The Athletic Hockey Show - Colorado Avalanche advance to Stanley Cup, Bruce Cassidy fired by Boston Bruins and better times ahead for Buffalo Sabres

Episode Date: June 7, 2022

Craig and Sean discuss the powerhouse Colorado Avalanche sweeping the Edmonton Oilers and advancing to the Stanley Cup for the first time in 21 years. Mike Smith returning to the Oilers for next season and the magic of Cale Makar. The guys dissect the Boston Bruins decision to fire Bruce Cassidy, and how the injury riddled Bruins might be unrecognizable next season. The boys welcome new Sabres beat writer Matt Fairburn who discusses brighter times ahead for the Sabres who might be a goalie away from snapping their decade long playoff absence.Plus Sean and Craig stick tap Kyle Connor on winning the dreaded Lady Byng, TNT's hockey coverage and Custance and Gentille wonder if it's time for the Blues to deal Vladimir Tarasenko and if Nazem Kadri might be the one to sign the worst UFA deal this summer. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey everybody, this is Craig Custin's. Why did you make that face, Sean? Was it my intro? What's not your business, dude? You're like, you just like, like you had a sour. Did I come in hot? Hey, hey, hey, everyone. I'm Craig Custin's host of the Tuesday or co-host or however you'd like to describe it.

The Tuesday edition. Star of the Tuesday show of the Athletic Hockey Show. That's what you're listening to in case you were wondering. joined every single Tuesday morning, like clockwork by Sean Gentilly. And welcome to the star of the Price is Right, Drew Carey. You know what I miss? I miss like everybody watching the same show when they were homesick. Absolutely.

That's my Andy Rooney. Whatever happened to watching the same show when you're sick. Now you just stream and we're all watching different YouTube clips. Andy Rooney Ranting about the death I'm old The death of the monoculture Yes

The Colorado Avalanche So the first team in the Stanley Cup final Fun Fun game last night Sean And we'll talk a little bit about it But I'm dying to get to the Bruce Cassidy stuff Also before we get too far

Matt Fairburn The new beat writer Of the Buffalo Sabres for the Athletic joins us I got to spend some time with Matt in Buffalo last week at the NHL Combine. And Sabers fans, most of you probably already know him from his work on the bills, but you are in for a treat. We are excited to have him join the show in the second segment. But first, Sean, your thoughts on the Colorado Avalanche,

just powering their way to the Stanley Cup final. You know, they're going to have potentially 12 days between, games. Someone said that last night. If Rangers, if Rangers, if Rangers lighting goes a seven games, yeah, they're going to have 12 days off. That's really all, that's really all I care about. Um, yeah, I don't know. That was a fun, that was a fun game last night. I guess we, we finally, we got a good one at least. I don't know. It was a fun game. That was a compelling sweep, I'll say. How about that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You're not going to get too many. sweeps that are, you know, more storyline rich than that. But look, man, I think that was always,

on some level, that was always going to be the way things ended for Edmonton. You know, you get some rough, some rough play in net. One of the big guys is clicking in Drysidal, particularly yesterday. Even though he was out there hobbling around, like, he, he had major old man hooping at the Y vibes where it's like, where, when a guy, just like camps out the foul line extended and you hit you you hit him on the elbow and he just shoots 18 footers like that was dry siddle firing you know set up passes and he ended up having four points and all that i mean it was it was something to watch i thought las the mark lazarus wrote something really good coming out of that game just sort of you know summing up the kind of

performance that we saw from dry saddle so that was memorable but ultimately yeah last night last night's about the about the abs advancing yeah i mean I know this is the American edition. We're not going to delve too much into the Edmonton Oilers. I've said all I care to about. Oh, my gosh. At the very least, my new favorite thing is Mike Smith blaming everything, everybody. Like that becoming a bit last night on Twitter was I was enjoying, like, people were like generating texts where Mike Smith was texting them, laying them for things.

Yeah, getting a text from Mike Smith. It's, it's, I don't know. There's something. Yeah. It was, especially last night, it was almost getting like hacky and played out to make Mike Smith jokes because everybody was having their bite at the apple. So, and I, but at the same. Did you sit that one out, Sean? Oh, no.

Oh, no, I'm, I'm certainly not. I'm not too good for anything. You know this. Um, so on some level, you know, you're like, I don't, not like you're piling on the guy either. I don't even mean it. I don't even mean it that way because it's all good fun. for the most part. But I'm going to miss Mike Smith.

I'm going to miss the Mike Smith experience in the in the playoffs at least. Well, Sean, boy, do I have some good news for you. The good thing is, you may not have to miss the Mike Smith experience. Guess who signed for another year at $2.2. 000. Run it back, baby. Run it back. Dano Nuzh embolement mentioned this in his kind of post-mortem coming out of that

lost last night for the oilers that all available signs point to them diving into next season with Smith and Stuart Skinner is the options in net, which is, you know, God, God bless. Thanks for, thanks for, you know, the endless sources of amusement for that roster, Ken Holland. You know, Smith, he's only making, and you can kind of squint if you see it, right? you can sort of see what the logic is. Because, I mean, Craig and Craig, you know it's better than anybody. And you mentioned it 15 minutes ago. You know, Ken Holland, one with Chris Osgood.

But Mike Smith makes $2.2 million a year. So you're like, all right, you understand it just because the price tag is so low. But, man, I don't know how you watch how they lost that series and be like, you know, actually, We're fine. Sign us up for this guy when he's 42, in fact. Like, let's go, let's go a year later on it. I want to give you a little bit of credit here, Sean. I actually went back and looked after the game.

As you all know, listeners of the show know, Sean does the trade grades at the trade deadline. And as we all know, every single trade grade grade is an A minus C plus. Of course. No, which is not true. But we became. So I'm like. Like half of them.

So I would like, Hold on a second. Yeah. Let me say about that. Is that by the end of the trade deadline last March, I was, I had to actively stop myself from doing A minus C plus. I had to tell myself like, all right. Yeah.

You got to, you got to stop with this because I was unwittingly like doing it every other, every other grade. Well, about as, as Arturi Lekinen sent the Colorado Avalanche to the Stanley Cup final. I'm like, did they get an A-minus for that trade? Did Sean not just go all the way there? No. Googled it. I looked it up. Sean, give yourself a pat on the back. Colorado Avalanche got full marks. Hell yes. Cross the board for this one. And he says, this is your words. If you're the abs, there's nothing not to like about this. It's an incredible fit for a player who, despite everything that went wrong in Montreal the season, has done nothing.

produce. Yes. The board. Vindication. That's like the one. That's definitely the one I was right on. Great work. It was,

was that a goal, by the way? Are we going to, like, I know we just, we're, we don't debate those things. We just move on to the next thing. But boy, Don Karaski wasn't sure I can tell you that. Oh, he, he seemed a little surprised by the outcome. I think that's a, I think that's a goal. I think, I think he's benefited too from like, it's borderline. the classic, like, there's, there's not enough evidence on the field to overturn, to overturn the

flag situation in NFL. He also tapped it down. I think that probably helps. I think that probably helps for optics where, you know, the, where the puck, the puck didn't jump up anymore either. Do you know what I mean? Like, like if he would have, if he would have, if he would have tip the puck up, it would have looked like he was maybe coming from a higher angle. And that, that didn't happen. I don't know, man. That's close enough for me. You know, he said, we're just going to move on to whatever. We're going to have another one. Something else is going to happen. in a night. We were at that point in the playoffs where it's like, whether it's a ref thing, or like whether it's a goal call, whether it's an off sides, whether it's a borderline hit

or a dirty hit that doesn't get, you know, a big enough, a big enough penalty. Like, it's something every night. And we just move on to the next one with some version of amnesia, where it's like we, we just run through the same set of, the same set of discussions and the same sort of talking points and everybody says the same stuff about the same stuff. And it's the same cast. You're exactly right. And it's become some version of the Coley Campbell Wheel of Justice only like league conscious.

So spin the wheel. It's the wheel of takes. Ah, it's an offside. Okay. Here's what these people are going to say. Here's what these people are going to say. And this goes, it was a hit on the board. Oh, my God.

This goes for all of us. We all have our different sort of hobby horses that we ride after this stuff because everybody cares about certain things. But it does. It just feels like whether it's on Twitter or whether it's stuff everybody's riding afterwards. It just feels like we're in this trench now where we say the same things after each game and then just rinse and repeat each night. I want to touch on Turner because that would have been with ESPN doing the final, that was their last broadcast. Yeah.

Right, I think. And the Karaski stuff was funny. But I was watching, you know, with Paul Bissinette and his incredible hair and Wayne Gretzky talking about, you know, like Kail McCar, the interview after the respect, like, you know, seeing Kail dealing with Wayne Gretzky talking to them about him. Like, I just reinforced how much I enjoyed Turner this year. So I wanted to put a bow on, you know, we've talked intermittently about the various TV broadcasts. I thought they, I thought they were really, really good. Like, I would, I would give them an A minus. Not an A, A minus.

Yeah. You can't get an A unless you're artillery lecking it. And you don't get to C plus. ESPN. ESPN. Yeah, 100%. No, I, I, we'll talk about, we'll put a pin in ESPN. TNT, I think they did everything you could have expected.

Like they were, they were trying. There was effort. I think that's a big part of it. I don't say that as a slam either. I think we had seen for years, years on NBC sports, this sort of rigormortous, you know, satisfaction that's set in with the broadcast there for what? Like, you're like, what are you guys actually?

It could have been any year. Like, you would tune in, it could be like, this is 2004 or 2011? Same cast of characters, stuff, looked the same. The sets were same. It was the same people talking about the same stuff. Like they,

and it was like, okay, it was like they, they set their shit in 2010 or whatever it was. And we're like, you know, we're actually, we're good.

We're good here. So to see TNT actually trying new stuff and seeming like they cared, you know, is, it was a win right out of the gate. And when you throw in the fact that a lot of the play-by-play teams had,

you know, solid chemistry or, or were good matches. You throw in the fact that they came as close as they could have reasonably expected to kind of recapping or recapturing the chemistry of the NBA show. I mean, I don't know what else you could have reasonably expected from them out of their first year. Like it's not, and they were growing pains, and I know that there were some, sounds like there were some logistic issues at times there, which, you know, whatever.

get that evened out, you know, it was their first year on the job. So, yeah, full marks to it. I think the broadcasts were generally good. And then, yeah, ESPN also had games. That's probably the best way to put it. And also as well. All right. Bruce Cassidy fired by the Boston Bruins.

And again, a bit of a surprise. But not to you. We were talking about this earlier because you actually listened to what Cam Neely was saying coming out of this season. I don't understand what... So this goes back to when we're talking about Barry Trots, when we're going through team by team and trying to figure out where he might fit and whatever. Not that Barry Trots clearly based on their preferences and based on the roster they have, okay, that's not going to be...

Barry Trots isn't going to be the coach of the Bruins. but the lens that you look through when you're trying to figure out if coach A or B is a fit at a certain place, you got to figure out there's going to be an opening, right? Yeah. Because you can't hire Barry Trots or David Quinn or anybody else if you're not looking for a coach. And you just, if you looked at that roster, you looked at, you know, just the way things have gone last few years. And if you, in the overall point that every coach has a shelf life and blah, blah, blah, blah. If you looked at that a month ago with the Bruins, I don't think it would have been unreasonable to say like, are we sure like, we sure Bruce Cassidy is going to be around for the long haul here?

And then whenever their season ends, and Cam Neely says, this is barely even a paraphrase. He says afterwards, like, are young, our young players are afraid to make mistakes and whatever. You're like, okay, this does, there's some kind of disconnect happening here. So to see people be shocked and, you know, startled and whatever else that Bruce Castle. was let go. And that's no knock on Cassie. He's a good coach. But I think if you were really shocked by that happening yesterday, I don't think you

were paying too close attention to what the guy in charge had been saying for the last few weeks. Yeah. Like, I just wonder, with him out, you have, you know, Patrice Bergeron, whether or not he comes back or retires. You have an, half the team is injured right now. Yeah. Like this might be.

you know, if you remove a pretty, I think he, I mean, he's a good coach. So like, you know, I think, in my opinion, probably the second best coach available right now behind very trots immediately. So if you don't get buried trots, I think you should hire Bruce Cassidy. Uh, here's a question. Wait, question. You're the Bruins. Question for you. Friday, Friday we get the laundry list of Matt Griswick and, you know, all these, McAvoy, all these guys are hurt and going to miss, get a miss meaningful time. So Friday news dumped by the Bruins. What was your first, what was your first? was your first reaction to seeing that? Well, I'd like, they're going to be terrible.

M. Berserun out. Mm-hmm. If I was smart, I would have been like, boy, I wouldn't want to coach that team next year. First thing I thought was like, I was like, I was like, this is sneak attack for Connor Bazar. Yeah, that's, that's what I was headed. They're a sneaky tank team. Yeah.

They are. You can take a one, you can do a one-year tank if you're the Bruins and all of a sudden things look really good. And you can do that by removing a pretty good coach from the equation. If you're bringing a guy. If Bergeron, if Bergeron retires and you're the Bruins and you already have all these guys that are out, you have all these, you have whatever, you're trying to find a coach and all this, if Patrice Bergeron tells you in two weeks that he's done and not coming back,

on top of all the other stuff that's happened here, yeah, start trading people. move people I'm serious yeah move people trade Taylor trade Taylor Hall like whatever strip it strip it down to the studs apologize to David Posternak for whatever's going to happen next year because Marchion's getting this time too they're going to suck they're going to be

but if you're doing the sneak tank you only need one year you get bad exactly and you want some of these guys back when you don't want some of them back but you have you have a lot of guys that have one year left on their deals or whatever, explore everything. Be terrible because that is the kind of team that, you know, that seems like the team that should win lot, should win lotteries in like this new world where they're, where they're setting up where, you know, they've, assuming they, they stick with the lottery rules because God only knows that they like changing those every six months. Well, I will say, the win lotteries. At the draft combine in.

then Matt Fabern was there and we're going to get to him in one second here. There was a lot of talk not about this year's draft but about next year's draft and how quickly teams are going to pull the plug on if things don't go well at the start of next season. Either teams are going to go in thinking they're going to want to sink to the bottom or, you know, if you're the sharks and Carlson gets hurt in week one, you just shut her down or whatever the team is. You should probably shut her down anyways, but I think there's going to be a lot of that. Literal quote from Don Swini this morning from our buddy Matt Porter at the best.

at the Boston Globe. Sweeney knows possibility of a rebut if injure player don't return well in Bergera doesn't come back. Could be a directional shift, Don Swinney says. The pumps are primed, baby. All right. Let's take a quick break and we'll be back

with Matthew Fairburn, new beat writer of the Buffalo Sabres at the athletic media company. We'll be right back. We are back and thrilled to be joined by Matthew Fairburn, who, if you are not a Buffalo Sabres fan or follow the NFL, let's say, hypothetically, you may not know Matt.

He is one of our best reporters at the Athletic. The hockey group, sometimes you get lucky when there's an opening and somebody slides in, and that 100% happened here. Matthew Fairburn is now covering the Buffalo Sabres for the Athletic, is going to do an incredible job. Like John Vogel basically knighted him when he's like, this is the, this is, should be the person that steps into these large shoes. Matt, first of all, wait a second,

Bogos said that about himself. Well, I added the large shoes parts. Bogo was like, this is the person who should replace me. I did a decent job. Like, Vogel's like the least. They would be the last person to ever say he did a good job. My shoes are gigantic. We need someone who's really good to step in.

And he's like, you know who that is? Matt, welcome. Thanks so much for having me, guys. I'm thrilled to be a part of the hockey group here. well we'll see how long that lasts Matthew I get to meet him at the at the Combine in Buffalo last week which was

it's such a great event because you can you can basically post up in the various hotels we were at the Marriott like lobby by the bar there and you can just run into GMs and agents and if you're getting into the into the hockey space

it's a great world to it's a great environment in which to start So I just wanted, now, what's been A, your impressions of the Combine and also, you know, getting to know people or reacquating yourself with people in the organization so far? Yeah, it's a, the NHL Combine was a very different event than the NFL Combine. That was probably my biggest takeaway. That little spot in the Marriott where you're kind of posted up and everybody's kind of coming through. I was waiting for, you know, I don't know. There's just a lot more people, I guess, at the NFL comedy media-wise.

The ratio is a little bit thrown off. I like the ratio in hockey a little bit better where we're more of a rarity hanging out around there and trying to bug these guys, whereas in the NFL, an agent pops around the corner and there's 20 reporters waiting to bug them, you know, with something. So that was cool. And I think a lot of people were, you know, I think the biggest impression I had was, you know, when I took the Sabres job, there's some people that are naturally going to say, oh, man, like the Sabers, they've been down and out for a while, right? They're, you know, they haven't made the

playoffs in a decade plus. But a lot of people that I met and, you know, started to talk to around hockey all seem to think that there's a little something going in Buffalo. And I think people have thought that before. So it's a dangerous thought for fans to have. But when it's coming from, you know, whether it's agents or, you know, secondhand through players or people like that, I think that starts to have a little bit more of an impression. You start to think that that can bleed through to other players in the league. And if it's becoming a fun place to play, that's already a big difference from the last 10 years. So I'm interested to see what direction Kevin Adams takes this this offseason

because there's clearly some positive momentum going for the first time in quite a while. I mean, you're talking to two people who are just so clearly in the tank for the savers already. Like we're, we're on board. It's a running. Just so you know where we're coming from. It's a running joke on the podcast because we had, you know, we've talked to Alex

Tuck and we've talked to Tage Thompson and we talked to Don Granato way back when. And these are all, these are guys who've appeared on the show. I think they're, I feel like there's someone I'm forgetting too. Do we have another player? I don't know. I don't know. But every time, the point is every time we have one of these guys on, we come out of thinking like, all right, they got some, they got some pieces. So I mean, you from, I mean,

last year, watching watching from Boston, you know, we know, we know that you've been around that team in the past, but, you know, what, what's, what was your assessment of, of, of that team and seeing some of these guys, you know, from afar over the last year, too? I think the big thing that stuck out to me is just that the improvement was constant throughout the year. And they had so many injuries at the beginning of the year. They were just kind of trying to survive and, you know, stay afloat and not get blown out in games. But as the year went on, it was a dramatic shift when they finally got out from under the cloud of Jack Eichel and everything that came along with that saga. And, you know, to see some of these pieces start to come

together and seeing improvement from a guy like Tage Thompson who was, you know, the butt of jokes with that Ryan O'Reilly trade when he went and won the cup. Now all of a sudden this guy looks like, you know, a very, you know, a unique player, you know, a guy that's big, that height and scoring the way that he is you don't find. I mean, even Kyle Otposo having a bit of a resurgence last year, guys seem to be really, you know, it feels like a team is coming together. And it never, I got here in 2014 when I started covering the bills. and that was basically a low point.

You know, they tanked to get Jack Eichel. And then that offseason, they sort of went all out and, you know, went and got some veterans. You know, they got a Vander Cain, Ryan O'Reilly, Robin Lainer, and that was going to be it. They were going to be good. And then it just never worked. And it feels like they're building it a more responsible way this time where there's tons of talent coming through the prospect system. and they're being patient about all of it. The way Kevin Adams speaks every time he's talking about guys,

some guys that choose to stay in college, whatever it may be, there's just the patience about what they're doing, but you're also seeing results. And it's easy, I think it's probably easier to go from 30th in the league to 20th in the league than it is to go from 20th to the top 10. And I think that's the next real challenge here

is taking that positive energy you had at the end of the year in those results and finding a way to take the next step as an organization and get that development from all these promising players. I think, I mean, that's such a great call because, I mean, we were watching last night the Edmonton Oilers who have taken forever to get, like, they won the Connor McDavid. They, you know, they did everything, every ping pong ball bounced their way and it's still taking forever to break through to that top upper echelon in the league. And, and I think, I don't think you can rush it in that if you're going to learn any lessons from the Tim Murray era. I mean, you could argue the players he targeted were pretty good.

Like Robin Lennar, you know, pretty good. Ryan O'Reilly, pretty good. Van der Kaine, whatever. You know, he's got, it's probably a different conversation. But, you know, you can't, you can't fast forward it. It's just a long, it's going to take another wave of young players to add on to the wave that are there. And then you need the players that you've committed to, the Jeff Skinner's, to actually be good. and that was even, you know, the jury was out there.

Like him bouncing back, that's kind of a quiet part of the optimism there. So I think you're right. I think if you have a guy in Kevin Adams who believes who has the time and the rope to do it properly, then that's reason for optimism more than anything in Buffalo. Yeah, and Kevin Adams is an interesting case too because I think a lot of people around the league, my early impression talking to people was a lot of people didn't know him that well. They didn't really know what to expect. He wasn't this guy that came up through a traditional general manager background. It didn't have experience in the role. But everybody seems to appreciate the way he goes

about business. And I think that's part of the reputation they're trying to rebuild as a franchise because it's one thing to rebuild your team. It's another to rebuild the perception of your team. as well. And I don't think Buffalo, you know, comparing it to my time covering the NFL, where Buffalo is, you better have a quarterback and you better be winning to attract players to come to your team. I think in hockey it's a little bit different because there's a lot more talent that comes from Buffalo and probably a hundred mile, you know, radius in any direction where guys, you know, don't think of it the same way. I don't think in hockey. And it's, If you start to build something that the guys in the locker room can share with their peers,

you know, I think that means something. I think Kevin Adams handled themselves pretty well throughout the Jack Eichael situation. It could have gotten a lot uglier and messier than it did. And I think at times, you know, Jack Eichael's camp even tried to get it to go in that direction. And Kevin Adams, I thought, came out looking pretty good. And that's not any, you know, we talk about a guy that didn't have experience. and people were wondering how he would handle the role, he gets thrown into a situation like that to start.

And not only did he come out of it looking good, you know, from a public perception standpoint, I think he got two pretty good players to build around. And so I think there's reason to believe that he's a guy who can build this. And I think the same is true of Don Granato. When you see the development, when you see the way Jeff Skinner played, the way Kyle Okposo played, guys that, like you said, there were questions about guys you're committing decent money to, is it going to be a waste?

And then you have the young guys coming along, you know, middle stat, you know, showing some light. And that's where you, and Rasmus Dahlin's another one who, after having some up and down, really started to come along this year. So there's evidence that what these guys are doing, both in adding players and developing them, is starting to work. now it's, you know, rounding out the edges a little bit and figuring out, you know, who's going to play goalie for you long term. Oh, yeah, there's that. Other thing, you know, that's a pretty big question. And, you know, what's going to become of some of these promising prospects? You know, are you going to just be the number one prospect pool forever?

Are they going to develop into NHL players? And that's the next, you know, challenge that they have. Is there any, has been any change, you know, any observable change to you in, like, the mindset of the city and the fan base over the last? couple years because that's something that fascinates us. I think Craig and I specifically about Sabres fan. We've talked about it a lot. You know, they just seem like, you know, kick puppies, I think a year or two ago. But is stuff changed over the last few years? Like, especially with you leaving and then coming back. Like, are the vibes any different? I definitely think it is. When I, around the time that I was leaving, you know, I think there were a few different.

factors that resulted in, you know, a bit of apathy and maybe not even apathy, just exhaustion and anger over how things had gone. And between COVID, I think when COVID happened and buildings were empty out of necessity, a lot of people thought after they broke that habit, they were on like autopilot just going to games and being like, this is what I do. And then once that stopped and they had to reassess when the building was open again, they were like, do I really want to go back there? And it was empty for a while. And I did wonder, you know, did they lose a generation of hockey fans the way they played, you know, for 10 years? And the way they've handled business, did they really, you know, turn some customers away? But what became

obvious to me was that Jack Eichael game, you know, everything that was going on with Rick Jenneret, you know, in his, you know, farewell tour. As soon as there was even a sliver of an excuse to show up, they were back big time. And that was encouraging to see because, you know, when I moved here, everybody talked about what a hockey town it was. People still, you know, when I took this job, I had friends in the area texting me like, just wait, like 06, 07, you know, there was nothing like it. And, you know, talk to Ryan Miller recently and he was saying, you know, when, when the sabers are good or when anybody's really doing anything in Buffalo, it's the energy of the whole city. It's not a niche thing. And I felt that Jack Eichael night, it was like,

oh, we can go boo this guy? Like, yeah, I'll buy a ticket. And, you know, our day night, everybody was like, you know, I'll, yeah, I'll pay, you know, whatever to get into the building to send that guy off. And it shows these people care. And they were showing how much they cared by staying away a little bit, I think, while the team was lousy and there wasn't much going on. Everybody, you know, nobody in Buffalo is saying, like, why are you coming back to cover the Sabres? They're saying, you're coming back to cover the Sabres at the perfect time. Yeah, that's what fans keep saying to me. And it's kind of cool to feel that energy from them because, man, they've deserved a lot better than they've gotten, you know, over the last decade.

and it feels like they have a team that they're at least excited to root for. And we'll see if, you know, the results continue to follow. But people know it's going to be, it's not like they're going to flip a switch next year and be playing in the conference finals. But I think people are on board with how they're building it, the type of guys that they have. And the type of hockey they're playing is reasonably exciting for the first time in a while. I love all these people texting you when you took the job in 2014, like, yeah, 2006. Just like, just wait.

It's like eight years later you've left and come back and Jack Eichol isn't playing there anymore, but they're like, like just, just wait, eight, eight or nine years, everything will be fun again. Right, yeah, what is going on 15, 16 years ago? People still talk about it. I mean, it's like, and apparently it was nuts. And if it's anything like with the bills, you know, same thing. When they got good, it's just been like all people can talk about around here. And they, they love their, sports teams with their whole heart. And I think they're, they're just looking for any excuse to root for this team. And man, that Jack Eichael Knight was, it was around the time John and I started talking about, you know, this job and stuff. And I was like, man, I wish I was in the building.

That was like such a, such an entertaining evening. And the fact that he comes back only once a year, I think is perfect. You know, it doesn't have, it's not like he's going to come back, you know, six times a year and he'll start playing nice and the animosity will wear off. Like, people can get, you know, get the energy to show up and boo him every time he touches the puck. Every time he touches the ice one night a year. That's easy. And he's probably going to be just as pissed off as he was that night.

Yeah, that's what I was going to say. I don't think you got to worry about Jack coming in and playing nice either. That shouldn't be an issue. I love that he wants to play the villain. You know, I'm like, that's great. That's good for, you know, Bill. up the interest in the game and, you know, it's fun for the sport when there's a little bit of a rivalry there. You wouldn't expect that Buffalo and Vegas would have a little bit of bad blood,

but I'm all for it. I'm just going to read Jack Eichol's quote because it was one of my favorite quotes of the entire season. This comes after the return to Buffalo. It's the loudest I've heard this place ever, really. Eichael said after the game, this is from an ESPN.com. Emily, Emily wrote this. It only took seven years and me, leaving for them to get into the game. That's all. What a shot. And he had the,

uh, the facial expressions and, uh, you know, because he said that and everybody went, like, and he went, huh,

hmm, yeah, really. Yeah, really. It was, and it was one of those times where like the added context of watching him say it,

like sometimes like stuff looks worse on, you know, yeah, in text than it does when you actually see someone in motion speaking it. Uh, not the case. Like, yeah,

that looked better. He knew what he was doing. It was, It was absolutely better. Yeah, it looked way better in print. And it's also nonsense. Like when they like had the building packed. There we go.

Like he had the building packed when, you know, he was first drafted and, you know, prospect camp and opening night when they got all those additions, his rookie year, I mean, yes, by the end, it was a pretty lousy, you know, attendance situation. But loudest he'd ever heard it. I was like, I love it. Like, go for it. Lean into the villain role, but I think that's nonsense. Like, Jack can lean into the villain role and this is just like, you can just put yourself

over with Sabres fans by doing this too. This is perfect. You're the good guy. You can, you can just hit the low hanging through. I was always a Jack sympathizer. I grew up like 20 minutes from where he did in Massachusetts and know a lot of guys like Jack so I was like you know I always felt he was a little misinterpreted as like that's just you know

Boston that's just Massachusetts that's how people are and then he did that and I was like yeah no now you're asking see you later man can't really help you now like hey like tip of the hat to you there you know more people should just lean into it like that I guess but you know it's it's hard to blame Sabres fans for for not liking the guy now Oh my gosh. All right.

Well, I wanted to end with, this is a little inside baseball, but it's, I think just in terms of career and path going from the NFL and covering the Patriots, that's like, that's, that's a big deal in the sports journalism world. Like, did you get any people like, hey, man, sorry about what happened? Like, did you get people that just assumed you were demoted or something? Like, because that happened to me. Like, when I went from covering, you know, football to covering hockey, I got lots of emails. People were like, man, I thought you were on a good path.

And I'm like, no, no, no, this is a great sport. Like, I want, I actively chose this. Well, it's been the response from, you know, people in the know. I think a lot of people, um, a lot of fans, you know, I tried to filter the, the reaction as much as I could because I, you cover sports in Boston. Even if, even if, even for a little less than a year, you have to kind of learn to, to filter some stuff out. There were some people that, you know, in Boston kind of wondering like, whoa, like, what's going on? like we were excited to have you and like, you know, but I think, you know, it's helpful when we're in the age that we are and it's not just like you're seeing somebody switch from one

newspaper to another. Like I was able to explain everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. And, you know, in a podcast I did with Joe Biscalia, you know, the old Bill's podcast we had. And I think people, you know, understood. And, you know, when I talk to people, you know, in the business and stuff, I just keep telling them I'm excited about, you know, what I mentioned at the top, like, even about the combine feels like a microcosm of, you know, the sport. And, you know, compared to the NFL where there's so many people covering it, what I, you know, said to a lot of people is, like, what we have going at the athletic in the hockey space is really, you know, unique because there's a lot of people that cover the NFL.

One could argue too many. And so I feel like I'm kind of balancing things out here. Yes, you could. You certainly could. You know, I had some people say like, oh, man, like, you know, we're losing a good football writer, but I'm like, yeah, but I don't know, maybe it's just balancing things out a little bit. Maybe, you know, like hockey could, you know, kind of be a fun space to explore some new

stories and in a place where people care about it, which isn't, you know, I know true everywhere like it is with football, but here it is true. And, you know, it was the right move for my family first and foremost. And that's what mattered the most to me. But professionally, I think having guys like John and Tim Graham who had done it before, you know, Tim has done both. And we were talking through the pros and cons. And it really was, you know, it's, there's good and bad to, both, right? And I think hockey definitely has some perks that football doesn't. And so I'm excited to, I've always wanted to be somebody who can not just be, you know, one sport that can be seen as somebody who can write sports stories no matter where they are. And there's a whole bunch of new

ones to tell about this team. And I'm really excited to just like dig it. I mean, there's, you know, you've got so many different layers to hockey that don't exist. in football with prospects and, you know, different things like that. I was joking with some people. I'm like, do I need to bust out the Rosetta Stone and start, like, learning Swedish or something to connect with some of these guys and just so many different things that you don't think about in football that will be really fun to explore? And hopefully if everything we talked about, you know, here comes to fruition, the team will,

you know, have, you know, some excitement around it. And, you know, guys will be excited to share their stories. and share how they, you know, turn things around. And I think it'll be a fun little change. So, yeah, there was a little bit of a little bit of that. But I think in this day and age, there's a lot of movement in the industry, right? There's a lot of, right, right. At times I felt weird.

I'm like, man, I just took this job, you know, nine months ago or whatever. But then you think about, you know, the versions of our company that we've had. And, you know, the Mood's fast over here. It's like we just kind of move fast. and, you know, kind of switch things up. So, but hopefully this is the last, uh, last change up for a while because I'm excited to dig in and, and really, you know, kind of ingrained myself in this hockey community here. Also, for the record, I know people who tried to learn Swedish for, for hockey related purposes

and pulled the shoot after not too long. So don't do that. It's a, it's apparently a really hard language to learn. When I got to college, uh, I got to college in 2010 and the Olympics, and the only, were going to be in Russia in 2014. And so my thought was, if I learn Russian, somebody, maybe somebody will send me and I can cover the Olympics. And I sat down in class for one day, opened the book, and we were going through stuff.

And at the end of the day, I dropped it. I was like, this is not going to have. This is too much. Like, I'll go take French. That'll be, you know, a little bit easier. That'll serve you, too. Like, I learned, even if you could just learn, like, thank you, like, if you're, like, speciebo to a Russian.

Like that's like that's it that you don't have to come in going full-fledged like they just appreciate an effort just you'll see that in Montreal like same thing they demand an effort in Montreal if you're ordering food or whatever but um I like that that goes a long way and I think that's smart well my biggest fear would be you know thinking I've learned Swedish and having some you know big conversation with Rasmus Dahlene and being thinking I've understood what he said and going and typing it all up and being like, what? I didn't say any of that. So it's like, yeah, you're probably right.

Learning the introductions and the pleas and thank you and all that is probably, probably enough to get the gist. Awesome. Well, welcome to the group. Matt, we're thrilled to have you. I think you are right in that you're joining at the right time on a lot of levels. And it's going to be fun. And thanks for joining us here.

See you at the draft, dude. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. I'll see you guys in Montreal. This is the only good segment on the show. Look, we go to the comment section. Like, anytime you start off with look, I'm always excited. Look. Folks, everybody, you tap once, you tap twice.

I'm following along. I'm actually in the, I hit the listen tab on the app. I'm going to, what, Discover? No, no, no, that's, you know what? How about you try to figure? you're out how to get here, Craig. I will do this as you say. Then I scroll down to the Tuesday show.

Oh yeah, Doug Wait, that was a good episode. Doug Wait was great. 27 comments waiting for us. First ones from our buddy Scott T. who was the music teacher who very aptly from a place of great knowledge criticized our performance of the Canadian National Anthem, which was a couple months ago and continues to pay dividends.

Scott says, you guys reading my comment made my day for background. I remember the day you sang the anthem, I was in my car driving to work and yelling, Sean, stop slowing down. That was what we figured out, was when we sang a Canadian anthem to pay up our bet to Ian and Haley on the Monday show.

I was trying to, like, slow down enough for Craig to catch up. And I just put us in this horrible. horrible cycle of of shame. Now for a hockey question, Scott, he says, what's the Blues do to improve their defense next year and does it involve a Teresenko trade? I don't think they, does it involve a Tarasenko trade? I know they'd be selling higher on him now than they were last year. But I feel like at this point, you just,

you kind of keep rolling with him, don't you? Yeah, are you getting better if you move? I don't know if I think that might be. Vladimir Teresenko? Who are you? And what defenseman do you get for him, I think, is probably the better question. Like, are you trading a dollar for three quarters if you move out Teresenko at this point? I don't know.

I'm not sure. I'm not sure what the return would look like there. Doug Armstrong, to his credit, like didn't panic and move Teresanko. And now he's in a position of strength where Teresanko is coming off a 34 goal, 82. season. And it was good in the playoffs, really good because he's a tank. And that's a good spot. So if you are trading him now, you're at least doing it at the right time.

I think I needed him to be good this season because I was like, I don't think I'm mentally ready for Vladimir Tarasenko to be washed. Like he's just, he needs to play a couple more years before he's done. Because if he's, if Vladimir Tarcenko's old, like what the hell does that, what does that make the rest of it? of us. We've established that we are old. I mean, yeah, but for God's sake. Chris Ryder's 39 years old.

Our son, Chris Kreider. That, God, that defense group is rough. It's rough. I don't know what to, I think that's the overall question here. To me, it's less about Tarasenko and how they add to that because you got Falk. Krug signed for 6.5 through 2027, which is, Fault Krug and Pereko are both signed for 6.5 long term. Fine. And at 4, you got Scandella, and you got Bortuzzo,

and you got Kelly Rosen, you got Nick Letty at UFA. They need to figure something out there because they have $9 million in cap space, you know, projected cap space. They have 73 million. dollars dedicated to the payroll already. So the options are going to be slim, but they got it. They got to figure something out there.

I just don't think, I just don't think involves trading Teresenko personally. If you're assuming Teresanko's gone, like if Teresanko for whatever reason is just done insanely, like, I don't know if we've updated, gotten any updates from the Tarasenko side as to whether or not he's rescinded his desire to leave. But he's, you know, he's got one more year left on his deal. So it's asset management. at this point, isn't it? Yeah, I guess is it that simple?

Like, I guess, you know what? For as good as things went for St. Louis this past season and for as professional as Doug Armstrong and Vladimir Tarasenko were about this whole situation, maybe that makes it too easy to forget how fractured and difficult things were or seemed last offseason, right? Because it just seemed like, I mean, J.R. covered it as, of course, better than anybody, but he had a lot of a lot of reports throughout the off season that were you know kind of gave us a window into how you know difficult that relationship turned out you know was or or is or so I guess

we'll see what happens but and maybe maybe we are forgetting you know maybe we're forgetting last summer a little bit too quickly and it's and it's a fate of complete like yep okay we had a good year you're at 7.5 you're done next year it just makes it makes sense for everybody to move on. Now, I think there's a valid question. Are you actually getting more value this summer than you are last summer because of the term of the contract? Like last summer you were trading a guy with two years, but you were uncertain how good was this year. No, well, that's what I said at the start, though.

Like, like last summer, they just couldn't, they couldn't give him away. Like, understandably, because he had two years. Right. He had two years at 7.5 and had all the shoulder issues and was coming off kind of a lot of season. But now he's rehabbed his value to a pretty wild point. And also has only one year left on the deal. So all those questions, which are what, can he produce and, you know, do you want to take on two years of that contract? Those are, those are, those are gone.

Those are gone now. I just don't, I don't know if that's, I don't know if trading him gets you. I just don't know if trading him is the, is the route to fixing the defense. I think those are kind of two. Those are two separate questions to me. All right. That was like, that was like 15 minutes about the blues. Wow.

At this rate, we're going to, we got four more hours left in the podcast. Slurms McKenzie. Beloved, beloved commenter, Slorms. Friend of a show. I played enough poker in Vegas to say, like regarding Kessel. Yeah, just to background. Somebody asked, where should Phil Kessel play? We said, of course, Vegas.

And then we were debating which poker rooms. And I said, Aria or Belagio. And so that leads us to this comment. Slurms agrees. Slurms says he would definitely play at the Aria. T-Mobile traffic is awful, so he'd be walking. And he's not showing up with a duffel bag of cash to play one, two or two to five, or two to five. That takes out of the small rooms and are the closest anyways, across the street through the park, MGM, and through the tunnel escalators.

Much like how you get to this comment section, says that is very, very, very funny. That's good. Plus, it's big and known, but not like Win Bellagio big and known. So that's perfect. I don't, I don't, I have, my Vegas experience is minimal. I needed someone like that other than Craig. So when I said it, I was like, you'd probably play at the aria. You're like, no, let's move on.

But when slurm says it, you're like, yeah, this is, this is insight. Buddy, I've been hearing you talk about Vegas for 15 years now. I don't think. So now from now when we talk about the comment section, we've got to go, you got to go past Park MGM. Through the tunnels and escalators. Answer three questions from the troll. Adam P., which fan base is the most consistent? delusional.

Ooh. Not necessarily heated or angry all at least fans is very out of touch with reality. Adam says

as a devil's fan, the insane trade proposals from Habs fans on Twitter for number two overall such as

as Petrie or Josh Anderson is the centerpiece of their turn have them shooting up my very high shooting very high

at my list. Delusional fan bases. So much every fan base. Montreal Montreal is a pretty good starting point for that,

I think. The most delusional? Yeah, I would buy that. like Leafs fans I have a soft spot for these fans I just feel like they're all beaten down and think the worst is going to happen

which it tends to and so like they're definitely not delusional like in terms of their vocal um so like delusional would be like they expect either great things from the teams or they they like someone was saying like trade proposals

like the fan base that's like hey we can give a you know fifth round pick for your best player I don't know. I think it's still like, to me it's like when people think that all, all the players on their team are good and that, you know, there's, there's, there's no problems to be done. I think, I think the hurricanes are in for kind of a rude awakening this off

season. Carolina's kind of an interesting one. I heard, I mean, we talked about it. I did my dumb little victory lap last week, but I, every, every, every Keynes fan I heard from throughout the course of the season was, was very, very satisfied with the makeup of their team to the point where they were, you know, apoplectic over someone who says, like, maybe there's some work to be done. I will say this.

I'm going to drop this in Joey N. We said, we kind of casually said coaching wasn't the issue in Carolina. Joey N doesn't seem like delusion. Yeah. He says, you know, that's true. I forgot. Carolina. Yep.

He says, Carolina definitely needs to look at coaching. Six attempts given to figure out a better match. up with no real adjustment, as predictable as a power play can possibly be no adjustment. That's a system issue. I think, and I think Joe Ian is representative of, if I had a guess, we represented a larger chunk of that fan base moving forward because the blooms off. That's the way it works. When you lose in the playoffs, you know, disappointingly, whatever, year after year after

year after year at this point, the perception changes. And it should. That's the way it works. people's it's okay for people to have high expectations and if and if they're not met you know you adjust you adjust the approach yeah um see vint says which look do you like better jersey numbers on the shoulders like panthers and penguins gold jerseys or the sleeves um i'm traditional enough to like the sleeves those penguins gold jerseys were did did not work for me um you don't care about that i do not have any jersey takes you know what i liked the angel's

jersey that was rolled out yesterday. Did you see that? I love the font and I love the logo and I like the idea of putting like the lifeguard stand styled numbers. Where they lost me a little bit was with that stripe along the sleeve. I didn't I didn't love that. That busied it up a little, a little too much for me. Connor R says, which player do you think signs the worst contract this summer? That's a good question. Do you know how many times I've done this? I just pull up the cap the cap key. like the Cap Geek page. Cap Friendly.

Just to just remind myself of who's available and who's not. So it's got to be somebody who's like in their early 30s who has like two more good years and is going to get a seven year deal. Like that's... Who's it going to be? Is it possible Chris LaTang signs a really bad contract? I think Chris LaTang is going to sign a contract that by the end will be bad. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Like, the first year, everyone's happy with these contracts, but they deteriorate. If there ends up being a bidding war for Chris LaTang and he ends up getting, he could end up getting two more years than he should or something. And then by the end of it, he's going to be, you know, 40 or 41 years old and making $8 million a year. I don't know. I don't know how much you want that. How about this one?

And I love this player, Nazim Kadri. The thing about cadre is that there's so few centers on the market. There's so few viable centers on the market. Right. And he was so good last year or this past season. Not like in necessarily an unsustainable way, even though the on-ice shooting percentage by his teammates was a little bit higher, was high. That's what happens when you play with, you know, the talent that they have in Colorado. I think that could be, I think that could be bad.

someone could someone could he's coming off a great playoff run he's all the ingredients 30 now or however old he is playoff run huge year on a talented team so like a loaded team so maybe you put him on a team that doesn't have nathan mcannon and look this is not a criticism of the player to be clear 31 years old all the ingredients you put it all 31 301 30s year old other positional rarity in the market. 31.7 years old, according to Capgeek, too. He's 31.7? So he's going to be 32 by the time the deal even starts.

Yep. And he's going to get a monster. He's going to get a monster. So I hate to say it. Maybe I'm wrong because I would probably sign him. I mean, if you sign them for, yeah, if you're a team that's a contender and you're a center away. for four years or whatever.

Just roll with it. We got some criticism from Jesse W. That's probably, it's not unfair. How did a Doug Wade interview, one of the greatest American players of his generation, we love Doug Waite. Good American. On the American show,

turn into Leafs Talk for five minutes, which it did. Surprise an Eagle did not swoop in to stop it. It was tough. I mean, we were at a tough point in the calendar that last week too. I think there was unfortunately too much, too much Canadian stuff to discuss

because we talked about, we talked about McDavid. You know, that's what happens, unfortunately, whenever the best player on earth is in Edmonton and they were one of the four remaining teams. Like sometimes we're going to slip up and actually talk about that dude and that team a little more than we should. Leaves was a mistake though.

Well, when you have Doug Wade on and who knows John Tavares as well as anybody and John Tavares is a person of interest right now. It was more Isles talk to me. That's right. I looked at all that as Isles Talk. There was no Leafs talk, in fact. Yardana's back.

She says she's creating a style guide for the pod because she's, I believe, a trained journalist. Thank you, Yardana. She has nailed us on, nailed me specifically on grammatical issues. The correct hashtag is, is the Tuesday boys with three Zs. I know Craig is easily excited, but five Zs in this economy, you are.

You keep saying five Zs. We need to stick to three. Here's the thing. Am I easily excited? You're Dana? I think when it comes to podcast hashtags, you probably get saying to calm down a little bit. There's a truck driving by right now. So I drove to Buffalo for the Combine and I went back and listened to portions of our last

episode because I'm an egomaniac. Me too. And the person that pointed out that I trail off, I must have done it 30 times. I'm really trying to be conscious of it today because I had to turn the volume up because I was trailing off when I didn't want to finish my sentences. This is the right space for this because we got some criticism of me by Lance T. I don't know if he was the one who knocked you for trailing off or if he's just trying to balance the scales on behalf of someone else.

But he's right. After the criticism of Craig, how about you on repeating words, multiple times or even has to sentences. I don't know. I don't know. Which is true. This is, if you have any sort of vocal tick or anything you're

self-conscious of or anything with your speech, don't do a hockey podcast. Because it's going to get magnified and you're going to become very, very aware of it. And whenever you're aware of stuff like that, there's two routes to take. You either sound abnormal

and you talk like a robot and that's not what we're going for here. Like I don't want that this is just us BSing and it's conversational and whatever else or you just kind of lean into it and you know, do it even more. And I think that's definitely the route I take

because I am not, you know, a trained, I don't have, we don't have radio backing. This is just guys talking. And I stammer. We're just your two buddies talking hockey in Vegas. Listen, this is just the Tuesday boys. Three Zs. Three Zs.

What else needs to go in the style guide? I'd be curious to see what other things. Write it up. Checks in the mail. Can I read this next one? I agree with this one. This is Jesse W. Again, maybe?

Is this the second Jesse W? Jesse W. Is it a regular? Either way. How is the Mark Messier Award a real thing? We just let Mark pick a player a year, every year, no voting, no transparency, and we treat it like a real award? It's a joke. He should have to pay for it.

He should have to pay for it, like discover pays to sponsor intermission shows or something. I think we should have an award. Yeah. Yeah, how about this? And the Craig Cusson. We don't, we're not going to. Yeah. The Craig Cussons and Sean Gentile award for hockey greatness.

Uh-huh. where it's like Americans only. And it's not even, it's not just. Wait a second. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Uh-huh. This is a good idea. The best American player each season.

Yeah, that's fine. Let's call Hansman. It's called the New York Times. Let's make this happen. Well, what, like, what do we need like a plaque? We'll work on that. Yeah. We need a plaque and some money to file for a trademark.

So nobody can actually can steal our, can steal any of this. that that shot of him reading the winner of the mark messier leadership award where it's mark messier reading the name of the mark messier winner from a desk where you have mark messier leadership award like on the screen behind him was just it's my it's my boggman not for nothing he also works for a it's insane company in the spn that covers the league the entire thing is insane and also not for nothing i didn't say say this in the first segment, Mark Messier just disappeared for like three months from,

from playoff broadcasts. He was researching the Leadership Award, Sean. Yeah, right. You can't just expect him to figure out who's, you know, the Mark Messier Memorial, like, Leadership Greatness Award. No. Whatever. I could, I could complain about that for 45 minutes.

I'm not, I'm not going to do that. That's good. Good question. Jenass back. Jenass is one of our, is one of our favorite stars. fans. So last week, Rob and Jesse saying the praises of Kail Makar, not saying Makar isn't all that in a bag of chips too, but Sean, can you please tell me honestly how our boy, Miro Haskinen rates next to McCar and his coaching team partners holding them back? That's a good, that's a good

question. I mean, it's unfair to compare anybody to McCar at this point. Macar is ridiculous. I, like it, I think there, I do think there is maybe a little bit of a systems question with Hayskin, um, I would like to see, I would like to see how. I would like to see how, he produces points-wise with a different with a different code because I think we saw him take that step in this past year where it hit start hitting that level that people had offensively where it wasn't just you know where it actually bore itself out but was borne out in production a little bit more so now I'm psyched to see if there's if there's some next level for for him to hit yeah I I but you could put him on the would the the best team of all time and I don't think his game has the offensive ceiling. Like this is not to take away from Payskin. It was a great player. But like there's,

I don't think he's Cal McCar. And can do some of the things Cal McCar can do. I mean, is anybody? No. But the question was how does he stack up to Cal McCar? He doesn't. He doesn't. He doesn't, but that's okay.

It's a different layer of player. Right. And it's not a criticism. And McCar is. Nobody does is doing what Cal McCar is doing. No, there's a 1A tier in the NHL. And I'm saying this as one of the tier guys. I'm already dreading doing this in the offseason to come.

It's McDavid and it's McKinnon and it's Matthews and now it's Macar. I can I can guarantee you that Kyle McCar will have made the jump from, you know, the very tippy top of 1B to that one. And that's rarefied air, especially for a defenseman. So it's no knock that Miro Hayskinen is one of the eight best defensemen in the NHL right now rather than maybe, you know, potentially the best we've seen in a generation or two.

No shame there. John M says, whoa, came here to say that the athletic comment section for playoff articles has been amazing, largely due to Sean and Dom. Sorry, Craig. John, it's no policy needed. I've retired. So much name calling and personal attacks. I would also throw Mark Lazar's.

Las has been a fun voice to go into the mix because he is not afraid to speak his mind. He's on a heater right now, baby. I'll tell you that much. I love hockey playoff article comment section. Hockey fans lose their friggin minds. Yay. It has, it's got a different vibe to it right now. People are worked up.

See, but Twitter. Like, you can, I tweeted something innocuous last night and people are like, like, people get mad about it. Everyone's all worked up. They're all lathered up. I think that's just generally the way people are. I said this, I said this a couple days ago. Like, Twitter is, every day you encounter people who have been carrying on some one-sided

fight with you for, like, you're like, did I do something to offend you? Like, like, what, like, what is going on? The level of, the level of aggression. and in responses has gotten insane. That being said, the comment section is, is, is, is, is, is, is really funny, especially for the, especially for the power rankings, because the degree to which people care about us having a team at seven instead of eight is consistently, consistently crazy. And yeah, they get very personal and, in vitriolic and strange, but, um, we appreciate

the, are you okay? Do you want to talk to me to this through? No, Dom's a soft boy out of the two of us. Dom is? I should call Don. I don't care. I've been fighting on the internet for long run. He's been alive. So who cares? Another, Anthony M says, what's with all the Leafs talk? Despite this way, it was a good listen.

I would encourage people go listen to Doug Wait, if you can stomach what I would call Islanders talk. Anything else you ought to get it to here, Choddy? we're going to tap into something Timby said can you can you pronounce Dom's last name this is an unfortunate bit that's been done before I don't know I I always have him say it to me three or four times before I have to say it so I say it correctly I don't try to like punt it's not that hard like the whole loose chicken loose chicken thing is always the starting point it's loose chishin I spelling it is still difficult for me loose chishin same same Valteri.

Craig. Philippa. As we all know. Craig. Craig Cushcheon? Before we wrap up, I want to highlight Kyle Connor, great American. Very polite boy.

Very polite boy. Kyle Connor, who won the Lady Bing trophy, as you all know, is, according to Wikipedia, born in Clinton Township, which is where I'm recording this. so I have a soft spot for Kyle Connor. I love the Lady Bing. I love the I love the we vote on Lady Bing for some reason. It's insane. Like how do we know?

How do we know who on the ice? Here's what I always do. I sort it. Yep. My penalty minutes when I, when, and then I go, all right, who do I, who do. And then what I would always do with my ballot, I would, back when locker rooms were locker rooms. I would bring my stentle pad of paper.

Oh, Craig. Those good old days. The good old days. And I would just have a stentel pad with my ballot and just walk around to players and be like, can you just make me feel good about this? And do you feel good about it? And they would say this guy's actually not a really good person. And then I went on a kick where I only put defensemen because I'm like, why do we

not vote for defensemen? So I would just go five defensemen. I don't know. I don't know. I voted Mark Edward Vlasic one year, I remember. Yeah. I saw Emily Kaplan voted Jack Campbell, I saw. Yeah, like, fine.

Who cares? The golden retriever, as we've established on this. Our goalies ineligible? They're not hockey players? Like, it's such a, in like, why is that even a thing that we're mentioning that Emily vote? Like, because it's silly. It's a silly award that we should not vote on.

You know who should vote on it? Mark Messier. I think Mark Messier should just determine who, Yeah, who is like, who's a player who's who's a player who thinks that he's really nice and is going to name the award after. It's not just a nice player. Also, is it a necessary award? Like, what other sport is like, a nicest player of the year is? Yeah, here are guys who don't know that these guys per on any, on any real level, a hundred people, go vote on this.

Yeah, and Kyle Like Kyle O'Connor, God bless him, but But congratulations to Kyle Connor Yeah, he took two, he took two minors somehow all season And scored a shitload of goals. Like, okay, there you go. He doesn't get enough love nationally. This is not Winnipeg Jets talk,

This is Clinton Township, Michigan talk. I will ignore the fact that he went to the University of Michigan. He, Kyle Conner should be appreciated more nationally for what he's done. And I think the fact that he plays in Winnipeg and isn't a big personnel. You know, he's a pretty subdued guy from what I can tell. He's hurt his star power.

But he's had a great career. Any other Kyle Conner thoughts, Sean, before we wrap up? Yes, that's it. Okay. Mike Russel, Jusel. Who's Russel? Antoine Rousseau. Yeah, Eds Juan Rousseau joins Rob Pizzo.

That's Burlington barking at the Amazon delivery guy. Hey, Burley. joins Rob Pizzo, Jesse Granger, and Sarah Sivian from the Eastern Conference Final. Rousseau, who we have out there covering writing about the Rangers and the Lightning, I love, I love when we get some of this cross-pollination. You got Las out doing his thing. It's great. So Rousseau will be talking.

I'm sure he'll talk wild, though. He can't help himself. He's going to talk a lot of stuff. We know, we know Rousseau. What is Burley's problem? He's really worked up about something. Wow, is he mauling the Amazon man? I'm thinking of it.

Wow, I'm watching. As I'm looking at my window, yeah, Burley just pounced. Call the police. Wow, somebody should help him. Oh, wow. This is actually, I'm looking at it is a big delivery. What do we order? Like a mattress.

I think we got a one of those that you open the box and it expands by 10 times. If you got one of those for free from one of our advertisers, I'm going to be mad. I gave up on that. I did not get a free. But if you're an advertising company that sells mattresses or a mattress company that needs advertising, I am in the market, clearly. An advertising company that sells mattresses. Yeah. The billboard, the billboard people have expanded.

Clear channel communications. I know typically they sell billboards, but they've moved on to overpriced. They're selling mattresses on the side. They should. Oh, gosh, we just, what else? Make sure you're subscribed to Athletic Audio Plus on Apple Podcasts. We are not the bonus episode this week. So guess what?

Congratulations to you guys for not having a list of this again. I thought it was a great episode last week. You start with a 30-day free trial, then it's just 99 cents a month after that. And right now, an annual subscription to the Athletic is just $1 a month for six months when you visit athletic.com slash hockey show. Sean, also, there's the, for those of you who rate and review the athletic hockey show, we thank you and we appreciate it greatly. But, and as you as you all know, listeners know, you can write whatever you want in the review, whatever you like, as long as you give five stars. We've established that.

And it appears people are taking us up on the offer. I was not expecting people to actually do this. to actually give a five-star review and then just I'm trying to I'm gonna I got it yeah I was I was distracted trying to find it This is a review from a very mysterious Cory Pratton passed this long Sean Gentile was broken to my house and threatened my cat Unless I rated this show five stars on iTunes

On an unrelated note I quite enjoy the right of personalities on the show and enjoy the player interviews Thank you to whoever that was Did you really threat a cat I can can't, there's, I, I can either confirm nor deny that, but I will say that between the years of 2009 and 2013, that could, that could, that could happen. You said I checked out, Haley Savian said I kicked her dog once, which is also also false. You would never kick a dog. I have never and would never in my life. No, I love, but harming a cat. Okay. Well, stuff happens. Again,

Write whatever you like in the reviews, as long as it's five-star. And if you accuse Sean of things, we'll probably read it. Animal abuse, what have you. Like I said, I probably didn't, but I can't say that for sure. Sean, have a great week. Thanks to Matthew Fairburn for joining the podcast. Thank you to producer Jeff for all his fine work as always. And thanks for listening, Sean.

Thank you for listening. Thank me for listening. Thanks to both of us Craig Thanks to all those advertising companies that are selling mattresses Buddy we're doing a great job God, maybe our best yet