Puck Soup - Play Gloria

Episode Date: June 13, 2019

The St. Louis Blues are Stanley Cup champions, and the boys talk everything Game 7, from crying Bruins to the Conn Smythe. Plus a debate about Raptors fans booing an injury, the USWNT celebrating goals and the competition committee makes NHL rule change suggestions. Sponsored by The Athletic and Seat Geek.

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's in tunes. It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense. I'm Greg Wichenski of the Worldwide Leader ESPN, live from Beendown. Well, I mean, let's, again, let's not call it that. But I'm Ryan Lamber from Yahoo. I am Sean McIndoo from my basement in Ottawa.

Oh, like a blogger. And you're in Puck Soup where we are talking on the morning after the stupendous game seven victory by your St. Louis Blues to capture their first Stanley Cup in franchisees. This was their first one I hadn't heard. They defeated Charlie Corley. who I believe grew up somewhere in the Boston area. Yeah, so it was, boy, was it like watching the 95 Devils last night. Yeah, that was not a fun game. It was assassin-like efficiency on the defensive end of the ice.

They played a perfect road game. I will be, once again, correct in my prognostication, not in the number of games. I said Blues in Six, but it was Blues and Seven. And for the very reason that I said, which is that their acumen for winning on the road, the style with which they played, Jordan Bennington, bouncing back after losses. Tuka Rask's game seven number is not exactly what you'd wanted of an elite goalie, by the way, not to get all Joe Haggerty on you. I mean, that's getting extremely Joe Haggerty on us. I mean, was any single one of those goals, like remotely his fault? I don't feel like it was.

No, I mean, it wasn't, but... It was a real... Look, you know, what did he stop? Four, 16 of 20 or whatever it was? Like, it wasn't good, but... But, I mean... That was the team in front of him totally shitting their pants. But even you,

card-carrying, flag-waving member of the anti-Jordan Bennington Club have to have been that he outplayed, took a rask, in the most important game of the season. Yeah, he definitely did. He made, I would say, probably three saves that, that, like, he absolutely needed to make, And the rest of the time, you know, Colton Perrako and Alex Petrangelo came, just didn't come off the ice the entire game. They played like nine minutes without one or two of them on the ice.

So, yeah, I mean, they definitely made his job easy. But when he needed to make the saves on like Nordstrom and I think Coil had a good look and maybe. Johansson had one too. Yeah. Yeah. Like, he had three really good saves. Tukaris had maybe two good saves. and, you know, he definitely, he definitely helped play Duker Rask.

There's no two ways about that. Sean, before we get to you, I just wanted to mention that I laid my 95 Devils theory on none of the other than 10 time now Stanley Cup champion Larry Robinson. I said, did you get a little 95 Devils vibe from the game tonight? And his answer was, 95, I can't remember last week. An actual quote from a Hall of Famer, Larry Robinson. That is an all-time old guy quote. That was fantastic. Yeah, first on the goaltending,

that Jordan Binnington third period save, where he gets across with the pad. That's the Nordstrom one. We are going to see that for years to come. If there's any justice, that'll be like the defining play, not in the sense that the whole series revolved around Jordan Binnington, but just like that was such a great save. It was the rare great save that actually was a great save.

So many great saves are just the guy is sprawled out and they shoot the puck into his glove and we all freak out anyways because we're so stark because goaltenders haven't moved since 1997. We miss the guys actually using their limbs and this was that was an all-timer save. So that's like that that was the turning. To your point, that's by the way, why? Tim Thomas as like beloved in Boston is because he was out of position every time he ever faced a shot. Exactly.

Yeah. Like him and Dominic Hacacic were the only two guys that like didn't make 98% of their saves by just like coming out, cutting down an angle and getting hit right in the logo. So yeah, that was great. And yeah, I mean, you talk about it reminding you in 95. I think the maybe even the more obvious comparison is, is 2011 when Boston went into Vancouver and did pretty much exactly this to the canons. You know, a little bit different circumstances, but that feeling of like, all right, here we go, home ice.

And then, you know, they get the first goal and go, oh, okay, well, they're going to need the second. And then they don't get the second one. And then the game's going on. You're just thinking, like, this is happening. Like, we're not even going to get the big push at the end here. This is, this is just one team is shutting the other one down completely. Are you, sir? Matt Grizzlick had that one goal when it was like 17 to nothing.

Yeah. So I'm sure. all things seem possible. I'm sure every connective fan is just broken hard to see the Bruins have to go through that last night. For sure. And kudos to Boston for not burning down their own city, which I think if you think of all the cities in America, where a sports loss might result in such a calamity, Boston probably top three cities. I do want to mention before, Ryan, you're going to chime in about Tim Thomas and about what happened before this game, which is the waving of, the Boston fan banner before the game is without question one of my favorite manufactured dramas of the playoffs. It's this constant harangue of rumors within the arena on who it might be. And so let's

take us through it. The first name that came to mind and was being bandied about was TB12 himself, Tom Brady. The rumors were always that Brady was going to show up for a game seven, that he wouldn't show up if it weren't a game seven. He doesn't get out of bed for anything, but game seven, yeah. Right. So the rumor was it was going to be Brady. Apparently, according to someone who works with the Patriots said this to Emily Kaplan, my colleague at ESPN, he had a scheduling conflict, which I can only assume

was his quack trainer injecting stem cells into his brain, so he stays young. So TB12 did not make a game seven. This then led to, to reference your Tim Thomas thing, the wildest rumor of the playoffs, which is that Tim Thomas would emerge from his bunker, tossing aside those cans of soup, laying down his arms, fly across the country, come to Game 7, wave the Bruins fan banner on a night in which a player who really doesn't like Tim Thomas, Tukarask, would be trying to win the Stanley Cup for himself. And that rumor was actually propagated by Darren Millard of all people in Canada, saying there was a strong possibility of it happening.

It did not happen. And again, if it was going to happen, wouldn't it happen when the rest of the 2011 Bruins had a reunion earlier in the series? Probably, I'm going to guess. And then, of course, maybe even more crazier than the Tim Thomas rumor was the logical step from the Boston media from, well, you know, if we can't get Jimmy Thomas, obviously the next option would be to sneak a banner into David Artis's hospital room and have him waving on the Jumbatron. So that became the new thing, that David Ortiz, a man recovering from a gunshot wound, who moments before Game 7, it was revealed there was a murder conspiracy involving several

different individuals in the Dominican Republic that Jeremy Jacobs was going to be like, all right my little flying monkeys fly to David Ortiz's room and give him a fan banner to get him on the Jumbotrod. And so that didn't happen. And there was a huge letdown to the arena because I think people actually thought it would happen. And then of course it ends up being Liam Fitzgerald, the delightful fist bump kid, a super fan for the Bruins who went viral a few years ago. And then behind him like two dancers from the David S. Pumpkin sketch is Julian Edelman and Ali Raceman and David Ortiz's jersey. from that moment on, I knew the blues were going to win, by the way.

Yeah, I think I was a little more confident when the Bruins were out shooting them, like, 19 to 2, that the Bruins might have this one lockdown. But, yeah, the thing I was going to say earlier is, once Petrangelo scored, I was like, well, that's fucking end of that. We're done here. Oh, all right. That goal, by the way, my God. What an awful fucking line change by Marshan. That should haunt him for the rest of that. That should haunt him for the rest of his career.

Marchand is floating towards the bench. The puck comes out of the zone. Marchand then decides to try to play defense, not necessarily his forte, and get smoked. And I took a screenshot of it and put it up on Twitter last night. There's a moment in which there are three Bruins all in a row coming off the bench as the blues get a three on two down low. And it's like it reminded to be a planes waiting to land at an airport. You know, when you look up in the sky, you can see the lights all lined up as they're trying to all land at the same time. Like, that's what it was off the Bruins bench because it was such an atrocious fucking change.

I think, I think you're being very charitable to say what he tried to do there was play defense. I think he tried to vaguely stand in Petrangelo's way. And when that didn't work, he was like, I got to go sit down anyway. Yeah. And that's the problem with being Brad Marchand these days is that he's clearly trying to turn over a new leaf. The old Brad would have fucking tilt a whirler or spirited him in the ball. to prevent him from getting into the zone, but not the new, Brad. Yeah.

I don't know about that. You hate to see it, but really, in his defense, you got to get, you have to get fresh guys out there for the last eight seconds, right? I mean, you wouldn't, that's a big, that's a big shift. You wouldn't want to be tired for eight seconds. Yeah. Jeez. Yeah, that was a disaster. Can I just point out, sorry, guys.

Just more, keep going, just to go back to the banner thing. if people didn't see it. I think the highlight of yesterday was during the day, while everyone was speculating about the banner thing, I threw a tweet out there and I said, who would be the worst possible choice to waive the banner? And I put a couple options out there, like Bernard Pollard, Ray Bork in an avalanche, Jersey.

And my problem was, I didn't say, like, I said who would be the worst choice? So you can imagine some of the replies I got. Like, it was a, it was, all, all tweets are mistakes, but this one particularly was a mistake. Up until Roberto Luongo tweet quoted it and said, okay, I'll go do it. Which I thought was, and also honestly might have been a slightly better choice than, uh, I, fist bump kid was great, but the rest of it, it was very clear. They did not have a plan B after Tom Brady.

So, uh, yeah, next time Roberto, Roberto and Tim Thomas together, have been good on a unity ticket okay okay did did Craig Janney get a call to help bridge the blues Bruins gap probably not I'm going to guess oh how far down did the list did they go down the list well Dennis Leary didn't get a call I don't think but he was there though they they made a point to show him oh speaking of celebrities he was he was worried I might have to say something and Bill Hicks never did it before so he wouldn't know there it is John Krasinski was at the Bruins game last night,

and I can't even put into words the amount of respect I have for this man now because he put up a video on Instagram showing that he was at the Bruins game. And as everyone knows, Jenna Fisher, TV's Pam, is a huge blues fan, brings Pam's television ex-boyfriend Roy. They were engaged, Greg. Okay, fiancé Roy, who, by the way, Jim broke up their engagement. And crossing enemy lines to troll Pan Beasley, my God, this is, this is, this is the television sitcom equivalent of face licking. That's the level of trolling we're talking here.

It was astounding. Fantastic work. Really good. So the game played out exactly how it needed to for the Blues in the sense that, boys, there was one penalty called. And it was a penalty. They had to call. It was a procedural penalty. Not a single penalty called either on a hook, a hold, a obstruction, which there was plenty of.

Your thoughts on the officiating in game seven. Let them play, boys, as they say. Yeah, it was a game seven. What did you think they were going to give them fucking? Boston five power plays? Come on, dude. But I didn't really, like, did you get the sense as you were watching it? Because there are games where they are, quote, unquote, letting them play, where it's just a rodeo.

And you're sitting there like, come on. Like, you've got to start calling it. Like, it didn't seem. There were a couple sequences in the second period where it was like, that's a trip, and that's a trip. And also that's a trip. Okay. Yeah. And it seemed like one of those things where you would go, okay, we'll give you the first two.

but that third one we can't we can't let you get by and and it never happened so i i thought i thought the officiating last night was fine which is which is what the nachel needed you were like if your work at the nchel you were just on your knees praying that you would get through a game seven without some crazy stuff and i was surprised i thought for sure boston was going to get like the one courtesy power play in the third period because they were down two goals uh which is usually how it works but yeah i mean it's i i still that i still don't know how you would explain to a new hockey fan that like well yeah i mean they're playing 60 minutes and they're hitting each other and and there's some trips and hooks and holds but we we don't call those because we let them go and then

they're like well how come you had to call the time the puck went over the class and you're like yeah that's the only one thing is this that we literally call everything as long as as as the puck doesn't go over somebody's stick doesn't get slashed everything else is to their discretion but that one little thing we have to call or too many men that would be the other thing too even that seems optional half the time but yeah

yeah like on the one Bruins power play St. Louis had a good eight seconds of having five guys on the ice so like I didn't even notice like Eddie Olcichick I think was the one who said it on the broadcast was like there are five guys out there right now

Eddie Lchek is good at three things, ignoring whatever Pierre says, picking horses, and saying, stop right there's too many. And then count the fucking men on the ice. That is, that is Eddie O's, it's his happy place, really, is to count how many Ben around on the ice to see how many, if there should have been a penalty. That kill was great. And I think that they, they definitely fed off that kill. Bennington was really good on it. Yeah, like, like if you, the Blues had one shot in this game, which was to, not have to do anything on special teams either four or against because their power play sucks

balls. Their penalty kill at some point was going to break if the Bruins got three power plays. Statistically, they scored out of one at every fucking three power plays they had. So it is a minor miracle that this game was played as it was with two penalty minutes, the entirety of the game. It's sick. Yeah, I mean, and that really is the reason the Bruins lost is they couldn't do shit at five on five this entire series. And that's especially true of the Patrice Bursar online, which was terrible. Now, he said after the game that he finally admitted he was injured.

Yeah, no shit is injured. Very big of him. Ryan O'Reilly, by the way, said he had a cracked rib in the Dallas series, and he heard it more in the San Jose series. And once again, I marvel at how the fuck these people do this shit, where they've got cracked ribs and broken wrists and all kinds of shit, and they're doing it. But that line, man, it's not only that they played, they were outplayed, And I'm sure the injuries have something to do with it.

But who the fuck knew that the key to the series would be the Oscar Sundquist line, which is, I mean, played extraordinarily well against both that line and Crachies line. Yeah, and got a combined, I think, four penalty minutes on suspendable hits. Right, yeah, suspendable hits, right. I mean, yeah, that's a good skill to have. Yeah. For sure. Totally line.

Yeah, I thought the reason they lost last night. Did you notice David Pasternak at all in that? game like he didn't do a thing i know i noticed him whiffing epically in the ovi spot on the power play at one point that's the last the only time i think i noticed him was that he also blew the back check on the shen goal so yeah can't say he wasn't there but yeah that's right yikes um no and i and i'm surprised that cassidy didn't try to do more of the kind of chess match thing and moving past neck around a little bit more to the crachy line like he's done in the past. He needed to kind of, I think, split those guys up more than he did.

But it's not as if he was out-coached. I thought Cassie did a pretty good job during the series, outside of being unable to pronounce Grizzlic, where it's constantly grizzlitch for some reason. So that's like a real Boston thing, because for a very long time, it was Milan Luchich. or you would hear look itch sometimes. Like they just couldn't, you can't get it right. So that's a Boston thing. Understandable.

But I thought that he did pretty well for himself. But I thought that Barubi did even better, man. What a fucking coaching job, man. Like, it's been a constant sort of definition of the blues that whenever they, they fuck up, they're able to recover from that fuck up pretty quickly. And look no further than trying to slot rookie Robert Thomas into game six of a series in which he's not 100% and hoping that you could recapture the magic of the Maroon Bozac Thomas line from earlier in the playoffs. Oops, that didn't work.

He was atrocious. Fuck it. Sammy Blay, get back to your position. And Sammy Blay had the one play in the game that he needed to make where he made the hit that basically set up the O'Reilly goal. Because the Bruins had possession, he fucking buried whoever the puck carried. whoever the puck carrier was in the corner, they turned the puck over, went back to the blue line, shot redirection goal, like completely against the run of play. Yeah, and just understanding that like what the game was going to end up being, which was

going to be a fucking slob knocker, and knowing that, you know, Robert Thomas wasn't prepared for that, knowing that Robert Pertuzzo was probably not the best officer for that, and putting in Joel Edmondson, who was a fucking trocious earlier in the series. And then knowing that he did the same thing he did in the Dallas series, he played at Binson, he was kind of shitty, sat him for a couple games, came back, was fine. And last night, he was a vital part of that penalty kill early in the first period. So fucking Craig Barubi, man, interim coach of the year. I'm going to tell you guys, if he keeps this up, I think he's getting the job.

He's got a real shot. By the way, this has nothing to do with the cup final. But like, what happened to it's Dallas Aiken's job in Anaheim? Yeah, you guys, I asked you about that like three weeks ago when you were like, no, no, it's just the AHL thing. And like, is it possible Bob Murray just forgot? Yeah. We've all been there.

We've all had that, like, thing on our to-do list that we check off accidentally. And then it's like months later, we're like, oh, no. He's like, oh, wait, coach. Oh, I thought this said couch. Oh, I got the couch re-enolstered in his office now. No, I was, I was assuming it was Aiken just by virtue of the timing of things. But the thing I had, well, it should be. But the thing I had heard from multiple people throughout the whole process was that Bobbury didn't want him to be the coach.

And I heard it again. I heard it again yesterday from somebody where I was asking around saying like, what do you think of this situation? You're like, well, he's not going to be the coach. He doesn't want to be the coach. Like, that's kind of fucking weird. So who's that cat, the NCAA cat that's for the job? So people think that he might have the inside track for that gig right now. But he just signed an extension like this week with Minnesota.

Yeah, but that's like college money, man. And the duckeys can come over there and be like, I'll give you some Getsla after his season. I don't know his contract. Sandlin's won two national titles in a row. Yeah, it's college money, but he's like making like probably, if I had to guess, like 800 grand in rural Minnesota money. That's like a week of the Cory Perry buyout. That's not a big deal with the ducks. So the thing about it for me is that like I still come back to the fact that that Ducks roster is a veteran roster.

I'm not sure if the NCAA coach is the right fit for like, you know, trying to still win with your guts laughs of the world. I don't think they're trying that, but yeah. But I think he's the best option of the ones they're talking about. Like, Lane Lambert, I mean, to me, is an assistant, much like Paul Fenton probably should have still been as a GM. And Rick, Rick, bonus, whatever, right, as far as his, ability there. So who's to say? But the one thing I know is that if you're a Ducks fan, whoever the coach is going to be, man, get in line now for tickets. Because if they're sold out, what are you going to do? What are you going to do without

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I did see, of course, before Game 7 was played, some very heavy lobbying from one voter in particular, Pierre LeBron, the Athletic, in which he made the case for two Krask to win or lose. Do you think it's the fact that O'Reilly scored a goal early in the game and the voters said, all right, the Blues have this in hand, he's got a goal, we can say he's got this thing, that usurped the, Tuka wins at all costs candidacy? I think it was the four on 20, Greg. I think. Like, it was, you know, again, I didn't think any of the goals

were Rask's fault, really, and I don't think that should have been enough to paper over an entire playoff of being like a 935 goalie or whatever he ended up being. But also, like, I totally get why it was Ryan O'Reilly. Like you said, if he hadn't scored in that game, I think Rask

still wins, but yeah, once he's scored and, like, you know, the goals continued to pile up, I was like, yeah, it's going to O'Reilly. There's no doubt in my mind, so. Yeah, I'm not a huge fan of losing team

winning the Kahn Smyth, just because that's typically not how it goes. You know, if it's, you could certainly make a case that it should happen more often, but it doesn't. I thought he was going to win because there was no clear pick on St. Louis, and I figured they were going to split all the blues votes, and Rask was going to win it on the strength of being second or third on a bunch of ballots.

And that might have happened if it wasn't for, yeah, the O'Reilly scoring early, if it looked like it was going to be the winning goal in a game seven, I think that gave everybody the green light to make O'Reilly the Blues choice, and once that was the case, then somebody... Because to me, you should win, based on how it's typically been done, you should win if you're on the losing team, if you are the guy who dragged that team to where they got. If you're the JSG-Air story,

and whereas Tuka Rask was very, very, very good, but it's not like the Bruins are one goaltender and a bunch of scrubs. So I was happy with how it worked out. I thought they got it. They got that call right. Yeah, they got it as like, if you, were going to pick somebody from the blues, the only person it could be was Ryan O'Reilly. And, you know, I guess the argument is that it was, what, less than two rounds ago, everybody was like,

he's got to be, like, hurt or something. And it turned out he was, apparently. But, like, he was really bad against Dallas. And, but at the same time, like, I, you know, I think I wrote it at the time, but he should be in the top three for the, for the, like, regular season MVP as well. For the heart. Yeah. He was unbelievable this year. So like, he was, he was top three on my ballot for sure. Yeah, so fair enough.

Like, if he, if he's going to get the cons my thought of it, like, I can't be too mad about it because it's like, you know what? Like, he was so good in the regular season and the fact that he had like a bad round and a half, a round and a half ago, basically. You know, I can't be, I can't be too mad about it. And, yeah, he was awesome in the final, so. He disappeared for a little bit in a San Jose series, too, but I mean, it might have been like just play. doing that sort of Jonathan Tave's exception of this defensive assignment saps his offense for a little bit. He was the most logical choice, I think. Bittington, it's hard to give the guy the con when he gets pulled in the finals game.

Well, that, and he had like eight games of below 900 save percentage in the playoffs. Like, he wasn't good for a big chunk of the playoffs. But there's something. I mean, there's something to be said for, his case, though, like the wins after losses. Yeah, if you want to make up, like, you know, on, on days when it was raining and... It's not a made-up stat. He's fucking, he's fucking eight and two.

I mean, there's something to be said for that. Okay, but that's not an argument against Jordan Bittington, though. Well, except that he was worse at the thing everybody said he was amazing at than the guy who didn't win the cons might. It's like... Well, he also walked into Winnipeg and won three games. He also walked into Boston and won three games. I mean, something we said for this kid.

Yeah, you were right. He was awesome. He was unbelievable. The guy got pulled. I literally cannot believe that you were still going to be anti-Jordan Binnington after what the fuck you just saw last night. You called him Chris Osgood like a week ago. Yeah, Chris Osgood's a money goalie, man. He has a hall of fame case based on how good he is in the playoffs. Chris Osgood, if there was a Detroit fan banner, I would be proud to have Chris Osgood wave that banner. He's vital to the success of the Red Wings in their history. Yeah, Colton Perego and Alex Petrangelo were on the ice for 51 minutes last night. That's... You know what? It sounds like we've got a real... It turns out Marty Brodor never left the Blues with the arguments you're making about the defenseman making the goalie, apparently. Didn't you say it was a 95 defenseman or a Devils team?

Is that something... Was Sean said it? Martan Brodor was the backbone of that team, sir. And also Scott Neutermeyer and Scott Stevens. Yeah, it fucking helps. I think you could make a case for Bennington, but I think that Ultimate League of Riley was the best case. I'm happy that, you mean, you want to talk about recency bias.

Petrangelo was the recency bias. Like, he really had an amazing final, outstanding final. I thought he's kind of struggled early on, honestly, in the final. I thought overall in the final, he played his best hockey, but I think overall in the playoffs, Perrako was the better defenseman. God, yeah. Without question. So O'Reilly was a solid choice, but I mean, Sean, it sounds like you might be a little more on the fence on whether it, like, so you're just, you're saying since it wasn't a situation where Tuka dragged a mediocre team kicking and screaming to the final, it's probably not a cons smite here for him.

Right. It's got to be more of a mediocre team. And I'm just, again, this is if I was starting a hockey league from scratch and I was going to have a con smith, I wouldn't have a problem saying it should just go to. the best player in the playoffs, even if they lose, even if they don't make the final. If somebody just kills it for three rounds, you want to put Logan Couture on a ballot or something like that? Yeah, you're talking. But that's not the way it's historically been.

Historically, it's been an award for someone from the winning team unless there is extraordinary circumstances on the losing team. And I don't think this year rose to that. And the thing that I was hoping was not going to happen was that I, like, I, like, said, I thought Tuka Rask was going to win, not because he was the best choice, but because he was the second or third choice on a bunch of people who couldn't decide between Ryan O'Reilly and Jordan Biddington and Colt Pereco and Jane Schwartz and all those guys would split the Blues vote. And luckily, Ryan O'Reilly came along and solved that problem.

And I'm sure fans in Buffalo are just thrilled to see a guy who didn't, you know, he didn't quit on that team. but who basically, like, lost his smile and had to go away and live in a nice farm somewhere. Yeah, that team almost made him quit hockey. I mean, that's like, it was the opposite. It was he. That's probably not what you want when you're the Sabres is to have, like, one of your star players be like, this place is killing my soul.

I need to leave. Leave and immediately win the Stanley Cup and the cons. And be the best player and, again, have a borderline MVP season. Yeah. I'm sure Jack Eichael's sitting there like, yeah, great, eight years. Good, good call. It's great. Dave Thompson's going to have a real big season next year.

Yeah, but that's just it. The Staper's got some quality players. We didn't want to give up a Tage Thompson. And I'm just wondering at some point will we start laughing? Like, will we start cackling at some point during the Soliloquies? He was winking a lot when he said that. Yeah. Fucking Ryan O'Reilly.

Could have been a heart and con smith winner potentially this year. Insane. Absolutely insane. A good choice for the con, I think, at the end of the day. Now, the con smith was handed out post-game. Betman comes out, ladies and gentlemen, and gets booed as is everybody's want. Sean, where are you on Betman getting booed? You seem like someone who might be over that.

Yeah. This is like a big thing for me because I've written a bunch about the Gary Betman awkward handoffs. And every year people ask me to rate them and continue on that. And this year's was fine. Like that's, unfortunately, it was, it was fine. Like, there's a couple things you look for. First of all, let's just say the booing was very mild. And I understand that it's not a close game.

Act of the shit, dude. After building it left. They're at a pub. I do get that. But can we just point out that if that's what it had sounded like in Vegas last year, everybody would be talking about how Vegas fans weren't real fans yet because they didn't boo Gary Betman loud enough. So it was very mild booing.

The photo went on a little too long. The Gary Betman hand, the crazy finger-pointing thing that has a mind of its own that he can't control was, was doing its usual crazy thing. But it was relatively smooth. I didn't love the fireworks. I don't know why we bore Bill Goldberg's entrance pyro for that moment.

Yeah, I was going to say. But other than that, it was fine. It was fine. It wasn't, you know. Am I wrong? What's that? Am I wrong that that podium was new to? Like the podium that said the Stanley Cup or whatever the fuck it said last night? Yeah, I don't remember.

I think that was also new. So you got fireworks. And the fire, honestly, like, I was looking at the front page of NHL.com. And the photo is kind of cool. Like, it's all the sparks in the background and Peterangelo lifting the, I'm sorry, Petrangelo lifting the cup. And it says Stanley Cup, the podium says Stanley Cup champions. It kind of looks like a garbage can a little bit, which is unfortunate.

But I don't know. Like, aesthetically, it seems like you don't need it because of that moment is so beautiful in one of itself that you don't need sparklers in the best. background. That's the thing. Like that's, like, especially if you're a blues fan, you've been waiting 52 years. Like, you want to see your guy take the cup, right? Like, that's it. That's the moment where he's going to take the cup. You don't need the fireworks going off in the background. So I don't know about that. But you know, guys, speaking of great takes, uh, that produce fireworks. Oh my God. Yes. That was, I got to give it to you. That was, we're going

We're going to need to forge another cons mythropey and give it to Sean. It is way too early for me to do any better than that. So The Athletic is a direct consumer subscription service serving sports fans in North America. The model is simple. There are no ads, no pop-ups, no autoplay videos, and Gary Bettman does not make you pose for photographs for an uncomfortably long amount of time. For a photograph that we never see. Those photos have...

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For more than a thousand stories published each week as well as audio content. So subscribe right now using promo code soup, download the athletic app from the app store, and come experience the athletic story is told in a whole new way. There's your ad. There it is. It was beautifully, beautifully done, beautifully rendered. Let's talk a bit about what happens now with the Boston Bruins besides copious amounts of vizene to treat those teary eyes

like Brad Marshan had after losing the cup. to see it. You really do. You hate to see it, and you hate to meme it as it will be in perpetuity now. What do you think about where the Bruins are and where they might be headed? It's tough, man. You know, I don't want to say like this was their last chance at it because I really don't think it was, but, you know, this team kind of had everything come together for them a little bit in the playoffs. And, you know, I, you know, I, you know, I, they have enough talent, like, and including young talent to, to, you know, stay competitive, but you can't count on Tampa shedding the bet again.

You can't count on beating the Leafs next year. You can't. Right, okay, sure. It might be. Like, like death in taxes, Sarah. You know, there's just like the amount of, Florida is likely to get much better this summer. Let's not forget that. and yeah, I don't know, man.

This was their chance, and they didn't come through. And that's how it goes sometimes. But at the same time, you kind of got to say maybe this was it. And they just shit their pants at home in game seven. Brutal. They shit their pants, but they, I mean, I was thinking about that last night. It's, it's, I know that there's some probably some fucking townie in the upper deco. and they need to try harder.

The Blues played a really fucking good game in Game 7. I can't fault the Bruins for losing that game. I think the better 5-15 team won last night. Yeah, I would agree with that, but also like maybe try getting to the net to get one of the 58 rebounds Jordan Bennington gave up. There it is. What about you, Sean? Do you think this is it for the Bruins? You know, I've got, my take on this is really boring, which is I'm not going to say this is it because I think

we've learned over the last few years from teams like the capitals that the declaring windows have been closed is well even this bruin's team right like yeah yeah absolutely two years ago they thought they were going to be bad when they when they when they brought cast to be aboard like they weren't expecting them to be any good and there's still a good team like the roster's so solid but and the roster solid there's no like there's no big free agency does you know there's there's no there's no the cap is is tight, but there's not like some sort of cap crunch where you're going to be forced to move out big pieces. I mean, the boring take is, it, it sucks. You play the whole year to get game seven at home, you don't come through. You bring the squad back and you take another run at it next year. And you know, you don't, you're going to go into the season as one of the probably six or eight teams that are considered favorites. And that's probably the best you can asked for. And you take another swing. You hope you don't get run over by fatigue next year, which sometimes happens to teams that go real deep, but sometimes doesn't. They've got as good

as shot as anybody. And you've got at least one more swing of the axe, so to speak, and see where that leads you. I think they could, I think they could win the East next year. You know, they have to make, they have to do one thing, a couple things. They have to buy out back us, obviously, or find someone that'll take him, but I don't know who would unless they need the cap money. And I think that that is tied to them needing to address that second line winger conundrum that's been vexing them forever, where I thought the answer would be Charlie Coyle, but it turns out that they wanted to be a center instead.

So they need to go out and figure out a second line wing, get themselves a dominant guy, and go from there. But other than that, I mean, the D is good. I also think it's going to be really interesting to see what they do with Krug. I can't imagine a scenario where you go 33% of the power play for the entirety of the playoffs and then trade your quarterback and hand the keys to like Matt Griswick.

But the financial realities of Tori Krueger that he's making 5.25. He's a free agent in summer 2020. And how much are they really going to give this, smurf. Like, are they going to keep them? They're going to trade them? I think you've got to keep them.

You know, the thing you're saying about, like, well, they got to give them a shitload more money in summer 2020, you know who's 58 years old and makes a pretty good amount of money and probably doesn't have too much tread left on the tire? Is another defenseman on the Boston Bruins? This is true. This is true. I agree. But he only makes, at this, he's only making $2 billion against the cap next year as Charra.

Is that, is that it? or because isn't there like bonuses and stuff like that that are very easy to reach? I'm pretty sure that's the case. I'm sure that's probably the case. But the point is, is that the Bruin, this would not be the first time that a defenseman has, you know, priced himself out of the Bruins's payroll if in fact that ends up being the case with Krug. And, you know, power play quarterback being arguably outside of goaltender, the most, you know,

well, I don't know. Maybe it is the most valuable commodity. Probably, probably great 200 foot center is probably the, most coveted thing, and then PowerPlay quarterback might be the second one's ever. Power play on PowerPlay that succeeds 40% of the time is, yeah, probably pretty, pretty valuable. It's going to depend on whether he has his helmet on during the negotiations. If the helmet comes off, he gains superpowers, and then he'll be unstoppable.

So, so with bonuses, Charra's contract is 3.75. Okay. Manageable. Manageable. You know, you get an extra 3.75 to give Tori crux. and that makes him a $9 million player. Like, that makes sense to me. If Kenny Holland came to the Bruins tomorrow and said,

we'll give you the nudge for Krug, would you do it? No. Oh, okay. That's always the place I figured he ended up if he did, if there was a deal. But I'm surprised that. You guys just seem a lot more optimistic. They're going to commit to this guy long term, which makes me happy because I like him. Oh, and the one contract they do have to give out,

and this is actually a pretty significant one, and it's going to be fascinated to see exactly how it plays out. Charlie McAvoy is a restricted free agent. So do they give him the big Eklad level deal or they give him a bridge deal through, you know, him being shackled as an RFA? I'd be interested to see how that thing plays out. Yeah. Brandon Carlo is also an RFA.

Yeah, he's a very good player. So they have to spend a good chunk of money on the Blue Line this summer for sure. Yeah. What do they have for space? All right, there you go. Well, they have $40 million to spend. I think they'll be okay. And obviously the blues repeat, right?

I mean, they're on track to be a defending cup champion next year. Everything will fall in place again, right? They've got to be last place on January 1st. So that's what you spend the first half of the season working awards. Right. And then you flip the switch, and it's a dynasty. Well, so here's the thing, right? Like, to the point about Osgood is, you know, they're, like,

they don't need Jordan and Bennington to be a 940 goalie if they're just good all. year. If he's, if he's league average, they're great again. And, you know, he since, um, the start of March, he's been a roughly league average goalie, and that's all they've needed him to be. And so, yeah, like, I, I can totally see them being a dominant team in the West again. And by the way, guys, it's just, speaking of guys who need new contracts, like Jordan Bennington, I believe, needs a new deal. And that's, he does. That's going to get interesting because he's, he's an RFA, but I think the he's arbitration eligible,

which is even more interesting. Like, what's the comp for that? Fucking Cam Ward? Yeah. Like, it's crazy. Yeah, no, I mean, like, I was being flippant, but the core of that team is very good. Very good.

And they have a bunch of younger players, too, that are filling out that lineup that they've been waiting on. I mean, you know, a kid like Thomas is only going to get better and so on and so forth. So it's it's good, it's good to be the, it's good to be the blues right now, I think, overall if you're thinking about contenders in the West. And to answer your question, the answer is, if you fire Barubi in January,

you have to then hire a Flyers retread. So Dave Haxstall, come on down. There it is, maybe. All right. Stanley Cup final. Okay, let's go. Stanley Cup final letter grade, Stanley Cup playoffs letter grade. What say you?

Oh, boy. Go ahead, Sean. I would say, I mean, the final will be remembered as a very good final because it went seven. I don't think, I mean, in terms of classics, I wouldn't put it up there with some of the other ones. You know, game, both, game seven wasn't great. Game six wasn't great. There was the other blowout. There was the officiating controversy.

We got one over time. I would say it's a B plus, the final, and the playoffs itself, I mean, it kind of depends. If you're saying, like, in terms of being interesting, that it was, this was a fantastic playouts, but they were interesting for the wrong reason a lot of the time. So, you know, we did the whole debate over whether all the chaos in the first round was good or bad, but most people seemed to like it. And even if you didn't like it, the rest of the, the next three rounds kind of, settled down in that regard, so it wasn't, it didn't feel like it was complete randomness

the whole playoffs. I thought the playoffs were pretty good. I mean, the officiating controversies were obviously a big part of what we're going to remember. But I think overall, I was certainly never bored, let's put it that way. So I don't know what grade that translates to, but I thought it was a pretty fun couple of months. And here I am assuming that your grading system is the same as as here it is in the States. I don't know. You probably use like numbers or some shit instead of A's and B's.

It's five or whatever. I don't know what goes on up there. I would give the final a B. It's funny you bring up the Vancouver series before, Sean, because the more I think about it, this is sort of the, if you take an R-rated movie

and put it on regular TV, that's kind of what this series is. Is that version of Vancouver series? No crazy, no crazy controversies, no Nathan Horton hit, no, you know, Sadine getting punched in the face 75 times, no shit talking between the two goalies, but kind of the bones of the series are the same where the hockey really wasn't that good, but it was never boring.

I'd give it a B overall, maybe, maybe inched up to a B plus for their having been a game seven, but you're right, there was way too many games that were so, that not competitive that, yeah, like, how many lead changes? that we actually have in the series. Probably not many. Not many, yeah. So that's, I'd have to give it a B. Overall, for the playoffs, I'd say A minus,

only because of the incredible, unpredictable nature of it, as much as the officiating controversies made us all go mental on this podcast, having to talk about them every episode, they did make for good copy and good fun.

And really, like any playoff that involves a sweet of the one of the greatest regular season teams of all time in the first round by the fucking blue jackets, no less. And games six and seven of the Sharks Vegas series, got to at least rank a minus in my book. That's, that's some shit that you can't, I mean, you get one of those moments in a playoff and you're happy. And also three game seven overtimes, which I think was, you know, like that. I mean, that's like a decade's worth. Oh. And great stories too. I mean,

God, like the double overtime game and game seven between Dallas and St. Louis. fucking Pat Maroon wins it. Dude goes home to be with his kids, scores a game winning goal for his hometown team and all that shit. There was a ton of that stuff going on here. That's a solid A minus for me, these playoffs. Maybe it becomes an A if there was a little bit more violence, but that's just my own predilection. Yeah, I would have said an A for the playoffs. I had a lot of fun.

Like, I think these are the most fun playoffs. I remember, like, front to back in quite a long time. So, yeah, for everything, you guys said, like, I think that's an A for me. Dog. Sure. But I kind of thought the finals

were a bit more of a dud than you guys. Oh. Just like you guys said, like a lot of the games weren't competitive. It was just one team being like, no, we're just going to crush the other guys. And then, you know, they traded those back and forth for a little while. And, you know,

I thought game five was probably the only, like, actually fun, good game, like, actually good game in the whole series. Right. And that's the day that everyone talks about the trip. That's, like, going to be the moment everyone remembers. Yeah. And so, like, even that's marred by controversy. Like, I think I'd give it a C where it was just like, I mean, it certainly could have been worse, but, like, there was just nothing in, like, the actual entertainment of the, of the quality of hockey that I was like, you know, know, this is the aesthetic I'm looking for in my sport in 2019. A C, C plus, if it was in the Tokyo Dome. A couple more topics to cover here. I do want to touch on the two incredible controversies that touch both of our nations this

week in sports. The alleged, I know, the alleged cheering of an injury in Toronto when Kevin Durant went down in game five for the Golden State Warriors and the over-exuberance of the U.S. women's national team in celebrating roughly 75 goals against Thailand. And the classic word in both cases used, of course, was class. Yeah, absolutely. Where is the class? Stay classy.

Sean, as the resident Canadian, what were your thoughts on the Durant situation? Here's what? I had to keep my mouth shut on this one because I know as the, I am, even though I haven't lived in Toronto in 20 years, I'm viewed as a Toronto guy. David Staples says I'm a Toronto writer. So I, I just stayed out of this one, but I just want to say I wrote about this topic 10 years ago when, if you guys remember in the Wings Penguin series, you had a kind of, a similar situation where Sidney Crosby was banged up and he came back and then he got hit and he left and he like went down the tunnel

and Red Wings fans cheered and everybody freaked out and and told them to be classy and all of this stuff and I wrote at the time I had no problem with fans being happy about

minor or run of the mill sports injuries to their opponents I think it's ridiculous that we have to pretend that these games are really important and we really care and we're really emotionally invested. But when something happens that makes your team more likely to win, if it involves an injury, you're supposed to bow your head and get very solemn and say that none of this matters. I think if it's a serious injury, different deal. Clearly, if it's a season-ending injury or something's going to affect somebody's quality of life, then yes, of course that's bigger than

sports and you shut up. But I think that with the Kevin Durant's situation, what happened is, I mean, first of all, I've heard people say, well, you know, as soon as he goes down, they start cheering. Yeah, the game's still going on at that point. Like, the Raptors are going down the other way to score. So yes, the crowd's going to be cheering. When everybody looks back and sees him sitting on the court, at first, nobody knows that this is a serious injury. Okay? Like this is a guy who had had missed a few weeks with a strained calf, which is a serious injury for a basketball player. But that's a sports injury. That stuff happens.

Okay, that's nobody's shedding any tears over a strained calf. When you see him just sitting on the court, he's not writhing in pain, he's not pounding on the floor, he's not holding his leg up and his foot's pointing in the wrong direction. He's just holding his leg. Everybody goes, oh, the calf's flared up again. he's going to have to come out of the game maybe he's going to have to maybe he's not going to come back in the game maybe he's out of the series all of that stuff makes your team more likely to win i've got no problem with anyone being happy uh that that an opponent suffers what looks like uh an unpleasant but pretty run-of-the-mill injury now as soon as people realize it's something more serious than that which once the trainer gets out and you can hear you can see him talk to some of the other players and the achilles is that that's one of those injuries where as it's been explained to me you you know you know you as soon as it happens, exactly what has happened. At that point, everybody shuts up,

everybody starts cheering him. They chant his name as he goes down the tunnel, which I've never heard before. Yeah. And they're currently raising money for his charity. They're up to like $20,000. So if through all of that, we're still going to play the You're Not Classy card,

then I think at this point I kind of want off the classy bus because this is all getting kind of ridiculous. So that's my defense of Toronto fans. that I couldn't do earlier in the week because I would just get called to Homer. But it's completely consistent with what I've been saying for the last decade on this stuff that didn't involve Toronto fans in any way. Finally, someone in the Canadian media comes to the defense of the Toronto fans, only two of whom actually clapped.

And they actually formed like one of those fire chains in the old days where they would hand each other water buckets, but that was to carry him to a hospital. and it still would not have been enough. Free healthcare, by the way, I don't know, and there was no school shootings. And yeah, we get it. No, like, Canadian fans are the very best in the world,

and actually they would never do anything bad. No, they're not. They're exactly the same as fans everywhere else. And that's why, like, fans in, any time this happens anywhere, and fans in other fan bases try to score points, like, oh, yeah, you know, you would do the exact same thing. And it's completely this, you know, this rush to, As soon as it happened, you knew.

You were like, oh, here we go. We're going to listen to two days of classy takes. And, yeah, everybody's delivered. We got them. To your point, to your point about, like, they didn't know right away that it was like a serious injury. Yeah. I was watching that game. And, oh, boy, no, that was right away, it was like, oh, he's fucked.

So when you saw him, when the camera cuts back and he's sitting on the court, just sitting there, kind of holding his like, you said this is a, you said this is a. an a, this is an Achilles, not his cap strain is, his, well, even if it was his calf strain, like, I thought, like, you know, that, that was his, that was maybe his calf, basically turning into hamburger meat in his leg, like, I,

I instantly was like, well, he's fucked. And, and, you know, the thing about, like, because, because what they had always said was, like, if he re-inters it, like, it's a really long recovery or something like that. And now it's looking like, yeah, he's going to be out to, like, December

next year. Well, because he tore his Achilles. Yeah, I mean, that's going to be. Well, right. But even if it's, so the other thing you have to understand is that, like, if you are a basketball player and you have a calf injury, it makes you much more susceptible to an Achilles injury that then is insane. That's why they're, I'm glad you knew that and factored it into your reaction in the

moment, but you should, maybe you should get the Warriors a call because they apparently didn't know that. All the Toronto fans were expecting to know. The Warriors had no idea that, yeah, okay. Like, because wasn't it yesterday, fucking Steve Kerr was like, would we put them in again? Yeah, we would. And it's like, oh, boy, I don't know, dude. Like, that is, I kind of fall on that.

Jalen Rose shit, man, where it's like. A lot of this, if everybody hadn't already fired up the very well-worn, let's blame the fans, outrage machine, there should be a lot more outrage pointed at the Warriors for playing the Warriors. That's what the story should be. Well, I mean, I think you can talk about both at once. But, like, Charles Barkley was on the intermission show last night and was like, you know, what do you think about that whole thing? And he's like, he shouldn't have been playing. And that, and that, I started to say it. Like, that was the Jalen Rose thing. I don't, I don't remember if it was on,

like, first take or what it was. But he was like, he used a, quote that he attributed to somebody else and he was like, they bring flowers, they'll bring flowers to your funeral but not soup when you're sick and it's like, yeah, man. That's really what it's all about. Like, they were like,

you know what? We know that we're putting Kevin Durant at risk, but like, we got to at least win one game to make this a respectable final or we're going to feel shitty about ourselves. And he's probably not going to be on our team next year anyway, so fuck it. And like, that just sucks.

get it right by the way it's it's NBC hockey analyst Charles Barkley man like can we get him to replace Keith Jones god dang he was like he was actually good they asked him all right all right now free now freeze it freeze it one two three four five six six players on the ice right there you can't be going to go that way yeah he he the problem is he's not going to know who Rob Thomas play for um and junior but but like he

talking talking Eddie they said like Who's the Kauai of the NBA or the, of the NHL? And he said Sidney Crosby. And it's like, fuck, man, that's exactly right. Like that's, there you go. Yeah. I fall on Sean's side. I think that the, um, the neanderthilic response of fans to something that benefits

their team is, is a natural response. I am a huge fan of the very Canadian overcorrection for one's behavior where they're actually fucking raising money to like help out the guy's charity. because they feel so sorry, sorry, sorry about having cheered his injury. But that said, like Ryan was hinting at, the thing that drove me fucking mental was the, the protectionism of Canadian fans, the, that's not us bullshit from every goddamn fucking writer in Canada outside of Sean. Hold on.

Dude, which ones? Because Bruce Arthur ripped on the, on the Toronto fans who cheered. He defended the ones who didn't. There was, the basketball writer for the athletic literally did a five point fucking presentation on Twitter as to why the, what happened with the fans and, and don't, don't give him shit for it. And other guys, it was, it was a constant. That video of Jurassic Park after where people were, like, waving as he's being checked out and that kind of thing, like, woof. Yeah.

But it was, it was, it was always, you know, and it was the usual, like, oh, it was only a few bad eggs or whatever the fuck. Or they were, they were, they were booing something. Who gives us? It was, it was just like, what do you mean who gives you? Like, that's, if that's the facts of the case, then yeah, you should be allowed to. He was like they were actually cheering for the steel and not okay, okay buddy. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like, like, fucking own it.

Like, it's, it's fine. It's shitty. Everybody's shitty. It means that you're just as shitty as Philly when you shit on Philly for being shitty. But, like, it just acknowledged that it happened. And don't try to, like, fucking Zabruder film this shit where, like, they're trying to say, oh, well, they weren't. So there was the kiss cam on the jumbo tron at the time. I don't know what the fuck you're talking about.

Like, like, yeah. Yeah. And I agree with that. Go back and read what I, you know. I could list the 10 biggest basketball writers and media people in Canada, and I bet you we go back, seven or eight of them are mostly critical of the fans who cheered. I mean, if one or two guys found their way into your timeline,

then I guess we apologize on behalf of the entire Canadian media, but don't paint us all with this. But, Sean, half of them were saying the cheering didn't happen, or that the cheering happened before the issue happened. No, no, it was like a lot, everybody was saying it was like, you know, six guys or whatever. It was, it was, it wasn't, it wasn't the whole arena. It was more than six guys, obviously. It wasn't 20,000 people. That's not what 20,000 people cheering sounds like. And yeah, it is perfectly valid when somebody else says the second he got hurt, they cheered to point out the game was

still going on. They were cheering because the Raptor scored at bat. Like that is, if pointing that out is not owning it, I mean, you're allowed to say what you can see with your eyes right in front of you. If you're not, then, I mean, I guess we're, we're, we're, we're, really down a weird place with this. Yeah, I don't know. There was a lot, there was a lot too much, too much sort of like, wagon circling. Yeah, wagon circling, apologizing for the fans when it was just like,

like you said from the top Sean, like the perfect neanderthilic response to something that benefits your team. Everyone's going to fucking do it. And it's fine. It's sports. By the way, can we also talk about the Toronto Sun being like, wouldn't it be better if the Raptors had Canadian guy on there? And then it's like, yeah,

You guys know who the fucking Chris Boucher is? He was on the Warriors last year. And to steal a bit from the press box in the ringer, the overworked Twitter joke of the week, by far was how many people responded to that headline by saying, you know, the Raptors need more dinosaurs on their team. It's just a great fucking line. And to put that in context just for people who might not understand,

the Toronto Sun sucks. Yeah. You now understand everything you need to. It's the Canadian newspaper equivalent of Fox News, pretty much. Like, it's bad. Yeah, it'd be like if somebody tried to put Fox News into the New York Post and then was like, whoa, this is way too complicated and intelligent. Let's dumb it down. Right. Yeah, that would be it.

As far as the women's national team, I've already planted my flag here, too. I don't give a shit, man. The thing that bothers me is the people who went to the, but what about the kids' argument? Yeah, what about the young, uh, soccer player, let's say like my nine-year-old daughter, who's watching the World Cup and seeing these women, these incredible women, these women who put their careers in the line to get as much money as the men make, celebrating and having fun and doing all kinds of cool shit. Like, yeah, that would really fucking repel her for wanting to be an athlete to see, you know, fucking athletes celebrating their accomplishments in the goddamn World Cup. Yeah, like, a lot of it was, like,

that I saw from, again, Canadian. um what was was you guys need to follow different Canadians because i don't know where this it we like we have won three Twitter accounts you probably so so there's so don't follow hailey wickenhizer is going to say dude 30 million of us i know i think i'm i apologize that every this stuff happens you see three tweets from various Canadians and that's that's the entire country but so haley wickenhizer cheat the thing the thing thing is nobody's upset about how many goals they scored. Like, I haven't seen one take about that. That's what I was going to say, though.

That's like, well, you're only talking about they ran up the score and we're talking about the celebration. And it's like, you know what, dude? Like, if you score fucking 13 goals, like, if you're Haley Wicke, because I'm sure that Canadian team beat like the Latvian women's team, 10015 to negative five one time. And like, at some point, yeah, maybe you do, like, Because it really, for coming from the hockey point of view of it, it really read a lot, like, please like my sport shit to me. Where it's like, I, you know, I personally scored 58 goals against the Russian team when the Russian team was like three women named Ludmilla and that's it. Right. And, you know, I actually just put my head down and skated back to the bench and cried because of how bad I felt that we scored all those goals.

And it's like, okay, like, you're, that's fine. but like also, you know, like Christine Sinclair didn't go out and score 58 goals. And if she didn't, if she celebrated it, I'd go, yeah, well, I mean, she scored 58 goals. So that's fine. I, I, I, sure. I, okay. So if, if, yeah, if Canada went and beat somebody 13 to nothing and they were doing choreographs sliding along the ice, doing leg lift celebrations, you guys would think

that was fine, sure. Sometimes the consensus take is just the, right take. Score as many goals as you want, but don't celebrate. Like when you're running over some nation that doesn't even belong on the field with you. It's not cool. It's not the end of the world. Nobody should care about this two days from now.

But yeah, most people were right. When they looked at that and went, that's too much. Settle down. It doesn't, it's not fun. It's just. Again, like what I, but I come back to the storm search conversation. Like, remember when people were pissed up, well, okay, like a few people were pissed about Storm Strange because they thought it was showing up their opponents.

Like, why is a celebration automatically default setting showing up your opponent? Why is it not just celebrating with your teammates? I think, I don't understand that. I think when you're running across the field and like doing like little, I don't know, at some point. They're not Lars Eller taunting the fucking Bruins bench, so Brad Barshan has to assault him. They were just celebrating amongst themselves. Amongst them, well, he's sliding across the field.

Like, I mean, this, like, nobody's saying don't high five or hug or smile or something like that. And as far as to go back to Haley Wickenheiser, when this happens, people are always like, well, until you've been in that situation, you don't get to say, well, here's somebody who's been in the situation going, yeah, no, I've been in exactly that situation. And no, I didn't act that way. I got more than a little problem with her, worth her taking a run at the fucking women's national soccer team, who, by the way, like, put their asses on the line to get the

thing that Wick says she's been fighting for her entire career. and there's trickled down to the other two hockey teams in North America for what they've done. Holster your fucking gun. They'll take a fucking shot at them. I guess. All right. So, okay, so basketball fans can't do, can't be emotional, but soccer players who have been around for doing this their whole lives, I don't know. I'm, I wasn't a fan of it.

I think we solved it. I wouldn't, if I was the eight-year-olds I coach started acting like that when they were up 13 nothing. I probably have to tell them to settle down. Yeah, but these are professional athletes, so it's not a lower one. Everybody knows that your kids does what you expect from rambunctious kids. You don't want people celebrating. Don't give up 13 fucking goals. I don't know what Yeah, Thailand. Like, look, you know, I don't think, I don't think Canada is going to be in a position to score as many in group play because they're not in the group with

with Thailand, their next games against New Zealand and then after that it's against the Netherlands. And those are not like complete afterthought. Because what you have to understand is like Thailand isn't even the worst team in the Women's World Cup this year.

The U.S. and France are just so much better than everybody else they're going to play that like they're going to 13 nothing is going to is probably going to be the ugliest score of the tournament. but there were going to be other real ugly ones too. Hey, just remember this game when Thailand wins the next World Cup and they cite this experience as the reason why they've, that competitive fire was lit.

Their numbers spiked locally. Legions of young Thai women come out to play soccer because they're so mad about what happened in this U.S. game. What's the line from The Last Jedi? We're the spark that lights the fuse that burns down the first order? or what have you. Something like that. That's exactly what the women's national team did. All right.

One more topic to touch on before we head out. Is there any other hockey things you wanted to talk about? I, for one, forgot to mention before how fucking insanely wonderful it was that the St. Louis Post Dispatch printed the owner of the St. Louis Blues letter in their digital edition, congratulating the fans on a Stanley Cup victory that hadn't happened yet on the day of Game 6. That is one of the most titantically wonderful fuck-ups in journalism in recent memory. Yeah, pretty bad. You don't want to do that.

That would have for it. Yeah, it was awesome. Competition committee met, and we are going to find out a lot more about the stuff when they have the annual meetings in Vegas before the awards to see what might stick here. They've mentioned a few things. We'll start off on the lower end of the thing. Changes in face-off procedures. Was it you, Sean, that said that the competition committee ignores all the big topics,

but they never met a face-off procedure. I wish I loved anything in my life as much as the competition committee loves tweaking face-off procedures. It's fucking 100%. Every year. Every year they're just like messing around with like what. But I will say this. There is actually something interesting, or something at least that I found really interesting, buried in this little release that doesn't tell us anything about what really that they actually did.

and that's the puck or sorry the net being knocked off they have changed the procedure for the net being out right now the net gets when the net gets knocked off if the referee feels it's intentional he can call it a penalty but otherwise it's just

a standard issue stoppage and they have changed it so that the referee can still call a penalty but if he doesn't if the defensive team knocks the net off it'll be treated like icing basically they don't get there there's a there's a face off and no

No option to change, no line change. Which drives me crazy because this is exactly what everyone, or what many of us want them to do with the puck over glass rule, which is if it's intentional, call it a penalty, otherwise treat it like icing and let's. And here you have the net being off is literally the next item in the rulebook. It's the same section as the puck going over the class. It's the next item.

And here they are, like they're so close to, figuring it out. Like, you know, when you see someone, you're like, you're just waiting for the light bulb to go off, you're like, they're almost there. They've almost got it. They've almost figured this out on the puck over glass thing, but they just, they missed by like one rule, uh, and applied it to something else. There had to be at least 17 puck over glass penalties in that final. It felt like it was, it was rough. Oh, but you see, Greg, it's, it's so black and white. They call it the same every time after they've met for 15 minutes to talk about where the puck is. And also, it's long as long as long as it was, it was rough. And also, it's, it's like, it's, it's like, it's. And also, it's, it's like, it's Yeah, it's not overtime of the... Yeah, as long as it's not game seven, in which case. Right, exactly. The, a couple, a couple things that were interesting. The regulation tiebreaker,

uh, or the regular season tiebreaker thing, just making the first tiebreaker regulation wins, round of a fucking applause. Yep, hell yeah, let's go. Anything that puts more emphasis on the first 60 minutes versus any of the circus shit that comes later. I don't think this is going to fix any of the problems of players or coaches, coaching for overtime.

players playing to get to overtime. But there's a part of me that hopes this is a very small first step towards finally just going to a 3-21 system. This is the first acknowledgement that regulation should be more important. So I'm choosing the optimist view and I'm saying this is the first little baby step towards where they need to get to. And then the committee recommends changes to the coach's challenge in expanded video review, including as it relates to a referee's ability to review.

some of his own calls on the ice. So things are real vague. I'm sure details will come out by the time you hear this as far as what that actually means. But the recommendation is to expand review. And whatever they decide, whatever tweaks they want to make, it does come back to something that to me is the most important thing in this debate right now, which is that Gary Betman is bullish on expanding video review.

And he's, you know, even for things like the handpass situation in the San Jose, St. Louis series, you know, Batman said, you know, what if the hand pass happened? a minute and a half of what a goal is scored. So they're going to have to kind of figure out a way to appease him and his concerns about what to review and when to review it and how long ago something gets reviewed before they're going to be able to expand replay for some of these things that we've seen in the playoffs, I think. Yeah.

And it is tough. I wrote a couple more things about that this week. Like, this is, people can read my pieces if they want to know, like, what I would do or what I think the answers are, but I will say, like, these questions are hard. And I'm so tired of people saying that it's easy. Like, just review it, just get it right. There's a lot of things you have to actually figure out when you're going to do this. And I'd love to know if the NHL has figured that out.

I wish I did instead of just reading a paragraph that doesn't actually tell me anything. I don't think that's a great start. The fact that they're already back into typical NHL mode of we're doing, something, but we're not going to tell you what it is. But maybe. I'll reserve judgment until we get the scoop at some point on what they're

actually proposing. I'm not optimistic, given that it's coming from the same group that came up with offside and interference reviews, but maybe they'll surprise us. Indeed. All right, that's a puck soup for this week. Congratulations to the St. Louis Blues

on their first Stanley Cup and franchise history. By the way, didn't mention this, How fucking cool is that they opened up Bush Stadium for a viewing party in St. Louis? Yeah, that was sick. Yeah. That was sick. Like, that's something I don't think I've seen before. Really awesome. That's, that's fucking cool as shit. And I really enjoyed my time in St. Louis. I know it's a scary place for a lot of people who grew up in Chicago. I know that I used to make fun of their food. I believe I once said that they ate like raccoons in St. Louis.

But I had a really good time. I ate some good food. I met some great people. and I couldn't be happier for those people to finally get a taste of this thing. It got a little misty on the ice last night watching a little Layla Anderson running over and hugging Colton Pareko and stuff. I think, you know, we all root for the narrative, you know,

when you're a writer and the better stories. I think clearly it was more interesting to write about the blues last night than it were the Bruins. But, yeah, good for them. It was a good time. Anyway, I'm Greg Wichinsky of ESPN. You can listen to my other podcast,

Pena Nice with Emily Kaplan. We've broken down game seven and all that good stuff with Levy of Melrose last night. That should be up at some point. And also, I did some reminiscing with Jimmy Trina on the SI Media podcast talking about the Puck Daddy Days and talking about the NHL media in general. That was fun this week. Yeah, you can sign up if you want to for, and you should want to because I do a good job. The Puck suit newsletter where I do. talk about hockey and movies and music and TV shows and that kind of thing.

Basically trying to distill what I would say on the podcast but we didn't talk about it on the show too much into just, you know, a quick, not necessarily that quick, but like a bullet pointsy kind of column. So yeah, if you remember the Puck Daddy power rankings, it's basically that, but with more. pop culture stuff in it. All right. Nice. And you can find my stuff at the athletic, including those pieces I just mentioned about Offside Review. My 10-point plan on how I would fix this when I am named commissioner.

So you can read that so that you won't be surprised when it happens. Awesome. Check out the mailbag on the Patreon. And thanks everybody for listening. And Sean's dying. He just got up for long. I saw it. I saw it.

RIP, Sean. I'm all right. We'll talk to you next week. Bye. See you. It's in goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to whatever you commute. But we also cover movies, TV shows, it's in tunes.

It's your weekly bowl of Hagi and Nancet. Book two.