Real Kyper & Bourne - Leafs Hour: Coyotes & Crouse Curiosity

Episode Date: February 21, 2024

Nick Kypreos, Justin Bourne and Sam McKee start with a look ahead to the Leafs' game tonight against the Coyotes, Toronto's past struggles in the desert, Matthews eyeing his 50th in his homecoming and whether it's concerning how much the team relies on him. Is Keefe doing enough to get the most out of depth players? Then, a chat about trade deadline and all-in scenarios for the Leafs. Finally, they are joined Coyotes GM Bill Armstrong (25:50) to tee up tonight's game, the young core's development and how active they might be at the deadline.The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Sports & Media or any affiliates.

it's the real kipper and born show this is the leaf edition we are live on sportsnet 590 sportsnet 360 and sports net plus from four to six. Welcome aboard Nick Kiprios and two guys who treat me like an all-star Justin Bourne, Sammy McKee. You're dressed like the all-star of the group again. What's happening? What's going on? Oh, just had to have an appearance today at Mercedes-Benz Queensway. Oh, the Mercedes-Benz at Queensway.

Yes. I've heard that's a beautiful facility. I met the CEO of North America today. That's a big title. I said, any chance we can get something used for my boy Sammy McKee? And he laughed. He did, eh? Yeah.

I wouldn't want to replace my dented Toyota Corolla. I love that car. We'll work on that. So we're glad everybody's aboard. Derek Brandeo, Jen Rolnick also along for the ride here. As we get set for the Toronto Maple Leafs and Arizona Coyotes, a game that JB, once again, will find us covering the game for Sportsnet Ontario. Yeah, so that's at 7 o'clock, right?

Can't wait. No, no. 10. Tonight? Yeah. 10? 10. Are you okay?

You want me to get Sammy to cover for you? 10 p.m. Boy, that's pushing it. But yes, I am very much looking forward to the game. Chance for the Leafs to go 5-0 without Morgan Riley. Austin to get 50 in his home state. Matthew Nyes goes back to Arizona. A lot of stories tonight, Kip.

And if you're Morgan Riley, like, 4-1 will make me feel better coming back against the Stanley Cup champions. Yeah, just have like Refire, you know, someone blow a wheel and give up a goal. Like just someone help me out a little bit. It's getting a little uncomfortable. But five and O. Don't go five and O. Come on.

You okay with that? Say we're doing okay. A bit of a heater. I see in my trusted notes that you put together, Sammy, that the Leafs record against Coyotes is not very good. Yeah, they've lost four straight to them. Four straight. That's not just in Arizona.

No, they've lost four straight. The Maple Leafs goalies in those four games were peter marazic eric shulgren and matthew murray well it's not good so they haven't had so samson off tonight we assume we'll get another crack at it yeah okay but yeah and lots of uh interesting storylines that being one of them that they've been you know had their lunch uh money stolen by the coyotes uh karel vejmelka yep he'll start in the net tonight for the coyotes he's 3-0-0 against leafs the 943 so he has basically been the difference in those games and i think oh no you go ahead well i'm just gonna say in a chance i think for the leafs to look at some players on a team that's going in the wrong direction that they could think about yes heading towards march

8th you know i don't know how much it would actually happen but you know a guy like matt dumba guy that you guys mentioned the broadcast the other day and lawson kraus which would cost you all your finest meats and cheeses but there's just definitely there's definitely some guys on that team that you look at oh my god we are talking to the gm of the arizona coyotes later this hour bill armstrong is going to join us so that's exciting we get to ask some questions about that yeah um and this is a team for the most part that that showed well for the first 35 40 games very until they won until they lost 10 in a row they were playing pretty well yeah honestly like they were in the play i know but they were in a playoff picture until they lost

10 matches and they actually had some some solid goaltending as well and it just seems that's gone completely south on a it just makes all the difference in this league doesn't it yeah now you got homegrown austin matthews coming in there licking his chops to the mullet uh fun stat tonight i don't know if you find this fun or interesting but i sure do um the maple leafs have not been shut out since november of 2021 with a goal tonight they'd be the 11th team in nhl history and the first in more than 30 years to go 200 straight games without being shut out. That's from Hockey Reference. Our friend Jake B. Leafs shared that.

Oh, he just jinxed them. 30 years. That's unbelievable. Someone's gone 200 games without getting shut out. Do you know who the next closest team is? I'd love to know. It's the Arizona Coyotes. No.

Yeah, I think with 52. Wow. Yeah. That's wild. They've really, it's an incredible streak. But, I mean, when you pay that much money for four guys who do it that well. Between four of them, somebody should get one most nights. Yeah, like you feel like one of them is going to get one. The most telling of that comment lies on austin matthews who has scored an nhl high 25.4 percent of all maple leaf

goals this season like that's just that's too many crazy yeah like it's awesome but i recognize that's too high a number right it's ridiculous no player has scored more than a quarter of his team's goals in a season since Stamkos did it over 10 years ago, 2012. That, to me, is like... What is the message of every team playing the Toronto Maple Leafs in the first 30 seconds of their team meeting? They're just going to write a three and a four on the board and circle it and go i have a defensive plan shut this guy down and we win the game can i you know play

devil's advocate here i think you're gonna i'm about to i mean you know there's it'd be worse if they had scored like you know 100 goals and he just scores a lot more goals than anybody else that's why he's you know it's just like he is the man like he's the guy that scores the most goals i think he just by sheer number of him that's put up the percentage it's not like it's just because the rest of the team sucks it's because he scores so much where is part of it that well he's got 49 he's got 49 but he's got 49 goals it's not march yet there is a part where we we have said yeah there's a lot of other guys around him that suck yeah don't don't take that off the table

there are clearly guys around him that suck but they're in years past there have also been guys that are like talked about this in the morning show today but we're talking about the exact same season again like it's the like we it looked a little different for a while there, and it was all happening differently, but the bottom six is underperforming. They've had injuries in the D-Core. The top guys are carrying them. It's the exact same thing,

but it's just the Matthews production has just gone up a little bit. That's the only difference. Yeah, and I get it, and I'm not stupid enough to suggest, hey, don't do it as much because it is what it is. The bigger question is, is this the game plan to win in the playoffs moving forward?

Do you really think for one second that the Leafs could go to round two or three or a Stanley Cup final? Just saying, score, Austin, score. Just continuing with Austin picking up 25% of the offense. Do you really believe that? I would have to be a huge idiot to sit here and say it works. I'm going to give everyone a sneak peek to tonight's broadcast. Not to do the content so you and I won't weigh in,

but one of the burning questions is going to be about who past the core four guys is going to score the most goals for the Leafs this year. Good luck answering that question. Bobby McMahon's. Bobby McMahon's your answer? He has nudged himself into the... Based on his last week and a half.

Bobby McMahon, though? That's where we're at? He's going to score the next most on the team. Yann Croup. Yeah, I guess Yann Croup. There's a vote. Yeah. I don't know why you guys are sitting here and looking at me like...

Yeah, you? No, like, this is... Like, we're all surprised by this. This is the whole thing. No, but we are surprised. Because they got offense in the offseason. You got Bertuzzi and Domi and Klingberg. Yeah, but when those guys don't play and they haven't been given any role

where it's like, we trust you, you're the guy. It's just the same thing. It's the same season. It's the same thing. You turn Bertuzzi and Max Domi into Zach Aspen, Reese, and Pierre Engvall where they don't play and they don't score. It's the same thing. Whose fault is that?

Where does that? where does that, is that on the players or is that on Sheldon? Is that on? You know that answer. You know the answer. It's the coach. Of course it's the coach. If you don't use the guys and give them opportunity

and they kind of get relegated to team B. Yeah. I believe ultimately you, you got to convince the coach to, to find different ways to, to squeeze more out of the lineup. But there's also a part of me that says on some nights, man,

I got to go to my horses right now. And yeah, the question is, is when does it finally catch up to you? Game 55, 65, 75, or in the first round,

83, 83. You know, like I thought Austin and Mitch were effective against Tampa Bay in the first round last year. You know, playing all the minutes they did, I thought they were very good. Main reason they got by Tampa was those two guys and Vasilevsky. And so, and they played a lot last year. And so, you know, you do have belief that it's sustainable to a point,

but they did hit a wall. In other words, you're telling me that Tampa did a crappy job of checking Marner and Matthews and Florida nailed it. Well, it depends. Or you could, she'd take the positive angle and say Marner and Matthews,

you know, beat Tampa's good checking, which, you know, they're pretty good offensive players. You could say that Michael Bunting took out one of their top pair of guys in the first, and they didn't have a whole lot, too.

I, you know, like, I think that series, you look back on it with the least winning, they were the far and away the second best team in that series for most of it, and we can't relitigate it because they were the better team in the other series where they lost. But, go ahead.

This just goes back to my earlier point for Florida in the second round. Just find ways to get in their face. They didn't score. Either one of them didn't score in the second round, if I'm not mistaken. And you have an easy victory against this hockey club. Well, I mean, anytime you're one-dimensional, you're at risk of having that dimension taken away. I feel like we had a lot of these exact same conversations

before the trade deadline last year where they completely remade the bottom half of the lineup. Yeah. Like, I really... But that pivots to, do you think that can or will happen again? I've got an article today on sportsnet.ca, the thesis of which is basically,

here's the top five teams in the NHL. They're not nearly as good as they've been in previous years. This is only the second or third time in the last 20 years the best team in the NHL is below a 700 winning percentage. The door is open, you know, for a team, which is I make the case for teams like Toronto, Edmonton, Winnipeg, you know, adding, adding and getting aggressive here because really if you separate

yourself in the pack at all the door's open except it's it's not it's not an equal playing field because some teams are now starting a position where the leafs were three or four years ago where they have all these assets and they can burn and add and the leafs cannot go toe-to-toe with some teams on going out there and being aggressive based on the fact that you have way more bullets than i do definitely yeah that's the cost of the past four years of going all in but it's foolish to not go all in yeah tell your bad team and you're losing and you're doing the other other going the other direction i gotta pick a direction we had gourd stelic on the other day and we we kind of got into it and i believe me i'm i'm with you here if i'm brendan shanahan

and and brad tree living and i know the history of this organization the last three four years i can't look my players in the eye and say you know we've got to be careful with our first rounder and you know there's next year in the year after i'm like all in but like you're really talking about another level of depletion yeah we're going to be two hours of an nhl show not one hour leafs one hour nhl in about three years when they're just completely tanking it not trying to win yeah i i actually sort of agree with gourd in the premises that like is it i want to argue that but like from a like a fan's perspective i'm a fan like i'm like oh boy you know maybe this isn't the year

but like you talk about dubas and sid having a conversation is brad gonna have a conversation with these four guys in the team that like want to win every year and he's gonna be like hey we're not trading the first this year because this guy may be good for us in four years like it's not even a start it's not a conversation you can even begin to have. You have to trade. And I don't agree with Gordon at all here. And we all know much respect and all that to Gordon. He knows what he's talking about with hockey. But I disagree here.

We do not agree. What are you going to do? What are you going to do if you don't trade for assets to get better this year? You're going to be one of the teams that's around 10th best and loses in the first round. And then you have some assets. And again, next year, you're middle of the pack. This is 10th best and loses in the first round. And then you have some assets. And again, next year, you're middle of the pack. Like this is a year where there's a chance.

And I look at analytics and what they've done to other sports, the NFL, nobody went forward on fourth down for years. Right. And now it's like, God, if you're fourth and two or anywhere at midfield, it makes sense to try to win the game,

but you know, going for it, getting aggressive. That's all this is. It makes sense now to push in when there's a chance to win because soon there won't be a chance. I'm with you just in terms of looking at

the East and going okay, outside of Florida, I think we got just as good of a chance as anyone in this conference. Yeah. No one scares me with the exception of Florida being deeper.

Maybe, maybe not. They're not going to play Florida in the first round. Florida will be jumping into a wild card. Yeah, Florida's going to win the division. They're in first right now. Same games as the Bruins. They're ahead of them. Yeah. So you're not facing Florida.

Right. And outside of that, I'll go a step further on how I'm buying into Leafs all in. There's nothing off the table for me. You want to have a conversation on Cowan? I'm having a conversation on Cowan. Wow. See, that's the one where I'm like, he's the guy that's going to kill you when he scores 120 points

maybe 10 years uh listen i've done the the junior to the pro thing yeah no there's no there's no guarantees nick robertson yeah 50 goal score 55 he was it he's a different like the thing is there's no guarantee sammy i know but easton cowan is a touchy one because he's exactly what they've like the idea of what he can become is nick robertson is not what he become was not like this what mccowan unless unless you bring back Someone that can kind of paint a picture of getting Cowan advanced here. Because of your window. You need to turn Cowan into something that can help you win now and maybe have a similar look to him.

So, Arizona tonight, I go knock on Bill Armstrong, the general manager's door, and I say, how do we turn Cowan possibly into Lawson Kraus? Are you having that conversation? Here's why I am having that conversation. The window is now, to your point, which is very well taken. The salary is very manageable, $4.3 million, and it's this playoff run plus three more.

Three more. Four years of contract. He's 26. That's what you're doing. You're giving him a loss in Kraus that sets back his program for Cowan to be ready when Arizona's ready. He's got 20 goals and 50 for you. You've got to treat the leafs like they're ready

now even though they're we can we can pick apart some some holes here on the blue line plays left wing too wouldn't that knock everyone into their place i absolutely am like i think it's a pretty controversial opinion to say that but like i don't disagree that i would absolutely trade him for a big help but the question i would say is you want to spend that chip on the forward core as opposed to the blue line because if you're spending that chip you look at this d core and it's like yeah the leafs no no it's it's not one or the other i'm i'm part of what you're doing after you trade your first for d i'm going to get another future first rounder and this is what i'm just doesn't stop. I'm like, you're all in. Yes.

You are all in on the next two years here. And Kraus can help you win this year and next year as we know that he's not a UFA. He's not Nick Foligno or Ryan O'Reilly. He's in the prime of his career. They're not flying away anytime soon. Yeah. Someone like Chikrin or someone like, you know,

on the back end version of that where you have another year. Punt it down the road. They're going to be bad. They're going to be bad at some point. And that's just, you know, the salary cap is the way it is. And their window happened to coincide with this crappy cap window and tough beans. But that's one that though it's guys Strathroy,

Ontario drafted by the lease plays for the knights yeah absolute stud he's like he's legitimately the best player in the ohl he will be no he like right now he'll be really good three or four years from now sammy i know he's not gonna win the calder next year i mean i don't know no i like just sitting here we don't it's he's still got another year of junior eligibility here, right? You can't even send him to the Marlies. What year is he a 30-goal scorer in the NHL? It's probably three years from now.

Like if you've got a team that's supposed to. And I don't know, Sam. You watch junior. I don't. Maybe he's a 50-goal scorer. I don't know. Let it go, bud. Let it go.

Let it go. The thing is, I'm coming from a fan's perspective because I do, I would happily move anybody. There's not one person in the organization that I would be like, don't trade them. Like any prospect, anyone. Truly. Either it's the big four, I guess, or Tavares.

Someone would take Tavares, sure. But, like, I think when people hear the name Cowan, they're going to be like, oh, no. No, no, no. But they're gonna be like oh no no no no but they shouldn't be like that because it's like when he's contributing but it's hard because at least i've had so few top banger prospects because they've had so few first round picks that when they finally get one and it seems like they hit on one and then you trade that one too like i can picture the trepidation from leaf fans but i'm with you trepidation what does that mean trepidation did you see the conor bedard cliff no oh i sent it to you oh did he say no the reporter asked him if he had any trepidation getting back in the game and

he was like i have no idea what that would mean we need uh derrick brandeo to find it for us yeah no trepidation yeah i i wouldn't i think you'd just do it. I really do. And you plug your nose hard and you try to win a Stanley Cup. There's a lot of stories in NHL history of GMs not wanting to give up player X to get this guy. And then you look back at who player X was. I know, God, there was a recent one where the Flames could have had a player, a star, and they didn't want to give up a Velimaki. Velimaki was their big star that they were like, we don't, you know, this is our guy. He's an unmovable, he's untouchable.

Can't have untouchable prospects. There's just never a guarantee they become what you want them to become. Especially with windows now and money still being an issue. Number one reason why we still haven't seen anything of significance in a trade is because there's still too much money

that needs to be burned off of contracts moving forward. All right. Oh, we have Bedard already. Look at Derek Brandeo. All right, we were talking about it. Let's go to Conor Bedard on a media question. Do you have any trepidation out there about taking a hit or anything like that?

I have no clue what that word means. I have no clue. There's nothing you're going to pretend to understand what you're talking about. Derek, we're going to bank that in the archives right there. I don't know. All right. That's a tough one. The boys are in Arizona.

No. It's him being Connor Bedard. I love it that he would say that i'm sure connor bedard was just pouring over the books at uh whatever elementary school and whatever uh high school he was at 14 years oh yeah yeah millionaire yeah the boys are in arizona uh sheldon keith a little grumpy today yeah like why why is he grumpy well listen to this clip four in a row listen to this clip this is all i row. Listen to this clip. This is, I'll tee it up for you. The question basically was, where's my clip sheet?

I don't know. Anyways, the first question, okay, basically told him, he's like, are you excited? A lot of juice, extra juice playing with all the Arizona ties or whatever. Are you excited about this game? And this was his answer. It does. That hasn't really manifested to positive things on the ice in the past.

But, yeah, certainly it's great to be here for myself. I have personal connections here. As you say, there's a number of others in our organization, obviously, that have much deeper connections. And it's beautiful here. You know, it's great. It was a great day yesterday, the sun shining. So, yeah, it's great to be here, and even the coming into this building is a nice change.

It's different. It's unique to the NHL, obviously, but it's also a terrific building. They did an unbelievable job putting this together. What's the key to key to beating someone okay i got so many things out of that i got sheldon the coach sheldon the weatherman sheldon the marketer yeah so then the architecture major he was all over the map on that but just like yeah what was the final point though no grumpiness just you didn't sense grumpiness? Yeah. No, I did sense it.

Okay. Really? Yeah. On the fact that every time we come in here, we lose. Yeah. He's definitely making the observation that, yeah, like it being cool doesn't mean it helps us, but it's cool. Where do you think the biggest area that he thinks is that the guys are out

there having a good time or or austin's coming in and turning it into a hometown uh distraction well how many guys play golf yesterday judging by the color of matthews's nose they were on the course yesterday they were they were enjoying themselves what's wrong with that and who wouldn't do it? Right. It's a day off in Zona. I would be on the course the entire day. Probably a couple cocktails. But it's really easy to look past the Coyotes and just be like, finally, in the middle of winter, we get to go away, you know, going away somewhere warm to golf. Doesn't that sound nice, Kipper?

Scottsdale. Oh, it sounds lovely. I adore Scottsdale. Scottsdale's great. Oh, my God. It's the best. They should put a hockey team there. What is wrong with them?

What's wrong with us? Why aren't we here right now? The Coyotes, the organization, just put the team in Scottsdale, build a rink, and you've got gold. Drop it on the old tortilla factory right downtown there. And we will never hear about Arizona being a market that can't work for the nhl for sure it's that simple is it not apparently that in a billion and a half dollars for a rink and a bill i mean we got a break here soon but can you just fantasize with me about being an nhl or living in arizona

showing up to the rink and flops i read a play golf jason zucker was like he zucker wants to be a coyote long term i was like i bet he does i bet you keller with his plus one handicap doesn't want to leave arizona too well we'll get it with john rom every day we'll get a chance to ask uh bill armstrong joe manager of arizona coyotes if uh if that's the case everybody comes in golfs and leaves two points on the table because that hasn't been the secret to a winning recipe as of the last what two weeks three weeks we'll see if that changes with the toronto maple leafs tonight in action against them all right we're taking a break yeah let's hit the break and when we return bill armstrong on the real kipper and Bourne Show. The best Blue Jays show out there, period.

Blair and Barker. Be sure to subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Nick Kiprios, Justin Bourne, Sammy McKee. Let's welcome in general manager of the Arizona Coyotes, Bill Armstrong. Bill, thanks for joining us. How are you, man? I'm doing great.

How are you boys doing today? We're good. We're psyched. JB and I are on the game tonight against your Arizona Coyotes. So there are games, and then there's a game against the Toronto Maple Leafs. No better way for your team to get a little extra attention than beating the Leafs, right? Yeah, it'll be a good matchup tonight. We've played really well.

We came out of the gates pretty good against Colorado. In our last game, we played a real good game so we're we're in the thick of things um i think in the process of going through the uh the rebuild um you know there are there are spotty patches we're probably in one right now but i but i like the way that we play and we're we're continuing to play hard and battle through it that's great yeah so you know you mentioned sort of continuing the rebuild process. You know, what does that process look like for you guys? You have a number of pieces now I'm sure you're happy with and content to see as a part of the future.

You know, what do you sort of have laid out as a vision for this Coyotes club? Well, you know, that's a great question. For us, we're kind of right where we kind of expected we'd be. We'd be in a place where our fans get to come and watch and they can see a little bit of the goodness that we've drafted. That's the Logan Cooleys and the Gunthers and the Mosers and some of the other guys that we've acquired,

like the Jack McBains and the Connor Ingrams. So you can see a little bit of the goodness coming through, but it's not consistent probably every single night that we play. But I think our fans get a look at what's coming, and I think they're very excited to know in the pipeline also the Lamoureuxs and the Geekies of the world and the Simichevs and Boots. So there's a good pipeline of young talent that's coming in. It's not there every single night.

You know, that's due to being young. I believe we're like the second youngest team in the National Hockey League. So there are nights where, you know, it gets a little scary out there. But there are nights, too, when you catch us on a good night, we can play with the best of them. So when you look at the last 10 games, and obviously it doesn't look good, but in terms of where you are in your development and where you're happy with,

but you just need more seasoning, i.e. the blue line, i.e. in net? Where is your focus right now on what you have to wait for to improve on? Well, you know, with us, if you look at the last 10 games, you know, we're an organization that doesn't like to make excuses, but if you look at the last 10 games, we're an organization that doesn't like to make excuses.

But if you look at the competition that we've played, I'm not sure if we spread out those 10 games, our record would be that much better. We've played some really tough competition. It's been good for this group. It's been a good challenge. I think our biggest concern as we're building is looking for a number one defenseman. Obviously, that's someone that can't hurt

to have. Anytime you're trying to go through the rebuild, you're looking at a number one goaltender, a number one defenseman, or a number one center and a goal scorer. You're always trying to get one of those pieces that fit in. If you look at any team, whether it's Vegas or it's the Tampa Bay Lightning,

you've got to have those core pieces that are elite to move on and play for a championship. So I think when we're going through the rebuild process and you look at the draft, you're always looking for one of them. In that process, so you guys obviously are taking stock of where you're at in the standings. We do a Leaf show, so we're always talking, looking looking around the league and be like what team might be sellers at the deadline um you know we're not sure about the coyotes necessarily but do you see yourself being active at the deadline i know you have about 53 000 draft picks coming up but what do you see for your activity level over the next few weeks yeah i mean i mean that'll work itself out you know as

we as we move down the stretch here. We've built some players into our lineup in the free agency process that allow us to, if it's not going our way, to acquire assets with those players. So I think that's a nice bonus for us to have. I think with our team, our core is slowly getting there. There's some fringe players that we've signed, you know, that we could move and have the ability to create more assets. And, you know, people always ask us, are those 500 million draft picks you have, were you to draft all of them? And the answer is probably not, but you can always use them as currency to buy players

like we did with Jersey and and jack of fame so with these consecutive losses there's no question teams probably call you up a lot quicker now and try to feel you out uh you know so when say brad tree living calls you and offers you a fourth round pick for lawson uh lawson kraus um when does it go from a fourth-round pick to something more serious? Does that just have to play out towards March 8th? I think it was a seventh-round pick. Just to be accurate with that. Yeah, you know, there's never any – it's just down to the deadline. It always is.

You know, when there's a deadline, you get something. There's no different than arbitration. There's a deadline to get it done, you know, and everybody, you know, plays the game until that time and point, you know. So, you know, for us, we'll play that game right down to the wire too. So, you know, we've done it before where we've kept guys because we didn't get the deal we wanted and we're kind of stingy like that and we've got a lot of draft picks.

So we can kind of go down that route too. But, you know, we've been able to work out. I think we've done the most trades with any other club in probably the last five years. So normally we can find deals. For us, we use comparable deals, you know, that have been done before. I think probably that's the fairest way as a GM to get the best deal and get it done as quick as you can. You know, just compare your player to a trade that's happened over the last five years and usually gets it done.

But sometimes teams are willing to pay that still. So there's 30 seconds left on the clock. Fair enough. You mentioned all the picks you guys have, and you've been a competitive hockey team this year. You're sitting in a great place on the ice. We appreciate you coming on the show, and so I'd hate to even ask, but how annoying is all this off-the-ice stuff for you guys?

Does it affect your day-to-day business when Toronto Maple Leafs fans are trying to move the Coyotes to Utah already? How much does that affect your daily business? In every market, it has its different challenges. You're in the Toronto market, you know, at the GM, there's a thousand different reporters throwing rocks through your windows every day, you know. Here, that's not like that.

It's a different quality of life, you know. It's a different way. What we have is noise, you know, that everybody around us, you know, kind of digs up about the arena and gives it to us. And I think, you know, hey, we're moving. And listen, let's be honest. Our players are human. They buy houses with their wives.

And I'm sure if everybody's been down to Arizona, nobody wants to leave Arizona. It's probably one of the most beautiful places. So everybody's kind of attached here and wants to see it work out and wants to see that next step happen. And as a GM, I'll be honest with you, if you build an elite facility down here with 19,000 people and it's in a good place with an elite training facility with a couple of ranks,

you're one of the 10 teams in the National Hockey League with the taxes, with the quality of life. There's no traffic. You get off the plane, you're home in 10 minutes, you're at your practice 10 teams in the National Hockey League with the taxes, with the quality of life. There's no traffic. You get off the plane, you're home in 10 minutes, you're at your practice rink in 10 minutes. It's a game changer. And you become one of the top 10 teams automatically because of the free agencies, people you can attract.

And let's be honest. You hear all the talk about this and that, about Arizona. We're ranked the number one place to go by all the wives of the NHL. There's no snow. You know, and it does matter when you're attracting the top free agents. So we can become that. You know, it's just in the process that, you know, the rink has to be worked out.

And like I tell everybody down here, I build teams. I don't build rinks. So, you know know we're hoping that we can take another step and our ownership is pushing them for a new piece of land so you know hopefully that can come to fruition one day and we can become

one of the top 10 franchises in the National Hockey League. Not to give away state secrets here but are you confident that this can be resolved fairly soon? That's a great question. You know, the NHL wants it to happen. Everybody wants it to happen.

So I want to believe the goodness that it's going to get done here, and it's going to take that next step because it is an incredible place to play hockey. And your fans will see that tonight. I'm sure the Leafs Nation will be packed in there too to watch us play. And it's a great place in the desert for hockey. They've added Division I hockey down here.

There's American League hockey everywhere down here. It's becoming a place to watch hockey. And it's a great thing. There's more fans here now than there ever has been, and we've just got to get the arena situation resolved. And if we can do that, this is going to be a strong franchise in the National Hockey League.

In the interim, how has the mullet experience been, the mullet arena experience been? I know it's not ideal for you guys, but it is. It's kind of a unique kind of – Sheldon Keefe said in his interview today, it's kind of cool to be somewhere different. Yeah. Yeah.

Hey, listen, it's, it's unbelievable. But I will tell you, we haven't, we've been going through a stretch where we haven't been successful and win. And the fans are so close to me.

It's almost like Harold Ballard's box. The bunker. They're that close to you. So when they're not happy, you know, they can really have that one-on-one personal time with you and there's nothing you can do about it it's okay when we won the last five games and i'm going through the crowd high-fiving everybody yeah bill when we uh we look at your lineup though we we do sense that you're a lot closer, but we also saw Pierre Dorian before he left Ottawa

talking about their build being over and we're ready to compete now, and that hasn't been the case. Would you be a little weary of saying that as early as next year this team should make the playoffs? Yeah, it is. Listen, I went went through with the st louis blues you know look how long a rebuild took you know the teams that you know sometimes

hit the lottery like pittsburgh's you know they flipped it in like five years but most times you know with the the avalanche they went through the process almost like a double rebuild um the blues went on forever i think it was close to 14 years. Washington was like 10 years. It's not an easy trick. So to say, hey, listen, I'm going to wipe my hands here. The rebuild's over. We're going.

That's not true. You can run into a host of injuries. We could be picking one again next year. I mean, that's happened to teams that are in it this year where everybody thinks they're going to flip the switch and a few injuries and a goaltender goes down. So the rebuild, it takes a lot longer than people think. And you have to leave some room for error.

But I like we've added the pieces. Where we are right now is where we drew it up on paper. And if we can keep making that progress with good drafting, and our scouts have done a great job so far, Ryan Jankowski and Daryl P pandelski have done an amazing job and we're we're on track to where we're supposed to be um but i would not put my hands up and say you know we're gonna we're gonna make this next year there's still more work to be done so if uh if fans here haven't watched your team all that closely who are the guys who maybe deserve a little bit

more national attention than they've gotten this year um you know michelli comes to mind for me as a guy who's probably uh you know an underrated name um is that fair to say and is there anyone else to add to that list well the fans are gonna notice tonight the speed of logan cooley um you know he's he's gonna catch your attention and Dylan Gunther, his right winger, is a hell of a player. And those two guys have got some chemistry lately together. They're two really, really young players. And Keller on

the left side of them, they're going to stand out for you tonight at times. And that's kind of the hope when you come. Lawson Kraus has been a heck of a player with Bukestead and Michelli, and that's kind of anchored our second line. There's some unsung heroes. Matt Dumba, he's done a nice job as a leader down there for us.

He plays against the big boys every night, and he's not afraid to take runs at guys, and we love that about him. He keeps us competitive with a little bit of fire. There's a lot of goodness in the desert. Obviously, it still has a lot of maturing to go. There's a patient process, but there's good signs so far, and we look forward to adding some more players next year. Hey, Bill, have you ever heard of the product Flex Seal?

Yes. Yes. That's Alex Kerfoot. That was the nickname here. Any line you had a problem with, you could put him on, and he just patched the hole. What do you think? Flex seal.

I agree. And stop leaks fast. I love that. He has been so good for us in the desert. Center, left wing, right wing, kill penalties, the bumper on the power play. This guy has been so good for us. And, you know, we're young. And, you know, in leadership, you know, he's pretty calm.

We were in a meeting the other day, and some of his words were unbelievable on how he just talked and calmed the group. And he's been such a great part of our team this year. We're very fortunate to have him. And he's fell in the net, and he's been a very effective player. Probably one of the best penalty killers I've seen up front, just ragging the pocket times. We'll get him to send some

Flex Seal up here. Our show leaks all the time, Bill. Really appreciate your time. Good luck tonight. Good luck the rest of the season. Good luck moving into trade deadline day. You got it.

Thanks, guys, for having me on. Much appreciated. Thanks, Bill. Appreciate it. Bill Armstrong, general manager of the Arizona Coyotes. What did you get out of that? He took the opportunity to build up Matt Dumba, who is available to him. Yeah, he's going to go for sure.

Yeah, that was sad. Someone will take a chance on him. I don't know how well he's playing. Who, Dumba? Yeah. Well, he's going to go for sure. Yeah, that was sad. Someone will take a chance on him. I don't know how well he's playing. Who, Dumba? Yeah. Well, I think he's making the point. He plays against the big guys all the time. He'll take runs at them.

Now, if you have the choice of making no changes at all or adding Matt Dumba to the Toronto Maple Leafs, you're taking Dumba all day long? Oh, my God, yes. Okay. He makes 3.9. He plays right D. He hits people that's

a lot of check boxes for me all right yeah lilligran for him yeah i mean yes i would do that i think they would well you should ask them well like just hold on for a second no i know i understand that lilligran is not having uh a great year and he's he's hurting a little bit but how old's lilligren and how old's dumba and what's dumba got left on his one year and lilligren's got uh team controlled team controlled so not not that quick i would throw the lily pad away i mean if you're talking about turning future help from a guy into current help, this, to me, is a pretty quick way to do it.

But yeah, I don't know that they would be interested in that. Yeah, he confirmed Arizona nice. Yeah, it was really quite the sales pitch for Arizona. I didn't get the chance to ask him, will there be water in the state in 10 years? Well, I did ask him how confident he was, and there was a bit of a pause there. Yes. You know, I'm no expert.

No, but he didn't immediately go, oh, it's happening. But there was one of those where he sounded a little, yeah. Political. sounded a little um yeah political he knew yeah well listen he doesn't sound overly optimistic if we kind of read between the lines yeah of course he's got hope like everybody else has had the last 20 years in the state of arizona for hockey but a really nice twist on it well the nhl wants it to happen and they do very much as do you think like, Gary has not let go of this thing for how many years now? Yeah. I build teams.

I don't build rinks. And Armstrong is not wrong in terms of if you just put a nice rink with a couple of pads and a facility in the right place, it's a top ten market. Like, I hope, yeah, for sure. I hope no one thought I was being sarcastic or Bill was being sarcastic when talking about it's the number one place wives want to go.

Like, if you're picking a city to move to and you say to your wife, what about Arizona? It's cheap and warm and, you know, like, it's an easy sales pitch. It's a, you know, instead of being in the winter somewhere. Right? You sell that to your wife little winter in arizona just it it's weird that this owner has had so much problem i mean they all have kip though that was the third straight

owner i don't think he's ever had the right ownership group in 20 years their draft picks are baffling it's obscene how many picks they have. I mean, yeah, I think I told you guys, in the first three rounds of the draft, in the next three years, at a glance, they got about 20. He should trade them for a rink. He'd have enough. Some guy who's got no team. No team.

At least now I have 20 draft picks. Just build me a rink. So in our last block, before we got to Bill Armstrong, we discussed the potential of dealing away Easton Cowan. And the clip of us talking about that has subsequently been put on X. Oh, I hate when that happens. Can I read some of the tweets that say? Yes.

No, no. What? No chance. No no that would be a bad move no no slow news day is it no this is my nightmare no so no uh multiple no gifts say one of those things where it's like it's talk radio if you can't discuss it even no i think you can discuss it we're discussing but i told you word for word that leaf fans were gonna get bent out of shape about this he let leafs fans be the gm this team would not be very good so go back and ask them if they thought moving him would give them a great chance to win the Stanley Cup. And if they won it, would it be worth it? Yeah. I mean.

Okay. So the reason why they say no, no, no, no, no, is because they don't think this is a team that has a chance to win a Stanley Cup. In conclusion. You don't want to know the things I do to see the Leafs. They're the problem. It's the children who are wrong. You don't want to know the things I would do to see the leaves hoist a Stanley Cup.

No, I genuinely don't. You really don't want to know. No. No. I agree with that. But yeah, it's just

they haven't developed any stars. So it's a fear factor of their condition to expect failure. It's a fear factor of not only

losing Cowan as a prospect but then losing anyway. Yeah, you're losing the first round and now you don't have Cowan. Yeah, it's like they just haven't, outside of the big four,

they haven't developed this guy. I'm not sure Kraus is that guy, but if there's a guy out there that falls into that wheelhouse that has term, and again, he's not flying out the window because he's not signing a new contract, you have to look at players like that.

It's funny, though, with those guys. The grass is always greener. It's like Kraus is big and a left winger, and he scores, and maybe you don't end up loving the player. I always think that when you talk about Pasternak so glowingly all the time, I think if he played here, you'd be like, this guy some nights. I think he'd drive you crazy some nights. Mid.

So, you know, there's all these guys. He's got 80 points. Willie's driving a few people nuts since he signed his contract, but he's still incredibly dangerous, like he showed the other night in St. Louis. Yeah, no one's good all the time. You're going to live with that with these type of guys. You're right.

You're right. They're all, in many ways, kind of of the same where they're not playing 82 games. You know what's remarkable too about Austin Matthews and his run lately and where he's heading towards 70, maybe 74 goals, is that we've also had half a dozen games where we've said, oh my God, he's been horrible yeah horrible yeah i just don't think you can play 82 games it's just the fact that they're not all going to be a box of chocolates no for any of them no you're right though he he is an all or nothing bunches guy he's actually

gone 24 games this year i think he hasn't scored a goal so that means his 50 goals 49 goals have come in the other quick math like 30 you know so he just like lights it up when he scores and then some nights not so much there are other factors besides hey i just not getting the bounce or anything like there are some games when you just know he's just not a very good effort yeah right he just didn't wasn't trying as hard matthews specific thing or a matthews i'm just talking about matthews like there's there's there's a there's a factor for guys that sometimes they're not getting the bounce or but there but there are some games when we've watched austin and go he's just got to work harder i just don't think you can work and that can be said for a lot of players around the league

but i genuinely don't think and i forget i wrote about this somewhere along the way that like if you're a top heavy team and you're counting on these top guys to score for you all the time this is my theory for why they're bad against good teams yeah they're gonna take some nights off if you're gonna play them so much every single night 82 times and say what nights are you gonna take off well when it's columbus or, you know, Anaheim or those are the nights they're going to hope to shoot a couple in and all of a sudden they're dogs and they lose to a bad team and you got nothing else. And for the record, like, he is working his ass off

the last two, three weeks. Defensively, just as good as offensively. I've never seen him better in terms of his commitment and his work ethic. I mean, that totally correlates to the success that he's having. Yeah, I'd agree with that. It'd be interesting to know, you know, we've talked about the chase for 70, and, you know, if that becomes a thing, and you and I agree

that it shouldn't become a thing regardless, because you don't want to pour your effort in before playoffs to some round number just for the sake of hitting a round number yeah especially where 69 would still be nice where they are in their development of this program yeah right if it was two years ago four years ago right and you get some personal milestones now it's like okay win building building the confidence right building the confidence to the to the point where you are now ready to lead this team to a championship. So, all right.

Our thanks to Bill Armstrong, general manager of the Arizona Coyotes. Coming up next. Eddie O! Yes. Former Toronto Maple Leaf. And now top analyst with TNT. He's the Kraken analyst. But tonight he goes national for TNT with the Edmonton Oilers

versus the Boston Bruins. So, Eddie O, after the break, still plenty more on the Real Kipper and Boren show. Do not go away.