Puck Soup - NHL Player Safety, Revealed!

Episode Date: November 3, 2016

Greg and Dave reveal the secrets of the NHL's Department of Player Safety with special guests Damian Echevarrieta, the NHL's vice president of Player Safety and Hockey Operations, Patrick Burke, director of Player Safety. They discuss why a play does or does not earn a suspension; the pitfalls of precedent; whether they hate your team; inside a player safety hearing; whether players actually like them; and whether the NHL's suspension policies go far enough. That, plus discussions on "American Psycho," Connor McDavid, John Tortorella, expansion team success, Christmas decorations and National League fanboy Greg takes on designated hitter apologist Dave in a fight to the death. Brought to you by SEAT GEEK.

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Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slapshots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to whatever you'll commute. But we also cover movies, TV shows, it's in twos. It's your weekly bowl of Hagi and Nancet. I'm Greg Wyshinsky of Yahoo Sports Puck Daddy blog. Oh, this is going to be fun because you got, like, new jobs. And I'm Angela Lansberry from Murder, she wrote. And you're in Puck Soup.

Where are you right? You got another writing gig, though. Yeah, once a week at a place called The Incline. It's a weekly penguin's notebook. It's nothing too flashy, nothing too crazy. It's just some jokes, some notes, some news, some numbers. So called the incline because you're supposed to read it while you work on the elliptical at the gym? It's because reading my stuff is an uphill climb.

Let's be honest. It's a slog. So big show today, and I would say that it's the most hockey-centric show we've ever done. Like not trying to pound. a square peg into a round hole with a celebrity of some regard to talk about hockey. But they're celebrities in a way. They are celebrities in a way. And that people love them and hate them.

Mostly hate them. Mostly hate them. Patrick Burke, the director of the Department of Player Safety and Damien Etcheveretta, who is the vice president of player safety and hockey operations, which we've come to find is a more important role than being the director. Right. Right. Like he's, Damien claims that Patrick's his subordinate, but I don't know.

The title, I'd rather be a director than a vice president. Subordinate is always such a weird word, right? It makes you think of like one guy being asked to crawl around the office and like a dog caller. Wait, is that now? I mean, I worked at five years for the NHL. I had to do that. Are you telling me that wasn't something I should have been doing? Because I kind of liked it.

It was fun. Do you ever American Psycho? Oh, sure. Okay. So let's talk about the ending of American Psycho real quick. I saw it the other day on a random channel. Do you believe he killed all those people, an American Psycho, or do you think that that was all in his head?

No, no, no, he did. I thought the point of it was, it was like, the 80s were so self, everyone was so consumed with themselves that no one cared that he was doing it. Like, he was trying to shove a cat into an ATM machine, and nobody gave a shit. He was murdering women.

And I thought that was the point of it. I thought the point of it was that once Chloe Sevenier's character found his calendar inside his desk, and it had all the drawings of the things that he did. that I thought that was the evidence that it was all in his head and maybe he killed

Paul Allen at some point and then that guy who said no I just I just had dinner with Paul Allen in London I thought that was maybe he just had dinner

with somebody he didn't know who it was and he assumed it was Paul Allen but I don't think he actually like I don't think he tried I don't think he tried to stuff a cat in an ATM and then shot an old woman in the chest No but like I think the reason why

that guy thinks he had dinner with Paul Allen was when he was when he tried to stuff he was dead was because no one knows or anybody else is because they're all so self-involved. Like, I thought that was kind of the point. But I mean, your interpretation, I don't know. I never really thought too deeply about it. Your interpretation could be correct.

I'm not a big... It just kind of stuck with me. I don't know why it became like a Halloween movie that was on, because I guess Psycho is in the title. But it was like one of those movies that was in heavy rotation for like the last week. I just, I just, the thing I love about that movie, everyone always focuses on the videotapes. I just like, don't stare at it, eat it.

Like, that's just a great line. The thing I love about that movie is that it spawned, and one of the more, I would say, inappropriate, superfluous, what's the word looking for? Sequels. I just, I saw the last five minutes of two with Milakunis. Oh, no, I'm thinking of something else. What were you thinking of that was a superfluous stupid sequel? It starred James Vanderbeek as a killer. Wait, are you talking about rules of engagement?

because that's like a real movie. No. Oh, because this is why I thought you brought it up. No, that's a real movie. American Cycler 2

was a 2002 direct-to-video standalone sequel subtitled an American girl with Milakunis as Rachel Newman. I don't remember that at all.

A driven criminology student who is drawn to murder and William Shatner as her professor. Come on, that's not a real movie. Are we doing this again where you mess with me

last week with that fake-ass Tim Allen show? It's not. It's a real movie. It's Milakuna. says... No, no, it's not it. There's definitely one where James Vanderby plays

like the brother of Patrick Bateman. Mm-hmm. Shit, Dawson's Creek, Jane Silent Bob. Oh, the Rules of Attraction. Maybe we think... Oh, did I say Rules of Engagement?

That's like the David Spade sitcom, I think. With Puddy? Right, with Puddy. Rules of Engagement's the one you're thinking of. That's a real fun movie. That was a Roger Avery movie, I think. The guy who did Pulpiction with Tarantino. Yeah, James Vanderbue plays Sean Bateman.

That's... Right. Patrick Bateman's brother. It's a Patrick Bateman movie. Right. I didn't realize there were two other movies that were spawned. Yeah, why didn't we get a full Patrick Bateman verse, you know, this is all into universe building.

And then at one point, like, Christian Bell and James Vanderbeek team up with Milak Kunis, take on Thanos. This movie had a lot of... Shannon Sossaman is in every movie from, like, the 90s and the aughts that I never saw. Like, she's in that shitty Heath Ledger josting movie, too, that... To mean... The Knights? A Knight's Tale.

A Knight's Tale. She's like the object of his attraction. Yeah, they also also done a Knight's Taleaverse with Heath Ledger and also Martin Lawrence's Black Knight. And then also the kid from the Yankee and King Arthur's court. Thomas Ian Nicholas. Yeah. So they're all in the Knight averse.

That guy won Rookie of the Year and he travel back in time. Aren't you pissed off how many people are citing Rookie of the Year now that the Cubs were in the World Series? Like, it's a terrible, like nostalgia for bad. sports movies is one of my biggest peaves in life. Like, for example, Space Jam. Oh, it's a bad movie. A terrible movie. But now because LeBron is involved in it, and because, like, people of a certain

age are now, like, you know, it came out in, like, the 90s. I remember seeing Space Jam specifically to see a trailer in front of Space Jam, and I want to say maybe it was one of the Star Wars movies. Oh, I bet you it was. Yeah, I'm going to guess it was. One of the special editions or something that came out. But, yeah, that's a bad movie. And now, and now Rookie of the Year is, like, people are, like, making a random rookie of the year. references and I'm like no terrible movie I thought it was I don't know like if you're looking at movies about

baseball that involve a kid becoming part of a baseball team you got to go a little big league every time like he becomes the manager it's a little more realistic because let's face it a child can manage a baseball team right and I thought that was a great movie I love that movie Kevin Elster I always saw a little big league as more of the nuanced deep impact to look in the year as Armageddon which was just all just you know action and violence right Gary Busey taking Thomasine yeah I mean deep impact As we've talked about in the show before, got into the whole logistics of presidential press conferences and things of that. And Armageddon was content to have animal cracker sex.

Is the difference? Oh, yeah. Wait, how do we talk about this? All right, listen, real quick, because we have to get to Damien and Berkey. It's a lot to cover in that interview, including the fact that Damien worked, has worked for player safety for 18 years. He may mention that once. Like I said in the interview, it's like Bernie Sanders when he kept mentioning the $27. Everyone, are the donations of 27.

Only it's 18 years. 18 years. Go to www.w.w. Bernie Sanders.com. The millionaires and the billionaires. The greatest thing about doing a Bernie Sanders is it's basically doing Ben Stern, Howard's dad from private parts or whenever he would do an impression of his dad. Don't be a moron, you idiot. You have to modulate the voices.

Vote Hillary. Don't vote for Trump. This is our last puck suit before the election, too, isn't it? Probably. I was going to say like we were texting about it. We bring on Susan Sarandon the day after the election to talk about the Rangers and Jill Stein getting rocked. And that would be a lot.

That would be good content. Just remember, like when the nukes hit, just maybe put all of the shows in a flash drive and carried around like the book of Eli. So you'll be able to tell all the other survivors about puck soup. Tell them about how Margot Robbie Robbie was our god and we never actually got to speak with her. We should have Chloe 7-Yean. She's a Ranger fan. Well, I mean, I think the good, we should have Chloe 7-Eon.

We should also have hit girl on too. She's a Islander's fan. Oh, right, right, right, right, right. Jack Donaggy's rival, I think of her as that more than big. So, but also, like, make sure you have the shows on a flash drive, because I imagine one of the only people to survive the nuclear Holocaust will be Tim Thomas. And it might impress him that you have a hockey podcast you can all sit around inside the bunker and listen to. And then we get to the point where we make fun of Trump and he just gets all mad or something and then kills everybody in the bunker.

Is this the part where we're supposed to compel everybody to vote no matter who you're voting for? No, I live in New Jersey. My vote doesn't matter. So it depends on where you live. If you live in a swing state, don't feel like it's a blowout and you shouldn't vote. You should go do it. Real briefly, Connor McDavid at Austin Matthews played against each other for the first time. It was a giant dud. It became a Nazim-Cadry show where he scored overtime and basically outplayed McDavid the entire. I had a discussion on the other podcast that I do with Merrick about whether McDavid is the best player in the world right now. And I said, like, I want to

see him in the playoffs dealing with defensive systems, dealing with four guys crowded around the crease, dealing with a guy that he's wearing as a blanket during the entire game and not just like what he does in the regular season. I think last night, as we taped the show, was a good indication that

Sid's still the best player in the world. It's close. I mean, it's definitely close. There's some days where I feel like it's McDavid. But to be fair, though, when you're matched up against a defensive stalwart, like Nazim Katzum, you're going to get shut down once in a while. It reminds me of like when Sid was young, when, you know, you'd look at him and be like, okay, he's great, but there's still flaws in his game.

Like, he had to learn how to win a face off. He had to learn how to go to the dirty parts of the ice. Like, he's got, and McDavid's going to be the same kind of guy. Like, he's clearly going to make himself better through experience and through offseason training to get to that point. But I think right now, you know, dollars to donuts. And God, God willing, that'll be our currency after the, after election days. We'll just go to an all donut economy. I only have powdered. I can't afford that. Sorry, buddy. It has to be a Boston Cream or you can't get on this ride. Chocolate spinkles are the finest donuts in all the land.

They are the new $100 a dollar bill. I'm with Her. I can't think of a donut starts with her. Dollars to Donuts, Sid's still the best in the world because he's the most complete player. And now we're going to have somebody all Jonathan TAVsing up our mentions on Twitter. Now,

Sid's better. I mean, Taves, I mean, I don't know what he has now, but he did have two points through seven games. But that's only because he chose to do that. If you wanted to have 14 points through seven games, he would. But he's just such a great 200-foot responsible defensive player. He chooses to have 58 points in. No, it's the system he plays that produced one of the greatest offensive seasons that we've seen in a decade from Patrick Kane last year.

Right. Like Jonathan Taves let him do that. He does the heavy lifting. That's why Patrice Bergeron never puts a point. Do you think the others are still going to the playoffs? I still do. I think the dynamics of that, division have me more convinced than anything the oilers have done.

Fucking Kings. Kings can't score a goal for three. They can't score a goal and their goaltending is poo. I think my Devin said a Gucci 30 goal season prediction. I still think the ducks don't make it. Probably not going to happen. So I think you're in a spot where the Oilers are prime position to make it a playoffs by virtue of a lot of other teams imploding pretty quickly.

I think they're going to do it. I think they might. I hope so. I'm excited to get as many of these Canadian teams in the playoffs as we can because that means great young players. across the board, entering the playoffs, and then forcing NBC to put them on against each other. That's what I want. I want a Western Conference final between Edmonton and Nashville that draws like 80,000 viewers. That's the dream. I just want, I just want anarchy and chaos. And I want like the next contract to be like, I want them to be on like lifetime. I want like no network to touch the NHL.

I would love that because that or maybe like Hallmark movie channel And then we have hockey themed You know They can guest star on like a Jennifer Love Hewitt movie The Zamboni mystery is starring Candace Cameron Burray And Pavel Borre They can be like a husband and wife team that's soft crimes To be Valerie Barry

Oh right Valerie Barry would do it Pavellable Burray's not Pavel can guest star He can be the guy that lives in the house He's like the brother-in-law, they can't get rid of He'll be the person in the unmask at the end Pavel Burray Would have gotten away with the two

If it wasn't for you a meddling kids How did you not figure it out? Everyone was being killed by Russian rocket. It was pretty fucking simple. Does it read the script? It's pretty obvious if it was going to be me. He's like, who's been hacking the email in the house? And pop-bobori, like, tiptoes around in the background.

Like, I'm with the- wasn't amazing that because it's hockey and no one gives a shit, that, like, Alex Ovetchkin's never been asked a single question about Putin while all this stuff has been going on. Like, you don't you think if this was the NBA? No. And everybody's politicized and woke? There's a Russian player in the NBA. Probably. There has to be.

But like, like, Ovechkin's overtly supported Putin for years. Has he? Oh, God, yeah.

Has he done like a horseback? He's got, he's, he's taking like Instagram photos wearing pro Putin T-shirts and stuff. Well, I mean,

if you're, if you're terrified of a guy is going to, like, kill your family back in Russia and he wants a, he wants a selfie. You're probably going to take the selfie. Like, you know what I mean?

Like, I mean, I would be super terrified. Like, I, like, remember, like, at the Olympics and everyone was, like, mad about, like, Russian players are speaking out about, you know, the whole situation with, you know, if you're gay

in Russia, that's probably the worst thing in the world. Yeah. And like, nobody would speak out about it. Like, I totally get the idea of, like, being afraid to say something because Vladimir Putin's going to murder you and your family. So, like, if, if the line is, is, I don't think he's a Putin fan. If you think it was bad for gays, you think she, you should think for a second about the gay dogs, who I think are all living with David Bacchus still. The gay dogs. Yeah, remember how they were rounding up and slaughtering dogs during the Sochi-Landis? What a fucking country. Oh, you mean the one that

invaded Ukraine, like the day after the Olympics ended when all the media was already out of there? Yeah, what a country. It is great, that's what he used to say. Hello. What a country. And the Russia dog get murdered by you.

Remember in the 80s when like the Russians were the bad guys in every movie and it stopped? Like we kind of started like working in different countries. We're back to that again now. Because they don't have any money in Russia. It's why that's all they can do is hack people now and not actually like invade anybody. That's a boring movie.

That's why the Chinese are the new villains in every movie because the movies are super popular in China and Korea. Oh, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I mean like, oh, I see what you're saying. So we're ever going to go back to that because of- All economics. All right, listen. Damien and Patrick are great.

We asked them a lot of questions, I'm sure that you wanted to know and ask some of your questions to them about player safety. So enjoy this, and we'll be right back with more of your questions that won't have to do with player safety. God damn, if it wasn't for you, you guys, we'd just be sitting near what? Oh, and

a teaser, though, we should let the people know in the interview. They do reveal which team they're most biased against the best. That's true, yes. You listen to all the way to the end, you'll be able to hear the most bias against. Right, be right back. So, we're talking here about NHL player safety with Damien Etchevarietta, the vice president

of player safety and hockey operations for the National Hockey League. And of course, lovely and talented, Patrick who is the director of player safety. Correct. Correct, director. So you're Damien's boss or Damien's your boss? Yeah.

Damien is my boss, despite what director sounds like as a title. How does vice president not sound like it's the director's boss? Yeah, if you handed me a business card that said vice president and you handed one that said director, I would think that director would be the more important role because, like, I know like in, I don't know much about finance, but I know in finance, like everybody, they just hand out vice presidencies like their starburst on Halloween. And in film. Directors in charge. You should be a producer.

18 years ago. Yes, that's true. But, like, I just feel like there's, like, 42 vice presidents at the NHL. I mean, China, Chinese was a vice president. Senior. No, he was senior vice president. Yeah. Right.

They worked hard for this vice president title. He was there for 18 months. So I've long thought that, like, Patrick is more like Clinton and you're more like Gore. Is that not how it works? That is not even close to how it works. And which Clinton? Yeah.

Oh, you didn't notice? Patrick told us all the time that he's running the show over there. Yeah, of course, I mean George Clinton, the master of P-Funk. There you go. Yeah. And I mean, Lesme d'or. Boy, they're only dating ourselves already. So the Department of Player's Safety, I had just one question to lead off. So you guys probably remember, December 7, 2011, Ville I was suspended for one game for elbowing Matt Reed.

Vili, of course, was with the Buffalo Sabres at that point. Why? If you could just break that down for us here on the show. like why he was suspended. Well, he elbowed a guy in the head. That's illegal. But as the video shows, I mean, he wasn't really all that mobile a player.

So I was wondering how he could even catch Matt Reed, who was very fleet of foot. Do you deny that he elbowed him in the head? I was, obviously, no fucking clue what that play was. So you're trying to do like a little gotcha question off the back? Yes, I was really trying to Tim Russ with you guys right off the back. I was working for Philly at the time, so that was a great suspension. It was also a great signing by the Sabres too, if memory serves.

No, the real important question is, can you just list the teams that you're biased against in order? From most biased to least biased? I just want to go alphabetical and list all 30 teams, and that way every fan can feel like they're... Right. So you're biased against all of them based on everything I've read on Twitter is every suspension or not suspension proves that you're biased against. We're not biased against all teams, but anyone who's listening should know that we hate your favorite team specifically. There you go. Confirmed on the Puckoo

podcast. Player safety hates are your team. It's got to be annoying though when you I mean listen both of you guys are you allowed to be on social anymore because you were both on social at one point but now I don't know if you're allowed to be anymore are you? I'm still on so is Patrick I think that we I try to keep it as professional as possible I don't know what I you know if Patrick believes the same I was instructed to tone it down and I believe I have so a little bit but what do you What do you think when you read someone tweet at you or whatever that you're biased against their team? Like, is there any getting around that other than like penalizing the team that they hate the most to say here, I really like?

Like, what is the thing that you could tell them to convince them that you're not biased? Well, I'm not sure there is anything. I think the nature of being a fan is that you're emotional and at times irrational and you love your team. And, you know, when you're only watching your team over and over, so you just watch your favorite team for 82 games, you don't watch the other 29 teams, you don't see the hundreds and thousands of plays that we review on a weekly and monthly basis. It's easy for fans to get caught up with my favorite player, got injured, I want justice. So, you know, the NHL wouldn't be able to pay us if we didn't have passionate fans. We love that our fans are passionate. We love that they care about their favorite players.

We know that the way our system is set up to remove any bias. We know individually that we work so hard to be good at our jobs that we're not concerned that we're biased against any team. We're confident in what we do and we can stand behind our decisions. So we know that there's always going to be fans who are a little exuberant and sometimes cross the line. It's just really just part of the job. That said, do you think Flyers fans are idiots for saying you're biased against their team when Chris Pronger works for the Department of Player's Safety? He's like a coyote. He's with Arizona now.

He's a coyote. He's not allowed to watch coyote games. And I was with... Does he stay out of the coyote stuff now because he's a coyote? Yeah, Chris doesn't weigh in on Arizona and I don't weigh in on Calgary. That's interesting. Can Chris weigh in on Winnipeg? Yes.

Oh, okay. Because he's not a former thrash. No, that makes sense. The one thing I would say, sorry. Like, you ask about if it upsets us when fans say that we're biased. That we get that. Like Patrick says, hockey fans are passionate. They have every right to.

They can yell and scream at us. The thing that gets me is when they say that we don't know the rules or we're being inconsistent. And I can assure everybody that's listening out there, I'm in my 18th season of doing this. I know the rules as well as you can know them. And I believe that our consistency is there if you want to see it. If you want to see inconsistent and compare two hits that aren't anything alike,

then we're going to seem inconsistent. but we take great pride in knowing the rules, knowing our job, and consistently ruling on the same type of plays, but no two plays are exactly the same. So if we want to talk about a specific hit from recent times, the Pasternak hit, is the one where you guys know me. I'm a liberal pansy, and I think everybody should get 10 games, and there should be no fighting and no checking. They should have been with pillows, because that's what I've heard on Twitter. So you guys gave him two. I thought it was a good hit where he didn't pick the head. You guys thought he picked the head.

Is that basically what it comes down to on the hit? You guys see the head as a principal point of contact, and that's the main part of why you guys had to give them two games. Well, if you look at the illegal check to the head rule, there's a lot of words in there, and people don't necessarily seem to, you know, but if you're going to worry about the details, then that's where they are.

That's where we live in the details of that rule. When we wrote the rule, we had many different circumstances that we considered. And it really boils down to two things. Is the head the main point of contact? And if you don't think it is, then it doesn't go any further. It's not an illegal check to the head.

If you do think the head is a main point of contact, then you have to ask if that head contact was avoidable. Not if the hit was avoidable, if the head contact was avoidable. And in deciding if the head is avoidable or not, we consider if the player put himself in a position just prior to the hit or not. On the Pasoenac suspension, we believe that he unnecessarily extends upward to make the head the main point of contact.

He has Gerardy in a vulnerable position, and contrary to what many believe, that necessarily in itself isn't a penalty, but you have to otherwise throw a clean body check. Stay low, keep things tucked in, don't extend upward into the head. So in that case, we believe that he extended to make the head

the main point of contact, and we believe he could have avoided the head if he wanted to. But don't you think Girardy has to call for the fair catch there? I mean, come on. Nine second hang time on that way. You got a wave off the defense.

It depends on what yard line you're at. If you're inside the 10, you want a fair catch. Just let it bounce. Yeah. You should have just let it bounce. That's not going to the ad zone. Take the touchback.

Yeah, take the touchback indeed. What do you think is, is an illegal check to the head the most, the most misinterpreted call you have to deal with with fans? Or is it something like boarding? No. I think it's probably also really a misinterpreted call. I think the illegal check to the head rule is probably the one that fans and media and even hockey. Hey, leave us the fuck out of this, all right? We're talking about fans now.

We're really learned it. We read the CBA and shit. Would you like me to quiz you on Rule 48 while we're... Absolutely. I know it like I know the Second Amendment. No, it's a complex rule that a lot of people have difficulty with. The language has changed a couple times since it's been put in. And I think a lot of people really struggle with the difference between avoidable and unavoidable head contact.

The idea that there is, there are hits that can be thrown with acceptance. head contact where a player puts himself in a position where you are unable to deliver a full body check unless you hit him in the head. Excuse me. And again, that's why it's called illegal check to the head and not head check or head hit because there are some situations where head contact is unavoidable and therefore allowed. Yeah. So I think it's just something that you see a player get hit up high.

You see a really particularly hard hit. And I think a lot of people in the hockey world have trouble sitting down and dissecting it to the level that we do and really saying, okay, is the head the head the head the avoidable. And for what you guys do, it's all the CBA, right? It's not like you guys can sit down and go rogue and. Yeah, you're not inventing rules like when Avery waved a stick in front of Bordeaux. That was a rule already. It was on sportsmanlike conduct. On sportsman like conduct covers many acts.

I thought that was funny. Yeah, isn't there a comedy provision? in the Unportually Conduct Rule where if it's super funny, like when Wisniewski made the blowjob motion with his hands, like that was a suspension, I think. But it was like, there should be like a super funny provision in the bylaws. No, but to your actual question, you know, everything our department does is governed first and foremost by the rulebook and the collective bargaining agreement. So a great example of that is everyone always asks us how come injury and history can increase the length of suspensions. Why does that matter? Why do you guys talk about whether or not a guy got hurt?

That's in the collective bargaining agreement. The owners, commissioner, the players association, all the teams sat down as a group and said, we want that to be a factor when determining the length of suspensions. We don't get, Damien and I don't get to sit there and go, well, we're not, we're not going to include that then. Like that's, and one point is history and injury will make its suspension longer. Right. It will not turn a non-suspension into a suspension. Which is always been interesting for me because it seems like before an incident you have a group of guys that you're in communication with and saying look you got to watch yourself don't hit like this this is borderline we don't want to see this and then after the viewing of the video and the the interpretation of the

play the reputation of the player plays into the punitive phase actually it only comes in after a hearing it doesn't come in before the hearing right now that's what I'm saying like after a hearing when you're deciding about a suspension, the history of the player will play into it. But there's never, like you said, it's kind of a weird thing. Beforehand and afterwards, reputation is a thing. But the play itself is never,

well, it's a borderline play, but we know this guy is a guy who steps over the line with frequency, so we should probably nail him for this. But I don't think fans want us making those judgments. I don't think anybody wants us saying, oh, we don't like this guy. We have a personal reason.

This guy plays on the edge a lot. Like, I don't think anyone would be comfortable with any department at the NHL making personal evaluations of players and issuing discipline based on that. I think it's important that all players in the NHL are playing under the same rules in the game. So one player will get penalized for it. Doesn't mean that we can penalize one guy because he has a history of breaking that rule, but we're not going to penalize another. All players are playing under the same rules.

And then a suspension is the time when we talk about a player's history and a player who repeatedly breaks NHL rules. Right. So I think we're doing it the right way. I don't think within a game of teams should be penalized where their guy would get a penalty and the opposing team did the same thing and wouldn't get a penalty. Yeah, I'd be real shame to have reputation penalties on the ice. Is there anything that prevents you guys from going longer?

Like if you give a guy three, like what prevents you from giving them five or six? Our past precedent for the most part, you know, for us to dramatically... You guys set the precedence that you guys can... We have to give comparables like... Keep in mind, every suspension is able to be appealed. And we also have to answer to the commissioner. We have to answer to the general managers. We have to answer to the board of governors.

We can't just make it up as we go. So we are always asked what our comparable plays are. Why is this a suspension? Why is this two games? Why is this three games? And we have those answers. We've been doing this for a long time now where we have case study, where we can say this play falls in line with this here and this doesn't.

Right. But like when Shannon was running things, He gave Pierre Mark Bouchard where he gave him seven games because he lifted a guy's stick. He didn't give him seven games. But I think if you asked Chaney in a candid moment, and I have, he probably want that one back. No, but like, no, no. It was a high stick. He knocked the guy's teeth out.

I mean, it doesn't matter that he hasn't, you know, played that way before. It caused an injury by an illegal act to a high stick. Right. But what I mean is is just, like, if you guys set the precedent, like, what would happen if like before a season you just came in and said, you know what, we're going to be a little more harsh. We're going to be a little more strict with like the same things. Maybe in the past we'd only gave three. three four, we'll do five this time. I mean, we could do that. None of us see any reason to do that.

I'm perfectly comfortable where our suspensions are in terms of how they regulate on ice play without taking all the physicality out of hockey. I think we've done a really good job of taking the non-hockey plays that are ridiculous over the top. You know, you watch plays from the 80s and 90s where players go way out of their way to just attack somebody or they go 30 feet out of their way to throw a hit. And I think our department's taken for the most part, those plays out of the game. The illegal check to the head suspensions that you're seeing are six inches away at full speed. You know, you talk about the Pastor Knock one and you didn't think that was even suspendable. He's, if he stays six inches lower, it's a perfectly legal hit. It's a heat of the moment, fast game.

He just missed a hit. I think we've done a really good job taking the really malicious plays out of the game while also penalizing ones that are a little bit reckless. But we're not trying to take all physicality out of hockey. I think one of the things that the Department of Player's Safety deserves a lot of credit for is the Blindside hits. Like once the Blindside Hits became a thing where you specifically said don't do it anymore, it was around the time. There's no rule against Blancid hits. But you don't want to talk about the head shots. Like like the East West. The illegal checks of the head? Sure. The East West illegal checks of the head. I'm talking about like the David Booth hit. I'm talking about the hits that

we had a run of like a year and a half where half the league was ending up on stretchers. And we got rid of that because we said don't do it anymore. And I also think, but I wonder how much you guys see player safety being responsible for maybe the cleaning up of that. But at the same time, the style of play in the league now, like, I remember when Shanahan came in, he said, we have a group of guys, a basket of deplorables, if you will, who, uh, what is that a reference? I don't know. Who said, he said, like, we got to focus on these guys because of the repeat offenders. And I feel like because of the way the game has changed, the speed, the success of the department in getting those kinds of plays out of the game is parallel to the kind of players

that would make those plays being kind of drummed out of the sport because they can't play this sport. I would say from when I started, again, I've been doing this for 18 years now. And I think the suspensions back then were obvious guys headhunting, trying to really send a message late in the game. the score was out of reach. It was 4-1 late with a minute to go, and you'd start to worry and say,

oh, man, what's going to happen here? Nowadays, our suspensions come from guys getting in on the forecheck that are just a little over-aggressive coming up, you know, a few inches too high. It's different now. I think players, the speed of the game is there. We don't have those guys that are just sitting on the end of the bench waiting to get a tap at the end of the game.

So I think just by, you know, nature of the way the game is going, it's a much safer game. But I think on any given night, you can see players making better decisions. It takes a lot because, you know, Shanney used to call it, like, watching planes land safely. Nobody really notices that. It's the same thing with us. We see guys have a guy lined up in a really vulnerable spot in the layoff. And it really comes out when a player has been suspended for an illegal check to the head.

And he's, you know, he has a player in the same position and he doesn't make that hit. So I think we've made, you know, a big difference. But it's, you know, keep in mind. There's some guys like Shane Don in the league who played in the game. who played in this league when a lot of these hits were not even illegal. This is a new rule. But that was always the Rafi Torres excuse. Like here's a guy who straddled different eras of hitting

and he didn't quite know how to modulate his game to not try to decapitate guys on the ice. Slew footing has always been a thing, right? I saw someone on Twitter was giving you guys shit. Are we getting to the Twitter questions now? This is a normal human being. And by the way, you guys can curse if you want. I know you probably are dying to say some swear words.

Somewhere John Delapina just twitch. I never heard of a Burke swear. I think he was giving you guys crap because there weren't a lot of slew foot suspensions, but like slew footing and tripping and all that sort of stuff. So, like, what's the deal there? So what's the deal? We have, you know, a lot of people like to comment on our decisions, but I don't know that they take the time to look at our videos that we put out.

We put out a series of videos called educational videos. We'll take you through all different types of plays, slew footing being one of them. Most people think that any time you trip somebody with your skate, it's a slew foot. That's not true. There are minor penalties for leg trips. Sle footing is very distinct. You tie up the player's upper body. You kick his legs out and you slam him violently to the ice backwards.

That's a slew foot. Anything in between is a trip. So we had Shaw. Everybody was upset about the Shaw trip. Larson, we just saw that as a two-minute minor for tripping. It was unnecessary. It was late in a game. It didn't matter much.

But we have not defined slew footing as just tripping a guy with the ski. But they can be just as dangerous though, even though there's not the upper body torque. It can be, but just because it plays dangerous doesn't necessarily make it illegal. There's degrees of all that's an illegal trip, then it's that dangerous. Yeah, it's a two-minute penalty or a match penalty in Shaw's case, whatever it might be. But the aspect of slew footing that makes it particularly dangerous is that you're tying up his upper body so he can't defend himself in any way. He take his feet out, you tie up his upper body, and you slam him into the same thing. the ice. Now, we've suspended for dangerous trips based on how fast players are going if they're

in close proximity to the boards. You kick a guy's skates out as he's approaching the end boards. That's something that we would take a close look at. But for the most part, the way we've designed the fine slew footing and dangerous trips, it's tough to rise to a level of suspension. And if you look at the Shawplay, he only kicks one leg out. And now that sounds like, well, what's the difference? But it's, again, it's, no, but there's degrees. There's two minutes for slashing. There's five minutes for slashing. There's match. Pound. for slashing. It's the same thing with trips. He takes one leg out. Yes, he trips him from behind. But if he takes both legs out, that becomes a much more dangerous play.

Or if he, yeah, if he was playing Chara, who here is a bit of a tripod and kicked out all three legs. Jesus Christ. Yeah, what's wrong? There's a problem? I have to imagine, though, that, like, I have to imagine that, you know, when you've, the way the suspensions work for those who don't know, like, you get suspended if you're a player, and then you have money docked from your pay. You lose money when you're suspended. And there's always been a discussion about, well, the only way you're going to get these guys to realize what they're doing is wrong is not by taking them off the ice, it's by hitting them in the wallet. They don't get paid.

They don't get paid. So do you want to see in the next CBA a higher ceiling for fines for stuff? Because slew footing frequently is something that falls under the fines versus suspensions category. And I feel like when you can only ding a guy, what, upwards of $5,000, which come on now. Like, do you want to see a more, you know, there are obviously certain infractions that don't rise the suspension level. You can only find them. You want to find them. But the fines are nothing.

So. I mean, they're not nothing. They're half of one day. Yeah, people say like, oh, it's like a parking ticket. How annoyed do you get when you get a parking ticket? You get, you get annoyed. Yeah. And the formula is half of one day's pay.

Again, like a week later. Yeah. No, but figure out when you get paid in a day and you'd want to give half of that for an accident. You're suspended that, no, like a $5,000 fine for something. That's not really a big car. Yeah, like Tyler, Tyler Myers got a $5,000 fine for cross-checking Tommy Wingles last year, and Tyler Myers could buy this company right now. I think I could buy this company right now.

I wish. What company we taught? I can. I don't know. If people could see this studio right now. Nothing microphones, nothing at all. Would you like to see a higher ceiling on fines? To be able to, you know, maybe make your point.

more emphatically. I mean, it's something that we would use if it was available to us, but between the fines, the warnings, low-level suspensions, you know, we've got a lot of tools at our disposal to educate or discipline players. And I mean... Just to be clear here, like, fines are the formulas half of one day's pay for a player. Suspensions, that's not a fine. That's a player forfeiting the money that he is not allowed to play. But a fine, but there's a cap on how much you can find players. Right. Half of one day's pay. Right. I want to hear about the educational videos because I just can't imagine

how frustrating it must be to sit down with like an adult who's been playing hockey for 20 years and telling you mean the educational meetings we do with players in the video so you go you go and you meet with a player who is like a guy you just recently met like Rinaldo? We did Rinaldo we did Andrew Shaw we did Goudis

we did Braden Shenz it's like summer school with the kids who like can't graduate on time so you have to give them like extra is it like an HR thing where like you go there and you show them a video and you're like, you're like, you're like, like goofus would hit a guy

from behind here, but Gallant would... Is that a highlights reference? Is it a highlights reference? Because unlike you two, me and Patrick have been to the dentist apparently. No, look, we have...

I don't know what's going on. Highlights for kids is a magazine that you frequently find in, in doctor's offices, his dentist's offices. My family had a subscription. And there's a comic in it where one kid is Gallant and he does everything right,

but his nefarious brother maybe? That's never really clearly defined their relationship. Lover, brother, goofus. One is a good person and one is a bad person. It's like how my family talks about my sisters and me. Okay, but my point is that, like, so do you show them the right way and the wrong way? Yeah, and I mean, it depends on the player and what we're, if we have to repeatedly talk to a player about a certain type of infraction, we can focus on that. Some of these guys like to sample the menu a little bit and try to break every rule they can as they go through.

I'll order everything. We call out the Chris Pronger, Sprangling, Manfield. And Zach Rinaldo looks over and says, I'll have what he's having. But the meetings we have with players, one, aren't that fun for the player. And two, are pretty intense. We send along a significant amount of video clips that show good decisions, bad decisions that show maybe just how close they were to getting suspended on certain plays. If we're focusing on a particular technique, then, you know,

you have Chris Pronger, Stefan can tell going in with video examples of how to properly throw a hit. Just because Pronger didn't choose to throw them clearly. That's one thing about player safety that bugs the shit into me when it comes to the media. You got guys like Ken Campbell from the hockey news, I'll call him out. Who said, yeah, I know, right, spit in hot fire, who are constantly bemoaning the fact that guys like Chris Pronger are the ones involved in player safety. And George Peros. I'm like, well, who do you want to be?

Like when a company wants to know who's stealing their information, they hire the hackers that steal information. Like, you hire the people that know the game and know the tricks and know what they're trying to do. And it's so funny to me because we hired Pronger and everyone was like, oh, this guy's been suspended so many times. This is ridiculous. Meanwhile, he's a heart trophy winner. He's a first ballot hall of fame.

He's one of the 100 greatest players of all time and everything like that. Then we hire Peros, who never was suspended or disciplined in his life, played 500 games in the NHL, won a Stanley Cup, never. was disciplined. And they're like, ah, we can't have this guy either. He fights. Because he fights. Chris Pronger was actually a pre-first ballot Hall of Famer.

He actually got him while he still had three years left on his career. That's a really good player. We have a good track right. We have Channy Hall of Famer, Brian Leach Hall of Famer. Chris Pronger, Hall of Famer. Like, we're surrounding ourselves at Hall of Famer. Me eventually. I'll get there.

No, but it's like they want you guys to have like a guy who was concussed a bunch of times. We do. Chris Pronger. No, but they want. And he's been on both sides. But they want like a Paul Korea type that is like a guy who's on the other receiving end of these things. Which is fine. And Pat LaFontaine comes on the hearing calls and consults as well when needed.

That's great. But like who cares? Like what are they going to point? Like, wow, that hurts. Yeah. It looks like it really hurt. Yeah. I'd rather have the guy who administers the hits tell me what that guy is trying to do.

We have such a diverse group, you know, with Damien, who's been here for 18 years, who played college hockey and who literally like wrote half the rule book at this point. college hockey, Damien. I only played Division III. Well, what college? St. John's here in the city? Yeah. There were the Red Men back then. You regret that? I was half Red Men, half Red Storm. All right, you're fine.

Then you've got, you know, Stefan, you've got Chris Bronger, you've got Peros, you've got myself who scouted and went to law school. We've got a whole bunch of game watchers who have a variety of different backgrounds, whether it's officiating, whether it's in the media, whatever it might be. We put together a group of like 10 people that come from a complete mix of backgrounds and have completely different views on how the game should be officiated and what type of game we want to see. And we're still told it's not enough. It's not like if people want to give us more money to hire a bigger staff and to keep like we can have 15 players and never get anything done because nobody can agree on something. We've got three former NHLers who are well respected, great players who played for a long time.

we've got two guys who never played in the league but our rules experts or went to law school, whatever it might be, like what else do people want from our department here? Well, the thing I wonder about sometimes is like with Coley, I know Coley is not player safety. Colin Campbell for the uninformed. Coley, he's my boy, Coley.

But he played in an era that's so different from now that the game has changed so much over the years that I wonder, oh. Don't worry about that. Literally just turned off the lights in the scene. No, it's fine. We like it to give in the way. Ladies and gentlemen, it's time for a slow dance.

Partner up with you. No, but like, power off the thing is great because he's played all throughout this new era, no red line and all that stuff, faster game. I just wonder how helpful like a guy can be if they didn't really experience hockey. Like the last five years has been different than the five years before that. But keep in mind that Colin Campbell is a lot of the reason why the game has evolved the way it has. Like he's been at the helm here and hockey's better than it's ever been.

So he's lived through all sorts of things and he's seen the game change. I think you have to listen. to what people's experiences are. And like Patrick says, we have people from all different backgrounds. We have, you know, in hockey operations, we have Jim Gregory and Mike Murphy, Chris King played in the NHL, Kay Whitmore played in the NHL. We're all on the same side here. We all will check in with each other and get a sense of what, you know, we're thinking

about the game. So I think the game is great off. And Colin has a lot to do with that. You love John Scott. Colin Campbell's a huge. He's great for the game, Colin King. By my tongue. By through your tongue.

A couple things before we get to some questions from the listeners. When it comes to the consistency of rulings, do you feel handcuffed by precedent? Are there times when you want to make a ruling, but then you're like, okay, but if we do this, this is going to blow up the five or six other rulings you've already made to establish that it's between this and this for this type of infraction for this kind of player? I don't think handcuffs the right word because we do want to be consistent. insist on each time. And if we can't justify adding games, lowering games, whatever it might be for some reason, then there's a reason, you know, that we can't justify it. We can't just make this up as we go along or else it's unfair to the players. I think we have numerous opportunities if we want to ramp things up or ramp things down. If we see a certain type of play happening over and over and over and

over and maybe at first it was just, okay, you know, that's probably just a minor penalty. Maybe we're seeing it too often. Maybe we start warning a couple guys. Maybe we throw a fine out there just to let players know that we're watching. We have our GM meetings where we can meet with GMs and say, look, we're tired of watching this happen on the ice. Tell your players going forward, we're going to start penalizing this more strictly. Any offseason, if we wanted to email every team and say we're ramping everything up, you know, it used to be a two-game suspension.

Now it's 50. You guys can deal with it. We have that power and that authority. But I think our precedent is what makes us effective. But do you want to do that? Do you want to send that email and say, hey, we're going to do that? We take our direction from the GMs for the most part, though, and the competition committee. They listen to what we have to say.

We watch games every night. We have thousands of different types of plays, not just suspension. So when we go to these meetings, we come armed with, we really don't like the tendency we're seeing for players to do this or that. But at the end of the day, we do take our direction from the GMs and the competition committee and ultimately the board of governors. So you feel like they would probably say, if you were like, hey, this three gamer is not going to be five, they would probably push back. If we said we're going to make a tripping minor into a. suspension, yes, they would probably push back. They were probably not like that.

I mean, tripping's dangerous, guys. You're not going to take it seriously. But one of the things that we discuss is with all these illegal check that they had suspensions, players were, we started to see that they were very much aware of not hitting their opponent in the head. They started not paying attention to what their legs were doing. So a lot of kneeing incidents. We went to a GM meeting.

We said, we're worried. We're going to see a lot more knees coming up. And they said, if you see knees, you know, you have to deal with them swiftly. And, you know, and we're on the lookout for kneeing penalties. It didn't. Thankfully, it didn't happen. in the way we thought it would, but that's something that we asked them in advance. What if we start to see more kneeing incidents? And they said, go ahead. You can find guys for knee.

We want, we wanted it. Go ahead. I was going to say, so if you give a guy two for something, like two years ago, and it's the same sort of thing now, you give him four, it probably, you feel like they would probably appeal it. There's no point even doing it at this point because of the precedent that's been set. It depends. Again, I think we could say, look, we're ramping this up slightly, but I've never felt that there needs to be inflation for suspensions. Because it was two games five years ago, now it has to be three or four. I don't think you have to continually raise the number of games just because you see, you know, an illegal check to the head happening just like it did five years ago.

Well, it's a play that we're never going to be able to take completely out of the game. So it doesn't have to go to a 10-game suspension. I think we're pretty happy with our levels where they are. Do you think players like you guys? Personally or as a department? Personally, you seem like you both pretty downs. They probably like you guys personally, but as a department. I don't think they think about us until something happens to them or one of their teammates.

Really? I think that they go through their daily routine and never even think about player safety. And then if one of their teammates gets hit, they might start to wonder if it's something. You don't think it's ever in the back of their heads that if they, while they're out there? Some players. Yeah. And it should be. Because because of like you talk into them.

Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, when we first started with Chani, we went on a tour. We met all the teams. We haven't done that recently. We try to put our rulings out there to, you know, a lot of times in our suspension videos, not only do we say what the player did wrong, but we say what he should have done, right?

Right. You know, we're trying to get to the players. The one thing that we've been doing recently is we go to the rookie orientation program every year, and each team sends two or three of their best young players, and we get to meet with them, and they come in, we teach them the rules, we explain to them what we do as a department. We show them that we're not bad guys. that we're here actually for their benefit.

We show them video and we have a fun little exercise we do where we have a mock hearing. We show a hit by Chris Pronger on Jody Shelley and we let the kids play the Department of Player Safety. Oh my God. Oh my God. They interview us. Oh, that's amazing.

Yeah, they interview prongs. I always play the GM because I have there. I've been on about 800 discipline hearings now. So I have the GMs down pretty good and Patrick plays usually the agent. And it's pretty fun because, and then we make the kids make a video. We have two different editing sessions. We show them comparable plays. And a lot of times it's the first time these kids read the rule.

And they're like, oh, wow. This is the most fun thing I've ever heard. Yeah, no, it's like, it's like player safety care. And then you get to see where, like, you've got 80 of the best young players in the game, smartest young hockey players on the planet, and they're all over the map and their decision. I think this is three games. I think this is a clean hit. I think this is four games. I think this is elbowing. I think that, like, we can't even get consensus from these 80 guys. But the biggest thing is you asked about if the players like us, and I think most kids that come through that will at least see that we're doing it for their benefit.

And that we're not bad. For the longest time, the league suits coming in with the suspension. But we show them that we're doing this for them. And I think as we go forward, it's going to really make a big difference. And you're like, Connor McDavid, you're the defendant. He's like, it's really funny guys. Never's going to happen at all. No, but funny.

You guys are funny clowns. Connor McDavid in one of the hearings that we were having, And he said, well, you make no effort to play the puck. And I said, well, that's not a rule. And, you know, first time it registered in his head because you don't, you can leave your stick on the bench. That's because he's always playing. Yeah, when he was a child and he didn't play the puck. He was thrown in a closet with a cold water thrown on him for an hour.

So, I mean, what are going to do? Just kidding. His parents are great at met him. When you, I wanted to ask you about the trial, though. So, like, the what? The trial, the trial that you guys do? The hearing? The hearing.

Sure. It's not a trial? Same thing. It's a different. They're synonyms. Take the guy out back and shoot him. No, that's murder. Well, Robp. Torres kind of got taken out back.

Well, listen. So when you have an in-person hearing, the player is there, his agent is there, rep from the team is there. Yeah, on any hearing, whether it's in person or on the phone, the team is represented by the general manager. Sometimes there's an assistant GM or a coach. The player is on, the NHLPA is on, and the agent is on. What's the nature of the defense usually?

Is it more of a character defense or is it literally them arguing the play and saying, as you can see, my client's skates are clearly on the ice? No, we rely on. Who is that an impression? Just a general agent, an agent. Here, let me try again. My client clearly should be the number one goalie for the New York Islanders. See, it's an agent. Well, the agent on the hearing, he is supposed to just speak on the player's character.

and all the charities he does and what a great guy is. Oh, Jesus Christ. Are you serious? That's part of it? No, that's being, you have to sit here and hear about, you know, we would love. We would love. We would love to stipulate with everyone that all NHL players are great guys

and just skip that part of the hearing completely. So, and do you know who nursed that kitten back to the other? No, no, but. Raffi Torres. The player, the player in the GM, we're looking for them to tell us something we didn't see. We've had a number of hearings that did not result in a suspension

because the player pointed out something. that we, even though we watched the video a thousand times, we're not able to see. So the GM and the player both really do a good job of trying to explain their side on what they did or didn't do. And then the NHLPA is there just to make sure that we're doing everything that we're supposed to and we're not saying things and we're not allowed to. We're not using evidence that nobody's seen before. You know, make sure that the medical report, if there is one, is accurate. The agent, again, speaks about the character of the player. Is there anything that they can say that will change the number that you guys might have in mind already?

There have been players who have talked us out of suspensions entirely. Really? Who have been? Dustin Bufflin was the most recent. Buflin on Gallagher was a great example. We ended up making a video explaining what he explained us because I know I personally, we hadn't discussed it, but I personally walked into the hearing was like, this is a suspension. And Buff got on the call and talked us through the play.

And I was like, he's absolutely right. And Chevy, Kevin Shevoldeoff. Yeah, Chevy did agree. He was on point. What was his reasoning? What was it like the light that went on? We thought he hit him in the head. You see like Gallagher helicopter a bit.

But as, you know, Bufflin points out, he hits his hands first. And Gallagher is actually spinning from the hit on his hands and his elbow before he hits him in the head. And he weighs 100 pounds less.

Right. So he spins out and it just looks clearly like, you know. It was more, yeah, it was more of a full body hit than we originally thought. And as you can see, counselor,

his hands move back into the left. That basically was, without the terrible accent was more or less. So like when Bufflin sees you guys now is you just like, hey guys. Well, we talked on the phone so Bufflin wouldn't recognize me if I was sitting in front of it. Was there was ever, I mean, without giving any names, was there ever a defense that you heard that made you almost snicker? Oh yeah. I mean, there have been guys who have come on and like lied and everyone knows they're lying and they know they're lying and we just kind of move past it. The best ones are the guys who come on and are like, yeah, I did it.

I screwed up. I know I did. I know you're going to punish me. Just know that I didn't mean to do this. I won't do it again. You don't have to like get punitive here because I know I made a mistake. And we're like, great, good hearing. That's got to be Sean Thornton and Brooks Warpick, right?

There's no way he had like I had any defense on that. I love authority. He's one of the best guys in hockey. When you, when you deal with, I mean, listen, we haven't had one of those on a while. Like the real controversial, everybody writing think piece kind of stuff, right? because what a great job we're doing. That's right. I agree.

And also the players are figuring it out and a lot of the scumbags are playing in England now. Well, my point is that my point is that when you have one of those, do you ever feel like there is a responsibility on behalf of the league to listen to that controversy,

listen to those people, and come up with a ruling that is amicable to those concerns? No, I mean, from my input anyhow, you know, it was, I work with Coley, with Shanney, with Q, so I'm not the main decision maker. Yeah, you are. But I, my input would always be based on hockey and, you know, past precedent, not necessarily PR or what the fans are saying.

I think you could get in a lot of trouble if you start letting fans decide on how bad a suspension is going to be. So my input has always been based on hockey and precedent. I've been doing this since, you know, Marty McSorley on Bruchier. I was doing this with Todd Bertuzi. So I've been part of the decision making on a lot of these controversial plays. Do you ever go into the hearing and say, like, reference your own experience at St. John and say, look, when I was playing at St. John. No, but, you know, I will say it drives me nuts when people say, well, you never played hockey. And just because I didn't skate as fast or shoot as hard as most of us guys.

Oh, don't say that. Hold on. I'm going to find your hockey D.B. Like, I've played hockey. Yeah. And it was before Hockey DB. I actually agree with that because like, I'm on there. We spelled my name wrong.

When someone's, when someone. True tease. When someone gives me the you never played the game thing to me, I'm like, well, no, I never did. But when I see them give it to somebody else who actually did play hockey, like someone like you, I'm like, but none of us played it at the NHL level. Like, it's completely different animal than anything that any of us have ever done. And even players in the NHL played at different levels, different speeds. And some people who played in the NHL are still idiots.

Just because you play doesn't mean you have a good hockey mind or that you can analyze a play or that you, you know, like obviously the best people. people in hockey, whether it's a GM or in player safety or whatever, are guys who played the game and have a great mind? Oh. Like, what is that a Twitter question? Dave Lozo, I was located. Active from 1991 to 1992, St. John's University, New York, ECAC. Statistics unavailable.

Yeah. So you could have had a 50-goal season. I could have. My coach said I should have. But a scrappy kid from Brooklyn. It's like Steve Rogers, Captain America. I was eight then if that makes you feel. All right.

Let's get to some listener questions because we have a few and they wanted to ask you something. You have a few listeners or a few questions? We have an ample number of listeners. We also have some mean tweets. It's like you guys have to read them. We can read them to you. We can react. Joe Rogers wants to know, and this is a good question.

Why does injury have so much weight over intent danger of action regarding suspension? So one of the common rejoinders against you guys is that you suspended the injury versus suspend to the intent of the play or the on the play. What say you to that? Well, we don't. You know, as we discussed before in the podcast, injury can only add to the length of a suspension. So once we determine that a play in and of itself is a suspendable play, injury will add games on top of it. So maybe it takes a two-game suspension to a three-game suspension or a three to a four or whatever it might be. But we will never look at a play that's a clean hit where a guy got injured and say, okay, like we got to suspend a guy because so-and-so got injured and vice versa.

We would never look at a dirty play where the victim got up and skated away unharmed and say, oh, like, it's fine. It's fine. It's fine. It almost seems like you've answered this next question already from Daniel Conme. Do you spin a big wheel like Wheel of Fortune to come up with your suspensions? It's really more Price's Right style wheel. It's a no bankrupt.

No, yeah, it's more of an up-down than a spinny thing. Yeah. It's great. There's a whole room for it at the league. It's a beautiful room. I find these jokes so funny. Yeah, for those you can't enjoy the ambians. Damien's laughing off mic right now so hard.

Damien's been no-selling every joke we've made, and God, I love him for it. I really do. Thomas Cook wants to know why is a high sticking penalty, a double minor of blood is drawn regardless of the severity. So I think it's more of a concept of the rule question, anything else. Well, it's not if blood is drawn. It's visible injury.

And it's the only way to know for sure if a player is injured or not. Yeah. You can't just grab your face. and say you were injured because if you got to know the only way to know for sure like new can get from space like in aliens got a only way we can be sure yeah I agree uh Jesse uh seal Han once though how do you track player history of suspensions and penalties do you use a spreadsheet is there a database just victimian's brain it used to be my brain yeah it was much more valuable then it's like a note it's like a little note pad that they just

they just sit through it's on the wheel it's on the wheel right we do have a database that somebody answers every infraction, then it's genuinely pretty great. You can go in and search by infraction. So if we have a guy who, you know, does something that we haven't seen in a long time, we can go back and say, when's the last time we had discipline for this or that? You can go by infraction, by player, by team. So when a team calls us and says, you never look at anything that happens to our guys, we can say, actually, we reviewed, you know, 80 plays where you were the victim last year, that type of thing. Like, I'm sure you won't tell us the actual teams, But how many teams would you say are really annoying when it comes to like hits on their players and they're always texting you?

It depends on the day. It depends on the hit. I wouldn't say any of them are really annoying. I would say there are times when they have questions or they have concerns or they, you know, again, like our fans, the GMs are incredibly emotional when they lose a game. They've got a little more riding on a thing. Do you think that they're trying to work? But do you know, do you think they're trying to work you? Like coaches work with the refs where if they think they complain enough, then you're going to pull the range back?

If they are, it's not working. But, you know, I think that, yeah, look, sometimes people just want to vent. And there are times when people from a team call us and yell at us for an hour. And you've got them on speakerphone and on mute. And you're just letting them yell and yell and yell. Doing the hand motion with your hand. Yeah, they tell you what a terrible person you are and how player safety doesn't know what they're talking about. And then the next day they called back and say, sorry, it was a really, you know, we lost the night before.

And we had to call up two players. And you were right. We were really out of lot. So sometimes you just got to let people talk. This is one I wanted to ask you, but I'm glad I didn't, because this guy's going to ask you. Mr. Jones, one, wants to know, given the brain trauma issues in the NFL and also the NHL, I guess, lawsuits and such, is there a tendency to overprotect the players now when you know that there could be litigious results? No, I don't think we overprotect the players, but I do think that we now have an illegal check to the head rule, which I think everybody agreed that as we watched a number of hits, a few you referenced already, the David, the booth hit and the Marks of Ardh

hit, we realized that we needed to maybe start to outlaw these penalties that were legal up until that point. So I don't think we overreact. I think that the rule was necessary and it's evolved into what we now have is an illegal check to the head. And again, the longer we go on and the more players play with

this their whole career, I think you'll see less and less of these. Can I do some mentions now? Can I do some ads at that player's safety? Sure. Just for fun. Please. Like, it's amazing to me how many people feel like they're going to get to you or get you to react. But some of these are pretty funny. These are people who have communicated with. These are actual. Are you reading these or

are we reading these? I mean, do you, I don't think you want to read these. I feel like, because if you guys don't want to, I mean, you can, if you want to, I mean, my mom's listening. I am not going to curse. Yeah, that, that's a little bit vulgar. Yeah. Go ahead. What does it say? This is someone who's reached out to player safety. It's an inappropriate oral sex joke. It's a reply to the Bruins, uh, Pastor not being suspended. It just says at player safety,

Jets suck, Yankees suck, Mets suck, Mets suck, Mets suck, and the Rangers swallow. Now I wonder when MP Roberts, who by the way has a car selfie. He does. I have a theory that every person who has a car selfie is their avatar is basically a psychopath. Maniac. Or James Gordon. Like, does he feel like

Stefan Kentile's going to read this tweet and say, he didn't say anything about us. I don't know what. He put it at team, at NHL player safety. He's just commenting to us about how he feels about those teams. But why would he think you guys care? But he's a Devils fan, I'm guessing, right? That's the only team he left out of that, Soliloquay. I think he's a ruins fan.

Oh, really? He's mad about Pashtenac. You should all go kill yourselves. Oh. Two games for this. LMFA 7-0's. Your incompetence offends me. NHL equals no hitly.

Oh my God, burn. I think it's. very rational to say that we're overreacting to a hit and should therefore kill ourselves. I think that makes perfect logical sense. This is one of my favorite ones. This is quality. This is from G. Duff. Duff Daddy. An old man in a backwards hat wearing a Rob Grancowski jersey.

I believe in Belidick the Patriot way, he says, on his profile. This is more of the, this is about Pasternak's hit. This is more of the pusification of the game. pass head never moves. But wait a second. Why don't you take the time to respond to this guy? Clearly he wants to engage in a thoughtful, rational way. I sent you that tweet.

That might be the best tweet we've ever received. The way that this gentleman spells pusufocation as three words. That's P-U-S-S-A and then F-C-C-C-E-C-C. And then you have another one here. F-Cation like vacation. Like, yeah. Like this was great too. Like it's not a reply to anything.

It's just how the fuck was that a trip? at NHL at NHL player safety, 13 question marks. And it was a clean body check. And so that's just like, he's watching the game and he sees a play. And he just kind of musing to himself. He's like, I'll just ring up the NHL and the NHL Department of Player Safety and see what they think. This is probably an appropriate time to note that we have no control over the officials. So if an official makes a call that you don't like tweeting at us.

And frankly, even if we did have control over the officials tweeting at us, wouldn't change it. But even less so. It's like tweeting the accounting department. And saying, I can't believe your ref screwed that up. All right. You've both been extraordinarily generous with your time. There's one more question that I'm kind of fascinated by from our listeners. No, that's a good one.

Brandon Wadlow wants to know. Would you have suspended the guy who killed Harambe? No. Wait, is that what he said? He's not that at all. What would it take to get a lifetime ban in the NHL? Now, we all thought that Rafi was sort of on track for that at one point. If he had done something else real bad.

I think a lifetime ban would not be our department. I think that would come from the commissioner and the board of governors to decide something like that. What about a season? Could you guys do a season? Yeah, I think we can do a season. Sure. Are you at all worried about the fact that Wydenman went to- Not our department?

That's hockey ops. Okay, but that's fine. That's accounting. But yours is the department that hands out suspensions that can be appealed to the arbitrator. And they won one. They got one. Maybe. There's still like lawsuits and shit going on, but like they got one.

Are you worried now that are they going to have more people fighting them? Oh, I think we would welcome. We trust our process. We trust our decision making. If somebody chooses to appeal it, we're confident in decisions that we make and that we can defend them. And frankly, if someone wants to come out and say we're doing too good a job protecting the players and we're being too strict in enforcing the rules, that's fine with us. How do you guys feel about fighting? What do you think would happen if fighting left the league?

Do you feel like you have more stuff? You feel like you'd have less stuff because there'd be less fighters or who are those guys? I'm a fighting guy and lozo is not. Yeah, well, I think what you're seeing is the natural evolution. We're fighting to leaving the game naturally where the way teams do roster construction now, it's no longer, you know, a top six, middle three, and then a third line that's penalty killers and fighters. I think you're seeing it leave the game naturally. I think we as a league have done it.

a very good job regulating it. You see it as a deterrent, though? Do you like? Do I? Yes. You do? Yeah. Because fighting exists. I mean, like, that's my thing, though, is always always come back to.

Like, fighting exists and like Rodco Gudis doesn't care. You know what I mean? Well, that's because the deterrent has been warped. Like, deterrent can be seen as policing the game deterrent, but also deterrent can also be seen as a way to open up the steam valve and not have guys do stupid shit they would otherwise not do if they could fight it out. And speaking for myself and not for the department or the league here. I think people use examples of guys who don't care about fighting and say, you know, he still runs around, he still does this, he still does that without recognizing that it could be worse than it is.

Just because some players aren't deterred in any way by fighting doesn't mean there aren't other players who are. Because I just think like both hits aren't like premeditated. They're heat of the moment and just stupid. So they're not thinking in the back of their head, oh, if I do this, I'm going to have to fight somebody or someone of my team's going to have to fight. No, but if you don't think that before the game, players are looking at the lineups going, oh, he's in there, he's in there, that type of thing. Yeah, before the game, I just think in the heat of the moment, you're not very hard. It's not a perfect thing.

We fighting is illegal for a reason and all the other things that go alongside fighting. There's no more third man in, no more instigator. You no longer in the NHL can ever get sucked into a fight that you don't want to be in without the other guy being penalized significantly. It's all willing combatants. It's all people who are willing to be in part of this fight. Last question. If you could communicate anything to the NHL fans about what the department does

and what you'd most like them to realize about your jobs. And this could be you saying, hey, assholes, we work until 3 o'clock every night watching these stupid monitors and watching somebody eat the last pizza pizza in the war room and get real upset about it, what would you like to communicate to the fans? I would say this. Rest assured that we've seen it. If you think there's any hit, we've already seen it.

Rest assured, we know the rules. We love hockey more than anybody that I know. You couldn't do this job. I've been doing it, like I said, for 18 years. You're like Bernie Sanders, but the 18 years. Seven nights a week. His career could vote. Watching hockey seven nights a week

And we're not just making The wheel and all that Who makes the wheel then? No, I'm kidding No, but honestly We respect the game, we love the game And we've seen it I guess that's the only thing I can say

I think to echo that just that We get a lot of tweets that say Like I can't believe you guys didn't even review this play I can't believe you didn't look at it We watch every minute of every game Literally everything that happens gets reviewed by multiple people at multiple times. Just because we don't have a hearing for something, just because we don't suspend for something, doesn't mean we haven't seen it. We literally watch everything.

That's why we're in there until 3 a.m. fighting over the last light to pizza every single night when we're there. We only have pizza once a week. Yeah, because I'm trying to get everyone getting better shit. Oh, yeah. You're the guy that goes out and gets the food and gets stuck in the elevator. Yeah. They gave me a $25 visa gift card for that.

They said I was the nicest person ever get stuck in an elevator, which is going to be my new Twitter bio. The building management. The building manager said I was the nicest person ever get stuck in an elevator, which I think is like a solid Tinder profile. There's literally a building manager that's like, I don't know if this guy's really a gift card worthy or not with his tone. It's like their department of employer safety where they're like this guy's way out of line. What are you trying to get into eat instead of delicious pizza? We have a nice grilled chicken veggies. We're trying to get healthy.

Yeah. We're trying to get a little healthy. I'm just amazed the director of player safety is the guy that goes out and gets the food. Like there should be people below you. You should send the... Yeah, you would probably like send a vice president out together. Yeah. Like send that guy out.

Yeah, someone below you. No, you, uh, we, everyone else was watching a game at the time. My game was at intermission. I went down and get the pizza. I got stuck in an elevator. Oh, so the guys in the room will way more upset that the pizza was getting cold. Then Patrick being stuck in the elevator. No, I got one text.

Try turning your head sideways. Maybe you can fit out. Because he's, when I said I got stuck. He thought he meant my head gets that. For those that don't know what Patrick looks like, he has a... I'm an incredibly attractive man. Yeah, it's a man. Slender build.

He's a runner. Yeah, speaking of struggling with doors. Oh, yeah. Thanks for having us at the lovely Yahoo! Opses today. Boys are marveling at the fact that I don't know the difference between push and pull. No, I was marveling at the fact that you screwed it up walking into the building and then coming through the same door.

The point is that you push your way into a room and then you pull open the door to leave is the way it should work and it doesn't work consistently like that throughout this building. And the door didn't magically switch direction in the four minutes we were in one room. Fucking Hogwarts door. It's just different directions each time you walk up to it. Anyway, Damien Etcheverietta and Patrick Burke of the NHL Department of Player's Safety. Thank you for your time and your candor. You're both gentlemen and scholars.

Thank you to Damien Etchevaryetta, a proud member of the St. John's Redmond Storm. and of course the lovely and talented Patrick Burke for coming in and joining us again the most hockey-centric show we've ever done but I think it's the sometimes we can go deep dive I think on the hockey issues and I think we did a good job with that interview

right and now to balance it out we're going to list our 10 favorite movies that have the word the in it oh okay the object of my affection the Shawshank Redemption The Gallows The Gallows. There was on the flop house this week.

It's the only reason I remember it. Oh, go ahead. I got another one. The Major League. The Empire Strikes Back. The Star Wars. The The Colon Concert Video. The Legend of 1900.

The Lucy, I believe, was the one with Scarlett Johansson. Right, where she played the woman who was finding the monkey bones and the evolution. Right. There was a sequel to The Her. The Her. Oh, the hunt for Red October. Oh, that's a very good one. The Patriot Games. The Patriot Games.

The sum of all fears. The fear of all sums. The accountant. Oh, yeah, by the way, he was on our show like four weeks ago, and I think we promised to promote his podcast that we never did. Who? David Elric. Remember he came on? He left his umbrella here.

Oh, yeah. And we were like, yeah, we'll put something out about your podcast. I don't know. You vamp for a second. Sure. I'll Google David Lick. I would also say probably the green. Meal

The Shining The Kujo The Dark Half The Stand The saving private Ryan The I was going Stephen King movies

The The Gunslinger The Dark Tower The Salem's Lot It just goes on and on I don't really see a link to his podcast here We appreciate all of your

feedback on this show And it's time to look at viewer listener mail here on Puck Soup Wes Gaddy wants to know who's the better coach N bench Which was numerous bench

Or for the Devils Or John Tortorella Oh boy That's actually a pretty good question I covered that Devils team a little bit It was a weird weird dynamic Yeah I think

I think That Devils Didn't that Devils team Like make a run at the end They turned it around Yeah Yeah they made Not in the same way

They may win it with Lamar that one time Oh, yeah, that's what I'm thinking of, the post-John McLean era. I would say N-Benzh is a better coach because at least you get the Atom-Oates special team stuff out of it. But the special teams, I think were bad. And Scott Stevens is obviously doing a pretty decent job in Minnesota too right now with their defense. Clearly, I mean, without Scott, yeah, yeah, he's, yeah. I would go end bench. Yeah, I'm saying, yeah, I feel like by default.

Yeah. I would hire N-bench to coach the U.S. World Cup team next time if they were eligible. Nicholas Bench. Andrew Dojack wants to know. Shouldn't we celebrate U.S. Thanksgiving before all going crazy for Christmas? Hashtag, think of the Pilgrims. I'm pretty sure this is one of those questions about

shouldn't they not put out the Christmas stuff until after Thanksgiving? But I will say this about it. There are people that I know from my neighborhood back home where the Friday after Thanksgiving, Christmas lights go up. On Black Friday, it's lit up. It's not Black Friday for them, my friend.

It's lit up Friday. That's when you're supposed to do it. Well, not everybody does. at them. But, I mean, my biggest problem is that, like, the Dwayne Reed by me here in the city had Christmas shit out before Halloween. That's my pet peeve. Like, Halloween should be the point of demarcation

between the fall. Yeah, the very least. And then after Halloween, you can get into winter shit. Like, I feel like when I see that first commercial for Target, that's like a Christmas ad is when I lose my shit. And I haven't seen it yet. Like, last year it was Craig Robinson was doing the play in the piano.

And, like, I think I saw that on, like, November 2nd. And that's when I started tweeting every day, Christmas is right around the corner because it was 60 fucking days away and they were already telling you what to buy. So I'm going to say, what was this question? Should I had another thing. Christmas until... After Thanksgiving. We should do Thanksgiving first and do Christmas. I'm with him, totally. I'm with him. Why are you gotta be so... Greg Faccini wants to know how long until the Las Vegas golden showers are an above 500 team. The whole thing's game planned for them to be at least a 500 team in their first season. Oh, they won't be. I think they could be. Right, Coach, with the talent of the assemblage of,

this is not going to be Darcy Walkaluck between the pipes, okay? This is going to be a really good goalie. The fourth best defenseman from a bunch of good teams. They're going to sign some free agents up front, and they're going to pick a coach that probably is going to be pretty good. I will bet you right now that team will not be 500, either NHL 500 or Real 500.

I'll bet anything on that. Whatever you want to wager, there's no way. Like, have you, like, I remember doing the... I will put up a Taylor Hammack, and cheese sandwich and you put up a pork roll egg and cheese sandwich and made the victor go the spoils like didn't you do mock drafts from when general fanager way back in a day remember when general fanager existed so painful but i did that and like the team was bad and since that's happened like months have gone past and teams have like done things made moves where like seven of the really good guy quote really good

guys aren't even available anymore so imagine once we get to the actual expansion draft like they're going to have like Dustin Brown, Matt Moulson, top line of Jason Zucker, Kevin BX, Paul Stasney, and Evander Kane. Like the Ducks right now, I think, have a situation. I think they still do, where they have like a defenseman they're going to have to expose, that's good, but they'll figure something out. Like teams are going to do stuff to protect themselves, so they have to give up the

least possible good play. There's no way that team is 500 to first season. Do they have a nickname yet? No, it's going to be the Golden Knights that we think. Oh, is it really? Jaber's rank, a good friend wants to know, where do you guys stand on the use of first person plural pronouns when discussing sports teams?

Oh, like wild lightning and then saying like, like the wild scores instead of wild score? Is that what he's trying to say? I think so. First person plural pronouns. I always treat, like, I feel like everywhere I've ever written, the style is always like treat it like a plural, like devils score, wild score.

lightning score. I think he means like I and we not like singular or plural. Like when talking about teams. Like we we really played a good game last night said the fan. Like that's what he's talking about. Is it? Oh, I'm totally against that. I feel like it's only good for college.

If you went to college at a place and you actually paid money into the school, then you can do it. I actually do have an opinion about that because I think there's a blurred line there. It's time for a well actually blurred line moment from our Our resident

Robin Thicklever Greg Wischinski I'm saying I stole this song I'm not that talented nationwide has lots word lines Listen

I think that when teams Try to build fan loyalty By saying that we are We are devil's army Oh you mean when the team set it No, but I'm saying that if the team says that you're a part of the team. Oh.

No, I'm serious. I'm dead serious. If the team says that you're part of the team and then you go around saying, well, we played really well, I was glad we won the game last night. How is, how, like, I feel like you get a pass. If a team, like, if the Seahawks want to say that you're the, how many guys? What, 12th man? 13th man? They do the 12th man.

They do the 12th man because the 13 would mean that they have an illegal formation on the field. Too many men on the field. So when they say you're the 12th man, and if Seahawks fan wants to be like, we won that game against the Jets, obviously. So your justification is really cheesy, obvious, fake marketing to draw fans and is a reason to say we. But you're, but it's bullshit because you said in college, you could say we. But you're not on a member of the football team in college either. I'm part of the university. Yeah, but you're part of the, you're part of the consumer base of the franchise.

I'm part of the franchise. So like, if, so like, okay, if I eat Twix and Twix and Twix. makes a bunch of money in the first quarter, I can say like, we generated a lot of revenue. If Twix, if Twix says you're part of Twix Nation, then sure.

Fuck Twix. It's a stupid slogan. If right Twix says, you're part of right Twix nation and left Twix says, what the fuck? I hate that commercial, by the way. It's so dumb.

It's such a tryhard. No, I feel like if the team identifies you as being part of the, of their movement, you know, then like, sure. Yes, they're part of the movement that tricks you into thinking, you're part of the team, so you give them more money, and they make more money.

What about those assholes in Tampa that get personalized jerseys from the lightning? And then they're like, look, you're part of the team. It's like being knighted. Oh, what do you mean? Like season ticket holders get personalized jerseys from the lightning. They're given jerseys. And with like their names on the back? Or whatever they want.

Fuck those people. But the team is literally now, not only saying you're part of our team, they're putting you in a uniform. They're taking advantage of your fandom is what they're doing. Like, I feel like, I'm at a point where someone's like, Like, oh, he won last night. I've basically stopped saying, oh, what position do you play or something like that? Like, I just let it go. But I feel like it's healthy to have that dividing line between we and they where you don't get so caught up in it where like, like, I feel like that's how so many like crazy, like we were talking about a player safety, how their mentions on Twitter are just terrible all the time.

Look at this hit. You guys are dumb. But after a while, enough people jump in where the conversation shifts to your team sucks. You suck. Your team's like, like that's not helping anybody. having the we they mental separation What about a fuck soup fan? Oh, you're all part of the show

So please send money to Care of We like you You're the best Go leave some good reviews and help us All right money Last question Last question

The question I want to ask Is gonna take way too long Which is the DH which we disagree on So let's punt that to the next show Oh but I mean What? It sounds like you don't want to be proven wrong I don't want to

We need to get out of the studio video. The short, the short, let's just, let's get here on time today. Let's do this. Let's do this. Let's pretend it's a presidential debate. Or how about this? We'll do our closing arguments.

No, no, no, no. We'll save it for next week. I don't want to, I don't want to rush the product. I want to give people that, let me ask you this question. I want to thank you, people of Iowa, and thank you Anderson for your moderation. Oh, boy. The designated hitter, Webster's defines. All right, we'll do it next week.

The question I want to ask is. Yeah. What do you think as an individual in sports is the most least thing you can do on the field, on the court? Like, for instance, like, for instance, like, could you score a goal? Could you hit a home run?

Like, what's the most in any sport? Long snapper. See, I don't think you can do it. You think you could long snap a ball perfectly for a whole game. Do you think I can't snap the ball between my legs back to the place to the holder of the ball? I think it's the, if the question is what's the easiest thing in pro sports to do?

The highest easiest thing you could do. Like what's the highest accomplishment you can do in any sport? Like, you know, struck a guy out, but like you could, you know. Well, okay. Well, I think the lowest is long snapper. So I'll put that aside. Okay. Like the highest thing that I could do in sports might be play first base.

Does it require you to catch a lot of fly balls? Not all that good with that. you kind of like just play you don't have to have the same mobility as the third baseman necessarily because the second baseman's doing most of the heavy lifting right you're just kind of catching the ball because i can catch a ball because i feel like the best thing i could possibly do is like hit an open jumper in an NBA game because like nobody would cover me they'd be like covering that guy and like i could hit it i could hit an 18 footer if i'm not appreciate the racial undertones of this what's what racial undertones because you're the white guy well no because i'm 38 years old and i'm not good at basketball and i would clearly be i clearly be i could be be the guy who would be the uniform that doesn't fit properly with the high socks who you wouldn't cover. Oh, you definitely have the John Stockton shorts. Right. Well, I have to. I'm like 80% legs, so my shorts would never fit properly. So you think hitting an open jumper would be the highest athletic achievement you can have. Because like in football, I could probably kick an extra point. Hockey, like I can't skate for shit. So I play goalie and the puck would hit me by accident.

Right. And like baseball, I figure I could get a guy out pitching, but it wouldn't be any skill. He would just rock and a line drive at somebody and they would catch it. But like basketball, I feel like I could stroke an open 17 footer. I think in baseball, in baseball, I would, I would imagine knowing my velocity and knowing my placement, I would probably get rocked. Like, even though I know how to pitch. Yeah. But like, you would, you would get a guy out because he would hit a rope right at the first baseball. Well, I would probably get a guy out because, like, he'd expected to be a fastball, but like, like, it's such a shitty pitch that it just, like, goes in the dirt and he just, like, like, nubs it back to me. He just, like, or like, he just like, pity strikes out. Right.

He doesn't want to run up the score. So in summary, uh, the D. The D. ruin strategy. I don't believe that the argument about pitchers, like, this is... Why do you love strategy so much? There's this insane argument that like, oh, isn't it better to not see a pitcher hit? I'm like, no, it's a great idea. And then we should just

replace all of the shitty hitters on the field with better hitters. We'll have a bunch of guys who hit and a bunch of guys who field... But they're not just shitty hitters. They're completely... They're so bad that when a guy gets on base with nobody out, they always bunt the runner over. Right. It's like Madison Bumgarner or somebody. That's bad. That's not fun

the watch. But my point is not that they're good hitters. You win the argument on pitchers or shitty hitters. I win the argument. But you lose the argument on the idea that the American League brand of baseball where there's some old fuck or some fat fuck like Prince Fielder hitting as a

DH and hanging on for your life in this league because he can't do anything else but hit is somehow a better, a better brand of baseball than the sixth inning of a national league game where a pitcher has to, a manager has to decide whether to take out a guy who was a two-hitter because they might score a run or leave them in and then maybe not score a run.

Like that is exponentially more interesting than here comes bet. Fuck to swing his bet. What? Rob Deer, Pete and Covellia, Rob Kittle. So in your mind, a guy with the potential to hit a three-run home run is not as compelling as a double switch is what you're telling me. I am so much more interested in the managerial machinations in baseball than I am by big lug swings would.

at pitch. You sounded like Jim Rome reading a headline in like a paper. Dear Jim. Big lug. Swingswood at pitch. Signed. Cessel. I just, but like, okay, so you're watching a game in the National League and it's first and second or second and third, two outs, the eight hitters up.

When they walk the eight hitter to get the free out, you think that's good. It's not, but what are you saying in the eighth inning? No, no, I'm saying any inning. Fourth inning. I'm saying it's never, it's not necessarily a free out because then it becomes, It then becomes the other team's decision whether it should be a free out, whether they pinch it, what do they do with the pitcher?

No, no, no, I don't mean like that. I mean, you're the team in the field. Yeah. Second and third, two outs, the eight hitters up. He's a 240 shortstop. Yeah. You walk him to get to the pitcher and the pitcher's out on three pitches.

Like, why is that? Or the other team has to make a decision as to whether or not to take the picture out. This idea that's in the seventh inning, the idea that the picture is always going to be in there to hit in those situations. is a straw man argument. Because if that situation happens

after the sixth inning, there's a decision to be the end. After the sixth inning, he's in about twice before that. And then it becomes a butterfly effect. You're stepping on a butterfly where there's dinosaurs and then three innings later,

that pitcher who was doing fantastic for you is no longer in the game and your bullpen's getting rocked. It's so much more interesting. That's the straw man argument. The straw man argument is that every time that happens, it's a tough decision.

A lot of times the guy's at 95 pitches and he's going to come out anyway. It's like the only time that's really a tough decision is like you're saying when a guy's got like a two-hitter and it's a one-nothing game, do you keep them in the protective one-nothing league? But that's more rare than a bad hitter hitting.

I'll go with your premise. Like, sometimes the guy's coming out anyway. And then you have to choose which guy off your bench you want to come in and hit. Depending on who you choose off the bench, then the other team has to figure out if they want to keep their pitcher in or bring in a lefty to face a lefty, and then they're going to alter what they do for the next several innings. It is so much more interesting than simply just,

fat guy who can't run gets up and hits ball. It happens in the AL2 though. Win! All the time late in games, they'll send up a left-hander to bat for a right-hander, and there's a right-hander on the mound. But it's not the same sort of thing as a pitcher, and it's also not anything that's going to affect

what the bullpen then does. Because you're not taking a pitcher out of the game, then, that's my point. I just feel like you're overvaluing. I feel like if the NL had a DH, and you watched a lot of NL baseball, you would still see that strategy. You would still see that stuff.

That portends that I don't know that there's a better way. It's like saying, well, if you just had a shootout for all your life, you'd think that's the best way to end a hockey game. It doesn't mean it's right. It's still a shitty way to end a hockey game. Just like the DH is shitty. Because I know that there's a better way to do it.

I just don't know what anyone gets out of watching an like Al Lighter bat. You know, like a dude is bat in 042 for his career, a big situation. It's a straw man argument because those guys aren't always going to bat. As you get later in the game, they don't bat and you have to change. You have to use strategy. But they're not going to bat anyway. thinking about when you're going to, you double switch. It's early in the game.

It's all so much more interesting. It's early in the game when that's an issue, when you're not going to take the guy out in the third inning when he comes up with the bases loaded in two outs. That's the issue. It's a very tough argument to make against an American League fan because ultimately I'm arguing about the greatness of baseball versus someone arguing about how fucking weepy they get, seeing David Ortiz for two more years or Dave Winfield at 43 years old. There you go.

You're more into Noah's Cindergard batting and maybe getting taken out for. First of all, bad example. Good hitter. Noes Sindergarde. No Sindergard's a good hitter, but I mean, if he's at 95 pitches or 110 pitches, all right, he's a bad. He's a good hitter. But like any other, like Bartolo Cologne. I mean.

Extra-early fun hitter. That's my point. But he's fun because he's bad. But what an adventure it is when he hits. Exactly. It's so fun. I would be into it if every single batter was Bartolo Cologne. So you're saying if we had a weight minimum for all pitchers.

They all looked like Barthola Cologne or Sidpranianian. or David Wells. Like when we're all this Chapman bad in the World Series in game five. Again, fascinating choice because they could have taken him out. But it stops being fascinating the second it gets up to the plate and strikes out on four pitches. It's like everyone, it's like, oh, here's a good chance

to break the game open and the cops are like, fuck it, one runs enough. It instantly, like, you're way more into the process that gets him to the plate while I care more about what happens at the plate. What was your favorite? This is an interesting question. What was your favorite?

baseball video game as a kid. Ooh. Oh, I like RBI baseball. This is, I'm so fucking happy you said that. Oh boy. Because the world is split up into two types of people.

The people who like playing RBI baseball because I get to be Roger Clemens. And I played Stratomatic. I had the road. And the people who enjoyed playing stratomatic. I knew it. You really was Stratomatic.

Or, or enjoyed playing baseball stars where it was more fun making a team, building up the players. I like baseball stars. Right, but you liked RBI baseball better. Sure. You just said it.

Because there were real players in it. Right. And baseball stars is more about the managerial side. You win money when you win games. You build up your players. You choose who you make a, you know, faster or stronger or whatever. But you're, you like the dumb down bullshit DH video game. And I liked the smart managerial video game.

That's the difference. Oh, I feel so vindicated now. My God, this is like, this is like a 39-year thesis I've been writing in the back of my back of my head, you just proved it. Clearly I won this argument. All right. I'm going to win the argument now in a skip Bayless way. LeBron's the reason to D.Hs. We'll put up a poll.

We'll put up a poll. That's what she said. We got to get out of here. Thanks to Patrick Burke. Thanks to Damien Etchevaryetta. 18 years. The Department of Player Safety. Thanks to all of you for listening to this dopey podcast.

Support the podcast. Use the code soup. When you download your Seekek app, it'll let it let's them know. that you're listening and supporting the podcast, and they'll get you to advertise with those. Thanks to Katie. Leave us some good reviews. Thanks to Katie Levine. Thanks to Nerdist. And we'll see you guys next week. And now,

Loza will take you home. Hey, if you have Spotify free, do this trick. I'm going to tell you real quick. Maybe you know it. Maybe you don't. Get your playlist. And it's random if it's Spotify free. So if you have a thousand songs on there, maybe you want to hear 10 songs, eight songs. Here's what you do. You drag eight songs to the bottom of your playlist. Don't tweet about this because I don't want Spotify to fix it. Seriously, if you start adding them, they'll probably fix this. I've been doing this for year. Drag the seven or eight songs you want to hear to the bottom of your playlist. On your computer, play the song at the bottom of the playlist. Take out your phone, open up Spotify and

it'll say continue listening on the MacBook or your iPhone. Click iPhone. And then when you're out and about on your phone, those same seven or eight songs at the bottom will loop through and you won't hear all 1,000. So boom. What is, what benefit is this to people? Because sometimes when you have new songs on your playlist, you just kind of want to hear the new songs. But when you have Spotify free, it's random. They'll go through your 500, 1,000 song play. It's a lot. It's You do it this way. You just get the six or seven new songs on there. Then what about those of us who carry around a full turntable and play 33s and 45s?

Well, I mean, for the people that do that and, like, people that prefer to, like, breakdance and have the boombox, I mean, that's different. But, like, for people like me that just don't want to pay for anything and want to hear the music they want to hear because I'm a terrible consumer and a bad person. That's what you do. Dave Lozo doesn't want to pay for anything. bought to you by people for the expulsion of the DH. Don't pay for anything, but also donate to our cause. using the promo code soup. Bye everybody.