Puck Soup - The Quietest Season Ever

Episode Date: March 30, 2023

Sean and Ryan talk about the Jets and Panthers, Jonathan Toews, the Chytil contract, and more.   Sponsored by Athletic Greens (athleticgreens.com/puck) and Gametime (download the Gametime app and use code PUCK)

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes. It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense. I'm Ryan Lambert from Elite Prospects. I'm Sean McAdoo from The Athletic. And first of all, first thing I got to say is we were supposed to record yesterday as you know, we always record on Wednesdays.

I was just super sick, so that's why we're doing it on Thursday instead. That's it. Yeah, makes sense. You gut it out a mailbag for the Patreon. Yeah. In the afternoon, but, yeah, we would, we figured we'd rather have us both fully healthy and ready to go. Yeah, well, you know, the kind of sick I was, I had a migraine and couldn't look at a computer screen. So it would have been really hard to record a podcast.

Would have been a little tough. Yeah. Anyway, just real quick, right off the hop, did you see the ideas that they were talking about on TSN for how the NHL could generate interest in getting fans to watch more games? I saw the bit about basically putting all the teams on the schedule at the same time. And then with a further idea being,

that you could potentially space all the games out in such a way that you'd create this marathon of NHL hockey, potentially using the European games as a building block on that. Yeah, so it seems like those were two ideas that logically would end up closer to being one idea. They initially said, like, oh, wouldn't it be great to have maybe not 24 hours, but like 20 straight hours of NHL hockey or something like that. Yep.

Where one team's playing at like midnight in the West, but technically you know, like Vegas. Okay, people are going to show up to a midnight game in Vegas, that kind of thing. That is an interesting early season gimmick, I would say.

I'd be, I, would I sit down and watch all of it? Yeah, you bet I would. Like, you know, as a, just tell my editors, I'm going to just like write a, live blog of this. And then, you know, 18 hours in, I'm like, I'm going to watch the fucking Jets now, huh?

God damn it. Shit. Yep. Why did I sign up for? Yeah, it's going to seem like a good idea until Blue Jackets, uh, Wild kicks off. And you're like, oh, no. But the idea to have all 32 teams play on one night, don't they do that like twice a year anyway?

It's usually only 15 games instead of 16, right? This was my first reaction, right? Like this does feel like it happens. Now, they had mentioned doing it on, at least in one of the references, to doing it on a weeknight. Which is insane. Well, it implies to me that they would not, that this particular version of the idea would be like you get all the games going

at either at the same time or you have the ball at night. So basically it's the fire hose, rather than spreading them out. And I know we all complain, and we, I mean, like, the real sickos slash media.

Like, we complain whenever there's too many games and, oh, they didn't stagger them and everything. I don't know that the average fan cares about that, because the average fan usually

just wants to watch their own. That's what I was going to say as well. But, I mean, I wouldn't, like, to me, I like the two ideas,

and I'm always, I'm always in favor of the NHL trying something new. Like, yes, go ahead. Try something. If it doesn't work,

hey, get out of your comfort. zone a bit, sure. So I don't mind the two ideas at the extreme end. One being, let's see if we could do, like he said, 20 straight hours of hockey. And the other one being, let's have all 32 teams playing at the same time. Like, start all the games at seven or eight Eastern or whatever. Yeah. And just everywhere. And, you know, maybe stagger it by a few minutes here and there, so hopefully you don't have everyone in the intermission at the same time. But let's get, you know, let's at least get all 32 teams at some.

point playing at the exact same time. And then maybe people will think it's cool. Maybe they won't. More likely, nobody will care. Well, I mean, I don't see how you're bringing in new fans with this. Like, I don't see anyone who's like, I don't like watching one hockey game, but I would like to watch 16 hockey games. That would be fun.

Yeah, the only way it's fun to me, and I'm not joking, is if like ESPN, I like the idea of they all start at 7 o'clock, 8 o'clock Eastern, would be a good time, I feel like. Yeah. Because sure, like the two or three games on the West Coast are at like 5 p.m. But, you know, you do it in Vancouver on like Family Day or whatever. Everybody's happy with that. Whatever, you know, what, anyway.

The only way I would want to see all 16 teams playing at once is if there's just an ESPN plus channel that's like, here's a mosaic of, all 16 games and we'll zoom in on the games that have power plays. Yeah. Yeah, certainly anything you could do. A freak red zone. If you could do TV partner something or other, that would be very cool. Like also with like the 20 hour idea.

I mean, if somehow you could get ESPN to just show hockey for 20 straight hours and like build it up as an event, great. I mean, that's that's obviously a great way to do it. But I mean, I guess, I don't know, like they say doing it early in the season. I don't know how early that. I mean, usually the European games are fairly early on. But, like, I find the offseason comes and goes, you get training camp. You have opening night, you're all excited. And for about a week or two, it feels like you're finding out something new about some team every night.

And then by about the third, fourth week this season, you're like, okay, crap, we've got five more months of this to go. Sure. I don't mind dropping something in there. Do it in November or something? Yeah, I mean, absolutely. Yeah, November. seems like the ideal time for me for sure. Yeah.

So. But knowing the NHL, it's going to be, yeah, all 32 teams are playing tonight. Nine of the games start at 7 p.m. Right. And then there's like one at 8, 2 at 9, 1 at 10, 1 at 10.30. And you're like, cool. You know, it's the classic thing we always talk about. Like, just start some of the games at 715.

It's not that fucking hard. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you would think. And also, you know, if you say the game starts at seven, maybe start the game at seven, and not seven-23. Seven-08, a classic move, yeah. All right, let's finish. We're done talking about that. Let's talk instead about two teams that seem like they really don't want to make the playoffs.

The Winnipeg – let's start with the Winnipeg Jets. Yeah, got some drama. I guess we got some coaching drama on both of those teams. but for sure yeah um yeah the other one we're going to talk about in a minute it won't surprise you is the florida panthers um but let's start with the jets this is this is my theory when the local media anybody in the local media writes an article going this guy doesn't seem like he knows what he's doing that's bad yeah and uh like it's it's not just uh you know he could be getting more out of these guys or whatever like uh i i i This was an article in the athletic that was just like, the bonissons is over.

Whatever magic he had early in the year where he was just throwing shit against the wall and it was all sticking. It's not sticking anymore. Yeah. Which, you know, and this is, Marat wrote this and he's very, very good. And it's very smart. He's not sitting there saying this is all Rick Bonas's fault. It's not this idea that Rick Bonas was a good coach for half a season and now he's bad. But he is making the point that I would argue is self-evidently true that things were clicking in the first half in Winnipeg in a way that they are not now.

Whether it's a Rick bonus thing or if it's some of the star players, it seems like all the players are mad at him, he's mad at the players, guys are getting bench, guys are getting weird ice time and moving up and down the lines. And he had his quote earlier this week where it was, you know, I'm looking for the actual cool. Maybe you have it where he basically said if the guys think they're giving a not. effort level they're dreaming. Yeah, that's basically, I don't have the exact quote in front of me either, but yes, that was basically it. Like, if these guys think they're emptying the tanks, something along those lines, yeah. Which, you know, like, that to me, when a coach is like, these guys just aren't trying,

that's when a coach is like, I don't have any answers. Yeah. You know? And the thing I said earlier about, like, throwing shit at the wall and seeing what sticks and Morat had like multiple examples of like, oh, he put this guy out for a three on three and that guy boxed out Nathan McKinnon and they won the game.

And like that's normally a guy that wouldn't play in the three on three. It's like, yeah, maybe you just got a lucky bounce there. You know what I mean? Like, yeah, it's tough to. You don't need to, you don't need to think too hard about what really went on there, I guess.

And the other thing that you have to say with the Jets is they're, kind of at a crossroads with their organization just because they're going to lose so many guys in the next year or three who, you know, are under contract and are getting up there or just want out. And this is all coming, you know, we talked about it with the Islanders a little bit recently and certainly last year where it's like, you know, you. Yeah, elite goaltending is really covering up a lot of fucking problems for these guys. Yeah. Although, I mean, the difference is that I'm not trying to be disrespectful to the Islanders, but I look at that roster minus the goaltending.

And I don't see like a scary playoff contending roster. I see a bunch of old guys. I see some good pieces, obviously. But I don't look at that team and say with average goal. tending this team is going to be much of anything. Whereas the Jets, it feels like a lot of the pieces should be there, but they're just not. Can I ask this? Yeah. Does it though? Yeah. Because I think, I think you're right if it's 2019. If I'm looking at this roster in 2019, I'm like, oh, this is so exciting, you know, it ain't 2019 anymore. There's a dust and bufflin-shaped hole in the side of that

building, right? Like, you know, part of the thing that Marat wrote about was like, boy, fucking Blake Wheeler and Mark Schifley get a lot of ice time and maybe they're not totally earning it, let's say. Yes. And those are two guys, this is shocking to me, that Mark Schifley is already 30 years old. I cannot believe that. Yep.

But like, Blake Wheeler, like, that guy should have retired two years ago, apart from he's getting a shitload of money. Yeah, I feel like that may have something to do with it. No, but like, just, you know, it seems like, people started questioning whether he still had it anymore like two years ago. Yes. And then, you know, who, uh, uh, uh, why am I blanking on his name? The, the old coach, now coach is.

Paul Maurice. Paul Maurice. I wanted to say Claude Noel and I was like, I know that isn't right. Yeah. Um, but Paul Maurice was like, well, he's got a shitload of goals. And it's like, right, you put him on the. power play and he's scored into 58 empty nets this year.

So like that's why he has all those goals. And now he doesn't even really have the goals anymore. Yeah. He's got 15. He's got a very underrated producer for a long time. And he's maybe not at that level anymore

is I think a nice way to put it. Sure. And like that happens. He's 36 years old. I'm not holding it against him. 36 years old, but still has another year after this one paying him. Not a great dollar cap hit. Yeah, eight and a quarter even. You know, they've got, I'm looking at the cap-friendly page. Shifley's signed through next year at $6 million, which is not bad.

But he's the guy that you think is going to move this offseason. Certainly a lot of Jets fans, just going through the comments on that piece, a lot of Jets fans feel like they've kind of had it with. Mark Shifley. Yeah, you mean the guy that doesn't back check even though he's the number one center? The guy who is... Or, yeah.

He is the number one. Yeah, he's a number one center. At least that's how they're using them. He has not yet, yes. Has not developed that aspect of his game at all. Because look, I mean, there's a lot of guys when they're 22 and you're getting 80 points a year and you stink defensively.

Like, yeah, it's supposed to come with age. It hasn't with him. There are, I mean, I hate to get into effort level and that sort of thing, but a lot of people who watch this team say that sometimes, you know, there are players out there that sometimes look like they're not giving you the full effort

because just because of their style and the way they skate and stuff like that. This is the Phil Kessel. Matt Sundeen was the classic for me as a leaf. We went from like little Doug Gilmore, Wendell Clark guys who were just legs going a mile a minute to this big guy who like glided around the rank and people were like, oh, he's not trying.

But it feels like maybe we should. Sheifley, there are some times where you would like to see. And clearly, Bonas' comment, he was one of the guys that people assumed was being referred to. So, I mean, you trade him in the offseason? Probably. We thought he was getting traded last off season. It feels like two off seasons now. We've been waiting for this inevitable trade that doesn't happen.

It feels like it has to happen this year. And then the other guy's pair looked at blah because his contract is up, but he wants to be a Montreal Canadian. And so does that happen this year? Yeah. So it can't happen this year without the Jets being on board. So the question there is, do they trade him to the Canadians, or do the Canadians wait one more year, have Dubois sign his offer,

have signed the offer that he has to get from the team? And then as an unrestricted free agent, go to Montreal for nothing next year. And obviously the Jets don't want that, but Montreal knows that the Jets don't want that. So Montreal's not going to offer as much as you think they should probably offer. And we go down that whole rabbit hole. So, I mean, we're already talking about the offseason,

and this team is still holding down the playoff spot. But, man, they are, they are rumbling and starting to fall apart, it feels like. Yeah, it reminded me, or somebody reminded me earlier this week of the Daryl Sutter quote from last year. They were like, hey, what do you think of anybody who finishes ace? and has to play Colorado in the first round. And he was like, it's a waste of eight days. Yeah. What are we doing here, you know?

And it feels like it's the same thing with the Jets, where it's just like, oh, you're going to play those guys? Best of luck. Like, no matter who they get, just this team doesn't feel like they have it. But the reason I said they feel like they're kind of at a crossroads as an organization, we talked about a bunch of players who have contracts up either this year or next year. They only have four, five, six. guys, seven guys under contract for next, for 2024, 25.

Wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, and like obviously that includes some RFAs that they'll be resigning. Yeah. To get added on to that. But like, it also includes Mason Appleton.

So it's not like. Sure. It's not like the whole core is all locked in. Right. Oh, Apple. Because of Apple, you're saying core. No. No.

I wasn't saying that at all. But kudos to you for finding, finding it work. win, bud. Wasn't even there. But this is the critical part to me. You know who's included in that guy whose contract is up in the next couple of years is Connor Hellebuck? Yep.

Does he want to not be in Winnipeg anymore playing behind these teams? Mm-hmm. I wonder what the answer to that question is. Unrestricted free agent. Yeah. And a guy who will be due 10 million bucks, right? Like, he's probably going to be a Vesna finalist this year again. He probably won't win.

A guy who will be in a position to ask for that. Yeah. Now, will is any smart team giving a goalie a contract like that? You don't need to have them be smart teams. You know what I'm saying, but I? Yeah. There aren't 32 smart teams out there. So.

That's exactly right. Hunter Hellbuck doesn't need to find 32 dumb ones. He needs one dumb team, ideally two. and then off you go. But yeah, he'll have four top four Vezna finishes in the last six years this season. It is, but it's interesting though, right? Because let's assume Winnipeg either misses the playoffs

or makes the playoffs and doesn't do much. I think they're pretty much locked in. Like the way Calgary and even Nashville, like I know Nashville's kind of worked their way back into the conversation a little bit. I don't think they're locked in at all. I mean, they're... You're right that Calgary has...

like not step through the door that's been left open for them, but... Well, that's what I mean. Like, I'm just looking at the standings and I'm going, you know, okay, MoneyPuck has them at 61% in Calgary's at 30.3. Yeah.

So, like it is... Dom has Winnipeg at 53. Yeah. Calgary 28% Nashville 20. So, so a little bit better than 50-50 with Calgary and Nashville splitting the rest. But, yeah, I mean, but let's, let's forsake

argument. Let's say they either just miss or they make it and they get swept or losing five to whoever. Or whatever, even if they get out of the first round. Well, I think it's different. Let's pretend. I think it's different if they get out of the first round because I think once you get there, I'm not saying it should be. I'm talking like per se, because there is a lot of sentiment I feel in Winnipeg or in the Jets fan base that says like this this version of the team has gone as far as they can go, it's time to hit reset now while you still can rather than make the mistake that so many teams make of continuing to push a fringe playoff team out there year after year, and then realizing it's time to start over when it's too late, then you can't really do anything.

Typically, when you have a team in that situation, a lot of times you look at them and you go, yeah, it's easy to say start over, rebuild, but they're too good for that. you know, there's too much talent here. You couldn't suddenly. And the point I was going to get to was you look at Winnipeg and you just go, if they trade Connor Hallibuck this offseason, what's the floor now for that team? It feels pretty low. I was going to say 27.

Yeah. So suddenly, you know, I mean, and assuming that, you know, Shifley and some others are gone too, now you're pretty firmly into rebuild mode. And they're, I mean, we know. No, right? There are always teams that need goaltending, and there's always teams that maybe don't, but their goalie plays bad for two weeks in the playoffs, and so they decide that they do. There'd be a market out there for him.

That'd be an interesting name to watch. Oh, you're telling me, brother, but what I must say here, I love how much I've rebuild pilled you over the course of us doing this show together, or you're like, you know what, maybe they should trade this. Like top two in the world goalie. You know what? But he's 28, man. I thought you would have been on board with this.

I thought, you know. He's 29. How about that? Come on. He's going to be 30 in May. Three years past two on this. I mean, yeah. Look.

Well, no, I mean, you know, I wouldn't be against it. I don't think it would ever happen in a million fucking years. This is the NHL, right? Like, if you can trade Connor Hellebuck this summer, like, think about what you're getting back. Again, he's going to be a top. three Vesna guy. I don't, I think Allmark's probably going to win it. We don't have to relitigate this.

But like, you know, he's going to be in that mix for sure. I don't know that there's another guy who's even maybe creeping ahead of him a little bit, like for the third spot, you know? Yep. But you're like, you know, like I just said, the guy's got four top four Vezna finishes in the last six years. Like any team without a goalie. This kid, how about this? This kid is from Michigan. He's not a kid anymore.

He's almost 30 years old. But he's from Michigan. To Detroit Red Wings? Do they maybe need a goalie right now? Yeah, it is time for their annual goalie trade. Yeah. And hey, look, they're always in the business of like making trades with the blues for some reason. Well, I guess the reason is they keep winning them.

That's why they're in. That's probably it. Yeah. Yeah. but you know this guy only costs a sixth of a million dollars more than Jordan Bennington and he's Connor Hellebuck you know it's just something to think about there there will be teams that need goalies this summer and you're not going to find a better one for less money I don't think than than Hellebuck if he's made available

which again he won't be so why are we still talking about it on the off chance and I don't think this is likely but if the Leafs go and lose to Andre Vasselis in the lightning in the first round and they don't fire Kyle Dubas doesn't he have to go out and get Connor Hallibuck if he's available?

I better look up and see if Connor Halibuck ever played for the Suez-Marie Greyh says your UMass Lowell no no not gonna not gonna happen sorry but no like the other thing I wanted to say about this remember when everybody was saying like

oh Josh Morrissey that guy's gonna win the Norris this year Josh Norrissey, I think, was... Yeah. Yeah. Kind of bottom dropped out on that one, huh? Yeah, it has. And I, you know, I don't think he's played badly or anything like that.

No, no, he's not, but he's not... Yeah, he's... Yeah, man, I'm looking at this decor, and it's like... Yeah, I guess the problem is when Josh Morrissey is your best defenseman. How good are you really? Again, not even a bad player. But, I mean, again, like, I... I mean, to be hyper simplistic, I mean, hockey team, you've got your forwards, you got a blue line, you got a goalie.

They've got a great goalie and, on paper, at least, a very good forward group. Like two out of three should be enough to get you into the playoffs in this league. Yeah, comfortably into the playoffs. Yeah. Not like barely getting it. Again, like Helberg is having a lot more comfortable than they are now. And that's what it seemed for two thirds of the season. Like the Jets looked like they were legitimate contenders to finish first.

division. And it's just, it's, it's, it's not looking that way now. And it's, you know, every team goes through some cold streaks, but it, it feels like more than that, the way, what's happening in Winnipeg right now from the coach on down and, and out and everything else. It's, uh, the other thing I wanted to say, we, they mentioned the bonescence in that article. You know, another athletic, uh, trope that has really cropped up in the last like two, two, three months is the Jamie Benissants. Oh, okay. Yeah. You know? And they get Rick Bonas out of their turn.

Jamie Ben turns into like a really useful player again. Like immediately overnight. You know? And one wonders if Rick Bonas is his coaching style like the way, the systems they, they use, whatever you want to say, kind of puts like a restrictor plate on, on certain kinds of forwards that it's possible. And again, like, playing Nick Eeler's

fewer minutes than Blake Wheeler or whatever in any given game, like, that's not going to help you. But I just wonder if this is a Rick bonus thing. Because, you know, when they hired him, we were like, I mean, I guess. Yeah. You know, like, were we like super enthusiastic

about that hire? No, they didn't get Barry Trots. And so they hired the oldest guy they could who would to hold the seat warm for a year while Barry Trots and obviously that's not going to happen now and the work bonus looked like a Jack Adams guy

for the first half of the season. So I don't know. It's been a it's been a big switchup. Yeah. It's really interesting. I'm fascinated to see because this is a team that just doesn't really seem to have a lot of, I guess, motivation to change things up, you know?

Like year after year. It's very rare that they have a big shake up with their roster. Yeah. And part of that, of course, is that nobody wants to play in Winnipeg. Yeah. Well. Or more specifically that no one wants to live in Winnipeg. Yeah.

And, but I mean, Kevin shoveled out notoriously for a while there, not as much recently, but for a long time was, it just didn't make trades. He didn't do player for player trades, which is surprising because he, you know, If you've got, you know, if people don't want to play in Winnipeg, it's the only way to get them to do it. And trading for them is, you know, you're not going to get free agents. Obviously, you know, there's guys with no trades and that sort of thing. And we all assume Winnipeg's on every no trade list that anybody has.

But still, you know, anybody under 27 doesn't have a no trade. So you would think he'd be out there. We all thought it was going to happen last year. Like last year, you went into the going, okay, this is, tear up the jets. Marks Reifley for sure going to get moved and then we'll see how deep it goes. And then it just never happened. I think it has to this year.

If this ends the way that it looks at the end of March like it's going to end. Yeah. And one last thing I wanted to say. Like I liked what they did at the deadline. Like getting Nino Nita Ryder writer for relatively little. Rick Bonas apparently didn't because he's one of the guys that he doesn't seem to like very much right now. Yep. Yep.

It's tough, man. Let's talk about the Panthers, the team that took the Jets coach from last year, well, sort of from last year for part of last year. Did you see this Keith Kachuck thing about the Panthers? Yes, so he, now where did this come from? Because I'm assuming this was like on some radio show or. Yeah, it definitely seemed that way. Let me just click on this really quickly and get the foot. He was on Toronto 10.

50. I don't know. Okay. That's the TSN. That's the TSA sports station in Toronto. Keith Kachuk said his team is, quote, devastated with his team's current spot as the Panthers go into tonight's game. I'm reading from Florida hockey now. Go into tonight's game against the Maple Leafs riding a four-game losing streak. This is Keith Kachuk talking here.

This is a do or die for the Panthers right now. I watched them the other night, and I know I am. staying at Brady's house and Brady's team played really well. They have some jam and you know, I'm a little disappointed with the Panthers. They are a soft team and they're getting everything they deserved right now. And then he continues,

instead of trying to get autographs on the ice from Matthews and Marner, they should probably check them a little harder. Whatever it is, it is disappointing. I know I sound like a frustrated person but I know every time I come and watch Ottawa, they may not be the most talented team, but they're going to play hard.

Perhaps Florida could take a page out of their book. And then there's some other quotes about, like, you know, they have good players. They just got to get it together. All right. Yeah. And that Matthew is brokenhearted about all of this. Yeah.

It's tragic. That's some pretty good quotes, man. Keith Kichuk's always been a fun quote. I mean, that is really like, look. And this is the classic thing of like, oh, oh, you want hockey players to be more exciting, but then you get, like this is,

this is exactly what we're talking about. Like, guys should be saying shit like this all the time. Yep. Like, just going, yeah, the Panthers are trying to get fucking Mitch Martin's autograph.

I mean, I do ignore that. That was, they shouldn't have done that. They shouldn't, you know. In my opinion, with their little autograph books and that.

Yeah, exactly. Like, as he's on a breakaway and the goal he's coming out, like with the little book, that was too much. So, yeah.

What's interesting is that, I'm assuming that quote, like they played, the Leafs played the Panthers a week ago and beat them. But last night they played them again. Yeah, these quotes were ahead of last night's game. So the Leafs are up in that game and Paul Maurice has an absolute meltdown on the bench. Right. Screaming obscenities at his team. And they then end up coming back and winning a game. in overtime.

I'm not suggesting those two events are related, but you know everyone else is going to, if this ends up, you know, being the start of the turnaround that gets them back in the race. It's all going to be about Paul Maurice's epic meltdown. Which is interesting because if they

hadn't come back, and I mean, they came, when I say they came back, they got a power play at the end of regulation and scored a power play goal to tie the game. You know what's going to really get them back in the race, though? At Montreal, at Columbus, hosting Buffalo, hosting Ottawa, at Washington. That's what's going to get the back in the race. But we're all going to look back and say,

it was, oh, Paul Maurice, that was the turning point of the season. Because we love stuff like that. Whereas if they hadn't got the power play, if they hadn't come back and won, we all would have said, that's a coach who's just lost, he's lost the plot. Like he's got, he's just in panic mode, he's yelling and screaming and like a toddler. And, you know, his team falls, apart along with them. But that's, I guess that's how it goes. But again, I would contend much like the Jets, that just barely getting into the playoffs when you have this roster sucks.

Yeah, especially coming off a hundred. You're going to play the fucking Boston Bruins? 120 point season. Yeah. President's trophy and, uh, and they're trying to. And look, okay. So I guess this is where you're going to chop up like, okay, they, they, they, They sold high on Hubertow.

And in doing so, they also had to give away McKenzie Weeger. And that kind of exposed the quality of their defense. Yes. Like, uh, although they clearly got the best player in the trade. Yes. You know, they got a guy who's getting hard trophy buzz if they can get back into the playoffs. I mean, I. He should regardless, right?

You do that trade again in a heartbeat. don't you? Yes. Yeah, no, again, they sold so high on Huberdo, who's had a not very good year in Calgary, and Uyghur, who's been pretty good,

actually, for the flames. Like, had to be part of it just more to make the money work than anything else I would expect. You know, otherwise, you can maybe do picks or prospects or whatever. But, like, I saw a stat the other night that was like, Brandon Montour

now is the, like, single season leader in points for a defenseman in the Florida organization. And it's like, yeah, Brandon Montor like shouldn't be. Obviously, uh, Ekplad got hurt for a little while there. But like, Brandon Montor shouldn't be your first guy over the boards in most situations, right? Like, this is, this is a problem. Um, and again, not even a bad player, but it's just like, you won the president's trophy last year and this is your number one defenseman now, like for, for a good chunk of the season.

What did you think of Air Neckblad getting heckled by a golfer slash prop comic? Yeah, so I saw that this happened. I didn't know who that was and I, like, I was just like, oh, some famous guy, I don't know who that is, is razzing a player. Yeah, sure. Yeah, some golfer was like at the Panthers game and he picked up like a pylon, right, and was waving around a traffic cone. Yeah. And which is not, yeah, that's, it's not a comparison you really want as a defenseman. I think it's fair to say.

Nope. But yeah, I mean, the other thing that you have to say with this team is look at the, look at who the goalies are. We've identified the problem here, you know, and I wrote about this like, I think over the summer just being like, if Spencer Knight can't really step up and obviously he's got a lot of stuff going on. Yeah. He's in the player assistant program right now. Yes. So like I'm not, I'm not doing that.

But like, what I was saying last summer before we knew all the stuff we know now about him is that like he needs to be the number one guy or else this team's in a lot of trouble. Just because again, we don't. Well, certainly I don't. Maybe you feel slightly differently. I think this coach is as mid as it gets and maybe a little worse than that. and if Sergey

Barbarovsky is the goalie behind that coach's team, all bets are off. Mm-hmm. You know? Yep. And, you know, again,

the Spencer Knight situation, like, I feel so bad for the kid, and I hope he, he can get back to a healthy and happy place and that sort of thing. But, like, that's just, that is the problem for them. And, again, easily predictable is that they just, you knew you couldn't count on Bropovsky, and if they couldn't get somebody to step up.

And like Alex Lyon has been doing it for the last little while, and he's even worse than Bavrovsky, you know? So, again, like, I guess my point is if you had said, if you had come to me in. August or September or whatever before the season starts. And you said, hey, would it shock you to learn that the Winnipeg Jets and Florida Panthers with the coaches they hired are like right on the playoff bubble? I mean, my answer is like, oh, of course not. For the Jets, absolutely. But I mean, the Panthers, again, they were a hundred and 222 point team.

Would you really, you know, if you said they're on the bubble, and oh, by the way, the bubble is going to end up being like 90 points in the east. I mean, could you have seen the Panthers dropping 30 plus points? I mean, doesn't that feel like... I mean, it happened, obviously. Yeah, so the thing, I guess the thing with that is I just looked it up. Because in my head, I was like, wasn't Brovowski like pretty good last year, actually? And he was, he was 913.

And so the question was, do you think that's an outlier and, you know, he's going to keep trending down? especially behind a team where a team coached by a guy who really makes it so that his goaltender has to bail him out a lot now and Connor Hellebuck did for several years right but like Sergei Virobsky wasn't that guy to me you know no there's there's a difference between playing behind a Joel Quinville slash Andrew Brunette coach team and a Paul Maurice coach team Yep. So all that being said, do the Panthers make the playoffs?

There are one point back of a Pittsburgh team that is also not playing very well. Yeah. One point back, Pittsburgh has a game in hand. And Florida has that stretch that you just. Yeah. Let me quickly look at Pittsburgh's schedule down the stretch year just to make sure, because like that is a lot of winnable games. Okay, let's see.

Pittsburgh next up here. Nashville, Boston, Philly, New Jersey, Minnesota, Detroit, Chicago, Columbus. They both have pretty, I guess I would say Pittsburgh has one or two more actual tough games than the Panthers do. And is that enough for the Panthers to make up the gap? I guess it depends on how much they play Alex Lyon because he's been bad this year. Dom's got it at Pittsburgh, 67%, Florida 36. So basically, Yeah, Moneycock has the exact same numbers.

And with the Islanders not quite at 100 and Buffalo, Ottawa, Washington combined, not quite out of it. So that's why the percentages get a little bit off. But essentially, we can pencil the Islanders in. We can pretty close to ink all those other teams out. and it's two-thirds, Pittsburgh, one-third Florida. I still feel like Florida's odds a bit better than that. I feel like if you gave me two to one on the Panthers, I might take it.

Yeah, I think that's a good way of looking at it, especially now that I'm a sports betting genius. But, yeah, I don't know. I just think, you know, with the loser point and everything, it does feel like the penguins just have the inside track. I don't think it's impossible. at all. And in fact,

I think it's extreme, like, it wouldn't surprise me to see. I guess, okay. I guess what I'm saying is, I think it is just as likely that Pittsburgh blows it. Rather than the Panthers go and clean up,

against all those dog shit teams down the search. That's fair. That's just kind of where I'm at with it. So, yeah. Why don't we take, A break. Do you have anything else you want to put out there about these guys?

I do not. Yeah, me neither. So that's why. Okay, let's take a break and we'll be right back. Thanks. This week's episode of Puck Soup is brought to you by a new sponsor, Game Time. And folks, one of the things that many of you have likely experienced is sports fans, music fans, fans of musical theater. I don't know.

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Terms apply. Again, create an account, redeem code Puck for $20 off. Download GameTime today. It's game time.com. Last minute tickets, lowest price guaranteed. All right, we're back. And while we get into now, we talk, boy, we talked about some athletic stories already. But let's talk about one that Sean actually worked on where they went to a bunch of guys.

It's a good website. I hope they have like an offer or something where people could. It's so rare that they do. So I kind of doubt that they do right now. No, I don't think so. No, I'll look into it and by the time we do the plugs at the end of the show, I'll try to get that information. They'll have shuffled through maybe three or four different ones.

I'll call in a favor. See if there's anything I can do specifically for our listeners. That's right. But yeah, this is the story. John worked on, and it's about the place of fighting in the game. I think that the QMJHL's decision to ban fighting wasn't fully an independent decision, let's say, but the Q's decision to ban fighting seems to have jinned up a lot of discussion about its place in the game.

And so the fine folks at the athletic, they went over there and they said, hey, guys who used to fight, you think fighting's good? And folks, you're not going to believe what these guys had to say about it. Yeah. Look, there are certainly some guys in this piece that are primarily remembered as fighters, I would say. But not everybody. You know, we did like, yeah, I'm not surprised that Ryan Reeves is pro-fighting, considering he would probably not have a job in the NHL if it wasn't.

I'm not surprised at like Darren McCarty or even like a Craig Barouba. Think back of it fondly. But we did talk to some other guy. We talked to Brighton Schen. Talk to Scotty Bowman. You know, guy who knows the oldest hockey man you could find. Yeah, exactly.

It said, what do you think, bud? Yeah. Bill Garrett and guys like that. So anyways, it's interesting because it's, they certainly had a lot of interesting things to say. And we also walked through the history. You know, that was, that was, that was my role in this, is let's piece together the history.

I don't, you know, people know I don't actually talk to people. So that was, my buddies, Joe Smith and Rob Rossi did all the actual journalism work. And I just cut and pasted Wikipedia's fighting article around it. But there's some real interesting stuff in there. There's, you know, Darren McCarty talking about what he did to Claude Lemieux. he's let's just say he's to this day not apologetic about it at all. Even as he acknowledges that he, you know, if he did it today, he would be suspended probably for life instead of getting four minutes like he did back then.

You know, there's guys talking about grown up watching Bob Probert and some of these guys grown up watching the Flyers. Dean Eveson has a story about fighting Dale Hunter three times in one. night. And there's also some very, I thought entertaining stuff with some of the guys who were involved in that Rangers Devils line brawl from about 10 years ago at this point. I had forgotten about that. Yeah, where they lined up and just right off the face off, everybody starts fighting.

And John Torterella was furious. I guess the backstory was the Devils felt like the Rangers had pushed them around the last time they played. So the Devils came in and put all their tough guys out to start. like a very obvious message and they're the visiting team so torterella is the home coach gets that and they're talking about like what's what is happening in the dressing room when john torterella walks in with that lineup card and basically announces to his team that the devils are here to start a fight and i i got to put all all our tough guys out there didn't want to but he he knew

that he had to you know because otherwise somebody was potentially going to get hurt and a very funny quote about Brian Bickle, who's a defenseman, basically being told that he was going to be the starting center because they didn't have three forwards who were fighters. So they put him in, and him asking his teammates,

like, how do you win a face off? How do I hold my hands on a face off? And they're like, dude, don't worry about it. Like, you're not, we don't need you to win the face off. That's not why you're being sent out there. Like, don't worry about it. And he was like, no, I don't, I don't want, to look ridiculous.

So it's, I, fighting is one of those issues where a lot of times, people just, it's, it's like a Roarschak test, right? And you just, you see what you want to see. If you, if you love fighting or you love that era, I think you'll really enjoy the piece and you'll, you'll get some laughs out of it. If you, if you have never been able to stand fighting and you couldn't believe it, then, then you'll probably be infuriated by reading these guys talking about. about it, but maybe you'll get some insight into, or your eyes will roll so far into the back

of your head, maybe as a... Yeah, that was more my reaction. But at the very least, you'll get more insight into what these guys think and what they were thinking at the time. And this is part of a series. There has also been that Dan Robson wrote a very good piece on, like, the psychological impact of fighting on a lot of the guys who lived it. So, you know, not just, hey, getting punched in the face. But what is it like to know that, oh yeah, tomorrow night in front of 16,000 people, I got to fight a guy, bare knuckles, and, you know, it's going to be shown on every highlight reel. It's going to be on YouTube 10 seconds after it happens. Like, what does that do to somebody psychologically? And there have been quite a few other really good pieces as well.

So I recommend it to people to check it out. You know, Ryan Reeves thinks that fighting is good. I think that this article I wrote about fighting is good and that everybody should read. In fact, you couldn't even have journalism if you hadn't written that article. That's right. Yeah. If I hadn't written that piece, then, you know, somebody probably would have hit someone from behind. I don't know. That's right.

I lose a little bit on that. The thing that Dan wrote about, I say Dan, like I've ever spoken to this man in my entire life. The thing Dan Robson wrote about, like, the mentality of it is really interesting to me because when I covered, I think it must have been the 2010 Winter Classic around there. When the ruins and flyers played at Fenway. And there was so much talk going into that game. I don't know what started it, but there was so much talk going into that game about, you know, there's never been a fight in the Winter Classic. These teams, they have guys that will fight. and I remember being like standing near Sean Thornton when he's talking about it

and he's basically saying like what do you think this is a fucking joke that I'm going to go out there like you want me to go out there and just be like happy to get punched in the face by some guy on their team like it's not how it works and then immediately he like you know first period he fought um Dan Carcillo who when I asked him about it after the game was a lot more like yeah I've ever felt like I had to fight somebody, right? It's a winner classic. Why not?

You know? But yeah, it was, it was very interesting because I guess I'd never thought about like the, the mental side of like just knowing, yeah, I'm going to have to go out there and really wail on some guys. As part of this, this series we've done, there's a podcast that we already recorded, but it's going up on the weekend at the athletic hockey show's podcast, special episode. And one of the points I made on that is there were, you know, I know it's, it's fans that are either young or newer fans, a lot of them look back on that era. And they're like, how did that all seem okay?

And I said there were two, there were basically two lies that we told ourselves. The first lie was nobody gets hurt in a hockey fight, which sounds ridiculous, but that's what we used to say back then. because like, you know, we knew guys got black eyes or got a, you know, broken nose or tooth knocked out, but really getting hurt meant like somebody sticking their knee out and blowing your ACL out or hitting you from behind and, you know, you go in and, you know, you suffer a spinal injury. Hockey fights weren't like that, you know. Yeah, they didn't invent concussions until 1998. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

And obviously that turned out to be false. We know now there were like devastating long-term consequences of that sort of. of stuff. But the other lie we told ourselves was these guys love it. These tough guys, they are so happy to be out there. They're fighting for their teams. They love their jobs, man. Oh, they, um, look at the big

smile on that guy's face as he's skating to the penalty box. And we found out as well that for a lot of guys, that wasn't true. And there's, you know, a lot of problems with addiction, alcohol, you know, any, you know, things that you would do to literally to numb the pain, both physically

and emotionally. So I don't know. I've got I've got another piece coming out on Monday that you probably won't like very much. But the key point I make in that is we are never going back. Ever, ever,

ever. And whether we actually do reach a point where somebody in the NFL says, it's over. We're not having fighting anymore. They basically do what the Quebec Major Junior League is doing. Or whether it

fades out or whether it stays at the level it's at now, it'll never be back to what it was. Yeah, and I think I'm also with all the people who say the NHL will never actively ban fighting. Yeah. We used to think that's what was going to happen. Like, 30 years ago, when people said, like, get rid of fighting, we assume that's the only way you would ever do it was you would have to pass a rule. automatic ejection, suspension, all that. Well, it's all the social media these days that's really making kids not want to punch each other.

We took out the quote with, I won't say who it was because we took the quote out, but the guy who blamed it on socialism, he's like, it's the socialism these days. That's why you don't see people out there uppercutting each other in the face on television. Hard to argue. The Brandon Empire continues to grow. I blame Bernie myself. Bernie is pulling the strings on the puppet Joe Brandon. That's right.

But yeah, no, I just think that there will always be enough hockey men in the sport who just go, well, we're not, we're never getting, we couldn't possibly get rid of fighting. Like, you know, even if you look at, I don't know, Kyle Dubas, I bet if you said, hey, Kyle Dubus, you think fighting's good for hockey? You go, yeah, sure. You know what I mean? I tell you, man, that in the 200 hockey men world, this is an unquestioned truth that fighting is good for the game. Now, they would argue about, you know, how much and under what circumstances.

But, yeah. There is pretty close to unanimous agreement that we still needed in the game to police it, which I don't buy, but they do. Yeah, you know, it's funny because that article had a bunch of quotes of guys going like, in retrospect, having a bunch of guys who couldn't play that. That's kind of stupid, actually. Like having two, three guys on the roster who just, like, couldn't skate, but they were good at punching people and their whole job was to play four minutes a night. Yeah, I don't know why we were doing it. doing that. Anyway, fighting's good and that'll never change. Yeah, now we need one guy a night who can play a little bit, but we'll also punch people.

Yeah, it's, and I mean, the thing is, like, it's, there was a famous Brian Burke quote from 10 plus years ago when he was at the Leafs and they had Colton O'R and Fraser McLaren and all those guys. And remember they said, and now there's a damn name. There's a name. Whoa. First of all, if his middle name's Gord, that's the most Canadian name. of all time. Amen.

That's Toronto Maple Leaf playoff lineup member Fraser McLaren to you. They put Fraser McLaren and Colt Nour in the lineup against the Bruins.

How did that series go for that? I think it turned out well. I don't remember exactly, but I feel like the Leafs did well. When they got sent down, they sent Coltonor down to the miners and Brian Burke gave this like impassioned speech

about how the rats are going to take over the game. now that the enforcers are coming out. The rats are taking on. Has that happened? Does anybody want to argue that hockey is dirtier now than it was 10 or 20 or 30 years ago? And it's crazy because, like, we just went through this thing where, like, you know, there were a couple of suspensions in the last week or two.

And everybody was like, hey, wait a minute. Was that the first suspension since, like, December? Yeah. I'm not saying there's not dirty stuff anymore. But no, of course. No, of course. Good Lord. I mean, back in the day, like,

guys were, like, swinging sticks at people's heads, and Dale Hunter was crushing guys, like, 10 seconds after a goal. And, I mean, and half the time, it was the tough guys doing it. Yeah. You know, it's, and now it's like, I don't know, man.

I don't, it feels like if Brian Burke was right, then we would have seen it. And we'd be sitting now talking about, what do we do about all these rats? Yeah. I haven't heard that. Sidney Crosby died in a game three years ago, you know? It's, you know, um, it's weird because like, I am kind of of the opinion that if there's like literally no consequence, like, I think you can just get like checked really hard or whatever, um, to have that be your comeuppance for like a dirty hit.

But the thing is that so often we see fight, and again, this is a thing the NHL is like moving to stamp out. Oh, hey, I just saw some news come across the wire here. Mark Schifely has been moved to the wing as not being made available to the media today. Oh, that's a shame. I guess he just doesn't have anything interesting to say. Yeah, that's weird. but anyway, yeah, so I don't know, like, I think like that because we're seeing so much fighting after clean hits

or maybe not even fighting, but like scrums and pushing and shoving and all that shit. Like I think I think it's over, man. I think you don't really have to like legislated out of the game because all these guys that fight in the CHL, you know, they're never sniffing the NHL. They're never getting close to the NHL. And especially if this ban in the queue happens and if the OHL eventually follows, which a lot of people think they will, I mean, you're not that far from a day where people are going to be coming into the NHL and they will have never been in a hockey fight.

At least, you know, in their major development, high level hockey. So, I mean, to turn around and do it, you know, Another thing that a lot of people mentioned that we talked to was having the visors in place. That, I mean, literally, you think twice about trying to punch someone in the face when most of their face is covered with hard plexiglass. That doesn't really feel like a smart idea. So, yeah, I don't think, I'm at the point now where I'm not, I still think you'll see it become less and less of in the NHL.

I don't think you'll see it banned until there's something happens. And hopefully it's not a serious injury or God forbid a death or something. But there will be something that they will then turn around and go, there's like 50 fights a year in the whole league. Why don't we just ban it? And then they will. But not the way that we thought it was going to go down if it asked us 20 years ago. Yeah, for sure.

All right, let's move on to the pending. sale of the Ottawa senators. Now, you're an Ottawa man. I am. Uh, what were you here, an ear to the ground kind of stuff. Well, here's the thing, here's what my sources are telling me. And my sources are I just like an hour ago, uh, did my podcast with Ian Mendez. And he, he actually, again, he does real journalism. So he told me what was happening. So you don't have to, baby. Exactly. So, um, yeah, his, what he said is there, there's a lot of teams. or a lot of groups bidding on this. It seems as if we're making our way through the process,

but nothing's imminent. It might be a couple of months before somebody emerges as the favorite. What is interesting is, and the number will be very high, and everyone's going to be very impressed. It could be close to a billion dollars. That's what they're saying. Meanwhile, the Washington commanders are in the process getting sold for $6 billion in the NFL.

So just, yeah, let's keep that in mind when we're all falling over ourselves talking about, you know, an NHL team getting, you know, something, a sixth of that. I read it in the, in the auto, was it today or yesterday? I don't really remember. But basically, like,

one of the guys who's trying to buy the senators, maybe, is also trying to buy the commanders. So this guy's just scooping up all the teams in capital cities. It's a good business to be in, right? Because even if you don't make money, the value of the franchise always goes up. So, but yeah, the two interesting things with the Ottawa sale are number one.

There is now some backtracking on the idea of the new arena and where it was going to be. And would they, they do need a new arena, but there's now even talk that they could build a new arena where the current one is, which, you know, that's half the reason everyone complains about that place. So this to me, this to me is very transparent, right? Like when, because there's this patch of land in Ottawa called LeBretton Flats that is very well situated and very attractive and to anyone who, you know, to develop it and the NHL wants that. So what you had to do was a few years ago you had to make it sound like if we don't get that, if you don't put us at the front of the line for that patch of land, then there may not be a future for this team in Ottawa. and you get everybody scared, they push you to the front of the line, and now the senators are at the front of the line,

and they just have to figure out the price. Well, guess what? Now it makes sense to suddenly say, you know what, we don't really need it to be there. There's lots of places we could do. And, you know, so it's, they're going to wind up there. I'd be very surprised if that's not where the new arena is. The other thing that's interesting is the Ryan Reynolds factor.

Yeah, and I was asking you about this, because what a lot of us assumed, was that Ryan Reynolds would be sort of front and center through this process, but that he would just kind of float around between the different bids, and then when one of the bids won, they would then drop Ryan Reynolds into the,

become the face of that, right? Like, everybody wants Ryan Reynolds to be the face of this team and all of this stuff. But instead, he's, like, latched on to one of the specific bids and is basically working with them, and that's like the Ryan Reynolds bid. And I was asking, yeah, like, what happens if they don't win?

out of, you know, the half dozen suitors if they don't win, like, what happens is Ryan Reynolds out of the picture? And he didn't think so. He thinks that I, he said Gary Bettman phrased it in an interesting way that, that Ryan Reynolds is, is committed to seeing the process through with this one group. And he, you know, when you think about it, the process for that one group could be getting to the point where they're told, no, you didn't win. And then Ryan Reynolds has then seen the process through and now he can go and jump in front of some other group. But what Ian said that really caught my interest was he thinks that the reason Ryan Reynolds is with this group is that they have told him that they will basically have him running

the team, not as a figurehead, not as just a face of the PR guy, but that he would basically be given control of the team. And obviously he would hire people. He's not going to be the GM or whatever. but that he would basically be running the team. And I'm... Now, do you want to... I know you didn't watch Welcome to Rex.

No, I didn't, but... You know who he hired is like, I don't know what the guy's title is, but it's like a guy who's like director of football operations or whatever. Like, maybe not that main guy, but like one of the top guys. It was just some guy that wrote for Rob McElheny's Apple Plus show. All right.

And, well, but here's the critical part that you may not be thinking about, Sean. That guy's British. Okay. They were like, they're like, oh, we need someone to run this football team. Hey, you're British. Are there any Canadian comedy writers? You ever see some guys kick a, you ever see some guys kick a ball around? What do you think?

He's like, yeah, sure. I'm just some fucking comedy writer, but I guess I'll do it. Yeah. I don't know if that guy still works on Vision Quest or whatever that Apple show is. I've never seen it. It's going to be fair. If they actually did that, I mean, hey, for the rest of us, hell yeah. How fun would that be?

Let a celebrity run a hockey team. Why not? But I really wonder, like, how that goes for the senators. But I'm curious to find out. So anyways, yeah, that seems to be where it's at with the senators. Don't worry about the whole about the arena stuff. Don't worry about Ryan Reynolds being locked into one group. He will end up.

he will end up involved with this some way or another, but... That's the thing I'm worried about. I'm worried that, like, one of the three guys who gets a story by credit on Deadpool 4 is going to be running the Ottawa senators, no matter which team or group wins the bidding. Could happen.

That's the big point of concern there. I feel like Pierre Dorian has kind of got his fingers crossed for that, though, don't you? Yeah, you put me out of my misery, he's saying. Oh, yeah. Well, maybe that too. Um, but yeah, no, I, it's something to, to watch with like a lot of interest just because, you know, presumably whoever buys the team is doing so kind of with the understanding that like, owners who buy teams now spend money. All the teams that have like kind of cheaper owners or whatever, those are like not newer teams or those are the Arizona coyotes, I guess, would be the other one.

Yeah. Um. Or not newer owners, I guess I should say instead, not newer teams. But yeah, this is just one of those things. We're like, I don't know anything about all these different groups. It could all be nothing. I really don't know. Oh, CTV article from two hours ago, Ryan Reynolds in Ottawa as Senator Sale beats up.

Yeah, he's meeting with the mayor and that and doing posting photos and stuff like that. So he's very much involved. Yeah, for sure, for sure. But yeah, the thing I'm mostly interested in is, like, if this hits a billion dollars for the Ottawa senators, like, what happens when somebody wants to sell a good team? Like, you know, I don't know what percentage of the penguins got sold to Fenway, but like they didn't pay that much. And that's a much more profitable franchise, I would think. And that was, you know, that was something else that Ian and I talked about is, you know, this is a unique situation because the owner died. And there's no very little interest in, it sounds like, in keeping the team with the family this day.

Like there wasn't a succession plan or anything like that. So it's rare that you have a sports team become completely available. Yeah, for sure. To own 100% of or, you know, whatever the vast majority is without the other owner wanting to stick around. So, yeah, it's interesting. but yeah, we're making our way to a conclusion, but not quite there yet. Yep. One last thing I wanted to talk about, and then we'll take another break here, is it looks like maybe this is it for Jonathan Taves.

He was talking like that a little bit, or at least as if he's contemplating that. You know, maybe he doesn't know. Yeah, and you know what they say, you start thinking about it, you're done. Can be. You know? But so obviously he's missed a bunch of time with an illness and missed all of last season with what I think is probably a related illness. Yes. Although I don't want to say for sure.

And now he's back practicing with the team and they only have whatever six or seven games left, I think. And so the hope is that they can get him in the lineup before the. end of the season and if they can, will that be it for Jonathan Taze? It's one of those things, much like finding out that Mark Schifley is 30 years old. It's like, well, Jonathan Taves can't retire. He can't be that old, right? And then you're looking, you're like, no, I guess he is. You know, that's how it goes, I guess.

Yeah. It's a... I don't know how to feel about it, I guess. I mean, it's just the passage of time, whatever. It's the passage of time and it makes you feel weird. And with his health problems, you know, we would say this for any player, but, you know, especially under his circumstances. If he can't go, he can't go.

And that's just his contract is expiring. You know, it may just, it may be time. And not to mention that, you know, if let's say he looks around and goes, man, if I really, if I really put everything I've got into it, I could, I could, I could play another couple years. You're going to play that in Chicago? Yeah. To finish seven in the central two years in a row. And you're not chasing another championship.

And I mean, is he open to going to some other team? Maybe. And who's going to want to sign him, given that like, well, he might miss 30 games due to illness and he wasn't even that good this year

when he was healthy and blah, blah, blah. Like, it's a really tough situation. You just, again, you just hope for the best. you hope he can be happy and healthy in like his normal life as opposed to as opposed to like being able to play hockey again. But again, I just wanted to highlight it because he's obviously rather notable as a player over the last decade plus, but also like the way he might be going out kind of, you know,

kind of sucks. It does. Although, I mean, not too many get the. get the good exit, but it's a tough one. And we'll wait and see. And I guess the other thing you'd say is, if he is thinking of, you know, if retirement is imminent, let's cross our fingers that he does get back in the lineup this year and gets like that last game in Chicago. One last skate for sure. Yep.

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All right, a couple things here right at the end of the show. Number one, I wanted to talk briefly about the Philip Heedel contract. It was four years and, what was it? 4.435. That's why I did not remember what the number was. Yeah, seems like it's a pretty good deal. Not a great deal, I would say, but like a solid one. The Rangers are definitely getting a little more from him than they're paying for.

But it does create a kind of interesting dynamic for these guys, in my opinion. They still have to re-sign Kianne Miller, who's going to be, you know, expensive, I would think. They still have to resign Alex Lefrenier, who not so much. But then they got to look at, you know, other contracts that are that are up like, you know, do they want to take a crack at resigning Patrick Kane? How can they do that, you know? Vladimir Tarasenko, same question, I guess. And yeah, I don't know.

Do you have any thoughts on the state of the Rangers? Not really other than, you know, that's the interesting part, is both of those guys when they traded for them. We all went out, well, they're classic rental, but sometimes. You know, Kane felt like, like less of a rental, I would say Kane. But Teresenko for sure falls into that category. Just the way everybody was talking about, well, obviously Kane's going to the Rangers. The fact that, yeah, he only wanted to go. He's doing it for two and a half months.

That's it. Yeah. Yeah, okay, that's, yeah, that is, that's fair. But, yeah, no, I mean, they're going to be interesting to see, because they are locked in on a lot of guys. And we'll find out, I mean, they could absolutely, and they were in the final four last year. They could be back there, maybe even go further,

and then we go, yeah, of course you want to keep this group together. Having the best goalie in the world making $5 million really seems to help. that seems to be a good starting point. I like that better than the Panthers plan of having one of the worst goalies making $10 million. He's been perfectly mediocre this year. How dare you, sir. I'm sorry. I owe him.

But yeah, it feels like the Rangers did the thing where they shed a bunch of salary cap space and like, oh yeah, that guy was making a little too much money. That guy was making a little too much money. And now they're right back to it where, like, Panthers. and you're going to pay whatever you're you're paying him. The Zabandajad deal is a pretty good one for now, at least. Crider, kind of the same thing. But like Trocheck, Goodrow, Philip Heedle, you're like, oh, those guys combined are making like 12, 13, 14 million bucks?

Mm-hmm. I don't know, man. And especially because it's like... If the team does well in the playoffs, it'll look, it'll all look smart. Yeah, and again, I don't think Heidel is the problem here. To be clear, I think he's a really good third, maybe second line center a year or two from now, right? But, you know, this is the thing I guess I wanted to say is every time I see that like one of those guys scored one of those three guys on the kid line, which I hate that fucking name. but one of those guys scores a goal.

All the New York media people are like, the kid line does it again. Yeah. And it's like, don't they have like, I looked it up the other day, they have like 50 combined goals this year, which isn't bad or anything, but the way they get talked about,

you would think it was double that. You're trying to bait me into suggesting that Capo Caco should be slightly more productive in his fourth NHL season. And there's a guy, he's making 2.1, by the way. Yeah. Was it you or somebody mentioned to me that Jack Hughes got his 40th goal of the season on the same night that Kako got the 40th goal of his career?

I didn't mention that. I saw that someone made an infographic about it, and some Rangers fan quote tweeted it that was like, this is just mean, man. What are you doing? Okay. So, yeah, I didn't have anything to do with that, but I did see that it happened. I'll put it that way. Someday, Ranger fans, I'm not remotely suggesting that there's any problem here. Some guys just take five years before they become 15 goalscores.

You know, patience. I think he's at 15 right now. I just looked at it. Is that true? Yeah. No, I'm sorry. He's at 14. My mistake.

Thank you. My pleasure. But I really am interested to see what they do with Miller because they are. already at 71 and change. And I'm not suggesting he's going to be like a $9 million player or whatever if like Adam Fox and Jacob Trueber are making nine and eight, nine and a half and eight respectively. Right. But like, I don't know, they got to sign, they got to sign more people than just the guys

they have locked in for next year. Plus Miller. They'll only have, let's say Miller's making six million bucks. let's say they have like $4 million in cap room to add

five guys to the roster basically including a backup goalie it's gonna be tight and again this is the problem with the flat cap obviously

but you know this is just another situation where the Rangers kind of painted themselves into a corner

a little bit you know getting a little high on their own supply with the with the kid line and then, you know, overpaying

for like Vincent Trocheck and Barclay Gooddrow. And again, maybe not even by a lot on either of those guys individually, but a million bucks here, half a million bucks there. For every guy in the lineup, it adds up. I think maybe the other thing we should do is just mention that you mentioned the flat cap.

We don't know how flat it's going to be because the NHLPA guy Marty Walsh was talking recently about that and I guess was asked you know are the players open to having the cap go up by more than that and he said yes but we're not

interested in doing any changes to escrow which would seem to imply the answer is no we're not interested but I guess to be yeah it does seem like that would the one affects the other pretty strongly yeah But yeah, I just thought, like I said, I like the contract for Heel a lot. And I like the player a lot.

But, you know. And I just want to say that I'm glad that you brought it up and you had to pronounce his name first because I did not know that's how his name is pronounced. And I would have screwed that up badly. Yeah. And everybody would have said, well, he did it again. This is the new Herberder or whatever. You're always mad at you how you say Huberto.

Yeah. Just because I say it, you know, extremely wrong. Absolutely incorrect. Yeah. So this is the last thing I wanted to talk about here. Ryan Nugent Hopkins is at 96 points, closing in on 100. I don't know when the last time a team had three 100-point players on it at the same time was, but it feels like it was probably a long time ago.

Yeah, and it feels like it was probably a bigger deal than absolutely nobody seeming to know or care that Ryan Newtard Hopkins is doing this. It's only a career year. It's only, yeah. This is the one downside of playing with Carter McDavid. Is that nobody notices that you, well, then again, maybe it's also the upside because he's not getting anywhere close to 100 if he doesn't play with Connor and David. No, he's not. but it's sort of like, you know, hey, I got 100 points. It's like, yeah, dude, you were 50 points back of your team leader.

Like, yeah, so we're lots of guys. Yeah. McDavid, by the way, has to score 10 goals in his last seven games to get 70 goals. But he is only seven points away from 150 points. So that's really cool to me. I think that rocks. But anyway, the thing I was just going to go down the list of guys who have had really good seasons in the NHL. Because I've heard this several times now.

Oh, Ryan Nugent Hopkins. Is this the quietest 100 point season ever? Pertheses. Yeah, you bet it is, buddy. But I'm just going to go down and we'll ask about a few of these here. Miko Ranton is two goals away from 50. Would that be the quietest 50 goal season in quite a while? In a while, man, it's cool that we can even talk about quiet 50 goal seasons again, eh?

Because, I mean, back in the day, there were some real quiet 50 goals seasons. But in a while, yeah, I think it would be. Well, so the reason I ask is, Braden Point is three away. Okay. With seven games to play as well. and people were saying that's going to be the quietest. Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean.

Whoever gets there first, man, that's. Or I guess whoever gets there last, really. That would be the quieter one. Yeah, that's true. How about, how about this? How about, um, Mika Zabanajad's two away from 40 again? Pretty quiet. Haven't heard a lot about that.

Yeah. A lot about the kid line. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. He's, that's, that's, that's, I mean, it's because he's playing behind the kid line. That's the...

That's exactly right, yeah. There was another one, too. What was it? Oh, what's his name from Tampa as well? Is about to hit like 30 goals. Brandon Hagel is maybe just did hit 30 goals. Yeah, I saw that at some point. Like, he was coming along at like nearly a point of game, which was fascinating.

Yeah, he's at 27 goals right now. Yeah. That's really interesting to me. because he was like, you know, last year, obviously, you know, there's the big trade at the deadline. They gave up a ton to get him, and everyone kind of goes, oh, okay. But, hey, no one's going to suggest this is the lightning. This is what they do. And then he didn't really do much in the playoffs.

And you're sort of like, okay, well. Right. And then this year, suddenly he was just like, oh, right, I play for Tampa Bay. I've got to be amazing now. Yeah, that's right. And then they were like, oh, well, let's go do it again. Tanner Genoa, I bet you it'll work again. And we'll see.

Well, not so much. Here's another one. Clodjeru has a puncher's chance at a point of game season. Is this the quietest point of game season from a guy that's like 50 years old that you've ever? Maybe, especially a guy, like a free agent, who goes in signs with a new team. A lot of times old, these guys get watched. And I think partly just because the senators have been a disappointment.

largely. Still, that's, yeah, he's, he's been real good. It's a good story. Yep.

And then one more for you here. If I were to say, how many guys have 30 goals on the Los Angeles Kings, a team that's basically guaranteed to make

the playoffs at this point, they look really good. How many guys on that team have 30 goals? I'll say one. One is the correct answer. Now, who is that man? Is it Kevin Fial?

No, it's Adrian Kempi. Jeez. Is that not correct? crazy. He has 36 goals. He could hit 40 this year. That would be, I'm sorry, folks. We're going to talk about the quietest blank season this year. Yeah. Adrian Kempi may be hitting 40 goals is the quietest anybody has ever done that. I don't care who else. Name another guy. Yeah. Name another guy who's done it more quietly than that. That is. And he's a good player. He's a really good player. That is really something. Wow. Yeah. Classic Eastern media, folks. Not even a of what's going on in L.A. I've watched a fair number of Kings games lately.

They've been really fun to watch. Boy, the Kings are fucking hot as hell lately. Holy shit. I know they lost to the flames a couple of nights ago. They're 15, 3 and 3 in their last 21 games. Yep, they're really good. I think I, pretty good.

Somebody was saying that like their last X number of games, 20 or 30, they have the same record that the Bruins did in their first 30, let's say. Well, of course, we're all falling all over ourselves going like, Holy crap, the Bruins are amazing. So it's a little scary. Going back to December 15th, they're 28, 9, and 5. Holy shit.

What happened to the Kings? Going back a while. Yeah. Don't want to talk about a quiet 100-point season. Los Angeles Kings. Boy, oh, boy. Anyway, folks, that's it. We're done for this week.

Not a lot going on, quite frankly, in the world of hockey. Sean, why don't you hit them with some plugs? You can find all my stuff at The Athletic, including that very cool series on fighting that we've been doing. You can also find me on The Athletic Hockey Show with Ian Mendez on Thursdays. Just recorded that and as well as the special episode on Saturday. And you're not going to believe this, but I pulled a few strings. Exclusively for listeners of Puck Soup, $1 a month is the current offer with promo code, whatever your credit card number is. just go and punch that in when it asked for it.

But it only works on my article. You have to do, yeah, send it to me. If it doesn't work, email it to me and I'll get on that. But yeah, you got to click on my articles. If you go to Gentile's articles, you have to pay like double. It's no good. But if you go to one of mine, you're all set, dollar a month. That's right.

And then for me, go to E.P.Rinkside.com. You just find all my articles and stuff like that. But what I guess I should say here is that there's a new tier of subscription on Elite Prospects. Previously, when you paid for the monthly subscription, you got everything. You got like all the deep stats and stuff like that that you can pull off any player's page and all that kind of stuff. If you're not interested in that and you only want the articles, the good folks at Elite Prospects are here for you, We have a new tier that for $5.99 a month, you get all the articles on EP Rinkside, but none of the elite prospect stuff. So if you just want to be a real article head, this is a cheaper way to do it.

I have people looking into whether the I Love EP code works the same way on that tier. Hopefully they can get back to me by the time we're done recording. this episode in three minutes, but I doubt they will. But if you still, I guess the thing to say about that, though, is that if you're looking for like the draft guide and the free agent guide and all that kind of stuff, that's actually on elite prospects, even though we publish it, like we co-publish it on EP Rinkside. So if you only get the E.P. Rinkside stuff, you don't get the huge draft guide that's like 1,200 pages or whatever it is every year. So just keep that in mind if the, you know, draft

three months away, so something to think about. But yeah, articles from me, Dmitri Filipovich, Jayfresh, and, you know, all are many, many prospect experts. You'll get them all just, you know, for six bucks a month. And the other thing to plug, I guess, is the Pucksu Patreon. We just did a bonus episode with Grunk Badunski. and, you know, all kinds of stuff going on over there as usual.

So check all that out. Patreon.com slash puck soup, eP.Rinkside.com. And that's it for plugs for me as well. Yeah, have a good one, folks. Thanks for putting up with this delay that I had due to illness. But I feel like we got there with it all. We did. Allswell and Enswell.

That's right. Until next week, and hopefully back to the normal day recording. Have a good one. Bye bye. Bye bye. Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes.

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