Puck Soup - Thomas Middleditch

Episode Date: January 17, 2019

We talk hockey, tech and nerd stuff with Thomas Middleditch of "Silicon Valley," including his stint as a fake Canadian NHL analyst for the LA Kings. Also, Greg and Ryan and Sean discuss that fake trade tweet that fooled a Philly beat writer, what you need to know about CBA talk optimism. the Sabres' bubble bursts, the West wild card is nuts, Rick Nash and the top five hockey hip-hop references in honor of Snoop Dogg.

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And enjoy the show. Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slapshots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and twos. It's your weekly bowl of Hagi and Nancet. I'm Greg Wischinski of ESPN. I'm Ryan Lambert from Yahoo. I'm Sean McIndoo from The Athletic.

And you're in Puck Soup once again to talk about the exciting world of hockey and all of its glory and splendor. Before we get to Gary Bettman's PR tour, I want to talk about the thing that we talked about right before we got on the air, which is Sam Cartcidi, Philadelphia Flyers, beat writer for the Philadelphia Daily News being duped by the world's worst Photoshop into believing that a trade had been completed between the Edmonton Oilers and the Philadelphia Flyers involving Cam Talbot, Jesse Polvi-R-R-V, and I

believe it was Wayne Simmons, right? It was the guy. I had a rant about this on ESPN and Ice, the other podcast, that was prolonged and probably longer than any of the other hockey talk that we did. So I wanted to find out what you guys thought about this epically fucking Titanic blunder in the history of hockey journalism. Sam seems like a guy who doesn't know how the internet works is, and just generally is not very savvy about things that happened after, say, 1984. Famously, he's also the guy who, when the Roots played the Winter Classic, one of the few

hip acts to ever play the Winter Classic. Yeah. He tweeted several times, like, I don't know why the roots are here. They should have got haul and oats. I don't even know if these guys are from Philly. And it's like, like maybe the most famous thing about the roots is that they're from Philadelphia. But, you know, I'm also not a 68-year-old man or whatever. So that, you know, that's a problem.

Sean, before you go, to frame it for the folks at home, the tweet, that Sam was duped by, it says, trade alert, the Edmonton-Oilers have traded gold tender, Cantalbot, and forward Jesse Polvi-R-V to the Philadelphia Flyers. Flyers, by the way, I just realized, I've read this tweet 105 times. I just realized Flyers isn't capitalized in the tweet. Nope, no. For forward, Wayne Simmons, stay tuned to TSN for more information about this trade. It is from, allegedly, the TSN hockey Twitter handle. And here are the telltale signs that it might be complete and utter bullshit.

Oh, man. The font of the tweet is 75 times smaller than any font that you've ever seen on Twitter. There are no handles in it to alert the teams of the trade like they normally do to get SEO. The fact of the matter is that the words TSN hockey are slightly faded by the erase tool that somebody used on Photoshop in order to place the bullshit text there. And I haven't done a character count, but I'm pretty sure in this world of, you know, Tab, was it 280 characters you get in Twitter? I think this is about 7,500 characters, this tweet. So I am pretty sure that it was a fake.

It did not stop Sam from going after the venerable Bob McKenzie to try to say this is the TSN post from today, confusing post and tweet. Apparently it was taken down a few minutes later. Apparently taken down by the organization that never actually tweeted it. I yield the floor to you, Senator, from Canada. Okay, so a couple of things here. First of all, you didn't even fully do it justice because the list of things that made this an obvious fake is even longer. Like, the text isn't aligned properly. And maybe my favorite piece of it is that the whole idea here, the reason that this was a big scoop that not just Sam, but Flyers fans and Oilers fans and other people were sharing, was the idea, as you said, that TSN.

posted it and then took it down very quickly. And yet the screen grab shows the tweet as being one hour old, which would be an indication that if your whole argument is it got taken down that maybe that didn't happen. I don't know, Sam. I don't think I've ever fallen for a fake like this, but I know I've been close a couple of times. There have been a few times where my fingers hovered over the retweet button and then I've been like, wait a second, there's something, maybe, maybe something's wrong here and I've,

and I've actually clicked. Right. Yeah, absolutely. But there's a difference between like, but looking at the tweet from Darren Durger and it just looks like a tweet. Yeah. And it's bullshit. Or, you know, you'll get a tweet from, uh, HNIC, a refrigerator and it looks like a real tweet. But when you get one that like this, that literally is cut and pasted and the wrong fun, I mean, it honestly looks like one of those, if you were looking at the Twitter feed of knock-off toys that you find in stores in, like, China. It looks like a knock-off of a tweet. That's how misshapen and obvious it is.

It's a fake tweet made by somebody who has never seen Twitter before and is just kind of winging it. But the best part of this story is that, you know, needless to say, when you put a false piece of news out there and you attribute it to another news organization, that news organization tends to get a little bit annoyed by that. Salty. And so you had Bob McKenzie come in, and the exchange is just like if people, if people haven't seen it, they need to check it out.

Because here's the thing, like Bob McKenzie on Twitter comes across as a very nice guy. And I think you guys will back me up that. In real life, he's a huge piece of shit. Just kidding. No, in real life, when you meet him, he's actually even nicer than that. Yeah, he's super right. One of the few guys that, like, he really is, you know, the nice guy thing on Twitter isn't just an act.

He's a really nice guy. And so what we got was- It has a margarita blender. You keep that to the- Don't forget about the margarita blender. Yeah, for sure. So what we got was super nice Canadian hockey uncle Bob McKenzie having to very nicely and as gently as possible slap down this irresponsible, you know, posting that was.

disparaging the organization he works for. And it was like this great series where, like, I think the first one, he was, he was like, nobody, nobody's tweeted that. I have it here. Yeah. I have it here. The venerable Bob McKenzie tweeted when Sam Cartchidi, who's a hashtag, by the way, his handle, by the way, should be said, is Broad Street Bull.

So let's just get right to that. Cartcidi tweeted, Flyers say that there's no truth to the TSN report that Wayne Simmons is being traded to Edmonton for Camtale but Jesse Polly Arvey. Story has since been removed. Story has since been removed, which would indicate the story was on

TSN's website, right. Bob McKenzie, mimicking the fucking cadence of Cartchiti's tweet, I'm told TSN says there's no truth to your report that says TSN reported it. None of our insiders slash reporters are aware of this quote unquote report, tsend.ca says nothing was posted, no story posted, no story removed, according to our people. If that's incorrect, let us know. Yes. If that is such a,

like a wonderfully Canadian way to tell somebody that they're full of it is to conclude it by saying if you're not full of it and we've made the mistake, please do. Please do let us know. And so then, and I'm hoping you've got the next series of tweets because then what happens is Sam goes back. He finds the screen grab that he may or may not have previously even seen, but that apparently was floating around on Facebook or whatever it was. And he posts it and says, here's what I'm looking at and looks real to me.

But if it's not, then, you know, let us know. And McKenzie's follow-up was just like a master class in passive aground. aggressive Canadian saltiness. He said, he, Cartini said, here's the TSM post from today. Apparently it was taken down a few minutes later. As you said, it has an hour time stamp on it. Bob McKenzie, I'll try to do the best Bob McKenzie impression I can do. Sam, as near as I can tell, you got duped by a fabricated screen cap that never existed on our website. And there it goes. Yes. As near as I can tell. As near as I can tell. I'm going to just leave. The in between one, though, is the Canadian nice one.

Because after Bob, you know, eviscerated Sam as politely as possible, then he tweets a classic McKenzie. Now, did one of our TSN branded radio stations report something? Don't know. Not that I'm aware of. Are you sure it wasn't a fake account or someone who fabricated a screencap? Anyway, just curious because we haven't seen it. I mean, this is just curious is brutal, dude. This is the equivalent of like, you know, and I walk into the kitchen and the cooking

jar is empty and my son is sitting there with cookie crumbs all over his face telling me that he didn't eat the cookies. And like, I have to remember next time to drop an as near as I can tell on him. And be like, as near as I can tell, you have chocolate chips smeared all over your chin. If this is incorrect, please let me know. But I believe that that that might be what's going on. It was such a... So good. And I mean, early clubhouse leader for best. fake fake out tweet of the trade

deadline season which normally is very competitive but I feel like we've like we've almost got it locked down now six weeks out

and it feels like it was early this year too like it was well placed it was like a warming up in the bullpen

kind of thing yeah exactly like nobody would have bought this except except a guy who like you know

believe like is 100% on board that like Jade Helm was real or whatever you know what I mean like just like, again, like, it really is, you know, Facebook uncle shit to believe, well, I saw this one screen grab from, you know, real conservatives USA 14 or whatever.

And even if, like, even if you had, if it if it was a real screen grab, if it got yanked down, that would be evidence that the story was incorrect. I mean, like places like TSN aren't in the habit of breaking big news. Right, to put them on blast for that. Yeah. Yeah. And then immediately yanking it down to keep it a secret is generally not the way it goes. So I don't know. I would love to know like what kind of DMs or emails were being sent in the background of all of that.

Oh, yeah. I'm guessing they weren't quite as polite as the public-facing tweets were. Yeah. The two things that we do have to mention here, though, about this are one, that Sam Crachiti actually took this. amateur hour bullshit fake tweet to Flyers management to ask them if it was true. So now you're just making an ass of yourself. Like if you can't, if you can't, you know, use a modicum of logic to dictate to dictate whether or not this bullshit thing is true or not.

And by the way, it's as simple as just finding if anyone else is tweeted about it, finding if there was a link to it on TSN at any point. Like, it's kind of how to do that, Greg. Like, come on, dude. But, but, right, it's, but it's, but that's, but that's, but that's not an excuse, though. I understand that, but like, I'm not saying he didn't fuck up or whatever, but like, I, he's just a guy who doesn't seem to really have it all together, right? And it's, and in much the same way that like, it, you know, when Bob Cole occasionally just goes silent for 35 seconds in the middle of a game, you're just like, nah, it's just one of those things. And, you know, it's, it's part of the charm of Sam Cartcidi that, you know, like, you can't count on this. guy to, you know, use his brain correctly in 2019. Like, it's just not, that's not how it works anymore.

But it makes him mental because you know if this was a reader who emailed him, this trade, and said, this happened. He wouldn't take that trade, that email to Flyers Brass, but he took a bullshit fabricated fucking faux tweet to them, just asked them about it because he thought it was real journalism. And that's embarrassing as shit. And the other thing to do that we didn't mention. It's embarrassing, but like nobody, nobody's, again, like, he comes in, he's like, or, you know, let's say he texted whoever he texted.

Like, nobody in the Flyers organization was like, this is very atypical of what Sam's getting up to. Like, he's usually so on the ball. Like, that didn't happen. So, like, I can't, like, it's not, it's not a thing of, like, I can't get mad at him or whatever, but, like, who would be surprised by this, really? Okay. And then my favorite part of it. Just real, two quicks and then we'll go to, then Greg. First of all, I'm going to show a tremendous amount of restraint and pretend like I didn't just hear Ryan disparage Bob Cole. And I'm not going to go in.

I'm not disparaging it at all. Oh, boy. I'm not disparaging him at all. I'm just saying, like it, like I said, it's part of the charm at this point. We appreciate your retraction appearing. Everything is happening. I don't think I retracted anything. And the other thing is, is just to add just a little bit more context.

All of this was happening as the Oilers were playing in a game in which both players were involved. Like, Cam Talbot wasn't the starter, but he was sitting on the bench. So you had, like, people in the press box who were tweeting, like, Camp Talbot is sitting on the bench in a baseball cap right now. He doesn't look like he has been traded. You know, Jesse Pliarvey is taking a shift right now that typically wouldn't happen after. you've been dealt. Yeah, we've literally seen guys get pulled from games, yeah.

It really was like a perfect storm. Everything really shifted the paradigm. Yeah, for sure, the other thing I wanted to mention was the fact that, and we didn't touch on this yet, was the fucking globetrotter level of dunking that occurred by everybody on the internet on Sam Cartyidi after this, including a really, and this is the cherry on top of the Sunday right here, a tweet that was sent out by somebody with a picture of Claude Giroux and Microsoft Paint basically on top of it that read, quote, Flyers Trade Giroux to Sharks for Stuff dash at TSN.

And the cherry on the Sunday is it was retweeted by former Philadelphia beatwriter Frank Saravelli, now of TSN, prompting his former rival Sam Cartini or Frander, I don't know what the fuck they were to tweet if Frank Saravelli wrote it and he and I see he retweeted it it must be true Frank still classy after all these years so kudos to Sarah Valley for for jumping up on the on the trampoline and sending one through the hoop as well after this fucking mess it was great how could you not though like that that's just how it goes yeah all right moving on to other media matters as we start off the show very journalistically uh why why is everybody writing um this stuff about Gary Bettman and the optimism that the league seems to have towards labor peace

when I don't think the players feel the same way? Where did this come from? Well, I mean, it's coming from Gary Bettman, which does make it a story. And I don't doubt that there's some truth to this that the owners are more optimistic. And Gary Betman is, is less inclined to push for a full out, difficult negotiation and work stoppage and all of that. I mean, when you see guys like Pierre or Elliott writing pieces on this, they're not just grabbing quotes out of the air. I don't doubt there's something to this. What I don't understand is why any fan would respond to this in any other way than saying, you know what, I'm glad to hear you say that, Gary, but we will believe it when we see it.

And you will get credit for being a dove and not a hawk in this negotiation the moment that we see you putting pen to paper on a new CBA or an extension and not a second before. I mean, the idea that there's any sort of optimism to be found here, you know, maybe there is. but how many times do we have to see the same playbook put in place before we start getting a little skeptical? I wrote about this and I made a reference to it in something I wrote this week and I went looking for a link because I wanted to link to a story about the quote to give the readers kind of the larger context because I was just sort of doing it quickly. And I found one of the top results. I looked for that exact phrase from Gary Bettman where he said the quote was, I am not looking for a fight. And I searched for Gary Betman, I am not looking for a fight.

And one of the first articles that came up was from 2003, a year before the lockout, it wiped out an entire season in which Gary Bettman said the exact same words in the exact same order. So, I mean, if that doesn't tip us off to the fact that there is definitely a large dose of PR and spin here, and we should be very skeptical. and if it turns out that that skepticism was misplaced and that this was all very sincere and legitimate and we end up getting a deal in place, then that's awesome. But until that literally that moment comes, I don't see why any fan would be buying into this. Let's put it this way. Anybody who buys that, like, there can be labor peace in our time in this league is like just a rude walking down the midway, right?

like just all their money clutched in one fist and a big thing of cotton candy in the other. And they're like, I'm going to win that teddy bear. All I'm going to do is throw the ball and knock over the milk jugs. Sure. And I'm going to get that bag. And it's like anybody who has ever been in this carnival before should know 100%. And this is on the media too for just like dutifully going like, okay, Gary sounds good. We'll use that quote.

And that's one of those things of like, I just think there's more of a duty as a journalist generally to like push back against things that are, I don't want to say obvious bullshit, but obvious bullshit,

right? Where it's like, Gary Bebben's not looking for a fight, but like he's definitely going to give them one the second he doesn't get exactly what he wants. I'm not looking for the one from 2003. I'm not looking for a fight, but I do want an entire salary cap.

And if we don't get that, then there will be a fight. Exactly. And like I think, I feel like with this, it might be worthwhile to do like a quick kind of summary of where things are out with the CBA. Because I get the feeling that there's some confusion out there because the current CBA expires in 2022, but everybody's talking about a lockout in 2020. And yet there's something happening in 2019 that seems important. So let's just to do a real quick summary, the current CBA that was signed after the last lockout is a 10-year deal. It runs until 2022-22. So that would expire right on the eve of the 2020-23 season.

But both sides have the option to opt out two years early, which would mean the CBA ends in 2020. That's why everyone's talking about 2020 being the lockout year. the window for those sides to opt out comes this September in 2019. So both sides have the option in 2019 to say we want to opt out and at which point the CBA, the clock starts ticking down to one year to get a new deal done. And all of that's important because there's sort of these moving pieces and different deadlines. And just because one side opts out in 2019 doesn't mean there's going to be a lockout in 2020.

They have a full year to negotiate something. And if neither side opts out, that doesn't mean that we have labor peace in our time. It just means we kick the can down the road two more years. But what I think is – go ahead. Go ahead. Yeah. Well, I was going to say – just go back to what Ryan said before. Like, you know, Batman's saying I'm not looking for a fight in 2003 when there is obviously a huge fight to be had about what the financial system of this league is going to look like.

I think is different than when he says it now because honestly from the owner's side things are pretty fucking good. There's not a lot they're looking for. So I do think that the league is being truthful to that end, but I think it really is ignorant of the amount of issues on the player's side. The Olympics isn't one.

They're going to the fucking Olympics. That's not even worth a discussion. It's redefinition of hockey-related revenue and it's figuring out how that can maybe ease the escrow thing because that's the game for the players, is the escrow thing. They should not have that taken out of their salaries anymore. Yeah, right.

Like when the Magna Carta got signed, the king wasn't looking for a fight either, right? It was, you know what I mean? Like, he was pretty happy with how things were going because all those nobles or whatever and all the serfs and things like that. They were getting caught. And they were like, oh, yeah, that's crazy

that you guys seem upset about that. I feel like this is a pretty good arrangement. Are you sour about thine ever? So here's what's going to happen. Here's where this is leading to. And this is why the kind of the context of how everything works is important for fans to understand out there. Is when September rolls around and the two sides have their opt-out periods, the owners go first. I don't remember the exact dates, but they've got like at the beginning of September,

the owners have the option to opt out. If they don't, then the players get an option a few weeks later. And you're right. This deal is working reasonably well for the owners. It's quite possible that they will not want to opt out and they're going to want to continue until 2022. Again, none of that means we don't get a lockout in 2022. It just means they're willing to take an extra couple of years under the current deal. At which point, the players will then have the option to opt out.

And it's very possible that they do. Because there are issues that they would like to see address, not least of which is getting a guarantee on the Olympics, even though we all know that that is going to happen, it needs to be, they just don't want to see the owners using that as leverage again. So they may want to get that on paper. That's a good point. And so what is being set up here is for Gary Bettman and the owners to spend the next few months telling us how happy they are and how they don't, they're certainly not looking for a fight. They may choose not to opt out, at which point the players choose, and the owners will come back to all of us, clutching their pearls, saying, can you believe that

those terrible players are looking for a fight? We didn't want one. This isn't a fight that we want it. But now that we have one, look out, we're going to go back to the usual playbook, which is, which is we go scorched earth and try to get every single concession we can ring out of this. Yeah. Or they just simply, I think they're going to kind of play Possum a little bit this time. I really think that they're going to just throw their hands up and try to put as much pressure on the players and not even be sharks and go after more of the pie. I'm just going to say, look, things are going great. Leagues making money. Don't forget about Seattle.

Seattle's on the verge of joining our party. I have a feeling like everybody's just going to be completely positive, positive, positive, and hope that there's public sentiment against the players who are, quote, air quotes, giant fucking mothrow wing air quotes, the bad guys in this situation. And we're going to pretend like the players, for the first time in a quarter century of the Gary Betman era, that the players actually being the ones to grab some leverage and the players actually being the ones to initiate makes them the bad guys. And they're going to count on all of us having the short-term memory of a tree squirrel and forget that the owners have pushed for the last three work stoppages. I mean, if you go into a bar and somebody is, you know, giving you a look and suddenly, you know, out of nowhere, they throw the first punch. And then you go into the bar the next day and the same person's there and they're giving you a look and then out of nowhere, they throw the first punch again. And then the third time you go there and they're giving you the look and then they throw the first punch again. And then you go to the bar for a fourth time and they're giving you the look and you throw the first punch.

You're totally justified in doing that. You don't have to stand there and let them get the first. And when they get up off the ground and turn to all the bystanders and go, can you believe he hit me? None of those bystanders have to play along with that nonsense. I mean, I mean, it is very... I mean, it is very... Well, yeah, that's the thing.

I mean, if we all go, if we all decide to go along with it, then the owners will win the PR battle, which does translate to some extra leverage. And that's what this is all about. It is very, like fans start to need to start getting their head around right now, the idea that it may be the players who don't, who opt out, and it may actually be the players who initiate the next work stoppage. It would still be a lockout because the owners, you know, the players aren't going to go on strike in September. The players would save that for later in the season. The owners can't let that happen. But yeah, it might be the players that are actually

the ones pushing for this fight. This is the fourth time down this road. They've got punched in the mouth three times. If you don't feel like they would be justified in taking a more aggressive stance on this, I don't know what to tell you. You know, if you're that easy to sucker you into the Gary Betman PR tour, I really, you know, all I would do is ask you to look back at how the last 25 years have gone in this league, not even the CBAs, but just every issue has to be a fight with Gary Betman and the owners. Everything has to be about leverage. And that's the thing like, and Batman's good at it.

Like, it's the old average. He's great at it. He's great at it. He's amazing. Yeah, do it. Like, why would he not do it? He's good at it. He's turned the Olympics.

into an item of leverage, an Olympic Games in China that we all know they're going to, and we all know is crucial. He has managed to turn that into a piece of leverage that he's going to get a concession from the players to allow them to do exactly what he wants them to do in the first place. He's great at this. So it's nuts that we're all sitting here being like, well, maybe it'll be different this time, as if, like, Franz Nielsen's going to change a shootout move. Like, what the fuck? Like, Bethen's, of course, going to go to labor war with people. It's what he does in every single, it might be a week, it might be a month, it might be half a season, it's just going to be what happens. And there's no getting around it.

Yeah. And if the players are the ones for once who are playing offense on this instead of sitting back and letting Gary Bettman dictate all the terms to them, good for them. Let them do it. I know whenever there's Lockett, we all want to pick one side to blame. The owners. But at some point, yeah, you know, like this is not, unless you're a hockey fan that has just. joined us, you know, now and you don't know any of the history, then find out the history. And if you do know the history, then don't forget it just because Gary Bettman periodically over

the next few months shows up on camera and bats his eyes and swears up and down that he's a lover, not a fighter, and he doesn't want, he doesn't want any sort of battle this time. I might actually side with the owners more if it wasn't for the fact that every single work stop which we have is because they can't control their own fucking impulses. Like, that's really where I go off the bus is the idea that one. Once, you know, we lost a season so these guys can control costs and then they just spend to the moon. And then they also find ways around the rules that they established with the bullshit, I'm going to pay this guy a dollar in his 50th year of a contract kind of shit they did. And it just seems like every time we go down this road, it's because these guys don't know how to control themselves.

And I can't respect that. I would have maybe a little bit more sympathy because I think the league is in good shape. But when it comes down to it, like we keep doing this dance because these guys don't know how to control themselves. It sucks. And I'll tell you one other thing, and this is just, I want to put this in the heads of fans now because I would not be surprised if it happens. A little down goes brown inception. Is that what you may see is the owners coming out and saying, we are at 50-50 now, we are happy with 50-50. We do not have any need to change those numbers at all.

Let's keep it at 50-50 while at the same time trying to shrink the definition of hockey-related revenues. which would result, which is exactly the same thing. You know, there are two levers for them to use. One is the percentage and one is how big is the pie. They're going to try to shrink the pie, still give the players 50% of it, and then try to tell you it's the same thing and that the players are the ones being unreasonable for not taking what they already have.

Please, please, please do not fall for that. What really interesting aspect of hockey-related revenue? I'll really go down the rabbit hole here, but is player tracking. Because, you know, player tracking was in the news in last week. They bought it to CES in Vegas. They did a demo at the Golden Knights game against the Rangers. It was the whole thing. But I've been reporting on this a little bit, and it's pretty clear that all of,

remember all those discussions that we were having about the NHL coming to the gaming companies, like, you know, William Hill and MGM and whoever, and being like, we want you to pay for our data? And everybody's like, why the fuck would you pay for something you can actually still find in a newspaper? paper. But it wasn't about the basic data that we can already find. It's about this new data that they're going to collect from player tracking. And that's the real interesting thing, because the NHL is going to get all this stuff that you can bet on in real time, from the speed of the skaters to the placement of the next goal, to which of these two players is going to skate the

farthest during the game. Like, it's fucking nuts how many prop bets they're going to be able to create from this player tracking data. And that's what these gambling companies are going to license. And the question then becomes, that is absolutely one billion percent pure player IP. That is the players creating this stuff that is allowing people to wager on it. And what do you make of that? How much of that pie do the players deserve? If Max Pachioretti's like Skate Speed is a thing that someone can gamble on and the NHL is licensing that data to companies, like, shouldn't the players get a bit more of

pie than the NHL is going to give them if they give any of that pie. Right. Yeah, I mean, like, but that's an issue to me. But that's an issue to me. But that's the whole point of this. And, like, what do owners really do for, like, what is, what is Jeremy Jacobs really do for the Bruins? Like, I know Charlie has, like, his fuck off job, you know, being team, you know, president, executive guy. Like, whatever the fuck is title is, you know, but, like, what are, what are these,

guys actually do, you know, that they couldn't hire, like, you know, if the, if the, if the players owned their, like, the full stake in the league, couldn't they just hire people to do that at a way lower cost than whatever, like, Jeremy Jacobs pays his son? I don't know, you know, but it's, that, that's the point, though, is that, like, everything the owners are trying to do is get between the players and the product of their labor. And... Right. Yeah, like, that's the whole point of capital,

is to extract additional value from that. And so, you know, of course, these guys who, you know, couldn't... Maybe the only owner worth respecting is Mario Lemieux because he just got it by being insanely good at hockey, right? but at that point it's like yeah obviously you know he's kind of whatever turned his back on his former union brethren by becoming their boss i don't know pisses me off impressive workers rights things happening over here miss acacio cortez you're going to start quoting allan more comics in a second here on the podcast no i mean she's she's a little too far to the right for me honestly so what Well, listen, if you're one of these people that likes making money, you're probably one of these people that also dabbles in the stock market.

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teams all kind of in the mix, including the St. Louis Blues, who I'm pretty sure we read last rights to you earlier in the season. What do you make of this fucking nonsense in the bottom of the conference? Yeah, like you said, it's a bunch of like average teams that are going to get smoked in the first round when they come, like when they make the playoffs. Two of them out of what, I don't know, maybe five or legitimately in the race, and then we're going to pretend St. Louis is also. I would say St. Louis is very much in the race. They've got two games in hand on Dallas.

They're five points in back at Dallas. I don't believe that they're going to make the cut, but they're very much in the race right now. So is Arizona. The only two I don't think are Chicago and Los Angeles. And I think it's just because functionally it's better than the lose right now. I don't understand how you can say Arizona is in the race. They're two games below 500. Like, they all suck.

everybody's got a negative goal differential that's in the wildcard race right now including the two fucking wildcard teams it's crazy I just yeah I mean I look at it right and like Anaheim's in the middle what are they up to 11 losses in a row 10 something like that

they're terrible excuse me that's a that's a winless streak sir in Gary Betman's NHL nobody goes on a losing streak it's a winless streak got it and so yeah it's just one of those things of like, it wouldn't surprise me if any of these teams end up making it, but it also, well, I guess St. Louis and Arizona.

But it also wouldn't surprise me if they all completely fell apart down the stretch, because, as you say, they're all fucking awful, right? Like, every one of the teams is bad. And it's the same thing, to a lesser extent, in the Eastern Conference where it's like, I don't know, there's four teams in that race, maybe really. only two that are on the outside looking in right now. But like, those teams suck also. We'll talk about them later, but the sabres are really bad.

And so I don't know. Like, I just think it's kind of a down year for everybody that isn't like one of the eight best teams in the league. Yeah, there's a lot of trash at the bottom. My favorite thing about the Western race is, like, how often do we find ourselves in this situation where you've got some team that at this time a year is like six or seven points out of the out of the wild card and they are acting as if they're still in it and they're not. That's the blues to me. That's the blues to me.

Well, but here's the thing. Like your seven points back, you've got four teams to pass and you look at it and you can kind of understand. I mean, you look at it and you go, well, you know, we play four games this week. If we could get eight points out of this week. If we go four and oh, that's eight points, we've made up the gap right there. But you haven't made up the gap because everyone else is getting points, including getting points for losing, thanks to the loser point, which makes it even harder to gain ground, not easier like the owners tell us, but harder. And you're sitting there going, you know, you have a great week.

You get, you know, three wins out of four, and you look at the standings. And it turns out you didn't gain any ground at all because at least a few of those teams ahead of you are doing fine. The thing is this time around, you know, the blues were that team. they went and had like the three wins or the seven points out of eight, except all the teams in front of them actually did like keep losing. And they actually did gain ground. And it's kind of like, wait a second. How are we, suddenly we're like three points back when, you know, because Anaheim hasn't won in forever and Minnesota is terrible and Edmonton spitting their wheels and Colorado's, you know, not good anymore maybe. But it's just this mess. And it's like, you know, I'm I'm sure blues fans are happy, but maybe they're not because I feel like blues. Blues fans are happy. Because I feel like blues. Blues. fans the first half had resigned themselves to this being a miserable year and they just wanted to blow it all up. And blues fans were, they were hilarious because they were the team, they were the fan base for the first half that whenever I didn't rank them low enough in a power ranking would get

mad at me. And we were all ready for them to just, they were going to trade everyone, Peter Angelo, Tarasenko and everybody. And now instead, it's like all of a sudden they've kind of won good week and they've stumbled right back into this race. And it's like, it just the, it's what they do. It's their franchise history. Yeah, definitely is.

They're never bad enough. And I hope there's a part of me that hopes that they don't make it only because if they do make it, this is the team we're all going to have to hear about every year at this time for the next decade. Everyone will be like, you're seven points back. You're not in the race. And they'll be like, well, the blues in 2019, remember what happened with them. And then, you know, it just ends up being a bunch of timid little timid GMs. You're saying you don't want them to be the example that teams you.

of, well, you gotta believe, look what the blues of 19 did. Because I'm sick of timid little pantswetting GMs not doing anything because they claim that their terrible, terrible team is still in a playoff race that they're clearly not in, just by pointing back to the one time that Andrew Hammond won 47 games in a row and a team actually made the playoffs. And listen, that's really rude. Peter Shirelli's not timid.

I think Dallas is a playoff team. I want to say minutes. I still, I will, to my fucking dying breath, I'll say that Minnesota is probably going to be a playoff team just because of Boudreau. Yeah. I don't trust Edmondson. Anaheim's been fucking garbage all year. St. Louis and Arizona probably to now ruin the bit, or probably too far back. Vancouver fucking fascinates me, though.

Like, Vancouver is a really interesting team in this race, because I think they've got a shot at making it. I really do. I agree. Because the energy around that team is sort of that. You could feel the forward momentum for that team in that franchise, all Pedersen-related. And when you've got that, and it's not Edmonton scratching and clawing and praying that their dumb GM doesn't do something else dumb. And Anaheim playing like dog shit all year. And St. Louis was a disaster.

And Arizona has a 1.1 shooting percentage. All these other teams are kind of like descending while Vancouver is ascending. And I feel like it's either them or Minnesota of that other spot. Yeah, I wrote about Vancouver last week. I think, you know, if they even get within a couple points of the playoffs, Elias Pedersen should be the league MVP. Oh. Because, like, if you, I can't remember it off the top of my head now, but last week, like,

when I wrote about it, I was like, what, you know, what's his goal difference when he's on the ice? And then he's, like, plus 32 or something like that. And when he's off the ice, it's like minus 47. Now, hold on, hold on, hold on. Hold on, no one. Vancouver and Edmonton finished one point out of the playoffs, tied. Yeah. You give it to Pedersen over, over Connor?

Yeah, I would. Because we all thought Edmonton would be like fine this year, right? And we all thought Vancouver was going to be a bottom five team. Elias Fetterson has single-handedly prevented them from being that as a rookie. Maybe we were just wrong. Maybe we were wrong about Vancouver. Maybe we were all team Trevor Linden and not team Jim Benning, and that's the problem. We didn't see their vision.

When Pedersen's off the ice, they're as bad as we all thought they were going to be the second, this 20-year-old 148-pound swede comes off the ice. Like, they're horrible. And he's just like, no, no, no, I got this. And then he often does. I can't remember if it was Friday or Saturday night, but whatever night they won. to last week was their first win without Pedersen in the lineup in regulation

in 10 tries. Wow. If they don't have Pedersen, they are bottom three easy. Like, he's been that good for them. And I'm shocked because I wouldn't have thought anybody, like, barring a Connor McDavid, like generational talent

could make that kind of difference, but here we are. What about you, Sean? Are you on the Vancouver trade? Are you doing Shotgun Jake with Jason and Mike from the curtain blog every night when Vertannon scores? Well, I mean, first of all, I'm East Coast Media, so I don't watch the Canucks. I go to bed every night. 9.45 when all the 7 o'clock games end. But I'm going to check out this Peterson kid you guys are talking about.

He sounds good. I should find out about that. You know what? I don't see Vancouver hanging around and not making the playoffs, but playing meaningful hockey, which I think will be very helpful to their development. Even though this is probably a team that in the big picture maybe could use one more bottom five finish and high pick. But there's also some value to having these guys play meaningful hockey down the stretch

into February and March and have that experience. So I mean, I'm still, I still think Edmonton squeezes in. I still think they get in as big of medicine. as they are. And I think part of the reason is they're almost there now, and that's with the team that they have. We're discounting the fact that Peter Shirelli is going to trade their first round pick for immediate help, whereas, you know, the other teams, I suspect, are not going to do that. Yeah, but what's that help going to be, right? You know what I mean? Like, who can be... Zuccarello. Okay, sure. That's what's going to end up being, right? It's going to be like Zuccarello or someone of that, or Gustav Nikes.

or somewhat of that nature. It's certainly, I mean, he's going to, he's going to overpay for a fucking rental. Yeah. This is what he's going to do. And what I really like is the thing about, oh, well, you know what, Pili Arvi might be in the mix for a, for that. And it's like, oh, boy, I can't wait, Peter Chiarelli giving up on a 21-year-old top pick.

Well, that could go wrong. That's the best thing about making the playoffs. He's like, he hired Hitch, he'll throw a Hail Mary with the top pick, with the first round pick. he'll keep his job, and then in the summer he'll trade dry sidle for Damon Severson. So it'll be like the best time ever for Edmonton fans. It's going to be the greatest. By the way, so John Shannon, the venerable John Shannon, tweeted if the playoffs started a,

and if the playoff started today thing. I love that shit, dude. I always love, I got to be honest. Are you being sarcastic? I fucking hated. It's so stupid. Oh, God damn it. I thought you loved it.

No, it sucks. I legitimately love if the playoffs started today's shit. I'm such a fan of it. It keeps me going. In these dark times, Ryan, it keeps me going. So if the playoffs, if the playoffs started today. Lightning Penguins, CBJ, Montreal, who gives a shit? Barry Trots against the Capitals. It's the revenge tour. Here we go. And Toronto, Boston, speaking, a revenge tour. In the West, Calgary, Minnesota, in a game that

will be on the golf channel here in the United States. Winnipeg, Dallas, nah. Nashville, Colorado, and then San Jose and Vegas. So the East actually has a little bit more juice, I think, in their matchups, if the playoffs started today.

Which they do not. Which they don't. We're not far from some good matchups. Like Winnipeg, Minnesota, I think, would actually be a lot of fun. And Winnipeg, Emmetton would be great because we'd all be having smite division flashbacks and, you know,

Jets fans would have to relive their trauma from the Gretzky years. So, yeah, we're, it's, and by the way, I just want to say I'm with Greg. I start doing, if the playoffs started today, like the first week of the season, I'm, I'm already looking at them. So, uh, indeed. Because, because usually the matchups are so awful, you might as well, uh, you know, you might as well pretend that you're going to get the good ones right up until you don't. You're outvoted, Ryan. We're having pizza for dinner tonight. So there you go. Um, so Tom, Thomas Midditch is our guest today. You may know him from Silicon Valley.

You may know him from his cameo appearance with the L.A. Kings recently, who have had a lot of cameo appearances, as we'll get to in a moment. As a hockey commentator from Canada named Tony Babcock should also mention that he's going on tour with the equally hilarious Ben Schwartz from Parks and Rec. So do the check them out there. The new season of Silicon Valley is coming out soon. And he was also in a Keanu Reeves movie recently that nobody saw. the one where he clones his family, not Middle Ditch, but Keanu.

We talk about a great number of amazing things, including hockey. So here's Thomas Middle Ditch. Thomas, you were Tony Babcock for a night at the L.A. King's game. Where did that come from? And which Canadian broadcasters most influenced it? You know, I'm kind of not that smart. and I just sort of pick things up and to be honest

I don't know a tremendous amount of hockey so it's just sort of like growing up in Canada and hearing hockey men in Canada every single and CSN and just Don Cherry and McLean and all the like everything mixed into one little sponge person

because growing up I was kind of like I just wasn't into hockey this may come as a shock, but the hockey players didn't really get along with the drama. So to me, it always represented people who were mean to me. But as I became an adult, I actually, this is so, this is so me. I got into hockey by playing the hockey video game. No shame in that. Yeah, I think that's a story for a lot of people.

Yeah, for sure. Well, because I actually have a whole analysis of it, again, shacker. It's because when you are watching a sport and you don't really kind of get the game, like when you're kind of like, why'd they blow the whistle when the whistle went across the blue line or what's that two-line thing or what the fuck is icing and all that kind of stuff? Or like the rules you can get, but even I think it's more to do with the why. Why does that play happen? Why are you dumping the puck?

What's the next move after that? What are the strategies involved? And when you play the game, you end up appreciating it and understanding it, and I could never play it in real life. I can't skate backwards. I'm far too frail, emotionally and physically. And so I ended up playing it through video games

And then started understanding the sort of the game aspect of it. And it wasn't about tough guys calling me a pussy at my own house party, but it was about, you know, a whole bunch of finesse and a whole bunch of strategy that goes into the hammocky. I ended up hosting the video game league in L.A. when I first moved here to make friends. Whoa. And then called the League of Champs, of which I was the commissioner. and yeah and one of the one of the players is like the guy a guy who actually tagged along with me that night and he just lives breathes the sport and his passion

rubbed off on me and and there you go but uh so now i'm kind of like a life fan i mean yeah don't let the tony babcock character fool you i know i was i was fooled sir it was an excellent proxim a facsimile of what a canadian an old-timey canadian announcer would sound like But two things on this. First of all, no shame in having the video game get you into the sport. That's actually what happened to me in college playing FIFA on PlayStation. Like, I wasn't like a World Cup fan growing up. Like, I wasn't a big soccer player or a soccer guy.

But I appreciated the fact that, you know, you learn the rules, you learn the game, the whole thing from playing FIFA and getting into it that way. So that was my story with that. And then the other thing is, so. Was this League of Champions deal? Was it just playing hockey video games? Or was it other video games, too? We graduated actually for our third season.

We graduated to FIFA. Two seasons, it was hockey. And I think if I ever bring it back, I think what it'll do is like a rotation. I might do like retro video games and do like five games that we all have to play and then to point to talbot and that kind of stuff like that. I don't know. Everyone's a lot more busy than that was a year ago.

What was your first gaming system? What was your first gaming system? Oh, oh dear. I think actually, technically it was the Apple 2, although it was quite late. I only remember a couple games from that. The two ones that were most serious for me was my Sega Genesis and my Amiga. Amiga. So you were not a Nintendo guy growing up?

No, no. I joined the Sega bandwagon pretty fervently. And I was like, the Tendell sucks, even though I was like, can I play NBA Jam, please? But eventually when I got a more substantial computer, I turned and have now forever been a PC master race freak. Interesting. Swaps out GPUs and CPUs and mobos. Oh, of course. But you and I are now like Blur and Oasis, like we're forever on different sides of the battle.

because I'm a Nintendo guy. What are you going to do? Until you're a kid like Mario game. I know. Yes. It's very, I make an infantile individual to be, you know,

to get giddy over what Toad looks like in the next racing game while you are playing actual palpable, exciting games with violence and blood and everything else. Even with the Nintendo games, you can't even play, like they don't even release the EA sports games on there. No, they don't. Like, you can't even play NHL.

you're missing out on have you ever played in the EASHO? I have actually not played. Yeah, no, you, yeah. EASHO. There's an answer. You're talking the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the play with everybody around the world kind of hockey. No, I've not. Oh, man, it's so fun, dude.

You can make your own team. You make your own player. It's like a role playing game. You get better. And you play just your position. Like, you're, you're, you're just a left descent. It's so fun. It's so cool. And the NHL tried to glom onto it last year by doing their own gaming league for that game.

But of course they fucked it up. And it wasn't the same experience as playing the EA. What they should have done. I didn't even know that, but I can tell you right now what they should have done. Within that, it's unofficial. But there's like an online website that you can join. And there are people who kind of like organize this stuff and have a whole league. They should have hard. These guys, man. And you go on YouTube, you see people doing commentary and just like, really trying to emulate it. That's what you do, really. No, but they tried to steamroll them. Instead of working with what was already established, they tried to create their own thing.

And it was cool because they actually held the finals in Las Vegas before the NHL Awards, which is kind of fun. Like, you get to go out there. They did a thing where, like, it's, you know, they had people from Sweden there and the whole thing. But it just didn't catch on like it. Like, I don't think it was a fraction of the popularity of what's already in place. yeah yeah so i always like watching um streams of esports games where uh the the game that they're playing is a sports game and they'll have like the quote unquote athletes of the video game playing and then so on so right who's the real athlete will come by and five them and just different

right it really underscores well who's playing what yeah yeah what one is an athlete and one looks like the thing that the athlete would throw in a competition of some sort. You grew up in Vancouver. You mentioned the Jocks versus Geeks thing. And I'm completely understood. I was in high school. I was sort of the-the-Jox versus Geeks thing in high school growing up. I grew up in a town called Nelson.

Oh, okay. Oh, yeah, I knew BC, but I always transposed Vancouver in B.C. When? Yeah. I went to every American. Yeah, I know. Well, you are, Vancouver, after all, a suburb of Seattle, well, based on sports allegiance.

But when did the worm turn? Did you ever kind of make peace with the jocks at any point? Oh, yeah, of course. No. Yes. It all evaporated as soon as, like, I don't know, I got my own confidence, and nobody was threatening me. I mean, it's not as soon as, actually,

that's, it kind of evaporated even in high school. Like, it's only really, for me, the most savage of, like, I don't know, kid on kid crime in middle school. It's that time when, you know, you're just shifting and you're trying to figure out where you fit in, and everyone's just kind of so scared that they'll turn on you in order to get ahead. Right. It truly is a nightmare.

And hormones are going crazy. It's all that part of the X-Men movie where the mutant powers start happening. You don't know what's going on. So everybody's just kind of like on edge, basically, when you're in middle school. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. But that left. And I actually inevitably became pals with my tormentors later on.

There you go. Please don't torment me, pal. So I read that you. when you moved to L.A., you dedicated yourself to following the local teams, which included the Kings. How did you get hooked up to go there and do that bit, though, recently for them? Yeah, well, to that, like, I mean, to following the Kings, like, I have a, I have, like, an allegiance to sports allegiance thing that's probably different than those people who grew up,

like, just, fucking breathing sports. it's because I'm not going to move to a city and then live there for the rest of my life and just not be behind the home team. If I'm going to move somewhere, I'm going to root for the home team. That city is my home. It's gracious enough to have me.

So if I move to, I don't know, Tampa Bay, guess what? I'm a lightning man. There you go. And then also, but I don't turn my back on it. This guy, my friend, Dave, who accompanied to this thing, he has a great thing.

He says, I don't root for teams. route for hockey. And I'm like, a lot of weight sentiment. Because then you can go to a game and realize, like, oh, this is your die time for this team and this team. And, you know, you just appreciate everybody's struggle.

Right. And it makes a lot of sense. You go to a Kings game here. The Staples Center, a beautiful place. Look at it. And if they're playing the fucking Red Wing, have to stay, have the arenas in red. Yeah.

Right. I want to listen to these people. I say, the city of Angels is giving you so much and you did it you shunner it's probably so you gave up your lives

in fucking Des Moines, Iowa Tintletown and then That's right You're a police Hops on a bus chewing a piece of hay like Axel Rose

and the Welcome to the Jungle video showed up in La La Land Yeah I want to make it in this business No No But what you're basically saying is that you

You can disagree with the I root for two teams, the home team, and my favorite team, which is what a lot of transplants end up doing. Oh, you can do that. You can do that. Okay. But, I mean, show some goddamn respect. There you go.

Exactly, for the silver and black, or whatever the hell they're wearing these days. Now, listen. Whatever it is. Right. You met Gretzky the other day. What was that like? Oh, Daddy. That was genuinely amazing.

Again, it was cool. It was cool because it was more special to have my friend saved there, who is, Dave Clock, by the way, he's an incredible artist. He's, like, follow him on Instagram, Dave Clark. He's a great artist. But it was just so lovely to see his reaction to it. Because first of all, our kind of our handler, Mike Oceari, VP of Brockett.

Oh, yeah. Good dude. Known well, yeah. Yeah, super nice guy. He was escorting us around. He said, hey, let's quickly go ahead and meet. Luke Robitang. I was like, oh shit, yeah, sure.

Here we go. And Mike's like, our day's like, oh, my God. He's got this. And we go, we say hi to him. He's very jovial. And Mike says, oh, yeah, we're, he's doing this. Oh, no, no, Luke's just like, oh, this is going to be crazy. You know, you're going to have so much fun.

It's going to be so weird. I'm like, yeah, it's totally not for them. And then Wayne Gretzky turns around. And then Luke says to him, this guy's going. on as a character with the broadcasting team. He's going to do bits for the game. And Wayne Gretzky just, like, just totally deadpan just goes, good luck.

Junk our hands and then went back to his conversation. But that was all we needed. It was, it was great as we walked away, Dave, of, like, hearing us the poor guy. Now, you as the drama kid, Did you feel the sense of meeting Canadian royalty at that point or no? I mean, when you grew up in Canada, there's the great one. There's like the greatest national hero ever.

Right. Right. So, like, you don't even have to know hockey to know. You know, you got Wayne Gretzky, Alanis, the tragically hit. Terry Fox. Right, Terry Fox. Right. Avrilavine. That's right.

These are our ones. And Celine Dionne. Uh-huh. Tachikwai, Dean, Patrick Gaw. I mean, oh, I don't know. Yeah. And on and on. Yeah.

The great one is he's the guy. That's brilliant. That's brilliant. All right. I wanted to ask you about Silicon Valley. I used to work at Yahoo. So I would get sadder and sadder when, yes, when the Yahoo billboard would get smaller and smaller in the opening of Silicon Valley every year. And to the point right, but I don't need.

I don't even believe it appeared in the opening in the last season. I thought it was fun that you, at one point, compared working on that show to working on a medical procedural and having to learn all the jargon and be at least a little fluent in it in order to pass yourself off as the character. Yeah. Yeah, I know. It kind of is. I mean, like, some of the species they have me say, I sort of feel like I'm going, like, give me 20 Cs of Gigabyte. I'm just like, what am I saying? There was something that Camel actually had found.

I'm wondering because I'm like forgetting it. But you can't say something like, it was like hyper or ultra. It was something like that. It was like hyper process in the like, in the ultra data line. And it sort of felt like, okay, now we've gone full circle into the 90s version of the future where we're just like Right If you just throw the word

You throw the word mega in front of something It's going to sound like it's going to be Something that occurs 25 years from now But there is mega and hyper and ultra And all this shit now Like we've gone We've returned to hackers Where now we're

Now when you hack into something It's like a full CD Like ride at Universal C If you hack the Gibson And you're there By the way Angelina Jolie and hackers where's a devil's jersey.

I just want to point that out. It's a real sexually awakening moment for this young hockey fan, seeing Angelina Jolie and hackers in a devil's jersey. Well, she looks great, but my condolences on the fandom. It's not an uptime for me as a devil's fan. That is for sure. It is a downtime for me. Oh, speaking of the tech industry, I was going to ask you this.

It's obviously, it changes every fucking two seconds, But in the time that you started the show to now, it's changed a lot. Like, do you find it that maybe it was funnier when you guys started and now it's much more sinister these days? How has it changed for you? Yeah. Well, that I don't, you know, it is interesting how, I love how we all thought that, like, companies collect the air data with harm off. Right. I think it's

I mean, nobody wants that to be wished on anyone, but it's like, okay, well, come on. Right. Let's grow up a little. I've gotten rid of my Facebook and Twitter. I have Instagram, which is I guess I'll buy

what Facebook, so I guess. Right. But you're everybody. Like, everybody loves Instagram so much that even if you are forcefully divorcing yourself from Facebook because of all the shit that's gone, it's still like, yeah, but when I use the game,

gingham filter on my photos. It looks really fucking good. No one's leaving Instagram. Well, I don't think, I think it's affected the show in the sense that, like, it's affected our storyline. You know, like, it's going through the minds of Mike Judge and Alecberg, it's always going to have comedy and sapphire involved in it. But, like, you know, Richard Hendrix's new internet is all about a user-controlled, internet where no one owns any type of private data. Right.

You know, it's a peer-to-peer's shared experience. So, like, and believe me, I've been approached by various people within the tech community saying me, like, I'm working on the actual pipe fiber. I'm like, okay, sure, sure, sure, sure. Like, it may be seen at some point in the near future as well. Yeah, right. You know, milestones like this in sort of like culture meets, technology happen and probably will continue to happen in the sense that you're going to have

these moments where the curtain is revealed to see the wizard behind it and everyone's going to like, oh, I'll like what I see. Let's build a new odds. Like, let's figure this out again. This sucks. Yeah. I mean, you thought in the first dot com with MySpace and stuff. Facebook is a better MySpace. So it's just, you know, you're going to get a different thing. And it's fucking mind-blowing to think, like, like, Myspace went by the way. side, but I don't, it's, it was so hard to conceive Facebook going by the wayside at some point, but I feel like now in 2019, it's like, it could kind of happen maybe. And that's nuts to me. Yeah, it could happen. And it, you know, I think it's just a good example of, you know,

you'd laugh. I always laugh at these BP commercials and these CL commercials. They're all like, because it's all PR stuff, they have a commercial being like, we're working for new alternative forms of energy. And it's like, no, you're not. No, you're not, yeah. What are you going to be, what are you can lie? Right. So you laugh at the face at a fossil fuel company being like, we've got your best interest in

mine. And but somehow, X amount of years ago, we totally embrace Google being like, we do good, you know. Facebook, we're your friend. Don't be evil, yeah. Yeah, they're a company in the world of capitalism. They're after money, and they have to stay afloat. And I'm sure Mark Zuckerberg didn't set out to be like an affair. But at one point, he had to monetize his company so he wouldn't, like, go under.

Yeah, what happened. He set out to get laid, according to the movie I saw, and then it all went sideways. Sweet documentary. That's right, that documentary. Two more for you. Can you please tell me what it was like working on Wolf of Wall Street? Oh, it was interesting. It was interesting.

It was about, like, a week of, like, background work, essentially. With, like, a half day of this, of the goldfish scene, which was kind of interesting. So, like, A, I got, you know, Matt Leonardo DiCapro. He is handsome and charming. Yeah. He's very tall. Surprisingly so. I get what everyone's talking about.

You are. this. Well, as interesting as filming it was like you do I mean, the scene in the scripts was only like one line. I think even one word. It was like whoops or something. I don't know. It was like

my character thing was bow tie guy. Like it was so, it was so insignificant. But you know, especially if you wanted to kind of keep it loose and all that. So, you know, Jonah Hill's flicking cigarettes have me and stuff.

And then he we all cut and Martin Scorset, like he had this AD, this assistant director, who was this, I don't know, English guy, and he would call Scorsesee the Gov, the governor. So he'd be like, all right, he's talking to this

a same, like 300 extras, you know, all right, everyone. So in a minute, God's going to come back here, give some notes, and then all kids send you on. Everyone's having a great day, you're all doing great, like he's like a assistant, but would be very positive? He's up.

And then since they do come back, he's very small and he come he's he his video village was like I don't know felt like another girl because it would always take an excitement for him to get over and then he'd come to you and his notes would be like that was great um you know try something new you know have fun

with it okay bye and then you run away is the expectation of working with a guy like Kim like how does that square up with actually working with Scorsese like you had to be like in your own head about it before you got there right yeah yeah a little bit

I mean I mean I like I like the clutch moments I like the moments where it's like hey man don't blow it it excites me so yeah it's the jock in you yeah I mean as I said the part was called Bowtie guy with a single line but it's Martin

Scorsesey so when I I got the part I said yes because that's pretty freaking cool right and yeah and it was the weirdest part was so I don't know if you remember seeing or whatever but like he's like you know John Hill's like new issue day what the you know fuck you you're fired get out of here and then everybody in the room starts screaming at me as I take my little goldfish bowl and get out of there so what was

you know you what the common audience members of realize is you film that and you you film that like what you see is only a second of what you film and you film that again and again and again and I new people in the like in the crew of brokers like Brian Saka and stuff and so when everybody's like get out of here fuck you Brian Zaka is getting personally you fucking you fucking big nose freak you're like you're like getting personal and then all these other extras are like oh we can get personal oh yeah there you go you open up the door strangers like you're taking me down a bit everything and it just it went on for hours and like it was one of those situations where I had to like after a day of shooting be like it's not they don't mean that they're

oh oh no back in middle school I'm a fragile uh little fan for like so what are you're going to do all right last thing you I read that you grew up being a huge action movie fan and now you're in a Godzilla movie so that's got to be kind of fun right Oh, it's incredible. Yeah, I mean, although, you know, like action movies that I'm talking about are like the... Schwarzenegger. Yeah, yeah, right. This is a different kind of deal. I was a huge guy...

I was a huge Godzilla fan growing up and still am, and every time I see that trailer for this movie and see King Godora, the three-headed monster, I'm like losing my shit because it looks so fucking good. Yeah, I will say, I mean, I haven't seen the movie. All I can tell you is, you know, I saw the trailer along with everybody else. The trailer is great. Yeah. It was a great movie trailer. And it was a weird experience in the sense that, like, you know, it's a lot of green screen, you know?

Right, right. You're like, and I, there's a ship in it, like a mother ship, and I'm on it a lot in the film. Like, I'm not running around with a gun being like, over here, there's a gun. Come on, I'm on the ship. I'm on the ship being like, we got to run on the radar, let's go. You know, that's me. So you didn't have to do the Jar Jar Jar Binks thing of talking to a stick with a tennis ball on it and it's Mothra? It wasn't like that?

There's none of that. I'm not a G. Okay. But, uh, so there's, yeah, you're like, you're like, most of the day, what people don't realize is a movie like that. Essentially a destruction movie where you're, the human actor is a witness to a bunch of CG going crazy. Right. Is, you're sitting there. You may have, like, two lines that, that day.

you know, and your line will be like, as I say, like, we got him on radar or like, move, you know? Right. Yeah. And for the rest of the day, you're, like, jiggling yourself around and someone, like, Star Trek style, and someone is pointing a green laser at somewhere on a green screen. And we had another British avie guy going, All right, so there's Godzilla, and he's rearing up. and you got it's all

and every time it goes to and the wood shiggles around like whoa and then he's like that's so cool it's doing it it's so weird

and so fun 12 hours a day oh yeah that's awesome all I got for you thank you for being awesome at the King's game your character was great

you should definitely bring back Tony Babcock at some point You'll probably now be asked to the NHL Awards. You realize that? You're probably now part of the NHL celebrity, whatever the fuck. No joke. There's another offer is coming in.

I don't want this to my thing, but it is hilarious. No. You are now famous for the NHL. That means you are amongst the Kubugating Juniors of the world, everyone else, to Jason Priestley's of the world, the ones that always get invited back to the NHL Awards. You are now part of the family, I think. Yeah.

Do you think I'm as big as, oh, what's the Phillies guy, Grimey or whatever? Gritty. Gritty? No, no, Gritty is the single most famous thing in hockey. Sidney Crosby, sorry, buddy. Your day is done. It is now a fucking orange mascot from Philadelphia that is the most recognizable face in all of hockey.

And it was a hell of a thing for us to accept, but it's happened. Until Tony Batscox. But hey, gritty, watch out. All right, man. Thank you so much

your time. I appreciate it. I'm a big fan of yours and I'm glad we were able to work this out. Thanks, buddy. Have a good day. Take care.

You too. All right. Thanks to Thomas Milditch. You could watch him on Silicon Valley and also in cell phone commercials. Was it Verizon?

I think he's the Verizon guy. That's right. He's kind of the goofy guy getting people to Was it who, okay, so was it Sprint that hired a way the dude that worked for another phone company as their mascot? Yeah. That was pretty, that was pretty fucking smart. I tip my cap to that.

Like, you figure, I was figure that, like, if you were the pitch person for a brand, then you're, like, signed for life and you couldn't, you know, jump ship and become someone else's pitch person. But apparently that's not the case. Yeah. And now, uh, Quiznos is going after Jared Fogel. Well, I highly doubt that, but who's to say? Listen, we talk a lot of hockey on this show more than we used to, actually, now that I think about it. I don't think that Lozo and I ever had a 25-bit of conversation about the intricacies of the CBA. So God bless this show.

We talk a lot of hockey. If you want to go watch the hockey, there's only one place that you need to go to get your tickies. And that is our good friends at Seeky, a proud love. long time sponsor, Puck Soup. Getting tickets online can be far too complicated with hundreds of sites and varying levels of reliability. It's harder to know, hubba, hubba, hubba, hubba, money, money, money, who do you trust? That's why Seekek is the way to go.

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I always like, I sell this a little time when people go to games and they tweet their photo at the game to us saying that they got their tickets from Seekkeek. But lately what's been happening and it's been pretty great is that someone will like yell at me. It's like, blar-blarg or blargle. How could you leave the Champ Bay Lightning Braiden Point Line off the best lines in hockey? Blargo, Largel. Also, thanks, C. Geek for these tickets. It's pretty great.

So I do appreciate that. That also tickles my fans when you do that. All right, listen. We mentioned Middle Ditch was on the L.A. King's broadcast recently as a special guest. It's L.A. It's the Kings. No one gives you shit about them because they're terrible this year. Trying to spice it up with any celebrity they can find. And the latest celebrity they found was, of course,

Snoop D-O-G Snoop Dog in the booth for the L.A. King's game. Who was it against the Knights? I forget who exactly it was against, but... I think it was, yeah. It was incredible.

It was so good. It was him telling, asking if Dionne of Kanoa Knaud was quote going to get Crackin or the fight during the game. It was so perfect. I endorse it on the other podcast. I'll endorse it.

Get that money. I'll endorse it here. Snoop Dog replaces Pierre McGuire today on NBC. I would listen to that and infinitum, although I'm sure he has other things to do. They couldn't afford him. Couldn't afford him. A proud leading voice for the use of medicinal marijuana

in the National Hockey League as well, undoubtedly. An invaluable asset to the hockey community. But it should be said, not the first intersection between the genres of hip-hop and ice hockey. I turn the mic over to Ryan Lambert to give us the top five hockey references in hip-hop songs.

Now, before we start, are these lyric-based? Yeah, all of them. So you're not included, you're not including when Chris Cross wore the totally crossed out doubles jerseys in their jump-jump video. I am not. And so along the lines, I'm glad you brought that up,

Because this is, and I hate to say it, this is some extremely pleased like my sport shit. Because if we were going to do the top five, I don't know, football, basketball, even baseball references in hip-hop songs, putting together a list of the top five would be literally impossible. For top five in hockey, I had to stretch it a little bit. I'm going to be honest with you. Before you go on, I will say that number one of my list of hip-hop basketball references would, of course, be J-Z-dropping Nick Van Exel in the Crazy in Love rap break for the Beyonce song, without question. Yeah, that – and the reason that's good is it's a deep cut, right? It's aged so well, yeah.

Well, there's that, too. But the problem with hockey, and I found this as a – I know, Greg, you are a big bar trivia guy. Who am I? I am, too. and as you probably know if you're a bar trivia guy, the problem is if there's a hockey question at all, and there almost never is, the answer is 100% of the time,

Wayne Gretzzi. Without question. Much like whenever there is a hockey clue and a crossword puzzle, 101% of the time, it's Bobby Orr, because they needed a fucking ORR somewhere in the crossword puzzle. Absolutely.

And when I was growing up, Growing up, and we would play my parents' version of Trivial Pursuit. Oh. And, you know. Which version was that, Ryan? This was the, like, the dark blue one that, you know, probably came out like. The Genius Edition. Yeah.

And so that came out in, like, the late 70s. And so the answer to every hockey question in that was Gordy Howe. Gordy Howe. So, again, like, I apologize for the please like my sportness of it. and I tried to be a little judicious in putting together this list. So we'll start at number five. Kanye West, power off my beautiful dark twisted fantasy. I include it because it's a very basic line that you hear a lot in rap when they reference hockey is something to do with ice, right?

My furze is Mongolian. My ice brought the goleys in. Tonya says power, you know, it's probably his biggest song in terms of played in arenas. And also the biggest song played in movie trailers as well, I would say. There's a lot of power that, ah, eh, thing from power is in a lot of movie trailers. I should say, the song kicks ass, the record kicks ass, all that. But so like, in terms of this reaching kind of its peak, I think, that like Kanye referencing it in the biggest song off his, you know, most celebrated record.

Masterpiece. Yeah. Absolutely. Along similar lines, I'm going to go number four. Cameron, horse and carriage featuring Mace off Cameron's first record, Confessions of Fire. He is telling a woman, I get you the stuff that Gretzky skates on. And so, so he means, he means, he means skates. That's right.

And so, but so this is funny to me because in the song, the girl says something along the lines of, what does that mean? And he says like, which is very, so the reason this is funny to me is, A, Gretzky is by far in hip hop the most referenced. hockey player because he's the great one he's the best player of of you know all time according to some people not me and he was he was in he was in he was in l.a so there's a certain by the way it's merriot uh he was it was in l. a certain well it's bobby or i don't i don't want i don't want to no i no you're not derailing the fucking hip-hop references hockey thing okay to have a best player debate right now the best player debate could literally be a pay-per-view show with the three of us for god's sakes that's true but so i i and also cameron rules so i wanted to get

him on the... So she doesn't know who Gretz he is. Right. No, I think she probably has heard of Wayne Grette. You know, I don't want to dig too much into this song from like 1998 or whatever. But... Oh, so he's like, sorry, baby, I met Forsberg. And she's like, oh, I did.

Oh, yeah. Now I get it. Sure. But that's just, you know, to me, that's like the quintessential. We know you don't understand anything about hockey. There's also a Lil Wayne song where he says, like, I'm like the Toronto Maple Leafs. And then he says, parenthetically in the song, that's a hockey team. Right?

That's a hockey team. Yeah. And he says like, that's a hockey team. I'm not a hockey team. Something like that. And it's like, yeah, that's, again, that's the level we're operating on. And so along similar lines, number three, Fife Dog, off, keep it rolling from a Tribe Call Quest.

Wow. Their classic record, Midnight Marauders. He says, I'll skate on your crew like Mario Lemieux. Nice. And, you know, I think that is a very similar thing about the Gretzky thing. But it's a little more selective. Mario Lemieux, of course, was very big at the time, obviously. But, you know, I just wanted to include a Tribe Call Quest because, you know, our record

Fife Dog and all that. kind of stuff. Right. But also, I think it should be worth noting that around the same time, there was a Canadian hip-hop group called Two Live Lemieux, uh, which is very misogynist, really horrible.

Uh, Gord Campbell, zooming his camcorder in on girls' booties at all times. Very, very, very awkward. Every song was just 90 seconds of the most offensive lyrics and then 90 seconds of apologizing for those offensive lyrics. Right. And of course, you couldn't go anywhere.

Any barbershop of Canada without people debating whether or not Too Live Yager made Two Live Lemieux or the Too Live Lemieux made Two Live Yager. It was very, very awkward. So we got Tribe in there, we got Cameron in there, we got Kanye in there. Who's number two? Probably the most relevant to current hip-hop off the super slimy mixtape he did with Young Thub. a couple years ago. Future says, sipping out the coffee cup, my presidential face, a hockey puck.

And he's talking, of course, about his Rolex watch there. Oh. And typically a presidential... Well, no, I... Ooh, it might be how big it is. I was thinking... I thought it was how big it is, yeah. Usually a presidential is all gold,

but I thought he might have had like some black inlay, but that also makes sense what you said. So you think it's like... It's like a black... It's like the black card, but it's a watch. Maybe, yeah. I only know with the black card because I just watched the Fire Festival documentary on Hulu. I got to watch that.

Oh, and the whole beginning of it is how that guy made all of his money creating a faux black card for people. And it was great. It's really, if he's not seen it, man, that is just. It's on the list for this weekend for sure. The crucifixion of millennial money lust and clout lust, it's the greatest thing ever. All right, so I think it's because, I think it's how big is watches. Sean, how big is watches, would you agree? Yeah, that sounds right to me.

I'm still just. Yeah, that sounded. I'm still disappointed that even when the NHL and hockey is getting a shout out, there's reference to sipping out of a cup and it's a coffee cup. Well, as you know, it's the most famous icon and all of hockey. Sipping out of the something something cup. I need a two-syllable word. Oh, coffee.

I like how forward-thinking future, as we should expect from his name is, because, you know, with the current puck tracking technology, it's almost like there's a watch inside of the puck guys. Almost like that, for sure. Anyway, number one on the list. And I apologize to all the real hip-hop heads out there for citing someone as whack as Wale. But Wale, very corny rapper. he, you know, he rose to prominence on the mixtape about nothing, which I think was like 0,600, 08, something like that. And also did a duet with Lady Gaga before she really blew up and became Allie and Star is born. Is that true?

Wow. Congrats to Wall. She sang the hook on, like, it's some, it's a video. The people who know I know what I'm talking about, in the video, she's very small. A second Mothra reference of the show, like the little girls from Mothra. And she fits in Waleigh's hand, and she sings the hook on his song while standing on his hand. It's like, looking at me. But people who have seen the video.

I didn't know that one. Remember that song? That was Lady Gaga. That was Lady Gaga. That sang the hook on that song, yeah. All right. Very nice. Go ahead.

So you have to say this for Walee. He seems to actually be a hockey fan, which is more than I can say for most of the people on this list. because he, A, refers, he's from Washington, D.C., so he occasionally refers to himself as Waleh Ovechkin. But this is the line that cemented for me that this dude is, like, actually a, actually like a real hockey fan. On the feature heavy song from the mixtape about nothing, he says, Sideway is talking out your neck like Zednik, which is a reference to an insanely niche. Wow. Yeah. Oh, my goodness.

That's an insanely niche reference to a skate-cutting incident featuring Florida Panther at the time, Richard Zednik, getting his throat cut open and like almost dying on the ice. If you don't get the reference, don't Google it. Don't do not. Don't do it. No. You don't want to. Now, according to this, I found the full verse. Do it for the capital. Wale Alevechkin.

Yeah. S. B. Hundreds. Yes, dear. I'm on that venison. Well, that's good. More or less Lindross flyer than the rest of them. That's a good line, too. Mind my intentions, there ain't nothing similar. Sideways talk will get your neck like Zednik. Or something like that, yeah. I was doing it from memory, sorry. That's like seven hockey references in one verse.

Yeah. That's impressive for someone who isn't white. Because as you know, hockey so well. And it's for everyone. Yeah, and you managed to get through that entire list without one Canadian rapper, I just realized, too. Yeah, I feel like I, like, I was racking my brain trying to think of Drake songs I knew, which admittedly aren't many. And, you know, if he's ever talked about, like, Austin Matthews or something like that. But I sincerely doubt it, and I haven't heard it if he does.

Cody C.C., do you love me? Are you rat? No. No, please don't. We could just insert hip-hop. hockey names into Drake's songs for the rest of the day if you want. Oh, thanks. I'd rather not. Okay, very good.

Lambert, you read about the Buffalo Sabres this week, and I imagine the Buffalo Sabres fans are split into their usual two factions. Fuck you, man. You don't respect the Sabres. And, yeah, we are that bad. Yeah, I think most of them were in the latter camp, honestly. And even, like, the one guy I heard from that was, like, how dare you, was kind of like, you said they're mediocre.

or I think they're slightly better than that. Medioka. I think they are, it's tough to say, like, you know what? I said the entire year that the minute something wonky happened to their top line

through most likely injury, the wheels could come off. And that's kind of what happened, right? Like Jack went out for a couple games, and then the slide started and all of a sudden it kept on rolling downhill. Yeah. So it makes me sad because I was here

for the Buffalo, a buffalo enissance for the brief time that it looked like it was going to happen this season. Yeah, I felt like I wanted to be a little bit ahead of the curve, like, at the beginning of the season and say, you know, they, they went out and got a bunch of mediocre NHLers. They got some good talent already on the roster. They drafted Dahlene, obviously. Like, I feel like this could be a borderline playoff team. And then, you know, everybody kind of said the same thing. And I was like, shit.

Okay. I guess I don't get to be smarter than. everybody. And then, yeah, I mean, they got out to that insane start. And so the premise of the article was that I went on the radio in Buffalo and said, like, I think these guys are good. I don't think they're as good as, you know, this winning streak would have everybody believe. And, you know, you would have thought I said, and they're going to be in the lottery by the end of the year. Like, the emails I got, not from the hosts, but like from the, from people emailing me and finding what I had written about them that week or whatever. Um, and, and, and, and, and, and, and,

then yeah, I mean, like, you know, it's just the thing of like, don't get ahead of yourself. Right. I don't know how else to. They're on the right track. I mean, sure. Give middle status season to figure out his shit because he hasn't figured it out yet. No, no, he hasn't. Resigned Skinner, re-signed Skinner at all cost.

They'll be all right. Right? They'll be all right. Well, and even the thing is, like, normally I'd even make the case that they can still be all right this year because I would, I would say that we were wrong to place too much. emphasis on the winning streak and maybe we're wrong to place too much emphasis on on a cold streak now. But the problem is when you've got a team that's this young, you know, where all the top players are young, where the head coach is only in his second year as a head coach, where

the starting goalie has never been a full-time number one starting goalie. Like maybe, you know, maybe a cold streak does hurt you more and snowball more than it would on a typical team because, you know, you kind of say act like you've been here before, but a lot of these guys haven't been here before. Right. And they haven't played important. Especially because like just historically, this is a team of losers, right? Like, so, so they're, you know, I don't want to put too much stock into like identity

or whatever, but like they might still feel like, oh, fuck, here we go again with the, with playing like shit for two hours, right? And not even necessary. I mean, the players themselves, I mean, you know, Jack Eichel wasn't even alive for, for some of the stuff we'd consider part of that history. but it's, you know, the people around it. And, you know, and the fans too can to some extent feed into that where you start getting this here we go again vibe. And, you know, does that factor into it?

Yeah, maybe it does. Maybe it doesn't. Or maybe they roll off a couple of wins. And by this time next week we're sitting there talking about how the sabres are fixed and they're there. But they've got to do it soon because, you know, they're, I'm just looking at it. They're four points back. And there are four points back right now, the Pittsburgh Penguins. and that wouldn't be a team I'd want to be chasing.

No. And, you know, the other teams are, you know, teams like Montreal. I mean, they got games in hand. That's probably the team you're targeting, maybe the Islanders. But you also got Carolina coming up behind all of a sudden. I mean, you talk about the blues, the blues rising. The hurricane as sons. Now we're talking.

Here come the hurricanes after we all broke them off. And, you know, they're making a push at it. It's suddenly, like Ryan, like you said in the piece that you wrote it, the kind of, conventional wisdom, even after the hot streak, was that even if they weren't that good as when they were winning 10 games in a row, they had banked so many points that they'd probably be fine. And now you're looking at it going, they're not fine. Yeah, they're not fine. And I feel like the banking the points thing was our failing as a hockey media to say that that was a possibility. It's never a possibility if you go on a skid.

And it's never a possibility when you have a lot of teams kind of slowly figuring their it out like the penguins for example. Carolina is the one I'd be worried about if I was Buffalo. I think they are last night aside on the march a little bit now and maybe getting a little bit better. And again, another team that simply isn't going to be that atrocious as their shooting percentage would indicate they've been. And it's a huge story.

If they're in the mix, because that changes everything in the east. we've been talking even, you know, a week ago about how the East was nine teams for eight spots. And if you were a team on the bubble like the Islanders or Montreal or Buffalo, you could look around and say, you know what? If we go on a streak, we're going to make it. And even if we don't, if someone in front of us gets colder than we are, we can slip in through the back door and we're all set. If another team, even just one more team adding into that mix and suddenly it's 10 teams for eight spots, that changes everything. It changes all the equations on what you need to have. have happened in order to make it.

Yeah. Oh, we'll see. All right, goalies did some sneaky shit this week. We should touch on that. First off, Mark Andre Fleury, taking the advice of our dear president, building that wall of snow as he leaves the net on an empty net situation against the rules, but brilliant. And it was, I think, an old Roger Nielsen trick, right? Wouldn't it refresh my memory to try to have the goalie build a snow wall in the goal?

If somebody came up with it, it was probably Roger Nielsen. Yeah. It was awesome, but there's actually a rule in the books that says you can't do that, which is kind of a bummer, to be honest to do. I think it's really clever. They were playing the jets, 30 seconds left. Flurry kind of puts his stick down, tries to build a little snow wall, and he got caught by the referees who then kind of cleared it aside.

but it was super smart. And again, that's why we all love Mark Andre Fleury. So crafty. I'm surprised. I didn't see Alan Walsh's tweets this morning, but I imagine it was Flurry reinvents position and tries to build snow wall. If you're not cheating, you're not trying.

That's exactly right. Win if you can, lose if you must, but always cheat, McMahon. Oh, sorry. That's Jesse Ventura, not Rick Flair. But Flair was also that if you ain't cheating and you ain't trying, wouldn't he? Wasn't that flare?

Well, the thing I was quoting was Jesse Ventura. Ryan, chat me up. Who is the one who tried to get the cheaters to cheat and the winners to win? Ryan, who booked this shit? I'm sorry, are you doing a Jim Cornett impression right now? I'm doing that, right? Conrad Thompson.

Conrad Thompson, if you're not familiar with him, is the purveyor of almost every highly rated wrestling podcast. now. He does one with Eric Bischoff, which is incredible about the downfall of WCW. He does one with Bruce Pritchard, which is sort of the flagship podcast. He has one with Tony Chivani for some reason. But he's a big jovial guy from Alabama who actually married Rick Flair's daughter. And his whole stick is interrogating these guys now. Now, when you had Doink the Clown go over Tito Santana here on Saturday night's main event, who book this shit? What the fuck y'all thinking?

and it's honestly like the greatest podcast true or false Ryan the greatest podcast yeah it's good yeah i i haven't like dove it all the way into it but at your suggestion i've checked out a few episodes and i've generally been like pretty entertained the problem with the episodes and i know that i'm saying this on an episode that's probably going over two hours but like their episodes can sometimes cross over four four hours long and it's not even four hours and it's like four hours on like you know year one of Razor Ramon in the WWF. Like, it's not even like a subject

that goes from like birth to death. It's just like, and you're wondering, like, I remember I did a four hour episode on like Christian. Not even Edge, Christian. And I'm saying to myself, do I really need to dig it? But it's good background noise too as well. But yes, that was a, in the repertoire of the

nine impressions that I do, entering the Conrad Thompson one into the pantheon. And then there was also something, Sean, you wanted to talk about, which was the Tampa Bay Lightning, goalie change on the fly. The Tampa Bay Lightning, if you didn't see it, pulled their goaltender and then put their goaltender back on the ice during the play, which was fantastic.

The circumstances around were a little weird. This was the game they lost to the Islanders. I want to say they were losing 4 to 1. That sounds right, yeah. It might even have been 5 to 1. 10 minutes left in the 3rd, and what happened is they caught the Islanders on an icing. So the Islanders have got a tired line out there, and so they decide to pull their goalie with the face off in the Islander's zone

to try to take advantage, get a de facto power play with the other team tired, get a goal, it's going to put them back in it. So they pull Andre Vasilowski, but they do it with the instructions that if the islanders get a line change, Vasilevsky goes back in during the play, which I thought was brilliant. I thought that was fantastic. Absolutely brilliant. And a lot of people were confused because there were people saying, like, is that even allowed? And it is, although in one of those wonderful kind of obscure bits of rule

book trivia, it's actually not allowed in overtime. You can do it in regulation. You can't do it in overtime, and here's why. In overtime, as some people know, there was a rule added back in 99 when they brought in the loser point, but before we had shootout, so games could still end in ties. The league realized that we're giving points for losing anyways. We don't want to have a scenario where both teams just pulled their goalie with a minute left, and it looks ridiculous out there with two teams shooting on empty nets because

they don't care if they lose. So there's a rule that if you pull your goal. goal in overtime, you cannot, you don't get the, you don't get the loser point if you end up losing. It's, it actually has come into play a couple of times. There been a couple of teams that have lost in overtime, not gotten a loser point because they had their goalie out because they needed to win. But they actually put in the rulebook, you can't put your goalie back on because they realize some team would just have the goalie sit on the bench and if the other team was about to score, jump back on the ice so that he was technically on. And I just love the

fact that they thought of that and wrote it into the rule book. And I love the fact that the the lightning thought of doing this with with Bazilevsky and you know it didn't work but it did work in the sense that he got back on the ice and got back into the play and it reminds me of the time that Scotty Bowman and the Penguins actually

once change goaltenders on the fly in the middle of a game if you've never so much ass if you've never seen it it's find it on YouTube because it's hilarious because what happens is that the puck is down in their zone you see one goaltender make a save the puck goes back to I think they're playing the Rangers back into the Rangers zone

the Rangers come back the other way and another goal he makes the save and it takes it second for the announcers to realize that the goaltender is different. It's one of my favorite highlights and it was Scotty Bowman just doing it just to just to screw around. There was no actual strategic reason. He just did it because the penguins are so good. They were just dicking around. That's the Down Goes Brown.

History of the NHL available now on Amazon. 1520 is the price on prime and the number three book currently in the United States and hockey behind Unforgettable Rangers. I don't know who's fucked by on that. I'm sure it's a great book. I'm just kidding. And the breakaway, the inside story of the Wirtz family, which I believe is only number two

because Rocky has tried to purchase all the copies. No, actually, he worked with them on that book. But, yeah, DGB's book is number three in the U.S. That's, by the way, a full four places ahead of ice capades, the Sean Avery memoir. So good on you, buddy, for finishing ahead of that giant fucking... Battle of the Hockey Shans has been decided. Seeing the Ranger.

That's right. The lowest rated reality show in American history, Battle of the Hockey Shons. Yeah, Sean Pronger's in on it. Sean O'Brien, S.O.B. We're going to get Gentile and everything. It's going to be fantastic. Leahy, everybody.

Will you allow Sean Podeen to be involved? No, that freak is not invited. Tell him to go get his own. his own show first player eliminated in shan chambers his rating his numbers are so low on nh l 94 uh he's the first one out surprise entered by the way and towards the end of the show is sean burke towering over the competition as it were um one last thing we should probably mention the retirement of rick nash i think that happened since the last podcast it did uh sucks uh really sucks in my uh january first sort of predictions thing uh i thought there was an actual chance that nash could

come back to one of these teams that's contending now, in particular the Leafs. And apparently they were actually in the hunt for him, but he decided that, or the doctors, I guess, decided he wasn't healthy enough to come back and play. Ryan, you were all over the, the Rick Nash praise train in the past week. Yeah. He's an interesting guy because I feel like, you know, kind of like that, I'm going to use the data reference here because, obviously, he has sort of that Dominique Wilkins thing for a while where he was the biggest star on a really, really bad team.

And we all knew he was really good, and we're like, what if he wasn't on this bad team? And then he was a star with the jackets, went through all the rig and moral of not wanted to be traded to Toronto, came to New York, played well in New York, except in the playoffs. And I think that's kind of where his reputation was cemented as a ranger was, you know,

going through those long-ass droughts in the postseason of not putting a goal on the board, and it really kind of affecting the overall feelings about his tenure there. Yeah, I feel like that was all kind. It was like a three or four year, like, uh, thing that got Tyler Sagan run out of,

out of Boston, right? Where like, he never, he, yeah, but he never, he never, he never got the, um,

the Joe Thornton get out of jail card. Like, when Thornton's reputation was cemented, then Jumbo, like, was fucking great for a few years. Like, he,

he's no longer the playoff choker, right? Right. But Nash never got that. No, he definitely didn't. And it's too bad. And to give you an idea of how inept the Blue Jackets were around Rick Nash,

earlier this week, Cam Atkinson passed David Viborny for number two all time in Blue Jackets scoring. And I was like, you had, like, I didn't know that. And like, that was just a thing I saw, you know, cross my desk on Twitter or whatever. And I was like, you've got to be fucking kidding me, right? Like, that's going to be four typos simultaneously somehow. because like, you know, like, it makes sense because they've only had maybe two top-end talents in Nash and Panarin ever, and Panarin's only been there for two seasons. But it's like, yeah, but like he was never like, he's never been like an elite scorer of any kind. Yeah, he was good.

Like, like he's good. Yeah, he's good. Oh, sure. Right. Yeah. Easier to say his name too. Forbornies is like an attendance record more than anything else. He was just with that franchise forever.

But, yeah, like the fact that he's their number two score of all time when they had Rick Nash. And, like, Rick Nash didn't play a pretty big chunk of his career with that team. And he's number one with a bullet. Like, that tells you everything about that franchise historically. And I just, you know, because of the, what, he didn't, he made the playoffs once. with the Blue Jackets. And they got swept. Like, I feel like he just didn't get his due.

And I love Rick Nash. You want to rocket Richard in a year where, you know, 41 was the total. And he was like 19 or something. Like, and he did it alongside, I want to say like a Ginlan, Forsberg, like two guys that are real good. Yeah. And he just, like I said, he never had the help.

And because of that, I feel like he knew. never really got his due as one of the great players of his era. Would you say he's a great player of his era, Sean? I think he's a great player. I don't think he's a Hall of Famer or necessarily all that close to the discussion. And I have a feeling that he will be talked about that way because, A, he was a great guy, and B, he is at least largely identified with one franchise. And those seems to be two of the big criteria.

But yeah, I mean, he was, you know, in a way, when you think, back to being picked first overall and then winning the Rocket Richard in like his second year when he's still a teenager. Like you kind of thought this guy was going on to like really a dominant career and he didn't quite get to that level. But he had a great career. I mean, he had a, you know, it was better than 95% of the guys out there. So I, yeah, I mean, and it's disappointing to see him not be able to continue his career.

But at the same time, good for him and good for the people around him. I mean, if the health isn't there, then going and, you know, chasing one more playoff run or one more cup run would not be the right thing to do. So it's good to see, you know, as much as if he had come back, we all would have played it up as, you know, this big heroic, you know, last charge at a championship. It's kind of good. Yeah. Good to see that it seems like common sense prevailed. You know, I'm loath to put over people as like good guy, nice guy kind of kind of thing. but like I feel like a lesser man would have taken one of those contracts that were on the table on July 1st

and just kind of like took the money and ran. You know, and he had the opportunity to. Like there were teams that clearly wanted to sign him. And he could have taken a four-year deal of big money and then just like, you know, tried to play through a year and then it didn't go. And then he's still, you know, making coin. And he didn't. So, you know, I think I would have. I mean, let's be happy.

I mean, I'm kind of a scumbag in that day when it comes to that, but like, I probably would have. And then been like, whoa, was me. I would have, I would have been, I would have called public sympathy for my plight while also robbing my employer of money. That's what a fucking scum I am. And that's the, why I'm the antithesis of Rick Nash. So, like, this is the extent of my, or not the extent, but like, this is the level of my Rick Nash fandom is the first time there was ever a live, like a puck daddy meetup or live event or whatever you want to say at Foley's in New York,

the NHL store had graciously donated some like signed jerseys or something like that. And I wanted to win the fucking signed Rick Nash Columbus Blue Jackets jersey so bad and I didn't do it. And like I, to the point where I wanted to be like, well, we make sure I win this one, but I didn't. Maybe I'm a nice guy. If you're nice to me, I have one.

And it's actually from the, 2K Sports when I went out there and covered him as the cover athlete for their last NHL game, they sent me a jersey. And it's signed by Nash. Wow. That was weird. Because I interviewed him and like, now he's like, did they say, hey, interview, sign this jersey for that boy that was just talking to you.

Like, what was that? Like, what was that? So like, if you're nice to me, maybe I'll give it to you one day. Although I do you kind of treasure it. You'd have to be really nice to me. All right. Last thing was the Puck Soup question of the week in which we asked you, the listeners, who are the Western Conference Wildcards?

Chris Matthews writes in, it wouldn't be the NHL playoffs without the wild getting bounced in a first round five game series. Excellent call. The uncanny ex-jerk, who I imagine is Cyclops, writes in, whichever team fleeces Edmonton before the trade deadline and the second wild card will be not Edmonton. Yeah. I like that.

Yeah. Probably an oilist fan. Scott Blixendurfer writes in, Stars, Avs, and Wilde, finishing a three-way tie, too complex for traditional tiebreakers to settle. Sagan wins the decisive rock-paper-sissors tournament to bump the stars into third in the central

leading Colorado and Minnesota as the wild cards. Sean, you would know better than I. Is there a rock-paper-cissors contingency plan in the NHL rule book in the event of a tie that can't be fixed by math? You know what? I don't know for sure. I believe that they're actually, if you go far enough down, you do get to a coin flip, but knowing this league, they would...

That's exactly right. You do get to a point flip. They would, knowing this league, and it's history, instead of just flipping a coin, they would spin a giant wheel or do paper, rock scissors or have them play Mario card or something like that. So just not Fortnite. No, absolutely not. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Do you imagine?

It could be Fortnite, but whoever wins doesn't make the playoffs because clearly they didn't want it bad enough. everything is tied we're playing squads to be great the uh Michael McGinnis writes in St. Leu

oh fuck it I don't know uh road run black hawks because obviously the NHL needs the hawks and everything they do and the biggest golden nights because come on

you can't mention cards without Vegas Waka Waka Evan Brucker writes in Stars get the first wild card promptly get eliminated after the players throw the series following gym lights calls, Jim Lights calls

a media meeting where he calls himself the world's best fucking motivator while get the second wild card. That was a very word-sality one, but the stars in the wild. Beast writes in the coyotes get healthy, sneak into the last wild card spot with tons of optimism supporting the healthiest team that they've had all season, only get swept in round one

and see three players suffer career-ending injuries. Jeez, it's bleak. Wow. And then finally, Wesley Lawrence says Florida The bottom of the West is so fucked that they end up somehow managing to lose the spot MLS style to Florida Which I don't think is also allowed in the rule book now that I think about it

That's always possible All right, well that was a marathon edition of Puck Soup Our thanks to Thomas Midditch For joining us to talk about hockey and bullying And movies and Scorsese and everything else and thanks to Lambert for researching hockey and hip-hop lyrics, although how many of those did you know at the top of your head? All of them.

Okay. Well, then no thanks to anything, you fucking lazy shit. Yeah, that's right. Where's my Rick Nash jersey? Great. That should be a T-shirt. So you can find my stuff at W-S-H-Y-S-K-I. Somebody was marveling that I've been able to spell my name so quickly.

I'm 41 years old. It's been happening for quite a while. You have a little bit of experience. You're supposed to know that. I mean, for God's sakes. Yeah. I mean, I didn't get it right until about 18, but still. And you could listen to my other podcast, ESPN on Ice,

where we had a spirited discussion with Marty B.ron and his piercing eyes this week. Lambert, where's your stuff? Uh, yahoo.com. Nope. Sports.jahoo.com slash author slash Ryan dash Lambert. I'm on Twitter at two-line paths. I don't want to hear from you, though, so... Oh, okay.

I'll plug my stuff. Follow me at Twitter at Down Goes Brown. I link everything out from there, but you can also find my stuff on the athletic, and this week I did a really fun piece where I tried to build the worst possible salary cap situation that I could that still fit under the salary cap, which when you actually start to think about it, is a ridiculous, borderline idiotic premise, but that didn't slow me down. And it's been a lot of fun because we're up over 200 comments of people being furious that the worst contract on their team wasn't included.

So if you subscribe to the athletic, jump in there. If you don't, this is a fun one. You might want to consider using your seven-day trial to get in there and yell at me because I didn't put Bobby Ryan or Andrew McDonald or somebody like that on the team. Was Bruins Healthy Scratch David Backus on the list? I read it, but now I forget. He was not on the, he was mentioned as an honorable mention, but I didn't, this is how stupid it was. He hadn't been healthy scratched yet.

I ran out of money to, like, have the truly bad contracts. I had to like, you know, I, some of these guys' contracts were so bad, I couldn't fit them under the cap on a team full of bad contracts. Which tells you everything about the NHL, right? Yeah, yeah. Right, it does. And you also clearly don't value great. or guys taking care of dogs. There's a lot of grid on that team.

And the funniest thing is, you know, I won't spoil it as far as like which teams have the most players in that. But two of the players on the roster were acquired by Peter Shirelli this season in mid-season trades. So it's, uh, oh my God. Here come the Oilers. All right. Well, there you go. Oh, one last thing.

I'm on, uh, on radio lab this week talking about the John Scott thing. A lot of people have listened to that and seem like they're impressed by how good it sounded. So if you like National Public Radio and a heart-tugging... Production elements. Yeah, production. That's right, right. John Scott is a hockey player. Puck a girl along the boards.

Yeah. Maybe mix in an organ sound. Yeah, we go. Sound effect of somebody falling through the ice and nearly dying, which apparently is what happened to John Scott a couple of days ago. Oh, yeah, I read about that. When they said they were making a story about his life, I didn't think it would be the one starring the lady from This Is Us called Breakthrough. It's coming out in just weeks.

That's a fake movie, Ryan. You're not fooling. Breakthrough is a real movie. It's about how a kid almost drowned, but then God saved his life. And that's not made up. Is Tofer Grayson that, I want to say? He is. He plays the youth minister who's trying to be hip.

Hmm. Wow. That looks amazing bad. You guys are messing with me. There's no way that's real. Breakthrough, a real clever title. Anyways, thanks everybody for listening to the episode. Bonus episode with me and Down Goes Brown next week.

It's the listener's choice. Some of the choices are interesting in the sense that a lot of people feel like he didn't see the Avengers Infinity War, but he definitely did. And if that wins, I don't know really know what to do with it. I think the people are to be like, let's make him watch something he doesn't understand but he already saw it if it makes you feel any better i did see it but i did not understand it so there's there might still be some some ground and plus and plus the joke would be that both of you have to now sit through a two hour and forty five

minute movie you've already seen to quote uh someone in that movie mr lambert i don't feel so good uh so uh we uh all right yeah and a mailbag also on the patreon uh patria dot com slash podcast Thank you to everybody who's signed up. A lot of people have since we rebooted the podcast and much appreciated. And that's where you'll find the rest of this week's episode, the mailbag portion on the Patreon. Thanks everybody for listening.

We'll talk to you next week. Bye. See you. Bye. It's in goals and saves and slapshots 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 Hagi and Nancet. Um, both Two.