The Athletic Hockey Show - Fallout from Gary Bettman press conference on Kyle Beach, Bryce Salvador pledges to help clean up minor hockey

Episode Date: November 2, 2021

On this episode of The Athletic Hockey Show USA, Craig and Sean look back on the press conference held by the NHL on Monday afternoon regarding former Blackhawks draft pick Kyle Beach. The guys express their frustration towards the commissioner to completely embrace with humility and empathy the gravity of the Kyle Beach story and the Chicago Blackhawks sexual assault scandal.Bryce Salvador, the former Captain of the New Jersey Devils joins Craig and Sean to discuss ongoing issues with minor hockey. Bryce who coaches a team of 12 year olds, addressed two on ice incidents at a tournament this past weekend which led to two of his players being injured. Bryce shares his hopes to be able to make a change for the better on how minor hockey is run, referees are treated and how parents and players act, on and off the ice.. Bryce talks about Kyle Beach's bravery which ultimately helped inspire him to speak up about the necessary changes that need to be made in minor hockey. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey everybody. Hey, Sean. Hi, Craig. This is Craig Custin's of the athletic hockey show. Coming at you live or however podcasts work. It is, by definition, not live. It's the opposite of live. We are live. Besides the interview we recorded with Bryce Salvador yesterday,

Bryce Salvador, by the way, was fantastic. and we asked Bryce to be on the show because he had a series of tweets over the weekend about an incident, an experience he went through at a youth hockey game as a coach that only further highlighted one of the million things that's wrong with the sport right now. And he said basically, I'm trying to be different. I'm trying to make a change. I listen to Kyle Beach. And it's enough with the old way. We're going to change and we're going to do things differently.

and of course every parent pushed back. And it's, it was, I'm so thankful for Bryce for coming on and sharing that story and for just saying enough. Like, we're doing things differently from now on. Like, my goodness. That decision on his part was 100% a reaction to Kyle Beach. Yes. He came out and said it.

Like, he watched the events last week and was like, you know, he had that in his mind whenever a situation popped up over the weekend with his team that he felt rightfully as the coach of it that he had control over and he said I'm going to do the right thing I mean we won't spoil the interview but two of his kids got hurt and he pulled a team out of the tournament and things kind of devolve from there we had uh parents and other coaches you know freaking out on I'm in a hotel lobby basically so yeah it was um it was great stuff from him it was some especially yesterday because we're we you and I are talking now it's Tuesday morning we talked to Bryce right after the catastrophe of a bedman presser yesterday afternoon so it was some welcome

perspective because I mean I think anybody we're I watched I watched it live and was it was in the Zoom room and all that so I was still pretty uh keyed up from all that so it was it was nice to hear Bryce talk about that and it was nice to know that you know that there's such a that That's a high profile example of someone who took Kyle Beach to heart, took Kyle Beach's word to heart and changed his actions and is letting that kind of dictate the way he moves through the world moving forward. So that was really nice to hear. It was, yeah, it was great. And let's stay on the Gary Bettman press conference for a minute because we didn't really talk about this, Sean, but you went on the Canadian version of the athletic hockey show or the Monday version. And they're all Canadian.

Let's be, except for ours. Because, and you went on the Monday episode with Haley, which is fine. I guess we're all technically on the same team at team athletic. I mean, technically. I don't know. Actually, I think Canada may be a separate corporation because of legal. So actually, technically, we may not be on the same. I don't know.

I can't say for sure. As a small business owner, of course, I should know these things. Oh, the post office. So, so. Fucking post office. So, Sean, you went on that show and you, it was recorded before the Gary Batman. Go back and listen if you'd like just to hear how wrong Sean was. Because you, you said, hey, look, the commissioner's going to speak.

No way this could get any worse. You know, this is now a time. I don't really know what you said because I don't listen to the Monday episode. Now, why would you? I couched it a little, a little better than that. I was like, I don't think he's going to go on and make things worse. I expected the standard, oh, the standard betman, legalese, alphabet soup, jargon, you know, debate team bullshit that we get from him on the coyote's arena deal and escrow. I'm sorry, there's a fire.

There's a fire. It's just, we've been in a five alarm for a while now. We're used to hearing Gary Betman speak that way when he's talking about. I don't know. Division realignments or CBA negotiations or TV deals or whatever. And that's part of the fun. That's part of the fun of listening to him talk because it is aggravating. But it's also kind of funny to watch him tiptoe through the tulips when it comes to that sort of stuff.

He's very good at it. He's like, he's got it down. And to the point where you're like, how do I phrase this question? So he can't, you know, he can't say yes or no. Or he can't. So you really are like, oh, he can parse this. If I say, so you really have to come prepared. But maybe we thought we would see like a huge, like, hey.

Right. You know, we're not going to try to legalese what is a poignant moment in this history of the sport right now. Under normal circumstances, you see that sort of stuff. And you're like, can't knock the hustle. That's part of the job. is trying to bullshit us as much as possible. Like, you don't have to enjoy it necessarily, but there's always been a part for me, at least,

where I've, like, not even begrudgingly. No. You're sort of impressed by it. Yesterday, you certainly did not have to hand it to them. That was a disaster from the jump. They appalled, he and Bill Daly, you know, sat in their office. It was a very casual atmosphere, you know, where they're just like, which was bizarre.

We don't even need to crack that one open. Apologized initially and then the bullshit started. And it was an hour of uninterrupted stuff, 46 of which went by without Rick Westhead asking a question, which was remarkable. And Gary was wrong on basically everything you could be wrong about. This was not, he was not speaking from a place of human beings. or morality or decency or whatever, he was trying to protect the league in the owners, in their money.

And I should not have been as surprised by it as I was. I don't even know that, I don't, I don't even know necessarily how, how surprised I even was coming out of it, but that didn't make any less, any less frustrating. That was not what anybody needed yesterday.

No. No. And so, so when Rick, really and you wrote about this and if you haven't read john's column it's it's definitely worth a read um in whatever it was 40 minutes in when rick westhead finally gets to the uh an opportunity to ask a question um you know maybe he was just in the queue at that point um or maybe it was because you know pierre lebronn our colleague had to actually there were there were other people in the

there were other people in the queue trust me if if they wanted if they wanted if they wanted if they wanted to freeze out Rick for the rest of it they could. That was, that was 100% the result of Pierre poking them in the right direction. Yeah. So Pierre, Pierre calls them out and like this, like that's, that's really, that's good, good stuff by Pierre. And Rick gets his question and, you know, puts, his question is, you know, there's a, there's another victim here in this story. And it's a league willing to, to help this victim by paying for, you know, medical costs or therapy or whatever it is. I don't, you know, I don't know the exact phrasing, it seems like, you know, an easy one for the league.

Sure. That's the wild, that was the wild part of the question is, is, and this is not a criticism of the question either. It's coming from Rick who's done whatever, the hardest work on the, on the topic possible. That's right. Impossible. And he gave Betman not a softball, but like an opportunity to say like, yes.

Yes. We're going to, we're going to pay for, if this, if this child who was assaulted, according to the state of Michigan, and according to Brad Aldridge's own guilty plea, by the way, assaulted three years after our indifference, yes, we will foot his legal bills for the rest of his life. It's the NHL, I'm pretty sure. In medical bills, right? That was the question, not legal.

Was it medical or legal? No, no, no, I misspoke. I'm, I'm at medical. We know the NHL is in some money trouble. We know they always are. Gate receipts are down. I get it. Probably could swing that, though.

Probably could swing that. And to hear him not even take the most chest-high meatball to do something that wasn't just correct, wasn't just morally right. Yeah. To do something that was PR-savis. as well. If he says that, that's the headline coming out of that presser. That's one of them at least. Yeah, sure. Right? Is that the NHL's pledged to foot the medical bills or the therapy bills for

a child who was harmed because of, because of their inaction? And he couldn't even do that. And the wildest thing of all. And that's the thing I led with because that was the, that was the answer that was freshest on my mind, you could come up with a top 10 list of lines from that presser that were just like, what planet are we living on? How is our reality different from whatever is going on on the other side of this computer screen? It was alternate universe shit from him from the jump. Yeah. I'm no lawyer. And like, is there some admission of guilt? If you you say, hey, we want to help. Like, I don't, I'm just trying to wrap my head.

I'm so puzzled by that, that response. And just, I've been thinking, I've been thinking about that too. Yeah, like, if he has said, yes, we want to help this kid. Is it like, gotcha. Now you're, you're, like, guilty of something else. Or, or how about this? If you're not willing to commit to it on a, on a Zoom meeting or whatever during a press conference, find a better answer than like, I don't know if we really have all the information

on that. You do have the information on that. That one's, um, there are a court, you've seen it. It's, it's, it's, it's in the civil suit. It's public record. We know what happened. It's a case that's been charged and tried. And Brad Aldrich was sentenced for it.

You know what happened. Don't pretend like you don't. Don't pretend like you need more information. On that end of things, you have everything you need. So his answer, and it's longer, but it, he starts with, I would have to know more about that circumstance. So either he's telling the truth. and he just hasn't taken the time to learn what happened,

which is, you know, what he's, I guess, suggesting, which is not great. Or he's, you know,

recovering and just taking the legal pill with it. I mean, he's doing what he's doing what he always, like he's, he's protecting the league in from some sort of legal action. I'm assuming that's always my assumption. Yeah, of course.

Of course. And we, like, we all get that. That's been kind of an annoying response to the thing that I wrote last night is, is people acting like, if you say that, if you say like, this is a failure on some level that you don't understand what the job of the commissioner is.

Like, I understand it better than anybody. We've been working on this for however many years. I don't need Gary Bettman's job to be explained to me by people in the comments or people on Twitter or whatever. I get it. I just reject the application in this particular space. my tolerance for bullshit from him is high. That's right.

That's right. Almost to a point of admiration where we're like, oh, he got us. Like we've always been like that way. Like up. More bullshit about the coyotes. You got to hand it to him. And that's not what this was. If there ever were an opportunity for him to behave differently, this was it.

And he didn't hit that. that he didn't hit that watermark. He didn't even come close. And it's understandable for people to intellectually, like you can intellectually understand the job of a commissioner and intellectually understand what he was doing there in reject the decision. You don't need, I don't need that explained to me.

There was a bit of good news. The league announced that the Akema Liu investigation has been, everything's fine we're done to everybody's satisfaction so so we're that was great so that investigation is over really that was great

great to hear that although as it turns out that's not true either probably probably could have run that one past Akima Liu yeah so according to Kimaloo's

legal representative Ben myzelis I don't know if I'm saying that correctly this was news to them news to them that the investigation had been completed. Akeem wants accountability and Akeem wants the truth, he said. This is the legal representative when Lisa Dilman of the athletic phoned him on Monday. Akeem wants transparency.

What we saw today was utterly lacking in the truth and causes serious doubts about the entire process. The fact that we are here, basically two years later after Akeem came forward with a detailed recounting of the racism he experienced throughout his entire career, it's alarming and it's disappointing an indictment on the sport and the leadership there that this investigation seems to have no legitimacy. So everything's going great, in other words. They can't even separate their scandals at this point. Like that's how just monumentally screwed this situation is and this league is. Like you're talking about as.

as you are dropping the football on the sexual assault investigation in the cover-up investigation, you also managed to screw up the investigation on a coach using the N-word on a player. It happened in the same breath. What are we doing? What is this sport? Why are we doing it? And I don't know. What are we doing?

It's a great question. Why are we doing it? I don't know. Like my mom My mom called me yesterday Was like Do you have like She just like saw the shit

I've been writing over the last Over last few days She was like are you are you all right Like do you ever want to just get out of it I'm like well maybe Yeah Go be a bartender or something Because this sucks

And we're just And we're just the people that are writing And talk about it We're not even state We're not even We're not even stakeholders in this shit We're not living in Right

Ugh Uh Um We used Anyways Cole Caulfield got sent down last night. Who's your rookie in the year? Because obviously we'd way rather more, you know, Sean and I, we want to have fun and we want to talk.

Like, this is what we got in it. And it's just like, but you can't. Like, this is so egregious. It's so bad. So many people are being hurt. It's so mishandled. It's all like, it's all you can talk about. We used to have Sean and I once did a pop.

podcast years, many moons ago. It was actually the first podcast. It was the first, the first, the first hockey podcast, at least possibly. It predated Mark Maren. So maybe the first podcast. In it, we would have a segment called The Week in Alan Walsh, because Alan at the time was, he was the first person on Twitter. So it paired up well.

And Alan would always say something outrageous on Twitter. Back then the only people anybody followed were Ashton Cutcher, Kevin Smith, horse e-books, and Alan Walsh. And so we would highlight, so I'm going to pull it back because I think Alan summed it up. He said, in all my years involved in the sports business, I've never seen a more disaster, disastrous press conference by a league commissioner. It's what, it was wild to watch. This week in Alan Walsh.

We're watching this. I was watching this in a little time. I was like, this isn't good. And then just like, you go from 10 minutes to 20 minutes and we're at an hour. And you're like,

there hasn't been one satisfactory bit of information to come out of that. Even like their big play yesterday was like, we're beefing up the hotline. Oh, the hotline. It used to just be NHL personnel that could call it. No, it can be anybody in hockey. You get pressed for even the most remote detail

on their plans for this, hotline beef up. Nothing. Nothing. They had no deliverable thing on their single big, like this is how we're going to combat it. Like,

lie better. Bullshit us better than you did yesterday. They can't even do that effectively anymore. Good God. Can you have... Again, again, again, Cole Cofield sent down to the Val Rocket yesterday. Big, big news out of Montreal.

Can you have an... person who is representing the owners in the commissional league, like, that's his job. Not be, like, are there good examples of somebody who's running a league who, I guess, like, no, the NBA seems to get it okay, right? They're, they're goblins is a rule. Like, that's what I'm saying. Do you have to just be some version of a lawyer to protect the billionaire's pockets to have that position? Are we just being unrealistic, like, polyattish? The only, the only way it works and the only way

it works with leagues is when they're shamed into doing the right thing. Roger Goodell is a creep. Rob Manfred might hate baseball. Adam Silver comes as close as you can get, but results are mixed depending on who you ask about him. They'll do the right thing when they're shamed into it or when it threatens their money. In the NHL isn't in that space. That's what's a that, that's what's amazing is that the other leagues at least have some sense of what will play publicly that they tacked to and there is nothing there right they're they're not going to do the right thing and they're not going to do the smart thing either from a public from a public relation standpoint and that is what consistently blows my mind about this league is you would think that they would that self-preservation

instincts would kick in at some point and they never do and it's a Amazing. It's amazing. And yesterday was example 1A, B, C through J. It was, and it was a parade of them. And I'm obviously still angry about it almost 24 hours later. Coming up next. Bryce Salvador. A great conversation with Bryce. Let's jump to that. As much as I like stoking Sean Gentile's fires when he's angry, it's equal parts exhausting in. And, you know, like, it's, it's brutal. And like, I want to give Bryce the floor because what he, he's actually, you know, not saying actually out there doing things. Like, like, whatever. He's doing things.

He's making a change. And yeah, we all have to be prepared for what that, what happens when we say, hey, enough is enough. We're going to do things differently because here comes blowback from team hockey culture and hockey parents and all that. It's, that's what's next for everybody. As we say, uncle, we're done with this. We're going to do things differently.

now on, here comes the blowback. And he did what should have been a layup. Hey, kids are in the hospital. Let's not play. The right thing to do. And we'll let him tell. You'll actually believe exactly what happened next. Uh-huh.

We'll be right back. And we're back. And we are thrilled to be joined right now with former NHL captain, Bryce Salvador, and who you can hear him. He's great with the Daily Face Off of the French. makes their belly. You can hear them doing devil's analysis. Bryce is always a great conversation, always insightful, but we, first of all, Bryce, how are you? Thank you for doing this. Well, you know, it's a, I think everyone is in a tough place emotionally, right? It's been a tough

week if you're involved in youth hockey or NHL hockey, full spectrum of hockey. It's just been tough. And so I think, you know, I know the time we're recording this, I haven't had a chance to really dive into it, but I know Gary Betman, you know, had his, you know, a conference today. And so it's just, it's tough, right? And we're all trying to navigate it. I know you guys are, you know, doing the best you can to stay on top of things. And it's, it's tough. It's a tough.

It's a tough. It's heavy in, and it just, but I think the important thing is for us, you have to keep talking about it. You have to keep highlighting things. And you have to share when you have moments like you did over the weekend, Bryce. And so if you can, and if you're not following Bryce, you can follow them at Bryce Salvador and check out his string of tweets that led us to wanting to have him on here. But Bryce, can you share the story a little bit for those who might have not seen that? Well, yeah. You know, first off, it was just really humbled by the interaction that it got.

It wasn't something that I was quite frankly expecting to see the feedback. And I respected at everybody's comments, even the ones that were negative and maybe didn't believe in my opinion. I think those are equally important in terms of making sure that everyone is weighing in on conversations like this. Youth hockey, unfortunately guys, is really going the wrong way. It's a toxic environment when you walk into that rink. And quite frankly, I really believe that just listening to everything that happened to Kyle Beach and over the last week and everything that he went through

the courage that he had to stay with his story for over a decade. Like I said, it's commendable, right? I can't even imagine being 20 in the National Hockey League and bringing those allegations and having them dismissed and then people make him fun of you and go for 10 years. And so when you start hearing things like that and then you start hearing people saying, hey, this stuff isn't right. Like who, like we need more people standing up for things, being advocate for change and whatever that environment is.

And I think that, you know, it really, I think, left an impression on me because after this weekend, you know, what I went through, it was stuff that I've been through before. In youth hockey, you go into these rinks and, you know, all the parents are fighting, the kids. kids are fighting, you know, the coaches are screaming at the refs, the players are screaming at the refs, the parents are screening after the rest, then people are fighting after the game, kids are getting hurt, and we're just throwing them back on the ice. And so it really just got to the point that after this week, and I'm like, if I'm not going to say something as a former captain in the National Hockey League, who is?

And then do I have a little bit of a social responsibility to try to effectively make change? and can I help that? It's not going to happen overnight. And by no means, is it to alienate or single out, you know, any one coach, any one player, any one parent, but we need to make a change. And so not to go along and win it, but basically what it ended up happening was we're up in the tournament and, you know, all the top teams are up there for our age group and, you know, we have a very strong team and we want to play all the best teams.

and they want to play my team. And I hate to say the word my team, but just the team that I coach. And so as the tournament gets going, Saturday morning happens. That's our last round robin game. We have a kid that's defending the play. He goes hard into our own goal to stop a goal.

Crash has really hurts himself. You know, he's winded. I rush on the ice and I see him and he comes to a bit. and he's, he can breathe. He's got the wind knocked at him. The first thing this kid says is like, if a pucker in the net, right? Like not worried about his health,

not worried about anything else. We're like, no, you, your play saved the rule, right? But unfortunately, it turned out, you know, after the game, he had to go to the hospital. And, you know, I'm not going to disclose, you know, his injury, but, you know, he had to go to hospital to stay overnight. So that was in the morning of Saturday.

So we're down a kid already Saturday. morning. We're playing top competition. So now the second game comes Saturday, which is the quarter finals. And we win that game. And without a kid already. So, you know, we kind of rally the kids, you know, around, you know, playing for a teammate. And so it's emotional moment already. Fast forward the next day, Sunday morning. Now we're in the semifinals. And we play a very competitive team. and we're winning that game. It's 4-1 with one minute left, and our kid gets injured in a situation where he was vulnerable.

And the kid is on the ice and he's not moving and it's a scary moment. And I just stop and I want to preface that I'm not being hypocritical here that that I've never hit somebody in a vulnerable position in my whole career and that I haven't coached players that haven't hit kids. in vulnerable situations. In fact, it's happened this year. And we've talked to those kids and we've addressed it and used them as teaching moments to say, hey, this is not right.

This is the moment. What were you thinking? And in a situation when we were really bad, the kid wrote a letter to the family and apologizing and stuff like that. So that's how we use it as teaching moments because injuries are part of the game. They're going to happen. It's tough to take out that emotion. But at 12 years old, I'm still of the opinion that there's no ill intent.

in a 12-year-old kid to say, I'm going to go out there and maliciously try to injure this kid. It happens because of circumstance. I believe it happens because it predicated because the kid might get reamed out by the coach. You know, they're 12, go out there, you know, we're losing respect. Or the kid might be re-rated by his parents because they lost the game. So I'm very sensitive to that, right? And I've been in those situations. I live, though.

So I'm not being hypocritical on the hip itself. But the moment is that we are now dealing with this kid that's injured. He's on the ice. We need to get an ambulance. My team is getting disruptive. They're looking for blood, you know, and we're trying to manage them. We're trying to manage the kid on the ice. The refs don't know what to do.

There's a minute left. We just call the game to give us our team to win. So now we're dealing with all this. Now I can see from my parents' expressions, my kids are going to walkrooms. Like, it's just, it's chaos. right they're 12 years old they don't know how to manage this emotion right the second kid now on their team that's gone to the hospital so they're 12 so now i'm just immediately like okay well okay we we need to take time out here okay talk to the rink director told them hey like tell the

tournament director we're not going to be able to play the finals right we're going to forfeit that game just you know and and what happened after that was just dumbfounded like i still am lost for words Like I get into the lobby because I'm thinking, well, I'm going to have to talk to the coach. I don't know who this coach is in the team are playing. Probably talk to some parents, whatever, and just kind of navigate, walk through this. And the mindset in that lobby, right, once it got out that we weren't going to play was just crazy. Like, nobody was asking me how the kids were doing. They're like, what do you mean you're not playing?

Like, no, no. Like, do you have numbers? Like, do you have enough guys to play? And I'm like, excuse me? Like, what do you mean? like I got to see if this kid is okay. He's left on a stretcher. You know,

he wasn't feeling his body for about five, six, seven minutes. And I, I, I was, like, sir,

I was using sir. I was being very polite. Like, sir, like, we're not playing. He's like, so just, you're just going to pack up and leave.

Right? I'm like, yes. Right? And I'm, like I'm, like I'm, like I totally respect that you guys

came here. You guys want to play us. I said, we want to play you. It's the finals. Right. I'm so sorry that this has come to this, but this game isn't going to happen. And he couldn't wrap it around his mind, nor could the parents, no, it could people.

So I'm not just single him out. It's just people, right? And so I left there and then parents are screaming. And when I walk out, they're fighting or screaming at kids. Kids are screaming at parents, right? It's coming almost a blows. And all over people wanting me to manipulate the mindset of 12-year-olds to get them to play a game, right? Yeah, I can do that. I know I can do that. Right, right. But I was

also trying to protect the other team. My kids are looking for blood. Right. So they may go injure one of their players. No one's even thinking about that. They're just thinking about, oh, this, you know, what about our players that need to play this game? Right. So everybody's ego needs to be reset as well. Like everybody's egos is, you know, wants this game to happen. So, you know, the egos are the parents, right? So that we can say, we had this championship game with, you know, and I just kind of circled back and said, like, these are 12 year old kids. They're not professionals.

They're not being paid, right? No scout. Whether it's D1, NHL, you know, at this tournament to watch 12 year olds. They haven't even hit puberty yet. And in fact, I had kids before the morning game on Sunday talking about Halloween. They're hoping they're going to get back in time because we're up in the Boston area, back to New Jersey, so they can still get a lot. for trick-or-treating.

Because that's what 12-year-olds to be worried about. That is a concern of a 12-year-old is how much candy he's going to score. Yeah. And so I just left there and I was like just like dumbfounded wondering like this is this is not good. This not healthy. Yes, it's been going on for a while. Youth hockey. But you know, you hear every ref I run into now they want to quit.

There's a lack of refs that want to be evolved in this game because everyone screams at them. And so, you know, I just hope that if anything comes out of some of the discussions here is that people will reflect on situations, right, and look back and say, wow, like, what was I thinking at that moment, right? And then maybe moving forward, other people be like, okay, hey, okay, is this in the best interest of the kids? And it's not to say, hey, every time something gets injured, we're not playing games. It's not that. It's not like the kid, you know, took a shot and he's got a swore when he can't skate, right? We had a traumatic, emotional, visual situation happened.

Twice. And quite. Right. Right. And where 12-year-old kids cannot compartmentalize that, right? They're just, you know, and so we have to be respectful. As coaches, parents, you know, I always believe that, hey, rule number one is we've got to make sure the kids, um, health and safety is number one.

one. And again, like not to be a hypocrite. Like I'm not saying I'm a perfect youth hockey coach. I'm not saying that, hey, I haven't made mistakes as a youth hockey coach. I haven't, I'm not saying that I haven't wanted to win at times at all costs because maybe I'm getting upset the way the other coaches are treating me or disrespect to me. I've lived that. I've been there, right? But I try to look at each situation and try to manage it and process and say, hey, Bryce, am I getting out of line here? I need to take a breath. Right. And it's partly the reason why people say, Bryce, you're on the bench. You never scream.

Why aren't you screaming at the kids? Why aren't you screaming at the rest? I said, sometimes I am. But I already know, and I know that I have a different perspective because I played. And I also try to understand that other coaches and parents may not be able to see that. You know, like I can watch a play and say that is a penalty. Right. Like, no, that wasn't a goal.

Like I, you know, you know, and so I also keep that perspective too, that not everyone can see it as quickly as a place happening. So, you know, so again, you know, that's just kind of, you know, where, where I'm at with youth hockey. And I've just really just kind of felt compelled that we need more people that have platforms that can talk about this and just say, hey, we're all making mistakes. But can we change this? Because if not, hockey is going the wrong direction.

Well, I mean, that's what struck me through all this, Bryce is here we have this poignant moment where it was like all anyone talked about and all you would read is, hey, things have to change enough. Like, here's this courageous player and we're all sick about it and it was heavy and to a person, everybody was sick. And two days later, you say, or whenever it was, all right, I am going to, I'm not just going to say something. I am going to make a change and we're going to, we're going to consider the kids' health and

we're going to do this. And every, and 12 year old hockey, people can't, you know, We're trying to make this incremental change or whatever it is. We're all trying to stand up and do the right thing. Moving forward, it's not good enough just to say, I feel bad for Kyle Beach and we're going to then go back to being how it was. And that you're doing the right thing and that's the response is so discouraging.

It's so discouraging to me. Like I was like in this moment of time, if we can't have these conversations and start trying to do things differently, you know, then when can we? Or is this just like, is this sport so broken at, at every level that, you know, the fight is, is, I mean, impossible.

I don't know. Well, I think we just need more people talking about it, right? Yeah. I just, at the end of the day, I would have never done that two weeks ago. Yes. Three weeks ago. I know that. Like, I've been in you talking for a while.

We all talk about how, you know, there's so many parts of it that are broken. Yes, it's not changing overnight, nor. Or, you know, but if more and more people aren't going to talk about it and have discussion, and to your point, Craig, not just say, okay, well, it'll just go away and, and we'll talk about it today. And then, you know, more days, everyone got, you know, the interaction and then just dies. If then we won't have change. And so, you know, the interaction that I've gotten from people that have text me, people that, you know, are that are owners of. the youth hockey programs, you know, people that are in stakeholders in different positions

in youth hockey have reached out. And I was surprised. Like I wasn't really thinking that so many people would respond to this like that. Like I just assumed that everyone in their own little area is kind of trying to manage things. And it seems that what I've become more and more apparent is I'm not alone in terms of people wanting to figure out how to help Utah. Because it's, It's not healthy. How far down the hill? Like, how much worse has things gotten culturally with youth are? And these things with parents yelling at refs and players yelling at refs and whatever.

I mean, like, you've been a youth coach for a decent chunk now. Is it getting worse year over year? Like, how, I guess that's really hard to quantify to be honest. Is it getting worse? Or are we getting more attuned to the problems that are, that are baked in? to it, right? You said two or three weeks ago, maybe your response to, you know, what you dealt with over the weekend is different. So, like, as we see things like Kyle Beach and just the various, you know, all these, all these different situations, everybody's waiting through,

are we perceiving these, these events differently, or are they getting measurably worse? That's a great question. I think, uh, I think both. I think that I definitely sensed a different energy in rinks, you know, uh, since COVID. since everyone's kind of come out, it's almost like everyone's trying to make up for the lost time. Right. And, and it's like, you know, my son wasn't able or daughter wasn't able to skate for five, six months. I got to get him on the ice. He's got to make up for it. Oh, you know, we got to get these games. And we've got to, right. So I do sense that, right? There's a, there's a little, there's a lot more angst in terms of, you know, what did we miss or are we behind in our, in our son or daughter's development because of COVID. So I definitely see that. And then I think that there's less tolerance in refs, right?

Where they just had enough. So that at times can, you know, make the games challenging because if they're not calling or the right calls or they're just mentally drained because this is their 10th game. Like I've literally had ref companies say, I've done 10 games today. And it might be by themselves because their partner decided not to show up. So I said that, I go, oh, shoot, we got one ref. right? And this is an important game. I cringe, right? Because it's impossible. I know he's missing off sides. I know that he's not going to be able to see if the puck actually crossed the goal line because he could be at the other end. A lot of times these refs can't even skate

properly. Right. So you know this game's going to be a disaster. So, so yes, there's this element of it is getting worse from that perspective. But I also do think that there is an old an awareness now of what maybe is right and and people perspectives and their lenses are opening up like and I would say like my the team that I coach like probably the wild like maybe three weeks or maybe whatever like I think day two would be like okay we got to play and even maybe myself like I'd be like hey like they were up here like this team came all this way in and yeah why are we why not like right like i said i'm not i'm not trying to be a hypocrite right but this weekend i think what happened with kyle and really the long-term ramifications of potentially what's happening to a 12-year-old

kid um weighed in on on this decision and and all the parents of my team like there wasn't even a question that we that hey we're not playing it was just it was it was it was assumed right and and the kids were like, you know, how, you know, and when they, everybody kind of settled down, you know, no one, you know, the only, the only kid was like, say, hey, are you sure we're not playing was our goalie because he needs to be mentally prepared, right? So, right? He's like, can I, can I, you know, coach, can I really turn off my, you know, my preparation, right? Because, you know, and that's the goalie for you, right? But, you know, and then you could just see the weight, you know, come off his shoulders. Um, so, you know, so, you know, so, you know,

Sean, it's a, I don't have a definitive answer to your question, but I hope that there, you know, there is an awakening. I mean, also, you seem so concerned about being perceived as a hypocrite here. Like, you said it a million times. Like, were you taking shit from parents? Because it was like, oh, I remember you boarded somebody in 2009 or whatever it is. Does that stop you from, from being able to do the right thing. now. I think that's something that in a weird way that that that connects to the Kyle

beat situation because it's like, well, we did we did the wrong thing then and that precludes us from doing the right thing now. It's the same kind of mindset that that you're hearing from people who are mad at you over this. Well, you know, and maybe that's the former captain in me. Like I just, you know, to a fault, guys, I like to take an. I like to take an. everybody's perspective. Because if you're not in their shoes, you don't know 100% what's going through their mind. Right.

And, and, and, and I know that I don't do everything perfect, right? So I don't like to try to hold myself above everybody else. Like I'm some almighty, you know, former NHL captain, right? It's, it's, you know, I'm very respectful to other people because at the end of the day, like, it was, In the NHL, that really means something. And maybe I get respect in the youth hockey space and maybe people listen to my opinion. But it also comes of responsibility. Right.

And if I want people to buy in or believe in my messaging, I can't then be saying that, hey, I'm perfect when people are going to say, well, hey, what are you talking about? I see how you act sometimes because we all get caught up in emotion, right? And I also believe that if you make people feel safe, that, hey, you know, that they aren't like in a 100% a bad person because they made a wrong decision, maybe they will change, right? Maybe they hear Bryce say, hey, I've made mistakes.

I've hit people in bad situations. I've made wrong calls with 12 year olds. But I'm aware of it. I'm trying to process it. Then I can get hopefully them to buy it versus me trying to say, I'm all mighty. And you find a way to not say like, I was also the captain of a Eastern Conference Champion team and I am the head and I am and I am and I am and I am the head coach of two players

who are just taken to the hospital over the last 24 hours. So maybe like defer to my perspective here. That's a tough balance. That's a tough balance to strike. I don't know how you didn't freak out on these people is basically what I'm saying. Like I like congratulations on not on not making it worse at least. Well, well yeah, you look a lot of people say that I'm really calm and and collective and cool. And like, why don't I just go off on people? Because again,

this is just the other side of me where I'm, I don't know their perspective, right? Like, I, you know, they want to play the game. They've got a team that's coming in.

I don't know the pressure that they're under. So the coach and all that. So I try to be caught. You know, I almost literally did lose it on this individual because I just, it was like we're five, six minutes in. And,

And he just wasn't, it wasn't registering. And to me, he honestly seemed like a, you know, a very astute individual. Like, he wasn't, you know, he just, I could just tell, like, the ego of where youth hockey is that, that's grown on every parent is, is dangerous. Right. And the only thing that gives me perspective is because I've lived it myself, like, in terms of I did play a, in the NHL. I do understand all the challenges. I, you know, so I can reflect back and say, you know what, I'm genuinely not living through my son. Like, I'm not living through these kids. I want to give them the best experience. I want them to, when they're done being, you know, with me that no matter

what they do, whether they play high school hockey, professional hockey, whatever, club hockey, that they will look back and say, you know, Coach Salvador, you know, did everything he could for us. And that we learned a lot of great lessons, discipline, respect, empathy, how to conduct ourselves. Because at the end of the day, that's all I can really impart on them. I can't go on the ice and score the goals for them. But I can hopefully lead them down the path of making more. right decisions than wrong. And so, so, so I, you know, so Sean to kind of like answer your question there, it's more of, um, I really go out of my way to make sure that I remember

that a lot of the people that I run to run into haven't played in the national hockey. Right. This is their dream. Right. And so I don't want to tarnish their dream. I don't want to take it away from them either. I want those kids to aspire and to compete. And I want to, I want everybody who plays youth hockey to have success, not just the kids of my team. Right. But so, so, so it's a fine balance. And, and I think that it kind of goes back to this situation this past weekend. I just really felt compelled that, you know, maybe if I start having some dialogue,

yes, they're uncomfortable dialogues. Right. And, and I don't know where they'll go or not go. and I'm also, why did I say, you know, I'm not a, you know,

I don't want to be a hypocrite because at the end of the day, like, you know, if people want to come out and say, hey, Salvo, we've seen you do this. Do that.

I'll say, you're absolutely right. Let's have a conversation. Right. Chazer, I'm probably not still doing it. Right. You know,

I've changed my perspective on some things, right? When I was, you know, coaching, when I first started coaching when the kids were six, right?

I just retired. Right? People come up to say, you know what, What does Salvador know about coaching? Right? Flat out, people say, why are you going to play for Salvador? Just because he played a natural hockey doesn't mean he's a good coach.

And you know what I would say, Sean? I would say, you're absolutely right. I don't know anything about coaching. But you know what? I'm going to learn fast. Yeah. Right? And so not to discredit anybody because if they make a fair point and it's valid,

I'm going to acknowledge it. I'm not going to discredit people because I got an ego. I didn't know how to coach. When I had six-year-olds and seven-year-olds on the ice, I didn't know what drill. I'm doing full-ice flow drills and all this. And I'm like, wow, like, these kids can't do this. Like, I had to reset my thought process. Yeah, they're six.

They're six or seven, right? They can, they don't know where they're supposed to go. They don't know all the slang, right? Holy cow, I don't know how to coach. These guys are right. So, so at the end of the day, it's like, you know, you need to know when it's appropriate to have an ego and not to. and and so you know I'm kind of being a little bit redundant and coming full circles here guys but so that's why you know it's tough for me to just you know come out and say that hey I know all

because you were all human and we're all always learning right so you did I mean you reacted as a human being in that moment that was a that was a that was a human decision first to call off that last game that was not necessarily a hockey coach decision or a hockey culture decision it was recognizably human. And I think that's what has been such a problem for people over the last week, is you see those men in that room with the Blackhawks not behaving recognizably like human beings. Like they're like that like not doing the bare minimum, just like writing off their their duty as people in deference to their duty as as front office employees of the Chicago Blackhawks. So to see your actions as like person first, I think over the last few days has been really.

interesting. And that to me is the big challenge facing the league moving forward is to how to get people to respond like human beings rather than products of the game. And I don't know how that happens. And I know we're coming off this Betman Presser, which was just wild for a million reasons. So it's all fresh on my mind. But like how do you how do you do that moving forward to encourage more people first kind of decision making? Because we haven't seen it. That's why we're here in the first place. Well, how it happens. And now I'm a testament. Now I'm not trying to equate my emotional experience over the weekend to anything that happened with Kyle. So I just want to preface that. But at the end of the day, I can guarantee you things have changed. There's going to be no

organization that's not going to, you know, turn over every stone if someone brings an allegation forward. Right. So that's how change happens. Now, you know, that's why I'm saying, It's heroic, what Kyle did, you know, and what he went through over the last 10 years, right? Yes, we're all upset that it wasn't handled correctly. The culture, the mindset, everything was different back in 2010. I was in those locker rooms 2010. It's not to absolve anybody from the decisions that were not done, not to absolve the PA, right? But, you know, like, Kyle will have a dramatic impact.

on all things hockey moving forward in terms of how people are treated. So the human element will come forward now because of what he did. And we're all going to say it's always too late, right? We're always going to say these decisions were made wrong. But, you know, I always believe that, you know, things happen for reason, but they never happen on our time table. So, yes, it's 10 years later. but the league is reacting.

Now, we're all going to have different opinions on whether it's the final was enough, if the decisions were made or not made, all the people, the right people were held accountable and all that stuff. But with social media and everybody now hypersensitive to this and understanding that this is not right, right? Then you can have change. And so, and I think where a lot of,

people always get, you know, tied up or or kind of stuck in the thought, in their thought processes when they don't see change happen overnight, right? And I also, you know, and I kind of, you know, again, not to draw parallels or anything, but it's just for me, it's the diversity in the game, right? I'm a, you know, I come from a biracial family and everyone, you know, saying, well, we need change. We need inclusion and all that. And the same thing happens there. It's not fast enough for everybody. Right. But then when I, you know, put in perspective, I say, well, when I started in 2000, compared to where we are now in 2021, I've seen tremendous change. Has it happened fast enough? No. Right. Does there still room

for improvement? Absolutely. But we just have to continue to go through the process and continually have discussions. And we just keep hoping that more and more of these type of stories really don't happen. But I really do think, Sean, that I'd be very surprised if you're ever going to hear of an allegation, not thoroughly vetted moving forward in the National Hockey League. My plea to people listening is that I've seen over the last few days, people are like, I'm done with the sport. And I think it's going to take people that care deeply about people and about hockey to really

have that change that you're talking about. price happen and not and not bail right or else we're leaving it to the to the you know the whatever that created the hockey culture so I just I if you're listening to this and you coach a youth hockey team you know make the tough decisions that lead with humility and with heart and compassion and thoughtfulness and and then and no you're going to deal with you know you're going to deal with the blowback because people don't like to change and they like the way things were. And there's people that

are gatekeepers in that and there's people that are benefiting from it. But if we just give up on the sport, and this is something that's been on my mind, like if we just say,

wash our hands of hockey and say it's never going to change, then that's right. It won't. But I thank you, Bryce, for doing what you did and not only doing it,

then sharing it on Twitter because I know that leads to blowback. And then not only that. Right. And then, you know, and then bringing, you know, using your platform to then continue to talk about it. Because I know there's people that are listening to this that probably hate all of this.

They're like, oh, this is, you know, what's wrong or whatever. You know, we need people like you to stand up. And I just hope people keep fighting. That's all. Thanks, Bryce, for doing this. Well, thanks for having me, guys. It was, uh, these are tough conversations, you know, nobody wants to have. But so I appreciate you guys, uh, you know, giving me the time and, and, uh, you know,

hopefully we'll continue to see progress. I am just so happy people like Bryce Salvador exist and have meaningful, impactful jobs in this space and not just in the NHL level at the 12-year-old level. And that's, I don't know, this is, that was awesome. And I'm thankful he's around doing what he's doing. We know a lot of youth coaches and it's great to see that there's people like Bryce out there who don't just have the perspective of an NHL captain and the guy who played in the league forever. but he cares and he's committed to change.

And I don't know, let's get a couple thousand more of guys like that, please. That would head off a lot of problems at the past. And it was, I'm glad you asked him about it because it was so clear he was anticipating the argument back almost with every point he used. And I know I've, you know, coached. Like, because you know, there's people that are like, yeah, but you did. I saw it. And it's like, stop it.

Here's your, here's your hockey fights page. Like, I remember, I remember when you fought such and, like, it's wild. I don't know what's wilder. The fact that he had perspective to realize that that was going to come or the fact that it was absolutely going to happen. You know, if it didn't happen, it would have. Someone being like, yeah, you boarded such and such 10 years ago. Unbelievable. All right.

Well, let's take a quick break. And we're going to wrap up with some questions, as always, from our comments section of the app. This is the fun part of the show. We can have like a 10 minute ballot cleanser after that. What we like to do here, and we've got the snowball rolling down the hill in kind of a fun way, is we want people to leave comments on the show page in the athletic app on the episode page each week. Super easy to get to. Just go to www.com.

go to the Apple store. Sometimes I just mindly navigate to it on my phone because it's so easy. It's like playing with the fidget spit or something. It's very relaxing. But yes, go to the episode page, leave a comment. We had 18 last week, which is, I think, maybe a record for us. We are conditioning for people. The fact that we're getting comments on a podcast, this is, we should be answering.

But now that we do it on the podcast, I don't want to jump in an answer. So every one of these is appreciated. and red and we laugh about them. I'm told, and again, I'm told, I'm told that there's a decent amount and I'm told they're very good because as we have a long established, I don't know how to get to this on the app. That's right. I can't find, I can't find this myself.

Craig is passing this along. So two things. We recorded the David Backus episode last week. And I'm thankful, like people figured it out because shortly after it dropped all the Kyle Beach stuff hit in it. And if you go back and listen to it, it just sounds like we decided to ignore it completely. Oh, man. Brutal.

And we're like, if you, like, we made a couple jokes. It sounded like almost like we, like, it was like, hey, we don't want to have Mark Lazarus on this podcast. Like, there was like three Lazarus cracks. We were talking. We were talking in the Blackhawks suck on the ice. Yes. We were very much in like, hey, which are the blackhawks? That was, that was the capacity that we were speaking in last week because I believe they'd just lost to Christ almighty.

Who was it? Who was it the night before? It doesn't matter. But they're horrible, obviously. And that was the mindset we were in. And then, you know, an hour after it posts, we know what happens. So I'm glad people picked up on it, right? That we weren't, that the timing was not great, but also that we weren't speaking in any capacity.

Like, we were still, we were still living in a pre. Thank you for giving us the benefit of the doubt that we wouldn't ignore the biggest story. And like, really, I was expecting to go under the comments to be like, hey, let's talk to the readers or the listeners. Hey, let's interact. And to be a bunch of you guys are assholes for not talking about this. Like, that's what I was literally expecting. And thank you for realizing we aren't completely. Sincerely, sincerely thank you guys for giving us the benefit of the doubt there.

Because it was, you know, just unfortunate, unfortunate, unfortunate timing and probably some unfortunate, completely coincidental topics that we were on before that. Thank you. All right. So, with that. Matt Kay says, so we've been accused of injuring Jack Hughes, which is defamatory. I won't stand for it. It's not our fault. He got hurt.

I can't say that enough. Nothing could offend me more than the implication that we would do anything to harm any member of the Hughes family. I mean, oh, speaking of which, Quinn Hughes, get ready for it, folks. He's coming. He's coming. Hughes is coming. Quinn is coming. Matt Kay says,

hey guys, if it helps at all, I have Hughes and fantasy and my team name is Ann Hugheser Bush. That's American. You couldn't make a more American name. Let's be a St. Louis.

Chris Jay, I love it. You can always get on if you talk about thrash. You need to get Brad Larson on the show while dressed in Thresher's gear. Last week they wanted us in Frasher's gear. We get Brad Larson.

Brad Larson, by the way, one of my favorite interviews when I was covering the thrashers. He was a good dude. Yeah. I think. I mean, I can't assume anything anymore, but yeah.

I remember him popping up a lot. Chris H says, please never stop jumping on each other to interrupt the guess answers. Chris, you are in luck. That is our pledge to you, my friend. I'm so bored.

I can't even get through this. We can't even read your comments without us interrupting. your comments about us to interrupting. So bored of the standard Q&A format. You guys make it fun for the listener and the guest. I guess. I don't know if I think Jack Hughes was why he gave up. He stopped it.

Like, if you go back and listen, maybe I saw it because we were on Zoom. He was like, fine. You guys want to just talk. You guys just talk. That's fine. I'll just go. I'll be over here. Yeah.

Who gives his shit what I have to say. That's right. That's right. Chris says, you make it fun for the listener and the guest. Manscaped is the best sponsor ever, never change my precious little cinnamon buns. And always remember, fuck the marmosets. Whatever that is. I don't know.

Hey, hey, Craig. Speaking of precious little cinnamon buns, I've got something that will take care of your precious little cinnamon buns this Christmas season at Manscaped. It's the ball, it's the ball deodorant, my friend. William T. They've gotten so much mileage out of us, Manscapes. we should get a cut. William T. says,

Sean needs a medal. Again, I'm not reading these ahead of time. So if this is bad, I'll stop. Sean, this is Ron Burgundy.

Sean needs a medal for the restraint he showed by not asking Bacchus about what condiments he will have available when learning he was starting a chain restaurant. That's good. We got a, we have a stick to sports

subscriber there, my friend. Yes. Big condiment boy. The only time Sean showed restraint in his life. Maybe in my life. Luke. Lucas says, got to be honest here, guys.

As an athletic subscriber, listening to the podcast on the athletic app, I feel like I'm missing out by not getting the ad reads. This is amazing to me. I made the long track out of the comment section to ask that you include out to the comment section. So Lucas took the 15 steps necessary from wherever Lucas. You packed the lunch. Lucas made the long track. out to the comments section to ask that you include the ads in the athletic app as well.

Great show guys. We'll get right up. We'll get right on that. Like, we've made our, we've made a name for ourselves for being ad free, clean, you're getting things. And now you're asking for ads once. This is just layers. This is layers of irony. Like, there's that, there's the fact that I am completely a vehicle for, you know, late capitalism here, where I'm debasing myself to sell ball tremors because I think it's funny. Yeah, there's a lot of, it's a, there's a, there's a, there's a lot going on. Would like 2010, Sean feel like you sold out in some way or would he, 2000 or 2005 show? You know what I mean?

Or would he get the irony or the whatever, whatever it is, the performance art? I can tell you, we'll say, 2006 Sean certainly thought he would be a sellout when I was a all in on being a, you know, whatever, guerrilla journalist or whatever my plan was back on. I just finished, it's top of mind, I just finished Jeff Tweedy's new book. You'd be shocked to hear everyone listening that I'm a Wilco fan

because I'm a 45-year-old dad. The new one or the one? Let's leave so we can come back or whatever it is. It was, I think it's from 2018 or 19. It's not a new book in it. You know why? Well, new to me. New because I had,

I hadn't seen it in my hands until this week. That was a gift to my dad at Christmas 2019 or whatever it was. And then I bought two copies, one for him and one for myself. So that's how you know that my father was born in 1960 and I was born in 1986. You guys are the rare. You split the time. Both bought the Jeff Tweety book. That's great.

So Tweety says, talks about selling out and says, just because our music is in a commercial, we're making money off it. We're making money off of our commercials. Like, it's ridiculous to suggest that that's selling out in any form. Great, great book wreck for anybody who has, anybody who's cared about post-Nirvana punk music

in that entire scene, sell out by Dan Ozzie. It came out last week. I've started reading it. Dan was a critic for Weiss before they laid everybody off. And then wrote kind of a band-by-band look at, at the concept of selling out. So it starts with Green Day and there's a chapter about Jawbreaker

and there's a chapter about at the drive-in and on and on, all these punk bands who had like kind of major label feeding frenzies around them at one time or another. It's a complete wheelhouse shit for me. Like there's not a book that I could be more interested in than that. And it's in it delivers. Came out last week. Really good.

Great. You should have told Jack Hughes that. We should send that to Jack. He was still looking for book racks and we couldn't come up with any. Jack can read about the process that led to Thursday, the band from New Brunswick, New Jersey, signing with Island Deaf Jam, in like 2002, I'm sure I'll love it. Nicholas Kaye says, are we sure Sean isn't a Canadian sleeper cell?

This is a good question. How dare you? Turning on the canes, which you have completely turned on the canes. I hate them, yes. A non-traditional market seems pretty Canadian to me. I bet. The problem last week was that I swapped out non-traditional market, Carolina for non-traditional market, Florida.

Good timing on that. Was not time particularly well. Oh, that was all part of our podcast right before everybody made, the world exploded. And it was like, you know who I love? The Florida Panthers, coached by the great Joel. They do everything right there. So I'm back on the Panthers.

I renounce, I renounce, or I'm back on the Hurricanes. I announced the hurricanes. On the roster, yes. Not in the C-suite. Okay. Nicholas. Still not a fan of 36% carloans. Still on a car loan of 30%

Nicholas says, I bet you've never even eaten Bojangles or gotten a cookout tray and shake. Buddy, you have stepped in it. I lived in Charlotte, North Carolina for five years. I put on significant weight back then because of the introduction of Bojangles to Sean was huge, by the way. To my daily life.

Disgusting a half, solid. Short little fat guy. That was me. And cookout every, every once a month or so, I think of, and I'm saddened by the fact that cookout isn't, what's the farthest north they get is like Raleigh maybe? Like up in North Carolina. It's the greatest place on earth because you can get corn dogs as a side. Great milkshakes. The trays are one of God's great inventions.

So you came at the wrong one, dude. I'm all about North Carolina. Big fan of that state. Caroline A says, so you might want to rethink your Carolina turn around. Sean's right. Vives are way off in Carolina. Quirky underdog stick works until it doesn't. You can't meme your way out of signing Tony DiAngelo.

That is well said and completely true. Wow. Caroline. Love it. That's so, yeah, you're got to, you're going to, have to find a new hipster team, Sean. I hate the Panthers again. Will C says the show gets better every week.

Thanks, Will. With the premier hockey federation coming to ESPN plus this season, is there any chance of getting some American players from that league on the show? Yes. I would. Sure. Producer Jeff is already on it. I can see him, I can see him working the phones.

That's a great idea. We will do that. Jason Kay says, well, Craig read this comment without looking it over ahead of time. like Ron Brigundy? I'm, Craig Custin. I am in fact doing this, Jason. Correct? Love the show.

And if you two were in charge of a jukebox at a bar, what are you playing on it? Oh my God. I mean, I am often in charge of jukeboxes at bars because I am, I'd love to know over the course of my life how much money I've spent on the Touch tunes app. Mm-hmm. Because it is quite, quite a bit.

Have I ever told you this? One of my, I used to live, I lived really close a bar that I didn't like for a while. And I used to put money in, in the app from my couch. And I would just play the Monster Mash four times in a bar, like, in a row. I was by myself. That's great. So the Monster Man should just randomly come out at the bar.

People are like, what? It'd be like in July. And people would, if you were like, oh, someone played the Monster Mash. And then it would be like, oh, someone played the Monster Mash again. Oh, someone played the Monster Match again. And I would play it until they turned off the jukebox. Wow. So we know Sean's answer.

Petty. Petty. I like to do, my jukebox depends in mood in locale. If I'm with a bunch of Canadians, I do try to play, like I'll do, I do like to at least

acknowledge that I'm with Canadians. And so I'll play the Canadian bands I like like like Blue Rodeo or Sloan, if I can. Is Sloan Canadian? Because I've heard you talk about them before. Yeah, Sloan's Canadian. Are they not? I don't, I don't know.

It seems like people in Michigan love Sloan. Well, it's a long story, but there was an alternative rock channel station called 89X based out of Windsor. And they had an incredible person that was curating music. And there was a reason why he didn't play the hits. I forget what it was. There was a great story written about it in some old music magazine. I'm not to find it. But so we got every, if you grew up in the 90s or later,

80s in Metro Detroit, you got this Windsor Canadian station playing incredible random B-sides of like of these bands, like tragically hip. So I was actually one of the few like Americans that knew these bands. And so it's weird. So maybe that's why I cover hockey. It became just like the universe moving itself in that direction. So I'll do that. I do like to, you know, like the pixies or I like Wilco if I'm out with my wife to bring

it back to Wilco. So that's where I'm at. Or the monster match. Sometimes I'll just put up on the monster match. I actually do have, here's a list of recent plays on the touch on the touch. Oh, so you have actual, so you have the app. So here's what Sean's last five plays. It was a fallout boy song that I played as a joke.

Mac Miller, Anderson Pack, Jeff Rosenstock, a couple of symbols eat guitar songs, great Canadian band Pup, Jim Blossoms, Vampire Weekend, Alcline Trio. Real Big Fish, beer. That's a great jukebox song. That might be it. Beer by Real Big Fish. It's a ska song, but it's very funny. All right.

I knew two of those songs. Which Ginbossom songs? That's at least something. Oh, hey, jealousy. Everyone loves it. All right. A couple killer songs. Oh, I like that.

Caution. Okay. Caution off one of the last records. It's good. Frank Ocean by Forrest Gump. Great. Forrest Gump by Frank Ocean, I mean. Et cetera.

Stephen M. recommends Otter for transcription. This is a little inside baseball. I am looking for a transcription service. I find Otter to get it mostly right, which is problematic to me. It lones you into a sense of... Yeah, it does really well until you're like, hey, that's not what... My favorite transcription story...

You can't wrap up ever. My wife helped behind the bench. I was running behind and had to get the transcript in. And so I was sitting on the... Claude Julian interview, and it was hours and hours of transcription. And she's like, I love transcription. She's like, I'll put headphones on. I'll zone out.

She's like, let me do it. And I'm like, all right. And I go back to read the transcription. And she got it mostly right, but there was multiple, multiple references to filet mignon. And I'm like, why is he keep talking about the Vancouver Canucks and competing against Filet Mignon? and she she had thought he when he said elaine vignon he was talking about filet vignon

and that's and she just was like why this guy loves steak claud julia that'll be or or hate steak that's true I don't think glad julian or maybe they're friends I forgot how it turned out so that's why you got to be careful with transcriptions but thanks for the thanks for the wreck

Yardina says I have nothing substantive to say today I'm here to dump on Craig. Oh, gosh, for mispronouncing my name. Whenever he reads, one of my comments, this is the Ron Burgundy me and me. I'm just, I'm getting crushed here. It's a shorty, Yardinna, right? Like A.

She's like, I expect better for my fellow Americans. And yes, I appreciate the irony of my name being Hebrew Yardana. Is that right? Short A? What's a short A? I don't know how, like, short E is a short E. A. Yerdena.

I'm sorry. We will do better. Bruno L. The archives of the full 60, I thought this was a new version of the full 60 with a new sidekick. It's basically become with that 40-minute-long Bryce Salvador interviews. On year 13 of being your sidekick, I'm completely okay with that. New sidekick, Sean did my sidekick since 2003.

On the original sidekick. This is like if Howard brought back, you know, Jackie Martling or something. My new sidekick, Sean. genteel. Nick L. Hey guys, thanks for the podcast. Before the American version, I was stuck listening to Ian, Haley, and Sean

talk about puns and teams that haven't won a Stanley Cup in over 25 years. Yuck. Your version is clearly. You're the best. Thank you, Nick, clearly. Haley, Haley does not like pun. She has made that known.

She is a pun hater, so the puns, the puns are all on the Mendez side of that, that equation for better and worse. Love listening to you guys. This is Patrick C. By the way, you were about six weeks late calling the hawk season. No way Flower was going to rescue that team with the poorest D in front of him. We were a little slow on that.

You might have been. Craig M says greetings from Port Huron. Hey, all right. Yes, I'll get that thrash your CD case from the cottage. Love the pod. Can I get a little Red Wings love? We don't completely suck now. That's true.

We talked at length yesterday about the Red Wings. Haley and Max and I. Are you pumping up the Canadian episode? I'm pumping up the Sean and Max version of the Canadian episode, also involving Haley Salvin. Max talked, Max had great stuff about the Red Wings yesterday. Give it, give it a listen. Okay. So, you know, people in, I'm in Metro Detroit, so I get asked about the Red Wings a lot.

And for the last several, you know, a lot of like neighbors just say, hey, we're going to be any good this year? It's like, you know, from Major League, whatever. And I'm like, they're going to be terrible. You know, people just want this and they're like, okay, good to know. I'll check out. And this year, everyone will ask us, they said, they're going to be terrible, but this year they'll be fun. And you actually can see the corner being turned and you're going to have good players and prospects and high end. And I made the comparison to the Detroit Tigers who finally had players worth watching in Casey Mize and Scoobel.

And I said, yeah, you have a reason to watch now. And that's exactly right. And maybe they're not even terrible. So yeah, we'll talk Red Wings. Corey Snyder had a good tweet yesterday after Adam Fox signed. he said the Red Wings might as well start carving out nine and a half million dollars from where it's cider right now. Just true. He's a real deal.

He's the real deal. I love him. He's fun to watch. This is from Ifa. Okay, I know it's absolute nonsense, but Ifa is pronounced, Ifa. It's not absolute nonsense. It's not absolute. It is your name.

If we're not like key and peel over here, we want to know how. We want to pronounce things correctly. Tachtheratrix. Balakate. This is from John W. Guys, that was a great interview and listened last week. I also wrote in just whether you were calling the Blackhawk season and a ton has happened since then to say the least.

We all can agree that Kyle Beach threw all of his pain and with all of his courage helped shine a spotlight on so many things the NHL has been truly avoiding. Thank you, John. You said it. You said it. Sean, I really enjoyed your article surrounding the commissioner's typical comments yesterday and how they repeatedly show us who they truly are.

My question is when will the owners and the players say enough is enough is enough with the commissioner and the NHLPA leadership. The owners will never say that. Never. Gary's good at his job from an owner's perspective. And also it's set up where he doesn't need the support of that many owners to continue. That's also worth noting. Like he has the support and even if he didn't, the threshold is so high that he's never going to go.

And we'll see what happens with the NHLPA. It sounds like last night's meeting went a little bit better for Donald Fear than people anticipated. We'll see. The thing about PA stuff, And I'll tell you less about Kyle Beach and what's happening now and more about lockout. Because I've talked to a lot of players is things that we get worked up about and we're like, oh, the players are clearly getting screwed. They don't care.

Tends to, like, there's only so many players who are engaged in it at the level enough to make change. And so you have players who care deeply about PA issues, and this is in general terms. And you have players who just want to go work out and get to play hockey. And like that's just the same as any industry. And so to get meaningful change at the PA level, you need a lot of players to actively care and actively be engaged. And history has suggested that it's hard to get to that point amongst a player, a 700 player organization. Best case scenario is that it takes forever. Worst case scenario is that nobody cares enough to even attempt it.

Is that it? Yeah. That's a wrap. Almost put your head on your desk there. Good God. that's what depressed you about this about this one good god all right thanks to everyone for listening thanks again to Bryce Salvador for joining Bryce is great has an open invitation

to join the podcast you can listen to him on Sarah Valley with Frank Zara Valley on their podcast and you can if you watch Devils he does analysis there so Bryce thanks again for doing that also Sean worth noting Sean and I do the bonus episode. We've got a bonus episode. If you are a subscriber to the Athletic Audio Plus on Apple Podcasts, you get bonus content from our entire network of podcasts at The Athletic.

You start with a 30-day free trial. Then it's just 99 cents a month. And you get all of the bonus podcasts that the Athletic offer. Sean and I are doing it this week. And we're about to record it right now. So go subscribe to the Athletic Audio Plus. And if you're not a subscriber to The Athletic, go to theathletic.com

slash hockey show and you get in for $3.99 a month and you can read Sean Gentilly Day, Sean Gentile's daily dispatches crushing the league. I need a break. Can I take tomorrow off, please? No.

Damn!