The Athletic Hockey Show - Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon take trips to the sin bin, Erik Karlsson's press conference apple, and more

Episode Date: April 1, 2021

Ian Mendes and Sean McIndoe discuss Connor McDavid's elbow and Nathan MacKinnon's helmet toss, the Sabres snapping their losing streak against the now-spiraling Flyers, and Erik Karlsson's press conference snack. Also, "This Week in Hockey History" looks back at EBUG Scott Foster, and what possibly may be the best April Fool's prank ever in the NHL.Have a question for Ian and Sean? Email [e-mail], or leave a VM at [phone]!Save on a subscription to The Athletic: theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the first April edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. I'm Ian Medes alongside Sean McIndoo, aka Down Goes Brown. Ahead on this episode of the podcast, both Connor McDavid and Nate McKinnon find themselves in the highlight reels in the National Hockey League for the wrong reasons. We'll chat all about superstar players crossing the line and is what McKinnon did the worst thing ever done by somebody who's won the Lady Bing. Hey, the Buffalo Sabres finally win the game. and now we ask the question if all of the misery from Buffalo has suddenly shifted over to Philadelphia. Eric Carlson has an epic answer during a press conference,

maybe giving us the sound bite, pun intended, of the year. And this week in hockey history looks back at the first emergency backup goalie to really grab the headlines and no, it was not David Ayers and the ultimate April Fool's prank pulled off by a Hall of Fame defenseman. I got to ask you this, Sean, because I ask Haley about this on Monday with the athletic hockey show. It's, you know, April Fool's Day, pranks. You are known as arguably, actually, not even arguably. You are, let's just go ahead and call it. You're the wittiest, you're the wittiest person in hockey on social media.

I'm giving you the mantle. You get the crown. But my question is, does the wittiest, funniest person in hockey, in social media, does he lean into April Fool's Day? and I kind of play some pranks on the kids, or does he hate it because he thinks it's so lame? Yeah, I think it can be fun with kids, although we didn't do anything this year.

I think even my group is outgrown it a little bit. Most of the stuff you see is pretty dumb. You know, the corporate stuff, the, you know, the wacky, hey, let's put something on the home page. I'm not a big fan of that. But I will say that to anyone listening to this podcast today, any takes that I have today that you think are especially bad, those are just April Fool's pranks. That's just, that's just me playing a joke. Don't worry about it.

Yeah. Actually, that's a perfect way to jump into this. So let's talk about what I guess at the start of the week, this, you would have thought this was a prank when you would say that both Connor McDavid and Nathan McKinnon could possibly be facing the wrath of the Department of Player's Safety. You would be like, what are you talking about? These are two of the cleanest players in the case of McKinnon, he's the reigning Lady Bing trophy winner. So that gives you a sense of how, you know, how honest these guys usually play the game. But McDavid with a, you know, an attempted elbow on the head of Yersperi Kotkinemi of the Habs. And then Nate McKinnon on Wednesday night, Sean, with a helmet toss at Connor Garland during a skirmish.

He gets, essentially gets the rest of the game for that with a game misconduct. Let's start by looking at these two. episodes, McDavid and McKinnon, and ask you, like, is one of them infinitely worse than the other? You know what? It's kind of tough to say, because especially when it comes to the Conor McDavid play, I mean, you're talking about throwing an elbow at somebody's head. That's, that's no joke. We've seen guys get hurt pretty badly on plays like that. And so if that's what happens, then that's the more serious play. I'm still confused. confused about that play because unlike just about any other controversial hit, there

always seem to be 19 different angles that they turn around and show you. And with this one, I've only seen the one. Like, I've seen the one angle right from the front, generally at full speed, where it does look like he comes across the late hit and goes right up high with an elbow. But it's tough to say, you know, would it look different from a different angle? is it actually, did he maybe catch him in the chest and then the arm flies up? You know, it's hard to say and it's a strange one to me. Because again, like, you know, when Tom Wilson does something, there's 35 different angles

and we watch them all in slow-mo and we analyze and we pick it apart and freeze frame it. And with this one, it was almost as if it was like, oh, who threw that? Oh, that was Connor McDavid. Yeah, we'll show you one real quick replay and then we're moving on. And I'm going to assume that the Department of Player Safety had all of the angles. And they didn't decide that it was worth a suspension. So I guess maybe this is one of those times where you kind of have to take their word for it, which is fine because I'm sure they've built up a lot of credibility and benefit of the doubt with most hockey fans.

I'm really torn on this too because I, you know, it's funny. I was on Montreal radio, yes, on Wednesday of this week. And I was on Chris Nyland show and they asked me, hey, what do you think about the McDavid, Elbaughan-Katkeny? And I, you know, I did think it was at least suspendable in terms of there looked like there was some intent there. And it was late too. And that's part of it. This wasn't like an otherwise clean hit where, oh, maybe he got a little up higher than he won.

This was a late hit coming across. Yeah. And so, you know, I go on there. I'm like, you know what, I would like to have seen him get a game. Like, to me, the $5,000 fine really does nothing. Like, it really does nothing. It's like, why bother? It's, you can find that if you're McDavid, you,

find that in the cushions of your couch. That's not a deterrent to do this again. So I said, I'd like to see him get a game or two. And then Chris Nyland and his co-host, Sean Campbell, come on. They're like, actually, we didn't really have a huge problem with the head. I'm like, what? This is Montreal Radio. I thought you guys would be all over this. But I mean, you know, Chris Nyland. I kind of figure he can't exactly sit there with the little choir boy face and say that how could anyone ever do something like that. And you know what? This is, you know, Snihans from that era and it's it's sort of an old school way of thinking but there was a time where you love to see this from a star player this was a guy taking care of his own business he was sending a

message letting everyone know i mean there there was a time where star players were told hey somebody comes at you and it's going to happen you feed them your stick you get your stick up high and put it in their teeth and that'll send a message to everyone else in the league not to do that to you so uh i i don't know it there is a part of me and i feel like oiler fans won't be on board with this. But there is a part of me that feels like it almost would have been better for Connor McDavid if there had been a suspension. Just a short one, one game, let's say.

Because when you do that, the way it played out now, you know, it was a hit that looked bad, whether it was or not. He doesn't get anything, you're right. A fine is meaningless in this situation. And now this just makes it so that a guy who, who is going to be targeted at the best of times, this just opens the door for people to say, oh, well, okay, well, I mean, if Connor McDavid can do it to other guys,

we can throw that hit on Connor McDavid. You didn't suspend him. The rules can't be different for the stars than it is for everyone else. So I guess it's fair game. Whereas if you had given him, like I said, even one game, suddenly now the message is, okay, we suspended Connor McDavid for throwing that hit. So what do you think is going to happen to you if you turn around and go after him with a hit like that.

Of course we're going to throw the book at you two. The precedent's been set. We're treating everyone equal. Stay away from this guy. And, you know, I just want, earned fingers crossed that it doesn't happen. But at, you know, at some point in Connery David's career, there's going to be high hits thrown at him.

There's going to be late hits thrown at him. Guys are going to target him just because of who he is and what he can do. And I do wonder if we won't be sitting there going, man, if only they had given him a game or two, and then we could point to that and say, okay, anyone who touches him is going to get it to because the precedent's been set. Yeah.

And Oilers fans, if you don't like that, take April Fool's. Yeah, just April Fool's. Check your calendar. Come on. That's not what we really think. Okay. So I'm going to run through, like I said, Nate McKinnon, Sean, is the reigning Lady Bing trophy winner.

Now I'm starting to think Nate McKinnon throw in the helmet at Connor Garland on Wednesday night. Is that the dirtiest or shadiest thing ever done by a reigning or a previous lady Bing winner? So I'm just going to run down the list. of Lady Bing winners. You stop me when there's like a moment that comes to your mind. You're like, oh, yeah. Okay, ready? Yeah.

Alex Barkoff. Don't remember him doing anything. Okay. William Carlson. No. Okay. Johnny Goodro. Johnny Goodro, I feel like there was something.

And this is the thing. I feel like with Johnny Goodro that there was something with the Leafs where he took a stick swing or something at somebody. And that is the thing with these guys. Everybody for their own team is going to run. I'm sure there's somebody else. there yelling at the at us right now like you don't remember that barcove did this to my favorite player six years ago and and nobody else notices i do feel like with grew there was there was something

um but uh but no he he tends to be a pretty clean player he definitely didn't throw his helmet at anybody yeah if i'm having a hard time think of anybody who's throwing a helmet other than no you know the the only and again this is this is my leaf fan uh perspective on this the closest that i can remember is there was a situation where darcy Tucker got in a fight. And during the fight, he grabbed the other guy's helmet, kind of pulled it off, and then threw two punches with the helmet still in his hand. And he got kicked out of the game for that.

And there was talk that he would be suspended. And then he wasn't, I believe. I think he got a fine. But the league's reasoning was that they said it was accidental. They said he didn't intend to do that. He was just, he grabbed the helmet and it was stuck on his hand. And that was their reasoning for not suspending him. So, you know, with the Nathan McKinnett thing, as funny as it was, this is something the league is going to look at it because you can't throw equipment at somebody.

And, you know, the way he did it, a little underhand toss, it's not like it was going to, you know, put anybody at risk of injury. But, you know, they're going to look at it. I would be surprised if they threw in a fine just to make clear to everyone that you can't be throwing equipment at guys when you're upset. The only helmet thing I can think of, I think it was a Chicago Winnipeg game a few years ago. Remember when Adam Party's helmet came off and the fan took Adam. It was Adam Party, wasn't it? I'm pretty sure it was, yeah. Took his helmet and put it on.

Yeah, the fan who was, you know, maybe he was pretty, he was enjoying the game, let's just say. And yeah, he put the helmet on. That was a highlight. I've seen, I can't remember players throwing things. We've seen coaches do it. We've seen coaches, Tom Webster threw a stick. and Robbie Ford threw the bench once, which was, I mean, that might be the all-timer as far as throwing things. Other than that, it's kind of, you know, it's Matt Sundeen throwing the broken stick into the stands, which he did get suspended for, but that was because he put it into the crowd where, you know, you can injure a paying customer.

I can't think of too many other examples of players throwing things at each other. Even a water bottle. I can't think of a goalie taking the water bottle off the top of his net and throwing it. Like in my mind, I can't picture it. Dominic Hasick threw his blocker at Peter Bonder. Yes. During a play. I remember that one, but it wasn't much of a toss.

And I don't think he got any additional. I'm sure he got a penalty for it during the game, but I don't think there was any of that. So it's, yeah, it is rare, though. You don't see the guys, the McDavid's and and the McKinnons flash out like this very often. It does happen, but it's. It's not common. No, exactly.

Like I said, as I look through the history of the Lady Bing, I was like, man, I think this might be the weirdest thing. Anybody who's won the Lady Bing has ever done. The last question I have for you on this lady Bing. So in the history of hockey, Sean, if I asked you to just,

if I said to you, who is the most gentlemanly player of all time? Who comes to mind for you? Like, you know, it's funny. There's classy and gentlemanly. Yeah, Bellevaux. I mean, if you're talking classy, Bellavow is definitely up there.

Yep. Let me stop it right there. How does Jean Belavow, who right away, top of mind to you, classy, gentlemanly, he never won the Lady Bing? He never won the Lady Bing. John Belovow not only never won the Lady Bing, he had a couple of seasons where he had over 100 penalty minutes. And this was back in the day, this wasn't 100 penalty minutes in the 80s.

This was back in the day when that was a lot. Because I remember I wrote a thing last off season, I think, where I was. I said, okay, what could we do if we took a team full of Lady Bing winners and we put them against a team full of guys who ever led their own team in penalty minutes? And Jean Belvo ended up on the penalty minute team because he led that Montreal Canadiens team back then. You know, there were no enforcers back then. If you had 140 penalty minutes, you were probably going to lead the team. And it was pretty crazy.

And then my favorite guy in that whole piece was Stan McKita because he qualified for both teams. Stan McKita is another who is another guy that a lot of people would say, you know, cleanest, most gentlemany player. Stan McKito was a dirty, nasty player for the first few years of his career. And then he just decided to stop playing that way. And he flipped the switch and became a guy who almost never saw the penalty box. It was one of the strangest and most amazing mid-career transformations that we've ever seen from a really elite player. Yeah. Listen, McDavid McKinnon certainly getting the headlines this week. But so too, Sean. The Buffalo Sabres finally bust out. They win a game. And I love the fact.

that last on Wednesday, you were watching Toronto, Winnipeg in a huge North Division showdown and you're like, I kind of want to watch Buffalo to see if they can close out Philly. At what point do you think Sabres fans exhaled, they had a multi-goal lead in the third period, but having blown a 3-0 lead 48 hours earlier, at what point in that game do you think Sabres fans actually relax? They're like, oh my God, we're going to win the game. When they made it 6-1? I think, yeah, I was going to say.

say how late was it 6-1? I mean, it was something like three minutes left. I feel like that was kind of the moment where maybe you felt some relief, but maybe not. There may have been some that we're still saying, okay, let's hold on because, yeah, definitely after that Monday meltdown, you didn't feel safe when it was when it was 4 to 1 for sure. You were just kind of waiting for the next goal to go in and then the next one after that and here we go again. But the good news for Buffalo is they're playing a team that's probably just as damaged right now as they are in terms of the psyche and in terms of waiting for something bad to happen. I also, I just can't believe what is happening, though.

Honestly, I can't believe what is happening with Philadelphia. And this is a team that almost won their division last year, Sean. The Carter Hart stuff has been really interesting this week. He basically got put on the shelf by Alainavino Monday, Monday and Wednesday. Look, Vino's point was you need to get kind of your game sorted out, get yourself in the right head space, come back, stop some pucks. But like, I look at Philadelphia.

And I know that Buffalo has been the most disappointing team. And I think Buffalo takes a lot of oxygen from hockey fans. That's where we put a lot of our emphasis on the Sabres. I can't help but think in a month. I saw the stat, Sportsnet had the stat, the Sabres save percentage in the month of of March was 831. Like, like, that's some, like, you're not even winning in the 80s with that. No, that's amazing.

There are so many awful Buffalo Sabre stats floating around. It's, it's, it's just stunning. But, yeah, that's, I mean, and that's the thing, right? Like, I was, I was on the radio in St. Louis this week. And they were saying, you know, what, you know, what's wrong with the blues? because that's another team that's sort of spiraling. And I said to them, so much of my job involves looking at a team that is having unexpected results and trying to think of something to say other than it's the goaltending.

And, you know, in St. Louis, Jordan Bennington is not having a good year. That's most of it. Buffalo, I mean, they went into the season with the same goaltending that wasn't good enough last year. And maybe you wouldn't consider that a surprising result. But Philadelphia, I mean, right there. I know we can all sit there and wring our hands and say, what's going wrong with the flyers? They had a goalie that they thought was one of the very best in the league, and he's been awful this year. And not just awful in the terms of a slump, but he seems broken right now.

And, you know, you don't want to, it's never just one guy. It's not like teams playing great, and it's Carter Hart's fault entirely. But that's it. You pick any team in the league that is built around a guy they think is an elite goaltender, and you say that goalie is going to be an 880 goal. goaltender this year. They don't make the playoffs. That's it. Yeah. No, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's frustrating. I know in Philadelphia. So it's certainly, uh, it's certainly a story to watch here. And, uh, and people are saying, maybe Alan Vino is, uh, is, is, he's, is, is, is, is

a hot seat. So it's, it's, it's not been a good year for the people who say that Alan Vigno is a guy that comes in makes a big difference in year one and then immediately starts losing the room. And that's been the knock on him, uh, for a lot of his career. And this is, this is, this is certainly not this year is certainly not helping. All right, Sean, I got to ask you about Eric Carlson's sound bite this week. And I use the term sound bite because you know I like myself some bad puns. Very good. Have a listen here.

This is, so Eric Carlson Tuesday night scores two goals in regulation time and then gets the shootout winner, full scale slap shot, full clapper wins it. Then he gets to the press conference and he has asked by a reporter in, uh, in the Zoom conference. We'll have a listen. And what I want to paint the picture for the listeners, Eric Carlson is sitting at the podium with an Apple. Have a listen.

All right, Eric, is that the best office game you've ever had, two goals and essentially a hat trick when the game winner and the shootout? Not even close. Okay, Sean, I got to tell you, that is maybe the ultimate power move that I don't know, that I've ever seen a greater power move by anybody in the NHL, then to have an apple with them at a press conference, kind of take a bite and just dismiss a question

in the manner in which Eric Carlson did this week. Yeah. And you know what? I've talked about this before. I, and I'm coming at this as somebody who has sat in those press conferences, put my hand up, ask some questions.

I'm sure I've asked some dumb ones. And I generally don't like it when athletes, coaches, whoever give you the short answer, give you the, you know, that was a dumb question thing. because I, you know, we're all trying to do our job. It wasn't a great question. This is Eric Carlson.

Of course, he's had a better game than, you know, some midseason game for a Sharks team that's going nowhere. This is a guy who almost single-handedly dragged his team to a Stanley Cup final. So, yeah, he's had better games. It wasn't a great question. But I still feel like you can offer up a decent answer, not try to embarrass somebody, not try to make a show out of it. But apparently, I'm willing to make an exception as long as you bring a prop with you. And you've got that ready to go because it was the apple bite that just made it.

And, you know, to the point where now I'm sitting here like looking at all the other guys that were I'm kind of tired of watching their press conferences and going, is this maybe the difference maker? Like, do we send John Tortorella up there with an apple or like a corn a cob or something? And like it and give him something to just bite into when he does his whole tired stick with the media. I feel like that would just breathe new life into the whole thing. Like Eric Carlson really might be on to something here. You can be rude and dismissive on your answers to reporters, but you've got to have a snack with you. Yeah. I'm also thinking, like, this would never happen.

It would be amazing if you could get like, you know, you get like a glass of wine and you can swirl it, you know, something like. That'd be good. Yeah. Just something. Get creative. Everybody can have their own gimmick. Somebody can snap into a slim gym, you know, somebody else can. There's got to be something where, you know, take a long drag of coffee or something.

Like there's there's all these possibilities. I feel like this is this was an untapped. There's sponsorship potential here. Like let's let's get on this NHL. That's, uh, there's there's got to be, there's got to be something.

It would be helpful for us too because, you know, if I'm sitting there asking a question and the guy I'm asking the question to suddenly starts peeling a banana in the middle of my question, okay, that gives me an indication that maybe it's not going well. Maybe it's time to wrap it up. Yeah.

This, this, I think, I think we all win if this becomes the new thing. See, I think the ultimate. power fruit, the power move is a pomegranate. You want to talk about flexing.

You roll into a press conference with a pomegranate. There's just no respect for anything or anyone around you. No, absolutely. You know what? That would be just, you know what? No questions. We're good. We got it.

This guy brought a pomegranate to the press conference. We're going to read the room here and take a pass on it. All right, Sean, I know we've probably given you an idea for some, a little, you know, add some fruit. I love your idea of to bring John Tororella up there with a corner cop while answering questions. But the one column I loved that you wrote this week

because the quirky rules the NHL, what was great about your column this week is I feel like I've watched this sport all my life and I read that column like, oh, actually I didn't know that. I didn't know that there's a potential for a three-minute power play. I didn't know that you could have

the one I want you to explain, this is amazing to me, is that there is a situation in the rulebook where a referee can award a penalty shot if a team, you know, if the team that makes the mistake or is penalized, has too many skaters on the ice. Could you walk our listeners through what scenario would happen where a referee decides to award a penalty shot based on too many men on the ice?

So this is one of my favorite things to do because I feel like among hockey fans and media, we do a lot of complaining about the officiating and about the rulebook, but I feel like I'm one of the only ones who's actually has so little going on that I've sat down and read this thing. And when you do that, it's a fascinating document because there is all sorts of stuff that's in there that's 100 years old, has clearly never been updated. There's all sorts of stuff that you think is in there that is not mentioned anywhere. And there's a lot of stuff. that, you know, frankly, doesn't really match how the game is actually officiated on the ice, but it's still in there. And every now and then, I like to just go through and pull some stuff out that I suspect a lot of fans wouldn't know. And yeah, this is one of them, that there is a scenario where too many men on the ice can be an automatic penalty shot. And, you know, I'll pause here while a cold chill runs down the spine of every Boston Bruins fan, since that seems to be their trademark move. But it is something that it's not a common occurrence. and, you know, in fact, it's something that arguably you would never see because there's two

criteria above and beyond just having too many men on the ice that have to come into play. One is that it has to be either at the end of regulation or an overtime. It has to be at a time where a two-minute minor for too many men could not be served in its entirety. And then the other thing is that it has to actually be a special type of too many men that a lot of fans don't even know is spelled out in the rulebook, which is an intentional too many men, an intentional illegal substitution. If the referee thinks that a team has intentionally put too many guys out there, as opposed to just the standard version of, hey, we screwed up, somebody got confused and jumped on, if he thinks it was intentional, that can be a penalty during the game,

but in overtime or at the end of regulation, it's a penalty shot. And you might think, why would you ever intentionally send too many men on the ice? but there's actually some reasons. I mean, you can imagine if Connor McDavid winds up from his own zone and he's coming in and he's got either a breakaway or a clear rush, yeah, maybe it makes sense to have somebody jump off the bench onto the ice and get in his way and you figure you got a better chance of killing the two minutes than stopping him on a breakaway. That could be intentional. The other way that it comes up, and we can thank Roger Nielsen for this one,

is that many years ago, Roger Nielsen realized if I'm down five to three and let's say there's a face off of my own. So five, five to three, like I'm killing a five on three power play. I can't lose any more players. If it's the end of the game, if there's 30 seconds left, I'm killing a five on three. I should just send out extra guys. What can they do? They can just give me another penalty. I don't have to, I don't, it doesn't go down to five on two. It stays at five on three. I'll just keep sending extra guys off the bench. I can send my whole bench out there. It doesn't really matter. And so because Roger Nielsen had the twisted mind to think of that, the NHL actually put this rule in there saying if it's an intentional and in the referee's judgment, he can turn

around and award a penalty shot if there's not enough time to serve the minor. I'm not aware of it ever having happened. Somebody in the comments is telling me it did in like a Rangers game in the 90s that that rule was actually called. I don't remember that and I can't remember ever seeing it. But there's a lot of stuff in the rulebook that you've never seen before, but it's still there and it could happen someday. You know, the best Roger Nielsen kind of just trying to, go outside of the rules. I remember, and I think this is when he was coaching in juniors, maybe in Peterborough, but when he would have his goalie pulled at the end of the game, so let's say his team was down by a goal, he would pull the goalie, but tell the goalie,

leave your stick on the ice across the crease, across the goal line. So if the other team was shooting from their own end and they tried to score, it would hit your stick and it wouldn't go in. And they actually had to alter the rules to say, yeah, actually can't do that. But that's the type of, like, it's almost Belichickian, if I can use that. You think of Bill Belichick and he always thinks about, okay, these are the rules, that's great. How do I circumvent them in a way that technically isn't illegal? That's what Roger Nielsen did in hockey for years. For years, I mean, the guy was a genius.

Another one of his was he wanted to know if there's a penalty shot, can I put a defenseman on the ice instead of my goalie and just have the defenseman charge out and try to knock the puck away? Because that ends the attempt. And there's another rule in the rule book that, A, you can't do that. And B, you can't even swap in a new goalie for a penalty shot without leaving him in the game. And that traces back to Roger Nielsen. I just love this idea, especially in an NHL and in a hockey world, where everything's so conservative and everything's, well, you know, we don't do it this way. And we're just going to keep doing the same thing that the last guy did.

that you had this genius like Roger Nielsen just sitting down and going through the rulebook coming up with all of these little loopholes and exceptions and forcing the NHL who don't like to update this document very often to go in and be like, all right, Roger said it again. We got to come up with a new rule. Yeah, you know, Roger, I had a chance to work with Roger Nielsen. I used to work in the PR department of the Ottawa Senators, and Roger was our assistant coach. And I, like, I remember, like, he would phone me, okay? this is this is the classic Roger Nielsen.

He would phone me. They'd be on the road somewhere I'd be at the offices in Ottawa. He would phone me. He's like, Ian, I need you to go to my office and look up something for me. So I'm like, yeah, of course, Roger. So I'd go to his office and I'd be on the phone with him and he'd say, okay, I need you to look in my files. And let's say they were playing like, I have this distinct memory for some reason of him asking me to look up something on Keith Primo.

And he's like, he would have these handwritten notes. And I looked into this game file, pulled it out. He's like, okay, just read to me what it says under Keith Primo. And I'd be like, yeah, it says squiggly. He's like, okay, perfect. Thank you. That's what I needed. Like for whatever, he had these weird terminology for, he'd be like, yeah, that guy's squiggly or that guy.

But he had them written down. And I don't know what they meant. He would just phone me randomly be like, I need to know about Keith Primo. Okay. Well, here's what you said about him the last time we played. You said he was squiggly. Okay. Sure it meant something.

Yeah. They probably won the game that night because they... Roger Nielsen's on the bench just... Yelling. ...looking down at a little no-pair. Yeah, whispering into someone's ear. It's time for Project Squiggly. And off they go.

Yeah. Oh, man. Good times. All right. A reminder that you can always connect with us. We love to hear your questions for us. You can leave us a voicemail. We love those.

Leave us a voicemail. 845. 445, 8459, 845445, 8458459. Drop us a voicemail, we'd love to hear from you. You can also send us an email. You can reach us that way. The email address is The Athletic Hockey Show at gmail.com. The athletic hockey show at gmail.com.

And, Sean, that is what Warren from Raleigh has done. Warren has dropped us an email from the heart of Keynes country and says, Hey guys, I appreciate all the love for my Carolina Hurricanes, but when is the National Hockey League's national press going to notice Mark Nekas? He is one of the leagues emerging superstars, and yet it seems like nobody outside of North Carolina is talking about him. Plus, fun fact, you can't spell Cain's without neckass. That comes in from Warren in Raleigh.

And look, he's having a really nice season, right? Almost a point of game. He's a pretty, he's what, 22 years old, really nice, young player for the Carolina Hurricanes. But I don't know. Has he reached the point where he needs national love? Yeah. I mean, Warren from, come on, Warren. I can spot a Sarah Sivian burner account.

And I know, I know what's going on here because this has been a bandwagon that Sarah's been driving, of course, which is. And I think it was a few weeks ago, maybe a month ago, where she wrote that the, we were about three months away from the Canadian media suddenly discovering this guy and suddenly writing all these stories, revealing how good he is to an audience in Carolina that would have already known it. And so I think if the math works out, we're still probably six to eight weeks away from that moment coming true. But yeah, no, I mean, this is a real good player on a team that. And I don't think this is a, while Carolina is a small market situation, I think Carolina's just got a bunch of interesting guys. And there's only so much bandwidth to tell all the stories. And, you know, between Sebastian Ajo, between Svechnikov, doing what he can do, you know, maybe this is the next big story that we're going to get to. But yeah, I suspect we're probably not far away from it.

And then, yes, of course, the national media, Canadian media, everyone will come in and come in and, go, wow, this guy's so underrated. What best kept secret in the league? And Carolina fans will be pulling their hair out going, we've been screaming about this guy all season long. Yeah, it's like, it's, yeah, like you said, the Barkoff Huberdo thing in Florida is the best example of those guys. It took them years to finally get a little bit of love, right?

Like, I feel like my point to Warren and Raleigh or Sarasivian, come back in five, if NECAS has five more good years, then we can maybe start talking about putting him on the national radar. Right. Or if he gets traded to the Maple Leafs, in which case, we will immediately elevate him to top 10 in the entire league status. Yeah, there we go. All right, a little this week in hockey history to wrap up show, Sean. And this week in hockey history, March the 29th, 2018. So, hey, we just have to go back three years. And when you say the phrase ebug, emergency backup goalie, the first name that comes to mind for a lot of people, David Ayers. But before, before

there was David Ayers, there was Scott Foster. And I feel like Scott Foster's story has been somehow forgotten in the last three years, but he was the basically the accountant, practice goalie turned, you know, goalie for Chicago Blackhawks. He plays the final 14 minutes and change in the game for Chicago in a win over the Winnipeg Jets March 29, 2018. How come we, we, or have we forgotten Scott Foster because of David Ayers? Yeah, I feel like we have.

And in fact, when I first saw your list for this week's show, and I looked at that, and I was like, oh, he's got that right. It wasn't 2018. It wasn't that recently. It was longer ago. I don't remember exactly. And it was. It was 2018. It was only three years ago.

And it does feel a little bit forgotten because, you know, there had been emergency backups that had come in very briefly here and there. But this was the first guy to actually play like an extended amount. of time, make some saves. You know, his team won. He didn't get the win because of the score when he came in. But I think there's sort of two reasons that it's been overshadowed. Number one, the David Air story was, you know, just an even better story and an even easier story to sell to a non-hockey audience to say that, you know, this guy comes in

in a game that's still up for grabs against a good team. He gives up two goals right away. And then in the third period, he goes out there and shuts out there. and shuts out this team. I mean, that's an easier story to get behind and get into maybe than the Scott Foster story. And then the other piece of it, and I remember seeing people mention this, you know, David Ayers, after his situation, he did the full on media blitz. He was going on talk shows. He was on ESPN. He was everywhere. He was making the most of it. He was doing what most people would do. Get your 15 minutes. And yeah, absolutely. Get out there. And when are you ever going to be

invited on to do the late night talk show circuit in the U.S.? Get out there. Have fun. You're going to have a story to tell. Scott Foster, for whatever reason, chose not to do that. He didn't, you know, he didn't really want to make a big deal of it. He didn't, he either wasn't comfortable or for whatever reason just didn't feel like getting out in front of it that way. So that probably let the story a fade a little bit more than maybe it would have. But I do remember at the time it was a big deal.

And then David Errs comes along and just one-ups him so much that it's sort of like, all right, wait, there's a new king in the ebug world. The other this week in hockey history that I want to bring up is kind of related to what we opened the show with, a little April Fool's Talk. Now, April the 1st, 1980, Sean, Montreal Canadian's defenseman Larry Robinson participated in an epic April Fool's prank. So I'll actually read a portion of this is from a book that Larry Robinson wrote and in which he included this anecdote about what he did.

April the first 1980. So just to set the scene for people at this point, the Montreal Canadians had won four consecutive Stanley Cups. This was the drive for five, the spring of 1980. And Larry Robinson gets on FM-96 radio in Montreal and does an interview with a young Mark Hebscher, who I had no idea was doing any radio work back and then in the day in Montreal. But Mark Hebscher does an interview with Larry Robinson, okay?

And this is the excerpt from Robinson's book. He says, quote, I was scheduled to be interviewed on April 1st by Mark Hemscher, who was the morning sports announcer on FM 96 radio in Montreal at the time. But rather than agreeing to the usual interview where I'd be asked for the thousandth time if we could win a fifth straight Stanley Cup despite losing Scotty Bowman, Ken Dryden, etc., I asked him if he had any plans to pull a prank on his listeners for April Fool's Day. It turned out he had not, so I suggested one. And that morning, thousands of Montreal Canadiens fans woke up to learn I had been traded to the Los Angeles Kings for Marcel Dion.

I'm a pretty modest guy, but I have to admit that my performance that morning was Oscar worthy. I sobbed on the air as I thanked the great fans of Montreal for my years there. Larry Robinson tricked the fans into thinking he got traded for Marcel Dion and then cried on the air. I feel like this is the greatest prank ever pulled off in hockey history. I think it has to be. That's fantastic. I've never heard that clip. I hope it's out there somewhere because that's a great one.

It's a great trade too. That's a fun one to think about right around that time. Marcel Dion, French-Canadian star coming to Montreal. that would have been something. I can only imagine what it must have been like to, to wake up and hear that interview on the airwaves. And I'd love to know how long they let it sit, you know, did they come on right after and go,

you know, we're just kidding. Or did they turn? It wasn't like a War of the Worlds thing where suddenly an hour later we got a, the Habs front office has got to break into live programming to let people know it was only, it was only a prank. But that's, that's an all-time great one. I really like that. Yeah, as the story goes, Marcel Dion himself was woken up in his home in Los Angeles.

Oh, man. To tell him that he, what's this story that you've been traded? Like, it's unbelievable. Oh, wow. That's great. I'm glad, hey, it's, it's a funny situation because, I mean, you can imagine Marcel Diang going, all right, I can't wait. Finally, I'm out of here.

See you later, suckers. It gets to the airport. And they're like, no, man, turn around. It's, it was just a joke. Yeah. And it's funny because you actually brought up Marcel Dion to the Habs. Was it last week? Yeah, in the mailbag.

Somebody wanted to know my, it wanted me to come up with a trade deadline deal that that could have happened. And then I ended up sending Marcel Dion to the 86 HAB so he could go win a Stanley Cup with them. And I thought that was a good one. But I didn't realize that there was this, this blockbuster had been announced on the air six years prior. Yeah.

No, amazing stuff. Hey, listen, this was a really fun show. All I'm going to think about the all Easter weekend is John Totorella with a corn on the cob at a press conference. Let's make it happen. I'm telling you. Let's do it. All right. This was fun.

Have a great Easter weekend. And we'll talk to you again next week. Right on. Talk to you then. All right. A reminder for our listeners, March Madness underway. The Athletics College basketball crew brings you the ding you presented by BetMGM. They'll cover all the action both on the court and at the sports books, grabbing insight from the athletics college basketball writers and picking the brain of the day of the thing.

of BetMGM's top bookmakers. Join them for their final four discussion coming your way on Good Friday, 1 o'clock Eastern time on the Daily Ding feed and streaming on the Athletics YouTube channel. Thanks again for joining us for this edition of The Athletic Hockey Show.

We'll get you again next week. A reminder, I'll be back on Monday to wrap up the weekend with Haley Salvean. Drop us an email, The Athletic Hockey Show at gmail.com. Drop us a voicemail. 845-4-45-84-84-84-4-4. If you're not a subscriber with us, you can join us at theathletic.com slash hockey show.