Puck Soup - The Fun Never Stops

Episode Date: June 23, 2026

Sean and Ryan talk about the Brady Tkachuk trade, various coaching hires, other transactions, and more. Get bonus episodes and more at Patreon.com/PuckSoup

I'm Ryan Lambert from the Perfect Takes newsletter. I'm Sean Magnu from The Athletic. And folks, I don't know if you heard, but there's a crisis up in Canada. All these American guys, they don't want to play there anymore. And it all really came to a head. What was it, Sunday? It was Sunday, yeah. Yeah, Sunday.

Well, I don't think it came to ahead. I think that was the most recent in a very obvious pattern. But, yeah. Well, I guess what I mean is it came to a head insofar as this seems to be the breaking point of the, do we have a problem here? Because Brady Kachuk went to the Ottawa senators and he said, you're going to trade me. And they said, give us a list. And he said, here's a list. And it had four teams on it.

And then he said, and by the way, it's really only one teams, okay? Three of those are fake. So. Yeah. So he goes to the Florida Panthers, which is a thing I think I said was going to happen in like January. Well, everybody said it. And the senators denied it. And most entertainingly of all, Brady Kachuk not only denied it, but he like pulled a little sulk about how difficult this all was on him because everybody kept making up this completely fake story that he was going to orchestrate his way out of town and go to Florida.

and it was really hurting his feelings. Yes. And then within days of doing that whole performance, immediately did exactly what everybody had been speculating for years he would do. Mm-hmm. That's right. Well. Super cool, dude.

At least they get three first-round picks, including two in this year's draft, back for him. But... Decent return. Let's tell you what, before we get to the crisis part, Let's just purely as a hockey trade. What are your your thoughts on all of this?

The thing about the four teams, I guess, is that it gave, because apparently Minnesota made a big offer. I don't, do we know the other two teams? Carolina and Vegas. That's right. It was those two. You're right. And so it gave the senators enough kind of plausible deniability. Like, look, there are suitors.

blah, blah, blah. But he was always the only going to one place. The other thing about that is it's incredibly frustrating, I realize when players do this with a no move and say, I only want one destination. Right. If you have to be in a situation where your star player is saying that,

the Florida Panthers are actually the best case scenario because they don't mess around with this stuff. Bill Zito, we saw him do it with Matthew Kachuk, where four years ago, everybody, there were like, granted multiple teams in the bidding and what have you, but he just walked in and went, here's a bunch of good players and high draft picks. And the phrase I like to use is with the Panthers, it feels like they show up and they're like, I want to drive this off the lot today. Yep. Let's get a deal done. whereas every other team is hemming and ah you know i i don't know that i can do this or that they're they're willing to maybe overpay under the circumstances to just get it done and

yeah and i think ottawa does okay here i don't think there's any question that like they don't win the deal based on initial returns at the very least but they certainly did a lot better than you could imagine in a scenario where they had very little choice. Other than you're just going to play her for two more years. And then you can go join your brother, but that's not a ton of leverage. So I think Ottawa does okay. And then we have to wait and see what they do with the picks because it's been very strongly implied that they'll be moving at least some of them for immediate help. Yeah, and the thing that is about the return, too, is getting three first round picks, one of them is in like 20, 29 or something.

So, you know, who knows. But it is, it gives them flexibility where they can trade just the 25th pick. And or what, where are they picking like 18 or something like that? So they got the nine, I want to say it's the 25. and then they have their own 32nd, which they can't trade, which is interesting. That was the one that they lost because of the Vegas stuff. Yeah, that is untradable for reasons I'm not quite completely clear on, but that's kind of a fun little twist to throw in this.

And then they get a second and a future first that's top 10 protected, so not super valuable, but. But again, it just gives them flexibility. they can keep one of the picks. They can keep neither of the picks if they really, you know, have a guy they want to go out and get. And it's much like the Matthew Kachukh trade where it's like, did they do well?

Maybe not. Did they do as well as they could have under these circumstances where he's like, I'm really going to one team? Yeah. And like you said, like Florida is in the position where they were like, oh, let's go. That's a guy we got to get.

let's just fucking take what do what it takes to get him you know and yeah i mean you know i know i know the joke lately you know the last 24 48 hours whatever it's been is well you know he was only the third best player on the senators but here's the thing about that that's true You know? And the other thing about that is now he's like the sixth best player on the Florida Panthers. Yeah. I think I said on the other show that two things can be true. Brady Kachuk has always been overrated based on his name.

And also he's still a really good, valuable player with a skill set that you don't see a lot about there. So, like, I don't think we have to veer so hard to the other side that we start acting like this guy's not somebody that can move the needle on a contender. Totally. But also, yeah, they didn't, they didn't just trade, they didn't a heart trophy candidate in his prime, let's just say. And frankly, like, that's pretty close to what Matthew was in Calgary. Like, he had whatever, like a hundred point season in Calgary or whatever. And then he's, what, 24 at that point? So you're like, oh, shit.

Like, that's crazy that they moved him and they got something good back. But Brady's not that. And, you know, Brady's a, I would say, borderline great player. and of course, you know, you put him on a line with Sam Bennett and Matthew Cichuk in Florida. And they're going to draw a lot of penalties, let's say. And they are not going to get too many calls from the Department of Player Safety for all the stuff they get up to. So it's all going to work out great for them. Absolute free pass.

The Department of Player Safety's favorite line. I pretend I do not see it is, you know. And so, you. yeah, I think this obviously helps Florida, and I don't think it's like a disaster for Ottawa, really. But I do think it depends on what they get back. Like if they're picking 9th and 25th on Friday, I think that's probably a problem for them. A big problem, I should say. And I think it's very unlikely that that happens.

Now, obviously, things can fall through and what have you. but I would be surprised if they are using all three of those picks come Friday. And I think they'll be disappointed if they being both the front office and the fan base. One thing I think is really fun is when, you know, Jayfresh, the guy with the hockey cards, he just like when a big trade happens and it involves picks, like he'll just go, Here's everybody in the last 20 years who's been taken with that pick. And there's a lot of good players that you can typically get at nine, just to give you a quick rundown here.

Josh Bailey, Michael Granlin, Logan Couture, Dougie Hamilton, Jacob Truba, Bo Horvett, Nick Eilers, Timo Meyer, Mikhail Sergachev, Michael Rastn, James Shepard, okay, let's, you know, relax. Trevor Zegris, Jared Cowan, Marco Rossi, Dylan Gunther, Brian Lee, Vitali Kravzov, is what he has. is his list for nine. And then 25, it's like, well, you know, there's Andrew Cogliano, there's Jack Roslavik, there's Michael McCarron, you know, guys who were like, okay, NHL players, a bunch of guys

you've never heard of. And then David Posternak is the 2014. And it's like, do not try to talk yourself into we could get David Posterok here. Don't do it. But yeah. So I think everybody gets it from the hockey side. on this, right? Everybody's like, it makes sense

why all this happened. It makes sense why Florida has improved. It makes sense why Ottawa for now has taken a step back, blah, blah, blah. But the implications, the capital I implications are the scary part. Just if you're a Canadian team.

One more question before we get to Okay. The implications, because I asked this on the other show and I'm curious to hear your take. give me a number one through eight. Where do you rank the Panthers right now in the Atlantic Division? As far as likelihood to emerge from that division into the conference final, not necessarily regular season standings,

but where do you, if you had to pick who's going to come out of that division right now? It's either them or Montreal. So it's one or two, you figure, yeah. Well, I mean, I think Montreal. I lean one. You could put Tampa on the list as well. I'll take a pass on that. Certainly some Sabres fans would like to be in the discussion.

But yeah. Well, they're about to lose superstar, can't live without him. Winger Alex Tuck, who's one of the greatest players alive. So one or two, you're already yet. And obviously, it's an impossible question to answer because we don't know who their goalie's going to be. It feels like it's going to be Conradale. It kind of does, doesn't it? even though...

So if that's the case, then easy one for me. But, you know, it could be musical chairs around the league, and they end up with Sam Erson, and I'm like, oh, never mind, you know? I mean, at this point, it just, doesn't it just feel like they just put the welcome mat out and say, we need a goalie, go to your GM and say, you want to come to the Panthers and... that's right. I do think the, and the hell of a conversation gets us into the crisis thing, right? Because even though they just, in theory, reached into their bag of tradable assets and emptied it for Brady Kachuk, they kind of didn't.

Because first of all, they didn't trade Lundell, who apparently they told the senators absolutely off the table, don't even ask about him. we will not move him. We love this guy. Yep. So it will be very funny when they turn around and trade him immediately to Winnipeg. But yeah, like they have enough cap room to make it work. Everybody just kind of assumes this is going to happen.

And boy, you think there's some pearl clutching going on up here now. Wait until the Connor Hellibuck to the Panthers. deal happens, or the Golden Knights, or whoever else, because this is a pattern, let's just say. But I would love to hear your take on it because I certainly have my own. I have heard a lot of takes up here in Canada. I was, to give you a sense of how this is playing. I, me, this, Goofy ass guy that you listen to on the podcast was on the Canadian national news last night to discuss this important issue. So I have heard lots of Canadian takes. I have also heard, I'm just going to go ahead and say it, some really, really dumb American takes brushing this off as if this is just some made-up thing. I'm very interested to hear your take as a non-dum American.

Uh, I, well, he said, you know, let's not go nuts. He said with an asterisk, I, I, I, I will revoke your non-dum status depending on how the next few minutes goes, but I, I would love to hear your thoughts. So, I guess my thing is, this could be a little coincidental insofar as, oh, a guy wants to leave Winnipeg, that never happens. Oh, wait, it happens. fucking constantly. Guys don't want to play in Winnipeg anymore for one reason or another. Guys typically love leaving the Ottawa senators. You know what I mean?

And I think it's coincidental that they are Americans who played on the gold medal team, of course. I think it's kind of coincidental that one of the states where a lot of this is coalesced is just happens to be Florida, you know, where they don't have taxes and all that kind of stuff. But what it really is to me is I don't look at too many Canadian teams that go, now that's a well-run organization. And there are guys, let's put it this way. There is not a crisis in Detroit right now about Dylan Larkin doesn't want to play here. It must be because he wants to go south of the Mason-Dixon line. The guy's from Michigan.

He couldn't get homeer than he is, right? And you don't think there's, that's viewed as a big problem in Detroit that even the hometown guy wants to head south, get out of the big rabbit hockey market and go. Well, Go play for the Panthers or the Golden Knights. What I, what I think it is, is, is it's a problem for them only because they're run like shit. You know, like that's really. I mean, we're going back like 20 years at this point, but there was a time where it was like,

I'll take a fucking discount to play in Detroit. There is, I don't, I don't think any of this is coincidence. I do think it's possible that, well, I think it's definitely true that this kind of stuff is cyclical, and maybe we're just at a point where the various wheels and gears are all kind of pointing in the same direction. and to talk about it, to say this is a problem, you know, sure is one thing,

but to actually expect the league to do anything when five years from now, it could be a completely different set of circumstances is unrealistic, I think, is possible. Because you're right. You go back 20 years, the Red Wings were the team that everyone wanted to play for. And you don't even have to go.

Yeah, and you don't have to go back that far. years that the Florida Panthers were a joke? I was literally going to say five to seven years. I mean, I think five. I think before they had their president's trophy season, and even then, like, there wasn't, there was no lineup. So, yeah, I guess what I would say, though, is this, because you kind of tiptoed up to the dumb take territory but didn't get there, and I appreciate that.

this idea that I have seen from various other people down south where it's like, hey, man, players just want to win. If you want good players, just get good. Just get, be a well-managed team, a well-run team, be a team that wins, and this won't be a problem for you. And the answer to that, or the reply to that is, okay, so how good do we have to be? Like, are we talking win the president's trophy and then players will want to come here? Oh, wait, the Winnipeg Jets did that last year. And nobody put Winnipeg on their trade list, even though they won more than any other team in the league during the regular season.

And now their best player is yet another American who wants out. And even last summer, coming on, because obviously they didn't have a good year last year, but neither did the Florida Panthers. the Jets weren't good last year, but even the year after, they win more than any other team. They're arguably their second or third best player goes, see you later.

I'm heading south. I'm out as a free agent. So if I'm a Winnipeg fan, I'm listening to this, well, just be a well-managed team that wins, and I'm going, that is BS, as far as being the whole explanation or even most of it. And I'll go one further.

Okay. Okay, so you're saying, all right. Well, yeah, Winnipeg, that was a year ago. All right. So be well run and well-managed. Okay, so I should put together like one of the very best young teams in the league and even like win a couple of playoff rounds, go to a conference final. Okay, Montreal just did that.

Montreal showed up on any list? Yeah, and is Cole Cofield trying to get out of Montreal right now? But who's putting, is Dylan Larkin putting Montreal on his trade list? Is anybody? No. it's not happening. So this idea that, hey, man, it's, and again, you didn't say this. So I'm not, I'm not lashing out at you. But this idea that, hey, man, just win, just be a well-managed franchise and it'll all take care of itself. Nonsense. Clearly, that is not all that is going on here.

Now, it helps, certainly. I don't think, you know, there was a time a few years ago where everyone want it to go to Nashville. And then Nashville's missed the playoffs for a few years and now you don't hear them mention anymore. Clearly, winning, being on a well-run organization, all of that stuff matters. It always has. That's not what's changed, though, in the last few years. And pointing out that, well, you know, players like to go for winners, yeah, no kidding, man. It's been that way for a century. That's not what's changing in the last few years. So to just point at that and say, you know, get good. No, man, that's, that's, it's a nonsense take.

I don't, I don't think it's a nonsense take. I think, I think what you're saying is correct. And, you know, I shouldn't have used the term coincidence earlier. I guess I should have said, like, it's like a confluence of factors all, like, the same, you know, year or two, basically. where again, like, the U.S. wins. Most of Canada's teams have been bad for several years now. For them, again, you know, you're saying Winnipeg won a president's trophy. I would say Winnipeg is it kind of in a unique position as like maybe the least desirable market in any North American sport in a lot of ways.

And so you can just kind of go down the list. I do think these guys all want to play together. And it kind of just so happens that a team that won the Stanley Cup did it with maybe the most like vocal pro-America kind of a guy in Matthew Kachuk. And like, I don't know, man. Like if, how do I want to say it? If they were, if they were winning, because wasn't it, um, St. Louis was in for, for Matthew Kachuk. Like, obviously, I don't think they would have won the Stanley Cup in the last couple of years

because they don't have guys like Barkov and, you know, go down the list, right? But is it as simple as, you know, like the best American winger is in a place where it's just really nice to live in Miami, if that's your thing? You know, like, I just, I really think it boils down. to a lot of these guys are, you know, frustrated with their organizational situations. One guy wanted to play with his brother, you know. Because that's it. And that is the thing.

Because with Brady, as much as I would love to make Brady Kachuk the poster child of this problem, because he's a great villain. I mean, he's fan. And, man, the level to which Ottawa has turned on him immediately, like within five, Like, there wasn't even an adjustment period. It makes him ideal. But he was going to play with his brother, man. Like, I do feel like that you've got to point at that as an obvious factor.

But also, oh, man, you got to have a good organization. You got to win. The senators have been rebuilding for years, and it's now at the point where they are a playoff team. They are ready to take the next step. They finished ahead of the Florida Panthers and happened to run into a really good team that they played tough in the playoffs but couldn't beat partly because somebody on the roster

didn't have one single damn point in the whole playoffs. Absolutely. And then that same guy is, that same guy is going to turn around and go, oh, I just really want to win. So please trade me to the non-playoff team where I can go with. Like, I mean, what is a,

small market like Ottawa to do other than you build up, you pick your guys to build around, and then I guess now we have to add, and you hope that one of those guys doesn't just quit on you. Again, I think you can kind of point at Florida and go, oh, yeah, I understand they didn't make the playoffs, but come on. You know, like, remember, well, more than a few years ago at this point, several years ago, when Tampa missed the playoffs and everybody was like, that's not really a problem. I would, I absolutely agree that the Panthers are not a typical playoff miss team. But they did miss the playoffs. And so if we're all going to just point and say, just win, baby.

I don't know, man. I guess here's the other thing, by the way, the other thing I wanted to say is, you know, Brady Kachuk returns home to his, to his market where he's the captain of the team. and, you know, if not, their very best player, certainly in their top three. And he's just won a gold medal. And they booed the shit out of him. I'd be like, you know what? Fuck you guys then. How about that?

No way, man. I get that. First of all, they didn't boo him. They booed the anthem in that a little bit. But he didn't, don't do this. Please don't be the guy who acts like Brady Kachuk got booed because he won a gold medal for his country. and he was just too patriot. It was a whole bunch of other crap.

I understand. And he got booed for like, and he got booed for like a game. If he's, if Big Tough Brady Kachuk, if that hurt his Fifi so much that he had to get out of there, then we're thinking about hockey players.

Of course that. I mean, there's, I, do you think I think Brady Kachuk is like the toughest, cool as guy? But he's not, I mean,

he's not. He's not. He's not. I mean, that would make him one of the softest athletes. in the history of professional sports. Okay, great. All right.

You know, like, I don't, I agree. You're right. They booed the anthem and not the player. But if you're, you know, again, in the wake of the, why is everybody trying to make this so political? It's like, if you don't get that, man, I don't know what to tell you, you know? Like, that's what those guys' mindset was at that time.

Well, I mean, if you, if you, you. we all know who they hung out with in the dressing room and whose jokes they left at and who they went to visit. And then they're going to turn around and go, oh, everyone's making this political and it hurts my feelings. Then screw all of you. Yes, that already happened. That already happened. And you know it did. Yes.

So we're saying they're huge losers and cowards is. And not that the fans up in Canada did something wrong to. Like, man, I get that there's like, I guess here's where I come from on this, okay? There are seven Canadian teams in the league. This country generates well over that ratio of the league's revenue. Of course, absolutely. This country's TV contract is the single largest revenue source for the entire NHL. As far as like one line item, Rogers is giving them almost a bill.

million dollars a year because of the presumption that Canadian fans will always love and want to watch hockey. The most valuable franchises, three of the top four are Canadian. You look down the list of, and granted, we don't have a lot of great date on this, and you have to go on like Forbes stuff and that that's only semi-reliable, but you look at the teams to generate revenue for this league, it's, It tends to be Canadian teams. It tends to be Northern American teams. Of course. You look at the teams that don't generate revenue. The Panthers are right at the bottom of the list. Vegas is about middle of the pack.

And, you know, the other teams that we're talking about are in the middle there. If I'm the NHL, putting aside is this good or better, I've got a problem right now. I don't think I have a potential problem. I have an actual problem because perception matters. And even if the problem is this isn't a real problem, and Canadian fans are just, Megan, and Northern fans and Detroit fans are making a problem where there really isn't one.

And if they just, everyone just took a breath and waited a few years, things would shift in a different direction. That's still a problem. I don't know what you do about it, if anything, but it's a problem. Like this can't be something that... You can't just hand wave this away

and be like, oh, yeah, are the... Because here's the thing that I look at. If I'm a fan, and I'm just going to say a fan in Canada, but you can go ahead and include a bunch of American markets in this. And maybe it's Detroit. Buffalo, certainly. You know, there are others. Boston, New York, Detroit.

Maybe, yeah. I'm looking at this and going like, look, when it comes to my team being attractive to players, which used to mean, I could get free agents and then it started to mean I could get free agents and also trade for guys because no trades and now it apparently even means can I even keep my own

players. What is keeping me from just being the Montreal Expos? What's keeping me from just being a feeder team, a glorified minor league team whose job is to draft and develop players and then when they're ready I send them to the Florida Panthers or Vegas

or whoever? What's keeping me from that? And if the answer is things that can change, then at least I've got some hope. Even if I don't have hope right now, I can look down the line, right? And it used to be that. It used to be things like players want to win.

You need good ownership. You need a good arena. Stuff like that that was certainly not easy. But I could at least hope that, hey, maybe my, I've got a dumb owner and a crappy arena and my management stinks, but all of those things can change over time. And maybe it won't change for me, but at least I can raise my kids to be a fan of this stupid team

and maybe someday they'll get that. If it's about weather and taxes and politics, none of that stuff is within the realm of anything that the NHL has control over. At least not until we get a free Albert. Yeah, sure. So we're now just talking about a, for more or less permanent state of affairs.

What the hell would I invest emotionally in this league? And, you know, Myrtle touches on it in his piece today. Viewership and everything in Canada is dropping. Hockey participation in Canada is dropping. The Stanley Cup final, which was a great series and did quite well, was a success, ratings-wise, in the States, did terrible numbers up here in Canada.

This league has operated for decades on the assumption that Canada was locked in. And it was probably a pretty smart assumption. Is that still the case? Maybe it is. If it's not, this league's in huge trouble. Because if you lose, if you, if you teach a generation of Canadian fans

that you're being played for suckers, you're not making that money back on Florida Panthers jerseys. I'll just tell you that much. So I don't know. I think the league needs to think seriously about this. I think that anybody who works in this industry and relies on this industry to pay their rent needs to think about this a little more seriously than some people out there are.

Because we are maybe not in crisis mode yet, but we're certainly headed in that direction. And again, some of that is on perception. So if maybe it's as simple as the league having to, you know, get ahead of this and manage the perceptions a little bit. But telling Canadian fans that they're all dummies and they should just want their team to do better is is not doing a great job of that. And I, I think we're closer to a tipping point than a lot of people would like to imagine. I think what I would say about that. And the thing that I'm really thinking about here is like the perception that your team is a feeder team for

five or six markets in the whole league, right? Do you remember what it was like before the salary cap? Everybody, the second they hit free agency, they were like, I'll be, you know, I'm an all star I will be signing with the Detroit Red Wings. The, you know, like, to a lesser extent, the Bruins. The Rangers are the, the Maple Leafs, the Rangers. Well, the Rangers is, yeah, I mean, they certainly, they didn't spend as efficiently as other teams back then, but yeah, of course, the Rangers. And you could go down the list.

There were, the Colorado Avalanche is another great example, right? And I've said it a million times before. Like, when, if we're approaching a point where the salary cap is, this summer, the salary cap is going up over $100 million for the first time ever. It's going to be $104 million. And that's like a baked in number that was previously agreed upon. And like, that's actually low for what revenues are right now. And so when it becomes unmoored from those agreed upon numbers and it is just like a

straight 50-50 split of HRR again, there are Canadian teams and a huge. percentage of American teams are just straight up not going to be able to afford a hundred and fifteen million dollar cap ceiling they're just not going to be able to get there unless their owner wants to like you know take a loss basically and I think that's like a way bigger probably I honestly I do I do wonder like what the appetite would be in Florida to increase spending, you know, it's funny because I saw somebody who covers the Panthers yesterday being like, look, I don't know why everyone is saying this is an aging core because, you know, like,

if you look at their seven, whatever the numbers were, seven highest cap hits, none of those guys are, or only two of those guys or whatever the numbers were, are over 31. And then someone was like, yeah, you left off these seven guys who are 30 right now. Like what you know, so like the days of the Panthers being a dominant team, you know, it's not forever is what I'm saying. And because of how they've structured their their salary cap and all that kind of stuff, they're just not going to be able to pay everybody continually forever, right? Like goes, oh, here comes, here comes Dylan Larkin. Here comes Conner Hallibuck. Here comes the next great Americans.

or Austin Matthews, whoever it is, right? You're just not going to be able to pay those guys. And so that those guys have to go somewhere else. And maybe it's Vegas. Maybe it's Carolina. Like go down the list, right? But I do think that these things just kind of change over time. The penguins used to be that team.

The Blackhawks used to be that team. You know? The Oilers, remember how many guys were like, oh, I'll kill my firstborn child to play with Connor McDavid. And look, that will always be part of it. But also, that's not, that doesn't do anything for me if I'm a fan in Calgary or Winnipeg or Ottawa. Okay, so I have to win the draft lottery in a year with a once every two decades generational player and then maybe some players that want to come here.

Like, I've seen this comparison, and I thought you were maybe going in this direction and you kind of didn't. But I've seen other people say like, hey, man, it used to be. it used to be everyone wanted to play for Detroit, New York, and Toronto. Did you have a problem with it then? And it's like, we shut down the whole league to fix that. So yes, people had a problem with. Did, like, fans personally, and was there like a Red Wings fan who's mad at Dillan Larkin now, who thought it was cool 25 years ago?

I don't care. We shut down the whole league because we shut down the whole league for a year. The biggest work interruption in the history of pro sports, because we were concerned that the league was tilting too far towards the teams that drove all the revenue. Now the league is tilting towards the teams that don't drive revenue, and people want to act like it's no big deal. I'm sorry, man, it is a big deal. This is potentially where we're headed.

I'm not saying where we're at right now. But where we're headed is potentially a really big problem. And I wish I had some faith in this league to say, we'll get ahead of a problem. But it would be the first time, I think, the league has ever waited until something was in crisis mode. Because, I mean, when they shut down the league for the salary cap, that was a crisis. Like Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Ottawa were literally going bankrupt. Players were missing paychecks. Like, I mean, it was, it wasn't like the league proactively saw a problem coming.

It was the problem was sitting on the league's head. and they finally got around to dealing with it. And we're probably going to have to go that route with this too. In the meantime, it's going to be, might be a rough few years here. I'd hate to be the Rogers guy who just bet my career on what the ratings are going to look like over the next few years. So what I guess I'm saying, and it feels like we're agreeing without saying it, is like I don't see this as a uniquely Canadian problem. again, I think it comes down to,

again, coincidentally, a lot of good American players were prominent players in Canadian markets. Mm-hmm. You know? And, like, I'll put it this way. Mitch Marner didn't want to be there. He's Canadian, you know?

And again, so, like, I agree that it's a problem. I just don't think it's a uniquely Canadian problem. Yeah. It's not unique. uniquely Canadian, but most of the things that are the problem apply to Canadian markets. And again, I think a lot of that is they're badly wrong. But look, and also, Americans are 30% of the league now. So it's no longer some weird coincidence when your best players are American.

Like that's, yeah, that you would expect that. And I don't know, you know, we're, that's part of this discussion is what do you even do if you're a Canadian team as far as American players now? I don't know. And look, it's always, nothing's an absolute. We literally just saw the number one defenseman on the free agent market choose to come to Toronto. Partly because, I mean, mostly because of the contract, but partly because he grew up there and he was a leaf band. And he's like talking about my, you know, my dad's dream was always to see me play for the Leafs.

So it's not all one way. It's not all like, oh, you know, the put – and if that stuff happened more often the other way, if the Americans all wanted to go play for the Panthers, but the Canadians all wanted to play for the HABs and, you know, the Canucks and whoever, then you've got sort of a different situation. But it feels very tilted right now. And again, I'm not, every fan has their own perspective on things. And I'm not trying to say that Lee fans and Canuck fans are more important than Panther fans. But there's a hell of a lot more of them.

And if I'm an accountant with this league, and I'm looking at the bottom line, which is what this league does and what Gary Bettman does, there's a whole lot of flashing warning lights on the dashboard right now. Mm-hmm. Yeah, and again, I guess I'll just leave it with the, you know, again, I think it is a problem for the league. I think more teams than just Canadian teams should be worried about it. I mean, there's fans, I'm sure, in Columbus right now going, yeah, welcome to our world for the last five years. Yeah, again, Zach Wrenski, Dylan Larkin, like, these guys are giving American markets reason to be concerned.

but ultimately it does seem like there's only like maybe eight or nine franchises that are being run competently at any given time in this league. So that's kind of, and you know, we're going to talk about the Darren Radish thing. I got a lot of thoughts about what's going on in Toronto. I got a lot of thoughts about what's going on in Edmonton. I got a lot of thoughts about what's going on in Seattle because we didn't mention that Florida traded Mackie Samoskavich to Seattle for a first. and the second to facilitate the Kachuktree. So I have a lot of thoughts about all this kind of stuff. And a lot of it just boils down to for me like, yeah, I wouldn't want to sign in

fucking Vancouver right now either if I was a good player in the NHL. And I wouldn't want to. And I get it. But first of all, there's a difference between I wouldn't want to sign there if I had my choice of all 30 teams. And I have signed a long-term contract with this team. And you know what? I'm out.

I quit. I think that is a big difference. And, you know, I think if you're the Winnipeg Jets, you've kind of resigned yourself to the fact that you're never going to be a free agent destination for big superstars. But you also remember a few years ago when they signed Shifley in Hellebuck and we're all like, oh, wow, they got their guys to commit. Well, now one of them is uncommitting and he wants out. That's where, that's where an already shaky structure crumbles. If I can't even say that the guys on my roster who have signed long-term deals

are going to be around, then we got a big problem. And you're right. Like there's not a lot of well-run franchises out there, but also, you know, I mean, Boston did a rebuild on the fly, missed the playoffs one year, and was back with 100 points.

They're not showing up on anyone's list. Yeah, I don't know how... Buffalo was a garbage fire for years, finally fired their guy, hired a new GM, had the best season, you know, everything and they're about to lose their best free agent. You know, like, Montreal is, is one of the best run teams in the league for the last five years.

Nobody's putting them on their list. Like, it's not, that part is, it's part of it, but also it's a bit of an excuse. I mean, let's, let's be honest. It's just, you know, and what does it even mean to be well run? It just means you win, right? Is Vegas a well-run organization? I mean, they win. Yes, undeniably, they backstab, they're cutthroat,

they leave a trail of corpses in their wake, but they win. So what we're saying is players want to go where they can win, and also the teams that win have the best players, and the best players all want to go there, and we go around and around in circles, and next thing you know, it's the same five teams over and over again.

Yeah, that's all correct. Yep, you got it. The senators had the worst owner in the world for a long time. He's gone. They've got an actual owner with actual money who cares, who is trying to build something, and it didn't help. Their captain was like, you know what, this is too hard. I quit. I'm out of here.

So I don't know, man. This whole, you've got to be a well-run organization. It only takes you so far. All right. Well, why don't we take a break? and we'll come back and talk about everything else that has happened in the league. All right, we're back. And, you know, I kind of touched on it right before the break here, but let's talk about

all the little things the Toronto Maple Leafs have done since the last time we spoke, which includes hiring a new coach. So that was after the, man, that feels like it was weeks ago. It does. Things move fast in the NHL. They really do, yeah. Yeah, I think they announced it like, Wednesday night or Thursday.

Okay. Yeah, what were your thoughts on the big hire? I don't ever see the show Arrested Development? I've heard of it, yeah. And George Michael, he has a girlfriend named Anne. And, like, she's very forget. Like, the whole thing is her character is very forgettable and, like, easy to just kind of, like, let slip out of your mind.

and anytime, you know, Michael meets her, he's like, her? And that was me with Jim Hiller. I was like, him? Yeah. Really? I love, one of my favorite takes from all this is like, wow, the Leaf's new front office really has things locked down because none of the insiders were talking about this guy. And it's like, yeah, none of the insiders were talking about me as a candidate either. because no reasonable person thought that that was, yeah,

I will be very honest, my first reaction when I saw, like, the news go across the was, is there like another coach named Jim Hiller? I'm like, okay, so Jim Hiller, so who is the King's guy? Was that like Hillier or something? Like, what was that all about? And no, it's the same guy. Same guy. sure is the same.

You know, honestly, like, I, I don't think it's a terrible hire. Like, I think he did about as much with that L.A. team as you reasonably could, you know? And, you know, we saw this year where things are trending with that group, let's say. And yet, I don't think anybody, even the biggest Jim Hiller, like, You ask Jim Hillers family, what do you think he's going to get the Leafs to, like in the division this year? They would go, I don't know, third or fourth in the Atlantic? Mm-hmm. You know, like, nobody thinks he's going to make them like a team that returns to the aspirations of four or five years ago, right?

Where everybody's like, look, obviously we all agree this Leafs team is lacking something, but they're only a piece or two away from being. real like cup competitive kind of a team right and maybe it's just the maturation of the of the young guys the core four all that and i just think i and i wrote about this in my newsletter like i think this is just like the ultimate signal of the dimming of aspirations for this group used to be we want to go deep in the playoffs we want to you know be cup competitive. Now it's, yeah, we'll get in the playoffs and see what happens. What do you think?

Maybe. Yeah. And, and I mean, admittedly, the Toronto Maple Leafs hiring a guy from the team, the Kings, that always loses in the first round. Yeah. Is very on brand. And a Babcock guy, too. That's the other thing that's pretty funny about it is he's like a Babcock

coaching tree guy. Yeah. And I mean, look, that that is very, one of the if you're looking for some optimism here and believe me I am I'm digging hard on this

I wouldn't come to this podcast looking for it too often maybe not the fact that he used to be in Toronto which I will admit I had completely forgotten I but sure yeah when I googled him I was like

oh there's a lot of pictures of this guy with a like Maple Leafs track jacket talking to Mitch Marner on on the Coca-Cola Center rice. You would assume that Austin Matthews and probably William Nealander, who both played under him during the Babcock years,

would have had some input on this. Yeah, sure. Now, I don't know, man. It's got to, if you want to leave a positive impression, being like the guy that people talk to after they've just talked to Mike Babcock has got to be the easiest way to do it.

That's right. You talk to Mike Babcock and then you talk to me and you come away going like, that dude is, I don't know what it is. He's a wonderful guy. What a magnetic personality. He's just a Mr. charisma over there because he's just, yeah, he didn't like grab my phone out of my hand and try to beat me over the head with it. I don't know.

Pretty, pretty underwhelming higher for the Leafs, but sure. Let's, you know, that he had to. some good underlying numbers in L.A. Yeah. But also L.A. had pretty good underlying numbers before and after him as well. So that might

be more team than, look, I think it's going to be an upgrade on Burube. Baroubae was a mess last year. But beyond that, I don't. And I mean, the fact that they interviewed like 700 people or whatever the latest, ridiculously inflated

number. Did they say the number got up to 50. There was a 55 number of like people they at least contacted. And maybe the funniest part of that is that apparently Bruce Cassidy did not get an interview. Despite the fact that he was reportedly the Leafs were the only team Vegas gave him permission to talk to. And they interviewed everybody but him. I don't know, man. I don't know what list of criteria you have that Bruce Cassidy doesn't check enough boxes for an interview, but Jim Hiller does.

But Jim Hiller does, yeah. But I don't know, man. I guess. You know, like, with that, with Cassidy in particular, he is seen as kind of like the hard-ass coach who, you know, really gives it to his players for not performing in that kind of stuff. and if they wanted to pivot away from that because that's kind of what Burubi does, did, again,

I kind of understand it. Would Hiller have been my choice? No. Do I think they're trying to be the 95 point in this team in the Atlantic Division? I really do think that's what they're trying to be now. They're Calgary Flames,

you know, hashtag going for it mode, as opposed to we're trying to like actually build a competitive team here because I do kind of think the writing is on the wall. Like they tried to trade Matthew Nyes last year. Matthews's contract is up in two years, I want to say. Yep.

Nealander's locked in, but everybody kind of feels like if they're trading everybody else, you might as well trade him. And like, frankly, I don't think, uh, you know, if Matthews leaves, I don't think they have to worry. You know, John Chaka and Jim Hiller don't have to really worry about, how do we find a replacement for it? Because they're going to be also getting replaced, you know? And that brings us to the Darren Radish contract where, you know, they go out and they identify in maybe the weakest free agent class I can remember. Certainly nothing else is coming to mind. They go, well, this is one guy that moves the needle. And he kind of does. You know, they give him eight years on a sign and trade, eight and a half million bucks.

and it's like I think he's probably an upgrade over Morgan Riley in certain respects but is this like the guy who's going to move the needle for you in the way that you really need him to?

So here's where I met on on radish yes I think he actually can move the needle if he is the same player he was in Tampa last year I think there are many very obvious reasons to think that that will not be the case. Right. Yeah.

Starting with the fact that, you know, at the age of 29, he kind of has an out-of-now-where career year. In a contract year, obviously that's a red flag. The fact that he's surrounded by significantly more talent, better coaching, et cetera, in Tampa is obviously, a concern and just frankly the fact that a very smart front office in Tampa that loves to give max length deals to guys to keep the band together was like you know what not only are we not going to do that for this guy but we are we will happily trade him within the division should be should be a question mark so I I think everybody can look at this and say we can all see the path to this to him not living up to the value of this deal.

Not difficult to do. What I would say is that with so many of these contracts that get handed out, it feels like the downside is disaster and the upside is it's fine. Like the best case scenario is it's fine. I've seen this contract, it'll be just because it's the least compared to David Clarkson. and with David Clarkson... Oh, it's not that bad. Well, the thing is when David Clarkson happened, right,

like everybody could see, again, all the reasons why it might be a disaster, which it turned out to be, but you were sort of like, okay, if David Clarkson is everything the Leafs want him to be, it's the contract ends up being fine. That was the absolute upside was it's mediocre. And that's not the case here.

because the upside is some guys are late bloomers. It just clicked. He had a great offensive year last year, yes, but it wasn't just shooting percentage, and it wasn't, you know, his five-on-five numbers, the underlying numbers are all actually really good. Like this, the obvious things that you look at to just say that some guy went on a heater

and, you know, had an unsustainable year aren't really there. So, you know, what's the upside? The upside is that you just got a guy who's like a fringy Norris candidate, number one offense driving defenseman, which is something the Leafs have needed for years and years and years, really ever since the ship sailed on Morgan Riley being that guy. And you got him for a fifth round pick. Yeah. for on a contract that if he is that guy will absolutely be a bargain

for at least the first few years. Now, the term is a completely different thing. I don't think there's any world where the term or this isn't a problem at some point down the line. But also, like, we always say that with these long-term deals and then teams do seem to find ways out of them. So maybe that's not as big an issue, but of course it won't be John Chica's issue anyways.

That's my thing on the term for sure is like, what do they fucking care about years 7, 8, and 9? They are not going to be there. I guess what I would say is... 6, 7 and 8, I should say. You know, the Leafs have needed a guy like this for a long time. And when I say a guy like this, I'm saying a guy like what they are hoping Darren Radish is. Because Darren Rattish might not actually be the guy they need. That's very possible.

I'm going to go out and say he's definitely not. Look, let me ask you this question. A 22 goal guy? A 22 goal guy? Is he a 15 goal, 60 point power play, number one power play guy, top pairing defensemen who can put up good underlying numbers? Now, granted, last year was the first year he really got the opportunity to get a lot of ice time. Right. Right.

Because of the headman injury and all that kind of stuff. But he went from a career high of six goals and 31 points to 224870. And you said it's not shooting percentage. He basically doubled his career shooting percentage last year. But his career percentage is, like, in this way, like the sample size almost helps his argument a bit, or at least the optimistic version of it, because, you know, You know, if this guy played 10 years and scored six goals every year and then one year he scores 20, then yes. Obviously, we all at this point know what that looks like.

But this guy was playing third pair ice time, no power play time and all of that. So the fact that, yeah, his shooting percentage went up in a year where he was suddenly getting one-timer feeds from Nikita Kuturov on the power play. And great news. He's going to get to do that again in Toronto, right? Well, he's going to get, he's going to be with some pretty talented guys on that power play. Yeah, sure. So my thing is 60 points I might even still say is a little optimistic. But to what you're saying, if he's like a 12 to 15 goal defenseman, there probably aren't a ton of those that you can reliably have.

And if it results of them moving more than really off the power play, I think that's great. Yeah. Let me ask you this. How many Maple Leafs players, period, had more goals last season than Darren Radish? Not defensemen, players. Yeah. Probably three or four. Matthews did.

Matthews? Matthews? Yes, Tyvers. Yep. Nealander. And Nealander. Yeah. That's it.

Yep. Not Bobby McMahon, not Nick Robertson, not Mochelli, not Domey. Morgan Riley had half as men. goals that Darren Radish did. And so, again, I think he's an upgrade. And I don't hate the contract. But I just don't know where you're going with Darren Radish as your number one defenseman.

You know what I mean? Yeah. No, I hear you. And you're right. Like, is he good enough to be the number one defenseman on a team that is actually scary in any way? Because, I mean, he wasn't that in Tampa, right? I mean, that's Victor Hedman's team.

We all know that. I guess what I come back to is. is this guy got Norris votes last year and was worthy of them. If it was a one-year wonder thing, sure. But the Norris is a award for one year. Last year, he got, you know, more than a couple of votes. Look at the list of guys. There were 14 defensemen in the league who got Norris votes last year.

Okay. Go down that list. I won't read the whole thing out. But if you go down that list and you say, what would it cost to trade for this guy? What would it look like to acquire this guy? You're going to have about half the guys on the list. You won't even bother because you'll say there is no circumstances where this guy would be moved.

You're not getting him. Yeah, for sure. There'd be a bunch of guys where it would be, I mean, you're talking a massive haul it would take to get a guy. There's, and then there's like Eric Carlson, who's old and expensive and is the outlier. And then maybe Adam Fox could be had given the rate. situation. Yeah. And then there's the one guy

that you could land with a fifth round drop. I think that's a decent gamble, especially if you're a team desperate for this sort of guy. Roll the dice. And I say this, the chances are

more likely than not that this doesn't work. And if it doesn't work, it could really not work. And I don't want anyone you know, a year or two or three weeks or however long it takes for everyone in Toronto to go,

oh, this was a huge mistake, don't come back to me and be like, oh, you said it was going to, no, no, I'm very aware of that possibility, but at least there is an upside to the gamble. Totally, yeah. And I don't, you know, I don't mind it because what you're not getting any of those other guys.

So how are you going to solve this problem that we've all been pointing it for three years in Toronto saying they don't have a number one defense. And some people have been saying it longer than that because you could question whether Morgan Riley was ever that guy. Mm-hmm.

I mean, you've got to roll the dice at some point. The only other option is draft somebody and check back in five years and hope they've developed into that guy. And that's not really working with the timelines that this front office is working on. So I think it probably doesn't work. I think there's a decent chance

that it is, disastrous, but I still don't necessarily hate it as a gamble because at least, unlike a lot of these deals, there is an upside on the gamble. If the dice come out the right way, you can actually win as opposed to just break even. Yeah, and the last thing I'll say on this, because it kind of applies to a lot of, a lot of the contracts were about to discuss that have that have changed hands or been awarded in the last couple of weeks here. But, um, you know, for me, like, I've been saying this for a while now. I just have to tell myself, and I certainly did with this contract, that that's just not as much

money as it used to be. If the cap's $104 million, that's like giving a guy like radish six million bucks in my head. You know what I mean? And so I can't sit here and say like, Darren Radish coming off the season he just did for six million bucks, like isn't kind of a almost good deal. Yeah. Well, he was going to get more if he made it to July 1st in terms of average value.

Obviously, he wouldn't have gotten the eighth year and that matters. But yeah, somebody would have given him more. And like if you think that the downside is, you know what, this guy isn't a first pair defenseman. He's a solid second pair guy. I think, and that's where I land on him. But for six million bucks, like what I think of, you know. I mean, I think the downside is.

Yeah, I think that's good. I think there's a realistic downside that's lower than that, and that's where the disaster part of this comes in. Yes. Yeah, it's not, again, like I'm, I'm like you. I'm really having to adjust my priors both on, on cap hits given how the cap is. Like, we all know the cap is going up,

but I don't feel like I've done enough in my own brain to, like, adjust what the numbers mean. Yeah, the growth over the last three or four years is just, like, so greatly outpaced what the growth in the previous, like seven or eight was, like year over year, that that's why it's hard to be like, oh, right, eight and a half is really six. because it used to be that like 8.5 was 8.2.

And you're like, okay, well, what's the fucking difference? But now it's grown so much that you're like, okay, I have to re-contextualize all of it. And so, again, I just don't hate this deal nearly as much as I, you know, again, if you would come to me and said, before this past season, Darren Radish eight by eight and a half, I'd have gone, did every other defenseman in the league die? happened. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So, I don't know. Let's see how it goes. Yep. Hey, let's talk about some other contracts, but first, we're going to talk about the coach as well. The Mike Babcock investigation is over. And I see here, folks. I think it's telling that the NHL's, like, official statement was basically, look, if you want to hire this scumbag, go ahead.

We're not going to stop you. Like, what was it? Even in the least favorable light, he doesn't, he hasn't done anything to warrant him not being in the league or whatever it was. And it's like, they were like, okay, yeah, does this guy suck? Sure he does. Can we legally stop you from hiring him? I guess not.

It was a very lawyery way to approach it, but it makes sense. The league is saying, we were asked a specific question. has this guy done bad enough things that he should be banned from coaching in the NHL? And our answer to that is no. And we have no other comment as far as what he did do. Was it bad? Is this a good idea?

Any of that? You asked us a yes or no question. Is this guy essentially banned for life from coaching? Because that's, I mean, we're three years on. If you're not going to let them coach now, then I don't see what's going to change in a few years. And the answer was no. So, all right, here we go. The oilists are actually going to do this.

Don't let us stop you was basically the league statement. But yeah. Which I don't think is a surprise, by the way. I don't think anyone was realistically. No. I think what people were wondering is how much would the league tell us? us about what they found in their so-called investigation, and I'm kind of scare quoting that because, I mean, it took them like three hours to put this together. And the answer to that is they didn't

release anything. And would other stuff leak out? Like, would there be, would you start to say, and that's the part I'm a little surprised is we haven't seen reports that like, well, one of the things the league found was blah, blah, blah, and they didn't feel this, but, you know, it's, it's out there. We haven't really heard anything about it. So, and there had been, like, When they announced the investigation, there were some of the insiders were like, you know, there's stuff out there. And if it comes out, it's going to look bad. And hey, you know what, Sean? It just got announced, officially hired.

All right, man. Good. Good luck with that. Best luck to you. Yep. Yep. Best of fucking luck. It's none of my business.

But let's also lump in two. other moves the oilers made this weekend they gave Jason Dickinson and Connor Murphy five years each at $4 million and $4.1 million respectively. If I'm Jason Dickinson, I'm going, you can get me an extra $50,000?

We can't, you know, like, we can't meet in the middle on this one? What the fuck, man? That's it. The cap is going up so fast that the guy who signed his contract an hour later got to, yeah. I mean,

I can't put it this way. I can't sit here and spend 10 minutes talking about why Darren Radish for 8.5 is okay because the cap is going up and then dump too much on teams for giving guys four. It all adds up, but yeah, I mean, you got that Connor McDavid money to spend. You might as well spend it. And isn't that really what this is all about? This is all about aligning things. so that Carr McDavid, you know, is able to compete for a Stanley Cup before this contract is over. I don't know that this is getting them over the line.

I really don't. Even if I thought Mike Babcock was a good coach, which I famously do not, coaching wasn't the fucking problem. The problem was their dumbass GM made the worst goalie trade in recent memory. It was, was it going well with Stuart Skinner? No. Was it predictably a lot worse with Tristan Jari? Oh, it turns out yes, it was.

And unless they do something to address that this summer, I'm not sitting here going, well, they gave it their best shot. what it ultimately boils down to for me, I guess, is the Babcock thing is like the last move of like the most desperate team you can possibly fucking imagine. We are all out of answers. Let's just smash the higher Mike Babcock button

because he's a capital W winner. Yep. I get like I would be this would be a fascinating move if Mike Babcock had all the baggage he has but was like an unquestioned top five coach in the end. Like a Joel Quinville type.

Yeah, Quinville, you know, or yeah, Quinville is an example, right? I mean, we didn't really know what we were going to get in Quinville in Anaheim, but he's, obviously the first year went great. But again, like we talked

last week and the week before, I mean, you go back to how long ago it was that Mike Babcock won anything in this league. And in a league that evolves very quickly, having a guy who hasn't won a playoff round since Nail Yakubov was a rookie is sure something. And again, I'm not exaggerating, by the way. Nail Yakopov was a rookie. No, that sounds right. The year, the 2013, yeah.

The last time Mike Babcock won a playoff. stuff around. And guess what, folks, that was a fake season. It was fake. 2013? Fake season.

So I just, I just, what I really think it boils down to for me is this, from everything I've read, this feels like it was a Darrell Kate's idea,

let's say, that then McDavid, dry sidel, presumably, Zach Hyam, and presumably some other veterans had to sign off on.

I don't even think they signed off on it. Like, I think it sure sounds like this is, like, they wanted this type of guy. McDavid and Drysadle and maybe some of the others were like, we need a hard ass. Which is a fascinating way to look at it. I mean, like, I've talked a bit about how McDavid has always, in this whole Oilers drama,

has always been like the sympathetic character, the guy that he's the best hockey player in the world and he's surrounded by incompetence. But I mean, he's got his fingerprints all over this. And isn't like him and him and Drysidal, whoever going to the GM and saying like hire a hard ass, isn't that a little bit like teacher you forgot to give us homework? Like there's a little bit of them, right?

Where it's kind of like, you know, all these other guys, guys aren't getting yelled at enough. Everyone around me doesn't work hard enough. Everyone around me doesn't practice hard enough. Bring in somebody who's going to scream and yell and make them miserable, and that'll make me happy. Yeah.

When this doesn't work, it's for the first time, it's going to be like some of this is going to drop on Connor McDavid's doorstep instead of. Oh, I think a lot of it's going to drop. Well, okay, so I want to say that first, I think it was yesterday's 32 thoughts. where Elliot said basically like in the meeting they had with Babcock Babcock was very blunt about like it's not just you know there you can blame a lot of people

but you got to look in the mirror too because maybe you haven't been given whatever the fuck he was he would say right and I think there's probably some amount of McDavid going like that thing about Gretzky where they they yelled it the one time they didn't yell at Gretzky and he was like, he said to the coach afterwards,

like, you got to yell at me too, because I got to be one of the guys. Like, I think that probably is like what McDavid, what was pinging on McDavid, right? Where he's like,

yeah, I do have to look in the mirror. It's not just all about all these other guys, but also it's kind of all about these other guys, isn't it? And again, I don't know, let me ask you this,

Sean, how much yelling at Tristan Jari is Mike Babcock going to happen? have to do for him to be a 900 goalie next year. Oh, man, a lot. A lot of yelling. 24-7, 365, maybe two years from that gets you. Like, he's going to have to sit in the net, like crouched up in the net and just yell at him on every shot.

Stop that. The rebound, too. All right. So. What are the odds that a year from now we're talking about this actually working? pretty low. Well, okay, so here's the thing, right? It's not zero, but is it?

No, it isn't zero. But let me put it this way. The only reason this happened is because they lost in the first round, right? But what else happened in the first round? Dries, Idle hurt, McDavid hurt. If they, maybe they'd still lose in the first round, but it's a lot more of a competitive series, isn't it? And, you know, it, you know,

It's not impossible for me to foresee. They make the playoffs. I don't think they're going to be a particularly good team. But what it is is, again, what do they think the goal here is? Because if they're saying we need to be back in a Stanley Cup final, I'm going to go ahead and say it's as close to 0% as you can get without actually being zero, that they make a Stanley Cup final with the team as it's currently constructed, right? let alone win one.

Yeah. Win one I'd go so far as to say zero. Obviously we've got still a, well, not a hole, but a bunch of offseason ahead of us. We don't know what they're going to look like. Let me throw one, and this is kind of only occurring to me now, but let me just throw one permutation of this, A.U. Babcock gets hired. Everybody says it's a bad move. Like we talked about, a lot of this gets dumb.

on Connor McDavid. Mm-hmm. And Connor McDavid spends the next two months, really for the first time in his whole career, hearing criticism, and that pisses off Connor McDavid. And we get pissed off Connor this year. Like, remember the one year

where Austin Matthews scored 60 goals and everybody lost their minds? And it was like, McDavid was like, oh, really? Okay. how to 65, I'm going to score goals this year. This is going to be the one year I score goals and win the Rocker Richard. And just remind you that I could do this whenever I wanted. Yeah, the story of Sidney Crosby, you know, Sidney Crosby famously bad at faceoffs early in his career.

So one summer, he's like, okay, I'm going to work on faceoffs exclusively pretty much. And then the next year he's like top five in faceoff percentage. Yeah. Like that's the one thing that's scarce. Oh, Vetchin scores all the goals, you know. Yeah. That's the one thing that scares me is that Connor McDavid has to listen to his previously impeccable reputation, take a few dents. And he goes, okay, all right, everyone.

So this can't work? I'm, you know, Mike Batcock's going to be a disaster. We're going to be a disaster. All right. Hold my Gatorade. And off he goes. Let me say this about the McDavid reputation thing. If this doesn't work and he ends up being traded out of edicton,

Edmonton. Sorry to all the, you know, Canadian markets. But, you know, he ends up being traded out of Edmonton or he just leaves at the end of this contract. I think this is a borderline reputation ruining thing because he has to be so front and center with it. You know what I mean? Like, I think this can be much like Brady Kachuk in Ottawa where their fans are instantly like, don't let the fucking door hit your brother. You know, I'll drive your stupid ass to the airport.

I don't want to see you anymore. I think, obviously, it sucks to lose a player of McDavid's caliber. But, and I've said this before, the perception that he's kind of running the show in Edmonton, you know, like if they go, even if he resigns, quite frankly. But it gets to a point where it's like McDavid never wins a Stanley Cup in Edmonton, which is looking more and more likely. is this era going to be looked at as this is when everything was done, if not with Connor McDavid being like, you know what you should do is hire blank as the coach, then at least with him as the, again,

they hired his agent, they hired his coach, uh, the last couple of years. And now they're hiring a guy with his like full-throated support or whatever. And it's like, How much of it is he going to wear in Edmonton, like, kind of permanently? I think maybe a lot.

I think you could be right. And I'm clicking around here because I have not seen yet how long the contract is for Babcock. I'm really curious about that. Does it go beyond two years? Oilers announce also that they have added DJ Smith as a... Oh, interesting. Okay, because there was talk that he would wind up in Toronto with Hiller. But, yeah, DJ Smith has the easiest job in the world,

which is he plays good cop to Mike Babcock, which... Yeah. Yeah. But that's cool. That's an interesting hire. And, you know, he'll make a great interim coach in a couple of months. Apparently, the Oilers release on the Babcock signing just does it, just elides Columbus completely.

Control F. Columbus, nothing there. Zero results. That's really fucking funny. All right. Other other transactions that happened in the last week here. Michael Kesselring gets traded to San Jose for a first. A little surprising, no? Yeah, a little bit and didn't quite work in Buffalo. Nope. Obviously, the first is a late first. But the interesting thing here is, does this free up San Jose to be more comfortable taking a forward second overall? That is kind of my expectation for sure. Because it felt like a lot of the mocks and speculation and everything had them with taking a defenseman second, probably Chase Reed.

and now it's sort of shifted back to Stenbarg or probably him. Yeah. And yeah, that makes sense. I mean, you've got, you've added another young defenseman. So he had a bad year in Buffalo, but it was mostly due to injury. I want to say it was like an MCL or something like that,

and then a high ankle sprain. And it's like, yeah, that's a problem for sure. You can't kind of play your way through one of those things, let alone both in one season. So I wonder what his ceiling is in San Jose. But, you know, obviously that was their big need on their roster. So go out and get a guy for a 20-somethingth pick. That's fine. I think that's great.

Ross Colton to Nashville for two-thirds and an H.L. goalie swap. Sure. Hey, that's the guy I know from work. That's, that's, that's, what's it? Why am I blanking on his name? The guy who's the GM in Nashville now. McFarland?

Yeah, Chris McFarland. I kept wanting to say Jared Bednar and I'm like, that's the coach. That's a different guy. That is an interesting, yeah, the fact that he immediately makes a, a deal with Colorado is fun. Help them out too. I mean, like just cap-wise didn't make a lot of sense to have Rosco. I mean, a couple of decent draft picks for that guy is not bad.

Not bad work. Nope. And Ross Colton's a good player. He's fine. So, you know, yeah, nothing wrong with him. Hey, we mentioned Samiskevich to Seattle for first and a second earlier. They also gave Bobby McMahon six years times. is 5.75.

Yep. They sure it is. Good for Bobby McMahon. Yeah. But, yeah, that's, I mean, Seattle probably has to overpay a little bit. They never saw a middle sick forward. They didn't want to overpay.

They just never met one. Never have. And I think Bobby McMahon's a perfectly good player. I think both of those guys are fine, but it is, it's a high price for both of them in different ways. Yeah, I think that's right. And again, then the money, like,

it's not like Seattle doesn't have cap space. And it's not like 575 is like even a ton of money anymore. It's the six years for a 30 year old guy who has, what, four years in the league. That's the thing. I'm like, okay, man. All right. So. Yeah.

And a guy who, by the way, his career high in ice time is 1556 a night over a full season. I just don't know about it. He did seem to fit well in Seattle as far as. He was so sure. He had 10 goals in his 18 games there. I think they're doing the Darren Radish is scoring 20 for everything. That's a 45 goal pace.

It's pretty good. Yep, that's exactly right. Pretty good price for. Everybody's going to be happy with that. Yeah. I think that's it for big transactions over the last little while here. So let's just move on. They announced the 2026 class from the Hockey Hall of Fame, Patrice Bergeron, Keith Kachuk,

Carrie Price, Pecker-Renay, Cindy Curley, Brian Burke. Mm-hmm. Your thoughts. It's decent class. I don't think any of it is outrageous. Obviously, Pecorane is the name on the men's side that people are focused on. I saw you in your newsletter. You were not on board.

Correct. My thought on this is, I think his case for the Hall of Fame is much, much more similar to Kerry Price's case than people are acknowledging. Oh, I totally agree with that aspect. of it. So if you want to say both guys should be in, like the committee did, I'm on board with that. If you want to say both guys should not be in, I could see that. I can also see the argument that Kerry Price should be in and Renee isn't because even though they're close, there is a gap and you got to draw the line somewhere. I don't even have an issue with that. What I do have an issue with is the people who seem to be out there who think carry prices,

slam dunk, and in fact it was an insult to him and his legacy that he didn't get in last year, but Pecker-Renay wasn't in consideration. These guys are both 360 win-goleys with one Vezina and who never won a cup, but who did drag a not very good team to the final one year, and had international success. If you think those two cases are significantly different to the extent that one's a slam dunk and the other shouldn't even be able to buy a ticket. I don't, I have trouble scoring that. Carey Price winning the heart obviously is part of it.

And, you know, he won gold medals. That's the only thing for me. That's what sets them apart. If he doesn't win a heart. And again, like I think the thing to say about carry price too is that there was just a broad acknowledgement during his career, like while it's happening, this team sucks, but they also have carry price. right?

And I don't think you would ever say that about Renee. Who, by the way, the other thing about Renee that I think is, makes him a weird candidate is he had several borderline carry price like seasons. It's not the like God tier MVP caliber carry price season that we're talking. But like just and then, but if you look at, there were just a few years where Renee would just mix in, I'm a pretty, I'm actually like a fairly bad goal. as well. And it's like, and you know, UCSAROS was always kind of hovering around. But, but the thing, like, Packer Renee was a Vesna finalist four times. Mm-hmm.

Over a stretch of eight years. So, I mean, that is almost a decade where he was absolutely in the best goalie. In the, like, if you had to start your team with the goalie, this is your guy kind of conversation. And he played in what I would say is like the golden age of, of, of, of, like, if you had to start your team with the goalie. of goal tending where it's just like... And was still very good. And like I don't... You notice I'm not quoting like his stats,

like his save percentage and his goals against because I think I saw somewhere where like he's like top five or 10 all time in those under like certain... Yeah, era matters a lot for numbers like that. But you know, I guess the other thing I'd say is he had one Vezna win. We've talked about with Sergei Bavrovsky, the guys who, like, winning a second Vesna pretty much locks you into the Hall of Fame. Well, Peckerenet had won Vesna and he had two other years where he finished second.

And one year was the year that he finished second to Kerry Price when he won the MVP, which was an all-time sort of season. The other time he finished second and it was a close vote was Tim Thomas in 2011, which was arguably one of the greatest goaltending seasons we've ever seen factoring in playoffs, which of course is not in Vesna voting or whatever. But this guy was two all-time seasons away from being a two-time Vezina winner, in which case he's close to a slam dunk. So I don't have an issue with it.

I think the hall has gone from not recognizing enough goalies to maybe being a little too lenient, but compared to like Mike Vernon or even maybe a Tom Barrasso, I don't think this is an issue. I think, you know, if you're Curtis Joseph or Ryan Miller or maybe even Chris Osgood, do you think you should have been ahead of this guy? Okay, you could say that.

But I don't, if you told me during his playing years, yeah, this guy's going to be in the Hall of Fame someday, I wouldn't have been shocked during that eight-year period where he was a Vezna finalist half the time. That wouldn't have blown me away. Yeah, and the other thing I want to say, just to differentiate between Price and Renee is like, even though, as you say,

they played a pretty similar number of games, won a similar number or had a similar number of wins. There was always this perception that like, because of how Carrie Price's career ended, that there was more in the tank, whereas it felt like Renee emptied the tank. It did, but also René didn't debut until he was 26. So,

well, that's exactly right. So, like, it's, it's just, you know, it's just like the contextually, what goes into it. But other than that, you know, like I said, I had a, like, the point of my article yesterday was just yes or no, should this guy be in the Hall of Fame? I said yes on Price and no on Renee, with the differentiating factor being the guy won the MVP, so you've got to put it in.

Which I don't think is unreasonable. I do think, and I generally speaking. And I like Renee, to be clear, I don't think he's a bum or anything, obviously, you know. He's not fucking Chris Osgood. you said. I don't like this argument generally. I think it gets overused, but there is a part of me that thinks if you swap these guys and one guy plays, Kerry Price plays his whole career in Nashville, and Pecoran plays his

whole career in Montreal, that I think some of that perception gap narrows, if not, disappears completely. What do you, what do you thoughts on Keith Kuchuk? Because he was the other one that he had obviously been waiting like 10 years. I've said it. a lot of times recently, where it's like, if you start letting in like Jeremy Roanick and Mark Recky, guys who are obviously great players, but who I wouldn't personally as a small hall guy wouldn't put in my Hall of Fame, if those guys are in, then Keith Kachuk has to be

it. I think that's about right. Yeah. I don't, you know, I think that him having two sons who are big name players in the league absolutely help this case. I think it's undeniable because it made him visible in a way that like Jeremy Roanick perhaps or Mark Recky maybe wouldn't be, right? But now I'm, it's more to the point where how do I want to say this? I guess what I'm basically saying is now it's a very slippery slope. Yep. Where it's like if you get 500 goals or you just automatically in the

Hall of Fame? Do you know who's up now as the leading goal score who's not in the Hall of Fame among eligible players? Not off the top of my head, but I can pull it up very quickly. It is Pat Verbeek. Yeah. And I wonder now if Pat Verbeek's a guy who's been out of the league for a long time as a player, I wonder if he starts getting because he's the guy that 500 goals, 1,000 points, almost

3,000 penalty minutes. Like he has some interesting numbers. And do I think he's a Hall of Favor? No. But I don't think Rod Brindamore is a Hall of Favor. And Brindamore is eventually going to get in partly based on the coaching. If Pat Verbeek keeps doing a good job as a GM, I think I wonder if we see him as the next guy up as a candidate. And again, it's the visibility, right?

Like it's just, well, Pat Verbeek, I'm going to see him on TV X number of times a year. He's going to be talked about in the media constantly. And you know what? Like, and this is. again, because with Brindow, it blows me away that Broad Brindamore is the guy that people now point to

and go like, how is this guy not in the Hall of Fame? And it's like the guy averaged 60 points a year and was never the best player in his own team. Like we don't have to act like it's amazing that he's not in the Hall of Fame. But it is the Hall of Fame, ultimately.

And if somebody is front and center and all that, I don't hate the idea that that can help give you little boost. Right now, once Kachuk goes in, like I wonder, should we just say everyone who scored 500 goals gets in?

Like that is what I do. Because it's only Pat for Beak and then Peter Bondra is the other guy. He's at 5003 goals. They like Peter Bondra. Yeah. And Peter Bondra was a legit star in the league for a while.

And, you know, I just, I wonder that and then the next. The next guy down is Brian Bellows at 485. That feels about right. Maybe it ends up being... You know what? 500 goals you're in and we don't argue about it. So let's do this.

Active players who are over 500 goals. Yep. I think probably all of them are in. Ovechkin, Crosby, Stamcos, Malkin. Patrick Cain, I think are all locks. Tavares is the one that some people kind of go, I don't know, but... I mean, John Tavares.

is getting in. So, yeah. I mean, I understand why, obviously, if you're an Islander's fan, or even if you, you know, there's people out there who don't love John DeVarres, and I get it, but he's getting in. He's going to finish with like 1,300 points. He's in. Yeah. So then the next layer of guys, how many guys who are north of 400, but not at 500, do you think are getting in?

Marshand? Corey Perry, I have no idea. And partly because- I miss Corey Perry, you're right. He's at 465. I mean, at this point, could he play three more years and score 12 goals a year to get to 500? Maybe. I think no.

Marchand, I think, does get in. Drysidal will get in. Matthews will get in. McKinnon, Pasternak. Jamie Ben is kind of the first one where I look at that as a no. I say no on Jamie Ben, yeah. this Connor McDavid kid I need him to get to 450

yeah Kuturov and then that's the last guy Matt Duchenne's an interesting Matt Duchenne's an interesting one because he could get to like 450 or so but I don't I don't see he could get over a thousand points and all of that and suddenly you're going but we got to wait and see if he wins

to Selkees for no reason at the end of his career and then those numbers will be good enough. We didn't mention, obviously, Patrice Bergeron's going in. I, you know, the most slain dunk. I don't know what you can say about it other than, yeah. He's got four Selkees, the next close-stilkes, or six Selkees, the next-close guy has four. Like, he just completely- And was a finalist 12 years in a row.

And, like, look, the Selke is a reputation award, so some of this becomes self-fulfilling, but still, man, like, come on. Yes, that's right. Cindy Curley, I saw somebody describe her as like she was a pioneer for the other pioneers. And I wonder what beautiful man

had said such a word about her. It was me. I don't know. It was some news word. It was. Yeah. No, that's exactly right. So, like, that was, hers was honestly a name I had, like, heard, but, like, I had no context for her career at all.

And the reason why is they didn't start doing a women's world championship until 1990. And she was the American captain for the first three women's world championships. Yep. Never got to play in the Olympics. Never got, but was a big part of why. So, you know, no issue with the pick, obviously. Nope. I mean, again, only using.

one spot when you're maxing when you're maxing out the men every year is that's what I was going to say

it's stubbornness at this point I don't even like I don't even want to complain about it anymore because I feel like

the people complaining are just the committee is just stubborn at this point and the more we complain the more we complain

the dumber they're going to be about it and then Brian Burke yeah sure why not slam dunk

I mean come on As famous as a GM gets really. Yeah. Without having been Steve Iserman or Joe Sackick or whatever, right? Yeah. As far as guys who didn't play and were just GMs, like there's Lou Lamarillo and then Burke is the next year. Worked in the league for a long time.

Media, personality, you know, his work with helping to get you can play off the ground. And stuff like not everyone's cup of tea. obviously I had my issues with them, certainly. Absolutely slam down call of favor. Yeah. Easy. That's exactly right. Yeah.

But again, it just boils down to like they're going to there's eventually going to be like a huge backlog. Not that there already isn't, but like just a colossal one for women. Meanwhile on the men's side, they're just like, did you have two 30 goal seasons? Come on down, brother. You know, like it's a little. silly at this point, but I don't know what you can do about it. Hey, Julie Chu, stand up. All right, can you let Joe Pavelsky in by you there?

Good. Here he comes. That's right. All right. You can sit back down. You're blocking the aisle, thank you. Yep. All right.

Finally, the draft is coming up Friday, and it should be very interesting because I think everybody has just settled on Gavin McKenna. You know, we tried to find a way he wasn't going to be the first pick. We couldn't do it. We looked high and low. We just couldn't come up with one. Sorry. And the only, like, fault he showed to scouts, if you want to put it that way,

is that he didn't have as good of a draft eligible season as Macklin Celebrini. Like, on the ice, obviously. You know, we'll leave all the other stuff aside. But it just set an impossible. And also, like, the hype around now they're letting in CHL players. And, and you might not remember this, but there were people who don't know anything about college hockey,

obviously, who were like, you know, it's possible that Gavin McKenna puts up a hundred points in college hockey. And anybody who knew college hockey was like, yeah, that's fucking idiotic. That's stupid to say.

But he got up over 50. He had like a nine point, an eight point game, I think it was, a goal in seven assists. He, you know, there were time,

he got a slow start. Let's put it that way. And then really, like as the season went on, it felt like he really figured some stuff out about how to compete at this level and that kind of thing. I've said before,

if I'm him, I'm like, maybe I'll give college one more year. But it's, that's not going to happen. You also said you don't think that's, that's a possibility. No,

I don't think so. But I don't think, let's put it this way. I don't think it would hurt him to spend another year in college as like the number one guy on that team. Not that he wasn't.

already, but like they had other name guys like, like, you know, JJ, name in college hockey, JJ, we wish Aden Fink, that kind of thing. And they're, you know, they should be pretty good again next year. They'd be really good if he came back. So, you know, I, but again, I said the same thing about Celebrini. He had an okay rookie year and then look what happened, right? So it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world for him. I don't think it's going to happen.

Like you said earlier, I think Stenberg's going to, uh, San Jose 2. And then this is the interesting thing. Vancouver at 3, the word on the street, like if you believe the local reports, is they won't pick the coach's kid. The Hill Melholtra. Yeah. Oh, wow. It's looking less and less likely.

But I wonder if, to your point earlier, that's, oh, Chase Reed might fall in our lap because San Jose doesn't need to take a defenseman anymore. and if they take Chase Reed, then you take Stanberg and you're happy with that anyway. But that seems to be the consensus that's forming in Vancouver is not Caleb Malthotra. I wonder how far he drops then given that. Yeah, I mean, it's a weird draft where there's like a one, two, and then like a three through seven or eight, depending on who you talk to, where, you know, it all comes down to preference and that kind of thing. things. So I'm, let me ask you this. And, and we'll, uh, we'll leave it at this.

How many teams do you think are putting their first round picks in play, uh, in this draft? I think it's kind of a lot. I mean, but don't we, don't we get tricked? I know I get tricked into this every year. It feels different this year. And I don't know if that's because of how much the cap has gone up and like, everyone's got money, you know, but.

Everybody's got a ton of money to spend. Yeah. Let's see, let me, let me look at this really quickly. I'll pull up Puckpedia. But 104 million, right now, there are only four teams that don't have more than, let's say, $9.5 million in cap space. And even they have like eight, seven, you know, that kind of thing. So it, without resigning their own guys, blah, blah, blah, but everybody has money to.

to spend. And like, if I'm Ottawa, doesn't it feel like I'm trading at least one of those picks to Vancouver? Yeah. Ottawa has to. They've basically called their shot now. I can't. Well, the only circumstances I can see them not trading one of their first is if they trade

the later for like the 2009 one. But I don't think you're getting, you're not getting anywhere near as much there. So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I would say Ottawa's up there. There's probably a handful of other teams. I just wonder, is there anyone that's looking to move up? That'd be fun.

Pick-wise, as opposed to, like, it's one thing to say, well, I have this veteran and I'm going to trade him to get a pit, but, like, is there anyone who's like, you know, there's like the five defensemen who all seem to go in a different order, depending on who you talk to? Is there a team out there that's like, no, we want this guy? and here's where we think he's going to go. So we need to get up to six to that. I wonder if that happens.

So the only thing about that is everybody, you know, like with the exception of the maple leaves, quite frankly, I would say everybody in the top six or maybe even seven are teams where you're like they should be actively rebuilding and they agree with me, you know. Toronto, San Jose, Vancouver, Chicago, New York. York, Calgary, Seattle, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Nashville is the top 10. That's a lot of teams that are like, yeah, we really need prospects as opposed to, again, Toronto, you wouldn't have said that's a team that needs prospects necessarily, but then they got the first overall pick and you're like, okay, fucking get Gavin McKenna at them. That's fine, you know? So it's very interesting.

I don't know, like, I could see like New Jersey maybe or, I'm sorry, the Islanders, I mean. trying to move up a little bit, but they're at 13. You move to nine or eight or ten. Like, what's the fucking difference? Given that there's not a lot of distance between all those guys. So there is one other thing I did want to point out, though, Sean. And that, are you aware of the Ruck twins? Yes.

Only relatively recently has that shown up on my radar. but yes, we have... I was going to say Timu Siddins, but when you call someone Timu in the NHL, that actually is a compliment, so... That's right. I know that a lot of people in Vancouver are really hoping that they can get both of them at like 24, 25,

like if they can get the pick from Ottawa. And that would be so much fun to have twins go to the same team back to back. That would be awesome. With the Sadiens and like, I mean, you did. Yeah. We have to make this happen.

This is my beautiful wish. I don't know this. Are they identical twins? I believe they are. Nice. Yeah, a lot of talk about, in fact, I even saw one mock where, because it's, it's, you've got the twins, but then there's also like a third forward who like is their childhood best friend. Oh, that I didn't know. That I grew up playing with them.

And they're like, Vancouver could get that guy at like 24 and then take the twins with their early. second round picks. Anyways, that would be very cool. And by the way, I just Googled and they are. They're not, it's not as uncanny as Daniel and Henrik, but it's close. So there you go. Nice. Why don't we hit them with the plugs and we'll be done?

You can find me over at the Athletic. We've already done the other podcast this week, so you missed it. What the heck? You fool. Subscribe to the newsletter, all that. All that fun stuff. Great. And hey, speaking of newsletters, go to perfecttakes.

Dot B-Hive.com, and that's B-E-E-H-I-I-V. To get my newsletter, it's $7 a month, but if you pay annually, you get a free month. So, like, I don't know what the math on that is. You do it. You know, that's somebody else's business. Where I'm going to do, you know, I just did my Hall of Fame. Did they deserve it? Thumbs up, thumbs down, that kind of thing.

article and here's why. And, you know, a lot of stuff will happen this week. I'm sure I'll be writing more than usual over there. So check that out. And then check out patreon.com slash puck soup. All kinds of bonus episodes, including we have Supolet, the listener's choice episode coming up. I don't know, at some point in the indeterminate future. June is always the hardest month to schedule stuff.

So, you know, TBD on just about everything, except I can. tell you for sure. Sean and I are about to go record a mailbag over there, and we'll answer a bunch of listener questions like we do every single week. So thanks for listening to the main show. Enjoy the draft. Enjoy all the trades. Enjoy Mike Babcock frowning when someone asks him the lightest touch question about his

time in Columbus when he is introduced in Edmonton. And we'll talk to you next week for post-draft and pre- free agency stuff, I guess. Thank you again. Goodbye. Bye.