The Athletic Hockey Show - Is it time to worry about Matvei Michkov?

Episode Date: October 23, 2025

Hailey and Sean welcome Kevin Kurz to discuss the Flyers opening two weeks under Rick Tocchet and the slow sophomore start for Matvei Michkov.  They talk about the red hot start for the New Jersey Devils, the Flames slow burn and who Calgary should put on the trade block, the Islanders firing their goalie coach already, Matthew Schaefer's ridiculous speed bursts per game and pending UFA Martin Nečas' monster start to his season in Denver with the Avalanche.Hosts: Hailey Salvian and Sean GentilleWith: Kevin KurzExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff DometWatch full episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowJoin our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/VTm9VjkFSubscribe to The Athletic: https://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic hockey show. What's up, everyone? Welcome to the athletic hockey show. It's Haley Salvean and Sean Gentilly here with you for the Thursday edition of the show. Kevin Kurz is going to join us today from Philadelphia to discuss the Flyers 3, 2 and 1 start and Matt Baimichkov playing some catch up to start his sophomore season. We'll jump around the league a little bit today too, but first, of course, let's bring in Sean, who joins me now.

from a very dim Scotia Bank Saddle Dome, are you having lighting issues today? I so badly wished that what happened in Calgary last night would have happened when they were playing the Chicago Blackhawks. And I wish it would have happened when Mark Lazarus was on the catwalk walking over to the press box because that man hates that setup in the Calgary press box more than anybody hates anything. Okay.

But can I just say? For the lights to go out when Laz was walking over there, that would have been my, that's one of my greatest dreams. And the fact that it didn't is a missed opportunity. I need to say something, though, because all these media people, I lived in Calgary, I worked in Calgary, you do not have to walk across the catwalk. People do it for fun. The only people on the other side are team staff and broadcasters.

No print media ever has to walk across the catwalk. They do it for the picture. They do it for the photo op. It's fake news. There is no need for the catwalk. I need to say that as somebody who would see every time someone came into Calgary. It's almost like. No, no, no.

Every time someone came into town, they were like, oh, I'm scared. I'm taking this video. I'm like, why are you on the catwalk then? For attention. For attention. Right. If you're afraid of heights, don't cross the catwalk. It's a good bit.

It's a good bit. No, no. Sitting in my little press box seat, never having to go there and seeing the videos of everyone crossing the catwalk and freaking out. I'm like, you didn't have to do that. You didn't have to.

You just chose to. They wanted to for attention. That's the way it goes. Anyways, it's actually me who's sitting in a dark room. Something's going on with my lighting. I need to speak with the manager because it's not dark in here, but I'm having a lighting issue similar to the Saddle Dome.

But just like the flames and the habs, I will continue on. Professional segue. A little Frankie Corado over here with the segues. Yeah, it's my professional segue after crashing out on the non-recording part, being like, I don't know how to work this. Somebody's a help me. The show goes on, the flames, by the way, off to a very bad start to the season. I was going to say pretty bad.

It's just bad. Blanket bad. one win in eight games, just one point above the San Jose Sharks who don't even have a regulation win yet this season. It's going to be a long season at the dome. We talked about this already. We were selling our stock in the flames. We've already been saying, like, you need to just pick a lane. Saw this from Elliott Friedman yesterday. One of his big questions in Calgary is like, how are the veterans, like a Nazim cadre, Blake Coleman? How are they going to handle a rough season? And how is Craig Conroy, the general manager going to navigate all that.

I don't know about you, Sean. I think it's pretty simple. You get a bag for Nazim Kodri. Trade them, lean into the skid, get what you can, because Kodry could still be like an elite 1B in the postseason. I want to see that guy back in the playoffs. Trade them, get what you can. Just end it.

I think you nailed it. I think we as a culture need Nazim Kodry in the playoffs. Calgary needs to do the right thing. send them back to, guys, send them back to Colorado. Send him to Montreal. How about that? Nazum Cadry, second line center behind Nick Suzuki for the Montreal Canadians playing the Toronto Maple Leafs in the first round of the Atlantic Division

playoffs. Like, let's go. Make it happen. Pull the plug immediately because that team stinks. They should get worse. Dustin Wolf is the eraser, the Cologne for whatever happened last season, it would have been unfair to expect him to do it again. Yeah.

And he's, you know, I don't want to say regressed. It's too early for that. But he's not standing on his head and doing tricks and keeping that team, you know, in the wild card chase at this point. So if this is what they're going to get from him this season, man, time to do something because I am tired of watching them already. Do the right thing. Yeah.

Flames lose 2-1 and O. last night to the Montreal Canadians, you know, who didn't lose the New Jersey Devils. They beat the Wild 4-1. They extend their early season win streak to 6. Sean, you pulled this stat. It's been three years since the Devils have even won four in a row. They're at six already this season. What do you think seems to be doing well in Jersey?

Because this is the team that, like, everyone's been picking, but then maybe this year was the first year where it's like, I can't keep doing this. maybe they're showing all the pieces coming together. What are you liking about the Devils early on? Yeah, shout out to All About the Jersey, the Devil's blog. They wrote about that extensively, the four-game streak finally happening. So I just swipe that right from them. Okay, great.

Because I was like, I don't know if I trust you with this stat, Sean, but I'm glad you got it from elsewhere. Yes, right. So, you know, all credit and or blame to all about the Jersey. And whatever, the streak did six now, too, right? So it's only, it's only more, you know, kind of more dramatic and more drastic. This is a team that for the last two seasons has struggled big time to string together wins. And I think that was a big, a big reason for skepticism about them, about them coming into the season.

Now, this is a 112 point team three seasons ago. There's a reason that people like them as much as we do. and it's because the bones from that team, your Jack Hugheses, your Nico Heeshers, your Jasper Brats, on and on, they're still there. They're still certainly in their primes, and there's still a reason to think that they can get it done. The issues around that team, though, goaltending, health, legit contributors on the, let's say, third line, I think all of those were reasons for concern. and what we've seen from them early is that all of those questions have been answered kind of in a positive way, right? They're getting more from Dawson Mercer.

He stunk down the stretch, especially after Jack Hughes was injured. He's a point-per-game player. He's centering the third line in a really effective way right now, on and on, right? So what we're seeing is all the questions we had about them heading into the season that was making people kind of sell, maybe not sell their story. stock, but certainly not buying any more of it in them as a legit contender. All those issues. Luke Hughes, looking like a number, like looking like a, you know, a true top pair

defenseman this year. We can just go down the list and talk about all the ways that they've kind of positively answered all these questions that we've had for them. And it's been, it's, it's been, it's been great. They're the, they have the, the, the best record in the, in the league pretty comfortably here. Yeah, it's the New Jersey Devils and the abs at the top with 12 points. They're six and one already to start the season.

I met the Eastern conference. It's okay. I misspoke. It's okay. I'm just letting the Aves fan listeners know that I see them. I hear them. I see you at the top of the standings too. Yes, you're holding space for them, yes.

I am holding space for the Aves fans who are listening to the show. I think one of the things that stands out too is, you know, they are doing this without Jacob Markstrom. He is out right now. He's missed the last few games. Jake Allen's been good. That's why they have him as a, he's not a 1B because when Markstrom's healthy,

you expect him to play a lot, but you've got a guy waiting in the wings who can take on that role and get them some wins when needed. Nico Dawes had the win last night. Pretty comfortably. I think it was 29 saves. I apologize.

I don't have it right in front of me, but they've got some depth in the crease. And it seems like they should be okay with their goaltending as long as this doesn't turn into a long term thing. Markstrom has already on the ice skating, so it shouldn't get to that point. But I know when we first saw the Markstrom injury, I think we talked about it with Jesse last week. And it was like, is this already the start of the injuries happening for the New Jersey Devils? Because every year,

as long as they can say healthy, as long as X, Y, Z can go right. They're going to be fine. And then two weeks into the season, Markstrom's hurt. But so far, a week into this injury, it's been all good. one six game win streak and they've gotten some wins even with markstrom um you know sitting out yeah and i mentioned i mentioned luke hugh's kind of in passing earlier i think we do need to make special note of what we've seen from him so far this year he's top 20 in game scoring among defensemen uh he's paired with brett pesci and pesche's also been fantastic that's not that's not an accident right um he just he just looks like a guy that's ready to level up he's got the contract out of the way.

He's, his defensive impacts have improved a lot. He's also a big part of the power play, which has been great. It's top five in conversion rate. It's top five in, in goals per 60. So any way you slice it, that's been a really effective unit too. I think if they can get those kind of minutes from him on a consistent basis, man, they're going to be, they're going to be interesting. They're going to continue to be interesting.

And it all comes back to where we started here. you know, a six-game winning streak would be impressive for any team, right? But when you look at the problems that they've had stacking those wins over the last couple years, they had 14 different chances to turn a three-game streak into a four-game streak and they couldn't get it done. That's also come up from all about the jersey. The fact that they've gotten that kind of weird, random monkey off their back, you know, and really started to play high-end hockey for a protracted amount of time, man,

that's a good thing. And it's a good thing for anybody who thought that they, you know, had a chance to look more like the 112 point, you know, super exciting, well-balanced team that we saw a couple years ago. I think we've, I think we've seen plenty of that so far. GM, Tomfisgerald, did an interview with Pierre LeBron, I guess, on Wednesday that's on Theathletic.com. Or I guess it's New York Times.com now. I keep forgetting that. But you can check that out on the app. It's an interesting conversation.

and they go into like the devil's next level, Jacob Markstrom's future, there is only one year left. I think his contract ends this season. Some Dougie Hamilton buzz. Obviously the big huge question about are all the brothers going to play together. But one thing right off the top I did want to mention here

is just like the Sheldon Keith of it all too. This is his second year behind the bench. They're off to a good start. They had a good training camp. This is something that Tom Fitzgerald discussed with Lebrun. Sheldon's a very good coach. He's demanding a lot more out of these players.

Like there is a new standard in Jersey. And Fitzgerald said the guys know about it now. There's no secrets. There's no surprises. Guys came in in great shape. We worked extremely hard in training camp. And like this group is maturing. They're not kids anymore.

It's a young core and they've realized they're not getting any younger and they're maturing on and off the ice. So I think we've got this mix of like this is just kind of the next level for the New Jersey Devils, and they have a coach who's kind of helping them get there, too. And I mean, it's also just nice, I think, to Toot Sheldon Keyes Horn sometimes because he was just... Yeah, you're always looking for an excuse to do that. He, people were, Leaves fans were still poo-pooing on him all year last year when the Devils weren't playing well. Um, like that man just can't get a break from Leafs fans who hate his guts.

So, also, we'll see what this does for the Dougie Hamilton. trade market, right? We've kind of heard. We, it seemed like the writing was on the wall for him once they got the, the Luke extension done. Yeah. I don't know if you want to trade, uh, Dougie Hamilton off a team that looks like it could, it could make noise in the playoffs.

Like, do you hold, serve with him and just, you know, see what happens? That's, it's going to be an interesting thing to track. Yeah, but do you have like, I, so I saw this in LeBron's piece and this idea of, well, you have two, nine million dollars. defenders who are like top power play unit guys like do you really need them both? It's like, well, why would you just put Dougie Hamilton on your second power play unit? And maybe, have two really good offensive defenders on your roster. You can have more than one guy and you can also take some notes from things that have happened over the last couple years

where this is just one of the most snake bitten teams we've seen in the league, whether it's, whether it's Jack Hughes, who we haven't even mentioned, who's been incredible. Jack Hughes, like, struggling to finish out seasons, whether it's Dougie getting hurt last year, whether it's all the goaltending issues. Like, you can have more than one good guy. You don't need to say like, all right, we're licked here. We got Luke Hughes playing legit top pair of minutes and on the power play. Like, Dougie's completely redundant. If that's my team, I'm not, I'm not doing that. I'm holding that guy for, for whenever Luke Hughes misses a handful of games or whatever. because Dougie still, as a second pair guy playing against maybe some easier defensive,

some easier defensive competition, you know, he's still capable of giving you good minutes, even though he's overpaid. So yeah, unless that's, unless they really need something somewhere else, and I'm Tom Fitzgerald, man, I'm holding serve on that. They're also different players, too. Like, Luke Hughes is the skating, finesse, make a play at the play at the, blue line. If you want to pinch on him, he's going to skate around you, whereas Dougie at this point is like, he's got the bomb from the point shot. Like, so they're different offensively

gifted players. So I think teams can use both. And it seems like Fitzgerald wants to just let things stabilize and be like, let's just have our, let's just have it. Let's just play the games. It's October. We don't need to talk about trading Dougie Hamilton yet. But it's an interesting conversation between Tom Fitzgerald and Pierre LeBron. And that's where we've landed to. Trade Nazim Kodry yesterday. Totally different teams. I completely agree.

In totally different situations. Like I said, like I said, Cadry, Montreal Canadians. Pick up the phone. Gorton, Kent Hughes, call Craig Conroy, make it happen. He's your guy. You're upsetting producer Jeff.

I'm saying this. I'm saying this specific. to throw producer Jeff into overdrive. Like he's, he's, he's just going to shut the, he's going to turn his laptop off. He's having a tough time with the Sheldon Keefe and Nazim Khadry conversation specifically.

Enjoy the world series, my man. I think if we want to twist the knife a little harder, we can have a discussion about how great Mitch Marner's been in Vegas and how the Leafs might just like not be very, they don't look great. I saw this tweet, I think it was from Jay Fresh, being like, when are we going to have a conversation about how the Leafs are playing and look exactly like people have been wanting them to for the last 10 years of like I want dump and chase, I want big hockey man. Maybe what they are right now and it's not been good or fun. So, congrats.

Just save it for the Leafs report, please. Matt can do and Frankie snuck something in on me yesterday. I'm still mad about it. So we don't need to play this game. It's the athletic hockey show, Sean. We're obviously going to talk about the Toronto Maple Leafs. I'm contractually obliged to discuss them every single show. If this could be a 31 team show, I'd sign up for it.

The tea in the athletic hockey show actually stands for Toronto. No, there's a silent tea, the athletic Toronto hockey show. And I just said Toronto, like someone who doesn't live in the city. He doesn't live there. Time to go. Time to go. Let's take a break. We can get to Kevin Kurz.

Lots to get into with the Philadelphia Flyers. That's coming up next on the athletic hockey show. Okay. The Philadelphia Flyers are off to a three, two and one start the season. They haven't played since a 5-2 win against the Seattle Cracken on Monday, but we'll catch them again tonight on Thursday against the Ottawa Senators to break it all down. Kevin Kerr's, our Flyers beat writer, joins us now. Kevin, what do you do in like a week like this?

just hang out at practice, no games, a couple days off. Well, yeah, they flew to Ottawa yesterday. They didn't have practice, so I haven't seen them since Tuesday. I am working on a bigger feature, so I don't mind when they go on these one-offs because it gives me a couple days to, like, set up interviews and wait for people to call me back. Yeah. So I'm fine with that. And honestly, a day trip to Ottawa is a complete pain from Philly because I'm sure there's nothing.

So I'm happy here in my apartment tonight. I would love to know, like, the door-to-door time on Philly to Ottawa. It's way longer than it should be. Yeah, I mean, especially because you guys all know where the rink is there, right? So you land and then you're probably taking an hour bus ride. Second consecutive show with Ottawa rink location slander from me. You know what? We were making fun of Frankie Carrado yesterday about it because he was stuck somewhere in the middle.

Well, the only road game I ever skipped is when I was still covering the islanders and me and Andrew Gross were staying downtown. And we went to the morning skate and there was a snowstorm. And we took an Uber ride back. And the Uber driver was like, he was a little bit older. And he's driving in this snowstorm and there's tractor trailers passing us on either side. And once Andrew and I got back to the hotel, we're like, I don't know if we're going to make it back for the game. So, yeah. Yeah, I'm not sure what we did.

But it probably is all. You took a mental health day. Yeah, we can just call it that. Yeah, it was watch right off one of those right off the TVs. We were lucky because we actually had spoken to Lou Lamarillo that morning. So, like, that was the content for the day. Easy, peasy. I definitely had days because I lived in Ottawa, but I didn't live in Canada.

So I definitely had days where it's like I don't think I'm actually going to make it home safely driving home from the rinks. The snow and the traffic and everything was so bad, like just white knuckling it down the highway. Canadian winters are super fun. But let's get to the Philadelphia Flyers. is like a fine start to the season, three, two, and one. That's like middling. It's maybe as mid as we can get. How surprised are you, Kevin, by this start?

Like, scale of one to ten, is this where we thought they would be? Is there a disappointment in Philly? Have there been, like, positive or negative surprises? Like, what's the general vibe to the start of the season here? Well, I didn't really like their training camp. So I think the start has been a little bit better than I expected, especially when you consider the first five teams they played, they had Florida twice, Winnipeg, Carolina, and Minnesota.

So right off the hop, you're starting with five really good teams. And then, you know, the first team that I think we can all say we don't expect to make the playoffs in in Seattle comes in on Monday, and they got them pretty good. So that was a positive sign. You know, they've steadily improved throughout the year other than maybe the Winnipeg game, which was their fourth game in the season. So, you know, I think when you can say, are some of the things that they're hoping will come around,

haven't quite come around yet. So the fact that they're still 3-2-1, I'm talking about Matt Veemichcroft, who I know we're going to talk about. Trevor Zegress has been fine, but I don't think he's exactly lit the world on fire yet. The power play has shown signs of getting better, but I think they still only have three goals on the season on the power play.

So, you know, they're getting some contributions, I would say, from some expected sources. when you look at the Noah Cates, Tyson Forster, Bobby Brink line. That was a line that John Torterell relied on a lot in the second half of the year. They were really solid. So that's been a plus. And, you know, Sean Cotorier, I don't think we really knew what we were going to get out of him. It's really just a yearly basis with Cotore.

It's like before the start of every year, you think to yourself, well, is this the year where his multiple back surgeries from a couple years ago was going to catch up to him. It hasn't this year. He's been, Rick Tocke has relied on him really from day one of camp. obvious he's going to put him in a, he's going to really rely on him to be a key contributor and he has, and Cotorier stepped up and done that. So those are some of the more positive signs that, you know, I think you have to look at it a little bit optimistically if you're a Flyers fan because you're waiting for Trevor Zegris. You're waiting for Matt Vey Michikov to come around. And

if those guys do, then, you know, this could be a team that hangs around the playoff race. You mentioned Michikov. We have to, we have to focus on him to some extent here. I feel like we're a little bit outside of like the true fever pitch stuff that was surrounding his start. You know, there's questions about his conditioning, hasn't played in a few third periods, or at least has been, you know, seen his ice time limited down the stretch at certain points, scored against Seattle, which is good, first goal of the season. But where do we stand on that? How, like, what is the status of Michakov, you know, in Rick Tockev specifically today? Like, how is the, how is the rhetoric kind of shifted over the last five days, if at all.

Yeah, well, Seattle was his best game by far. I don't even think it's close. And, you know, the one thing that Tocke had reduced his ice time late in a lot of the earlier games before that Seattle game. And I don't think anyone watching him would say that was the wrong decision. Mietchkoff just wasn't very good. It was, you know, we've, we've seen him. He's always going to be a guy.

that's cheating for offense a little bit, right? That's what he brings. And I think Rick Tocket is fine with that, but he was doing it a little bit too often. And then we've just heard enough from Tockett over the last little while to figure that Mitchcoff just wasn't in shape when he came in the camp. Now, they've partly attributed that to an off-season ankle injury that he had on the ice late in the summer in Russia. You know, I would think that the organization probably was hopeful that he was going to

return to the area a little bit earlier. than he did. So, you know, that's probably affected him. But Tocke's also mentioned, you know, he's got to take care of himself off the ice a little bit better. And that's in terms of recovery. He's mentioned the word eating, you know, at least three or four times. So that seems to me that's something that anybody can appreciate. I think we can all understand. You know, if you've got a poor diet, it's not going to work out so well. But that said, I don't think anyone's worried about him in the long term. I think they just view this as a short-term thing that they've consistently praised his work ethic since he's got here. His desire to get better is something that no one's ever questioned.

Keith Jones has talked about it often. Danny Breyer has even Talkett has mentioned that in practice, he's still working hard. So this is just something he's going to have to work through. So, you know, it was, it's obviously coming off of the Seattle game is a hopeful sign that maybe he started to turn a corner because, you know, they're going to need him, right? He's still, the most important individual when it comes to this rebuild. He's got to be, if not a superstar, at least like a 40-goal, all-star level player if this is going to work. So, you know, that's why you talk about the start and it's been pretty good,

three, two, and one, but that's sort of the dark cloud that's been hanging over this start, this encouraging start is that, you know, he's got to get going here. Yeah, and we, you and I had talked, I think the three of us talked, over the summer when we were doing the, you know, post-mortem on the Flyers previous season and kind of the look ahead to this one, you'd praise his work, his work ethics and his work habit and his desire.

I'd heard that from people around the league, too, honestly, when we were doing player tier stuff. Like, there was no question over how much Mishab wanted it or whether he was wired the right way for it, right? Like, there was, it seems like, consensus is like, this guy, this guy does everything, right? He shows all the, all the traits that you want to see. And I think that's kind of, that's certainly been in the back of my mind, as we've seen the way things have started here.

But like, my takeaway from a lot of this is talk it. I think he's, I think he's threaded the needle pretty well in terms of finding, you know, levying legit criticism, Edmichkov, being honest about what he's, what he's struggled with and where he needs to get better, but also not throwing gasoline on a potential fire early on. Like if, if this was a different guy or a different temperament, at head coach, you know, we're hearing a lot more about, it's certainly framed differently about as far as Matt Fame Mishkoff starting the season and maybe not the best of shape and blah, blah, blah. I think Tocke is, you know, been as advertised there with him in terms of, yeah, there's some tough love, but also he's framing it the right way to stop it from turning into something something sillier than maybe it otherwise would have been. Yeah, I think it's

safe to say that if this drill was John Tortorella in charge and he was Benching Michigoff with I don't want to get specific there. Yeah, the rhetoric would be far worse. I can't even imagine what social media would be looking like because, you know, I go back, I think John Tortorella handled Matthew Mitchcoff great. And I think Mitchcoff himself has said that. It's, you know, we haven't talked to him much because we're still speaking through an interpreter. I think he's a little bit reluctant to open up with the interpreter there.

But if you go back and read some of his Russian language interviews from on the off season, he had a good relationship with Tortoella. And they conversed, I think, over text message after Torch was fired. So, you know, the part of it right now that I push back on is I think you hear some criticism from afar about Mishkoff saying, oh, well, he had some character issues coming into the draft and now they're all kind of bubbling to the surface. That's not the case here, at least from what I could see. You know, if you go back, the criticisms of Michikov where before he was drafted was maybe he was a little bit not a great teammate. Maybe he didn't act great or, you know, on the ice. if he wasn't getting his ice time or if he wasn't getting his goals.

But, you know, part of the reason the flyers drafted him is because in those draft meetings and the lead up to the draft, he admitted to them. Sometimes I don't act great around my teammates because I expect them to be so good and they're just not as good as he is. So he's, and, you know, he's a 16, 17 year old kid at the time. So, you know, and as far as Taki goes, he's mentioned a couple times that Meachcroft has come to him. He's wanted to do video.

He's, he's taking the time. off the ice to try and get better, to try and fix this. And so I have very little doubt that at some point he's going to start to pick it up. And, you know, I covered a guy in Eric Carlson who was notorious for coming to camp out of shape. Or maybe maybe that's a little too harsh. Maybe I should say playing himself into hockey shape. Yeah. That's a very generous way of putting it. Yeah. It's very diplomatic. You know, I remember his first season after he got traded from Ottawa to San Jose. I mean, he was brutal for the first couple of months. And then he got himself in a shape. and by mid-November he was Eric Carlson again.

So I fully expect Michikov. I don't know if it's going to happen tonight or next week, but at some point I think he's going to get it together and he's going to more resemble the guy that we saw in the second half of last year. I mean, he's also a kid too, right? Like he's 20 years old. I think we maybe take it for granted when we see, like,

respectfully the hockey robots that are like a Connor Bred who go into the draft and they're already this like, well-oiled machine of like, I eat the right way. I train all the time. I'm on the ice all the time, like hockey, hockey, hockey. So then we see a young kid who's maybe not like working with Gary Roberts and has the best nutritionist on North Vancouver and da-da-da-da-da can be like, oh, what's wrong? But like, they're also just a kid who are figuring out how to be a professional athlete in

real time. Like, that's okay too. Philly's a great food city, man. As long as he's making some better decisions when it's when it's, when it's, when it's late, like, he'll be fine. He's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's just eat straight garbage after games and, and it can expect it to pay. Like, it's fine.

I'm not, I'm not, I'm not worried about this kid at all. And he had, you know, it was his first off season where he's got a pocket full of money. And let's not forget all of the things this kid has gone through in his life already. You know, he, he loses his father right before the draft. Um, he's got to go through the complication of getting his family over here to the U.S. after he comes and joins the flyers. Like, he's had a lot going on. He's probably had to grow up really quickly off the ice.

Did he, you know, is there a chance he had a little bit too much fun this summer? Maybe. But again, like, as you said, Haley, he's a kid. He's going to figure it out it's probably a lesson he'll take with him in a next offseason. And, yeah, I don't think there's any worry long term about him at this point. All right. Let's move on. We did kind of touch on the head coach in Philly this season.

It's Rick Tockett. There was obviously quite a bit of chatter. I mean, there was a lot of different B-Writers saying why Rick Tockeet is perfect for insert team here. But Philly obviously was one of them where people were talking about this could be a really great fit. It's still early, Kevin, but how are we seeing the Rick Tockeet Philadelphia Flyers kind of partnership working out in practice? Well, yeah, obviously Rick Tockeet is known more for his MO is sort of the defensive aspect, right? And he's talked about that a lot, how he wants the goal he is to only practice. play half the net and, you know, for the Flyers goalies, even if they had half a net behind him

in the last three years, it probably would have been a struggle. So defensively, that's where it's been encouraging. He's leaned really heavily on Travis Sandheim. And Sanheim has stepped up and been, you know, other than maybe Dan Valdar has probably been their team MVP to this point. Cam York, he didn't have Cam York for the first three games after an injury late in camp. Cam York for me was the Flyers best player in camp, someone that's, you know, moving on from not seeing eye to eye with John Tortorella and looks a little rejuvenated. So he gets back in the lineup as their top pair. They've been great.

Jamie Drysdale's skating well, you know, I know the hope with him is that eventually he's going to become more of an offensive type. That hasn't quite happened yet, but he's at least moving well. Him and Nick Seeler are a pretty good second pair. The third pair has been kind of work in progress and not in a good way. That's where they really lack the depth on the back end. Rasmus Ristelian is out at least another couple of weeks. He's a guy the welcome back.

But defensively, they've been pretty good. They've allowed very few shots in the league on average. I think they've made it a little bit easier on their goaltenders. But the goaltending has been better. I know we want to talk about that. But defensively, any coach will tell you, right, they'd rather have the defensive structure in place and wait for the offense to come around than vice-we.

versa. That's sort of what's been the fly, what, what the, reflects what the flyers have been so far. Defensively, they've been fine. Offensively, they've been a little dry at times. But, you know, they hope that comes around with, you know, with Croft and Trevor's egress and whatnot. But defensively, they're, they're doing some encouraging things. Yeah, we've talked at length, I think, in various spots about, who how brutal their goaltending has been, really for the last two seasons. last season in particular, if they get anything even approaching league average, garden variety, mediocre play from their goalies last year, I think the shape of the rebuild looks a lot different.

I think we would have spoken about them in different terms coming out of last season. We've seen Dan Vlodar play well thus far. He's got a 9-29 save percentage, a few goals saved above expected, and four starts already. whether it's him, whether it's Samerson, like what is the state of things moving forward? And it has Vladar, you know, kind of put his flag on the ground in terms of taking,

taking more starts and maybe emerging as a legit, you know, if not a 1B, than a 1A in a timeshare sort of situation. Well, right now he's emerging as the guy, as the guy that's going to get the bulk of the work. But, you know, you guys know how it works now. No goalie's going to start 60 games, right? and I would assume Sam Erison is going to is going to play again very shortly, whether it's in Ottawa on Thursday or Saturday against the Islanders.

But Vladar has earned his playing time. He's earned the right to be the guy that's sort of taken the lead in that race. And, you know, Sam Erison's only played two games. And neither games have been terrible. And they were both against, you know, they're against Carolina and Winnipeg, so two pretty good teams. But, you know, with Vladar, he saw an opportunity as a free agent. for a chance to become what he, at least right now, seems to be becoming. And that's, that's a guy that's willing to take on more of a role. Now, you know, you have to take it with the grain of Saul a little bit because this is still a guy that's never started more than 29 games in a single season.

Yeah. So is he going to be able to, you know, maybe not double that, but is he a guy that's going to be able to start 41, even 41 games? That's pretty significant increase over 29 games. So, you know, it's. It's looking good from so far. And as well as the Flyers have played defensively, Lidar has certainly done his part.

He has looked very good. The numbers reflect what the least I've seen from watching him play. He's a big guy, right? He looks like he's aggressive at the right times. So, you know, that's a hopeful thing. And, Sean, I mean, you're right. Anyone can look at the Flyers team's say percentage over the last couple of years.

And yeah, if they get, if Lader is even just, you know, if Lidar and Erson combined to have just a league average save percentage, I mean, that's a double-digit increase in points. Erson was it, Erson was at 883 last year. And between him and Fetotov and Kolasov, that group allowed almost 50 goals above expected. I mean, that's, that is abysmal. So they don't need Dan Vlodar to be at 930 for 60 games to be better here. If they get a decent stretch from him for any amount of time, like things are going to look a lot different from them.

Like you really can't overstate and kev to your credit you haven't. You can't overstate how bad that goaltending has been. And I think the fact that they're getting anything that looks even halfway competent here is, is a major change for sure. And you have to look at it from Sam Erson's perspective, too, that he's still a young guy. And, you know, two seasons ago, midway through the year, Carter Hart goes away. And then it's Sam Erson.

And literally for the last, this is not, this is an overstating at all. For the last year and a half, it's been Sam Ererson and not. no legitimate NHL backups. So that's a lot of pressure to put on a kid. I think he's 24 or 25 right now, tops. That's a lot of pressure to put on a guy when, you know, he had to know that he was the only guy that could stop the puck on a regular basis when you've got Felix Sandstrom, Cal Peterson, Alexi Kolesoff, Ivan Puttof.

I mean, these guys, none of these four guys is in the NHL right now. So, you know, with Erson, I think you have to be a little bit patient with him, too. And like I said, he's going to get a chance to play some more. I think taking the pressure off of it, you know, Vildar taking the pressure off of him and also increasing the competition a little bit is going to be a good, is going to be good for a guy like Sam. Because we've seen in pressure situations, not so much in Philadelphia, but on the international stage, I mean, he played well in the four nations tournament. He only got one start. He shut out the Americans and, you know, a game that didn't mean anything to the Americans. But still, he shut them out. And then he played very well in the world championships too. So, you know, Danny Breyer and Keith Jones both voiced their support for Sam and their belief in Sam before the season started.

They're going to let this play out. You know, he's going to get his playing time. It's up to him now to see what he does with it because his playing time might not be as much as he may be anticipated early if Linar keeps going the way he did, their way he is. All right. Final question for you, Kevin, before we let you go, Owen Tippett, he was someone who was not happy with his 20, 24, 25 season, only 20 goals. 77 games that's fewer than the year before. He already has five this season through six games. Do we think we're seeing an Owen Tippett offensive emergence here this season?

Tippett's an interesting guy because it seemed like throughout camp Rick Tocket and really Torrella last year was trying to do the same thing, just trying to figure out where he fits because he's a unique guy because he's got a ton of speed and he's got a great shot. But just it was difficult for for Torturella, especially to find anyone that he really had chemistry with and I frankly I think Rick Tocket's still trying to do the same thing he's still trying to figure out which pieces fit in the top six whether that's you know Trevor Zegris he's moving around a little bit he's got Christian Dvorak there now um played a little bit wing center and tippet's a guy that uh you know he we've all seen the flashes of his offensive skill and you know he's he's even

added a little bit of a physicality to his game he's he's he's a decent sized guy um so we'll see but But Tippett's a guy that, yeah, he struggled last year. I think it was a couple of things. I think it was the lack of chemistry with anyone on the roster. And I think, you know, he admitted he was pretty, he was pretty emotionally. I think he sagged a little bit when the Flyers traded some of his good friends. You know, Morgan Frost, Jolt, Friarby to Carab to Calgary. Those were maybe his two closest friends in the dressing room.

And Scott Lawton, too, is a guy that everybody loved. So he did struggle with that. But, yeah, he's a driven guy. He signed here long term. He's an interesting case because the flyers do have a lot of wingers, and they've got another one coming next year probably in Porter Martone, the six overall pick in last year's draft. But, you know, for a guy that if he can become a regular 30-goal scorer,

I think his salary $6.2 million. I mean, in a couple years, if he becomes a 30-goal scorer in a couple of years, those guys are going to be making a whole lot more than $6 million. So it's going to be interesting. to see what happens with him because he does have something to prove, I think, this year. He knows it because of a step back last year. And he's, you know, right now he's one of the parts

driving this offense. Lots of chew on for the Philadelphia Flyers this season. Thanks so much, Kevin. I think if you guys are listening and you want to get more, Kevin has a great story. What are you seeing from the Flyers after six games, a little bit more depth. I read that story and came up with all my questions for the show.

If you were interested in those topics, just read the story too. Thanks, Kevin. Thanks, guys. All right, welcome back to the Athletic Hockey Show. We're just going to go around the league. Jeff actually put the title of the segment, Around the League, Goofy Kill Time and Show. That's our plan here for the final segment of the Athletic Cocky Show.

We actually do have a couple little news items that we can get to. We don't need to be super goofy this time. The New York Islanders fired their goalie. coach, Pierre O Greco on Wednesday and have brought in Sergey Noamovs, who has a history with starter Ilya Sorokin firing a goalie coach mid-season. And this early, it's not even mid-season, like early in the season is, is a bit unusual, but it's pretty clear that the organization is trying to get Ilya Sorokin back on track, a two, three-and-oh start, three-point-90 goals against average, and an 873 save percentage. Sean, you had a lot of

folks talking about how he was maybe technically the best goalie in the NHL. The stats haven't proven that. And it seems pretty clear that the Islanders are trying to get that guy back. Yeah. Across the board over the summer when we were doing the player tiers stuff, didn't matter who we were talking to. It didn't matter whether it was a GM or a data analyst or a coach. Everybody was on board with Sorokin being,

maybe not the best goalie in the league, but closer than not, right? Like a top, the top tier guy. And I think what people were willing to do was look past the season he had last year, right? A lot of that blame went to the Islanders overall as a team. I know someone like people continually talked about, not just the amount of shots that he faced,

but the quality of shots that he faced. That was a pretty poor, I think people still have, it in their minds, maybe people who don't pay super close attention to the Islanders, that this is the Barry Trots, Lou Lamarillo, you know, choke you out defensively teams of a few years ago, and it's not. Like, that's it, this is a team that struggles with structure and it, it struggles to, you know, limit, limit not just quality, but, but quantity in front of Sorokan. So I think people were willing to, you know, look at that as an explanation for the, for the mediocre overall numbers that we saw from Sorokin last season. But clearly, man, Pierre Greco was on a, Piero Greco was on a,

was on a short leash. Life as a goalie coach under Patrick Waugh seems like it might be, might be difficult. I don't, I don't think I would want to be, uh, the goalie coach working for one of the greatest goalies to ever live, right? So, but we, we do see, you know, it is an interesting time to make a change. But I think it's also an indication, really, of, you know, of how important Suroken is to the overall state of things there. Like that guy is as close as they have outside of Matthew Schaefer, obviously to a franchise player. And if he's at his best,

they're going to have a chance to contend for a playoff spot. And if he continues to play the way that he has in the first five or six games of the season, they're not going to have a prayer. So I think they realize how important he is, obviously, and I think this is an interesting way to try to get him going by bringing in a coach who he's got some. some real experience with.

GM Matthew Darsh said that the change in the goalie coach was 100% his call. Like he didn't, he didn't necessarily address whether he and Seroquan had a conversation about the move, but he said it was his decision. Like the players will never tell you I want this coach or that coach. But I think Matthew Darsh obviously knew that those two had had success together. In the KHL, they have a history. So we'll see if that helps out.

Let's stick with the Islanders for a second here. First overall, pick Matthew Schaefer is having a nice start to his rookie season. He's leading rookies and points with 70. He has two goals. Five assists also leads all rookies. When we were doing our draft in the first week of the season with Dom, I was sitting here for the Calder and thinking, like, no one's picked Matthew Schaefer yet. Maybe I should do that.

You know what? I'm going to go with Zeev Bouem just because maybe the Islanders aren't going to be good and no one's going to be getting points and Schaefer's not going to not going to pop offensively. 18 year old defenseman, yada, yeah, et cetera, et cetera. I'm dumb. We're all dumb. He's having a great start, again, leading all rookies.

And he's also putting his skating talent on display. This is from Dom 16 stats and they track stats and skating and speeds and all this now through the NHL. So since the NHL's tracking era started in 2021, 22, there have only been a 11 seasons in which a defenseman has had two or more 20 plus mile per hour speed bursts per game. Kale McCar's 2.6 per game in 2022, 23 is the highest. Schaefer is averaging five, five speed bursts. I'm doing that because like whatever that means.

He skates quick for a bird. It's like my dog Bono. He's got a quick speed burst. He said five. speed bursts of 20 plus miles per hour. That's incredible. And that's was the book on him coming into this season, you know, whether it's Corey or Scott or any of our prospect guys, but also just generally scouting.

Like that is his superpower. Yeah. Is that is, is that skating. So the fact that, you know, he has, you know, he's had the opportunity to show that off and really just generally be more, the fact that he's this dynamic just straight out the gates is it's it's incredible like i and you know we we talked about it a second ago like 18 year old defensemen like you think there's going to be some kind of learning curve and that's obviously true we're just like a timidness but there's there's nothing but what i what i will say

is 18 year old defensemen who are picked at that point in the draft there aren't many of them right it's it's it's it's it's victor headman you know it's it's guys it's guys like that um they tend to hold their own because it's an indicator of like high-end talent and high-end quality. Like those guys, you don't, maybe, are they going to, is, do those kind of players lead rookies and points? Like, maybe not necessarily, but they also tend to tread water pretty well just because it's such an indicator of like extreme talent, right? So I'm not surprised that Schaefer's doing well. I think there's enough track record of players with his profile doing something similar. But man, the fact that The production is where it is in the fact that he has the confidence and usage and the confidence of the coaching staff to just be able to dial it up that far, that frequently during games is wild.

And, man, if we have a couple more Kale McCar clones running around the league over the next couple years, I am not going to complain about that because there's nothing more exciting, man, then seeing a defenseman, you know, pick up steam like that through the neutral zone and get to that level. So yeah, I'm psyched. I'm psyched about the Matthew Schaefer era so far. Yeah, that's just game changing, break the game wide open kind of speed. And also from 16 stats, this isn't just all flash and speed. We mentioned the points. He also is 16th among defensemen in net rating to start the season again, 18 year old rookie who when you get a first overall pick, like you expect they're going to be great, but I do think it's fair to say that he has exceeded expectations early in the season here.

Bo Horvatt was on the NHL Network podcast with Mike Rupp hosted. I think it's called Players Only. And Bo Horvatt said he's been phenomenal, in my opinion. He is one of our best, if not our best player right now. Okay. Hey, Beau Horvatt says it. That's good enough for me. I agree with you, Bo Horvatt.

He looks great. Great start for Matthew Schaefer. They had an 0 and 3 start to the season. The Islanders did. They've won three straight. So if Schaefer can keep this up, if Sorokin can get it together, maybe the Islanders will be a bit more interesting or just a little less bad this season.

Let's get to one more thought. We haven't really talked much about the Western Conference since the start of the show when we were poo-pooing on the Calgary Flames. I do. I am sorry. sorry for that. With all the chat about the New Jersey Devils to the Colorado Avalanche, they are also at the top of the standings.

And I want to mention the Martin Natchez, Nathan McKinnon chemistry here. Yeah. Through seven games, Natchez has five goals and 11 points. Nathan McKinnon has six and ten. Basically, all that damage has been at five on five. And 84 minutes on a line with Arturie Lekin, Colorado's top trio. has already outscored teams 9 to 1, scoring 6 and a half goals per 60. That's courtesy of DOM 16 stats again.

Just a great start for the Aves in general, but also their top line here. Because there's a lot of worry about what are the Aves going to do without Miko Ranton? It's like, well, Martin NACIS can slide in there and they're going to look great. And NACIS was fantastic for the most part, especially in the regular season at least after they acquired him last season. Yeah. he'd been certainly had been good with Carolina. The issue for him always is following up great seasons with something similar, right? He's had the chance to do that at a couple different points throughout his career hasn't happened.

I think what we're seeing there, what we're seeing now with him is, you know, that kind of consistent, sustained play over multiple years that we haven't seen from him. And it's coming at a very fortuitous time for Martin Natchez because Martin Natchez is, is a pending unrestricted free agent. So there is no better place to be if you're a forward of his type than riding shotgun with Nathan McKinnon during a contract year. So, man, I'm watching this closely. I think everybody who has any interest in the free agent market is as well. Like I'm fascinated in seeing how much money Martin H.S.

is going to be worth on his next deal, whether it's in Colorado or elsewhere. The Colorado Avalanche play the Carolina Hurricanes today team we didn't really mention, but if the devils are a team that want to be a top one in the east, like the canes are maybe the more obvious choice. They've had a nice start to the season. That's a good hockey team too, obviously. That is probably the game to watch is Av's Cains tonight. As always, there's a ton of games on Thursday, 12 tonight.

But I think that's the one I've circled today. Not Blackhawks Lightning, Ducks Bruins. I don't know. Penguins Panthers. Nope. Nope. No thanks. This is a hurricanes.

This is a Hurricanes Denver night over here. Yeah. Denver. The Denver Avalanche. Oh, what happened there? Yeah, 5-1 and 0 start for the canes. 5.0 and 2 for the aves. That'll be a good game.

That's background. That's background during power rankings when I'm in hell. Dealing with the hated Domestician. Yeah. It starts at 9 o'clock Eastern though, so. It's usually when we start writing, honestly. It's fine. I thought you started writing at midnight.

That is when I start to think about starting to think about writing. Is it 9 o'clock? Two years away from being two years away. Bruno Cabuco is a gift that keeps on giving. All right. Thanks, everyone, for listening to this episode, The Athletic Hockey Show. Thanks to Kerr's for joining us,

a good chat about the Philadelphia Flyers. Sean has once again done his job fine today. It was a fine effort. It was adequate. Passable. We aim for adequacy. Passable podcast by the two of us.

The Prospect Boys have the next show tomorrow. Sean and I will be back next Thursday. Thanks everyone for listening. We'll see you next week.