The Athletic Hockey Show - Is it time for the Bruins to fire Jim Montgomery?

Episode Date: November 19, 2024

Sean, Frank and Sean discuss the struggling Boston Bruins and ask if it's time to make a coaching change? The guys look at the slow motion Red Wings rebuild, Alex Ovechkin's knee injury, which puts his goal scoring record on hold, and Frank presents his 'Dudes' project, ahead of what Sean and Sean learned this week.Hosts: Sean Gentille and Sean McIndoeWith Frankie CorradoExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff Domet Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic hockey show. What up, what up? This is the athletic hockey show. Tuesday edition. I almost said Wednesday reflexively, because that's when we're normally here with you. It's Sean McIndoo, Frankie Crado,

Sean Jintilly. But it ain't Wednesday, boys. It's Tuesday. We're changing days this week. I hope that's not a problem. For the many, many, many people who are listening to the show and wondering where, Laz and

Maxie and whoever else are. Boys, we had a fun night last night. I think that's where we want to start, but that's all going to come before a new segment. I don't know if it's going to be recurring or not. We got... We'll see how it goes. Frankie's got dudes. He wants to talk about dudes. You'll hear all about that later on.

But I think I like... My big takeaway from last night, and it's kind of a weird week for the schedule, because they games are more spread out than they normally are. It's not 16 on Thursday and, you know, 16 on Saturday. We have a nice, like, dollop of games on each night. I think I like the five game night. That was my big takeaway last night because there was enough time to lock in on stuff,

but you could also flip around a little bit. And we had, we had a pretty eventful night, right? We have Alex Oveskin, scoring and then getting hurt. We have a Dallas, we have a Dallas comes back and then couldn't quite finish it against Anaheim. big red wings meltdown. We had a, we had a bunch of stuff

happened last night. You almost buried the lead there. Did you, like, you know, I mean, you know what? I said,

I said Dallas for some reason. I don't know why. Because I was watching Dallas, Anaheim. So it was like, it was like top of mind. I'm like, oh, yeah,

what actually happened in that game? The Bruins, man. What is going on in Boston? Like, here's my question. Give me a yes or no. Are we getting a Jim Montgomery firing

as we're recording? as we're recording this. Is the news going to come across? No. Adam is no. 9.41 Eastern. Wow. I don't know.

Maybe by the time this thing gets pumped out onto the Twitter sphere, this will be, I don't know. But I just, I can't, I, I don't know why you're going to fire Jim Montgomery. What's going on with the team around Jim Montgomery? Because you brought in Lindholm to be a first line center. He's not a first line center. He's a complimentary centerman on a good team. The regression was going to happen for the Bruins at some point. It didn't happen last year when you had Zaka and Coil as your top two guys down the middle of the ice.

But with all the noise around Swamen, it's happening now. It's vastly different than any other Bruins season I can remember the feeling around that team. the reason that they are where they are, I feel like, are the reasons that we didn't believe in them at the start of last season. And a lot of it starts with Zaka and a lot of it starts with Coyle. Those guys were good last year. Like credit to them, they played over their skis for a little bit. But now it looks like they've regressed too, right?

Like going into the last season, you're like, uh, center depth, it's Palfelzaka, it's Charlie Coyle. doesn't seem like it's going to work. It did for the most part. And now we're back to kind of ironically, you know, you add Lindel into the mix. Zach is playing a wing.

The whole thing is just, it's rough. They are a rough watch right now and it feels like it's a time release situation from last year where this is a season. Hold on. Is it a rough watch though? Is it really a rough watch? Like if you were,

I don't find it rough. I don't mind just one bit. there's there's a lot of people that I think are very happy to see this happen to the Bruins because finally the narrative can end that like next man up the Bruins they just know how to do it they dig in they win all the time it's just like maybe the time's up on that it DGB is that like

it's got to be coming up except that except that as they pointed out after last night's game they're still holding out a playoff spot now it's fake because they played a couple more games and if you go by points percentage, they're not in that. And like they're clearly, it's to give you a sense of how bad it is in Boston, they're under 500 and the record is flattering them right now,

which is not a good situation to be in. So you're right. I mean, we see it all the time. Sometimes the window closes slowly and sometimes it's slam shut. And we saw that happen to San Jose a few years ago being an example where they, and they still haven't dug out of it. I feel like we spent the last few years looking at Pittsburgh and Washington thinking they were the teams that was going to happen to. Boston might be the ones.

But the thing that fascinates me is like online isn't always a great sample of where fans are at. But you look in the comments sections, you look at the social media, all that. Man, there's a lot of fingers being pointed at Jeremy Swamen by the fans. It feels like this fan base is turning, maybe not turning. on him, but putting a lot of the blame that, hey, this guy missed camp, comes in, gets the big money. It hasn't been sharp to start the season. Is it because he missed camp? Is it, you know, is there resentment from the teammates and this and that?

And that's not a situation you want to be in with the mid-20s goalie. You just signed forever. And swimming is so different. It's so different than anything that's ever happened there, guys. Like, everyone in the past, all the big name guys that brought the. team all success, right? Like the Stanley Cup, Stanley Cup finals, long playoff runs, all those guys, it never went into training camp. Correct me if I'm wrong. I don't remember any of the big name guys going into training camp with the contract negotiations. There was always a little more of a

slice of the pie left over for everyone else. And this guy drove his stick into the ground and said, it's my time to kind of reset the goalie market at that time. And then everyone followed suit. And it's so different than the Bruins way of doing things. And it was so much noisier. than the Bruins usually do things. And if you're a fan, you're like, okay, be that as it may, you better be a rock star for us when you're in net. And all of that will be forgiven and no one will care. Well, that is not the case.

And just quickly on Jim Montgomery, like, if you're going to fire him, take a look at the game sheet from last night, okay? And go down the list of guys like Mason Lurie was minus four. And then if you just look at some of the names that are playing like, bigger minutes for this team. It goes, like guys like Beecher, geeky, this Merculov, Veal, Peek, Brazo, Osterly, Tyler Johnson, who's, you know, not a spring chicken anymore. Like, there's a lot of guys there that I would argue if you're the coach, like,

this is what I got. I just, I can't play with six guys. So, you know, this is what I got to work with. But, but you know what else you got? You got one year left on your contract this season. He's not extended past this. They haven't made a commitment to him. And at the end of the day, everything you're saying is correct.

What's Don Sweney going to do? Fire himself. Right? Like, you know, Fluto has a piece on the athletic that went up, I think last night at the end of the game, where he basically says it's time to make the coaching change. And the comparison he makes is sometimes as a coach, you pull the goalie and the goalie comes to the bench and you say to the goalie, hey, this is not your fault, but I got to wake this team up. And I'm going to

throw the back. And I don't, it's not that I think the backup's going to play better than the goalie, but I'm trying to, I got to wake these guys up. And, and he wonders if it's not the same sort of thing on a coaching perspective. And, and there were reports last night that the Bruins aren't practicing today. Should we read anything to that for any? Like, does that, is, is that a bad sign or it's, yeah, I guess if it's not like a scheduled day off. Now, today's a, today's a Tuesday. Thanks for the reminder, guys. Tuesdays are not necessarily days off in the NHL, like unless you had a back-to-back on a Sunday-Munday,

which I find is rare doesn't usually happen. So, yeah, that, I mean, could be something. Maybe I'll be proven wrong. But I just, I always think the firing the coach thing is such an easy out for the players that aren't performing. Like, I don't know, you're letting guys off the hook if you just fire Jim Montgomery, when last year he was the. coach of a team that wasn't great in a lot of aspects, but it sure felt like he got a good amount

out of them when push came to shove. I mean, all of a sudden with Boston, it's like, what are they supposed to be good at? Like, you look at the score list, you look at the stats. I don't understand what this team's identity is anymore. And I think part of that, you know, a lot of that comes back to Swam and a lot of it comes back to the goaltending. I think a lot of it comes, you know, we're talking about fan reaction and stuff. This is a lot of that's, you know, we're talking about fan reaction and stuff. what it looks like when you can't rely on goal-tending to bail you out on a consistent basis. And I'm not saying that that's

necessarily what happened last year, because I think they were certainly a better all-around team than the now. But that's a fan base. And I'm not even slagging the Bruins fan base necessarily, because this is just the way it is. You watch what you watch, but this is a team that's accustomed to getting elite high-end

goal-tending, if nothing else. And you can say, like, on a bad night, you know, whether it's whether it's, whether it was Swamon or Olmark or Rask or whoever, go back, go back years and years. You can say if nothing else, there's a guy back there, then give us a chance to win on a given night. They're not getting that with Swam in right now. Save percentage below 880. He's like near the bottom of the league and goal saved to all expected. Like he's stunk all around.

And that's layered on top of a roster, Frankie, like you said, where there's, you know, you're getting big minutes for the Johnny Beechers of the world, right? which is not something you necessarily want to see if you're, if, if you're a team with, uh, real cup or playoff aspirations. So there's a lot of stuff going wrong there. The,

the goal has been bad like, you know, I just don't, I don't look at the way things have gone for that team so far this season and say, this is where they're going to dig themselves out. Outside of swimming, outside of saying,

outside of saying, maybe he can get better and play the way he did last year and that'll help him dig out of the hole. But outside of that, I don't really see necessarily, what the way out for them is. And that's a bad thing to be feeling if you're the Bruins on November 19th, right? Yeah.

It's crazy how, you know, so much of a coach's tenure can hinge off what kind of goaltending you're going to get. It's a sad reality, but that's, you know, you go back to Tim Thomas was there and he was unbelievable. Like there has never been a letdown in that crease for over a decade, if you want to call it that. And I just, just one last thing on, on Montgomery. You can't say that he hasn't tried to hold players accountable.

Like he's almost sacrificed the star guys to make points to maybe other guys on the team. It's like, I will call out Pastor Neck. I will sit Brad Marchand. Like I, I want you to know that like I'm setting the tone with the star guys because I need everyone to, to buy in here. And I just, I don't know, watching that team play, I'm, unless there's like a communication breakdown or something, but like he's tried,

he's tried multiple different bullets here. Not a lot of other buttons to push for him at this point, I think. Yeah. And that's why I think he's the button. Yeah. Yeah, it could be right. Could be right. The other, well,

we'll say meltdown because it's a team losing to the San Jose Sharks and that qualifies as a meltdown loss. I think across the board is the Detroit Red Wings. Another piece is on the site, DGB, you mentioned Flutos like, what's going on with the Bruins piece. We got a good one from Max Boltman up there today, and it's what's going on with the Red Wings. This is a team that I think a lot of folks may be expected to take a step back from where they were last season, but also still be in the, I don't want to say playoff fund, but still be relevant to a very real degree. and you can argue pretty convincingly right now that they're not because they're you know they've

oh and three on this west coast trip i've some play against the penguins last week there those are two two bad teams in a rock fight no matter no matter what the records suggest um where are we at on the wings because it seems like we're talking about pushing buttons and panicking it seems like that's finally starting to happen there people are maybe come to some hard some hard truths and some realizations about the roster that Steve Eiserman's put together. Because we said at the start of the season, I don't, I don't quite know who the good players on that one are supposed to be, or whether they have enough to truly make a run. And I think that's coming to roost.

If you said about the Bruins, you don't know what kind of team they are. Like, you don't know what their identity is. You can double that for the Red Wings, because I don't know what would make the Red Wings a hard team to play against or what makes them a good team. And it's such a mishmash because you have the, the TerraCense, and the Sherrots and the petries of the world mixed in with, you know, your, you're kind of next-gen guys, whether it's Marco Casper, I know, you know, Edvenson, cider, like, Bergrin is playing more this year now.

It's like there's such a discrepancy between like the guys that are supposedly going to move forward with this group and the guys who are the, the veteran kind of patchwork guys, but I don't know, like, I don't know if I'm sitting in a room and I'm about to play the Red Wings, I actually. don't know what my coach is going to come into the dressing room and say about this team. Like what is going to be the big message that he's going to tell us? They're a team and if we play our game, chances are we'll beat these guys tonight. That's the only thing I can think of. There's just, there's not, there's not a distinct identity to them. And I think, you know,

if Jim Montgomery would be on the hot seat, Derek Lalonde would have to be as well. Like, because you have veteran guys. And if you have a lot of veteran guys, Chances are you're trying to make the playoffs or push towards it at least. And they're going the other way pretty quickly right now. You said they're a team. Shades of Pierre Dorian and the Ottawa senators. Look, if we're talking about Jim Montgomery being a good coach in Boston and you're saying, okay, maybe if you make a move there, maybe it's a panic move.

The opposite of the dreaded panic move is patience for the sake of patience. for the sake of patience beyond any reason. And you look at Detroit and the slow motion Steve Iserman rebuild. And look, I get it. I love Steve Iserman as a player. He did fantastic in Tampa. You have Team Canada, all sorts of things. I thought that was going to work.

I absolutely did. And I get why he's going to get every possible chance from that fan base. I can't even imagine being a Red Wings fan and saying like fire Steve Eiserman after the 20 years that you got out of this guy's player. But at some point, what is the plan here? And I hate to say this because I know if you're a Red Wings fan,

the first thing you want is you want optimism. And if you can't have optimism, then maybe you want some blame. I honestly think the big problem with Detroit is. They were bad for a long time. They never won a lottery. They never got a truly. elite player.

100%. A hundred percent. And, you know, Morseider was a great pick at six. You know, they, we, we thought they had found something there.

But at the end of the day, can you contend for anything if Dylan Larkin's your best player? And I like Dylan Larkin a lot. Don't, don't send this back to me when he scores the, the winner in the Four Nations Cup against Canada. But he's a good player. Can he be the best player in a division?

where you're competing with Akita Kudharov, David Pasternak, and Austin Matthews, and everything the Panthers have. Ten years, they've been, call it ten years, they've been in this rebuild, one top five pick.

Like, they have been rottenly unlucky when it comes to getting the lottery pick, and of course that plays a big part in it. And you talk about Larkin. If Larkin is ever not playing, teams even worse. Like, it's actually crazy.

how much the team falls off without Larkin. And the thing on Sider that is wild, Sider's a really good player. I think he does a lot of things really well. It's almost like at times they've made it way harder than it has to be for him. Like if he had a little bit of help, whether it's, you know, who's on the other pairs, who he gets to play with,

you know, guys that can maybe help, you know, take some of the matchups away. We would see a totally different more at Sider. Like this guy has had so much thrown on his plate, at such a young age because he showed he could do it when he was a rookie, and he's had to continually do it with not a lot of help around him. But I think, like, that's the biggest thing that sticks out. It's a 10-year rebuild with one top five pick.

They have been so unlucky when it comes to the lottery. And rebuilds, they're hard enough as it is. Like, you could have been the Edmonton Oilers and have, how many is it, four first overall picks over the span of a few years. And, you know, there's still holes in that team. You know, like it's just the rebuild, you got to be lucky. Like, you really do have to be lucky. And they haven't had that.

And if you're not lucky, you can't go out and spend $11 million on JT. Com for an Andrew cop to be the guys behind Dylan Larkin. You can get away with having Dylan Larkin on your best player, as your best player, if you have a person behind him who's like a tick worse. If like say, like call Larkin a 1A, that's fine. get a 1B behind them. You can't have that guy be JT. Comfer. You can't have that guy be Andrew Cobb.

If you don't have the guys to build against, if you're not getting that luck, at some point you've got to find some plug-and-play pieces. And I think that's where the failure has been in Detroit. Is there been a few of those where at the time everyone went, oh, that's, you know, Ben Chirot was not the right move for this team. But then there's other guys where you just hope that a few of the, them are going to click in and work and and they just don't and and not to keep

arping on the lottery thing but frankie you said one top five pick in all this time that was a lucas raymond fourth overall in a year that the red wings finished dead last by a mile they were historically bad and then one two three teams go scooting by them in the lottery and they end up picking forth um and i you know what and got a really good player yeah even that even that one exception is not an exception because, you know, first of all, you can't even fall three spots anymore. The league has changed the rules about that a little bit too late for Detroit. But, I mean, they were the worst team in the league by like 20 points that year. Got nothing.

It's bad. It's not nothing, but got nothing as far as luck. Yeah. It could have been better. Anything from the lottery gods. Well, and isn't that this is their overall problem? Like, it's bad luck, but it's also kind of an inability to help yourself. Like they've, they've whiffed, I think, on, on two levels.

And we're talking about the Red Wings like this is, you know, a 72 point team or something, and they're not. But it also seems like things have stagnated because Larkins is good as he's going to get. The Brinket is what he is, which is a good support player who makes, you know, probably a little bit too much money. And what's happened now is if you talk to the Red Wings fans who are still drinking the Kool-A, they're looking down the pipeline. They're saying, like, Axel San Felica is going to be a good.

player and da da da da da and there's and there's there's a bunch of guys coming up through the system where they're like no this is actually going to be it you got to call time out on that to some extent like what are we how are we still we're still having this discussion we're still saying wait for three years for this next wave of red wings prospects to come through to come in and what play behind and do what year old dylan larkin at this point exactly like to what's the cycle what's the cycle look like a hunt to me they're their their timeline is directly in step with Dylan Larkin. Right?

To me, he's, he's their, he's their best player without a doubt still. And we're going to be talking in a couple years, the dude's going to be 30. And then you're like, what do we, did we just, wait a second, we just, you know, wasted the prime of, we'll say a top 15, top 20 center in the league when he's, when he's going right? I don't know. I think that's, I think it's, I think it's silly. I think if you're talking about wasting the prime of a top 20 center, that that's your problem. right there.

Completely. Completely. And I mean, geez, you said, we're talking about them like they're a 72 point team and they're not,

are we sure? They're not that far off that pace. You're right. You know, just ahead of Montreal. Like they're literally just ahead of Montreal right now. If you look at the standings, which is a Montreal team that,

that it feels like the market is in full blown crisis, even knowing that it was a rebuild, even knowing they weren't going to be in the playoff mix. Man, so what do you do, though? I mean, the coaching change is possible, but Iisman, I mean, geez, we've been doing this so long. I remember doing it with Jeff Blasel where it was like, well, this is definitely the year

Eisenman's going to make that change and didn't happen and didn't happen. I can appreciate loyalty, you guys. I can appreciate the patience. I can appreciate the loyalty because as a player, I thought that, you know, I really valued that. And I think that goes a long way with getting good performances at it, guys, like not having to show up to the rink every day. thinking that you might not be there anymore. But the cycle for the Red Wings is not going to reach a pinnacle. Like this group as constructed will not reach any kind of pinnacle.

And at some point, you're going to have to shed these contracts, whether they expire or you move them. And then what? You're starting a rebuild again, but the rebuild initially never got anywhere. That's the biggest fear, I think. And that's why it's not a great situation for them to be in. And that's why, you know, when we were texting before the show, and of course, everything always comes back to the Pittsburgh Penguins with me. That's just the way it goes. But like, would you rather have a situation like the one in Pittsburgh where I, they're obviously it, this is Kyle Dubus standing over the roster with a little TNT plunger like from from Wiley Coyote, right? Like this thing could get blown up at any moment. Would you rather have that a team that's. clearly made the decision to rebuild and start and start over.

Or would you rather have the Detroit Red Wings who seemed like they topped out last season as a, you know, congratulations. You got close to the playoffs. And now, again, we're looking down the road and Tanserson and Fanderson, Prospect A, B, and C, maybe those will be the ones to get it done. Like, we're on the verge of having a pretty much a blank slate in Pittsburgh, where you can, you can paint the canvas and do what you one or start over. You can have the blank slate, but then you're Chicago.

And who the hell knows when Chicago is going to be a good team? Like, really? Like, Connor Bedard is struggling. Taylor Hall's a healthy scratch there. There's, we thought they would be a little bit better than what they are for sure. And it's just, it hasn't happened there. So for me, I would still say Detroit because at least there is some kind of pipeline of prospects that's not bad.

actually that has been built up over time. And some of those guys are playing on the team, whether it's Edvinson. You know, Nate Danielson is coming up. Like, Marco Casper is playing now at least. And he actually, like, I like Marco Casper as a player. I think he's pretty good. There's the other guy that they,

the Swedish kid they drafted this year that they're, they're pretty excited about. Yeah. Or he's, yeah, he plays in Sweden. But there's like, at least you have that. I think in Pittsburgh, you're right. Like, you're just, you're scratching all the names. off and you're saying, okay, we got the blank word document right now.

And so I think that puts you a little further away. And I don't, I would say, I don't think Pittsburgh's that close to being a blank document. You look at that, some of the guys they've got signed at least through next year, let alone guys that, you know, you're, you're not going to be able to, nobody's lining up to make you an offer for Ricard Raquel with four years left or Michael bunting with another year. and not to mention you got the Crosby factor looming all over this where are you really willing to do a rock bottom rebuild in what could be the final years of his era. I'd rather be Detroit, but I would rather be Detroit with a better plan than what seems to be the plan right now, which is just let Steve. Steve will fix it somehow, even though we're in the year five, six, seven of waiting for him to do it.

It's still Detroit for me, but I mean, I think there's something to be said for being like, all right, this team, this team stinks. We need to, we need to move on. Even if, even if in practice, that hasn't quite come to pass in Pittsburgh. There's, there's some degree of acceptance that's taking place there, I guess is what I'm saying. And I don't know that we're seeing that from Detroit, which is like, you know, we keep saying, it just feels like there's, it feels like there's stagnation there. And if the cycle has to restart without anything meaningful coming of it, that's a tough, that's a tough pill to swallow.

Let's put it this way. There are some prospects that could be dudes there, whether it's Nate Danielson, Axel Sandine Pelica, Marco Casper, Bransig-Neggarde is the guy that I was talking about, COSA, maybe even Soderblom. At least there's some guys that could be dudes for the Red Wings at some point. That's a perfect segue into the second segment. We're going to take a break. We'll be right back with that. This is Frankie's baby coming up. I'm very excited about it.

This is one of the more excited texts I think I've gotten from Frank over the last, over the last six months or whatever. We need to come up with a creative name for this. This is like the dude the dude sheet. I don't know. The Jude Ranch? Is that, is that anything? Hey, what about the old saying? It's just just dudes being dudes.

Dude being dudes. Well, this is inspired by you because every once in a while we're doing the pod and we'll be talking about a player and you'll say that guy is a dude. And basically what you're saying is. Cole perfetti, by the way. I think in that situation, it was like they need to know if he's going to be a dude. Yeah. You know? So it can be applied so many different ways.

It's kind of like the F word. It's very versatile. And what we're going to do is we're going to test its versatility. So I have five different creative categories that are going to springboard us into five little mini conversations about these players. Dude, I know. Dude. I know. You guys good?

We ready? Everyone knows the premise of this. Driving the bus, brother. Let's go. Get to those dudes. Okay. The first one is that dude. You know, when you say he's that guy, he's that dude, I can't believe this guy is doing it, but we shouldn't be surprised.

Who else, Alex Ovechkin? He needs 27 goals now to beat Gretzky, had the hat trick on Sunday, two goals last night versus Utah, the guy's 39 years old, and he got hurt in that game, which, you know, it's tough because he's trying to accomplish something. But like, he came back this year and he said, oh, you guys don't think I can do this? Did you forget that I'm going to be the greatest goal score of all time? Maybe I'll just do it this year. Now, we got to see what happens with the injury, but like, what can you say about what he's, what he's done this year. He leads the NHL and goals. He's got 15 goals.

He's leading. Started slowish. Slowish. I write a piece on the end of October every year where I go like, here are the dudes having bad starts. And when I sat down to write it, like the day before it ran, Ovechkin was stuck on two goals. And then he scored two goals that night. And I was like, ah, should I get? get the editors to yank him out and swap it i won't worry too much about it and he's basically been

unstoppable ever since um and it'll shock you to know that capill's fans are all up in my mentions reminding me of that but the knee that that injury it didn't look great last night didn't look catastrophic like it wasn't something where he's crawling off the ice and you know on a sir going on to a stretcher and you're thinking it's it's really bad but we've seen knee-on-knee hits turn out to be not much we've seen it turn out to be season ending. And the latest update I've seen from wishes that the capitals are going to have something later today. It's, you would have liked to have heard after the game, like, you know what? It doesn't seem that bad.

We're not too worried. But you also, sometimes with stuff like this, you hear like, well, the fear is this or that. And you start hearing those scary words and like ACL. And I haven't heard any of that either. So I think we're just legitimately waiting. I watched that guy dig pucks out of the corner last night, like with some regularity of actually. I don't remember the last time I saw that, right?

So it's a mix of him. Man, man, he looks, he looks great, but he also seems energized playing on a good. It's wild how that works. When you're playing on a legitimately good team with some legitimately productive linemates, and he's with Stroman produce. And just that looks like a more. We said, like, coming into the season, he was either going to fall reasonably well short of the record or he was going to get it.

There's no scenario where he's going to finish like a goal or two short because this guy, he's like a dog smelling a steak. Like, you just, he, he's suddenly ready to go and it's like right now he smells it. They're like, they're like must see TV for me at this point. And again, we got it. We just got to cross our, cross our fingers and hope that, hope that he, you know, didn't, didn't tear ligaments or something last night. But on a night to night basis, and it's not just him. They're fun for a whole lot of different reasons. So I found myself, whenever they're on, man, I'm gravitating toward the caps and I'm gravitating towards

the local broadcasts with, with Jobi and in locker. And I'm just like, this is, this is wild. This is 2011 type stuff here where I'm like, I'm watching the Washington Capitals of every night. Why? But it's because it's ultimately because of him. I love when we get the center ice feed, the cap center ice feed. and it's Joe B and he just fires off Oh, Vetchkin. It's so good. It's so good.

He's made the highlight reel that much better with all those goal calls over the year. If over the years, sorry, if OV's back soon and it's just a little bit of a tweak or a sprain and he can kind of just pick up where he left off, wouldn't it be the best possible way for him to do it

where he has this year where a shooting percentage right now is like above 20% and it never really has been. Like it's always been in that 11 to 15% range, you know, just to just to finish it off with authority and say like, I am the best of all time and I'm going to do it in my best shooting percentage year of all time.

Like that, that just kind of screams like, yeah, I am that dude. And we all said, right, like if he was going to break the record, we didn't want to see him crawling across the finish line.

and just, you know, bear, like hanging around, hanging around. Dude's not hanging around. No, but he's that dude. He's that dude. I have a dude. Dude, at least make it seem like you're trying. Oh, oh, boy. At least make it seem like you're trying.

And did you watch the Leafs versus Oilers on Saturday? Oh, yes. And he is a great defenseman. Evan Bouchard is a great defenseman. please don't get me wrong. That is like one thing that cannot be disputed. The stuff he does with the puck, the vision, power play, the shot, he is, he's really, really good. But there have been two instances this year that I can think of. One was against Vegas. It was an Ike goal goal, I believe, where he's, you know, straight-legged, gliding back to the net, basically from the blue line in. And then Saturday

against Toronto, it's a shot that gets deflected, pops up into the neutral zone. between him and Ekholm and Bobby McMahon throws on the jets and Ekholm is trying to get there, but Bushard might think that Ekholm is going to get there. So he does the straight leg glide all the way back to the net where it's like, dude, if you just buried your head took three or four hard strides, maybe you can dive out and prevent that from happening. Because Stuart Skinner wasn't sure if he should go out because the puck was in no man's land. I just think he's so good. It just optically looks odd when you're a defenseman and you straight leg it glide back to your own net. Am I wrong about that?

Like, I just think that looks, that's got a weird look to it. I was, I, I saw it in real time. And I was, you know, thinking like, okay, that doesn't look great. And, you know, he had the bad giveaway. And, you know, but then seeing the clips, like going around after the game, a lot of them from Oilers fans who are. very frustrated with this was was kind of like you know when you see it over and over again it really hit home what does that do though like I saw some comments from people uh you know dudes like me sitting on their couch going this is going to get this is going to get noticed in

the dressing room this is going to get talked about oh you're 100% right oh because guys will look at that you know where that gets brought up it's like sometimes you have your little side conversation with your buddy that you're kind of tight with on the team you know whether it's on the bus like low volume or you know out to dinner and you're like you believe that stuff like everyone else has to kind of bury their head and and work their ass off it's like does that not apply like you're your defenseman at the end of the day and let like again let me just reiterate doesn't take away from the brilliance of his game offensively and on the power play and I think he's a very good like defense and very good player but like why can't you just make it seem like you're at least

trying in those situations. I don't understand it. Is this like, and whatever, maybe reading too much into this, but there's like that old, there's like that old Bill Murray quote where he says,

after you get famous, you have five years to act like an asshole. And if, and if you're, and then after that, you're just an asshole. Like, like, there's like,

there's like a, there's like a grace period, you know, for someone who comes on to great fame and great fortune and great acclaim. You, You can be, you know, you can walk around with a big head for a little bit. But at some point, you got to figure it out.

When I see it happen with guys like Wouchard, that's what I wonder. I'm like, he was so, he was so incredible last year. The playoff, the playoff performance was, you know, as good as we, comes into the, comes in the regular season. He's on Norse short list and all this stuff. You know, like, he's still, he's still a young guy, still hasn't played a ton. Like, you just wonder if this, if this is some kind of nests. bit of like recalibration that's going on there where it's like there's two

paths he can he can either be the guy that does that or or he can and in that sense maybe this is in a twisted way good news they chewed rather if those bad habits are there for him to have a couple of years where he kind of skates by that maybe it's better that he takes his lumps now and sort of figures it out or something I wouldn't want it's going to have to start winning it mad thanks to Amazon. I don't want to be dealing with that. The Evan Bouchard versus Quinn Hughes argument is not that should even be an argument right now.

That should not be an argument. Quinn Hughes should be in a conversation with Kail McCar and Adam Fox. I think he is. No, I know, but that's, I know he is, but Evan Bouchard is not in that conversation. Oh, right. Those guys. No, no, no. this is one I'm excited about because everyone has this dude.

Everyone has the dude that they didn't think was going to be a dude. And this was really inspired by Connor McMichael of Washington and what he's doing this year and his goal scoring. But I didn't pick him. That's low-hanging fruit. He had one taken away last night. Terrible, terrible goal interference called Sean. I don't know.

I don't know if you saw that. This was like this was one of the 20% that is just. So I had people mad at me about. that because I, you know, I wrote the rule. This is, here, here, here's the thing on that one. Uh, the guy was in the crease. Yeah, I, I, I had people saying, well, but he barely even touched the goalie. Maybe he didn't touch the goal.

It doesn't matter. You're in the crease. If you're screening the goalie, that's interference. But he gets out of the crease as the shots coming in. I'm just going to say, I feel like we're sleeping on the trend of goalie interference reviews not being overturned this year. I don't know what the number is, but it really feels like at some point the league decided if it's not super.

super obvious, which is supposed to be how the rule works, we're not going to flip it. And the call on the ice was no goal. So I didn't see it in real time, but if I had, I probably would have thought, okay, that's coming. They're going to change it. But I'm not shocked that they didn't. It's been such a weird year because I thought early in the season, they really had established what was going to be goalie interference or not.

And I think things have gotten murkier since then. That doesn't change the fact that McMichael's a dude. But I got someone in New Jersey that I didn't necessarily. think was going to be a dude. And that is Stefan Nason. Nine goals, 16 points in 21 games this year. He had a career high 37 points last year. This dude was playing in the HL like three years ago. And he wasn't playing in the HL as like an early 20s guy on an entry level contract. This guy was in his late 20s. Like when you're in your late 20s and you're playing in the HL, a lot of times, that's kind of

where you're at. That's where you're going to be. And if you get called up, you play this like depth, complimentary role, you know, limited minutes. And now this year, he comes back to Jersey. And the guy's a big part of that team because he's different than a lot of those other guys. Like, he's different than Brat and Hughes. And I don't know, go down the list of guys that are really skilled on that team. Like, he's pretty bulky. He plays a pretty rugged game.

And he's, you know, he's able to contribute offensively. I didn't necessarily have Stefan Nason being a dude this year, but he is a dude for the devils. I think he was good enough with Carolina last year over the last little bit before this, where I don't know if I'm entirely surprised by it, but man, you look at that being said, the production is where you're like, okay. That's what it is. Even the biggest Stefan Nason fan isn't going to, is it going to say that they said, and I'm sure that exists, isn't going to say that they saw this comment.

Like he was a useful piece for Carolina for the last couple years. And now with with Jersey, man, he's he's leveled up. And Frank, I think he said it. Find the right spot. Put a guy in the in the lineup. And sometimes it clicks. Sometimes it clicks for a while. And then it doesn't.

But different body type too. Like you said, different kind of physicality, different player profile, something that they've that they've lacked, I think, the last couple years. That's that's hand and glove fit stuff there, I think. This one I'm very excited about. This was all the talk in the offseason. And this dude, he's sitting there right now and he's saying, I told you so. And that's Marty Natchez.

This dude is sitting there saying, I told you so. I want to play more. I want to play on the power play. And guess what? On the first power play, that is, this year, Marty Natchez, 30 points on the year. And he's playing with Eric Robinson and Kotkin. And guess who's having good years? Eric Robinson and Kotkinemi.

Like this guy is elevate, not only is he taking care of his own stuff where, you know, he wanted it, he got it and he's delivering. He's like elevating the play of the guys around him who were, you know, I would say a lot of people have written off Kot Kenyemi,

you know, rightfully so. I think Eric Robinson is, you know, you take a flyer on a guy like that who's been a tweener guy for his whole career. And it's like this, this Marty Natchez, he basically called a shot. Like he called a shot and now he's delivering.

And he's sitting there saying, I told you so. The thing that I really like about Natchez too is like, yes, he's getting more power play time. Yes, he's on a true top six and he's, he's cashing it on it. The thing that he, the fun part to me is that he's doing it on the wing. Because I think what we saw from him over the last couple years is like he, this is a, this was a public talk talking point for a little. bit for Natchez. He wants to play center, blah, blah, blah. And it didn't seem like it was going to happen. Like, it seems like, well, he called his shot and the money's weird, like, whatever. All that stuff's great. But part of that is like he had to come off the center thing, right? He had,

like, you give and you get. And you say, like, all right, you're on the power play. Top six minutes. You're playing on the right wing. You're playing with with Kotkinemi. And I like that he, you know, knew where to push and knew where to kind of kind of ran himself in, right? I think that's, I think that's cool. And I think that's an indicator of growth. And it's, man, it's the guy's still, he's still just incredible, incredible hot streak. And it's not over yet. He could have been playing somewhere else.

Like the guy could have been playing somewhere else. And now he's a, do you want to go play center for Columbus or do you want to be a right wing on a cup contender? I think that was part of it. And he made the right call. The last one I have is a dude, I feel bad for that dude. I feel bad for Anthony Mantha because he's torn as ACL. He's done for the year. He takes a one year deal to go to Calgary.

Basically, if you're taking that deal, it's because you're hopefully going to have some success there individually. Parlay that into a trade to a contender. He has a reasonable cap hit. Like it's just over $3 million. and you'll line yourself up for something great next year. Tor is ACL. And if you've seen the way a lot of the guys have recovered from ACLs over the past couple of years, whether it's Kirby Doc who's struggling in Montreal,

Connor Brown struggled last year for Edmonton until the playoffs. Taylor Hall, who's, you know, was a healthy scratch for Chicago. He's struggling off the ACL. A couple years back, Tom Wilson, you know, really struggled coming back from it. The only guy that I could think of that came back from the ACL and was himself right away is Zach Hyman. So it's tough. I feel bad for him because that would have been, you know, that would have been a good position for him to be in. And now he's, you know, he's really going to have to recover and find his game next year.

And it is tough because a lot of, I don't know what his situation would have been as far as whether there were longer offers out there. but it's easy for guys like me to always sit there and say bet on yourself. These guys should bet on well. I mean, he did bet on himself and he was living up to that bet, but this is the risk that you run. And, uh, yeah, 100% with you on that one. It's a tough one.

Yeah, that's all I got boys. Those are my dudes for the week. Dudes. I like it. Frankie, you're our dude. You guys are dudes. You're our dude of the week.

Yeah. He says we're dudes, but he doesn't say which ones we are. Yeah, we're... These are the dudes. The dudes you also feel bad for it. I think one of us is feel bad and one of us is just look like you're trying and I'm not quite sure which is rich. We'll talk you next week. Thanks as always.

Okay, boys. See ya. All right. Frankie's gone. Just me and you, Sean. Time to tackle. We'll be learned. What have we learned, Sean?

Here's what I learned. I learned that you can be quite possibly the worst team in the entire league and still not have room in your lineup for a former MVP. I don't get it. I don't get what's happening with Chicago. I don't get what's happening with Taylor Hall. Obviously, not partial to any of the kind of internal dynamics of whatever might be going on. But healthy scratched.

I'm going to go ahead and say for the first time in his career, certainly, since his is the first time in his life first time in his life quite possibly yep and not happy about it which you wouldn't expect but also expressing some frustration at how it was communicated

which is not good that's the problem nobody's ever happy to not play but to say you know I didn't really I didn't see it coming I didn't and even Luke Richardson sort of say maybe it could have been handled better but I don't think

There's no way to do this and have it look great. And coaches have got to make, you know, you've got to have accountability. You're trying to build a culture. You're trying to teach some lessons to young guys. In some sense, maybe Taylor Hall is the perfect guy to make an example out of. But that's a tough one because, you know, obviously when he surprised some of us by going to Chicago initially, he loses the season of injury and then this year just it hasn't been there at all. I thought the worst case scenario for Taylor Hall in Chicago with any level of decent health

was trade deadline. Yeah, a guy you can get a second round pick for at the deadline. Correct. At the very least, you know, he spends most of the year with Connor Bedard. Connor Bardard gets to see, you know, what does a pro look like? What is another first overall pick, a former MVP? what does that look like, learn a little bit, and then you move him off to a contender. And he goes and has a nice postseason somewhere so he can get his next contract.

And it just doesn't seem like it's headed there. And I don't get, I mean, I'm not shocked that Chicago's bad. I am surprised that they're this bad. And this is not a step in the right direction. It doesn't sound like. I'm trying to think how much of this situation I blame on Luke Richardson because, you know, gets scratched on Saturday, Taylor Hall says. And then, of course, today or yesterday after practice, everyone's trying to kind of say the

right things, but you can tell that there's still some residual weirdness here. This is Hall. We communicated. It wasn't anything argumentative. He thought it was best for me to reset, so that's what I'm going to do. I'm not immune to coaching or immune to being helped. accountable. I just want to play better and be better for our team. If there were some conversations in the days leading up about my game, or if I was constantly being shown video,

it would be one thing, but I was a bit surprised. I don't, I don't, I don't love that. I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't love that for Luke Richardson to tell you the truth. Because I think that's, I think that's a very respectful, um, measured way for Taylor Hall to say like what yeah like we're fine but i'm still not sure what the hell is going on here yep not great i would agree with that and and it's you know it's interesting because richardson is he's a rookie head coach but this guy played in the league forever and luc richmond was like a third overall pick too it wasn't like obviously he wasn't taylor hall he wasn't getting too many MVP votes but he was you know he he went through it was he was

he was a guy drafted by the toronto maple leagues which back then meant okay 18 year old get out there on the first pair of the ground. So it's, it seems like a major unforced error by him. Like I don't know. I mean, the flip side is I know you could look at it. You could go, well, Taylor Hall, you got six points, man. You're 10th in team scoring.

But man, I'm looking at their scoring list. Taylor Hall is in a four-way tie with six points. And two of the guys he's tied with Lucas Reichel, who's supposed to be the future. Yeah, that's all cool. And they feel like they're screwing that up. Yeah. And then Tyler Bertuzi, who was the big offseason acquisition, who was going to be the guy to help them get to that next step of, okay, the days of finishing dead last are over.

Now we got to start making progress. And Tyler Bertuzzi would be a good fit and just hasn't worked anywhere. I didn't think they were going to be good, but I didn't think they were going to be this bad. And I didn't, I didn't think they were going to be as bad as they are in the way that they are. Dude, you said it. Like it's Lucas Reichel, you know, they need someone to step up as a legit option, you know, who's in the same age range as Bedard. It doesn't seem like it's him. Bertuzi, I was wrong about that.

I thought he was going to be a solid bit on the middle sticks there too. Yeah, that's not a good situation. And even Connor Bergard, I mean, as great as he is and nobody's, you know, nobody's blaming the guy. 13 points and 18 games. This is a guy we were talking, you know, hey, the second year, right?

Remember Sydney Crosby in second year? Connor McDavid, David. That's when these guys jumped up and we're winning scoring titles and MVPs and this and that. And we're kind of, you know, I don't think too many of us were picking Connor Bedard

to win those awards or to, you know, to be even right in the running. But, you know, maybe as a long shot, maybe as a dark horse. And instead,

it's almost like production wise, he's regressed. now don't I that is not me saying oh you know it's his fault or he's a bust or anything like that but that's in theory you would have thought he'd be the guy that could wallpaper over a lot of big problems and maybe maybe he did last year and that can be the difference that's the difference between the crosbys and macdavids of the world and everybody else there's no shame in being a little bit worse than them and I think that might be what we're seeing here like those guys are true generational players.

The generational tag is overused to the point of meaninglessness. And I think, I know, I'm not trying to throw out butard as, we're not saying it, but if I'm a Blackhawks fan,

I might, that might be keeping me up at nights starting at some point of, did we actually get the next Crosby here? Again, We're 18 games in with season on a terrible team that has a million other problems. I guess so. Those other guys were also on terrible teams.

Yeah. And they won, and they won scoring titles and won hard trophies. Like, if that's the standard that we're going by, you know, unfair or not. You know,

Crosby had Malkin and Hunter McDavid had, I mean, Dry Saddle wasn't himself there. He had Taylor Hall. is who he had in theory, at least for that first year or two. And it all comes about, it's all two other holes fault, is what I'm saying. I agree. Just bench him forever and never give him a reason why.

And I think that's, I think that's, I think just tell them every night you're playing. You're back in in the morning skate and then, and then just, don't talk about it. Just grab them by the back of the jersey when he heads out onto the ice and go, no. Notch all time, baby. Take off your skates. I learned last night that, look, I, Dallas lost Anaheim, right? Never a good thing.

Anaheim jumps out to a three-goal lead. Dallas makes a late push, but couldn't quite get it done. There's issues there. Jason Robertson's still not scoring. Rupa Hens, you know, not playing like Rupa Hens. Not a, not a, they're not at their ceiling, let's say. that being said Matt Douchain

Best player on the ice last night He's been the best player on the ice I think for the stars Probably a little bit too often But hey What are you going to do 21 points in 10 games I saw on the broadcast last night

Because I love watching the stars broadcast It's been the best 16 games stretch For him that he's had in his career ever Matt Dushan has never at any point Been more productive in terms of points than he is right now. And he looks it. Right?

So it's a heartening thing to see. I know we're sitting here talking about Matthew Shammie. Like he's 42 years old. But like he's got a jump in any, and there's a, there's a wow factor when he's got the puck on his stick that I said like, you could, if you threw an abs jersey on him,

I would be like this is, this is 24 year old Matthew Shand. He's 33, which these days might as well be for. I did well be. I know. And he's a guy that, yeah, I mean, you look at his career numbers. He's a classic guy that came in as such a high pick that you sort of just went through his whole career going superstar. Superstar.

I mean, this guy was a third overall pick in the Tavares headman year, if I'm not mistaken, where some people were saying, hey, it's not a two. This isn't a two-studd draft. This is, there's three guys. Dusha is right up there with them. and he's been a very good player but he's been like a point of game guy and obviously was part of the big trade with Ottawa that did not work

and goes to Columbus and it has bounced around I'm surprised to hear like this is the most productive stretch that he's ever had because the talent has always been there but it's just yeah it hasn't hasn't ever clicked into

and that's fine Like, again, if he was a second round pick, you take that career in a second. It's just the fact that sometimes that initial draft pick puts, puts the, sets the expectations. And now he's, and now he's 33 years old putting up monster numbers for Dallas on a $3 million cap. Like that, that to me is where it's for the second straight year for them, by the way. Like they've gotten very productive Matt Duchyne at a cut rate price for two consecutive seasons now. And that's the kind of thing. That's the kind of thing that if and when Robertson and Hins get their stuff together,

you hope that Douchain is still rolling at that time because it's going to be fun to watch. Yeah. A good example of, you know, sometimes it's about the fit. And Matt D'Shaun, a guy who has bounced around an awful lot of teams and was in a position last year due to the, due to the buyout where he could pick his destination. He picked the Dallas stars. I think a lot of us, you know, again, one year deal. A lot of us looked at that and went, okay, you do your one year, have a big year,

and then go somewhere else and sign the big contract. And I don't know, maybe that wasn't offered to him last summer, but he sticks around and it's working in Dallas. It's a good fit for him. And it feels like after years and years of us constantly saying, okay, this is the spot. Remember when he went to Nashville and we're all like, he likes country music. This will be great. He thought that was the spot for himself.

Yeah. Turns out he gets the Barry Trots who's Scalak a couple years ago. Turns out what type of music you like doesn't necessarily dictate how productive you're going to be. But yeah, it's good to say. I mean, this guy who's been around forever and probably nice to see him, have it all click. He can play acoustic guitar and wear cowboy boots in Dallas, too, based on what I've noticed. Also, the goal he scored, as an aside, scores to make it 3-2.

It's like kind of late in the third. The loudest building I've heard on TV all year in Dallas. They went ballistic. On a Monday night game against the Anaheim ducks that they were trailing, that place just exploded. So shout out to them. It's a fun. On a Monday night when the Cowboys,

are on TV. That might explain it right there. They are trying to prove a point in the building in Dallas last night. Then they might very well be doing that. All right, buddy, I think that's it for us. You have anything you want to shout out? Anything funny working on this week? Working on a few things, but I got the,

well, I'm going to have a piece soon. I don't know when it's going to run. Might depend on a few things, but it's let's bring it back to Pittsburgh. I'm contemplating the idea of maybe this is how it ends for Sidney Crosby with, has made the playoffs in two years. A bang and not a whimper and not a bang.

Hasn't probably doesn't make the playoffs this year. Are we really going to see a world where Sidney Crosby, the last three, four, five years of his career doesn't make the playoffs? And my answer is we might, And it wouldn't be unprecedented. And I'm going to look back at some other guys who were maybe not quite at the Crosby tier, but pretty close, who had very sad endings. Oh, sweet.

As far as team success, you know, obviously Sidney Crosby's still great. Not great enough for that mess in your neck of the woods. It's going to make everyone feel real happy on it. It's going to be a bummer. I wouldn't, I would skip it if I were you. Oh, okay. I will. Thanks for the heads up.

And thank you folks for listening to Athletic Hockey show. The next show is on Thursday. No Wednesday, or obviously no Wednesday show. And then Thursday is going to be Granger and Russo. So enjoy that. We're back next Wednesday. Normal schedule for us just ahead of real Thanksgiving, as we call on these parts. Have a good week, and we'll talk to you real soon.