Spittin Chiclets - Spittin' Chiclets Episode 338: Bonus Episode Featuring Colin Blackwell

Episode Date: June 10, 2021

On Episode 338 of Spittin’ Chiclets, the guys are joined by Colin Blackwell. Blacky joined (1:18:46) to discuss his crazy road to the NHL, his time at Harvard, the Tom Wilson situation and tons more. The guys open up the episode wrapping up the Bruins-Islanders series. Biz has also found himself a new team to root for, which brings up a debate about the CN tower in Toronto. The guys then give a full playoff update and and even some predictions for the next round. The boys wrap up talking a little golf, league awards and some flicks.You can find every episode of this show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or YouTube. Prime Members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. For more, visit barstool.link/schiclets

Hey, Spittin' Chicklets listeners, you can find every episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube. Prime members can listen ad-free on Amazon Music. Hello everybody, welcome to episode 338 of Spittin' Chicklets, presented by Pink Whitney, from our friends at New Amsterdam Vodka, here in the Barstool Sports Podcast family. Howdy gang, we're coming to you from the Marriott at North Station in Boston for the last time. We're going to be closing the season on Boston. It's not the last time we're going to be together, but it's the last time we'll be together in this city. Bruins are all done, but let's say hi to the boys. How are we feeling, Biz, after a week in Beantown?

I feel great. What a great time. It's unfortunate it's going to come to an end here with the Bees getting beat out. Smell you later, Boston. I was hoping one more live stream. I actually didn't get a chance to get over to Borelli's. I was going to go for Game 7, but wow, what a closeout and what a job by that fan base serenading us for that whole third period.

Congratulations to the Islanders. Yeah, we'll get to that in a second. The Whit Dog, how you been enjoying? I know you haven't stayed here all week, but having the boys in. Oh, I love having you guys here. It's very nice. We get to do the live streams we talked about. I didn't get to Long Island either. Oh, I love having you guys here. It's very nice. We got to do the live streams we talked about. I didn't get to Long Island either.

Oh, shucks. More than anything, I'm very happy for Islanders fans. I'll go into that in a little bit, but Bruins, see you later. Winnipeg, see you later. Carolina, see you later. We got three of the four finals set, and tonight,

tonight's game could mean the final four is ready to roll yeah absolutely semifinals are going to be starting this weekend at some point so be sure to hit up your local package store to load up on the old pink whitney mick mickies the 375 milliliter bottle whether you're celebrating your team moving on or you got to drown your sorrows after another tough year grab some pink whitney mickies all right and of course g't with us right now. He's here in spirit and on camera. What's up, buddy? How you feeling?

You were at the game six last night. Yeah, what's going on, guys? Tough, tough loss last night. The second you heard the Coliseum singing the national anthem as loud as they were, it was like, oh, we're fucked. Game over. So tough loss. Islanders fans, super respectable.

Shout out to everyone at Borelli's. Shout out to everyone at Hurricanes. The past two weeks have been amazing. Dream come true for me to stream these games, but I'll kick it over to you guys. It was like lacrosse practice. He refused to clap. He thought that would be the move. They sang the anthem, so he walked out and gave up, just in straight G fashion.

Basically, yeah. Oh, actually, before we move on, you just did the Pink Whitney ad. I saw a video, and I know, listen, you've been on an insane tear. You've been getting minimal sleep, and then I think an Islanders fan handed you a bottle of Pink Whitney, and you took the shot, and a little bit came out at the end. So that was another tough look before the puck dropped. I don't think it was too tough of a look.

I mean, he's fountaining the Pink Whitney in my mouth. He poured so much in there. And then when I closed my mouth, some fell out. I hadn't drank yet. I was dead sober. I was trying to stay sober for yesterday's game. All right, blame the poor. Yeah, there's quite a few Pink Whitney's going down, especially last night.

The Isles won 6-2, Game 6. They take the series. They're going to play Tampa in the semis. I was down. I know, Biz, you want to go back to Game 6. They take the series. They're going to play Tampa in the semis. I was down. I know, Biz, you want to go back to Game 5. We want to get to the Barry Trotz comments. Mental warfare. Mental warfare.

But, yeah, I was down there with Borelli's as well with G. I want to thank Mr. Borelli and the Borelli's. Dude, that place is huge. Like, I walked in. You know, you think it's a little family restaurant. Place is giant. I had to run in the kitchen to use the bathroom there. Fucking huge.

Absolutely giant restaurant. And there was a line four hours before the game there just to get in. And like G run in the kitchen to use the bathroom there. Fucking huge, absolutely giant restaurant. And there was a line four hours before the game there just to get in. And like G said, the fans were wicked nice. I mean, you know, every city has their reputation. You're getting a cat called a little, but they really were. They were really very nice to us. So we want to thank them as well. But going back to Barry Trotz, like you said, the mental warfare.

He called Bertrand a cheater. He said he's a veteran guy who knows how to cheat on the face-offs. I'm relying on a very capable officiating crew and linesman to make sure that the cheating doesn't go on Bergeron then called basically Trotz was a veteran play says a veteran play by Trotz as a coach to try and get the linesman in officiating to think about it and then in the game Bergeron gets checked out of the circle three times just a veteran off it was just a veteran off that's what it was it was a veteran center versus a veteran coach, and they just love telling each other. Sounds like a Russian prospect.

Veteran off. Veteran off. He's actually going behind Owen Powers. But he's got a big drinking problem. Fucking veteran off. So there was more mental warfare before that game, was there not? Then Cassidy chimed in about the whole or no that was after that was after the game okay that was post game all right well let's get to that game just a

little bit yeah and ironically Bergeron was only 45.7 in the series at the dot going into the game so he wasn't even winning a shitload of face-offs but either way the Isles won that one five to four to take the 3-2 lead uh let's see here well I mean there's there's a couple notes to that game that were very important and the fact that we've been hearing that tuka rask was nowhere near healthy before that game and maybe even leading into the series right yeah he was he had his back injury flared up back in march that's why swayman had to come in and basically keep the season afloat when he did then you get into the question like the, the guy wants to play, which you got to respect. It's the playoffs. You know the history of, like, the Bruins in terms of Bergeron

playing through the punctured lung and guys doing anything they can to stay in the lineup and play. And Tuca did it. But are you then risking, like, the team's success? Are you not healthy enough to do your job? And he didn't look like himself the last few games of that series. I mean, he wasn't moving well. He wasn't able to do what he'd done prior.

And I think that more than anything, once you heard after that it's possible he may need surgery, it's like, I thought Swayman would start game six. I really did. I thought he was going to start game five based on what I'd heard and what I'd seen. And they ended up throwing him in the third period, which I was talking to your old man last night by the way Dan oh great guy oh yeah we had an absolute character he said that what Swayman let in one goal on four shots what it was and that ended up sure enough being the game winner but you got to think if he starts that game uh we we gotta we gotta talk about the discipline too Boston not necessarily the most disciplined team in that game. We thought one of the penalties was a little bit cheesy on. Was it the Corrales

slash? Yeah, the Corrales slash. Yeah, they were already up 1-0 and then of course Richie elbowed Mayfield so we don't know if it was a make-up call. I know you mentioned it might have been a make-up call. Corrales would I mean, chintzy-ass call. Islanders end up scoring. It's 1-1 going into the second period. Also, too, you've got

to mention the Marchand layup. I mean, that's a tough play to make, but if he puts that home, it's's 1-1 going into the second period. Also, too, you've got to mention the Marchand layup. I mean, that's a tough play to make, but if he puts that home, it's up 2-0. And then the Basel, I mean, the Corelli call probably doesn't even happen. But they ended up scoring. Islanders ended up scoring three power play goals in that game. Like you said, Tuca didn't look like himself. He couldn't get that save when he needed to. They switched it up in the third period and go to Swayman,

and then they make that surge late and then end up coming pretty close making it an entertaining game but then then the real fun begins the post game with Cassidy I'll say this that you can talk about the refereeing and Bruins fans very whiny I don't think it was great and I think in the third period they missed a call on Gryzlik they missed another call and maybe maybe in the end as a Bruins fan or Cassidy, you look and say, I thought the refs really leaned towards the Islanders in Game 5. Fuck, guys. Your penalty kill is horrible. Yeah.

Maybe you didn't agree with some of the calls. You got to kill the penalties. They were brutal. And the Islanders' power play isn't like the best power play in the league, and they just warped them. And that's why we are talking about the rest with the Islanders. Dude, just alligator blood this team. R.A. said, when I always chirp down, I said, do you really think they can win the Stanley Cup?

It was like January or whatever. You're like, yeah, I do. And you're seeing now why this team, they don't go away. They got great goaltending, and their special teams are picking it up. But as a Bruins fan, whine about the officiating. I did agree with you in Game 5, but you've got to kill penalties at this time of year, and your power play's got to be good. And so when you want to whine and complain and talk, it's like, that's what happens.

There's going to be games when you get calls, and they ended up switching the officiating crew, right, for Game 6? Yeah, but then Wyshynski said that was part of the routine anyway. It was played as if it was a reaction to everything. It's like, no, this is kind of how it always goes anyways. Yeah. So that game, I mean, to come back the way they didn't give themselves a chance. You wonder if Swayman had started, would it have been a completely different outcome? But it wasn't. But then you get to game six and that's when it's like, I know Tuco wants to play, but he's obviously not himself. Throw in Swayman.

Change something up. Well, what you said, R.A., was if he wasn't necessarily healthy enough to finish the game in Game 5, how much healthier is he going to be 48 hours later to start Game 6, do-or-die situation? In a crazy barn. In an insane atmosphere. Now, let's talk about the post-game comments. And you talked about the officiating crew. A bit of a tidbit here.

I guess the official in Game 5 who Cassidy went after was the same guy that Brindamore went after and got chinged for $25,000 as well. So that guy's got $50,000 under his belt. He should get the $50,000. I thought he originally got fined for that terrible pinstripe suit he was wearing. Did you see that thing? That thing was a nightmare on Elm

Street. But he ends up getting dinged. He even said afterward he didn't think that his comments warranted the $25,000 fine, but it was a blatant call out of the officials. Yeah, he said usually if you keep it civil, they don't fine you. He goes, I thought I kept it civil. They didn't.

He said it's a very – talking about the Islanders, it's very well-respected management and coaching staff over there, but they set up a narrative over there. It's more like the New York Saints instead of the New York Islanders, and obviously everyone went off running with that. But, yeah, he's basically saying that the refs did what Trotz wanted them to, and that's why he got fined. He didn't come out and deliberately say it, but he implied it. I want to say this.

When he said they might actually be the New York Saints, I think it's top three nerdiest lines in the history of a postgame press conference. Honest to God, I heard that. I was like, the series is over. That's the geekiest thing. The New York Saints? Like, what? And now you got, when the Saints go marching in.

Like, Islanders fans just hopped right on. Are we selling T-shirts yet for the Saints? Oh, yeah. We got New York Saints shirts on sale now. Oh, yeah. I mean, that was just a no-brainer. But what a nerd comment. The Saints?

If you're going to say something, you can't say the New York Saints. I couldn't believe it. I thought there was a joke that I was missing. I'm like, no, he's trying to call them saints. I don't understand how you could go after that game and that be the message that you're going to portray. Like I said, kill the penalties. And what does it do when you go after the officials, right? You're thinking that subconsciously they're going to give you a call, right? That that everyone knows you're upset i think all the refs look at it like fuck you

like what are you doing you're pissing them off even more for going at him like i don't think that that's going to change the way the game's refereed i understand he was pissed off but i don't really see that maybe look at how bad your team played at home we've seen a few cards pulled by the coaches this playoffs you saw the bednar calling out the boys and that one backfired they've lost they've lost three in a row and then and then you see that going after the refs and the bees lose three in a row so yeah can't be using those cards too early you got to save those for maybe the semis or the finals and then uh anything else any other notes on that game in general, R.A.? What's his face? Nick Ritchie also got a $5,000 fine for elbowing Scott Mayfield.

And also, too, Cassidy stuck up for Bergeron. He didn't like the fact that Trotz called him a cheater. Now, I know, you know, everyone cheats on faceoffs, but, you know, usually people don't come out and call a future Hall of Famer a cheater. He didn't, though. He said he – I completely agree. It's like he cheats at faceoffs. He's not saying the guy

is a cheater. You know how much respect Barry Trotz has for Patrice Bergeron? It was just a weird off-ice series in terms of coaches' comments. I don't know. I think the Islanders played that series to a T. And what I look at when I look at

this series is, I swear to God, the 2015 draft. The Bruins had three picks in a row. They went Zobrol, Zobrol, Zobrol, Zobrosk, and then Sheshin. Dude, all of them, and no disrespect to Zobrosk, it was a tough season, right? He's not getting a ton done. The other two, horrific. You know who the Islanders got after that?

Barzell? And Bolivier. Oh, no. You know who the Islanders got after that? Barzell. And Bolivier. Oh, no. Look at the difference. I mean, Barzell and Trotz called him out, said we can't win if he's going to play like this to be in the series. Now, I'm paraphrasing, but he fucking took his game to the next level. And that killer bees line that Pirelli talks about, Bolivier, Nelson, and Bailey, holy shit. bolivier nelson and bailey holy shit so that team is built by a guy who built teams to win in like the dead puck era with the new jersey devils 95 2000 2003 whatever years they want it

25 years later this guy is still building teams the same way if with today's game and like you said like instead of winning 2-1, now they win 3-2. And they are so difficult to play against, and they know exactly their role for each guy, and their team is just deeper than Boston's. You look at Boston's third and fourth line, they didn't get anything. And then look at the third and fourth line for the Islanders. Look how much Sezekis gets done when he's on the ice.

Martin, they play these guys a lot. They're able to get in the offensive zone, control the puck. The Bruins, how many times did you see a point shot from the Bruins with nobody anywhere? You see a point shot from the Islanders. There's three guys in the crease banging away. It's like Zajac's goal to start game six, make it

1-0. A bad rebound by Tuca and then nobody's covered him and it's just a ripped rebound, right? It's the empty net. It's like, what the fuck? The way that they were able to out-muscle the Bruins all over the ice was so apparent, and when you look at the Bruins right now and where they're going to go, they're not the big, bad Bruins anymore. Look at 2011.

That team won a certain way. That's 10 years ago, but the Bru Bruins they don't have they don't have the guy they don't have the toughness they don't have these guys who are able to like they don't have a team where they can roll four lines and out and out physical teams and just wear teams down that's the Islanders now so in looking at me thinking the Bruins are going to win the series I was looking at the first line and how much better that line is than really any line on the Islanders. No offense, but after that it was a whitewash.

I think the only thing that could have pushed us a little bit further, maybe game seven, maybe closer games, would of course have been having Carlo and Miller in the lineup just for that physicality on the back end. Those are some tough minutes to eat up and they really struggled when those guys left the lineup.

There was a massive difference. Of course, Tuca on top of that as well. I was impressed with Halsey in the first round. Obviously, he had that big fight, but ultimately, you talk about depth scoring too. I don't think maybe he brought his A game offensively. Who are some other guys who should probably— Krejci didn't do much. brought his eight game offensively um you know who are some other guys who should probably she didn't do much yeah that whole line hall creche uh smith uh charlie coil didn't do much basically

none of the bottom six didn't you mentioned miller and carlo and that carlo's a huge loss that hurt the penalty killing but it didn't really matter almost i think because the bruins depth was woefully overmatched and then the goaltending we go back to volum often and like we said we actually texted tested texted yesterday we have receipts when you said raska start and i was like i'm leery of this move like i think after he gave up uh four goals on 16 shots the game before the coach comes out says he's not 100 at what point is is he below the threshold of being uh effective so when you mentioned that yesterday i i, I don't know what the relationship is of that core group. I would imagine that they're confident in Rask and they want him to come back.

Oh, yeah. The guys on the team love him. So maybe if Rask does want to play that game and maybe Cassie thinks, I don't think you're 100% and then they go with Swayman. What message does that send? And maybe you end up losing him in free agency because then emotions come into play, which I get what you're saying. You're like, you need to do what's best for the team at this moment. But he also might think that Tuca at 80%, 70% might give them a better chance to win

than Swayman at 100%. And you're looking forward saying, hey got we got a banged up blue line maybe this isn't our year but moving forward for the next two three years when we think this core group is still going to be together and still have a chance to make that run they think that they need to karaska in order to do it because we you know these types of goalies who have been in these situations and taking teams on runs they don't't, you know, they ain't growing on trees, man. You know, you could look to move to the next guy, but we know how that works out.

And I think Cassidy said that when he went to Tuca and he said, I can play, that was it. He trusted a veteran. And your point is like, maybe don't listen to him. Well, that's what a coach got to be a coach and say, don't have loyalty to your guy because he's telling he's got it. Say, hey, this kid played his balls off all through when we used him. Oh, yeah, Swayman.

The team looked different in front of him. I mean, yeah, he had a small sample size, which isn't always a bad thing because the other team has very little tape to study on him. Whereas with Tuca, they know he's going to play butterfly and they can shoot upstairs on him. And also, too, Biz, when he puts him in the third period when they're down 5-2, this isn't garbage time in the NHL playoffs anymore. This is 20-fucking-21. You're still in the game. We've seen so many comebacks. So putting Swayman in, yeah, it's going to kick the team in the ass,

hopefully, but he's also trusting him in that position that he can come back and get the win. He only saw three shots. He gave up one. So you can't say he played good or bad. I just thought, like, why start a guy at 75% if he's going to give us what he gave us the game before instead of the guy who's 100%. And looks, again, it's a small sample size,

but this kid looks like he's the future goalie for Boston. And then after the game, Tuca said, I could have made a couple more saves, definitely. Yeah, should have made a few of those saves, kept it tighter. And it's like, well, fucking clearly he wasn't effective, and he's probably going to need surgery. So it's like, yeah, man, Cassidy, like, maybe he was too loyal instead of saying, all right, what gives us the best chance to win the game and fucking i think it was clearly swayman after what

we saw the last two games and you heard after i think um he was asked cassidy said you know tuka for sure wasn't his best but our whole team didn't play well enough to win this was a team loss and like i don't ever hear him come out and say i gotta do a better job coaching yeah he got out coached to the umpteenth degree. And let me tell you, if you're a fucking Washington Capitals fan, have you seen what Barry Trotz has done since he's left your team? Why you got to go there? Have you seen what the Capitals have done?

This Trotz guy, holy shit, is this guy a hockey coach. He is able to get out of – he's able to get so much out of teams. Their sum is so much better than – what is the word? Sum is better than – The sum is better than the – Parts? I don't think that's the saying. We're mushing it.

We're butchering it, which makes total sense with this podcast. But I think everyone gets the gist of what I'm saying. What does Trotz want? Six series since he got to the Islanders? Every year they fucking move on. And what? Six series since he got to the Islanders. Every year they fucking move on. Like, it's just... And what? Well, I was going to say there's a stat with Lou Lamorello

as far as how many times he's advanced. Emily Kaplan ended up tweeting it out. Gee, pull that up while Witt finishes his thought. Other thought. I'm sorry. I just kind of lost my train of thought. Oh, Brock Nelson. Jesus Christ.

This guy's now the current leader in the NHL in games where you can end the series, right? Clinching series. Clinching series, possible clinching series games. In 12 of them, he's got nine goals now. He shows up when the moment's at its brightest, when the games are at the biggest. This guy is so big, so strong, so fast, and he was outstanding. That whole line, I talked about him already.

But, yeah, I mean, you've got to look at Trotz and how he's able to get these guys going and then look at Cassidy and look at what he's saying about the refs after Game 5 and look at the decisions he's making. And, yeah, they had injuries. And I will say this. If you're looking at the entire series, right,

there was moments the Bruins dominated. I think five on five, the advanced stats said they really outplayed them in terms of scoring chances. Bruins also had a little bit of tough luck, right? I mean, you remember the game two, I think two pucks went in off feet, right? Yeah. A couple went in off Tonorti, I think it was. Lazon had a tough series.

Yeah, and it's like, so there's a bunch of different plays. Tonorti broke the stick, and it's's just like you look back and there's some bad breaks but in the end your depth was dominated by the islanders depth all right Grinnell he's got it so talk about this is the tweet talk about consistency Lou Amarillo has reached the semi final slash conference finals in five different decades as a GM once in the 80s twice in the 90s three times in the 2000s once in the 2010s and twice in the 2020s, three times in the 2000s, once in the 2010s, and twice in the 2020s. Now, and I've chirped Lou Lamoureux. He's an old guy hard-o, but fucking A, can you not respect what this guy's done?

He knows exactly how to build teams, how he wants to get teams. And then, like, a guy like Paul Mary, who the Bruins have been trying, would have loved to get. He goes out and gets them. How good was he? How good was he this series? Four goals, two assists. And an elbow to, I mean, a shoulder to mcavoy's chin that wasn't called very interesting decision there not to call that with four refs in the ice but lula amarello can build winners dude and mainly we hate him because i'm a player he'd never won on his team and he won't let people

and he won't let people come on our podcast but, the guy keeps everything in-house, and they just win games. We've got to talk about the fans bringing it home on Long Island. That performance in the third period, the last 20 minutes. Well, you said at my house, you go, how great is this, that the game's pretty much over, and you can just celebrate and rip on the Bruins the entire 20 minutes. That was a 20-minute stoppage time dump on their chess fest. That's exactly what that was. The chance the whole whole way i'm sure the saints one came up i couldn't hear

it that clearly i mean grinnelli you were like saints chant the new york saints chant they were doing that the entire third period it i just felt so degraded it sounded like it sounded like european soccer shout out chelsea your uh League champs. They were just singing the whole game. It reminded me of Nashville in 2017. They were just partying from start to finish all game, entire barn going nuts. Yeah, so congratulations to them. I think they're going to bend over Tampa now too.

Well, I'm actually rooting for the Islanders because then I can laugh even harder at them when they lose in the finals. I got Islanders in five against Tampa. Should we jump over that series real quick or no? No. We just said with you what we're going to do. My love of business. His brain works in different ways.

Captain of Baton Rouge. As far as the Bs, what's next up for the teams who are getting dumped? The Bruins got a lot of UFAs. Krejci, Hall, Corrali, Riley, Miller, and Raskin, Halak, they're two goalies from this year. Well, obviously, Swingman came in late. A couple of RFAs, Koshie, Ritchie, Frederick

coming out of his entry level. Koshie, they gave him a first rounder for. Yep, so probably assume try to keep him. And then Carlo, too, is a RFA. Swingman and Vladara both signed through 2023. It's an interesting time for the Boston Bruins. I don't know if they got a couple runs left, if not one run left. But you also aren't crazy to think in two, three years, are they rebuilding?

I don't know. Where's Krejci going to be? Can they re-sign Hall? Bergeron's getting older. He still looks awesome. Marchand, one of the best players in the league. You can't put any fault on him for his effort this series what a player but

Jesus Christ did your depth just get completely completely overturned by the Islanders yeah Matt Basal too I don't know if you mentioned him there's three goals three assists he feasted on the bees this series as well I mean he's a stud anyways but he showed why yep alright boys well today's

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They actually came out with a new flavor called Leafs Tears, and I'm actually drinking it right now on my Habs cup, if you guys want to zoom in on that. I don't know if anyone's seen his outfit. I guess if you're listening in your car, there's no way you would have seen anything. My bad. Biz has a sweatsuit from the Montreal Canadiens, probably sent directly from their locker room, as well as a coffee cup.

Yeah, this is team-issued apparel. So you're just switching right over. I think I remember saying very clearly at the middle of the season that I was very confident in the moves that Berger Van was making. And on top of that, and we'll get to it later, my boy Sean Burke. And let's save it. Let's put it on the shelf. All right.

And Body Armor helps today's athletes stay on top of their game. Body Armor, available for purchase in-store and on Amazon now. Learn more at drinkbodyarmor.com. Next, we're going to take a look at Vegas, Colorado. They had a Game 5 last night, pivotal Game 5. But before that, Biz, the Kadri, Nizam Kadri suspension was upheld per an independent arbitrator ruling. So he's still going to be out.

Game five, the home team has won all five games so far. Vegas won 3-2 in OT. Mark Stone breakaway. Just unbelievable game. Colorado looked like they had it in a bag. Two-nothing lead going into the third. A couple of bad misplays, a Burakovsky turnover in his own end where Alex Tuck, with yet another baseball goal, ends up in the net.

And then the Landerscog pass hits a skate. They go back the other way and tie it up. Well, the Caudry suspension being upheld is huge, right? So now Colorado has to force it to seven if they want him back in the lineup. And we know what the second line for the Vegas Golden Knights right now have been doing to the Colorado Avalanche, especially over the last three. We said that they played really well in game two and deserved to win as well. But it has been an absolute slaughterfest.

Now, going to that first period, missed opportunity, wide open net for Ranton. And right afterward, he ends up getting that goalie interference call. I thought it was an absolute rubbish call. Kind of fucked with their feng shui because I thought they were pressing. But they end up getting that lucky goal late in that period. Brandon Saad, what a play by him. I think there was about three and a half seconds when he got the puck. Just to look up.

He checked the fucking score clock. And he saw it, and then he takes that extra move. I think what memes described it as is the spezzum move, where you kind of go with the shot, and then he takes that extra move, and I think what Meeams described it as is the spezzer move, where you kind of go with the shot, and then you kind of keep pushing the puck. Completely changed the angle, got away from the defender's stick, and he throws. I don't want to say it was a muffin,

because I thought he got pretty good wood on that puck. It was an awful goal, though. It was an awful goal. Pecorine. I remember how he used to do the crossbody glove save all the time, and he he mastered it i i don't know i don't i guess i don't pay attention enough to flurry to see if he does it a lot but maybe he maybe he just had a brain glitch i think he had a brain fart no joke brain

fart he goes with the cross body glove save and he just completely whiffs on it and you could see his reaction right afterward he he's disgusted with himself he throws a stick picks it up does the old figure eight to the corner like he normally does and you're thinking okay Colorado's off and running that's a big bounce given the fact that they missed that rant in an open net and first goal has to be important for their confidence and psyche given the fact that they just got smoked the last two games they go into that second period and they keep pressing. Now, the interesting quote that after the game was Marc-Andre Fleury. Do you have it right there, R.A.?

As far as the goal? Yeah, just as far as the goal because, guys, we've seen this before from Marc-Andre Fleury. I mean, credit Patrick O'Sullivan for being at the right place at the right time. But when he was with Team Canada, he ended up throwing one right off his body. They ended up losing that gold medal that they were supposed to win. So we've seen this type of gift from Fleury before, but... Yeah, he said, I think maybe when I was younger,

this would have thrown me off a bit more, but I've been around a bit. Guys had my back on the locker room, and that felt good. I always believe in this group that we can come back. Well, I mean, so his performance in that second period is the only reason that they were still in that hockey game. I know it was 2-0, and they ended up potting one more i who ended up don's going got the other one on a great pass from new hook who played at bc this year it shows colorado's depth but flurry that quote was so interesting because to bring up how when you're younger it would really rattle you is is i'm not

impressive but almost like he's realized how much he's grown and the immediate thing i thought was like i remember playing with him. Granted, it feels like 30 years ago I was playing with Marc-Andre Fleury. But he would come in the room, and if he gave up a goal like that, he would feel so bad. And he'd apologize to the team. And I'm sure he did the exact same thing. Like, guys, I'm sorry.

But right away, that team's so close. They all love the guy. You can only imagine. Don't worry, Flower. We got you. We got you, buddy. Hey, we're going to get two or three don't no worries no worries so like that team being that close and being that confident even being down two going to the third it shows their resolve it shows how good

of a coach DeBoer is and it shows that right now they are just gelling at the perfect time it's a deep team and when you do see a goalie your star goalie let in a real shit goal and not a must win but the biggest game. You win game five. I don't know the percentage. I think it's 75% of the time you win the series. To see that happen late in a period, it could kill teams. And it didn't.

It didn't. And they didn't come out and get the lead back in the second, but they stuck with it and stuck with it. And Fleury, he just kept kicking and played awesome. Well, and on top of that, I think he had a big save right at the beginning of that third period, right before Alex Tuck ends up going down. Now, you said that it was a turnover just outside the blue line? Yeah, so Landis Gog, are you talking about on their second goal?

On the first one with Alex Tuck. Tuck, that was a Berkovsky turnover in his own zone. He didn't make the safe play, lost it. He never even got it out of the zone. Oh, shit, I had the assist written down. Whoever got it to Tuck and Tuck batted out of midair. Roy did. got it out of the zone. Oh, shit. I had the assist written down. Whoever got it to tuck and tuck batted out of midair. Roy did. Roy did.

That's right. Okay, Roy. And then, like, Marcio, he ties it up with a beautiful – he's in tight. He goes up top. Like, just the perfect shot at that moment. And at that point, it's like, oh, my God, they came back. They fucking tied it up. Colorado's at home.

You got a two-goal lead in the third. And then right away, you know, what are they saying after the game? Three games in a row, Nathan McKinnon doesn't have a point. I think he's got five shots in the last three games, right? So for a guy that's right there in terms of best players in the world, like, you just can't have it happen. And right now, when you talk about depth and the Bruins' lack of, losing Kadri is just a killer to this team because they're kind of a one-line team right now. And instead of that second line having Kadri, maybe Burakovsky or Kompfler on the side with their other winger, you know, who usually, right, is Landeskog,

it's just a different second line. But now it's Nikushkin's playing on the second line. The third line's Tyson, Joe, Spurikovsky, and O'Connor. It's like Kadri just changes an entire unit that you have on the ice, not only offensively but defensively. So right now you have Vegas who rolls four lines, three of them playing great hockey, and Colorado's got one. So it's like the depth issue is all it is about in the NHL playoffs.

And that's why Tampa's the best fucking team in the world because every single line keeps coming. So Colorado to get nothing from McKinnon makes me think in game six tonight he'll show up. He has to. He has to. That's what it comes down to. And if he doesn't, he's going to catch the heat.

No points in his last three, minus three. Yeah. And I think Rantanen has a goal and an assist in those last three games but it's still it's just not good enough but when you're the only line that's able to produce anything and then you're getting shut down and you just look around at the team it's like we are they are a different team than the regular season and at the first five six games of this playoff um the other question mark i had and i don't know if he's completely healthy i heard that about what three four weeks ago he got cleared and he started practicing with the with the guys Bo Byram I I don't know if they're trying to protect him because he is a maybe maybe a little bit

undersized but I said when I watched him play this year he played above his size he plays a physical type game he can move the puck I've been a little bit disappointed in a few of the guys on the back end for the Avs. And given the way they've played in the last three games, I'm surprised that they haven't tried to insert him. I mean, we saw that. I mean, I think Graves has been solid. I don't think Graves, Taves, or Makar or Gerrard are coming out. But when you look at the bottom pair.

I think Nemeth. You swap them out for Nemeth. I don't get it. And Nemeth, I think the thinking is, say think again. I believe that Nemeth is big guy and you look at Stone and how physical that the entire Vegas team can be and Tuck's enormous. You're like, all right, let's get some size in there. Maybe get in a top five pick who moves the puck as well as anyone and could skate like the wind and just at least get him in. I don't know if he's going to see game six and coming back off injury

and then just being thrown into the playoffs as a young guy is certainly something they may be worried about. You've got to change something. You've lost three in a row, and you probably should be out of the series already because game two, Vegas deserved to win. I think Vegas closes it out tonight, but as you guys know, I'm never really right. The comments by Tuck after the game. Now, I think that Stoner— What a player he is

jesus christ stoner was at the end of his shift and it did look like he was sucking back some wind going up ice but him and that elephant knob he ended up getting down there and he got a nice clean shot off at the end of his shift didn't he oh you're talking about the winner the winner oh it was a fucking snipe and the craziest thing is at the end of the game i don't know if there was under 30 seconds it was under a minute. He walked Devon Taves. And he had a great chance. And Taves' last-ditch effort just got a stick on the puck.

It was a good play after getting burnt. But I'm like, oh, I thought Stone was going to end that thing in regulation. Actually, somebody tweeted already. I think you tweeted it out. He had, I think, Vegas live down 2-0 in the third. It was like plus. That was some random list that he got. Plus 3,000. 30-1 he had Vegas when they were down 2-0. But third was like plus that was some random list that he got plus 3,000 30 to 1 he had Vegas and he went down to nothing but they had to win in regulation so Stone almost did it

but but then the play sorry all right then the play that you're talking about when you see hockey IQ which so many players lack they have all the skills in the world but they can't think the game where Stone is just at another level the puck's's a little bit turned over, right? And what does he do? He just takes off. He takes off and he got a great pass and then all of a sudden he goes down and just shelf. It was the perfect shot. You know, you needed a save from Grubauer there, but you really can't blame him when you

pick a corner like that and boom, 3-2 and they're going back to Vegas looking to close out. Maybe I was being a little too critical of Graves there, but I will say he did the Patrick Marleau special that you did. He buried two right in the guy's shin pad. That's the wit. That's the wit.

Hey, wit, we've got to work on getting pucks through. Shin pad, other net. Oh, hits his skate. Shit. Other way, two on one. And then I slide into the goalie. And then the forward net front taking cross checks to earn that space in front, just rolling his eyes at you. And then when you look net front, taking cross checks to earn that space in front, just rolling his eyes at you.

And then when you look at Vegas, right, and how they're able to play, and I don't think Vegas and the Islanders are that dissimilar in terms of like the way. Is that a word? Dissimilar? Yes. Yeah, I don't think that they're that different in a sense like they never change the way they play. They continue on the path no matter the score until late in the game. If you've got to get a couple, they'll open it up. But they've really kind of, I'm not going to say slowed down Kael McCarr,

but he doesn't look like, you know, the Kael McCarr from the regular season or the Kael McCarr from the first round because they're just taking away time and space. It's all they do. It's the same thing as the Islanders. They don't give the best players room to make plays. So you've seen it with McKinnon. You've seen it with their best defensemen. They need more and they need it tonight. That was a hell of a pass from Pacioretty to send Stone in. The quote

from Tuck, he was exhausted and you saw how hard he skated down the ice. He's the heart and soul of the team. He's the captain that we've always wanted. Mr. Exuberance in that picture I tweeted out. Awesome photo of him jumping into Pacioretty's mid-air with the fucking screaming in the face. Just awesome stuff.

And go back to that bet the kid made, too. He ended up losing. It was regulation. And then some idiot chirped, and he's like, oh, because the guy cashed out early. So he actually made money and got it. And some idiot tried to chirp him. He's like, oh, you fool. And I'm like, buddy, you're the fool here.

And he's like, oh, you won't tell me who it is. I'm like, asshole. He's like, I don't gamble. I'm like, well, why would you jump into a Twitter feed and call a guy a fool for taking money, and you don't even follow gambling? You fucking idiot, man. People, so many mutants. Fuck him, all right.

No, me and Whitwood talked about it early. Twitter is just loaded with mutants. I'm getting tight with the Islanders fans. I told you. I'm rooting for them. Hey, I got 17-1 on them. I told you. When they were 2-2 at Pittsburgh, the Islanders 17-1.

I threw a few bucks on them. Actually, if the Islanders play Montreal for the cup, I'm done-1 on them. I told you when they were 2-2 at Pittsburgh, the Islanders 17-1. I threw a few bucks on them. If the Islanders play Montreal for the cup, I'm done. I'm not watching the games. When I come on the pod after the finals, I'm going to talk about my golf if I'm back playing. I'm not talking about Islanders-Montreal. Fuck you guys. And Montreal fans, Jesus Christ. Hey, watch your mouth.

Jesus, we'll get to them. Fucking A. These people, Montreal fans are painful. I didn't know that. I never had a problem with Montreal fans. I think I'm up to six teams' fan base who hate me and I hate them. Montreal's now on the list. Yeah, we'll get to that in a minute.

We've got to finish stroking off Marc-Andre Fleury. A couple of huge saves in OT on Landis Garg, then Kompf on the rebound. Biz, he's now tied for fourth overall playoff wins with Monday's guest, Billy Smith and Eddie Belfort. Patrick Waugh, of course, leads. Wait, wait, wait. Do you know who the other three are? Pardon?

Do you know who the three are for playoff wins as goaltenders ahead of him? Martin Brodeur. Mm-hmm. Patrick Waugh. Mm-hmm. How am I forgetting? Number one is probably so obvious. Hold on, hold on, hold on.

No, number one is Patty Waugh. Waugh's one. No, but I'm thinking the other guy must be so obvious. Hold on, hold on, hold on. No, number one is Paddy. No, I'm thinking the other guy must be so obvious. You had him on recently. Billy Smith? Grant Fuhrer. Grant Fuhrer. Wow, yeah, I should have thought of the Islanders dynasties. I was starting to think like Canadians dried in,

but then they didn't play as many games. I don't think anybody is ever going to beat Roy. How many more games ahead right now? He's got 115 for wins? 151 playoff wins. Oh, 151. He's fought so 63 ahead of the current active leader. That's fucking crazy.

And he's the only goalie in top five career playoff wins that also, when coaching, punched the glass and tried to fight Bruce Boudreaux because he was in his first game. He's like, clean up your collar bruce hey he's like you do two trips to the buffet in the fucking lounge before i get my fucking game me are you fucking kidding me fucking me man that bad neck look call this is that this way yeah call this call this top of neck that's what i heard from terry and i've been back uh biz yen mark up back on the lineup

and he replaced ryan reeves who was the health bomb, and I know you wanted to talk about that. Yeah, first guy in the tunnel just giving his boys hugs on the way in. Typical team guy, Reeve. I figured I'd give my fourth-line buddy a shout-out. Any final notes on that series, boys, that you want to share before you move along? No, just that through five games, with game six being tonight, Vegas is significantly a better hockey team. It was one game after playing game seven, two nights prior,

and since then, Vegas has fucking owned them. Well, hey, the ball's in your court, Vegas fans. Can you sing your team home to victory just like the Islanders did? We'll be watching. Not sure if you guys can bring it to that cadence. Yeah. We'll see. You don't think the Vegas crowd can get as loud as the Coliseum?

I guess we'll see. There's more fans. I guess we'll see. There's more fans. They're known as the craziest, loudest fucking fan base in the league. You're wrong, Biz. You stick to the Canadians and you're 300 people in the stands. Before we get to the Canadians, Jets, we do want to mention, I guess,

Colin Blackwell. We're going to bring him on a little bit. New York Ranger. We talked to him. Where was the world championships? It was over in Riga, Latvia. Probably the hottest girls per capita in any city in the country. I hope the guys had fun.

Actually, I don't think they did. They were in a bubble. But Colin Blackwell has been through more to get where he's at now than I ever knew. And I think it's going to be a really interesting interview for people to hear from a 2021 Masterton nominee. So we'll get to that in a little bit. But first, we've got to discuss the Montreal Canadiens, Winnipeg Jets. Another stunner of a series. They have sweeped them.

I don't think anybody saw a sweep coming, even with or without Shifley. They win game 4-3-2 in OT. We'll see what biz who else, but Tyler Toffoli in a one-time from Cole Caulfield to win it. Biz, what do you got on this one for us, buddy? Well, first, Biz, so we see the get-up, and we hear, since I've known you, Toronto Maple Leafs, a Toronto kid, like, what is going on here?

Are you trying to jinx them? No, it's Canada's team. I don't know if you saw. I don't know if you saw. Come on with the CN Tower, Canada. What the fuck? Brutal. That's what I was just going to say.

Trudeau's got the whole country rooting. He forced them to change the color. So I obviously am jumping on the bandwagon. Now, let's go back to a couple months ago when I said this was all going to change when not only they brought in Ducharme, but that was Eric Engels who came on and told us that he thought he was prepared.

He was going to be able to will this team to victory. Now, who was the other coach that they brought in? Do you remember? A man named Sean Burke. Burke? The goalie whisperer. Legit the goalie whisperer. Hey, Price.

Start being yourself again. Just carry. Just stop more pucks than you've been doing lately. I think we're going to be okay. And look at the turnaround this team has had. Can we get his numbers over the last seven games? We got seven games. The last seven games, Carey Price has played

since they were down 3-1 to Biz's beloved Maple Leafs. He's gone 7-0. His goals against is 1.64, and his save percentage is 943. You are looking at a man possessed right now. And that's where it all begins, with the goalie whisperer, Sean Burke,

telling him to stop the puck more, and he's done it. And when's the last time that the Montreal Canadiens won six playoff games in a row? In 93 when they won the Stanley Cup, and now they got seven to close out a series. They are going to be full of energy going into the next round, and I don't really care who it is, Vegas or Colorado. Are you picking them as well? Canadians in four. Okay, so you've got the Islanders in five against the best team in the world,

and you've got the Canadians in another sweep. The craziest stat I've seen is I believe it's over 450 minutes now since the Canadians have trailed. They haven't even fucking been down in a game since game four. Well, we should actually roll blake wheeler's comments right now he had a pretty uh a pretty heartfelt post-game press conference or maybe a season wrap-up conference the same one where shifley was uh chirping a little bit the league again but he he said those exact words roll it right now you know with the goaltending that they

have um any breakdowns or you know, he's putting out those fires. And, you know, we just couldn't get the first goal. We just couldn't do it all series. And that plays right into their hands, you know. They've, you know, especially their top four defensemen are big and heavy. And, you know, they do a good job of just clearing pucks and throwing them out of the zone. And, you know, we just, like I said, I really felt like in any of these games,

you know, probably outside the first one, games two through four, if we just could have found a way to get that first goal, you know, could be a different series. But we didn't. And you just got to give them so much credit they they uh they're playing unbelievable right now just how they were unable to ever get the lead it's they could they couldn't score that first goal he said that he said that he didn't feel as a team they were that far behind it was just the minute that they gave up that first goal

montreal did a hell of a job of locking things down. We also saw an unreal performance in Game 4 as far as, like, where did they outshoot them? By fucking 20? 42-16 in Minnesota. Montreal had 39 minutes in the Ozone. Winnipeg only had 17. I mean, just domination. So they weren't even getting...

Winnipeg, I mean, as great as Price was, Winnipeg wasn't even getting too many quality chances. Because once Montreal gets that lead, they just sit on it, man. They got the big D. They keep everybody out from out front and they fucking and you got price on the last line man I would probably uh say one of the biggest unsung heroes of the playoffs so far in a sense of maybe what expectations were coming in Joel Armia no points seven games coming into playoffs and then you look back to game five against the Leafs.

He ends up having two goals and an assist. That was kind of the turning point and what has propelled them to this seven-game win streak. And what I would imagine is the game where maybe the Jets could have got any hope back this series, game three, two short fucking-handed goals. This guy's got what now? Four goals and three assists seven points in 10 games this guy is i believe he's an unrestricted free agent you go from not even knowing if you're going to get an nhl contract maybe next year to now dude this guy might be getting a fucking uh he might be getting a tyler toffoli special now four years at foreign change

whatever he's making so talk about a guy who stepped up at the perfect time because they have not been getting offense from all the guys that they were expecting to get offense from coming into playoffs i know that we've we mentioned josh anderson i still think he only has one assist so far in in the in the what in the nine games that they've played or 10 games his stick has a couple goals via or at least one goal via perry that's that's true so sorry i was-fucking on the game situation. But those are the types of guys you need to step up. And they even get it done in Game 4 against the Jets without Petrie,

who missed the game because of that finger in the hole. It's okay now. That's what she said. I think that Armia is, I'm not going to say showing why he was drafted so high. I mean, that's a first-round pick with Buffalo. Shocker it didn't work out with the fucking Sabres. But now he's in Montreal, and he's adding to the depth. So you've got to talk about Bergervan,

and you've got to talk about his celebration. And you saw him up top, and he sprinted down. He's hugging all the guys. I think he was just giving everyone hard high fives, but he was so fired up. Caulfield hugs him. Perry walks in after that. It's like we just swept the Winnipeg Jets to win the north nobody saw this coming and Montreal got up to a

rocket start at the beginning of the season and then things really did slow down and you saw the coaching change and everything that was happening and now they've just completely peaked at the right time but to look at that first line right so you have you have Deneau and then you have Gallagher who's just such a rat to play against and talk about crashing the crease and scoring goals and in in the dirty areas Gallagher is a professional at that and then Leckanen and they're just able to just shut lines down no you lose Shifley right I think right then you know you're probably not winning the series I mean the guy's the center on one of the best lines in hockey, and Wheeler and Connor weren't able to do anything without him.

And I think that you've got to give credit to that line, but you've got to give credit to Bergervin and all the signings he made. And he made a lot of difficult decisions in terms of firing a coach. He was getting laughed off stage by half the fan base. I know, but to bring in Perry, who's obviously played great again in another playoff, and then to just make different changes to a team that you had to change, and to bring in Edmondson, who's looked really good on D. And Petrie had an unreal regular season, and losing him, hopefully he's healthy,

but he's got time to rest now before Vegas or Colorado, whoever wins that. Doesn't matter. They don't even need him. Yeah, yeah, it's another sweep. I forgot. Sorry. We shouldn't even play the games. But Suzuki's playing phenomenal. And Caulfield finally got into the fucking lineup. You look at now. Would they have beat Toronto earlier if they had this guy? What an assist he makes on the series-clinching goal to Toffoli.

And then Toffoli's another signing. So it's like all these guys that Bergevin brought in and wanted to change the culture with, they've been able to do it. So the good thing is you're moving on without maybe your best forward and Anderson doing anything. So that's kind of shocking. If you heard Anderson's numbers, what they'd be at now, you'd say no chance they win the North.

But they're getting depth and they're getting goal. They have depth and they're getting goaltending. So when you think about the Leafs' tier body armor blend, you've got the fact that Lou's advancing to the conference final. They let him go. You got the fact that they've taken over the CN Tower in Toronto. That's just such a tough one. That's brutal. And of course, they've eliminated

the Toronto Maple Leafs. So there you have it, folks. Leafs Tears body armor. The new special cocktail for all you people in Montreal. Tabarnak! Let's call it. It just come over the wire here, Biz. Actually, four Canadians are on the DL right now because Berger van Patten, my back's too hard. He put him on the DL for beating on him.

Dude, he's fucking jacked, dude, when he was doing that. He's probably going to sign a 10-year deal if he wants one now. People were saying he was gone if they didn't make the playoffs or lost first round. Now look at him. They're champions of the North. The North is a pretty pathetic division. Budweiser them. They're champions of the North. The North is pretty pathetic. Pretty pathetic.

The Budweiser Canada. Budweiser Canada North. Our friends over at Budweiser Canada. But here's my thing with Canadiens fans. Be so proud of this team, and you have this world-class goalie who's figured it out, and you're moving on, and you have a chance.

But you are crazy. If you can't admit, you've gotten a little lucky throughout this playoffs. And it's weird. When you say that to a fan base, they take so much offense to it, getting lucky. You beat Toronto without one of their best players. Tavares left game one.

You didn't have to deal with him. And you did a great job. You shut down Matthews and Marner. You then beat Winnipeg without their best player. I mean, things have gone your way. Things have gone your way. Things have gone your way, and you should be able to, at least as a fan base, admit, we are playing well, but we've also got some bounces.

And if you can't admit it, as a new Canadian sort of Leafs fan, you're a fucking piece of shit trash bag for Canada. You might as well have a trash bucket breakfast sandwich with fucking R.A.'s uncle while talking about the shitbag Canadian Leafs like fandom you now have.

No Tatar. He's healthy scratch. Okay, that's not bad luck. They're deciding to scratch him. That's not losing your two best players that you're playing against or two of the best. They lost Drew N. He ended up having to leave for Pro Football. They don't even want him in the lineup. Petrie.

Finger in the box. One game. You've gotten a little lucky. That's all I'm saying. The Canadian fans, it's so weird as a fan base. You can't be like, yeah, we've gotten a couple bounces so far. We haven't had to deal with two of the best players on both teams we've beat. Well, I'll consult with the rest of the fan base. You do that. You fucking speak your French.

Speaking of Habs and Bergervin, we are going to be dropping some merch on the website and on Twitter. So keep your eyes open, Canadians fans. We've got some stuff coming. And going back to the Shifley loss, Winnipeg got just four goals after losing him. And their power play was outscored 3-0 by Montreal's penalty killing.

You mean Joel Armia? Yeah. By the way, he was a former Winnipeg Jet, too. They actually traded him to Montreal a couple years ago. Yeah, the Shifley Co., where is it? I thought I was going to be tried to be shut down by Philip Deneau, said Shifley. Instead, it was Department of Players Safety that shut me down.

Singer! When the Saints come marching in. It was obvious to say that the Winnipeg Jets and March Life, they didn't agree with the decision. A lot of people thought it would be two games, but it ends up being four, and boom, there goes the dynamite, as the legendary viral clip says. The Jets go down, and they went down hard. Now, interestingly enough, in the postseason kind of wrap-up press conference,

Connor Hellebuck, phenomenal goalie, he mentioned that they're close to being a dynasty. I don't know what the fuck he's smoking. He's on some R.A. Biz type stuff right now. And he's trying to figure out that he's close to a dynasty. They went to the Western Conference Finals once three years ago. I don't know what's going on there. They are nowhere close to a dynasty.

I like their team. And I think Wheeler or Scheifele said you guys counted us out from the beginning of this year. We ended up having a good year. We had some tough luck. But in the end, that's not a dynasty. That is not even close to a dynasty. So I respect Connor Hellebuck believing in his boys, but that was crazy. Yeah, I think they set up pretty good forward end goal.

The defense is still going to work on Hellebuck. 2.23 goals against 9-3-1 save percentage in eight games. He's got three seasons left on his deal. Connor has five. Ehlers has four. Scheifele, three. Wheeler, three. Adam Lowry got five.

Josh Marcy signed for seven more. Dylan DeMello, three more. As far as UFAs, Stastny, I mean, he's 35. I don't know if he's going to be back. Perrault, Thompson, Ben, Forbert, Laurent Brosseau, the goaltender. And for RFAs, they got Kopp, Thompson, Ben, Forbert, Laurent Brousseau, the goaltender. And for RFAs, they got Kopp, Pionk, and Stanley, who the defensemen

got two goals in the game the other night. So you want to sign all those guys. Kopp's a nice player. I'm just saying. Yeah, they're not a dynasty. There was one thing I failed to mention last podcast. I was a little bit critical of Dubois, and I guess maybe the lack of production. he did

miss the first game of playoffs this year i don't know i don't know if he was battling through injury oh i got the quote after we talked we talked last night yeah he said no i'm not hurt i mean i'm as hurt as anybody bruises and scratches and stuff like that nothing major that affected my game no goals in 24 games played after columbus traded him uh three assists in seven games in the playoffs and invisible i mean he didn't score a goal no no that he didn't have a goal in his last 24 games 24 games all right yeah but i mean that's still oh my god that's oh my god i mean let's let's be honest oh my god in 24 games he probably would put up as much ice as I would in two seasons. So that would be like me not scoring a goal in two seasons, which I don't know if I've ever went that long of a run.

So it's kind of like – Yeah, he never chased the Emmy. He never chased the Emmy with a knee drop in San Jose. And I ain't getting power play time either. Yeah, you should have been net front, man. You got screwed. He said, I didn't play how I thought I could and how I know I can. The only person to blame is me. And he's got one more year left at $5 million. Well, I didn't play how I thought I could and how I know I can. The only person to blame is me.

And he's got one more year left at $5 million. Well, I like the accountability. So I hope he – listen, I think that if he's able to find his game – sometimes when you come over from a different team in this whole weird year and how it all played out, I know he had to also sit out a couple weeks when he first got there too. So maybe that took him out of his rhythm. But either way way that's

an important piece that if they want to create this dynasty that hellebuck's talking about they're going to need him to contribute more than no goals in the last 24 games especially come playoff time when scheifele's out yeah that was the one moment you're like okay all right step it up dude we need you and he wasn't able to but i did really respect putting it on himself and and saying no i'm i'm as injured as anyone else is right now. He didn't make excuses. And like you said, he had to do the quarantine when he went. He wants to be in Winnipeg.

It's where his parents live. So let's look at the offseason. And you really wouldn't be surprised to see him come back and have a great year next year. And then the dynasty begins. Tyler Toffoli, four goals, six assists in 11 games. Outside of price, I'd say probably the best Canadian. And he's a guy you're able to watch in the new age of just burners on guys and being able to skate so well.

It's not his strength, but he's so smart. You mentioned the hockey IQ, and you mentioned his release. He's able to shoot it from anywhere. He's kind of mastered that curl and drag, shoot it through a stick, shoot it through the defenseman's feet, and then to have Caulfield play in and dishing it like he did on the winner for the series. He's a great player.

And the season he's had, I believe he was on pace for close to 50 goals. So good for him. I think I saw a picture online as his girlfriend sent out, or maybe he's married to her, after the game bringing his dog. It was like a little lap dog for a walk.

So I thought it was pretty cute. He's walking walking his dog he puts the dog in like a baby carriage to go for a walk with it that's yeah i respect that like paris hilton he had him the old lap dog um uh go ahead no i was gonna say i'm looking at all these cars were right above the uh the bridge tunnel here in boston and you know i don't know if you're gonna have any car issues are you gonna pay for anything with what if you're going to have any car issues. Are you going to pay for anything, Whit? What do you got for us? Yes, R.A., we are talking cars, and we are talking all of mechanical breakdown coverage. We all know auto manufacturers' warranty only goes so far. Everyone knows, when's my warranty up?

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Well done. I got rid of my car a couple years ago. I don't need a car. I work from home, live in the city. Random Uber business. I was going to ask you, do you have a driver's license? Oh, yeah. No, he's a driver.

Yeah. Oh, okay. It's a guy Ricky grew up with. He just drives them everywhere. No, I've had a license for, fuck, 33, 34 years. Yeah, no, I don't need a car, though. Good job getting a license. Yeah, I got on it pretty early.

All right, boys, moving right along. Tampa Bay, Carolina series. I thought this was going to be a much more entertaining series, probably even last a couple games longer, but Tampa finished them off in five. They won game five, 2-0 to take the series. Carolina's goaltending, less than Stella. I know Nadelkovich was pretty good in game five,

but Vasilevsky was unreal. I think he might have let up one bad goal the whole time. Braden Point, this kid is just unreal. Steps it up in the playoffs. Averages.40 goals per game during the regular season. That goes up unreal. Steps it up in the playoffs, averages 0.40 goals per game during the regular season. That goes up to 0.55 goals per game in the playoffs, 0.88 points per game in the regular season, goes up to 1.13 points per game in the playoffs. In his last 31 playoff games, he's got 21 goals, 21 assists. I mean, he's today's stroke off session.

And we talk about how important those first goals are in the game and playoffs. I think earlier in the season, or earlier in the season, earlier in the series, he scored the first goal of the game. And then, of course, in the closing out in Game 5 on a… Sick poise. Sick poise. Killorn has turned into the palat of this year.

Now he's got fucking 12 points, but he slides that over, and he goes to his back hand to beat nadelkovich and it's just like under those high pressure situations in playoffs the fact that he could just slow the heart rate down and go walk around just fucking silky backhand right top cheese how's the mama keep the fucking keep the change and and they're off and running and then you mentioned vasileski He ends up closing the door. Now, what's crazy about his numbers are in the last three games to close out a series.

Yeah, he stopped all 29 shots for his third career playoff shutout, all three coming in clinching game scenarios, all in the last three series, 8-3 with a 2-2-4, 9-3-4 save percentage and two shutouts. And it looked like him and Brendan Moore had not an animated chat, just a little bit of a kind of a nice chat. Yeah, he said, we're trying to address goaltending. You want to come over to Carolina?

Well, he said after the game, he said, I've been around this league a long time, and I think he's the best goalie I've ever seen. I'm paraphrasing. He does it as well as anyone I've ever seen. And how do you disagree with him? He's so big, so mobile. He makes it as well as anyone I've ever seen. And how do you disagree with him? He's so big, so mobile. He makes it look so easy. He never really has to make a crazy fantastic save because he's so big and he just sits there and it hits him.

His angles are perfect. And that's why when you talk about this team, it's like I don't know how many times you can say every fucking line can score. Every line can produce pace of play and play in the offensive zone. They're deer. They got three stud left defensemen, and then they have the best goalie in the world. So you look at every team left. You look at every team in the league before the regular season.

They are the best on paper, and they are the best on the ice. They have so many different ways to beat you, and they have so many different types of style to play. And then when all of it breaks down, and in the end every team has moments of weakness and breakdowns, you have this fucking goalie who makes it look so simple and so easy that even rod brindamore an all-time great player and a great coach you could tell he's intense and the guys love him is sitting there

and a tamperer trying to get vasilevsky to to request a trade to carolina he's sitting there it felt like it was like three minutes long right like he was blatantly like pointing him in the chest like we couldn't beat you i don't know know what he said, but it had to be, I can't tell you how impressed I am. And there was nothing we could do because you say, you were hoping for a different series. I actually think like some of the games were pretty good. I mean, zero, the game the other night, the closing game, it wasn't a high scoring tilt to nothing final, but it was a good game. And Vasilevsky made some huge saves. And the first two games of that series

could have easily gone the other way for Carolina, right? They were closely matched, and Carolina could have got one of them, but when you lose two at home, we said right away that was it. We thought it maybe goes six, it ends up going five, no problem. Yeah, that's the one thing that stuck out,

although low scoring opportunities at both ends. Like Carolina was still putting up some high-quality scoring chances at the other end. Now, back to my comment earlier about that Patrick Wadden number of 151 career playoff wins not being touched. Maybe I'm dead wrong because Vasilevsky is still very young, and he's on this juggernaut team who likes to cheat and manipulate the cap, and they seem to find their way

making runs every year. I'm so amazed that people who talk about Tampa know, you talk about Tampa and it's Twitter. They're cheating. They're cheating. Their cap's 96 million. It's like they're not fucking cheating. How many times can I tell you this? They're doing what is allowed.

Be mad at the league for having it be able to happen. They are not cheating. They are taking advantage of a system. They're doing what the New England Patriots say. So if you say the Patriots cheat, you're clowns as well. They're working around a system, and they're able to win without their best player in the lineup the whole regular season. All right, he comes back. Yeah, now you have Tyler Johnson making what, like $4 million or $5 million on the fourth line?

Well, their fourth line's amazing. And they were able to sneak around the cap by doing what any other team would do if they were capable of it that's why eiserman left his he has integrity yeah exactly he saw what was coming you're just trolling this episode you're a fucking canadian's troll and i don't appreciate it because your team's trash and you're gonna lose to vegas to colorado and then who you're gonna hop on i'm not sure yet i haven't given any thought but i haven't gone that far. I sent you guys a text the other day. Tampa's, I mean, they're like the model franchise when it comes to drafting, having patience.

Do you remember when Hedman early struggles in his career? I don't think they were coming close to trading, but there was some scuttlebutt that they might. Yeah, they were never trading. They gave them time. But they let their guys develop in Syracuse. They bring them along slowly, and then they have to have the transition from Stevie White to Breeze-Bi.

Breeze-Bi, I know that's what they used to call him when he played in Montreal. I know it's Breeze-Boi. But, like, it's been seen with him. This team has been a contender for a decade now. I don't think that's the Breeze-Boi who played. I think all the... Julian Breeze-Boi?

Breeze-Boi? No, I thought it was. Is the GM of Tampa the guy who played? No clue. I don't know anything. Are we going to do this again? That was Patrice Breeze-bois, wasn't it? That might be him. And going back to where all the

development started, I think they were in Norfolk when they started developing all these guys. And they ended up, I think they set an AHL record where they didn't win for like or they didn't lose for like 40 straight games. And Tyler Johnson was there. They ended up going on to win the Calder Cup. So great, great development.

And just going back quickly to Killorn, we talk about all these superstars on this team, of course, Stammer, Kutra, but it just seems like last year it was Palat, the guy to step up and kind of play out of his mind, and now you've got big shoulder at Pad Killorn who's ripping it up with uh with uh what's his name with braden point yeah and and i talked about um i i on twitter i mentioned that braden

point at you 79th overall in 2015 and then in 2016 i think they got sorelli like 675th overall so you talk about the drafting and then i mentioned in in the 2015 draft, Braden Point, I think, is the second best player now. Leon Dreitzel, I would say, is head and shoulders, right? That's fair. And then people argued and got very upset that I said that Point is better than Pasternak. 100% come and argue with me. I'd love to have a beer, and you can talk and look at numbers. And people, Pasternak, his goal-storing.

I'm sorry, man. I look at fucking Braden Point, overall hockey player. I would rather have him. I love Pasternak. He's an absolute game breaker. But this kid is at a different level, and he plays so good defensively. And then you want to talk about, oh, he plays with Kucherov? Look at who Pasternak plays with.

So don't talk about being on a line making the player. It's a guy who's a nonstop motor. He makes that team go. I'll tell you right now, you watch Tampa Bay play. Now, Vasilevsky being their goalie who shuts it all down. He's their most important player. After that? Patty Maroon.

Fuck, Maroon. What a game he had in Game 5 to close it out. That line, that line with this Ross Colton kid who flies around with Tyler Johnson and then they got Maroon down low. He is so good at protecting the puck. And that line had about 40 chances to score. And then Colton finally buried the second goal to make it 2-0. That pretty much put the game away.

But that being their fourth line is wild. That's got to really irritate other fan bases. When they insert the one guy who's not a household name in the lineup. He's been awesome. American kid, too, from Jersey. And then he gets the... He's been awesome. He gets the... American kid, too, from Jersey. Yeah, and then he gets the... What do you call that? The insurance goal?

Yeah, he gets the second goal in a clinching game. And Islanders fans, he lost in six last year, and it was in overtime, so I think there is a lot of confidence for Islanders players and fans in terms of going to this series. Basically, as much confidence as you could have

going playing a wagon like Tampa. But they didn't have Stamkos and Point missed two games. So, Islanders, you're not playing the same team. And you don't have Anders Lee, which, by the way, I do need to mention the Islanders are doing this without their leader and one of their best forwards. Very impressive. But you are going into the lion's den in Tampa. And good luck.

You're going to need it. But you're not playing against the same team that you played against last year. Well, I disagree with you. And even John. About what? Going to Cooper's comments after the last two rounds and play the clip right now, Grinnell.

Okay. I've been very fortunate to coach in a few playoffs now. And those are two of the toughest rounds we've ever faced. And it was a hell of a grind to get out of this division. So he said, after those first two rounds, he goes, as long as they've been there, those have been some of the hardest they've had to battle through. We know Florida was a war, and even though this one was five,

every game was competitive, chances at both ends, and it took a lot out of them so i actually think advantage islanders given the fact that they steamrolled boston and they playing that playoff type hockey i think that they're going to be able to shut them down and i in fact like their depth even a little bit more what the fuck are you talking about dude what are you talking you like Islanders' depth better than the Tampa Bay Lightning? Are we fucking doing this right now? All right, let me tell you something. Let me tell you something. Let me tell you something.

Sezekis, Martin, and Wellens' own Cal Clutterbuck, yes, I do like their depth a little bit better. Okay, Biz. All right, all right. So let's say this. Adam Pellick is a fucking stud. We've talked about him. And him and Pulak did a great job playing against Bergeron's line.

And they're going to have to do it against Kucherov and Point. Do you think Letty and Mayfield are going to have a better time or an easier time playing against Stephen Stamkos, Alex, and fucking Alex Killorn than Krejci and Hall? It won't matter. They're going to be put on the offensive blue line. Do you think Andy Green and Doy green do you think andy green and dobson and dobson's a nice young player but there was some third periods he didn't see the

ice do you think it's going to be easy for them do you think it's going to be easy for them to go against gord goudreau and coleman probably the best third line in the nhl the last two seasons no the depth issue right now and the the the fucking mentality you have that the islanders have more depth than tampa is top three dumb things he's said in the history of the podcast. And we both have a million dumb things. That right there, put it on a fucking clip. That's one of the dumbest things I've ever heard him say. Now I know exactly why Islanders and all these other fan bases hate your guys.

There's six fan bases who hate me. That means there's 25 once. No, no. We got 32 teams now. So there's 26 team fan base who still love me. Despite the fact that they have two big players playing in this series that they didn't have last year. Who was it?

It was Stamkos. And who was the other one? Point missed two games out of the six. And pointed at missing two games. I like Islanders chances way more this year than last year. I think he's on meth. Okay. Two episodes in a row. You put it up my hoop with.

I got my French-speaking names mixed up. It was Patrice Breezeby. The lowering the mound one was great, though, because you were, like, talking shit. Well, I was making that wrong joke for 20 years. No one called me out on it. Sean, our new videographer, he ended up coming in with the answer. He was well aware. Well, he's a baseball stud, so he knows. He goes, they fucking lower that. And everyone, it's all. Sean, our new videographer, he ended up coming in with the answer. He was well aware.

Well, he's a baseball stud, so he knows. He goes, they fucking know what they're doing. And it's great. Everyone who listens to the show heard me argue, and then they run to Twitter and tell me. I'm like, yeah, keep listening to the show. I apologize to it halfway through. You actually came over and sat next to me just to apologize. Yeah, I did.

I had a grovel before you. Bizzle will be apologizing once Tampa wins in five or six. We've got to mention one other thing. We've been talking about Palat last year. Well, Palat made his presence known the other day with a fly-by-chicken wing on Brett Pesci's melon. Now, I know it wasn't the highest speed one, and Pesci was fine,

but I was surprised he didn't even get a fine after that. Like, those are the type of hits we talk about. I don't get it. The league is trying to get rid of. They're trying to eradicate him. That's a guy going out of his way to hit a guy in the head with a fucking arm shoulder elbow whatever he lifted his arm up to hit him he doesn't even get a fucking fine i have no problem with palat as a as a person but how does

he not get a fine especially we go back to the scheifele he gets four playoff games for checking a guy 0.3 seconds after after he had the puck was it already mentioned that you ended up sending a tweet you said that's way dirtier than what Shifley did. No, we didn't say that. But it was. It was. Palat made it clear that he was blatantly going for the guy's face. And he put a shoulder right into his face.

And people go bananas on me on Twitter. It's a day that ends in Y. So I'm not surprised. Shifley fucking skated the whole length of the ice wall yeah he was trying to stop an empty netter i said it was charging but if you're going to talk about actual act of like trying to injure somebody fucking palat did it way more than shifley did shifley was trying to save a goal palat just blatantly shouldering a guy in the face he got two minutes for it i was shocked r.a i thought after the game he might get suspended yeah not even a fine i mean like richie get five it's confusing fine it is it is

very very very confusing but and i love george peros and i don't fucking resent i'm not jealous of having that job that might be one of the toughest jobs in the world but that one made no sense to me yeah it's just like they say the only inconsistency is the inconsistency great job r.a great job uh carolina um know, did they make progress this year? I know they had designs on a Stanley Cup run. I thought their goaltender let them down collectively. Again, Nadelgovich was fine the last game, but he let up that dud in game one when it looked like overtime was coming.

Then they go to Mrazic. Mrazic has that disaster of a game where they had eight goals in the second period there. So I don't know. I don't know if they're going to get goals in the second period there. So I don't know. I don't know if they're going to get by Tampa Bay no matter what. But I don't know. Do they take a step back? I think they got their core locked up. Yeah.

Oh, they got a lot of free agents. Well, they got Martin, who I believe is a free agent, who I think is a leader in that locker room and a good depth player. Dougie Hamilton. That's a big one. Yeah. But other than that they got shvetsnikov as a rfa rfa they got ajo they got teravine and they got the they got the big pieces

locked in so in that regard i mean yeah is it is it easy to go out and fill the guys around them well maybe not on your typical year but given a lot of teams are up against the cap and and you know we're in a in a bit of an odd time, and there is expansion. Can they fill those roles with other guys around them where they can make that next step? And, Ari, I agree with you. The biggest one, in my opinion, 100% has got to be goaltending. And that's the thing. When you look at where Carolina is.

Go on. He likes golf. Close to North Carolina. Tobacco Road's got some golf courses. You look at Tampa Bay and you ask if Carolina has a step back. Well, if you want to compare yourself to a cup champion and an all-time great team, and that is Tampa Bay right now, you're missing the high-end talent on the blue line in Victor Hedman.

I love Jacob Slavin. I love Dougie Hamilton. Neither one of them are Victor Hedman. Now, that's not a I love Dougie Hamilton. Neither one of them are Victor Hedman. Now, that's not a crazy thing to say. He's one of the best defensemen in the world. So you're missing that high-end talent on the back end. I love Sebastian Ajo. Tara Vinen's a really nice player. Svechnikov will continue to improve.

You don't have a Kucherov. And I'll say you don't even have a point. Maybe Ajo, if he's playing on Tampa Bay, could be legitimately better and look like point does, but you don't have the top end talent on the front. And then the biggest issue of all is you don't have the goaltender. So when you want to talk about what do we need to do? If I'm looking at Carolina's team, what do we need to do to become a Stanley Cup champion? You need the superstars. And you've seen with the Blackhawks and the Penguins and the Kings, you have those superstars in the key positions that Carolina doesn't have

and the biggest ones goaltending. So where do you go out and figure that out? I don't know. But right now, that's what you're missing, that high-end talent that's able to put you over the top. Fair. Smartest thing you've said all podcast. I've been fucking rolling through this podcast.

You're like a Canadian Jets Canucks fan. I don't think we've mentioned the biggest piece of that organization, Brindamore. He's not signed, yeah. I don't think he's signed either. So you kind of go to the Barry Trotz talk and, you know, what he can do as a head coach with the players that he has and how he's able to galvanize the group and, you know,

get them to play under the system. Well, that to me is the main piece because if you lose him, I feel like you lose your entire team identity and as crazy as that sounds as a coach you know because oftentimes we say you know is what you know there's only so much coaches can do it's about the players this kind of has a little bit of a different feel to it and I feel like they beat to his drum not signing Brindamore would be like hitting the reset button for that franchise I think well and they could have already signed him all he wants is the entire staff, including his coaching staff,

trainers, equipment managers, to all be re-signed, and they still haven't given him that. I mean, many people have said, like, give this guy whatever the fuck he wants. Because not only are you going to continue to have a culture that's on the rise, you're not even going to have to pay Brindamore what he'd get on the open market. I don't even think he's looking for one of those $5 million, $6 million a year coaching jobs that are now being given out to the elite. more what he'd get on the open market. I don't even think he's looking for one of those $5 million, $6 million a year coaching jobs that are now being given out to the elite.

So crazy talk to not even consider doing whatever Rod Brindamore says to get him back. I think they're just being weary that he doesn't get all his people signed, then he bounces off to Seattle to go meet up with his boy, Ronnie Francis. Imagine he gets them all three-year deals, and he's like, I'll sign last. His office is cleaned out, but he left one cracking sign in the back. And yeah, they don't even have a goalie signed for next year yet. Reimer and Mrazic, both

UFAs. Nedeljkovic is an RFA. He's not signed yet. He made $737K last year. Probably be looking for a bump. He seems like to be a big part of their future, but I don't know if they're going to bring in another veteran. I'm just going to remind everyone going into this series. And this is no shot at all against Andy Green.

What a career he's had an older player who's grinded his way for fucking 16 years. I think he's been in the league. The third pairing of the Islanders is Andy Green and Noah Dobson. The third pair of the fucking Tampa Bay lightning is Sergeyev and Savard. There you go. Wow. So Savard's been in and out of the lineup. It's been him. No, he was hurt, and now he's back in, and he's playing great.

I thought him and Cernak were switching. No, Cernak's still in. Cernak's playing with McDonough. How's that fucking second pair, Biz? Okay. Yeah, good call with the depth talk. And also to a Carolina, Dougie Hamilton. That'll be a huge hole if he leaves.

He made 5.75 last year. He's probably going to be looking for a raise. Oh, he— Fuck yeah. That guy's an offensive wizard. And I think that with what happened in Boston and Calgary, you remember the talk about how he was pissed his brother got sent down with Calgary? And finally, he really has found his way in Carolina.

I'm sure a lot of it has to do with Brindamore, and a lot of it has to do with him getting older and more mature as a player. You cannot lose him if you're looking to continue to build this thing. Yep, absolutely. Maybe the Islanders can pick him up, because you said they need to work on their depth. Oh, not you, though. They've got the best depth in the world. Alright, boys. The internet has

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stuff so without further ado, Colin Blacko. What do you got, Piz? Well, I think, Grinnell, you end up growing up with him. You said he was a pretty good lacrosse player as well, right? Unbelievable. I think they won a state championship their senior year. I think he could have went and played at Harvard for lacrosse as well. He's a five-star athlete.

Five-star athlete. And I tell you what, great story and a lot of resilience and adversity battled through, and congratulations to him on a great year and a bronze medal at the world championships yep all right let's kick it over to Colin Blackwell it's time to bring our next guest on the show and it's been a while since we had a fellow Massachusetts guy on wit this guy played at Harvard before turning pro he just finished his fifth season and his third in the NHL, where he posted career highs in goals, assists, and points for the New York Rangers. Thanks so much for joining us on the Spittin' Chicklets podcast.

Colin Blackwell, how's it going, man? Not too bad, guys. Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. Our pleasure. Congrats, dude, playing over for Team USA in Latvia for the World Championships. Your first time representing your country? Yeah, it's pretty unreal. The only time I really got a chance to, obviously, did those festivals growing up.

Yeah. And then did the pre-World Junior Tournament thing. So for me to kind of get a chance to do something like this overseas, wear that jersey, it's pretty special. Yeah, for people who don't know, when the COVID hit, we started doing some online video game and you came on you were an awesome guy to just kind of shoot the shit with when we were playing video games we said we'd have to have him back on and then who knew the

season you'd have this year it's really cool to see what happened in new york for you just kind of getting a chance to play a role you never had had had the opportunity to before yeah i think when i played nhl with you guys i had to scratch myself or i had to scratch somebody else in order to get myself in that game so you called yourself up dude from the minors i think yeah i did and then ended up getting hurt like a minute into the game so that went well but um yeah like it's just kind of one of those things everything kind of went so uh it was wild year and i finally got a chance to play and i was was all I was really looking for, and it ended up working out for me. So it ended up being a great fit.

When's the first game? Who are you playing? So I guess right now we're Thursday. So Friday we got one more practice, and then we play Finland in the first game, quick back-to-back with Finland and Canada. So jump right into it. A couple practices before we kind of get the ball rolling so looking forward to it it's the rink is sick everything's pretty sick out here so it's pretty exciting i mean just even going back to the last couple years like i don't want to say

you didn't have stability but obviously not given the ice time and then even going back before that bouncing around the american league what was it about coming into this year and finally settling yourself in as a full-time nhl hockey player yeah i think i've had two different times in my career where i kind of really needed to you know make the jump or make the step like i think going into my second year in the ahl too i was like all right either i'm going to be a full-time fourth line player in the ahl and also uh maybe borderline coast player and I kind of needed to just change my mindset a little bit I think when I played in Rochester after jumping over from San Jose I finally just you know I was like you know what screw it I'm just gonna play hockey and kind of do my thing and I think just being able a little bit looser and stuff like that and

then I kind of took that mindset into this year I mean I was turned 28 years old I've got a little bit of a taste of it going into the year I think I played what 33 games beforehand and I was basically saying you know this is my last chance and you don't know how many chances you might you might get in this and you know the league's getting so much younger and I know this year too we had so many young guys on the team and I was kind of one of the older guys even though I didn't have too much experience so for for me, it was a little bit of a mindset, just kind of, you know, saying, Hey, this is my last chance. Let's let's take a run at it. Cause if I don't crack it this year, then, you know, you know, some teams are going to move on for me. So you combine that with getting a little bit more playing time and having a little bit longer leash, you know, good things can happen

when you get a lot of confidence. And that's kind of what happened with me. I've kind of always been able to do it and jump up and down the lineup and i was just kind of waiting for that shot i think that's one thing guys don't understand or you know you get to the national hockey league level and all of a sudden you're on the bottom two lines and your leash is this big and if you make a mistake you're playing not to make mistakes basically and that's probably what you were feeling when you're bouncing around even the american hockey league at the beginning yeah absolutely mean, when I came into the AHL, I mean, a lot of people, I think, don't realize it or kind of get it. Like I was just saying, like, even though I never really played that situation in my life, like I remember playing

against you. I played for the Barracuda and I was saying the last game that you had when you played in Ontario, like I was literally on the ice for that um when you fought um Sortini like I was a fourth line center in the AHL and I was like I might not be happy with it but at the same time this is how I'm gonna get noticed and this is kind of how I'm gonna uh you know get more ice time and just kind of go from there and it's either you can go down to the coast and maybe put up a lot of points or kind of accept your role and end up being the best thing for me because I think a lot of teams maybe saw you know i've always been more of an offensive minded guy my whole entire career and then i showed i could kind of play that

bottom six kind of mindset and that kind of gave me a good kind of perspective of how i was gonna you know play my game moving forward like you're not gonna take guys who are on the first and second line uh out of the lineup uh when you're coming up from the minors. They're just that good and that skilled. So for me, I knew I was going to start on the fourth line and kind of climb my way up from there. We love going back and, you know, to kids growing up and how they got into hockey. And I kind of want to hop quickly, though. You played at Harvard and I think a lot of people don't know what guys go through in their career.

And you yourself, I think you had to miss a whole year playing, right? Because of a concussion? Yeah, two years, actually, a little more than two like uh that's amazing journey journey's been long and uh so like even just coming back here everything coming full circle the year that i had uh like this year was special but just kind of going back to some of the beginning years that i had my freshman year at school i did pretty well and then going into my sophomore year i was hoping to do and expecting like big things and I end up getting two concussions my sophomore year back to back and I think I played 50 percent of my sophomore year missed my whole junior year withdrew from school and then pretty much missed

20 26 out of the first 28 games of my senior year um so then i ended up coming back for playoffs that year um doing pretty well and all of a sudden kind of got the ball rolling again had that fifth year of eligibility and used it there um and kind of tried to climb the ladder to get my hockey career back on track pretty much that is amazing because to be where you're at now a great season with new york playing for team usa I mean there was a time you probably wondered like am I ever going to play hockey again oh yeah like I remember uh you know uh looking at internships and being like what's the next thing and like one of the funny stories is I remember going to I was doing like consulting interviews and like financial interviews and it

was like a group interview with like on campus with a bunch of like five other really smart like Harvard kids. And basically everybody went through why you should be the person to get this internship. And I basically looked around the room and I was just like, these guys answers are 50 times better than mine. Like you can take him over me. Like, come on now. Like I was like, I was looking like kind of hockey was in the rear view mirror. I started looking at a lot of different things, what avenue I was going to go. And I mean, yeah, there's some pretty dark times where I was just ready to kind of hang them up and kind of see what the next step was kind of going from there.

And definitely I was lucky I was able to climb out of it. But I was definitely looking at some different things I could do. When you said there was two back to back, was it for sure you came back a little too early from the first one or were you more stubborn? Like how did that all go about where you were already playing maybe too soon? Yeah, I think the first one like kind of messed me up a little bit just because, you know, I'd never had one of these before. So when I took the hit, I knew something, you know, I didn't feel 100% right, but I didn't think it was like bad enough to maybe sit out or something along those lines. So I ended up playing maybe a couple more games through it when I,

I looking back shouldn't have. And then going back to the second one, I mean, I was healthy enough to come back, came back, probably played, you know, a handful of games before I got the second one. But, um, and then all of a sudden you kind of go through that whole dark hole, black hole of, you know, one hit something along those lines, uh, you know, you don't feel right. And, you know, looking back, like, you know, one hit, something along those lines. You know, you don't feel right. And, you know, looking back, like I definitely had, you know, some battles. You know, maybe I could have come back like the second time

or after the second one a little bit quicker. But it's just the mental head games that I kind of played with my head that a lot of people don't really think about. Like it's an invisible injury. Like I look good from the outside but you know I was dealing with some things and to kind of get over them and finally you know you know break the hump and break the mold and kind of feel like myself again was you know it was two years so it was pretty dark times but just to kind of go back and feel

comfortable playing again that was like the biggest thing was was there anything in particular you had to do like go see any specialists i know yes i saw him i saw him all going to see uh jonathan siglet i believe the guy's name is yeah so i'll give him a little shout out like i you know first six months kind of had um was kind of taking it easy in the next six months my parents kind of got involved and then the next six months after that i was kind of researching different things like trying to go outside the outside the norm of seeing osteopaths and doing acupuncture and all that stuff just at that point in time it wasn't really about playing hockey again it was just about feeling like myself again i ended up like withdrawing from school because you know i was feeling like shit and wasn't doing school wasn't

being able to like party go out do anything like that drink too much and then I wasn't playing hockey so I was like what am I doing here I gotta start thinking about myself as opposed to you know think about getting back on the ice so one of my buddies on my team I was ready to hang him up and kind of give it up and basically he had said know, I got a concussion and went down to the boys at TV 12 and Foxborough. And I was back in, you know, uh, like, uh, two weeks or so. So I was like, you know what, why don't I, you know, go give it a try and I went down there and my guy down there, physical therapist, Dave, uh, you know,

he got me back and probably a week and a half, two weeks. It was all my neck. It was just so messed up. Wow. That's what Crosby did. It was all his neck. Yeah. It was all these different muscles and stuff. And I ended up coming back and playing in the playoffs that year.

And it wasn't until two years after all this stuff happened that obviously now anytime I go back and see him whenever I can. And he's the man and basically saved my hockey career pretty much. Shout out Dave at TB12. I'm battling an elbow injury, not to make it about myself, but I randomly, no, I randomly got a text. I got a text from a buddy who said, Hey man, I had the same injury in this guy, Dave at TB12 helped me out. And then you just said it. So I wonder if it's him. It's Dave, Dave Marison. He's, he's the best. Like anytime I'm home, I, uh, I try to go in and see him. So Are you on the diet now? Are you a full-blown cult member?

No, not that big. I definitely started eating healthier once I got there. That's kind of part of it. Some of the stuff you eat and everything along those lines. No, I'm not that big. I think everything's good in moderation. For me, it was really just getting the right hands on some of the stuff that I had trouble with. And, you know, he's the best.

So I've gone to him for a couple of different stuff here and there. And, yeah, he's the man. I actually saw him right before I came out here to Latvia. And the guy just gets it. Colin, was Harvard a place you wanted to go as a little kid in grade school? Did hockey put it on the map for you later? Yeah, I think, honestly, growing up, i was a big unh and maine fan like i remember the days when maine was in the um yeah the frozen four i remember i love their jerseys both their jersey

i just thought that rivalry was so sick growing up in new england and BUBC like Nathan Gerby was a guy my size I enjoyed watching him growing up and then for me it was basically I went on all these tours in college and got to the point where Teddy Donato said to me and he almost jinxed me but you know if you get hurt and never play hockey again you know what kind of degree what do you want type of thing and I was like you know you just hit the nail right in want type of thing and i was like you know you just hit the nail right in the head right there like at the end of the day like i want to play hockey afterwards but if it doesn't work out like harvard if i get a chance if i get a chance to go here that paper goes pretty far so i was kind of like it was a no-brainer and took me

man i took that sat so many damn times like just trying just trying like again again yeah literally it was an absolute grind but ended up working out and um you know can't say enough good things about that and that program and just kind of how it started and how it finished for me like the way i came in when the program was kind of in the bottom and our class i felt like did a really good job of kind of bringing it back and seeing where they are now and some of the guys that they get like um it was definitely pretty special to be a part of did you fill out a league in classes with like all the nerds that are super snot oh it was a funny story my dad will probably kill me but um it was right after i got my first uh conch i all the a lot of classes there are um like participation base you get a lot of points and stuff for going.

So I had just gotten a concussion and it was sophomore year where you have to like pick and choose your major and they call it a concentration. And I chose government, um, after hacking it through some math and econ, I couldn't hack it. So I switched over. And, um, so all of a sudden there's this huge lecture hall, like three, 500 kids and some political science class. And this is this world renowned professor. And I'm sitting there in the front row.

Cause I had to go see the doc and the neuropsych guy afterwards. And, you know, he said, raise your hand for where are you guys just trying to, from a political standpoint, left wing or right wing. We had like half the group say they were like right wing, half the group say they're left wing. So like, I'm buzzing out the door afterwards. Didn't a word didn't raise my hand and i uh he stops me and is like oh i didn't see you're the only one that didn't really raise your hand he left winged or right winged i looked at the guy dead ass in the eyes and i'm like no i actually play center

and i uh and governments is major and i walked out the door i'm like halfway down to the rink oh my god like this guy either thinks i'm the biggest idiot of all time or he's like damn this guy is clever as hell and i'm like holy shit like i just told this guy to his face like i thought he was talking hockey oh my god i hope he gave you a sympathy grade after that one. No, he did. No, I just, like, I had, like, my, at the time, I had my hockey stuff on. He saw me, and I just thought he was like, oh, what, like, position do you play? And I was like, no, man, I'm a natural center. Yeah, man.

Hold on a bit. Sorry, you brought up your dad there. He might kill you for telling the story. And I heard another classic one where apparently you scored, I think, a hat trick to win the state title in an unreal celebration with a cover on the Boston Globe, Boston Herald. But your old man wasn't thrilled. Is that true? Yeah, I think you heard that from one of the boys. Yeah, I think I did way too big of a celebration and my dad grounded me at the time.

That's old school. Selly by the other team's bench and he was the coach at the time because I think I was sellied by the other team's bench. And he was the coach at the time. I remember he was so pissed at me. And yeah, so you kind of learn the hard way that way. But yeah, you win some, you lose some. Oh, I was just going to say, so he was very strict growing up? Yeah, like not too bad. I mean, I think, yeah, he was definitely pretty strict.

Now that you say you say just like hockey wise like I mean the way I look at it is like he invested so much time and money like growing up mass high school hockey like then sending me to school and stuff like if you let the guy down like uh that's just how our bond like grew just through hockey going to the rinks and stuff like that so um definitely it was pretty strict like I mean I feel like if you're a parent you're putting that much time and effort and, you know, money into your kid, like you want them to put the best foot forward. So like, yeah, he was definitely pretty strict and, uh, but he was definitely a huge role

model for me. Like, uh, hopefully I don't ground my kid. I hope he celebrates pretty well when he scores a goal. But, uh, at the time, like, yeah, I totally get it. It was pretty hilarious. So over the top, you guys have a bit of a, an FU match when he tried to suspend you for a couple weeks after celebrating? Yeah, we've definitely had a couple of those, but he usually wins those. Well, another classic story Grinelli tells me is, I mean, you're the best player in the state,

but apparently you got four goals in the first period against Grinelli's team and just walked off the ice. How do you think he remembers? I don't know about that one. I think we had like, we definitely had a rule. Like our team, like 93 Warriors growing up, like we were stacked. And, you know, there's two leagues in Mass. There's the Metro and the Mass Select League.

And a lot of the good players played in that Metro League. And we didn't play against them. We'd scrimmage them and still do really well. And I felt like our team was pretty stacked we always won a bunch of like state championships you guys won it every single year man you guys would go to nationals every single year but whit was talking about restuccia preseason st john's prep versus burlington high first period it was you pharaoh and sam kirker kirker who went to bu you you guys ended up beating us like eight to three you scored three

goals in the first period, and then you skated after your third goal in the slot. You skated directly off the ice and then came back on the bench in your street clothes, and you and Farrell are just chirping us the whole game. It was the cockiest thing I've ever seen. I forgot about that. It was a preseason game.

In preseason, like, it's basically a tryout for all the guys. So our bench, like, you couldn't even stand on the bench because there's like 30, 40 guys on there. on there guys are like bleeding into the locker room so then all of a sudden we got our reps in we scored we did our thing and i remember a coach looked at me and he was just like get the fuck off yes type of thing so we went and showered and yeah it was like a coach for like the second half of the game I remember that it's not often anymore that kids go right from mass high school hockey and without a year go right into d1 so that freshman year you had a good season it was pretty easy for you had you even looked into playing junior for a year it

wasn't necessary yeah I actually looked I was looking at uh playing for junior Bruins or junior Warriors and the EJ at the time and then I talked about maybe going out to to Dubuque for a year in the USHL and pretty much how it worked is that that was the plan I was committed for a year after that and what ended up happening as a kid who ended up going to BC he got waitlisted at the school and didn't get in so the next day they were short a guy and I was the only really one I had done really well my senior year and like progressed a little bit faster than they thought. And then on top of that, I had finished all my high school credits and done all that. And basically a lot of people were like, you don't have to go play juniors.

And I ended up working out. I went right in. And but yeah, I was definitely working out. But yeah, it's definitely a huge jump. But, you know, when i was a freshman we had a lot of good players come in too and then the senior on the team captain he was i think the best player in college hockey that year was alex calorn and he just was so dominant and i got a chance to play with him a lot um and for a young guy go in all i literally i could have told you i had probably a couple primary assists where i just passed to him in the D zone. The guy went coast to coast.

That was Wynn's career. So like it made my, my life a little bit easier. And then finally when you have a team that goes from, I think coming in, they were Harvard was one of the worst teams in the ECAC, I think last place. And then we finished second lost in the championship that year. That's when everything started turning around. Colin, do you play like you talking for your town before like all the traveling elite teams at all yeah i think like going up to pewee's i played for north daniel youth hockey um and then it kind of switched over i played for both for a little while i used to play

saturdays for your town and Sundays for Valley Junior Warriors. So we kind of play all over the map. So we look at you leave Harvard. You're healthy now. You had been picked by the Sharks. What was the contract? Did you sign an AHL deal? Did you get an NHL deal?

Because it was just one year with the Barracuda. I'm wondering how you ended up in Rochester so quick and what the contract out of school looked like. Oh, it was not good. Pige deal I joke I joke with my friends I was eating chocolate I was getting paid chocolate chocolate covered almonds back then I I basically uh yeah I think I got paid one year AHL deal league minimum 45 and a um it was kind of like uh I think I was one of their better prospects for a little while and then all of a sudden I stopped playing and yeah um I think it was kind of like uh i think i was one of their better prospects for a little while and then all of a sudden i stopped playing and yeah um i think it was kind of one of those things my senior year i did pretty well but i still kind of had the injury bug and i still wasn't 100%

quite myself so it was kind of a you know take what you can get for them yeah they give me a contract and you know maybe i do well for them and turn out to be myself and then um if not like i wasn't really worth anything to them and basically we had i think we had 14 rookies on that team that's like you talked about it uh biz in a in a different podcast that san jose barracuda team was so stacked there's so many guys that play in the nhl right now and um team o'meara was down there wasn't he yeah Timo Meier Kevin LeBanc Ryan Carpenter Daniel Regan was the HL player of the year on the back end we had um Yoakum Ryan played in the NHL um this guy just did a great job of drafting and developing in San Jose they've always done it pretty well and it's hard for for probably a guy not getting an entry-level contract

because at that point in time, you'd been drafted by them. The time had gone up where they didn't sign you, and then they obviously gave you that opportunity because you'd recover from your injury. So at that point in time, it's like part of the financial investment plays a big factor into the development now, especially in the American League. Even when we came in, even as a rookie,

if you were highly drafted. You get chances. Yeah, well now, especially they put you right in the power play where even more so back when I started that you still had to ease your way into it. You weren't just handed everything. So yeah, it's a grind for sure.

Yeah, so it was kind of like when I went to training camp, I saw one of my jerseys that was kind of being made for the Allen training camp I saw one of my jerseys I was like kind of being made for the Allen Americans um and I was like oh shit like that's like a big wake-up call it's the east coast like maybe that's where they see me type of fit and I had a pretty good training camp and I remember like a lot of guys that at Joe Pavelski there like he's had some really good things to say to me and I think for a young guy coming in, like that goes a long way. Like probably has no idea who I am now,

but like pulled me aside and just said he liked some of the stuff that I had. And it just gave me a little bit more confidence, like kind of going into that training camp. And I basically, you know, ended up going down to the Barracuda and our team was like pretty stacked and we were really good all year. Like I think we went on a 17 game heater and, you know, I kind of saw my role was kill penalties and, you know,

play on the fourth line and kind of go from there. And I didn't get that much playing time. But I had a really good playoffs, I thought, that year. And I thought going into the next summer that I'd have a job. And it ended up being, like, interesting. It was October pretty much, and I still, after the summer, just, yeah, didn't even have a contract. The worst feeling in the world.

Wait, so guys were going to camp and you had nothing? Nothing. I ended up going to Buffalo's and it's funny how it worked out. There was a, I ended up going to Buffalo's rookie tournament. And the only reason why I went was because one of my teammates at Harvard was a center and he hurt his back like the day before and I ended up they call me and be like hey we need a center for this rookie camp and I was like this is perfect like there's gonna be a bunch of teams there and I can showcase myself and if I don't end up signing with you then hey whatever like so I end up going and I end up like kind of leading it and scoring

doing really well holy I was one of the older guys there but that's kind of why i was like shit this is like a hit or miss like if i if i do poorly i'm done 20 24 years old like that's the last chance so like a lot of pressure on me there going into that and i did well and they basically said hey we want to invite you to rochester's camp and i basically said hey i want to come and i want to be a part of this but um i kind of want to go knowing that if I go to this, then there's going to be maybe a potential to sign like an HL contract for the rest of the year or something along those lines. So I end up going, doing really well. And I ended up landing in a situation that, you know, really changed my hockey career in a sense that right when I got there, you know, you just talked about there's a lot of prospects and a lot of people that may be general manager that um you know drafted them or signed them has a lot of affinity to and it was all new management that came over from pittsburgh um so they had no basically affinity to any of the people

in the pipeline and it was basically a clean slate for everyone so i kind of went in there did my thing got a pto out of it signed a 25 game p. And then in my first like five games, I did really well. And they ended up signing me to a contract for kind of the rest of the year, maybe after five, 10 games, something like that. So, um, and then I ended up kind of playing on the third line, killing penalties, didn't play in the power play at all, found my little role. And, um, I ended up like kind of leading that team and scoring it was just like a perfect fit for me and like I was saying earlier like confidence is kind of everything I just kind of took off from there where I was like that was the year where I was basically like

all right I'm either going to be out of the league in a year and a half I'm going to be working behind a desk or I need to kind of basically stop worrying about what other people think and kind of just play hockey like I've done my whole entire life and you know I also then started gaining some confidence trust from the coaching staff other players and it kind of went from there and we also had a sick team so like if you play on the top three lines you got to play with some really good players so like I played with Alex Nylander who plays in Buffalo I mean in Chicago now and Hudson Fashing for majority of the year who plays really good AHL player right now has got some NHL experience too so like that was our third line and so the team was pretty stacked that's wild that not only did you deal with a concussion and wondering if there was

going to be a future then you come back actually have a good year in the AHL and stuck again so it's so crazy to see how it could end it and then you play in Rochester have that good year were they not did they not want to re-sign you? How did that go down? No, they did. It was just interesting. A lot of the things that went on were I really felt that they liked me and that they wanted me there.

But when we came in, there was eight, I think, NHL contracts that they had buried in the coast from the previous management. So it was like a contract thing where they wanted to wait, wait, wait. And I didn't really want to wait. And it was finally coming off that big year. And, you know, I already felt like I kind of, you know, missed a lot in a sense of maybe getting an entry-level contract out of college. And I'm seeing all these guys making four times as much as I am. And I'm playing over them and stuff.

And I was like, I'm sick of, it was kind of one of those things like, you know, you want to go where you're wanted type of thing. And that's how I ended up in Nashville talking to Scotty nickel out there. Like I ended up talking to him and, you know, he, basically everything that he said is everything that I was kind of asking for, looking for that chance type of thing. And so that's how I ended up signing in Nashville for two years and um you know I know that the Buffalo wanted me it was just along the

lines of you know they had a lot of prospects there they had a lot of things and I was just really looking for where the best fit for me really was it's it's so interesting talking to you because I think people listening at home and just looking at like my career it's like everyone thinks it's pretty easy. You get drafted, you go to camp, you're in the NHL. Whereas 90% of the guys, they have routes like you. I mean, maybe not as crazy as yours, but it is such a grind. And so many players in the NHL like yourself had a time in their early 20s

where they maybe thought, I'll never play in that league. It's just crazy to have to have that self-belief grinding through so many times when there's no answers for you. No, 100 percent. Like I've said it to a bunch of people before. There's obviously a huge difference between the American League and the NHL. But there are so many good players and the minors that they just really haven't really gotten a chance or they get called up and they put up a ton of points in the NHL. But they're buried on a fourth line and that's not really their style of game or their role. So I kind of basically had to reinvent my game a little bit,

and basically I was like, hey, I grew up a Bruins fan, so I saw guys like even look at Marshawn and Lucic. Those are two guys that I could be wrong, but they didn't get called up, and they play on the first line the first year that they were in Boston. I remember Lucic was fighting people left and right, and he was playing that fourth-line role. And then once he got that trust or whatever it was from staff, management, coaches, then all of a sudden he got a next opportunity and the opportunity after that.

And I was like, it's not going to be pretty, but that's kind of how I have to do it type of thing. So those are the kind of things that I started working on in the summer and the offseason and kind of changing my game a little bit. And I ended up working out. what led to your first call up from Nashville um yeah it was interesting that first year in Nashville was um I thought that might have been it was tough because I played probably 40 games in Milwaukee and probably only six I think six or seven in Nashville that year.

And I was one of the first one or last one sent down at training camp. Had a really good talk with Laviolette. I really think that he liked me. They liked me. And then my first game, I go down to the AHL and I pop on my shoulder, miss two months, come back. Jesus Christ, dude. Spumoni.

Yeah, come back. And I played 10 games, finally getting into it after missing some time. And then I, the fluke thing, I got another concussion, missed two months. And that's when I was like, shit, like during that time, a lot of guys had, um, you know, out for six to eight weeks. There were a lot of injuries that year. So I was like, man, if this is all about timing, I really missed out with a lot of the timing stuff. So finally i got healthy and started playing and even though

i missed a lot of time scored some goals and you know i ended up getting called up and our coach down there carl taylor like he does a lot of like individual meetings and he called me into his office and i was like oh you got to be shitting me like another one of these like i was coming off a weekend i didn't think i played that well or whatever it was and then all the staff and management were in there and told me i got called up and that's definitely one of the the worst like uh the best like most rewarding times of my life like i remember running grabbing my phone calling my parents calling my dad letting them know and it was kind of cool too because um the assistant coaches uh at the time in nashville dan mucy recruited me to go to yale and i end up going to harvard so it was 10 years later

however then kind of comes full circle and he's the one that called me like we had a lot of guys that year get called up and you know they didn't actually play in the game because you know somebody was a game time decision or something like that and And he called me up and was like, hey, like, like you're playing. So like you can tell your family to come stuff along those lines. So it was pretty sick. I had probably eight of my best buddies from growing up, my parents, my brother. So I think I lost money playing in that game because I paid for all these tickets and shit out there. And I remember looking at the invoice for all that and how much i actually

like got paid and i was like holy shit this isn't as great as it seems but um it was unreal just to experience it and share with those guys like people have stuck by me from day one and through all the stuff that i've gone through it was it was awesome who'd you uh get your first talk against um i got my first tuck against cory crawford not a bad one to have decent not a bad one to have and yeah and playing in the united center like i never really played there that place is unreal place to play yeah i get the goosebumps going for the anthem i was going to shift it over the rangers because we got some stuff to talk about what did you have before that all right uh no we could do that i was going to say real quick, how awesome is Nashville,

especially coming from Milwaukee? Unbelievable. Milwaukee, that's actually where I spent a lot of time in the summer now. When I played there in Milwaukee, honestly, one of the sneaky best cities I ever played in, the Miners, and so much fun, so much to do. It's a mini, I guess, major city. They got the Bucs. They got the Brewers. It's awesome to live there

and then when I lived there was winter time like not great weather so in the summer it's on the lake like lake life like it's unbelievable so I end up dating a girl from there and uh kind of live there in the off seasons now uh a lot of the time but then going to Nashville like we had the shutdown like I was in Nashville for like what is it six months where all i did was play golf like every single day pretty much golf and work out and then once rink started opening up um nashville is just it's unbelievable like that's a sweet place to play like it's everything about that the weather stuff to do you got broadway like fans yeah it's pretty it was pretty special so yeah biz last october you signed a two-year deal here in New York. Where do you live down here, by the way?

You live on the island? Honestly, this, yeah, this year, I actually, everybody but six guys kind of lived in the suburbs this year because we didn't really go into MSG. When I got there, everything was shut down. So it was, you know, it didn't really make much sense for me. We were going into the practice facility in Westchester pretty much every single day. And even on off days, we had to like test COVID tests every single day. So guys were driving 45 minutes into to test. So I just end up living kind of in the suburbs next year.

That's definitely not not the plan now that everything's kind of opening up, but definitely didn't get a chance to experience it as much as I know how sick it is. The last week that I was there, I spent a little bit of time. The weather was beautiful, and it almost seems like once everything got lifted, the whole city was buzzing around. So you finally got that chance in Nashville, and were you almost like, I'm not resigning here, or was it more like you just liked your opportunity and where the Rangers were headed?

just like your opportunity and where the Rangers were headed yeah I just like uh I definitely I felt like um you know I felt like I was grateful for the opportunity in Nashville but uh I didn't know if it was like the greatest fit for me they just had a lot of guys yeah I didn't really know kind of towards the end of it where exactly I fit um and I felt like I I felt like I maybe could have you know made a difference or something along those lines and just kind of the way I play. But I was just looking for that right fit, right spot. And, you know, Nashville is a pretty veteran savvy team. And I think, you know, going to a spot where overall there might have been a little bit more opportunity for me kind of up and down the lineup.

Like I signed as a center and I didn't play center at all the year, the whole year I ended up playing wing the whole entire year. And I got to play, you know, first line, second line, third line, fourth line, got on the power play a little bit towards the second half of the season, played penalty kill. And that was really what I was looking for just to kind of show everybody what I've always felt like I was capable, capable of doing what I showed for what I was able to do in the HL for a

little while and just really kind of get that chance and um you know talking to Chris Drury like he's one of the guys I talked to when I signed there I just felt like everything that he had said kind of you know fit my mold really well and what exactly they were looking for and you know how he saw my game um you know fit into the Rangers lineup and I think when you have somebody say that they want you and then give you specific examples is why they want you i think that kind of goes a long way it's not just somebody you know telling you what you want to hear because a lot of people in this business definitely do that and uh i just felt like he told it pretty straight like where

he saw me and how i was going to compete for a spot and kind of go from there and that's really all i was asking for i mean there were just so many big expectations coming to the year for you guys but you know second half you guys did pick it up you guys played extremely well I think you guys really turned around with that Philadelphia game the one that got I think you guys had what eight goals with no coach without the head coach right yeah like the second half of the year we finally we got off to a slow start like I I mean even for me like even the beginning of some of that distraction stuff I actually got taxi squad in the beginning of the year so I wasn't even like really there for it to be honest with you um so I didn't really know half the stuff that uh that happened or whatever so for me I can't really speak to it but um I think you know our team as

a whole we just kind of got off to a slow start like I can look back to a handful of games in the first 10 that we either lost in the last five minutes or in overtime like games we probably should have won and we just kind of got off to a slow start a little snake bit and it wasn't until kind of you know right after that 10 games maybe 15 games in we started picking it up picking it up and our big guys started dominating type of stuff like you have Zibanejad, Panarin, Bucinavich, Adam Fox, the year that he had like was insane. Like some of the stuff that guy pulls on the ice,

he's just so smart, so cerebral. And once everybody started clicking, like you said, there were a lot of expectations maybe coming in because how hot we got or how hot the Rangers got maybe the year before, before COVID happened. But this year is just so interesting with all the COVID stuff. We had a lot of guys missed training camp uh because they got covid or all of a sudden we'll have a game and somebody

missed it because maybe a false positive or something along those lines so from a covid perspective like it was just an interesting year like just having anxiety because i felt like i was one of the only guys people had gotten in maybe the previous year over the summer or right before training camp. And you look around the room, there weren't too many other people outside of myself and some others that hadn't gotten COVID yet. And, you know, if there's a breakout in the room or something along those lines, you know, you're probably going to get it. And it wasn't a matter of that. It was more like all of a sudden, this is a big year for me to basically make it or break it. Like all of a sudden, this is a big year for me to basically make it or break it. And I was like, that means I got to take possibly three weeks to a month off, depending on how things go.

So with the protocols and stuff. So I think guys were pretty dialed in from that standpoint. And once we kind of got all that figured out, everybody was pretty healthy. Everybody was on the same page. And we just started clicking and doing really well. The offenses started clicking. And it was just kind of no worries hockey. Colin, you were part of a pretty exciting moment a few weeks ago here in Manhattan. Obviously, the Tom Wilson, Panarin thing happened.

The next day, a team puts a statement out. GM gets fired. President gets fired. Next game, triple line brawl right off the hop were you expecting that did you know when you go on the ice that that was going to happen it was a talked about before or did it just spontaneously combust yeah it's actually funny uh um just the game in general like obviously um it's just kind of the unwritten rules of hockey like you guys know that like you stick up for your teammates and bread's a guy that we love and uh we just felt like you guys know that like you stick up for your teammates and Brad's a guy that we love and we just felt like you know what happened was a little bit over the top and we kind of needed

to respond and that day and even in pregame skate I wasn't even on that line I was on the third line at the time and I didn't really know I was starting until like five minutes beforehand so I knew obviously you know we were going to respond and try to, you know, stick up for, for what happened. And all of a sudden I heard my name call right beforehand and I i like i like i said i mean we love that guy and everything he's done for us and just to be able to i was so proud of a lot of the guys and everybody that that stepped up i mean for me i mean i went against like carl hagland i think i was like hey we're we're going here and uh you don't really have a choice and uh it was kind of like a friendly one of those and um it was kind of one of those things where, you know, I was so proud of some of the guys and just to be a part of it. And everybody kind of sticking up for one another and kind of things like that.

It's just like I said, the unwritten rules of hockey, like a brotherhood. And when one of your boys goes down, you got to stick up for him. And I think he would have done the same for us, too. What about Brett in the locker room? I mean, he's so, so amazing on the ice and he has so much energy at the leg kick celebration in the room is he loud is he quiet is he cracking jokes what's his whole vibe away from the arena uh he's awesome like uh he's one of the nicest guys i've ever met and he's honestly like so smart uh he's that was one thing that i just didn't really know about him or anything along those lines like he's so smart super smart guy super intellectual uh on the road he's always playing

chess but he's a he's russian like he loves cracking jokes making stuff like we always joke around uh how like you know the classic stuff like maybe malkin and uh in pittsburgh how he didn't know some of the guy's name so he'd always joke around and say how he didn't know my first name and stuff along those lines because everybody calls me Blackie and stuff like that. But, I mean, he's probably the best passer in the NHL and I got a chance to play with him a lot this year. The way things kind of unfolded and like if I miss one of his passes, like he'd always like smile at me and just kind of like give me one of the head nods, like shaking his head type of thing. Like I'm so much better than you. No. And then like finally, like the first time all season, I gave him a pass and he didn't

bury. And I just went up to him and just like took my head. Then you're in the minors again. You're the fucking coast. No, he's a great dude. He's always like playing jokes. And like he was also like one of the guys when I first got there, like it was tough this year because there's no like team building just because

all the COVID stuff. When I first got there, we had a quarantine for seven to 10 days or whatever it was. And everybody's wearing masks. I knew names, but I didn't know faces. So he was one of the first guys in the locker room introduced himself to me. Like couldn't be more down to earth. And guy just loves hockey.

Like he's sick. It's insane the way he sees the ice does uh is it been a jad get the the ox cord in the locker room i know he's a big dj in the off season yeah it's funny like i heard that too coming in i've heard some of his music and stuff and um he didn't really run the the dj stuff too too too much uh it was a couple other guys uh we had lemieux before he got traded and then um i think it was like truba um kind of some of the decor had the ipad and we're running the oxcord but um yeah he he's the same way like we had a lot of quiet guys that were like really funny and like mika like he's got his dj stuff on the side and some of the stuff and talk about

some of the most like down-to humans. Like I've ever met. They're just welcoming you in with open arms, nicest guys. And, and our leadership core was, was, was really good this year. Was that scrap with Hagelin your first fight ever? No, I've had a few in the minors. I've been more of a punching bag in the minors, but I don't even know if you can barely call that a scrap. That was more like a wrestling match than anything but uh yeah like i probably fought four times maybe in the ahl um most of the time it's because i've i play a little bit over the edge sometimes and i you know blow

somebody up and then you have to kind of like answer the bell type of thing i remember fighting like uh joseph labate in the ahl and he he fought like Ryan Reeves and some of these guys in the AHL. Oh, boy. Why the fuck are you like fighting me 6'4"? And I'm like, literally, I got my four quick punches in and then absolutely he went to town on me. But, yeah, like I've never been a fighter and obviously I've had to head stuff in the past. But I feel like that is kind of in the past. And it's just kind of one of those things like uh i know a lot of guys over the years

have stood up for me so um when i see stuff that you know like you said it's kind of that honor code uh your line mate guys you go to battle with every night um you always stick up for them and try to do what you can even though you're not really a heavyweight so i uh i've been good friends with quinny for a long time so i'm a a big fan of him. And I got two questions, one being were you really surprised when he got fired, and two, almost maybe a little disappointed because you had a head coach that really finally trusted you, and it's almost like, fuck, I was in with him. And now you're almost restarting everything again next year. Yeah, I'm used to that by now.

I feel like it's definitely tough, but I feel like, you know, nothing's ever really been given to me. So even this year, like I got a chance to play with those guys and be on that line. But every single day I'd come to the rink and check the board to see if I'd still be there. It was a tryout for me kind of every single day. So I got nothing but good things to say about Quinny.

Like I said, it was the first time I ever got a chance to play really. And he kind of gave me that chance and kind of get that confidence. So kind of same thing happened with me in Nashville with Peter Laviolette. Like he, towards the end there, I was there when we ended up having a coaching change. And towards the end in Nashville, too, I remember I didn't even play a game in the third, not a game, a shift in the third period but I was snapping it and draws and Blavie with 30 seconds left in a game in Anaheim we're up 4-3 told me to go take this defensive zone face off and I look back at him like you got to be kidding me like

I haven't played in literally 60 minutes because I've been sitting on the bench so like you know having coaches like that and then he you know ended up having a coaching change halfway through the year um and it's just you know next man up kind of mentality for me like it sucks definitely because I finally got that trust with that coaching staff and finally got a chance to play um but at the end of the day like I feel like uh I ended up you know it's my fifth year pro and it's been the same kind of almost every single year when I've made that change. So, you know, I definitely looking forward to seeing who comes in and stuff along those lines. But, you know, playing for Quinney was awesome for me.

And I'm really grateful for the opportunity that he gave me. Well, dude, as a as a fellow mask, I'm really proud of you and happy for you because I think people are going to listen to this, including kids. And like realize it isn't always easy at all. And the way you've just continued to grind and find that you're getting a good chance, I'm happy for you. And we appreciate you coming on. I'm sure it's late over there in Riga. But the other thing that's great about you playing in the Worlds is I remember when I went to the KHL. And who knows?

Maybe you want to continue to play in Europe when your NHL career ends. But if you play in the World Championships, it guarantees you a sick job in Europe. It's so important over there. Like the fact that you represent your country in that tournament will really open doors for you over in Europe someday if you do want to go over there. So congrats. No, I appreciate that.

Thank you. I know playing on this big ice surface, I'm hoping it's pretty good for a small guy like me. Going back to just mass, like you said, I think we got like eight plus mass guys that kind of were bred in mass uh hockey here kevin rooney rangers guy brian boyle a couple younger guys like shazo the whole crew of yep shazo yeah uh we got a heck of a we got uh ryan donato too i played with at school and his dad was my coach so like there's an awesome group there and it just says a lot about mass hockey, too.

Quickly, we'll let you go, but you got to tell Ryan Shea. His dad's a legend. Dan Shea, my buddy, this guy one time, Biz, unbelievable hockey player at BC back in the day. We went down golfing. He had two beers on the ride down. I was driving. He had seven beers in the front nine and shot five under. Shea's his dad.

He's a fucking living legend. So tell him. Get the mechanics going. Tell Ryan I said hi, and good luck over there five under. Shazo's dad. He's a fucking living legend. So tell him. Get the mechanics going. Tell Ryan I said hi and good luck over there, man. Thanks for coming on. Thanks, guys. I appreciate it. Big thanks to Colin joining us all the way from Riga, Latvia.

And again, congrats on the bronze medal. We had a few Massachusetts boys over there. Yep, Brian Boyle was the captain who didn't play all season. He's looking to continue his career. Did a great job over there. And Canada ends Boyle was the captain who didn't play all season. He's looking to continue his career. Did a great job over there. And Canada ends up getting it done. But they had a chance playing Canada in the semis to maybe go and get a gold or silver. So good job team.

I think Kevin Rooney was over there too, right? And also Connor Garland too. Ryan Shea. We talked about it a little bit last week and Team Canada winning it. There was a lot of great stories. Troy Stetcher. What a pass he made. What a play he made on the winner.

Yeah, so it's a lot of cool stories over there for a lot of guys who got a big smile at the end of the season. All right, boys. Well, Sport Clips stylists are experts in men and boys' haircuts with specialized training and techniques. Cutting guys' hair can be harder

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speaking of start to finish the islandersampa, the schedule is not out yet. We'll keep you posted on that. They obviously didn't play each other this year because of the way the divisions were set up. Tampa beat the Isles in six in last year's semis, as we mentioned. Our predictions, they'll go out over the weekend once we get the schedule. What do you think? Might as well give them now. Yeah, I guess.

Fuck, man. I mean, I have a financial stake In the island That's funny enough now But it's gonna be tough To beat Tampa I don't know How they're gonna

I don't think Go ahead sorry I'll go Fuck I'll go Isles in seven Wow He's got the 17 to one On them winning the cup

Yeah I mean I don't think It's gonna be easy When I'm talking About the depth I'm not trying to say This is going to be a fucking sweep. I know I said five. I said five.

Backpedal, folks. There's no backpedal, Biz. There's no backpedal. I said five. I'm backpedaling that. I was excited just because how stupid you've been this podcast. But it ain't going to be easy. But Tampa gets it done in six again.

All right. What's yours? I already gave it. I already gave it five. Pay attention. Good job yours? I already gave it. Iles in five. Pay attention. Yeah, good job. I got Tampa in six. I don't know.

I'm just hoping for a good series either way. It'll be a good series. Yeah, it should be. Moving right along here, the hot finalists. They just got announced literally seconds ago. Nathan McKinnon, Austin Matthews, and Connor McDavid. And one of you guys noted that it was different from the Ted Lindsey. Crosby was nominated for the Lindsey, which is voted by the players,

and Nathan McKinnon is here for the Hot, which is nominated by the writers. Any comment on that? No, I mean, it's not surprising. I think if it had been either one of them, you wouldn't really complain. I think that if you look at the players voting, there's so much respect for Crosby and the season he had with Malkin out for a lot of the year, and you look at the players who all know how good Crosby is and he gets a vote. I think that tells you what maybe the players thought of the North Division.

Why? McKinnon was the ad. Good call. McKinnon wasn't in on the players. Keep talking. No, but you said as far as was Crosby not involved in the one? Crosby was a part of the Ted Lindsay with players vote on MVP. They took out Crosby and added in McKinnon. So Matthews was a part of both. So nice call. Okay.

Fucker. I'll take my own. The fuck are you laughing at Grinnelli? Spitting out the Pink Whitney vodka on camera. Yeah, fuck off Grinnelli. Why are you spitting out our vodka? Yeah, I don't know. It was poured down my throat. I don't really have an answer.

Blame it on the poor guy. Open the throat out. Look at Dana Beers. You know what? Maybe my comment tells you what I think of the North Division. Give it to Cosby. Oh, so take out Matthews from both of them? No.

Okay. He's all over the place, folks. No. Yeah, I mean, I think McKinnon's well-deserved. You're talking about Matthews from both of them? No. Okay. He's all over the place, folks. No. Yeah. I mean, I think McKinnon's well-deserved. If he was in the Ted Lindsey, I wouldn't have been surprised. If Crosby was in the heart, they both had awesome seasons, and none of it matters because McDavid's winning both.

That's true. Yeah, exactly. And it is interesting, too, because none of these teams now when we get into the semis have played each other at all this year, which is unusual. This is what's exciting. Yeah. This is what is going to be interesting.

In terms of game planning, it's difficult because you have not seen teams in quite a while. I mean, Tampa and the Islanders are as close as you're going to get because they did deal with each other in the bubble. But the Tampa Lightning did not have to deal with the Coliseum, which will be rocking again. That's another reason why I said this. Yeah, you didn't even know until I just said it.

We also got the Norris finalists, New York Ranger Adam Fox, Tampa Bay's Victor Hedman, and Colorado's Cale McCaw were the three nominees. So the defense player who demonstrates throughout the season the greatest all-around ability in the position. Yeah, McCaw missed 10 games. So pretty impressive for him to get on that, missing, I don't know, what, a fifth of the season? It was only, I think, what, the third time in NHL history that a couple of two college guys were nominated.

Really? I forget what the other two were. I know Chelios was involved in one of them. Leach. But, guys, I think Adam Fox is going to win the Norris Trophy. I think he's going to win it. I don't think it's going to be Hedman. I don't know, man.

Because based on his numbers compared to years past when it's I don't think it's going to be Hedman I don't know man based on based on his uh his numbers compared to years past when he's it's not really close he wasn't even he wasn't even as good defensively I guess compared to to prior years numbers I think Adam Fox is going to win it uh you said Kale McCarr who was not I just don't think I think if he had the full season and the whole sample size I think that he probably wins it but i can't that can't be held against adam fox and i think that as the season progressed and as the season finished he kept accelerating where you thought maybe there was going to be some dip off there and we got better and in an 82 game season yeah maybe it's different but it wasn't so i think uh i think the rangers got their guy yeah i'm i'm curious to see i mean mean, because Hedman, like I mentioned before, he's already in that kind of that stratosphere

where once guys already win, I think some voters tend to automatically go with those guys again. And it's harder for maybe, if Fox is more deserving this year, it might be tough for him to break through because writers tend to just go with guys who've already won, I think, sometimes.

But we'll obviously see what happens. We already mentioned the CN Tower is a traitor and they're flashing the Canadian scholars. I still can't believe they're doing that that's absolutely it's a tough look for ontario i mean they knocked the fucking team out and now they're sucking them out to be fair it's called the canadian national tower in toronto fair i'm just trying to play the devil's advocate the other side of the argument but it's it's well it's trying to say like yeah we're all behind the canadians whereas every fan base fucking does not want them to win in Canada, so it doesn't make sense. It would be like the bridge in front of us, the Zake and Bunker Hill Bridge.

It would be like if tonight they have blue and orange lights on this thing tonight. That's a bad analogy. The islanders just knocked them off. Well, it's actually a bad analogy because he's saying it's the Canadian National Tower. That is a Boston Bridge. That's not a United States Bridge. That's the name of the tower. It's not Canada's Tower, though.

It's a Toronto skyline thing. I don't think of that as Canada's Tower. That looks like it's actually Manchester. I didn't even know it was the name. I didn't know CN stood for Canadian National. That might not even be the case. No, it is the CN Tower, but I don't know. That bridge looks like it's Manchester Monarchs colors

because we won the Calder Cup 45 minutes north of here. So keep the fucking change, Massachusetts. Massachusetts. Oh, fuck that. Oh, yeah. It's named CN, originally referred to the Canadian National, the railway company that built the TOW. It's a fucking railroad company. Not even a fucking Canadian National, the railway company that built the tower. It's a fucking railroad company.

Wow. Not even a fucking Canadian National thing. So suck on that, Witt, and suck on that biz. No, R.A., that is still a brutal analogy. No, it's not. They didn't fucking just lose to Montreal. They lost the other round. You're trying to say Boston would—

Toronto get knocked out by Montreal. They're flying the colors. The Bruins just get knocked out by the Islanders. Blue and orange would be the same fucking thing. Like I just said, it was a round earlier. It was not this round. It doesn't matter. It does.

You got knocked out. It's about the team that knocked you out flying their colors. The team that knocked you out. That's the analogy. Okay. The fucking Islanders knocked out the Bruins. You win. You win.

You win. You're right. You win. I got to give you one. Seriously. Two out the Bruins. You win. You win. You win. You're right. You win. I got to give you one. Seriously. Two out of three falls. Biz, Ray Sherrill joined the Minnesota Wild as a senior advisor. He's a genius.

He traded Witt for Kunitz. He also gave me $24 million. I love him. I'll forever love him. And Minnesota's probably going to go on to win 15 Stanley Cups. Do you think this is kind of like some GMs, they kind of get out of the GM game, they step up in these sort of senior roles, and they have a hand, but they don't seem to have to do as much work.

Imagine having a guy like that with that experience in a room with Bill Guerin. Because hard decisions have to be made. You don't want necessarily yes men around all the time. You need to bounce hard decisions off people who are going to think with the other side of their brain, kind of like when Witt thought that Tampa was going to roll over the Islanders and then I bent him over in that argument.

You need intelligent people in the room like Ray Sherrill and myself because you might have a guy like Witt at the helm and who knows? Next thing you know, you're fucking picking lotteries. And, of course, him and Billy Guerin have a history together. Yeah, he brought in Billy Guerin the year he traded my ass. He brings Billy G in. They win the Stanley Cup, their first, against Detroit. And I'm sure that at that time, Ray Shero knew what he was getting in terms of not only a player in Billy Guerin but the guy he was.

Probably you could see right away he's a future GM, a future staple in, like, making decisions to run a team. And now it all gets reversed, and he brings Ray Sherwin to help him. So Biz is right for the first time ever, and I think he will be used greatly in terms of making decisions and realizing what you've got to do in Minnesota to get them to that next level. Well said, well said. Boys, while we were here, we had

a little bit of partying in Boston, and thankfully we had no days wasted so that we could bounce back. They're killing it too, aren't they? They're doing well. They got the hydration replenisher. I'm going to pull up the ad read right now. Biz, you go one paragraph.

I'll go the next paragraph. We'll do this thing together. Tag team like you're back in Wilton's. I don't know. I think I can handle this one by myself. Okay, okay, okay. Here's the deal. We've been hammering drinks during the NHL playoffs,

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Let's see. Oh, yeah. G just wanted to have us remind you. We're back on our normal schedule next week. Obviously, there's going to be fewer games going to the semis. Yep, Tuesday. We'll see you on Tuesday. Yeah, we've got a couple more things here.

But, yeah, I just want to let you know we'll be back. Today is a bonus episode. We'll be back Tuesday with our next episode. The CN Tower. Have you ever gone on top of that? Oh, yeah. Have you been? No.

I went to Wonderland in Toronto, though. Remember that amusement park? Yeah. Yeah, my dad told us we were going to a museum one time. He's like, we're going to a museum. We went up for a hockey tournament. Whole family went, drove up. And when we got there, we're going to a museum.

I was like, are you fucking kidding me right now? But you could never say that in the car. But my brothers are younger. Museum. And he wheeled the old shagging wagon into fucking Wonderland. It was an absolute day for the ages. You got to play pranks on the kids when you're doing something nice for them. Tell them that you're doing something miserable just to fire them up even more.

Shout out Wonderland. They got the see-through glass at the top do you get scared by that oh i'm a not a heights guy yeah i'm not a heights guy i'm not but i'll do shit like that like but i never have been able to overcome my fear of it i'll be i've gone bungee jumping a handful of times and i still like if i watch a russian youtube video those crazy kids like climbing old cranes i get like sweaty palms and start getting like weak so once you get to the top that you're looking what down through the yeah the building yeah like at the top of the needle you can like you know obviously the the base of it is very thin

right so you yeah you can like stand over it and look all the way down yeah you could you could also eat up there and i believe that it rotates yeah they serve poutine up there yeah yeah oh my carlinda ben yeah there's a a memorial to like railroad workers there too because it was built on the site of former real real ads it's like all it's like a multi-plugging pot thing of all like multi-part i'm trying to think of the proper word but yes it's a it's a huge memorial but it's all like it's not like one little like bronze statue it's a bunch of yeah this it's not like one little bronze statue. It's a bunch of- Yeah, this is RA's master class on engineering.

Just hang tight here for the next hour. Just put that bolt there and then get the screwdriver over there and it's done. It's built. I was going to say, you mentioned those kids that do that for clout where they go and they climb these types of buildings. I haven't seen this. Well, they'll post a video of them off of the end of the CN Tower where they're hanging on by one hand.

What? Kestani does that kind of stuff. It's crazy. Wait, but how do you? There's no, like, what do you mean? The CN Tower's got to have a huge wall, right? Right, so I was using that as an example. Oh, okay.

But ultimately, the places that these guys are going, they're trespassing. Yeah, all these crazy abandoned buildings in Russia that they could just – I will say, though, when I watch the videos, it gives me that feeling in my stomach that you don't even want to watch it. Nauseous, dude. Like legit start sweating. Like your palms start getting sweaty. When you said Wendland, I thought you were talking about the dog track down in Rivera.

I got a little excited. R.A., would you ever put on one of those squirrel suits and and jump down have you ever only puts those on when he has his furby nights with his wife what is it called what is it called you're taking furries but we put a furby out and we let a furby watch us the only time i ever think the only time i ever what i think of is when you talk about the suits is Turtle just pounding that girl out in Entourage with the suit on. That was an all-time scene. Do you know what I'm talking about as far as those squirrel suits though? These guys –

Oh, yeah, like the base jumping. Like the flying squirrel, yeah. That is even crazier. So they do not have – No, they have a parachute, but they jump. They basically base jump from a crazy height. They fly through the air like that, and then eventually they pull the chute. That's fucking – that's dead.

Oh, one quick mistake. Yeah, and I'm pretty sure they try to stay close to the cliff they're jumping off of too. They'll try to get 10 feet above rocks while they're – It's one of those things where like i don't know if respect's the right word but good for you it's like you're you're you're finding something to really like make you happy and make you feel alive but like if you were to die that way i don't feel bad yeah you're pushing the limits of you know you know it's kind of it's i i would say the most extreme case of all that would be that documentary that came out on that guy who ended up climbing uh

oh my god the free free climb holy shit what a documentary that is yeah that guy was so strong somebody somebody said apparently that he was he was nervous about doing it the first time and he didn't he didn't want to fail it while being recorded so he actually had climbed it before they recorded him doing it for the first time quote unquote that was a ridiculous talk it's free solo yeah free so what a what a movie check that kid is i think it's on hulu and you could tell he had a girlfriend but he's like wants nothing to do with her because i think he knows he's so close at any moment to dying it's just bizarre yeah yeah well that's pretty much the main reason. He doesn't want to get too attached to someone or maybe have not someone become so attached

to him because, yeah, he's living. He has to be in a different mindset to be doing that. He has to get his next fix. He's probably thinking, what's the next thing I have to do with no harness? You have to not care about living to do that. I mean, to willing to die just to climb a fucking rock. I mean, hey, like you say, that's your passion. You can find it.

Good for you. It's just like, dude, just chuck the safety thing on like you can still climb it bro but if you fall you're gonna be alive it's not the it's like saying fucking the islanders have more depth uh i know what you gotta get cracking soon i don't know if you guys had had any other final well i i want to ask you what about your buddy uh you know he it was a life goal of his to reach the senior pga tour and he ended up qualifying for an event oh yeah a guy doug clap local stick he um he qualified for the u.s senior open yesterday which is awesome he had to go to a playoff to do it it was at thorny lee in brockton you got to be over 50 years old but to get into the u.s senior open it's one round you know to get into the U.S. Senior Open, it's one round. You know, to get into the U.S. Open, it's three rounds pretty much, but one round over 50.

You go in and you shoot a number and you play with Freddie Couples and, you know, all these legendary older golfers. And he did it. He went out, I think he shot one under and made par in the playoff hole and moved on. So he's an old sandwich guy, just hits a hard draw every single shot. And he's moving on to Omaha to play in the U.S. Senior Open so congrats to him it's pretty cool is Greg Norman still playing in the scene he doesn't he doesn't he some guys never end up getting into the scene like once they're done on the PGA Tour they're done and then some guys obviously love it they're traveling they're

making good dough but no Norman doesn't play I don't know if his game isn't there because some guys like Nick Faldo he just announ, but he stinks at golf now. That's a six-time major champion. So it's weird. You get older and certain guys can get better in their 50s. When you say stinks. Stinks is so relative. But he's not an all-time great golfer into his 50s and 60s like some of these guys are.

If you went toe-to-toe with him, you could potentially beat him? No. No. No. I'm not going to say that. No, no. Because when I say stinks, I'm saying like he's not a top world golfer in his 50s and 60s. Stinks was a horrible word to use. Is that a pod for you? I thought I crushed it.

I think you've been pathetic. Palmetto Championship this weekend, you bet anything at that? No, I've never seen that course. Congaree, I believe it's called. I think they're filling in for another tournament, but I'm more focused on the U.S. Open, Torrey Pines the following week. Father's Day weekend should be a blast. Jon Rahm was the pick. The guy crushes that course, but now he can't even because his quarantine has to be in after testing positive for COVID. He can't even show up till Wednesday. So he's played the course a million times, but you don't play it in U.S. Open. When you play it at the Farmers Insurance Tournament, it's a different setup.

The rough isn't as long. The fairways are wider. So it's going to be a completely different course. But I love watching the U.S. Open. It's a blast. Yeah, it should be good. We'll have some picks next week. Yeah, we get some open schedule, Biz.

We're going to have to catch up on some movies and TV shows with the open nights. I also wanted to ask, what's the latest on the on the on the brooks and bryson situation nothing's really come out besides brooks gave a press conference leading up to this uh congaree tournament um i think it's called palmetto he he said he thinks it's great for the game and so many old golf heads are are calling it bullying and and calling it wrong because as much as you like to see a rivalry between two golfers, if it forms through your play, it's one thing. But when it forms through like social media and Koepka offering beer to fans who got kicked out for making fun of DeChambeau, there's people who are in a tizzy about it. I don't really care. I don't really

like DeChambeau. I'm not even a Koepka fan either. I just think it's interesting now that DeChambeau has come out, like we said, and said he hates it. And every single social media post and every swing he has, people are yelling, great shot, Brooksy. So he's in one now. And what were you saying about movies? No, I was saying now, you know, this Friday night, those games scheduled, I don't imagine the Islanders

in Tampa are going to start then. Just, I know, going to fill your schedule with anything. I know I mentioned it a few pods ago. Halston. Yeah. The American designer one. That's an easy one to binge watch. I don't really know if I've watched anything since that.

Yeah, I haven't seen, obviously, with the hockey going on. My wife's crushing Handmaid's Tale. Yeah, I haven't started that. It's been recommended a bunch. She's into it. It's basically like it's current day, but it's a different world where there was kind of like a civil war in the united states it's it's it's it's kind of a crazy show but a lot of people like it so maybe check that one out it's on hulu yeah just like a dystopian society where basically they've dialed back the clock for

women more or less yeah well there's like there's there's only some women who can get pregnant so then like they have to have babies for the leaders. And then the guy's wives, who they're married to, that can't have kids, they hold down the woman as the guy has sex with them. It's a bizarre show. I watched the first episode. I wasn't that into it, but she's just said it keeps getting better and better. So that's one you could check out, The Handmaid's Tale. Liz Moss from Mad Men.

She's fantastic. Yeah. She's great in it um actually tonight on hbo the last two episodes i talked about before it's called hacks honestly the best new comedy on on tv streaming on hbo max jean smart she stars as like a joan rivers type comedian who's who lives in vegas works in vegas and she hires this young it's a zuma like the the right is a Zuma and she's a Boomer, and they have this like generational conflict, which is hilarious because I'm kind of in the middle, so I can laugh at both of them. But it's just a well-written show, absolutely hysterical, great show, the last two episodes airing tonight.

So Hacks on HBO Max definitely gets my highest recommendation if you're looking for a new show. It's easy too. It's a half-hour episode. I think there's 10 of them. You can binge it in a day or you can space it out uh and also jesus let us know we got some new sweatshirts that dropped in the store as well uh the hoodies right g yeah it was the one wit was wearing on the podcast the other day it's the black one and then it has that crazy

uh pink and black black and black and gold print in the pink and white print yep on the inside of the hoodie so we got a ton of questions about people asking when wit wore it so it's on sale now and it's barstoolsports.com slash chiclets nice and uh i actually uh one more thing bo burnham oh yeah comedian i really like he just came out with another project he did he took he took some time off i think he uh i think he really struggles with uh like the mental health stuff so many comedians it seems have that that that struggle i I feel like. Their job's so difficult in terms of making people laugh, and then when you're away from it,

maybe people expect you to be funny, when in reality you're more quiet. It's weird. You see different comedians go through that. I want to say a few years ago, he said he was going to be done with it all, but the quarantine, he was sitting around, and he ended up doing it.

I think it's called Inside. Yeah, I started watching it. What I ended up doing it. I think it's called Inside. Yeah, I started watching it. What I saw was really good. I haven't finished it yet. I might finish it today. Is it a comedy special, or is it more like a show? It's comedy, but I guess it gets a little bit dark. And it was all filmed.

He was the only person in the room, so he filmed it and did all. I think he's a creative genius. Yans has chirnt me before. He hates him. I don't think the comedy sits well with him, but he's had a couple Netflix specials before where they've been 10 out of 10. I know Grinnelli's a big Bo Burnham guy.

Huge Bo Burnham guy, but fun fact about Bo Burnham, went to the same high school as our guest on this week's podcast, Colin Blackwell. No fucking way. And the Avs need to put him in tonight on Lefty. Another show. I don't know when season two premieres, and we did talk about it back when season one ended, but Dave starring Lil Dicky.

Fucking hilarious. Go watch season one right now. I think it was on FX. This show, this guy's a rapper. He's hilarious. He's kind of a comedian as well. He writes this show, and it's so good. Season two is coming out pretty soon.

And I will say I think it's one of the all-time best endings to a season, the end of season one. It involves him rapping on a radio show. I'll say that. I'll say no more. Check out Dave. His freestyles. Oh, he goes on Sway in the Morning sometimes. So he went – yeah, I'm not even going to say.

Just go watch Dave and get ready for season two. I bet you it's probably out by july one of the one of the best shows of the pandemic oh my god he's like the white version of uh childish gambino he just like multi-talented he can act he can probably i would assume he directs his own show to a certain degree he probably writes a lot of it do you know do you know childish gambino yeah glove on what the fuck no not danny i No, not Danny Glover. I was thinking... No, I think it is Danny Glover. Donald Glover?

Donald Glover. Danny Glover's lethal weapon. I'm too old for this shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, yeah, Atlanta. Isn't he sitting on the toilet when he's got to get the bomb? Yeah, there's a bomb there. Donald Glover, he's very talented.

Did you watch Atlanta? I never watched Atlanta. I was more into his rap music at the time and where he was going with his music career. I never got into the other. Was he on 30 Rock? No, Community. He was on. Atlanta's a brilliant show.

I think they're actually filming, I think, seasons three and four right now, back to back. They're both actually, Dave and Atlanta are both on Hulu. You can check them out. They're awesome shows. Also, you have stars. I know you get it from like a doll of like three months on Amazon. There's a show on it called Pea Valley. Anyone listening?

It's a show about a black strip joint on like the Mississippi Delta and like this fictional town. Dude, it's fucking awesome, dude. I'm watching it right now. Fucking savage. It's a very unique awesome, dude. It was another. I'm watching it right now. Fucking savage. It's a very unique show, dude. It was another show I thought was fantastic during the pandemic. It's just about all the characters and all the various things they got going on.

But it's called P-Valley. It was based on a play, and it got turned into a show. So if you have stars or if you're going to get stars, check out P-Valley. So got to kill some time. We're in the mix. Like we said, we got three of the four set. A lot of people are thinking that after tonight, it's going to be four for four in terms of the semifinals,

getting ready to go. Vegas, Montreal, and Islanders, Tampa, look out for the coverage we're going to have. And it almost makes me a little sad, boys. We have, at most, 21 hockey games left this year. Let's see how it goes. No, 22, 23. hockey games left this year. Let's see how it goes. No, 22. 23!

Stack I went. Alright, this wraps it up from Boston for the season and then we'll be getting together somewhere soon. Yeah, we'll be in the finals. We will be at the finals wherever it is. Vegas, hopefully. Peace. Have a great weekend. Go Habs. As always, we'd like to thank our fantastic sponsors here on Spit and Chicklets.

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it the next day on these road trips. Have a great weekend, everybody.