Puck Soup - Michael Russo

Episode Date: February 15, 2019

Greg, Ryan and Sean discuss Poop Johnson, the "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" remake, Randy Carlyle getting fired, Ken Hitchcock nearly quitting, Ryan's "lippy troll" feud with the Edmonton media, the Islanders, a world where The Beatles don't exist, NHL trade deadline, David Pastrnak's "sponsorship dinner" injury and your next coaches to be fired. Plus, Michael Russo of The Athletic joins us to talk about the Wild, the Panthers and Trampled By Turtles. Presented by Seat Geek and Leesa.

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes. It's your weekly bowl of Hockey and Nancet. Puck Soot. I'm Greg Wischinski of ESPN. I'm Ryan Lambert from Yahoo. Hello, I'm Sean McAnew of The Athletic.

And you're in Puck Soup, where we will begin this episode. episode with everybody's favorite topic, movie talk. First of all, as you know, Puck's... Puck Soup is, of course, a remake of the original Puck Soup. Only this one stars Rebel Wilson and Anne Hathaway. Lambert, your thoughts on the remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels? Um, it's nice to see Rebel Wilson in a movie where she might not in every scene be going, isn't it, uh, isn't it so funny that I'm like overweight and it's, and like, normally, you would think I'm gross to look at and horrible. But the premise of this movie is that it's actually funny that I'm gross to look at and horrible. Now, the interesting thing about this film for me is that so far, according to the trailer, Anne Hathaway could either be doing the worst British accent in film history as part of a con, or Anne Hathaway could be doing the worst British accent in film history. And that, to me, is enough to sell me on potentially seeing this film.

Yeah, it really is a thing of like, I think Rebel Wilson is funny. And I think Anne Hathaway can be... She's great. No, don't even qualify it. Fuck you. She's great. She was great as Selena Kyle. She was great Notions 8.

She was really, really... Well, she was great notions 8. You're right about that. Yeah. I think she's really good at a certain thing. And that's what I was going to say. So, like, does this fall into that being? a certain thing, or does this fall into, like,

is she going to need to do the kind of broad comedy that, sorry for broad, I guess. But, like, the kind of broad comedy that's in dirty, rotten scoundrels. You know what I mean? Where it's like, where there's like a lot of physical comedy and stuff, because I don't know if she's any good physical comedy. Right. Well, here's the thing.

Like, I think she's good at three things. I think she's good at being the innocent, like she was in Devil Wars. Prada, you know, where we kind of see the world through her eyes and the Princess Diaries. I think she's good at being a con woman like we saw in Ocean's 8, Ate spoiler. And I think she's great at being a cat burglar like we saw in Batman, what was the Dark Night Returns or whatever. Rises.

Rises. Sorry, Jesus. So, like, I think we'll get at least two of those three things in this film. Now, listen, Sean, I know this is movie talk, but you're being drafted back in. Okay. What if I told you there was a movie coming out by the director of train spotting, no doubt, in which a man, a musician, a musician who's not very good, falls down during what looks like, correct me if I'm wrong here, Lambert, a planet-wide blackout? No, yeah, a planet-wide blackout and also, like, he gets hit by a car. Right, okay, so this guy gets hit by a car during a planet-wide blackout.

He wakes up. He discovers that he is now living in a world where the Beatles never existed. But he knows all of their songs. So he then becomes the biggest star in the world playing the Beatles songs to audiences that don't know the Beatles ever existed. What would you say about that premise, sir? You guys cannot fool me with your fake made-up movie premises. No, you know what? I didn't see the trailer, but I heard about it because everybody was kind of talking about this over the last couple days. And I think it's adorable that we're going to pretend that songs become popular just purely based on the quality of the song. That's a great point.

If anybody, you know, that like if I could sing a Beatles song that, you know, I would just show up and suddenly I'd be a worldwide sensation. Well, I... It's a, it's a, I guess it's a cool premise. and it doesn't seem to be related to a comic book or like a or Star Wars. I mean, that's something. It's got that going for it. Are you sure? There was that scene.

I'm pretty sure the song from the canteena in the first Star Wars wasn't exactly written by. The yesterday extended universe where the next movie, no one heard of the Rolling Stones. But no, like, so he's, you know, like the premise of it is set up in the trailer as he's sitting around like, breakfast with some friends of his, and he just kind of like absent-mindedly start singing yesterday. Right. And everybody at the table is like, holy shit. Because yesterday is like such a good song.

It's a great song. But to Sean's point, though, I kind of agree with it in most cases, except I will say that having seen guys in college play Blackbird and Norwegian Wood in like, the dorm common area and having freshman girls who were unaware that these are Beatles songs fawning over these songs, I do think there is something to be said for songcraft can triumph over lack of charisma and or talent. There's something to be said for that.

That is possible. And if the entire movie takes place in Greg's freshman dorm, then I am all in the first day lineup. I'm seeing that movie. We'll see if Pat Nosswalt's available to be face down after dreaming his first bottle of Jack Daniels like I was freshman year. Yeah, I think this is going to be a real fun movie, but I think it's like, you know, not to get movie nerd for a second. Like, Danny Boyle is pretty good at a lot of things. I don't necessarily know if, unless this has got a real cynical bent that I'm not seeing in the trailer,

I'm a little bit worried this is going to get a little slumdog millionaire for me, which was a film that people really love, but people... Yeah, that was a miss for me, too. I wasn't a fan. But yeah, this is... They sold it to me just on the premise of it,

which is like, I love when a movie does that. Like, taken, for example, was just like, they showed me him giving the speech, and I was like, that's it. I'll see this fucking movie. You got me. And it's the same thing here.

Yeah, I agree. I do look forward to... The trend now in Hollywood, by the way, is to take movies like, this and have it remade a few years later for a black audience. So I look forward to Kevin Hart discovering that he lives in the world where Eddie Murphy didn't exist and just does his joke. Oh, wait, that is this world. It's the same joke. All right. By the way, speaking of movies, we should also mention something hockey related. On this very podcast recently, we lamented the fact

that there are no new line nicknames in hockey. Apparently, according to some of our readers and listeners, there is now one in Long Island, or on Long Island, for the Islanders. And it was coined by Barry Trott. Are you aware of this? Have you had about this? No, I'm not aware of this. Is this the E equals MC squared, or do they have like another? Oh, no. This is a line that he coined, online featuring noted, well-loved veterans, Leo Kameroff and Voltaire Fupola.

it is called the fix-it-felix line, a reference to the movie Wreck-it-Ralph, of course, the video game character who is constantly trying to wreck it when Fix-It Felix is trying to fix it, and he says that this is the Fix-It-Felix line. These two guys are sort of my, like, Fix-It-Felix. If you need someone to be fixed, sometimes you send it to that line and it gets fixed. So the Fix It Felix line, despite neither of those guys being named Felix, is the name that Barry Trots is bestowed upon this line. So there you go. I'm going to look up what their on-ice PDO is this year because I have a feeling that it's high. Because those two guys are, what's the word I'm looking for? Bad. So you're saying that you think they're more of a wreck at Ralph line than a Fixed Felix line.

I think in the long run, I think if you give them more than 45 minutes together or whatever the number is, I think you're going to end up looking at a, come on, natural stat trick, here we go. And the Islanders have a 2-1 lead entering the third period. And Fupo and Kamaroff looking at it, they're like, we're going to wreck it. You know what, that is a terrible line name, but I respect, I respect Barry Trots for being like, I feel a connection that he only, the only movie references he knows are like kids movies. All right.

What do you think, what do you think those two guys is on ice save percentages together in about 540 minutes this year? This is interesting because the Islander's save percentage as a team is like pretty fucking high. It's like 925. I would say, so the way you're selling this obviously tells us this is going to validate your opinion

about these players. Of course it is. I'll say it's, I'll say it's, I'll say it's, I'll say it's, I'll say it's, I'll say it's, I'll say, 9.30. The answer is 9.58. So they did fix it. They fixed it. Wow. Right on.

958. That is, there you go. That, like, I don't know that I've ever actually seen one that high. And it's in 500 minutes. So, like, that's not a small sample. They've been together most of the year. They fix it. Now, you've, I've seen you on Twitter a few times in between tweets about, you know, climate change and, you know, the Edmonton media, which we'll get into.

But you seem to believe that the Islanders are not, are not sustainable. Boy, Greg, I don't know if this has come up earlier in the year. But no, I mean, like, like you said, they have two goalies who are like, okay, that now they're nine, they're both 930 or something like that. and the league average is down. I don't buy this at all. Come on. But maybe it's the Jacques Lamar fan in me that believes that, you know, if you have a system and you have the structure and clearly Trots has come to that team, there are shots per game

or shots against per game or is down by like five on average from last season, which is insane. Yeah, but, but it is, though. And I'm saying to you that like, I think that it could be sustainable. Well, from a defensive point of view, do they have enough horses to fucking compete in the playoffs? clearly not, which is why they should trade for Panarin. But, like, that's, I think that from a defensive standpoint, I could see this continuing on. I don't.

With that defense, with that, like, that personnel. So the argument is that, and boy, I'm glad I get to relitigate this again for all these people that are going to be in my mentions about it. But, no, like, the argument is that Barry Trots always has an okay, coursey, but a pretty high expected goal difference. Uh-huh. And my argument is high-end players always outperform their expected goal difference. Alex O'Berichkin, Nick Baxter, Evgeny Kuznetsov, John Carlson, Braden-Holtby,

you're always going to outperform that. And do the Islanders have guys like that? Obviously they don't, right? They have, like, one guy like that. Right, they have Matt Barsall. And do they have a, like, who's their best defenseman? Is it still Nick Letty? like one yeah because they're trying

they're trying to sell me on well you know Devon Taves came into the lineup and it really turned everything around and it's like the Quinnipiac guy the the HL guy who barely made it you know you say you say all this shit without acknowledging that they have the fix-it Felix line and the best fourth line in the NHL so go fuck yourself they're great yeah that's right

Sean do you believe the Islanders are sustainable well I mean And sustainable, the thing is that, I mean, Ryan's right, they're writing a goaltending, you know, hot streak that probably isn't sustainable in the big picture. I don't think Robin Lanner is suddenly even given all the changes he's made in his life that he's suddenly, you know, one of the very best goaltenders in the entire league. But we've seen goalies go hot and stay hot for an entire season. And, like, there's a part of me that thinks when you get to the 60 game mark and you're still doing it, you know, maybe it's not sustainable in the big five-year picture, but is it sustainable for the last 20 games of the season and into the playoffs?

Like, at this point, it could be. Yeah. You know, I mean, I don't think the Islanders are, you know, like I finally this week put them in my top five on the power rankings. I don't think on paper they're the fifth best team in the league. But when you start getting into who has the best chance of winning a Stanley Cup and you look at them, you know, the gaps closed a little bit, but they'd open up a bit of a gap on top of the division.

The rest of the division seems like a mess. You know, like, things are falling into place here. And, you know, obviously, if they were to win a couple rounds and have to go up against Tampa, they're going to be the big underdogs there. That's the thing. Like, I think, I think that they're a, their ceiling is two rounds. Like, their ceiling is they could make the conference final. Absolutely.

They could make the conference final with that, with that, by playing the style of defense, and then they get fucking marauded by whoever comes out of the Atlantic. I mean, right now they might be, and this will make Islander fans mad at me. But they've got kind of a vibe of like a better version of the 2017 senators where it's not, I said a better version. It's not a better version. But it's like it's, you know, they're, they're a good team, but everything is also falling

into place. And, you know, that's, that's senators team, you know, they got the two, you know, very good matchups. And then they went into a conference final. And, yeah, they, they lost two. to the eventual cup champs, but they took it to game seven overtime. So, you know, I don't think there is such a thing as a ceiling of logic that has the Ottawa senators right where they want to be in 2019. And like that's the thing.

So that wasn't sustainable in the big picture. But that year, yeah, you know, 60 games in, they were what they were. And it did turn out to be sustainable. I do look forward to the next season after this run for the Outers when lose like era, we will trade off first round pick for Matthew Shane. We're that close. Yeah, no, because that's the thing. We can do that right now.

That's the thing Don wasision from the athletic said the other day, or maybe yesterday, where he said, you know, any guy, any team that's going to trade with the Islanders should really be angling for their 20-20-first round pick and not their 2019. That was a great point. I love that. That was fantastic, and he's completely right. All right. Well, there's the Islanders. Hey, so we should probably stick with hockey stuff before we get into Twitter beefs.

Randy Carlyle was finally fired. Always tough to fire a friend. Always tougher when you've stuck with that friend far too long because he's your friend, despite every single fucking, you know, mile marker telling you that you're going in the wrong direction. But he gets fired. And then, of course, what happens last night, boys? The Ducks play their first game with Bob Murray behind the bench. Getslaff fights, Kessler fights, they all look like they're back into it, and all of a sudden now we're talking about, like, they've got their mojo back. They're playing harder for Bob Murray because he's the guy who could hire or fire them, even though they all have trade protection,

and Kessler and Getslap are completely unaffected by him being behind the bench. I think the big change, as far as I'm concerned, is former UMass Lowell goal contender, Kevin Boyle getting between the pipes. There it is. Big shutout in his first NHL start, and I got to tell you, nobody should be surprised by this.

No, not at all. Not at all. It's so funny when you see, like, that's why, that's why, what are the most interesting trends, I think, that we've had in the last 20 years in the NHL? And maybe we haven't, like, written enough about it because we're all sort of afraid that these guys are all going to turn to pumpkins at some point. Like, you don't have to do the Carrie Price thing anymore. Like, you can just fucking find goalies.

Well, so I don't know that that's true. Because every time, you know, somebody's like, like, look, you can ride anti-Niemi to a cup to a cup win. Then 15 teams try that the next year, and all 15 of them are mediocre or worse. No, that's a, that's an understand. I understand what you're saying. And I understand that, like, we're living in a world where Andrei Vasilleschi, I think was a first round pick, right?

Like, clearly the cream of the crop does have goalies that they drafted high and then developed. But then you see, like, Jordan Bittington come up and, you know. Yeah, but do we think Jordan Binnington? who's a 26-year-old goalie who's been average at best in the NHL for five years? Like, do we think he's a 9-30 goalie like he has been? I don't fucking Keith Kincaid got the devils out of the playoffs last year, for God's sakes. Yeah, Keith Kincaid. Once.

How's he doing this year, Greg? Shitty. Yeah, exactly, because he sucks. I don't know. Like, I think ultimately you're probably right in the sense that, like, when you look at Winnipeg and you look at Tampa, you look at Nashville, you look at Nashville, Bishop, I think, was Bishop a high pick or was he a low pick? I think he was a second rounder, but Connor Hallibuck wasn't a high pick.

He was like the fourth or fifth round, I want to say. Okay. Another UMass little goalie. If you took the top eight teams in the league, the majority of them probably drafted their goalies high. But I'm still saying that you don't necessarily, I think there's probably been more goalies. Well, first of all, goalies aren't really taken in the first round, but I bet there was more goalies, brought in with lofty expectations who didn't pan out, you know, versus a bunch of guys that maybe were developed within the system and came through. Like, I, I feel like that's been the trend,

but maybe I'm wrong. Who's, who's the fucking saying? I think, I think that's mostly right that, like, you know, teams are now taking the Jonathan Quick approach and, you know, saying, you know, we can get a good goalie in the fourth or fifth round. It's not a big deal because, you know, goalies are, as the saying goes, goalies are voodoo, right? Like, they're just hard to project. And look no further than that situation. Quick was 72nd overall third round in 2005,

and a guy who was backing him up this season was the 11th overall pick in 2010 in Jack Campbell. Right. Who never became the guy that he was drafted to be. And the thing, it takes him so long to develop that even, you know, you're right. Like, you know, a guy like Carter Hellibuck isn't necessarily a high pick, but by the time he arrives, he's considered a top goaltending prospect and he's got a lot of, but you're right.

Like, goaltenders to me, and I've been thinking of this for a while. Like, goaltenders to me are starting to feel a lot like kickers and football in the sense that there's more of them out there than jobs available. There's a few really good ones. And if you've got a really good, reliable one, that's awesome. But if you don't, that's, you know, in theory, that's not too big a deal because there's lots of guys. out there, a guy that maybe you don't think of as a star might have a great year. And if he doesn't have a great year, you go out and get somebody else, you can do it. The problem is, like, you know, goaltending in hockey and kicking in football, if you don't

have it, you are screwed and it can ruin your entire season. So I understand why, you know, I see this from time to time. Somebody will say, like, you know, if I was in NHLGM, I would just sign like three or four guys, veterans at low salaries, let them find it out. chances are one of them's going to have a big year. And yeah, chances are they will. But if they don't, you've just screwed your entire season and you're going to take the blame for it as a GM.

I understand why teams would rather go out there, lock somebody in long term, and just say, he's our guy. I'm done with this position. And if he doesn't play well, that's on him, not on me for not having a guy in here. Yeah. There's a lot of guys that should be in the league right now that aren't. I could still be playing goal time door for the Philadelphia Flyers, but that in a place with no parks or with bears because of Chinese tigers and also the galaxy.

Pris is cooked. I'm just kidding. Yeah, it's a weird deal. The ducks are, of course, going to turn their season around now. Yes or no? Yeah, Kevin Boyle. They're only, what, six points out of the playoffs? They could get right back into it. I think, I think, I mean, if I'm Bob Murray, I'd just remove any, you know, any speculation right now, make myself a full-time coach going forward. I mean, this is clearly, I mean, it's easy. I mean, geez, this is like, first time out there. To be fair, they got to play the Canucks. He's a savant. Oh, yeah. He's a natural

with this. I wouldn't be surprised if they rallied to make the playoffs, only because there's enough on this roster to be a playoff team. It's just they finally got rid of the fucking shitty coach that was holding them back. I mean, for God's, like, and this is like the single, maybe most predictable thing that was going to happen this season was the minute that John Gibson couldn't carry the team anymore, they were going to

fucking fall apart because they'd been terrible. since the first night. Anybody could have seen this. So it was like malfeasance to not have fired Randy Carlisle previous to this. Yeah, that's the thing. I don't think they're going to make the playoffs. I think they're going to miss the playoffs by two or three points. And we're all going to look back and say that sticking with Randy Carlisle was the worst

decision that any GM made all year. Because like I, I got to say, man, like I, as a Lee fan, I lived through the Randy Carlisle experience. And so I haven't been a huge fan of him as an NHL coach who moves the needle. But, I mean, when you get fired and you get replaced by somebody who has literally never done that job before, and they come in and immediately start doing it better than you did. Like, that, that hurts. Like, that's, that's rough. Yeah, it's basically the premise of an Adam Sandler movie.

Like, the coach gets fired, and then all of a sudden they turn to you. They're like, stick boy, do you want to take over? I can be the coach. And then he just leads them to within two or three points of the playoffs. It's fantastic. It could happen. With somebody, I believe it was Lambert, wanted to talk about Gerard Gallant, his heel turn against the Golden Knights this week as he was exasperated by how shitty they were playing. Yeah, like, I just think that they haven't been playing that shitty.

Like, he's like, I can't believe these fucking guys are the worst. And it's like, I don't know. Like, they're not amazing like they were last year. But like, on the back. balance, they've been really good this year. And obviously some of that's going to be like trying to light a fire under guy's asses or whatever. Right.

But I was just like, you know, I can't get like super mad at these guys for only being third in a conference with two of the best teams in the league, like, or a division rather. Yeah, he, he seems super pissed because the effort wasn't there, I guess, in the third period. You don't want to lose the fucking coyotes for sure. So. You certainly don't. You certainly don't. But they, you know, they're, they're a funny team.

Like, I, you know, I can't quite figure out what they're, I mean, we'll talk about the deadline later. Like, I can't quite figure out what they're going to try to buy. You know, they're going to buy something because their owner is like, we need a Stanley Cup now that we played for one. And, uh, and they've got a ton of assets to trade. But like, I don't, I just think overall their date, when I've, when I've seen them play, they're not the same sort of like pain in the ass to play against that they were last

season. And I'm not quite sure where that change happened. maybe it's they don't have the chip on their shoulder anymore. I don't know. That's like playing pop psychologist here. But they just don't look like it's hard to play against this last year. Well, I think... Go ahead, Sean.

I was just going to say, the thing that I find interesting about them is I'm looking at them and the standing is right now. As of Thursday morning, they're eight points back of Calgary, nine points back of San Jose. So they're basically, that was a three-team race for the Pacific, and it's a two-team race now. But they're nine points up on the Canucks for third in the Pacific. So they're going to make the point. playoffs. They're basically this year's version of, do you remember last year with the Leafs where for the entire season we knew they were finishing third in the Atlantic? And it was kind of like, okay, so what do

you do when you already know you get 25 games left and you know where you're going to finish? You know, it gives you the opportunity to do some things. You can try some things. You can put people maybe higher in the lineup than you might want to and sort of see what they can do. You can rest your goaltender more than you might. You can rest your player. You can give guys nights off. and everything. And the Leifes didn't do any of that last year. The Leifes basically just kept pedaled in the medal, kept playing exactly the same way,

started Frederick Anderson 65 times or whatever it was. And, you know, I'm not saying that's why they lost in the playoffs, but, you know, he certainly wasn't very good. And they didn't really have a chance to learn much about, you know, the younger players on the team. And I'm curious to see whether Vegas takes advantage of that opportunity or whether Gerard Gallant treats it like Mike Babcock did and basically just says we're going to keep doing

the exact same things that we always do and just see wherever it winds up. I'm going to say option B. Yeah, I think that's probably, I think that, well, especially because unlike the Leafs, this is a team of, like, guys who have been around for the most part, right? Like, these are all guys who have been in the league four or five years minimum. And certainly, you know, the best players on that team, your pet your Redis and your top line from last year with Riley Smith and Will, Will, William Carlson and all that.

But to Greg's point about them being hard to play against or whatever, I think their underlying numbers are like relatively similar to last year. But you know what isn't is their PDO is pretty bad this year. And last year it was really good. And like, really good, yeah. And I think that is a thing where, you know, goals going in and not going in is often what gets,

what like presents itself as being hard to play against, right? Like, if you're really good at keeping the puck out of the net and the team has a 917 save percentage or whatever, you know, that's great. But if it if the next year it's only a 908 save percentage, that looks like, oh, you know, we're slacking off on defense a little bit, blah, blah, blah. I think, I think there's something to be said for the eye test. Like you look at the devils this year and they're like a fucking pushover compared to how they played last season. just like they're playing in the neutral zone, their forecheck, like they're just not the same team. And in Vegas's case, like, when you saw Vegas play last year, like, it was like watching wave after wave after wave of line come at you and they would just fucking control pace and take over games. And it's just not been as consistent.

Not to say they still can't do it because I've seen them play well this year. But like, like, I just feel like it's not the same vibe. But you know what it is, though, boys? Maybe sometimes they're just tired. They play a lot of games last year. Maybe they need a little rest and, you know, if you need some good rest. This is a real good one. There's only one place to look and that's our friends at Lisa mattresses.

Everybody has the right to rest, including the Golden Knights. The key to getting your best rest, the right mattress. Meet Lisa with two awesome mattresses plus accessories and bases for better, deeper rest. The all foam Lisa mattress is new and improved featuring cooling LSA 200 foam, except no substitute. for enhanced pressure relief for side sleepers, or rest on their Sapira hybrid mattress, the perfect combination of foam and spring for pressure relief and edge-to-edge support. Get on your edges, boys. Lisa's mission is to provide a better night's sleep for everybody,

and from day one, Lisa set out to create a company with heart, like hard or heart. That's why they donate one mattress for every 10 they sell to organizations that work in causes, like foster care prevention. Underreported aspect of Carter Hart's whole thing is that he really does a lot of work with foster kids. Yeah, right. And he's also very springy and provides the flyers a cushion. To date, they've donated more than 32,000 mattresses through more than 1,000 nonprofits. I've got a Lisa mattress. It's great. When I'm not on it, I miss it. The foam completely encapsulates me. Lick them in the womb. Don't miss Lisa's President's Day sale. Get 15% off any mattress for a limited time at Lisa.com.

That's L-E-E-E-S-A-com slash soup. And then use the promo code soup. That's L-E-E-E-S-A-com slash soup. Promo code soup. Don't Mr. President's Day Sale. My favorite president is William Taft because he was morbidly obese, and it always fascinated me that he got elected despite that fact. If it was today, Lambert, and there was Instagram. I don't think that William Taft would get elected personally.

Yeah, we don't have a morbidly obese president now, that's for sure. Look what happened to Chris Christie. Everybody started making jokes when he showed up on that beach after he closed the beaches and then he was on the beach by himself with his family and the helicopter caught him. That was very cool. I think the same fate would befall William Howard Taft. Do you have a favorite president, Lambert? Abraham Lincoln, I guess.

Probably one of the very few just wars we've ever been involved in. Yeah, that's a pretty good one. Sean, do you have a favorite prime minister? Yeah, I was going to say, if you guys think I'm not down with movies and pop music, you should hear my takes on U.S. presidential history. Is there a good prime minister? Were you a, I don't know, I'm going to just name some. Did you like Brian Mulroney?

He was fine, I guess. Do you like Justin Trudeau? He seems a bit of a rock star. Yeah, we all like him, but he's involved in a big scandal now that nobody understands. It's literally, like, it's great. Like, you know, I love, you know, for all the issues you guys are having down there, like your scandals are easy to understand. It's like the president.

The president punched an orphan. So we're all going to be mad about that for like three hours and then move on to something else. Whereas we've got like something. Well, hold on. What's the Justin Trudeau scandal? Did he forget to wipe down the equipment? There was some contractor or some company that was working with the government and they did something wrong. but then there may have been pressured for them not to be prosecuted to the full extent.

And did that come from the prime minister's office and this and that? But it's one of those things where like every article on it has like 18 paragraphs explaining who is doing what and where all this comes from. And we all just kind of go along and nod, but not one of us up here actually understands what's happening. It's a real teapot dome scandal. It's a real teapotome scandal. Exactly. Why doesn't it just end like every other Canadian political scandal with our, everybody apologizing.

Well, it probably will accept the problem is we've got an election coming up soon, so it, this could be like, this could be the scandal that results in the Rockstar being, being, like, imagine the worst Canadian Trump impersonator that you can imagine. And like, that's, that, that may be what we're doing with.

Doug Ford. Well, okay, so the second, the second worst. I was going to say Martin Short doing Donald Trump would be the worst Canadian. I would vote for that guy. I would 100% vote. vote for Martin Short doing that. So are elections in Canada like here,

like are you inundated with fucking propaganda and shit at all times leading up to your elections or no? No, because our elections, like, we're more like the bridge system where elections are called. They're not like every four years where we know well in advance. So what happens is they call an election and they tell us there's going to be an election in a month. And then we're inundated for like a month,

but it's not like you guys where you're already in election season. Let's really break down this 2020 field, by the way. It's going great. Hold on. Can I just, I will freely admit not being familiar with either of these political systems. When you say it's called, it just like one day, someone's just like, let's have an election and then like a month later you have one. Who says that, though? Yeah, the ruling party, like there's a limit to how long you can serve.

But the, you know, so at some point in there, the ruling party has to say, okay, we're going to hold an election. they dissolve parliament and there is a new election held. And so if you're the ruling party, you might be forced into it. There's certain scenarios where maybe you don't have the support anymore and you have no choice. But generally, you're trying to pick your spot where you feel like you're in the best position to win an election. And then you kind of hit the reset button. And if you win, you've got three to five more years in power. And if you lose, then somebody else.

So there's a strategy to it. And the nice thing is we don't have to talk about elections. for like two years in advance like you lovely folks seem to like to do. Yeah, it sounds like you really have to pick your spot. It's like in bar trivia, when you circle that little B at the bottom of the sheet to double your score for that round because you think you're going to do really well that round. It sounds like that's exactly like it is.

That's actually how it's explained in our constitution. It's exactly that way. Speaking of Canada, Ryan Lambert made more friends this week. I would say renewed acquaintances. Okay. enough. Mark Specter tweeted, over the years, we've watched every Oilers coach reached this point. Oh, we should stop before we get there, by the way. There's some background here. Thoughts on Ken Hitchcock. Elliot Friedman reported that there was a rumor going around

that Ken Hitchcock was going to fucking quit last weekend. Just walk away from the fucking team. I am, first of all, it is a stunning thing to have. have that appear in Elliot's column. Like, I don't think he necessarily traffics in that level of rumor. But on the same side of that coin, it's the fucking greatest rumor to ever report. Yeah, that's so awesome. So fed up with that team. He was going to walk away from it.

And just to be clear, it wasn't like at the end of the season where we all figure there's a good chance Ken Hitchcock will walk away. This was like, like, now. Yeah, my man was like, it's February 8th. I got to get the fuck out of here while I still. can. I've been here for like seven weeks. This sucks.

But like I said, like I said, I did a ranking of the coaching changes since last April, and I had him last, I don't have any problem with him walking away. He had one job. His job was to save Peter Shearrelli's job. You couldn't do it. So your work here's done. You're not there to fucking serve at the pleasure of Keith Gretzky. You were there to save Peter Shearrelli's job, and you couldn't.

So if you wanted to walk away tomorrow, I'd be like, fine. The one thing you were paid to do, you couldn't do. Yeah. Well, I mean, he was, when he was brought in, it was made, clear that it was, this could potentially be a short-term thing. So, yeah. But, but, yeah, him dramatically quitting. I hope he quits in the middle of a game.

Just walks out the bench, throws a clipboard on the ice and just fucking storms out. Yeah. I hope there's like a game where, like, the Oilers come out and like, they give up a goal on the first shift and they cut to a shot of Ken Hitchcock behind the bench looking angry. And then they give up another goal and they cut to a shot of him looking even angrier. And then there's another goal and they cut to a shot of him just simmering.

And then there's a fourth goal and they cut to a shot and he's just not. there. And the players are just looking around and you just look and you just see like a door flapping in the distance where it's like, yeah, he's done. You get that, that stationary camera that they have in the hallway between the bench and the dressing room. You just see him waddling away with like a copy of a book on the Battle of Manassas in his hand going to the coach's room and just, he's getting. Yeah. And he pulls off his hockey sweatshirt to reveal a retirement sweatshirt or whatever else he would say. Just that's it. Goodbye. All right.

So Mark Specter tweeted, over the years, we've watched every Oilers coach reach this point. Hitchcock got there last night. It's bigger than him, the culture problem in Edmonton, bigger than any of them ever think it is. To which Ryan Lambert, America's sweetheart, wrote, Imagine being in the yes man local media and not realizing you're part of the culture problem. To which Mark Spector responded, sorry? To which Ryan Lambert responded. you liked the Hall trade, you liked the Luchchich signing, and as of 1.15, January 15th,

we're saying he's providing hope that he can turn it around. You still back Chris Russell as a valuable piece. You said Ken Hitchcock was the perfect hire. You're about face on all of this is, let's say, conveniently timed. You don't get to agree with every bad decision the organization made over a multi-year period to get more identity that bought the team to this point and then also go, boy, whatever's going on is fucked up. You liked everything they did. You fucked up, dude. Get a clue. To which Twitter cop and good taste arbiter, Ryan Rishog, then jumped in to say, don't engage with the lippy trolls spec. Zero discussion of value to be had here. Keep on, keep it on.

Like he's a fucking convoy trucker. To which Mark Spector said, yep, out. So, lippy troll. What say you about this? intense exchange with the Edmonton media. So, I mean, like, I'm right, of course. Right? Like, what are we fucking talking about, dude?

Like, Mark Spector, here's Mark Spector. Peter Cheorelli makes any, like, in asterisks, like it's on Twitter. Peter Chiarelli makes any move. Great decision by Peter Chiarelli. This is a really good one. And then, uh, four years. years later when it doesn't work out because anybody could have seen it coming

that it doesn't work out Mark Spector's like wow, I'm real and you know in hindsight this was a bad deal but who could have seen it coming and the thing I compared it to in the power rankings I do

this week was like if you have a shitty old car and you get a new coach or a new mechanic and the new mechanics It's like, well, here, won't we get rid of the steering wheel? Why don't we get rid of the stick shift that works pretty good? And you know what?

Let's swap those out for a couple of glove compartments, a new spare tire, a couple of headrests for the back seat. And then the Edmonton Media is like, boy, this thing is just a few pieces away from being able to be in the Indy 500. Right? And then you win a contest where you have the worst car in the world, and they let you put a free Ferrari engine in it. And they go, now, if you had a nice driver, this would fix everything. And like you go, well, wait a minute, this car sucks.

It's terrible. I don't care if it has a Ferrari engine in it. It's missing two wheels. And the Edmonton media goes, well, you know what? a lot of mechanics would actually put more glove compartments in there. And that's the fucking Edmonton media. The thing that drives me the... I know.

The thing that drives me the most mental about Spector besides the, you know, the fucking ping-pong game of opinion that goes on in his head, where it's contrarian for one week and then it goes to completely opposite way the next week. the fucking Luchich saga like it is it is it is settled law that that is a fucking horrible signing

but every few weeks like a goddamn groundhog he puts his little fucking head up and starts like I don't know two assists in six games he could be turning it around and just like what the fuck are you talking about

just because you like the guy and he's obviously a source like you can't keep doing this bullshit of trying to relitigate what is without question one of the most regrettable contracts has been signed in last fucking six years. Like, it's insane to me that he keeps doing that.

Anyway, you're a lippy troll. Yeah, we all know that. And boy, I wonder if the fact that he's like the head of the PHWA has anything to do with all these people rushing to his defense every time he fucking says another dumb shit thing about how bad the fucking oilers are.

Like, literally last night, he had a tweet in the middle of the Oilers game. Look, people don't want to talk about it, but McDavid and Drysidl need to be better defensively. And it's like, you have to be fucking kidding me, dude. Like, you just, you just defended all of this shit and said there's something in the water. But no, no, no. The worst part about that was like, he was one of the guys who was like, the Ken Hitchcock signing is great because it'll make McDavid and Drysidal better.

Yeah. I didn't even do that. Incredible. Two things here. First of all, I just want to say I love the fact that this, this big. fight between the, between Canada and America begins with the, like, the first punch thrown by the Canadian is literally him saying sorry. That is such a Canadian, that is such a Canadian flame war. Sorry, question mark.

And then just like 18 angry tweets, just directed right out of it. Here's, I'm going to say something on the subject of the Oilers because, and I got to be careful how I phrase this. Because this, if I put this wrong, it's going to sound like I'm making a really bad take. and I'm actually trying to do the opposite, but I'm going to be, I'm going to tread carefully. I mean, do you know what show you're on? I mean, it's fine if it's really bad. Good point. Here's the thing.

The Oilers, like, it seems like the debate with the Oilers lately has been this whole idea that it is a culture problem and that it's a... Well, Sean, there's something in the water. Something in the water, it's the compete level, the hard, like the effort level just isn't there. And I'm firmly of the belief that the problem in Edmonton is self-evidently and obviously the lack of talent. And that if there's any sort of problem around the effort level, it's simply a result of the fact that the players aren't stupid and they know they don't have enough talent and they know that they're going to get their teeth kicked in most nights. And so that probably over the course of a long season might affect your commitment and effort levels. but I understand that there are some people who don't buy that,

and they think that it's an effort and culture thing. And the thing that strikes me is what happens whenever anybody points any kind of criticism at Connor McDavid? Because if you are going to believe that the problem in Edmonton is culture and compete level and just wanting it, You know, you can't want it. The coaches can't want it more than the players was Hitchcock's line, I think. Right. If you actually believe that that is the issue, then you have to think Connor McDavid is part of the problem because he's the captain of this team.

He's the face of the franchise. He's the guy the whole team is built around. And so, you know, when somebody who seems to think that it's a culture issue comes after Connor McDavid, to me, that's the only thing you can do. You can't say it's a culture issue for everybody, but not Connor McDavid. David. He's your leader. It's got to be part of his problem. I don't think it is a Connor McDavid problem because it's a talent issue. And if we're talking about talent, Connor McDavid's most talented player in the league, and it would be ridiculous to say that he's

not doing enough. But I do think that it's interesting to me that there are people out there who seem like they want to say that the Oilers problem is a culture and effort problem, and yet they don't want to point any fingers at Connor McDavid. To me, that's a a giveaway that you don't you actually know deep down that it's not a culture problem. You know that it's actually a talent problem. And that's why it sounds so ridiculous to even suggest that Connor McDavid has to shoulder any of this. Well, so my thing with that is I see what you're saying and I like mostly agree with it. But like my thing is how are you in the fucking hockey business and you think it's a culture problem? Like it like you said, it's self evidently not a culture problem. Or, you know, it's a culture problem underlying a complete lack of talent, right? Like, they're not, like you say, like if I'm Connor McDavid, yeah, I'm not fucking, if everybody else is standing around on defense, which is what happened on the goal that kind of led Spector to say that, like, everybody else was standing around and Connor McDavid was also standing around. So, like, do we want Connor McDavid just fucking going balls to the wall on every shift because everybody else? sucks and isn't trying.

Like, I think that's an unfair standard to put on him at the end of the day where it's like, hey, you're going to lug around a bunch of fucking no talents all year. And it's February, it's a midweek game against a team. You don't care about playing. Like, they're not a big rival or anything. I want you to really be fucking up for this one. By the way, your four points out of the playoffs. It is, but hold on.

It is a culture problem. But the problem is that they are not going to identify where the culture problem comes. from, and it comes from Kevin Lowe and Craig McTavish and Bob Nicholson. And, you know, when you have eight coaches in 10 years, and in that 10 year span, you've made the playoffs, you've made the playoffs once. And it was almost an accident. Yeah. Yeah.

It's a fucking culture problem. It completely is. But the issue is that it's not a culture problem necessarily of the making of the players. They're just marinating in it. And we saw it, too, with the Taylor Hall teams. Like, they marinate in it. They had no fucking confidence. They would blow leads left and right in the third periods because they had, there was no reason for optimism or no reason for confidence.

And also a lack of talent. Like, that definitely plays into the way of the leads. You're completely right. I mean, and you could say that one causes the other, but without question, there's a toxicity in that organization. The problem being is that the people that could actually try to affect change to that end and say, you've got to get rid of these guys that for a decade have mismanaged this organization into the fucking ground. they're never going to do it. They're friends. No one's going to fucking go after Kevin Lowe.

He's a fucking dynasty oiler for fuck's sake. So of course they're not going to go to the root of the problem. We're just going to nibble around the fucking edges up there. That's always been the issue. Yes, absolutely. But that goes back to my thing of the media's part of the fucking culture problem. That's the whole argument I made. Well, you're a bit of a lippy troll.

Right. But, like, that was my point is that, like, Mark Spector is as much, of a fucking problem is Kevin, well, maybe not as much of, but certainly in the same ballpark as being the same kind of problem as Kevin Lower or Craig McTavish. And it's like, because he was around in the fucking 80s too. It's true. All right. Speaking of culture problems, Mike Russo is our guest this week. He, of course, is the multimillionaire from the athletic who bought his third house based on how many subscription signups he's had from the Russo Army in Minnesota. We talk about the wild. We talk

about Parisian Souter and that legacy. He used to be the beat writer for the Florida Panthers, so we get a bit into the Panthers and their issues with Anton Kudobin this week saying that a recent crowd reminded him quote of an exhibition game. So that's always good. And Russo's the best. We also talk about VEP. So that's always a good thing to talk about. So here is Mike Rousseau. Mike Russo is, of course, the predominant voice in Minnesota sports. The man who is behind the Minnesota faction of the athletic and one of the best damn beat writers in the NHL, before we hopped on, you had to go track down something.

What's it like being a Minnesota wild reporter in these Minnesota wild days that having with this franchise. Yeah, well, it's funny. I'm driving out to the eastern Burbs right now, which is about 30 minutes from where I live, and immediately you start thinking, I had the teams in the tank.

You just never know what's going to happen. So all of a sudden I started to get word that something might be happening, and that looks like it's to be a false alarm, but either way, it's like kind of in a panic, I ran home to get my laptop just because, you know, regardless, two weeks before the trade deadline

in any point, want to have your laptop with you. And so you just never know, right? I mean, this team is coming off one of the worst losses of the season. They've won once in the last seven games. And so you just always kind of want to be prepared, eventually something big. And for at least a five-minute span there,

I wasn't sure of what's going on. Now I kind of think it might be nothing, but I just figured, better be safe and sorry. What the fuck are they doing? Like, I remember when Fenton, Paul Fenton, got hired, the notion from the owner,

Craig Leopold was, oh, hey, we just need a few tweaks. Do you think that, like, Fenton actually ever believed that and has just waited this entire year knowing how things would go, and then he can come back to ownership and be like, actually, as you can see, more than a few tweaks, like, do you think that in a strange way, maybe this season has sort of validated what he kind of thought the plan would have to be

but couldn't really vocalize that when he got hired? Yeah. Yeah, I wouldn't shock me. I mean, I would say at a minimum that's the narrative now. I mean, and I'm not even saying that I know what Paul Fenton's thinking, but anybody with two eyes and a brain, let alone somebody that's been in hockey as long as Paul Fenton has, just looking at this product, and you could see they are far from being any sort of legitimate contender. And I do think that right now they are meeting, and a lot of it is letting me owner know,

look, you know, it's going to be painful probably, and I guess you got to sell tickets, but the reality is we're losing every night on home ice anyway, and the fans are going to stop showing up at this could be it, so we might as well make some potential critical moves here. So, you know, last summer

he did try to make some big-time hockey trades. None of them came into fruition, and eventually once you got past July 1, you just knew that they were going to have to go back to the whole tweaking thing. And then they added, you know, Greg Pattern and Free agency and J.T. Brown met Hendricks.

Then it really looked like he was abiding by the owner's wishes. But the reality is that even Craig Leapold at that point was giving him the green light to do whatever you want in terms of big trades. And those included guys like Meaderrider and Zucker. They were absolutely potentially on the outs here. And they wound up getting past July 1 and they weren't traded and one was resigned, extended. And it became kind of the whole tweaking narrative again. But I do think the owner is a smart guy.

realizes that this team needed some major overhauls and was going to let his GM do it. It just didn't happen. And now it's just a matter. Can you get it done now or do you happen in the summer? But I do think there are going to be some major moves here coming off regarding a lot of the poor players. And whether that's in the next two weeks before the trade deadline or this summer. But this just cannot continue. They're not good enough.

They're getting older. Their core has been unbelievable disappointment. Starting the last year's playoffs, where three of the guys had no points in the playoffs. So I do think that we're going to be some significant changes here. The Victor Rask for a need-a-rider trade, it kind of reminds you, like, when a studio pays a director a lot of money for, like, a five-picture deal, and the first picture flops. And they're kind of like, oh, shit, what have we done? Like, as a litmus test for Paul Fenton's acumen as a general manager, the Nieder-Rider deal is not exactly heartening, I don't say, is it? Yeah, yeah, it's definitely, you know, I'm not trying to make excuses for him, but first few years.

GMs make mistakes. I think if you go back to the Chuck Fletcher, his first year he traded Nick Letty, and I think that Chuck Fletcher will admit that it was probably his worst move in Minnesota. He just kind of lost his way here and just started thinking, you know, not thinking, you know, long-term and rationally about that situation. And since, tellerly here, you know, Paul Fenton, they have not been in love with Nieder 's contract. Niederrater was playing on the fourth line here at least the last week and a half,

and hadn't been playing well either. And so I think that they were just trying so hard for so long to trade him that when all of a sudden they called Carolina and Carolina was interested, he just jumped at the move instead of realizing that one, Victor Raff stinks, and two, his contract stinks. And now you've created kind of a bigger problem. And to give you an example, I mean, now Rask is hurt, so I don't want to, like, be stomping on somebody that's, you know,

Right, right, right, right. You know, the wild have lost Nico Kuovo for the year. They traded for a center, and last night, Bruce Bucro had to play Raskett wing. So on a team that desperately needs somebody to step at center because they just lost their guy for the year, they can't even play him in the middle because he's not one of their top three best centers. So it just, it didn't make move. Like, I get trying to get rid of Nider Rider. You know, I mean, they were not happy with them.

I know it looks horrific, especially now that he's off to such an amin. I think Starr playing with Sebastian Ahjo, but what he forgot was kind of the long-term things. And I think sometimes GMs, first-year GMs also, you know, the forward-thinking sometimes is not their biggest thing. I mean, we've seen it even with a couple of other moves with Brad Hutton and Antoinetteau. They really didn't make a lot of sense, and now it's really messed with the chemistry of this team. And so I do think that, you know, there have been some issues here that from a mismanagement standpoint, and the hope is that, you know, Rask could at some point come in and at least make a contribution, but right now it just certainly doesn't look good.

Now, so let's go back for a few years. Like, there's a big sort of revisiting of the idea of package deals with players now that, like, Panarin and Bobrovsky might have done this, like, where they're going to be, Timo and Korea. And there's been sort of a chatter about, like, whether or not that thing ever works. Parise and Souter were kind of a package deal in some ways. both coming to Minnesota. I mean, they weren't like buddy, buddy. It wasn't like we're taking our talents to Minnesota together.

But they certainly were too big signing at the same time and kind of tied together in that way. With the benefit of hindsight, would you say that that gambit was successful for the team? It was obviously successful for the players because they made a lot of money. But for the franchise, looking back on it, when you were hiding in the anti-Anse pretzel in the airport, trying to get Zach Parise's attention to interview him. Now that we've got some hindsight, was the pseudor and freezy thing, a successful thing for the franchise? Well, you know, I'll answer them two questions. From a business perspective, it actually absolutely changed the franchise from the standpoint.

One, they've made the playoff six years in a row, which only Pittsburgh has done more often. And from a business standpoint, this team was dying. I mean, Craig Leopold was dealing with an organization that was starting to really struggle getting guys seats in the building. fans in the seats and and they hadn't made the playoffs since 2008 and they were they were struggling and he was trying to make some pizzazz with a couple of hometown signs the problem is is well there been a couple problems one they were hit with the cap and capture after the fact um you know so so while even technically they were living by the rules then they they they are the ones paying the piper in hindsight if these guys ever retire right and the other big thing is that they

gave them superstar money when they're not superstars and the captain and accelerated to the way that they thought were that it has inhibited their flexibility to go out and ever get in on the Johnsaviruses of the world. But the other area where I, as a GM in hindsight, would never give deals this long, not that you can anymore, is it absolutely has handicapped their ability to ever put guys in roles where they could potentially succeed here. There are players here, whether it's Ryan or Zach or Miko Kuoivu, that have blocked out other guys. So, like, Eric Kala, never, ever, ever able to get into a position like he was in Vegas because he always had to contend with, you know, Eric Stahl and Nico Kovu and, frankly, Marty Kanzal even. And same thing here. I mean, Nino just never could get to a point of really elevating in the lineup because he's always behind the Parisis of the world.

or even Coyle Zucker, Grandlin, and those guys. So what it does is on a 13-year deal, it puts the coaches in a position, too, where you feel like you have to constantly keep them in their roles because you're going to create an atmosphere where now they're pissed off. And it just creates a dynamic where guys can't... In those 13 years, the hope is that you're going to have the Luke Cunnen's and the Erick and X and whoever's of the world

come in here, step in, and then all of a sudden be able to peel off being a top six forward. And if you constantly have number one defensemen and number one left wings and number one centers that are blocking those guys out, they can never succeed. And then all of a sudden you get into a situation where guys that need a right or a trade in and then all of a sudden they potentially are wrong. I mean, essentially what you're saying is that the team has been too veteran laden, right?

Like it's not just pre-zine and pseudo. It's a number of veteran guys that they've committed years to and committed, you know, to not move that have sort of clogged up the works and kept. And frankly, it's amazing because when you think about why Parisian suitors signed there, it's because they had, allegedly, all this youth in the pipeline to come up and eventually become a contender. So you're saying because the team was so veteran heavy, that youth never got a chance to really blossom there. Well, you know, the reality is also it has been now the seven seasons since they've been here. So, you know, a lot of the guys when they sign here that they kept on hearing about were the Zucker's Grammons and coils of the world,

roeating and players like that. And those guys became core members of this team. The problem is that core never was able to be good enough to get this team over the hump. So, you know, a Brazilian suitor got those 13-year deals, but the reality is they hope to win a hump in those first four or five years. Now they've hit year seven. The core hasn't been good enough. And now they've hit their, you know, 33-year-old ages here where the team just has sort of passed that window.

So, you know, from a business standpoint, I made all the sense in the world. but, you know, I did an oral history. I figured out when the exact halfway point of the contract was, and that was actually early January, and so in a way I did kind of a really cool oral history on the days that they led, the days that led at the actual signing of Freezing Theater, but it was also a way to write the story to kind of like,

hey, everybody, they still have six and a half years left. And so that ran early January, and the one thing that you will realize when you read that, which is a little scary, that I didn't even realize, is that this really was a spur of the moment's vision from the wild. There was always this narrative, the six months leading into pre-agasy that the wild were going to go after both Paris and Suter and try to tagging them. But the reality is inside the organization,

Chuck Wedger and Craig Leopold only fought and expected until we get one of them. And the plan to go after one minute, and all of a sudden, I mean, literally on the eve of them signing, it became real to Craig Leopold, the owner, like, wow, we can get them both. now suddenly want to play together. And then it was like a 10-second decision by Craig, yeah, let's do it. And probably much to the very discomfort of Chuck Fletcher, because he knew the commitment, and he knew that in years 5, 6, 7, if they didn't win, that all of a sudden it would hurt the flexibility in this team to potentially block other guys out from going.

And so, I mean, it's just an interesting thing that you can, you know, you can make such a million, multi-million dollar long-term decision where you invest $100. $196 million into two players and frankly change your franchise for the good and potentially eventually eventually for the bad if you don't get it and that decision actually wasn't over months and months of analyzing it was it was literally a 10-second phone call like how committed are you do you want them both you can have them both okay let's do it you know it's just it's a really interesting story and it's you know very much suggest that they go back to uh or the first week of January I wrote that story and it's

I mean, it took me probably 15 hours to write the article. Wow. I've seen this all together. You think these oral histories would be easy to write. They're actually very, very difficult. They're not. They're not easy at all. It's a lot of calling around and a lot of shit.

But luckily, it seems like you understand where they should be applied and where they shouldn't be applied. If I ever see another fucking oral history of a play that I just saw the night before, which is like a thing. The NBA is famous for this now where like a guy hits a shot to win a game, and the next morning, it's an oral history of that shot. Motherfucker, I just watched it. I don't need the oral tradition to tell me how important the shot is. I just watched it.

I understand. Now, is that story that you wrote locked or unlocked for on the athletic? I believe it is locked. But if you go to the athletic.com slash I know Russo, you get 40% off. you you are when I talk to the athletic people the people that you work with and not just on the hockey side I keep hearing about how you are an absolute marvel at having cultivated subscribers of having marketed

that you've made tons of money just by how many people have signed up because of you is that accurate well I don't know about that I mean we have I don't want to make it an infomercial and you know but we are so blessed with I mean it is every day I open up the app and my first hour and a half, two hours are just reading articles to my colleagues

and I'm just like, God, I'm not doing, like it gives me motivation, like, oh my God, I better get back on the, start working here and catch up to all these people. And so, you know, we've been really, yeah, in Minnesota alone, I mean, luckily I had a following and I will say that the first week and month that I started the athletic,

I was really concerned if people would follow me over and we surpassed our year their year expectation in terms of subscriber numbers, we hit in the first, like, weeks. Wow. It was really humbly, really cool. But what's really, you know, neat about the whole thing is, you know, honestly, like, when I for it and put out all these subscriber links and, you know,

please subscribe, please subscribe, I really do believe in it. Like, I just love it. I just, from a hockey fan perspective, I was a subscriber to the athletic before I was working for them. And I just love it. I just think that if you are a hockey fan, it's just the greatest place to go and read everything. And trust me, that doesn't mean you don't read everybody else.

I read you every day. Oh, that's sweet. And, you know, like the other day, you know, I went out to the Buffalo News, and I loved my Carrington piece on the column that he wrote on the, frankly, I made a horrible that I remember vividly, the aftermath of that continent airline. Oh, yeah.

The plane crash, yeah. For sure. I absolutely do newspapers, but to me, it's just, you know, because not the hockey. band and everybody's got a different voice and different things to cover. Let me ask you about a place he used to work. He used to work in Florida. It used to be the Panthers Beat writer. I think it's the first time I ever read you was as the Panthers beat when did you leave Florida? When did you leave that beat?

2005. 2005? Okay. Right after the lockout. Okay. So 14 years later, Anton Kudobin, goalie for the Dallas Stars, is talking about how the attendance is so low at Panthers games that it feels an exhibition game. 14 years after you left the beat, are you fucking fascinated that, A, these things are still being said there, and B, the team is still there to have these things said about it? Yeah, I mean, logically, I'm not, because I also... Terran, which when I was covering him, it's pretty much unbreakable until 2016. Yeah.

Yeah. Trying to get a new downtown arena, which, you know, if I was the government, I'd laugh at Adam. But, you know, I don't blame the fans there. Like, the one thing I, and we've talked about this before, the one thing I am sensitive to is I know there are passionate and knowledgeable fans down in South Florida, but there is so much entertainment dollars down there that could go around and you can do a thousand different things that if you are going to show up to Panther games, you want to see them win and you want to be entertained. And the reality is, is that they have not won a playoff round since 1996. There were a 23-year-old event, and

and women that have not seen this team win. They stink as an organization because they are so absolutely dysfunctional. And it's been a never-ending cycle for as long as I've been around. And so I blame the organization for this, and they've got to figure it out. The problem is that a lot of times that they figure out the way that they try to do it is go out and say, all right, we're going to fire Bob Boogner now. And we're going to get rid of Dale Tallinnor now. And we're going to have a new owner now.

And every time you do that, you start the plan over again, and it just leads more and more dysfunction. So I'll be interested to see here. This Bobroski-Tenarian tag team to Florida stuff, I believe, is absolutely real. I think there's a reason why he fired Dan Milstein and hired Paul Seeabana, and they both love South Florida. If they can figure out a way to get rid of Luongo's contract, there's a way that they can fit them both.

And I remember at the All-Star Break, the All-Star Break, which Columbus's last game was here in Minnesota. These two guys took a limo over to Minneapolis Airport, got on a private chartered aircraft that they chartered, and they flew together down to South Florida for their vacation for the All-Star break

in the by-week. And so these guys love it down there, and there's a lot of reasons. And they're at an age where this wouldn't, I think, for a reason to suit or I think this would be a potential game changer for that organization. Yeah, at least in the regular season with Bob.

I wanted to ask you about Minnesota fans real quick. On the level of psychosis, and you know what I'm talking from psychoses because you're an old New York fan. On the level of psychoses, rank the Minnesota fan bases for me, wild, T-wolves, twins, Vikings. Who is the least craziest to the most craziest? I would say that they are all equally crazy, and that's because of the nature of Minnesota sports. Every day in Minnesota sports fans wake up, and they've got to wake up and watch these teams that never seem to win. And then at the same time, watching some sort of team in Boston parade around with their championship trophy. And it leads to a lot of craziness here.

And these fans, I mean, I'm not kidding, not to dodge your question on who's the craziest, but these fans here deserve better. Every organization, every single year, it's the same thing. and they're getting tired of it, and you see it. You know, everybody came in his year expecting the Vikings would potentially have a championship, and next thing you know, they don't even make the playoffs and people get fired,

and it was just an awful season here, and same thing here. I mean, all of a sudden, you know, I remember kids had the press comments two years ago, everybody's all excited about the future of this organization, and next thing you know. The Butler thing happens? Yeah.

Yeah, so the Butler thing happens and everything. So, I don't know. It's just a mess. Real quick, pop culture. Tell me why I should care about trampled by turtles. They're just amazing. Amazing lives. They are, so Trampled by Turtles is a Minnesota based of bluegrass fans would be there

considered genre. But if you ever see them like at places like, you know, red rocks or basefront here in Duluth or down, you know, at First Avenue here where Prince makes famous. I mean, they are absolutely unbelievable musicians, great singers. They have a man-known player, a violin player, a violin player, a banjo player, acoustic guitar player is also their lead singer, a bass guitar player, and a stand-up bass, and if you love music, you will absolutely love them. And so I highly recommend them on Spotify.

Yes, I've become their biggest salesman. I mean, I was a huge fan of the band, before I became friends with them. Huge sports fans, too. And I do. I'm a groupie. I travel around. I follow them. I train the off season.

I show up at their concerts in North Carolina or Colorado or wherever. And I already am planning about three or four different concerts in summer to see them. That's so cool. They don't sound like Old Crow Medicine Show, do they? Or they sound different, like a different bluegrass? They're different, but I'm telling you, just go on Spotify, listen to songs like Winners, Midnight on the Interstack, Victory, way too long, alone.

You'll absolutely love them. The middle. Great, great band. All right. Last thing, you and I are both big fans of Veep on HBO. I don't want to turn this into a political discussion, even though it's a political show. But do you, I'm afraid that Veep can't be as good in a Trump world as it was in the early Trump days or pre-Trump. And I know that the creators of the show have talked about that, the struggles that they've had to keep their own sort of wild world spin in when the world itself is so wild. Are you as a VEP fan concerned about that at all?

Yeah, I mean, like, all I know is that when I turn on that show, it makes me laugh. I mean, she is, like, first of so, Julia-Louis-Ra-Lewis-Raeft is one of my favorite human beings in terms of being an actress. I just laugh every time from the days of Feinfeld and days of Saturday Live. And I just think she does a phenomenal job making her the most likable, unlikable human being ever. I mean, that character, what she has turned her into, is just hysterical. I mean, and it is just a great show of the level of incompetence of them, and I'm really looking forward to this final year on there. It's an ensemble that doesn't get the due that it deserves.

Like, every other ensemble, like Seinfeld, for example, like everybody knows how great the ensemble was and stuff. But, like, she's amazing, and then the characters they put around her are equally Jonah and Matt Walsh's guy. Like, all of them are so fucking funny that I was genuinely surprised after the first season how much I liked scenes that didn't involve her, which I didn't think would be the case because I thought she was the key to sort of everything on that show. But you can go a couple scenes now where it's just a supporting cast and it's still as funny.

Yeah, no, I totally agree with you. All right. Mike Russo is the best. Sign up. Where do people sign up for athletic crap again? Theathletic.com slash I know Russo. I know, Jesus, you're like, you're like a diamond salesman on billboards. I know Rousseau.

What is this shit? All right. Thank you so much, Mike. Here, Greg. Our thanks to Mike Rousseau here to talk about the foibles of the Minnesota Wild. There were a few times during our conversation where Rousseau was checking his phone and saw text messages come through and he was worried that news was going to break whilst we were doing our interview. So keep an eye on the wild in the near future as far as.

what might happen there. Listen, if they start really sucking and falling down the standings and it's just a huge disaster, that means one thing for all of you. Tickets will be available. And if tickets are available, there's only one place to get them, and that's with Seatkeek. You know, getting tickets online can be far too complicated with hundreds of sites and varying levels of reliability. It's hard to know hubba, hubba, hubba, money, money, money, who do you trust? That's why Seekek is the way to go. Seek pulls millions of tickets into one place so you can easily find. the seats that you want for a price you're willing to pay. Plus, every purchase is fully guaranteed so you can shop for tickets on Seekek with confidence. Make Seekek your go-to ticket source for everything from sports to concerts to comedy to theater. I use it all the time when I'm buying hockey tickets because of the big green circles. Go to the app.

Look at the big green circles. The bigger and darker and greener the circle, the better the deal it's going to be for you. And that's a good thing to know because sometimes you're looking at the price and you're like, ah, that seems reasonable. But then you look at the circle and it's like yellow and it's like, warning, do not get this ticket. So, Seekek makes it really easy for you to buy tickets. And we thank everybody who uses the Seekek app and sends us photos of themselves at the game because, frankly, our sponsor enjoys seeing that you use their product.

Best of all, listeners to Puck Soup can get $10 off their first Seekkeek purchase. Just download the Seek app today. Under the promo code Soup, S-O-P, that spells soup. That's promo code soup for $10 off your first Seekkeek purchase. Seek, life's an event. we have the tickets. I don't think we talk enough Canadian Football League on this podcast.

So I am delighted to bring the CFL into focus this week for a story that I honestly think might be the best Puck Soup football story that could ever be mentioned. The Toronto Argonauts, former home of Rocket Ismail and Bruce McNaul, have signed international defense

defensive linemen. This is how they phrase it. International defensive lineman, Poop Johnson on Wednesday. Poop Johnson is 26. He has played two seasons with the Winnipeg, Lou Bombers. He played with the Atlanta Falcons and the Kansas City Chiefs. And he is one

of these internet things where whenever his name gets back into circulation and the CFL certainly put it there by saying DT Poop Johnson has signed with Toronto Argonauts. Then it becomes a massive international sports story. Poop Johnson, signed by Toronto, Ryan. Yeah, that's...

I know who Poop Johnson is. I know what the Toronto Argonauts are, and I've definitely heard of the Canadian Football League. Poop Johnson got his nickname, according to Deadspin. In 2014, when he was still playing college football for the Kentucky Wildcats, the defensive tackle was asked about his fluctuating weight, so he was honest about his bowel movements, quote,

I try to poop like five times a day, three times a day, so it's hard keeping, it's hard to keep weight when you're, when you've got so much going out. Now, to break down the sentence structure here, I try to poop like five times a day, three times a day. That's 15 times, I think. How much is this guy eating? Yeah, right?

Like, it's, it must be like a garbage disposal to have that much fucking leaving his system. But that's how Poop Johnson got his name. And that kids is how Poop Johnson got his name. It's pretty incredible. He's good, like, this is going to be the most marketable player in Toronto Argonaut's history. But it's also like in the grand tradition of amazing sports names of which obviously the NHL has contributed not only. New Zealand, but also the great Cummy Burton back decades ago. Yeah. And we want to know if he got his nickname the same way that Poop Johnson got his nickname.

If he was at, how do you keep your weight off? Well, actually. Five times a day, three times a day. You know it. Poop Johnson. It's beautiful. And again, like, as a journalist, you are forever indebted to, players that give you a room to operate with headlines and put on some, you know, 100%. A hundred percent. His players should view an article is the straight poop, you know, it's just on and on and on. Poop in the dumps.

I hope it works out and the Argos don't have to drop poop. That would be a shame. You know, as a defensive tackle, you'd wanted to be a bit more aggressive. Actually, poop's a bit of a floater, I found. That's kind of a problem. All right. One thing, you just, you don't, you don't want him to end up getting injured because, you know, you never, you never want to have a player up in the, up in the press box, a real upper-decker situation. All right.

That's true. Yeah. That's right. Too bad he didn't play in the NHL back in the late 1980s against Jim Korn, because it could have been poop on corn rather than corn on poop. Yeah, I just killed that. I think Darren Poopa did play against him. Jim Corn, so pretty similar. Corn and pupa.

Yeah. Could be that, yeah. Pupa corn match up. That's right. If you're listening, right, this segment goes for another 45 minutes. That's right. You might want to just skip a head. Thank you, future, Sean.

David Pasternak was injured while, quote, attending a sponsorship dinner on Sunday night for the Boston Bruins, which is the single greatest fucking line I've ever read in an official statement from a team about a player who fell. down and hurt himself while drunk. Well, we... Allegedly, we can say allegedly. Because my favorite part of the statement was that they gave the time, which was 1130,

which is late, but I guess... It's a very normal time to be out on a Sunday night. It's late, but I guess they figured it wasn't so late that like... Right, it wasn't 2 a.m. Right. Like, when you hear that somebody fell down in a parking lot after being out at night and you kind of just assume it was two in the more... morning, I guess, you know, he was getting home before midnight. That's not, that's not so bad.

Is that why? You know, that's funny. It didn't even occur to me that that's what the reason was. Like, you think that they did it just to be like, hey, you know, keep in mind that he actually, he actually was done with his activities before the bewitching hour. Yeah. You'd have to, I mean, you'd hope so, because otherwise they're, or you don't have to, like, awkwardly say that something happened like early in the morning, which that always cracks me up when they're like early Monday morning. It's like, really? Was it early? Did he get up early? Very early. At 12.45, was that, yeah.

No, I, that's how I read it that they were. But it's the attending a sponsorship dinner, which is the greatest thing ever, because it's like, it's like, oh, God, what if people find out he was, you know, hanging out with friends at 1130 on a Sunday night in a city like Boston? No, no, no, no. If people know that he was serving in his official capacity as a Boston Bruins ambassador to one of our fine sponsors, then then it'll be fine that he might have fallen to. down and injured himself afterwards. I'm going to tell you right now, if you make me go to a work thing at 11 o'clock on a Sunday night, I'm damn sure getting drunk. I better fall down at least once. It depends on the sponsor, man. Like, if it's like Mercedes-Benz, maybe not, but if it's like Chico's Bellbonds and you're like, David Pastronach, go glad hand at this fucking sponsorship

function, yeah, I might knock back several. Yeah, there is no way I'm doing that. Uh, doing that sober. So yeah. Yeah. I'm all, this, I would lose respect for any player

who was fine at the end of that. That's right. A sponsorship. Or it could be, maybe we're misreading it. And it's like one of these things where it's like, it's a place for potential sponsors.

Like they're trying to impress people. And, you know, David Pachanak comes rolling in, fucking shirt half unbuttoned. And he's just like, hey, he should definitely be on the boards

of the Brewers games. And then he just falls down the way to the car. Maybe he was sort of embarrassing. I don't know. Maybe that's just like a euphemism that he just like loudly announced that he played for the Bruins and they're like, how could we spin that? That was a sponsorship event. How was this not Marchand, by the way? He cleaned up his act. Everybody, you know, like people, people don't give Brad Marchand enough credit for, you know, he had his party days and they're over and now he's just

one of the best. Like, I feel like he doesn't get like, Tyler Sagan gets it a little bit, but people still really act like because, I think maybe because of the champion's tattoo. Oh, yeah. I think people really kind of still expected out of Marsham, but he's been a perfect little choir boy. Well, and co-e-co-e, so moratorium on licking jokes, because in the last two days, I've seen an NBC segment where he went to a canoli factory with Catherine Tappen just so they could have video of him licking jokes. the cream out of the canola. Classic shit. And then also, like today,

being that it's Valentine's Day as we record this, I've seen at least 105 different Valentine's involving Brad Barshan and licking. And none involving Jamie Ben, isn't that weird? Did you see that the Dallas stars? I think it was the Dallas Morning News put out a thing where it was Valentine's Day advice from Tyler Say Again and Jamie Ben.

And I'm like, come on. I didn't watch it, but I'm just like, come on, really. Between that and poop, John. This has been the only good week in Twitter history. We all knew if we stuck with it for eight or nine years would be worth it eventually. What's the Valentine's Day advice? Show her your spread in ESPN's the body issue and or never please her. Yeah.

And that's the Valentine's Day advice. You'll be your big pile of trash that you live in. Another classic. You'll be the other one showing their spread in that situation. That's an amazing deep cut. That is incredible. For those who those who don't remember, that was the accusation, I believe, of who was it? It was somebody with the Leafs, right?

Or somebody who used to be with the East? When he was with a Swiss team during the 2013 lockout, he was accused by like the cleaning company or whatever that managed the apartment he was renting of leaving it in horrible disarray. I'm remembering a different thing because there was also a situation where the house that he was renting in Toronto would have these mad crazy parties. And, like, somebody who I want to say it was like, used to be a Leafs owner. Remember those? Yeah, like, like, complained about the parties. I feel like that might not have been Sagan. All right.

I'll look it up. You vamp for a second. But yeah, Jamie Ben, Valentine's Day Advice. Yeah. And it's like, you know who it was? And this is going to kill, Sean. This is from 2015. Ex-Mapelief CEO, Richard Petty took to Twitter this week to let everyone know the 23-year-old Tyler Seagan.

It was Seagan. It was Seagin. Wow. Yeah, Taz been partying until all hours the night. Quote Petty, Tyler Saygan now behaving himself. Yorkville neighbor sure don't think so. Lots of loud, noisy parties at 6 a.m. Lots of garbage left behind.

So the Trash Man thing did extend. from Switzerland to his party house in Toronto. He lives the gimmick. You've got to respect it. He loves the gimmick. That's right. When he's not trashing houses in Yorkville, he's walking around with this valet Virgil giving out $100 bills to homeless people, just like Ted DiViase.

Exactly. He lives the gimmick. All right. So pass your neck. All right. The NHL trade deadline is fast approaching. We do have a show before the deadline, which will be great. because that means all the shit will happen while we're doing the show.

But we did want to talk about the deadline briefly in the sense that the Ottawa senators, as of this podcast, have not indicated whether or not they're going to move Matt Duchayne or Mark Stone or Ryan Zingle. And so what's going to happen, Lambert? Are we going to see trades of these gentlemen? Or do you think that they end up resigning? The definitive update last I saw was that, Dushan told Craig Custin's that it's a process and things are progressing and all that An ongoing process.

Wow, that's the best kind of process. Those are the best kinds. But, yeah, no, so, yeah, I think they're going to trade, I think probably two of the three. If I had to guess, I would think that probably Stone and Zingle would be, would be the two, because Duches just kind of in the middle situation where, like, I don't think a lot of teams really

need the kind of high-end center that he would carry, like, too much of a cost, right? Whereas I think Stone is, if you're going to add a high-end guy, you want to add a guy like Stone, who is a winger, and a lot of teams

that are really good need help on the wings and not so much at center. Boston, Calgary, probably Vegas, spring to mind. And Zingle is just going to cost less than Duchenne would. So, you know, like he'd be more of the budget pickup kind of a guy. Yeah. I think Stone moves for sure. Like, I feel like he's, like, there's been so much connection between him and Winnipeg,

probably because he's from Manitoba. But there's also been talk about, like, you know, other places being in the Stone business. I fucking love him. I think he's probably the best acquisition. Yeah, but by far the best acquisition of the three, although single doesn't cost anything. Sean, how do you see this Ottawa situation? I mean, I don't have a good read on it even being up here.

It seems like it changes every day. But the thing that strikes me is, you know, we've, I remember two weeks ago being told that, you know, within a few days the senators needed to make a decision. Make a decision, yeah. And then a week later it was within a few days. And then it was, you know, last on Saturday, it was by midweek. They absolutely had to know.

And now we're, you know, we're past midweek. And they still don't know. And they're still, you know, and I get having patience. But it does, to me, it kind of feels like this fits a bigger pattern with the senators lately, where they always seem to want to wait as long as possible on this stuff. Like, remember with Carlson, there was that whole weird thing. where they kept pretending that they couldn't make him an offer until July 1st, even as Drew Doughty and Oliver Ekman-Larsen had already agreed to deals.

They couldn't sign until July 1st, but they had already had the negotiations, they'd already gone back and forth, sat down, hammered out a deal. And the senators kept insisting that they weren't even allowed to put anything in front of Eric Carlson. And then they kind of did it again with Mark Stone, where there was the January 1st. And again, we were told that they couldn't really do anything until then. And now we're told that they can't do anything until they get decisions back from these guys.

And, like, I understand you want to be patient. I understand if you want these guys back, you don't want to do something that's going to make them feel rushed. But at some point, like, I feel like it would be completely reasonable for Pira and to go to either of these guys and say, look, I've got to start talking to other teams. And I've got to start putting some trade pieces in place. And, you know, I want you guys back. I hope you decide you want to come back. If at any point that's the decision you make, I will be more than happy to drop all the trade talk and to get your signature on a contract.

And I will not trade you without coming back to you and at least saying, like, look, this is the last chance. We're ready to go here. I think that would be fine. But I've got to start talking to these teams because we're down to 10 days to make two of the most important trades in the history of the franchise. guys and to just keep kicking the can down the road. And look, maybe they are. Maybe they're doing this in the background and this is exactly what's happening. They have to be.

Just like you can't just sit, because what's he doing otherwise? Like what's he fucking doing all day in that office? What do most NHL GMs do at this time of year, right? They listen. They sit around listening but not shopping. And if Pierre Dorian is listening but not shopping right now, he's not doing his job. So, you know, I would say to these guys, look, I have to do my job. I have to start the process on this.

that means you might hear some rumors, you might hear some reports. If that's unpleasant to you, then I'm sorry, but this is me having to do my job and look out for this team, because I can't wait for you guys to keep kicking the can down the road. Because at the end of the day, like, I mean, I'm sure Senator fans want these guys to stay. I know that for a fact, but at some point you've got to take the hint. And if there's a deadline and somebody keeps telling you, I'll let you know in a few days, and then every few days they tell you that it's an ongoing. going process and they'll let you know. At some point you've got to take the hint and just say that

maybe what's happening here is both these guys are running out the clock and they don't want to leave on bad terms and just say I'm not coming back, but that they're just running out the clock on you. And, you know, I just hope for the sake of the senators and their fans and the organization that this isn't what it kind of looks like, which is the senators once again waiting too long to do the things that they need to do and talk. themselves out of making the hard decisions that they need to make. Yeah. So my thing with it is kind of from the other side where I think it might be a situation

where, you know, they're doing the thing that they did with Carlson last year where they go, hey, we're going to make an offer. And it's going to be a dog. And like the subtext being it's going to be a dog shit offer that he would never take in a million years. But we're going to make the offer anyway just so we can say, say, well, look, we made the offer and the guy wanted to move on. So you can't be mad at us. The Ottawa are senators who are actually a really well-run organization.

And it's the same thing with these two guys where it's like, we want to keep both of them. And it's like, well, you don't want to pay what it's going to take to keep both of them. And also, like, they probably don't want to stick around because this is a dog-shed organization. Yeah. And so you have to go. Wasn't DeShane's whole thing? Wasn't you. Dushan's whole thing that he didn't want to be part of a rebuild, then, like, in the, in the twist of Black Mirror episode he's living, now he's in a rebuild again. But, Greg, you're forgetting that the rebuild we've been told only has two years left, and then the senators are going to go on a run of unparalleled success. That's right. For five years of unparalleled success.

Right. And the Iraqi people will shower them with candy and sweets, and it'll be amazing. Exactly. But here's the other thing with this is, like, it seems like there's this assumption that if the players, if either Duchenne or Stone want to stay, that at least one of them will stay, maybe both of them will say, what do you do if Matt Ducain comes back and says, I want to stay, but I want eight years at nine and a half million? Does that make sense for the senators to do? I mean, it does on one level, which is that if they lose Stone and Dushane, and maybe Cody Cici and Ryan Dingell, um,

they're going to be approximately $7 billion below the cap floor next year. Yeah. Right. So like part of the, part of the equation on this has to be that, you know, like let's say Mark Stone is a guy that Bruins are targeting, right? Part of that conversation has to be, and I guess we'll take the fucking David Backus contract off your hands.

Yeah, that's true. But you have to throw in an extra piece or two. and like that's the way the senators should fuel this rebuild is by saying look you want to give us James Neal for the next five years we'll fucking take them but you get to throw in an extra prospect in a second round pick or something like that well yeah but again they they can't if if this is if they really think their rebuild only has two years to go they can't be taken bad contracts or signing bad contracts that go past that for the next year or two absolutely 100% like they should be you're taking Eugene Melnick at his word here on spending money and stuff. You have to only in the sense that... The irony being, by the way, that he said that bullshit at a sponsorship dinner.

So we can't really say that he was of his right mind, as we know from sponsorship dinners. The only reason anybody, nobody should ever be taking him at his word except that we should take him at his word only in the sense that if he's not

telling the truth, we have to assume that Mark Stone and Matt Dushain believe him, because if they don't, then there's no point even having the conversation. They're gone. I still think there's no point in having the conversation, but yes, it's possible. Yeah, but I mean, if, and because the other thing is, I think there's, there's two questions. There's, is Eugene Melnick telling the truth when he says he thinks the rebuild is going to be over in two years versus is the rebuild actually going to be over in two years? And is that a realistic goal? I think the answer to the second question is obviously no. I think the question of, has the

owner diluted themselves into thinking this is how close they are, is potentially, Yeah, they absolutely could do that. So, you know, put it this way, if they start bringing on bad contracts or signing bad contracts that have four or five, eight years attached to them, then that's your dead giveaway that they don't believe what they're selling. But again, like, he might think David Backus is the fucking answer to the shoring up the third line or whatever. And like, and in the Bobby Ryan way of, yeah, we're overpaying this guy, but like he's useful. You know, like he's useful on the ice and he's good in the room and, you know, you need leaders.

I mean, that's the thing. Like, I can totally see them trying to talk everybody into believing the David Bacchus acquisition that they eventually make is good. Every team. Whoever. Every team hates bad contracts, but the senators, like, they can't afford to have another Bobby Ryan. That's the thing. Like, they really can't, for the long term, you know, again, for a couple of years, yeah, absolutely take the hit. And, I mean, because you're right, you got to ice a roster, you got to hit the cap.

Travis, you always had, like, a really good piece on TSN where he went through some of the names that the senators could potentially go out there and try to get. I think that'd be a really smart thing to do. It's just how far. But also doing that, like, speeds up the rebuild, right? Right? Because, like, if you get an extra two picks, like, an extra pick and an extra prospect out of all three of those trades because you're taking on bad money in addition to giving up high-end talent, well, maybe not Zingles High End, but affordable talent.

But like a guy who's talented and is going to have value. Like if you can get, I don't know, like a first round pick and two prospects out of Stone and Duchenne and then you get another prospect and a second out of Stone and Dushain because you're also taking

back shitty deals. Like, that really fucking helps. So I think that that's only in furtherance of the idea that you're, that you'd be rebuilt. building. And maybe, you know, like, Backus maybe isn't the best example because I think he has some no trade protection and who would want to go to Ottawa. But like, what, you know. You know who I, you know who I think I could see them going after? And this is maybe a little bit

crazy. But Roberto Lwango, if the Panthers are really in on Bobrovsky, like he, he's going to need to go somewhere. I don't think he wants to sit around and be a backup. Having a guy like that come to Ottawa who has some personality, can sell some tickets, has some name recognition. Everybody loves him, yeah. That's not bad. He is a well-like guy, a respected veteran, a future Hall of Famer. And, you know, he's got a few years left on the contract. The salary goes way down.

You know, if he retires, it doesn't impact you as far as the cap recapture. I could see that being one where you go to the Panthers and say, all right, you're in, maybe this is an off-season thing, but you say you're in on Bobrovsky, you know you can't have Luongo around. What's it worth to you to get out of the rest of that contract? and try to extract something from a team that you would think would be pretty... You can probably get Jonathan Hubertow out of that deal. He probably could.

Luongo would be sort of like their flurry for like the Golden Knights, like their ambassador or whatever. But, you know, it's the difference between like, is he going to want to... Does he have a no move because he already gave it up? Or, well, he's got a no trick. Or I'm looking at his thing. He's got a modified no trade, it says. If you wave a no trade, you keep it. The general understanding is that.

that it is no longer enforceable and like it would only be enforced by like a gentleman's agreement or that kind of thing. I thought, is that how it works? Because I was in the impression they travel with you. It happens in some cases and in some cases the team can give it back to you. The interesting thing about Luongo, though,

is I always assumed that like if it's not Florida, it's nowhere. Like I just assume you retire if he's not playing for the Panthers just because of, you know, the family the whole bit. But we shall say, all right. You could end up on Robida Island, too, like where he's just like, Oh, I'm hurt. All right. Question of the week for the good people of the Puck Soup audience was give us the next coach you think will be fired.

We've had 12 coaching changes since last April, and a lot of people believe there'll be more. Rob Taub says, John Tortorella, if CBJ can't get out of the first round this year after the last few years under him, will they ever? Well, I think a lot of that depends on who's playing for him. D. Machado says Jared Bedner, the abs have been hot garbage for the past two months. Their star player was an open revolt on the bench, and it's not like he's got the no training camp excuse this time. I don't know.

I think making a playoffs last year probably gives him a little bit of hope. Silver says, Jeff Blasheel, please. I don't think that's going to happen. Did you see Elliot report that Blaschel might get an extension, which is kind of crazy? Yeah. Who knows what goes on in that organization? Yeah, I wouldn't.

I wouldn't be letting Ken Holland sign anyone to extensions unless I thought Ken Holland was still going to be around. He's got a year left. Maybe. I mean, listen, he could easily just go to Edmonton and fix it.

That's a possible destination for Ken Holland. A lot of Jared Bedner's, some tortillas, people saying John Heinz, but I don't think that Heinz is going anywhere. No, I don't either. Yeah, there's really the same old, same old that you see.

Ken Hitchcock, Probably getting a lot of mentions on there, I would imagine. You can't fire a guy if he quits. That's right. Brian Roberts says the coyote's train and conditioning coach. That's funny. And then finally, Annie says Bob Murray is going to fire himself, so he doesn't have to watch the ducks up close impersonal.

Which would be a hell of a thing. All right. That is Buck's Soup for this week. Our thanks to Mike Russo for joining us to talk about the wild trampled. Do you know the band Trampled by Turtles, by the way? Lambert? I do. Big fan. Their most recent record was a real return to form for them after I didn't like

the previous two. But still number one, Palomino for me. Not close. Well, there you go. Well, Mike Russo, as stated, a super fan there, so thanks. That makes me very jealous. Like, a lot of times I am the hockey writer guy who

knows the band and, like, as buddies with them, but Russo being friends with Trample by Turtles. That pisses me off. And as it should. Anyways, so thanks to him. Trade deadline shit next week. And then after that, obviously, you know, we'll review all the shit that happened.

You could read my shit on ESPN. I had a piece today go up about the Austin Matthews contract extension and the ins and outs of it. And you could read my shit on Twitter at Wyshinsky, Wysh, and S-H-Y-N-S-K-I. and where's your stuff, boys? Sean, go for it. You get some stuff to plug, so. Fine, you can find me on Twitter at Down Goes Brown. You can find me at The Athletic this week.

We are arguing over what was the most important trade in the history of the NHL that didn't happen, going through some of the weird history of trades that were reported or very close and didn't end up happening. And you can also get my book, The Down Goes Brown History of the NHL. It fine bookstores everywhere. And you can find me on Twitter at two-line pass You can find my stuff on Yahoo!com

slash author slash There it is Ryan dash Lambert HTT TTP forwarding backslash Well put your yes in there so it's a secure connection And then also the other thing I have to plug is I started on the Patreon A weekly newsletter that's

you know, just kind of my thoughts on some hockey stuff, on some pop culture stuff. I reviewed the second Lego movie last week. And yeah, it's, I think, three bucks a month if you get it with the podcast bonus episodes and four bucks a month if you just want only the newsletter, which, hey, you know, who can blame you? And yeah, so sign up for that. people seem to really like the first one, and so I'm just going to keep doing it.

Nice. I should say that I saw, I don't know if I told you I saw glass. What'd you think, Greg? I thought that it had the makings of a really good flick, and, but there was something maybe lost in the execution. Not to spoil the film, which I obviously won't do, but there's a few twists at the end.

I know, shocking in the Shambelon film. But one in particular was very interesting, but completely not communicated in any way before the end of the film and I think that it required maybe a little bit more foreshadowing than it was given.

If you know what I'm saying, buddy. I think I do. We can talk after, but I'm pretty sure I know what you're talking about. Yeah, for me it was fine. Like, I liked it well enough, but like, I don't know. For me, it was just like,

in much the same, way as split, I was like, oh, that was pretty good. I don't know that I needed to revisit this universe as much as I liked Unbreakable. The Unbreakable Exeter Universe. Okay. Thanks to everybody for listening. We will talk to you next week and enjoy the Patreon mailbag as well. Bye, bye.

Bye. Bye-bye. Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slapshots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. But we also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes. It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense. Borksu.