The Athletic Hockey Show - Bobby Holik, living life with a purpose

Episode Date: November 29, 2022

Former NHL'er Bobby Holik is Craig and Sean's special guest on The Athletic Hockey Show USA. Bobby catches up with the boys to discuss his life after hockey, where he got his notorious work ethic from, his admiration for Larry Robinson, Eric Lindros and Jacques Lemaire and the lessons he learned from his father. Plus the boys discuss the red hot New Jersey Devils, the NHL's best team, and we answer your questions and respond to your comments too!For more from Craig and Sean, listen to bonus content, exclusively on Apple Plus. This week, the Tuesday boyzzz borrow from Pierre Lebrun's column and critique goaltenders who have changed teams this season in the NHL Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Tuesday American edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. I am your host who never misses a Tuesday. Why would you? Ever. Craig Custin's, never. Joined, as always, by the occasional, my occasional co-host, Sean Gentilly.

Better known for his work on the Friday show. It's the Friday show. Hey, buddy. You made it back from taking the family trucks here down to Georgia in one piece. Everybody's okay. We did. The whole, everybody's okay. We did banged it out, 12-hour drive back and forth. The Buckees in Tennessee as one does. Yeah. Yeah, we did it all up perfectly. This is, this show will forever be known. This episode is the Bobby Holyoke episode. I think it's going to be referenced a lot in the future. because Bobby Holick is our guest.

We teased that we were going to have him. We don't always do that with guests a few shows ago and just said, look, you know, you may not be a New Jersey Devils fan. You know, where Bobby Holick, of course, won a couple Stanley Cups. Or I'm sure you're probably a Thrashers fan during his, he was a Thrasher's captain. You know, Rangers fans probably may or may not love Bobby. I don't know. I don't think they're all that interested in this one. This feels like this feels like a devil specific.

But they should. Here's my point. You don't need to be a fan of any of those teams or Bobby Holick to, I am asking as a personal favorite, just listen to this whole episode. Or I mean, not even the whole, you can skip this part. But Bobby is such a wealth of knowledge and wisdom. And the reason we had him on here is we just, I hadn't talked to him in a long time, but always. you know, my favorite interview for years. Even mentioned poor Marion Hosa

had to listen to how much I enjoy talking to Bobby Holicke as part of his... Which is what got us on the train of being like, yeah, we just see what Bobby's doing. That's right. Because it was just, it jogged the memories. See what Bobby's doing. I remember back in the day when we worked together

a million years ago, it was like in case of emergency, break glass on Bobby Holicke. It was like when you, it's true. When you had nothing, you were like... you could tell. Yeah. I'll just call Bobby Holy. When I was a kid thrashers reporter and there would be like three off days and a team

had a 10 game losing streak, I would just go over to Bobby and he would just feel like and he was at the point in his career. He had no issues. You know, if he wanted to call out a player or a reporter for asking dumb questions. Like he would challenge you had to come prepared. You had to come with good questions. And I didn't have any. You know why?

It led to some great conversations. Why? That's right. And Bobby delivers. It's he, this is, I think the first time we've done this, Sean, he's going to be in our first segment. Our second segment and our third segment. That's like, we were doing ad interruptions because we're like, this is good. We just got to do. Yeah, just let, let Bobby cook.

Well, I think that's, I think we may have hit on something. Here's a question. Do we think that's going to ever repeat itself or is, or is it just a testament to? what we think of Bobby Holy. That we go three segments of the guest. You think that'll ever happen again. You need a couple things. A, somebody who's retired in working on their ranch.

Not a lot of those guys. Okay. So that's got to be it. And B, somebody was something interesting to say. Like, there's times where it's like you just want to get in and out of the interview because sometimes people aren't that interesting. No. Like I said, we're both really dull and really stupid.

But Bobby Holic is not. And the problem is, like you said, not a lot of hockey players out there who are interesting and or funny and willing to communicate that publicly. It's tough. Yes. We got one here, though. It's tough. Oh, so good. So enjoy that.

So if you're like, hey, I just want to talk about hockey, man. I just want to talk about what's going on right now in the league. Sean and I are doing the. You shouldn't be listening to the show in the first place. Yeah. Just listen to CJ and Julian are right down the street. You can just find their stuff. Yeah, you probably should listen to a different podcast.

Or Sean and I are doing the bonus episode on Apple Podcasts. Plus, and we will be talking about some of the goings on around the league, I'm sure, as part of that. But a 30-second teaser, because I think some Devils fans will probably. probably be listening to this. Sean, the devil's may be the best team in hockey right now. Probably, this is the best devil's team since Bobby O'Leek was running around. What are your thoughts on the devils? Give me a 30 second taste in what we're going to talk about at Apple Pot. Is this team like, are you in? I've seen enough. It's a combination of VDEC Van Chek being competent and the rest of the team around him being a wagon, right? Like, if you look at,

If you look at the expected goal percentage standings for defensemen who, you know, play basically every night, this is just like a little snapshot, I think, of what the devils have done so far this season. Four of the top five are our New Jersey Devils. So you have Jonas Seganthaler at 67% expected, then Dougie Hamilton, then Brendan Smith, then Phil Myers on Tim Bay and then Severson. So does that mean that it, well, I'm not even talking about those guys as individual players. I think that is a snap, but it is a snapshot when you have like the four guys outside of maybe John Marino at the top of their lineup who are just killing it, in the unexpected goals. And the goalie, Vanichek, is decent enough to make it stand up. That was the big question last year.

They got destroyed. If they would have had above 900 goaltending, they would have been. an even goal differential team last year. And we're seeing what they look like now after A, taking a step forward with guys like Nico Heeshire and whatever else, and B, getting NHL caliber goaltending. And if that stands up, they're going to be fine

because they knocked off the Rangers last night, came back from, came back from, you know, multi-goal deficit, knocked off Shasturkin, on and on. And then it's been happening for, you know, really outside of the first few games of the season, it's been constant.

They're really, really good, and they're for real. Seattle's kind of the Western version of that, right? Yeah. Terrible goaltending last year. Yeah. I mean, were they one of the three or four worst teams from a skater perspective last year? No.

But Gru Bauer and Chris Rieger, before he got hurt, they destroyed him. Goaltending counts. It's just the way it goes. I think we lose sighted. We try to explain a way. People can't understand goaltending. They can't understand year-to-year fluctuations and just. just the randomness of that position.

So I think our inclination is to just kind of discount it and act like that because a team has a shit goalie or is getting shit goaltending, that we should just pretend that, you know, that something else was going on there. And it wasn't. It counts. That's, they were one of the three or four teams in the league last year because goaltending,

unfortunately counts. And they're not anymore. Like Martin Jones has been fine. You know, nothing special, but that's a good enough group of skaters with some added fire power at the top where, you know, this is the way it goes. They've been fine. I do I think that now, do I think that they're real on the level that the devils are? No, but they're, you know, that's a major jump up. We're just going to say this all over again on the Apple podcast plus

mega super. Guess what? If you like that, you need to hear it again. Seven good minutes. You're supposed to save that last bit. All right. Without further ado, let's, What are we selling for? Let's get right to it. Bobby Hulink. Live from Wyoming. One of the best. Live from Wyoming.

Wyoming. We are now thrilled, as always, to be joined by Bobby Hulik, who I swear I've talked to fairly recently, but I have not, because I went to look up like the last conversation we had. And it was in 2009, Bobby. Thank you. Come on. I believe you were coming to Thrasher's or what you were. Have you moved on since? I had moved on to, it was, I wrote about your retirement, which I, like, this is how old I am.

Like, I thought, like, you retired like three years ago. It's been a long, what? So this is Bobby Holy, everybody. How long have you been retired? It's been 10 years, 12, 13 years. May 22, was 13 years. I can't believe that. So I looked, I read a story that I wrote about your retirement.

And the last line you said in it was, it's time to be a husband and a father. full time. And you really have done that. You signed off and went and became a husband and a father full time. How is that gone? Yeah, it was, it was the decision I wanted, I was ready for that decision. I was happy to make that decision. And that's what I've been. And, you know, now years later, decade plus later, I'm like, why was that such a great transition for me? Yeah. It was my dad, my uncle who were famous legendary hockey players and their peace, who were world champions, not necessarily NHL players, except Batslaude Monski, who were very good friends with my dad at the time, you know, in the 16th and 70s. And they were, I grew up with them,

and these guys were as accomplished as anybody of that era. And they just, they were there for our practices. They were there, you know, at dinner at night. And they were there just, I didn't, never thought of my dad or my uncles as great hockey players, except, They were great mentors as men and hockey players. Yeah. So I had great role models, and you see, I think, a lot of guys from Eastern Europe, not necessarily Eastern Europe, but Czech and Slovakia or Czech Republicosl. Do the same.

They just, you know, when the game's over, when you can't do it the way you want, you move on and you are a man, you know, husband and his father, and you're there for your family, because the family is always there for you during your career. And that's the most direct way to pay that sort of, you know. So that's strong time jobs or full-time commitments, but it was always a priority. We talk about part-time jobs. Yeah. Hold on a second.

Was it was it the part-time job that they got the house in Jackson Hole? Because I saw that hit the market last year. That didn't seem like that was something that was a part-time job. Well, we, we, uh, what was the, what was the question again? Bobby, Bobby, I, I just saw you, I saw you listed your house for $22 million in, in, in Wyoming. That was the first thing that popped up when I, when I, when I Googled you, you know, just to see, just to see what, what, what was life like in Wyoming? I know, I know you guys are back down south, you know, more regular, you know. The thing is we are

because our daughter is getting married in South Lake City, Utah, which is we are here. And we're still here in Wyoming. And it's, you know, Wyoming, we've been here for almost 20, on and off during my career. We spent off-season here, so almost 30 years.

So it's home to us. And we're just making adjustments. And yeah, I thought that a lot of people would get to see that because it was kind of a big news at the time. But, you know, it's life. You just live. And then when, you know, family has different needs, we move on.

But as of right now, we are in Wyoming still enjoying the winner. And we're trying to stay close to our daughter because, you know, the wedding's coming up and just, just be involved with the family. Because it's not as she's a kid, she's a grown up, but also, you know, it's a big event in all of our lives. That's great. So you bring it. So the whole fam's coming in? Well, my wife. wife,

her family coming in, my mom's coming in, uh, my, our daughter and her, Beyonce, they're trying to keep the wedding small. So it's,

it's, uh, but still you, the West is so, so vast that you've got to keep everybody together. So it's like, you know, we're trying to stay here close to everything.

So it's, it kind of goes smoothly and everybody can enjoy themselves. So what, what kind of part-time jobs? You're working at the local ACE hardware behind the, no, actually, uh,

First of all, also a full-time ranch hand, you know. Of course. As you do. We travel all over the country. So that was my full-time job. No, actually volunteer. Yeah, ranch-hand. And I coached or mentor and taught hockey with the high school juniors all over the country.

And I also did a full-time coaching high school here for about three years. And also, for age, I don't know if you guys are familiar. I ran a shotgun club, we're shooting plays, trapsky, you know, teaching kids from middle school to high school, teaching them how to properly. So it just, and also I worked for a firearms company from Czech Republic as a spokesperson for about 12 years. And that was a lot of fun traveling to different fundraisers and tournaments. and so it end up for a full life. But I would never compromise my time with my family. So I had big,

because a lot of it was volunteering, so I had the flexibility. But you might not know that. But volunteering, you know, gets to you eventually because I believe people appreciate Peter. When parents or clubs hire people and pay them out of money, they appreciate them a lot more than they appreciate volunteers. So, you know,

As of right now, I tremendously enjoy teaching, mentoring, but I'm taking some time off from it because it, you know, you know my commitment. When I commit to something, I went to fall in. And after 10 plus years, you kind of like, you know, it's time to take a break. Well, do the 4-age kids have any idea that, like, they're being taught to shoot clay pigeons or whatever by a former NHL player? Like, is there any connection being made there? I mean, some of them did. If the parents were somewhat in the hockey or. Some people are, you know, some people who have even lessened.

But they didn't. I just hope they thought I was a good teacher. And surprisingly enough, but it was teaching, you know, clay pigeons, spawning clay, skit, trap, or hockey, or just mentoring young men. Yeah. I've tremendous, I've enjoyed teaching tremendously, far more than I ever thought I would. What, like, why do you think that, like, what do you appreciate about it being the mentor side of things? I think that's the only way to be involved in those things, especially hockey.

When I coach or I wasn't just coaching, but I would be mentoring or teaching. I feel like it wasn't always a team. It would be a couple of friends, kids, you know, a couple of teenage boys. So to me it was the closest thing to playing at that level I did for some reason. There was nothing else. I don't play shini hockey. I don't play. I don't go just skate.

fun. As the time went on, I really, it was, I was teaching and coaching a lot, a lot of hockey. And it was so much fun, but eventually, as I said, it felt like I was far more committed than everybody else. And I could see that. I lacked the reciprocity. I didn't expect people to be, become an inch of players or all stocks. I didn't expect that, but I expected them to give their best effort because I did. And eventually, you know,

I call it reciprocity. You give, you get back. And it was just give, give, give, and I wasn't gaining that situation. Do a lot of mental

coaching right now of individual kids and their dads in regards the shot of them shooting, but hockey's on the back burner right now until another opportunity comes

and presents itself. Do you think that you could get that reciprocity from like lower like lower level teams like is is do you need to coach better players to kind of get that to kind of get

your juices flowing in the way in the way that it needed to or is it or is it something you could get from coaching like community like just like on a community right? No yeah I was getting it well from high school team here or from from the middle school players that the dad's asking to help them out and all that it has nothing to do with the quality of you want to believe me I'm sure you have heard before it's called the give a shit factor

and we don't have to bleep you by the way you can say it okay very good thank you but that's the best way to do the hockey people that's the best way to explain because you hear it a lot he just doesn't have give a you know factor and

and I don't expect kids to go to some prep schools or whatever I just expect if they show up I want I recently had a conversation with an 11-year-old, and he's like with his mom. And they were like, what's the best way to appreciate coaches, you know, coming in early and working?

I said, best way to appreciate, it's not to think or give him fist publicly in the practice. It's give everything you got that practice. Pay attention. Stay focused through the 45, 55 minute practice or hour 15 minute practice. That's the best way to appreciate a coach if that's what you're looking for. Same thing. I appreciate the players if they keep their best effort. they stay focused and pay attention.

And whether they execute the drills the way they should or they're supposed to or not, that's a different story. Are they trying their best? That's the point. And that was kind of missing there for a while. So I had to step back and allow myself to just kind of relax sort of. All right. I want to get into your, you mentioned learning a lot from your dads and uncle.

I want to get into that a lot. Also, as a coach, I liked gift cards. I didn't really care if the kid. I liked to give gift cards at the end of the season, but that was my own. But we need to take a quick break and then we'll be right back. Now, let's get back to our interview with Bobby Holyoke. That emphasis on, you know, self-motivation and all that you were just talking about. Is that a nature or nurture thing?

Like, is that something that was just baked into you from birth or is that, did that come up, you know, is that is that something you figured out during your career does that have to do with coming over from from from from from check like how when did that become a priority for you so i will respond to it as a as a teacher like one thing i did would have maybe why i love teaching or mentoring is because i learned so much every time i work with the team or with individual players and so a lot of times you have things are happening or you're doing things as a player but you and you know let it late teens or 20s 30s late 30s, very few guys in the 40s, and you're so busy playing and when you time off,

you just go home, you have your family, you don't think about these things. Then you retire and you are working on a farm and you have all this time to analyze and think about what you've gone through life. And I think it's both. It's nurture and nature. Of course, some players or some people are more motivated by nature. They're just more driven. But you as a coach or a teacher have to find a way to channel that.

because a lot of times the ones who are more driven, more motivated, I'll also not as focus because they're just driven, they're aggressive. Then you have players or people or kids who are less driven, less aggressive, and you have to find a way to spark their enthusiasm and inspiration. So I always thought that working with youth, they help me realize or learn how you have to work with everyone individually. Yeah, there has to be a team plan. If you're coaching a team, there has to be a team plan that everybody adheres to.

But at the same time, everybody might adhere to it in a different way because there are different personalities, different characters. So nurture nature, you can't say one or the other. In any instance, you just have to, as a coach or teacher, your responsibility is to find out, is this guy more motivated on his own and you just need to do more teaching, more system, more things that he doesn't, don't come to him naturally because he might not have to gain intellect or sport intellect. The other ones who are not as physically strong and not as aggressive, they might have

the intellect, but they need help to build their physical abilities or their drive. So I find coaching team sport is also a very, very good. practice to work your teaching your individual players and then put it together. And also, you know, I had a great experience coaching the Israeli teams, national teams, for a couple of seasons there. And that was whole another experience in my life. So it's, again, you're dealing with people from different parts of the world or from different background.

And so maybe it's great to answer your question why I love teaching or coaching so much because I learned so much every time I get on the eyes or every time I work with with players or young people. So the Israeli team, I saw that, did Stan, I read that Stan Fisler kind of helped you link you up with the Israeli team. How did that happen? Well, again, if you have time. Wow, we do about it. Yes. Dan Fissela is a legendary broadcaster and writer and author and reporter and reporter.

and I spent a lot of time with him when I played in New Jersey and New York because he was always in a tricel area. And we go back way to Sport Channel. I believe that was the network that carried a game. I think Jeff is the only one who will remember that. So we- Some shade for producer, Jeff. I love this story. We always talk not only about hockey, but a lot of other things.

And when I retired a few years later, I got an email from Stan who moved to Israel to leave at his son and his grandchildren. And he's like, hey, we have a hockey camp here. We have a hockey rink. Would you like to come out and teach in hockey school? So I went there two summers in a row. I spent a couple of weeks running the hockey school there and teaching and coaching. And I enjoyed it so much.

And I enjoyed Israel so much. And I enjoyed people in Israel so much. They, after two years of having me there for the summer, they asked me to come back and coach there. There was a kind of a reorganization in the hockey federation. day like, hey, would you like to coach the national teams? I said, it's a tremendous honor. And so I did the U-18s, U-20s, and the Nath-Men's team. And that was whole another experience because of many reasons, many reasons,

traveling with them around the world and the tournaments and all that stuff. But as I said, it was, again, volunteering. But this was, there was a tremendous amount of reciprocity because these people have tremendous national pride, and they represent their country. And so it was probably one of my best experiences of my life. What's a story from that time that stands at? Like, when you look back and you're like,

that was unbelievable if that happened or some takeaway that you had from that experience? I have tremendously positive experiences and also tremendously negative experiences. I actually think about coming on with you guys. And I just came to me, there's a lot of talk about anti-Semitism around the world or in this country or it's on the rise. But we were with the U-20 team in Croatia at a tournament, which was a World Championship group. I don't remember the group, but each group has their own tournament.

And we played the Dutch. And I'm not going to be shy and I'm going to call them out on it because that was, and after the game, we lost, tight game, but we lost. And you have to understand, we had a U-20 team, but we lost. And you have to understand, we had a U-20 team, but our players were 16, 17, 18, we didn't have 19 and 20-year-olds because they are serving in the mandatory military service in Israeli Defense Force. So we had a young, very fragile team. And after the team game against Dutch, as everybody else does, shake hands.

And the Dutch players started calling them extremely insensitive anti-Semitic slurs to these 16-to-18-year-olds from Israel who are giving their hearts out of them. on the ice. The talent is not there, but they show giving their hard time. So we go to the locker room, and I see them coming off the ice and just cry, few of them in a really bad way. And so my assistant coaches, he's from, I believe, Mississauga or somewhere there, and he's Canadian, but he lives in Israel, married Israeli girls. So he speaks Hebrew, and I found out that they called them old Polish, very, very bad, anti-ssonant slurs in the line of, you know, hand-shake line.

So I didn't hesitate. I marched down the corridor to the Dutch team's locker room and confronted the players, the coaches, and I said, I want the players to come out and come to apologize. And, you know, there was a, it was a little bit of conflict, but I didn't hesitate because they did not only hurt my players who were so innocent at that age. but they pissed me they didn't hurt me they pissed me off in a really bad way

so I had to there was no hesitation because you have a player especially when you're a new coaching team that is wherever they go they have to have extra security and there's this to some degree

a danger to them all over the world wherever we are playing hockey you do what you can as a you know I have the experience I believe I have the the courage to stand up for them.

So it was not an international conflict. I didn't make it that way. But what ended up happening that the players who did committed those inappropriate behavior on the Dutch side, they came to our players

and apologized secretly, which I respect because these are boys. They were still young men. They didn't know how to handle it properly. But the apology came. It just didn't come in a public because they were

somebody confronted them that they did wrong and they were extremely embarrassed but that's one of the that's would you say is that the most negative? No I found it that I could make a difference in the world in my own way at the time

because I was not going to let that go and then there's a lot of other you know experiences when we want our group tournament in Mexico City with the adult with the men's team we were big underdogs, but those guys were so disciplined. They played the assistant to a T, you know, the assistant duty.

And my coaches, one of them was from Israel, one of them from Canada, my assistant coaches. It was a great, great team effort. And again, I learned so much working with them. And then we got a silver with the U-18. So it was a lot of fun, a lot of fun. And I did learn a lot as a coach handling players. And they were surprised because I had a certain. reputation as a player, but I believe I was nothing like it as a coach or I'm not like

nothing. I'm not anything like that as a coach or a teacher. I just learned from what I've accomplished as a player and I've learned from others who are better and smarter than I was. And I'm trying to apply it when I do have the opportunities. You said you learned a lot in that process, you know, in Mexico City or wherever it was. What do you think the biggest thing you learned was about I don't know what the biggest thing is, but it was, I was just, I learned, if I ever had an opportunity again, I would, you know, I even learned from my assistant coaches, who's formerly from, he lives in Canada, but he's formerly with the men's team and things that sometimes you cannot demand as a coach, your responsibility is to teach what you want from them. And you're going to make sure that they understand. They are fully, and then you can start criticizing if they don't execute. But at one time, it was a player on my men's team who I already had on a tournament with the U-20.

So I had him second time in the same season, and I expect him to do certain things. We were playing track to some extent or neutral zone luck, and he wasn't getting it. And my assistant coach who's from Israel, he was like, hey, did you ever think that he might just not know? And I stopped myself. I'm like, he probably doesn't know. And I'm demanding something from him that he doesn't know. So I grabbed him, told him, worked on him with him.

And then I was like, now I can expect him to do it right or get on his ass. But that there was a huge. So now when I analyze our social issues, when it's a politics, where it's the education, with sports, that is such a crucial part. Do they know or do they don't know and need to be taught first? People need to know first before you start getting on them so they're not doing it right. I hope I'm articulating properly. No, I understand.

Absolutely. And you know what? The funniest thing this all comes from the Bible from three, four thousand years ago. So it's, again, you know, I don't want to get it too deep in that way, but it's, it's been a wonderful, wonderful time since retirement, the amounts of my other things. I learned so much more. And I thought I knew, as you know, Greg, I thought I knew a lot. Thank you. You did. You did. I, you mentioned, like, when you're out on the ranch in post, in retirement, that you had time to think, really for the first time about your playing career. what like in analyze things and probably overthink about things was where did your mind go when you were thinking about your career um one thing i i was very i'm extremely happy you know it was probably the

goal from day one since i was a little kid and my dad always demanded for me to give my best i i truly can look back at my career and say you know what there's not a day or practice when i just didn't give my best not that i was always at the top of my game but what it means is is the day whatever you had, whatever that 100% was, maybe you were sick with flu, maybe you had a bad growing, you had a walking knee or, you know, banged up shoulder, you still gave that 100% you had that day. And that's the message I tell, I try to relate to most of young men nowadays or young athletes or students that I work with. It's not, you're not always going to be in an all-star form. But whatever the form is, you can, you give, you can,

your best. Basically be the best version of yourself. When it's playing hockey, where it's a student, whether it's a young husband or a father, that's kind of my message. And when you do that consistently, good things will happen. And I honestly can look back and say,

yeah, I was not always good, but I was my best. I told my daughter, I was not the best there was or best ever, but I was probably my best, more often than most. Right. Yeah.

If there was some stat that just said you were giving a hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. Percent of your, of the Bobby Holick output, you, yeah, I would like to see that.

Yeah. So that is one thing that I kind of thought back. And I keep, I try to carry it on from a teacher or a mentor or a coach or just fixing fences. Same thing. I don't want to walk away from something that it was not my best. And, it's a fun way to live.

You know, for young players in hockey or sports, they're like, whoa, that seems hard. I'm like, don't look at doing it for next six years. Look at it of doing it today and repeating it at tomorrow. And when you do that for a few days, then the week's going to go by

and you gave your best. Then you put a few weeks together, it's months. And before you know it, it's a learned, we talk about learned behavior. Doing your best is a learned behavior. Nobody has that. Even the most talented, talented athletes don't have that.

They have to learn that. That's when you get Crosby's and Gretzkees or Oletchkis, because they're talented. They have the hand-eye coordinations. They have the game sense. But they also learned giving their best every, not only in the games, but in practice and pre-season and in off-season workouts when they're on their own. I'm working on a story about Eric Lindrosse. And I saw in the last year or two, someone asked him, who's the hardest player he'd

ever played against? And he said it was you. Um, so I, what was, yeah, I know this is a little out of left field, but like I said, I'm, I am working on a Lindrae story. You had a lot of battles with teams he was on, whether it was the flyers. Then you guys were teammates and with, with the Rangers. What does it mean to have that rep, I guess, A is being one of the toughest players, a guy of his caliber ever played against. And then B, just what are your memories of, you know, playing against him? I think Kevin Weeks, a friend of mine, Kevin Weeks, sent it to me like a screenshot of the, Twitter, I think he was on Twitter or something. It was on Twitter. He put my name on. I took it as a tremendous, tremendous honor. That meant to me that one of the best players of the era, if not the best player,

kind of knew I was played. And that's all the matter. I wasn't want to, I didn't want to be there just to be there. I always wanted to give my best. And sometimes, again, you know, if it meant to be the hardest player to play against, that's something to be proud of. So to me, thank you for bringing it up.

It's probably one of the proudest moments of my career, not necessarily the trophies and stuff, but when somebody of that caliber says that means a lot. Hmm. So to flip it, I'm sorry, we asked about everything. Yeah,

what was it? Yeah, yeah, do that second part. What was it like playing against Lindrauss? Because I'm always fascinated by stories like that. It was phenomenal because I always say the best, best in the world bring up the best item.

you or me or that's that's why you look at it i don't want to play against the average i want to play against the best because that's the only measure is it measuring it matters and we had some great epic battles in when he played in philly and um you know we played two conference finals against that flyer team that he was on and all and dozens of regular season games or even preseason games i mean going down i go back to philipare spectrum you know before they close that was something else and the same thing

with the I don't know what it's called now the big newer arena but again it wasn't just

Eric it was like player and Dejard dance and everybody else around on those

teams and it was it was just awesome and unfortunately or unfortunately I was we had dinner last night with friends

from Philadelphia who live here full time Flyer fans and I cannot tell you how many Flyer fans

in this town in Jackson, Wyoming, maybe it's relative to speaking, but I have half a dozen friends who are flyer fans, and we always go at it when we see each other, whether it's at the coffee shop or go out to dinner, or we just kind of run across each other in the parking lot. It's always, you know, flyers and devils and this and that.

And there was actually a gentleman who I've known for 25 years here, and he, at one evening, we were going in a restaurant, he was coming out, admitted after having maybe one or two drinks too much, that he was one of the guys on the glass calling me names down in Spectrum. But it's all fun. It's all fun. I love those days, and I love playing against Eric. I played with him in New York, and we became great friends, great teammates, and I really, I think, I didn't just like playing against him. It was a great challenge,

but also playing with him, getting to know him the type of person he was. And that was a nice experience as well. That's great. Are you done double dipping, Sean, on your assignment? Can I ask a question? No, this is great. I can just, I can scratch that one off. That's a call I don't have to make today.

Thank you, Bobby. That's great. So to flip it, so if who is the toughest player you ever played against? Like who would be your answer to what Eric was saying about you? I never looked. People ask me that all the time. I never looked at that way because harder it was, better it was. Yeah.

There was, I'm sorry? Yeah, I'm agreeing. Yeah. So for me, harder, hard of the game was, harder the players to play against where more I enjoy it. And so there are some of them, they stand out. And I'm not going to name them because it's just too easy. as a dirty player. Not that I was a fair and clean guy,

but somebody was really, but his reputation in the general public is quite different than what he had on the ice. And you know what? Maybe, and again, to go on this podcast and say the name, you guys can text me,

I can text to you, but I just don't want to name it public because it's just too easy, you know, because... Oh man, everyone's going to have guesses here. Yeah, we're getting a million guesses from people. And they're going to be like, what did Bobby tell you?

The public, general public, or the executives and general managers around the league. And then the person, you know, the type of person or a player he actually was is two different things. And it happens. It happens. You know, I feel like I was far better off the ice than I was on the ice. You know, so we have all alter egos when you play the game. So that's how it is. Did you find, as you started coaching post-career,

that you could tell your influences of your coaches that coached you? Like, where you're like, oh, that's something Lou would have said or whatever it would have been? Like, did you feel those influences when you started coaching? Oh, absolutely. People don't realize. That's one thing. I talk to people at the time. There's so many bad coaches in the national hockey. Oh, maybe in my days. You know, I was extremely fortunate.

I had really good ones. like Jacques Lamar, he's a standout all by himself. He changed the game for me. Larry Robinson changed the game for me. And they were also great people, great teachers, great coaches. But then there's a lot of coaches that people think, just because you're going in the NHL, you must be good. That's not as really true.

I learned out so much from bad coaches or bad coaching that what not to do. Or, you know, I remember sitting in a locker room or on the bench. I'm like, this is just so ridiculous. I'll never do that if I'm ever coached. That's how bad it was, you know,

or the way they were treating players. Oh, I couldn't. That was probably the worst thing. A couple coaches, they always, something about these coaches who are not that good,

would love to just punish fourth-line players. We lost the game, fourth-liners, you're sitting, somebody else is playing, or we're going to call some now. And I actually, towards the end of my career.

I'm not going to say details, but I challenged somebody like, you're telling me you're blaming the fourth line or the third line for that we didn't score, we averaging goal a game for the last, you know, two or three games. That's, that's, the reason why they did it,

because there was no, there was going to be no challenge from fourth liners. They were just having to be on a team or even third line players. But I learned that if you're going to get the team play better, you challenged the first line of the star players, the starting goalie to be better. You know, because it was so, it hurt. It heard to see these fourth line players who were just hanging on with everything they had to be able to play in the national hockey league.

And then the coach just decides, I'm too much of a pussy. So I'm going to blame them for a loss of the team instead of blaming the star players who are underperforming. So that to me was like probably the biggest lesson that I ever learned. And I always try to, even though I was fourth liner for many years, and I always try to go out of my way. So those players or the seventh defensemen or eight defensemen, they felt comfortable, they felt like a part of the team, even when I was a player.

You know, I looked at them as equally. Or they needed more attention than the players on the first line because first liners or start players, they always got attention. Right. You know, it's media, what it's the trainers, what is the coaches. But it's a team. so you've got to make everybody feel part of it. Especially your experience, you were, like you said,

you were a guy who came into the league, like on a bottom six and then progressed into a point where you were, you know, an All-Star and a top-line guy. So is that something you just sort of carried over from early in your career where you knew what it was like, you know, to kind of be on the other end of those discussions? So I did start in the league and, you know,

I played on fourth line. And to me, I was not a fourth-liner. I knew I was better than that. But I was patient. The way to prove them wrong is to be just excel at that position. If I'm at fourth line center, I'm going to be the best fourth line center in the league, which eventually happened with the crash line in New Jersey. Then I start moving up and start playing different role and contributing differently.

So I never looked at myself, but there's hundreds of players who are, you know, bubble players or borderline or whatever. And coach doesn't need to get on their ass and ride them when the team's not doing well. that just a couple of coaches will stand on and I'm like that's yeah name them Bobby come on huh name those coaches let's go no no no you're gonna text them to us after the uh I think I could could I name them if I confronted them at the time they know who they are I'm not gonna do it on on TV you know like that's not my style so um all right fine so that that that was the probably biggest lesson that I learned that everybody's you have again back you have to players individually. If it's a first-line or a superstar center, you almost have to ignore him because

he gets plenty of attention as it is. You save that energy you have and put it towards the players that you're going to need down the road as a depth player. So that's one of the big, big lessons. I heard, you mentioned Jacques Lumer. His ability to teach everybody very specific to what they brought to the team was something that made him so unique. What did you learn about teaching from from Jacques specifically. What he taught us, basically, to kind of make it simplified,

is he simplified a game. So when you go out there, you have these finite amount of energy for a game or for the season, but when you become more efficient, suddenly you feel like you have twice or three times that much energy because you're doing everything.

You do forecheck, back check, playing in your own end, you know, cycling in the corners, you're doing everything more efficiently. You're putting your stick in the right spot. And that saves the five. finite energy you have, I said, because we are human beings, you know, we are players. He can't just pour more gasoline in the tank and keep going. You have so much.

And he gave us tools. He didn't necessarily like, this is how you're doing and that's it. He gave us tools for us to get better ourselves. A lot of people felt he's too restrictive, but, you know, they benefited from it themselves, even though they felt he's restrictive and he wants to play defense. but we all benefited from it. And so efficiency is the is the, is the, is the, is the, probably key there that he, we became so efficient. We didn't run around.

We didn't waste our energy. But when we did, when they did turn, we made them turn the puck over. We had the puck. We had all this energy to go and go offense and have fun with it. You know, so that was big. Blair Robinson was just, he was probably better than anyone that I've ever come across as coach or teacher who understand that we are people and we all need, you know, some of us need a little more kicking the butt and some of us need more pat on the back. And he was, he had the

perfect balance. And on top of being one of the smartest hockey guys that ever played or ever coached. Yeah. I did want to ask about Larry Robinson because you hear, you know, sometimes it's tough for great players to be great coaches and vice versa. But that obviously wasn't a problem for him. top 20 player, whatever, of all time and also a great coach. But is that, was it the interpersonal stuff that made him a great coach? Or was it, you know, the wealth of, you know, the experience he had and ability that you had like in his playing days. Like, what made him so great to work with? I think, Larry, when you isolate his knowledge of the game and his teaching skills and his coaching skills, he would be at the top no matter what. But then he's almost all by himself,

because all the players that he's coach elevate him not only as a great coach but a great guy. Genuinely, one of the best, if not the best person there ever was in hockey. And as I said, the combination of his teaching skills,

coaching skills, his ability to sense what the player needs at a certain time and his personality, which was wonderful, made him very unique. And that's Larry Robbins

is a standout by himself. He's just, he's just there's no one like him so again and it's a combination he just stand out as a person he's just stand out as a coach but you bring that together and there's generations of players who look up to him and learn so much from him that uh especially from like the new jersey days you know the 90s early 2000 yeah all right we're gonna send a one more break and then we've got like we're probably pushing you bobby more than you wanted to talk to us this afternoon but

this has been as long as you have interesting questions that's i mean I'm engaged. Okay. We'll start with those in the third segment. We've been saving all the interesting ones. But let's take a quick break. We'll be right back. All right.

So, Bobby, gosh, the one thing I do want to talk to about, you're a voracious reader. I miss, you know, going into a locker room and talking about what books are reading. And, like, it was always fun. And, you know, it was always interesting to learn from you and to kind of have debates oftentimes. And I know there was a book that was written. called Freedom to Win, and it was about, you know, the Czechoslovakia playing against the Soviet Union. And you had a hand, you didn't write it, you had nothing to, but you had a hand and I'm sure guiding it. What was that process like? So the writer, Ethan Shiner, he's from, he's a, what is he,

he teaches California Davis up in, just outside of Sacramento. I think he's a political science professor. He sent me a letter, written, handwritten letter to my address. And I get, I, I still get some fan mail, not much, but I get. And my wife was going through it, and she read this letter, this is years ago, a few years ago. And he would like to, during his, during research on sports and politics, he came across my dad's and uncle's team in 1969, the events that led up to it, which was the Prague Spring and the Soviet re-occupation in 1968 and all that stuff. And then the two games they play against their Soviets.

I'm not going to say Russians because at the time it was a Soviet Union. And it was 1969 World Championships, ice hockey world championship in Sweden. I'm not sure if it was Stockholm or Yadipurik or some one of those others. And the Czechoslovakian team beat Soviets twice in the same tournament. And it was unheard of. At the time, Soviets were so dominating all over the world, Olympics world championships.

My dad and uncle did not win the goal, but they beat the Soviets. twice in the round in the first round I don't know what the and it was just a national event of of the six I mean you know it was six months or less after the soviet occupied us and the only way we could answer we couldn't fight them militarily I wasn't born at the time I know history but we could fight them on the ice you know there was not much of a soccer that hockey was it was everything at the time and they beat them twice in the same tournament and my dad I don't know was the first, he was thinking, there's a red star on a Czech jersey, and he taped a black tape over it in protest. And he was the initiator, and a couple of his other teammates did the same. And then when they beat the Soviets, he was on the red line, putting his ear to the ice. And the reporter's like, you know, Mr. Holy, what are you doing there? He's like, oh, he's listening to the Russians turning off the oil, you know, as a boycotting our energy source. And funny thing is that now with the war in Ukraine and all that stuff, everybody worries in Europe worries about the energy sources where they're going to come from.

So this gentleman was found about these two games and how much it uplifted the nation after the occupation, Soviet occupation. So he was like he wrote me because he knew I live in the States. He wrote me a letter and then he got together. He came here. and I helped him to try to put pieces together and also put him in touch with, you know, he went to Czechoslovakia and he interviewed all the remaining the players who are alive from that team. They're still alive.

He interviewed them. He interviewed my mom. And he just interviewed everybody. He's done tremendous amount of work. And this book is coming on next spring. And it's going to be basically about my dad's era all the way to Nagano, how fighting the Soviets,

on ice led to hockey being such a powerful tool for Czechoslovakia to make a mark in the world. And also, living in an oppressed country, I believe to my generation, it was a huge driving factor, huge motivator to prove ourselves to the world that we matter. Even though we are a small country, we were occupied, we were communist, but you can still rise up above all that through hard work. and sacrifice and commitment and become that the world or hockey world will take you, you know, you matter. And I believe if you talk to Jeremy Yager or Raiko or any of the Dominion Hachshik,

it was a motivating factor for us to prove to the world that we matter. And it started in the 60s with my dads and my uncles and their peers generation. I'm going to I'm going to for anyone listening that wants to check that book out I'll give the full title and then we can get back it's called freedom to win a cold war story of the courageous hockey team that fought the Soviets for the soul of its people and Olympic gold I believe it's coming out in March 2023 yeah yeah okay we can reorder it and all that I'm not selling it I'm just saying it no I just think it's interesting yeah what do you what do you um what you what we'll do you um what we'll What would you like people to know about your dad? You know what? That I think about him. He passed away seven years ago, almost eight years ago. I think about the things he taught me, the things he said, the thing he did and how he

did it every day of my life. Because he was so ahead of his time. No, let me take that back. He wasn't ahead of his time. The man he was, it's, it was just such inspiration, not only. only as a, when I was a player, because as a player, I wanted to become myself. I have to have my own identity. And when I retired, I had more time, and I spent some, they came and visited and all that,

but then he passed away, not suddenly, but still at fairly young age. And ever since, I think, so many things, he was, to some extent, you find out in that book, he was very rebellious. He was very outspoken. The secret police at the time, the communist secret police had files on him, and there'll be pictures of the, or copies of those files in that book. And bold letters on the cover of his file, they were actually found maybe a couple of years ago. They showed me the pictures of these files, and it just said, rebel. And in my dad's picture, his name, all his information.

That's it. The communist secret police. But what I think about, the way he looked at, you know, living life with a person, whether you are a player, whether you're a coach, whether you're a teacher, whether you're a husband, whether you're your father, whether you just work on your cottage, you know, somewhere and chopping wood, how fully he lived life and the purpose he thrived for. And whenever he did something, how he did it, best of his abilities, that's, you know, it's just, and there's a lot of other things that come to my mind because for some reason,

And if he said it 40, 50 years ago, or 45 years ago, 40 years ago, and I remember him saying that, and now I can apply it because I'm that age that he was then, you know, or he was maybe not as old as I now. Or it just, it's amazing that he, the insight he had on life, not only sport, but on life. And again, there's rarely a day that I don't think about his wisdom, let's put it that way. I look at our society today or what it's a sport of hockey, what it's a society. We are so well educated, but we lack wisdom. And my dad had so much wisdom. Unfortunately, because of his personality, not everybody always took him.

It was hard because he was rough around the edges. And he was, if you think I was rough around the ages or I am, you know, I'm pretty smooth out compared to my dad. My dad was just an animal, you know. And unfortunately, that sometimes takes away from his wisdom or from his accomplishments because he was such an animal. But that's life. Nobody's perfect. Where do you think that courage came from for him to be so rebellious when, like, life

could be at stake, right? Like, that's, you know what I mean? There's different courage in hockey and courage in life. Where did that courage come from? I think we can pinpoint it to February, 1940. actually of February 25th, 1948, when the communist takeover of the Chickaslovakian government, and shortly after his dad, who worked all his life up to that point, to have a butcher shop, he wanted to put a, my grandfather's dream was a butcher shop.

So at the time, he bought a butcher shop, he ran a butcher shop, he was very good at it, and the communists came and nationalized the store. Basically, he took it from him. You know, there's no, there's no trial, there's no... peel. They just showed up. They took the store, threw him out. He was working, I believe, in a brick factory somewhere because he had to support his family. The chance of him to end up in some gulags was just as good. But because there's small business owners, entrepreneurs, were the enemy of the state at the time or against any totalitarian regime. So my grandfather

ended up working in a brick factory, some manual labor type of deal. And my dad was six years old at the time. So you're old enough to remember that. So it was a huge trauma is an understatement. And ever since he despised authority and the communists were famous for try to control every part

of your life. So there were again, driving factor for him and his brother, my uncle, becomes so good. But my uncle is just recently received a presidential medal for lifetime achievement because he was just a great man and completely opposite

from my dad, incredible hockey player, far more talented my dad, but he was just nice men. You know, good men. He is nice and great man. My dad was tough, and he wouldn't, he couldn't keep his mouth shot and it got him in trouble.

But fortunately, he was too good to be denied, so the country needed him to play hockey for the national team because at the time, the communists, just like the Soviets, the Czechoslovakian communists, used hockey or hockey teams as a propaganda. You know, The hockey team did well.

They would say, hey, our hockey team's doing great. Our system is better than yours. You know, it was crazy. It's crazy stuff, but that's what it was. Even though after this 69 thing when he taped over his direct star, he did get in trouble. He got suspended from a national team, but 1972, he scored a game winning goal for the world championship in Prague. You know, like, that's, and that was part of me. like we were talking being on the fourth line.

I'm not a fourth liner. I might be on a fourth line, but I'll prove them that I should be on the third or second or first line. You know, I'm playing against the best in the world because that's the type of player who I really am. But when I was on the fourth line, I didn't look at it as like, oh, my career is going nowhere. Because we have a fight in us,

and that fight never, that fire never dies. My goodness. I don't know what else to ask. to that, Bobby. No, it's life. I learn from it and again, I absorb it. I adjust it and I try to adapt it to my teaching and learn, take the valuable lesson. Of course, I don't want the kids today to go through what my dad did for them to be better hockey players or better students, but you can take lessons from it and the persistence, you know, and all that and apply it to. It's getting hard and harder to today's youth, but I believe if you work hard enough as a coach or teacher,

you can. I'd be curious as a father, you're now, I mean, your daughter's raised wealthy. So it's so different. How do you pass that family trait and hunger and fight onto somebody who hasn't had that first hand experience? It's, first of all, you don't just talk about it. You live it. you know so when I retired from playing I wasn't just enjoying retirement I worked I worked 12 14 hour days

that was unusual where I went from sunrise to sunset you know and it's because I had I love working I love you go back to the fulfillment to have a purpose right so when you ask your children to work hard but you on social media following your friends doing nothing and you ask them to do they have children or youth has a tremendous sensor, bullshit sensor. And if you tell them something and you're not doing yourself, you might as well not tell them. But when you up before daylight and,

you know, they work till dark and you ask them to work hard, they're like, yeah, because everybody's doing it, everybody's working hard, you have to create an environment. You know, not just like, that it appears you work out. You truly have to work hard.

And my wife and I, we always do, which, you know, right now we are in a transition. But my wife was amazing throughout my career to, you know, creating a support system that I could focus on my career and accomplish what I accomplished. But when I came home, we had a great home. And then when I retired from, I gave everything I had to them to pursue their dreams. And they were into horses. And, you know, our daughter competed in a national level. and she could have been just as well professional doing it, but we said education is more important,

so she's working on becoming a doctor. Again, you don't talk about it, you do it. And that's how you, that's how, and also another thing is to, I'm the first generation immigrant, or my daughter is the first generation American from my side, and my wife's family, you know, mom from French, Canadian, And her grandmother, paternal grandmother came from Italy, literally with a suitcase off the boat like they used to. And it's just like, no, it's not always, it hasn't always been like this.

Yeah. It's like this because not only us, but generation before us were extremely hard to get, to give us or give me an opportunity to succeed. And that's, it's not just our family. It's a society-wide. We don't talk about it because for some reason we are, we are ashamed of. shame of our past and everything, the only thing that's good is the future or young. And I have a huge problem with it because there's so many lessons to learn from the, from the generations of our, of our past.

And that's, that's, that's my approach. Yeah. Well, it's worked out. Okay, I'd say. Well, Bobby, I think, I think, I think we've pressed up against the end here. We went three segments. When it, normally, it's one, but it was, I mean, so much good.

You talk about wisdom of your father. There was so much wisdom in that conversation, Bobby. And I appreciate you sharing it with us. I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to share that because maybe there's going to be a young man who hears that and will help him to be like, yeah, I need to get my shit together and get going and find a purpose and, you know, fulfilling life. And that young man is Sean. I was going to say, there's definitely someone who's going to listen to this conversation and apply the knowledge of that. another I can guarantee you that. One thing before I was just one person.

I know you guys right. I'm tied on time. But when I retired, again, I finally had time to think or analyze what I've done or not necessarily what I've done, but how I did it. And then I realized I have a tremendous responsibility as a man who had a great family and great mentors and great coaches as a pro. I have a responsibility to give that back. So if this.

if this someone is going to watch this and listen to this and hear like, well, you know what, maybe I should get going or I should be more focused or I should work on my discipline or it is somebody, you know, during my coaching my high school years or the Israelis, I feel it's not I'm not going, I don't go out of my way. I think it's my responsibility as a man who has had success for the right reasons, which is hard work, sacrifice, discipline, and also be great people in his life, I need to share that with others. And every opportunity I get, I appreciate it. So I thank you for giving me this opportunity and asking the right questions because I think

it's important to talk about it and have follow-up questions. And more young people, more young men see it, the better. Well, thanks, Bobby. It was great to see you. I look forward to doing a follow-up in 16 years. And we'll have it back on. No, sooner than that. All right.

Six weeks then. All right. Congratulations on the wedding and all the best to your family. And I hope that goes well and it's everything that you all imagine will be. Thank you very much. You guys have a great holiday season. Yeah, you too. Thanks so much.

Bye-bye. Well, Sean, he was as good as advertise. I was nervous a little bit. Like, I'm like, what if we're pumping up Bobby? What if he's, you know, got nothing to say? I was actually. I, I, I, I, was less skeptical than you, I guess.

Skeptical is right word. I was just, you know. No, you're skeptical. I was just nervous, like, worried. You should have, Bobby, if you're listening, you should, Bobby, if you're listening, you should have heard the things that Craig said about you before that.

No, I mean, I think, it's, it's fair. It's, I mean, we hadn't talked to him in a while,

but I was a blast. I think you should write a book of course it was. Just, like, like, 100 proverbs from Bobby Holick or something. Not,

not, get him a good, get him a good editor. I think he's, I think he's there. I think you, I'd read it. He was awesome. I hope, like, I'm, I'm going to have, like, the kids listen to that. That was great stuff.

All right. And it got me motivated. I was up early this morning, ready to work. Yeah, you're, you're like a, you're like a TED talk addict, aren't you? I need to feel my self. You listen to, you listen to, you listen to shit like that constantly. So you're, you're ready to go. You don't like to, you don't like to, you don't like to, you don't like personal growth in any way.

Like, you want to. I, I'm a big fan of personal growth. I just don't. I just don't look to tech CEOs to deliver lessons on it to me. Okay. Do you hear that, Adam? Anything else? We have time for maybe two or three questions.

This is already running super long. We're down to like... We're doing this. We're doing this because it's the right thing to do. We can't skip this. So we're going to go into the comment section because it's my favorite thing to do. it's my favorite part of the podcast. I'm going to be off for a couple weeks.

So we got Jeremy Rutherford coming in next week, and it'll be great. But yeah, I wanted to get a couple of these in. Can I just, I'll start because Jimmy L. has a great idea. If Twitter does fall, which it will, does the comment section of the Tuesday show become the new home for hockey Twitter? I'll tell you what's not good. That's a great idea because you know, it isn't going to be mastodon. Oh, boy.

Oh, boy. I think Twitter's coming out of this, by the way. I think it's staying in one piece, generally. Okay. I have no thoughts on that. But everyone, you sign up for Sean's substack. But if it does. Dude, I set up a substack.

I set up my little link tree page with all my, with all my various things on it, because I was spooked, but I'm not anymore. Adam P. Yes or yes. Jesper Brad is the best player in the NHL. Hashtag JBI. ITB, P-I-T-N-HL. Shout out to the Brad Pack.

Shout out to Devils fans who were really, really fun. There's, there is, they're an awesome group on, on Twitter these days. Yes, of course he is. Desperad's the best player in the NHL. We've established that. That's, that's what the last 25 games have been about, him taking the throne. Alana O. says, we're going to go back to Twitter. With Twitter in a death spiral, I'd love to hear about some of your favorite hockey

Twitter moments. I almost want to think about this and come back to it because was it last year someone did like a hockey Twitter moment bracket for March Madness. It just reminded me of like Yeah. Who was it that like when after TSN like there was supposed to be a DM? That might be my like it was a gross or one of those like that was funny.

Yep. There's so much like the trade the trade is one. The trade is one for one was was unbelievable. Anything that happened during the locker. The mockout was gold. I think my, the podium stuff, we know the, we know the true identity of the NHL, of the at-NHL podium account. You do?

Let's just say he's a, let's just say he's a co-worker, yes. Really? Is it you? Yeah. It's not me. I don't think you have to go that far to figure out who it is, but I'll say that much. Maybe just a couple days into the future. Wow.

If you know what I mean. The funniest Twitter thing of all, I'm pretty sure, for me, was the, was when the mediator got involved with the lockout. And the guy had this like impenetrable Twitter account that was just basically jokes about jokes from repurpose jokes from the Craig Ferguson show and a bunch of other stuff. And everything was out of context and weird. And he ended up getting taken off the case. and I tried to call this man's house and was told in no uncertain terms by his wife not to call back ever again.

Like I found this guy because he lives in Pennsylvania and I just wanted to be like, hey, what, do you want to say anything about that? It kind of sucks that, you know, ass-mode jokes from the late-late show got you taken off the job and his wife told me to get lost. I can't believe that.

I thought he'd want to talk about that. That was one of my favorites. No, you would think so. I think Twitter in that era was the best. It was. Let's see. someone wants to know where Sean's. Oh, the other, the other really funny moment.

Yeah, that's fine. Not to keep this segment that we're supposed to keep for five minutes. Go ahead. What am I supposed to do? When the Bruins had the three first round draft picks and Reese Jessup on Twitter was like, oh shit, they could get Shillington, Matt Barzell, and Kyle Connor here. And they went and drafted, you know, Jake DeBrusk and Jacobs, Borell and Zachson, or whoever, whoever it was.

That was very funny, too. But it doesn't matter. Twitter's not going anymore. Someone. Jesse W. specifically wants to know, what do we have to do to get Sean, Craig,

and Max on the same episode, a live recording at Tipsy McStaggers? Yes. Just come out, come out to the D. That's me. Sean? Yeah, fine.

Okay. Stay with me. Just invite me, maybe. Come on up. We'd end up not doing a lot. We'd end up probably going on Zoom in the same room or something weird because it's probably better for us. That's not true. Do you have any more?

Somebody wants Tuesday Boy Slippers by American Christmas. Good question. Tyler, I'd probably get it to you by Canadian Christmas. Zane wants Sean to have a Wikipedia page. I think Zane, that's probably on you to set up. I work. I interned at the Washington Post when I was in college in a dude who I I worked who I worked with like just a random guy had his own Wikipedia page there.

It was because he 100% set it up himself. And I periodically used to check to see if it was still up and someone took it down. It's been taken down because this guy, he was just like a random, he was a random dude who worked to the Washington Post website. That wasn't enough to get a Wikipedia. So I feel like I'm at the point now. I've got one, Sean, in case you want. Yeah.

That's the book deal. Did they set that up for you? book, some, I have no idea who did it. It's, I like, it was updated after the book, but some random person, you know, you kindly set it up for me. Some random fan, you, you know that you can get back, like, I can probably figure out to the IP or whatever you want to do if you don't believe me. Clinton Heights, Michigan.

Why can't, why can't puck soup be as good as the Tuesday shows are, Hayden? It is as good. I wonder the same. It can be, and it is. All the time. All the time. Oh, so Emily has a request to get Gary Bettman on the show. This is like says producer Jeff, so calling producer Jeff out by name to get Gary

Bettman on the show. So we can propose our U.S.-Canada World Cup idea right to the boss, the NHL. Emily Ellis says she's a lifetime member of Team Chaos. I am also on the roster, and I think that will be great. great. Yeah, we should, Jeff should get Batman on because Bill Daley is just kind of like a co-host of the Wednesday show at this point, I think. So we can, he'll spend on a few times. He's on a lot. He answers, he answers Russo's calls. So you guys just want up and get Batman on there. That'd be great. Can you imagine, like, maybe that's, maybe that's what I can do next time I'm someone

where Gary has one of his, like, random, you know. Oh, yeah, Gary's in Winnipeg. such for the day. Yeah. Yeah. Like pass it to Marat or whoever's on site. Like, hey, can you ask, can you ask what he would think if for a U.S. Canada tournament, wherever it's men's senior teams under 25 teams, women's teams, and then U-8 teams, please?

Did you ever end up writing that story? Please. You probably didn't. We got distracted by the holiday. We can stash that one. That was not going. You get nothing for time. We need to get it.

We need to get far enough out of the initial conversation. where it's less obvious that it was just, you know, a random bit that we thought of the podcast. It'll seem a lot smarter. Because as we know, you like to double dip. If we get Gary on the show, you can ask him about it, put it into your lead, and then flush it up in that. Yeah.

Without any indication that it came on the podcast, just making him like I specifically talking about myself. It'd be good if you just said, you know, like, because I'll ask the question and then you can name me in the piece if you'd like. You will ask the question. Okay. Okay, boss. That's it. Thanks to everybody who, um, I said the 20 plus of you who found the comment section on the one episode that I've been on. Keep them coming. Leave lots on this one so that when I'm back, we can go back and go, I'll have at least one in December.

We should do a year on special, Sean, like an extravaganza. When did we do? That was at the end of the season when we did the awards for. That was great. We can't, we got to wait. We got to wait until June. for that one. We can't, we can't scrape this together at the end of the, at the end of the calendar year. We can figure something out though.

Rob Pizzo, Mike Russo and Jesse Granger have Bernie Nichols on the round table this week. Ryan Reeves is Mike Russo's guest on straight from the source. What do you got going on Friday? Anything you want to plug for Friday? Power rings on Friday. Nothing. I'm just, I'm in the NHL 99-mell right now.

Don't forget to subscribe to the Athletic Hockey Show on YouTube. That's what? Oh, the podcast I do with Hayles out. I mean, that's what I was thinking. But if you want to talk about your own Friday morning, yeah, my bed. It was a weird, that was a weird setup. That's my fault.

Do you have it? Yeah, that's right. It's your fault. I'm plugging in the podcast and I say to you, which is anything you want to highlight about your Friday's show. If you want to subscribe to the Athletic Hockey Show on YouTube, go to YouTube. com slash as we know there's an ad sign in there at the athletic hockey show and make sure at sign the athletic hockey show you leave a review that mentions Sean specifically on Apple or wherever

you're listening to this it really helps us in it oh man by the way I checked I checked up on those after you said that last time and they're they're getting some people hate me oh I was hey I didn't I forgot I forgot this was not I didn't mean for it to become a negative thing Leave a five-star review and compliment Sean. If you like Sean, there's haters out there that don't. It was just me for the Thanksgiving opening. There we go. Cut the shit.

It was you. I traced the IP again. Subscribe to the Athletic Audio Plus on Apple Podcast this week. It's Sean and I bringing you all kinds of hockey talk goodness to get all the bonus content from our entire network. Start with a 30-day free trial. then it's 99 cents a month after that. We got Jeremy Rutherford co-hosting next week. We got Max

Baltman the week after that. You the week after that? I don't know. Please? You get Chris Tarian as a guest. I think I'm on it. I'll be back for that. Any final thoughts? Well, let me thank Bobby Holick one last time for joining. Bobby, thank you for doing this.

Incredible performance. It's great wisdom. Great questions for John. Thanks to producer Jeff for setting that up. As always. Enjoy the next couple of weeks, Shawnee. And thank you. Dear listener, yeah, well, go good.

It'll be nice. Oh, yeah. Thanks, listener. Have the great week.