The Athletic Hockey Show - Buffalo Sabres buried in negativity and snow, Evgeni Malkin scores in 1000th game, Matt Tkachuk vs Jonathan Huberdeau doesn't disappoint

Episode Date: November 21, 2022

Ian and Julian look back on the Calgary Flames led by Jonathan Huberdeau and the Florida Panthers and Matthew Tkachuk game from the weekend, and Julian takes us through the oral history of Hockey's biggest trade from the summer. The guys stick tap Evgeni Malkin's 1000th career NHL game, Marian Hossa's jersey retirement and lament the fact that Pittsburgh and Chicago never met in the Stanley Cup in the 2000's.Matt Fairburn joins from snowy Buffalo to tell us what's gone wrong with the once upstart Sabres who are reeling, losing seven straight, and Ian and Jesse award their Jack Adams winner of the week ahead of multiple choice madness.Subscribe to The Athletic Hockey Show on YouTube: http://youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowBlack Friday sale from now until November 28th. Get a 1 year subscription to The Athletic for just $1 a month when you visit http://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. We are back. It is the Monday edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. As always, it's Ian Mendus, Julian McKenzie with you for the next hour or so. Boy, we got a lot to get to. Wrapping up the weekend. We're going to have Matthew Fairburn, who covers the Buffalo Sabres for us. They're buried in negativity in snow in Buffalo.

So Matt Fairburn's going to join us. We'll chat all things Sabres in Buffalo with him. We'll talk about that. really fun. I didn't expect Chicago Pittsburgh to be fun, but it was fun pregame, game itself, all of that. I'll tell you what, though, man. Julian, we got to kick it off with, I think the game of the weekend, at least from a storyline standpoint, Matthew Kachuk, Jonathan Hubertow, Calgary, Florida. Pretty exciting, entertaining game, right? You get shootout and whatever, eight goals during regulation time. But the biggest story was your,

your oral history of the Flames, Panthers, Blockbuster. Now, what I want to ask you about is usually these types of stories, Julian, you read these five or ten years later. Someone's like, you know, let's do an oral history of this trade and everyone's willing to talk. You did this like three months, two and a half months after the deal went down. So like, walk our listeners through how this all came together, the idea, how willing everybody was to participate.

Oh man. I love those types of stories. It's been like a dream of mine to say like, okay, I look back at a moment and like I tried to get all these people to speak about it. And just when the opportunity came for me to to do the beat in Calgary, I was like, you know, I would love to do this. And I just kind of started in training camp, just trying to talk to a couple of the guys. about, you know, just their thoughts on, you know, what happened when they got traded and

just hearing from Hubertow and Uyghur and they were pretty open and honest. And Cole Schwint gave me his story too, which I thought, I still think it was the most underrated part of that piece about him basically being up in the bushes and not knowing he got traded until like the very next day. But I think I had something when like Bradtre Living was willing to sit down and talk to me about the trade and everything that went on with that and the conversation he had. with, as much as he could tell me about the conversation he had with Matthew Kachuk ahead of that week where he was eventually traded.

And then Bill Zito and Matthew Kuchuk also responded to interview requests and participated to. It was, I don't know, like I wanted to put something together when I realized I was able to get all those elements together. I figured putting it in an oral history format would be really good. Just get an opportunity to get a sense of what their thoughts are about everything. I thought it was the right format. So I'm really happy that it's doing well.

And thank you to everyone who's just, you know, show me some love for the piece. I really appreciate it. And for you, Ian, a checks in the mail. Checks in the mail. There we go. Hey, no, it was awesome. And I'm with you. I love the oral history pieces.

And listen, as writers, it's a little bit easier than actually putting, you know, like, you know, putting our own words in there. But what I thought you did a really good job. And one of the tricky things about doing the oral histories is it's, it's a little got a flow, right? Like, it's got to, it's got to find a nice cadence and flow. And boy, it was, uh, it was great. And just for our listeners who don't, are, maybe aren't as familiar with, you know, the way we do things on the, on kind of, um, uh, the app in terms of, you know, how we give stories, uh, different prominence. Julian's story last week was classified as what we call an A1, which is like, you know, every, every day with the athletic,

usually, I think the odd days, maybe there isn't an A1 story, maybe holidays or whatever, but there's basically one story that the editorial team looks at well in advance. And they say, you know what? You know, so and so is working on this piece. And, you know, Katie Strang is the classic A1. She's the goat of A1 probably, right? Like, you know, Katie writes a lot of A1 front line headline material. But this was an A1.

And that speaks to two things. One, you know, the nature of the story. But two, that you were able to get it because I want people to understand. Just because you get assigned an A1 story doesn't mean it's going to be an A1 story. You know, there's a lot of times that I think the editorial scrutiny at this place is tremendous. And I mean that in a good way and in a thorough way. You don't just get to just submit something and be like, oh, yeah, they ask me for an A1, here's a, and, you know, here's 1, and, you know, it gets scrutinized.

They come back to you and say, we need this, we need that. So I want people to understand that the amount of work and creativity that went into this piece It really came shining through. And now I'm asking for that check to be doubled. Whatever you were about to send me, you need to double it after what I just said. Yeah, I got a, I think I see my checkbook around here somewhere. I'll write something up. But yeah, it's a really interesting process to go through the A1.

And, you know, I tried, I figured that like it would be held for however long it would need to be. So the editors like Mark Wallabin and Israel Fair, who were the two main guys who looked at it, would have as much time as they would want. to make sure it looks good and all that. And yeah, at that point, like, I was just hoping you would just see the light of day. And then when they said that it would be coming out a couple days before that Panthers Flames game in Sunrise, I felt like a kid on Christmas morning. Like, that really made me, I felt really happy. I put in a lot of work on that piece.

And I get there are some people who looked at it. They're like, hey, you know, there's some stuff that, you know, maybe I don't know how much new stuff we're hearing from it. But, like, I don't know if we had a clear timeline about how long, some of that stuff took to materialize. I think there's some other little mini stories out there, like Alan Walsh's perspective. I don't know how much of that has been out there too,

or how Huberto kind of heard the news as well. Like, I think there's still a lot of new stuff and a lot of cool stuff from that piece that I'm pretty proud to have put together and have available for everyone on the app at the athletic to read. So, yeah, I'm really happy about it. I'm really happy that got the A1 designation too,

and I'm just really happy that people are enjoying. Yeah, so now let's talk about it, what happened on the ice with the Panthers this weekend. Huge game, Panthers Blue Jackets. I'm joking. That was the Sunday game. Jackets beat Florida on Sunday.

But part of me wonders if, you know, the game on Saturday was where the Panthers put all of their kind of emotional effort into. That, you know, that's a game that a lot of hockey fans had circled on the calendar. First time, Cachuk facing his old team, Huberto, McKenzie Week. Now, granted, this was in sunrise. I think the temperature will rise. significantly when that game's in Calgary just because, you know, Cichuk was the guy as your story lays out, kind of said like, I think I need to leave.

And, you know, so, you know, players often get villainized for wanting to leave. And I think you're going to probably hear some of that when Matthew comes back in, in that next game in Calgary. But look, this was a big game. This was a statement game. And Calgary, the season hasn't gone off the way that they wanted it to. And certainly from an entertainment standpoint, that game delivered, did it not? to Calgary and Florida?

It absolutely did. It was kind of funny because at the start you're wondering like, okay, like what's kind of happening? There was a bit of a slow start. It's kind of funny considering the fact that both those teams are in like the top five in shots per game. It was kind of surprised seeing a shot count be like three

two after like a couple of minutes. But then once the goals started flowing, like that's when the drama and the pace really intensified. And I'll mention this too. Like Matthew Kichuk deserves obviously a lot of attention for, you know, before that game, considering the fact that him essentially wanting to go somewhere else kickstarted everything. But as a result, like, and I'll take a bit, no, it's weird to say blame,

but like I'll take some of this too. Jonathan Huberto and McKenzie Weaker's returns were sort of overshadowed as a result of the attention being pressed upon to Matthew Kachuk. And I tried to at least in my column after that game, try to, you know, just put that as the focus. Because, Remember, like, because of the fact Matthew Kachuk says he wants out, a trade gets consummated. And then Jonathan Huberto discovers after playing like beer league hockey that like he's on the move. Mackenzie Weaker is at a spa somewhere with his mom and family and learns that he's on the move as well. Like those two were fixtures for the Panthers for quite some time.

And one of the best things about that game, which I don't know how much they showed on broadcast before, was seeing those two players in the pregame skate. At one point, it was just those two guys for the flames alone. And the fans, the Panthers fans, were cheering. And on the other side, Alexander Barkoff. So at one point, you see, like, because these guys were all teammates. And they're all on the ice at the same time. And even at one point, like, you see Barkov send a pass from one end to the other, and Hubert don't gets any scores.

Like, like, there was, it was a really cool way to kind of start off everything. And then everyone gets to business. and McKenzie Weger after the fact is all like, you know what, I really wanted to beat those guys. There's some guys chirping. Huberto was saying, I don't think he heard as much chirping on his side. And he joked that guys might have been scared.

But also, I wonder if he actually heard stuff too. Like, with all the storylines that were kind of around that game and the fact that it delivered the way that it did with the shootout and the Markstrom stare down on Matthew Kachuk, like that was a really, it was a good game.

And I still can't believe they pulled it in the middle. the afternoon. And maybe it's because of the fact that it's Calgary, Florida, maybe it's not the sexiest markets. But like you'd think for a game like that, this is any other league, they put that as like a, I don't know, in like some kind of marquee spot. Like 4 p.m. Eastern is a bit weird for me, but I don't know. I thought that game itself, especially as it went on, I didn't even mention the fact, Matthewsichich tried the game in regulation. There was a lot of drama. There's a lot of interesting, there's a lot of interesting moments that happened. Now, you, you were in sunrise for that game, right, on Saturday? Now, where are you, where are you speaking to us from today? Back in,

Oh, I, I went back home. Yes, I know, I know everyone, everyone's been making the jokes, you know, you fluid for, for one game and then you came back. Yeah. Yeah. All right. I'm not going to do that again, okay? I'll, I'll do three, four games on a road trip. I know. I know. And I didn't get to do that much either. Man, what? Did you at least hit the outlet mall across the street from the arena? Not even. What? Not even. I know, I know, I know, I know. Okay. You're a rookie, rookie, rookie move.

It's a rookie move. It's a rookie move. I already got my lumps from siege. I already got my lumps from some of the other traveling members of the media. I'm getting the head shake from Ian Mendez now. I made a complete rookie move and I will learn, I guess, whenever I'm back in sunrise again for next. Okay.

Well, listen, Calgary, Florida was a lot of fun on Saturday. Chicago, Pittsburgh was a lot of fun. on Sunday. Now, I was thinking about this, Julian, and I'm, I'm blown away by this because it's a perfect time to talk about this because, you know, you see Marion Hose's number go up to the rafters in Chicago last night. Evgeny Malkin plays his thousandth game. And you see all these great players, all those great Chicago players are on the ice for the host of ceremony, Latang, Crosby, they're all there. Think about this for a second. Between Pittsburgh and Chicago from 2009 to 2017, they combined a week.

win six Stanley Cups. Can you explain to me how we never saw them face each other in the Stanley Cup final? Like, this has to be one of the biggest disappointments in the NHL is that you almost have two, and, you know, I'll use the term dynasty loosely, but certainly two juggernauts or powerhouses that win multiple cups in a short span and we don't even get to see them head to head like this, what the hell happened here? that's a good point. Like, yeah, we think of like teams of the salary cap era.

Like I still think Tampa Bay is the team of the salary cap era to this point because of the appearances that they've made in the final and the fact that they were able to get things done in a pandemic. But like, yeah, Chicago with the cups that they've won Pittsburgh in the finals that they've been. And I'm sure those finals would have been really good too. Like Jonathan Taze versus Sidney Crosby and the finals, a Stanley Cup final two good hockey markets in the United States too. So I'm imagining that like, I don't know what versus or NBC, whoever was airing those outdoor life network maybe. Was it OLN?

Remember that? Did you imagine? Yeah, I remember OLN. Remember, just imagine Doc Emmerc calling some of those games too. Like, yeah, like that's kind of, yeah, I never really thought of it that way. But like we did miss out a potential like a really great, even if it happened. once, even if it happened just like once. Like, we could have probably used that matchup as a way to determine like which dynasty

or which, which of these two great franchises who were having as much success. I guess it depends on what it happens. But we'd use that as a market to determine which team was better over the last how many years. Absolutely. Because that's our, that's our nature of sports people. You know, the problem was when Chicago kind of reached its peak between 2010 and 2015, that's when the penguins hit and it's a little tough to call it a, you know, a tough spell. But, you know, Mark Andre Fleury was fighting it.

Like there was a way, Sid had the concussions there a little bit. And then I think, you know, I think there was a feeling like when she got to like 2014, 15, like, I think the conversation was has the window closed on Pittsburgh, right? Like, I think I was having that feeling. and then the penguins come back in 16, 17, 17, 8, or 16 and 17 and win the cup. And that's when Chicago starts to kind of, they're hitting it. Yeah, it's like they're, even though they each won three Stanley Cups in that kind of eight, nine year window, somehow, weirdly their peaks never matched up. Right? Yeah, they never really kind of connected at the exact same time.

But like, now that I think about it, I'm trying to think like, what year. What year in the 2010s, like, if we're thinking of if their peaks match up or if, you know, this, if we try to think of the best possible final we could get between those two teams. Because you think of guys who is like, oh, like, remember what like people wanted like a Floyd Mayweather Man and Pacquiao fight for years? But like we got it. It was too late. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. It was way too late.

Like what year in the 2010? 2010. I think. No? Do you think 2010? Yeah. Well, is it? I mean, yes, the Chicago, like, is that the.

beginning of that dynasty. And then like Pittsburgh, like they, they had come off the, the appearances in the final, not too long before then. Is 2010 the answer? It would have been,

would have been, 2020, any time that Flurry was fighting it, would have been fun. Because imagine, well, remember Chicago, Philly in 2010, that was a banana series

with a ton of goals, especially in the early part of that series. I would have loved to have seen anti-Ni-M-E against the shaky Mark Andre Fleury, and everything's on the line. Everything's on the line. It would have been a ton of fun. You know?

It would have been like, look, especially, look, we love goals around here. So we would not have complained in the slightest. So is 2010 the answer? Is 2012 not in consideration? Is that like, I mean, Chicago probably gets better. I guess Crosby came back in 2012, right?

Like, he kind of missed 2010, 11. kind of in that window. Yeah, he was back into, 2012 is when the Flyers beat them in the playoffs and Claude Jureau, like went at Sid. And that was that crazy Philly Pittsburgh series was 2012.

That was like game one or game, like they had all those goals at one point. Like that was, that's still one of the most fun playoff series. And people don't like hype that up enough. Well, they do in Philly. I'll tell you that. They do in Philly.

They do in Philly. Okay. One other thing about that Pittsburgh Chicago game. It was really cool. If you haven't seen, there's two videos I would like to direct our listeners to check out if you have it.

One is Evgeny Malkin's son coming into the room before the game to read the starting lineup. You see if, you know, Gino gets a little emotional. Looks like he's wiping away tears at the end. And then when they go out to do the stretch, Malkin has this very unique stretching routine that he does before every game. And the entire Penguins team decided.

on the night of his thousandth game, we're all going to mimic him at the same time. So it's phenomenal footage. I laughed at. Somebody tweeted out and said, imagine this was your first NHL game you were ever attending in person. And you're watching the warm-ups

and you're seeing this one team all do the same. Stretching routine. It looked like synchronized swimming with 18 guys. It was hilarious to see. But I don't know. It just, I guess last night I watched a little bit of Chicago Pittsburgh and I had to have the lamenting feeling like

I wish we had just seen these two teams meet each other in a game that mattered because it was fun. Sunday night was a fun game. Crosby with the winner late in the third and, you know, just a fun game. Just the comment on Evgeny Malkin and the stretches. Like I think someone responded to that tweet too saying like I would buy like season tickets like instantaneously.

Like that was hilarious to see. that's a fun hockey moment to just like look at and be like, oh, hey, the players, they, uh, they're not just robots.

Like, they could do something like this. Like, that's fun stuff. I like that. Uh, but yeah, I can also feel your pain too.

Um, in the fact that like, you know, we did not get, we did not get to see those two teams play each other at their absolute best. Not to say we didn't get any good Stanley Cup finals with both of them against their old respective opponents.

But, uh, Chicago Pittsburgh, especially considering like Jonathan Tays, like if the ping pong balls fall another way, might end up as a member of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Like there's some, there's some connections between those two franchises too, right?

Like it's like both those two teams at one point were like terrible. Like the 2000s, remember? And both in their respective dark ages and then they emerge as the best teams. Like there's a lot we could have taken from a potential Chicago Pittsburgh series. And who knows how that changes the course of the course of NHL history. Yeah. Because, you know, we got. Chicago, L.A. in that window.

That was a lot of fun in those Western championships. That was fun. We got, obviously, we got Pittsburgh, Washington multiple times earlier in the playoffs, and that was a, you know, that was a ton of fun. We even got a little bit of Chicago, Detroit at the tail end of Detroit, too, of Detroit's time and beginning. They were just hanging on, right? Detroit was like hanging on by their fingernails with Datsuk and Zetterberg there.

It was almost like a passing of the torch. But they were getting some runs in near the end. Yeah. They at least it. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, anyway, it's fun to think about that. Look, the other thing I want to talk about from the weekend, real quick, Julian,

was Saturday we had a 15 game schedule on the dock at the NHL. Now, I don't believe we've ever had a, and we could have one, we could have a 16 game night because now there's 32 team in the league. I don't think we've had one of those yet. I don't think we had one last year. But here's my thought. And we saw the NBA do this two weeks ago the night before there was the midterm elections in the U.S. and the NBA decided we're not playing on election night.

We're going to jam up the schedule on the Monday night before. Every NBA team is going to play and we're going to stagger the start time by 15 minutes. We've got to see the NHL do this, don't we? At some point, the NHL's got to play 15 or 16 games and it's go time. Start the games at 6 o'clock Eastern every 15 minutes and let's go. Who says no? I look thank you I don't for I remember I don't remember who else having this conversation with the other day but like imagine one game finishes you can go to the next one you go to the next one you go to the next one I mean I can imagine it would be very difficult to do some kind of NFL red zone esk thing in the national hockey league considering how the way games are played but the idea that like all these games are happening at the same time you can't stagger times I think it's surprising that the national hockey league has not instituted something like this yet. And if they do find themselves, even if it's like a 13 or 14,

I mean, 13 game wouldn't make sense. But you know what I mean. Like if a multiple game slate on it's like Saturday night, like do that. I think it would just be really good, uh, just for fans just to be able to try to tap into as many games as they can if they have like NHL Center Ice or whatever they call it now, uh, to be able to tap in all these different games. Like it just makes sense. And I hope they took notes from that NBA day because that was a genius idea on their, Oh, man. And now I love the idea of red zone for the NHL. I don't know what we would call it.

Offensive zone? No, that sounds stupid. Zone time is already taken. But here's the thing, right? Like, in NFL Red Zone, like, you have it where the two teams playing where you're watching right now, there's a closer chance of them scoring. But like in hockey, because of how fast that game is like. You just have to switch to the game, watch it for 30 seconds, and then.

Yeah. Yeah, right? Like it would have to be, it'd have to be time-based. I think the only way they would make that work is if like, if they see that a game is getting close to its conclusion and they see that it's close, it's one of those like, I think the editorial judgment on that one is a little bit more finicky. You have to determine in that moment what is more pressing to watch, like a three-two game with 13 minutes to go or like a four-two game with six minutes to go. Like that starts to get a little bit. bit tricky. But NFL Red Zone, shout out to those guys. They have the formula down for that. Like, that is, I don't, I, that's like what I watch on Sundays now. Like, I will put that on and I will go through the entire slate of games for an entire day. Like, that's the best way to do. All right, Julian, I teed this up off the top of the show. I got to tell you, you know, the Buffalo Sabres, they rolled into Ottawa last week. I thought this was funny. Actually, Julian, we hadn't had any snow in Ottawa until the day that the Sabres arrived. And I was laughing. to myself. I was like the two coldest teams in the NHL are meeting, of course we're going to get

our first snowfall. But it was like a little dusting. It was like five centimeters, whatever. They got more than a dusting in Buffalo. Let's bring in our pal, Matthew Fairburn. That's such a great job covering new sabers. And we got to start with some weather talk because this was one of the most unbelievable things. Julie and I were saying like, you know, we heard terms like thunder snow and all these things. Can you give our listeners a sense of just how much snow fell in your neighborhood? Yeah, it's probably about six feet or so. Somewhere in that neighborhood. It was, it started late Thursday night, continued throughout Friday. We got a little bit of a break and then it came back. So I'm about 20 minutes south of the city, probably about 15 minutes west of where the bills play

in Orchard Park. So we're right near the lake in a little neighborhood in Hamburg. and not a great spot to be for the for the lake effects snow right on the lake. It was it was pretty intense, but as, you know, it's funny how it works out the way the wind blows and the way these storms settled. The sabres were relatively unaffected by it all. They were able to practice on Friday because the storm hadn't moved north yet. And then they got out to go to Toronto on Saturday. they got a, you know, an exception from the city to go straight to the rink and practice on Sunday. And they're back practicing this morning.

But I saw the first plow in my neighborhood last night, like very late last night. So throughout the whole weekend. So there was still, you know, five plus feet sitting in the road and still in the process of digging out. But we're getting back to normal little by little here. Hopefully by tomorrow we'll be back on the roads and things will be smooth sailing. I hope so, man. Because just seeing someone posted a thread of all the Buffalo Bills players reacting to the snowstorm and some of them trying to drive through it. Some of them are trying to dig themselves out.

Like I think like Matt Barkley, that one of the backup quarterback, there's like a whole feet of snow like right outside his front door. And these kids are trying to shovel their way out of it. Like it's, it must be like, look, I get upstate New York gets a ton of snow. But like this is unlike anything I've ever seen. And yeah, we mentioned it, thunder snow. Like the fact that that's a thing. Like that's, that must have been insane to deal with. Yeah, it's a bizarre, bizarre to hear the thunder.

And then just the conditions are truly like, so the first time I moved to Buffalo was 2014. I covered the bills for seven years. And 2014 was the last time there was a storm that was anything like this one. And that one was nuts. This one is right there with it. I think it might have been slightly less snow or pretty close. But the way it just comes down, the pace at which it comes down, right, to get three, you know, three feet of snow, three plus feet of snow in the span of like half a day, you know, go to bed on Thursday night and it's about a dusting, a few inches maybe. And then you wake up on Friday morning and by like 10, 11 a.m., there's three or four feet.

You know, you get a break for a couple hours and then it keeps coming down. I mean, you can't, you really can't see much. And you can't keep up with it. It's not a super common occurrence, but the fact that it's happened twice and now, you know, eight, seven, eight years I've lived here is a little too common for me. And to put this in a context, that's enough snow that it would be taller than like Nathan Gerby and Tyler Ennis and some of these guys that were under six feet tall, the Sabres, right? The snowfall that they got in Orchard Park, the bills tweeted something out that it was taller than

only five players on the roster. And that's a football roster. You know, so it was like Josh Allen's height, essentially. Josh Allen is a big man. So it was, Orchard Park ended up getting the worst of this one. I think it was 70 something inches of snow. And in Hamburg here by the lake, we got, we were spared. We were in the 60s or something, 60 something inches.

It was, it was something. but it is amazing to me how the community and the county is able to respond to storms like this. The fact that I see people driving out of my neighborhood this morning is somewhat astounding, considering as of, you know, 12 hours ago there was still five feet of snow sitting in the road. They do move swiftly to get things back up and running. You know, and I like for me, and I love that. And I think anybody who hasn't been the Western New York or Buffalo, you'll love the city. you love the people and it's hard not unless you're a you know somehow you hate the buffalo

Sabers I think you every hockey fan should feel some sympathy for what Sabres fans have been through the last 10 years have been really hard and now I need to talk about what's going on right now because you know what Matthew like three weeks ago Buffalo was seven and three they they dust Pittsburgh I think in a game they're just beaten Detroit there's got like 14 goals in two games. Everyone's like, man, is this Sabres team for real? And now they've lost eight in a row. And in your writing, you've pointed out, when you lose eight games in a row in regulation time, it usually doesn't bode well for your playoff chances. What on earth happened here? How could you go from seven and three to losing eight in a row in regulation time?

It's wild. It's my first season covering the NHL and first season covering the Sabres. But But it sounds like it's very much a common pattern with this group, you know, and watching from afar, I didn't cover those other early season rises and falls. But, you know, it seems like not that long ago that I was sitting next to Julian in the press box at the Saddle Dome. And, you know, he's like, man, this Sabres team is really fast. And they've got a ton of energy and they compete really hard. and, you know, that win against Calgary felt like really the high point of what they were doing. It was still very early in the season at that point, but to go into Western Canada and beat the Oilers, beat the flames, in the manner in which they did, you know, playing pretty well. Then they go to Vancouver. They win, but they lose Matthias Samuelson.

And it kind of started a string of injuries on the blue line that they, you know, they managed to, handle because like you mentioned after that Pittsburgh game, they were still seven and three. And that was a few weeks after, uh, you know, everything happened, uh, was Samuelson and Ilya Wuschen got hurt. Henry Okiehariu got hurt in Calgary. They didn't really make any moves on the blue line, but it seems like it started to catch up with them. And look, they, they faced a tough stretch of games too. They played, they went south and they played Carolina and Tampa, played both of them tight, had to play one of those games without Rasmus Dahlene. Then they came back home. They lose to the coyotes, which was a tough one. They play Vegas, then they play Boston.

So four of those five games, you're thinking, all right, they played tight, they played really tough teams. Five game losing streak isn't the end of the world. But then to lose to Vancouver, lose to Ottawa, and lose in Toronto on Saturday night, and to lose the way they're losing, to have Don Granato start to talk about not seeing enough compete and not seeing the type of, you know, energy he wants to see right out of the gate, that's where it's troubling. You wonder how many of these guys are sitting there thinking, man, you know, same old, same old, and here we go again. And I know they're young. And Don Granado thinks that's a plus, right? Because maybe there's a naivete to the young players where they think they can work out of it. But I think the concern should be that. that these are young guys who don't know how to break out of a slump like this at the NHL level. And they've got the Canadians on Tuesday night. That should be a chance to get back on track. But it's starting to get to the point where I feel like they need to play with a little bit more desperation.

And they need to have players other than Tage Thompson and Rasmus Dahlene step up because those guys have still been playing at a high level throughout this streak. It's really interesting to hear you say that, at least from Don Granados, perspective that this team is not at least playing with that same pace or at least starting off games at the way they would want to, or at least with the effort and energy, at least just, I remember there was a game last year where the Sabres were in Montreal. And I remember I got to ask a couple questions to Don and Rasmus and Alex Talk was available too. And it seemed as if just with the way that Don Granato was coaching this team, he was getting those guys

engaged. And even if they were not the most talented team right now, the Sabres at the very least were going to try to bring some kind of effort. I wonder if it has to do with the fact that the injuries are taking a toll and maybe just some fatigue, just starting to settle in. And then the fact that they're taking themselves out of whatever playoff chances, you could muster up 20 games in obviously doesn't help. But I'm also curious, like, what are fans hoping to see from the team?

from now until the end of the year with the way things have kind of shaken up. Yeah, it's weird because I don't think by any means players have checked out or are tuning out Don Granato or anything like that. I mean, you come into the season with the youngest roster in the NHL and you have the oldest player in the NHL on your roster and Craig Anderson. So even that average age really could come down even more if they didn't have Anderson. and also the cheapest roster in the NHL. You know, they didn't go out and spend money to add veterans to this group. They wanted to clear the way for guys like Jack Quinn and J.J. Peturka and Peyton Krebs to get significant ice time.

So something that Don Granato mentioned that I thought was pretty interesting over the weekend was that he thinks psychologically the expectations is something that they're learning to deal with internally and externally. the fact that people legitimately think they have something going and that winning should be the bar. Don Granato has said that that they need to win more and that, you know, this season was about, you know, competing and finding a way to learn how to win. But I do think even the most optimistic Sabres fans came into the year and thought maybe some mild improvement, maybe 85, 90 points just on the outside of the Eastern Conference playoff picture. The problem I think a lot of fans are having, a lot of people expect. that maybe they would be outside of the playoffs. That's not really the problem. But to go through an eight game losing streak, all regulation losses, like eight games without a point is really rough. That's stuff that the Sabres have done that two other times during this playoff drought and both

of those teams finished in dead last place. So, you know, most teams that go eight games in a season without a point finish somewhere near the bottom of the standings. It's not a common occurrence to, at least since 2000, nobody has done it and made the playoffs. So I think the fact that they're going through another stretch like that and losing games the way they're losing them, particularly in the last week. The five-game losing streak wasn't super concerning because they were playing tight and they were playing against really good teams. A lot of people are losing to Boston and Vegas and Calgary, or Carolina and Tampa. But Vancouver, Ottawa, Toronto's tough, but, you know, there's some games mixed in here where you think a more veteran team, you know, would have been able to stop this slump. And I think maybe the kernel of concern here, when you zoom out big picture, you might forget an eight game losing streak years down the road if they become what people think they have a chance to. But when you're developing players and you're so focused on development, I wonder how that development. That development

is impacted by losing like this. You know, you do have to have some sort of winning for these young players to get used to. Some of them went through it in Rochester last year where they made the playoffs and felt what it was like to play meaningful hockey games. To go through something like this, yes, it can be a learning experience if you find a way to snap out of it. But, you know, we saw it years ago with all the young players that they had. You get so used to losing.

And, you know, at some point, you need to find a way to surround these guys with players who can help them win. And maybe they can grow into that themselves. It remains to be seen. But this is a tough stretch of hockey. You know, it's interesting, too. Well, first of all, everything that you said, it sounds like it can apply to the Ottawa senators in their fan base, which is we didn't say we're going to make the playoffs.

We just thought 85 to 90 points is kind of where we were going to be. And, you know, as we hit U.S. Thanksgiving, it doesn't feel like it's trending in that direction. So I think everything you said there, boy, I think it resonates with Ottawa fans. Wait a minute. Time out, time out, time out, time out. There are senators fans who didn't, who after the offseason that they had thought that they weren't going to make the playoffs. I thought, no, I think most Ottawa fans thought, just get in the hunt, be in the hunt.

Now, yeah, some, like, in my preseason, I did an athletic survey, I think it was 51% said that they would make the playoffs and 49% said no. Like, like, that's still pretty close. Yeah, but I think most reasonable fans thought, just kind of exactly what Sabres fans were thinking. We're probably not a playoff team, but can we just take a step in the right direction? That was it. And it didn't happen. But I thought what was interesting, too, speaking of the Senators connection, you mentioned Craig Anderson and being in the mix there. And I'm always wondering and curious when a team kind of gets to a stage like Buffalo is right now, is it time to start playing the younger kid in net?

And this UPL prospect is, he looks like a lot of fun. But is there any chance he plays a lot of games here? moving forward or they want to protect him? He's go. The plan, it was funny because on Tuesday night, they were playing Vancouver and they were, you know, they got down early, slow start, bad game. And I was having that conversation with somebody in the press box that it was unfortunate that they put themselves in a position the way they set up their roster, that it was going to be

difficult to get UPL games because Eric Comrie, you know, was signed. And Craig Anderson, you can't move one of those guys. to the HL and carrying three goalies is a little bit tricky. Then Eric Comrie got hurt and he's going to miss multiple weeks. So now out of necessity, they're going to get a bit of an extended look at UPL. And I think that's not a bad thing because the way coming into the season, they did want to protect him. They wanted, he's dealt with some injuries.

And because of that, his play has been a little bit inconsistent in the HL over the last few years and he hasn't gotten the number of games that they wanted him to. So they wanted him to have that full, healthy season to really, you know, lay a foundation in the HAL. But now with Comrie out and with the season going the way it's going, it doesn't seem like a bad thing to get a look at him and see what he can bring. I mean, at every other position, they cleared the way for young players to get ice time this season and learn at the NHL level. Goalie is a little bit different. You know, they they wanted him to get some more AHL games and he was still below

that threshold that you see with most goalies of getting a certain number of HL games before they bump up to the NHL. He got the game on Saturday night against the Leafs and got very little help which has been a pretty common occurrence for goalies this season in Buffalo. When I saw Julian about a month ago

that the Sabres goalies were standing on their head. Eric Comrie was in the middle of a great stretch of hockey. He cooled down a little bit, got some bad luck, and then got injured. So UPL will get his chance here. The question is, you know, they're close to getting Matia Samuelson back, which should be a huge boost to their blue line. But how much help can they give UPL?

Because you don't want to, you know, shatter this kid's confidence either. You know, he's had every time he's gotten an NHL chance, he has been behind a pretty spotty, spotty group in terms of goal support and defense. So I'm interested to see how he looks because they need to start identifying what they have at a few different spots, goalie being one of them, because Anderson's got to be in his last year. They have Devon Levi at Northeastern probably a year or two away, a couple years away from being in the NHL, I would think. So UPL is going to be that guy that if they can identify something there, that would be a huge boost to what they have going forward. It's been their biggest problem for quite a few years here.

How's Owen Power doing eight assists through 18 games with the Buffalo Sabres? This was a guy who a few people were thinking could be a true Calder Trophy finalist this year. How do you think he's been playing this year? I think he's been playing really well. Been one of definitely one of the bright spots on the team. When they were going through those injuries, and they still are to an extent on defense, he was logging like 29 minutes of ice time, 28 minutes. of Ice Time. He's 19 years old and they're just treating him like he's, you know, a workhorse on the

blue line. And I think it was the best thing for him, you know, early in the season, it felt like he was a little unsure and not playing the most confident game. And I think just getting thrown in there and getting that huge workload made him, you know, his instincts kick in. And I really think he's been one of the bright spots. You look at Tage Thompson, obviously been great, Dahlene and a few others. but power looks like a guy that's going to be a part of their core. And it's kind of weird to say that, considering he's, what, you know, 20-something games into his NHL career and he's 19 years old, but he definitely looks the part of what you expect. And to be playing the way he is as a 19-year-old defenseman is super impressive.

They now will get a chance to protect him a little bit more. If Samuelson comes back, he usually plays with Rasmus Dahlene. and he's just a different type of defensemen that they don't have healthy right now. Ilya Lubushkin's getting a little bit healthier. Henry Okie Haru is working back in. So now you can find a way to shelter power a little bit more in terms of who he's playing with and how many minutes he's getting. But he handled it really well.

And I think I can only wonder what the defense would have looked like if they didn't have power when all these injuries happened because when they started, you know, condensing the minutes a little bit and working some players out of the rotation and going to 5D. He was a guy that really had to step up and he handled it well. Listen, we appreciate you dropping by the Monday edition of the podcast. Well, maybe you couldn't even leave your house. So maybe he had nothing else to do. But we do appreciate you dropping by because you know what?

Sabres fans are fantastic. They are, you know, they're just so full of passion. I always say, like, I want fans to understand how great Buffalo is as a. Sports City. So question before we let you go, because as you said, you're an NFL guy, where you were an NFL guy, covered this NFL for a long time. As you look at the bills, not an overly convincing win over the Browns, but they get the job done, kind of weird circumstances. Legitimately, what's the feeling in Buffalo? Is it Super Bowl or bust right now? Like, is that how people are feeling? Yeah, people definitely came into the season feeling

Super Bowl or bust. And I think because of that, you're starting to see some angst creep into the fan base for sure, the way they've played the last month or so, a couple losses. Josh Allen had that injury. And like you said, they weren't super convincing against the Browns. So the angst that is creeping in is definitely the result of a Super Bowl or bust mentality for the fan base and probably for the team. It's not as if they won't be contenders next year if they don't win the Super Bowl. But that is where the bar is for sure. People are pretty jacked up about the team. And I said it, you know, earlier in the year to anyone who would listen when I would pop on and talk about the bills like, folks need to pace themselves, right? They need to, they need to understand it's a long

season and that when you're putting the bar at the Super Bowl and you're freaking out over October and November games, like you need to pump the brakes. You need to let things play their course because they're not used to rooting for teams that play into February. You know, they're not used to rooting for long playoff runs. It's a different beast. You need to keep the big picture perspective. And this is still a team that they can snap out of this little lull that they're in. They have one of the best quarterbacks on the planet.

And they have some pieces on defense. They've been through through this before. So we'll see. But, yeah, Super Bowl or bust is an accurate way to describe how these people are feeling. He's a dual threat, Julian. He can talk NFL, NHL. He's Matthew Fairburn. Matt Fairburn.

Bring it. What a guy. There we go. Hey, thanks for doing this and happy Thanksgiving, man. Hope you get a little bit of downtime there later this week. Thanks so much. Hopefully I'll see you guys soon. All right.

That was a lot of fun with Matt Fairburn. There's a great job covering the Sabres. You can tell he's got a lot of passion for the NFL. Are you one of these Canadian people, Julian, that takes, like American Thanksgiving. Do you take the day off work? I know a lot of Canadians do. They take the day off work. They sit down.

They watch football. They don't necessarily make Turkey, but they certainly kind of make a day of it. It's like a quasi holiday up here as well. Do you do that? Am I allowed to do that this year? Yeah, yeah. The Atlantic allows you.

Yeah, I'm sure. Check, check the HR manual. I'm pretty sure we're allowed. Because I try to remember what happened last year when I was still an editor for, you know, I just wondering what I had to. You know what? Knowing me, I might have had like the day off from like my actual job, but I know I probably had to do some kind of podcast. I always find a way to do work on days.

I don't need to be working that much. I know for the CJ show, a show you can listen to here on the athletic app. We will do some kind of, we did this last year where we look at all the teams that are in the playoff position right now. and we figure out, at least according to CJ, if they're contenders or pretenders, I know we're going to do that again this year. So that I know for sure I'm going to do on American Thanksgiving. But the World Cup is on and NFL football is on.

I will find a way to watch both. Yeah, this is a sneaky good week for sports with the FIFA World Cup starting as well. All right, let's wrap up the show, my man, as we always do with a couple of segments. We look back at the last seven days and we say, who did the best job coaching in the NHL over the past week. Look, there's a bunch of candidates here.

I feel like we just need to just, can we just cut to Craig Barubei? Like St. Louis, can we just give it to Craig Barouet? Look at, they're now sitting in a playoff spot. I have no exception. They're in a playoff spot after being 30th in the league, what, two weeks ago? Like, they were one of the worst teams. They've won four in a row. Baroube's got them firing on all cylinders.

To me, you go four and over the course of the week. You turn the narrative around in your team. I don't know how you don't give it to Craig Baroube. Feels like between the New Jersey Devils and now the Blues, if you're off to some kind of bad start, there's hope for you to turn it around. And I guess that's maybe a bit Captain Avi's here. But it's funny considering the fact that the devils at one point were dead and buried.

Craig Baroube at one point looked dead and buried with the St. Louis Blues, and he's found a way to turn that around. That's why you're patient with your head coaches, right? So, yeah, really interesting to see Craig Barruve turn it around for his guys in St. Louis with all they have going on. So I have no qualms if he gets the Jack Adams award for this. Also, shout out to Dave Haxhill in Seattle.

Cracken, look, they only play two games, but they won them both. Like, you can only play the games that are on your schedule. But, you know, Haxdoll's got them going. They're looking a little better. And how about the news coming down that, you know, they're going to send Shane right down for a little conditioning stint? right? Like a, that's a curious, that's an interesting situation in Seattle.

Yeah. You know, right was the guy. You probably go back six months ago and everyone thought he was the consensus number one overall pick, kind of had a little bit of a speed wobble heading into the draft. You know, Corey Promin accurately predicts he'll, he's not going to go first. He might go forth. He does slide to four and not the best of starts for him in the NHL. I have to say, like, what a rough last few months for it. like, you know, this is a guy who you're right. Like, we all thought he was going to be the number one overall pick, pretty much leading up until draft day.

And then not only does he not go number one, he falls all the way to number four on the draft, in the draft. Like, that's, I have to admit, that's really tough for a kid like that. I mean, he has to find a way to fight through that adversity.

But also, like, he can barely, I mean, he's being in, he's in the NHL on a conditioning stint, right? Like, it's not even like,

as if he can be in the HAL full time. It's either in the NHL or he has to get sent all the way back to the C HL. Like that's, that's a bit of a tough one for him and only one assist in as many games that he's played so far. It's a tough adjustment for a kid who, still a teenager,

still trying to figure it out in the National Hockey League, still should be given a lot of grace for him to figure that out as well, but not an easy situation for him. Yeah. Yeah, it's fascinating to watch, right? I mean,

I think a lot of people figured he would go to Seattle and him and Maddie Baneers and they would just kind of take off. and it's going to take some time, but I give Dave Haxel some credit there. Obviously, they've, you know, they're going with a tough love route and, you know, hopefully this is going to, you want to always see the athlete, you know, succeed.

And it's going to be a longer road than a lot of people thought. But I got to give, anyway, we're giving Craig Baroubae are Jack Adams of the week. I just wanted to give Dave Haxel a shout out for winning both his games, making, you know, probably being part of a tough decision here to send his prize prospect down. But, boy, after,

A year after we thought Seattle was underwhelming, they're kind of overachieving, right, this year? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, last I checked, they were still to, they might be changed, but I mean, they're not in the basement. They're 11th overall or 10th overall in the league standings. They're in a playoff spot in the Pacific Division. Like, this is a team that, uh, similar to how I was looking at Buffalo with Matt Fairburn

a couple of weeks ago, quick, uh, some excitement on the back end and also on the front end too. I mean, Maddie Baneers. I thought, I thought, Owen Power before the season began was going to be like, he was going to be my Calder pick. And then I watched one preseason game of Maddie Baneers. I was like, nope, I changed my mind. He's going to be that guy.

So I still am going to, I still feel confident in my switch. But yeah, it's really fun to see that the Seattle Cracken, even if they did not have the inaugural season that some people might have wanted them to have in light of what Vegas did a couple of years earlier, they are at least trend. upward. So it looks like. Unfortunately for Shane, right, he still needs more time. But at least with the way everything's looking, they seem to be trending up. And talk about Calder Trophy, don't sleep on Logan Thompson in Vegas. What he's doing there in goal. It's hard to look at him and not say he's the guy that wins the Calder.

But a lot of racetrack left, a lot of racetrack left. All right. We don't have a lot of racetrack left, Julian, in this pod. I want to wrap it up with a little multiple choice bad this Monday. Okay. We're talking about. There we go. Evgeny Malkin earlier played his thousandth game for Pittsburgh Sunday night.

And I think we can all agree that, you know, Malkin's career has been somewhat eclipsed or overshadowed by Sidney Crosby, right? When you think of the Penguins, you think of Sid I, G02. Rightly or wrongly, that's the way it goes. And my question here, to wrap up the pod, which player do you think had his greatness overshadowed the most by a teammate? I'm going to give you four options here. Is it, A, Fadney Malkin, overshadowed by Sidney Crosby.

B, Peter Forsberg, maybe a little overshadowed by Joe Sackick, C, Sergei Federov, maybe a clips by Steve Eisenman, or D. Yarmir Yager, in the shadow of Mario Lemieux, who do you think had their greatness overshadowed the most? My answer is Peter Forsberg. Here's my reasoning for it. Yeramir Yager, I mean, yes, playing alongside Super Mario. I feel like at least just from my vantage point, like they were parents. like together like the the what's the like if you take yarmier's name

i do you like scrambling mario jrador yeah an anagram yeah like i mean they were always kind of joined together i don't know if you say overshadowed but i mean maybe you could but like i feel as if like you look at yarmier yager now and with the career that he's had like you know he could stand on his own as a guy who was like yeah like he's had his own career um if genie malcon And so we mentioned earlier about how Sidney Crosby was playing through the concussion issues that he had in the early 2010s. When he was out of the lineup, Evgeny Malcon was called upon to step up in his absence. And for my money, and you cannot tell me otherwise, when if Gennie Malkin was put on to be the man for the Pittsburgh Penguins, he played as if he was the best player in the world. Not the best player in the world.

So I feel, too, that, yes, fine, you play with Sidney Crosby, but if Gennie Malkin has also really shown out to be the guy. Sergei Fedorov, I mean, I don't know if it's right to say that Steve Ironsman overshadowed him too. I also just feel with the personality that Federov had and the looks and everything of the endorsements and stuff. Like, Federov definitely showed out for himself. I feel as if his time passes. What federal commercials here? Well, the Nike, the Nike skates, right? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Okay. He had that. He was a brand. There's like a fun video that like circulates around on Twitter all the time. I think it's from an all-star game where like you see his like, is he like skate up and like it focuses on his face and you look at how beautiful he looks like just objectively here. People would be like, oh wow, they're swooning over Sergey Federer. Dude was like a charming. He was Henrik Lundquist before there was Henrik Lundquist.

100%. So you don't have to worry about a guy like Steve Hiresman overshadowing, which leaves Peter Forsberg. A guy who I think as time passes on more and more, I think more and more people, and this is from my advantage point, you could tell me if I'm wrong. I think more and more people forget about how great he was as a player. He also had to deal with injuries too, right? Like, I don't know. I feel as if, you know, those Colorado teams, Joe Sackick and all those pieces that they had, like, I don't know why, but like Forrestberg's greatness kind of gets, he's underrated now. But he should be underrated. Like he's a Hall of Famer. He's an incredible player and when healthy could dominate.

Like he's my pick and hopefully my reasoning makes sense. But like I think Peter Forsberg's the answer. No, it makes total sense. I think you can make a compelling case for all of these guys. But I'm going to go with Gino. I'm going to go with Malkin because I think, and I know that that stupid NHL when they did their 100 list at the 100th anniversary, that Malkin wouldn't have made that list,

I think speaks volumes for how this guy was overlooked. Like a heart trophy winner, three-time Stanley Cup winner, a rookie of the year, he's got 50-goal season, 100-point seasons, Art Ross, all the boxes you'd want to check, he'd check. But it always felt like he was second fiddle, whether it was the draft and it was Ovechkin 1, Malkin 2, whether it was the team and it was Crosby number 1,

center him number 2. He just always seemed to be overshadowed. And yet, I think he was pretty darn dominant. in his own way. And maybe for him, maybe it was the reverse of Fedorov, Julian, where his personality was so introverted,

so quite like, can you think of a hilarious of Gany Malcan video? Probably not. Just a reserved quiet guy who just went about his business and I think he got overshadowed by Sid to some extent.

You know? I can't think of any funny videos, but I'm sure you could with the warm up. Yes. That's true. But also like, I'm sure you can go back on some of his older quotes. and be like, okay, well, short,

because he's like one of those like short to the point, blunt kind of guys, right? And he has an Instagram page where he'll post kind of funny stuff too. I don't know. Can you, is there any funny moment? Can't think about this with Peter Forsberg. Is there any funny off-ice moment you could think of

involving Peter Forsberg? No, when I think of Peter Forsberg, I think of the gold medal winning the shootout goal that he scored against Corey Hirsch. The stand. Yeah, put on a post as, stamp, off ice moments? No, I'm having a hard time. No, no. I can't think of any of those guys. And I think even for all the other options too, like Malkin, Yager, I'm sure Federov has something

somewhere. Like, those guys also stood out on that point too. But like Peter Forsberg is, unless I'm wrong, like quiet. Like, Yager, it's not like he had his own personality that would stand out. Yager had his own peanut pie. Do you remember that in Pittsburgh? Like his own brand of peanut butter. Like, so I feel like he marketed himself. That's the personality that he is. Yeah.

Hmm. We'll have to think about that. Well, help us out. Listeners, you can hit us up, let us know who's the most overshadowed superstar in NHL history. Like a guy that's going to end up being first ballot slammed on Hall of Famer who just, you know, maybe just didn't get the appreciation or love that he could have or should of because he was, you know, playing in the shadow of, uh, of, uh, somebody greater.

So hit us up with that. That doesn't. Man, this hour flew by. Really flew by on the Monday show. Oh, man. I always enjoy these hours with you, man. I should say this about Peter Forsberg. He was on the cover of NHL 98.

He had that. NHL 98. Okay. Was Malkin ever a cover guy? Do you have the list of EA sports cover athletes? Let me try to think of the, so 98 was, was Forsberg. I think John Van Breesbrook had at least one of those.

2000 was Chris Pronger. 2001 was Owen Nolan. 2002 was Mario Lemieux. 2003 was Dr. McIntyre was Danny Heatley. No, 2003 was Jerome McGinlet. 2004 was Danny Heatley, but then he had the unfortunate accent with Dan Snyder. So that got flipped to Joe Sackett.

2005 was Marcus Nasolin. 2006 was Vines Faisana Cavalier. 2007 was Alexander of Etchkin. 2008 was Eric Stahl. 2009 was John Finnaf, 2010 was Patrick Kane. Yeah,

once we get to 2010s, it's kind of spotty. Yeah. But like, I, from the 2000s on, I got it. Okay.

Well, there you go. I, man, I don't know. I got P.K., Austin Matthews got, Tateen and Tays got,

didn't they have one together? No. They had one together. Well, they did that weird year where everyone had like a regional cover, right? Did they not?

Yeah. Does that make sense? Gloujiru, I think had one. You know what I love about you, by the way? Is your bilingualism will just drop in when you pronounce a French player's name. You're like, yeah, you know, you're like, Danny Heatley, but that got switched to Joe Sacki. Then you're like, a Vesant Le Cavalier. And it's just like.

Vincent Le Cavalier. I know I'm going to say Vinnie Le Cavalier is how I know. So when I hear Vinny down, I'm like, oh, yeah. It's just, it's, you know, it's, it's, it's. Or like Marty Saint-Louis, it's like, but I. I've known him to be Martin. Yeah. Like I don't like, it's a, it's an adjustment for me.

Yeah. I guess. It's weird because it's not like I'm like, it's not like I'm like, you know, oh, like French was like the language I spoke growing up. Just, you know, product of going like French immersion schools and just watching hockey in French sometimes. I don't know. There's a guy.

I remember like I said, uh, Chris Le Tang, instead of Chris LaTang on an episode I did with Sean Chintilly and they were very confused at that. So, uh, yeah, sorry. I don't know. It just, it just happens. Yeah. Well, listen. It's great. It sounds fantastic. I'll tell you that much.

All right. Thank you. We better leave it there. We want to thank everybody for listening to this Monday edition of the podcast. Follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Leave us a rating review. We'd certainly appreciate that. Hit us up with any feedback from this episode. We always read the comments. Granger, Rousseau, Joe Smith are going to drop by the Wednesday roundtable. It will be the next edition of The Athletic Hockey Show. You can always follow us on YouTube at YouTube.com slash at the Athletic Hockey Show and hey, it's U.S. Thanksgiving week coming up. So you know what that means.

Some killer deals are going on right now. A Black Friday deal live right now. You can get a subscription, a new subscription to the Athletic for a dollar a month for a year when you visit the athletic.com slash hockey show. This offer is available right through the weekend up until Monday. So make sure you take advantage of that, a Black Friday deal for us. For our American listeners, hope you have a happy Thanksgiving. And we'll hit you up again.

Peace.