Puck Soup - Olympic Roster Check-In

Episode Date: November 18, 2025

Sean and Ryan talk about potential roster moves for the Olympics, injuries, new contracts, and more.

I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I am Sean McAnneux from The Athletic. And Sean wanted to start this week's episode talking about the big fight in the game because the man did the empty net. Yeah. Not allowed to do it. We've learned so many rules the last few years of how you're allowed to do empty nets. And sometimes guys don't remember the rules. And then you need a veteran to remind them.

You pay in blood. And yeah, it's you can't shoot the puck into the empty net just after the buzzer. Or just before in a certain way. Yeah, that too. I mean, there are lots of ways to not do it. Yeah. But it's, yeah, it made Jonathan Quick very angry. And he almost.

I mean, he kind of almost started a bench clearing brawl. It did really go that way, but just given the nature of it and everything, that was, and everybody's reaction was, oh, that brawl looks cool as hell because of the uniforms, which was the other news out of that game that they did the... Color on color. The color on color. And, yeah.

So, as my good buddy Ken Campbell reminded us, hockey players are the absolute toughest people in the world and also if you hurt their fee fees they will be very very sad so I've been very slowly working my way through the

Amazon show from this year and just this morning I was like you know what I'll just watch this this Seth Jarvis episodes really quickly and he is I don't know if you've seen this episode, Sean, but he is like constantly going, I missed an open net.

I fucking, like, just bad self-talk, you know? Okay. Where, like, he's like, I'm a fucking idiot. Oh, God damn it. Shit. Like, every time he does the slightest thing wrong and they showed him, like, on the four nations team and that, and that sort of thing. And he's like, if I do this in front, like, he's going back to the bench apologizing

to Brad Marshand for fucking something up on a shift and that kind of. to think. It was very funny. But he's like the one guy I feel like he's just kind of like, oh, whatever. Like, he wouldn't be that offended if you shot it into the empty net. I feel like. You know, you're living my dream. That's... That's exactly. Yeah. But I'll say this about Jonathan Quick.

If I was the backup goal and I was like 40 years old, I'd be doing this shit all the time. Just something to keep it interesting out there, you know? What's the worst that's going to happen? Can you get suspended for 10 games? Oh. Too bad. Miss one start.

That's what I'm saying. And look, he's made a lot of money in his life. And I think his salary is pretty low these days. So he's not going to miss that like 60 grand, the 10 games cost him, you know? Whatever the number works. I don't, you know, I'm not doing the math on this. But that's what I'd just be, I'd just be trying to think of creative ways to, to keep to keep myself mentally engaged, you know?

It's just like I can understand if you shoot the puck into the net after a whistle when the goalie is there. I actually get that one, right? Because it's like even if you just tap it in because the goalie is like, well, I stop playing. And then like you did the thing that you know I hate. But when the goalie's out, I don't know. Hockey playing. Cool, man.

It's just a fascinating psychology thing. Sure is. You know? But whatever. I can't, again, I can't get too mad at Jonathan quick about it because it's like, we can say it's stupid all we want. We do know that you're not supposed to do it. So the guy did it.

I get where he's coming from, where he's like, we all agree. This isn't the thing that we should be. doing. And the guy did it. And so he's like, so something has to happen here. And that's something is I have to start a fight and then leave and let everyone else fight. Again, he's like 40. This guy probably has osteoporosis.

He can't be fighting guys. You know? Drag him away. Come on, grandpa. Oldest player in the league, a miracle. Is he the oldest player in the league at this point? He must be up there. He's going to be.

Brent Burns has to be. Yeah. Brent Burns has to be. Do you think it's like a bad grandpa, the Johnny Knoxville movie? That might be it. Yeah. This is all guerrilla marketing for a sequel. I, you know what?

I love it. That sounds great to me. I got no problem with that. I just saw Johnny Knoxville got married the other day. So big shout out to him. I saw that too Probably the same way you saw it By seeing Sammy Zane

Talk crap about him So Oh no Instagram fed me Fed me like his post The officiant of the wedding Was John Waters Very Johnny Knoxville thing to do

For people who don't know I love jackass So you know It's a whole thing with me What was the other thing I was going to say Oh Another thing on Instagram they've been doing lately.

You know how they're like, finally, there's an account that shows you blank and it like kind of shows you the thing it's advertising. Okay. Have you seen this on Instagram? No, I'm not on. Yeah, that's true. Too old. And this one's like, finally, an account that shows you terrifying videos. I don't want that.

The fuck are you talking about. Who's asking for this? Finally, an account that shows you ISIS beheadings. What? You know, like, I don't want that. Oh, no. Ryan, to be clear.

Finally, an account that shows you Sabres highlights. Oh, okay, I'll go back to the... Yeah, go to the last one. Give me the guy getting hit by a car instead, then. You're right. But you know what?

It's never like that, though. Like, they say terrifying, and then it's like, you know, the backstory of how, like, a lady drowned in a pool or whatever. And it's like, I... That's, like, just sad. I don't know that that's terrifying. Anyway.

We mentioned, oh, this is the other thing about color on color jerseys. The NHL's like, oh, we should be doing more matchups about this. I saw this report last night. Wow. Great job by the NHL picking up on this. The thing that people have been saying for 15 fucking years. Basically, Evers, I feel like since the Leafs and Red Wings, Winter Classic, everybody's been like, what are.

How long ago was that? Was that 2013, 2012? That was the audience. Justin Matthews era, I thought. So like probably 10 years, maybe, maybe even less. Or am I getting it mixed up? Was that the... I think you are getting it mixed up.

GVR. 2014, so you were close. You were, you know what? We split the difference. You said 10 years? I said 12. Yep. The answer's 11.

There you go. Anywho, I briefly mentioned, Four Nations and things like that. This week, I believe, if I'm doing my mask correctly, is like the exact midpoint between the start of the regular season and when Olympic rosters have to be submitted, which is like New Year's Eve. And so I thought to myself, well, we're halfway there.

Who's like kind of playing their way into these spots? Who's playing their way out of them, et cetera, et cetera? And we're only going to do the U.S. and Canada. I, you know what? We'll let the Swedes and the Finns pick the Swedes and the Finns, you know? Mm-hmm. So I assigned Sean a little bit of homework. Sean, give me three guys who are playing their way onto Team Canada,

and I'll give you three guys who are playing their way onto Team USA, and we'll just trade off. So I gave myself a degree of difficulty here, because I limited myself to one goalie spot. Right. I think that's more than fair, yeah. Because I feel like I could pretty easily just go all three goalies. But yeah, my first one and I think the most obvious of the entire group is the guy who should have been on last year's team, Logan Thompson.

Yes, that's right. I am almost, I'm willing to say has played his way onto this team. He's a lock. He's a lock. Yes, I think that's exactly right. He's, he's been awesome this year and there's no, there's not really any two ways about it to me.

We're just, we're sitting here, we're saying, Canada is in a goaltending crisis. It's been going on for 25 years now, I think it's been. And like none of these guys can make a fucking stop, including the guy that we all agree,

is a lock to be. on this team, Jordan Binnington. He has been, I'm going to look at G-Sax here, literally the worst goalie in the league. 869, or I'm sorry, 868 save percentage minus 10.2 G-Sax. The worst goalie in the league. And everybody is going, unfortunately, he will be on Team Canada. That's right.

I just straight up don't get it. he was good last time and that's it he was good last time he won gold last time and also there is like nobody really planning a flag to take like his all three yeah yeah yeah Logan Thompson you could make the case for Darcy Kemper he's pushing his way back in but even then I don't think like you you could certainly find a third Canadian goalie who's better than Jordan Bittington right now but I think they Well do you want to hear the sad part Is Scott Wedgwood has worked himself into this conversation

He has Yes he has And I'm not saying like that's That he's been bad or anything this year Because obviously he hasn't He's been quite good But just if I told you Ahead of four nations

You know One year from today We will be saying Has Scott Wedgwood fully made the case To be the third goalie for Team Kays? Canada, you'd be like, was there like a horrible accident where the arena collapsed at orientation camp? That's right. The scoreboard fell on the...

Yeah. Just the one area where all the goalies were doing their weird stretches. That's right. They're stretching next to each other and talking, but they're not allowed to cross the red line. That's right. You can't. No. So, yeah, I think that's like the most obvious.

the most obvious, like, change for Canada. But also, you know, I'm listening to 32 thoughts yesterday and, and they're talking about, oh, has, and I'm sure these names will come up later, but like, has Celebrini played his way onto this team, as Badar played his way, has Matthew Schaefer. And Elliot's like, I don't think so was Schaefer. Because here are the, here's the list of, uh, of defensemen who I think are locks. And he names like seven guys. And he, and he's just like, oh, Travis Sanford.

That guy's a lock. And it's like, that guy's a lock? Yeah. It sounds like they're just bringing the same blue. Like, I don't have any defensemen on my list mainly because, well, for two reasons. One, I don't think anyone's playing their way off. And two, I don't think anyone is playing their way on other than Schaefer and, I mean, just a teenage defenseman. We know the 200 hockey men.

Not a chance. Are going to need Bobby O'er numbers from him. I'm not saying it can't happen, but certainly if they're picking it today, they would talk themselves out of that pretty quickly. And I don't think, like, you go down. I kind of think it can't happen. I think it should. I'd be hard pressed to find seven defensemen of any country who have had a better season so far than Matthew Scha. He's been so good.

It's unbelievable. And the thing with him is not only has he been so good, but he started off pretty. good and you can draw like a straight line even in the six weeks that he's been playing that he's getting better and better. And if that line keeps going to the point where by the end of December he's like legitimately in the Norris conversation, then maybe as like the seventh or eighth depth guy who probably still won't play, but yeah, you know. Yep.

Anyway, my first pick here. for this is Tage Thompson. Just, they should have brought him last time he's having a good season. You know, like they, there's nothing that I've seen this year. He hasn't been like unbelievable. Oh, you can't believe how fucking good Tage Thompson's been. He's been as good as you would kind of expect Tage Thompson to be. He's scoring about half a goal a game.

He's a little under a point of game. This is, this is what he did last year when they fucked up by not bringing him. So, just bring him this time. Simple. Yeah. I don't have anything beyond that to say, right? It was hockey brain that left him off the roster last time. And the one thing with the United States that makes this exercise a little easier, I don't know if you know this, Ryan.

They didn't win last time. That's right. They lost to, I want to say Canada. Was it Canada? I'm going to go and look at YouTube highlights for about an hour. But I'm pretty sure it was, I'm pretty sure it was Canada. To bring it back to the Seth Jarvis Amazon episode, every once in a while they will just show like, oh, here's this guy's perspective of that game. And I just keep going, I can't fucking believe I got to go to that.

That's so sick. You know what I mean? It was just like, man, that was such a good hockey game. Oh, all the stars were there, you know? Yep. It was awesome. It was very cool. My second pick, I'm going to go, and again, I limited myself here to Celebrini Orbadard.

Yep. Which I don't necessarily think is an either or for the real roster. I would have said that even a few weeks ago, but they're both still playing so well that I'm starting to wonder. But for now, I'm going to just say Celebrity. And it's kind of a coin flip. If you're a Hawks fan or something, you know, if you're mad and you're saying it should be badard, yeah, maybe it should be. Probably should be both. But I'll go celebrini.

Yeah, I'm looking and it's just one of those things where it's like, oh, look at all these fucking guys that Canada brought for forwards to four nations. It's really hard to say to yourself, that guy shouldn't be on the team about almost. any of them. Right? There's maybe a little more wiggle room. Like, for example, you didn't name any defensemen. It's very easy for me to say, Drew Dowdy shouldn't be on this team.

And he is also hurt, which he's expected back and all of that, but it is possible that. But even if he wasn't, I get it. He's old. He's a veteran. He was pretty good at Four Nations last year. But to me, I'm just, I'm just, saying to myself, we have to, like, this is Drew Doughty's last ride, you know, and they totally

fucked him out of his ability to play in two Olympics, that he absolutely would have made those teams comfortably, maybe been one of the two or three best defensemen on those teams both times. I'm totally with you on all that. I'd rather have the guy who's playing in his first Olympics at 18, 22, like, take your pick for a young Canadian defenseman, I'd rather have that guy go. Mm-hmm.

Than the guy who's like 38. Yep. Or whatever. We all know how the, I mean, the, the famous one is Crosby not making the 2006 team, right? Yep. Totally. In a year in which he, I believe, won MAPE. Yeah.

Did he? Yes. Oh, no, that was, sorry, the year before, right. That was his rookie year. He was only putting up 100 points or whatever it was and then and didn't get to go. Well, now I'm trying to. Yeah. You're right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yep. Okay. But yeah. So to me, but again, like, are you saying, you know what? Anthony Sorrelli, you suck. Get out of here. We're going bad Arda and celebrate.

I get that. I get why. I personally would bring both of them, you know. Yep. I think I would too. I'm just. Like as people who know me will tell you, I cannot do anything without giving myself an unnecessary degree of difficulty.

Sure. Yeah. Here we go. My next guy, another guy where, again, we talked about him last year. Like he had two goals. It was a minus 6,000. Jason Robertson. This guy's a bomb.

He only had 35 goals last year. Well, now he's got 9 and 19. He's got 23 points. He looks fucking awesome. He took all that, all the badmouthing to heart last year. I think he's also in a contract season, which helps. And so, like, this is just another guy where it's like, well, I know what the U.S.'s problem was last time was they didn't have enough guys who could put the puck in the net. So I'm bringing two guys who can put the puck in the net, you know?

Mm-hmm. It's really that simple. Um, so yeah, I don't have a ton else to say about it. There's just like, barring something going disastrously wrong in the next six weeks, which I guess could happen. Thompson and Robertson have 1,000% played their way onto this team for me. But also maybe shouldn't have ever been left off it last year. Mm-hmm. So that's all.

Yeah, Robertson, you can at least kind of get it, although he's funny. Like, it's every time I look at his numbers, right? Because all you hear about is, oh, this guy used to be good and he stinks now. Right. And you're looking. You're like, what did he have last year? 45. Oh, okay.

He had 80 something. He just isn't getting 100 anymore, except that maybe this year he will. So. Yeah, he's on pace for about that. Yeah, about 100 and about 50 goals. Cool. 40 goals, sorry. Didn't do the math so good on that one.

No. But, yeah, it makes sense. Also, this is a big boy. They're going to be throwing their bodies around out there. Tage is another big boy, too. But, like, Jason Robertson, I think of as being, like, more able to take the punishment and all that, whatever you want to say.

Yeah, not a physical. player, but... Takes up a lot of space out there. Takes up some space, and I mean, you know, certainly when it comes to the games against Canada, they're going to be physical, and so... Yeah, a lot of in-close stuff.

You know, you can... When you're Jason Roberts in size, you can just kind of lean on guys. And refresh my... Is Tage Thompson? Is he a rather large individual at all? Yeah, you know, it's funny you mention it. I think it goes, him and then the only guy bigger on the U.S. is Cole Cawfield.

Yeah, that's about right. Who's your last guy? So the last one, I'm going to go into the veteran forwards. And this one's kind of a mess because there's a bunch of guys having similar sort of seasons. I'm going to go Mark Shifley, narrowly over John Tavar. just to prove that I'm not a homer. Sure. They have very similar numbers.

Sheifley started really well and has been not as great lately, and Tavares has been a little more steady, but I do worry a little bit about the speed factor with Tavares. So I guess it won't shock people, and probably the article will be out, but me and Cam did basically this exact. exercise over for early prospects that I think it's coming out today. And he was like, look, how can the way things have gone, can you really say John

Tavares doesn't belong to be there? And it's like, no, you can't say that. But also, and to the point earlier, you're not, you're not counting on Tavares for speed and you're not counting on Tavares to like take defensive zone draws and that kind of thing. It's not going to kill penalties. No. He's probably not going to be on your power play on that All-Star team. Correct.

So why not bring Badar or Celebrini to do the same job instead of this guy who's 38? Mm-hmm. But if you're talking yourself into we need veterans and all that thing, Tavares has had a really good season, especially for a player his age. And he's not 38. How old is he? He's 35.

He's like 34, I think. Okay, well, there's only one way to find out. We're both typing. Listen to us go. 35, 35. He just turned 35 in September. Whatever it is. This is also his last shot at the Olympic.

He was on the Olympic teams before this, right? This wouldn't be its first one. I... think he was on one with the Islanders. Oh yeah, the one he got hurt at, famously, which is why they were like, we could never go to the Olympics again.

And he was on the Canada Cup team as well. Yes, of course. So he does have the international experience. So yeah, you could go him, I mean, Nick Suzuki is another guy who was posting similar numbers.

And is a bit younger, a bit more of a two-way player. So maybe he's he's a guy that they would prefer. Totally. That's an option as well. Yep. My last guy. And I say this, knowing this will never happen.

It's never, ever, ever going to happen. But right now, three of the top four goalies in the entire world leading by G.Sacks are American. Not really a surprise. I'll go from the bottom up here. Jeremy Swayman is in fourth. He's 11.3. Connor Hellebuck is in third, 14.3. And number one with a fucking bullet, nobody else is even within five and a half goals of this guy almost.

Spencer Knight. Wow. So you're taking him over Jake Ottinger is what I'm hearing. Way down at the bottom with his 899s. save percentage, 2.4 goals saved above expected, 35th in the league behind Daniel Tarasov, and Esper Walsett, and Stuart Skinner, is Jake Ottinger. You know, I'm with it, man. I think you guys should focus on the next generation. Bring Spencer Knight. I think you bring Dustin Wolf, and I think as a veteran, you bring Anthony

Stollers as your third guy. Maybe throw in Devon Cooley. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I get it. Yeah, like I think... Jonathan Quicks has got to be in that running. Well, just for the, you know, just for the international etiquette. You don't want to create it. Well, look, we've said it a million times. If your third goalie's playing anyway, like, it's over for you.

Probably even if your second goal he's playing, quite frankly. Yeah. But... I mean, it is the Olympics, so you get like the game against Latvia or whatever. Yeah, that's true. But this is Hella bucks net. let's not pretend, you know. And he's been one of the three best goalies in the league again this year.

This is unbelievable shit from him. And so he's starting. Okay. Well, Jeremy Swayman, he would be the guy that you would, in theory, leave off the team. He's been fucking awesome. He's the fourth best goalie in the league by G-Sax right now. Say percentage leaves a little something to be desired, obviously. But he's, you know, he's playing a ton of games and he's been good.

And then Spencer Knight, again, you can call it a fluke. I would certainly tend to agree with you that he's not going to be the best goalie in the league this year by the end of the season. But we're talking about a youngish guy. I don't know. How old is he, 25? Young for a goalie. Young for a goalie, for sure. And I don't know.

If you told me that he's on the 2030 Olympic team, that wouldn't surprise me at all. Like, you know, he's like 29, 30 years old at that point. That wouldn't surprise me. And if you told me Hellibuck isn't on that team anymore or Ottinger, for that matter, I'd go, yeah, that checks up. Just age-wise, that kind of thing. I don't think this is ever going to happen again. to reiterate.

But I think he is certainly, I'll put it this way. Spencer Knight has played his way into the conversation. And would you have said that in fucking June last year? You'd be going, the guy that got traded to Chicago? Yeah, he's going to get lit up. Yeah. That's what I'm saying.

He's been fucking unbelievable. So my hat's off to Spencer Knight, I guess is my point. The other thing to say about it too, though, and we'll talk about this in a bit. The one guy you probably thought would have been in that conversation is Thatcher Demko. He's been bad and he's been hurt. Uh-oh. Yeah, he was sort of viewed as the number four.

Yep. Certainly among the established guys. And Wolf's the other guy that you would have, like if you were going to say a young guy was playing his way onto the team two months ago, you would have gone, yeah, this is the Dusty Wolf story is continuing along. That's right. You know what? I said Demko's been bad. He hasn't been bad.

He hasn't been like particularly good. No. But I overstated things. But the question is this, Sean. If those guys have all played their way into the conversation, they don't let you just bring three extra guys because they're having good seasons. You got to find guys to kick off the team. So who you got? That would be good.

If they just said, you know what? Just everyone who's Olympic caliber gets to go to the Olympics. Team Canada just brings 70 guys. Yeah. This is how we finally get Tom Wilson onto this team. All right. So who's coming off? Do you want me to just do all three or do you want to go one?

Yeah, go for it. So of the goalies, I take Montembow off. Sure, yep. None of them have been good, but Bittington, we covered. And Aden Hill at least has the cup ring. So, you know, if I have to keep one, I'll keep him. And then I need to take off two forwards, right?

Yep. The first one I'll take is I'll drop Sam Bennett, partly because he's evil and I hate him, but also because he just is not off to. He's been horrible this year, yeah. And I know, like, he's the playoff guy, he's the cup guy, he won the cons. Like, it's very tough to leave the,

the reigning cons might. winner off. Yeah. I just, I just don't see him. I'm, I'm not going to take Sorrelli or Hagel off just because it's John Cooper's team, and I,

I just don't see it. I think I might, I might take Jarvis off. He's, he's quieted it down. He had a good start. He did. Quiet it down.

And just, you know, especially if we're, if we're going to do the, like how many young guys do we think we're going to put on this team? He was sort of the surprise last time. He was, wasn't, yeah, absolutely.

Didn't do anything to play his way off or anything like that. So, you know, I imagine he probably does make the team. But if I've got to clear guys off, I guess he's the one. The other one you would look at would be Mark Stone, especially with injury. Like if he's just can't go, but that feels a little like a little like a cop out too. Well, I also, the one other guy I would kind of think about here is Travis Kineckney. Not that he's been bad or anything like that, but he also hasn't been what. you would call, like you said, Olympic caliber necessarily.

Sure. Yeah. And to me, if it's a choice between a guy with five goals like Travis Kineckney or Macklin-Cellebrini, obviously they play different positions or whatever, but let's be serious here. Well, I mean, let's put it this way. You as an American, who are you hoping Canada brings out of those two guys? Oh, Travis Kineckney, absolutely.

Who worries you? Who are you going, uh-oh? Yeah. You know, like it's... No, I'm biased. You know, Travis Kineckley didn't play college hockey Macklin, Selbrini did. Yeah. There you go.

We got the... He's got that going for him too. But no, like, it, it, again, I understand they play different positions, different roles, that kind of thing. But... Celebrini's going to be on, what? Three, four Olympic teams, in theory? If he makes it this year, I think four is certainly in the conference. a potential outcome here.

Well, 20, 24, 28, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And so, to me, I'm saying I'd rather bring the guy that's going to potentially be one of my top two centers at the Olympics for a decade plus over a guy where it's like, oh, he might be like my third line left wing or right wing or something, you know. I love how even in the Olympics you're doing, you're doing rebuilds. You just Well, it's just the thing of 26 year old bums out of here

Well, it's just the thing of We want We want guys with big game experience And Travis Kinectney Now that he's played You know, for the Four Nations team he has He didn't have it before this And so if you're like,

Macklin-Sellibrini, You just don't have the big game experience Well, where's he going to fucking get it on the San Jose Sharks In the next four years? Probably. You get it by going to the world championships and pretending like that matters. That's exactly right. Yeah.

Not like the tower of Connor Bada. The penguins are locked in, man. Yeah. But yeah, that's just my argument. Like if you have to have played big games, there are guys on team, look, Chicago, three years from now, are we going to be going? And of course, all the times they went to the Cup final or the Eastern Conference final or whatever. I don't think so. So, like, if you want them to have that experience, you give them that experience by letting them be the 18th and 19th forward on a team that probably wins the fucking gold medal in a couple of months.

Anyway, my guys who were out, this is so easy. It's unbelievable. Brock Nelson was on this team last year. I don't know if people remember this. Not only on the team, but in the lineup for the gold medal game at the expense of Kyle Connor. Yeah, and to me, big goof right there. They blew it. Another guy who was on the team last year,

and I thoroughly has thoroughly played his way off this year, J.T. Miller. Okay. You know, like, he's been bad. There's no other way to say it. What if you guys need somebody to comically punch themselves in the face? Okay. Well, the good news is if he does that, he's going to get himself thrown out of the game for punching him. Right. Good point, yeah.

And I don't want J.T. Miller on the ice of up the U.S., so get him out of there. And then, like I said, in goal, you know, if we're saying you're making a change in goal, Jake Ottinger is the guy that you would leave home. But injuries and things like this, there's a lot of question marks up front for the U.S. We might be going deeper down the forward depth chart than the two guys I'm bringing, the way things are going right now. I was mildly surprised that Caulfield, I know we mentioned him, but that he didn't get to. Well, what about Zegris, you know? What about Cutter-Gotiate? These guys are having awesome seasons.

Like it's not that the U.S. is like, whatever, starving for offensive talent. They have a lot of really good guys. I would have said there was a chance Dylan Larkin plays his way off this team at the beginning of the year. He's been phenomenal, right? Like, he's not what's the problem in Detroit. Gensel's been great. Eichl's been great.

Conner's been great. Bold, he's been pretty good. Like, there's just not a lot of guys. I guess like you would go, oh, maybe Vincent Trocheck comes off this team. I guess. Yeah, sure. You know? But with all these injuries and stuff,

frankly, who's going to be ready to play for this team? I don't know. You're not taking Austin Matthews off. He's in the first six, you know? And also, you know, in theory, he's one of the best goalscores of life. In theory. By the way, I don't know if you saw this.

While we were doing the podcast, this scrolled across my feed here. Brad Trill Living on Craig Barup. Craig didn't become a bad coach overnight. When you go through difficult times, the easy thing to do is pick off the coach. The important thing is to not point fingers and dig in together. I have all the faith in the world in him. The reason Bradrow Living doesn't want to point fingers is when he points one at Craig Barubi,

there's four pointing back at him and they're all saying, look at all these defensemen you acquired. So he doesn't want anybody point fingers. If I'm him, I'm going, yeah, yeah, pointing fingers. That's the worst thing you could do right now. now. Don't go looking around for whose fault this is. I love that when they're like, well, you see, the thing is this would be the easy way to do it. Okay.

Right. Sometimes. Well, Bradra Living's a guy that he's shown he really needs like a, like you, he needs that steep curve to really challenge himself. He's got to do, he's doing the sword fight left handed just, just so it's not over too. If I acquire another 31-year-old defenseman who doesn't have it anymore, then that'd be really interesting. Rasmus Anderson's right there. He's going to fucking do it too.

I just know it, man. I can't wait till we trade Easton Cowan for Rasmus Anderson and then have to sign him. Has Brides for Living? Has he ever made a mistake on signing a guy that he just traded for? It's never happened. We're so screwed. All right. On that note, why don't we take a break?

We'll come back and we'll talk about all the big damn contracts that got signed this week. It's been a bunch of them. We'll be right back. All right, we're back. And I actually lied. We're going to talk about something before the contract stuff. We're going to talk about all the injuries and things like that. But let me lead off with two trivia questions for you, Sean.

Ooh, okay. One, how many teams across the league are plus or minus, two points of 22. Oh, man. Okay, so I saw this morning, I think there's like 10 teams that are at exactly 22. That stood out to me when I looked at the standards after last night's games. So how many are plus or minus? Is it half the league?

Are we at 16? We're at 21. My God. Are you kidding me? No. So two-thirds of the league is within a game. a hunk. That's cool.

Isn't that fucking, again, Gary's league, this is what we always wanted. But this is the follow-up question of that. How many teams in the

Eastern Conference have what you would call a true goals difference taking out shootouts and bullshit like that? Better than plus one. So, okay, so I actually did this

for the newsletter this morning. I did it with just the regular one. Okay. I may be a little love. I know that nobody in the Atlantic is positive right now. That is correct. The entire Atlantic Division is underwater in goals to score. The only in, if we factor in shootouts,

the only Atlantic team, I believe, that is even even is the Boston Bruins, who finished dead last in the division last year. Yep. positive teams in the metro are Carolina, New Jersey. Pittsburgh is way up there. Yep. And are the Rangers? The Rangers and Islanders are both at plus one.

So the answer to the question, how many teams in the Eastern Conference have a goal difference above plus one? So plus two or better. The answer is Pittsburgh, Carolina, New Jersey, end of list. Love it. What a cool league. It's unbelievable, man. And again, there are a handful of teams at like zero and minus one and plus one. But teams that are two goals above water, there are three of them.

And one of them is the New Jersey Devils who just lost Jack Hughes for eight weeks, maybe. Yeah. Something like that. With one of those classic, like, I bent down to pick up the newspaper and I threw in my back. out style borderline inexplicable injuries. Do we know or do we think we know what happened other than it was just something at a team dinner? Like has anything else emerged?

He, I don't know that like it's officially, officially out there, but what Elliot said on 32 thoughts yesterday leads me to believe he like slipped and either was holding a glass when he did or fell. and like went to put his hand out and put it on glass. But he fell down, cut his hand on some glass. That's all we know.

Okay. I think. Because I'd seen, I think, I think Greg tweeted out that like people are like, Devils fans are review bombing the restaurant now. And I was like, what? Did they like, did the waiter come over and like drop a tray of glasses on them or something? But, oh, okay.

That's a tough one. Yeah. especially for a guy who's had so much injury trouble. Yeah, this isn't a cursed team. Well, and it's also like, you know, when a player is always hurt, you know, at some point staying healthy as a skill and all that, but not here, right? Like if he was like, oh, yeah, he tweaked his knee, you could just be like, man, this guy's just, maybe he's just not cut out for this.

But given that, you know, whatever, he threw his teammate through a barbershop. window, which is by, that's the story I'm going with. Yeah. That's a tough one. Yeah, it's crazy. I mean, if I'm the devils, I tell him, like, you're not going to the Olympics. Just, we're just going to, you know, let's just, and I do the same, you know, people are like, would, would you want your team to do that? Yeah, I think the Leaf should do that for Austin Matthews.

I think Vegas should do it for Jack Eichel. I think, I'm trying to think if there's any other random players. as I can think of. Conor Hellebuck, I guess. I wouldn't risk it if I were the Jets. You can't let him get overworked like that. This Quinn Hughes kid, no. If I'm the devils, I'm telling him he can't play either.

And he's like, but I don't play. And you're like, yeah, but you do. And so, yeah, I'd shut all the brothers down. So here's the question. I think we're all in agreement that New Jersey is one of the three, four, five best teams in the Eastern Conference, right? and they've dealt with injuries this year. It's not like this is like the only guy who's gotten hurt on the New Jersey Devils this year.

Surprise, surprise, it's Jack Hughes, you know. Markstrom's played under 10 games for them this season, I think. Yeah, eight, it says here. Yep, you missed time. And Brett Pesci's on LTIR, Jonathan Kovicev's on LTIR, Doddanov, Cody Glass, Connor Brown. and these are all guys who are making some amount of money and they're on the IR or LTIR or whatever

and it's just like classic shit, the New Jersey Devils, everybody's hurt. And this year it doesn't seem to matter so much. I don't know how many more injuries they can really withstand. But it does make me wonder how much their, how much cap space they're going to have by the deadline, by the playoffs, whatever you want to say, because the playoffs now matters as well.

Yeah. The whole accruing cap space as the season goes is much less important. And much more difficult to do. Yeah. But it just kind of makes me go, you know, we got to be thinking bigger picture here. We're all in agreement the devils are making the playoffs. what comes next? And is that a Quinn Hughes trade?

Do they just get it done now? A little extra flexibility? I think clearly not given Jim Rutherford's comments this week that it's all good, man, full speed ahead. We're going to make the playoffs. Oh, yeah, I'm super convinced that the Canucks are going to do what they said they would and make the playoffs and all that kind of thing. Yeah. I can't think of a single fan base where everybody's like,

I fully believe in this team more than the Vancouver Canucks. Exactly right. Who, by the way, are sub-500 as we speak? Oops. And, again, not like NHL-F, or no, they are sub-NHL-500, not just like fake 500. They've got 476 points percentage. minus 10 goal difference, it says here on the NHL standings page.

They're 3, 5, and 1 at home. They're dead even 500 in their last 10 games. This team stinks because Thatcher Demko out maybe two to three weeks, maybe with a groin. Uh-oh. Again, Demko has been perfectly good this year. He's certainly not the problem in Vancouver. You're not going to believe this. The problem in Vancouver is.

they don't have any depth. Isn't that crazy? That never happened. That doesn't sound like them. Why did they spend like a huge chunk of their salary cap on a guy who's not very good anymore? Did that? I don't think that happened. They probably will have a chance to trade him in the offseason.

Like they would, they'd do that before. Oh. Never mind. Well, hell, they did go out and get David Camp this week. He did. We wish him the best, actually. He got kind of. He got kind of a rough deal in Toronto.

Yeah, they were just like, we're not going to put you in the NHL lineup. He was like, okay, can I play for somebody else? And they were like, okay, but like you're going to give us back that signing bonus. And he's like, well, why would I do that? Yeah. And they were like, you know what, that's a good point. Have fun out there. He was a classic guy that was good enough to be in the NHL but made more money than he should on his NHL deal.

Yep. So you get buried and then, you know, just. I don't know. He, among other guys, was going to get traded for like six months, but apparently that was too hard for Brad for Living to pull off. Well, he doesn't, no, it was too easy for Brad for River to pull off. You're right. He doesn't do it the easy way, baby.

No. That would have been the easy thing to do. That's right. And so here now, now that they've added David Camp and they're going to have him playing in the middle of the ice. This is their center depth. I want you to tell me if you think this is good, Sean. Okay.

Leas Patterson. Yeah, that's an $11 million player right there. Correction, 11.6. Yeah, he just doesn't seem to have it this year. Maybe you're starting to go. I guess that means he doesn't have it, period? You would like him to have, uh, show you some, I mean, it's not that he hasn't shown flashes,

but yeah, you need a lot more than that. And I'll say this too. He is producing. There's no two ways about that. He's at 19 points in 21 games. If he's making 11.6, you want him to be doing more than that. But he's playing with Evander Cain and Kiefer Sherwood.

And are those guys top line talents, do you think? I mean, Sherwood's having a great I guess that would be... He's having a great shooting the puck year. I don't know if he's doing everything else particularly well. Fair enough. I mean, so you give some credit to the linemates on that, maybe. Yeah, for sure.

Yeah. But 44% of the expected goals when when Patterson's on the ice, 44 and a half of the actual goals, Corses 44. We're about where we're supposed to be. This isn't just bad luck.

The team's just not very good. Here's a really funny stat that Harmon Dyle tweeted out last night. Canucks said five on five since November 6th. I'm just reading the tweet. Shot attempt difference with Quinn Hughes on the ice plus 11. Shot attempt difference with Quinn Hughes off the ice. Minus 109. That is.

Since November 6th. That was less than two weeks ago. Wow. Yeah, that doesn't even feel possible in that amount of... No, it doesn't. And yet here we are. They gave up eight last night to Florida is what happened. But anyway, back to reading the center depth chart for the Vancouver Canucks.

You know what the Canucks should do when Quinn Hughes leaves the ice? Is they should put another guy on to replace him instead of just... It's not smart to just leave four guys out there. Instead of like just putting a sign on the door that says back and 15 minutes. They should replace him with a different employee. Anyway, the answer is number two center, Atu Ratu.

That's why they went out and got David Kamp, moved Ratu down the depth chart, because the fourth center is Max Sasson, who I don't think you know who that is. He played for Princeton, I want to say. And perfectly good

college player, but Western Michigan, of course. So it was a silly, was I thinking with Max Vero. I think I was thinking of Max Vero. Anyway, Max has a pretty good college player, pretty good HL player. In fact, some might say

a very good AHL player. He's got seven goals in about 40 NHL games. So, that's where the Canucks are at. That's your weekly check-in on those guys.

and hey, at least their goalie's healthy, oh wait. You know? Yep. It's not going too well over there. Finally, another team that needs centers, and they're like, fuck, we should have signed David Kempf a little while ago. Alex Newhook and Kirby Doc out with, like, potentially really bad injuries. Yeah, it's been for Montreal.

Tough in Montreal. Bad luck, bad injury luck on us a little while. Yep. So let's see here. Four to six weeks for Kirby Doc with a foot injury. Not clear on the timeline for Alex Newhook, but it seems like he like broke his ankle or something like that. So that's not one of those ones you bounce back from quickly.

No, you do not. No. So that's tough for them. They also need to go out and get somebody now, it feels like. And I don't, you know, hey, they say, sells but who's buying. Nobody's damn selling in the NHL these days. Everybody's within two points.

That's what I'm saying. Everybody's within a win of being like, we're in the playoff picture, baby. We're locking down the second wild card spot. We're feeling great about it. If everybody's kind of mediocre, nobody's getting traded, which leads us to once again, all the guys who maybe could have gotten traded a little while ago, you might have said, oh, if the team goes sideways, three big extensions signed in the last little while here. Scott Wedgwood, I guess, is the least notable of them money-wise. Yeah, that one's interesting just because it was only the one year.

That's right. One year and two and a half million. It's not like he's, it's not like he's cashing in for one year, you know? Yeah, you would have thought he would have. tried to get more security out of what's been a very good next season and a bit, you know, yeah, and certainly this year. But yeah, that's a little odd because, I mean, how many times in the last little while have we pointed at a goalie who was pretty good, but certainly wasn't Connor Hellebuck getting three, four, five years and going, I don't know about the term.

And this guy gets one. And, yeah, like you say, it's not like he got one year in an exchange. change for that, he got a $5 million cap hit that he can parlay into his next deal. That was interesting. Obviously, it's a great fit. And the guy like that has, he's been in situations where it wasn't a great fit for him. Yeah, he was on Nashville last year. Remember that?

9-17 since he got there, about 10.5 goals saved above expected in 34 games. You can't do any better than that. If you're Scott Wedge, if you're most goalies, but definitely if you're Scott Wedge, would. So, you know, totally makes sense for him to continue the partnership. But just given his age, like you said, you would have thought, make me the extra year, huh? That one feels like a player driven decision, right? Or were the agents, like, dude, let's try to squeeze them for more years. And if they don't pay up, we get to the offseason, you might be the best goalie available, the way that guys get snapped up. Yeah. Someone will throw money at you.

And he's going, you know what? Yep. I like where I am. My stuff's there to use the phrase that I invented. Oh, I didn't know. I thought you may be talked to Scott Wedgwood, and he said that because I've never heard that before. He did say that. But he said, you know, Sean, as you often say, my stuff is here.

I guess I forgot that you came up with that. Yeah, that's my thing. You have to put my name. You have to put a dash in my name anytime you use that phrase. And I certain, I'm happy to. Another kind of a little bit surprising on this extension, for me anyway, Shane Pinto, four years seven and a half. I think that's a good. I'm a little surprised.

Which in which direction are you surprised? The term mostly. That he didn't get more? Yeah. Yeah. He's a good player. That's fair, but he is a good player. youngish.

This is a lot of times we say don't necessarily sign your whole career away. So, you know, there's a pretty clear window developing around the senators with some of their guys who had signed longer term deals a few years ago. This kind of puts it in the mix there. So, yeah, that's good.

Not cheap, but certainly, I don't mind it from a senator's perspective. and, you know, Shane Pinto's a good player, but he's not a superstar. And if somebody offers you $30 million guaranteed, I don't mind taking that swing. The other thing here is, I feel like the senators should have been buying higher on this. Listen to this. These are his stats through 19 games. Nine goals.

That's his career high is 21. So nine and 19 is insane, right? Six assists, whatever, you know, assists or. kind of an overrated point of comparison in my opinion. 56 and a half percent of the goals, 59% of the expected goals. And again, this is another situation. He could have fucking hammered them, in my opinion.

And he didn't. You know, like, give me the extra year. Maybe he doesn't want to do that because three years from now the cap will be, you know, 140 million to whatever the number is, you know? Maybe he didn't want to do it on that front. I get that. That's fine.

But like, he's been really having a lot of success. And in fact, again, by expected goals versus actual, he's been a little unlucky. Yeah. You know? But it is, I mean, it's, he's, he's a good player. He's, you know, was a high pick, all of that. But like you say, he's 25 in his career high is 21. He said a 20-goal season and a 21-goal season.

I, the senators are a reasonably smart organization. I don't think they're going to go absolutely haywire on based on 20 games where a guy. Yeah, and if you didn't want to go long, then maybe, then maybe the money makes just perfect sense. But like, like I said, I thought the way he started the season, he had more, more of like the ability to really throw it down on. I guess the other thing to say is he would not have been a UFA at the end of this, I don't believe. So he's too young for that. So not as much leverage as... Yeah, that's true.

If that had been different, then yeah, maybe you can hold him to the fire a bit more. And then the big one, Adrian Kempi, eight years, $10.625 million per. And this is a guy who will be, I believe, third. before training camps open next year. He is, yeah, September 13th is the birthday. Yep. It's a big commitment. That's a big chunk of change.

And this is, again, like, this is exactly the sort of player who should be getting the max length, or trying to get the max length from a horse perspective. This is where you jump on that. Good chunk of change. I mean, he's a real good player. And when that great this season. He's almost a point of game.

scoring goals at the rate. He's really racking up the assists this year, which that's not what I want, Adrian Kevin. This is a guy who can score a goal per 60 or whatever. He's shooting 9%. He's about 12.5 for his career. So, you know, he should get a little better. The fact that the Kings are doing a little better than expected doesn't, doesn't hurt. Obviously, but everybody's doing better than expected. This is what I'm saying. Well, not everybody. They're one of 21 teams. They're one of the 21 teams, you know? Yeah, fair enough.

But, uh, coping. They have a, by the way, they have, they have a, they have a negative, uh, NHL goal difference as well. So they're only second in the division. That's probably fine. They were going into last night, they were even. Yeah. And is that right?

First place in the division. And then Anaheim passed them again. But, uh, yeah. They, they're a weird team. Yeah, they certainly are. They're a good team from what I've, from what I've been told. We have a good team. So did you, um, did you like everyone else, like, pour a bottle out for the, uh, free agent frenzy?

Yeah, I think that is the, well, I can't, somebody said it on the Discord, I think. Um, I don't have it in front of me now. But they were just like, congratulations to like the one forward who gets to free agency and some team just has to go. I guess we have to give you like $9 million? Which is at this point, it's going to be... Alex Tuck is the guy everyone's watching. Fuck me.

Okay. I got a jump scare listening to 32 thoughts yesterday. God. Because Elliot said, Alex Tuck has to be looking at the same dream, Kempi dealer, going, that's what I should get. Huh? I almost drove off the fucking road, man.

but like it's true that he probably is but also like Adrian Kempi is a way better goal scorer than him and goals are more of that like they're at their points over the last however many years are very similar I think it's like the last four or five years are very similar but Kempi has like 35% more goals

or something like that I don't have the numbers in front of me now but I just I was like looking at the two just comparing them being like yeah, a lot of secondary assists here for old Alex Doug, you know? And also a guy, not the healthiest. Not the healthiest guy in the league. He's...

So my... That was why I reacted like that. He's going to play that... Get the same... This is the case where I think the sabres are going to be paying the Buffalo tax. The no... Well, that's the other thing. That's the other thing I wanted to say about Kempi.

is the can't this is a lot of money for for adrian kempie a guy i i think is good but maybe not like it an elite player well a we just got to get used to 10 millions the new seven right like that's just how it goes now and and b this is a guy the kings couldn't let go because you don't when he had 35 last year he had 28 the year before that and then 41 and 35 the three the two seasons before that This is a guy who scores 30, 35, 40 goals. There aren't a ton of those in the league. And Alex Tuck ain't one of them, except sometimes, I guess. But, like, you can just pencil him in.

He's going to get like 30 this year. And then anything beyond that, we're feeling great. And the Kings, with Kopitar retiring, Dowdy's going to be winding down his career. They don't have a ton of guys to spend money on, and they need to stay competitive in theory. So you don't, well, yeah, you don't bring Ken Holland in so that you can. So they just said, okay, I guess we have to almost double this guy's salary.

Because the alternative is we potentially lose him for nothing. And then we don't have a guy who can score 30 something goals for us every year. So that's why. And it's the same thing with Buffalo with, with, uh, tuck, you know, I think he's gotten a bit overrated. but we're going to get to free agency and it's going to be Artemmy Panarin and David Compton are going. Are Temi Panarin going, yeah, I'm going to need eight years and they're going to go, aren't you like 35? And he's like eight though, you know, I hate to tell you. You'll get it from somebody.

I don't know if he's getting eight. He might get like six, but eight's going to be. The league will be like, oh, that's fun. Yeah. Um, but yeah, I'm looking at this. There's just, I don't know, man. There, there's a lot here where you're like, there's some name value here on the, on the pending free agents. But actual on-ice quality, maybe not so much.

Like, the one free agent that's under 30 currently, I think, that's like, a, you know, a, kind of even vaguely named brand player is Nick Schmalt. Well, Patrick Linae, but I think everybody's kind of seeing the writing on the wall there. Yeah. No, Schmaltz is the other guy that years. Yeah, he's having a great year. You're starting to see, is he going to be the big? And yeah, I mean.

This is just one of those things, though. I'm looking at this. I said he's under 30. Nick Schmaltz is 29 years old and he will be turning 30 in February. So, like, somebody has to get this money that all these teams are going to have to spend, right? Somebody has to. And you're like, fuck, I hope my team's not the one that signs Jacob Truba. You know, that's where we're at now? What a world. Is Jacob Trubba pending UFA? He is. Oh, great. I should just get the True Belief jersey now, shouldn't I?

True belief, that's what Bradford Living has in Craig Barooby. Nicely done. You're welcome. But let me ask you this, Sean. To all these contracts mean we're getting closer to trade season because trades usually start to happen around U.S. Thanksgiving. That's a week and a half or so, less than that now, I guess. And I don't know. And the answer is no because GMs just these days can.

not make hockey trades. Yeah. They can only, they can make hockey trades at the very bottom of the lineup. I'll trade you my fourth line winger for years.

Everything else has to be present for future style. And as you pointed out, when everybody is right in the same mushy middle, um,

that makes it very, very hard. In theory, it would mean that a team like Calgary, and maybe St. Louis and Nashville you group in here should be absolutely working the phones. Go ahead, hold on. If I'm the only seller in a league of 30 buyers, now is the time.

But I don't know how you're not, if you're Nashville, how you're not just going, do you know what Stephen Stamco has scored 60 goals one time? Mm-hmm. Did you know that? I'm just, I'm just, if I'm Barry Trotz, I'm just calling everybody. in the league.

Oh, I heard you needed a center. I got one. You're not going to believe it. This guy had fucking 60 goals one time in a one season. Can you believe it? And they go, when was that? Don't worry about that. Don't worry.

And you just hear a scroll mouse going for 45 seconds. That's right. But like, what, is Vancouver going to do a sell-off? No, they bought, they just bought a guy. They just bought a guy. Didn't, like, cost them anything, but, money, but they just bought a guy. If you're Nashville,

if you're, St. Louis is such a tricky one because it's just like, we know what the problem here is. It's the gold tending. Everything else about the Blues is like top 10 in the league underlying numbers. And the goalies can't make a fucking save to save their lives.

They just can't do it. Yep. And I'd be, and if I, if I'm if I'm Doug Armstrong, I'm going, uh, You're not going to believe this. I got a goalie. He won a gold medal last year.

Sure did. He's a winner. He's going to be in the fucking Olympics this year. This guy. Oh, you have Logan Tubwell. This guy can't even get through a metal detector because of all everything he's won. And also his titanium hip. Did you know he should have won the, uh, the Kahn Smyth?

And it wasn't even that long ago. It was only like six years ago. They're like, oh, really? How's he doing this year? Well, don't look. I just, I look, and nobody wants to sell in the East. I totally get why. Even if you're Buffalo, you're like, I'm two wins away from being ahead of the Columbus Blue Jackets for a playoff spot.

Yeah, I think that makes sense that I could get there. It is so, like, I don't even know how to explain to new and or young hockey fans that teams used to make trades that weren't about buying and selling. Right. All the time. Like I was watching Hockey Night in Canada, and they had, like,

Elliot Freeman was like talking about the Leafs, obviously. And, you know, he says that they're, as of right now, not looking to move futures. It's not about picks and prospects, of which they barely have any, but he says it's guys off the roster they want to move.

And Rahm McLean was like, oh, well, like Austin Matthews and William Nealander, and Ellie Freeman was like, oh, no, don't be ridiculous. It's not, and I know a lot of people kind of roll their eyes at that. But it used to be that if you hit, like a team like the Leafs would trade a guy like Bobby McMahon. Like they would trade Bobby McMahon and Max Domey to some other, to like the Islanders for two guys who were basically the Islanders.

version of Bobby McMahon and Max Stomy. Yes. And like one guy would be a couple years older and one guy would be a couple years younger and like they're shot with different. It would be and then you would just tune into the game and be like, oh, there's the two new guys. What numbers are they wearing?

What lines are they on? My team is different now. This is interesting. Yeah. And like it just doesn't, it's like front offices are no longer wired to do anything that isn't primarily, if not entirely through the lens of

buyer-seller futures for present day. Yeah, well, there was that kind of a trade just over the summer. Zachary Bullduke to Montreal for Logan Mayu. How's Bulldoch doing? Fine. He has four goals in 19 games. How's May you doing? He's in the HL right now.

Back in the minors, yep. So, like, that's why teams don't do it. they're like, oh, trading our problems, that's just going to give us more problems. Then they're probably right about that. But like, it's all like McKinsey-ified a little bit at this point, you know, where like everybody, every team is so, not every team, but so many teams are so reliant on, like, just getting into the playoffs. Let me get a round of home playoff dates. The revenue from that will fund X percent of our budget for the season.

We're all set once we do that, you know? And so they're just trying to kind of min-max every decision in a way that, like, they don't want to, I guess what I'm saying is they don't want to be the team that fucked up and like did whatever, like the Scott Gomez trade a million years ago where the Rangers get Ryan McDonough. They don't want to be that team anymore. Yeah. Especially if you're Brad Trilliving and you're like, it'll take three dudes on Twitter going bad trade to immediately set the bar right there for evaluations and then everybody's yelling at me. But the thing is, it's like, it's kind of your job. Yes, that's exactly right.

And look, like, I'm saying this is a guy that read Moneyball in. Ben and was like every sport should be like this. And now it kind of is. Yep. And I, but I do get to sit here and go, isn't that kind of boring? Didn't I make it boring for myself? Yeah, I kind of did, you know? But like I guess what I'm saying is I get the irony of that as like the look at the expected

goals, trade everybody the second they turn 30. Absolutely. I'm that guy 100%. But here's the thing. These guys don't trade everybody when they're 30. If there was a market of just 30-year-old guys, there'd be so many fucking trades in this league. But they're also all going, like Brad True Living,

they're all going, I'm really going to keep this like 31-year-old who sucks, though. Mm-hmm. You know, like, that's the problem. They are so convinced that the guys they've traded for are the exact right guys to do that job. You know? even like Cody C.C.

And, uh, fuck. Brian Dumlin in L.A., right? Remember the stat I read however many weeks ago that was now where it's like, oh, when they're on the ice together, they have like 20% of the fucking corsie or whatever the, I don't remember the numbers anymore. But it was bad, bad, bad. And since then they've been like, fine. And everybody's like, and that's like, and that's.

why you don't judge it after eight games or whatever it is and it's like I guess that's true but also like isn't them being fine for like four weeks straight the best possible outcome of signing those guys they're not going to kill you anymore great that's awesome

I don't know I hate this league it sucks man we need more guys like Seth Jarvis like just yeah I don't know I've I've done the bit a million times but It's the only job in all of hockey that you're allowed to just say it's hard, and that's it. Well, again, to like the Seth Jarvis thing. At least if, like, Brad Trillivin was going out there going, like, look, I fucked up.

I don't know what you want me to say. Then that's something. There's like an entertainment value in that. But he's like, oh, Craig Barubi, this guy who, like you were saying last week, has my boys playing to an identity that they don't really have the ability. to meet and you can see why it's going sideways now, you know? I think that guy's great.

I get you don't want to throw the guy under the bus. You don't want to say, look, I fucked up hiring him. That all makes sense to me. But at least when Brian Burke was around, like, Brian Burke had a million flaws. You'd hear the fucking drunk on the lamp post quote and go, oh, this fucking guy with the post, the lamp post,

I got it. He'd say, stuff, though, you know? He would say stuff and he would do stuff too. Brian Burke might have been the last of the old school GMs, you know, and and who could also head the guts to make a, pick up the phone, have a conversation and make a decision and not run it through his 17 assistants and associates and the analytics department and the scouts and the fortune teller and everybody else and go, all right, if all 17 of us agree, we'll do it. Oh, well, we don't. Oh, okay. Well, then let's sit around and, uh, like, look, obviously the stakes are very different when I'm playing my little stupid hockey video games or whatever. They're higher for you, yes, obviously. Then for, for me, they absolutely are.

Yeah. Mm-hmm. You know? But like, I am. I practice what I preach playing those games where it's just like, this guy's like 31. let's see if we can get a slightly worse 19-year-old to replace him. Like, that's how I approach it. And if there was one GM in the league that was doing the same thing, you know?

Because, like, look, nobody wants to be the guy who makes the Cutter-Goteer trade, even though Cutter-Gotier kind of forced the Flyers' hands, where it's like, how's Jamie Drysdale doing? Oh, you know, like, he's fine. but Cutter Gautier is kind of going fucking psycho for Anaheim these days. You know what I'm saying? And you don't want to be the guy who makes the Trevor Zegra's trade where it's like, yeah, we were just trying to, again, square peg in a round hole. We were trying to get this guy who doesn't play defense to play defense.

And we were shocked that it didn't work out. And it still took us three years to fucking trade them or whatever two years. It did. Yeah, it was like. That's what I'm saying. That's like John Gibson for like. Three years. And Pat Verbeek's one of the better GMs right now, and he still had to...

Yeah, you absolutely have to say that Pat Verbeek is like the wheeling-dealing GM in the league, and it moves at a glacial pace. The new market inefficiency is actually doing your damn job. That's what I'm saying. I'm in the video games, I'm picking up the phone fucking 10 times a year. What can I do to make this team 1% better? maybe not this year, but over the next five years.

And no GMs think like that. And again, I'm playing a video game. It's fucking bullshit. That's fine. There are, this isn't a seven figure job that all these GMs have. I understand that. I'm just saying, I wish there was one G, there used

to be GMs who treated it like easy come, easy go. Yes. You know what they always say? There's 32 of these jobs. But if you get it one time, you're forever, counted among the 32 guys who could hold, or whatever, 40 guys who could hold one of those 32 jobs. And everybody's like, look at Bredra Living.

Fucking GM's his way out of Calgary. And I promise, I'll wrap this rant up now. But Bredger Living, absolutely GMs his way out of Calgary. The team stinks for quite a while. And everybody's like, well, you couldn't possibly let him go. Look, they have one 24-year-old who shot 38% last year. year. So he's actually doing a great job. He's not, how long was he out of a job? Four days?

Something like that. Yeah. The Leafs are like, I got, they jumped on it like it was a fucking loose ball in the fourth quarter of the Super Bowl. Mm-hmm. Worked out great. Yeah. Crazy. Who could have seen it coming? Bradger Living, a team that he's coaching is kind of mediocre and shouldn't be. Interesting. Well, anyway. Wouldn't it be fun if there was one guy? One guy.

That's all. We need Ron Carrant to come back. I don't even know who that guy is. He was the crazy guy in St. Louis with the untucked shirt. They would have one bad shift. They would cut to him in the press box, waving his arms around like a lunatic. And then they would make a seven-player trade the next day.

No picks, no prospects, just seven dudes. I just need one of them. I just need one of them. versions of Craig Janney. Well, you need two of them is what you need. Because there might be one of them out there right now. We wouldn't know. You know, that's interesting.

From what I understand, it takes two to tango. Yeah, that is. But I wonder, again, this is just, if I'm Doug Armstrong or Barry Trots, I'm just calling everybody every single day going, you're not going to believe all the fucking guys I have available. That's the problem. one of those guys isn't a GM.

But I'm saying if you do it every day. Isn't the GM of his team, really? And Craig Conroy is, I don't know, I don't know. I'm just saying if you do it every day, you can maybe shake something loose. Every day and trying to all those teams. But you know what? That's why they're GMs and we're podcasters.

Because we're smarter than them. That's right. We're just so much cooler. I agree. Why don't you hit them with the plugs? Let's get out of here. The Athletic Hockey Show tomorrow with the fellows. I also have a piece coming later in the week where I have gone back and I'm going to rank every single time the Leafs have traded away their first round pick.

In the franchise it, do you want to guess how many times they've done it going back in the, let's say, 50 years of the draft? 50 years of the draft. You know, because I almost said like it's going to be in the 40s because, but of course, they didn't have a draft for a long time. Yeah. So I'm going to say exactly half of however many years the draft has existed. I think it's, it ends up being a bit more. Wow, more. They've done it 28 times.

Now, that includes like just flipping picks on the draft floor and everything. Okay, sure, sure. Yeah, it's, and roughly 20 of those by Bradshaw Living in the last, at the last deadline. Well, you got, what was he supposed to do? Not go get Scott Lawton? Can't. Can't. They have an identity they need to be playing, too.

Hmm. They got an identity, all right. Yeah, it sucks. Anyway, for me, elite prospects, did Olympic stockwatch me and Cam? That again, I think is coming out at some point today. And if not, it'll be tomorrow. And then, yeah, I'm just. doing a lot of college hockey coverage over there.

I'm loving it. It's been a really fun, interesting season. Shall I remember we talked, I think it was last week about Gavin McKenna and like, should we panic and all that kind of stuff? The next game they played, they lost 7 to 1 and he was a minus 4. Uh-oh. But then I believe he had a goal the next night and they won 4 to 1 or something like that. They beat Michigan.

Hey, hard to do that. So shout out to Penn State. Maybe they're not on fraud watch. Just kidding, they definitely are. And then patreon.com slash puck soup. We're about to do a mailbag over there where we're going to answer seven questions from our beautiful, perfect listeners

who've never done anything wrong or that annoyed me in any way. No. And bonus episodes, all kinds of stuff coming your way this week and next. And we're trying to get stuff done before Thanksgiving and all that. So keep an eye out for all that kind of thing. And yeah, that's it. Thanks so much for listening to Puck Soup. And we'll be back, I guess, next week with more

opinions. And probably by then, like the leaves will have fire at everybody and traded Austin Matthews. Yay. So we're loving it. Have a good one, folks. Bye bye. Bye bye.