The Athletic Hockey Show - How will the NHL salary cap increase affect small market teams?

Episode Date: February 3, 2025

Max and Mark are joined by Pierre Lebrun to discuss the NHL and Players Association announcement of significant salary cap increases over the next three seasons and how it affects every franchise in the league. They go over the four trades from the weekend involving the Canucks, Rangers, Penguins, Stars, Flyers, Sharks and Flames. Jesse Granger stops by to tell us why goalies are getting paid again, debates if Jonathan Quick is a Hall of Famer, and he forecasts the playoff odds for the red hot Detroit Red Wings.Hosts: Max Bultman and Mark LazerusWith: Pierre Lebrun and Jesse GrangerExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff Domet Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. Hey, everybody. Max Boltman here alongside Mark Lazarus for another episode of the athletic hockey show. We're talking trades today after another busy weekend in the NHL. Jesse Granger are going to join us shortly. But let's start by bringing in our NHL insider, Pierre LeBron. And Pierre, Pierre, you're not getting much Friday sleep lately. They're keeping you busy on Friday nights.

Yeah, good thing this past Friday. I decided not to open a ball of wine. I don't know if it was spider sense or what. But yeah, I had a late-night TSN hit to do on that JT Miller trade. And well, you know what? Get it open. I know everyone thinks that when you work at a network like I do, we want everything to be on March 7.

That's James Duffy. He's the host. He's the superstar. Those of us who just work on the breaking news part, I don't care when the trades happen, man. Just get them over with it. Let's go. See, I always think like being a baseball writer would be awful

because the offseason just drags on forever. and the hockey off season is like 36 hours, and then you guys just all screw off to your cabins up in the wood somewhere. Like I would think that this would be excruciating to drag it out for weeks. You're going to have to be like covering the four nations and still have things in the back of your mind. Just there's a lot going on right now. Yeah, I like it because busy means it's easy to find stuff to write about.

And so that's certainly been the case for me of the athletic I've laid. And, you know, that's the juice. Like you want to have things to follow up on. and to look into and the four nations adds an awesome wrinkle to it all and i you know i tweeted this on saturday the stars and the sharks but there were a number of teams about a month ago coming out of the pro scouting meetings and we're telling me you know we don't know we'd actually like to get our work done before four nations and let me be clear because i actually verified this with the league because i just wanted to make sure it's not like there's

an actual trade freeze four nations but think of it as all-star weekend you don't really really year of any trades ever during all-star weekend, right? I mean, it's sort of like an unwritten rule. Don't, don't, you know, don't cast a shadow over the league's big event. And I think that's how teams are going to treat this. But I think there's a more tangible reason to it. And that's that there are four nations players I've been traded over the last week, right? So, you know, a risk of injury when they're playing for their countries and not wanting to deal with that risk.

So, and so, yeah, I've heard of the league, really, have been able to make moves. And we're still a week away from the break. So it's an unusual year that way. Because there's 12 days after Four Nations, 12 days leading up to the March 7th century deadline. We talked about it a little with CJ a few weeks back. And it seemed like there was going to kind of be this weighing of two things. One, they're on your cap during the Four Nations. So they're accruing even though they're not playing for you.

But on the other hand, a lot of these players who are big ticket players, you really need them to transition well. We'll now get sort of a mini camp on the back end of this, although some of them, if they're still playing at the Four Nations, maybe that gets wiped out. But you'll get some practice days for some of these guys, you know, a Philippe, a Jack Drury to help you acclimate a little bit, which maybe you wouldn't get in a normal season. Yeah, no, that's a great point. I mean, listen, it's not like people aren't in agreement on this. If you pull 32 general managers on the show today, it would be 100% that everyone believes if you're acquiring a player as a contender. You want it to be done as early as possible. The problem is in the cap era, that teams are accruing space and having to wait for very obvious reasons, for mathematical reasons.

So it's not like, you know, Jim Rutherford is certainly known as the January trade guy. He always has been from his days in Carolina, Mark Hockey trade. He's in Pittsburgh and now he's the president of Lockhartiaup Bravesant, Vancouver, working alongside GM Patrick Alvin. And guess what? They got their two trades out on January 31st, right before February came. So he maintains his Hall of Fame January reputation. But he's not the only one who's ever thought of it. Of course, the earlier you can get a player into your lineup, the better of the chance that he adjusts properly and has the proper impact on your team from playoff time.

we all agree on that it's just hard and you know i was chatting with kevin shoveled out yesterday for a piece that ran on our site he did both last year and it's not like he can really plan for both he traded for sean monahan on february second last year and then waited all the way to deadline day and got a player that no one knew was on the market until about three days for a deadline day in that player was never available from new jersey until new jersey finally in the last Dyer said, yeah, we're out of it. And here's Tyler DeFolde, who's a terrific player. That's going to happen again, close to the March 7th.

Now, we may not have maybe as busy a day because of all the moves we've seen already. There are still some players that are going to be dealt that day that right now, the three of us talking, have no idea is even available because the standings continue to change. Wins and losses matter, and teams are going to make some last-minute decisions that could the mock cart there coming Mark 7th. Well, that's kind of I mean, Miko Ranton, and we knew it was a slim possibility that he could get moved because he was a pending

UFA who was going to make, you know, probably dry sidel money, but it still kind of came out of the blue. Like, how does, peel back the the curtain a little bit? How does it trade like that? How does it trade like that come together? Is it Colorado? Is it, are they just going, hey, just so you guys know, this is out there or is it Tulski just contacting

them out of the blue? How does it trade like that start and come together? Yeah, so, you know, I've made a point of of interviewing both those GMs last weekend and that was a lot of it is I wanted to retrace the steps on how this thing came together. First of all, he said there was a slim chance.

I didn't, I had no sense to me to get dealt. I will tell you that I'm like Nathan McKinnon who said this. When Nathan McKinn said that day was exactly what I thought, which is I just assumed this would go to the wire and they would try to go right to July 1st trying to sign him like they did with Gabriel Landisg of 2021.

I'm with Nate on that. And the reason I will tell you that is that, is that, you know, it's my job to talk to teams around the league. 90% of the teams around the league not in Omigo, and it was available, okay? And there's a reason for that. And I asked Chris McFarland that question, that interview last week on the GM of the avalanche.

It's because they made a decision with, you know, once they realized that they might be willing to trade him, they had to make a philosophical decision. Are we actually putting him out there everyone to bid on? or let's go see if we can find what we need in this trade first. And if you find it, that's good. And the point being, he confirmed that no other team that wanted to talk extension

with Rantanin got involved. He did not allow Rampenit's camp to start talking extension with other teams. So that caught out a whole slew of teams that might have been interested as long as they had some, you know, some insurance that they'd They're not. Why not, though? What's the harm in doing that? Doesn't that make them more valuable? Yeah, well, because they made a determination at the end that what Carolina was willing to pony up, especially in Martin Nietzsche's, but also Jack Drury was going to be as good as they were going to get anywhere. And their estimation, when they examined the field, it's not like they didn't examine other teams. They just didn't open it up twice to a lot of our teams. So it's not 100%. I know one team that got a call.

and I was asked not to the report of who they are since they didn't go very far. So there were a few other teams involved. But again, the reason this team is engaged is because they didn't want to give up that much for rent. So once Carolina fit their match and they got a decent return in that text, that did not open it up. So it's very similar to be honest to a trade covered 20 years ago showing my age. Joel Jordan trade from Boston to San Jose caught a lot of people off card in the sense that there wasn't a ton of speculation. And there's a reason for that.

It really was a Boston-San-Ozay conference only. And so it was kept on their apps. And so that's the interesting thing for sure. And the other thing I think that one of my big takeaways from that interview with McCarland, and he was careful how he answered this question. So a bit of it is me between the lines. but, you know, when I said, well, obviously, you know, you obviously decided he couldn't sign this guy, and here we go, here we are. He said, well, it wasn't so much that we couldn't sign him, dot, dot, dot.

And then he went on to talk about Nathan McKinnon's contract and then Caleb Carr on the horizon. And then it kind of the answer kind of came back to the train station after that. But I think what he was gently getting to was once they opened the vault for Cala Car in two years, I don't think the organization they could have three players tie up so much of their cap or budget, whatever it is, in two years. And so I think that determination might end up being as big as anything else

for why this shocking blockbuster happened. It's not like they knew what number they could finally get that, I think. That's a perfect lead in. That's a perfect lead in to our next topic here because this feels like a week ago now after how much news we got this weekend. But the salary cap projections,

and I guess actually I shouldn't say projections, the agreement that the NHL and NHLPA came to for estimated cap numbers for the next three years are pretty high. I mean, you go from where we are right now at 88.5 million for this, or sorry, 88 million this season to 95.5 million next season,

104 the season after that, and 113.5 million in 2027, 28. When I think about those numbers, That's where I go back to what you just talked about in the avalanche saying, we don't know if we can have three teams taken up that much of our cap. And I wonder how much is this practically going to affect the way we see teams behave versus how much is that everyone's imagination running wild? I mean, I think one of the reasons it's difficult to answer in the vacuum is that I think teams are saying,

let's see where our revenues go. And for some U.S. teams, it has to do with the regional sports programming, right? So let's see where the money goes on that. For teams, well, really, it should be for all teams, but for Canadian teams, the Canadian dollars is a big deal. I mean, you're paying players in US dollars, but the Canadian dollar is helpful again, with some of that being political events out of their control right now. And so there are some wild cards out there, although on the other hand, a Canadian TV deal thing. So that's a new source, you know, should be a higher source of revenue that all the teams share.

it should be a bigger number than the U.S. deal. So these are all, my point is, as Alan Walsh, I quoted Al Walsh saying in my piece on Friday, he actually thinks the cap numbers for the last two years of that three-year projection are going to be higher, even higher than 1.13 at the end. And so if that's the case, I will tell you that there's some teams that reached out to me. that obviously didn't want to be named, but that would surprise people, I think, that said, I'm not sure

we're going to be a captain. So I think what the new world will look like is that, you know, right now, what is it, two-thirds of the league are at the cap, pretty much? I mean, a lot of it is pandemic, black cap-driven, but it could be a world where,

you know, there's cap teams, more so than we've ever seen probably since O'Fodd since the cap came in. Yeah, I don't think it's going to be Dodgers pirates, but there's going to be halves and half-naughts as you wrote in your piece. My question is all this extra money that's being funneled into the system here, is it going to go to the top players or are we going to see the resurrection of the middle class in the NHL?

Everyone's either a $10 million player or a $2 million player these days. Are we going to start seeing, you know, third second and third liners getting $5, $6 million or is it just all going to go to Cal McCar? Yeah. And those things, they're hard to predict because it just takes. takes a couple contracts for something to become a magnet where every other contract negotiates is affected to it. If you ask me, Mark, my, you know, my top of the head reaction will be, it goes mostly

to the top players. I mean, let's just go to the best player in the world. Honor McDavid can sign an extension in summer. And I know a lot of people around the league kind of were guesstimating that it would be around 16 million a year. You know, obviously his buddy who was going to perhaps win the Heart Trophy Land Drysadle is making 14 million a year starting next year.

But now with these cap numbers, is it 16 or is it 17? It's at 18. Now the other thing is David is the guy that wants to take more anything else. Does he take a bit less than he could

because he wants his team to be as deep as possible? All these things come in the play. But I don't know. I mean, David's contract is going to be fascinating from that perspective because everything will really feed off but the best player in the world's soccer. But the reality is, there's not a lot of leverage for the end of the conversation.

That's sort of like, here's the contract, put in the number of you won, and then we'll move on from that. It's going to be interesting. Now, again, Nico Ranton is an interesting one. Carolina is the only team that can give them a, years. They'll be super aggressive as Eric Kolsky, you know,

Settemaybler's about trying to get him done. His A.E.V. on a seven-year deal on the open market first would be higher than obviously what he would be with in Carolina over eight years. But, you know, that'll be a great test. You know, what's he worth on the market? And a lot of people depend, I think, on a performance in Carolina. One of the points you made at the end of your cap story on Friday, Pierre,

was about revenue sharing. And you talked about with the haves and have-nots. One of my first thoughts is, well, if it's a 50-50 split, a hockey-related revenue, shouldn't the growth of the league support these cap changes and not lead to that? But that does depend on revenue sharing. And you kind of got it at the end that maybe this leads to some teams asking the league, hey, can we get some enhancements there?

Yeah. So no one wanted to comment on this at the board of governor's meeting last. I almost said last in early to mid-December in Florida. But we were getting a whiff of that conversation. And we had not heard that conversation quite a while. I mean, the league had been, you know, with the flat cap and it's not been that conversation. But it's coming back now. And now with these two cap numbers, there are going to be sub-owners in the year of Gary Betman wanting to know if I'm sharing will be enhanced to try and maintain a competitive battle that the league has right now.

And it truly does have it. I mean, the league is so close, so hard to pick a cup winner every year. That's a delicate conversation that I don't think Gary Bedman enjoys having because it puts him in the crosshairs of a lot of middle to, a lot of mid to smaller market owners. And, of course, the bigger market owners that are pretty excited about $113, $113,000 to a half million cap and, you know, people in Chicago, in New York and Toronto in Boston gives them a little edge.

Now, as I like, I said this the other day to someone, I said, you know, there was no cap before 2005, and it didn't seem to help the Leafs win a cup despite all their spending. So you still have to spend wisely and manage your team well. But, you know, that's the interesting balance to me is how the league will red the needle between the different needs of their owners when it comes to to enhance revenue share. A lot of the big market teams are in heavily taxed areas, too.

I wonder if this is like a natural remedy to some of the tax issues we have where maybe some of these Sunbelt teams that don't spend at the cap, it'll kind of balance itself out where the big teams are willing to pay more and that'll cover the tax difference. Yeah. I mean, you know, we don't have time to get into this, but it's interesting. I mean, that's a great point, Mark. And, you know, Kevin Sheffield layoffs, we were talking about something

for that piece that would have never crossed my mind, I'll be totally honest. I mean, let's just tell the elephant room. No team has it harder to lure players in lieu of rage in the Winnipeg Jets. But he said something interesting about how close-knit this Jets team is this year. On a lot of the off days, a lot of these players, they're so close to the outdoors in Winnipeg, it's wintertime. They all go ice fishing and all do these outdoor activities together. They're totally into it.

They bond over it. they negotiate off days with Scott or Neal depending on wins. This whole thing is happening where it's really healthy and fun. And again, we get all the negatives about, you know, cold weather, small place and why some, you know. No airport. Yeah, the Florida teams and Texas and Vegas. We know what teams are always going to have the advantage over the rest of the league.

But it was interesting to hear that because, because, you know, there's a hook for depending what your background is a player and the stuff you like to do in your own downtime and all these different things. So I think it's a lesson for me in a way to be careful at how often we generalize.

Again, there's a reason why there's generalizations. We know what markets have an easier ability to lure for agents. But still, that doesn't mean that's for 100% of the players, right? Some players like to play in hockey markets. Where the fans are on you, bring out the best

out of you. And so I thought that was illuminating for me. Yeah, you have to think that the Hellabuck and Shifley extensions maybe changed the perception a little bit around like, well, these guys were willing to stay, but everybody thought they were out the that, you know, everyone, you know, Winnipeg is always going to be at the top of everyone's

no trade list because some people just don't want to go there. But I think it's, it's not like this, you know, terrifying place that a lot of people used to think it was for players. I think they're seeing the success they're having, the fans they have, the atmosphere they have. the lifestyle you can have.

It's not quite as this like pariah that it used to be. No, and again, I think, I mean, this is kind of ridiculous to say, but there might be the smart fans in the league. I mean, there's a chance and how they're organized. And, I mean, there's just something. My favorite place to watch a game in the league is in Winnipeg, without question. Yeah. So there's something to those things.

I remember, you know, Doug Gilbert once telling me this story. And it was time for him to lead Toronto. I mean, he obviously, he was so big here in Toronto and had those years where they went to the conference final years and so on. Got traded into New Jersey and then I remember him the story. He says it with great humility. It's not that. But he couldn't get into the parking lot the first day because he was. He was like, oh, pros and cons of when you have no life in Toronto and everyone knows all your moves and then you go to somewhere.

And he was a guy that I think played his best hockey in Calgary. Toronto when the pressure of the fans and media forced him to bring that out of him. It's not for every player. Literally, there are players, I think, who grabbed the play in Florida and Tampa and Dallas and not deal with that kind of glare. But that's just another example where not every player is made up the same way in their DNA. Some guys love the spotlight and feed off it, and other guys would rather, you know, go golfing once they leave the rink and no involvement them.

great stuff pierre we're going to take a break right there you can follow all of pierre's work on the athletic we'll talk in just a second all right lads and i are back at lasin i know you had a couple other things you wanted to hit before we ran out of time with pierre on the potential cat or the projected the expected cap raises in the coming years here well it's just it opens up so many different kinds of possibilities and it might maybe closes the doors on some too it's is this going to inhibit player movement because teams can more readily afford their own free agents are we going to see fewer cap dumps uh what does this mean for offer sheets after what St. Louis did when Doug Armstrong poached Broberg and Holloway from Edmonton,

we all thought, oh, man, this is this is a way to do it now. We're going to see more offer sheets. Our offer sheets are going to be more difficult now because teams can more easily match them. It's a fascinating development. The cap has been flat for so long now or just growing so gradually that we have no idea how this is going to affect things. Like it's a completely different market now. It's a completely different free agency mindset. GMs think differently now. And the next few years could be a completely different offseason than we're used to seeing. And I'm just, I don't know how it's going to play out, but I'm fascinated to see because

all of a sudden it's like the NHL is a big boy league and we have actual money to spend. And it's exciting and it's interesting and it's frankly confounding because I don't know how it's going to play out. Yeah, what does it say about me that one of my first thoughts seeing it was, oh, is this going to mean the death of the third party broker? that's right what is chicago the new arizona coyote is going to do now yeah it will be interesting i mean i think what pierre said about you know mcfarlane and the three salaries is one of the you know being macar mccan and can you also take rattan and that is one of the first big tests

that we're going to see and i don't as much as this got announced a week after the rantan trade i got to believe that chris mcfarlane was prepared for an announcement such as this by the time you made that trade i don't i don't think this is like a game change in that way like oh if he didn't know it then maybe you don't do that deal and i do wonder they knew this was coming so yeah so so i don't know that that is a regret or anything but i wonder how many teams will be able to to keep uh cores like that intact i mean i think we know that the teams like the torontoes the vincolvers the rangers the boston's the chicagoes uh once they build those cores up that they will be able to keep them but i do think it's it's a risk that that's not there

anymore for some of these medium market teams to say, yeah, we just can't do it with the cap. Well, I also wonder, like, you know, you talk about Chicago and the big discussion point here for years now has been Seth Jones's contract, right? He's getting $9.5 million. He's playing great lately, but he's not a $9.5 million player. And there was all this talk, could the Hawks eat half that salary for the remaining five years on the deal? Is that doable? Well, on the one hand, it makes it more tradable because you can eat that salary in theory. But on the other hand, three years from now, Seth Jones's contract is only going to be 8% of the deal. cap. It's not going to be an out. It's like a six million dollar contract used to be. It's not that

big a deal. So like anyone with like an albatross of a contract, it's not quite a compliance buyout, but this completely frees up these teams that thought they had these albatrosses around their neck. It's a, it's such a, you know, 30, it's like, what, $25 million is going up in three years. That's an extraordinary jump for a league that's used to seeing it one, two percent. Yeah, our producer Jeff just mentioned Darnell Nurse, same things. He's got basically the same contract that Seth Jones has. It's not that onerous now. You can still sign other guys and have a contract like that on the books because it's only 8 or 9% of your cap now. I think it was Justin Bourne who made the point over the weekend. Like, I mean, the greatest outcome here would

be that we can finally stop, you know, railing against players who are good, just not quite as good as their contract, right? I don't know that I'm optimistic about that. He was talking about, like, we could stop talking about the cap all the time because everything we do, for years and years and years has been about the cap. It's been about LTIR. It's value. How are you going to get this? You know,

we, Scott Powers and I have been talking about Connor Bredard's second contract for two years. He has even been in the league for two years yet. We were talking about this when they won the draft lottery. Like it's always cap, cap, cap, cap, cap. It's process stories. And, you know, James Myrtle loves a, loves a cap story. I don't like writing cap stories.

I find it, it's math. I didn't, I don't want to be writing math all the time. And if we can get away from that a little bit where the cap is always going to be part of it, But if we can get away from where it's just the overbearing topic on every single possible potential transaction, the league will be better off for it. Like the NBA has the most confusing cap I've ever seen. Like I have no idea how the NBA cap words. I'm always hearing about bird exceptions and mid-level whatever's and max contracts. I don't understand it at all.

And I don't have to. But to be an NHL fan, you have to understand all this stuff because it's all that matters. And if this cap keeps going up and we can kind of like get away. from that because like Pierre says, there might not be as many cap teams. Right now, two thirds of the league is a cap team. If it's, if it's a lot fewer teams than that, it's going to just open up the discussion for more trades are possible, more signings are possible, and we don't have to get bogged down in the math all the time. It'll be great. Yeah, I'm not quite as optimistic that we'll get away from it too much. You know, I think it's

still going to. I'm hoping. I'm hoping. I'm not thinking it's going to, I'm hoping. But I do think it's a little bit of a reset. Certainly for a lot of the contracts that people have already decided are untenable and blah, blah, blah. And maybe in some cases on the right cap, they might have been, right? On the $83.5 million cap, they might have been. They will not be those long-term deals within a year or two. And that is a good thing, I think. I think it reframed.

I had a friend who talked about this with the Swedish hockey league. And he went over there for, I was actually doing a story about him. He became a friend after I wrote about him. He had gone over there like foreign exchange in college and he'd just fallen in love with the SHL, partly because it was just about the hockey. It wasn't about like, oh, how can we, you know, shrink everything down and make it about the, you know, goals per 60 per dollar kind of thing. And it was just, you know, the hockey.

And that little boy grew up to be Eric Tulski. He does work in hockey now, actually. But it's, it makes you wonder what things would look like with, if COVID never happened, right? Like, would the cat be at 113 million already? or is this just the league is just thriving so much after the pandemic? Because we lost like, what, four years of cap raises, basically. So I wonder where the league would be at and what Connor McDavid's next deal would look like if that never happened. Obviously, not the biggest priority when it comes to talking about a global pandemic.

But, you know, this is one of those things. We're five years out now from the pause. How different this league might look if that never happened. It's a great point. And I think the team that most wants to know, that is Toronto, right? How much can they build on this core of players that they extended expecting the cap to go up? And it just never did. But it's sort of just a lost four or five years.

And now we go from here. But you look at it like Mitch Marner is obviously he and Ranton are the two big prizes this summer. The leaves can afford Mitch Marner now. John Tovaris's contract is coming off the books. There's no reason they can't give Marner 12, 13 million. They can do it. Will they? I don't know.

Do they think that's the best way to do it? I don't know. But it's not. difficult. They can do it. The math works now. So you can, you know, for years, we've always talked about how the NHL needs exceptions for homegrown talents. And, you know, it's not fair that you, you draft the right player and you develop him properly and it becomes a superstar. And then you can't afford them because of the cap. Well, that's going to happen less now. You will be able to afford some of these guys if you're willing to pay. And we all know Toronto's willing to pay.

Will Carolina, will Dallas, will some of these other, you know, smaller market teams, Nashville? I don't know. But the option's there now. If you want to keep your guys, you could probably keep your guys now. Yeah, or at least, you know, in the Marner case, right, at least it's a hockey decision. At least it's, is the right fit. Do we trust when, you know, this is a guy we want to build around that we trust them in the playoffs. At least it's that decision. It's not, well, we only have 10 million and you need 12 million and we need you to take a pay cut if you're going to stay. That, that is, every year when the Hawks were winning Stanley Cups, every summer was who's the cap dump this year. It was Dave Boland. Then it was Patrick Sharp. It was Andrew Shaw. Every year, there was

somebody or multiple somebody's because they just, there was no way around that fact. Now, it's conceivable. You can keep a team and a core together longer than you could before. And, you know, I know I'm always clamoring for more trends. Like, we love the Garantan and trade. That's great, exciting stuff. In the NBA, you know, when they're trading Luca Dantzich and the world's exploding, it's that's fun stuff. But from a fan standpoint, you know, you want to be able to keep your core, the guys that you grew up rooting for that you raised. essentially. It'll be less rooting for laundry and more rooting for the players that you've come to love. All right. Let's go into some of the other trades that happened over the weekend because even

though we did the Friday night emergency pod for the J.T. Miller deal, there have been two more rather significant trades, two first round picks changing hands in the time since. And of course, one of those was the first round pick in the J.T. Miller deal. Vancouver didn't even take it through the night. They got that out of there as soon as they got it in. And in return, they get Marcus Patterson and Drew O'Connor to expiring contracts. obviously they're going to try to extend. What's your reaction to this? Was this the best use of the first round pick?

No, not at all. I don't know what Vancouver is doing. Everyone seems to be like, oh, Vancouver did pretty well considering, I don't think they did well at all. They lost the best player by far. And then they gave away the best asset they got for the best player for two expiring contracts from guys that are,

they're fine. Marcus Pedersen's a nice player. But he's not a, he's not the missing piece. He doesn't replace what you lost. He doesn't completely nullify that. That was a potential lottery pick. If the Rangers don't make the playoffs this year, which is distinctly possible,

and that's a top 13 pick, then it moves to 2026. And if the Rangers miss the playoffs this year, they might even take another step back next year. You're giving up a potential lottery pick or at worst, like a 15th or 16th pick, a solid pick for two expiring contracts. Does anybody think the Canucks are contenders after trading away J.T. Miller? This is a transitional year for them now. and I just, it seems foolish to me that they gave up the best asset they had so quickly too. So quickly they gave that up.

Yeah, I think what it is for me is, yes, you can extend Pedersen. Obviously, you could have bid for him in the off season anyway and not having to give up the pick. But once you do extend him, especially on the new cap and what we know is coming, you're going to be paying quite a bit more for Pedersen and Heedal than you were for Miller. And I don't know. That doesn't really, to me, I get that it's a little bit deeper and there's elements they both have they needed a steady second pair D. I really like Marcus Pedersen. Yeah. I just don't know how this really moves the needle.

It's not even like you have the flexibility at this point. And everybody looks good. The first few games after a trade, right? Miller is tearing it up in the Rangers. The Canucks look pretty good last night. He'll scored. Marty. Yeah, he'll scored. Marty Natchez is scoring. Rantanin looks great in Carolina. Like that's how it always works, right? The first week, oh, man, everyone's a winner. Let's see how this plays out a month from now or in the, or, you know, if Vancouver's even in the playoffs, what we think about the JT military thing, because I don't know,

I've seen a lot of praise for the Canucks for like making the best of a bad situation. And I just disagree. And it's because the same thing that you and I have been talking about, I can't believe it came to this. I can't believe that these two grown men couldn't get their blank together and just behave and just live with each other.

And, you know, the pressure on Elias Patterson right now, I don't know if there's anyone in the league that faces more pressure. because if he doesn't immediately become the Elias Pedersen that we know, then he's just a big baby and he forced this trade for nothing. Like there is so much heat now in Vancouver. Removing J.T. Miller doesn't really alleviate that.

If anything, it exacerbates it. And I just, it's just such a mess because, you know, these two guys couldn't get along. Like two guys, his town ain't big enough for the two of us. What are we doing? Grow up. There are always guys on teams that don't like each other. just play don't hang out don't go to the bar together just freaking play we made it three days since this trade before the drama is back of all the pressure on peterson is that what we're going

well isn't it like if peterson continues it has like a 60 point season this year after they traded their you know a hundred point guy to make him feel better that's that's a problem man you're not wrong you're not this is vancouver this is the most psychotic market in the NHL. You know that. There is no market in the NHL that creates and sustains drama like Vancouver. I think that's true.

But wow. Yeah. No rest. No rest for the weird. I love Elias Pedersen as a player. I want him to succeed. One of my favorite guys in league to watch when he's going. But, oh boy, he better start going. How about in Dallas? Dallas made a move as well. And it wasn't quite as splashy as the Miller one. But they come and they get

they get Mikkel Granlin and they get Cody Cici. They ship out a first round pick. I don't know that you're getting a first round pick for either of these guys straight up. But to get one by packaging them together, I think was good work by San Jose. And obviously Dallas with Haskin and her had to do something. So I think to get the two players, that's probably the key for them too. Yeah. And this is a normal this time of year trade, right?

Good team sends first rounder to bad team to get expiring contract guys, right? Like this is what you do. Like the the Ranton and trade and the Miller trade were. not what we're used to seeing. This is a standard smart contender move. Michael Granlin's having a great year, man. He's point to game right now this year. He helps fill in that Tyler Sagan void with the injury. He gives you someone in the middle six who can give you some scoring punch. I love this Dallas team. I know we've loved them for years and we keep expecting them to make that jump. But this is still, I think, the best team in hockey, the best constructed team in hockey.

And this just bolsters them that much further. And then one more we should probably hit Philly and Calgary. This one, I think, more of a hockey trade than the classic deadline deal. But Philly sends Joel Farabey and Morgan Frost to Calgary for Andre Cusmenco and Jacob Peltier. I think I like the Calgary into this better, but it's a little bit of a trickier one to wrap your head around. I mean, it's a lot of former first-round picks who haven't maybe had quite as much success. But I think if you were to rank the guys who have had the most success, I mean, Cozmanco had the huge year. So I guess you have to give them credit for that. Frost is the young center. Ferabee's had a good year. I think I lean toward the Calgary end of this.

Yeah, that Kuzmenko, 39 goal rookie season. That's like, what, that's one of the great flukes in modern hockey memory that he was able to do that. And then he just became like a guy. I like, what I like about this is Calgary is going for it. They see an opening. They've got a great goalie and Dustin Wolf. And they're like, you know what? This wasn't supposed to be a playoff year for us, but we can smell the playoffs. We're in the spot. We're not going to like dip our toes and we're going to try to win. I think they got a lot better. I like Morgan Frost a lot. I think they did pretty good here. And just the message it sends that we're adding here because that's an adding trade. Losing Cozmanco doesn't really detract from much.

This is a trade to make you better. And I think that sends a positive message to the guys in the room. Yeah, I mean, because Mecco's an expiring contract. So from Philly's standpoint, this might as well just be, hey, we're clearing off money and we're going to try to use the space to make a run at somebody else. But, you know, and obviously, great. If you, if you succeed in that, if you pull Sam Bennett or whatever, you're probably pretty happy if you're the flyers, there's also some risk that you strike out on that and man, that you've traded away a good young center and a good young score. Granted perhaps, I mean,

I don't think he's going to be overpaid on the rising cap, but maybe it was for where he was so far this year in Farabee. Yeah, I think Philly's going big game hunting this summer. I think you're right. I'm always curious about how pending free agents in particular view a John Tortorella team. I've talked to a lot of guys over the years about this through, you know, polls and just idle conversations. And there's like this,

there's like a portion of, of the players that have this morbid fascination with torturella. And they're like, I kind of want to play for him to see what it's like. But most guys, if you ask, which coach and lead do you least want to play for is John Torterella? So I always wonder how that affects free agency, because you want to play for a guy that you want to play for. And to sign for a torts team, you got to really want that kind of coaching.

But here's the thing is that I do think there's that there's that resistance with Tortorella and there's that kind of inherent skepticism of him or that inherent like, oh, you know, I've heard the story. But I also think everyone's also knows players who have had great experiences with it. And so I think there's the reputation of John Tortorella publicly, the brand of John Tortorella, I should say. But then you go past that. And I do think everyone's kind of like, but I've actually heard guys like playing for them, you know? Yeah, you have to be wired a certain way, right?

You're going to have to work a lot. It's like playing for like Tom Thibodeau in the NBA. Like, if you like practicing and working really hard on defense, this is your guy. But not everybody likes doing those things. So with Torts, you have to play a certain way. We'll see what they do. We're going to take a quick break right there. We're right back with Jesse Granger.

We are back and we are joined now by Jesse Granger. Let's head into the Granger Zone. Granger Zone. Welcome to the Granger Zone. Hey, Jesse. All right. So we talked with Pierre earlier today about the NHL salary cap rising in the coming years. And I thought you had a really timely story that published on the athletic Monday morning.

The NHL salary cap is rising. But why else is the goalie market booming now? We obviously just saw a big contract given out to Logan Thompson recently. Obviously, there were some large ticket deals over the summer. Linus Allmark, Jeremy Swayman, getting into some territory that maybe runs counter to the workload trajectory for goalies in the NHL. So why are teams more comfortable giving those big ticket deals out to their netminders? Yeah, we definitely, it definitely feels like general managers are more willing to pay their goalies now than even just a year ago. I look back at the Connor Hellebuck deal last summer and the UC Soros deal last summer.

Connor Hellebuck signs for eight and a half. Soros signs for not even $8 million a year. And now this year you look at these guys who are clearly less proven, very talented goalies in Olmark and Swamen and Ottinger, but they're getting paid noticeably more. Obviously, Igor Shisterkin gets the highest paid contract for a goalie in NHL history for the Rangers and well-deserved. But a big part of that is. the cap going up and the GMs have been projecting that this cap was going to go up for a while.

So it's not just starting the day they announced it. All the contracts are going up. Obviously, that has played a factor for a while. And I spoke with three agents over the week just to kind of get their thoughts on it. These guys are negotiating with GMs every day. They understand the way the NHL views goaltending, probably better than anyone. Jerry Johansson, who covers a handful of them, Elaine Waugh and Ray Petcoe, who represents is Connor Hellebuck.

And they had some interesting theories. I think that it's definitely, there is definitely a shift in the market. And I think that the biggest shift is just due to the NHL is a copycat league. And that's not just the NHL. That's every pro sports league. And I think that they're the, the,

Sergei Bobrovsky deal played a big role in all of this. And it's so interesting to me because you look back to when the Panthers gave him that mega contract. Got crushed. Yes. And they, for seven, several years, his stats were not good, and for several years, that contract was the example that everyone pointed to, every GM in the league, point to Sergey Bobrovsky and say that right there is

exactly why you can't pay a goalie $10 million. And then I think that it also simultaneously, that slump for Bobrovsky with that big deal also just happened to happen when the St. Louis Blues win the Stanley Cup with Jordan Bennington, who's making $600,000 and came from the AHL. Then Colorado wins a cup. with Darcy Kemper, who wasn't making that low of a contract hit, but he played league average goaltending in the playoffs, 902 save percentage, and they win. Then the Vegas Golden Knights win the Stanley Cup on the back of Laurent

Brousa and Aden Hill, an unlikely pair that nobody really thought would carry you to a cup. So I think all of those factors gave GMs a lot of reasons and a lot of examples to point to as to why you shouldn't pay your goalies. Mark gives. I think I think that you've basically, in the past, we've looked at goaltenders as a duo, right? You're willing to vote X percent of your cap to your goaltending, not your one goaltender, right?

So does this mean that if the number ones are getting more money are the number two who are playing more, as Max points out? Like, there's a much more even split on most of these teams. Are the number two guys going to get screwed here? Or are they going to see a bump also? One of the agents actually said they view it kind of like a slinky. So you pull the top up,

the bottom kind of gets drivet. rug up with it a little bit, they do think that there is a delay in that. It's not, you don't, there's, there's, it takes some time in order for those lower contracts to catch up to the up. And, and one thing I did notice when crunching the numbers, like I, I think we all think the goalie contracts went up, but then you crunch the numbers and actually, they're just going up at the same rate that the top 10. So I took the, the top 10 skaters in the league to highest paid skaters, average their contracts. And I did the same thing with the goalies. And I tracked them both on a line graph, and it is shocking how closely the two mimic each other.

So they were both going up, then the flat cap hits. Nobody gets paid. They are all, they're both stagnant. And I think it stands out more for the goalies because there are fewer of the contracts. But then in the recent couple years or recent few months, actually, now that we've known that the cap was going to go up, you see the goalie contracts going up, but we also see the top 10 skater contract going up as well. So I think that maybe it's, in our.

mind, it's a little more of a big deal than it actually is. And I honestly think that that plays into it because I just mentioned all those examples that GMs used. Well, then Sergey Bobrovsky turns his career around in Florida, carries his team to two back-to-back cup finals, wins the cup. And all of a sudden, it doesn't, not only, not only does, is that an example of, well, you can build a good team around a $10 million goalie? Because we hadn't really seen that. I mean, Vast Salevsky, but Tampa had started to decline after paying him his big deal. So I think Florida gave teams an example of not just that a goalie can perform under a big contract, but look at the team they built around Babrovsky.

There aren't a bunch of holes in that lineup. And you can say, well, the goalie covers them up. No, they built a great, solid, deep team around a goalie. And I think that that gave general management example. So I think that it's just weird how the goalie market went downward as soon as Bobrovsky's contract looked bad. And then as soon as all of a sudden it doesn't look bad and he's winning cups and it's like, oh, that's, well, you got to have a star goalie in that. Now all the goalies are getting paid. So that is simplifying it a bit. But I do think that it is a legitimate, like, reason for,

I think Sergey Bobrovsky controlled the goalie market, like honestly. And also, I think that the other part of it is GMs are just more afraid to sign goalies to long term deals. One of the stats that blew my mind when I was writing this story was in the last four months, we've had more eight-year contracts given to goalies than in the five years prior, which is pretty insane. PMs don't like to give eight-year contracts to goalies, and that's for two reasons. One, the margins are so slim in goaltending.

Like Connor Hellebuck's having a historically great season right now. He's saving two and a half shots more than a league average goalie for every hundred shots he saves. So two and a half saves for every hundred shots is the difference between historically great and league average, not good enough goaltending, basically. So you sign a collie to an eight-year deal, it's like he can fall off really, really easily. When a top scorer falls off and has a bad month, it doesn't completely derail his season statistically.

So I think that plays a big role. And then I also think that you can't hide the goalie. When you sign a winger or a defenseman and it's a bad contract, well, there are ways the coach can remedy it. You can play them less minutes. You can play them with better linemates or a better defensive pair to try to elevate his game. You can give him easier matchups. You can do you can hide him so many different ways. Your number one defenseman becomes your number six defenseman. It's not that big a deal.

Like, yeah, you'd rather him not be underperforming his contract, but you can get around it. The goalie doesn't perform and you're paying him to play in the minors. It's a buyout. You see all these Rubeauer, the Jack Campbell contract. It's happening to Tristan Jari in Pittsburgh right now. You just can't hide the goalie. So that's why GMs don't like to sign him to eight-year deals, because when you make a mistake, you pay for it a lot more than you do with skaters and defensemen, I think. The other thing, though, and this goes back to Bobrovsky as well, one of the reasons that that contract was as panned as it was, is that pretty quickly after it was signed, they draft like the top goalie prospect in recent memory, Spencer Knight. It felt like a sure thing, right? And now it's how are you

going to possibly deal with having Bobrovsky and Knight and you have this great young player? I think what, you know, in Knights, Saga has been, obviously, for a number of reasons different than we expected at that time. But I do think maybe that also reinforces, hey, when you have a proven goalie, that's worth a lot. One in the hand is worth more than two in the bush, so to speak, right? And I wonder if that's planned into this, too, is that there's just so few goalies that teams know this guy's bankable. We know exactly what he's going to become playoff time. Yeah, there's going to be variance year to year. and at the start of it, the contract that is,

wasn't what we had gotten accustomed to with Sergey Bobrovsky, but when the playoffs start, he's pretty much been a horse for them for the entire way. Obviously, Alex Lyon started the playoffs two years ago for Florida off the back of a really good end of the season. But by and large, they've known what they've had and they've been rewarded for it. Yeah, you mentioned that there aren't as many. And that was another thing that the agents brought up in those conversations was

when a goalie contract looks poor, the way Bobrovsky's did for the first couple years. It just stands out more to us. It stands out more to the GMs. It stands out more to everyone because there just aren't very many big goalie contracts. Here's an example. Adam Fox on the Rangers has three goals this season. Two of them were empty nets.

Adam Fox has one goal with the opposing goalie in the net this year. Is there a single person on earth pointing to Adam Fox's contract saying, that's why you can't pay defenseman 10 million? No. Why? Because Kail McCarr and Quinn Hughes and Zach Warr, And all these other guys that are getting paid a bunch of money are awesome every night. So it just doesn't feel like as dramatic of a of a letdown.

Whereas Bobrovsky, I mean, once Kerry Price retired, he's the only goalie making 10 million. So when he's having a bad year and that contract looks bad, there aren't nine other goleys you can point to that are outperforming those big contracts. So when and it goes the other way too when one team pays Vasilevsky and he wins two cups, it's like, oh, that's the way you have to do it because there aren't a bunch of other examples. think that the fact that there's only one goalie in each net and there just aren't as many of them makes each success and failure stand out more than it does for skaters and defensemen. Let's talk about a goalie who never made more than I think $5.8 million in his career. Jonathan Quick on his 400th game with, he did it with the Rangers. This is a guy who was just, he dropped off the face of it.

He was phenomenal in L.A. He kind of revolutionized the way you could play goalie, that kind of cobra style where he's just, he's down on the ground. He's looking through guys' feet instead of over. their heads of so much fun to watch him. Then he just disappeared into oblivion almost. And he came back to New York and he's, he kind of solidifies his Hall of Fame case these last couple years.

How did how does quick come back from where he was? It's amazing. It's, it's, I honestly don't know how he did it. I saw his numbers in L.A. Decline the way they did. I mean,

he was statistically the worst goalie in the league. Like we're talking not the worst starting goalie. Like out of like 60 goalies who played, he was number 60 in just about every metric for a hand. of years there in LA. Like it appeared statistically and when you watch him play, it looked like he didn't have it anymore. And it made sense. He's a guy who doesn't rely on great technique. He is not the most technical goalie. He's not in the position that the goalie coach wants him to be in most of the time. But he's just so athletic and so fast and his reactions are just, I mean,

his quick twitch muscles are insane. So he makes up for those things. So it would make sense that, okay, well, he's not as fast. He can't make up for the technical deficiencies. He's going to hit a wall. And I thought that that's what he hit. I watched him practice here in Vegas. He was with the Golden Knights during their cup run. He didn't play much, but he goes paddle down so often, it freaks me out. Like I, he does things. No goalie in the world does and somehow makes it work. And it look like he was done. But he, I think going to New York rejuvenated him, that was his childhood team. I think that that and playing behind a better team for a while. I mean, the Rangers have kind of fallen off now. But last year they were very good. And I still think they've got a lot of talent.

think that that helped and he's just found his rhythm. I think with these rhythm goalies that aren't the most technical and they are kind of flying by the seat of their pants and they're playing on instinct, they are more streaky than and less consistent than maybe a more technical goalie who's not as athletic. But man, when they're on, they're great and quick. I think not having to play as much because they're counting on Shasturkin every night helps him. And he's been so good. Like his numbers are great in New York. When you watch him, he passes the eye test last night against the Golden Knights. They had a ton of chances.

I thought Vegas had the better chances in that game. But Quick was excellent. His glove hand is awesome. He had a million glove saves last night. He's defying what he should be able to do for a goalie of that style at this age. And first U.S. born goalie to 400 wins. Pretty cool. Is he a Hall of Famer for you?

I think so. Two cups. and they were they were on his back like he he he was a major player in both of those guys especially the first one at 2012 you mean you could just etch his name alone on that thing yeah and then he wins a third one with Vegas obviously he was just kind of a backup for for a handful of games during the regular season but yeah two cups on his back I think that's easily uh halt no no vezina and I think that that speaks to the the not as consistent like he's not like Connor hellabuck is the model of consistency and that's because he is a positioned based

goalie where the pucks are going to hit him when he's having an off night he's still in the right spot so the puck's going to hit him when you're relying on athleticism you're having an off night the puck doesn't hit you it goes in so i think that that probably is a reason why he doesn't have a venezna but he's had those hot runs where he goes on cup runs but i think the cups are enough jonathan quick eli manning of hockey hey i'll take eli manning any day i'm a giant's guy i'll take eli manning all day all right well this being the granger them presented by bet m gm we got to do some odds here with you, Jesse. And we've been hitting the Eastern Conference wildcard raise hard, and we're not stopping. I think it's interesting. One reason I thought of it is the Red Wings

have obviously been maybe the hottest team in the league over the last month. Their second six-game win streak on top of the clone already in five weeks. There's still plus 240 to make the playoffs. And the teams that are favored by BetMGM are the Rangers plus 155 and the Bruins plus 135. And the Bruins plus 130. You've also got the Islanders plus 240, same as the Red Wings, Blue Jackets, plus 260, where you come down on kind of shaping, handicapping this Eastern Conference wildcard race. Man, it's fun. I feel like we haven't had a playoff chase this deep into the season this good in a while.

I am begging these teams to stay this close to each other for the first, for the last couple weeks of the season because I, do you got, when was the last time we had a good, like chase down to the, with the couple teams involved? Like, it feels like it's been forever, doesn't it? Wings had lost it on a tiebreaker last year, but it was a horrible race. Like everyone was backing into it, right? Like it took until for the whole like three weeks leading up to the end of the season, they were just all losing.

So no one was actually falling out of the race. And then they won a little bit in the final week of the season. This is different in that a lot of these teams are actually hot. And now you've got the Rangers just added JT Miller. They're right in this thing again, right? I think I agree with BenMGM that I would have the Rangers in this field right now. It's the Boston plus 130 that I think is sticking out to me as like, man, I don't know that I see the Bruins is that much better than,

frankly, any of those other teams. The Red and the Islanders and the Blue Jackets. We're seeing the teams that are getting hot. It's Ottawa and then it's the Islanders, then it's Detroit. It's not Boston. We all know that the Rangers can do it. Boston, that feels like one of those inertial things. It's a legacy.

They'll probably make it. They got past and actually heard that. And he's been amazing lately. Don't forget. I mean, he's doing what he can, but he doesn't have a heck of a lot of help. The thing with odds is it's all about what they think the public is going to bet.

what odds makers think is going to happen. It's what they think people are going to bet. And you're totally right. Boston has the name. If you put Boston at plus 500 to make the playoffs, that's obviously an extreme. But just an example, boom,

you're just getting all the money on that. And then now they're at risk for Boston making the playoffs. So I totally understand it. But yeah, I agree with Max that I think the Rangers probably should be the favorites of that group. They're adding. Just Sturkin's hot lately. They're winning a bunch of games.

Wings have been great. The Islanders are interesting to me because that's a team that is. we'd never talk about them because they're so boring and they just play hockey in a boring way, but Sorokin's been great. They don't even have Verlomov right now. He's been injured for a while, but they are, they're making do without him. And Sorokin's been great and they've won a handful of games in a row. So that, I mean, it's like, like you said, Max, they're actually playing well.

And it's just, there's so many of them. It seems like you look at the standings on a night-to-night basis. Like a winner or a loss, you can, you can jump up three spots, down three spots. It's, it is pretty wild what the way that race. is shaping up. It's exciting. And with the Islanders, it's interesting because they have maybe the most high-profile decision to make left on the trade market around Brock Nelson. Now that Ranton's off the board, now that Miller's off the board, it seems like Pedersen's off the board.

Brock Nelson's the prize. And yet, here the Islanders are knocking on the door of a playoff spot. Yeah, it's going to be interesting. In the West, I've been looking at the same situation with Utah, and they're starting to fall out. I think there's six spots out of the wildcard too. But I think Karel Vamalka, the goalie market, It is getting pretty slim pickings. And I would think that of all the people left, Vamelka is one of the guys that some of those contenders would be interested in. But does Utah even want to sell him?

They're still within that window to try to make that wildcard spot so they don't want to give up quite yet. I think that those two teams, Islanders and Utah, there are other players on Utah as well that could help somebody. So I think the way that those teams play, those first couple weeks coming out for the Four Nations break, could really shape the deadline. Going to be fascinating to see it all play out. That's going to do it for us. Thanks for listening to this episode of The Athletic Hockey Show. Please leave us a rating and a review if you're enjoying the show, preferably five stars.

The Wednesday crew, Sean Gentile, Sean McIndoo, and Frankie Carrado are up next this week. And I'm sure you're getting here from Laz and I again on some Friday night emergency pod. So we'll talk to you then.