The Athletic Hockey Show - Brady Tkachuk goes off on Brendan Lemieux after on-ice bite, Artemi Panarin throws glove at Brad Marchand, Arpon Basu talks Montreal Canadiens turmoil, the reignited Ovi-Crosby debate, a brand new Hailbag, Multiple Choice Madness, and more

Episode Date: November 29, 2021

First, Ian and Hailey discuss the Brady Tkachuk-Brendan Lemieux biting incident, Tkachuk’s blistering postgame comments, and how long a suspension Lemieux should face, Artemi Panarin’s perfect glove throw at Brad Marchand at the end of the Boston Bruins-New York Rangers game last Friday, and what sparked the incident to begin with, the reignited Alex Ovechkin vs. Sidney Crosby debate, Fenway Sports Group purchasing the Pittsburgh Penguins for $900 million, and more.Then, The Athletic’s own Arpon Basu joins the show to talk about this tumultuous time for the Montreal Canadiens and discuss the firing of now-former GM Marc Bergevin, Jeff Gorton joining the organization as executive vice president of hockey operations, why it’s important that the next GM is bilingual, if the Habs are now in an official rebuild, Carey Price’s status, and more.Plus, a brand new Hailbag featuring questions about NHL player participation in the Olympics potentially being in peril and which team currently has the bleakest outlook: Montreal Canadiens, Vancouver Canucks, or Ottawa Senators, and, to close things out, Multiple Choice Madness questions including who will end up playing more NHL games in the future: Evander Kane or Matt Murray, and which Wednesday night matchup is the most interesting.And, through midnight tonight, you can still get The Athletic’s best deal of the year: $1 a month for 12 months when you visit http://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome back, everybody. It is your Monday edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. As always, it is Ian Mendezon, Haley Salvean, with you for the next hour or so. Coming up on this show, we're going to touch on some individual rivalries that kind of sprung up over the weekend around the NHL. We're talking Brady Kachuk against Brendan Lemieux, Artemie Pinaran against Brad Marshand, and an oldie but a goodie. How about a little Sidney Crosby against Alex Ovechkin,

Arpin Basso, who is our Montreal Canadiens Beat Reporter, He's going to drop by after listening to the Jeff Moulson press conference on Monday. Give us his thoughts on some seismic changes for the Canadians this past weekend. The Pittsburgh Penguin sale to the Boston Red Sox Group has been finalized. We'll talk about that. Plus, we'll take some listener questions, wrap with some multiple choice madness, asking who's going to end up playing more games in the NHL down the road? Matt Murray or Avander Kane, a couple of high-priced players placed on waivers over the past week.

But before we kick off their show, Haley, I want to remind our listeners here. And depending on when you listen to this podcast, if you're listening to us on Monday, the 29th of November, okay? I want to direct you to theathletic.com slash hockey show. You're going to have a few hours left, okay? Till midnight tonight, it's our best deal of the year. You can subscribe to the Athletic for a dollar a month for the next 12 months.

Again, if you're listening to us on Monday, you've downloaded this and you're not a subscriber on the print side, get on it. Dollar a month, 12 months, athletic.com slash hockey show and I need to know, based on that, did Haley Salvean do any online shopping?

Black Friday, Cyber Monday, anything in between. You know what? I didn't. Which, I don't know why. I just, I think I got overloaded with emails about it, that it just annoyed me, that I was like, you know what, I'm not going to do this.

I don't need 65. emails from places I've shopped at once in my life telling me that I could get, you know, this bar of soap for 10%. It wasn't soap. It was like clothing and shoes and whatever places that you get. I was just like, you know what? This annoys me. I don't really need anything right now. So I didn't shop. I stayed home. It's been busy with work. So I avoided the mall because I don't like being around lots of people. Just generally cranky person. In general, I don't need the lines and the crowds at the mall. Uh, an online shopping, no, like the one place I shop at, it's like I shop at the most. It's like the funniest thing. Like, they'll have big Black Friday, like up to

60% off, select styles. But then the stuff that's the most popular to buy, it's like $5 off. And there's no sizes, it's all sold out. So it's just like, what is the point in going to this place? It's Eritzia. If there's any, like, I don't know, millennial people listening to this, they probably understand looking at the Eritzia sale and seeing, like, a t-shirt that's usually $28 that's now on sale for $2650. And they only have it in size, like, extra, extra, extra small and you're like, ooh, got to capitalize on that deal. Nope. So nothing for me.

Nothing for you. I was smart with my wallet. I like going to marshals and fighting people, you know, for cheap t-shirts and that type of thing. And it's a year-round thing. You don't have to go to, you can go to marshals anytime and battle people. Nordstrom rack rocks for that. Nordstrom rack.

Yes, absolutely. Yeah, exactly. It's a year-round. Like a random pair of like designer shit. shoes that are like $100 instead of thousands and there's like a fist fight for the right size. Luckily, I'm not even going to say it. I was going to talk about my shoe size, but I don't want to get into that. Yeah, that's going to get weird here.

Let's not bring up that. Yeah, let's not do that. Let's talk about something more normal, which is biting. Okay? So Brendan Lemieux, and I'm watching the game because I'm a guy who covers the Ottawa senators and I'm watching this game, Ottawa, at L.A. and you could see Brady Kachuk right away get up from this scrum, and Brady, for anybody who knows Brady, he is a very passionate, fiery guy.

But the way that he got up from this altercation with Brendan Lemieux, it was different. You could tell he was sour, and he was sideways, and you could see him going to the referee, showing his hand. And sure enough, Brady Kachuk comes out and, in fact, why don't we play this audio? I feel like this audio is worth playing because it's very rare. to hear an NHL player go after another fellow player in this particular manner. This is Ottawa Senators forward, Brady Kachuk, talking about Brendan Lemieux after the game on Saturday in Los Angeles.

I think it's the most gutless thing somebody could ever do. Not even children bite. This guy is just, you can ask anyone of his teammates. Nobody wants to play with him. This guy is a bad guy, bad teammate, you know, focus on himself all the time. just a guy's a joke. You shouldn't fucking be in this league. It's, it's,

this guy's gutless. I know no other team wants him. He's going to keep, you know, begging to be in the NHL, but no team's going to want him. This guy's just an absolute joke and just a bad guy. And it's just, it's gutless,

but I can't really wrap my head around. Children don't even do this. This guy's just a bad guy and not even a good player either. Code of conduct broken, obviously, big time. How shocked were you when that happened? It's outrageous. It's, like, kids don't even do that anymore. It's babies do that. And the fact that he decides it's, I don't even know what he's thinking. He's just a complete brickhead. He's got nothing up there. Bad guy, bad player. But what a joke he is. So it's a couple of years of, I don't even think it's a couple of years. He's ticking for him. Nobody wants him. Haley, that's some gold audio.

I know that the words that he said were widely shared on social media. I think it's different when you hear it. When you hear it, it's even better. That's some gold audio from Brady Kachuk on Brendan Lemieux. A couple of questions here. First of all, was he justified in saying that and being so over-the-top angry about what happened? Because, again, you don't often hear this. I loved hearing it.

As a media member, as a fan, you like hearing author. authentic, legitimate, honest quotes from players. That's absolutely what that was. What did you think of Brady Kachuk? Coming out and spitting venom here. Yeah, well, I think when I first just saw the clip of how angry he was in the moment, like I don't think I've ever seen Brady Kachuk like that before. Like that intense, that like just really heated and pissed off about what happened.

And so, I mean, biting in, like, there's so much stuff that shouldn't be in hockey, right? Like, and this is obviously something that's down the list in terms of some of the bigger picture stuff we talk about. So I don't want people to, like, take what I'm saying and think, like, oh, she's, you know, fighting for just this. But, like, there's, why are we biting in hockey? It's not a thing that we should be doing. It's gross, especially within the context of COVID right now. Like, he took in his, the fact that Brady's hand started bleeding, like, he bit, it. into Brady Kachuk's hand.

Like he broke skin on another person. Like it's just, it's gross. It shouldn't be happening. And I think Brady Kachuk absolutely is allowed to be angry. I do wonder like what else has happened between those two or what else has happened with Brendan Lemieux that hasn't been shared in the past that we don't know about for Brady to be so intensely angry about him as a bad person.

and as a nobody in the league likes and stuff like that. Like there's little things, there's stuff that's come out about Brendan Lemieux in the past. But like obviously there's a lot more that we're dealing with here than just him biting Brady for Brady to react in such a holistic way, I guess, against him. But like you said, I think it's great. Like this is a league with such like watered down, careful, cliche answers all the time. And that's part of what I like the most about both Kachucks is that they're not afraid to, I think they both resort to the cliches sometimes. I think they're both careful sometimes, but they're also not afraid to just unload in ways like that and show their personality and actually say something.

So I'm not going to complain about what Brady said when we're just like as media members and fans too are just clamoring for somebody to show some. something and Brady did that. And now I have a new dis to add to my repertoire. Brickhead. I love it. Such a brickhead. Like, I love it too because it's like rated PG, right? You can drop it anywhere. You are such a brickhead. It's like calling someone like you're, like you're a stupid head. Yeah. I love it. It's like it's rated PG. It's a PG rated tirade. And I love it. It cuts deep. It does. It does. And you know, Jonathan Quick, as you would imagine came to Brendan Lemieux's defense and he called Kachuk's comments garbage, but what do you expect?

I think that that's his teammate sticking up. Now, we should point out to our listeners at the time of this recording. We were recording this around 12 noon on Monday. Department of Player Safety has not levied their ruling on Brendan Lemieux. There is a possibility that this is greater than five games based on the in-person element that was offered to him. My question is what's a fair, what's a fair, suspect? here if they are able to review the tape, talk to Kachuk, talk to Lumew, talk to the officials,

and say, yeah, you know what, he definitely bit him. I've heard, okay, I'm going to point something out here, and I'm not saying I agree with this, but I have heard from a lot of people on Twitter saying, if someone sticks their glove or their hand in your mouth, what are you supposed to do? Like, that's the, listen, I'm not defending it. I'm just saying that that's the defense that's out there. Somebody sticks their hand in your mouth. What do you expect is going to happen?

Well, look, I, again, I think you need to review the tape. You need to see how this all came about. But I would imagine there's going to be a five or six or seven game suspension. The only thing that bothers me, though, is sometimes you see, like, I'd rather this league gets down really hard on hits to the head. Like that's the epidemic in the game The epidemic in the game is not biting. Like if you send a strong message to breath,

biting will not be tolerated. Like, yeah, okay, but there's only one guy doing it. Like, who cares? Like, we don't have an epidemic of biting in the league. We have a, you know, it's the shots to the head. It's the cheap stuff we want to get out. So I'm less interested in this. Like, if they give them five games or they give them 10 games or whatever they give them,

I'm not going to be like, good, send them them, message because I don't think there's a message to be sent. I don't think anybody's out there on the fence about biting in hockey, right? Yeah. Yeah, I agree. And that's why I said, like, I'm not trying to make, when I'm saying, like, there's, we shouldn't be biting people in hockey. That's what I mean what I'm saying, like, this is lower on the list. Like, this isn't the like, we need to get rid of this in the game. We do, but it's not like we're screaming it from the rooftops because it's happening all the time. Um, I think that. that like if he, if this ends up just being like the same fine that Artemey Panarin got for

throwing a glove, that's, I mean, that's stupid. Throwing a glove in a verbal argument and biting somebody potentially multiple times, like there was potentially two bites of the hand of Brady Kachuk. That's not the same fine. Like that's the thing. I just would like to see this being treated as its own. and like it's just gross. It shouldn't happen.

I don't know if he gets suspended for multiple games. I don't know what the max fine is for biting. I don't have the rule book right in front of me, but you would just like to see this as with everything that happens in the game. And it sounds so cliche. We're just talking about it. But I would just like this to be taken. I've dealt with properly, you know?

Like I'm so sick of seeing the stuff that comes. down, the decisions that come down and like being disappointed and consistently being like, oh, that's it. You know, it's the hits of the head. It's, it's the boarding calls. It's the dangerous cross-checks. It's the biting. Like, can we just get something right?

Please, that's all I really care about is. I would like to read the verdict and say like, yeah, that makes sense on a consistent basis. You'd like to read, again, a lot of people are waiting for the statement to come out from Department of Player's Safety. My question is, do you want longtime actor Gilbert Godfrey to read out the statement

because we want to play a little audio here? If there's one gift that this Cachuk Lemieux thing has given us, it is the soundbite that we played earlier, but then there's this. So a fan, and I love the fact his Twitter handle is John Cougar Colleen Camp.

I don't know what the backstory is, but this guy actually hired Hollywood actor Gilbert Godfrey who I think, Like, see, you're probably too young to know Gilbert Godfrey, right? I'm thinking, Haley, in your 20s? I know, I know who that is. You do know who?

Okay, I didn't know. I wasn't sure. He's like, I think his best stuff was in like the problem child franchise of movies. I think that's where Gilbert Godfrey is like best known from. Anyway, annoying, grating voice. And this guy on Twitter hockey fan decided to pay Gilbert Godfrey through the cameo app to read the Brady Kachuk, you know, kind of verbal dressing down to Brendan Lemieux. So I think we've got the audio of that. If we can play that here, I just want our list,

just to appreciate the absurdity of this situation. This is the one time I'm going to answer this, said, Doc Jop. It was the most gutless thing somebody could ever do. This, the guy's just a joke. He shouldn't be in the least. the guy's gutless. No other team wants him. It's outrageous. Kids don't even do that anymore. Babies do that. And I don't even know when he was thinking. He just a complete brickhead. He's got nothing up there. Bad guy, bad player. What a joke he is. is Tukhaq. I mean, I love how he pronounces Brady Kachuk's name there.

Look, I'm all in for this new thing where you get like B and C level celebrities to kind of reenact media availability from the NHL, Haley. I'm all in on this. Yeah, people should start using the whole cameo thing way better than just happy birthday messages. Like, let's get more people reading random statements from the NHL. I think that'd be really funny. And because, like, with Cameo, you can actually pay for, like, pretty decent celebrities, too. Like, can you imagine spending how much money it would cost to get someone, like, really famous to just read an NHL statement or something? What do you think

that would cost to get, like, an A-list celebrity to read? Why don't we look it up and tell me, what are we thinking of like a like a like a like a like Matt Damon level of celebrity oh my gosh yeah like I don't even think that guy's Morgan Freeman Morgan Freeman would do such a great dramatic reading of this thing that guy's not available on cameo there's no way like he did the Sends Foundation commercials yeah it's not cameo but like he did it he did it how much of that cost well exactly they didn't go through cameo I tell you that no no no no no So I don't know that like you'd have to go with a Kickstarter with a bunch of hockey fans.

Like one fan isn't going to pay five grand. No. Are they for like a 90 second message from Matt Damon? So I don't know like what, like how long these messages are based on like the price that's here, you know? There's a lot of soprano actors on here. But like, like, what if I want one of the Olson twins? What's that going to run me? Are they?

Give me Mary Kate. I want Mary Kate to read a statement from the Department of Player's Safety. What am I in for? I don't know. She's not on here. I'm panic scrolling. The Olson twins seem like their prime cameo candidates. No?

I don't know. Oh, my God. The voice actor for Winnie the Poohs on here. Oh, my God. Oh, my God. It's $287 to get Jim Cummings. To read something. That's Winnie the Pooh.

Can you, oh, my God. Can you imagine the Winnie the Pooh voice, like reading something, reading that Brady Kachuck thing about he's a bad guy. I want Eeyore reading out the Brady Kachuk. You know? He's a bad guy. Can you imagine? With the E.O.

voice, I think that would be better. That was a really bad impression. See, this is, that was a good impression. I think I tweeted something like maybe a year ago. Oh, you can get the. coach from high school musical. Oh my gosh. Wow.

Why aren't we doing this? Do you think we have a budget for a cameo? Yeah. On the athletic hockey show, you know when we do the intro, when I do the intro to the show, hey, coming up this week. Oh, my God.

Why aren't we hiring somebody through cameo to read our 45 second intro? I will personally pay to get the Winnie the Pooh voice. Yeah. To say welcome to the athlete. athletic hockey show. Is that 287 American though?

287 American? Canadian. Canadian? Okay. I was thinking 287 American that's like 400 Canadian. This is the best thing I think we've ever done on the show. I think so.

That's probably more of an indictment on the rest of the body of work from us. You can get the guy who played the Night King in Game of Thrones even though he doesn't really, I think he just screeches a little bit. Yeah. See? This is what we should do. This is what we should do. If there's anyone listening, that it's still listening to this.

They're listening. Let us know who we should pay for on Cameo. There we go. It'd be really funny to just get like James Duthy or something. But they're on a different app. Like James Duffy, they're on, is it memo? Oh, I see it. Okay.

No, we're sticking with Cameo. Yeah. Sorry. They're on memo. So it just have been funny to get like a hockey adjacent. Yeah. Somebody who's more famous than us, but still in hockey broadcast to do it. It's like, hey, can you do the intro for a show today?

Yeah. We'll give you $20. Just go up to Darren Pang and be like, can you mind reading this? Yeah. Incredible. Yeah. I'm going to keep scrolling while you talk about hockey. I'm going to find someone for us.

You're going to find somebody. I want to find the Olson twins. The Olson twins might be really far down on the list. I just want to say. That might mean they're cheap. But imagine it costs more for like Mary Kate than it did. for Ashley. They're like the Sadiens, right? Like they come as a, like, they're the same, right?

Like, you couldn't get one without the other, I'm thinking. Yeah, their movies were great. Got to kick it up. Oh, good stuff. New York Minute. Oh, man. Miss that. But were all the movies like the same premise where they were like, either they're switching or they're in the wrong spot or there's been some misunderstanding. Like they were all- They were kids movies.

Exactly. What do you want from them? I don't know. I don't know what I want. Okay, listen, we're talking about Brendan Lemieux and Brady Kachuk and the biting. That wasn't the only. That wasn't the only great kind of individual rivalry from the weekend. Haley, that gif of Artemie Panarin throwing his glove at Brad Marshand, his time expired between the Rangers and the Bruins was something that was shared quite widely as well on social media.

So at the end of that game, Rangers and Bruins, Panarin is jawing at Marchand and vice versa. And finally, the Rangers superstar has enough. Takes his glove off and whips it. And with great accuracy, mind you. Like, it was a precise throw, right? Like, it was, like, Artemian, like a high school quarterback or something? Because it was delivered with great accuracy.

Now, what I think is interesting is Arthur Staple covered that game, said the reason why. Or it Temi Panarin was upset with Marshand, is that, according to this is from Arthur Staples' piece on the weekend, according to his source, Brad Marshan made some Russian-centric comments towards Panarin. Along the lines of, quote, nobody likes you there while bringing up Russian president Vladimir Putin, who, of course, Panarin has been very critical of Putin in the past.

Panarin had enough, and it might draw the attention of the Department of Player's safety. Now, it's worth pointing out, Marchand does have a visit with DAPS on Monday, Department of Player Safety, but that's for a slew footing incident against Vancouver. But let's go back to what happened with Panarin, and I'm wondering, it seems to me that that would, for me, that would cross a line. Like, if you're making comments about Vladimir Putin and Russia to Artemi Panarin, I'm sorry, to me, that crosses the line. I don't know what you think.

Absolutely. Yeah, I think, especially. knowing what happened with Artemey Panarin. God, was that at the beginning of this season or last year, Ian? Last season, last season. Where he, you know, took a leave of absence from the team because I think there was legitimate, we talked about this on the show with what happened with Russia. And, you know, he was, I think there was a legitimate, like, fear for his safety and his

personal well-being. And he took a leave of absence. So that's, it's, I mean, even that. that aside to be making comments like that. It's just inappropriate. It's stuff like that where there's chirping in the game. There's things that people say. Sometimes it can be funny. It just crosses the line. There's no need to be making comments to people because of where they're from or, you know, nobody likes you in your home country, et cetera, et cetera. It's just, again, I feel like we talk about stuff like this all the time. Like we should, there's, we got to get rid of that in the game because there's just so much

stuff that it's like we need to just get rid of this this shit enough so it's it's not cool it's not funny you know the glove throw the whole situation it was funny at first you know i was just like oh is that allowed like he just whipped his glove like that's really funny what a fun clip and it's not that you get the context and you're like yeah that's not that's not funny i think he absolutely i mean artemie penherne probably had the right to do more than just throw a glove across the bench if that's actually what Rod Marchand said to him. Yeah. And through, you know, like I said, whipped it with his left hand.

It was just delivered with accuracy. And now is that the only piece of a, like, again, Panarin, by the way, got a $5,000 fine for this. And I laughed. Panarin spoke to the media on the weekend and joked that, yeah, I'm out $5,000. But hey, thanks to the Rangers, I'm making $11.5 million. So I'm good. Like I thought that was a great clip and a quote from Panarin. But is a glove the only thing you can throw at your opponent that won't result in a suspension?

Like you throw your helmet at somebody, suspension, right? You throw your stick at somebody, suspension. I think the glove is the only thing you could throw that. You're like, well, you know what? We're going to give you a fine. You probably shouldn't do that. But you're not going to get suspended for it, right? Yeah, because there's nothing else you could really take off easily and that you could throw without harming someone.

Like you're not taking your shoulder pad off and throwing it at someone. Unless you're in a fight and they like ripped one of your pads off and then you throw it at them. You're not unlacing a skate. No. No. You're also not going to throw a skates unless you're a psychopath. Yeah. So I'm thinking it's glove.

Yeah. Yeah, I'm thinking it's glove. So a $5,000 fine for Panarin. Marshand is in some hot water for the slew footing incident. But again, we think that maybe the NHL should investigate what Marchand said the Panarin, uh, cause him to throw that glove in the first place. And, you know, we'll see what, uh, we'll see what comes to that. Now, we're talking to individual debates and something got reignited last week, Haley. It's an oldie but a goody. It's Sid versus Ovi.

It's Ovechkin and Crosby. And Ovechkin is off to a banana's start. Arguably, on pace for the best season of his career at his age. And the thing that was thrown out, and now I can't remember, was it our pal Scott Wheeler that was the first to throw this? out last week. Yep. And basically said, I don't know, like, you know, maybe it's time to start saying that Ovechkin's career is better than Crosby's. And it's a, okay, I think it's a really great debate.

And I think the thing that I hate about these debates is it ends up that you start ripping on one guy. And these are two of the best players of all time. Like, if you're making an all-time top 10 list, these guys are on it. And, you know, for Wheeler, we're talking about, like, does Ovechon? Vetchkin end up on the Mount Rushmore of players. Look, it's a great debate. But I think here's the fair question to ask.

It's not which player would you take it at their peak, because I think it's Crosby at his peak, based on his position, based on, you know, some of the things. Again, it's a fair argument. But I think here's the question. Haley, if Ovechkin breaks Gretzky's all-time goals record, is it fair to say he had a better career than Crosby? Not that he's a better player.

He had a better career than Crosby. Is that fair? If you think that goal scoring is the most important thing in the NHL, then sure. But isn't it kind of important? Is it the sole, like, most important thing in hockey is to be able to score goals? Or is it to be able to score goals, make plays, be good defensively, and be one of the best all-round players in the league? I don't know. I don't, I don't, I don't love the...

I know, I know. And I'm not either. Like, Ovechkin is going to have an incredible career, whether he breaks the record or not. But I think the debate is, I tweeted once we, I even said to Wheeler, I was like, why did you do this? And I even tweeted like, no, no, we're not doing this debate again. It's 2021. I think it's a really, I think it's kind of a tired debate. I look at it the same as the like messy Rinaldo debate in football.

it's a little bit different, but like it's, you know, you've got a player who is one of the, in Messi, has some of the best footwork. He can go through anybody. If you have five people on him, you can still get out of that situation and score. He's one of the most overall best players in the world in football. Cristiano Ronaldo is a very highly skilled player also, and he can shoot and score from anywhere. And everyone wants to talk about who's better and who has more goals, who's won more Champions League, who's won more trophies, when we could just like enjoy the fact that we're watching two of the best players in the world and their prime at the same time,

who both approach the game in different ways. Crosby is, in my opinion, one of the best all-around players in the world. When he was in his prime, I think he was the best all-around player in the league. And Ovechkin has been one of the best scores. And now in this stage of his career that he's in, like, obviously he is getting older and we're watching the way that he's adapting to that. And he's still got it. And it's incredible and it's so impressive.

But isn't that a little bit of recency bias to look like the reason this argument right now bothered me is you had Sydney Crosby coming off of risk surgery and missing the start of the season, playing one game and getting COVID and trying to readjust from wrist surgery and COVID? or I believe he had symptoms. And so you're looking at Sidney Crosby's like three games that he played. And you're looking at Ovechkin's body of work this season where he's been scoring and saying, well, Ove's clearly better. And it just reeks of recency bias. I think the debate is blah. I don't, I,

I texted Chris, our producer and said, I think I'm going to sit in silent protest and not say anything. No. It's just. Haley, like, I think if Alex Ovechkin ends up with 900 career goals,

goals. He's going to be the best goal score in the world. That doesn't mean the best player. No, and that's my whole point is I think you can make an argument if Oveskin breaks Kreskes's record that he had a better career than Crosby. But I'm not saying he's a better player. It's like, it's like Marcel Dionne. Marcel Dion probably had a better career than like, I don't know, Peter Forsberg or like

Paul Correa or like, you know, pick a player. And you'd be like, yeah, Marcel Dion had a better career, but he wasn't the better player. I think you can make an argument at the end of this, even though Ciddle have three cups and all the metrics that you want. You think goals are better than trophies and championships and stuff? I just think you can make- Don't you think that OVee, do you think Alex Ovechkin would rather have three Stanley

cups or a goal scoring record? I think, okay, this is such a great question, okay? Would you rather have three Stanley cups or worse? And Olympic gold medals and the gold. metal goals and stuff. What would you rather have? But if you're telling me I can have the all-time goals record and a Stanley Cup, boy, oh boy, Haley. I don't know.

I, like, like I want to maybe, maybe I want to be the Hank Aaron of my sport or, you know, again, and here comes the Barry Bonds crowd, but whatever. Like, I don't know. I think I might want to be the all-time goal. I might want to knock Gretzky off a perch and have a championship. That's all. Like, I don't know. I think, I don't know.

I think it's a great debate. I think it's a really good debate. It's good, like, radio podcast fodder, but I think it's just, I feel like we've been talking about this and debating the merits of each player for so long. Like, even, even Crosby sat down, I think with ESPN and said, like, I want him to beat the record. That'd be really awesome. Like, I think it's cool the way that their rivalry has evolved over time. I think that's really awesome. I think OV beating the record would be cool.

But like, yeah, I guess I think it's a good debate and it's a fair question. Like, if he breaks that, is he the, does he have the better career? And again, I think I just say, like, if goal scoring is the thing that matters the most and winning that record that matters the most. And yeah, I think this is like a choose your own adventure thing, right? Like, we can all pick what we value more. Right. Talking about a player's career.

And I think, I don't know. I don't know if I would rather look at somebody's like whole body of work and say look at all the things they won in the way that they played. I don't know. I know. It's hard to look at. It's hard to look at a goal scoring record and say, nah, he's not the best. I think I want to be Ovechkin. I think I want to have the all time goals record.

Now, if it was all time goals record and no cups, yeah, I'd probably go sit. But you're giving me a cup. You're giving me one Stanley Cup. It's not like, like, Sid is the only guy ever to win three cups, right? Like, there's lots of people, Taves and Cain and, you know, go through the list of players, Messier and all these guys. They all got more than three cups. So it's not like there's only one guy with three cups. Like, there's lots of them.

But there might be only one guy with 900 goals. That's all. But I think it's a fun, I think it's a fun conversation. Hey, speaking of Crosby and the Penguins, Haley, we got some finalized news that kind of came out on Monday. And that is the Fenway Sports Group, that always, owns and operates the Boston Red Sox, among other entities, has finally purchased the Pittsburgh Penguins. And they do it, Haley, for $900 million, which I think is kind of significant, because now I think the penguins are kind of like your classic mid-market team, right?

They're not New York or Toronto or L.A. or what have you. They are a mid-market team, and they're close to a billion dollars in the sale price. I think that's pretty significant, No? Yeah, I think so. And it's $900 million sale that Pierre LeBruns reporting, which would be $250 million more than the Seattle buy-in. So that kind of valuation for an NHL franchise, it's obviously good. I know people were talking about this when the news was initially kind of being

speculated and reported. Like, is there some kind of like snowball effect for other or other ownership groups going to come in and try to buy franchises or franchises are going to try to look at what their valuation is. It's probably a humbling thing for owners who may or may not be selling to be like, oh, God, I'm not going to get that much. We're not the Pittsburgh Penguins too. You know, I think it puts a measuring stick in. That's not just like an expansion team, you know. Now teams, if they want to sell or owners, if they want to sell, they're not looking at the Vegas or Seattle buy, and they're looking at like a legitimate team. And they can see,

where they stack up against penguins. And so obviously that's a big chunk of change. It's almost a billion dollars, like you said. I think there was like a bit of, and we talked about this on different podcasts about the week too, so we don't have to linger on it too much. But I think it's interesting. I thought there was a little bit of like, oh, God, what is this going to mean? Like what's going to happen when the news initially broke?

But it seems like this is a generally positive thing for the penguins. I think Lemurie. and Berkel are still going to be involved in stuff with the penguins, which I know that's a big thing for fans having Marloni is still involved with the team. He's not going anywhere. It doesn't look like. And it seems like this, you know, this is a ownership group with a strong portfolio who were interested in purchasing the Pittsburgh Penguins to add to their already strong portfolio.

like they weren't looking to buy a, you know, a franchise who was struggling that they could help build back up. They wanted to add a franchise that they already knew was strong and profitable to make it even more so. And we can see that this group has been, they don't seem to be afraid of spending money. And that can only be mean good stuff for the Pittsburgh Penguins. And Josh Yoey was on the Tuesday show last week. And I think a big part of it is there's this parcel of land around the arena that's just, been parking for so long since the old building a Mellon Arena, which I used to go to as a kid, really old like igloo barn.

That parcel lands just been like empty parking spaces for a long time. There's been like a fight over what to do with that. And I think that's going to be a priority for this new ownership group is to figure out what they're going to do with that. And I think that's a pretty significant thing for for Penguins fans. So it seems like there's a lot of good that can come from this for for the Pittsburgh Penguins. So, yeah, all I know is like I'm on mountain time. I woke up this morning and I was like, oh, a lot of stuff happened.

The penguin sale, everything with the Canadians coming up today because we're having Arpinon. I was like, oh, a bunch of stuff happened while I was waking up at 8.30. I miss a lot. All right, Haley. Time for us to bring in our feature guest today because we said this was the biggest news. As much as we, you know, talked about Kachuk and the bite with Lemieux, and Panarin and Marchand and all the stuff that's gone on.

The Montreal Canadiens cleaning house was, I think, the biggest story of the weekend. Arpin Basu does a terrific job covering the Montreal Canadiens Force. Arpin, listen, thanks for joining us. I know this has been an interesting Monday for you. We'll start with the Jeff Bolson press conference and was there anything

that you heard from the owner that surprised you, shocked you, anything like that on Monday. Shocked to know It was encouraging to hear him Say that Adding diversity to the hockey operations department And support for the people in those roles

Was a priority for the group It's obviously something that did not exist Under Mark Bergevin at all It was just a group of white men Middle-aged white men So we'll see how that actually plays out I was also encouraging to hear that The medical performance team

is going to put an emphasis on player wellness and mental health, especially with what we've seen with Carrie Price of late and Jonathan Drewie last year. So identifying that as a priority, I think, was a good step, and it was a good thing for him to announce. But otherwise, his main point of emphasis was how, you know, this is a fresh start for the Canadians, and this is a two-person job. And what the two-person job part of it, why it's important,

is no one is more aware than Jeff Moulson that he just hired someone who comes from Massachusetts and does not speak French in a very high-ranking role in his hockey operations department, the highest-ranking role, if we're being honest, in his hockey operations department. So it was important for Jeff to come out and say, well, the GM is ultimately the one who's going to have to live with the decisions and be accountable for them,

and that GM is going to be bilingual. If we're being honest here, Jeff Gordon didn't just take this job to be sort of a passive observer or advisor to this general manager who's yet to be known, but who is likely going to have very little experience in a managerial role, because when you look at some of the candidates that are out there who are bilingual, none of them have extensive experience, and they don't need to because Jeff Gordon has extensive experience.

So the beauty of this situation is the Canadians can go outside the box, maybe even look at a woman for that position, maybe even look at any number of types of people. They don't even have to come from the hockey world necessarily, they could just have a good managerial background generally to mesh with Jeff Gorton and form sort of a two-headed monster. But I think it's quite evident that Jeff Gorton's going to be running the ship because even Jeff Moulson, when he was asked what the criteria is for the new general manager, deferred to Jeff Gorton and said we should ask him when he finally speaks to the media.

So it's pretty clear who's in charge here. Can you contextualize Arpin? Why now? I know for people who are paying attention, there's been a lot of stuff piling up, but why did these changes happen when they did for the Montreal Canadians? Well, I think Jeff Moulson was in a bit of a difficult situation in the sense that, you know, Mark Bershavans contract is up at the end of this season. The Canadians made the Stanley Cup final last year, and Jeff Moulson mentioned this right off the hop, is that, yes, they went to the Stanley Cup final last year, but if you look at their last few regular seasons, the performance has been so-so, if not bad. You know, I mean, they made the COVID play

off 24th in the league. They squeaked into the playoffs last year, you know, after a terrible regular season, only solely because the Canadian, the rest of the Canadian division was not able to take advantage of how bad they were. And then they went on this magical run in the playoffs. But, you know, the actual basis of the team, the, you know, how it had performed over a larger sample was not all that convincing, but you can't really fire a general manager after you just appeared in the Stanley Cup final.

So I think a series of circumstances led to Mark. Bergerivay entering the final year of his contract. I think Jeff Moulson tried to get him to sign an extension after the Stanley Cup final. It's a good thing he didn't. And I think Mark Bergevin's sort of demands were pretty high for that in terms of money and responsibility and title and all that stuff. So then September came around and Jeff Moulson was like, well, let's just wait and see. And then what happened happened this season. So why now?

The Canadians are terrible. They're after the worst start in franchise history. they are already out of playoff like far out of playoff contention like there's no hope of them making the playoffs at all so you know i think it's good to get the next person a head start and that's what jeff courtin has right now he's got you know 60 odd games to to fully evaluate everything that's going on in the organization and so that's probably better than waiting till the off season and having someone come in then not having this time to learn about the people who are already in place and then make some more informed decisions later.

Arpin, did it have to be this sticky and messy? And maybe Scott Mellonby is the best example of that where it felt like it got awkward with Scott Mellonby. And I guess my question is, did it have to be done that way? No, of course, it didn't have to be done that way. But you also shouldn't be making, I don't know, to what extent it was a promise to Scott Mellonby that he would be taking over for Mark Bersivay. but there was obviously some level of commitment made in that in that vein that

that Melanby felt that that was his job to lose and then suddenly he had lost it I think it's Jeff Molson's prerogative to hire whoever he wants to run his hockey operate he's the owner of the Montreal Canadiens this is not a decision that should be made lately and if you have to go back on certain promises that you made in the past then so be it. But it's not a great look to have someone who had been with the organization for 10 or 12 years suddenly leaving on these terms. And it's, you know, I think the thing with Jeff Moulson is that he's always been someone who would prefer stability

than having to make a difficult decision. Today he came out and talked about how I'm the guy who makes the tough decisions and it's my job to do that. but frankly, Jeff Moulson avoids difficult decisions as much as possible. In 2018, the Canadians were, you know, the third or fourth worst team in the NHL, firing Mark Borgevin at the time would have made a ton of sense. He didn't do that. And, you know, to Mark Bershvene's credit, he actually did a pretty good job from that point forward.

But, you know, this is not something that Jeff Moulson did lightly. It's, it's, but I think the ugliness of it, if you will, first of all, I don't think there's ever a smooth way to do something like this to fire so many people and to, you know, to make the decision that he made. But I think some of the, some of the, some of the uglier portions kind of speak to some of the, I guess, indecisiveness that Jeff Molson has had over the years as owner. And it really takes, it really takes a disaster for to get him to act. And that's, that's what he has on his hands right now. Arben, I kind of want to go back to something you talked about in your first answer, just about,

you know, how you have an anglophone in. Jeff Gorton and then the general manager is, I guess, he's supposed to be and will be French speaking. But can you explain to our audience why it's important for the next GM to be bilingual? Because I'm not sure if it's a concept that a lot of people completely understand. And maybe that's not giving people enough credit. But could you maybe just go through that a bit? Yeah, sure. What I think a lot of people don't understand is that outside of Montreal, there's a good chunk of the Quebec population, like a significant chunk of the Quebec population that does not understand English, does not speak English at all. They represent the, you know, they are hardcore

Canadians fans, many of, you know, maybe not the ones who are in the Bell Center, but people who live and die with this team, there are many of them who don't speak English at all. So, you know, some people say that, oh, it happens in Europe all the time, teams hire translators, fine, but this is not that. The Canadians represent to the city of Montreal and the province of Quebec, what they represent to this population is different than any other team in the NHL, for sure. I imagine is different than a lot of the teams in Europe. I think the closest comparable would probably be FC Barcelona in Europe, but it's something that is tied, like deeply tied to, you know, national identity in Quebec and culture and everything that the Quebec population holds dear.

The other thing that's important to Quebec culture and identity is language. There are the two of the sort of central tenets of what the Quebec population considers to be important. So basically what it comes down to is it is a sign of respect. That's all it is, is that we will not ask. ask you to listen to the person making decisions for your hockey team, we will not ask you to try and understand this person in a language that's foreign to you. It's a policy that I think is justifiable. I understand why people feel it limits them because it does. I understand why people feel it holds them back because it does. They do not have access to the full gamut of coaches or

general managers that can work in the NHL. But I also feel that it's an acknowledgement by the Canadians of their own importance in the society that they live in and is a sign of respect to people where the question of language is probably the most sensitive issue in this society. What I'm curious about is now, and whoever takes over as general manager is obviously going to have, you know, quite a lot on their plate. I know Jeff Moulson said in that press conference, I'm not afraid of the word rebuild.

I don't think our fans would be afraid of the word rebuild. So is it fair to say that the decisions coming in the next few months from hockey operations ARPEN are solely with that in mind that this is now a rebuild, that yeah, they went to the Stanley Cup final, but this is a rebuilding team and you're going to be in for a couple of painful seasons now? I don't think so, not necessarily. I mean, again, Jeff Moulson deferred that question largely to Jeff Gordon, which again shows the extent to which Jeff Gordon's going to have his hands on the steering wheel here.

But I don't think Jeff, Jeff Moulson just said that in the sense because he was asked directly three times about the word rebuild. And, you know, all he was saying is that I'm not ruling it out, that it's something that he'd be willing to do. It's something that he feels the fans would be willing to live through. I honestly don't think the Canadians are in that situation. We looked at it recently. There are 10 players on the Canadian's current roster, including Shea Weber, who are signed for at least three more years.

No other team in the NHL has as many contracts that last that long. They are as contractually locked into a roster as any team in the NHL. Actually, the only one who rivals them is, ironically, the Rangers, Jeff Gorton's Rangers, former team, who have a lot of money committed to a lot of their core pieces. But a lot of that money is devoted to, you know, Carrie Price, Yol Armia, Jake Evans, which is admittedly Shea Weber, who's probably never going to play again. But they're not, the only real core piece in that group of 10 players is Nick Suzuki.

Otherwise, it's Josh Anderson, Brennan Gallagher. They're guys who are kind of complementary pieces. So tearing this down is not exactly easy. It's not something that you can just walk in and say, well, we're going to buy out this, this, this, we're going to trade this guy for picks. To do basically what Jeff Gordon did with the Rangers is not going to be nearly as easy to do with the Canadians.

You know, when Gordon announced the rebuild in New York within a month, J.T. Miller, Ryan McDonough, Michael Grabner, Nick Holden, Rick Nash, like all these players were gone within a month. I don't think he's going to be able to do that in Montreal. He's very limited. And so given that circumstance, And given that a lot of these players are not bad players, you know, Josh Anderson's not a bad player, Gallagher's not a bad player, you know, Tyler Tofoli's got a couple more years on his contract, it's not a bad player. I mean, they have some decent pieces here. They just don't fit together. So I think it's going to be up to Gorton to figure out how to make them fit a little better and maybe create a little bit of room under the cap.

But I don't think they're in a position to go full on rebuild right now. Do you think Gorton's going to take some time to be there, look at the team, look at the coaching staff before making any changes? Like, is there something like that that could be coming? Or do we think he's comfortable with the bench right now? Well, I think the beauty of the situation, considering it's a lost season already, Jeff Gordon doesn't really have to do anything. He can literally sit there and watch and evaluate. I mean, what's the point of hiring a coach right now?

Like, there's really, you know, too bad for Dominique Duchar, but he's basically going to have to prove to Jeff Gordon that he deserves this job and whoever the next GM is. but this is it's what makes the timing of this make a lot of sense is that you have this 60 games to work with where you can observe and learn about this organization from top to bottom. And honestly, if I were the Canadians,

I wouldn't be rushing into hiring a GM either. I would wait until the offseason when everyone, you know, when you have full availability of the limited pool of candidates that you have to work with if you need a bilingual GM. So Jeff Gordon could sit back. He can run the trade. trade Ben Chirot for a pick, trade Brett Kulak for a pick, trade anyone else you can really,

other than your young core, but if you can get some other picks for some of these other guys who have term on their contracts, then so be it. I think Jeff Corton is more than qualified to handle that. But if I were there, I would be in no rush to make any other moves. Just sit back, let Jeff Gordon learn about this organization, the people who are in it, the players who are playing for him, see how they react to adversity, which first. frankly, so far has not been all that impressive. You know, as soon as things went south for this team,

it just continued going south. Not a lot of pushback. So let him learn those things. And he has a long time. He has months to do it and learn everything he needs to know about this team. So if I were him, I wouldn't be rushing into any moves. I mean, maybe other than hiring some people that he likes to work with, but otherwise, you know, firing more people wouldn't make a whole lot of sense right now.

And maybe just to close this out, Arp, and I think there's a lot of hockey fans all over. North America that would just love to know if there's any update on Kerry Price, how he's doing. You know, obviously, I think everyone is pulling for him, given what he's up against. Is there any kind of update, any idea of how Carrie is doing? Well, he was on the ice this morning in a track suit long before the morning skate. So that's an encouraging sign.

Dominic Duchar mentioned him having four steps to returning to the team, one of which was, you know, mental and physical conditioning. The other one was getting on the ice, which is what we saw this morning. The next one would be practiced. And the next one would be working with the goalie coach on the ice, which has not happened yet. And then the next one would be practicing with the team. Then it would be playing. And so the other beauty of this terrible situation for the Canadians is that Kerry Price should feel no pressure to return one second before he's absolutely ready to return.

You know, there's no pressing issue where the Canadians desperately need Carrie Price to show up for their playoff lives, you know, for their playoff chances to remain alive. Their playoff chances are dead. So Carrie Price could take all the time he needs, not feeling the pressure to come back sooner. And it looks like that's what he's going to do. And I hope that's what he does, you know, because I think, and it'll be great when Kerry Price reaches the day when he can talk to the fans. about his decision and what he went through and what he did and how he bettered himself by seeking help because I think he has a full understanding that he can be a large influence on a lot of people who are maybe going through some of the same issues that he went through

and be inspired by his desire to seek help because if people feel they have too much to lose by admitting they have a problem in seeking help well not too many people had more to lose than Carrie Price did, and he did it anyway. So, you know, I'm hopeful that we won't see him for a while. I don't think we will, you know, considering he was in a track suit today, he wasn't even in goalie pads. So we're probably weeks away from Kerry Price being in a Canadian's uniform. And I hope that's the case because I want him, you know, I would want him to take all the

time he needs. Well, listen, Arpin, this was a great update on what has obviously been a very eventful 72 hours for the team that you cover. Appreciate your time. And hey, listen, let's give you a little. a chance to plug your own podcast here because there are obviously some HABs fans and hockey fans that might want the latest free plug for your podcast here. Free plug.

Well, our podcast is called the Athletic support or Les Bar-Athe-Cic. We had an emergency pod Sunday evening where Mark Antoine was in an airport. So you hear the, you hear the PA announcements going in the background. But we felt it important to get our thoughts out on sort of the monumental events of Sunday. but we record every Wednesday normally. So by Wednesday, late afternoon or early evening, you got a new episode. They alternate between French and English

because it's a Montreal podcast, and so it should. And on Wednesday's episode, we'll be in French. But there's an episode right now that you can go listen to from Sunday night in English with Mark Antoine and I talking about all this stuff for about 40 minutes. Awesome stuff. So yeah, check that out if you're looking for more HAB's content. Arpin, thanks for this, and we'll get you again,

I'm sure, down the road. All right, thanks, guys. Time for us to wrap up this show with a little, you've got a couple of questions from listeners, we've got some multiple choice madness, and want to hit on this. This is actually a good question. This came to us via Twitter.

And I think all of a sudden, there are some louder, the whispers are getting louder. And it almost feels like it's, it almost feels like now we should prepare ourselves to the fact that we may not see NHLers at the Olympics. And this is a question that was tweeted to us by Ozzie. He says,

what do you think the sentiment is with the NHL going to the Olympics seeing the disturbing situation that is happening overseas right now. And as you look at it, I think there's a fear that the COVID numbers aren't great in Beijing. There might be kind of a safety issue from the players. I think there's a fear from players that if I go over there and I test positive, what if I'm stuck in Beijing for two, three weeks? January 10th, Pierre LeBron is often talking about this. that is the date where the NHL can essentially Haley pull the rip cord and say, hey, sorry, we're out,

we're not going to the Olympic Games. As we get closer to it and you listen to some of those insiders, whether it's Pierre LeBron and others, it seems like we should start to open up our minds to the idea that they're not going to the Olympic Games. And I don't know if that's going to happen, but it feels like that's where we're trending, no? Yeah, I think it's obviously with, you know, more games getting post. If that happens more, we're going to start thinking about that a little bit more, too, with just games getting pushed back. It's three days. The penguins are, or not the penguins, excuse me, the Sends were three days.

Islanders were three days as well, I believe. It doesn't look like a whole lot when you're looking at the individual team cases. But if more teams start getting games postponed and it's three days, three days, three days, three days, then you're starting to push games back in a way that the NHL won't be able to send people just based on that. And then you have all of the – and I don't want to say that to raise the alarm again. It's only been the two teams. And I think we've seen insiders and say, I don't know if that's enough. I think the underlying thing here is the health and safety of players and the health and safety of just people in the world.

But Gary Bettman has also said that he made a promise to the play. that they would go to the Olympics and they're going to do everything that they can to do that. I don't know if we believe Gary Bettman when he says that wholeheartedly, but I do think that it's a really important thing for the NHL players for the NHL PA. So I think like they're going to try to find a way to go and go and do this. But at the end of the day, if it's not safe due to COVID or other factors that are happening around the world in Beijing within the context of the Olympics, If it's just not possible, then it's not going to be possible.

And I don't know if right now, like, I don't know if we have enough of that stacking up to say, like, no, they're not going to go. I think it looks like, it looks like more of a topic of discussion right now because of things that are happening for sure. But I don't know if we're in a spot where we can say, like, yeah, there's no chance they're going to see Olympics. If the NHL ever puts out a statement announcing that the players are not going to the Olympic Games, I say we hired Gilbert Godfrey to read that statement. I think we go with Winnie the Pooh. Or Winnie the... Actually, that might be the E.R tone of all Eeyore tones right there.

The Eeyore voice actor is not on there. It's just Winnie the Pooh or Tigger. Yeah, this is too downtrodden for Tigger. Also, I was looking at Mimeo, not Cameo. I made a mistake. Camio is where the high ballers are. I looked at cameo. It's not cheap. Okay. That's good to know. Hey, one more question here from a, from a listener via social media. And look, it's been a rough week for the Montreal Canadians, the Vancouver Connects, the Ottawa Senators. Max wants to know which of those three teams has the bleakest outlook, Vancouver, Montreal, or Ottawa, Haley.

Oh, gosh. probably depends who you ask in what market, right? Like, I'm sure every market's going to, most those markets are going to say they have it worst. I feel like Vancouver is pretty bad just because I don't know how you see a way out there. I think with Montreal, I mean, Montreal kind of just looks like a team who probably, they punched out of their weight class last year, looked a lot better than they did, came this year.

Lost a bunch of players, obviously Kerry Price wasn't what the team start the year for. an important personal reason to take care of himself. But I think a lot went wrong for the Canadians, but you can at least kind of see, like, okay, they're going to bring a new brain trust in. They're going to get a fresh start. They're going to, you know, are they going to rebuild? Are they just going to start from scratch, whatever it may be?

They're kind of at that starting place where you can maybe see something happening in the future if you believe in the people they're putting in place. But with the Sends and the Kinnaks, like they don't have that yet. It's the same people who got them into this point that are still at the helm. And how are fans supposed to see the way out? Is Jim Benning going to be the one to fire Travis Green and hire a new coach when Jim Benning is the one whose hands are all over? Jim Benning and Francesco Acalini, their hands are all over everything that hasn't worked. Is Jim Benning going to be the one that's hiring the coach that's finally going to make it work,

that's going to make the changes that make it work, or is he going to be gone? Is it Travis Green who takes the fall? Is there players who are going to be on the way out? With the Ottawa senators, I thought the rebuild was over. So I don't know which one specifically is more oblique, but I would definitely say it's between the Canucks or the Sands. And a lot of that's because you have the people who the architects of the mess are still in charge. Yeah, it's a tough one because I actually think Ottawa's got the great core of young players.

Like you can sell me on the on ice product. And even Vancouver, Quinn Hughes and, you know, I know Bessor's had his ups and downs and Pedersen's had his ups and downs. But there's some nice young pieces. The habs have whiffed on so many of their draft picks in recent years. And the ones that they haven't whiffed on, whether it's Surgachev or, I guess to some extent, Katkenyemi, they're not even there, right? So my concern on Montreal is, you know, you got these guys that are,

whether it's Josh Anderson or Brendan Galle, or Devorak or Jeff Petrie. Like you got a bunch of guys locked up and like where are you going? Like where are you going in the next couple of years? Mike Hoffman is there on a longer deal. Again, you don't know how it's going to play out with Kerry Price. So it's just they're the ones that are caught in the most awkward situation. I actually think Ottawa and Vancouver, you can sell me on the fact that they might be okay on the ice.

And like you said, maybe the decision makers, maybe that's part of the. issue there. But I don't know when the Montreal Canadians are going to be competitive again. And that to me leaves them with a little bit of a bleak outlook. Yeah, but if they're committing to starting from scratch and doing it, right, I don't know if I look at Montreal and say that's a bigger mess than what's happening in Vancouver right now. Maybe that's because I'm reading too much Thomas Trans lately, who's been doing a really

good job of this and Arpin's doing a great job too. But I don't know. it seems like it's a little bit more messy in places like Vancouver than it is Montreal. I know that they've got the good young core and the pieces in Montreal are exactly what you said, but I'm pretty sure don't the HABs have, I think they probably have the same amount of wins. They both have more wins than the senators do. And a promising young roster, as we're seeing, can only get you so far. They're not doing great right now. So what are they going to look like and what pieces?

are going to surround them based on the people who are still in charge. All right, Haley, and as we always do, a little multiple choice madness on your Monday here. Now, it was a significant week in the NHL. You don't often see players with this type of term and dollar amount and star power placed on waivers in the middle of the season, but we had it on two occasions this week. San Jose doing it with Evander Cain. I think that was kind of expected. Ottawa doing it with Matt Murray, though, was wow.

It was like, didn't see that one. coming. So here's question number one. Haley, multiple choice bad is who's going to end up playing more games in the NHL in the future? Is it A, A, A, Avander Kane or B, Matt Murray? Part of me wants to say Evander Kane, even despite everything that's happened and everything that he did, there's a lot of examples of players who've done questionable and bad things that go on to continue playing because they are good. And Evander Cain is a better forward than Matt Murray is a goalie right now. And I think there's teams who are going to look at Evander Cain and say that's a point per game player, an elite winger. He can add something to our team. And they're going to

go for him. We saw it with everything that happened with Tony DiAngelo. I don't know if anyone thought that Tony was going to play. And now he's in COVID protocol right now, but he's having an excellent start to the season with the Carolina Hurricanes, and he's showing again why he is, you know, a really talented, really skilled, very good defender. It was never his skill and aptitude at the position. That was a question. It was all the personal off-ice stuff, which is the same with the Vander Cain. But I think he's probably going to play more because he's good. And Matt Murray has struggled for a while. He hasn't been the Stanley Cup winning goalie for, what, three, four years now?

There's always, I mean, there's always value in goaltenders, but there's more value in top line wingers who can score at the rate that Evander Kane has. He was really good last season, and I think teams are going to remember that. Yeah, you know what? I think you made a really, really good point when you said right now, Avander Kane is probably a better forward than Matt Murray as a goalie. That's a fair statement.

And it's not to say that Matt can't or won't get it back, but when you've had a sub-900, save percentage for three consecutive seasons, and now you've got a cap hit north of $6 million for the next couple of years. Like here's the thing on Matt Murray, Haley. Real dollars, real dollars, he is owed $8 million in real cash coming up in the 2023, 2024 season. So think about that. When you're paying somebody $8 million to be your goalie in two years from now,

what do you want them to be? They should be a franchise goalie. They should be stealing you games and keeping you in, not being. sent to the American Hockey League. And speaking more than Jacob Markstrom. Yeah. I know. It's five shutouts this season.

It's tough. And you make a good point in that Cain, look, if these guys are going to end up anywhere, it's either going to be because the team San Jose and Ottawa retain salary or because they get bought out in the summertime, right? Like there's no way a Vander Cain with a $7 million cap hit is being traded from San Jose somewhere else with no salary being retained. I don't think, right, unless there's some awful contract that comes back. And same with Matt Murray.

I don't see Ottawa trading him to an Arizona or a Buffalo, whoever else you might want to speculate, might be looking for a goalie, without Ottawa taking half the money or a bad contract back. So I look at this and think you're more likely to find a team willing to gamble on Vander Cain to come in and be a 20 goal score than you are for Matt Murray coming in and being a 920 save percentage guy, right? Yeah, absolutely.

Especially for the price of admission. like the ticket, right? Yeah, exactly, exactly. All right. So the other multiple choice madness question I have for you on this Monday, we spent a little bit of time talking about dysfunctional Canadian teams. We got a little dysfunctional Canadian team tournament happening this week. Monday it's Vancouver and Montreal.

Wednesday is Vancouver and Ottawa. But Haley, that's not the game I want to ask you about, man, maybe you're going to pick Vancouver, Ottawa. I don't know. Here's my question. What's the most interesting game on the docket Wednesday night? I think this is going to be really fun. Wednesday night.

Is it A, Colorado against Toronto, B, Vancouver against Ottawa, or C, Pittsburgh, Edmonton. Haley, you could choose one game to sit down and watch in its entirety for whatever reason. Entertainment, misery, star power. What do you pick in? Avs, Leif's, Canucks, Sends, Penguins, Oilers. I want to say Canucks. sends just to be like this is hilarious. But I wonder if it's really bad that it ends up just being kind of sad.

Or maybe it ends up being really good because they're both on the same level of struggle right now. Yeah. I mean, I'll probably watch that one to see what it looks like for sure, probably over Toronto, Colorado. But the Pittsburgh-Edmonton game will probably be a good one. McDavid and Drysidel have been pretty lights out to start the season. I mean, especially on the power play.

Did you know that Drysidl only has six, six of his, what, 20 goals are at 5-1-5? Like, he's just a monster on the powerplay, which is impressive. It's crazy. So, I mean, the Oilers are obviously a fun team to watch if you're watching them when one of their top two lines are out there. And the Penguins have been playing really well. as of late. They've got everything starting to click. They did, they did enough in the absence of Crosby and Malkin and Lattang and Russ. So many players were out and they just kind of kept it on

the rails just enough. And now they're starting to, to look really good as they're getting guys back. And obviously Malkin's not back yet, but the penguins are always an exciting team to watch and they've been clicking really well lately. And Trist and Jari is playing really well. So, I mean, if I'm being, I'll probably end up watching that game over the other two. Yeah. Well, I think I'm probably going to be stuck covering Ottawa, Vancouver because it's in my, it's in my market. And it's going to be a weird game.

Like, you almost feel like does the loser of that game, if they lose in a, like, will changes come from that? Like, you wonder, right? Like, is that a tipping point game for either of those franchises if you lose to the other guys in a kind of embarrassing fashion or a lopsided fashion? would that be a catalyst for change? That would be the only reason why you tune in. It's almost like a car wreck type of thing where you're driving by.

You're like, I kind of want to see what's going on over there. But how do you not look at Colorado and Toronto and think like what's going on? Like the Toronto Maple Leafs have been on fire. And they've been fun and they've been competitive and they've been good defensively and they've been scoring goals and buckets and they went out west and they cleaned out the California teams. And this could be, again, if Colorado gets, you know, all their things. things back like, like this could be a potential Stanley Cup final preview of everything goes

well. But again, I think that might be the most entertaining game. I think Colorado, Toronto, Wednesday, Haley is going to be super entertaining. Yeah, I mean, Cal McCar is fun to watch. You wonder if Nate McKinnon's going to be back in the lineup because obviously he adds. Yeah. He adds, he's going to add a ton to that. He's still out.

But like watching Kel McCar do work as magic on the blue line is always, is always pretty fun to watch. And yeah, the Leafs have been rolling too. So I think all three will be interesting. This depends on if you're looking for skill or a train wreck. Okay. Well, listen, we're going to leave it there. This is a little harsh.

Yeah, a little bit. You called it a car wreck. I did it. Whatever Ian said. Yeah. Listen, we'll leave it there. This was a super fun podcast. The hour flew by.

I'm going to leave you with some homework, though, for next week. Okay, Haley? Before Monday's show, you need to find some B, C-level celebrity either on. Camio. What's the other one? Memo? Mimo? Whatever. I thought it was a memo. But anyway, whatever it is. For under a hundred bucks, can we find somebody to do the intro to the show for us at some point in December? You know, somebody like in that realm. Do we have to know who they are? Like it has to be well enough that they're known by most people If you kind of say their name or

Something like that So under a hundred bucks can we get somebody 45 seconds They're just going to read the intro That's your homework, okay? All right. She's on it. I'm doing it right now

But don't come back with like Laura from Family Matters or something You know? Like it's got to even be Actually, you know what? Laura from Family Matters is good enough for me for a hundred bucks. Okay. I changed my mind.

All right. We'll leave it there and hey, listen, if you got some suggestions for who you'd like to see us try to get to the intro. Do you know how much Gilbert Godfrey would have cost? He's on sale right now for Black Friday for $191. See? This is why. This is the time to do it.

Shooter McGavin's on here. See? Okay. See if you can find us somebody. Well, maybe we'll make, if Gilbert Godfrey is 191, then let's take the number to 200 and under. Okay, because maybe $100, yeah, at that point, you're not getting anybody, right?

So, 200 and under, let's see what we can do. Work our magic. And maybe our listeners can drop a little rating and review. Drop us a note, let's know who you want us to see, track it down. I want to remind you, though, of a couple of things. Like I said, off the top, if you're listening to us on Monday, you got an opportunity to jump on an annual subscription to the athletic for just a dollar a month, 12 months.

Go to the athletic.com slash hockey show. Again, that amazing deal ends at midnight on Monday. So if you're listening to us on Monday, jump on it. Athletic.com slash hockey show, a dollar a month for 12 months. And you can also subscribe to the Athletic Audio Plus on Apple Podcast. You'll get all the bonus content from our entire Athletic Network. You can start with a 30-day free trial. And then it's just 99 cents a month after that.