Puck Soup - Whack Panther

Episode Date: December 1, 2016

Greg and Dave discuss the stunning turn of events for the Florida Panthers, in firing their coach; our confusion over the show "Dirty Jobs"; an apology to NBC, which actually does like showing young Canadian players in the All-Star Game; the NHL's offensive problem; a thrilling round of "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story Character or Finnish Hockey Legend"; NHL Awards at the quarter mark of the season; and listener mail, including Christmas traditions.

Today's episode of Puck Soup is sponsored by Seatkeek for all of your Seek needs. Let me tell you what I do in December. As a New Jersey Devils fan, I go to hockey games. You know why I go to hockey games? Because double fans don't really mess around with October or November. We go in December. We go around stocking stuff for time. Mom and Dad putting little tickets in your stocking.

Hockey tickets. Maybe some lottery tickets to scratch off games. You know, win that two bucks or that free ticket. and you win another two bucks, maybe get yourself a slurpy, but mostly hockey tickets. And if you want to get some hockey tickets, or really any kind of tickets to sports, concerts, whatever you want, you need to get yourself the Seekek app.

And here's the best part about it, ladies and gentlemen, of the Puck Soup audience. You can get a $20 rebate on tickets. What do you do? Here's what you do. Download the free Seekek app. Go to the Settings tab, add click a promo code, and to the promo code, S-O-U-P,

Spell Soup and Seekeekeek will send you $20 after you made your first ticket purchase. So here's what you do. Again, if you want something to stuff you're old stocking, you get the free Seekek app. You go to the Settings tab, click Add a promo code. Enter the promo code S-O-U-P that's spell soup and seek-eek will send you $20 after you've made your first ticket purchase. Download the free Seekie G app today. Enter the promo code soup and enjoy the show.

Now entering Nerdist. com sticks and hits and goals and saves and slapshots and goons we've got sportly commentary to what if you commute but we also cover movies TV shows it's and tunes

it's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense I'm I'm Greg Rishinsky of Yahoo Sports Puck Daddy blog I'm Dave Lozo of the 6 and 7 fantasy football team that has the most points in his league because fantasy football's stupid and you're in pox soup it's a dominant team Greg

and I can't I can't buy wins on a consistent basis my team is very much a submissive team it's for damn sure yes I mean it very much is my team's not a dominant team so I feel like we would probably see each other at the club we definitely would I think our teams would get along pretty well no it's uh fantasy football is not been my friend this year I I'm basically like I think I'm like three and nine, but the joy of fantasy football is that if you're three and nine, you still play it, because all it does is it takes about, you know, 25 seconds out of your week to play a fan. That's the reason that, like, my fantasy hockey team right now in the league, you're in that league too, right?

No, I'm not doing any fantasy hockey this year. Okay, I'm in the Puck Daddy League, and you figure I would have gamed the system so it would be doing well, except for the fact that I had Jonathan Quick. like U. Leahy and Lambert should be like original teams that get like the advantages that all the other teams don't get. Yeah, it should have been like back in the day when you know, the Canadian teams had

provincial rights to players. Right. Like I should have been able to really grab any player that I wanted. How did Montreal one of those cups all those years? They were just a really good franchise. Yeah, that doesn't do with the fact that like your name was Geelah Blahrevebertail. Right. Through another Rangers never got any of those games. Yeah.

That's why the, yeah, imagine they still did provincial players. Like Mike Commissaric had to be an Islander. You know, like Bobby Ryan had to play for all the flyers probably because he's South Jersey. That's actually not a bad premise for some content, actually. Well, content. Shotgun. Called it. Too late.

30 teams. Well, now I got a draft. Now I got to draft. 200 players. Luckily, it's never a case where you ever use this show to mine content, right? like your Brian Bickle fucking thing from the end of the week. Which literally just dawned on me

while we were, I didn't even think about it until we started talking about it, but Matt Nietto, you know where Matt Nietto would go. Where? You know where Matt Nietto. Where's Matt Nienna from? Oh my God, you watch NBC and all? Where's he from? He's from somewhere in California. I can't remember where. Thank you. Right. But I mean, this is actually

just probably a way for us to get Austin Matthews out of Canada, right? Not that I think about it. Oh, yeah. Oh, shit. You know what? This is a horrible fucking idea. I just realized how many fucking leafs there's going to be. Like, the leaves would literally have the pick of the litter. Like every player that Don Cherry has ever been on TV and being like, go Ontario, buddy,

it's like, come on. Bola, blah, blah, but, like, they're going to have the rights to that player. That's, like, probably about 33% of the league from Ontario. Actually, yeah, well, yeah, what would you do with, like, Nick Lydstrom and team of Solani? What would you do with the Europeans? The Russians? No, those are the players. Those are the only players that would be

free agents. So, basically, it's like the opposite of Trump's world, whether the immigrants can come in and do whatever they want? This is, this is never going to fly in 2016. Well, that's why I think the NHL needs to be a progressive leader. I feel like if we allow the immigrants to come here and basically have whatever job they want and be wherever they want to be freely moving from state to state, I think that it would really

be a beacon of hope for our friends from over the seas. But honestly, so if you're from a North American city, you have to play in that city. Or if you're from a metropolitan area, you've got to be a metropolitan area. got to play for that team. Or, like, if you're from Sweden, like, if your town is, like, the blank of Sweden, like, the Toronto of Sweden, or, like, the Las Vegas of Sweden.

The Paris of Texas. So, if you're, okay, North American players play in North American cities. European players are free agents. And I think the league would do really well, except for the fact that, you know, Florida ain't there, ain't quite there yet. ain't quite there yet as far as producing players. So that'd be a lot of Swedes.

Oh, so there'd be no more team in Florida? That's too bad. All right, let's talk about that. As we do the show this week, I'm actually honeymoon soon, so we're doing the show a little bit earlier than usual this week. But we are, luckily, listen, by the time you hear this, Jack Capuano is probably going to be fired.

So that'll happen because, like, you know, whenever we drop a show, shit happens, like, right afterwards. But the thing that did happen this week that we're able to talk about is the... As the Panther turns, soap opera in Sunrise, as Gerard Gallant was fired by the Florida Panthers on Sunday and was found to be waiting outside to put all of his belongings in a taxi cab. Just fucking awful. Just embarrassing for that fucking organization.

So embarrassing. Tom Roe is the new head coach. Tom Roe, it's funny how things work out sometimes, Lozo. Tom Roe was hired to be the general manager. when Dale Talon was fired upstairs. And at the time, was much more qualified to be a hockey coach than to be a hockey general manager. And now he fired the GM.

Okay, I'm sorry, revised that. He promoted the GM who hired the coach that he just fired so then he could become coach because he was more qualified to coach than BGM. Here's what I know about. And he was in a few good men with Kevin B. The thing I know about the world is whenever you let a billionaire's son run an organization, it always works out great. Like that's how you want to do business. You want to have, for instance, like, let's say you're like a really wealthy, you know, real estate mogul and you do a lot of your work outside of Manhattan and then you have a son.

You really want to just give him a bunch of money to sort of like start a career in real estate. And like don't really give them any checks and balance. Let him do whatever you want. Just do what it wants. And, you know, maybe he'll run for election one day or whatever. And now we have, now that I'm talking this out loud, think about where America is and the Panthers are at this moment,

where the Panthers spent years in turmoil, just bad team, bad, bad, bad team. Dale Tallon comes there. Dale Tallon's like Obama. Takes that team, slowly builds it, gets it going on the right there. Gary Barry members in law school when Obama lost those players to free agency because he didn't know how to work a fax machine.

Right, right, right. Chicago is like that law school he worked at for sure. They had to get rid of him because he didn't file the bar exam. Filed the bar exam. That's lawyer talk, right? File the bar exam. And now, you know, here comes the new Vinnie Viola to be like, hey.

Oh, hey, cry me a river. I'm going to play the world's smallest of Iowa. Oh! And I'm going to change everything that was working so well in a span of like Vinnie Viola's first hundred days are going to be like Trump's first hundred days, where you're going to look back and be like, what do we do? We were going in such a great direction. Why? Why? I guess Trump's not really an analytics guy.

He's probably not good at math. So here's the bottom line about it. Galant gets fired. He was complaining about the personnel changes in the Panthers, losing Dmitry Kulikoff, losing Eric Grantson, losing a lot of toughness and grit and sad paper in size from that blue line. the new management group

wanted to go with a more sleek and fast defense rather than a big bruising one See, they also went young They also wanted a new young product Like, wow, I've But here's the thing, here's the thing though Like

Didn't we just get done praising The Pittsburgh Penguins for having a sleek faster defense Rather than one with guys like Eric Good Branson back there? Like, when are we going to make up our minds as a hockey world as to how we want teams built. Because, like, we praise the Suban trade,

and then that didn't work all that well for Nashville yet. And then everybody's like, well, Shea Weber is a perfect guy for the Montreal team. And then, like, everybody's crying a river over Gerard Gallant because he's like, I lost all this muscle off my blue line. Everybody's like, he's right. They fucked them. Like, at one point are we going to decide on what we want it to be?

Because, honestly, this crazy bat-shit ex-arby, whatever the fuck group that they have in Florida, is building the team how everybody in Twitter world wants a team to be built, aren't they? Yeah, but you, I feel like Elaine Villos kind of like that as well, too. Like, he took a while to kind of like, like, the one thing Ranger fans always kill him on is how he deployed his guys. And, like, you know, he'd have Tanner Glass on his fourth line. He would just, you know, defense. Like, he was the same sort of way.

Like, but he's a good coach. So you kind of afford him the Dan Girardi usage because he's good at every. else. And Gerard Galant, I understand that maybe, like, he's like the art how in the Moneyball movie where he doesn't want to use the lineup the way the GM wants to. But it's just weird

to, like, punish him now when they've got a bunch of dudes underproducing. They've got a bunch of guys who are hurt who are just not coming back. And, like, I'm sure he'll get over the way he was fired, but I don't know. I just, I don't understand

why you just don't can him in I get what you're saying, but I think that speaks to one basic problem that I have with a lot of the coverage of Gallant being fired, which is that it's not at all about the performance of the team. Like, it's just not, right? Like, the performance of the team was middling at best, but it's also a team that was missing Jonathan Hubertoe, getting nothing out of Yager, getting nothing got to Barkoff, missing Yokin, missing Buickstad, the defense was different, the PDO had dropped. Like, it's from a, but, but as a top ten possession team. Yeah, they are. You're absolutely right, which is sort of the weird thing about them being an analytic driven thing. And yet as a possession team, they're still pretty good.

It had nothing to do with performance. It had to do with a very simple sports thing. A guy paid a lot of money for a team. A guy who, lest we forget, had his son represent the team at the draft lottery. Hey, yo, we're picking first over here. Hey, we got Stoulaughts in the draft, Dad, I don't tell you. What a great name. That's a great name.

Anybody who was. So, nepotism and favoritism and cronyism, all the isms were present already. So, buys the team, never hired the GM. The GM predated him, so the GM gets kicked upstairs. The GM who predated him not only hired Gerard Gallant, but then gave him an extension before Talon was removed from the general manager spot, right? So it has nothing to do with how they were doing it. on the ice. It has everything to do with.

I want my boy's vision, because it's not even Viola's vision, mind you. It's probably like all the guys in the organization that he's bought in from the outside. It's not about that. It's not about performance on the ice. It's like, I want my vision and my boy's vision represented, and Gerard

Galant is standing in opposition to that vision. So it's nothing to do with anything that's happened on the ice. But it's just weird, though. Like, I understand that one. Like, a new guy comes in and he wants to fire that guy and bring in his guy. But it's weird to do it when you've had the most successes of franchise in like 20 years with the group

and the plan that was clearly working and they were clearly going in the right direction. And again, I have no problem but trading Kulikoff and Gavrancen and all that. But to like 20 games in, just, I also think part of it too is the fact that nobody goes to games there. So they probably feel like

they need to have that you know, sleek, fast, exciting team to get people in the building more too. I think that plays into it a little bit, even though they were winning last year they come out this year and the building is still mostly empty. I think that's that puts pressure on them in a way that maybe

people aren't appreciating but first of all also by the way this idea that he's going to go to Vegas is insane. Yeah he's not going to go to Vegas. He's going to have his pick of jobs next off season like he's not going to Vegas. Why would you do that to him? I'm glad you bought that up

I'm glad you bought that up about Gerard Gallant. Gerard Gallant. First of all you know the the Jack Adams' curse is alive and well as far as... Yeah, but he's not the... He's not the why there's a jacket.

He's not a bad coach who just had a really good... Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. He spent three years with the Columbus Blue Jackets. His last year there was 2006. He was hired in 2014 by the Florida Panthers

to coach their team. Okay, so that's a eight-year spread. Fuck everyone in hockey who's whispering to a little Toronto insiders and being like, he's a really good man and a great coach and God. Boy, those Florida Panthers

did him dirty. I'm like, you had eight fucking years to hire this guy, and you didn't. And now all of a sudden, he's like, he's like, you know, the bell of the fucking ball in your eyes, because you think, because you saw a picture of him looking sad by a taxi cab. Fuck you. I've done that right. I got to be honest to you, like, right now.

Like, I am in the aftermath of this decision to get rid of Galant, and, you know, at the time, I'm like, wow, this is bad shit. But the more I hear about it, the more I read about it, the more I am a total mark for the Panthers have pulled this off. That's nothing to do with them being now

the lab rat for analytics because that's the rap. I actually got to ask them on the radio today about that. You're going to think if the Panthers fail that's an indictment of analytics, no, you dumb shit. There's nothing to do with it. Why do you do radio?

I hate doing it. But it's true. It's true. If the coyotes fail and the Panthers fail, it's got jack and shit to do with analytics. That's everything to do with them being bad hockey teams. And analytics, you know what analytics does? It helps make bad hockey teams just a little bit better,

but not all the way better. And you look at some of the movies. that the Oilers have made. They got a little bit better. You look at some of the moves that some of these other teams have made. The devils have made.

They got a little bit better. But at the end of the day, it's not going to be the be-all and end-all as far as, like, whether you turn the corner. So that pisses me off. It's not about analytics. What makes me root for the Panthers

to succeed here and get through this and pick the right coach after they kick row back upstairs and all that shit, what makes me hope that it works is I fucking hate the old boys club. I fucking hate it. I love the idea of a bunch of guys

who don't have a hockey background, who have maybe an analytics background or a business background, coming in here and trying to reinvent the wheel a little bit, try to do it a different way. And this is a very personal thing for me. You know what I never did when I was growing up and it was a little cub reporter at a weekly newspaper day? I had sex.

No. No? Paid for dinner. Or insurance. No, the answer is that I never worked for the Washington Post. and everybody I knew was an intern at the post and then wrote six-inch game stories on Friday night for high school football

and then hoped and prayed that someone noticed they were kissing the right ass and then they got a reporter job. I worked at the weekly paper and I made a career out of it. It's not the path for everybody, but it's the path I took. I love the idea the Florida Panthers have turned the keys over to people that have not paid their dues. I do. I do. I hope that works.

And the reason I hope it works is because I loathe Loathe. All of these little hockey insiders taking to social media after this shit happen and parroting the words of their sources being like, the entire hockey world is looking down on the Florida Panthers. Really? When the fuck aren't

they looking down on the Florida Panthers? When is the last time the hockey world didn't look down to the Florida Panthers? They won the division. Even then they were like, it's an anomaly with the Luongo trade. Even then they were like, well, he had nowhere else to go. Like, you know, I'm rooting for this team harder than I usually root for them because I hate the

idea of these old white duches that constantly get these jobs being the ones that are in the right on this just like I root for rooted for Oren Koulos and Len Berry and Brian Lotton and Tampa even though that was a five-ring circus I'm rooting for these guys okay but just to go back it's totally about analytics that's that's that's 100% what it's about it's about having a coach that doesn't buy into it the way the front office does and so they brought they brought down a guy to coach the team who will coach the team in the way the way analytics guys want. This is the...

Totally by analytics. This is the quote from them. This is from Tom Rowe, the former GM that is... I'm sorry. Is it Tom Rowe, the guy that does all the dirty jobs and has the Chevy commercials? Yeah, it's pretty amazing. He once showed me what was like to work at a bacteria farm, and now he's coaching

a professional hockey team. It's pretty impressive. He's like cutting Yacht Garmer, Yager's mullet. This is a really hard job to trim this greasy thing after game. I'll show you. So, he has... He has a very deep voice. What happens now? Well, now we climb inside of the shit tube,

and the only way to clean the shit out of the shit tube is with our teeth. Shruggs at the camera. Pulls the brim of his hat down and just gets right in there. What a pitch that must have been for that reality TV show? What's the pitch? Well, I'm a rugged dude, and, like, guys want to be me and women like me, and I'm just going to roll around and shit for 30 minutes. Wait, really?

Just shit every week. Sometimes it's regular garbage, but mostly shit. And I'm also going to coach the Florida Panthers. My biggest problem with Dirty Jobs is always that at no point did it ever seem like he didn't enjoy it what he was doing. Like that show would have been exponentially better with Carson Cressley from Clear Eye for the Straight Guy. Some miserable, he doesn't want to do it at all thing? Totally. What's a gooey dock?

Did you ever watch that show where Dave Attell got drunk? Like you stayed up? Insomniac? Was it called insombiac? Yeah, I was called Ensambi. That was, like, that's, I don't know why. There's so many, every show I like on TV. never last more than two seasons.

But that was a great idea. There's an entire sub-droner of shows about guys getting loaded and just hanging out, like Burke Kreis' show is like that. What was that? The Zane Lampreys show who's, by the way, a hockey fan, and probably a future guest to this very podcast. Are these real people you're listening? Yeah, he used to just

go to bars and get tanked and, like, review the bars or whatever. I know, right? But, like, they let David tell, like, raise and lower a bridge while he was hammered one of the other. I was just like, wait, is this legal? Wait, was he doing it on behalf of Chris Christie? more politics on this show.

That's right. Everybody loves that. Tom Rose said today on a, by the, today we mean Monday when they did this conference call. Wait, wait, wait, can I guess the quote? If you give me the topic of what the quote is about, I bet you I can guess what he said. Go ahead. On which changes will they implement first after Gerard Gallant was fired? All right.

What they're going to do. What they're going to do is, you know, they're going to assess everything. They're going to, they're not going to roll anything out. They're going to see what works. And, yeah, they're going to apply analytics to it, but they're not going to use analytics to make every single decision, but there are some changes that we're going to make, and it has really nothing to do with how Gerard Galanth did his job. How dare you, sir?

You just decided that you were going to give the Trump campaign review of the changes, and I'm going to give you the Hillary campaign review, which is with specifics. Pantherswors.net. The first change, and I've already talked to the coaches this morning about it, is that we are really going to attack our defensive zone system. We've got to tweak that a little bit. We want to go more into an area zone coverage type system. As far as the systems go, that's the only area that we're going to fix

and talk about with the players tomorrow. That sounds kind of like a little bullshity, right? Like he was like midway through the answer and he realized he was revealing too much and that was like, that's it. It kind of sounds like when you're on a job interview and you're like, oh, well, how would you fix this process? Well, I mean, every process needs fixing at the end of the day. There's many ways to fix the process. And that process to fix something processing is a very processed fix.

So, in summary, all in all, of mice and men is both of mice and men. I mean, here in Florida, we have a lot of panthers that Floridians enjoy panthering. So, Tom, what are your plans on fixing just mess that Gerard left? We probably score a few more goals, keep a few more pucks out of her own. Matt. Yeah, you know, we're just looking to play better in all three zones. Yeah. So that's what they're going to do. And this is from Matthew Caldwell,

who is the president and CEO of the Panthers. Oh, this is going to be good. As a management team in front office, we got together around the 20 game mark, and we just have been unhappy with the inconsistent performance. It was like a game ago. And we think that we can be playing better at the stage of the season. We decided to change what's necessary

to move in a different direction. It's the, just giant shovels of bullshit In the sense that like, again, Jonathan Herbertoe, Your top line offensive players Could you imagine like the lightning firing John Cooper And being like, you know, even though we don't have Stephen Stamco's We should be doing a lot better than we are right now That was Florida's 22nd game

Yeah Right around the 20, you know what I want to do? This had to get really drunk and eat some case of these right about now Oh, this NHL.com website sucks. They don't have the on this date thing anymore? No, they don't. You mean where they were last year? Yeah, I wanted to see where they were through 22 games last year. No.

I feel like it wasn't much different. Like, yeah, no, they were better at this point last year. They were a little better. But, like, you're a quarter of the way through the season. Like, you just, you brought it a bunch of new dudes. Like, again, you know how when Dodds-Sweeney took over? We were all just waiting for the moment when, like, Claude Julian got called in, and it was going to be over.

And, like, Claude Julian was like, well, you know what? I got a pretty good track record. People like me in the locker room likes me. likes me and hey look I'm going to get us to 95 points with the playoffs but he still got him to a pretty good season and seriously I've waited outside that's a bad place to get a cab

because like the arena is not it's not like in a downtown location where you just walk outside and like wave your hand right you do have to drag your bag to something like it sucks like it's probably the worst place in the league to get fired if you're a visiting coach because you just have nowhere like where do they go from there they go back to Florida like did he just what did he do

they couldn't fire him back home Nope. Like, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, I couldn't. Like, that's, I mean, the day, you get fired, you get fired, but like, that's a really Mickey Mouse way to get, unless, like, after the game, like, he just blew up at Tom Row. He was just like, fuck this, you know, eat by that. I just, I just, I just, I just, I just don't, it makes me so angry to see these people being like, you know, like, and you got guys, you, you literally have guys that are

working in television now because they were such shitty executives. coming down on this regime. Yeah, that's the thing like, like they're on television to talk about... Oh, sorry, God, you were talking. Sorry, I just got a cold. It's November. I get a little...

You literally have guys in television are like, yeah, Jonesy. These guys in Florida are insane. By the way, how's that long ago fellow doing? Got a lot of longevity there, doesn't he? Not exactly injury-prone, is he? Maybe playing with Brian Campbell was a pretty good thing for Ironcloth. That was a good thing for him.

So, yeah, so Charlie Gallant, good luck to you, sir. I'm sure everything will work out, right? Yeah, when you're coaching the Islanders next year, stop by the studio, we'll talk to you about everything. You can go on the record and talk about what you hated most about. But again, it is about analytics. Like, you do get, like, that's the reason he was, number of one reason he was fired, is that he's not, like, you probably say the word analytics to him,

and he's just like, what's the deal with chicks? How can we don't have any more chicks? exactly what am I looking at I should you do this oh yeah wait a

you want to I could again yeah anyways forget it inside inside Pucks Stoops I'm playing

it's been kind of a weird day so I wanted to talk about on the podcast today first of all we were just talking about Mike Mulberry

and since we've done that we should probably and I hate doing this because I'm extraordinarily prideful and arrogant offer an apology to NBC We have said in previous editions of Puck Soup

that NBC would never, in their right mind, put on Austin Matthews or Connor McDavid because, well, they're from Canadian teams and they've been very allergic to that. Well, it turns out that not only is a Toronto Maple Leafs versus Edmonton-Oilers game on this week, okay? But for the first time since

I think it's 94 maybe yeah for the first time since 1994 the national hockey league all star game is going to be on the actual NBC and not

NBCSN there has to be a reason there has to be like okay what was on NBC let me give you the quote as the NHL celebrates the centennial we're excited to bring the pace and energy of the NHL all-star game to a network television audience for the first time in more than decades, said Sam Flood.

This move combined with... Sam before the flood. Wait. Sam... It would be his Chris Berman nickname. Sam Kurt Flood. Sam, Flood of emotion. Sam Flood... Sam Flood Lights.

Sam Noah Flood. It's a thinker. It's a real thinker. This move combined with the addition of games featuring rising stars like Austin Matthews, Connie McDavid, as well as our upcoming Star Sunday matchups. What the fuck is that? Continues to illustrate our commitment

to showcase the best talent in the NHL and grow the game of hockey in America. So, bold names Austin Matthews, Connor McDavid, in this quote, indicate that with those two guys in the All-Star game plus the three-on-three format, which worked last year. By the way, just

throw this in here for you. Last year's NHL All-Star game, which took place in Nashville and was televised on NBCSN was the network's most watched All-Star games is the NHL Broadcaster rights were required in 2005-06. There's nothing there about why. But the three-on-three format, obviously, is very exciting.

Yeah, that's what it was. And so three-on-three, plus Austin, plus Conner, plus maybe Sid finds his way to this game in L.A., probably because of the Centennial shit. Like, the perfect storm of stuff, and NBC is putting the All-Star game on its actual NBC. But you're crediting NBC. So you started that off.

I bet you're going to be like, three Winnipeg Jets games will be on in February. I'm just crediting them for bolding their names in a press release. Yes, I am. How low must the bar be? The far is extraordinarily low. But, oh, that's why they're putting it off, because they saw the ratings for last year,

and they said, we've got to get those ratings on our regular number. And I think three-on-three is something they can sell, probably. But, like, it's not going to be the same. It's not going to be as good. Are you saying no one's going to carry off Austin Matthews on their shoulders after he was snubbed for the MVP, and then inexplicably won the MVP? Well, I also think that John Scott's not going to be there.

Scott, by the way, he's got a book coming out in December. I don't know if you knew that about his journey. Is it just the game story from the All-Star game? Really? He's got a book coming out, huh? That's good for him. Yeah. Good for him. It's good times. Keep your eye on the votes. How to get to the All-Star Game and not ever

thank Greg Woschinski and Jeff Maritz on any sort of public airwave. I just hope that it's like one of those deals where it's like the affair where we're going to see everything from John's perspective. What's that? out of TV show. It's one of those TV shows where you see the story from the woman's perspective

and you see the same story from the man's perspective. So I just hope it's like John Scott's version of it. It sounds like an S&O of it. It's all like, you know, Gary Berman walked in, he was, you know, slapping a lead pipe in his hand. He said, one false move out of you in this all-star game buster, and there goes your knee

and your livelihood. And then Gary Batman's perspective is like, please, John, I want you to play in the game. You seem like a nice man. We do like you. Bring your kids. We're not going to put Colin Campbell on the with you at any point to talk you out of this. Colin Campbell got out of the phone with me. I heard, I was nervous, and I heard in his voice a threat.

You go to this All-Star game, and it's curtains for your kids. And then Colin Campbell's version is, if you go to the All-Star game, it's curtains for your kids, because he doesn't care. He's just going to tell you, I don't give a shit. I can't get fired from this job. So good on NBC for putting that game on. That's all. Good on, good for them for the All-Star game, good for NBCSN for, for, you know. putting on Connor versus Austin, and hopefully, you know, hockey fans within the sound of our voices,

we'll watch those games, so we get more of them. It was American Ninja Warrior, I think, that was out at the same time. It was the finals of American Ninja Warrior, you're correct. So I guess that shows off the air now. Yes. Because good for them. No, no, whatever gets Brian Bickle on TV, that's all for me. As you know, coming up in a few weeks is an amazing film,

one that has already sold out tickets across New York City, even though it's weeks away from coming out, that's Rogue 1, a Star Wars story, my friend. What's that about? So, remember how in the first Star Wars there was the Death Star? Kind of.

Have you ever wondered how Princess Leia got the plans that she put inside of R2 before him and C-3Pio got on that thing and they landed up? No, never? I figured she just used her feminine wild. She was just like,

hey, Star Trooper. Oh, hello, ma'am. What do you have over there? All right, nothing, ma'am, I'm going to plant for the last door. Wow, this is a really firm armor suit you have on. It's so, wow, is everything firm? And then, like, she, like, knocks them out with an elbow and then takes that. Yeah, because, I mean, it's pretty easy to knock out a stormtrooper with your elbow

when they can be knocked out by rocks but thrown by teddy bears. Apparently, a teddy bear just drops a little tiny rock out of a tree, and the stormtroopers knock unconscious. So Rogue One is the story of how the rebels. got the Death Star plans to then find out that the Empire had built it with a giant exhaust pipe that was just big enough for

torpedoes to be fired into that led directly to the giant glowing red self-destruction switch apparently existed inside. I would rather see the movie that where that guy, I want to see where they interview the contractors to come in and build it

and this guy's like, well, yeah, the tailpipe, it does lead right to the self-destruction button, but it's more efficient and it's more energy-efficient. I mean, seriously, though, Mr. Emperor, you'd have to fly of an X-wing fighter right down this here trench to get there, and who's going to be able to do that with

the propensity of fighters and gun turrets you got over here, seriously? And the Darth Vader guy's got the force, right? So he can just force his way to move the planes out of the path, right? Can he do that? Meanwhile, somewhere Mike Rose and a construction at the garbage disposal

or they all were... What am I doing it here? What's that one-odd thing? Hey, you know, if I were you, I would take that long, convenient, metal pole, and just stick that end. I got to tell you, like, ah, you're still to be out to a floating robot with a syringe, and what am I supposed to do with it? Just, you know, just play with it for a little bit, Mike. All right. It's pretty weird how, like, how the water doesn't seem very deep at all, and then for some reason, when Luke gets pulled under, it's, like, 44 feet deep, but I don't know how that works. Hey, shut them all down.

By the way, I don't know if we were talked about this on the show, but do you realize that the entire Star Wars trilogy, would have never happened, were it not for the actions of one man? And that man is? That man is the guy on the Imperial Star Destroyer who told his gunner not to blow up the escape pod because there are no life forms on it. Right. Don't waste a bullet.

Don't waste a bullet. Space bullet. Which, again, you know, when you're fascists, you're apparently very economically cognizant. of the cost of laser beams? I mean, like, when you're just flying around the galaxy and murdering people on all these planets, like, you may need that bullet for some sort of, like,

give me a planet. Give me a Star Wars planet. Oh, you mean, like, Dagaba or Bespin? Tatooine North. Is that a place? That's a New Jersey town. West Dagaba off exit 122 on the parkway. Like, you may need that bullet for somebody from that planet.

That's fair. But, like, that guy decides to blow up the escape pod, goodbye Death Star Plans Goodbye R2Dio, goodbye C3PO Hello Luke Skywalker rummaging through the desert to pick up scraps of metal that fell from the sky And that's it

No movie, no nothing I don't really thought about that Like I mean that that dude on the ship was aware of droids Right He didn't like hypothesize well there could be droids on there Yeah what the fuck like everybody's got droids all over the place And he's like well there's no life forms on it Right

I'm like that's great Like let's say like in 2016 Like I stole some plans and I threw it on like a zip desk and I threw it into like a thing and pushed it pushed it like pushed it like into like the river or something right should we blow that up nope no light forms in there like data could be in there in the prequels there were entire armies of robots that like right were killing people let's face it star wars wasn't a good movie no star but that guy right there like that's that you want to you wanted the movie about the death star

contractors I want the movie about that guy just sitting back and drinking copious amounts of whiskey knowing that his decision is what led to all of this led to the downfall the empire for God's sakes. That would be a fun bit. It's like, all right, who we got next? We got Hugh Hefter. See, the guy that built a Death Star like a big giant penis. That guy's overcompensating.

We can't have that floating through space. It's going to make us look bad to the rebels to make it seem like we're overcompensating ourselves. Who's next place? Hello, or who are you? I'm Bebe Galini. I'm a cosmetics designer. I'd like to make the Dead Star a compact.

It opens up, like a compact. How are we going to fit everything? in there. It's a compact. Get out of here. Hey, Donald Trump, hey, let me tell you, a lot of people tell me you should make it out of gold. Just a bright gold floating object.

A lot of diamonds inside. You know, a good place where you can store your mail-a-briads, okay? Mail-order brides? We're to worship. We're not doing that on this thing. Let me tell you, the generals tell me that I need to have a place for my brides. Yo, dog. I took you that star

I'll put some rims on it boom it's a better dead star in honor of Rogue One a Star Wars story I'm going to play a game with our good friend Dave Lozo okay

what's the game it's called Rogue One a Star Wars story maybe it would help if I read what I actually have here you're staring at a piece of you're talking I think you were reading Rogue one a Star Wars story character

or finish hockey legend. So the names I'm about to give you are either a character from the new film in the Star Wars saga. Well, wait. The saga is the main ones of the numbers and the text scroll, and this one is sort of an answer.

So it's a Star Wars sidebar or it's a Finnish hockey legend. Ready to roll? All right. I don't know how I'm going to do this, but sure. All right. Try your best. Bodie Rook. Booty Rook Booty Rook

That was actually Patrick Swayze's Nickame in point It was a point break sequel in which they robbed a chess tournament Yeah Like they would wear the masks

of like famous chess players Bobby Fisher Get the gold The ex-presidents or Gary Kasparov Oh wait shit Fuck that up I'm sorry

Ex-presidents They're probably presidents They're probably presidents of their chess clubs The President of the Russian Chess Federation All right, I'll say Body Rook. I'm going to say Body Rook was a

Star Wars guy. That's correct. He is in Rogue One. He's played by Riz Ahmed from the night of a show I didn't watch. Oh, so you're telling me Rogue One's going to be super awesome for the first hour, and then the rest of it's going to drag on for a long time. You're going to wish that everybody dies.

Yeah, just like the Force Awakens. Lenart Petrel. Lenart Petrel. Hockey, Finnish Hockey legend, or Rogue One a Star Wars story character? I'm going to just think that you alternate it at the start and I'm going to go Finn. Motherfucker.

Lenar Petrell is in fact hockey. He played 95 games for the Edmonton Oilers and you are correct. It's too bad we didn't do this a year ago. You could have been like Finn. Is Finn Star Wars character or Finn?

Hey, both answers are correct. He's a Finn legend and he's a Star Wars character. what's the deal Zal Dinez Star Wars character or

Finnish hockey legend Rogue 1 character I don't want to confuse you by saying this might have been a character in like attack of the clones Actually he was in a deleted scene from Empire Strikes back He's actually part of Star Wars rebels

on a Hardoon network Zal Denez Zal Denez Like that guy sounds like he could be like Italian or like Zaldanez I'll go Star Wars That's correct I will tell you though Zaldenez is actually a lady

She's a lady rebel X-wing pilot And Rogue One you are correct so you're a three for three right now Whoa whoa whoa she's a lady Riku Hall Riku Hall That's actually where I took a lot of my classes I had a couple classes on Livingston campus at Riku Hall Where I learned to do the Riku

which is an ancient dance. No, I'm going to say Star Wars. The answer, of course, is hockey. Riku Hall played 92 games for the Colorado Avalanche. We're definitely stretching, although you're definitely stretching the word legend. Now, that is not true. You are, again, like, when I tell you that

Lenart Petrel played 95 games to the Oilers, Rikou Hall played 92 games for the Colorado Avalanche, you are basing that opinion, solely on their legend in the National Hockey League back in Finland. No one knows who they are. They are. They run like delis and they're just like, it's like Reku the Delly guy. Tima, where are you going?

It's Riku Hall Day. We're off of school. Down to Riko Hall, listening to the Finns of Change. Riku Hall actually is the Finnish Arsenio Hall. Is it a woof, woof, woof, he just says. Bork. Wait, that's sweet. What's the finish thing?

What's the stereotypical finish word? Yerky, jerky, lurky, lurky. Baze Malbus, Rogue-Wan, a Star Wars story character, a Finnish hockey legend. Yeah, that's Star Wars, because it has Mao in it, and, like, they want to make it. That's probably a bad guy, bad person.

Well, it's not a, well, I mean, it could be a bad person. It's the character played by Wen Jiang, or as I call him, please deliver us to the Chinese box office, as we'll put this guy in all the commercial. Bayes Malbus is a member of the Rogue One crew, I believe. So he is a bit of a near-do-well, but not necessarily a villain. That actually could be like a way you describe, like, you know, your girlfriend or your boyfriend, like you have to see Bayes Malbis. It is huge.

Bays Malbis sounds like an very impressive part of the cell. What is that, the endoplasic of particulum, not the Bayes Malbis. Right at the Bayes Malbis. You have a problem with your endocrinological. That's right. Bays Malbus. be a band. Watch it be Baza in the movie, you know less.

Bays, Malbis. Ristu Holo. Risto Holo. Risto Jallo. Risto Ristow is also a hockey guy. Ristow Paca Spakas. And Ristowice-Lainan. That's a fan. That's definitely a fan.

He played hockey. He played three games for the Edmont Toilers in 85, 86. So once again, another Finnish hockey legend on the list. How did you find these guys? Like, what did you do? So there's a site called Quant Hockey. I don't know if you've ever used it. And you can search the highest scoring players by nationality.

So there was five pages of fins, and I just went to page five. B's Malmas. Wait, that's not a hockey guy. That was the... That was Rogue One. All right. Finally, UC Soros. You see Soros.

Soros sounds like almost like Soron, like, like... Lord of the Rings. U.C. Soros. Rogue one character, or... Finnish hockey legend. It's also like, what's her name? What's her name from the TV show with the mother and how you met her?

Come on, Jessica. Come on, Tori. What are you talking to? Let's go to the mall. What's her name? Who sings, let's go to the mall and how I met your mother. Are you talking about Colby Smolders?

No, but like her, like, her, like, character. Robin. Robin. Sparkle. Robin Sparkles. He's, like, DoC. Jesus.

That's obviously the national. Predators backup goal tether. Obviously. Everyone knows that. Jesus. I got into it with some people this week about goal scoring and hockey. Yeah, let's talk about that.

Now, I am somebody who has grown tired of the idea that goals are the thing that you need to attract casual fans. Now, I know that... They are. But why are they? But when you say that they are, do you mean the exhilaration

of goals being scored in a game, so games are like 6-5? or do you mean we need Connor McDavid to have 150 points and challenge Gretzky records to get the casual fan to care about Connor McDavid? It's more the first thing, but the second thing's part of it. Like, I think the way I look at it is you and I, like I think there's like levels of hockey people.

Like there's people like you and I who watch all the teams, like you're a Devils fan, but like we're watching a ton of hockey. So like I do think we can appreciate the 2-1 game way more than the casual fan can. Right. I think the person who's a fan of, like, the Leaves or Nashville or whoever can also do that. They can also appreciate the 2-1 game as long as it's their team playing and winning the 2-1 game. Like, I don't think the Nashville fan really cares if Calgary beats Anaheim 2-1 in a well-played game. They're just going to see 2-1 and be like, whatever.

But if it's their team, great. But to get the casual fan, like, I don't think it's almost like, please don't like my sport. When you're like, oh, you don't get that the 2-1 game is super. I saw that 2-0-0-Centers game West. Like, that was fucking terrible. Most of them were terrible. But what do you say to, well, the senators don't play a beautiful game. Giebusha's, once they got that first goal in the second period, man, oh, man, you can just go to sleep in that building.

Oh, go ahead, stop playing now, people. Stop playing, guys. Like Craig Anderson, you know, after shut out, Skullies always go, yeah, my team's blocked a lot of shots and kept pucks to the outside. He said it, and he was right. He was not bullshitting anybody after that game. But, like, what do you, okay, that all said, what do you say to the person that says, but Americans are really digging on soccer now and soccer ain't got no score. Are they, though?

Like, what's that's... The ratings are extraordinarily high for Premier League. They packed the stands for the America's Cup or whatever the fuck it was. Like, people like soccer, and they ain't no scoring in soccer. I hate to see those ratings to believe it. You know what I mean? Like, I just... Somebody is a soccer truther?

That's your response to this? You're the first person I've ever heard talking about the high ratings of European soccer in the U.S. It gets ratings. Like, how high? Give me a number. Give me a number. Like, remember the finale of Mesh? Exactly that for Red Bulls.

It's that, but then plus more. I just, I... But, like, also, the other thing, too, is, like, soccer has always been that. Soccer has always been a 1-0-0-2-1 at most, sport most times. While hockey had a heyday of, like, you know, 7-5 games and stuff. And, like, in baseball, like, think about it. Like, think about baseball. They got to a point where they were, like, yeah, we got to lower the mound.

Like, too many guys are awesome at pitching. Right. Like, that's how it is kind of now where, like, too many goalies are awesome at making saves. And that's where you make the nets. Okay, you make the Nets bigger. You fundamentally change a part of the game, thereby making every record obsolete because the Nets were smaller. Like playing 3-on-3?

You know, that's at least got some semblance of hockey, not fundamentally changing the equipment. Well, what about baseball? You know where, like, the Center Field on Yankee Stadium was in, like, 1930, and where it is today? It's like 100 feet closer. They bring stuff in. They lower the malls.

They change stuff. I get that. But you... It's fine. You have to go farther than make the Nets bigger. to increase goal scoring. Because here's the thing that making the Nets bigger

doesn't account for. Block shots, obstruction, all of the things the teams do when it matters most. That's my biggest problem with people that are always like, well, did you just change the game

and we can market offense and every game we'll be 5, 4, or whatever. When it comes to winning hockey games, the only way you win a hockey game is by preventing scoring. And I know the Penguins were able to play a very high-tempo offensive game. That's great.

They have some of the best offensive players on the fucking planet. And not everybody's going to be able to do that. It's the same principles people are like, why can't you play Olympic-style hockey? Those teams shouldn't win. The teams are the best players should win. The teams that have the Phil Kessels and the Sydney Crosby's and the Connor McDavid will benefit from the bigger nets because they don't need to have.

Think about it. Imagine if they, what are they, six, four, imagine if they were seven, five. So there you go. So you do want hockey to become baseball in the sense that only the teams that can afford to keep the best players around on their roster. And nobody who's below the billion-dollar payroll of the, Dodgers can compete because they don't get the same kind of players as the teams like the Penguins do.

Wait, why would that fundamentally change? Because you said the teams are the best players you play. I'm saying that you can play that style of hockey when you have Chris LaTang, when you have Sidney Crosby, you have Getty Malkin, Phil Kessel, down list. Yeah, but like, I don't get what you're arguing. Are you arguing for the existence of... I'm arguing it's great that the Penguins can play that style of hockey, but not every team can. But it's not really...

And because not every team can... Essentially, they're always going to go back to defense, to win. And that's the issue with hockey, as far as the offense is twofold. You have trouble marketing stars that we've talked about before, because they're not on the ice for two-thirds of the game. And when it matters, most teams will play defense. They will not try to score. They will prevent you from scoring and try to win one-nothing.

But the guys that always can break through that are the super-skill players. So they will be the ones least affected by it, and they'll be the ones doing the scoring more often. Listen. Like, think about Ottawa last night. They played a two-nothing game. They scored in the early in the second period and just locked it down. the rest of that game, like there are some chances,

but the guys on Ottawa who normally, like, like when Mark Stone gets to the net or a crossing gets to the net, they're going to be more likely to score a goal because they're the guys that are harder to obstruct because they're better hockey players. You know what I mean? Would you rather see the game played four on four than make the nets bigger?

Because honestly, like, this is the fundamental... But this is the fundamental issue that I have with this debate all the time, which is that it's not about goal scoring, it's about flow. And you watched a life- A life-ending Senators' Rangers game that had no flow. I've seen a lot of hockey this year. Like, I've seen a lot of good games. You can have a shitty 8-7 game if there's not back-and-forth action.

Yeah. It's hard to have a shitty 8-7 game. 4-4-4 is back-and-forth action, you know? That's the thing. And here's the thing. Like, if you really want to pump up the stats of someone like Connor or someone like sit that said a need to help.

But like any of these guys, here's my fast and easy solution. Two minute major power plays. Yeah, that's insane. Why is it insane? But wait, how is that? You're talking about

making the nets bigger fundamentally changes the game. If you're going to let a team score as many goals as they can't. It used to be the case back in the day with Montreal Canadiens. Now, where you should have pointed out my hypocrisy is railing against your idea

of the teams of the best star players being the ones to get the benefit when obviously the teams of the best star players are always going to be the ones that have a better power. play. But my point is that if it's about goal scoring totals, I would rather see that.

I rather see a lot of things before fucking around with the net. Maybe it's the goalie of me that's saying that. But the idea that you're going to have these guys fundamentally relearn their position because you've decided to make the nets bigger. And in some cases, leading to injuries, in some cases,

leading to everything. It's going to take a generation before guys figure out how to play with a larger net. How is it going to lead to injuries? Having to stretch across? Yeah. Your groin's not going to go. Well, just think, to me, like,

somebody, somebody wrote about this or tweeted about it or something, but, like, we do all these things where it's like, this guy's got to put his stick down on the faceoff circle first. Now the face off stays in deep if it gets deflected out of play and all this stuff. But the end of the day, like, you watch hockey from 1984, the goal is

basically, like, he's basically dressed like a defenseman. Like, his pads are so tiny that you could... He's dressed like the child in that commercial that wraps paper towels around them so they can fall on their bum and not get hurt. Right. He's dressed like Ralphie from a fucking Christmas story. That's why you're going to snipe somebody goals in the 1980s because there's so much more

net to shoot at. Like now there isn't. So what do you do? You can't reduce the padding because guys have, you know, sticks made out of Adamanteam that are going to fire 120 mile power slap shot from 40 feet away. So what do you do? What do you? Well, clearly you need to find his brother's Sabretooth to go after him. Actually, if you just, if you're just to get

rogue and have her touch some of the players and take their powers away, that would actually make the teams more balanced, I think. That's absolutely right. If you get rogue, you're eventually going to get gambet and who will wants that in the NHL. But, again, you were talking about, like, casual fan. Like, I think the casual fan, like, imagine if baseball was always like that, where every

game was two to one. It takes away from, like, you want to see Madison Bumgarner and Clayton Kershaw have a duel. You don't want to go out there and see Bartolo Colon and, you know, frigging the fitzartner and the Padres do that. Like, it takes away from all the other good two-one games. Like, if they're all two-to-one, they all meld together for people that aren't watching it super closely.

I think that I've watched a lot of hockey. I think the hockey right now is pretty good. I think there's games that have flow. I think part of the problem, as we talked about in the show before, is that regular season matchups have no juice. There's no rivalry. There's no sense of hate. There's nothing that keeps your eyes glued other than the action.

I'm worried about the NHL going in this direction from marketing perspective, which is to try to market stars and market offense and market this and market that, when one of the only things that's consistently sold through every era is hate, is rivalry, and things like that. So maybe you get that, maybe you don't. The other thing, too, about this sort of offensive era is, again, we've talked before, like, there's so many guys that are in Canada. It's part of the issue, too.

Like, the casual American fan might love Patrick Linaid. They might love Connor McDavid, but the casual American fan is going to see Edmonton Oilers and went to pick Jets and run the other way. They just are. They care about sports. They care about the Flyers because they hate the Eagles. They care about the Kings because they hate everything.

in LA. But like that's, to me, that's the NHL's fault. You're saying, like, they've been marketing hate and stuff for years. Like, the NHL hasn't been growing the way it should be, because they don't, they're not doing things differently. They don't do things like the way other sports leagues do. Like, when, if the Toronto Raptors are good, and they're

on TV playing against the Cavs, the Warriors, some team, like, I feel like the NBA fan is way more likely to tune into that game than an NHL fan is willing to tune in to see the Leafs. And I just think that's, that's like something the NHL can tap into if they want, but I mean, you heard Bill Daley.

He's like, we love marketing teams. We think teams are the way to do it. Record revenue. It's an interesting time, but I mean, it's a good time. It's a blessing of riches, but it's an interesting time. And again, like, it's going to be really interesting to see if the catalyst for making the nuts bigger or fundamentally changing some of the rules in the game is McDavid and Matthews and Linae and all these guys that are now here, that, you know, knowing that they

have an opportunity to sell these people to a casual fan if the, if the numbers are super high and juiced up and stuff. It'll be interesting to see if that ends up being the catalyst for kind of like... Four and four is... I wouldn't mind four on. I wouldn't be against that. If the NHL one day was like we're going to just have four... How about no offside? I've always wanted to do blue line and red line out.

You have to gain the blue and to get it out of the zone to relieve the pressure. You got to get it outside the red. I think that would... Think about how many... It would just change where a defenseman position themselves. There would be way less opportunities to just chip it out of the zone. Like, you'd be able to hold it in between the blue and the red. and get it deep again and keep cycling, I think that would do a world of good.

I also think if you don't like my two-minute major idea, then they should adopt another thing that was tested at the R&D camp, which is you have to skate the puck out of the zone rather than just clear it. I love that idea. Also with the two-minute majors, like, let's say that happened tomorrow. You know what the referees would do. Stop calling penalties?

Well, it all depends on what the score is by the end of the game because they all run a fucking script. Or like how many penalties in a row they've called for one team or the other? Can you imagine if a team was down through? Actually, yeah, a team was down three with like a minute 30 to go, and they got a little over-the-glass penalty, and they got to score four goals in 90 seconds. Yeah, right.

And speaking of three, by the way, we are kind of talking around the elephant in the room, which is the three-point game. Like, if a regulation game was worth three points, that remedies a lot of this stuff, I think. It remedies teams playing super conservatively because I think at least one team would be going and gunning for it to get that extra point in the standings.

Like, I think the three-point game is something that has a lot of support, never has enough support because the NHL essentially games the systems that everybody's within a point of each other getting into like the new year but I think that remedies a lot of the problems that we have as far as game flow goes especially towards the end of the game I think that would just be like another band-aid type thing you know where they they that's big that's bigger I think that's the simple obvious thing nobody wants to do right I would work the best but what do I know before we get to to listener mail real quick

or a quarter way into the season or just past it as you guys listen to this podcast, who's your heart trophy guy? I'll give you mine. It's Carrie Price. Yeah, it's either Carrie Price or Connerman. Yeah, it's a two-horse race there. And I think Price gets it only because,

and no offense to Connor, like, we've seen the giant smoldering dumpster fire that is the HABs without carry price. And honestly, it's unfair. Any guy that can actually calm the conversation about firing Michelle Tarion, deserves some kind of award for the first quarter of the season.

But Conner's definitely number two. That team is dog shit when he's not on the ice. Yeah, it's a disaster. I think I'd go carry price. That said, Vezna Trophy right now, I'd probably go Devin Dubnick over Price. I think DuPnick is... You're going to be one of those people.

He has faced just the same amount of shots. Carrey Price, I mean the Dubnick Vezna. He is... Yeah, split it. He is... He does not have the benefit of a manned Mountain, Shea Weber in front of him. He's playing on a Bruce Besson.

Drew team, for God's sakes. He's got like a same percentage of north of like 960 and even strained. Doobnick's my quarter point Vesina winner right now. But if you're going to chop it, why don't you give it to Corey Crawford? He's a 996 or some crazy shit. QVY number three on my ballot.

Boy, I would launch you out of the PHWA if you had carry a price first at MEP and then second or third for the Vesna for some bizarre reason. Well, luckily I don't vote him of Vesna. Thank you, Kershaw, for MDP. But he's fifth of my son of young ballot. Why?

Check out my website. Baseball. Well, you see, that's the beauty of it. Writer Greg voted Price in for the heart, but GM Greg voted in Dubnick for the Bezina. Did you see the guy who voted Michigan ahead of Ohio staying in his ballot? What an asshole. I kind of dig it.

Yeah, it'd be fierce. Norris trophy, Shoebacher, as much as I was trying to find a way to not give it to Shea Weber. The numbers are all there, the impact's all there. No one, one of the greatest. myths that we've seen in hockey, I think, is the idea that people were like, oh, this Jay Weber deal is going to be a bust immediately. Now, everybody knew you had a couple of years left in them. We just think in the long run, trading a generational talent like Suban for a guy like Weber

who's going to seem real old in about four years is a bad trade eventually. But in the short term, it could have worked nice and it has worked nice for him. Who do you go with? 18 points in 22 games. You see, him Burns, Chatton Kirk. Shant Kirk's been really good for them, for the blues. About Ryan Suter. Sure, why not? You can give it to Ryan.

I can give it to everyone I want. I'll give it to everybody feeling through it too. How about Fred Burns? How about just go with the obvious guy? Sure, why not? Good guy. Dresses and camouflage a lot. Has a bunch of snakes in a drawer.

Good guy. Works hard. Loves the game. Calder Trophy. Now, here's where things get fun. Here's where things get fun. What are you thinking? Terry Price. Now, so here's how it's breaking down. The hipster Canadians probably are going to put Marner over Matthews.

Everybody else who wants to vote for a forward is probably going to put line A over both of them. But the guy who's getting the most support, I think, quarterway through the season is Zach Werenski. Because he's played over like 22 minutes a night. He's big quality minutes. his possession numbers are off the chart. But that would forget the guy who has started the year in his first eight starts with a 7-1 record

and a 1.75 goals against and a 9-39% percentage. A guy who, for some reason, people feel like should be disqualified for being rookie of the year because he nearly won the Khan Smy. The guy named Matt Murray. If another goalie had his numbers to start the season,

people would be law-dive. him as the next great goaltender, Canadian goaltender. But Matt Murray has the audacity to have been a known quantity before this season. I'm going to give it to Brady Shea. It's Patrick

Leine. No, I do I do kind of like Zach Werenski. Yeah, Werenzky seems to be the pick that everybody likes because all the least forwards and Linae are going to get a lot of support and then Wrenzki

He might be able to slip in and get... He feel like he should throw the blue jackets a bone of some sort for that start, right? He's like Gossus Bearer if Gossus Bear started the year in day one. Right, if Gossus Bear could play a league of defense, he'd be Rensky. What? No, oh, shit, I'm sorry, that was out loud, wasn't out. If, if, all right, picture it like this. Yeah.

All right, imagine if Shane Gossus Barron was partnered with anybody besides Andrew McDonald's. Right? He'd be so much better. You'd be a lot better. Now, picture this podcast, if you replace me with Andrew McDonald's. You'd be dead. You'd have no one to playoff of, knowing the laugh of your Star Wars references.

He'd just be sitting here just like, I got a big contract. I don't know, I'll just stand here and block some shots because I play in my own end all the time. You're going to be like, I want to get out of my own zone. So, Andrew, tell me about life on the road. In the A. In the H.O, we take a bus.

In the NHO, sometimes you take things. The stipe that's not as good, but, you know, it's okay because I'm getting my full age. I'm sorry. Do you guys, do anybody on the Islanders? They miss them. Shane Gossel, you're one of those guys that was, like, good, scratch.

I know. Well, no, hold on. Again, I was, I was, again, I was, I was good to scratch Shane Gossespaer because I think that it's, it was a smart tactical decision by, um, uh, by what's, what's the, what's the fact. Yeah, by Haxstall. Because, um, like, it, it was a good wake up call. He's a, he's a good guy to kind of target. Um, I know Flyers fans lost their minds. You're like, we're going to lose a game.

It's not about that. It's about making an example of somebody early in the season and hoping that it pays off. And I like Haxdoll a lot. I'm a big fan of his. I think he's got some stones. And I love the fact that he walked into that situation last year where you had everybody on that Flyers roster being like, college guy. And he managed to. What are you going to do?

Coach with your pro tractor? And so he managed to make it work. And it was great. It worked out really nice for him. So I'm a Haxstall fan. So I like the scratch. I thought it was a smart decision. It was stupid and just a complete play

because just to do a thing. They won that game like six to three, right? Whoever they played that day. Yeah, inspired by his scratching. Yeah. Reader mail time here on Puck Soup. Eric Van... Oh, Jesus.

Eric Vanderkamp? And Eric Van Slembroke wants to know better chance to make the playoffs after a brutal start. The Red Wings or the Sabres. Sabres obviously get Eichl back. Red Wings. Getting better than expected goal hitting from Jimmy Howard and Marazica is going to probably

rounded to form. I don't think either of them make the playoffs. I think the streak ends the season for the Red Wings. But of the two, I still think Detroit is probably the better pick to eke in if I had to pick one. Yeah. Buffalo's just like, Buffalo's got a lot, still has a lot of holes in that team that need to be addressed, I think. although I feel like people have been kind of pooping all over Jack Eichol

first 20 games like he's not Connor McDavid he's not on there he's gonna come back and with ferocity he just fucking lights everything and unprecedented ferocity they just go on it they just go on eight game winning streak and like not for nothing they're there's six points behind the Devils for the last wild card spot three points behind Detroit with a game in hand

this is on we're taping Monday by the way oh yeah we have the day we're doing this whatever day this is just pretend it's Monday go back in time yeah I you know what 1112 9 10 70 there's no real home away I think Detroit stinks But no fucking Buffalo

There you go There it is Friend of Buffalo Dave Lozo Buffalo will finish more points in the right I'll just say that James Tomlinson wants to know What are the best Christmas Traditions

For me it's watching Santa Claus versus the Martians On MST 3K I do that every Christmas As I mentioned in the Siki I always like stocking stuff I was a big fan of stocking stuff. I feel like presents or whatever,

like you can look at a present and kind of know what you're getting, maybe by the shape of the box. But you stick your head in that stocking. You don't know what you're going to find. Lottery tickets, Dildo, Hershey's Kisses. Dildo would make a shape in the stocking.

It's a good one. It's not one of those bullshit dildos. Well, we buy Magnum stockings. So, I mean, like, the shape is obscured. It's like a little rabbit, then you're not going to know. But if it's like a good old-fashioned, like concrete dilton.

Yeah. If it's, you know, yeah, if it's like, Jim Brown, All-American kind of Dildo. Like, you'd know what it is. Mine's the New Mexico Bowl. Great game between New Mexico and some other team. What was your favorite...

What was your favorite shitty bowl bowl name of all time? I got two. There's a current one that has beef in it. It's like some sort of like beef bowl. The Bailey's Beef Bowl. The Bailey... Oh, you mean the Beefo Brady's Bowl? That Beefo Brady's...

Yeah, there used to be a Beefo Brady's in Virginia when I lived there. And it was like a shit, I don't want, maybe they'll sponsor. It was not my favorite sports bar. Yeah, I won't say it was a shitty one. Ruckers might have played in that bowl. Yeah, I think they definitely played that bowl. I was definitely the furniture gallery. Any bowl sponsored by a business that may no longer be around,

the Furniture Gallery.com bowl, and there was actually a Pets.com bowl. I remember the Pets.com bowl. The Insight.com bowl. And you used to be the Insight Bowl, then it became the Insight.com Bowl. God. Ruckers also played in that one. Like, why would you, like, just anybody's, going to throw you money? The Chico's

Bell Bonds bowl? Like, teams apparently lose money on some of these bowls. Some of them turn down the shitty bowls that are like on December 10th or whatever. Yeah. College football's stupid. Thanks to Rutgers for making Maryland bowl eligible, by the way. That's pretty strong. Pretty strong play. What a bad season. Steve wants

to know... Basketball team 6 and 0 guys on Monday. Steve wants to know what's your favorite hockey moment as a fan for each of your favorite teams. Mine is Gagne Game 7 versus the Bruins. My favorite moment as a Devils fan is always and forever going to be. Johnny Mac scoring against Darren Pange in 1988 and putting the Devils in the playoffs the first time. I was two years into my cognizant phase as a sports fan when that happened,

and it then sent me on an amazing journey as a Devils fan through a playoff that included two of the most brutal series violence-wise have ever seen against the Capitals, against the Islanders, and then a Boston series that was The Infamous Have Another Donuts Series. What an amazing impression that left on me as a young lad that playoff run. Yeah. I'm going to go when I got Scott Pellarons autograph in a program that let me go do Squarrow. Oh, wait, what?

I've done Squirrel four times. Shut the fuck up. Did we ever talk about this? One time I got the autograph three times I was an alternate because they didn't sell the program. Oh, that's right. You went into like the reserve area. I think we did talk about this actually. If you had the program, you had the program.

But if you didn't have the program, you can go downstairs in the arena where they sell like all the tickets in the main ticket area. There would always be somebody there. And if you got down there with like five minutes to go in the period and you were the first person to sign up and they only saw. sold three of the four programs. You go back down after the second period and you wait and see, and then they were like, Dave, yeah,

like, well, come on, you're good to do it. But Scott Pellerin was the one time I got to do it, and I got to do it at an Islander Devil game, sell-out crowd, and that was the time I came the closest to scoring. Eight times, I hit the net. Never missed the net once, but the Islander game, I got it into the I got it in there, but it didn't cross

the line completely. You talk about traditions that I love. Very sad. The emphatic booing of people in score that missed the net completely is one of my favorite traditions of all time. They fucking... Dude, so this is how it happened.

I was like... I was like 13 maybe, something like that. And it's like, I knew how to play hockey, so I knew how to just guide the puck towards the net. And I just didn't get enough on it. But I thought it went in because the light came on, the crowd behind the net stood up. I may have had my first orgasm at that point in my life.

I put my arms in the air, and the devil's fucking mascot, skates over to the crease, bends down, his hands on his knees, bends a little bit looks and he waved it off. The fucking mascot waved off my goal, my chance to come back in Game 82 and play for the car.

Did you get in his face afterwards? Were you just demoralized at that point? The crowd started booing me. I think I may have given the middle finger to somebody on the way off the ice. And the worst part too is when you're walking back to your seat, you have the stick from the ice. Everyone knows who you are.

And they were like, let's try, buddy. Fuck you, buddy. Finally, Dan's Straight Edge. Cheers. Once note, if you could kill any cartoon character for realzies, who's going to die? If you could kill any cartoon character for real zies? Now, I imagine this means, like, if you met a cartoon character in real life vis-a-vis

Roger Rabbit, or does he mean, like, you have a giant magic eraser vis-a-muck, and you can, like, erase them from a cartoon? I have never contemplated cartoon-character murder before. I've contemplated a cartoon character sex before. Hello, Jessica Rabbit. But I'm not... Actually, I have a picture of me and Jessica Rabbit when I went to Disney when I was like 10.

It's like one of those ones where you stand there. Wait a second. Like a woman dressed like Jessica Rabbit? No, no, no. It's like... It's like... Oh, like a cardboard thing or... No, it was like computer generating.

Oh, yeah. And it's just like her giant breasts in my 12-year-old face. Can't figure out why I am, like the way I am today. Oh, so the squirrel was the second time you came. I don't know why I didn't put more on that shot. Every other shot I took slammed off the board It just didn't go in

And that one just Just They should fucking say a boating the ice first And I want to want a car And I was Whatever I'm fine I'm trying to think of my least favorite character From The Simpsons

Like someone Who I never felt was funny Um I'm trying to think of the cartoons I watch that I don't like the characters Maybe Cyril from Archer He's annoying He's annoying

Yeah I mean if you're going classic I mean I would probably kill Huckleberry Hound because why do you need Huckleberry Hound in our lives? Like, what does he even do? Never like Mr. Magoo. Sensitive to blind people.

But that's like such an easy, like, if this was the most dangerous game, like that'd be the easiest mark to kill. Oh, yeah. No, he's Mr. Magoo. He would walk out of the way as my bullet was coming there on some stuff. You could stand right in front of him and like split his head with an axe, and he would be like, what are you doing now, sodder? You're trying to think of old-timey cartoons.

Who are the, who are the, bad guys and the Thundercats. Oh, you mean Mumrah? Oh, it was like that, yeah, that thing that wore the mask. Oh, now you're bringing the over to that area. Like Skeletor? I would probably

kill... Who is Sheer's bad guy? Well, I would probably kill Flint from G.I. Joe, because I was more of a Duke guy. Oh, right, G.I. Joe. And then I would definitely kill... Oh, is Jarvink's a cartoon character? I think I might have found it. I would kill Evil Lynn from He-Man.

Never had any use for her. Zoidberg, maybe. Zoiburg is a good one. I'm trying to think on The Simpsons who I'd kill, and I can't think of, like, a character that I did not like on that show. What about... I mean, Krusty the clown...

Yeah, he's... Krusty's hilarious. Yeah, he is. Krusty's greedy and takes advantage of people. I love him. He's great. He's my, he's my, he's my, I probably kill Maggie the baby. Like, what's the sense of it? I mean, Maggie did it. Didn't Maggie attempt murder?

Maggie was involved in the stupid Mr. Burns plot. She's super smart. She, she, uh, there was that episode where she spoke and it was like Liz Taylor's voice. I'd probably kill. Maggie's been a lot of cheesy stuff. I would, I would have infanticide. I would kill. Is that, wait, is it having sex of the baby or is that murdering a baby?

Infanticide? Yeah. I think that's murder. Okay, I'll infanticide Maggie Simpson. Otherwise it would be weird. Otherwise would be weird. I think I'd kill all the animaniacs. Oh my God.

You're assholes. Fuck off. Oh, shit. Now you, okay. That's wacko. All right, Maggie Simpson, congratulations, your life is spared. The one I want to kill is that girl on Tiny Tunes that did the, I want to love him and squeeze him and hug him and

Blah, blah, blah. I don't remember that. It was a character on either Tiny Tunes or Animaniacs. It was like a little girl who would always find... Yeah. Yeah, always find, like, the characters and then treat them like the little baby dolls or whatever. Like torture them. Yeah, oh, throw her in a fucking volcano tomorrow.

Yeah, she's got a bullet coming for her. She's a fucking... She's torturing living... Technical, living things. This has gone on way too long, and by that I mean, you guys have no idea of the technical difficulties you've had today. Yeah, I can't. Can't wait to put the headphones on when we get stopped here to see how this sounds. I don't want to even hear it.

I'm looking at the screen then. We've had the audio screen, our levels in front of us the whole time. We never do that to see how it sounds. I'm sitting far away from the sensitive mic, and Greg's on top of the dead mic. Our screen looks like a cardiogram for like a newborn rabbit, and it's not a good look. It's like a 78-year-old man with heart issues, having a Minajatatat 2-21-year-old playboy playing. With Margot Robbie and, like. Yeah, Margot named a little bit of a little.

didn't respond to my text Monday night so anyways thanks everybody for listening and we've actually no puck soup first week of December back the following week because your boys on honeymoon time in Hawaii

Greg's gonna live a fantasy light for the next two weeks and Ponticity Island and thanks for listening you can find my stuff on Puck Daddy when I'm not on vacation you can find my stuff on Twitter at Wachinsky which is

you know at Wichenski You can buy my book for the holiday season. Take your eye off the puck. And if you save your receipt, if you buy this and save the receipt, I can promise you, something might be coming your way. Save the receipt, though.

And here's Dave Lozo to take you home. Oh, I had a thing to take us home with. It's been such a traumatic day that I don't remember what it was. What was I going to talk about? What was a fantasy football? I had a nice lady on the escalator today who moved over without anybody asking her. She's nice.

Is that, you know? She was in board authority, and she got on the escalator, and she had, like, her bag on the right side of the home. On the escalator and herself on the left side. Yeah? And I wasn't going to say anything. She's kind of an old lady, but she just sits on to the side. Very nice.

There you go. I don't know. What's going on in the world? Anything chapping your ass in the... Not at all. Nothing. Nothing. There is.

All right. Well, then that's it's it then. Listen, we love you. We love you all. We thank you so much for listening. Leave positive reviews. If you like it, if you don't like it, leave negative reviews. and that's the show for this week.

Sorry if it was too loud or be quiet. Bye. A leaving nerdist.com.