The Athletic Hockey Show - Alex DeBrincat’s blazing start for the Red Wings, what constitutes an NHL dynasty?, Evander Kane drops the gloves after limited ice time, Connor McDavid injured, and much more

Episode Date: October 23, 2023

On a busy Monday edition of The Athletic Hockey Show, Ian and Julian are joined by The Athletic’s own Mark Lazerus to discuss Connor Bedard’s first goal at The Madhouse on Madison, what constitutes a dynasty in the NHL, Alex DeBrincat’s huge start to the season for the Red Wings, Evander Kane’s postgame comments to Scott Oake following another Oilers loss Saturday night, Connor McDavid’s injury timeline, Travis Dermott breaking the Pride stick tape ban, and more.Plus, The Athletic’s Jesse Granger joins the show to talk about goals being down to start the season, the Golden Knights’ potential to win 11 straight games out of the gate, NHL Power Play on ESPN+, and the guys wrap things up with some listener questions. Subscribe to The Athletic Hockey Show on YouTube: http://youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowSigning up for Chime takes minutes. So join the millions of other Chime members and sign up today. Get started at http://chime.com/nhlshow. That’s http://chime.com/nhlshow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. It is your Monday edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. We're live for you on this Monday. It's a three-headed monster. It's Mendez. It's McKenzie. It's Lazarus. Here we go.

Who's ready for an hour of some fun hockey talk here? This is where both of you say, not me. Usually when you have me on, it's not fun, to be honest with you. It's usually something horrible. we have to talk about. Yeah, exactly. Nine times out of ten, it is that, but then there's like that one instance

where it is something fun, and then like we just let Mark go full Mark, and it's like super entertaining the whole time. You never let Mark go full Mark. That's what I've learned. Yeah. Well, you know what, though, we do have some fun. We should have a tool this that early.

Yeah, we do have some fun stuff, though, to get to. Look, there's an outdoor game later this week where we may not have Connor McDavid. We've got some Evanderer Kaine stuff to get to. Jesse Granger is going to drop by later. I do want to ask you, though, last, on the weekend, I mean, it took Conrad all of 90 seconds to score in his home debut. And I want you to take Julian and I and the listeners through Connor Bedard's home debut

to get something like that 90 seconds into a game. Well, I mean, it was pretty crazy all day. You know, the Blackhawks like so many teams do. They do the red carpet and all that. And this is the first time in a few years now. I know nobody feels any sympathy for Blackhawks fans, but this is the first time in a few years that there's been excitement around. this team and it's all because of Bedard. I mean, every jersey they sell is Badard. You know,

like 40, 50 percent of the people in the building had Badard jerseys on. You know, it's only a matter of time before they start selling Bulls jerseys with Badar and just to keep selling things. And the excitement there was palpable. You know, the Hawks opened with that five-game road trip. I was wondering if that was going to kind of stunt some of the excitement, but it didn't. I mean, people were there. They were ready. During introductions, he got by far the loudest cheer, not surprisingly. And then for him to score 90 seconds in, I mean, I mean, it felt like the old days. It felt like 10 years ago when the roof was coming off the place,

the way that place exploded when he scored. I mean, he was so wide open in the slot when Taylor Hall kind of dug that puck out of the corner. He had all day to shoot, but he didn't hesitate. And, you know, he took that shot. That's the shot we've been waiting for, right? This is his first goal where he scored a goal like that, right? Where he scored just a straight up, me against a goalie, I'm going to beat you. His first goal was a wrap around.

This one was the first time where we really saw what he can do. And it was impressive. And the place went nuts. And, you know, it didn't really matter that the Hawks lost that game. They hung with the Knights for two periods, which is more than anyone had reason to expect. And you got to see Connor Bedard's score. So everybody left that place happy. Rate the jersey file on a scale of one to egregious, someone wearing a Chicago Bulls,

Connor Bardard 98 jersey. There's so many jersey fouls out. I saw one person. She was wearing just a standard red black hawks sweater, right? On the left arm, it said 10. on the right arm the number was 13. And on the back it said 15 and the nameplayed said dynasty. What is going on?

Dynasty. Like I'm a pariah. Look, look, I'm a pariah in Chicago for a lot of reasons. But one of them is I will die on this hill that the Blackhawks of the early 2010s were not a dynasty. They never even won two in a row. They were the team of the decade. They were a dominant run. Dynasty don't like yield power and then take it back two years later.

That's not like how the Ming's did it, you know? that's not a dynasty. And everyone here wants to call dynasty, and it drives me insane. Because I just, I used to, my dad, you know, I grew up an Islander's fandom. My dad had on the wall the Newsday covers from all four of the Islander Stanley Cups in the early 80s,

which I was 0, 1, 2, and 3 when those happened. Don't remember them. And I remember, it said, now there are three cup, now they're a dynasty and there were three Stanley Cups there. And that's been in my head since I was three years old, basically. And I can't get over the fact that people want to call a team that never even repeated the dynasty. You know what I love is that instead of just using that as your example, you use the Ming Dynasty.

You're like, you should have just famous dynasty than the Ming Dynasty. I don't know. So look, but like we were wondering, was this young man going to come out of his shell? Because he was very guarded in training camp. Like, do you guys even know who he's living with? Because that was at one point, that was the running joke is he wasn't even saying who he was living with. Have you guys extracted that out of them? First of all,

I love the crawl on the bottom of the screen right now. That's hilarious. Blackhawks were no Ming darkness. Big news, big news. Yeah, freaking. I don't know who he's living with. He won't say. I mean, we all think we know,

but, you know, he doesn't want it out there, then we're not going to put it out there, really. It's not like it's real news who he's living with unless they want to share. You know, we always like to write those stories. You know, Kirby Doc, live with friend Seabrook and his family. And, you know, Alex Nealander was living with Robin Lennar.

Everybody loves those stories. Sidney Crosby living with Mario. But he doesn't want it out there. He's a private guy. For someone who talks literally every day, I mean, he is out there once, twice a day doing media. He wants to be private. And we respect that.

That's fine. I got no problem with that. So is there, like, anything beyond him loving hockey that you know about Conrad from just being around it, being in the room? Like something we wouldn't, something you have to be in the room to know about Conner. Not really. There's not a lot out there. Like I was talking to Nick Folino and he said,

what he likes about Bard is that he doesn't play video games, which is incredibly rare for a kid his age. He doesn't play video games. So, you know, Felino's like, thank God I don't have to talk about Fortnite or anything with him. He's just, he lives and breathes hockey.

He's an 18 year old. I mean, he can't do much yet, right? And you're 18, you know, there's not a lot you can do, especially when you're arguably the most, you know,

one of the most famous people in the city already. Granted, he looks like a, you know, a kid walking around, but he's very recognized already. His faces on billboards and everything. We don't know much about him beyond the hockey. I mean, he seems like he's loosening up a little bit. He's starting to recognize those that are there every day and he'll, you know, he'll crack a joke.

He'll challenge you if you say something. Like, when we were in Denver, it was they had a practice in Denver and there was just, you know, the four of us core people on the beat. And finally a chance to kind of have a little give and take and some follow-up questions. And I was asking him if, you know, I was looking at the numbers and he was shooting from too far away. Like he was averaging 28 feet distance and Austin Matthews was averaging 14. And he's supposed to be Austin Matthews like with his shot. And I asked him, like, are you not get away with that here like you can in the WHL.

The goalies are just too good. And he looked at me and he just said, I've got a pretty good shot. And I was like, all right, you know, if you think I'm wrong, and he was basically telling me, I'll be fine. Don't you worry about me? And then he scored from, I shit you not, 29 feet. on Saturday night. Did he point at the press box when he scored? That's for you, soy boy.

Yeah, stick this soy boy. This kid is not lacking for confidence, let's put it that way. I like a guy he'll do that. He'll challenge you. We won't just accept your premise on face value. So we're doing this show, as we mentioned, live here on YouTube. And Joel has written in. We're talking about whether or not Chicago qualifies as a dynasty.

with Chelsea Dagger, they're a song dynasty. It's not a knock on the blackouts and say they weren't a dynasty. I'm just a pedant. And this is just a literal technical definition of a word that we're talking about. They were the best team of the decade with due respect to the penguins and the lightning and everybody else. What they did cannot be minimized. It's just not a dynasty. It's just that word means something.

Words mean something, damn it. Okay. So Tampa went to three straight cups 2020 to 2020 to 2020. One of two of them. Erno wants to know Tampa. Dynasty, yeah, or Tampa, dynasty then? Well, Erno is wondering. They're the closest thing. Like his question says, are they the closest team?

Yes, they are the closest thing. They came one series went away from being a true dynasty. So, in fact, I don't think there hasn't been a dynasty since the Islanders, really, right? There's been a three-time champion since the Islanders. Well, what about Detroit? They won in 97, 98, and 02. Nope. Nope.

No. Pittsburgh, 92, 93, or 93. 192, no? No, two in a row David Ballick prevented that dynasty. Edmonton four in five years. No, that's the best

that's the best argument, right? Is it if that's not a dynasty and it's not, then nothing to be a dynasty. The only one is winning five times in seven years is the dynasty. How's that not a dynasty? Are you that? Yes, I am that pedantic.

Yes. He's using them to win consecutive. So basically, if I'm getting this, if a team wins at least three consecutive trophies. That should be a dynasty. Yeah, it should mean something. Words have meanings.

But what about the idea, what about the idea that a team can win and still be among the most dominant teams in that era for a long period of time? We need a better word for it because dynasty means something.

What's wrong with dynasty? Because dynasties don't seed power in the middle of their dynasty. That's not how dynasties work. The Habsburgs didn't just go, all right, we're going to sit this year out. Like, that's just not how things work.

I mean, you have to, you have to rule for somebody punch in, dynasty synonym into the internet and see what comes out. You know, whatever you want to call them, that's fine. But the word, like, we need a word for that. I agree, I've been having this argument with Hawks fans on Twitter for a decade now. We need a word for it because it's not a dynasty, but it's still incredibly impressive and dominant and good and great and hard to do.

Just, all right, we spell, now we're spelling Hapsburgs wrong in the crawl. I don't know what's going on anymore. That's half the Habs and half Pittsburgh. That's what a Habsburg is. There's a Montreal, Habsburgs. It's a Montreal in Pittsburgh. Combination. Because like when you look up the word dynasty,

like it's very easy. I mean, Wikipedia, and I get it, Wikipedia, you can put whatever you want there. But you recognize teams, even if they don't win consecutively, if they've been dominant for a stretch of time, that's enough to consider them as a dynasty. I would say that we have as a society apparently decided that that's okay,

but I still write underway as two words no matter what the AP style book says. They're changing things too fast for me. I'm an old person. I like things the way I like them. And a dynasty should mean something incredibly special. So you don't consider the Golden State War is what they've done over the last like seven years of dynasty. They never won more than two in a row, right? They never won more than two in a row.

The Patriots, New England Patriots. the Patriots. They never won more than two in a row either, right? They won two in a row, yeah. But they never won two in a row. The Patriots are a perfect example. Like, there needs to be a term for what they did in the Brady area, much as I hated them. But they did have- Eli Manning says, you're not a dynasty. We have a couple of suggestions here from the viewers who are taking in this live. Eric, Oh, you walk me down this road, by the way. How are- Empire? Eric says, what about calling these teams empire? Chicago-

You already called the Patriots evil empire. Tampa's an empire. Now, there's a negative connotation to that. You always think of like the evil empire. Like, you know, like the Red Sox used to call the Yankees. But I like that. That's better because empires suffer losses, right? You know, the British Empire lost some colonies over the years.

So that's pretty good, actually. I like that. Anthony rates in. The Tampa's a light to get pyre? Anthony's got one. He says rain. Okay. Rain implies you rule.

right the whole time. That's where the dynasty is. A dynasty reigns. Yeah. This is important stuff and I do. I've been wanting to find this word for a decade now. I want to know who's going to be the first person to write the Tampa Bay Lightning Empire of the late 20, of the late 2010, early 2020. It's got a nice ring. It's your early church race. Yeah, I guess. Gary Batman. You guys, I'm already on thin ice with most of Chicago. You guys are going to run me right out of the city. Okay. Well, listen, let's move along because we're going to, we're going to spend so much time talking about this. Mark Lazarus doesn't believe the Bulls of the 90s were a dynasty. The Bulls were a dynasty.

They won three. They won three twice. And as a Knicks fan, I really wanted to blow up that evil empire. So, yeah. But they were absolutely two dynasties. Yeah. I'm just trying to run you out the pain in Chicago, man. I just trying to run out of pain.

Like, I don't know. To me, the Oilers of the 80s were a dynasty, but that's neither here nor there. In fact, Mike, Mike is with us. Get this guy out of here, Mike says. here. Yeah, that's right, Mike. You don't think it's a dynasty. What are you on about? We've turned this into the athletic comment section already. And look, let's talk about a couple of other storylines that happened on the weekend in the

NHL. You know, we had somebody tweet at Julian and I, Las, said, you guys better get Max Boltman on the show. Detroit runs off back-to-back wins against Ottawa and Calgary. And I said, forget it. We had the next best thing. Forget about getting the guy who currently covers Alex DeBrinke it. Let's get the guy. the two guys who used to cover Alex DeBrington on the pod. Last, you know Alex DeBrington really well. I got to know him fairly well last year. He is mild-mannered.

He is quiet. He is quiet. He is mild-mannered. Doesn't seek the spotlight. Just like, it was so fascinating. I mean, he got just booed and it was off the charts. And I don't blame Ottawa fans. Like, you know, you have out of it. You buy a ticket. You do what you want to do.

And I think it created a great atmosphere. But what a weekend for De Brinkett. His team beats Ottawa on Saturday. Then he comes back with the hat trick on Sunday. Like right now, guys, there's not a better fit in the offseason, free agency, trade, whatever, than Alex De Brinkett in Detroit, right? Let me tell you what I, you mentioned mild manner with Alice de Brinkett. He is not mild.

He's mild manner with us. Yes. That is one of the most almost terrifyingly competitive people. I used to, you know, at the United Center, you have to walk through their little soccer game through Two Touch. When you get to, if you get to the rink at a certain time, you always got to walk through it. And Alex DeBrinke is a psychopath sometimes. Like, I used to joke about this with him. He'd be sitting there, this little quiet kid, right?

Mr. Quiet guy, just kind of chilling out, do better! He'd be dropping MFs on these guys screaming in their faces that they weren't playing two touch well enough. Like, he wanted to win and he was taunting. And, like, it was hilarious. But he is so hyper-competitive. So he was, I'm sure, on the phone with you, like, Everything he said was true. Like, I don't doubt it.

But inside, that guy was just doing victory dances in his head and dropping F bombs and just going nuts for what he's pulling off early this year. Oh, yeah. Good for him. Absolutely. I'm really happy for him. He has been painted as villain here, though, in Ottawa. And, well, sure. And again, I understand it.

But what I always go back to is that, you know, Alex DeBrington never asked to be traded to Ottawa. And Ottawa took a gamble. They took a risk on a guy that was set to be a UFA in two years. Isn't that what we all said when they made that trade, we were like, Ottawa, are you sure about this? Yep. And they gambled and they lost. But I think where Alex was disappointed is he felt like all of the blame got put on him.

You didn't want to stay. And then I think the narrative that hurt him a little bit too was that, you know, you held up a trade. He had no power. He didn't have a no trade clause. I think he gave four teams, five teams that he was willing to go to. They could have traded him to Winnipeg. They could have traded him anywhere.

They sent him home. I mean, they did him a favor. They sent them home. And he looks so happy. This is all this is, I never understand this. We, we, you know, I'm using the Royal We here. As fans, it seems like the blame and the hate always goes on to the player and never the team. Like I got a story running tomorrow if I get a cheap plug in here on Seth Jones.

and Seth Jones has Brent Seabrook syndrome right now where the Blackhawks, Stan Bowman gave him a crap ton of money and everyone's mad at him for taking it. They're not mad at Stan Bowman for giving him the contract. They're mad at the player for taking it. And it's unfair. There's this weird anti-labor bent in sports fandom, right? Like even like even if you're like a union household,

when it comes to your pro sports, you're pro-billionaire because you want your team to just own these guys and to do whatever you want with them. and then you wanted to be like the 1940s in baseball work. It was like indentured servitude practically, where they just, you owned every aspect of their lives. And I don't understand it.

I don't like it and I don't understand it. Alex DeBrinke had every right to go become a free agent. He signed a contract. He honored the contract and he wanted to go somewhere else. He's allowed to do that. If you work at some consulting firm and you don't like it, you're allowed to go somewhere else. Why can't pro athletes do that?

I never understood. I never got that either. And for me, whenever I see we're on the verge of of any labor strife with a lockout, that's when you see fans act all anti-labor for whatever reason. All of a sudden,

they're spoiled millionaires, yeah. Yeah, but they don't think about the billionaire making more money trying to make more money off these players. Maybe it's because of the fact that, depending on what market you're in, the billionaire that owns your team is very faceless. Maybe just you cheer for the team and players

just come and go. So it's just a lot easier to just look at a place. and be like, oh, well, you're going to be gone tomorrow. You're just asking for all this money. You're not going to be on this team, maybe in 20 years. Who knows? And especially with hockey, where you're playing for the crest and the logo and all that. Maybe that plays into the identity.

But no, I'm with you guys. I think I get being hurt. Like, if you're Columbus or Winnipeg, I get being hurt that Pierre Lut Dubois didn't want to play in your city. I get that. And you can be mad. You can be a little bit mad. But in a situation like this, Alex de Bring, it didn't force anything.

He wanted to stay in Chicago. He was traded against his will from Chicago to another country. I think we underestimate how big a deal that is to a 23-year-old kid to get traded to another country. And, you know, far from his home, far from his family. And he still played his hard out. He didn't do as well as he would have liked, I'm sure. But he played hard. He worked hard.

And then he had a chance to do what he wanted. And he, you know, did what was best for him and his family. Chicago and Ottawa two different cities too, right? You're going from deep dish pieces and all the sporting culture. that's there compared to the nice tranquil. I like Ottawa City. It's just a nice tranquil. It's a different vibe.

It's completely different. I'm dying at this comment. By the way, forget soy boy. We've got a new nickname for Laz. This one from our listener, viewer, Mike, who says, more like Mark's Lazarus. Am I right? That's pretty good.

Marks Lazarus. I'll allow it, though. Ah, that's good. Look, I think part of the issue on De Brinket Ottawa fans are convinced he didn't try here. That's the issue. And, you know, he had a quote that he told the Detroit Free Press in training camp, you know, maybe I got a little bit lazy on some of my chances and rebounds.

And that comment just went, Ottawa fans tore him to shreds. And I did give him a chance to try and address that comment when I spoke to him last week. He said, look, that was a terrible choice of words on my part. I didn't mean I was lazy. I meant maybe I should have just on a conference. couple of those rebounds may have been kind of bared down it didn't matter at that point a genie was out of the bottle and whatever it was a great atmosphere on the weekend here it's fun i like that i like that ottawa fans gave him a rough ride because it's a fun yeah sure a fun environment that

he's anyway at the end of there's just there's just lines that some fans cross where it gets ugly i go boo the guy absolutely booed the guy sure he rejected you boom but it gets vitriolic sometimes where it's just unnecessary. Look, Ottawa's on the upswing. Detroit's on the upswing. Everything is good right now. Like, why do you got to be pissed about everything? I want to ask you guys,

real quick, Laz, about Evander Kane's comments. We're going to play these. Avander Kane was essentially stapled to the bench for a good chunk of the first period on the weekend, and then he dropped the gloves

and got into a fight. Have a listen. This is Evander Kane with Scott Oak in the intermission. Yeah, I didn't play much in the reverse period, so I thought might as well get into a fight and take seven or eight minutes in the box. I like when athletes are honest, so I don't want to crack down on them too much because I think we always say, like, give us honesty. How do you think that comment landed that he was like, I didn't play that much? I figured I may as well get into a fight.

I thought it was hilarious. I don't know. That's a very 1970s, 1980s thing, right? just to do something like that. Like, that's how hockey used to be. And I don't have a huge problem with that. I don't know how serious he meant it. I'm sure he was kind of messing around a little bit.

But they're also, yeah, I mean, if I'm not getting it. Like, you hear that a lot from guys. Like, I'm not involved in the game. I'm going to go hit somebody. I'm going to go start a fight to get myself into the game and wake up the crowd and everything get my teammates in the game. It's like, if they're not going to let me play, I'll go do something else. Like, I don't have a huge problem with it.

It's because it's a Vander Cain that it carries extra baggage, right? If another player says that, If Jared Tenordy had said that, who would have cared? Because it's a Vander Kaine, everything he says becomes kind of a lightning rod. I don't have a huge problem with it. I thought it was funny. God forbid these guys have any personality, right? Yeah, I'm also odd to this too.

It's a van der Kade with one assist through six games. Like, there's a reason why Evander Kaine put himself in that situation, and it seems like his placement in the lineup is where it is. I mean, it'll probably change because now they need them. Now they absolutely need them for the next few games. but yeah, I didn't have a problem with how, I like the snarkiness. It was kind of funny in hindsight, but also at the same time, like, it better not snowball into anything worse.

Well, there might not be a worse market to make that joke in than Edmonton, right? Like, that's going to be taken and ran with for a long, long way now. Is it what they got going on in Edmonton right now? It's a terrible start. You couldn't have predicted a worst start for the oilers tripping out of the gates in Alcona McDavid out anywhere from one to two weeks. and why that's important, Julian, is coming up this weekend. It's the outdoor game.

I mean, Connor McDavid, he's not going to, they're saying one or two weeks, there's no way he's playing in the heritage classic, is there? I'll tell you what, if I'm Steve Mayer from the NHL office, I'm going to all of those oilless practices and I'm sitting in the stands and I'm like, please let this man play. Please let this man play. Please, please, please, please, please let this man play. Look, I mean, he is the big draw of that game.

It's the Battle of Alberta. I understand that. Connor McDavid is going to be the best player playing in that game if he plays. Leon Drysiddle doesn't have that same draw compared to what Connor McDavid is going to bring for that game. Already, we're already going to have to accept the fact that this is a game that's probably going to be a much bigger deal in Canada compared to what it's going to be in the United States, where it's going to be in the middle of the day on a Sunday, competing with NFL

football. I think it's supposed to be in between days during, well, I mean, maybe the World Series might have started by then. I think we're at that point where the LCSs are starting to end. But like, we're at a point where the U.S. side of things, they're going to be focused on other stuff. The NBA is going to have started too. This is going to be the bigger deal in Canada.

So they need as much star powers they can get for this matchup. I think it'll be fine because basically everything you just laid out. Nobody in America is watching this game anyway. Like honestly, the heritage classic happens and nobody down here pays attention. Every year it's the same thing. Like the winner classic will draw the curiosity. If there's a stadium series game in a cool place, that'll draw some curiosity.

Heritage Classic does not ring any bells down here. Most hockey fans, American hockey fans, won't even know what's going on. Casual fans certainly won't know what's going on. That's not like some, like you said, this is a tough time of year to make a hockey game in the middle of a Sunday be a dominant story. And whether Connor McDavid's there or not,

it's not going to play down here. And whether Connor McDavid's there or not, it's going to play huge in Canada. It's the Battle of Alberta. it's the biggest sport up there and it sucks that McDavid's not going to play in it. Don't get me wrong. Everybody wants to see him, but I don't think it has any real impact on any bottom lines here.

In all fairness, though, the Heritage Classic has been purely in all Canadian matchups since its inception like 20 years ago. That's the whole point of it, yeah. Yeah. But I just think if you're Edmonton, an outdoor game, sometimes you can't control those elements as much, you're not putting McDavid at risk in an outdoor game. There's no way.

I understand that. I mean, it's not snowing there yet, right? No, but, well, well, it literally. I'm in Calgary where it's snowed in November early, so. I'm in, I'm in Calgary now and it's snowed today. I'm literally looking at my left and there is snow on my balcony. Oh, brutal. It's 65 and sunny here in Chicago.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Shut up. Las, before, before we let, before we let you go, you kind of teased a little bit of a piece that you have coming up this week. Why don't we plug that here a little bit more? Yeah, sure, yeah. I spoke to Seth Jones for a while a little bit ago about just he's such a polarizing figure.

All he is is a very good hockey player, right? All he does is go out and he plays pretty well on a bad team. And he gets so much hate from so many people. And I wanted to talk to about that. He's another guy. He was traded here, right? And then he was given this contract. And people resent him not just for the contract, but for the cost Stan Bowman.

paid to bring him here. Two first round picks and a number eight overall pick and Adam Boquist and a second round pick just to give him an eight year, 9.5 million a year contract. None of that is his fault, right? And he gets hate from, you know, every year Dom is sitting there shitting on him about what

a terrible player he is, you know, I'm only half teasing Dom. But like the analytics community tends to not think very highly of him. Old school hockey people love him. He's a big minutes eater. He's a big rangey defenseman. Well, let me tell you, was great last year. The second half of last year, he was, he played really, really good hockey on a horrendously bad team. That's really hard to do as a defenseman. He's only 29. There's a lot of

good hockey left in this guy. And it's just, it's interesting how like, go to the United Center, you won't see a single number four jersey. Nobody buys Seth. He's the biggest star in the team until Connor Bedard got here. Nobody ever bought a number four jersey. And I just wanted to talk to him about what he thinks about how polarizing he is and, and about some of the hate he gets. And he was, he was interesting about it. You have to also count too, not just the analytic stuff, but like when you see other defensive like Kail McCar play at such a high level and make less money than him, that's also going to be put against him.

Sure. He's making the same as Adam Fox, the same as Charlie McAvoy, and half a million more than Kail McCar. That's not great. He is not those players. He never was those players. Even in 1718 when he was like fourth in the Norrisville, he was never what those guys are. Well, listen, we're looking forward to that because it sounds like a fascinating, I have a theory

that every passionate hockey market in North America, the fan base complains about one defenseman being overpaid. Like, that's kind of like a rule. You got to have one overpaid defenseman. So in Chicago, it's Seth, and we're looking forward to reading that. But listen, thanks for dropping by the Monday pot, as is always.

Marks. Thanks for setting me up for getting torched again on Twitter like usual. Appreciate it. Love it. There you go. I think you like it at this point. I am a masochist. At some point, I keep doing it to myself,

so there must be some truth of that. Yeah, Marks Lazarus joining us, as he often does here on the Monday pot. Thanks for doing this, buddy. Let's bring in our next guest, courtesy of our friends at BetMGM, the exclusive betting partner. With the athletic, it is our guy, Jesse Granger. When's the last time Jesse Granger physically stepped into a bank? They probably don't even have banks in Vegas because they're like, this is too dangerous. No, there's tons of banks in Vegas.

They like they're the, where else are you going to pull out the, the money to put in the slot machines? They have banks everywhere. I'm with Julian on this one. It's been a while since I've actually been in the bank. Like I'll drive to the bank. I'll go to the drive through ATM. So I just rolled my window down and do that. But actually parking and walking inside the bank, it's been a while.

Yeah. Yeah. There's no real reason to get in into into the bank. Look, last week we talked about having you on, Jesse. And we're like, we need a nickname. for you because we said, are you the goalie guru? Are you the goal? What was the other one?

Golly guru. I like the crease correspondent was a good one. Crease correspondent. We got one from Casey. Connoisseur there. Yeah. Okay. Casey and Kentucky's got one here.

Casey has written into the athletic hockey show, the athletic hockey show at gmail.com. Net gnome. No. I'm six three. I'm six three. It's the exact opposite of a gnome. He's massive. Casey from Kentucky has written in with their sort of,

here's the benefits of making Jesse Granger the net gnome. Benefits are the knowledge requirements for said position of a gnome, less strenuous than a wizard, sorcerer, philosopher, or scholar. What are they? Who knows if Jesse gets it wrong, he's just a gnome. There are some fun, there are some fun hat opportunities for you. I mean, let's be honest, who's not looking for some fun, had opportunities, we all are.

It's fun to say net gnome. I'll give them that. It almost rhymes with no, as in KNOWW, no, like knowledge, no. This is what I don't quite understand. No and Granger, there's a silent G and a silent K. I'm not following that one. Granger's not silent. Yeah, that's what I think.

There are no, yeah, no silent. letters in my last name, I don't think. No. Okay? There are some strong beard opportunities for you here. If you really lean into the no... You can't shave. If we call you a gnome, it's like a... Yeah. It's that... And then Casey...

When last time I was seen, beardless Jesse? Beardless Jesse. Since I've been old enough to grow a beard. Yeah. Last time Jesse... Since I've been able to. Last time Jesse was clean-shaven was when he walked into a bank. I believe that was the last time. It's been longer than that. Yeah, about to say, maybe he walked

with his parents and they set up an account for him. That's right. That's exactly how. Here's your checking account. And also, Casey from Kentucky says, if NHL and Fanatics is already making no merch, I will buy a little gnome and I will name it Jesse. This is both a threat and a promise.

This dude, this dude thought about this gnome thing way too long. And just completely discounted the fact that Jesse is 6-3. I like showing the work though. Like, I don't know if it's better than some of the other answers, but I appreciate showing the work.

That's fair. He tried to make their case. Okay, well, I like this note here from Amy, who is written in and says, The Habs of a goalie prospect, nicknamed the gnome, and it's one of those ironic nicknames because he's super tall. Who is this?

Who is the gnome? I'm trying to remember who, I'm trying to remember who, I don't know why Jacob Dovish is, it comes to mind, but like, it might have been him. I don't remember who it was.

I don't know, but I'm going to have to double check on that. Wow, you could tell I'm far behind from the Canadian. Your hampstays are gone. Because I don't remember who was nicknamed the Gnome for the Montreal Canadians. I like the irony in it, though. It's like tiny from Friday, right? Exactly, yes. Going along nose lines.

So what's the height you have to be as a goalie for this to work? Because, like, if your, your nickname is the gnome or, like, 6-4 is the minimum height. Like, you can't be 6-2 and be called the norm. You just believe, like, you're an average guy. 6-1. 6-4? 6-4 is the height? 6-5. The way the goalies are going now, I feel like 6-4, you're just an average guy.

Like, you have to be, like, 6-6 to be considered one of the tall ones. Yeah. Anders, Lindbach, those were the tall goalies. Look, the Vegas Golden Knights, the team that you cover, still haven't lost the game. They're off. That's both of you guys. I'm curious that we're about two weeks in the season. I'm going to give you a handful of teams here.

You tell me who's the biggest surprise to you to start the season? Is it Vegas at 6 in 0, Boston at 5 in 0, Detroit at 5 in 1, or Edmonton winning just once in five games? What's the biggest surprise, Jesse, to you? Probably Boston for me. I know we keep doing this with this team saying they're final. okay, they're going to be dead now. They're in the context of Halloween in October.

They're like Jason Voorhees. We keep saying, okay, he's dead. All right. We don't have to worry about the Boston Bruins anymore. They all retired. This team is old. They're finally done. We said it before last year.

And then they won 135 points or whatever it was. So I am once again surprised that the Bruins are better than I thought they would be. I can't wait to do this again next year this time. This team, we keep thinking they're going to be not as good. and they're awesome. So I would say Boston is probably the biggest surprise for me. What about you, Julian? Okay.

First, I believe it's Frederick Dickow, the goaltending prospect for the Canadians, who's nicknamed the Gnome. Okay. Yeah, I forgot he was nicknamed that. I know he was in the system when I was still there. Just need that set. I think the Emmettinoeers are still the biggest surprise for me. I think the fact that they're one three and one,

I believe the Jets are the only team that they've played so far that was a playoff team. last year and they've had the poor results to start. Then they're going to have Connor McDavid out for up to two weeks with an upper body injury. I'm not pressing the panic button. My hand, if I was an oilish fan, I'd be like creeping it over to that button a little bit. This is not an ideal start. There's time for them to fix it and time for everyone to get back on track. I get that.

But for a team that feels like so many people penciled in into the Stanley Cup final this year, a one three and one start is not necessarily what I expected. Boston, I just like, they're too unpredictable for me. So the fact that they started as well as they did, you know what? Fine. Go off. Okay, fine. You're that good.

Consider you don't have Bergeron and Kreich anymore. Not to mention they already proved after last year, they could have as great of a regular season as they want. It's only going to matter if they do well in the playoffs. As for the Vegas Golden Knights, I said last week, this team was going to start 8 and 0. They have Philly and Chicago next. I still stand on that. So I'm not completely surprised if they're doing as well as they are. Detroit deserves some consideration in all this because I think there were people entering this season

who were not as convinced that they would take that step compared to Buffalo, compared to Ottawa. And now the Red Wings have the best offense in the league. And Alex DeBricket torching the Calgary Flames over the weekend. But none of those teams surprised me the same way that Edmonton has to start off the year. You know why they have the best offense, right? You know, everyone knows why the Red Wings have the best offense. in hockey. It's because they switch their goal song to Eminem. Yeah.

The best goal song. It's not even close. Yeah. It's the best goal song in a league. And now suddenly these players are way more motivated to score than they've ever been in their lives. Yeah. Who would have thought using Eminem, you know, from 8 Mile, that guy as your goal song would have been a great idea. That's a really, by the way, I mentioned that yesterday on Twitter. That's actually a really good goal song. Shout out to the Detroit Red Wings for doing that. You know, for me with Edmonton, where I think I would be most concerned, as Julian said, you know, they got their hand kind of hovering on the panic

button. What would scare me is that if you think about who the three heavyweights are in the west, outside, you know, a lot of people thought Edmonton is there. Vegas is 6 and O. Colorado's 5 0. Dallas hasn't lost in regulation. Those are your measuring stick teams. And they're all off to great starts. They seem like they're super motivated. That's what would scare the heck out of me at Edmonton is that we thought we were in that group, and it's still very early, but boy, they're all off the great starts, all of them. And Julian mentions the next two games for Vegas, Chicago and Philly. If Philly wins this game against Vegas, they'll go to 4-1-1.

I'll be willing to give them, wow, put them, I would be willing to put Philly kind of in the Detroit class of, wow, they have shocked me to come out of the gates like this. But the thing is with Philly, though, is that, like, they're still not in a position to win. Like, Detroit, I would imagine even if some people did downplay them a little bit, their expectation was to compete for a playoff spot. And one thing I thought about watching that game between Calgary and Detroit yesterday is Detroit spent all this time accumulating talent, guys like Joe Valeno in the lineup and Lucas Raymond and most cider. And getting a guy like Alex DeBrinke, who is a pure goal score, a pure goal score, a pure, you're top line forward. I mean, you can debate about eliteness,

but like this is a guy who at almost everywhere he's played at, he's found a way to score goals. They need talent like that. And the Red Wings are just at this point in their development where they have the core in place, but they can start adding to it through trades and free agency to really legitimize themselves. And, you know, we look at Ottawa's core.

We look at Buffalo's core. And I think there's a lot of people who would want to be in charge of those cores. But the fact that the Red Wings are off to the start that they're at, like we can't forget about the Red Wings, too. It looked a little shit. with the way they were building their defense. But the fact that they're off to the start that they're at, we can put more of that spotlight on some of those younger players

who are helping to put them in that position. Jesse, when we bring you in, we often do it, as I mentioned, with our friends at BetMGM, and we sometimes will play around with some fun lines and over-unders. It's early in the season, but what do you got for us here today in terms of maybe some lines or bets or props? Yeah, so I'm noticing an interesting trend early in the year, and we do this every season.

in hockey, I feel like the first month of the season, the goals are off the chart. Yeah, goals are off the chart. And we're like, oh, here it is. This is going to be the highest scoring season ever. And then it goes back to normal. And it's every year we go through this until this year. It's different this year. The goals are down, which for me, you know what that means?

That means the saves are up. It's not a huge number. But so we're not saying this isn't a, the goals aren't. plummeting, but they are down, which at this time of year, they're normally way up. So if you project that out and you say, okay, well, if we're starting out at a lower baseline, the time of year where goals are usually much, much higher, all of a sudden, the goals are lower than a year's past. So like just a couple quick stats, safe percentage is 905 right now, which, and by the way,

we've had a couple bad days of safe percentage. The league average safe percentage was 910 just a few days ago. And that's much higher than last year it was 904, year before that. that it was 907, 908. So this is the first time in 10 years that save percentage has gone up. And obviously, we're only 6%. I did the math. We're 6% of the way through the season in terms of total games. But the fact that the first month is always the highest scoring month, the fact that it's lower than last year's whole season average tells me that maybe when these teams start to get locked in defensively, when they start to get comfortable in their schemes, we see this every

year in the NHL, the scoring goes down as the season goes on. Maybe we're looking at a reversal. I mean, it's been a long, long time. If you go back and look at the league averages for every year, save percentage has consistently gone down and goals per game have consistently gone up for about 10 years. So maybe we're looking at a reversal. And what, I guess, to strengthen that point, power play opportunities are off the charts early in the season. We're talking 3.7 power play opportunities per game. That's almost a whole power play higher than you see in years past. Last year, the average was three, flat three. So we're 0.7 above that year before that was 2.8.9. So 3.7 power plays per game is a lot. And despite that, we're seeing less goals. We're seeing

more save. So how does that translate to a betting perspective? The under has been a good bet, which is usually not the case early in the NHL season. Usually you're pounding the over every night and you're hoping you're going to see a 7-6 game because these teams haven't buttoned up their defenses yet. So right now, it's, we've had, like I said, a couple days of bad safe percentage, a couple days of overs hitting the under is still over 50%. A couple days ago, it was 56% of the games had gone under the total. So just a little trend to watch. If you're watching these hockey games, we're not seeing the high scoring early season, wide open hockey, tons of defensive breakdowns, high scoring games. You're getting it here and there, but not nearly at the same rate that we do

early in the season. So it's early, but I'm already starting the hashtag year of the goalie. If the save percentage can go up, I know I'm the only person out there rooting for this, but I am rooting for it. But you're what's fascinating too. I just decided just to look at the NHL website

and just look at the teams who have allowed the most goals. Off the top of your head, can you guess who that team is? Carolina is allowed the most goal. And that is a team that we have regarded them as a really good defensive team over the last little while.

Tampa Bay second allowed most goals at 24. And yes, fine, Audrey Vasselowski is not there. That's also a team that, you know, has at least played a solid defensive system to get them success. There are teams like Boston, Edmonton, and Calgary that are switching from a man to man to a zone defense off the strike of teams like Tampa and Vegas doing that.

And Calgary and Emmington, both in the top 10 in goals allowed this year. Calgary was like one of the better defense defensive teams. I know with Jacob Barksstrom in the goaltending, it wasn't always great, but they were one of the better defensive teams last year. They've allowed the third most goals to start off the year. So, yeah, you're right.

Like, we're maybe not seeing all of the high-flyingness that we would like to see from an offense, but it's still really interesting to see the teams who've allowed the most goals be who they are to start off the year. That is fascinating to me. Yeah. And you know what I think is really fascinating, too? It's going to be fun to watch.

Jesse says that we've played roughly 6% of the season. Tuesday night's going to be a lot of fun because you've got all 32 teams in action and if you're not aware of this, the games are going to start at six Eastern time in Washington. Washington hosts Toronto at six Eastern time and then roughly every 15 minutes after that

up until 10 o'clock, well, 11 o'clock Eastern time, there's a new puck drop. Great game, great concept. I love it. This is something that should have been done a while back. what do you think we see more of like do you think we on Tuesday night Jesse do you think we get more shutouts or more team scoring five plus goals if you had the guess right now I'll go shutouts just because that's what I hope we see yeah I'm excited I mean I'm I'm excited for it

for the setup the whole I think they're calling it power play it's they're like copy they're they're playing off of the NFL's red zone. I'm a huge fan of NFL red zone. It's as good as it gets. You can watch the one channel all Sunday and get all the stuff. It's obviously harder to translate in hockey because in football, there's a lead up to the score. You can see it happening.

Okay, they're getting close. They're getting close. They're going to score. In hockey, you obviously don't have that. I'm curious how it translates, but if it does translate well, this could be a gold mine for the NHL.

Like I've always said, I think one of the things, like obviously here in America, the NFL kills. The NFL is king. Part of that is the scheduled viewing, right? Like Sunday afternoon, I know what I'm doing. I'm sitting on my couch. I'm watching football.

All the games are on. If hockey can have, they don't need it every week, but if hockey can have days like Tuesday regularly that become regular viewing where all you do is sit on your couch and watch hockey all day and you've got this red zone power play channel, I am very excited for the potential. I don't know how it's going to work.

We're going to see. but I am excited for what this could be for hockey. I think SportsNet had tried to do something similar a couple years ago with a show called IceSter thing. Steve Dangle was hosting that. I think it was around just before the pandemic hit where that kind of started and it never really picked up. But yeah, I would like to see this idea work.

I think the fact that they have all those games on with the staggered times for tomorrow too, that's going to help. Plus, it's at a point in the schedule where you're not competing with Monday night football. I'm not sure exactly where we're at with all the league championship series in the in the in major league baseball. But I think there's like a game seven. There might be a game seven tonight actually. There's a game seven tonight. Yeah. So so we could be in that dead zone with that, but I should double check with that too. But more important, but also the NBA starts Wednesday. So it shouldn't be competing with with that league as well. There's like a perfect night where the league can actually

kind of be a focus. But also I've also I've also just seen people complain about the fact that even though there is that game, that day with all these teams, I don't know if you guys have noticed this, but we had two games yesterday. We're going to have one tonight, only one NHL game, the Canaanians and the Sabres. We have the big day on Tuesday, one game on the Wednesday, and then 11 on the Thursday, and then Friday, it kind of gets a little bit back to normal. But like, yeah, I don't know if that's, if that should be an attraction or anything like that, but like, people are making the point that like, hey, well, even though we're going to have all these

games on one day, one game between one day and the Wednesday? Like, what is that? Well, what do you want them to do? You can't, like, you can, if you're having everyone play on one day, the day before that, there's not going to be very many games. I mean, we're not going to have the entire lead play back to backs, right? Like, otherwise the hockey would be terrible. Yeah, anyone that's complaining about one game today. That's the sacrifice you have to make so you can have a day like tomorrow. Yeah, I, I agree. And Wednesday night, you don't want to go up against the NBA on their opening. No, right? You want to, you're respectful of that. Would you guys like to see, look,

you look at the schedule for Tuesday night, and the only quote-unquote rivalry games that are there, I would say you can maybe make an argument, Buffalo, Ottawa, maybe make an argument, Carolina, Tampa, maybe Boston, Chicago, original six. Would you like to see everybody kind of partner off? I don't know some teams like Montreal and Toronto and whatever.

They have more than one rival, per se, but would you like to see this be it's Philly Pittsburgh it's Tampa Florida it's L.A. Anaheim it's you know whatever pick score off and and everybody for the most part it's a rivalry night all 16 teams 16 games 32 teams and everybody is essentially playing a rival as best as they can can construe it. I love the idea. Yeah. Throw the battle of Alberta in there. It'd be good. Yeah.

And then and then maybe on another night don't do rivalries do like. And obviously, this is hard to schedule out hockey so unpredictable. But it would be nice to see, like, the contenders in it, like do like Vegas, Florida, Stanley Cup rematch, do a do a big, like a rematch from one of the big Eastern Conference playoff series. You know what I mean? Like, New Jersey, New York. Like, I don't know, throw in some maybe not traditional rivalries, but big games rather than just ruins Blackhawks. Like, what is this game? It's nothing.

There's not a lot to it. Yeah. But it's Connemadard versus whoever. he's playing. I don't know. I agree with you that they could. It's hard to do in hockey because the schedule comes out so far in advance and the teams, you never know, you could get some duds. But I think having some more interesting games and survival games would definitely spice it up. Okay. I just want to correct myself with something before I mentioned one point I want to say here. So the NBA season actually starts tomorrow. And not only does it start tomorrow, these are the

two matches. It starts Tuesday? It starts Tuesday? So here's the thing. Not only does it start tomorrow. Here are the two games that are on tomorrow. Lakers Nuggets, sons and war. Those are the two games. So they are going head to head. So they are going hit to head with the NBA. And not only head to head they're going, they're like, it's four of the best teams in the league.

Yeah. That's how you do it. That's how you schedule it. That's what we were just saying the NHL should have done is you should have games like that. Those aren't traditional rivalries, right? Like, I'm a Nuggets fan. I don't like the Lakers, but that's not like, that's not the rivalry. It's a rivalry.

It's a rivalry. Right. Right. It's just a, yeah. Yeah, it's LeBron versus the reigning cup, the reigning NBA final champion. Then you get sons and warriors where, I believe that's going to be like the first time Kevin Durant returns to Golden State since.

Yeah. He has it. How is that possible? Well, he only plays 10% of the game. So they've probably been back there seven times. And he was in Brooklyn. And he was all in Brooklyn all that time too. Like he like Eastern Conference team, right?

Like we didn't have a lot of games against it gets golden state. He doesn't play a lot of games. That too. So I went to a Nets game when I was in Brooklyn. And you'll be shocked to know that Kevin Durant's. did not play in that game. No, exactly. So I just wanted that said, but the thing I would love to see with this format,

I would love for the NHL to emulate what MLS does, where in the final day of the season, pretty much everyone plays and they call it Decision Day, where especially if you're still competing for a playoff spot, like those matchups are heightened up. And I know there's something similar out in the Premier League too, but could you imagine a final day of the NHL regular season and there are teams competing for playoff spots

and whatever matchups that are going to be in focus that day in order for teams to clinch those spots, they're there on that calendar. Say, like, Buffalo needs a win or Tampa Bay loss, just as an example, to make the playoffs. Like, you have that on. You could focus on another matchup at the same time. I think if you could find a way to do some kind of similar decision day

with all the teams playing, everything staggered, plus you could hype up the fact that teams could play spoiler. Yes, there are going to be some teams who are going to be in the playoffs and they could be rested. but if you have matchups that matter, and I guess it's dependent on the standings too, but if you have matchups that are going to matter and everyone's able to watch on that day,

that could be a really fun time. That sounds like flex scheduling, right? What the NFL is able to somewhat do too, right? Flex games in. Wow. All right. Well, listen, Jesse, we, have you been paying,

I know Sean McAdoo mentioned this, Down Goes Brown, that Vegas, and even Julian mentioned this too, like Vegas could very much be looking at the greatest start in NHL history. It's sitting there like do you think it's possible they can win their first 10 games 11 games before we let you go? Could they

run this to 11 and all? I mean, the team hasn't lost in like eight months. So it's hard for me to say it like yeah, I absolutely think they can do it. I mean, they lost a couple playoff games, a couple. They didn't trail since game one of the playoffs last year.

They have just steamrolled through everyone. The cup final was a slaughter. They bring everyone back. they've had injuries, it hasn't seemed to matter. And then you look at their, they're six and oh, the next four games are, they're at home against Philadelphia, at home against Chicago. Then they go to L.A. That's a tough one.

And that's a division rivalry. Those two, and L.A. with their one, three one really gives the Golden Knights problem. So that is the game. But this is hockey. So like it won't be that game that costs them. It'll be, it'll be Philadelphia tomorrow. But and then they come back home and they have Montreal, who is again, another team near

the bottom of the standing. So I think that it's absolutely possible. And this team, again, I'm not picking them to lose until they show me that it's scientifically possible for them to lose a game because at this point, it feels like it's not possible. 10 and oh, 10 and oh, I've been beating that drum since last week. They're really good. They're really good. And they, and they, to me, the most impressive thing about what the Golden Knights have done so far this year and it's just rolling over from last year is they just find different ways to win. And like you, you see other elite teams in the league and it's like, this is how this team wins.

They like, it's the oilers. They're going to score seven goals. Toronto kind of similar. Toronto is better defensively. But Vegas doesn't really have that. They, they kind of can win in all different types of ways. They can play a big physical checking game with Dallas. Like Dallas came in to Vegas.

And that was a like, they came in to make a point. Like that was a rematch of the Western Conference finals. The stars came in and punched them in the mouth and they were super physical. And Vegas just adapt. to that. They just, they're a chameleon. They, they adapt to that type of game and they end up coming back in that game and winning in a shootout. And then they play against Chicago, who's a little more run and gun. And there's a lot more skating in a game like that, not as much hitting, a lot more skating. And Vegas has the skaters to play a game so tough to beat is they can play whatever type of game they find themselves in and they don't really care what style of hockey is. They can win at all of them. Okay, not to project too much into the future here, but let's say Vegas, you know, continues to be the solid team that they are, they return to the cup final, and they win.

How many cups do the Vegas golden nights need to win to be considered a dynasty? So someone asked me this in a mailbag in the off season, and they said, if they win one more, are they a dynasty? And I was like, kind of,

they're a salary cap dynasty. Like in the salary cap world, if you went, like, and to me, it's not just the two cups. It's the fact that they've been to, they,

two Stanley Cups, they've played in three cup finals, and that would be five conference final rounds in seven years. That's about as dominant of a run as you'll see in the cap era. Now, prior to the cap era, there's some teams that, like, if you're going to compare them to the pre-cap dynasties, no, it's not even close. They probably have to win four cups, right? Like, that's the standard is much higher for back then. But if you look at what Chicago did, you look at the penguins and the lightning, to me, Those are the three, like in recent era, those are the three standards of what a dynasty is. And I think if Vegas were to win back to back cups and have that third cup final and have five conference final appearances in seven years, it's hard to argue that that's not about as dominant of a stretch as we've seen in this era.

So you're not like Mark Lazarus who needs to see a team win at least three times in a row to consider them a dynasty. it's it's such a like abstract thing right like every you you ask a hundred hockey fans a hundred of them they'll give you a hundred different answers as to what a dynasty is and I'm sure I guarantee there are people listening to this right now that are like he's an idiot there's no way that's a dynasty with two cups and we literally argue you could argue that it isn't but I'm just saying if you compare them to the dominant teams of the salary cap era another cup would put them right in that conversation we literally had people up the start of the podcast when we had Mark Lazarus debating this.

I mean, they didn't call him an idiot, but they were more or less trying to do that. Because that's how he feels. No, we called him an idiot. We called up an idiot for saying that Edmonton winning five cups in seven years was not a dynasty. That's insane.

What in the world? That's insane. Like what? It is. He said five cups in seven years is not a dynasty because at some point you have to win three to be a dynasty. because when these dynasties don't seed power.

Yeah, that's what he said. If that's the standard, then Vegas is not close to a dynasty. No, they've got a long ways to go. But, hey, we look forward to your coverage this week of the, well, still undefeated Vegas Golden Knights of the defending Stanley Cup champions. Jesse Granger, thanks for dropping by. We'll hit you up again next week.

Yep, always fun. Thanks for having me, guys. Before we get out of here, let's open up the email, the athletic hockey show at gmail. Actually, before we do that, real quick, we're sitting here. We're recording this at about 3.30 Eastern time, 1.30 for you mountain time on Monday. And we have not discussed Arizona Coyote's defenseman Travis Dermott using Pride-themed tape on his stick. And the reason why I bring up the time is we are now almost 48 hours out from Dermit using the Pride-themed tape on his stick. we have yet to hear if there's been any fine or suspension or I don't think a suspension's in play,

but any sort of discipline, I guess is the right phrase I should be using here. What does the NHL do here? I don't know what they can do. They've painted themselves into a corner with this memo. Like, if they punish Travis in any way, that's a bad look for them. That's basically saying that they're not in favor of, of, of the LGBTQ community. And I mean, look, they were trying to put this rule in

just so they could get out of players being singled out for not abiding with whatever specialty jersey nights were going on. But ultimately, because of this memo specifically attacking the pride tape, if they go against it, it looks bad on them. But also, if they don't enforce anything, it also sort of looks bad on them. So that just kind of opens the door for so many other players to defy this band. It's not really a band.

It's going to get to a point where the league is going to have to rescind this rule, because I don't think they want to be in this corner. And I think they're starting to realize that it's not, the bad press that comes with it is not ideal. Like, it's not something you want. If you're trying to continue to grow your game and be open in more households and whatever, you can't be this oppressive and you can't be this ass backwards. So I really, and maybe it's naive to think this optimistically,

I really think the NHL is going to have to rescind that ban. And I think they're going to end up doing it, especially if more and more players start to go against it, which in this case, like, it's going to look really toothless if more and more players do it and they don't do anything. Do you think it matters? Look, Dermit is a guy. He's kind of on the bubble of being a full-time NHL player. he's not a two-way deal, right?

So it's not like he's got a five-year secured contract, which, again, to me, actually even shows more bravery on his part that he would be willing to do this. Would it matter if this is McDavid or Crosby or McKinnon or Hughes or, you know, pick your super stock? How much more clout would it have if it was then versus Absolutely. Travis Dermott, who I just, I think,

think my respect for him just went through the roof because he was willing to make a stand or take a stand when he doesn't have a guaranteed contract beyond this season. But would it make a bigger difference if it was a super, super star? I think so. I think it would reverberate around the league a lot more. It would reverberate around just the sporting world a lot more if a star player of the caliber that you mentioned would have done this. especially the fact that Travis did this is brave enough,

but the fact that he did this in the face of other bigger quality stars being asked about it and some of them expressing their disappointment, but ultimately pushing back and saying that they don't want to do it to get in trouble, like that makes it even more impressive what Travis did. So imagine if we saw Connor McDavid. I mean, that Emmetton Oilers team was very much in favor

of wearing pride tape. They were all over that. And I mean, if Connor McDavid, I mean, he's injured now, but if he was in a situation where he would do it in a game, I think that would mean a lot to those communities, but also just to the sporting world at large. It's the fact that a player with the profile that he has, who, I mean, we think of hockey players as pretty guarded people

who aren't seeking the spotlight, but they would want to change things. Like, I think that would look really good in terms of trying to change the culture. I think it would, I think it would go a long way if a Crosby, if a Hughes, if a McDavid did it. At the same time, even though Travis Dermott did it, it opens the door for those guys to step up and say,

hey, you know what, I'm going to do this. Maybe it won't have that same effect. But at the end of the day, I mean, again, if the NHL is not going to enforce this, it opens the door for so many other players to defy the ban on their own. Let's, yeah, well said, and we'll see how it plays out this week and beyond with Travis Dermott and other players.

Let's just read one email here. Then we'll dip out here on a Monday. Elise and Philly has written into us. Julian, Elise has written in via email, The Athletic Hockey Show at gmail.com, the athletic hockey show at gmail.com. If you want to hit this up on voicemail, too, it's 8454-4-5-8459.

Either way, we love to hear from you. Elise and Philly says, everyday listener, always enjoy the pod here. This might seem small, but it's had a big impact on my experience this season. I've been thinking a lot about how the newly updated NHL app has seemingly removed a tab that amazingly could allow you to tune in to any live radio broadcast throughout the league. It's something I absolutely loved as a new fan coming in. I would listen to

games while driving, biking, cooking, cleaning, etc. I ended up following a lot of out-of-town teams that I wouldn't have otherwise. I live a busy life and being able to get the play-by-play in an audio format, let me stay into the games when I couldn't find the time to sit down and watch them. losing that has been a dampening disappointment to what I see as an exciting new hockey season. I can only speak for myself. I imagine it's a disappointment too to anybody's sight impaired who still enjoys these games, as they can get them in an era where podcasts have become so big. I think the audio format is a huge part of any kind of marketing these days.

It's something that shouldn't get buried instead of opening the NHL app every week and tuning in as I did last year. I'm now having to find myself Google and digging up rando sites and stream radio broadcasts as I'm able to find them. Unsurprisingly, it means I listen less often. I think I might just delete this app entirely, considering how much the NHL of despair for accruing and keeping fans, what is the logic of removing this feature to, quote, one user's comment I saw,

the NHL is no longer playing hard to get at this point. These guys just really are running away like a black cat in a Pepe-Lapue cartoon. And I cleaned up that quote. You, yo, you, you, you, you censored the word they were trying to use there. Yeah. I didn't agree it up. I only swear if I'm quoting Snoop Dog directly. Oh, man.

I feel like that complaint probably should have been in the inbox of whoever runs things up the NHL.com website. Generally with the changes, the look, I'm not all that impressed. That being said, Michael Rousseau wrote a really great article. on the NHL edge platform, which basically is, the league has a hub for more advanced stats and tracking metrics, which I think that looks okay on the surface,

but I'm sure other people who are a little bit more at depth at using those sites have more stronger criticisms. But yeah, I think that's pretty, that's sad to hear from our reader that they're not able to enjoy games on the radio the way that they used to. My youth, I spent so much time being in my room, turning on the radio to CJ-D-800

and listening to Canadians games being broadcast over radio. And I'm sure there's still people who still do that to this day for Canadian's games, Leafs games, whatever team you follow. And the fact that the NHL is kind of, I mean, I'm not sure exactly what happened to, I don't know if that capability is still there. Maybe it's in a different section. But I think that's a bit of a disappointment. And I'm sorry to this person for them going through it,

at least in Philly. Sorry to that. That sucks. Yeah, yeah. I'd love to hear from other people, too, whether it's on the NHL's new stats page, as Julian pointed out, Mike Russo has that piece or on the app,

altering whatever, not able to get radio broadcast. Hit us up, the Athletic Hockey Show at gmail.com. As we wrap up here, speaking of Mike Russo, Mike Russo is back on the Tuesday edition of the pod. with the head coach in Los Angeles Kings, Todd McClellan. It's going to join him.

So that conversation, Julian, we'll have that for our listeners coming your way on Tuesday. That's a big get, man. I mean, we started,

I mean, this podcast's getting better and better as we keep doing this. Maybe Kevin Sheffel day off last week and now we're getting Todd McClellan. I mean, well, we had Bill Zito through Russo.

We don't have a segment name for him, though. You know, we need to come up with something catchy. We can workshop this with producer Chris and the rest of it. and the listeners. Mike Russo. Give us a great,

maybe it's just called Mike check. And every week, Mike Russo checks in with a new guest. Time for a mic check. I like that. I like that.

I'm down with Mike check. That's pretty good. I was going to say Mike drop, but that feels like he bungled. That's only when he bungles the other. Yeah. Yeah. That's it, man.

Like maybe you give him a mic drop. Like maybe if he has like a little like rent, maybe if he has something that's kind of grinding his gear. years or something and then you just let him like but now he's mowing las's grass if he does that las is the rant guy yeah that's true but also las doesn't need a time with you just go he just go all right well we we got to go that does it for the monday edition of the plot julian man this hour and whatever 20 minutes hour and 10 minutes just flew by what was that no noise did you just make like a like a plane i don't know like a yeah yeah yeah it's flying by i love it i love it

I always think, I always think, dude, these hours with you are great. So I'm always happy to do these and I can't wait for tomorrow's episode. Yeah, we're looking forward to that. Thanks for listening to the Monday edition of the podcast. Follow us your favorite podcast platform. Leave us a rating of review. Review. We certainly appreciate that.

You can follow us on YouTube. At YouTube.com slash at the athletic hockey show. As I mentioned, we're back on Tuesday. Mike Russo and L.A. King's Head Coach, McLaughlin, we'll talk to me.