The Athletic Hockey Show - Labor peace in the NHL for 4 more years

Episode Date: July 9, 2025

Gentille and McIndoe discuss the NHL and Players Association coming together to officially sign a 4-year contract, ensuring labor peace in the NHL until the 2029-30 season. The guys dissect the trade between Edmonton and Tampa Bay involving Issac Howard and Sam O'Reilly, and how the Oilers have failed, so far, to upgrade their goaltending. Hosts: Sean Gentille and Sean McIndoeExecutive 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? It's the Athletic Hockey Show Wednesday edition. Oh, we've got some bad news. Frank isn't here. We are frankless. There is no Frank. I assume he just hangs out and.

Canada's Wonderland or whatever, one of those places. One of those places up by Vaughn for the next three months. All that stuff that people with very young twins do, just with all their free time. Free time. Probably sleeping in right now. and some of us how to keep working. Frank hasn't seen

the north side of 11 a.m. for the last week, certainly. Yeah, exactly. Just kidding. Sean, what's the most washed thing you've done in the last week since free agency up and up?

What's the biggest old man thing you've done? Because I've found myself spending my time filling it with things of that nature. Ooh, boy. I mean, I do. Is it complaining about your, about your neighbor for not cutting his lawn?

in a post. Yes, absolutely. I mean, I'm old all the time these days. I don't, I'm trying to think of any young people stuff I've done. Kind of coming up empty on that one. Yeah. No, I'm old. And I wrote a whole column about it this week complaining about.

I think that's it. Well, let me walk that back. I don't think, I see, I tried to do it not being the old guy who complains about how everything was better. I'm not saying things were better in the past. I'm saying I miss how things were in the past. Is that too, is that, you're laughing at it. You're right.

You're trying to thread the needle a little too fine here. First off, there's nothing wrong with the sentiment overall. But yeah, you're, you're, you're telling the line, brother. Come on. Okay. My pants are up around my waist and I'm waving my, waving my, waving my cane and the kids are around my lawn. I painted a bedroom yesterday and listened to Steely Dan. Okay.

Through the entirety of it. Not bad. Not bad. is like I like tape primer first coat like the whole whole kit and cabood I listen to steely dan like through the entire was it like a steely dan mix on random or were you like doing it i was picking i was picking and choosing for i i i listen to i listened to royal scam all the way through and then and then just ended up picking and choosing based on a playlist can i tell you honestly i don't know if i've ever i couldn't name a steely dan song

And this is very funny because to go behind the curtain and when Sean got online, me and producer Jeff were just talking about all the old man bands that we're going to go see in the summer. And now Sean's like trying to join the conversation with his steely Dan and I'm just completely no selling it. Just cutting them loose. I mean, I don't know any Steely Dan songs.

Yeah. A steely Dan song. And then I'll be like, I knew that. I just didn't know that was dirty work. Do I have to sing here? Like I'm, that's it. I think you do.

You got to sing. the maximum amount that won't get us a copyright strike. I refuse to do your dirty work. Yep, I do know that one. Yep, I know that. Okay. All right, so there you go. Yeah, you would know them more if they were on a Gunson & Rose's record or a 9-inch record. That's correct. Absolutely.

If there's a remix album, I'm all over it. I'll get that one. This is how we're going to spend the next six weeks or whatever. It's just completely trying to BS our way through 35 minutes. every now and then for you folks. Just kidding. And you guys are going to like tweet at us and that. You'd be like

slow newsday. Yeah. Yeah, it is man. It's July 9th. Yeah. For the next two and a half months. All slow news days. I'll save you the trouble. Here comes the Jack Roslovick deep dive. Oh, good. We actually, I feel like we still have a little, there

are bits and pieces and a slow trickle of news stuff that's still taking place. Obviously, saw the Gavin McKenna's stuff, which was well covered by the prospect guys over the last couple days. We've got to trade. We've got some other things to look forward to as detailed in the wonderful red light. But the first thing, and we'll get to all that in the second segment, but the first thing we want to talk about is this is actual news, is that the CBA was ratified. It was ratified over the weekend. The NHLPA approved it. Takes effect for the 26th season. in last through 20, 30.

It's crazy. It expired. So meaning they got it done 14 months in advance, which is still strange to see. I know we're in a time of labor, you know, it's, I don't want to say it's a great time for labor because that's a whole other discussion. But there's minimal disagreement between the league and the players, which is wild especially. It's always strange.

It's always strange. right? Like, because whatever. The last lockout was 2012, 13. That's 12 years ago.

It's wild. Yep. And a situation that had become the league's calling card lockout every time. And, and you know, the 2012 one being the worst of the bunch

because even though it didn't wipe out the season like the last one had, it was over nothing. It was over, I mean, there was no excuse for losing half a season other than some of the,

the owners just wanted to lose half a season. And so the fact that we, I think with that one, a lot of us, certainly myself included, just went, this is just what's going to happen now every time. Completely. And then 2020, obviously, was a outlier situation. But it does sound like that kind of system shocked the things back into the way every other sport does it, which is sometimes they walk up to the law. but, you know, there hasn't been, you don't have to set your watch by it.

It's not just like, all right, we're going to, every five or six or seven years, we're going to have to have to be half a season, lay off a bunch of people and, you know, disrupt a bunch of lives and then jump right to it. And, you know, the, I believe, am I right that the, the NBA was the only other league to lose games to a work stoppage, like in this time period. Baseball hasn't done it since, obviously, 94, and they lost the World Series. NFL has had some weird stuff, but now... Yeah, there was a tough NFL lockout, but they figured it out before they actually had to lose games. So, yeah, that's... It's the norm in other sports. It seems like it's become the norm in the NHL for better or worse.

There's a really good post up on the site that went live this morning. A bunch of folks worked on it, just kind of gauging reaction from players across the league, looking at it through those lens because obviously we've known that the CBA seemed like a formality where that the CBA ratification was going to be a formality for a week or 10 days or however long it's been. That's not that's not new news. But I think what is new news is some of the bits and pieces that are in this story, which was top line by a top line by Jesse Granger and in Robert Rossi.

There's some, there's some interesting stuff in there. It's really interesting, especially if you're like me and your reaction to all this news that's been percolating for a couple weeks now of, you know, and things leaking out of, okay, the new CBA is going to have this, going to have that. The question that I kept asking myself is what did the players get out of this so-called negotiation? The give and take, okay, I see lots of give. I see lots of things that are small wins for the owners. Nothing huge.

You know, the owners didn't come in and go, we want to make, we want to knock your share. of revenue down to 40% or, you know, get rid of guaranteed contracts or anything. Yeah, it was mainly stuff on the periphery. But it just, it does feel like all the stuff on the periphery, uh, were small wins for the owners and discussions for the players. And so I, I sat down, I read this article going, all right, now I'm going to find out where the win is, you know, where, what am I missing? Yeah.

Turns out I wasn't missing much. Nope. The only piece in there that I didn't know on the player side was, they're they're changing how the playoff money gets divide. Basically, what happens is, as we all know, players get paid in the regular season. They don't get paid in the playoffs, but based on how your team does, you get a chunk of money and then the players themselves decide how to divide that money up, which has always been kind of a weird thing, but that's just how it works. And now they're getting more money and that money does not come out of the hockey related

revenue. So congratulations to the Florida Panthers, I guess. But everyone else, I don't really see how, I mean, obviously that that's a change that, by definition, doesn't do anything for half the league because half the league doesn't make the playoffs. And then half of that group gets booted in the first round. Everything else in here to me is an, is an owner. With the exception, I think you could argue that going to 84 games is maybe a win for both sides.

The players have to play. It's more wear and tear. They don't get like an automatic 3% raise or whatever it is on all their contracts, but it generates more revenue and that sort of thing. So I guess, but I mean, that's certainly not a concession by the owners. I don't think Marty Walsh had to twist any arms to get the, the, the owners to sell an extra home game in their regular season packages. Let's go back to the playoff share for a second.

Because in this story, it's under the subhead. It's quote, a massive win, which is something a set. It's something on Western Conference Forward told one of the guys. Increased playoff funds a massive win for the players. Guys mentioned when they went to distance, they generally weren't bringing home much money relative to all the work they did in the expenses playoffs can cost for family and friends going to games. So it's only appropriate the rising revenues and salary gaps.

saw an increase in the player final. So it's not just, it's not just that it's a win. That's an oiler right there. It doesn't say. Yeah, it's Corey Perry. He's the only guy in the league who's the big winner on this. He's like, hey, I mean, an anonymous Western Conference forward who's been to the finals every year for the last decade said, this was really, this was really important for all of us for sure. Yeah. Man, it's, this bothered me so much. that I intentionally signed with the team that goes out the first round every year, just so I wouldn't have to deal with it. It's just like,

this player, and I'm not to not to begrudge him because I get it. That is a big deal. It's a lot. I'm sure it's, because it goes from, it's going to go from $24 million to $40 million over the course of the CBA. And again,

they're not going to draw it from the revenue funds, right? So it's not money coming out of the salary cap. The salary cap will be unchanged by this pretty significant increase in, in money that they get, in the playoffs. So that's fine. That that is a tick in in the player column. But to frame it as a massive win is like that's when you know man. It's not just a win. It's a massive win. It's like, yeah, are we sure about that? Because we got. Immediately followed by other players sale going

like, yeah. Yeah. If you if you have people who are like, yeah, it's actually not maybe not that big of a deal, then I feel like the massive designation probably doesn't deserve to be in play. I feel like the wins for the owners come in both what they got and what they didn't change, right? Correct. Because like, and maybe this is, this is where you view it from a player side, I guess I could see is, you know, for example, as I think most of us have heard by now, maximum contracts drop one year. so it's now goes from eight years to seven years if you're resigning with your team goes from seven years to six years if you're if you're a ufa by the way i think that's a good change for fans i think that shorter contracts is so i'm i'm fine with that but that seems like pretty

clearly a win for owners at the expense of players now i think so i think i think that might be one you can frame as a win for like if i were a player i could i could convince it's myself that that was beneficial. But again, like is it, remember, like in 2012, Bill Daley had his whole, like, we're going to die on the hill of five-year contracts. And so, I mean, this is clearly something

the league wants. Now, I was going to say maybe as a player, you say, well, the league wants five, and it had been eight and we got them to keep it to seven. So that's, that's our win is that it wasn't, you know, we didn't change it even more. But there were changes around how

bonuses work. that doesn't help the players, some other stuff like that. And then the big one is just the thing that didn't happen is there's no change on expansion fees. Yep. Counting as hockey related revenue. So when you hear about, you know, these crazy numbers now, $2 billion potentially for expansion teams,

none of that will go to the players. When Atlanta or huge. Houston comes in and writes a $2 billion check to the NHL, it's none of that goes into hockey related revenue. And the reason for that, I know that sounds crazy to say like, how could that not be hockey related revenue? The reason is that the owner's argument has always been that is the owners transferring money amongst each other.

Money that comes from an owner to other owners is not revenue. It's just the money shifting. If I was the players, like, I mean, forget getting 50% of that, obviously, to get even a percentage of that would have been huge. And yeah, the last piece of this that is interesting is some of the players saying, man, this got done kind of fast. I didn't even hear much about this. It seems like we just, nobody is saying like that I'm seeing, nobody seems to be saying, well, the players are rolled over. the players just gave the league what they wanted, but I don't know. I wonder if we'll look back at this and go, maybe it should have been a bit more contentious.

It's just one of those things that it's been that way, but it doesn't mean it should. That's an Eastern Conference goal like talking when it comes to expansion stuff specifically, which is true. Every owner is going to get $62.5 million if and when there's a $2 billion evaluation placed on an expansion team, which is wild. And it's like, and, you know, we can have, the other part of the discussion is when you, when you see it really broken down that way, like here's how much money every preexisting owner gets. That's when you really start to feel like this is half a Ponzi scheme with expansion. Because it is, it is, it is crazy. But yeah, no money makes that. That extra few thousand the players are going to get out of their playoff runs.

Yeah, that's a big one. Huge one. The big win for us for the fans is we don't have to hear about this for four more years. no lockouts, no labor peace is nice. As someone who has spent a long, long time complaining about the complete lack of labor peace and how everything is a fight between the league and the players, I'm happy to see this get done.

So we're not going to have a blue sky account or an Instagram Threads account for an NHL podium at negotiations. I don't know what you're talking about. I don't. Was that a thing? I was just a general, general state. statement. That sounds pretty cool and funny. I don't know. We're going to close this out on one bit since we're talking about feeling old and being old. One one bit up at the top where I'm sure this was Jesse just really, really twisting the knife.

Of the 1,000, 23 players who played in the NHL last season, Sean, how many do you think we're around for the 2012-13 lockout? More than a thousand. How many were there? Oh, no. Yep. Please tell me there's like at least like 300. I could tell you that, but that would be a lie. Oh, no. How many? 108. All right. We're going to contemplate our life, take a break, and then come back for a segment two.

We're going to talk about kind of an interesting prospect trade and some other stuff that hopefully is coming down to fight. See you then. All right, we're back. Sean, we have a July 8th prospect trade. That's what we've been reduced to at this point. It kind of reminds me of the of the Braden Yeager Rutger-Mogority swap with Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh and Winnipeg last year.

It kind of happened at a similar time I schedule where it's like everyone just over-analysis this because there's nothing else going on. Well, I got to say, in the newsletter, I complained about how there's no trades. There had been, we got a solid week of zero trades in the league. At a time where usually we get a few

And also this is that thing that happens every year. We fall for this every year where during the season, you see some sort of problem with your team and you go, we should make a trade to fix this. And you're told you can't make trades like in November. That's just not how this league works anymore. Wait till the deadline. And then at the deadline, it's like, well, you know, buyers and sellers and the cap and everything.

It's too complicated. But you know when they're going to make this trade is at the draft. And then you wait for the draft. And at the draft, they go, well, you know, again, there's not really a lot of cap space out there. And, you know, it's got to be free agency. Once people start missing on free agents, look out. Then the trades happen. And then you get to where we are now, the second week of July.

And GMs look around and go, oh, everyone actually kind of likes their team. Nobody wants to make trades. But you know what? In training camp. And then like, it just, we continue to kick the can down the road. There's always a reason why you as a fan are dumb to think that this would happen now. and you've got to wait for a little bit. It's a little kid getting told by his parents.

Like, no, Disney World next year maybe? That's right. Yeah, exactly. It's, we were told this year, especially with all the cap room, like we've sort of documented how free agency was a bit of a bust because even though there was all this money, there wasn't the players. And so then it was, well, okay, but now all these teams that have money, and maybe some of them were holding on to it for, for,

for Mitch Marner or Nick Eelers or whatever, but now that they've missed out, now we're going to get going on the trades. And we had a week with nothing until we got one yesterday. And I'll be honest, when I first saw, I think it was Friedman broke the news to me on Twitter. From a cold play concert. Yeah. Yeah, I'm stepping away from my old man concert. And I'm breaking.

And he just said prospect trade. And I just was like, oh my God, really? Like, are we, is this like, you know, two guys on the 50s? contract list getting swapped for each other. But no, this is an actual legit. A hockey trade. I was like, I know one of those names at least. That's pretty good when it comes to prospects for me.

And yeah, Corey has his trade grades. It's the reigning Hobie Baker Award winner getting dealt. Interesting. That's not nothing. That's, you know, it's like any sport college is kind of weird. Like sometimes the guy wins the Heisman is the gray is a generational prospect. And sometimes it's some guy with no NFL future. And it's, you know, we get some extent of that in with the Hobie Baker.

But Edmonton Oilers go get a guy who in, in, uh, Isaac Howard who is expected to play for them next year. It's a guy they needed to. Frankie, Frankie talked about it. I think it a certain point over the last month or so. you look at just some of the attrition that they've had some of the roster attrition with Dylan Holloway signing an offer sheet blah blah there's several other instances of that you lose those younger cost controlled you know talented players who can really like if Isaac Howard ends up being a quality third line winger for them even that's a win like that's because that and it's also a guy that they didn't have in the system they deal Sam Riley back to Tampa Bay they're sending out a defenseman which like they're pretty well. set there too, right? So I think that, I think they're, uh, logically that it, it checks, it checks all the boxes. You get a ready made, you know, potential day one middle six option back for them. And that's the kind of stuff that they were short on. Like I really, I really

sincerely like the straight for, for Edmonton. Absolutely. And, and what's, what's so interesting about it is, you know, we're describing why we like it for, for Edmonton. And Corey does too. Corrie gives Edmonton a B plus, Tampa B minus. But the context here is Howard, I guess it communicated to the lightning that he would prefer a trade. I don't know if it had been a trade demand scenario quite yet, but that he didn't see a path to the NHH. He wanted to play in the NHL next year.

He felt he was ready. He felt that was what was best for his development. And he didn't see the path in Tampa. And normally when you see it, it makes me nervous that he didn't see a path. in Tampa because he should be on that he should be on their third line yeah i mean but tampa is a team that is very all right now you know going out and getting you know when you see them going out and getting the yonnie gourds and locking them in maybe you're you're thinking okay uh that that's you know that's not the path for me but what's interesting is when you normally when you hear that

you think, okay, this is a guy who's going to get shipped off to some rebuilding team. And instead, he goes to the back-to-back conference champion, Edmonton Oilers. And yet because of all the attrition in the summer, they can offer him a spot for the taking that Tampa couldn't. Whereas Tampa sort of, I think does the reasonable thing, which is, all right, if we're going to move this guy because we don't have an NHL spot now. And we're all in on winning right now. let's get the best prospect we can who's a couple years away. So, you know, you don't have to worry about him being blocked by anyone because he's a couple of years. And then by then, who knows, we're all waiting for the window to slam shut on, on Tampa.

And it probably will happen at some point soon. But, yeah, it's, it's, they'll have one asset at least ready to go to compensate for all the draft picks. that they previously traded for Tyler General. Because that asset for a while was Isaac Howard. He's a guy whose name came up in the last couple years. I remember he was part of the discussion with Calgary for no Hanifan. You know, like on and on and on. Like whenever we would see Tampa be connected to a piece,

he was kind of at the centerpiece of it, right? Because there's no, there's nobody else. So now they actually use it to kick the can a little bit further down the road because he was getting to the point where, you know, he's really close to being an NHL player. He's not the prospect to throw in. So, you might start the clock. Yeah, 2002 draft.

He was a very late first round pick. So, I mean, that's three years. That's about the timeline, even for late first round picks. You know, you're okay, it's, if you're a prospect and not just a guy who's going to play in the NHL, and I feel like there's a difference, then, yeah, it's, it's time to get in there. And man, there's got to be some teams out there frustrated, though. Like, Tampa's got no draft picks ever. They trade every pick they have.

And they're like, well, we do have the Hobie Baker winner, though. From the one time we picked 31st overall. Yeah. That's nice. It's good that something good happened to Tampa. It's the success rate of running an organization like that. Also, the Montreal draft is three years ago. Like, we're like, this is our lives are just passing so quickly.

My God. He was the kid in the suit. Dude, how about this? If you don't know a single thing about Isaac Howard, if you know less about prospects than me and Sean do, which is saying something, he was the pick in 2022 that had the white suit with a turtleneck and chain. Wow.

Yes. How is him. Now I know. You didn't know that. I remember that, but I did not. That's good. I like how you,

that's what I like about the show. Interesting. Interesting. Yeah, because you and I were running around the, Bell Center without any cell service trying to live blog or something. That was still, the number one memory of that for me is still the reaction to the Shane Wright.

Incredible. Incredible. The pro wrestling style crowd response. After the slow build of everybody in the building realizing that they were maybe going to do it and maybe draft a Kevin Costner their way into walking out of there with Slavkovsky. You know, like fans in homemade Shane Wright, Montreal Canadian shirts and just, oh, that was, that was great. And yeah, I feel old. It was three years ago.

You know what makes me feel insanely old? I have, I have a photo somewhere kicking around that I think, I think it was, I think was Friedman tweeted out in 2014 of like the prospects, the big 2014 prospects. And like, I'm, I'm with them because I'm like, you know, I'm just getting a quote or whatever. but it's and and it's that group the fact that that group is officially old guys now like you know and it's like dry siddle and those guys but the one that that gets me is always arineckblad because even at the time like I'm watching this guy's 18 I'm like this guy's older than me what are we doing I I know joke I remember the two of us joke about that back then that's and now he's like the grizzled erineck like I mean he's like he you know he's the he's the he's the

Charlie Huddy of this league all of a sudden. And you're like, wait, how are you the same age as Leon Drysaddle? That doesn't make sense. That doesn't work. You guys must have been like eight years apart in the draft. But no. But he's an extremely old man, even though he's 25 or whatever. It's the beard, man.

He's always, he's always had the beard. The beard grows all the way down the neck. You know, connect with chest. That's what doesn't, man. Right there. But not, you know, you're because he's, he can do that. He's not, you know, It's not like me where you got to shave the beard to simulate the jaw line.

I don't know what you're talking about. Give us one thing to pay attention to because I know I know this was like this was like the bit from red light a couple days ago. Like we're like we're starting to see, you know, some of your bits and bobs come to come fruition. Like is there it was what's the one thing from that list that we should look out for? The thing that I wrote about was, you know, like there are just some things that. just aren't happening, right? Like this is the thing, this time of year, we all go, oh, nothing's happening. And yeah, that is generally true.

But sometimes you got to pay attention to what's not happening and what maybe isn't going to happen. And as an example, the big one to me, the huge, you know, looming storyline that got introduced and set up and is now just kind of hanging there looking like maybe it's, it's not going to get fulfilled, is the Oilers goaltending. Are we really doing this? Are we really going into next year with the same two guys? We're going to risk, I'll say another year of the Connor McDavid era.

I will avoid the temptation. Not the F word. I will, yeah, I will avoid the temptation to say the last year, potentially, of the Connor McDavid era, but a year, one precious year of him and his prime, we're going to do that again without goaltending. And, you know, I hinted at this in the piece. But the fact that John Gibson's gone, the goalie carousel seems to have stopped. That suggests one of two things. It suggests either they're really going to just do that they're really just going to go into the season at least with everything the same and roll the dice on that, which to me is a not only is that a huge.

I mean, that's a everyone in the front office is risking our jobs on this kind of gamble. or are they aiming a little bigger? And it's something that we're not seeing. And they're not, you know, they weren't in on John Gibson because there's a bigger target out there. And it's hard to think of who around the league that might be. But there's, you know, there's some guys. Is it possible that they're going bigger game hunting than we think?

And something's going to drop that will make it make sense that they weren't, in on John Gibson. The options were so slim to begin with. We're primarily talking about John Gibson and Jake Allen to some extent. Yeah. And beyond those guys, it's backups. And all those guys have signed too. Like, you're not going to go, go back and look at the free agency list on June 30.

It's just pathetic. We're talking about Dan Vladar is like a top. James Rimer is like a highlight. And look, there's nobody available now. now that is clearly better than Stuart Skinner. Nope. I'd argue there's probably nobody better now is clearly better in Calvin McCart. So you go inside someone now.

You've got three guys and now you've got to move someone and maybe you're even worse. I get it. But just try to do your version of the McKenzie Blackwood trade in December. That could be it. If that's what they're relying on, it's curious. It could be, right? I mean, that would be the other counter argument is, hey, Colorado. did this last year.

And when they realized it wasn't working, they moved quickly, guys were available. I don't know. I seem to remember that when Colorado did it, we all wrote about how incredibly rare it was to see a team do that. So if that's the plan, also like credits to McAnzie Blackwood

for making it stand up. Like that's, I think that's a bit of lightning that I wouldn't expect to necessarily strike twice. Like he'd been injured and inconsistency. for the majority of his of his career outside of some spurts with with jersey right and then at the start of the season with san Jose he kept it going he looked good he seems like he's going to be the answer moving forward but whatever he's a goalie who knows like if mackenzie

blackwood comes out in face plants then you know yeah proofs the proofs in the concept right and you know it's we all like what colorado did but it's not like they ended up yeah they lost successful, no, they lost the run. So I, on the other hand, I'm just assuming

that the penguins are going to trade one of Carter, Cal and Brian Rust because I convinced myself that that was going to happen over the last couple weeks. As you said at the start

of all this, that's like where we are, though. Like, we're like, yeah, the trade, I mean, plus free agency.

They have, you know, the two best wingers who could easily, conceivably be, be on the move. And of course, of course I'll trade one of them.

Yeah. Now we just sit and wait. We just sit and wait. And then, they're going to start the season one of the phone or whatever. And then we're going to do that dance, right? You got to wait until the deadline. You know what?

Maybe the draft. Maybe free agency and maybe the deadline. And it's just it's the it's the circle of not doing your job, which is what NHLGMs love the most. And then, oh, hold on. Can we get in that circle? Can we get in that circle? I'd like to be in the circle of not doing my job. Yeah, really.

Let's give that a try. We'll get Elton John to write the song. And then you'll sing it since you're apparently the, you're doing vocals on this podcast. That's right. All right, second three is coming back. We did learn a little bit over this week. We'll hit you with that in a minute.

Stick around. Sean, we've learned things. We always learn things. Here's what I've learned. So often in our time together. And my time is just a reader of your work. I was just some random loser. You had no time for at all.

Yeah. I mean, I think fan is the word you're looking for. Yeah. That's fanatic. You know, fans short for fanatic, Sean. And I, like I said, I got a bookshelf. I got a book on my shelf downstairs that. I need to get you to sign that at something.

What have we learned, Sean? I've learned plenty of bits and pieces and wonderful trivia from you over the years. That's like slowed a little bit over the last couple. I'm running out. You're running out. I'm unfortunately accumulating more. institutional knowledge about the NHL. You got me on red light, man.

There is a reference that I just, that I just missed. And it was at the end. It was the answer to a trivia question. You're asking about the 20% limit on a one-year deal with a salary cap. Here's the way you wrote it. Well, it's technically possible to exceed the 20% limit on a one-year deal under very specific circumstances.

Jeremy Welsh fans rise up. Only one player has ever signed a multi-year deal that nudged up the ceiling. That's a bit about Brad Richard, Brad Richards that isn't relevant for us. I did not get the Jeremy Welsh reference. There was no link provided, which is something you,

something you do on purpose. Sometimes it sometimes it gets past editors. Sometimes it gets past the editors and sometimes it doesn't. We're not here to hold any hands, man. You know or you don't. This time it didn't. Did not know who Jeremy Walsh was. So I googled Jeremy Welsh salary cap.

What's the first thing that comes up? It's a Sean McIndoo Grantland post from God knows when this was. Let's see, 2015. So, okay, so it's relatively, relatively recent. That's the most old man thing that anyone has said. Only 10 years ago. Oh, God. Coming up on the 10-year anniversary of this post, actually.

The NHL's five most unbreakable records. Yeah, this is pure off-season content. You talk about a quirk in the cap. It's about it's about bonus laid and one-year deals. It's meant to cover cases. Back to an example he gave was Matt Sundeen. Jeremy Welsh signed a pro, he was a 23-year-old NCAA center who signed a pro,

who signed a contract on April 5th with a pro-rated bonus for $92,000. Basically to the weird accounting methods of the NHL salary cap, that bonus counted every day on the schedule, right? And the end result was that Jeremy Welsh had a cap hit listed on Cap Geek for how much was this? 17.9.9.4 or 5 million. There it is. 17.9, 4 and 5 million to the point where there is an FAQ on Capkeek's website back then saying, like, is this a typo?

No, it was not a typo. Jeremy Welsh counted almost $18 million against the Carolina Hurricanes salary cap for a time. I had no idea of that. For one thing. For one thing. For one day. I had no clue. He basically signed a contract on the last day so that he could get into one game.

It was one of those like let's burn a year of the contract deal. And it counted. It was a line item of basically an 18 million. million dollar cap hit. And it could fit under for the same way that like when you when your team gets a guy at the deadline, the cap is pro rated so they can fit more. Well, I mean, this was pro rated to one day. So it fit in as if he was on a minimum contract. But I'm I'm excited because now I mean, I feel like with Connor McDavid's deal coming up, like we're getting towards the era where somebody is finally going to break this record. I listed it as an unbreakable record, but 10 years later, somebody. All it took was 10 years. 10 years, billions of dollars in expansion, ESPN TV contracts and all of that. Somebody, man, you got to get Jeremy Walsh on the phone. You're like, I, that, you got to get him for when McDavid signs his $18 million deal and be like, how does it feel to lose that record?

And then have him be like, what the hell are you talking about? Leave me alone. We're bringing back the guest segment. You can be on the, you can be on the, you can be on the, you can be on the, call. It'll be 45 seconds of Jeremy Welsh just asking to be left alone. It'd be like, dude, I'm at work right now. Can we not do this?

Selling cars, leave me alone. Speaking of guys from 10 years ago, 20 years ago, and beyond, I learned this week that we might get to do another Mark Andre Fleury retirement tour. Incredible. We only had six in the last year, uh,

goodbye games for Mark Andre Fleur and according to Alan Walsh, five teams have reached out. And I would love to know who are those four teams that have joined the Oilers in reaching out and said, hey, any interest in Mark Ander Flair? And he says no for now. Is Mark Rondry Fleur going to be like NWO era like sting up in the rafters? NW, NWO, he's, he's going to, he's going to be like, oh my God, I almost said, I said, I must have said, I must have TNA Sting. Late period sting. He's going to be a, he's going to be A.W. Sting with, okay, with, yeah, with Harvey Allen.

Yeah, with like the, the, the white beard and all that. But just up in the rafters, like, you know, every time Stuart Skinner gives up a goal on the first shot, they'll just pan up and then it'll be like the one lone spotlight in the dark and Flurry is sitting there. with a sword instead of a baseball bat that he can plunge into the back of whoever's job he steals. They got to get some, if he's late period sting, they got to get some little backup goaltender

who rides a skateboard. Yeah, that's right. That is an AW reference. Thank you very much. Oh, man. So that's it. That's what I learned. I'm very excited for the new.

I think we will dis into existence. How many times over the course of the regular season do we joke about this? I'm going to write a column of like ranking the 10 best Mark Andre Fleury goodbye games once he comes back and we're just going to break him all down. Top top 10 from a list of from a list of 35. We 100% created. We like we put him on the World Championship team.

That happened because me and Frank. We will this into existence and it's yeah, it's going to happen. Like I said, we got it. More generally, we got to do what we got. We got a will more. We got a will more stuff. See, I don't know if you know this about Mark. Mark Andre Fleury. Here's my theory. You may not know this because it doesn't come up often,

but he's a bit of a prankster. He likes his pranks. What if this is like... Wait a second. Wait a second. Is that true? It is. It is. Ask around. You'll find out. He's a prankster. What if this is the ultimate Mark Andre Fleury prank? You retire and then just convince the Edmonton Oilers that you're coming in on day one of the playoffs. And then you just, where is he? Yeah. Oh, he got us. There he is. There he is.

He's up in the rafters, but he's just not wearing a jersey or anything. He's just hanging out. Just there. It's just not on the rosters or anything. Not going to happen. All right. That's it for us this week, I think. We've hit our limit here talking about Mark Andre Fleury and Isaac Howard and what have you.

Do you have any posts coming up, Sean? I do. And it's, you decided on what the topic of that one may be. I talked about slow news day. I'm bringing back a concept I introduced last year, which is a slow news summer, where I'm allowed to just do whatever I want. We're going to play,

and in fact, I'll even tell you, we're going to play a silly little game that somebody suggested to me where you have to take your favorite team or whatever other team. You've got to build a six-man roster, three forwards, two defensemen,

don't make that face, and a goalie, without repeating any initials. Jesus Christ. We're going to just see how it goes. Are we allowed to say that on the podcast, Jeff? Can I drop it? Can I drop it? Can I drop it, J.C.? That's against the New York Times conduct rules. We're about to find out.

Yeah, we'll find out. He may be tweeting out apologies. The note apology is all the way. All right. Let's get that out of here. McIntyre, thank you. Thank you folks for listening. We will be around throughout the summer in one form or another. Thanks for sticking with us.

enjoy whatever you're doing. Hopefully nobody blew off their fingers with fireworks five days ago in the United States. That's all that matters. Take care.