't be asking you that and then like the answer is Elias Pedersen. Right. That's right. Do you know how much he's on their cap for?

OEL probably like two million bucks It's almost five million Oh no 4.8 and he is on there It was eight years When they bought him out And that was three years ago By the way this is

You know The guy who has already been on two different teams since then Mm-hmm I believe he's on their cap For five more years after this one now it drops down to two million for the last few years of that but nevertheless yeah that's it was the biggest i i had read so i it was at the time and maybe still is the biggest ordinary buyout so we've seen some huge uh you know when they

compliance buyouts yeah had those compliance buyouts and and and that sort of thing that were far bigger, but, yeah, 34-year-old defenseman, Oliver Ekman-Larsen, has more points while counting 4.8 million against the... And it's not like this is 34-year-old Nick Liddstrom, right? Like, there was never a point where you were like, oh, Oliver Ekman-Larsen and elite player. I did not say Eric Carlson. I did not say... No, Oliver Eggman-Larsen.

That is unbelievable. Great organization over there. A higher cap hit on the Canucks than he is on the team that he's got 31 points for right now. So we know the Rangers are sellers. We know the Canucks are sellers. Those are the two teams I feel like have definitively put out a statement of, we are not trying to compete this year. Thank you.

Yep. Who else do you think is a seller at this point in the season? Is there anybody? I'm not sure there is quite yet. the blues have got to be extraordinarily close. They're thinking about it for sure. It's getting kicked around. Well, there's just so many names out there from St. Louis.

And I still don't buy this idea that they're going to trade Robert Thomas or Jordan Kairor or somebody like that. But there are so many names and there are so many blues on trade boards around the league that, like, if Doug Armstrong didn't want these names out there, he would make some phone calls. Yeah. So I think they're probably the closest. They just haven't. They have the letter in the outbox, but they haven't hit send yet. Yeah. It gets really interesting from there because you look at the other teams that are bad.

Like Winnipeg, they've got to be close. Tough to see them selling, though. Like maybe move a guy on an expiring contract, but I don't count that the same as selling necessarily. The Winnipeg Jets were, they won four in a row. and had points in five in a row on the weekend. There are nine points out of a playoff spot. Oh, yeah. It's going badly for that.

So, I mean, you've got to think there. And then the other one that you would think would be close would be Columbus. The fact that they fired the coach is sort of the, A, the acknowledgement this season is not going well and be kind of the last ditch effort. Now they turn around and win four in a row. So and isn't this exactly what I said like they can go you know what it was that it was the other guy but you have to think that you know they they will wind up there I think pretty soon I that sounds like a safe assumption yeah you look up from there the senators I don't think the senators will wait till the last minute if they decide to be yeah yeah we should mention the senators also there's

the, as we're recording this, we know that the Allmark interview with TSN is coming out this afternoon. We have only seen like a little clip. So we, that's why we're not, if there's, there's nothing for us to say it. If there's super interesting stuff in there, the reason we're not talking about it is we haven't seen it yet as we're. I think they said it's not out until tonight. So, you know, we got some cushion on that one. The devils, I think are, I don't know what they do. Yeah, we talked about it earlier.

like they, it depends on what they think they're doing if everybody's healthy, which again, this is like the Thatcher Demko thing. I think the, I think the Panthers are going to, like, you, you maybe don't add necessarily, but you don't, you don't throw in the towel. The other one that's interesting to me is the Flyers, who have been in the mix all year and now they're kind of plummeting. and you wonder if like if there was a like there's an envelope labeled cell that's been sitting in

in Danny Breyer's desk drawer and now it's getting close to time to open it up there three points out of a playoff spot right now but right finally got a win last night desperately needed but beyond that

I don't know the ducks were headed there Seattle is I don't think, I mean, they've been so close all year, or you wouldn't think, although they've got some guys that could be attractive. Yeah, absolutely. I think you put them in the category. I mean, if they've lost three straight and regulation, if they lose five more, then, yeah, absolutely.

But for now we hold off. Yep. Okay, and then let me ask you this, along kind of the opposite lines, like, is there anybody you don't think is like a buyer at the deadline? Because like, if we've said it a million times, if everybody's kind of good, who's really good, who's like able to make the case for themselves, like internally, mentally, whatever you want to say, like, let me ask you this. I'll put it, I'll put it to you this way first, first and foremost.

How much are the Detroit Red Wings willing to buy? See, that's the thing. Like, I think there's an awful lot of teams this year because the argument against buying. if you're a playoff team is hook me up to a lie detector and I'm going to tell you we're not winning the cup this year. Sure. And I ran the numbers, Ryan.

Do you know how many teams win the cup every year? No. On average, only one. It can't be that low. It's actually, it's a bit lower if you do the fakeness ratings, but it's one team wins the cup every year. That's unbelievable. It feels like there's an unusually high number of teams in the playoff mix where I don't think that applies.

Like to a team like Detroit where you go, we haven't made the playoffs in 10 years. We haven't won a round in, you know, I haven't know how much longer than that. We got to take a swing here. We know we're probably not beating Tampa. And we know if we do, we're not going to like, we're very unlikely to win the cup. But we got to take a swing. It's time, it's hockey town, it's time to put a charge back in this team. You look at a team like the Penguins.

Could be Sidney Crosby's last push. Do you have to take a swing? You look at the Sabres, the most obvious one of the group, right? Yep. They're not winning the cup. Of course not. Get to the playoffs, man. Like, you've got to.

I don't know about, you know, the Canadians I could see being a team that, I don't know. They're on the surface, they seem like a team that should be happy with where they are, but there's been a lot of talk connecting them to some big names. Yep. Islanders, I don't know, Bruins, I don't know. You look in the west. I think Utah would like to get some playoff hockey into that market before too long. What do you think of the big three, the Colorado, Minnesota, Dallas?

Do you think any of them take a big swing? I think Minnesota's done probably. They just don't have a ton of cap space, let alone assets at this point. And they made the biggest move of the year. Well, yeah, that's exactly right. Colorado doesn't have a ton of cap space, but I feel like they have guys they can move around. You know what I mean? Like they have got, you know, we'll give you a guy from the bottom of our roster plus a P.

You know, that kind of thing. I think they can maybe get away with that a little bit. Um, Dallas is a boy, who knows. They should trade Jason Robertson. They hate that guy. Yeah, I mean, if, uh... He's a bum.

They think he stinks. The Tyler Sagan... It makes it so interesting. Opens it up for them, yeah. Yep. And you would think it would be on the blue line that they'd be looking. But again, you know, do they... Do they go after another Tammy Panarin?

Yeah, I mean You don't like at the end of the day Like I get that there's a lot of these teams You go well, you know, they don't need a first line winner Okay Are we at the end of the day We're trying to score more goals than the other team Yeah

They're set in net They're blue line They have to feel pretty good about it I think if they're adding They're adding a forward So why not go fucking big game hunting You know? Yeah

But can I say this though This is the other thing I was thinking about with Detroit specifically. Do you know what, this is according to Puckpede, do you know what their deadline cap space looks like right now? No. If things stay as they are, they will be able to add players with AABs up to $59.5 million. They currently have $13 million in caps or $28 million in cap space, 28.7 as a matter of fact,

that will then by the deadline be 59 something. That's crazy. They should trade for Panarin. Fuck it. Who cares? They shouldn't do that, but they should. Let's make it happen. They shouldn't, but they should, but they should not.

Yeah, but don't, but like think about it. But if you did. It would be something interesting and fun and funny. I guess the only other bit of like real news this week, that's like kind of interesting to us is Mitch Marner returning to Toronto. Yes. What I'm what I'm picturing is you ever watch like Memphis wrestling from like the 70s in the 80s where it's like... Not very much.

First of all, you should. It rocks. Like that's real heat. That's back when people people like old ladies hitting. Jerry Lawler with a fucking purse on his way to the ring, throwing trash and diapers at people. Like, it's going to look like Bash at the Beach 96 when Mitch Marner is in the starting lineup.

So let me ask, okay, because I was talking to someone a couple days ago who was basically telling me the same thing. They said this is going to be John Tavares 2.0. Mm-hmm. if people didn't see the the Leafs played Vegas last week in Vegas and Marner was getting booed in Vegas by Leafs fans

came down for this and somebody saw that and they were like when I saw him getting booed in his own arena it's going to be and I'm still not completely convinced that it's going to be that bad like Tavares level that I think it's going to be Tavares level bad

I really do Why do you not think that Yeah I I I think To me Some of the fan base is just Tired of it and ready to move on I think that

A little bit of time has passed He got booed in his own building though You know like that's that's what it boils down to for me People made the fucking trip just to be like I hate this fucking guy Yeah Yeah. It definitely could be. I mean, it's, I don't know. I mean, I didn't think the Tavares thing was going to be as bad until you actually saw it. So. Yeah. Oh, you know what? Yeah. I forgot to say this earlier. Speaking of teams in the Atlantic, what do we think Tampa does? I meant to say this and then I forgot. I mean, they've got no room. They've got no picks. They've got no assets. They probably go and get back.

Aaron or something. Yeah. They're one of these teams that they find a way. They figure it out. They do. And everyone wants to go there. Everyone wants to be there. They have more cap space than I think you would think.

Like 2.29 million isn't like an unbelievable amount, but it's just enough where you're like, they're going to fucking do something with it. Someone's going to end up on Robida Island, you know, all that kind of stuff. Oh, it's crazy. You wouldn't believe it. But it's really. It's really interesting. I hate this stupid fucking playoff cap space thing.

It's so annoying. You can't cheat anymore. We want fewer trades out there. Grow up. You should have to trade a guy every single week. That's my take. One guy a week, you've got to make a trade. And if you don't, you lose a million dollars in cap space.

For next year. That's how it works. Okay. There you go. Anyway, I guess that's it. Thank you so much for listening. Sean, why don't you hit them with the plugs? If I made the athletic, I will be on tomorrow on the podcast.

Newsletter went out today. And I have some content coming later this week. Great. For me, you head over to Elite Prospects. I'm doing all kinds of college hockey coverage over there. and boy, it's an interesting time in college hockey. A bunch of teams adding guys partway through the season in a way that I asked the coach of one of the teams that added a goalie this past week. Like what, or I guess it was two weeks ago now.

Like, what do you think this all means for college hockey all these teams adding it? And he goes, I think we need to have a beer to discuss this. There was just so much to say. And so it was like, wow, some interesting stuff came out, came out of me asking these questions. So I would encourage people to check that out. But I would also encourage people to, we just dropped over Italy prospects. Our top 75 mid-season rankings of every draft eligible player,

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