Puck Soup - Worst Hand Job Ever

Episode Date: May 16, 2019

The boys break down the Game 3 controversy between the Blues and Sharks, where a missed hand-pass handed the win to San Jose. Plus the Hurricanes blow in conference final, a Boston writer gets pissy about basketball, Ralph Krueger takes over the Sabres, a wrestling mystery is solved, the joys of ranch dressing and a Puck Soup Stanley Cup rings quiz! Sponsored by The Athletic, Leesa and Seat Geek!

Sticks and hits and goals and saves and slap shots and goons. We've got sportly commentary to what if you commute. We also cover movies, TV shows, it's in tunes. It's your weekly bowl of hockey and nonsense. I am Greg Wichinsky, live from St. Louis, Missouri, a land of toasted ravioli and provolp. and also from ESPN. I would like to point out, I'm Ryan Lamber from Yahoo,

and I'd like to point out that this is not live, and the clapping we did to sync up our records woke up my dog. So thanks for that. I am Sean McHie from The Athletic, and I would be totally fine if we just skipped all the NHL talk and just talked about Ryan's dog for the next hour and a half. And you're in Puck Soup. Ryan, can you please tell the listeners the name of your,

your dog. My dog's name is G.H. And you are not allowed to know what that stands for. Mm-hmm. We'll just go ahead. We'll just go ahead and assume it's for, let's see here. Well, I've gotten a few guesses in the last few days. George Harrison being the most common. It is not for George Harrison, the best people. I'm going to say, by the way, congratulations on that, sir. Oh, thank you. He is the best beetle. I don't mean your dog. I mean, the getting the beetle thing right. Yep, thanks. Also, I will formally guess Greg Hughes, your tribute to Opie from Opie and Anthony. I think it stands for great hockey because Ryan just loves the NFL so much.

That's right. The NHL, feel the fever. Before we get to last night's fun, let's get to another bit of fun from last night. Kevin Paul DuPont, who, by the way, the first time I was ever at the Hockey Hall of Fame was his induction. I went with my friends at Sports Fan Magazine because we helped lead a campaign to get Rod Langway in the Hall of Fame and he got in the same year

that Kevin Paul DuPont was inducted into the Hall of Fame. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, fuck. As soon as I fucking said it. I know, as soon as he was not inducted, he was the winner of the Ilmer Ferguson Award, which is the award in which they honor journalists, as you know,

the award spontaneously combusted and melted down when Larry Brooks was given it this year. Such a sad incident. So Kevin Dalpaw, Paul DuPont is a well-respected hockey writer in some circles. And last night, he was in Raleigh for the Boston-Carolina Eastern Conference curb st. and he was trying to watch the San Jose St. Louis game on television at a restaurant. And it was on, apparently, and then they switched it over to the Milwaukee, Toronto NBA Eastern Conference Final. And this is what Kevin Paul DuPont tweeted. Left restaurant because TV dumped NHL for NBA, returned to hotel to find NBA playing on lobby TV.

now in process of checking out, Hicks. Now, the only good thing about North Carolina Hotel with NBA on lobby TV, at least it's not showing Fox. Someone named Lauren wrote back to him, oh sweetheart, we have three major universities, the highest concentration of PhDs in the country, and you couldn't find anyone who could explain how to turn your hotel TV on. to which Kevin Paul DuPont, again, a writer who is well respected and in the hockey hall of the whole bit, wrote, where I come from, sweetheart is a sexist remark, try harder you hick. Yeah, so it's meltdown May, folks. And KPD, Boston Globe legend is really on one last night.

Like, look, we've all been in bars where they put on something you don't want to watch or something like that. And maybe we've even occasionally complained about it on Twitter. Maybe we've made a joke about how the South is full of Hicks and all this kind of stuff. Like, we've all done these things, but we probably don't do it quite as publicly, quite as indignantly. And emphatically. And I would say the woman's point about. maybe just turn on your own fucking TV is a well-taking one.

That's really the best point. Yeah, he really, you know, I think that, oh, and oh, we should say, by the way, that the neck like later, like at 427 a.m., he tweeted two tweets, realized facetiousness does not always translate on this platform. Yeah, it's Twitter's fault, dude. Right, you're fucking idiot.

Oh, he also said, somebody said, can you ask them to change the channel? It's pretty simple. And he said, dude, this is America. There is no one to ask. I don't know what that means. And if there were, they wouldn't understand spoken language. I also don't know what that means. Holy shit.

Wait, he means that the people in North Carolina are dumb hicks to the point of not understanding spoken language. Like, he'd have to draw a fucking picture for them. Wow. I, yeah, I don't know, man. It's, uh, it's a, it's a, that's, if you're going to go ham, go ham. Yeah. Sean, I have to be honest with you. I, I, I switched my TV over to Raptors, uh, Bucks. So I, at some point last night towards the end of the game. So, uh, apparently I'm also a

hit. I didn't, uh, this is a tough way to find out, but, oh well, I guess, well, I got to live with it. Better to know than not know. By the way, I should say, um, this is a tough way. say I did not see after maybe halfway through the second period last night because I was very sick and fell asleep on the couch at like 9.30. Well, good news. The referees also didn't see from there it is. The one thing, the two things that perturbed me about this the most. First of all, I'm going to go ahead and assume that he's staying in the same hotel as other writers and is going

to the same restaurant that maybe other writers are at. What's the percentage chance that the Raptor game is on because somebody who's covering the Boston Carolina series requested to watch the Raptors. Yeah, somebody from maybe the Sportsnet broadcast or something like that. No, no, it's because North Carolina is full of Hicks, which is why we put on in the basketball game. Maybe it's because the NBA is more popular than the NHL and more fun. In virtually every market in the United States by an enormous amount. Yeah. Yeah.

And it seems pretty reasonable to me that they would put that game on. But I remember having, I remember having this conversation with Merrick before on the old podcast. And this is why I bring this up, Sean, because you're in Canada and Lambert and I are in the States. Canadians don't understand the plight of the American fan when it comes to walking into a bar and not being able to get a hockey game on. It is, it is something that happens with frequency all across our great nation, or formerly great. And, and, and, and it's, it's a real pain in the ass. But the thing that you learn quite quickly is that if you go to the bar and they don't have the game on and they don't want to turn the game on, fucking leave. Like it's, you know, don't have a sit-in because you can't get the thing you want to watch on the bar TV.

Like, just go to a bar where they're, like, Raleigh, they've had a team in Raleigh since the mid-fucking 90s. Yeah, are you telling me there's not a hockey bar any? where you could be like, hey, want to watch the game? Everybody does it. At every city, when you go there, you're like, hey, where's a good place to watch the hockey game? With the understanding that you can't walk into fucking, you know, TGI Fridays and know for a fact they're going to have the hockey game on the one TV at the bar. That's just what, it's a fact of life here. If only there was like little magical TVs we could carry in our pockets that had the ability.

Yeah, no shit. To broadcast game. That could solve everyone's problem. We'd all be happy. I did that as soon as I landed in St. Louis. I went to this restaurant called Louis and had a good meal because I know the rest of the food here in St. Louis is shit. And I streamed the NBA draft lottery at the bar by myself eating a roast chicken. And I was in fucking heaven, mainly because the Knicks didn't win it.

I mean, that was just beautiful. Although, again, the greatest thing about that draft lottery was the fact that the Lakers were in the top four. and for that brief moment there was that moment of like everybody assuming that it was fixed for the Knicks then transferred their concern that it was fixed for LeBron and it was the greatest moment of all time and then everybody just got mad because they were like but New Orleans tanked by putting their best player on the bench for half the season or whatever yeah and then everybody got pissed off because now Zion Williamson's going to like wallow out in obscurity in New Orleans forgetting the fact that like the biggest star in the world got his start in front of the fucking Cleveland. Right. And also, like, now maybe Anthony Davis stays because he gets to play with Zion fucking Williamson. And Drew Holliday is going to go from maybe being like a top 15 point guard in the league

to, oh, he's going to look incredible and be maybe a borderline all-star. Sean, you're a band the draft guy, aren't you, if memory serves? I'm not. Oh, okay. Sorry. Oh, you are. Right. I'm sorry.

The whole band the draft thing is, like, I'm not. slamming the door on that. The more I see it, like, I'm not on board, but I, like, I went from having that kind of hockey fan reaction of this isn't how we do it now, so it has to be a no to going, like, yeah, some of these people are making okay points. You're the band, the draft guy, Lambert. Yes. You know, I think just from a labor practices, like, labor fairness. And, and, you know, people say, well, what if everybody just signs with Chicago? or whatever, and it's like, okay, have a rule where you can only sign like one top five, one top 20, one, you know, every three years or whatever it is. Like, it's not hard and it's, you know, like, it's unfair to tell Connor McDavid, you have to go play in Edmonton.

And granted, you know, he could opt to sign an offer sheet somewhere or something like that, but that's not how the NHL works. And you see a lot more unrestricted or restricted free agency. happening in the NBA or moves and offer sheets and that kind of thing in the NBA because they have a better system where you know like sign and trades can happen

and things like that because of salary exemptions and yeah. I'm willing to entertain the notion of if there was a cap on the number of players that you could sign that would that may be

that's the only way I'd be interested in this because I do really fear, looking at it through an NHL prism, literally no one ever fucking signing with like, like, could be the example. Well, but here's the thing. An example of that would be

or Winnipeg, yeah. Or Ottawa. And yet Ottawa has actually got a great track record at signing college free agents, which is not the same thing, because clearly you're not getting like the Connor McDavid level guys, but they're right in there. Every year, they get a couple of these guys

to come over. And the reason for that is that a lot of the, once you get past the very top tier, they're looking for fit and opportunity as much as they're looking for anything else. So, yeah, like that's, my gut reaction is nobody would ever sign with Ottawa, but then you look at the, the closest equivalent that we have, which is college free agency, and lots of guys are signing with them. And then we also have to remember that, like, there's always in hockey, especially these sort of X factors of, you know, let's say a team has, Connor McDavid's junior coach, right? And he's just like, I love my junior coach.

I want to go fucking play for him. Like, that's a thing in hockey that happens all the time, the sort of nepotism and and sort of base level relationships that determine whatever guys want to play. Yeah, and plus the fact that we no longer make new hockey players, just every hockey player now is just the son of a former player. And that former player played somewhere. So, you know, that's just, we've got like the same 18 families. is making all the NHL players.

Right. And then the same 18 families house the other players, like the well-trodden Robert Thomas is hanging out at the Kachukes House story that's been on every website this week. It's a whole thing. All right. Let's get to this. I'm so fucking sick of talking about officiating with you guys

because I feel like we had this amazing balls to the wall, nuclear Chernobyl meltdown argument, and now we still have to talk about it every week. Yeah, it's very cool. And it's really cool that it keeps happening to the same team. Okay. So let's pause on that. Your thoughts on that, Ryan Lambert.

The sharks, once again, the beneficiary of an officiating controversy, one that may result in the NHL's second apology to a team this postseason for a call that went the sharks way. So it's one of those things where, you know, I am, I think generally a conspiracy moment. minded person and I don't you know obviously think the NHL is being this bad like if they were to do it I guess it would be like a burn after reading type situation where it's just the most obvious

shit in the world and like just everybody fucking up constantly or whatever but like I just think it's if you're the sharks it's a very fortunate coincidence and if you're you're not the sharks you like would be

right to be like well what the fuck man Like, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's, I made a joke about that on Twitter last night, and I can tell you, Shark fans are very sensitive about this. They feel like they, uh, A, they want to tell you all about every missed call that's gone against them this postseason. Uh, and, uh, they also want to tell you about their entire miserable history and, uh, which, which I think is, is, that part is kind of valid.

Like they, uh, if, if, if there's a, um, if, if there's a, a fan base that probably could use a little bit of good luck. This is the one. And they're getting it. They're getting lots of good luck. And that's life. It happens. The problem I have with that theory is that like their bad luck is like of their own making. Like like the loss of the kings is not because of the officiating. It's because they've fucked up. And the other thing too is like, and I completely understand what you're talking about because I saw the same thing last night. dude, if you're somebody who's salty because they missed a delay of game penalty on David Perron, and you think that call is somehow comparable to a fucking hand pass that led to an overtime game-winning goal in game three of the Western Conference final,

just shut the fuck up. Just get out. So here's my thing with it. I think that, you know, reps are going to miss hand passes, and they're going to miss hand passes on goals and stuff like that. Like, and the rep who was right there was actually, like, had his vision of that play blocked by, I can't remember which blues defender, but one of the blues defenders. And you can also maybe make an argument that the puck hit, I think it was Jay Beaumester maybe, after it was hand-passed along. And so then that negates the hand-passed. But that, but it doesn't. That doesn't, that doesn't negate the hand-pass. There's a, there's bad information going around that a lot of shark ban are cleaning up there.

like these are the arguments that that people. I just want to make it clear on that because I've had that clip sent to me a bunch of times already. That does not, the fact that the puck deflects off somebody's shin does not negate the handpass. Yeah. And it's also like, I don't, I didn't see a clear shot that showed that the puck did go off a Bowmeister either. No, no, I agree.

The one that killed me was arguable that it might have. The same assholes that are saying that there was a magnetic rim on Kauai Leonard's shot are are also saying that that Tim O'Meyer didn't actually glove the puck. It is, we are in a time of truly personal, uh, uh, truth in our, in our culture.

It's insane to me. But you were going to say, buddy? But what I was going to say is, the thing that's fucked up is you can't review that. That's, like, the problem is, and has been with all of these, or not all of them,

but a lot of these stupid reviews, the one in the Columbus series where the puck went off the netting, and they scored immediately and all that shit, like, that should just be reviewable. Like, you should be able to see if there, maybe not if there was like a penalty on the play or something like that, but if there's anything that would have otherwise resulted in the play being blown dead, that should be fucking reviewable.

And the fact that it isn't is what's wrong with the NHG, or, you know, is one of the many things that are wrong with the NHHA. Yeah, I mean, I still, I mean, the netting call, I still don't mind. I mean, obviously they missed the puck going out. That part's the problem. I think the rule there is okay in that it is, it is reviewable, but only if it leads directly to the goal. Otherwise, keep playing and you just, and it's, and it's game on. The problem here is that it's not reviewable at all. And I think there's like, I'm, I've made it clear. I'm a review skeptic, but I'm not against the idea of review in general. Like some people are. Some people just don't want any review in sports. They want the human element, all this other stuff. I've never been on that bandwagon. My argument has always been, if you're going to do review, do it in very specific situations, in a very limited way, and do it on calls that are going to be black and white, not subjective, not judgment calls. And I think you can make a real good case that this falls into that category and that we should be reviewing plays like this.

if it's, you know, if it's a hand pass that leads to a goal and the other team does not get possession anywhere in between, that becomes reviewable. I wouldn't have a problem with that. And I, I just hope that if this is something that leads to new review and new rules, I hope we address this problem with a scalpel and not a sledgehammer. Because I'm already seeing all these people going, just review everything. Just get it right. And it's like, Sean, I'm right here. Yeah. And we know where this is going to go, and it's just, I don't know. I've seen some real bad takes already. And not from blues fans. Blues fans get an exemption. You have 48 hours to be irrational and pissed off and scream at everyone.

But just from the rest of us, like, just everybody just stop, take a breath. Let's figure out a way to do this in a smart way and not just stamp our feet and yell, fix it. and review, start reviewing absolutely everything. Yeah, the thing I was going to say, too, is like, you know, it's one of those situations where, yeah, you definitely don't want to review literally everything. But so much of it is contingent on either, well, A, that's not, that's just not something we can review at all. and B, well, we don't have enough information to overturn the ref's decision. And, like, I think I said it on the show a couple weeks ago, but, like, the only thing the ref should do is be there to go that puck crossed the goal line.

You know what I mean? Like, to take out him going, well, I don't think that was goaltender interference, and then there wasn't enough evidence that it was goaltender interference to overturn. Like, just make, like, because Toronto is reviewing that shit, way. So don't make that, like, and this isn't obviously related directly to the shark's goal last night, but like don't make it contingent on what the ref thinks happened. Because as we saw last night, sometimes the ref get screened out, doesn't get a good view and nobody knows what happened. And then, you know, like I said last night, I disagree on that one. I think somebody,

if you're talking about stuff that's subjective interference and some other plays, somebody's got to make a subjective call. And it can either be the referee who's right there 10 feet away, or it can be somebody sitting 500 miles away watching on a screen. I'd rather have the guy 10 feet away do that. And when it comes to the subjective stuff, at some point, we've all just got to live with the fact that we're not always going to agree on every one of these calls. And some of them are gray areas, and that's just life. This is the one where it's, you know, the way the rule is written, there really isn't a subjective element there kind of is.

Like if you actually go and check the rule, there is some element of like whether the player intentionally did this. But it's not much. Like this is pretty close to black and white. So what I hope we do is if we're going to make this sort of play reviewable, do it in a limited way.

Take the time to think about are there other plays that seem similar to this. For example, high sticks are not reviewable right now. We saw that a few years ago where if you, high stick the puck to a teammate and they score, that's not revealable. That should probably also be reviewable. Let's figure out are there other ones like that.

Get a batch of them. Make it very clear that, hey, it's only if it leads directly to a goal. If the other team gets the puck, that's it. That wipes out the opportunity for review. Keep playing hockey. That would get us to where these sorts of situations wouldn't be the issue. But the part that scares me is this feels like to me another Matt Ducayn's. situation where it's an obvious call. And I wrote a thing that's going up on the athletic today

where I said that there's this, there's a concept in law that says hard cases make bad laws. And in the NHL, I think easy calls make bad rules. And Matthew Shane was an easy call. And it led to a really bad rule with offside review because we thought we were going to put this rule in to catch the Matthew Shane plays. And three years later, we've had hundreds and hundreds of controversies and arguments and nitpicky reviews. We haven't had a single Matthew Shane play that got caught by this. That hasn't happened. Instead, we're arguing over all this other stuff we didn't see coming. And I could see if we just go, hey, how about for every goal, we review everything, that's the easy call making a bad rule. And we're going to be in the same situation as offside, except far

worse, because we're just going to be nitpicking absolutely everything. It's going to be a mess. what I find interesting is the next GM's meeting it's going to make like question time in the UK Parliament look like a meeting of librarians by comparison like every single every single GM is going to have something that happened to them in the last two months that they're going to be uber pissed about and try to affect some sort of legislative change with in the rulebook I don't even know what that I don't even know

what's going to even pass because you've got guys saying Landis Cogoff side play. You've got guys saying hand pass. You've got guys saying puck off the netting. There's been so much shit that's happened that it seems like they're all going to have these different gripes and who knows what's going to even get any support. The question I have for both you though is this. It is demonstrably true that this is one of the worst officiating officiated playoffs we've ever had. And you can go myopic on that and just say game to game. You can go big picture on that and say the NHL had to fucking apologize to a team because, because of a blown call in a game seven.

Like, it is without question one of the worst officiator postseason we've ever had. Does the NHL A, care, B, kind of like it because it gets people talking about hockey. I guess what you're asking is, is any publicity good publicity?

Basically, yeah. I think the answer is probably no. I mean, like, they, the NHL, accustomed as it is to looking ridiculous, maybe is more insulated from like that sense of shame that an more professionally run league might have. But like I don't think that they're sitting there going, oh, this is having like a positive effect on the ratings or anything like that. I think they would prefer to get it right. And then, you know, the fact that they aren't is probably not a positive for them, which is why the, the,

the refs from the San Jose Vegas series aren't working anymore. Right. And it's why the refs from here won't be working anymore in the next round and maybe even for the rest of the series. I mean, the NHL hates this. The referees hate it. The people up the chain and the officiating process hate this. You know, they really do want to get it right. And it sucks when stuff like this happens and everybody knows they didn't, that they didn't get it right.

I did find it kind of curious that, you know, I've seen a lot of fans were very upset because Kay Whitmore, who was the officiating supervisor, to his credit, did a very quick kind of pool reporter interview and had, and basically he was asked, was this a bad call? And his answer was, it is not reviewable. And a lot of people were saying, like, you know, that's not a good answer. why doesn't, to me, this is as close as he's ever going to come to saying we blew it. And I don't even think you have to read between the lines. I think we can take him at what his clear meaning is, which is he's acknowledging it was a blown call without coming right out and saying those exact words.

And I keep seeing people saying, well, you've got to hold the referees accountable. The refs from the Vegas game aren't working anymore. These refs are going to be held accountable. They're going to miss out on the final. They're going to miss out on, you know, that takes money out of their pocket. It's, you know, reputation, prestige, all this stuff. There is a cost associated with this. Now, should we fire every referee who makes a mistake?

Yeah, if there's some magical land of referees out there that are better at this, then yeah, go ahead and bring them in. But, you know, I don't know. There's an extent to which putting aside the whole replay issue, I mean, I don't know what we, what level we expect and how, you know, and it's clearly got to be better than it has been in this. playoffs. But, you know, I see all this frustration out there from fans. And I don't know. I mean, I don't know how far it's allowed to go and how much perfection we expect and, you know, what level of account, like, do we want public shaming? Do we want these guys skated out before the next game so we can all boo and throw tomatoes at them? Or do we acknowledge that it's a

incredibly fast game with a little tiny puck and, you know, a big surface? And things are going to get miss sometimes. And if we can come up with a smart way to help these guys with replay review, let's do it in a smart way. But beyond that, I mean, at some point, guys, there's going to be some miscalls and we can either live with it or we can't. And if we can't, then we're going to be pretty miserable for pretty much all the time because this problem isn't going away. Devil's Advocate, no reviews of anything. No. Now we need them. Well, here's the thing. If you take away review of everything, you're going to have, obviously, a lot more miscalls and problems. But the problem with review is every time you add some new form of review, the number of calls you get right goes up.

Okay? That's what happens when you start reviewing things. But the expectations for the number of calls you get right also goes up. And if it's not done well, the expectation goes up by a lot more than the reality goes up, which means you've just made the gap between what your fans want and what you deliver even wider, which means everyone's angrier, everyone's arguing even more, and everyone's less happy than they were before you brought the replay in. And that's what happened with off-side. We never used to think any of these off-side calls were wrong. Now we're all arguing over half an inch here and there.

So, you know, that's the danger of the road we go down when we start saying, let's, let's review all of this stuff. As soon as you start doing review, your fans expect you to get it right 100% of the time, and you won't. And so your fans aren't any happier than they were. right now. So I don't know. I don't know what the easy answer is. I don't think there is one, but I know that just pounding the table and saying, let's review everything is not the right answer. I just wanted to get it right. And I don't know what that looks like. I do kind of like

respect the Corey Hirsch, Jonathan Marsh's so sort of notion of like, these guys need more help because the game's too fast. Like, I feel like that there might be some validity there and that you could at least sell the idea that you need more expanded review to help them. You could sit down with the refs and say, what do you guys want? Because I guarantee you they're not going to sit there and go, we'd really like to have every penalty call nitpicked by replay review.

But they might say, yeah, like, I'd be willing to bet those referees last night would say, we wish somebody could have called down and said it was a half-past. I've had guys in the league tell me that despite what we think about these referees and, you know, video review essentially like rubbing their nose and their own, their own shit like a puppy. Like, they actually like it. Like, they actually don't mind there being a safety net or a check and balance on their work or, or in most cases, a way for them to check their own work on the ice.

Like, I was sort of surprised by that, but I've heard it from enough people inside the league that I think it's probably true. And you're right. Like, if you give them the chance, they might say, hey, X, Y, Z is what we need help on, so give us that. And maybe that's the solution. No referee wants to be in the middle of what happened last night. Like that, I'm sure any sort of system that would prevent that they would be in favor of. What they don't want, I'm guessing, is a situation. What none of us should want is a situation where a goal gets scored in overtime. And every time a goal is scored in overtime,

this is supposed to be the most exciting thing in the NHL, right? It's, you know, motorcycles and helicopters and all that. Every time a goal is scored, we all sit around. and watch them review the last few minutes of play to see if anybody was in the wrong spot, anything was touching the wrong, any of this stuff, it just turns into a mess. Yeah, indeed. But you know, guys,

speaking of things that are subject to nitpicky reviews and criticisms, this is my transition. It's B minus maybe. It was very meta. I appreciate that. The Athletic is a direct-to-consumer subscription service serving sports fans in North America,

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Marinating in the Scott Burnside. So back to Kevin Paul DuPont, the Bruins and Carolina Hurricanes are playing a series that is immensely disappointing. Well, the Bruins are playing a series. I don't know if we can say the same about Carolina. Well, they had one good period out of nine so far. Let's put it that way.

And they're getting the good puppy treatment of like, oh, they're not even supposed to be here. It's so cute. And oh, you know, they tried their best. No, fuck off. They made the conference final. They'd beat the defending Stanley Cup champions and the best offensive team in hockey. And in the first two games, the series, they played their two worst games in four months. It's inexcusable.

I mean, I know the Bruins are good, but they're not that good. It was incredible how bad they were. And then, like, they threw a switch to open game three. They looked unstoppable. I think the Bruins had what, like three? three shots on goal in that first period. It was like the hurricanes again. Yeah.

Yeah. And then because Tuka Rask just stood on his head and made 20 whatever saves, they were like, well, that's it for us. Good night, everybody. And we're back to being horrible in the second period and beyond. It was amazing to watch. Yeah. And not in a good way.

Depressing to watch. Yeah, it was a bummer. Yeah, because, I mean, like, A, you want a good series and B, the hurricane story is kind of good. And like, just it's never, one of the worst things to watch in a playoff series is the unraveling of a team. And like, you just saw that with Carolina. You saw that with fucking Justin Williams, who's this like, you know, Zen model of consistency and your captain and now he's acting like an asshole. It's just, it was, it's just not the way you want to go out. Yeah, Boston's good.

The thing with Justin Williams and that is, I'm always kind of fascinated. by what you see in the playoffs where when guys who don't normally get involved in that sort of stuff get involved and their team wins, it's wonderful because look at him getting it. He really cares so much. He's right in the middle. He's shoving guys. He's throwing punches. But if they lose, it's, wow, he's lost his cool.

They're under his skin. And it seems to be just completely based on what happens on the scoreboard. We all kind of retro. If they come back and win that game after Justin Williams goes and mixes it up with Brad Marchion, we're all sitting there going like, yeah, that's a captain right there. He wasn't going to put up with any of that. I mean, look, it's, Boss is just a really good team. I think the issue with that was that Boston scored immediately.

Yeah, exactly. It wasn't so much that like, if nothing had come of that, we probably aren't even talking about it, except maybe using the Brad Marchand Giff of the C thing. But because he had that one play that ended up with a goal, and then he took, what, three penalties in the first, in the second game? Or the third game, I mean? And to your point, like, the Bruins power. The Bruins power play right now is, like, akin to the Blue Jackets power play in the first round.

Like, it's just unstoppable. Everything's going. Like, if you're in the penalty box, you were severely hurting your team at this point, based on how good the Boston power play. And let's, I mean, let's, this is a hockey podcast, so let's use the technical hockey term that we all learned. He's eating a poop sandwich. I'm learning so many new terms and phrases from the hurricanes.

Between getting kicked in the ding ding and eating poop sandwiches, it's my vocabulary is really expanding. So hopefully they stick around because I would like to learn even more. The question I always have about a poop sandwich is that is it the actual tubular poop on the sandwich, or is it more of a spread, like peanut butter? I think that's up to the eater. Right, who is eating the poop sandwich. Yes.

There's no wrong way. Well, no, it's all wrong. There's no right way to eat a poop sandwich, is what you're trying to say. I'm sorry, I brought this up. Maybe with a lot of cranch on there. You heard about this? Yeah, it did. Have you heard about cranch, Sean?

No. What have you Americans combined? with ranch dressing to... Well, who is it? Is it Heinz, maybe? It's definitely Heinz. Okay. A company we will assume is Heinz has come out with four new condiments that mix either,

that basically mix together two other condiments. So you have mayo stirred, cranch, which is ketchup and ranch, obviously. Cranch sauce, yeah. I can't remember the other two, but they're apparently not bad, but I will never try them. I believe there's a sarach arsenic. It's one that they created. Oh, then I will try that one. Yeah, I don't need any cranch sauce.

I'm not a ranch dressing hater per se, as many people are. I definitely am more of a blue cheese guy when it comes to wings. And I will say that my favorite kind of ranch, to go back to Saracha for a second, the Trader Joe's Saracha ranch dressing is an all-purpose master condiment that you could eat on salad and also use this as a dipping sauce for like sweet potato fries. So, yeah, I'm not a ranch hater per se, but cranch can go fuck itself. Listen to this guy say sweet potato fries like he's eating healthy on the road. Fuck on. No, fuck off. I get sweet potato fries from Trader Joe's.

They come in this beautiful bag. You throw them in the oven. They're great. They crisp up nice. My wife, beautiful Ruby, is more of a fan of sweet potato fries than she has a regular fries. And sweet potato fries with like a ranch dressing or a barbecue sauce, I think, is just as good as any french fry.

Like regular potato french fry. Non-sweet potato french fried. Wrong. Unsweetened. Unsweetened. Unsweetened. Unsweetened. What were we talking about?

Oh, that's right. Justin Williams. poop sandwiches. I mean, listen, I'm mad at Carolina now for being this bad. They might as well wear Whalers jerseys in this series. They've been that bad. But when you take a step back, this is all right. Like, they're going to be all right.

Like, they've got a good core. Everybody on that team's 25 or under. Like, it's fine. Yeah, and Svetichikoff is young, and they've got the other kid, the center that's in the system. They're going to be fine. You know, they could maybe move one of those defensemen now to get some more help up front. They're going to have to pay Aho a lot of money, but they probably

will. I mean, assuming that Dungan has anything left after that fucking football league failed. So, yeah. They'll just raise interest rates on poor people. There it is. It will be fine. The only thing that worries me for them is like, this is kind of what they do, right? You have the one big playoff run and then you got to go five years before you make it back. Right. They disappear. That's a good point. That's a scary point, actually. And then they show up again. Yeah. So I don't know. That's the part that might worry me.

as I noted on ESPN and ice they have to eat the pig now right like when you're out of the playoffs you have to eat that pig I mean it's Carolina for God's sake they're going to throw that vinegar sauce on it and eat the pig right yeah got to do it with some crutch

By that I mean Roanick of course the Bruins are really good and they're scary good and now they're getting that whole thing where like every line is contributing the question is and this is a classic playoff trope are they peaking too early? I don't know.

They're going to get out of the Eastern Conference final in four, maybe five games. Yeah. And just sit on their asses while they watch the other two teams beat the hell out of each other until the referees decide it's time for the sharks to advance. It's time for sure. Yeah, of course. I think, I think, you know, much respect to Carolina, from a pure Vince McMahon booking point of view, Bruins against Out of the Blues of the Sharks is a fucking money

series. Like, either of those teams. Like, obviously the Sharks, Bruins, is the money series. But you could sell me St. Louis, Boston, and a cup final, and I'm watching that shit, too. I think it'd be a lot of fun.

Hope you like seeing Bobbiore goals. Yeah, no. That's going to be all over the place. But yeah, no, these are both. And it's actually, you know, it's interesting because for all of the craziness of the first round, we might be

heading towards a pretty standard cup fight. Like, I mean, Bruin's Sharks is, what would that be the two seed in both conferences. Yeah. You wouldn't have shocked anyone if you would say, yeah, the final is going to be Bruin sharks. So even Bruins Blues, I think a lot of people probably had at least one of those teams in there.

So I don't know, maybe the craziness has self-corrected or maybe the craziness is so random and crazy that sometimes it just comes out with the expected result after all. And sometimes you're going to get seven games of Jordan Bennington and Tuka, only allowing a total of three goals per game. And if that's the case, you might get a little bit tired of watching it. And if you're tired of watching it, there's really only one thing you need, a great mattress. And a great mattress comes to you from our friends at Lisa. They believe that a bed is more than just a place to sleep. It's a place for relaxation and rest. And they believe that every body has the right to rest. That's why they make two awesome mattresses, plus accessories and

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Well, I figure you probably sleep upside down like a bat, Lambert. That's always been my sort of... Oh, come on. I don't. And you must know this. Sean, are you a tummy sleeper or a back sleeper or a side sleeper? I'm a side sleeper all curled up in a little ball like a child. I dig it.

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Ralph Krueger gets hired in Buffalo. This makes me very happy for a number of reasons from a certain chaotic standpoint. I want to see if you can coach the NHL in 2019. I think he can. He's a really smart dude. But also just to have this guy back in the NHL after the run that he had with Team Europe and the World Cup, like, I've been waiting for this. Buffalo is kind of an interesting.

spot for him. And I'm happy for bottle roll that he didn't like fucking hire Jacques Martin. Yeah. Yeah. I did, I did radio in Buffalo maybe a week, week and a half ago. And they asked me, you know, who are the, who are the people you would want the Sabres to hire if you were a Sabres fan? And I said, nobody who you would think of as being a good candidate. Right. It seems like the right one. That gross. on board guy who went to the Swiss league, who I don't know very much about, like, people were saying his name. And it's like, well, at least he didn't get fired by the senators four years ago. And that's like his big qualification. And to be fair, Kruger is, well, he got fired by the Oilers.

So maybe not the best. But, yeah, you know, I think it was Zadain O'Chara said that, like, Kruger was the reason that team, Europe team was any good in the World Cup. And, you know, I'm not going to fall to coach for not getting the oilers where people in the oilers front office think they should be. So, yeah, I think he's a good hire. He seems like a real smart guy and all that kind of stuff. So, yeah, you know, they did it as well as they possibly could have with it, which given how long the search lasted, is kind of amazing. Yeah, it's like it's a mild surprise only because I sort of figured that where the sabres were at and, and, and, and,

with all of that Pagula money floating around that they would be going after bigger ticket guys. They probably did if they didn't get them. This is, this is, it's intriguing. And I don't think it's guaranteed to work, but I'm very interested to see if it does. And he's clearly a very smart guy. I'm kind of fascinated by the fact that

you've got somebody who has had success in multiple sports, and what does that tell you about their thought process and how they approach the game and the strategy? and just all the elements of it. I think it's really interesting. And yeah, I mean, versus recycling some, somebody else that we've already seen a bunch of times. I think this is probably of the pool that was left. This is the right one.

And like I say, I'm very interested. It could be disaster, but I'm very interested to see how it turns out and how it goes. And if you're going to roll the dice, I think the ceiling here is, is, much higher than it would be on just about any other higher that was available to them. Plus, the more he does well in a roundabout way, the worse it makes Edmonton look, which is always something I'm fond of. So I'm in favor of that as well. Sean, you wanted to bring up the Brett Hart Tom McGee match that came out this week on the WWE Network,

a lost classic? I think that's what they call him, yeah. Tell the people what that's about. Okay, so what happened is this is a match that happened, I don't know, like 30 years ago. We're talking going back to the mid-80s, I think, right? Yeah. Late 80s, yes. Yeah.

And what happened is you've got this guy comes into the WWF at the time named Tom McGee. And if you picture what a wrestler would look like in the mid-80s, this is the guy. He looks like a bodybuilder slash movie star. He's got the, like, the 80s perm and all of this. He's got what in the wrestling world, you would say, is the look. He's right out of central casting. But they got to figure out if he actually knows what he's doing in the ring. And so on a show, not on a pay-per-view, not something that was televised, they have him go out there and basically do a tryout match with Brett Hart, who is at this point a young, up-and-coming guy, but is already a veteran of many years in the business.

and he's seen as like one of the better wrestlers in the world at that. Exactly. And he's a shirt, like he's a shir- Like technical wrestler, I should say. Yeah. So he's going to go out there. Excellence of execution.

Exactly. I don't know. I don't know if he was that yet. He was not yet. He was like just some tag team guy, but very well-respected guy. And so the idea is, all right, you guys go out there and try to have a good match and and try to make this Tom McGee guy look good. And the, the legend.

of it is that they went out and had a match that was so good and that made Tom Beguyen look so good that Vince McMahon and the people who run the WWF were in the back watching going, this guy is our next Hulk Hogan. Tom McGee is our next superstar. We're going to build the company around him because this guy is so amazing. And as it turned out, he wasn't amazing. He was actually awful. He never had another good match. And this became this thing of legend because it was this example of Brett Hart getting a great match

out of this guy and making this guy look like a million bucks which of course in a scripted sport performance like wrestling is half the battle. You've got to make your opponent look good. And then it took on its whole life because the WWF even back then taped everything but this tape

was lost somehow and so it was this legend and rumor that went around and finally 30 years later they found it and they broadcast it The match itself is fine. Like, it's not, it's not some five-star classic, but you can definitely see why they thought that this guy who could barely do anything in the ring was going to be their next Hulk Hogan. So can I, can I give you one thing real quick?

Yeah, chat me out. There is a, a theory out there that this is actually a rematch of that first match. Oh. The first match is the legendary one. And this one is like, and it was apparently like, you know, whatever, a four-star match or something like that, but from this guy who- Five stars in the Tokyo Dome. That's right. From this guy who couldn't work.

And then so they had him basically on a show maybe like a couple of weeks or a month later had him do it again. And it was still a very credible match, but not as good as the original one. That is the theory because this was built up so much for so. long. You've got to see this match. Nobody knows what happened to the tape, blah, blah, blah, that when it came out, a bunch of, like, smart wrestling people were like, that's it. Like, that was a good match or whatever, but that's not. And so somebody, like, dug through the archives or something and found out they had done a previous match, and that, and the theory is, that must be the one that is, like, oh, this is why they all thought that. But, yeah, again, like,

this is still, I haven't watched it yet, but this is by all account, still a very good match. Yeah, and it's the sort of thing, like, there's, in wrestling lore, there are stories of guys who could have a great match with anyone, right? Like that, like, the old thing that Rick Flair could have a four-star match with a broomstick. And Sean Michaels was another guy. But, like, Sean Michaels, you could put him in there with someone who was terrible, and he would bounce around and flop around and sell the hell out of everything and make the match entertaining. but there's also the concept of making your opponent look good. And that was the thinking is, here's what happened. Because you've got a guy who literally never, I mean, he was out of the business within a few years.

He never went anywhere because he never had another decent match. But, you know, here he did it. And so people are just, it's interesting to wrestling fans just from the perspective of this is the example of somebody doing what, in theory, half your job is, which is make your opponent look like a million bucks. And it's, I don't know, it's just, it's interesting and it's, you know, it wouldn't, if this had happened two years ago, nobody would care. But the fact that it was 30 years ago and it had been like this urban legend for so long. And then it resurfaces was, was kind of neat. And so the question that I threw out to you guys was, what is the NHL equivalent of the Brett Hart Tom McGee match? It would have to be, I think it would have to be something goalie-centric, like a game that was sort of, pre-national TV contract and it and it and it be like a bordeur-hashik level goalie battle

um or or maybe even just a game in which somebody made a bazillion saves we never got to see it um that that would probably be where i'm mad at it because it'd have to have to sort of that that mid-season house show kind of aesthetic of nobody having really seen it pre pre-sports center highlights pre-internet but that kind of thing. Do you have a thing in mind for this question? Well, I mean, I had, there's a couple of angles to it. I was actually thinking of it more from the angle of somebody making somebody else looks so good. So, so good.

It's like a Mario and Rob Brown kind of situation. Yeah, the one that I came to mind for me was like Joe Thornton and Jonathan Chichu. Yeah, sure. Or, you know, or maybe Sidney Crosby and Chris Kunitz, except that would be like if, if Tom McGee went on and actually got like a bunch of title runs because people were still like thinking about how good he was and got to go and wrestle on the pro wrestling Olympic team. As far as like loss, there's actually a ton of loss footage. When I was researching the book, there's all sorts of things where you just run into.

There is no more footage of this. It was taped. It was done on Hockey Night in Canada. They reused the tapes at the end of the year and it was gone. One of them that did, they did find that kind of feels like this is, I don't remember what year it is. but there was a year that the Stanley Cup was won on a overtime goal that they thought was a hand pass. And they lost the footage forever. And then it turned out that they found it.

And it wasn't great footage. It was like from a distance. It turned out it was game three of the Western Conference finals this year. This was like when I say hand pass like a hand knocking the puck directly into the net kind of thing. And they actually found it. And you can find it on YouTube now. It's like silent, you know, kind of grainy newsreel footage. But it's, you can actually go and see it.

When you say silent, do you mean there's like dramatic piano and then there's title cards to tell that what's going on? No, that would be even better. Everybody is running around at two-third or like 150% speed. The game wouldn't goal was scored by the little tramp. Anyways. Well, you see, what you're saying essentially is that if you have to be there to see this shit happen because you never know when you're going to be able to find video to watch it, which is why you've got to be in the arena, courtesy of our friends from Seat Geek. With millions of live ticket events from sports to live music to comedy and more, C geek has the tickets you're looking for all in one place.

How come you're not criticizing his transitions? Oh, you know, I totally forgot C to both. They're fine this week. Oh, oh, C is good. C is average. Yeah, it's average. C is a passing grade. Well, you know, some of us have higher standards.

A C for me in math class was, in fact, an A C for me in English class would have been back bin and D. That's how I felt about things. Yeah. So, you know about the Seekek. They rate each deal on a scale of 1 to 10. They display them on an interactive seat map. The big green dots tell you that it's good deals. The red dots tell you it's overpriced. You don't want them. So you could stop searching for the perfect seat and start enjoying it. Every purchase is fully guaranteed so you can shop on Seekek with confidence. No wonder, Seekek has over 50,000 five-star reviews. That's only roughly 49,200 more than we have.

I have C-Geek on my phone. I use it to buy tickets for everything, whether it's, you know, when the New York teams come to now the Bay Area, we're going to see a show on Broadway. It's the go-to app for me to buy concert tickets or Broadway tickets or game tickets. And C-Geek will give you $10 off

your first C-keek purchase of tickets. All you need is the promo code soup. Download the Seekykeek app today. Use the promo code soup, S-O-U-P for $10 on your first purchase. That's promo code soup for $10 off your first Seek-Eak purchase. I have a quiz for you guys this week. It is a Ryan Lambert versus Down Goes Brown quiz. Down-Gos-Brown. Still undefeated?

Undefeated? Yep, that's right. Okay. Putting a streak on the line. All right. There you go. By the way, I'm still pissed at you for referring to Lex Lugar as a broomstick during your talk about Rick Flay. He aspired to broomstick levels of... He was certainly trying for it with his hair. That's right. He was a narcissistic broomstick.

Today's, this week's quiz is called Lord of the Rings in honor of Game of Thrones. Well, now hold on. Basically, it's like this. I'm going to give you two players. You tell me which play. one more Stanley Cups during his career as a player. All right. Okay.

So not as a coach or what happened. He'll be worried there for a second. Straight up. No, don't worry, buddy. I understand. Straight up. Who won more Cups as a player? Sean, since you are the current trivia master,

you get to receive the kick or kick off to Sean, to Ryan, rather. I will go first. I want the pressure on Ryan. seen how that typically goes. Here it is. Adam Graves or Adam Deadmarsh, who is the Lord of the Rings?

Okay. Now, is this, every question has, like, is a tie an option at all? No. No ties. I'm not fucking around this time, like I did with Lambert that one time. Adam Graves would have won with the Rangers, and I think that's it. Deadmarsh, was he healthy?

I'm going to say Adam Deadmarsh, two to one. The answer we're looking for, was Adam Graves. Wow. He won with the 1990. He was on the Oilers. Ed Benton Oilers. Which is why he was on the 94 Rangers.

And that's why he was on the 94 Rangers. And Adam Dead Marsh only won once with the 1996 Colorado Avalanche. So a chance for Ryan to really take the reins on this one here. Ryan Lambert, Ian Cole or Colin White, who was Lord of the Rings? It's got to be Ian Cole, right? That is correct. Ian Cole won two cups with the penguins in 2016 and 17, and Colin White only won once with the 2003 New Jersey Devils.

So, Ryan Lambert takes the one-nothing lead. Oh, wait a minute. So you were talking about like old-timey defenseman Colin White. I was thinking the guy who plays for the Ottawa senators right now. That makes a lot more sense why this would even be a question. God damn, that's too funny. But hey, by any means necessary, friend. It worked out either way, but.

They all count. They don't ask how. That's right. The refs missed the handpass on that one friend. All right. Sean, Sergei Ganchar or Sergey Nemtinoff. Okay. Mm.

That maybe Sean. John's in the spiral. Are you in the shallow, sir? No, these are... These are tough. That is a Hall of Famer to be Sergei Gontchar. I have to say that, or else I got to deal with Dallas fans for the next week. Well, I mean, are you thinking of Zubov?

Because that's the guy that Dallas fans go fucking nuts over. Oh, yeah. You're, okay. Oh, man, there's too many Sergei's. That's it. We're done. There's no more. Broccoli.

Okay. Gondchar. I or Nemchenoff. I'm going to, you know what, I'm going to, I'm going to go meta here. I'm going to say, he seems too obscure a player to just throw in there unless he's the answer. I'm going to say Sergei Nmchinov. Well, you've, you've quizzed the quiz master on this one, sir. It is Sergay and Mchinoff.

1994, Rangers, 2000 Devils, Ganchar only won with the 2009 penguins. Yeah. All right. So we are tied one-one, but Ryan has a game in hand. Lambert, Mike Kean or Mike Vernon? Who is the Lord of the Rings? Oh, Jesus. I think it's probably Mike Keane.

That is correct. Mike Keene, three cups. Montreal, 93, Avs 96, Dallas 99. Mike Vernon, 2. Calgary 89, Detroit, 97. I forgot he was on that Detroit team for some reason. And, of course, was on the 95 Detroit team that got swept by the devils. All right.

Sean, here we go. We are now, it's two to one Lambert. There's ten questions, by the way, with a tiebreaker. Okay. Lots of time. Sean, Sean, Yari Curie or Brian Trachier, who has more cups? Who's the Lord of the Rings? Stay with the fucking meme that I created here.

Okay. So, Brian Trotche, four cups with the Islanders. Yari Curry, five cups with the Oilers. but Brian Trotcheye Two more with the penguins At least one more with the New Jersey Rock and Rollers as well Yeah

Niari Curry did not I don't think after they wind up anywhere where he won a cup He could have He played for so many teams But I don't feel like he won a cup anywhere I'm gonna say Brian Trotche That's correct

Great noodling through that answer sir You're right Trachier the four cups of the Allenders and the dynasty And then two with the Penguins in the early 1990s. So you get your second correct. Ryan is two for two so far.

And so I ask him this, a Battle of the Pats, Pat Verbeek or Patrick Eliash, who has more cups? Who's the Lord of the Rings? Little ball hate. Verbeek. The answer we were looking for was Patrick Eliash.

Patty Verbeek only has one cup win with the 1999 Dallas Stars. You probably were thinking he grabbed one with the red wings at some point, but no. What I was actually thinking was people think Eliash won three, but he only won two. The only won two. And maybe Verbeek was, had, yeah, had won more with the red wings or whatever. Beaker only had the one in Dallas. So now we're tired. Fair enough. Now it gets interesting. Sean, Ulf Samuelson or Shell Samuelson, who has more cups? Oh, geez. Uh, considering

Battle of the Mountain. The mountain is the same guy as far as, as far as I'm concerned. All right. Alfie was on, yeah, he's, he's Alfie to me. He, okay, so he would have been on the, I believe both of the penguin teams.

I don't know if he was on any other shell. Uh-huh. Honestly, Michelle Samson, you could tell me he was on pretty much any team from 1982 through 2006. You could tell me he was on the 2006 hurricanes. I'd be like, yeah, okay, I believe that. I'm going to go Alf Samuelson. K. Jell Samuelson, one cup with the 92 Penguins, Olfie, two cups for the penguins in 91 and 92.

That is correct. All right. Sean moves into a temporary lead. Ryan. Yes. Luke Robatai or Brett Hull Who has who's the Lord of the Rings Lucky Luke

Or? I'm pretty sure Luke Robatai only won Wait, who's the other one? The Golden Brett, sir. Brett Hull. I got to say Brett Hull because I'm pretty sure Luke Robitai only won the one with Detroit in the early 2000s.

You fucking nailed the Brett Hull, two cups 99 in 2002. Robatai also won that 2002 Red Wings team and so we remain tied 3-3 heading into this round which could be our final round

Okay Yeah or we before we get to the big old big old tiebreaker All right Sean Chris Coonitz or Chris Chelyos Who is The Lord of the Rings

Oh my God Um Okay, Chelyos, Montreal once. He wasn't around for the second one. Detroit, he would have been there, 97, 98. No, he wasn't. He was still in Chicago there. So he only got, he was there 2002.

Was he still there, 2008? But Kunitz has four. So I don't think Chelios gets, that high. I'm going with cousin Chris. Chris Kunitz. Chris Kunitz is correct. Four cups. Chellios only three, 86, 2002, and 2008. Okay. He was still around me. Well, 22 years apart. And here we go, buddy. This is exactly what Sean wanted. This is all the pressure on Ryan Lambert to try to extend this thing into overtime. Don't overthink it, Ryan. Just go with it.

The rest will hand it to Sean. Yeah, don't. Just ignore it. Ignore the spotlight. Ignore the crowd noise. Just go there. Play your game. You'll be fine, probably.

Maybe. Here we go. Here it is. Big question here. Toronto Maple Leafs executive Brendan Chanahan or Edmonton-Oilers executive, Paul Coffey.

Who is? Oh, Jesus. The Lord of the Rings. Brendan Shanahan. or Paul Dark Roast Coffee I believe was probably his Chris Berman nickname.

So Shanahan would have only won with Detroit. Unless the Whalers won a cup, which I'm not aware of. I'm pretty sure. They didn't. So let's see, he would have won one, two, probably three cups with Detroit

from the mid-90s to the early 2000. He wasn't on the 2008 team. Paul Coffey was in Edmonton for three cups alone. So I got to go with Paul Coffey. Oh, he must have been on one of the Pittsburgh teams. Is that right? So yeah, I'm going with Paul Coffey. Paul Coffey.

Got it. Four cups, Edmonton, 84, 85, and 87, Pittsburgh, 91. Brendan Shanahan, three cups, Detroit, 97, 98, and 2002. Ladies and gentlemen. We go to the overtime tiebreaker. My God. This is so exciting. Down goes Brown.

A tenuous grip on his perfect record. I've been here before. On fuck-s-up quizzes. Oh, shit. All right. Now, this is, the answer is going to be a number, and I want to ask you guys your thoughts. Do you want to do closest to the T or Price's Right Rules where anybody who goes over does not win? I'm going to leave it up to you.

What do you want? Closes to the T's fine. me. Clos us to the T. All right. If we do prices right, then the second person just. Okay. I could go $1.

You're right. Okay. How many players, just as players, have won the Stanley Cup in NHL history six times or more? So how many players have won the Cup six times or more in their storied career? Many of them, of course, are dead now, but many of them aren't. How many players won the Stanley Cup for six times? I was more. Sean, since we started with you, we start with you here.

What's your guess? Boy, there's going to be a lot of old-time Montreal Canadians. It's just, I don't know, 18 guys from the Montreal Canadians. I mean, they won five in a row at one point. I mean, I'm trying to think back from like 1980 on, you get, there's only a few. I'm going to say 15. 15. Ryan?

Just based on the number of guys who would have played for just a bunch of different Montreal teams, not just like in the 70s, but also like from the 50s and maybe into the 60s, I'm going to say 20? Let me do some quick math. Uh-oh. According to my calculations, 15 is 9 away from 24, whilst 20 is only 4 away from 24. Nice job. The answer is 24. Wow.

Ryan Lambert is the Lord of the Rings, baby. Well done. Thank you. The king has fallen off the iron throne. How many of those 24 were Canadians? Okay. one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, sixteen, sixteen, nineteen, nineteen, nineteen, nineteen, nineteen. Nineteen. I literally said eighteen guys from the, from the Canadians. Must have done it. That's wild. That's awesome. That's awesome. All right. That was a lot of fun. Good times, as always, on the, on the Puck's Sub Quiz. And congratulations to Ryan Lambert. This is exciting. All right, question of the week.

How do you guys want to see replay and video review in the NHL? We put that question out there for you. John Spur writes in, International Rugby has a fourth official in the booth with screens to review plays on the go. He can speak to the head officials' earpiece and alert him that something has happened that he's missed. It provides review capabilities even without stopping play. So that's what he wants. It's just like a guy that's always constantly monitoring the game on video.

in the booth. That's kind of an interesting idea. Dan's story writes in, Toronto has a shame team. Rests don't review during the game, but afterwards they get a reel of all the times they messed up, and a father-like figure stands in a room with them and tells them, I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed in you. J-Hug-0-0-0-0-0-0. J-Hug-0-0.0.0.0.0. Well, I was joking when I said that one.

Okay. You know what? No video at all. everybody only gets an audio feed and we just have to shut up and go with whatever the voice says happened so we're abolishing television as long as the voice isn't jack edwards because then we would be calling major penalties on whoever the bruns are playing on every play in nineteen seventy four a bag of red tag farmers

gotta love jack edwards no i don't yeah i kind of do uh harrison wright Any play that can be challenged by the coach and failure to be correct in the challenge will give the opposing team of power play. The game won't be slowed down too much with challenging every little close call. However, all the game defining blatantly wrong calls can be corrected. Even I, a replay advocate, do not agree with giving the coach the chance to review everything. That is a recipe for a nine-hour game. J.R. writes in, any goals scored scoring play were an automatic

whistle, e.g. hand pass, puck hits the netting could have resulted at the official's discretion to determine the severity of a penalty can keep goal interference, but I still don't know what it is. We'll get to your goal of the interference thing next time, by the way. And then finally, oh, at Brandon V, make all rules reviewable, including missed penalties, only give coaches two challenges per team per game, a challenge that is incorrect results in the lay of game. Bodie McBowice says Pierre McQuire and Mike Milbury should be subject to review. an eligible supplemental discipline by the league for driving fans away, PM Require. And finally, Mishka writes in the preferred review system is, I think the one to five bag of popcorn

system is always a good review system. Hopefully this helps. I give this episode of Puck's Soup, five bags of popcorn. That's all the fun. By the way, Jonathan Willis had a really good idea of you just tell a team, every team at the beginning of the year, we're going to give you X number for, uh, like, we'll review anything you want us to review. And if you get it right, you can keep it. And if you get it wrong, you lose it. And that's it for the whole year. That's it for the whole year. Yeah. That, that would be great just to find out which coach like blew them all in the first week. That's exactly right. That would be fantastic. I'm telling you, Brooks. I thought they were all good

calls. All right. That's a Puxley for this week. Our thanks to no one. It was just us talking. Well, I guess our thanks to the referees in the Sharks Blues game gave us something to chew on. And by that, I mean bile.

I don't know when you're listening to this, but there's a meetup in St. Louis on tonight on Thursday night with me and the St. Louis game time boys. It's at setter ice brew at 7 o'clock. It should be a lot of fun. and I'm Greg Wichinsky. You can read my shit on ASPN.com and, but yeah, that's it. And I have another podcast called ESPN and ICE.

It's a lot of fun. Ryan Lambert, read my stuff at Yahoo. I'm not going to tell, just go through the whole thing of the address. But definitely do sign up for the Puck Soup newsletter on our Patreon. It's $3 a month or if you are subscribed. to the bonus episodes already, and $4 a month if you're not, and don't want to be, I guess. And yeah, it's about hockey. It's about movies, TV shows, music, all that kind of stuff, like basically what you would expect from a puck soup newsletter.

You can find me at The Athletic. This week, I went through all 15 of the lottery teams and tried to come up with a good reason to trade their first round pickaway. And it was easier for some than for others. So if you were a fan of a lottery team, go check it out and find out if I ended up trading yours or not. Now get thee to the Patreon for the mailbag and do vote on the support lay coming up soon on the Patreon as well, the Listener's Choice episode this month. Thanks everybody for supporting this dumb podcast and we will talk to you next time.

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