The Athletic Hockey Show - Mitch Marner's preferred destinations

Episode Date: June 25, 2025

The boys discuss possible destinations for Mitch Marner, including Chicago, Anaheim, Utah, Columbus, Seattle, Los Angeles and the Vegas Golden Knights. Sean, Frank and Sean stick tap the 2025 Hockey Hall of Fame class led by Alex Mogilny, and they talk about the Florida Panthers savage Stanley Cup celebrations.Hosts: Sean Gentille and Sean McIndoeWith: Frankie CorradoExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff Domet Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic hockey show. What up, what up? It's the Athletic Hockey Show. It's the Wednesday edition. McIndoo, Carrado, Gentile. We are starting our record 27 minutes later than we were supposed to. I will leave it to the audience to decide who was the culprit for that one. Someone fell asleep.

You'll find out. Was it the American who can say? You'll find out when they mysteriously are scratched from tonight's skirt. It was a, it was a, it was a. It was a Tyler Sagan situation. I missed a team meeting. He's been exiled for missing a team meeting. We're going to handle this internally.

No further questions. I wish we were still doing video like we had been for the past few weeks for the playoffs because I could have had the missed team breakfast, Kairon under my face on the social shares. Fellas, how were we doing? What did you guys talk about in my absence? I'm sure it was mainly. Mitch Warner focus. That seems like that's where everything is these days. Also,

we're going to talk about the Hall of Fame class and some other stuff down the road. But, man, we're six days out from free agency and stuff starting to cook. You can tell just by looking at the site, by the way. There's like a gross amount of free agency content up there and starts with DGB's Warner, free agent destination. Mitch Marner. We're six days away from the beginning of the Mitch Marner. free agency, uh, market.

Yeah, you see how long it takes. Everybody will wait until Mitch has made his mind up. Oh, Columbus. Imagine hearing from you. How do you think Nick Elers feels about

Marner's slow playing things? Just take your time, man. I don't have anything else to do. Not like I want to get signed. I guess how much of the the market is you going to hold up? Like there's really what, two or three teams.

that realistically think they have a chance at Marner, like there's probably going to be an outlier team that just throws a huge amount of cash and says, that's your incentive. We'll give you so much money. And then he'll ponder that, I'm sure. But I wonder how many teams realistically think they have a chance at this thing. I think the numbers got to be up at like at least,

there's got to be at least half a dozen, don't there? that think they have a chance to get them based on... Of teams that are going to make a serious offer. Yeah. You know, like I'm thinking of a team like Detroit. I can't imagine that they're sitting there thinking they're the favorites, given everything that we think we know.

And, you know, we got to put that disclaimer on everything that we, you know, none of us are inside that Marner camp knowing what the priorities are. You don't know that. Maybe that's why. Maybe that's why I was late. Fair enough.

But, yeah, team like Detroit could be that team that says seven times 14. That's the team. That's got to start with a 14 in Detroit. No doubt. You know, and that's what you're going to have to do, right? Like, you don't go away. That's not a team that you go in the door and say, we're really close to winning and all this other stuff. That's the team where you go and say, we want you.

We're going to, you know, kick the door in with a big number. Now, does that make them a favorite? No. But does that mean that they're going to be significantly in the mix? And this is a big first step in their free agency? I think so. And I think, like, let's list the teams. Carolina, Vegas are the two big ones right now that seem to be.

I mean, that did you, it was Elliott over the weekend saying that Alex Petrangelo might not be ready for the start of the season. There's like some, some, some concern over his status. Like that that immediately set off alarm bells in my head. And we had all the Thomas Hurtle stuff yesterday with rumors flying around that he was potentially on the move, including to Carolina. Nothing as of as of this morning has actually come from that. So who knows if there was any truth at all to it. But it, it sort of reminded you that, oh, yeah, Vegas is always in on guys like this. Always.

So you got Vegas, Carolina. I think that the Florida teams have been mentioned early, but. it doesn't feel like maybe they're at the top of the list, but you would assume L.A. You would assume teams like San Jose and Anaheim are at least going to kick some tires. Chicago, we keep hearing that maybe they're done. I can't imagine that.

I mean, like, they have to get better. Lazzin Powers wrote something a couple days ago that was like, this might be it. It might be Berkovsky and Ryan Donato. and then they're just going to finish last again. Is that the, well, you can't, sure, I guess you can do that, but then it's hard to sell the hope that in the not too distant future, you're turning the corner and you're saying we're trying to be competitive. Like, what is it for Chicago? Is it a 10, 12 year rebuild at this point?

Like, if they're lost, they're lost in the sauce when it comes to this, man. Like, like, that team, they've, they've, they've completely, they've been bad enough long enough to. totally lose perspective on on the point of any of this. And, and if I'm Kyle Davidson, like, what am I, if I'm done, am I just collecting top five picks for my replacement to use? Like, yeah, no kidding. What do I think is going to happen? I'm going to be there three years later when this all,

the big plan all comes to, comes together, maybe. 18 million dollars in caps page, Chicago. So, so, so, so you're going to walk into a season where you, you're one of the three or four worst teams in the league again with no real support for Connor Bedard again and you're going to

do all that but you have $20 million. I know Philip Khrushav is like not that good of a player but they're probably going to like non they're not going to non qualify like what are you doing? What do you saving this money? What's the path? Especially when Connor Bedard

A hasn't fully lived up to the hype and B, B, spent half last year, sitting on the bench looking like he was blinking out a hostage message. Yeah. No kidding. Not to mention like you, I don't think all, like all the pieces are not there for the Chicago Blackhawks.

Like there have been young teams that we've seen and you say like San Jose is a good example of that where you look at it and you're like, all the young pieces are there. They just got to get older and they'll get better and you'll supplement that with some veteran guys that maybe you pick up an unrestricted free agency, kind of like a Tyler to Foley. for Chicago, you got to go get the guys. Like, you don't have the nucleus already of Eklund, Smith, and Celebrini, and others, you know, Sam Dickinson.

Like, you got to be aggressive. And it kind of, this is an opportunity for you to just say, we're going to be so aggressive. We're going to spend more money than anyone can imagine on this player. And maybe we regret it, but maybe we don't because we actually got a guy that we can, we can work in with our should be super. star Baderd. And look, I mean, it happens on bad teams,

too. And, like, when, when they're rebuilding, Chicago's looking on what they, what they have,

it's easy to imagine that. Chicago's looking to what they have. You say, well, if, you know, if Padar, the guy everybody

thought he was a year ago, then we're in great shape. And if Nizar turns into a legitimate second liner behind him, we're in great shape. And if, and if all these,

if this handful of prospects that we have, Lvshunov, whoever, if everybody hits, then, like, you know, what's to worry about? That's like Anaheim Ducks level thinking. That's the kind of stuff they were doing two years ago

when they had this group of prospects that everybody loved. And it's like, well, hey, if all of it works out, it's great. It's not going to. Like someone's going to be the first team in history where every prospect hit his ceiling. Right. Yeah. And the other thing, the other trap you run into,

if you're Chicago, and you can imagine some of their fans saying this. They go, look, where we're at, right now, we're not one player away from being Stanley Cup contenders. We're not going to win the Stanley Cup by adding Mitch Marner. So, okay. You're not going to win the Stanley Cup by adding Connor McDavid either. So what are we doing?

We just don't add anyone. That's the path to being the Sabres. If there's one team that is a Mitch Marner away from winning a Stanley Cup, I would say it's the Carolina Hurricanes. Could be. That's the one where I look at it and I'm like, you might just be. And it's hard to say that, though. given his track record in games five, six, and especially seven come playoff time, right?

Because that's where that's where Carolina has had issues at a certain point, like conference finals, and that's where Mitch Marner has issues. Do you marry the two together and say, now we get over the hump? I had to do, I had to do an exercise this week on, on Sports Center where I had to pick my three, you know, favorite destinations for Mitch Marner, but we did it as, I'm a real estate agent and I'm selling the home of this location, you know, hockey, location, living, all that kind of stuff. And I had to like phrase it as as a real estate agent.

So I'll tell you what I did. I did number three, the Anaheim Ducks, because everyone loves an up and comer. Oh, this is an up and coming neighborhood. You know, like you're going to want to be a part of it. You get in here early. And next thing you know, it's like your profit sky. rocket because you bought in at this amount. And once the neighborhood's really gentrified, man, you're going to, you're going to really

see this pay dividends. And I kind of see that with Anaheim where it's an up-and-coming team. You could go there with the new coach, all these young players, you guys turn the corner. And next thing you know, it's like, A, you made a ton of money because they have cap space. And you guys, you did something. And maybe Anaheim's not that far away. Is there something to that that? I think so, because I had the thing.

thought when obviously we saw the Ziegress trade a couple days ago and it's not a one for one thing like you don't send like they've been trying to trade Trevor Zegaris for years now like you don't yeah send him out you know as the A to signing Mitch Marner as as the B but like I don't know man like he like he makes it makes a decent chunk of change this year he's headed to he's going to be up for a contract again after this season where you know it's which will be weird just because of the way it's because of his career arc. So you're just saying like, yeah, let's just get this future commitment off the, off the books.

Let's like actually actually make her. I think, you know, I'm Marner-brained right now, unfortunately. Like everybody, everybody in the media and everybody who works it for our company specifically. So like, it was kind of the first thing I thought. And it, because it does. It makes sense. They're an up-and-comer. Right.

And they could give you a ton of money. And so the second one, I, I, the team number two, was Carolina. And I had a harder time putting that into real estate terms because really I think that's a legacy play. That's more you're going there to say, I can show that I'm a winner in a big moment with a team that needs that. But I think the real estate play into what we were doing is you live in Toronto where you're in the fishbowl and you're in the spotlight all the time and it's traffic. You're 30 minutes away from being 30 minutes away somewhere. You go to Carolina, man. Different way of life. Just different attention. and that might help you kind of get over that hump come playoff time.

And then the first one was Vegas. And I used Vegas as like, the house doesn't need any renovation. It's ready to go. Just pack your bag, unpack them, move right in. Your next door neighbor is Jack Eichel. You're going to fly on the flank with him. And you've got a really good situation there where you don't have to do anything except show up. and be you and you're in a ready made, ready made situation.

Yep. Here's the thing with Vegas, because I did in my rankings when I was done being a smart ass and, you know, on all the other lists. I did my actual predictions. Wait a second. I did my actual predictions. And I had Vegas number one. Two things on Vegas.

Number one, this is, this applies to Vegas. and maybe Tampa, certainly Florida, although again, I don't think they're as big a player as maybe they could have been. If you go to a team that's recently won, okay, you're Mitch Marner and you go to a team that's already won and they don't win, guess what? Guess what the story becomes is you think you've got a reputation as the guy who can't win in Toronto, where they never win anything before, after during the time you were there, wait until you go. go someplace it's two years removed from a Stanley Cup and then they don't win with you. That's number one. Number two, and again, this is, we're all kind of reading between the lines because we don't know what the thinking is on the Marner side. But there have been at least some reports or

some suggestions, speculation call it, that there is frustration on the Marner side with the Maple Leafs, how he was treated there, the fact that they asked him to potentially wait. a no trade clause, even though his wife was pregnant, and they knew that he didn't, he didn't necessarily want to move. And basically that there is some sort of element of, I wasn't treated right in Toronto. They didn't give me enough respect. They didn't treat me the way a player like me should be treated. You go to Vegas. How does Vegas treat? How's the loyalty factor for the Vegas Golden Knights? This is the most cutthroat organization in the league. And I say that with admiration, by the way.

That's why they win. But this is a team that, you know, we're told right now is shopping Thomas Hurdle around to make room for Mitch Marner. Hurdle's got a no trade clause. They just got him. He went there a year and a half ago. He went there a year and a half ago probably, you know.

It wasn't even that. Jesus Christ. And now they see a guy out there who's 10% better or whatever. And they're like, no, we want him instead. You're gone. Get out. It's like they took a year off. from, you know,

building that reputation is the most cutthroat Oregon in the league. And I'm like, no, we're back. We're actually going to make someone disappear. Martin Johnson,

Marsha, so didn't get any loyalty out of that group. You think you're going to when you show up? Like, are you out of your mind? No kidding.

And the other thing that I think the, the Vegas thing looks like, you know, Mark Stone has this year and next year left on his deal. I think as far as Vegas being cutthroat, that's where they draw the line

on Mark Stone. I don't think they would just throw him aside. I think they would let that contract expire and say, we gently acquired our replacement for you. And we're going to play it out, obviously. But that's one where it's like, I feel like they draw the line on cutthroat. There's too much history there with McCriman and Stone.

But that's like, you're talking about going from Toronto, where they gave you a huge contract, where they constantly reassured you, won't be traded, where they had the president of the team call you a couple years ago and say, you might hear some stuff. I'm personally assuring you you're not being traded, where you've got mild criticism from the coach occasionally, and then the next day the coach would be sitting up in front of the

media saying, I was wrong to say that. I shouldn't have said that, you know, maybe Mitch Martin didn't play well. All of this, not enough, but you're going to go to Vegas and they're going to treat. Good luck, man. Good luck. Hey, can I throw one team out there we haven't mentioned yet? that I think that maybe makes some sense and we add to the list. What about Utah?

That was an early team. That was like everyone was like, I feel like, it's got much money to spend. Utah's going to be in on it. They got to make a big splash. They got fans, new facility.

I get it. I get it for sure. I just, I wonder what, what kind of a sell, like what kind of pitch they're going to give him as far as how competitive they're going to be. Well,

that's it, right? I mean, I think the cell is, first of all, we could be committed. We're certainly ahead of the Chicago's and San Jose's and Detroit's as far as the short term. I mean, that team might be a Mitch Marner away from making the playoffs at the very least. And then we go from there.

And then I think the sell is, look, if the real problem in Toronto was just the market, the attention, the constant noise and the spotlight that you just don't want to deal with anymore, Utah is the absolute opposite of that. A brand new market that the fans are just happy to have a team. They are years away from being the sort of market that's going to criticize a star player for not living up to this or that or the other thing. So come here. We've got lots of money. We can be completely competitive.

There's going to be very little pressure. We'll be happy to get into the playoffs. And then we go from there. Good nice place to raise a family. Maybe I don't know. That's that's your selling point. I have another sneaky. I have another sneaky one for you. I have another sneaky one for you.

And I'm just looking through your article now. I don't know if you had it in here. I think you did maybe. But the Columbus Blue Jackets. Yes. The last time there was a 100 point player who became an unrestricted free agent, that player chose the Columbus Blue Jackets. That was Johnny Goodro.

And nobody saw that coming. Right. No one saw it coming. But I feel like it does check off some boxes in the sense that they could pay him a boatload of money, right? They have the flexibility cap wise. They have this like young team that feels like they're on the precipice of making a push. It's a quiet market where you could live a pretty cushy life and not have, you know, national Canadian media attention on you. And I don't know if we've talked about this, but I don't know how much like going back to

Toronto plays into things, right? Like if you're in a divisional team, you'll go back a couple times a year. Maybe because you're in the metro, you go back once, maybe twice the next year. But I think Columbus could be one of those teams that, like, is in stealth mode on this and saying, you know, we can offer a ton of money plus some other things that might be of interest to you. Well, they'll go back. They'll go back once during the regular season and then once for the playoff series, whenever they make for wild card coming out of the Metro division. Oh, I thought you were thinking conference final would be the, uh, would be the one. I don't know.

I don't know. Let me just throw one more. Even for the purpose of a joke, I don't think I could get there. Columbus is also interesting to me because if Carolina is the favorite or the co-favorant, I think Donnie Waddell might like throwing a bit of a wrench at the old, the old Carolina hurricanes by zipping in at the last minute and at the very least driving the price up. We got some good stuff from Portsline, too, over the last week about how badly Wadell wants to add talent in Bill. because he wants a top six wing and he wants to figure out,

he wants a top four right shot D, and they want to maybe figure out their goal length. Waddell's laundry list is long, and he's shooting pretty high. I'm going to throw one more thing at the Columbus, and we've talked about a lot of West Coast teams, right? We talked to Vegas. We talked to Anaheim.

We talked to Utah. Columbus would be that point geographically, where as a player, you just had a kid, So you probably want some family help around. Columbus is really not very far. And that's like you can get the best of both worlds as far as like being close to family, but also being quiet and tucked away the same way you would be in a Utah, Anaheim, or Vegas to a certain degree.

Yep. They need Kim Atkinson to step up and give him the neighborhood tour like he did, like he did for Johnny and Meredith Goddrault. Because that sounded like that was talking about real estate. close that. He was like, here's, here's where you can buy the house. The schools are great. There's like, I'm going to vouch for Mark Mathaught to do that. I think Mark Matha given his leave sends ties. I think that's the guy. That's the guy that should do the tour in Columbus. Like the point is that there's guys who are willing to do it. And that's what makes

Columbus kind of sneaky in all this. Like, we've already been over this. We out, everybody had that, you know, Columbus really reaction whenever, whenever, uh, the Goddrow sign there. Yeah. a couple years back. So like we're the, the pump is primed. We know that's a place that, you know,

is appealing to guys. Like it's, I'm telling you. I've, this is one of those things for the last few weeks. Like, I've been making jokes about him signing with Columbus and I've done it long enough for now.

I kind of think of my. Wait a second. It could happen. Let me throw one more team out there. LA Kings. This is a team that desperately needs, uh, something to get them,

get them better right now. Because I mean, the hopeless. of losing four times in a row to the same team, you can't beat the Oilers. And you're not going to beat the Oilers by going out there and adding, you know, depth around the edges. This is the one guy. Now, I think it makes a ton of sense because it's also, they've got cap space.

It's a big, sexy city. So if, you know, we just talked about Columbus, maybe that's what you want when you're just starting the family and everything, nice, quiet. But if that's not what that family wants, L.A. is the biggest market that you can go to where there's also very little pressure, right? You know, even Chicago, those sorts of, you know, one of the New York markets, the spotlight is going to be there, not like Toronto, but it's going to be there. LA can be as quiet as you want it to be, man.

Manhattan Beach, Newport Beach, it's pretty, pretty quiet. If it wanted to do. The flip side that I did have them there. I had a few people point out there like, so let me get this, because I was kind of pitching this, this L.A. being the thing. And also, if I'm L.A., you didn't bring in Ken Holland to not go big game hunting. right like this is you got to make your move now forward or backwards the flip side of it is you know I had a few people give me some variation of let me get this straight so you have a team that can't

get it done in the first round of the playoffs and your solution is to give a bunch of money to Mitch marner well that's the thing it's like yeah he's right it is it is kind of true yeah the thing that would be I think somewhat appealing about LA as well outside of hockey just from a strictly business point of view. As you guys know, Mitch Marner, I don't know if he leads the league in endorsements. It's got to be him and McDavid that are up there. But you know, the difference

between Columbus and L.A. is L.A. is a big market. You can still have like an endorsement play or some endorsement plays because you're in Los Angeles as opposed to even being in Anaheim or Utah or like you can still kind of

find a way to capitalize on that aspect, which if you watched any kind of commercial here in Toronto, you know that was pretty much a part of the Mitch Marner plan financially. Not anymore. Not anymore. Kings have $18 million in projected space, by the way.

We did that a couple days ago. It's going to be dropping on the site soon, or we just factor in how much RFAs make, potential LTIR plays, whatever, and just to see how much, you know, a spitball spaghetti against the wall number

for how much these teams are working with or will be working with. LA can get it done if they have to. All right, fellas, let's get, I don't know if we're going to, I, we're not, probably not going to be, not going to do a show until after July, uh, July 1st. So whatever, put you on the spot. Where does he, where does he land?

Sean. I mean, in, in my piece, I said Vegas was my number one. So, you changed your mind in the last 24 hours or whatever. No, but I'm going to say Carolina. I'm going to cover my bases. I'm going to go on as many different outlets as, I can. I'm going to give a different team every time.

And I'm going to take that. A loser. Yeah. All right. But here's Carolina on a two-year deal. No way. No way you take a two-year deal. You don't know what's that, Frankie.

Dude. Two-year deal. Try it out. Try it out. I mean, look, first of all, you're going to make way more money long-term on a two-year deal and then hit free agency again. And the other thing is, this guy had nine years to make it work in Toronto, his childhood team where everything was set up to succeed and for whatever

reason it couldn't work, you really want to commit eight years to some brand new team and just hope that that's going to be fine. Give it two years. Try it out. Some people like Roderindamore, some people don't. Two years. Give it a shot. I can't, I can't reason with the two-year deal when you're this type of magnitude of player, because if he goes to Carolina, I guarantee you, there's a year where it's like the Miko Ranton thing or half a year where you're trying to figure it out. And then the next year, once you got it figured out, you're like, holy, I'm back in a contract year again. I just did this. Like, why, why would you put yourself through that again when you can cash in for a hundred million dollars? I would love. I would love. You get to be the focus

of the whole league. You're telling me you don't love this. It's like everyone's talking about them. It's like when stuff goes to winners, no offense to winners, okay, but eventually, like when the clothes, the premium clothes go there too often, they're not the premium clothes. clothes anymore. You can get them at winners. So if you come up again in two years. That off the list of endorsements for for this show. Damn. Okay. I shouldn't have said Frank. You can move on to Marshalls with all the other cool kids, dude. That's fun. Shout out to Mitch Marner just got referenced as a winner for the first time in his NHL career. The whole point for me of this, if you're the agent and you're trying to build the

hype is Mitch Marner is up now and you don't know when you can get him next. You can't. It's not going to be available. So pony up, gets a $14 million, make us a six or seven year offer because this is it. It's going. And I don't know. Maybe you can drum up some interest that way. I pay real money.

I pay real money to see Tom Dundon's face whenever someone slides the two-year offer to them. I don't want to see it. I don't want seven times 14 when Connor McDavid's going to reset the market to $19 million a year from now. I'm Mitch. Yeah. But you're also, you're not the player, Connor McDavid is,

and you're not the player, you know, and Drisital is. Maybe I am. Maybe I am. After he leads the Carolina Hurricanes, once everybody starts being nice to me

and showing me the respect I deserve, I'm going to, I'm going to blow up and I'm going to be the guy. Here's, what's my team? Here's my team. Here's my teams. I say,

most realistic, Vegas, the team I would like to see the most, Columbus. I just think that that would be, it would be interesting. I think that throws a wrench into all these teams that think they had a chance at him. And meanwhile, Columbus swoops in stealth mode. And also, and I referenced this in the piece and a couple of Columbus fans, I think, took it as if I was taking a shot. And I meant it the other way.

But this is, there's already, like, because there's so much attention on Mitch Marner, like, people are just ready to be mad about wherever he goes. and I feel like Columbus is the one place that everyone would be like, oh, cool. All right. Yeah. You know, hell yeah. Good luck to everybody involved in that.

Sean, what's the real answer? My pick, of course, is the Pittsburgh Penguins. There you go. No, no. No, no. Kyle Dubas and Mitch Marta back together again. Find me a more iconic duo than those two negotiating a contract. Does a joke.

Don't aggregate this. Not happening. No. It's boring, but it's, but it's, Vegas, I just look at the, at the media apparatus that seems like it started to move over the last three days between perangelo, like, Patrangelo and hurdle and whatever. And I just see their prime in the pump to, you know, clear the space that they need to make it happen. Because the, you know, the other important thing, and this is all true, like, you know, we're talking about

the cutthroat rep of the Vegas organization and all the stuff they've done there in the past, from the jump, as we've heard about Marner's preferred destinations, who's always been on the list. It's Vegas since word one. So whether they care about the, whether they care about the front office, you know, brutality or not,

it seems like they made up their mind. So that's a hurdle, I would imagine that they've probably already already been able to jump. So the fact that the fact that Marner seems to want it, I didn't even think of that one. It seems like Mardle won, Martel.

Martel and Harnel. Merdle. James Myrtle. It seems like Marner wants it. It seems like Vegas is pulling the financial strengths necessary to make it to reality. So they're my pick. All right. Very boring.

All right. That's a good 30-minute segment all about Mitch Marner. I hope you all enjoyed it. If you are a fan of any of the teams that we did not mention, talk you tomorrow, I suppose. Segment two is coming up for talking Hall of Fame. with us. All right, we're back. Boys, we have a Hall of Fame class to discuss. This is still relatively fresh. This dropped yesterday afternoon. I don't know why it feels like it was so much longer ago. It's not. The list is as follows. Alexander McGilney, Zedano Chara, Joe Thornton,

Duncan Keith as players on the men's side. Jennifer Botryl and Brianna Decker as players on the women's side, Jack Parker as a builder, Daniel Sovajo also as a builder. Sean, let's start with you because I know this has been one of your main bailiwicks for years. This is Hall of Fame stuff. You're the go-to guy for that. What was your initial thought on the class? I know what mine was. I have a feeling they were pretty similar.

Frustration, anger, ordering on rage. Because as a professional take merchant, this is. This is prime time for me to sit down and talk about what the heck is that dumb committee doing. And they screwed me over because I think they got it exactly right. I think they got this. This is the absolute right class for this year on the men's side where they got the two obvious ones, I would say, first ballot, which is Charon Thornton. Duncan Keith was really close, no issue with him going in. and then McGillney was the big outlier as far as guys who hadn't made it yet.

Now, I'm not saying that those are the only four guys that are Hall of Famers. Kerry Price fans, settle down, keep your powder dry. You're okay. You'll get in next year. But that's the four. If I had to pick four, that would have been it. And so now what am I supposed to do? Say good job.

I don't do that. I got to find something else to complain about. If you weren't such a diehard leaf fan, you would have an angry piece. out today that Kerry Price is not a first ballot Hall of Famer and it's an injustice. And because Henrik Lundquist and Roberto Luongo got in, Kerry Price should have been in as well. And you would be completely outraged. Tell me, I'm wrong. Oh, I've seen it. Trust me, I've got it in my mentions. As soon as I said that this is, they made the right call. There were a lot of Habs fans. And look, Price would have been fifth probably on my list. I think he's getting in.

I think he's getting in next year because the first year class next year. year is basically only one guy for three's Bergeron. So there's lots of room for some cleanup. I think you could make the case price over Keith, maybe. But as far as, you know, first, the whole thing, I mean, remember, first ballot Hall of Fame, or that, that is an honor that we as fans have sort of created. That is not an official NHL. It's not an official Hall of Fame thing.

Um, you know, Kerry Price was good. He was a good candidate. He's a worthy candidate. He's not a slam dunk candidate. He's not a has to be first ballot. And some of this is just based on when your card comes up, you know, is, is, is Kerry Price a better candidate than Roberto Luongo? I personally, I don't think I would say that, but I get that some people would.

It's not now outrageous. A lot of people would. I think a lot of people would. I think a lot of people would say that he's just as deserving as, as, as Henrik Lundkfist. I think it's interesting though that this is the year that. that McGilney gets in. And I don't know if you guys thought this, that it just wasn't going to happen.

It was just one of those things that, like, for whatever reason, it had been so long and all these guys had come up and, you know, Tom Barrasso and you're like, if McGilney's not in by now, and then in a year where they could have made Kerry Price a first ballot Hall of Famer, it's the year that they made McGilney a Hall of Famer. And McGilney should have been in a long time ago. but I find the timing, I guess, interesting when you could have had Kerry Price deserving of this based on the two goaltenders that he played with in his era who also got in. Not to mention, like, I think there's people that that look at the Hall of Fame and say,

was that player the best when he played, right? And two defensemen that played in the same era, In Chara and Keith both get in at the same time, when Carrie Price, you know, for however many years you want to call him, it was largely considered the best goaltender in the league. And you have two defensemen who probably at times split that honor because they overlap so much in their careers. But listen, Kerry Price is a Hall of Famer.

He's going to be a Hall of Famer. It's just the way the timing worked out. It just, it wasn't this year. But I do understand Habs fans' frustration with it. And let me just say real quick. Carrie Price, great guy, great story. had some great playoff runs, had the one legendary year where he won the MVP. One time All-Star, one-time Vezina, no cups, not in the top 20 for wins, for shutouts, for goals saved above percentage, anything like that.

It's the idea that he is a slam dunk, oh my gosh, what an insult that he had to wait one year. Doesn't hold up. Sorry, Habs fans. You'll get in. He'll get in. He's getting in next year. He's getting in next year. I strongly suspect he gets in next year.

Yeah. And then we get to do the fun price and Bergeron habs and. Yeah. You can have a cross-ac-cobec celebration there. Yeah. I was fully ready to table a McGilney discussion. Like, I just wasn't. Especially since there was like, part of it was people are like, well, they're not going to, you know, given everything happening in the world today,

they wouldn't put him in now and they're concerned about he's not going to show up at the ceremony or all this stuff. Like what changed? Wouldn't you love to know? Like, again, this is the problem, one of the problems with the way that they do things, with this mysterious committee and everything. We have no idea what was going on for the last 15 years with Alexander McGill. Maybe he was one vote shy every year. Or maybe he wasn't even discussed because he wasn't one of the nominations. a year after year. Maybe there was, you know, one guy who was pounding the table for,

maybe there was one guy saying, we can never put him in. Who knows? We have no idea. And, you know, you look at the way baseball does it. Baseball has the writers vote on. And I'm not necessarily saying it has to be the writers, but the way you see it evolve year after year. Football, like, kind of does that way where they have the different tiers and the different, like, kind of milestones that you get to, checkpoints. We have no idea if McGilney was getting closer over the years further away. And, you know, we've seen this before. We saw it with Roanick last year.

Roji Vaugham being the classic where it was like 30 years and then suddenly he gets in. We have no idea. And we'll never know because they're all sworn to secrecy because apparently if any of this got out, somebody's feelings might get hurt. That's the most important thing. Yeah, baseball is the most public with how they run the process, right? we have the ballot tracker. Like if you really want to get granular with it,

you can, A. Yeah, you can, you can project, uh, you can look at baseball and say this guy probably is, is two or three years away,

but if you want to stay in it through the process, absolutely, you can, you can pull out and, and kind of see the, just based on math, the way things are going because of the other, the other factor with baseball,

that you have to consider is that people get a vote once they've been covering the league for 10 years. Like the electorate is so much larger. Yeah. so much younger, like, because think about it, if you take a baseball beat when you're 25, you have a, you have a, you have a hall of fan vote by the time you're in, you're in your mid-30s. And that alone helps keep the pool fresh. That's not really in play with hockey.

And that's why I was ready to just like stick McGilney in a drawer and return to him in seven years or eight years once a bunch of, once more people who are in their 30s or 40s right now and are beating the drum for Alex McGillney as a Hall of Famer end up in one way or another on the committee. I thought there was going to need to be more turnover. There's up. 18 people

on the committee. I was going to say guys, but it's men and women. There's 18. That's not you. 18 and they get in a room and discuss this. That's the other thing. You know, with baseball obviously, people are mailing in their ballots. And you see, you know, some people write articles and some people go on

social media and talk through what they're thinking. So you have a sense of where the wind is blowing. But I don't know. Like, you could walk into that committee going, this has got to be the year for Alexander McGilney. And then maybe Brian Burke gets up and really gives a pay. And I'm just picking a guy that I think would be tough to argue with, right? I have no idea what none of us will ever know if he was pro-McGilney or against. But maybe he gives a whole speech about, you know, one time when I was the GM of the Hartford Whalers, here's what happened with McGilney. And I'll never vote for him and blah. Blaine, you're sitting there going, yikes, okay, I guess I'm not voting for this guy.

And then, you know, that's it. And we would never know it. We never have any way to find out. Versus 400 ballots cast in the Baseball Hall of Fame last year that were all done via mail. Like, those are just fundamentally different processes. Based on what we see with the NHL awards and some of the weird voting that happens, I'm actually okay with it, not being the writers that do this. Yeah, it's not like baseball gets it right.

every time. I think I've had some people. We do have to point out, the people that vote on this, they are like hockey lifers. Like people that have seen so many different eras and so in tune with the game. So I'm okay with it being their decision. And I'm happy McGilney got in. I think the next guy personally that I'm going to be like banging the drum for

is Henrik Zetterberg to be a Hall of Famer. Really? I get people got mad at me a couple years ago. I think I'm like, Henrik Zetterberg deserves to be a Hall of Famer. I totally agree. Okay. Let's go like team stuff. Like Stanley Cup champion, Olympic gold medalist,

won a Kahn Smyth, you know, almost a thousand points, over a thousand games. I think it's hockey Hall of Fame, not necessarily hockey Hall of, I had 120 points in a season a couple times, right? Like I think he exemplifies a lot of things like when a King Clancy, great leadership.

He deserves to be there. And I think, I think his name should get called sooner rather than later. I don't know. I just, I think, I think you're actually on the committee. I can't wait to your actually on the committee in 20 years as a, as a renowned T.S. Long time TSN guy. Well, we're both there. I'm going to be arguing with you about Hendricks Zetterberg.

Didn't get a thousand points. Never, never was a heart candidate. How about this? All-Star. 120 points and 137 playoff games. that's that's good it's not it's not in that era is better oh god we're not we're not doing this wait a second we're not having a henry zetterberg argument in mitch martyr and i think mitch marner's got more points per game that's the edherberg what are we doing that's the next guy i'm banging the

drum for it that's all i'm saying ready for it that's all i'm saying a good and by the way buddy i yeah i know you don't you probably don't even realize this and you maybe you don't see the connection have fun dealing with the patrick elliash people now now now that you gone on record saying Zetterberg's your guy. Have fun with that. Eliash is out. Zetterberg is in. Settle. Yikes. We're done.

Yeah. Keith Kachuk still has to get in. Keith Kachuk is the guy that I think is next on the the ones that have been waiting and hanging around. He's benefiting from what Matthew's doing year in year and year out on on TV, undoubtedly. I think Hall of Fame. Hall of Fame. He's a he's famous.

He had an unbelievable career. He scored a bunch of goals and like international success as well. Keith Kachuk is a Hall of Famer. And he should be soon. I just this is the thing. There's only so many guys that can get in every year. So new guys come up and, you know, guys get pushed to the back. And some guys just get pushed to the back.

And again, that's like, and we don't know. Like a guy that I bang the drum for is Curtis Joseph. I think Curtis Joseph at the time he was playing. was every bit of Hall of Famer, he's got some of the career numbers. You know, the case, the statistical case is good, but not unassailable. But, and we have no idea. Curtis Joseph might have been one vote short for the last 10 years. He might not even be on their minds.

He might not even be on the list. I'm worried. I'm worried they're going to say we led in the older goalies already. We let in Barrasso, we let Mike Vernon in. Once you let Mike Vernon in, that was, because that was my other stick with the Hall of Fame, was that I used to be able to talk about how weird they are with goalies and how the bar was way too high and then they let Embaraso and Vernon and now I don't even know what to Too many good decisions on that end of things.

Yeah. One other, the bold, we'll line with this one other good decision that they made yesterday. There's, they're still not out of the woods when it comes having a ridiculous log, and they still have one, but they need to keep working and clear it out.

Huge log jam on, on the women's side of things. For whatever reason, Jennifer Botryl had, Benin, which is ridiculous. So they righted that wrong. They put in Sovajo, who 100% deserved to go in as a builder. By the way, she'd have the PWHL draft last night.

She did a great job there. So big, big night for Daniel Silva show. But they needed to start clearing out that log jam because there's a problem coming down the pike where, you know, because if Jennifer, if Batchel doesn't get in, like, a whole bunch of other people get that had so many of us banging our heads on the wall was they they gave themselves two slots for the for the women to use every year now we can argue whether that's the right amount whether it should be the same as the four for the men or or what have you but two is the rule and then they weren't using it year after year

after year they would put one woman in and they never put they never put one man in or two men in. They always used all, you know, a couple of years they, they would do three, but it was almost always four men. Two years in a row now, they, they, they used both the slots on, on worthy candidates on the women's side. And that's, that's, that's the most they can do. So, like, once again, like, they got it right. I can't, I can't, I can't complain. I think they, they, they, there's, there's, you know, on the men's side, there's always going to be people where we point, go, oh, that guy's not really a hall of famer. Like, that's not going to happen on the women's side for a long time. But use two.

That'll be. Both the spots and they have two years running. That'll be the sign that the women's game is truly gained equal. When they have in the world of hockey, whenever they have their own female geek or whoever else that people give the. Bird a debt for Durko needs to come on in. And really that's when we'll know that we've got it done. Oh, bird is that for Durko?

I'm not going to be able to forget that one. All right. that does it for segment two, I suppose. Frankie, you're back on the board. You're headlining TSN's coverage of Free Agent Frenzy. That starts at 11 a.m. on July 1. We're not going to talk to Intel then. What's the plan? Do you have another practice session coming up here or what? Yeah, we got a little practice session with the board. We got some new additions, maybe some rosters that we can prop up on the board, which is exciting. The other thing I'm doing is that goofy real estate segment. I'm doing it two more times between now and Free Agent Frenzy. and I'm doing it from Marchand and Brock Besser.

Okay, did they give you props? Like, how does this work? Like, are their special graphics? Yeah, they, how do they sell the real estate? They built a for sale sign. I sent it in our group chat. They built a four sale sign. They put it on the set.

And then they made like all these graphics of like North America and all these homes. And it's like me standing there in a three piece suit acting like a real estate agent. And they like, I'll send. the pictures. Maybe JD can pop them up, but it's like, Oh my God. I'm looking out of my home. Your expert guide for the perfect summer move. And there's me looking like I'm on a park bench or a bus stop bench. Yeah, that's a bus ad. Can we get the bus? A bus is it wrapped on a bus. That's literally a bus ad, but I'll tell you what, if I was a real estate agent, I would never put my face on a bus stop bench because I don't want people farting on my face. Just get the classic, get the classic mustache, devil horns, graffiti, graffiti work. The bus and it gets back.

over Mitch Marner as soon as he leaves Toronto is going to have Frankie's based. Little real estate work with some hockey mixed in the next couple days. Frankie, I'll tell you what, man, you got a busy day. So get a good night's sleep the night before, but not too good. Just don't over sleep by 27 minutes. That's what you're saying. Trust me. Maybe two alarms on July.

That doesn't exist in my world. I don't even need to set an alarm at this point. Got two. I was going to say you do. You've got two alarms ready to go. Two very cute alarm clocks. All right, boy, see you. All right, bud.

Good luck. We'll talk to you soon. All right, there goes real estate agent. Extraordinary, Frankie Carrado. I'll have to sign some closing papers to real estate agent things. That's not kind of the only thing I could thought of. Signed closing papers. Talk about escrow inspections.

What have you? Uh-oh. Don't say escrow around. Ooh. Their face is immediately turned purple. It's right. It's time for what we've learned. I'll go first.

What have we learned, Sean? I learned watching the PWHL draft that it is indeed possible to create a bunch of problems for yourself and then solve them. That's always saw it from the New York Sirens. GM Pascal Dao had the first pick in the draft, also coming off of like many other PWHL GMs, coming off kind of a disastrous run in the expansion.

in the expansion draft. The rules in that one so heavily favored Vancouver and Seattle, who are the new franchises. The league really going out of their way to make sure that those teams ended up with some

legit high-end players. Daoo paid the price pretty dramatically. He was under a microscope at the start of all this, not just because he had the first pick in the draft. It was, second year in a row that's happened. Definitely seemed like a franchise

that needed to get its act together and he pulled it off. makes the first overall pick trades you know one of his one of his defenders to uh Toronto trades Ella Shelton to Toronto for the third overall pick picks Casey O'Brien who won the Patty Kaz last year so he walks out of there with two premium forwards just generally sets himself up well moving forward and there was like legitimate question over whether he was going to be able to pull it off so I think there is a lesson to be learned there that if you're the general manager of a professional hockey team if you're proactive and you know set a plan and actually hold

yourself to it and follow through that it'll that it'll work out and i think pascaldow gave us a little example of that last night so if you're the gym of a professional hockey team in new york that has the first overall pick in the draft that's right you can figure out a way to get really aggressive and make things happen interesting yeah especially when especially whenever your your overall situation doesn't look so great if you maybe don't have a ton of caps base but your team's not looking so good. There's ways out. And I think the PWHL taught us that last night.

Yep, for sure. I learned something, and I'm still sort of processing this, and this is upsetting. So I'll warn people in advance. But I think some of the members of the Florida Panthers might be consuming alcohol. I think since they won the Stanley Cup,

I think a few of these guys might have got a little wobbly, both, you know, in their celebrations. I would have thought it would have been high fives and orange slices, but apparently, apparently it might be more than that. And it is, take a break at some point.

There might have been orange slices or something similar. I don't, I don't think there have been too many breaks taken. I don't, and as per tradition, whenever anything like this happens, and we have all these players showing personality, there's only two lanes.

And you've got to pick one lane. You're either mad that they're being disrespectful, they're being, you know, they're not showing the level of sportsmanship that we expect. You got to be mad. Or it's the funniest thing that has ever happened in history. It is the absolute greatest comedy act. Har, har, har, har. Ever seen since the days of Carlin and Pryor, this is as good as it's ever been. You got to pick one.

One or the other. Let me know, but it can only be one of those two things. And if you're the fan of another team, you actually have to think it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, that's the other side of the argument.

That's like, that's like, where I, that's like where I stop. The point of all this for the Florida Panthers, and the reason it works and the reason it's compelling is because they're openly leaning into the, I don't even want to say villain, but like, they're, they're playing, they're playing, they're playing, they're playing the heels, the heel.

And if other fan bases hate them because of it, of this, of this, of this, Great. That's the point. The Edmonton Oilers and whoever don't have to find this to be particularly funny. Listen, they're a lot of say this sucks, even even though it kind of doesn't. We're hockey fans. We hate success anyways. We're going to find something to complain about. So I'll tell you, man, this in this league, you have 32 teams that are going on and on and on always about, oh, we're going to have an identity. We're going to have an identity. And it's like, let me guess, is your identity going to be. tough defensive team that's hard to play against.

Like, what a great idea. The Florida Panthers say what you will. They have an identity. They know their identity. They are leaning into it hard. And it's completely unacceptable and or the funniest thing I've ever seen in my entire life. I haven't decided yet.

One of the two. Depends. It all depends if Brian Marchant's size in Toronto or not. So I'll let you know next week whether this is all the bit or not. Let bygones be bygones. Do you guys do whatever you want? Burn the elbow room down for all I care. Who cares?

Yep. All right, bud, that's it. Do you have anything in particular coming? I know the Marner thing dropped this morning. Yeah, that's the big one. Go check that out. And other than that, yeah, more on the way, but who knows? I know I say it every week, but red light's really good.

It is. It is fun. Yeah. Myrtle's got the next. I like the Myrtle days more than the Maccadoo days. Okay, well, he's got the next two, so you're all set, and then you can sort of, I'll have the, I'll be back a week from today. Maybe there'll be some news. Who knows?

Maybe. Well, that's the good part about the rest. That's a good part. Well, for us, it's the good part about the next five, whatever, four days. Until the first round, just let the draft guys take over. let the prospects boys handle business. I don't know. Has Promin put out his spoiler yet of how the entire first round is going to go?

That's usually on draft day, I think. We had a great. We had a great Pranman moment in the intro to one of his pieces last week. And I'm going to pull this up because I sent it to Max Boulman, just because I loved it so much. Corey opened his full seven-round mock, which I think it was last week. It's psycho behavior right there.

Do you know what his first sentence was? Do you know what his lead was or how it started? It made me laugh out loud. Because you can just hear it in Corey's voice. Today I attempt the nonsensical. Yep, that's about it. We love it, man. Prodman season, Bolton season, Scott Wheeler season,

Chris Peter's season, this is their time to shine. Drafts dominate in the rest of the week for sure. So it means those guys are back. They're potting tomorrow, which is Thursday. They're potting Friday. They're potting Saturday. Carrying the team on their backs. And I love them for it.

The three of us will be back. We're doing one more show post-draft. July 2nd. Sift through the wreckage, talk about Frankie's big day, touching TV screens in a three-piece suit or whatever the plan is there. And get ready for it because we almost are. Enjoy the rest of your week.