Real Kyper & Bourne - Leafs Hour: Injury Bug

Episode Date: December 30, 2025

Nick Kypreos, Justin Bourne and fill-in producer Cristian Ceniti begin the hour touching on the questionable tags and piling injuries across most of the Leafs' roster before their game against the New Jersey Devils, Jacob Quillan's second go around on the main roster and what to expect from the young forward, the connection between the increased number of blocked shots from star offensive players and being in your own zone a lot, if the coaching staff are under utilizing Scott Laughton and if he will have value on the trade market, and the potential of playing without Chris Tanev in the long term. Then, the guys talk about players stepping outside of their role and becoming physical. 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.

all right here we go game day on the leaf edition hour of the real kipper and born show we are live on sports net 360 sports net 590 the fan in toronto and streaming always on sports net plus catch us if you can on a download just as well it's apple spot spotify and youtube nick kiprios just born, Andrew Adams in for today, Jake the Snake Shilts, and in place for Sammy McKee, who is off for maintenance. Maintenance still? I'm calling the rest of the week, Sammy off for maintenance. We welcome in Christian Cheneity.

Christian, welcome, welcome. Welcome. Round a stab to the boys. Pleasure to be aboard. Absolutely. Thanks for joining us, man. Listen, you couldn't have come at a better time. we did the show yesterday of course you were upstairs

and buddy i was exhausted too many words we didn't realize how many sam just fills for us i never even realized like how much sammy talks i never really truly listen to what he says but just the mere break is is really refreshing when sammy speaks on our show yeah that's the nice part is that he fills the air but you also don't have to listen so anyway welcome cheers man yeah i i i'll be

like the Dennis Hilda B to Samie's. I don't know if most people stole ours, but... Are you third string? Hildaby's good. Are you third string? Listen, I'll take third string. Or like Jacob Quillan tonight. Like, I can take them. Give us some good minutes.

Have we pushed disco Dan to fourth? Well, listen, he's not here. You know, he got availability is the most important ability. So listen, I mean, pretty much the way I started this show like almost five years ago, really knew not a lot about Justin or or Sammy. I think I met Sammy two days before we went on air. Two days before. Yeah.

So, like, just tell us a little bit about you, Christian, and where the heck did you come from? I mean, listen, if there's one thing that I have in common with Sammy, I definitely have the passion. First and foremost is definitely where I'm at as far as hockey's concerned. Where it came from, I mean, you guys mentioned disco Dan, Daniela Franceschi, the awesome guy he is. I'm also from Woodbridge. I'm also Italian, like, or interchangeable, to be honest. So, I mean, as far as first... And both your lineups are flawless.

I'll take that, man. And I know you guys are complimenting me on the lineups yesterday. Don't compliment me too much. Like, I got to stay in Sammy's good books. Like, he's on vacation from this show. But he's back on Leifstock this Saturday. I got to stay on that crew as well. So thanks, but not too much, thanks.

We are looking forward to your passion. I'm not sure if it needs to come with a box of Kleenex, like it often does for Sammy, especially when we're considering what's going on with the Toronto Maple Leafs as they face off tonight again. against New Jersey at Scotia Bank Arena. Sportsnet, Ontario will cover the game. Carolyn Cameron, Elliott Friedman, J.B.

And yours truly will do puck drop 7 o'clock, but our pregame is at 6.30. Yeah, just keep in mind, our show ends here at 6.30. We're live at 6.30 for the Leafs pregame. And we are currently not in suits. So you can imagine what that half hour looks like. It's like a gumball rally to get there. I'm like running him over.

Yeah, it'll be fun. Try to get to make up first. But in the meantime, the story of the Toronto Maple Leafs is the injury front. Oh, boy. It's a mash unit. Yeah. Right now we have Austin Matthews as a game time decision, and it's sounding like Chris Tann of sustained a significant injury against Detroit.

We've got updates on that. But overall, just the feeling, J.B., of going in tonight with more so of a Marley, feel than at any point during this season. Yeah, the joke I made in our group chat is all four lines have a player on it who is scratched, healthy scratched in the last two weeks by the Leafs. So there's your

context for the lines. Two of the three D pairs have had a healthy scratch in the last couple weeks. So things are not ideal going into it. I also you know, looking where the Leafs are at right now and this is something that we'll talk about more on the broadcast tonight. But between now and the

end of January, the Leafs play 17 hockey games. It's December 30th. So in one month, they play 17 hockey games. At that point, you're going to be at, what's the exact number, 55 games, and then it's the Olympic break, the trade deadline. You basically have a month to figure out the season.

So the problem with the slow start is, yes, I believe this team is better than the record has been, but if you get hurt now, you're in real, real trouble. So Kip, tonight is as important as any game, just because you don't have these guys, you can't go, well, well, not going to get it tonight. You need it.

All right, not much going on at morning skate as far as the Toronto Maple Leafs were concerned, which meant the focus were solely on injury updates. So let's get the first one off of Willie Neelander, who was unavailable against Detroit. We'll go to Craig Bruby for clip one on Neelander. Kneelander's day-to-day still. So, you know, he's doing better,

but it's still day-to-day. Matthews would be a game time decision and TANAB is lower body not the same injury he's getting evaluated today so we'll have a better timeline tomorrow or later today on him

Joshua is still in Detroit he whether he took a hit or went into the board his kidney and it's got blood and everything so you know we've got to see where he's at too all right

I'm sorry who was that What was that last one from Berube? I didn't even recognize it. Was that still his voice? Does someone jump in? Is that an AI clip? The specificity that I used there is something we haven't seen. I don't even know just this season, last season.

And then we have other clips too. Like he goes right back to old Barubei. So just in this one moment with Dakota Joshua, I don't know why. I got very specific. That was a real injury update. That's like what you would get from an NFL team. He was like, look, it's a kidney possibly lacerated. We're looking into it.

There's some urine in the blood or blood and urine. We're concerned about it. So we're looking into the kidney. Okay, okay. Just, I want you to just take a deep breath and explain to me why they're so forthcoming on Joshua. And it's like, can we get anything on Stolars? Well, even TANF. TANF is a lower body, not the same as before, more evaluation.

Don't worry about it. The clip before that, he's like, it's somewhere in that half. If I'm in that media scrum, after I've picked up my tape recorder, microphone or Apple or whatever you want to call it these days, like, do you not go, okay, am I dreaming? Like, okay, why?

Why are you giving us all this information on him and where you've been all year? I would say that like the why for that part is easier understand than the rest of it. The why is that's the injury the guy has. They want him to be healthy to play. They're going to look into this thing that we now know he has and we understand that'll take some time to look into and evaluate

and all that. The rest of it I don't get. Basically the only thing I can think of is like kidney is like not even soft tissue. Like that's a specific organ. Whereas like Tanev, Matthews, Willie, we're talking like tendons, ligaments. Like I don't know if Baroubate for whatever reason is just not comfortable going He has an organ disclosure policy.

Only organs are you about. He's a kidney specialist, apparently. If you can't write it on your driver's license, you know, we don't talk about it. It's as targetable as anything, isn't it? But anyway, so that's what's up with Joshua. I don't know. Did you watch the clip that Joshua got hurt? Well, we believe that it was off of a hit he took by the boards.

Obviously, there's no glass to absorb. He misses a hit. He's trying to throw one. But he lands into the boards with no glass. Yeah. It's the dasher and the regular. Top part of the bench that we see. see the players jump over in the northwestern quadrant of his kidney caught him yeah so okay well

that's what's up with joshua terrible by the way because he had been playing well i don't know if you agree with me but i've liked his game more lately no no uh everything you kind of expected out of him right from day one it just never materialized we talked about needing some time for the chemistry to kick in for whatever reason it took him 23 games 25 games to start seeing what we've been watching the last couple of weeks. Yeah. So it's a shame because it looked like at this point, the lines were starting to settle in.

Yeah. And his role was starting to settle in. Now you got, you know, Domi, who's a, you know, smaller skill guy on one line, Machelli on another, Cowan and Robertson on the same line. Like, it's a lot of, you know, it's not the look they want. I will say one thing I'm glad to see is Jacob Quillenback. I think we all really liked what he brought in his brief call-up,

fourth-line guy, not asking too much of them. But, you know, Barubia had some comments on him, too. Do we have a Quillan clip, right? Yeah, clip four. Let's listen to Peruby, talk up Quillan. Oh, for sure. I love Quillan's energy and his speed. He's a young kid, but, you know,

he could come in and provide what we need, I think, tonight. And going forward, you know, I think he's getting close to being, and an NHL player and a full-time one with, you know, his ability he has. So, yeah, for sure. I mean, it's a good opportunity for him tonight. Yeah, I agree. It's a great opportunity. He got a little bit of a taste earlier this year, right?

Yep. Yeah, he... I really hope he can come in and relax a little bit here, feel much better on a second go-around. Yeah, I mean, the guy had a great college career, National Championship winning goal just a couple years ago 40 points, 20 goals last year

at the Marley's like he's having a good year this year too. It's Tavares, Lotton, wah, and Quillen. There's going to be opportunities for him in this hockey game. Like it's certainly not a it's not a playoff lineup right now without Austin Matthews there

and no wheelie. It's not a playoff roster. So these are the opportunities where it's up grabs boys and if they can if they can just come in grind work hard keep the checking tight wait for some opportunities maybe they can keep it close tonight against new jersey but new jersey just hasn't been great either so i do believe it or not i do tonight expect toronto to to work hard and hang in there the one concern i have is that jersey has been really hurt all year and they're not hurt anymore. Peshi's back, Hughes is back. That gritsick had been out for a bit.

Like these guys are all going. So you're getting a healthy devil's. Well, you're not overly healthy. But yeah, Barubi has a clip here on pushing forward despite the injury's clip three, please. Clip three, sorry. Ruby Clip three. We talked this morning. You know, everybody needs to step up for sure. And, you know, might have a couple different younger guys in there tonight. but the team game is what it's all about for us. And, you know, when you have injuries like this, and you don't know, we don't know if Matthews will play tonight.

I mean, we need a real strong team game. That's the bottom line. Like, the team game can take care of these injuries and get you through. I think Matthews plays tonight? I think he does. You know, I'm really losing faith in that game time decision term. What do you think it means? it means you know if he can play or not

and I mean it's it's kind of weird but it's for me it's just so outdated like I'm listening also to you've never had that happen though on like a day of a game where you're like I'm not sure very very rarely yeah I've had stuff where I've been like my ankle I don't know

I'm going to test it tonight we'll see if little adrenaline some medicine some warm up so 10 a.m. 12 p.m. lunch you're going to go out there and do two hard laps and then no for sure i think it's all the stuff you do for prep like okay like let's say we put this thing in you know hot water for you know whatever we soak it and then the rehab or the physio does a big stretch routine and then we do adville and then we tape it and let's see how it feels that's fine yeah for a slug like me i'll throw you in that category oh yeah i deserve worse than that's fine

for us, your star number one centerman, right? If you're at that point where you're at that line, that hard line where he's either going or not going, and you're at that point where it's like, I get it if it's playoffs. Yeah. But this is your number one centerman. Yeah. To me, you know, he knows. Yeah. Do you want to take a chance? You want to be at that point

where you think you could tape it up and glue it together, not for Austin Matthews. Here's the thing, though, are they at that point of the season where it's like, is it playoffs? No. It kind of is playoffs. You know what I mean? Like, it's like, gosh, it's like this guy, they need points.

They got no one going tonight. He's the captain. Edvinson got a hit last game and he went out and scored the OTI winner. The next day, can we get this guy going again? I get what you're saying. I just don't get it now with Austin. I'd rather just give him a day, see you a Thursday. At this point.

If you're close today, you're definitely good Thursday. I just think, like, we've been through this before with him. He's not that guy. So if he's... What's that? What do you mean? Not that guy? He doesn't appear to be that guy that can limp in and find a way to battle through things, right?

He's got to feel right. He's got to go to Germany. He's got to come back. He's got to... I mean, he limped around the whole year. I could argue last year, but I get your point. I just, I just, I would not, if, if, if, if it's to the point where it's 50, 50, you're don't, don't, don't anymore.

You're right. Don't, don't. You're right. It's, you're not at the halfway point yet. Yeah. To me, you already got Willie out. You're going to take a chance now on losing your captain longer if he, if he plays at 60% or 70%. Anyways, you know, I look at the New York Rangers, so Adam Fox has been out for five weeks.

started practicing he's practicing regularly yeah uh the rangers next game he's a game time decision like five weeks five weeks five weeks in a couple days will be just fine game time decision like okay all right anyways yeah yeah i guess anyways beyond that it's it's a huge challenge here even with austin out and you know particularly a block shot forever we've been talking about Austin and blocked shots and being one of the league leaders I get was this inevitable I mean you know we have that

group chat going and I shared the stat I think Jonas Stiegel had it since he came in the league in 2016 the most shot blocks of any forward by pretty good distance almost 700 blocked shots and it hurts and it leads to injuries and I think the case is like do you

want your number one center eating hundreds of pucks per year. It's tough to change your ways, right? Like, he's not going to start letting those pucks through, I don't think. So you can call it inevitable, but I mean, it's a product of doing something that helps the team a lot. I don't know. Personally, I'd say, like, I don't want Austin to get away from that part of his game.

Like, I don't feel like some of the chronic injuries that we're talking about in his history. Like, are they from the blocking shots? We don't really know one way or another, but I feel like that is something. that we should hold like if you're looking at Austin Matthews and you're saying how can he reinvent his game that's one part that I think can be consistent the offense is what we're concerned with right I think defensively the block

shots like Elias Pedersen is another guy who's like one of those leaders there and I think if that goes away I'd have even more concern with Austin Matthews's game so personally I'd want him to keep blocking them you know I know a lot of times they debate putting guys like that on the penalty killer or not do you want to put them in front of more pucks maybe you take him off there

the one thing that leans me more to use the term inevitable is that this team has spent so much time in their own zone so much well absolutely like that itself is an issue and they got to stop doing that yeah they're you know what helps not getting hurt blocking shots is not being on offense in your own zone so much and there's so many times that i've sat here in this chair over the over the last little while and said no, it's not on Barubi, it's on the players. This is on the players. But this is on Barubi to find a way to get this team to stop playing so much in their own zone. Yeah. And that is either find a way to get the puck out cleaner, find a way to support, find a way less stretch passes. But Barubi's got to coach these guys to spend less time in their own zone. So league average for ozone possession time against.

So the amount of time you're in your own end is somewhere in the five-minute range. The Leafs are 27th in the NHL. Of course he's going to, somebody's going to get hurt blocking. Yeah, you're in there way too much. And your goal is you're seeing too much action. They're on their toes. They're getting tired out. It's just, it's a lot.

The Leafs are around 620 per game in their own zone with the other team having the puck. That's a lot of chasing and, yeah, not ideal. So with Austin, potentially out on this game time decision, Scotty Lotton, we've talked about him needing ways to get more involved, more ice time, another great opportunity to step up and play on a top six now. Yeah. Do you want to listen to Burubi, and then I have some thoughts on old Scotty Lott's? Love that. Clip five. He's played up and lineups over the years in different roles and things like that. I don't think his game needs to change, though. But we can, he can be used more and be used in different situations.

He can be used more and he can be used in different situations is wonderful to hear, right? I think that most people would agree with that. That Lawton's been very good and just hasn't got the opportunity here. It remains one of the baffling things that they traded a first for him and a prospect. And then he's playing 10 minutes a night. Is a guy who's 31, skates well, plays physical, competitive, has the passion. I would say, you know, he's, I can't make sense of it. So I'm watching Lawton right now and I'm thinking, if I'm him,

is he kind of playing for his next job? Like, I'm not, if I'm him, I'm not signing with the leaves. No, no, no, he's, he's a pending unrestricted free agent coming up. Make him just 1.5 right now. Is that it? Oh, yeah, with retention, dirt cheap. Okay, but three million contract. Okay, three million.

Yeah. So at the end of the day, I don't care where the money's coming from. Yeah. But he's a guy that wants a raise. Yeah. And you ain't getting a raise. Playing 10 a night. No, no chance.

And so he needs to play well to get more. I'll just say, you know, I tweeted today about what the Leafs need to do to not be sellers. They need to be really good. About 25, 14, and 5 would get them into playoffs. I don't think they're going to be that good, but we'll see. So if they sell Scott Lawton's like your number one guy who teams would want. Yeah, there's. I mean, we're steps ahead of ourselves here.

We are steps ahead of ourselves. But yeah, to your point, for sure, Scott would be an attractive piece. They'll never recoup what they paid Philadelphia for. I wonder at 1.5 if they retained again, if he could get another first. That's what I was thinking is. Well, 750K, right? Yeah. No one's given up a first rounder for Scott Lawton.

I'm sorry. but I don't see it now if if you think that you're going to trade for him a first rounder and resign them I can have a conversation on B prospect B plus prospect but I just I don't see it I don't see it the offense has not been there you're not trading for a 25 30 goal score you're a guy's average 15 goals the last four seasons. Yeah. So I like it in terms of a depth guy for another club trying to win a Stanley Cup, but it's going to be hard.

It's going to be really hard to get any type of value that you unfortunately gave up for him. This is a failing of the Leafs. This is a wasted asset. This is a good hockey player who is not being used in any capacity. This is the first time I remember him getting any sort of opportunity. up the lineup and you're playing with Machelli and McMahon. I think it's fair to say that there's

there's not a real love affair between Barubi and Scott Lotton. Is that not the strangest thing? He's not thirsting for more out of Scott Lotton. It's almost as if he's got him boxed into a certain type of player that he is or I want out of him and that's enough. Is it not, does that not make no sense?

Like Barubi's like, I want guys who play hard and go through the body and go to the net and good team guys. Check, check, check, check. The way he talked about Braden Shen. Remember we had a clip of him talking about Braden Chen? That to me is how we should talk about Scott Lawton. I don't get it.

Anyway. Yeah. All right. We have not really yet talked in depth on TANF and his situation. Do we still have a clip on an update on him or did we get everything? No, we haven't listened to that yet. All right. There's Craig Brube, head coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs,

on how concerned he is about Chris TAN. of latest injury? Yeah, for sure. You know, there is, but I want to wait in here first. You know, I don't want to jump to conclusions and speculate on what it's going to be in how long. Our Elliot Friedman, I think, tweeted there is concern for a longer-term situation here.

I think he also tweeted that it does not have anything to do with his last injury. that kept him out seven weeks, almost eight weeks. So that in itself is good news. But depending on how long he's out, could be horrific news for the Toronto Maple Leafs, who even as I watched them this weekend, a little tentative for me,

which is understandably so. But even 10 at 75%, is making smarter and better decisions than almost anybody that they have. You know, I've been waiting for this decor because when healthy I like their decor a lot more, I know early in the year, it didn't look great,

and some guys weren't playing very well, but Carlo back skating, and now you're going to be with Otana again, this is what I mean with like when you mess around in the early season go, ah, we're better than this, we'll make it up. It's like, you don't know what's going to come down the pike. And if they never get healthy on the back,

And you got, you know, Riley's playing with Philippe Myers. Yeah. And then you got a Benoit Stetcher pair. I don't know, man. It's not great. No, it's not. Last year, I really believe he is their most valuable player. Tanev was.

Yes. Yeah. I mean, he can be a absolute game influencer. Yeah. Got them out of their end. One of the things that they did well last year, no second chance opportunities. Tanev clears the net so well, like just body position. position, gets puck's out of their zone.

This year it's been okay, but it's not the same strength it was last year. Yeah. I think we did show him reaching for a puck just up at the top of the blue line. Do you remember seeing that against Detroit where we think he might have gotten hurt? Oh, yeah. It was defending a pass. Yes. Yeah.

Something. Yep. Which, again, doesn't lead to anything that looked like groinish. Like whiplash at all. Which, yeah, to me, suggests hip flexer or groin. Think about how long he's been off, right? And you can only probably do so much on a bike or it does lend towards a pulled groin, a torn groin. Jeez, God.

That's a yikes. But to your point, in the small time he's been back from injury, He hasn't looked like Chris Tanna of MVP of last year, right? So it definitely looks like he's not at 100%. No, and a lot of them same way, right? Like Matthews hasn't been 100%. Some of these guys, not quite where you need it to be. So got to get hot.

By the way, the team is won, what, or they've got five of their last six points. Yeah. They, you know, they're trying to fight their way back into this thing. But it's funny, you look at the Sabres who've won nine in a row now, still can't get in the playoffs because everyone else gets points too. So it's not about the points necessarily as the teams are plan and tough road ahead big month the Toronto Maple Leaf said and any number of these teams

including Buffalo after their nine game winning streak like you cannot afford to lose three in a row no like someone is going to be winning you know the the pack is too tight so it is it is wild right now watching some of these teams um the three I don't know what the stats are on three point games but every time i looked up i checked it was the highest ever ever yeah it's like 23 percent of games or something it's almost as if teams are like okay you're good with your point we're good for our point we'll just leave out of conference fine kinnucks have your point we'll play after whoever whatever western conference team you want to play so but it's Tampa Montreal yeah Boston still loses the other day against calgary but

ends up with a point. Yeah. It's actually wild, like seeing some of the numbers in like shootouts and OT losses. Montreal and Detroit are in second and third in the Atlantic, both of them with negative goal differentials. That's how close the games are that they're playing. We talked a little bit about Scott Lawton

at the center ice position between Machelli and McMahon, John Tavares, who got off to a terrific start and hit a little cold, spell for a while came back against Detroit with two nice points especially on the Robertson play but man

it's a big ask right now to carry the mail without Austin Matthews well this is what happened earlier in the year Hughes and now his sure like that that would be a big concern for me Tavares T.O.I was you know he barely played more than

17, 18 minutes than Matthews went out and he played 21 and he was very good but then after that when matthews came back he just didn't have the whole you know the jam to keep going uh fun fact that uh christian has in here john tovar's fourth in the n hl and puck battles one this season he cohesion here is not a second but 127 puck battle no he's he gets in there and he's heavy on his stick he's elite six feet around the net yeah along the walls he he's he can leverage himself he can do a lot of great things where he gets burned is in foot races in the neutral zone, which especially was abundantly clear

when cousins, you know, flipped them a bus token at the center ice Saturday night. We should go to get to your pal. Should we have... Brad May. Do you want to do the Popeyes as a Popeye's time? Let's do some Popeyes. All right. We've been talking about Leafs this whole time

because it's a Leafs game day. Score a Popeye's chicken sandwich for only $6 in classic or spicy. Make it your new game day tradition. Get your $6 chicken sandwich at a pop. buys near you. All right, thank you. Better than Sammy, I can tell you that. Oh, my God.

Clean, right? Clean. You want to just come in and do those and leave? Sammy's good works, guys. All right, right. All right. Brad May, we haven't had May Day on for a little while. We'll get his thoughts on the Maple Leafs.

He's doing a lot of work down at Scotia Bank Arena with Ryan Leslie. So we'll get into that a little bit. Plus, we'll ask him about Buffalo in their recent run because he's been very, as an alumnus, you can feel the emotion that he has of watching the Buffalo Sabres in their struggles over the last

decade. So we'll get Brad May's thoughts on the Sabres as well. That and more when we return to Real Kipper and Bourne. Big opinions and in-depth conversations covering the Leafs, J's, Raptors, and the NFL. The Jady Bunkin's podcast.

Subscribe and download the show on Apple. Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Graham, it's the Leaf Hour edition of the Real Kipper and Boren Show. Nick Kippreos, Justin Bourne, Christian Cheneity from Woodbridge. Doesn't get more stereotypical, guys. It really doesn't. That's awesome. Woodbridge should have their own NHL franchise.

Is that a serious take? A bidden? I'd love to see it. I think they'd have a lot of support. Tons of fans up there. Location, I have no idea. It's maybe not optimal. No, yeah.

I think you put another one anywhere in the GTA, you'd be okay. In a few minutes, we'll welcome in former national hockey leaguer to 2007 Stanley Cup champion, Brad May. We haven't had May Day on for the last little while. He's been doing Leaf stuff. He has. Doing stuff with Ryan Leslie pregame. Yeah. Fun to watch that.

So you guys, yeah. Your career's ever crossed path? Were you teammates? Oh, my God. He gave it to me one night in Hartford. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Punched your base dealer region.

You never realize how big a guy's hands are. Yeah. Until, like, it's across your face. Like, he's got feet like my, he's got hands like my feet, is what I'm trying to say. Yeah. But he punched hard. Yeah. Yeah.

You know, I just don't envy that you ever had to be in those situations. it's a different, different universe. You see the jack-eye Sabrin won the other night? I did, yeah. Like that jack-I did. Large animal. The other one that was interesting was the featherweight fight with... Yes, Garland.

The Nuge and Connor Garland. No, no, it was Garland. Garland and... Newge. No, Jared McCann. Oh, that's right, that's right. Enuge had won last night, didn't he? I want to say Nuge just fought a few times.

Yeah. Which is, to me, if you play in the NHL long enough, there's some days where you get mad, you should have a couple of fights. I'm so with you. Like, just a night or two where it's like, oh my God, stop spearing me. I'm having a bad day.

But I am screaming for Bobby McMahon to be that guy for the Leafs. You know. And we saw a taste of it against Detroit. You're not that guy, pal. Listen, it would serve him. This is your guy, because he did it to White Cloud. It would serve him so well. True, it would.

Right? And it's like, and it's 20205. It's not my era where you're like, buddy, you're on your own and you better learn or you're going to get hurt. If he was in 75, he would be forced to do it. You could fake it pretty good now. In tight. Hold on. Like make faces.

There's 10,000 cameras. Look mean. Look tough. Look like if this referee wasn't. standing in front of me you'd be dead meat right now buddy yeah like like a little of that yeah guys know but you don't think like McMahon went out of his way to go give talbot a shot yeah it's great and it was a great reactionary um domino effect which gets everyone's attention everyone's including your own bench it puts everybody on high alert

it's a good thing you know you don't want to go out there and take stupid penalties and cause your team a power play goal but sometimes you got to take a chance that your team will kill it for you if you do you know i think the more you do it the more you realize it's hard to get back at a guy you know like you it's you don't have to fight thisly marchand has you know yes he's fought a few times but he made a pretty good living tripping hooking spearing undercutting guys and not you know you just kind of runs his mouth of him. You know who's impressed me? Adam Fantilly. Fantilly is built like I was, which is, you know, you think a stiff breeze would blow him away. And after whistles, he's in there with guys, he just shove them, stick them. I thought Barzell got even with

marchment with a chop that cost him $5,000 in a fine. Big deal. The guy's a new hero, though. Oh, God, that's the best money he ever spent, and I'm not joking. On Long Island, you go to a Delhi, they're talking about him now, like he is a hero. And the cost. And the Coach loves you for it. Your teammates love it for you. Yeah. That's where I think the Leafs have kind of been missing a little bit of that. But every time they get a guy who's supposed to be that guy,

it's like they don't want to do it in Toronto. Ryan Reeves doesn't want to do it in Toronto as much. Or Simmons doesn't or whoever, whatever pest they get doesn't. Bunting did it. Bunting did it. They get a green light for being reactionary. And that's where Ryan Reeves came in. And he thought, I'm doing my job.

job. If nobody is given my players a hairy eyeball or running them or talking to them, then I've done my job. And it's like, no, it's not enough. You actually got to go and get under the other team's skin or make them nervous or make them aware. You just can't be reactionary. You got to be, you got to initiate.

You know, not just not worry about retaliating, but initiate that. Be the forceful. We have games and games and games where you highlight Austin Matthews not being that guy. And here you got Steve Lorenz who's 6'4 foot four and making a million bucks on the fourth line. And it hasn't happened once. There's no Stephen Lawrence moment that I can recall where it's like, God, he just gave it to you. We just showed him. You know, that's how you're in your spot.

It hasn't happened. I know. I don't understand why it can't happen. I don't know. And I just wish Either leaf management or the coaches And I don't know Burubi

It's not like Doesn't look like he's coaching them Into trying to be more aware of scenarios And Barzell to me Was the type of guy that like Matthews It's like I'm not That's not my role

That's not my type But one incident And we go back to that outdoor game when he cross-checked Dahlene, Matthews, we still talk about it as one of the most emotional. Physical highlights of his career. Physical highlights, emotional. Wow, good for you, Austin.

Good for you. And it's like, has anything happened between then and now that stands out in any type of situation? No. And the biggest problem I've had with Marner, Matthews, DeVaris, and Nylander leading the charge this whole time, It's like not one of the guys is that type of guy to say, you know, I don't care.

I don't fight. I'm not an aggressive guy, but. But F you. But screw you. Here's a glove in my face. Here's the, slash a guy. Please. Just show some emotion.

You know, and the best part, if you do that, everyone knew those guys were so valuable that had they taken some liberties on the opposition, I think you'd have engaged the lower half of the team to stick up. for you to be involved to kind of get the intensity of the game up oh you can you can guilt guys very easily it's like schaefer right now shaffer's he's got a he's having a great time out there does whatever he wants on long island because he knows if anyone touches them everyone's like mits off yeah stick stick sweet there's uh somebody sent me an amazing clip of pat la fontaine who just got into the islander hall of fame yeah my mom went to his thing it was awesome and he was speaking of I'm going to find the clip on another day.

And he was speaking of Bobby Nystrom. Bobby Nystrom in the penalty box. It was in Toronto. It may have been one of his first games in Toronto. And he's in the penalty box. And Bobby Nystrom tells him just when you get out of the box, he says, first of all, don't talk to me. Don't talk to me.

Don't say a word. When you're leaving the box, go straight. to the bench and what did he do he went and answered straight to the guy who hit lafonte exactly yeah and beat the crap out of yeah and palafontein was barzell he was matthews highly highly skilled guy not physical not a fighter never has been never is going to be but he speaks of that like it was like as important to him as anything he did anything in his career that that that's stood out to him of what a team should be and how close they should be and why the islanders had won.

Don't you think that's Florida now? Like every team feels like they've got mercenaries and they're built just to, you know, guys are trying to get as much money as they can. They want to live so more warm. They want to do whatever. But like teams don't stay together like they used to, but this Panthers team all made that choice to go back and resign this year. And they're hurt right now.

but you text last night and said Florida kind of looks like Florida again. I watched a good Washington Capitol's hockey club last night in Florida and they're down a goal who else? Brad Marchand scores a power play goal

ties the game up and they looked like they were in playoff mode. Hungry hitting, forceful Sam Bennett was really good and we know that he hasn't had

a great start but they're smart enough to know when to play hard but like they they looked like a team like wanted a third Stanley Cup last night in the third period. Let me ask you this why does it seem like you can't trade for the quality

you're talking about? Yeah, you can you can. Yeah absolutely. You can't. Yeah absolutely. You can import someone who'd be willing to but just make sure you got the right guys picking. Yeah. Okay, we're talking about... Like Lawton was maybe supposed to be some of that. We're talking about scouting.

And general managers, you know, whether we're talking about Stan Bowman or Bradtree Living, like, they're at the mercy sometimes of guys that are telling them. They're scouts. This is what we need. This is what this guy can do. This is... And you're like, okay.

Yeah. All right. And they're wrong. Right. just wrong and that's a big issue yeah it's a big issue like look at Tampa Bay Tampa Bay one they won two Stanley Cops right and they're supposed to be in a transition where no good there's no good out of assets now we got a recoup and we got rebuild again and what do they do they they trade uh they did the Utah trade and

JJ Moser comes in for Sergutchev. Sergit Chav, thank you, Christian. And like, the trade right now looks like almost a one for one, but it was plus draft picks. Moser plus, yeah. Plus, yeah. Because Moser was really this, I don't know, second rounder who had some upside,

but really weren't sure how good he was going to be. What did they just give him for money? 45 million? 54, maybe. 54 million. It's like, hey, that's, an organization that's scouting that's analytics that's a real department that can turn something into much more that's how you stay in the game you know if you sort the eastern

conference by goal differential right now Tampa Bay's first plus 25 you know just ahead of Carolina he made a ugly ugly decision for the organization to have your leader and your captain move on, right? And then you turned them into... Was that McDonough? Stamcoast. Stamcoast. Yeah, stamp coast.

Like, it's a tough decision and not a popular one. But they did it. And then they found a way to get Gensel and they're right back in the game. And, you know, just... I'll turn this. Totally.

I'll turn this back on the Leafs. Like, that's... They start making some tough decisions. Yeah. You know what's funny is like if you're a kid coming up trying to make the NHL today, everyone is skilled. And it's almost come full circle where if you have a bit of dog, if you have a high dog per 60 in your chest,

you know, these guys, look at Tampa Bay. Kutrov is this slick, bad body language, but he's nasty. He's, he's greasy as hell. Braden Point competitive, Gensel's mean, haggles mean, Sorelli's competitive, you know, Nick Paul, Yanny Gord. they have a team of dogs. They were the Florida Panthers before the Florida Panthers were.

And so I'm just saying this is like the new attribute where it's like everyone has skill now. For a while if you had skill, you separate it. It's like analytics. If you were first to analytics, you separated yourself. Now everyone has it. Skill, everyone has it now. Now it's this competitive edge.

Who's got it? And I know that you look at the Toronto Maple Leafs and you go, you know, it's not always there. Domey's a guy you can say has it. Nyes can have it, but it's not consistent enough for you. I mean, Lotton, McMahon's trying. You think Nyes can turn himself into this? Like, how many guys in the league put fear in other guys? I think he could, don't touch me.

Like, he could have real don't touch me vibes because he's a refrigerator, but he doesn't have it yet. He wants to be a skill guy, first and foremost. Does he not? Which he does have. skill oh he's skilled enough to be one unfortunately he's well fortunately he's also built like a mattock truck yeah so he nature versus nurture right like that's kind of what it feels like i feel like if

you took matthew nyes put him on those teams that you guys are saying florida and tampa in that culture in that guy we're talking they pull him into the fight so is it a matthew nyes problem or is it a simultaneously a leaf's problem it's almost like okay but it has to start from some guys on the leaves to create that culture he could be one of them that creates it and pulls guys in i agree But that's not the way it should work. The way it should work is that you come out of college and you've got three or four that are passing the knowledge and the torch on. That's the way it's supposed to work.

The knowledge of the torch is go to Sugo. The meatballs are delicious. You know, it's all the high-end attributes. That's the way it really should work is that you got a group of your nucleus that take a guy under his wing and say, okay, this is the way it's going to be. Yeah. You know, kind of like Nystrom and Lafontein in a penalty box.

This is the way it is. I'm going to show you how it works here. Yeah. This started with the McMahon conversation, right? The Talbot incident. And I think you guys have talked about this. Maybe Justin, maybe you talked about it on Leafstock where it's like Neelander. He has like this transactional relationship with Barube.

Like Baroube kicks him on the butt. And then he all of a sudden performs well to get out of his bad, like the dog house, right? And with Mac McMahon, I feel like we've had that conversation with Keith and Baroube where he asked for a little bit more. you see it and then it disappears right or it's like florida and tampa it's not transactional like it has become who they are right maris and cooper doesn't have to give them the reminder right yeah no and that it all feeds itself because eventually you build a trust with your coach you trust what he's saying the coach trust that you're going to figure it out on your own and um yeah that we'll see ben we'll see benoit in tonight another guy who i think has the capabilities of

of being a hard-ass to play games. And is, is that it? I think he was a everyday guy in the lineup. These last two scratches, I don't remember him being scratched. No, I agree. For a long time before that. Maybe there's one of them.

And he has, he's a big strong guy. He has dropped the mitts on occasion. And on a team that needs that, he needs to be that. Right? That's an element to his game that they've, they've missed this year. Another guy, new father. It's challenging.

It'll be with Stetcher tonight. You okay with that? Does I make you nervous? It's not a Stetcher rebuke here. It's just, are you thrilled about Benoit Stetcher? It's fine. As a 5'6, I hope they can just stay even tonight. Just stay even.

I don't know what that means for 12 minutes. I tell you, 14 minutes. I'm worried for the Leafs tonight. I am. All these injuries, the devils are. Getting healthy? Finally back healthy. I watched them play.

the Islanders on the 23rd, Hughes, Gritzik, Brat, they can skate. Like, it's just starting to come for them. They're a team that last year was top 10 in Odd Man Rushes. This year, they're like 27th. They're not that bad. They're going to find it. I know Sheldon cares a lot about beating the Toronto Maple Leafs. I got to believe they've put some real effort tonight.

And some real cash on the board? I'm imagining, yes. So, yeah, I think the least are on the outside looking in, man. That's not going to, it's, they should be so much. further in their program than chasing a playoff spot right now. When we do game time in the next block, there's got to be a devil shots prop.

I think you'll see if you can find that for us. I think the devils are good for, I don't know, 37 shots or so tonight. Anyway, we didn't get Brad May, but we did get to talk about Brad May things. Is he on assignment with Ryan Leslie? Maybe. We'll find out.

Are they doing like street chats and stuff like that? I don't know, man. You really feel a certain way about those street chats. No, no, they're all good. They're all good. Now, did you see Brad Marchand's a little... Thousand point video?

Yeah, you like that? You know what? I came away from... If you haven't seen it, there's a video of Brad Marchand, all the people he got into spats with over his career, wishing him. Licked faces.

Congrats on a thousand points. And I came away from the video thinking, wait, has Marchand been the good guy the whole time? You know, it's Subin and it's Avery and it's all these guys. that he's got into it with and was like that Marchand might have been in the right in some of those cases. I'd like to hear the guys that were

asked to do it and said, not a chance. I hate that guy. That's... That definitely happened. That definitely happened. All right, great job so far you guys. Christian. Wow. Sammy, who? What do you think? You got another hour in you? Let's keep it rolling. All right, let's keep

it rolling. We go national next on the Real Kipper and Born Show.