Puck Soup - Will Leitch

Episode Date: February 23, 2017

Dave and Greg welcome Will Leitch of Sports On Earth and the New Republic (and the founder of Deadspin) to talk about the St. Louis Blues, how baseball and hockey are constantly trying to court fans that don't like them, Barstool Sports and the changing digital sports media landscape, and Will's Oscar picks. That, plus the Auston Matthews vs. Patrik Laine debate goes nuclear; the downside of the "Miracle On Ice"; previewing the NHL trade deadline; and musical tribute to the sad, ignored Ryan Johansen; a Blackhawks fans marries a Wild fan on the ice but betrays his team; and listener mail that takes us through pizza dipping, hockey documentaries and Ilya Bryzgalov on the seven new exoplanets.

Today's episode of Puck Soup is sponsored by Seat Geek, the smartest way to find hockey tickets this season. Ladies and gentlemen, there is nothing like seeing live hockey in person, feeling the spray of the ice, hearing the roar of the crowd, seeing the fights develop behind the play when there are fights. And there is no better service to use to acquire said hockey tickets than Seekek. I've got the app on my phone. By far the easiest way I've found to buy hockey tickets. and you can always get the best deal on these hockey tickets because C-Keekeek price compares for you by searching multiple ticket sites.

Prices can vary depending on where you shop, but C-Keekeek will always find you the lowest available price. It's the best thing to use, and you have 100% guarantee so you can shop for tickets on C-Geek with confidence. It's the best. It's the easiest. It finds you the best deal. What more can you want?

Oh, I know. How about $20 back? A rebate off your first C-Geek purchase. Here's how you do it. You download the Seekek app. You go to the Settings tab. You click Add a promo code. The promo code you will add is S-O-U-P.

That spells Soup. And you get $20 off your first Seekek-Eak purchase. Once again, download the Seekek app, go to the Settings tab. Add a promo code. Promote is Soup. And Seek will send you $20 after you made your first purchase. Download the Seek app today. Support your favorite podcast with your boys, Greg and Dave.

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. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's and tunes. It's your weekly bowl of Hockey and Nancet. I'm Greg Wyshinsky of Yahoo Sports Puck Daddy Blog. And I'm Dave Lozo.

And I think you should get married to whoever you want, wearing whatever you want, whenever you want. And you're in Puck Soup. Dave is, of course, speaking about the biggest hockey news of the week. Is it Austin Matthews versus Patrick Line? No. Is it the 37th anniversary of the Miracle on Ice? No. Is it hockey day in America?

No. It is, of course, a gentleman by the name of Kent Johnson. Action News. That's a very, very local news name. Who was married to Shanta Ballou. They are from Moose Lake, Minnesota. It must be confusing in Minnesota to have so many places named Moose Lake, I imagine. It's like, oh, my God, I went to Moose, Moose Jha High.

No, no, no, no, Moose Lake. I'm from, oh, East Moose Lake or West Moose Lake? No, just regular Moose Lake. And the beautiful part is that you have to wonder, is it named because of the moose sightings around the lake, or is it like some legend in which, you know, a moose drowned in the lake? No, no, no, it's actually a lake that's filled with moose. With moose, with aquatic moose?

Like, you ever see that? Like, there's always, every once in a while on Facebook, I always catch someone sharing a video of, like, this island or something where it's all dogs. You ever see that? Like, dogs run out of the forest. Yeah. It's all great or whatever. Yeah. They're St. Bernard's.

Same thing. It's an actual pit where water used to be. Right. And they just dump dead moose in there. It's just filled with dead moose. Wait, dead moose or alive? Oh, no, they're dead. Like, it's when you hit your hit moose with your car.

Right. What are you going to do with it? It's, like, you may bring it home and eat it. But if not, you drop it in moose. It's like... It's like the Walking Dead where they dig a big pit, and then they put all the zombies in it, because then they can't get get you. They just put all the dead moose in there. Oh, the zombies can't get out of pits on walking dead?

No, Walking Dead zombies are not runners. They're the lumbering zombies, and they haven't learned how to open doors or climb. Unlike the zombies. So the World War Z zombies can climb. World War Z zombies could probably figure out math equations. They're like the smartest zombies. Remember the part where they all climbed on top of each of, other like ants and climbed over the walls and Jerusalem like that's a pretty fucking smart zombie for something that doesn't have a functioning brain. And at the end one of the zombies like figures

out like science or something right when like Brad Pitts, he goes to the room with the medicine in it or whatever. And there's also a movie too where like zombies figure out they can walk under water because they're already dead and they can't drown. Right. Well they probably don't figure that out. They probably just do it. Oh wow. You're saying zombies can't learn?

I'm saying there's not probably a zombie symposium where it's like Noon to one. Can I walk underwater? Great question. Break for lunch. It's just them eating like brains and dead pigs and shit. Really excited for after party with Young MC.

He plays great songs. You should be able to fit everything in this backpack. Can you feel it? It's heavy. Now think about every. everything in the backpack. There's brains and brains. And like that

thing you bought from IKEA, brains. A zombie Tom Cruise doing the Magnolia symposium. Team the brains. Respect the brains. I don't remember any dialogue for that movie except Tom Cruise is just like talking about crushing

ass whenever he's on the stage with the microphone. Shanta Blue and Kent Johnson from Moose Lake, Minnesota were married down the ice at Excell Energy Center on Tuesday ahead of the Minnesota Wilds game against the Chicago Blackhawks. The reason we're talking about it, the bride wore her most beautiful white Minnesota Wilde road sweater with the word bride sweater with the word bride's sweater with the word groomed. He's not on the team anymore. He's kind of terrible. Kind of a dirt bag.

Kind of a scummy baggy. And then also two other accoutrement, which drew my ire and the ire of Pete Blackburn from Fox Sports, a Minnesota wild tie draped over the Blackhawks logo and a Minnesota wild hat. So she's wearing a wild sweater, nothing Blackhawksie. He's wearing a Blackhawks jersey, a wild tie and a wild tie and a wild hat. hat. So it's like, you know, Catholic wedding with a Yarmulka. So the issue that you and

Pete Blackburn had are the, or is the fact that he's conforming to her wild ways, which is weird because when you marry someone, you're supposed to tame them as that the thing or whatever. And she's just got the wild thing on. Yeah. Let me present you this hypothesis. Yes.

Blackhawks, bra and panties. You know, I considered that, but I felt that would be a bridge too far. But you're right. I mean, we don't know for sure that she's not wearing some sort of Blackhawks guarder. Right, right. Yeah. We have some sort of wedding night entertainment Chicago Blackhawks, less formal wear.

Underwear. But assuming she isn't, I do generally have a problem with the idea that, like, look, look, there's absolutely nothing wrong with him supporting her team. You know, giving her a shoulder to cry on when they beat the Wild and seven, which, of course, they're going to do because Bruce Woodrow is the coach. Wait, wait, seven. Oh, Bruce Briggs in again, seven? Yeah. Up three, two. But, like, the idea, like, you know, like, Ruby's a Cubs fan, and I'm a Mets fan.

And, like, when the Mets beat the Cubs in the playoffs. Oh, I do remember you being really sad about that. I was, oh, yeah, I was real heartbroken. That might have been pre-Pucked Soup days where I fill on on Wednesday and you had to, like, express regret about how bad you felt. Oh, I felt so I don't know. Oh, I felt so bad. Like, when she came home from work the next day and I was literally eating goat. I was just like, oh, oh, it tastes like curses.

Ryan Sandberg's way worse than Wally Bachman Great to see you But like I don't know man I respect the idea that Again it's not like a Rangers fan Marrying a Devils fan Like I would have a bigger problem with that Happening if you know

The guy had a Rangers tie over his devil's jersey Or something like this is a rivalry But it's not like a blood rivalry necessarily But still Why? Why? Is it because you're getting married in Minnesota? Yeah maybe that's like maybe that's the requirement of like the building.

They said if you're going to do this here, you can wear the Black Hawk stuff. Right. But you got to also throw on some Minnesota. They laid out five things for them. Yeah. So it was like, Scoro.

Well, when you go out for Scoro, you have to wear the gear they give you. You can't be like wearing like a Rangers jersey to double Scoro. Oh, I don't think that's true. Is that true? You can't wear a Rangers jersey to Scoro in another building. I think you've, I think I've seen that.

They would. Dude, I have done Scoro four times. I know. Yeah, yeah. I'm a Wiley veteran of Scoro. I'm a Scoro. veteran. If there was like, if

Squero was a real sport, I could be like an old time retired Skoro guy on TV giving my all time he takes on how to win at Scoro. But I definitely remember like in Jersey, like a dude would come out and be like you know, Kent Johnson from Massapequa and he came out there in a Ranger jersey and people would boom. That was a thing

that happened for sure. I know your feelings on the Blackhawks, but give him this. Don't you think that they should have the power in this relationship? Don't you think she should be the one converting? Well, I think if that was case they would have got married at the United Center and everybody would have screamed the whole time and nobody would have heard the vows because that's just the cool thing to do is scream

for two fucking minutes. Maybe her family wouldn't have gone to Chicago. Maybe there's a lot more behind the scenes than we are conceiving here. Like her family wouldn't accept him unless he did that. Like this is his way of like, yeah. No daughter of mine is going to marry a Blackhawks fan. I can't believe we're going to have another Blackhawks fan in the family. Honey, can't you meet a nice guy?

Gophers fan or an old North Stars fan. What was the name of that guy you dated in high school? He was a big North Stars fan. Mom, we broke up 15 years ago. Get over it. Kent's a wonderful man and I love him and I'm not going to hear any more of this. Mom, I have great news. What is it, honey?

Have you found that North Stars fan you dated in high school again? No, Mom. Kent told me last night that he decided he will, he'll convert. Is it like a test? Is it like you have to like pass like a like a test to like learn all the spell gabberic? I'm sorry, Kent. The answer is not Manny Fernandez. It's Josh Harding.

I don't know if you could be in this family. By the way, this is like an older couple too, right? They're not like in their 20s. Yeah, this isn't some like teenage Romeo and Juliet. This isn't this isn't Baz Luhrman's Blackhawks and Wild. sits down with her dad I love your daughter a lot I love her like

I love her more than I love spinoramas I want you to know that her dad's like what are your intentions with my daughter he's like probably take her to a Stanley Cup parade you know based all the fucking odds I don't know get out of my house I never like Prince get out of here before I get my shotgun

congratulations from puck soup yeah we're very happy for the happy couple and again like the support your loved ones and all the things that they love, but by no means the support necessarily mean draping a Minnesota wild tie, which this guy inexplicably owns, over one of the greatest jerseys in all of the sports. You know what else is the greatest, my friend?

I'll tell you what the greatest is. Not pizza with pineapple. No, it is. Well, I don't know. You might be able to choose it, but the best thing about Blue Apron is that you can make all your choices, and it's not like you're stuck having pineapple on pizza for the Dave Lozos of the world that don't like it.

Should we look up the Blue Apron? paper menu first before you keep doing this to make sure they don't sell pizza with pineapple, dude. Even if they had pizza with pineapple, dude, it's not, the whole point is that you have choice. Like, you can pick your meals. Like, you're not, it's not like your little kid and your mom's like, guess what, pork cutlets, overcooked, and spaghetti. The great thing of Blue Apron is that you can find a meal every day of the week if you wanted to. And the thing about it is that it's super fresh. High quality ingredients, they make a real difference, so it's important to know where your food comes from. Thankfully, for less than $10 per person.

per meal blue apron delivers easy to follow recipes, along with the pre-portioned ingredients, courtesy of over 150 local farms, maybe someone in Hawaii that have pineapple, Dave, but you don't have to necessarily get it from them. I mean, pineapple's fine. Pynapolis has a time and a place, Greg. Fisheries across the United States, right here to your door. Seriously, for someone like me and someone like Lozo, we work weird hours. We also kind of live in places where going to the supermarket is kind of hassle.

Like, I go to the supermarket without the car. I got to lug stuff back to the apartment. Pizza places are open 24 hours a day, basically, when you're walking home for something at night. And that's the point is that you don't want to be stuck having pizza every night, right? So you go to Blue Apron and you get some amazing meals. Some of the ones that are available in February. Cashew chicken stir fry with tango, mandarin, and jasmine rice. Uda noodle soup.

Uda noodle is my favorite type of noodle. By the way, the big sign of kind of like cylindrical ones, very tasty with miso and soft-boiled eggs. roasted pork with apple walnut and pharaoh salad, crispy barramundi with quinoa and roasted carrot salad. Roasted carrot salad, by the way, money. Check out this week's menu and get your first three meals free. That's three meals, ladies and gentlemen, that you can check out from Blue Apron free with free shipping

by going to blue apron.com slash puck soup. You'll love how good it feels and how it good it tastes and how good it feels to create great tasting food at home with Blue Apron. That's blue apron.com slash puck soup. If you love the podcast, go to there, support the podcast, but then also get three meals free with free shipping by checking out blueapron.com slash puck soup. It's a great service. It has made many a good meal for me that didn't require me to go have terrible pizza somewhere in New York instead. Blue Apron, it's a better way to cook. Let's cook on a different topic here for a second, my friend. Let's cook. Here's what I decided about

life this week, I decided that it's entirely possible that everyone in Toronto is delusional. Yeah, there it is. I knew there's no way that was going to end with a positive description. Absolutely fucking delusional. Listen, about what? About the Patrick Lineag, Austin Matthews thing. And listen, I am fully on board with the idea. Wait, what are they delusional about?

They're delusional about the Calder race being a blowout in favor of Austin Matthews. Oh, they think that? They do. I discovered it this week. I wrote a story about Matthews and Linae. I wrote about how I believe Linae probably has the edge right now because... Oh, Linae wins if it's today, for sure. Well, yeah, and the reason why is because he's leading the league in goals for rookies and leading

the league in points for rookies. Where is he, like, overall in goals? He's got to be top five. He's got to, yeah, he's up there. I don't know exactly where he is. He's got like 28 now, I think, maybe, but like 30. You scored two last time. We've got 30 now.

Okay, here's the point. I know that we live in a... a world where there are a thousand different ways to prove the value of a player. And Austin Matthews, not leading in points and goals, is catnip for the center of the analytic universe in Toronto to prove his value over Patrick Line. And I completely understand some of the points that are being made. For example, it is tougher to play center in the NHL as a rookie than it is to be a winger. However, if we're going to go based on that, that ideology, then Zach Warran. Srenski should win the Calder in a walk because it's tougher to play defense than it is to play center than it is to play wing.

Well, in that case, Matt Murray. Because it's tougher to play goalie than it is to play defense, that it is to play center than it is to play to wing. Do this all day. Right, exactly. Do this dance all day. Who was in Hollow Man with Kevin Bacon. I was thinking today for some reason it would be a great idea if Kevin Bacon had a television show where he yelled at trolls on Twitter and it was called bacon and eggs. I thought of that had the bus stop on the way here.

And I didn't tweet it because I really didn't have the right frame for it. But if Kevin Bacon listens, I'm happy to be a creative consultant on that show. Hey, Hillary's not a lizard person. You're wrong. On the next, bacon and eggs. Why is Rona Mitra naked and Hollow Man? It does nothing to do with the plot. There's no reason for her to be naked during that murder scene.

Why did you agree to that, Kevin Bacon? So it's Twitter eggs assailing him about his career? Like anything. Why did you let the footloose remake happen? Don't you care about art? And then Kevin Bacon is just like, I don't have anything to do with that either. Hey, when that quarter went through your head in first class, was that real? Are you dead?

Why was it a quarter? Why not use a penny? Why not use something smaller in value to indicate symbolically your value? Again, I don't write the scripts. I don't produce the movies. I just act. I'm Kevin Bacon. That'd be the whole show.

I also get the idea that Austin Matthews has played with demonstrably worse off line mates than Patrick Linae. Lainey's had Mark Schifley. He's at Nick Eiffords, he's had, Eler's rather, he's had... Well, his linemates have been pretty good too. Austin Matthews has had... Austin Matthews has had Zach Hyman, right, for most of the year? Yeah, but Zach Hyman.

So it becomes a situation that's like, it's like Panarin and Cain where it's like, everyone assumes that... He said Eilers and Shifley and Buffalo on the ice as his primary defense and most of the time. and Matthews is it Zach Hyman, Connor Brown and now sort of Willie Neelander. But like, I mean, without question, Linae has had the better line mates, but here's the thing. Like, Shafley's having,

again, demonstrably his best season as a pro. Right. Now, why is that not Linae is doing? That's the thing that's baffling me, which is the idea that in the same thing. Yeah, it's in the span of a year, we went from a world in which we all praise are Timi Panarin because he gave Patrick Kane

one of his best offensive seasons to a situation where now all of a sudden Patrick Linae is the product of two good line mates and the other thing that bothers me too about the arguments against Lainey like a lot of people were saying that you know all the metrics are in Matthew's favor the only thing that's in Lina's favor is shooting percentage

which they're like which is unsustainable but wait a second I don't know though but what like we just got through a year where people were like you know this guy is he's the finish Alex Ovechkin He's finished he's finished Cobbuchar like you see the goal he scored last night

Yeah he's he can he can He can snipe from anywhere But like like literally like they're like well this is Unustainable I'm like because you have What body of evidence that this isn't actually going to be What his shooting percentage could be every season Like if you if you look at you know Ovechkin's rookie year or whatever like I don't remember a lot of people

Well that's because analytics weren't a huge thing back then But I don't remember a lot of people saying oh there's no way you can keep this shit up Also it doesn't matter it doesn't matter if it's not sustainable You don't give about the rookie of the year, we're at the year based on what he should have done. When people were saying that, I assume they meant for the rest of the season. Like there might be some trail off. Yeah, but I mean, for sure.

20 games for now, it's possible Austin Matthews will do have 35 points in 20 games and be a complete force and get the leads to the playoffs. And Lionel slow down if that happens, and sure, Austin Matthews wins the Calder, but it's not a blowout. It's not a blowout. And I think the thing that bothers me a little bit right now is like, okay, if Lainey wins, if he leads the rookies in goals, and he leads the rookies in points. And he plays fewer games.

He's going to win. No, but he might not. No, I mean, that's how people vote, though. But I agree with that premise, except for the fact. Shane Gossis Barrow would, if we're using the same parameters of harder-to-play positions, Shane Gossus Barrow would have won the rookie of the year last year in her walk. Austin Matthews has had more hype. He's had more attention.

He's going to have American voters voting for the U.S. American kid. He's going to have all the Toronto voters voting for the Toronto kid. And there's no question that from like a highlight real perspective, he's had a stronger season than Linae. He's gotten, the hype machines louder for him than it is for Linae. And I really think that if it's close, and if it's like close as it is right now where Lainey beats him by two goals and beats him by two points, Matthews is still going to win. Because there's going to be like an analytic argument for him and there's going to be a linemate argument for him. And there's going to be a quote unquote impact argument for him where the

Leafs, if there are like a playoff team and the Jets aren't, that's going to be credited to him, too. You're also forgetting the possibility that assuming Mitch Marner's not out for a long period of time and he has similar numbers to Austin Matthews, yeah, Americans are going to vote for Austin Matthews, but you know what those mother-effing Canadians do? They steal shit from Phil Kessel. They give it to Sidney Crosby. They'll steal shit from Austin Matthews and they'll give it to Mitch Marner. It'll be that split and then Lainey'll get all the other first place votes.

I guess there's also a part of me that is obviously hoping and praying. that we all return to a fact-based society. And the idea that the guy who leads the league in rookie goals and rookie points and plays fewer games than the guy in back of him doesn't win the Calder because reasons is hard for me to small. It's like pointing to the guy who wins the Art Ross, and it's like, well, he doesn't deserve the art Ross. Why?

Well, look at his line mates. But he had the most points. Yes, that's how it works. That's the actual. In a battle of two forwards, that's how it works. If you want to make the Werenski argument, I'm listening. If you want to be a hipster and say Matt Murray, I'm listening. But like, if the battle is between these two guys, you have to go based on the actual accomplishment.

You know where I might have, what's the word, began to realize that maybe Toronto was losing its mind was when someone said, that Austin Matthews goal against Cam Ward. That was just as good as the Ovechkin, no look backhand from his back. Got to ask the question. Got to ask that question. Got to ask that question. Like, I, I, I, I,

like, so I remember a couple years ago, Mookie Betts for the Boston Red Sox made this catch up against the wall in right field. And right field and Fenway is that short wall that comes up to like your hip or whatever. And I think it was like a game saving ninth inning home run saving catch. And like a week earlier, maybe like days earlier, Mike Trout in Anaheim climbed the fucking wall in center field in Anaheim, A legitimately 10-foot, 12-foot wall climbed it and made the catch to snare a home run. And guess what people in Boston thought was the better catch?

Right. That's just what happens in sports when you have a sports town that loves a dude, loves a guy. Everyone loves Mookie Betts. Everyone loves Austin Matthews. They start saying, oh, that was kind of, no, he got tripped up, scored a backhand goal through the legs of Cam fucking Ward. By the way, this is my favorite thing too. the NHL does this every year the NHL the Stanley Cup final will get transportation

put us on buses and said this to it from like the rank for practicing for the reporters yeah yeah yeah and they have a video that runs in the bus and it's always goals of the year saves of the year eight of the ten goals of the year are scored against dog shit goaltenders that never like watch if you're

like if you ever see the NHL brand video put out like it's always it's like already Lukinen gave up this goal to like some fucking guy and like and you're like oh well I can I played four games in the NHL. He's not very good. Scoring the goal against Cam Ward, I don't know who a veteran scored his goal against in Arizona that year. It was probably not anyone of note.

But, you know, beating Cam Ward on a breakaway fireful, even though you got tripped up during it. It's, come on. Well, it's like when they show highlights, and it's like in the NBA, and it's like, oh my God, did you see the dunk by, like, LeBron on Joel Whiteside? Dude, Vladimir Tarancenko scored a goal a couple years ago against the Rangers on a power play. And I forget who the four guys were on the ice, but it was the backup goal at the time.

Yeah, I remember that, yeah. It might have been Cam Talbot at the time, I forget. But, like, he cut through, like, like, Dylan McElrath. He cut through, like, all these dudes that were terrible and scored his highlight real goal. And it was a goal of the year. And you're like, well, that's how you usually score very pretty goals is when you're out there against. But isn't this just, I mean, our guest today is Will Leach, and we get into a lot of stuff about sports media and, and digital fandom and stuff.

It's a good conversation, but you're kind of trafficking in the things that we've talked about and the idea that, like, we are now at a point of scrutiny and cynicism on the internet where we have to add context to plays of the year. Oh, you know, it was a cloudy day when Willie Mays made that catch. I'm just saying. Well, I'm just saying. I mean, if you throw a perfect game and it's 25 degrees outside, that takes away from it to me. You know what I mean?

All I'm saying is that Bobby Orr didn't need to jump. I don't know why I jump. That's different. Like, like... Hey, Mika Kipersoff, why did you have to use the back of your skate to make that save? What, you don't have gloves? We used to do this thing in college and we used to go play pickup hockey with each other. We like four of us, we take turns playing goalie.

And like every, at the end of our goaltending shift before we changed up, we'd always have like a little 10-minute session where we called it the over-dramatic goalie. where like guys would shoot from 45 feet away and you'd snare it in your glove and do like the Patrick Wah Oh yeah Rais it in the air and fall on your backside and hold the like Sometimes you people add style to a play that makes it look better than it is And sometimes there are bad goalies in a play that makes the goal better than it is

It's all it's I'm okay with that context Rewater of fun Dave Loso But like I'm okay with context to what a play was and why it was good as opposed to like I don't know guy with a TV show where he shouts shit about how Boymueather's dad could beat up Connor McGregor. That's the stuff I don't like, personally. I'm okay with context. Context rules.

I like to score goals. I play pretty well. I'll not ready to play 30 goals. And, you know, there was that one time that I flew up into the stratosphere and shot debunk from the stratosphere. And it traveled down and caught fire. And it killed a goalie by going to the goalie like a hot bullet. But also I like Winnipeg. The rivalry between me.

in Austin Matthews, I don't really care. I'm playing Toronto over there. I just focus on what I need to do to help everybody pay well and win, much like the way I focused on getting Skip Bayliss the job at FS1, where he gets $22 million over four years to just save stupid shit five days a week. I feel like he earns more money than me right now, which is ridiculous, because I'm on an entry-level deal, and he's old and stupid. But I'm just glad we got a point out of that Toronto.

You know, I enjoy trying to make the Jets, the playoff team. I think that we can be in Flaggapy, hard every night and try to play good with Mike Schiaf, also scoring that goal to chase away Trediak in 1980 for the Americans. It was very impressive, I felt, and I did not play in the next game against Finland, obviously, because I did play for Finland as well. But I tried to play hard. I try to play hard.

Scoring 30 goals as a rookie is not what I planned on. I wanted to just score the one goal. I'm happy to score goals, much like I was happy that Val Kilmer's movie The Saint was based on my life, where I helped Elizabeth Shue create cold fusion for the people of Russia. But in real life, it was Finland, but for the movie, they made it Russia because it's more a bigger country. But, you know, we just want to get a wildcard spot. Val Kilmer didn't do the movie, didn't do Batman and Robin, because he decided to leave and do The Saint instead, which I think was probably a smart decision, even though nobody saw the Saint.

Even though that was a pretty bad movie, too. Real quick before we get to Will, I do want to bring up the miracle on ice. I mentioned it just before. I mean, Patrick Lyon, I mentioned this before. I'll see you later. No, no, real quick. So I'm going to go. I know, listen, I love the miracle.

I love the movie miracle. I love everything. I love folklore and fairy tales and Micahruzioni and patriotism and a great day for hockey and Al Michaels and the whole thing. The thing I don't like about it. And Lambert on Puck Daddy today, wrote, you know, a screed against the miracle, which I don't agree with. But, like, the thing I don't like about it is that 37 years later, it is what defines American international hockey success.

37 years later. Being a juggernaut doesn't. Having an amazingly skilled players doesn't. Challenging for gold medals on the reg doesn't. Define challenging. Define on the reg. You know, like, our junior team does pretty well. But, like, you know, Vancouver happened.

Then Sochi happened. Before that Torino happened. Yeah, but I mean, we weren't really close. The World Cup of hockey happened. Vancouver, we were close. The World Cup of hockey, you know, we got curb stomped. Right. Like, we get curb stomped more than we get close.

I guess I, but that's my point is that, like, 37 years later, not only is the underdog story, super sorry, boy. I actually invented the term, Miracle Lennie. Yeah, right. Not only is that the defining moment for American hockey and remains so, to the point where, like, the guys who are now representing the United States weren't born then, never saw it. Everyone on that team is literally dead now.

Yeah, but, and like, and I've found a quote from T.J. Yoshi and Sochi, say, like, they're like, so, uh, game against Russia. What do you think, TJ? Big, big miracle and ice moment. And I'm like, for first of all, we were the fucking favorites. And then second of all, it's like, you know, he's, he's like, He's like, I'm sorry, I wasn't alive then. Like, talk to someone who was alive then. And I felt for him. It's like the guys that are up today trying to make new legends and new things,

gain new success of the United States are still defined by a thing that happened 37 years ago, which is essentially a team that everyone thought sucked getting a good, lucky day against a juggernaut. Like the 2012 Kings only for two months. Right. And this isn't, I mean, like, I'm not, I'm not. shitting on the miracle or anything. It's an amazing moment in sports. It's like a top five sports moment in the history of sports.

Oh, boy. And I don't even begrudge the political and socio-political, you know, connections that are made and how important it was and the Rocky Four of it all. Like, and Herb Brooks, like, all that shit's great. I just as an American, it is, it is this. I will draw this comparison. It is the fucking Hanson brothers being the face of slap shot 40 years later. That is, that is the same thing.

It's like, whenever we talk about Slapshot, let's bring out the Hansons and you know, we do. Actually, we're our fucking toys. Like, great, fantastic. There's a thousand other ways to talk about Slapshot. There's a thousand other people talk about Slapshot, unfortunately, Paul Newman. And I feel like in much the same way, like, the miracle on ice still defines American hockey 37 years later because we've not done anything since then. Yeah, you said the, I don't know if it defines us. I think it's just a thing that happened a long time ago.

I think not being as good as Canada is what defines us now. Like, we're just, we're just like the other. Maybe that's why we don't want to be defined that way. Maybe that's why we still define ourselves as Microsianoni. You know what it reminds me of? It reminds me of how before the Rangers won in 1994, you would constantly hear about 1940 and how great the team was and all that sort of stuff because, like, nothing happened for five decades.

That's all they had. Like, this is all we have. So to me, it's like, it's like this sad clinging on to like an awesome thing that happened once by accident. Lambert made the example that we're Al Bundy. That's what I said too, yeah. And we had the four touchdown day or five touchdown a day for Polkai. And we don't fucking stop talking about it. We all know what happened.

Like seriously, like it's just, we bring it up on the anniversary and that's fine, I guess. It's still, I don't need to. Like, nobody brings up to Scott Norwood-wide right field goal on the anniversary every year. Like, nobody does that in any other sport. Says the guy clutching a Giants hat, by the way, right now. Dude, that was like the greatest thing. Fucking bills, 10-point favorites, whatever they were. But I just, like, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, we're, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, we, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the,

that you don't believe, like I do, that we have now spent the last 37 years trying to rebuild teams like that. I was different. Dude, I think every time USA hockey dabbles in the grit, you know, picking your jurors and your Callahan's and

building the team that they build for the World Cup, like I feel like every time they do that, it's because they want to cast themselves as the underdog because of the Canadian thing you just mentioned. Inherently believing that they are inferior and that in order to win, they've got a conjure up the spirit of our brooks and go out there

of the fun. Work hard. Outwork them, outwork them, boys. I'm tired to hear it about Canada. Fuck them. I think that's just a general hockey thing as opposed to, like, rooted in that. I think every, if you're Canadian, if you're finished, like, no matter what your players are,

you don't do what you always want them to work hard. You don't work the other team. It's about, you know, like last night in the Montreal Ranger game, after the game, it was just like, I loved our work ethic. We worked really hard. We showed that we have to work to win. I think that's just a hockey thing. I don't know if that's necessarily like a, like, it's less that, and I think it's more we don't realize, like, we realize we don't have the same amount of talent as Canada.

Right. But we don't really realize we have a lot of it, though. That's the issue. Yeah. We downplay how good we actually are. Right. But we're not as good, but we could be better than we pretend to be. I think that philosophy of building teams is more just about being, being, being, like.

not as good as Canada knowing it where they say it they say okay if we bring Phil Kessel if we bring Keith Yandel and we leave home whoever fucking Ryan Callahan and somebody else like we still won't have as much talent as them so if we're not going to have as much talent as them anyway let's bring

the gritty Ryan Callahan let's essentially we believe that in order to win we have to be the underdog right which is a symptom of the miracle on ice is that we have to we have to win in a different way I don't think it's related to that I don't know I think the miracle on ice is a

sickness. I think Austin Matthews is the cure. I think you should win the Calder, despite not leading a league in any category. God bless him. Like we're going to throw Austin Matthews out in the Olympics maybe in two years. And Ikel. And Ikel. And Ikel. And Larkin. I ain't heard anybody refer to those dudes as gritty. Like they're going to play top six minutes. I'm willing to, I'm willing to concede to USA hockey that like we're just in a moment where we're in between skill players. Like the Madano. group aged out. The Kane group isn't completely skilled.

And now we've got some fucking ballers, right? Like we're going to have like Joe Pavelsky at the very end, Patrick Kane and mostly his prime. Matthews. Shatton Kirk and Gossus Bear. Yeah, like we're going to have players.

And we're still not going to be as talented as Canada. So you can't, again, it's like you have to just get your most talented human beings that are good at hockey. Put them on the ice against the guys that are more talented and then have Corey Schneider make 38 saves, have whoever you're putting at that day, outplay

carry price. That's the only way you can win. Or conversely, believe in miracles. That's the other thing, too. That's the other worst part about it is like, it's so, it's such an insulting thing. Because like, if you're going to fucking sell me on how it's hard work and grit and American try hard, you can't, you can't

attach a fucking religious term based on Jesus or whatever, touching the team and causing them in the wind that way. You're saying it's got to be one of two things. It's either American grit and American Moxie or it's supernatural. Right. If it's supernatural, then fine. Let's get out the fucking Ouija board the next time you pick a team and fucking let fucking Herb Brooks pick it from beyond the grid.

What is it saying? It's saying bring Phil Kessel. Or it's like, ba, babooie. Oh, you got us. Oh, no. Fucking Herbie. Oh, man. fuck the boo.

Look at Herbrook's a stern fan. Get by that booing from the afterlife. God, I love this podcast. Howard Stern rules. When we come back, we have a tribute to a player who deserves a tribute, but here's Will Leach. It's a great chat. You're going to love it.

Will Leach is a senior writer for sports on Earth. He's a contributing editor in New York Magazine. He is a film critic for the New Republic. And he was the founder, founder of Deadspin. Yes. And a guy who, to give you a little history, I worked for. I worked for you for like six months doing the NHL closer.

We had quite a strike son of talent there for a while. Me, skeets from the starters, Jonah Carey. Jonah Carey. Joe Carl's basketball for us. I've never heard of Jonah Carey. What's he do? I'm sure he's tweeting about this conversation right now, even though he's not perfectly doing. I always tell people that, you know, when they ask me about the writing gig,

Like, I would tell him that the most fun I had was writing for Deadspin because inherently every single day that you wrote, you knew that the people reading it were smarter and funnier than you were, and it made you be better. How has that changed for you at all? Well, I don't know if you've read the comments on Yahoo, but you find out that the people reading you could potentially be smarter than you. But definitely are more hateful and gun-toting than you. I mean, the advantage that Deadspin had back then was that there were fewer people. people on the internet. Like honestly, I'd love to say that like, oh, well, this been was just the example that I set was such a high level. But no, there were just, it took a general kind of level of education and general kind of level of access and general kind of interest

to be on the web in the first place, let alone to comment on a blog all day. So there was like a, there was like a test or something you had to pass too to become a commenter, right? Yeah, I famously did not want commenters at all. History has proven me very correct on this, by the way. But Lockhart Steele, who now runs Vox, and he was going to hire me. He's like, well, you don't really have a choice. Everyone in the Gawker is doing comments. I'm like, okay, the only way that I'm going to let commenters in this site is if I have personally approved every single one of them.

So I put a post. I put up a bonus just saying, email me why you should be a commenter on this site. I'm going to reject like 95% of you. And it was funny. It's like some of the people that email me, like Drew McGarry and Matt Offer. Like, I still have those emails from like, Drew McGarrie and be like, I think you say it's really funny. I don't know.

I'm just a boring guy doing an boring advertising job in D.C. I just want an outlet. It's all very Mark Zuckerberg of you, actually, try to establish the exclusivity of the site in order to make it. To get back in the next girlfriend, yeah. Right. You had me do hockey, which I thought was very big of you, because not everybody puts it for me on having any hockey on their sports sites.

Yeah, one of the things I realized very early on in debts, but as a lesson I still have today, is that everybody knows more than me. And for me, it was fun because you were obviously really talented. I mean, back then. Yeah. And what happened to you? Oh, drinking. It's hard living.

Hard living. Too many trivia nights. Yes. But so for me, like, it was fun to read you. That was the kids with all you guys. Like, Skeets was the same way, and Jonah was the same way. And Dan Chanoff wrote closure for us as well. Because I famously did not want to give up any control.

I wrote every word. Rick Chandler wrote one post so I could have lunch. It was just like, I was obsessive. That's one of the reasons I had to leave because it was just becoming my entire life. And so for me, it was so fun. I was so honored. I mean, I find myself honored still today to see what Deadspin doing to see, like, wow. Look at these really talented people back then and now.

And the place that they decided to ply their talented trade is Deadspin. And it like blew my mind. It still blows my mind the talented people they have over there. Like Dave McKenna and Lindsay Adler and I've talked to Greg Howard at the times. But like, I remember talking to Greg Howard one time. And he's like, well, I work for Deadspin because it's the only place to where I can do the work I want to do. And I was like, oh, my God. He's like, well, you left six years ago.

You had nothing to do with that. So for me, that was an honor back then just to even have you on there. I was going to wait to get into the Deadspin stuff and might as well do it now. Like, what fascinates me is, like you said, I mean, you started at a time and place in the history of Internet journalism that seems forever ago now. I mean, the landscape has changed so dramatically. And I've always been fascinated. I've always wondered what you think of, A, where are we? are today as far as digital media and sports, but B, more specifically, what you think are

the Barstool phenomenon? Those are, those are interesting questions. I would say, somewhat related. They are very related, yes. Listen, there, I like Barstool, like with, say, Bleacher Report at a certain time, I had an initial strong aversion because of the way, like one of the things I really loved about Deadspin was, Despin had no marketing budget, it had no VC money. It literally just had had to spread around by people saying, hey, did you see this site? Very DIY, very, like, kind of, listen, I'm a kid of the 90s. I just the idea that, like, I just put my stickers behind the urinal in the bar. People just found my band. Like, you know, I'm still of that. Like, that's how I feel. I hate marketing. I hate advertising. It feels like junk. I'm, I know I sound like Bill

Hicks, and I'm sorry. No, no. We don't know what you're talking about podcast that just held a contest that said, hold up a picture of our logo somewhere and we'll send you something. And I get it, And so for me, like, you know, my just constitutionally, I have an aversion to anyone that says the word brand unironically. It's always going to feel very, very wrong to me. So like, so I had a hard time when like police report came around kind of the way that they started. I think Barstool as well. But I think what's happened on the good side, I'm going to give us the good side of the way we are now, is that while I might have a natural aversion of those things, eventually they realize, wow, we need to actually become a little bit legit to get to the next level. And you look at Bleacher report, there's all sorts of talented people to work.

to report now. Look at Barstool. They're working on it. But like PFT's there. PFT's obviously a very smart guy. PFT commenters is a very smart guy. And they do good stuff. Like they there's a, there's a clear okay if we're really good, we're going to have to stop being the, um, pick a word. Yeah, bad word things that I was trying not to say. And kind of progress a little bit. So I'll say that, uh, specifically to them that while that's not my cup of tea, often things aren't my cup of tea and then they like become a little bit more full of themselves the way that

full of their own fart sniffing the way that I am. As the internet in general I think it's I mean it's not just sports obviously the idea that people the idea I've read a yearly column to fill in for Drew. I've talked about Drew on

that's why I write a yearly column filling in for his jam-review the last column of the year and it's always a big it's always my big brain dump on wow the world's completely falling apart The internet is the reason. What's not true? And one of the things I wrote, someone sitting around yesterday, something I wrote at the end of 2014,

about this idea that you are really only talking to people that agree with you anymore. It's an echo chamber, yeah. And what's so frustrating about that for me is I'm constitutionally not like that. Like, it's fine. My friend Tommy Craggs, who worked for Deadspin, just was laid off some slate, hire Tommy Craigs.

He will transform your entire media organization. But he and I've had this ongoing fight for years and years of years because I truly believe I'm not like you know journalism professor let's hear both sides both sides get equal notion

but I also don't think that just because I believe something it just means it's automatically right and you're wrong like I go on the internet now and everyone I have to say I'm envious I find myself envious of people in the internet because everybody is so certain

that they're correct like it's amazing to me like and and forget never minding whether they disagree with me or what they agree with me the certainty of it's funny We spent years and years and years hammering the media for you guys skew the stories to being whatever you want. You have whatever bias.

We are now little individual biased media, every single one of us. And because of that, the only people we talk to are people that agree with us. And occasionally, every once in a while, it ends up with a psychopath and Oval Office, theoretically speaking. I think what makes me mental about it is the idea that, like, it's gotten to a point where not only does everybody believe their own bullshit, but they don't even feel like they're too lazy to defend it. Like, you're too lazy to even present an argument. Like, I'm all for the idea that you need some bomb tosser Skip Bayliss, you know. I mean, no, no, you do. I'm glad you're for that.

No, it makes life interesting. But at least, at least defend it. At least have the ability to, you know, to have a take and don't suck, as it were. And I feel like everybody sucks now. You know, again, I am a wrong person to ask by this because I didn't like, like this was probably going on. when deadspin was happening and I just rejected it. Right. Like I told Lockhart and the logalker, I still have this today.

I don't want to look traffic numbers. Don't tell me traffic numbers. If I'm not getting enough traffic, just fire me. Just find me. And that's fine. And I still am like that. I don't like that. Imagine how much better Twitter would be if we didn't have follower accounts and we didn't

have light counts. It was just actually a communication device. Like that would be so much better. It wouldn't turn into this big dick measuring contest that it constantly becomes or or more to the point, more of this. since desperate need for people to, why are you looking at me? I'm not.

This desperate need for people to be vindicated, for people to be validated, you know, and I think that that is what I don't like about the internet, what I don't like social, about social media, is that all of a sudden we've all decided to keep score. And for me, what I loved about doing Despin, what I love about doing now is, sure, everybody wants their stuff to be read.

No one wants to live in a vacuum. But the, like, the joke I used to make when I was doing Deadspin, is like, well, you know, if you want, this is how long ago it was, by the way, I can just write Britney Spears pantsless as the headline for every story, and we'd get huge traffic numbers. But I would hate myself and you would hate me and everyone would hate everything. But we'd be rich. I would hate you because I would go there and then Britney Spears would be pantsless.

And then I'd write you and burning me an email. During the days, Britney Spears was always pantsless. So don't. Yeah, that's true. But the point is that, like, you know, I rejected it back then and I hoped, there's the famous quote in the Bissinger thing that everyone always likes to bring up, where I said, The internet is a meritocracy, which is literally one of the dumbest things I've ever said in my life. But it's something I truly believed, and I have to say, it's been disappointed to be proven wrong about it.

Do you think there's too much content? Do you feel like it's just the reason why we get the Skip Baylaces is because people are just desperate for the one angle nobody has? No, actually. Like, pineapple on pizza is good. See, the irony of this is as a consumer, I have to say, it's fantastic to be consumer if you're discerning about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you know, like if you know, like just as a, I'm a fan of the St. Louis Cardinals. I know if I may knows that.

Yeah, yeah, that's true. I'm a fan of the Cardinals. And as a fan of the Cardinals, I have so much access to everything I could possibly want to know about the Cardinals, think about the Cardinals, wonder about the Cardinals, people analyzing Cardinals players that are 16 somewhere in the Dominican and they're projecting them out for 10 years from now. I have so much Carlin's information as a consumer. I have, like, to me, one of the great things that's happened in me the last 10 years, it's, frankly, not just a bunch of white dudes talking about things all the time.

Yeah. Like, there's been so many more, like... Outside of this podcast. Wait, hold on. Yes. But, I mean, honestly, like, to me, one of the great things about, the good things about Twitter is there's just so many people that just didn't have access to have their voices heard 10 years ago that are now heard. That's great. But, you know, I'll say that, uh, generally speaking, I just, I'm never going to be the one.

I don't care. Like, I don't care how many hits I get. I don't care. I just have never cared. And I know it's every year, I just become a little bit more. 95 years old about that. But that's okay. Like, that's okay, honestly.

Like, maybe my brand will be the guy that doesn't care about that stuff. And he's so, man, that guy really sticks to his guns. And I think you're exposed one day as having, like, every single possible site tracking thing on your phone. No, totally. All right, I had one more barsole thing.

Chart, track, chart, chart, hit me. Site meter. On the site meter. Ball hype. We'll just start throwing out. Ball hype shit that used to track the shit used to do it.

Who was it? I had 5 to 55 likes on ball hype with this thing. It's gone super viral. And if you went dig, dig. Oh, and dig too, yeah. Boy, you're talking about gaming the system. Boy, you can game that system. And I did.

Barstle, to me, is interesting because I watched that show that did on Comedy Central. And it reminded me how, like, they've kind of, I used to think that they were doing something else, but now I realize you're doing jackass. Right. They're doing, you know, we have several different personalities, including the things. including the fat guy who gets it with the football, and we're well-liked personalities by the people who follow the site. And this is our gig.

If we do goofy things, and, yeah, sometimes our readers and followers do goofy things they shouldn't do, and we'll try not to take ownership of that, but that's okay. We'll just put a disclaimer on the front of the show, and everything will be fine. My question to you is, was there ever a moment in Deadspins history

when you could have been that Comedy Central show? Did people come to you and say, the thing you're doing is revolutionary, and we want to cultivate you guys as this other thing, in another media. Constantly, to be honest, constantly. And I was, I'm cranky about that stuff. Like, I, and I honestly, like, I'm self-defeating in a lot of ways in that, you know, I, I did not want to be a part of anything that was, I just didn't want to do. And I, you know, I, sure, I wanted to decide to be exposed. I wanted to be bigger that way. But, you know, there is, I grew up idolizing, like,

alternative weeklies. Like, that was for me, like, that was what journalism was, and that was what writing was. That's where you found out well, the real things were going on. And to have those, you need to have a foil. You need to have, like ESPN was, of course, famously the most wonderful foil in the early days. And, of course, it helped that everyone in the ESPN was like, yeah, we totally suck at these things. Here's some more information for you. And so, but I never wanted, like, to me, the idea, even now, and look at someone like Bill Simmons. Like Bill Simmons, I think, has obviously much more revolutionary than I think even the other days of Deadspin and Deadspin now.

But, you know, Simmons has this ambition. He wants to be on every TV show. He wants to be a CEO. He wants to, for me, Deadspin was a little place. There was little boxes, and I wrote in them, and I hit publish, and then it published, and then I hit with another box, and I hit published. And I did that 30 times a day, and I loved it. And so for me, the idea of, okay, well, you can have stopped doing that, and now you're going to manage a bunch of people. And now you're going to go talk into a camera.

And now you're going to write comedy sketches. And now, oh, look, here, do this Ed for Budweiser or otherwise, whatever. What's the deal with soup? I love soup. Whatever brand is good with you out here right now, that kind of fear. I'm not sure, actually. And, you know, I'm, listen, I'm Justin of 90s. That felt like sell-out to me.

But your approach is essentially the right approach, and it's the approach that we take here, which is that... We have an approach? Yeah, we do. And the approach is, we're going to make our thing, and hopefully people like it. And if they don't like it, that's okay, too. I will never... No, I will never begrudge anybody who goes on the iTunes comments.

No, no, I just... It leaves like two stars and they're like... I never thought there was a possibility that anybody would like this. Exactly, right. That's the part I was doing. Are you guys even posting these? I went back and listened to the award show that we did. We did an entire NHL award show, like a 25 to 30-minute sketch,

which was me and you're doing horrible impressions, and people listen to it. And a lot of people hated it, but people listen to it. It's like that line from Seinfeld. Why does anybody listen to this? Because it's in their ears. It's just there. But again, like the essential thing with Deadman was like, you know, you did your thing. And if people loved it, great.

Yeah. And it's okay. There's other things. And this is, and so I just kind of kept that rule, to be honest. And like, you know, that was, I rejected, even when I started Deadspin, they'd asked me to do a gambling site. And I said, I don't like gambling on sports. I think it's bad for sports. Again, another thing that's totally been proven incorrect. And apparently now commissioners are like, fine. Roulette spin? Yeah.

Yeah. So I was totally not going to. I'm Will Leach for Draft Kings. Yes. Yeah. Welcome to my say. Yes. Please someone shoot me. Please someone destroy me right now. My advice, cardinals. Cardinals, Cardinals, Cardinals, Cardinals. All the Cardinals. Wait, give me, like, the worst thing somebody pitched you to do that was a non-Deadspin, different medium thing. The Men of Deadspin calendar.

It was just me in different poses at the same desk every day. Showing like a little tricep. Yeah. Hey, ladies. You know, like, how many Cardinal shirtsies do you have? So, I'm trying to think, back in the very early days, and one advantage I had at Gawker, too, was, you know, Gawker was, you know, Gawker was run by people that knew nothing about sports. So therefore, they were just like, well, I wonder if we don't know why this side's popular, but go ahead, keep going, which gave me a lot of freedom, a lot of autonomy, and frankly spoiled me quite a bit.

So a lot of things they would leave me alone on, but I remember there was like an ad, and I'm going to probably get some details wrong. There's some old Gawker ad people to be like, he has this totally wrong. He never even worked. But there was an old, like a highbrow liquor company. that wanted us to... Captain Morgan? Yeah. No, not that high brown.

It's good stuff. It's good stuff. I love it. I'm thinking right now. They wanted... They wanted us to do... Remember the other days of the athlete, drunken athlete photos?

Yeah, I'm sure. And so they wanted us. They wanted to have me and then, quote, my friends. And I was like, I was like, oh, yeah, that's awfully presumptuous of you guys.

And to recreate recreate drunken athlete photos for like not a calendar but like a print ad yeah it was like a dead spin we want to be just like our favorite athletes and it was like fun I was like and it's funny because

as you guys know as people that work in sports but often deal with often deal with people in your jobs that don't know anything about sports there's nothing worse there's nothing worse you pointed at great in case You need a visual aid right there. There's nothing worse than when someone has like an idea for sports, but doesn't know anything about sports. The joke I always make on this is anytime there's like a fancy fashion photographer who shoots like an athlete or an owner, they always want them to hold balls.

It's just like the thing they always want them to do. That's right. Yeah. And it's actually, in hockey, what's funny about it is that like anytime there's a hockey player that that is blessed with doing anything that's close to marketing or advertising, they always have. to be in their full uniform because otherwise no one knows the fuck they are. Football, it's only the jersey. Right. Hockey, it's the full everything.

It's the full kit, yeah, shoulder pads, a helmet. The pants. Yeah. And like, when there's a football player in a suit, they love to put the eye black on them. Like, there's just like, fast photographers only know, like, three or four basic sports things. There's a ball. They'd seen some eye black. Sometimes there's a hat of some kind.

Well, like the sports center ad they did with Ovechkin and Leonis at the vending machine. Remember that? Like, Ovechkin's, like, wearing gloves and trying to get a fucking candy bar out of the thing with his gloves on and stuff. Like you have to wear the whole kit. Right. Just to recognize. All right. You are St. Louis guy.

Tell me where you see the blues and the pecking order of St. Louis sports. They're higher than I think they give credit for. And, you know, there's been a big turn since the Rams left, particularly between the blues and the Cardinals, obviously, the big thing in St. Louis. But the blues have always been a pretty big deal there. And that, but they've always kind of been separate from the Cardinals. Like it's been, they've been, you know, they're, I've always considered it more like the way that the Rangers and Islanders, were before. Like, like, they're, like, the Rangers and Devils, or even, like, the Cubs in White Sox. Yeah. Like, they are, there is, like, the other team in town that has some

loyalists, but it's a different kind of people. Yeah. One is like a religion and one is, one is a thing you go to. Right. Yeah. And, but, except for the small group of, like, very insane people that are really into it, which the Blues have plenty up. But since the Rams left, I think there's been this sense of community in St. Louis, you see so much, I think, obviously, with the Winter Classic there this year, too, you've seen, uh, the Cardinals and Blues, like a ton. You see. You see. see all sorts of Cardinals Blues merchandise. My father is now going to Blues games.

He's never been to a hockey game in his life. He's now been to. So I think there's been an uptick of excitement with the Blues since the Rams have left just as a hang on to our thing here. Has it helped the Billikins basketball team at all? I don't think it has. No, it does not help the Billikins. Remember, that's a team that got left by the basketball team got, after their game

was over, their bus driver took off on them. So no, it does not help them. The Blues were always fascinating to me as it, as again. I grew up in Jersey because, like, I mean, they had some star players. They had Brett Hull and stuff, obviously, but like they were the team that all, like, they had a consecutive playoff streak that was like 20 years. Yeah. They were always the almost great team.

Yeah. Very, very long time. And I think that's one of the frustrations of the last couple of years as well. I mean, obviously last year they, they almost made the finals. Right. And I think that there's always a sense of even when they're good, and they've been very good during regular seasons. It's never, there's definitely a kind of playoff fatalism.

To lose to the Kings, it was to the Blackhawks to go on to win the Stanley Cups every year. And then they finally beat the Blackhawks. Oh, now, San Jose is good now. I mean, knowing the market, though, like, one of the great sports stories the last 15 years, I think, is the way that Boston woke up to the Bruins again, when the Bruins beat the finals. And all of a sudden, everybody is a fucking Bruins fan. Or Blackhawks fans. There were no Blackhawks fans pre 2009. Well, it's a different thing, though, because I think in Boston it was people that drifted away from hockey, you came back to it.

In Chicago, it's just like, well, they got a girl squeeing over Patrick Sharp, you know. And also, I mean, the Chicago thing, too, is they finally got a decent owner. Yes, that's true. That's true, too. And Boston still has their miserable old cryptkeeper owner. But do you think in St. Louis that, like, it could be that sort of genesis effect of if they won a cup that? Would it be more fans that maybe drifted away from the team getting back into it,

or would it mint new fans in that market if they ever want to come? I think you saw a lot of this last year, to be honest. When they made that run, you know, I was, I lived in, I don't, I live in Athens, Georgia, but I lived in New York for 13 years, and we had a Cardinals bar that we ran that got together twice a month that to watch Cardinals games. And that used to not be insufferable. Now everybody hates it. Best fans. Yeah, let's get, let's talk about that for a little bit. But what's funny is what you saw, because I'm still in all, I'm still in all the groups, I still help organize everything. what you saw last year was that group all got together for every blues playoff game. And everyone was all there. And now, of course, there's also that group, John Hamm has come to that group,

Eddie Cohen's come to that group. Like, there are blues, like John Hammond famously. It's like he is, like, I've watched the blues game with him. Like, you know, it is like we are, there is a, there is a segment of what the playoffs brought out last year that I didn't really know about the Cardinals fan group. There were actually a lot of people that were like the Blues more than the Cardinals. I can not know that were there, just didn't have a group. So I think there is passion there.

And I do think that thing, that combination of last year's run and the Rams, I think, pushed them up. And frankly, is one of the reasons that this year has felt kind of disappointing because it felt, and not say that it's over yet or any stretch. I think they went on a run after the, after the track firing, and now they're settling back down again. But I think that there is, those were the two things I think got, like, again, got my father who was never really thought about hockey being like, you know what? A Blues game sounds really fun. And it has now been to like three or four, and now he's getting everybody into it. I think you've seen a little bit of that with a combination of last year's running the Rams. That story reminds me.

My wife, Ruby, tells the story about how she goes to a Bears bar here in the city called The Lookout, I want to say it's called. And like one day... Chicago Bears. Yeah, Chicago Bears. Yeah, I mean, there's... Listen, I live in Chelsea, there are plenty of Bears. I'm saying. I want to distinguish the sports.

But they... But, like, one day, like, it's just the football Sunday. And, like, fucking Ashton Kutcher and Milakuna is come in to watch a Bears game. It's just like, what? It's like, Haley's comet ripping through your... bar. It's the world's right of thing.

But I could see him. Like, I'm just looking, it's like every hockey fan. Like, no matter where you are in the U.S., you're looking for an oasis, you're looking for an island. You're looking for a place of like-minded hockey people where you can marinate

for three hours and watch a game. Yeah, you know, and there is, and it's fun because, you know, I don't know if you know, but there's a, uh, there's a fan-made newsletter if you go to in St. Louis. And it's fine because, like, that guy, I wrote something about the Blue, I wrote something about the Blue, I wrote a conference on Earth about the Blues

last year. and the guy read is like, wow, I didn't realize you were a blues guy. I'm like, yeah, I've been like everybody else had been the last couple years. And so now, like, I get that news. Like, he has like a mailing list now that he sends that newsletter out to. And I remember because one of the games that we watch with John Hamm, I mentioned like, Hey, listen. John Ham's, John Ham's coming to the book.

It's going to be so cool. I can't wait. It's going to bring him your newsletter. He's like, dude, he's been subscribing to this for years. Oh, wow, I don't feel like such a cool guy anymore. He's like, well, you're literally the last person. That's hockey, though. Everyone who's a fan of hockey is either the biggest fan in the world and you know everything about them or they're just like hiding, waiting for that conference final run to come on the podcast. It's one of the things that we do on the podcast is you're trying to pull them out of the dark.

We're trying to, we're trying to disinfect with sunlight. And as everybody, as it were, yes, yes. And as everybody knows, as you guys know as well as anyone, a key thing for hockey is you just, like, more than any other sport, you have to see it in person. Yeah. You have to see in person. And I think that's what my father has done. Like, once they're saying, it's like, like, I called him. last time. I called him

when they lost the Panthers this week. And I called me, he's just randomly watching the game. I'm like, that you just, this is just on? Like now it is just on all the time. He's like, he's like, yeah, they're hot. And I'm like, okay, you've seen that, you know, again, you know, we grew up in a place where there was no,

like there was ice, but there was no, you know, there was no, you know, there was no, so. So beyond taking somebody to a game and converting them, which I agree is, you mean, you bring a non-hockey person to a hockey game, they're drinking the blood of the Kali Ma. They're going to be. It's over. They're in the cult. As it's sort of a general sports columnist, like, when you look at the NHO and you look at hockey, like, how do you feel it? What do you feel it needs to be or do to break through more of the normies that don't like it? You know, it's funny. This is something that the baseball is going through a lot now, too, is the...

Well, we don't have a lot of Latino teenagers playing hockey. That's true. That's true. That's true. There's a lot of differences. That's true. But my point is that, like, you know, the key thing, the thing that, the thing that, the thing that, This question of, do we change what this thing that everybody loves to make more people like it? Or like, it's funny. This kind of hard. Hold on. That's actually what's going on in baseball now, isn't it? Like, do we change the extra innings?

Exactly. And I never made the connection. Yeah, that's the play to the fucking hockey fan is every year we stress and strain over the same shit. I hate to hear baseball being in that because honestly, like, you need therapy for it. You need therapy for every year having the same fucking conversation about making the nets bigger. Yeah, I agree. And so much of this is based in this idea that, like, we're worried about these kids in their phones and are we losing to them or so on. God damn millennials. Yeah, exactly. And to me, one of the things that I find strange about that, and if this actually frankly harks back to our previous conversation, is this obsession with, like, listen, I know we live in a capitalistic society. And I know everything works as everything gets bigger and bigger and bigger. Tremendous. A tremendous sport. A lot of people love hockey. It's a tremendous sport. A lot of people are saying that's the best sport in the world.

That's a really good point, Will. By the way, Harry's Razors. I mean, I get it. I mean, these things are good. But, like, it is very strange to me. And maybe this is just, maybe I'm just becoming that old person. But it's very strange to me that there is like, there is this thing that is liked by so many people and beloved. And think about how many conversations that you guys have had about, like, oh, how do we have to change our sport to make sure that we bring people in so much that we don't hurt it too much or we don't.

And to me, like, it's hard to find things in the world that are good. It's hard to find things in the world that are good And it's very strange to me to think how much time we spend How much time you spend in hockey How much time people spend in baseball Of being like, yes, this thing is good But I'm, but we're going to have to change it To make sure that people that don't think this is good

Start to think this is good Right And it's very like it's very counterintuitive If you take a step back from it To realize that like Wow this thing that is really well liked And I think that I mean, listen I don't

Like if you are This is a constant thing with any sort of Capitalistic Enterprise is how do we grow it? This is the thing I used to always go and criticize ESPN for. It's like if you're a sports fan, you can't live without watching ESPN. Like if you like sports, you're going to have ESPN at one point or another. And so they realized, wow, that's great, but we have to keep growing. So now we have to make a program for people who don't like sports.

And now it's hard to turn on ESPN. And I think that's the inevitable, this weird outgrowth of this idea that like, well, how do we get people that don't like hockey to like hockey to like hockey? It's weird how the response is always, well, change hockey. Yeah. But it's very bizarre. The difference to me, though, is baseball is way more popular than hockey. Hockey is about the sixth or seventh most popular sport in North America. And you count colleges, college sports as being-

College football is a sport. It's a business. Even though the players don't get paid, it's still technically a business. No, no, it's an education enterprise. But hockey's already proven that they can lock you out for a full season. You're going to come back. So I don't understand why there's just, like, resistance to bigger nets or taking away the blue lines, where in baseball, they're set. They can do whatever they want.

And there's an argument over whether or not to have the intentional walk be automatic or throw four straight pitches. So I understand where hockey comes from when it comes to getting more fans because they don't have as many fans as the other sports. But baseball, like, you guys could do whatever the heck you want. Well, baseball's argument is that their numbers show that their fans are older. Right. And so they're worried. And I get that. And that's always a concern.

But, you know, I mean. Just have Joe Torrey come in on a scale. skateboard? I think the real concern is in the makers of little tiny pencils. I mean, you have to get the older fans to keep the bigger else no one's going to score the games. Hey, listen, I've resembled that remark. But it seems strange to me that, just to go back to that idea, it's so hard to make something good that. Obviously, like baseball, obviously, when you guys change the playoffs, the playoff system,

there are probably a lot of people that are like, nope, I don't like this. But like, what was weird about it, though, is that they changed it from something people really liked. Yeah, that's, like, there was no problem with the previous format. Nobody. Of all the things we all complain about as hockey fans, that was like the 64th most hated thing. About as often, we complain about the intentional law, which is not all. Right. But that said, as it is, you know, I mean, like, there's probably still like, I liked it more before now. But other people are like, oh, shit, I'm not watching the playoffs now.

Right. Like, people still tune. If people are going to tune after they were locked out for a full season, they're going to watch anything you do in the playoffs. And that's why we're all screwed. But it's also the push-pull tradition. Like if the NHL was really serious about like this idea that you know what? More offense, more scoring, more goals, more speed, more up and down. That's the way to get the fans that don't watch hockey to watch hockey.

Be like, all right, go 4 on 4 the whole time. The whole time. And they're like, whoa, whoa, it's not fucking crazy here. But the problem too is the players, Jamie Band on the Dallas Stars was recently quoted. I think they just played like a 5-4 game and they won and he was like, yeah, you know what? We don't like that. We'd rather win 2-1. And you're just like, buddy, you're Jamie Ben.

And you should want to score goals and play five, four games. That's the other kinship between the two sports is that inherently the goal in hockey is to prevent joy. And inherently the goal in baseball is to prevent joy. And which is fun because that's why I think that you see, like, everyone kind of wants it to be the NBA right now. Like obviously NFL is all joy. Yeah. It's like fucking orgasm every 25 seconds. Exactly.

And which is the opposite of how I've lived my life, actually. I was like 25 years. At least the first 25. But I know. But that's the thing, though, is that, like, everyone wants the demographics of basketball right now. Like, that's, like, even the NFL, which obviously is the big mammoth thing, that's still, like, their average age is not that much younger than baseball. Like, it's a little bit younger. But their numbers are so massive that nobody cares.

But basketball is what everybody wants. Like basketball. But you're right. Like the reason basketball, like basketball, I think does some things right that I think the other sports could improve upon more autonomy to the players, more, like giving players more freedom, having them show, like, there's nothing worse in baseball than when someone does something great, celebrates it, and then someone hits them in the head with a pitch because they were so happy with the thing that they just did. They get mad when they bunt to break up no hitters. That's how dumb baseball is. So like, and for me, so I think that people, like, I know it's a crazy concept, but people like happy things that make them happy. And so I think that's something

that basketball is embraced And other And but I think that's something inherent in the sports You know I think that It's just And again this is

Going back to the initial idea It just strikes me It's so strange That people come up with Like everything's just got to get bigger And everything's got to get larger And it's just like Does it?

Like does it? Well it's also a case though If I tune in to watch Lebron play Like Braille Like Braille's gonna be out there For most of the game Right

And that's the issue with baseball on the issue with hockey and baseball. You've got to wait the whole lineup to see the best hit or hit again. And in hockey, the best forwards on the ice for a third of the game. Have you found that the, because baseball's now just starting to get into this, have you found

that the changes that they've made in hockey so far to try to bring in new fans, have they worked? I mean, not based on television ratings. No. Yeah, I mean, not based on television ratings. And I think television ratings are, like, television ratings for every, like, regular TV

show or down. Like everything's down on television. Scoring's up this year. I don't know if that'll have an effect. But the biggest thing, honestly, though, about hockey and trying to connect with casual fans has been the very organic and not at all forced, to be honest with you, decrease in fighting.

There's been a segment of the hockey population that's always said, when we get rid of fighting, you're going to get all these people that find hockey repellent to check it out. And I've always said, but MMA, but all of this other shit that has fighting and roughness and toughness that people like. So I'm interested to see

if that has any effect as we see this generational shift. Like last year, there was, was the lowest year in fighting ever. It's up a little bit this year, but last year was like the lowest recorded year of fighting in hockey. So I'm interested to see if that has any material change and people being like, oh, thugs hitting each other over the head. I don't want that, concussions, yada, yada, I don't know. Yeah. The issue to me is, it's like you said, everything's getting bigger. Hockey players, the mirror too big. Like, if you go to a game and you sit down by the glass and you see all 10 guys in the offensive zone at the same time, I don't know how anybody gets a puck to the net.

Has it any room? Ever. And most goals get scored in those situations by a guy just flipping it on net and it bounces off a skate. It goes right to someone stick and it goes in. Like back in the day, of course, goaltenders wore basically like pillows around their knees and weren't wearing any pads.

So you could score 40 foot backhanders, which I'm not saying that's where we should go now. But like you said, like four on four is probably the best way hockey could exist. Never do it. I mean, we can't get nets bigger by a half foot. If you're not getting fun or four foot. You're not getting four and four. We're not going to get four on four.

No, but then, you know, how do you possibly do the next top 100 players? Holy shit. I mean, this guy has more goals than this guy, and this guy played when it was five on five, and he's playing four on four. Apples and oranges and oranges and oranges and apples. That was the best part of that top 100 thing is when they were showing highlights from guys in the 70s and they're just flipping in backhanders from 45 feet. Against goalies that don't drop.

Goleys that like fall in the accident. It's like shown highlights before the curve ball was invented. The leather helmet, the piece of the piece. Right. Before we go too long here, we should touch on the fact that you are, of course, a film critic. Yes. You and Tim Gerson do... Yeah, Tim is my best friend from high school. Tim Gerson is my best friend from high school. He's a legitimate film critic. We write for the New Republic together. We do a weekly podcast, Gryerson Leach, and your iTunes browsers. And we, but we, like,

we were best friends in high school, but, like, he's, like, a legit film critic. He's the vice president of Los Angeles Film Critic Association. He, like, hosts this dinner where, like, he and, like, Michael Faspender, like, gave a speech together. And, like, yeah, and, and just like, he's really fancy fan. He goes to Cannes. He does all those things. And I often catch movies at the late show on Thursday so I can write about it on Friday morning. Like, I am dabbling.

He's a legitimate film, Craig. The thing I love about Will's reviews, I don't know if you do it for everyone, but you've done it for most of that I've read, is you read it and list, like, number two terms. I love that. For some reason, I'm just like, you know, if you needed to differentiate yourself from the billions of online critics, I think that's a great way to do it. But what's your, the Oscars are this weekend as we tape this show. What is your, I happen, I've not seen Manchester. I've not seen a rival.

I've seen mostly everything else. And I kind of feel like it's not a spectacular year. I feel like Moonlight was real good. I feel like the last 25 minutes of La La Land are as good as that. Okay. But nothing really knocked my socks off. But does something knock your socks off? Are there some keepers this year?

I actually think this was a pretty good movie year. And more to the point, the Oscars mostly reflected that. Like, it's not often that the universally top-reviewed movie of the year, like on, forget Rotten Tomatoes, but like Metacritic or like The Village Voice Poll, the number one reviewed movie the year across the board without question was Moonlight. And Moonlight is nominated for a ton of Oscars. It's going to win. We're going to predict winners or anything. It's going to win best supporting actors. He's going to win adaptive screenplay.

Which it should. Yeah. Although you can make, I guess, the argument that arrival should is. Yeah, I think so. And I think it's probably, I think La La Land's going to win, but I think Moonlight and I think increasingly hidden figures are the only ones I think have a chance to stop it. That's the Oscars now really are like an election. Like they're, they're, candidates are introduced at the Cannes Film Festival or the Toronto Film Festival. And Moonlight was one of the first, first Manchester by the Sea debuted as Sundance last year.

And immediately everyone was like, okay, this is, this is, this is going to be a contender. Then La La Land premiered at Toronto, and they were like, oh, this is... And La Jolla Land has been first ever since then. Moonlight and Manchester by the sea were considered the top two contenders. But Hidden Figures has become, like, one of the massive success stories in Hollywood this year. It has made more money than any other, any of the nominee movies, including a rival, which is about aliens. Right. Like, that's impressive that you're able to do better than that movie.

And people love it. Like, that is a movie that I guarantee you. your parents love. And oftentimes those are the movies that do very well. You know, the King's speech famously is the parents love this movie and that's what they gave him an Oscar. Or Crash is the, the parents think this movie

will solve racism. So this movie will be. Well, speaking of that, okay, so we're one year removed from Oscar So White. And right now we're in a place as we do this podcast where Denzel seems to have a bit more of the momentum for Best Actor. And both supporting actors are

definitely going to be after. And it seems like Hidden Figures also was riding that wave too. Did it boomerang back to the voters maybe reconsidering, oh, we are going to look like complete assholes if we over reward this movie that's about young white kids in Hollywood singing songs? Or is Denzel getting the Oscar he

deserved for the equalizer? I mean, come on. It's like a makeup Oscar. I agree. I think of most shooting. Most inventive use of power tools. But aren't we at a place right now where it should be Denzel, Keanu, and Liam Nason, and some sort of Avengers-like.

Right, just old men kicking... Kickin' ass. You took our granddaughters. YARP car didn't come in the mail on time. I think it's partly that. It's also, I mean, it is worth knowing that after the controversy last year, the Academy legitimately looked at its membership, and they actually...

There was a good piece in the Hollywood Reporter about how the... It's actually a more diverse voting group than it even was a year ago. Is it possible that all the people we lost in terms of... 2016 was the Academy poisoning them to change the border? I just realized that. All these famous people died and now it all makes sense. They, uh, for

George Michael's like, I'm not even inside. I'm not even inside. I'm not always like, I barely act anymore, guys. Jesus. I think that it helped, the advantage this year too is, like, Moonlight is such a

like, Moonlight's a great movie. Like, like that, if Moonlight would have come out a year earlier, there would have been no Oscars so white problem last year because Moonlight would have got a bunch of nominations. Now, I think you can make a pretty strong argument that there should be movies like Moonlight every year, and you shouldn't have to just wait for that. But I think it's a combination of a more diverse voting group. The Academy, I think doing some of what you're talking about, and frankly having a much wider selection of movies to choose from. I mean, like, again, Hidden Figures, Fences, and Moonlight are all three movies that I think in any year would be nominated for Best. picture. But I think have you come on the heels of Oscar so white? And I think now, I think there's a good piece in Hollywood reporter today about how now it's Oscar so male, because if you look at like the non, like now it's like, oh, actress and actions, okay, it's even. But if you look at like every other category, all men, all men. And so I think that like, you know, I think that's, that's probably the next thing. But, you know, I think we've seen not just

in entertainment, but I think even particularly this 2017 in politics, social media pressure works and so sometimes Twitter is good. That's true because that that drum thing really got Donald Trump. Oh, yeah. That was killer. Was it? Zing. Boom.

I'll give you two options for my last question. Two options. Was it? I want the second one. I feel like we're on match game now. You want B? So what was the movie that you felt like was overlooked and or what was your favorite part of suicide squad? Okay.

And is John Wick two, the front runner for the? the ostrac. There's not the frontrunner, nothing there should not be. Suicide Squad. Good Lord, that movie. Listen, I am the most, as Lozo will tell you, whenever a thing

comes out in my genre, just cream all over it. But I can't, I was fucking horrible. My favorite thing about Suicide Squad is in Viola Davis, sends everyone on a big mission to go rescue someone. And so we spend like half the movie, and then they bust in the room, and it's

Viola Davis. Yeah. Why? What exactly happened? Like, if everything else is bad about that movie. Like, it's just nonsensical in the middle. The thing I couldn't believe, because I read it in so many reviews was, like, they're like, they're like, this movie is so poorly conceived and so poorly edited, and so chopped up by the studio.

They actually introduced the characters three times. I'm like, that's fucking impossible. And then I'm watching it, I'm like, ding, ding. And they're making a sequel to it. And there's still a moment at the end where someone comes in and dies. I'm like, I'm sorry, which guy was that? Which guy was that was that? I don't know which one that was. Wasn't the bad guy or the bad whatever, like a ghost or something or like a mist? Wasn't that?

She's from Ghostbusters. It was the lady from Ghostbusters. The Ghostbusters remake. Don't tell me. We agree that movie was bad, right? We're far enough for a move. The Ghostbusters remake was just, oh, God. It was bad, but it had some virtue to it, which was that Kate McKinnon was really

great. It was bad, but the reason it was bad was not because they were winning Ghostbusters. Right, exactly. They were, like, literally the best part of the movie. The main problems with the Ghostbusters movie is every time it tries to, like, hark back to the old Ghostbusters. Oh, my God. That was the worst.

Like, it's terrible. Murray is awful in that movie. Dan Aykroyd looks like, my God, he looks like slimer. And at the end, you know Ernie Hudson's getting out of that verse at the end. You're just like, what are we doing? I had an easy fix for that movie, man.

The biggest problem they had was not rehashing than having the old ghost posters in the movie, it was doing the fucking thing in New York. If they had done that thing in New Orleans or like Boston, it changes the whole dynamic. Also, the villain is really lame. Yeah, really bad.

Yeah. Anyway, so what was the first? What was the movie that you felt was overlooked this year? What was your favorite flick that didn't get the Oscar love you thought it would get? My favorite movie of the year, actually, this year was, Moonlight was number two. My favorite movie was actually O.J. Made America. I actually thought that was the best movie I saw this year. It's not a TV show.

Don't look at me like it's a TV show. It is not a TV show. Let me answer that, because you saw me grimace. Let me answer that with this. He's got thoughts on this. Okay. If HBO released the entire next season of Game of Thrones as one continuous film, in theaters for two weeks.

Yes. Do you believe it should be eligible for an Oscar? Yeah, it's a movie. It's in theaters and it's a movie, so therefore it is it not. Yes. Okay. As long as you're consistent about it. It's a consistent.

It's a fact. If I punch myself in the stomach, it will hurt. That's a fact. I'm on the record as being upset that the OJ thing got so much love and past and probably not future Puck Soup guest Anthony Wiener's documentary. Which is great. Which is fantastic. To me, that's the, OJ is going to be a time capsule thing.

but Weiner was a time capsule thing too. I didn't understand it not getting nominated. You are not going to get me to trash that movie. That movie is fantastic. We had Barbara Morgan on my podcast with John Heilman. I do a political podcast with John Hummel. Barbara Morgan, who is his press contact in that movie. Oh, God.

He constantly beleaguered, the one that he has to explain. Right. There are more women. The blind in the car, yeah. And we had her on. So you were the press contact, the head of the press liaison, for the most disastrous press.

I can't tell you make Jeb look like that. As long as you have loved... I have much love for that movie. We were about to say you have much love for Wiener. We're both going to say it and we might as well just end it there. Will Leach, where can people find all of your genius? You can find it on Twitter at William F. Leach. I have a...

The best way to see myself there, I have a weekly newsletter that I read a... Because I totally am on brand. I spend about two hours every week writing like a 12-100 word essay. just for like the random people that subscribe to my tiny letter. So that is how anti-mode That's how that's how 2005 I am. Just like the male Lenny letter.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly, exactly. Except, yeah. That's your favorite actress Lena Dunham's letter. Except I write them. I don't hire other people to write them. I write some of it. I thought Lenny was a young pope reference.

He said it over at my own newsletter. It was very hurtful what he said. I don't know if I really like it. And when I make it with Patrick Wilson, no one thinks it's weird. That was a reference to the show Girls I figured that one out Yeah okay

Anyway so Andre William Fletche and I invite for sports on earth.com Every single day There you go Thanks Will Yep And we're back Thanks to Will Leach for joining us In enlightening conversation

With a really fun dude And a internet vanguard A one of the One of the guy He invented the internet Lozo Invented the whole internet He created it

He did Out of his Al Gore gets the credit But really Will Leach was like I got an idea comment sections Will Leach took his rib and stuffed it inside of a disc

drive and that's how the internet was born I believe Is that what it was? I think it's more like when Hellboy kills those things in Hellboy. Yeah? And those monsters died and then they multiply and there's two more monsters. See, like he's Hellboy but like everything he does

just creates more bad stuff around them even though he tries to stop it. He's the virtuous one. Yes. But everything around him is hell Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that means... So AJ Delario's the Fire Girl?

What's her name in the movie? Yeah, he's the Fies, Liz, the Fire Girl. Liz, yeah. And so who is... Who's Abe Sapien? I guess that'd be Rick Chandler. Right. And so the old man would be...

Nick Denton from Gawker. There you go. All right. Well, there's a little trip down Internet Memory Lane. Listen, another big story this week was Ryan Johansson, of the Nashville Predators, the Predators visited Columbus, and Ryan Johansson was very upset that he didn't get a tribute from the Blue Jackets

for having played there so many years and created so many memories. Poor Joey. That one memory at the time they made the playoffs. He was sad. So, Joey was very sad. To be fair, Stephen Gianta got a thing when he came back for the Devils

for an Islander game this past week. Stephen fucking Gianta. Dude, the way that the devils are going, it's a fucking miracle. He didn't get his own bobblehead. Okay, when he returned to the devils. But we actually felt kind of bad for Raijo and that the Blue Jackets didn't recognize

his contributions to the team and his talent and his genius. So we decided here on Fuck Soup that we would craft our own tribute to Ryan Johansson on behalf of the Blue Jackets. And it's set to Concrete Blonde's seminal classic Joey, which you may have seen on 120 minutes, which many of you probably don't know the references to, but if you're old like me and lozo, you're probably nodding your head

in appreciation of thinking about. I don't know what you're talking about. MTV at 2 in the morning. Oh, is that what that is? I think you're referencing the movie with the arm. Ever since you started those fucking texts lists with those millennial girls, you always pretend that you're not old and you don't know. Texts. Oh, the teen chats. Yeah, a teen chat. You like, you pretend that you don't get references to MTV shows from the mid-90s in the early 90s. I know Matt Pinfield. I know Headbanger's Ball. I don't know what 120-19 is. Oh, so maybe it's just that I was an alternative kid. Oh, that was the alternative.

And you were, and you were a metal head. No, I liked alternative. I was waiting for the next concrete blonde song, and you were like, where's Docking? I don't even know what Docking is. Yes, you do. They sing Dream Warriors and the Nightmare in Elm Street three Dream Warriors soundtrack. How does that go? Dream.

I gotta dream no more. Oh, man, you could be making that up right now. I could be 100% sure. Don't you remember? They sang Air Force One. in the movie Air Force One. Air Force One, crushing into the cap. Get off my plane.

Yeah, yeah. Get off my plane. Air Force One! All right, and we're sufficiently warmed up. So here is our song for Ryan Johansson set to concrete blondes Joey. Our songs also called Joey. And really do appreciate this production design as we do. song live, which is, I think, in our own way, a tribute to the late, great

Kerkowai. That's what used to be good. Kirk Cobain and the MTV unplug that Nirvana did. He would have been 50 this week. Right. Speaking of that, going back to our discussion on the U.S. Olympic team, and we do that every year, I saw a great tweet that was like, wouldn't it be great of Kirkobain was 50 and alive and nobody fucking talked about him anymore?

It was like, yes. great. And I love Kirk Covane. Right. But yeah. He'd be in Vegas. Right. No, he'd be like, that Milo had some great ideas. I mean, he'd be like, no! When Milo would speak! First Amendment, man! No, Kurt!

No! I always liked the foo fighters better anyway. Well, they wouldn't exist, actually. I couldn't even excuse that. I mean, I'm sorry everybody. Here's a song by the Vaseline's. All right, here's our tribute to Ryan Johansson. It's set to

concrete blonde's Joey and it's we're just going to do it Joey baby you weren't lazy

it's a good enunciation F tor it's senseless you weren't you weren't defensive I know you've heard

Whoa You're not a jacket And we just stood by Makes escape You really carry the tune, can't she? It just keeps going It just does It's hard to cover

It is Joey hug You've got Your mom Forgiven Wow, this is beautiful Listen Listen

Listen But I feel because you weren't to trade you. Ryan Johansson, that's for you, baby. The crowd in Columbus appliance. We are so sorry that everybody overlooked how great you were for that franchise and how important you were for that franchise and how much value you bought back in that trade. And I can't believe.

I'm just putting on the headphones I have sitting over here where Will Leach sat. Yeah, he's on the whole time. They don't work. You know, I was wondering about that. And I said I decided to that maybe when he, does his podcast with Tim Gerson, he wears headphones, and he's comfortable with it. Yeah, but like he's...

Oh, actually, I can kind of hear a little bit, maybe, no? I'm happy you didn't have him on for that last second. He was dressed all nice with his hair all coming. He's a very attractive man. He was a, he was like a male-ish, a boyish way. But yeah, the fifth, we did something for Ryan Johansson that the super awesome fifth line didn't even bother it.

Yeah, the fifth line didn't even bother to thank him. Oh, by the way, someone sent me a note on Twitter today that there's a quote of mine praising the blue jackets, earlier this season and saying it's quite a moment for them that streak they were on and they and the Blue Jackets had that on their season ticket renewal page and all I could think of is like there's some fifth line guy who's like super pissed at me he's like I can't wait to renew my season what the fuck that guy they're using him I'm not giving you many my money

to watch us lose in the first round trade deadlines next week which is super exciting we're going to have a show obviously covering the trade deadline next week and um Anything you're looking forward to anybody you want to see you get traded? I know what, like I... Jerome McGinnler to anyone else. Get him out of that. Preferably to like Edmonton.

Would that be kind of fun? Like I want to see him go someplace where, you know, fan casting him there would be fun. I'd love to see Shane Done finally Matt Sundeened up and agree to go someplace. I don't know if that's going to happen. I don't think so. And I want to... I think the Islanders are going to do something crazy. Like I think the Islanders are going to be chips all in trying to make the playoffs

and also kind of change the conversation. from like we're being evicted from our arena like make Severus happy change the narrative go out and get Matt Dushan do something like that I could see them doing that too I was looking at TSN's top 40 trade deadline target guys it's fucking sad

it's always sad but like it's sadder than usual the number four guy on the list is Patrick Eves Patrick Eves is there somebody in the room yeah there is yeah Patrick it was but like there's guys below Patrick Eves who were better, like Gabriel

Landa Scogs below him, but Patrick Eves is the number, because he has 21 goals or whatever, but I mean, you put Patrick it's like, Lee Stepney Act, that you're at the Devils where he had 20 goals and he went to Boston and you're like, well, I mean, he's playing top nine minutes for a team when he shouldn't be. Like Patrick Eaves is riding shotgun

with Tyler Sagan. It's... I think, the more I think about it, the more I think Schattinger gets traded. I mean, I feel like the argument could be made that they could absorb that loss, and the argument can be made that they will get a king's ransom for him. But I think they're going to be real tempted by the fact that they've played well under Yo to keep

them. That's the thing is like they should. Like there are so many teams that are like the blues and the Rangers are two teams to me where you should get whatever you can for any sort of like asset that's playing over his head. Like get everything you can for Michael Grabner. Not that Shatton Kirk is playing over his head, but you're right. They have enough guys to absorb that loss, still be a borderline wildcar playoff team and losing the first round of Minnesota with or without Kevin Shatton.

He might as well do something for the future since this year is going to be a wash anyway. And you're going to lose them. I mean, you're clearly going to lose him. He's probably going to go to the Rangers anyway. Don't sleep on Boston doing a dumb thing by adding to the strongest part of their team by overpaying a dude.

That could totally happen too. But who's going to be the best guy that gets moved on trade deadline day? It should be Duchenne, but I just don't have any faith in Colorado getting it right. I think that Dushan's the guy that's more coveted than Lannis Cog. Yeah. For obvious reasons.

I mean, not only because you can play center, but because I think there might be some concern about Lannis Cog and, you know, the diminishing stats and whether or not the health's there or not. And he also is a, I mean, he's a power forward, so there's going to be more miles on him anyway as the years go on. I think, I think Dushain would be the one that probably moves. I think the real intrigue, though, is whether or not a goalie moves. Like whether, I can't see Tampa trade.

Bishop now because he's really played well for them and they're trying to climb back into it. But, like, Halak is obviously just collecting dust. Like, there's a couple of guys that could probably help out teams that are on the cusp if they wanted to make deals, but I just don't know if they will. Like, Halak has won, like, 12 in a row in the HL. He's on some crazy hot streak with Bridgeport. Yeah. But, like, Ryan Miller, for instance,

should go somewhere for somebody for us. For anything, yeah, just to be along for the ride. Just go to Calgary and, like, try to shore up their situation for 20 games. retire or go free agency but like the penguins can't trade mark Andre Flurry Tampa probably can't trade Ben Bishop for the obvious reasons unless they say to themselves well look

Andre Vasseleps is going to be our guy going forward yeah why not let him play the last 20 games down the stretch you know for now purposes for future purposes and if we can get something for Ben Bishop that'll help us another area great and then we'll throw in Krister's Gullos the rest of the way

Black Pia's own Christor has gone forward first here Christis Chrisers Chrisers got Flarser Flores or flare But yeah like goalies There's just It's hard

Goleys What are goalies like Goleys are like Quarterbacks in a way Where even if you have one on your team That's not good And there's better ones out there Like teams just love their goalies

Like Who's the Brock Osweiler of goaltending Where they can't Is Cam Ward the Brock Osweiler Goldtending Or they just throw them out there all the time Even though they know he's not that good No but the Brock Osweiler

Goaltending would be like them Be like Tampa trading Vaseliski And keeping Bishop You know, or it would be the understudy who comes up and he's great and then like he gets a crazy contract for it. Well, it's like Matt Murray, only Matt Murray's good. Right, exactly, right. Yeah, exactly. So he's actually got a 9.45.

Do you think that the expansion draft is going to have a huge influence on this or not? I feel like, oh, hello. Oh, the cupcakes are ready. No, not really. I think teams are going to do some shit after the season to kind of shore up their guys that they have to protect or not. Like Ryan Callahan today has got the hip surgery situation. Like they're going to protect him anyway, but now they can't buy him out because if they bought him out, then they could protect like Alex Collorid or their extra forward because they have a bunch of forwards.

Like I think all that stuff will happen at. I don't think the trade deadline's going to matter for that. That's just me. That's just my personal belief. I like it. All right. Now at the time on the puck soup in which we dive into the mailbag and find out the things you want to know about. from us. That's the way it works.

Is that what works? Paul Vance wants to know with so many people in Austin, Texas, dip their pizza in ranch. What the fuck's wrong with them, Dave Lozo? I don't know. That grosses me out. There's no... It doesn't gross me out.

It's so gross. No, hold on. It's grosser than pineapple on pizza. We've talked about this before, but I will say this. Okay. If you dip the actual pizza, cheese, sauce, that part of the pizza, People do that.

The triangle of joy, if you will, into the sauce. That's insane. It already has sauce on it. I just realize I haven't talked about my penis episode, so I'm going to say the triangle of joy is what I call my penis. Okay. Keep going. Just wanted to make sure we checked off that box on the show checklist.

It's weird because I've often heard it refer to as the Bermuda Triangle, a mysterious place where things disappear. Yeah. No, no, no. That's when I let it go. But then I use Harris to clear the jungle. Um, but if I, I have no problem with anybody dipping their crust in anything. Like, one of my favorite things in, in, in, when I'm in Canada, is to get loaded and get that horrible pizza pizza, but you can, but you can, but you can, but you can't, but you can't, but I, uh, I, I, I love going there and, and, um, but you can, um, yeah, so, like, I, I, I, I love going there and, and, and, I'm like, what is that meat? Sure, whatever.

I'll take this sauce and this, and this, what is this? So I saw, sure. That's awesome. What is that? Just chocolate syrup. I'll take that, too. Let me get a chicken and broccoli on my pizza. I remember I had a fat guy night where I watched an episode of Nathan for you on my iPad in my hotel room in Canada and ate two slices of giant slices of pizza and just had five dipping

sauces and I was never happier. But like, what were they? So like marineros one. No, no, no. It's like ranch, blue cheese, like a honey mustard. Like all these dipping sauces there. Oh, the best. As long as you don't dip the triangle of joy in the dipping sauce and it's just the crust.

that I think we're all right. No, because, like, people have, like, Buffalo chicken pizzas that have either blue cheese or ranch on them. So people actually put ranch on the pizza. Yeah, that's crazy. It already has sauce on it. It doesn't make sense. It's pizza. It doesn't make sense.

It's, like, putting—it doesn't make any sense. Scott Aiskevsky—oh, Jesus. Ask, why is offside a thing? Does it need to continue to be a thing? We may have touched on this before, but I have become more open-minded to the idea. idea of eliminating offside and reinventing the wheel and having a guy cherry pick pucks at center ice and stretching out. You talked before about the defensive zone becoming too crowded because all these guys

are like giant tankers. There's no room to do with things. Right. Well, if you got rid of offside, then all of a sudden you stretch out the offensive zone almost like two-thirds of the ice. Right. It's not a bad idea. I like it.

But they would never do it. But it's more for like off the rush. like just because like we changed the rules in 0506 where guys like Dan McGillis couldn't play anymore because they couldn't handle guys coming through the neutral zone now like imagine Shay Weber and Shay Weber trying to back up on the blue line when like a super fast guy You mean the genius move Lou made to replace Scott Niedemeyermeier with Dan McGillis and like the rotting corpse of Vladimir Malikov.

The Molokov cocktail. Great times. Oh by the way, wise off side of thing. Well we just covered why it's a thing in regulation but wise off side of thing in overtime at all. Why is icing a thing? Why are any rules a thing in overtime at all? That's crazy. Especially icing because the team that gets the advantage from icing

loses it in overtime because nobody wants icing. Goalies come out of their nets all the time to break up the icing so they can just hand off the puck. Offside's a thing because it's always been a thing. None of it should be a thing in overtime. They should just switch it all off like you do on NHL 94 and have fun with it. Rangers Report 2.0 wants to know. why is nobody talking about firing Bill Peters

three years in the job, Keynes Stone in last place? The Carolina Hurricanes being in last place, well, first of all, it has a lot to do with goaltending, but second of all, is a bit of a shocker considering how many people made them their glamour pick to potentially make the playoffs in Eastern Conference based on how well they possessed the puck last year.

Yeah, they just, it's not, I don't think it's Bill Peters. I think it's Ron Francis. They don't have a lot of good players. They don't have a lot of talent. And I get it, man. Like the goaling market sucks, But there's no excuse for giving Cam Ward two mother effineers. Yeah, there's just not.

There's not. I mean, it's a, I've never understood it. I understand the loyalty. I understand familiarity and known quantity, maybe a good guy in the room, whatever. But like, from a performance standpoint, I mean, I think we have a pretty good proof of concept. Cam Ward is not that guy anymore. Right. Like, he stepped in shit in 0506.

Still had a little bit of crap on him a couple years later, but that poop is long left. What's that smell? Cam Ward. We should keep Cam Ward. still has that new shit smell. Felix, Felix, I ain't gonna try. Tempaniere, why do I got to read the fucking names? I'm horrible at it.

What is the best nut to put in chocolate, Dave Lozo? Wait, is this like a sex question? No, I think it's a food question. It's one of the other types of questions we get here. We get hockey questions, sex questions, food questions, and then movie questions. Almonds. Ammons.

Hershey's Almond's bar. It's delicious. Hersch's bar with almonds in it. That's my, that's my, that's my, that's my go-chid nut. I would have to go with my balls. No, I'd have to go with peanuts. Peanuts is the answer. What do you mean? Like, just like.

Like a Snickers bar. Oh, okay. Yeah. What did you think I meant? Like a Hershey's bar with peanuts in it? No, I was picturing like a, like a jar of cashew's where, like, you just had chocolate in there. And it was like, it's like a, it's like a cashew trifle with just chocolate.

Rachel made that on season, season seven. of friends. He's like, Fee. Rob Beach wants to know what happened to host his fruit pie is featuring Fruit Pie

the magician who went from 15 flavors to zero. Did someone die? What is that a reference to? I mean, I think he's legit asking about

hostess handheld fruit pies. You remember hostess fruit pies? Oh, I thought he was asking about a character that promoted the fruit pie. Well, I think he is talking about fruit pie, the magician,

who much like, you know, you know, lucky charms, Lepercon and everything else. I used to work at the Journal News up in Westchester and I was like a desk guy

there and you worked shitty ass hours. And I remember like the fruit pie was the best thing in the vending machine, but that was like, oh, three. Do they not exist anymore? I don't know, but I've never been a fruit pie guy. Especially like, like, okay, for example, like the two places you'd probably get a handheld fruit pie are

from our friends at Hostess, in which case I would get a Twinkie or the cupcakes before we get a fruit pie. And then, or at McDonald's where you get a hot apple pie, in which case I would get a shaker, a Sunday, a million times before I got apple pie.

I've been having this debate with Ruby a lot because she's been doing a lot of fast food writing and stuff with the ringer. Like, I'm not a fast food dessert guy. I've never been, I don't find, I never make room in my fucking diet

or my selections for a Sunday or whatever. No yummy in your tummy? No yummy in my tummy. Like, I understand the appeal of a Frosty when I worked at Burger King in high school used to make shakes that had like double the chocolate syrup and shit. Like I get, I get it.

But it's not a thing that I'm ever like, boy, I might, I probably don't want to eat that second cheeseburger because I need to leave room for a McFurray. Well, that's different than like, like, what if I walked in here today? And I was like, dude, good news. A hostess apple pie truck tipped over outside the building. I picked up like six off the ground. Here's a couple. You wouldn't eat them?

No, I wouldn't eat food that was on the ground in New York. It's a rapper. I know what you're saying, but you've ruined it. You've shifted the paradigm to, hey, these things were where horses shit is. all the time here in the city do you want one? Do you leave your shoes outside your apartment when you go home? No. You can put it up on my Japanese? No, I'm not.

In fact, I leave my shoes on all the time. It's a problem. See? I only have two states of foot in the house. I either leave my chucks on or I take off my chucks and my socks and I'm barefoot. I am not a socks only guy. You are without question a

socks guy. No. You're a sliding on the floor fucking Tom Cruise, Rixie business motherfucker wearing socks. Oh, dude, I'm a barefoot guy. You kidding me? At home? Oh, like, if I go to someone's place, I don't take my shoes and socks off and, like, get comfortable. Like, if I go to someone's place, I usually leave my shoes on, or I try to. Really? Because people always ask you to take

your shoes off. Yeah, I hate that. I'm like, I don't care. So, like, you're like the anti-Japanese guy. Yes, right. I am I am an... Fuck your traditions. I'm living on the chucks! I don't care about germs and dragging corsion to your house. So we request that you remove your shoes before you kneel down to the... I don't care. Give me that raw

fish, baby. Put it in my mouth. Is it a foot? Is it? odor thing? Is that, yeah, are you... No, I don't have foot odor

at all. I have beautiful feet. I have very softs. I have tremendous feet. Many people have said that I have the best smelling feet in the world. All the generals

say that my feet are the best feet. Oh, God. The lying media is always telling me that I have foot odor. Wrong. Don't believe them. They're the enemy of my feet. Rogue Poteus

Wischinski tweets. He's got those scent balls in his shoes. He keeps in the corner. This is a real account with real people who know Greg Wichinsky's feet. Oh, that fucking Twitter account has been.

A Russian dossier said I only have nine toes. And then I like hookers to put their feet on my feet, so it looks like I have ten toes. He actually rented a room that Barack Obama stayed in, and he had two hookers dump Dr. Scholes, odor eaters all over the bed. His feet were probably there. I take a shit on it. Thanks, Sean Leahy. I know.

Trump is my Leahy. There's no getting around it. Fully wear that. Um Let's see here Oh, if you had to go after John Wick What's your pro strat? What does that mean? Somebody asked me that for a mailback question

How I would kill John Wick And my answer was I would You know Sneak up behind him Hit him with a trank dart While I was out cold I tape him to a chair Tape his eyelids open

And I make him watch every episode Of the TV show Girls Until he kills himself One hand has a gun And it pointed to his head Like that gun in that Mark World The Mark Waldo's shooter where he has like the fake suicide thing. I give him that.

And I'm like, buddy, you can watch as many as you want, but you're going to kill yourself eventually. I really don't appreciate you're trying to kill people homicidally by having them to see my show. It's a good show with lots of lessons. I was in a bad place once when I made it, but now'm in a good place. Why is Patrick Wilson on that show now? I don't know. No, he was just on for one episode. Oh.

Yeah. It was an episode where she, he's like a doctor and she spends the day with him. It's like a May December romance. It's actually quite quite a good episode. Does he play the character He played in the 18 movie? No, he actually is Night Owl from Watchman And she finds out at the end

That he's Night Owl and then they make love In the Night Owl Ship to Hallelujah But it's like a modern version of Hallelujah that's like sunned Yeah, exactly. Marnie sings it in the next room Yeah, Marney's Marnie gets done singing Kanye Bow in the presence of greatness

And then she sings She sings Hallelujah while Lena Dunham and Night Owl make love above the city I thought I heard a shitty show That why wish that it would go But here's a sixth season Of these fucking people Four girls in New York City

None of them have any black friends Strange Roche External The one girl's been dating Kyle Loren for four years I can't figure out why One time he hit her with his bike it was weird

who's watching this is it supposed to be funny I'm not in this apartment with you Chessa you're in this apartment with me wait that was Batman Rorschach sounded like Batman that was the whole point

he was like a hard-edged Allison Williams gets her buddy in at once at least I think that's what happened I never actually watched the show I meant to Google that last week after the last show we talked about this but now I just remembered it now

and Dr. Manhattan touches the ground and the earth disintegrates, and that's the end of girls. His big old dong flopping around. Hannah wants to know what part of hockey history culture would your tell-all documentary masterpiece cover inspired by the awesome soul-on-ice documentary. Wait, is your real name Hannah? Are you still doing the girls' bed?

No, no, it's actually... It's actually Hannah. Hannah Horvath wants to know. Do you ever sometimes take a cue-tip in a year or two fart? No, Hannah, we're not doing that question. What part of hockey? history culture would you tell a documentary? I'll tell you, I have, I have,

I don't know if this will ever happen, I don't know if he'll ever do it. But I, if I could do like one, and I wouldn't even do it as a documentary, I would do it as a movie. I would love to do a dramatization of the Lindrosse situation with the Nordiques,

but with the Flyers and with the Rangers, with the judge. Like, I would make it manic and kind of like a VP way, maybe try to mine it for comedy and make him like a, you know, like a petulant, you know, boyprints and have all these different characters in it. But like I would love, like, I've always been fascinated by the chooser and adventure-esque nature of that decision.

But I think that, like, dramatizing it would be amazing. I don't know. I don't know if I have a thing. Hockey people are so boring. I can't imagine stretching it out into a two-hour movie about anything. But if it was like a Henrik Lunkwist story, because, like, he's a really good-looking guy. So you can, like, build around that for the movie. You know, like, he's like Zach Efron.

You know, you just have him take a shirt off a couple times. It's a movie. But, like, it's like a comedy where, like, he's the dude who pulls himself from a game because he's not getting enough help from his goal, from his defense in front of him. He doesn't want to play hockey because he'd rather go play guitar with John McEnroe. You know what I mean? I like it. Yeah.

He skips practice to get, like, his suits tailored the right way and, like, the team hates him. And it's like this weird sort of thing where at the end, he realizes that team is more important than anything. And then he doesn't win the Stanley Cup. Exactly. And that's how. But he wins friends. He wins friends and influences people. Finally, Kari wants to know,

could we get Bridges' take on the newly discovered planets? Oh, yeah, this is probably a big thing for him, right? There are seven new planets outside the Trapper 1, which is the big sun, and they tell me the people can live there. Do you think bears can live there if people are? But spice bears, like Ursa Major, would obviously not be a play. I would not want the bear.

The people will be there first, and then we will determine which of the seven planets the bears will be committed to. Wait, what if the planet was all bears? A planet of the bears? All bears. Well, then I would probably go beneath the planet of the bears. There would be a war of the planet of the bears. And then I would go outside, and I would go down the bench,

and I would ride my horse on the batch, and I would look up and see giant statue. of Brish Ghaloff, sleutting crowd outside of the Flyers Arena, and they would be stuck in sand, and I would say, you bastards, you blew up the planet of the purse. Wow, that's a

pretty good story. Let me ask you this, Brise. How many more planets do you think there are in the universe? The universe is vast. It's probably billions in planets, but how many of them can you live on? I don't know. How many of the planets resemble Vinipag? Many

of them probably do, and no one can even survive in Phinepeg. There are no parks. Would you like to live on another planet? Besides the one I already live on? And if I come visit here, I would... Oh, how far away is your home planet? I didn't realize you were going to give us... Many, many miles. Like seven?

Seven. Like probably seven miles, at least. Would I want... I would like to be the emperor of my own planet? Planet Bridge. Would you play hockey there? There would be only hockey. I would be the emperor of the planet that would make sure that I would have an army of armed tigers

for my troops. Makes sense. And no shooters, only goleys. A planet of goleys, a tiger guards, and my planet breach. What about bears? But if there'd be like a bear's...

Bears versus tigers. You keep up bringing up bears. Bears versus tigers. We would be at war with the bears. They would be Klingon. Oh, so you... The bears would be Klingon. and we would have the United Federation of No Bears.

Briss, that's very close-minded that you think all bears are the same all throughout the galaxy. Why couldn't there be loving? They are. They are hateful creatures that attack people. I completely agree with Betsy DeVos. Every school should have an arsenal of guns, including RPGs, to make sure that bears do not attack. We must be prepared as a society.

The biggest threat to humankind in order, bears, bears causing global warming, bears causing nuclear war in that order. So maybe the key is to ship all of our bears here to the new planes. I think the key is to take from Superman 4. In Superman's 4,

Superman's decided to take all of the weapons on the earth and shoot them into the sun. Oh, wow. So kill the bears. I would round up the bears, put them in a giant net, twist around like Superman throwing a discus,

throw them, into the sun. Watch their first scene as I scream out in agony. Please help. To which I look at them and say, you'll receive no help from me. Thank you. So your favorite movie is the movie

where Anthony Hopkins kills the bear? The edge, yes. And scene. I hope that does the job, Carrie. All right, that's Puck Suit for this week. I'm Greg Wishinsky-Yahu Sports. Join me and Leahy and maybe Lozo.

Stuck in a room next Wednesday for NHL trade deadline all day on Puck Daddy. You could buy, take your eye off the puck. You could buy the 100, the 100 greatest players in NHs. You know, one day we're going to learn

the name of the book, man. Again, just go to Amazon. Go to Amazon, 100 NHL players and it'll come up. And then listen to Merrick Mrs. Wershinsky, my other podcast. And thanks to Will Ech for stopping in. That was a really cool chat with a dude

who I've respected for a long time, and it was really enlightening. And here's Lozo to take you home. All right, so make sure you tune into mine and Ryan, Lambert's new podcast, Pope Podcast, a 13th, in which we will discuss one week at a time, all 10 episodes from the first season of the Young Pope. We did the first episode already.

It's on SoundCloud. I think it's under the stick to sports flag, as was what he did. Like, there's really no time, effort planning, or design, or anything like that. So just go to our Twitter accounts, and you can find that. And you could find our takes on the Young Pope episode one, or first episode. and that's, that's it. Young Pope episode one when they find him

as a young slave boy on tattooing. This is before the Pope has magical powers. This is the origin story of the Pope. All right, everybody. Bye. We'll see you next week. Now leaving nerdist.com.