The Athletic Hockey Show - NHLPA heads to Columbus to investigate Babcock story, Adam Lowry named Jets captain, playoff odds for the Tampa Bay Lightning

Episode Date: September 14, 2023

Ian Mendes and Sean McIndoe return to discuss the latest in the Mike Babcock situation, as the NHL and NHLPA heads to Columbus to investigate. Also, the Jets name Adam Lowry captain, and they discuss the remaining teams in the league to have open captaincy positions. Then, in "Granger Things", Jesse Granger brings some playoff odds and questions about Tampa Bay's potential shot at the postseason this year. To wrap up, the origin of "Down Goes Brown" is revealed in the mailbag, and to wrap up, a look back with "This Week in Hockey History".Have a question for the show? Email [e-mail] or leave a VM: [phone]!SUBSCRIBE TO THE ATHLETIC NHL'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL AT youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowGet a new subscription to the Athletic for $/1 per month for 12 months when you visit theathletic.com/hockeyshowRight now, Nuts.com is offering new customers a free gift with purchase and free shipping on orders of $29 or more at nuts.com/hockey23. So, go check out all of the delicious options at nuts.com/hockey23. You’ll receive a free gift and free shipping when you spend $29 or more! That’s nuts.com/hockey23 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Make sure to stick around to the end of this episode to hear a segment from the Athletic Women's Basketball Show, a new podcast diving into everything women's hoops. Hosted by me, Zina Keda. I'll be joined by our national writers, Ben Pickman and Sabrina Merchant as we dive into the WMBA, college hoops, and even a little international game. This is The Athletic Hockey Show. Here we go. We are back. It is Bittawha. It's the Thursday edition of The Athletic Hockey Show. It's Ian Mendes Sean McIndoo.

with you. I feel like we haven't done a show together in a month, five weeks, six weeks. I feel like it's more than that. I don't know. Like, are we allowed to say that I think the last show we did? Oh yeah. Came out like a month ago, but we recorded that one. Yeah. Well in advance. Yeah. So let's, let's get caught up. Trade deadline. What did you think? Yeah. Let's get caught. Tell me about your in fact, don't even tell me about your summer. Just open up your phone and share some pictures with me. Tell me what you did this summer. Yeah. What's your family right?

Show me pictures of your kids. Random selection. It'd just be me scrolling through like nine out of nine immaculate grids that I screen capped. I got a picture of the family in here somewhere. Yeah. Oh boy. Low unique discourse. Yeah.

Here we go. So who had the over under on Mike Babcock controversy. Who had minus four. four weeks because I think that's, yeah, that's what we're, that's what we're at. It's got ugly this week. You know, and I should point out that, and we're recording this on Thursday morning, but I do see that the NHLPA has sent their executive director, Marty Walsh, and Ron Hainsey,

who is very high ranking with the PA. They're actually on the ground in Columbus to conduct interviews. And I guess an investigation into what happened, which to me, that's interesting. Like, I correct me if I'm wrong here. When is the last time you heard of like the NHLPA like with an actual boots on the ground investigation? It feels like it feels like to me like this seems like a significant turn of events that you would actually have the director of the NHLPA and Ron Hanzi come in, right? Like, feels like it. I honestly can't remember something like this where we heard about it, right?

Because that's the key. It's, you never know when some of these things are happening in the background. And obviously, there's new leadership at the NHLPA. I think they want to, they want to look proactive here. But I, my read on that is you had the original story break on the Spit and Chicklets podcast. Paul Bissonette comes out and in his very unique. way breaks this story, or at least these allegations. The Blue Jackets put out the statement

denying it. Boone Jenner is part of that. Johnny Girdreau, I think, has since come out and also said, hey, you know, same thing happened to me. It didn't bother me. My read on this is this is the NHLPA wants to get in there and face-to-face talk to people and just make sure, you know, it's one thing to put out the statement that's co-signed by the team and everything. And I saw a lot of people when that statement came out going, well, you know, Boone Jenner is the one guy we trust here because he's got no reason to to mislead, except that he kind of does because he's the captain of the team. And when it's their PR guys and everyone's around you saying like, hey, you know, we'd really like your name on this statement saying everything's okay. Yeah, maybe you get pushed into saying that. I just get the feeling Marty Walsh and whoever else wanted to sit down, Boon Jets.

or Johnny Gras, whoever it is, and just go like, hey, you know, blink twice if there's a problem here that we need to know about. And if not, then that's fine. We'll, you know, we'll let it go. Because this does seem to be, it's a weird story, right? Because it feels like 90% of the details are agreed on. But that little 10% of ambiguity seems to make all the difference between, hey, this is an enormous violation of privacy by a guy versus this is a total non-story that nobody should even be talking about, let alone being mad about. But that, you know, it's interesting you bring up 10% kind of ambiguity. Mike Babcock really has zero percent to work with here, though, right?

Like, can we agree on that? Given where he's been, given some of the stories, it's not like he's got 5%, 10% leeway. No benefit of the doubt. No benefit of the doubt. And he's earned it. That's a lifetime achievement award because clearly there are a lot of people in the hockey world that are waiting for Mike Babcock to fail. He's made a lot of enemies. And I've personally, I've never met the guy.

I've never dealt with him. But I've heard stories. And I've heard a lot. You know, I think from what I've heard, it's a reputation well earned. And then it's a little bit of chickens coming home to roost here. You treat people a certain way for a long enough amount of time. And sometimes the people you step on on the way up are waiting for you on the way down too. And maybe that's a little bit of what's happening here.

And maybe it's not fair. I mean, it is, especially in this case, when you see that this is something that he apparently did in Detroit, did in Toronto. It's not something new. There is a party that goes, man, people are just looking for something to knife this guy with. But this is the result when people see you behave in a certain way and treat people a certain way for a long enough time, that benefit of the doubt's gone. And as Eli Freedon said, you know, he had the piece where he said, the standard is going to be perfection. Mike Babcock just can't slip up at all. Yeah, and a lot of people would say, good.

So we're, okay. So is this a weird story because it's Babcock or is it a weird story because that coach, like pick another coach without Luke Richardson in Chicago, a Greg Cronin in Anaheim, you know, pick your coach, Derek Lalant in Detroit. If you found out that in some meetings with players, they're like, hey, I'd like you to show your pictures of your family. Are we like, oh, that's weird? Or is this just because it's weird because it's Babcock?

It's, I mean, we wouldn't even know about it if it was those other situations, I don't think. I mean, clearly this is, there's people have an eye on Mike Babcock and, you know, Paul Biss and that, I think it's fair to say, not a fan, probably other people that he's close to, not big fans. And there's this kind of whisper network that springs into action. And look, again, with Babcock, he did this in Toronto. He did it in Detroit. So two or three years ago, when we were having the big discussion about what a jerk

Mike Babcock was, we didn't even hear these stories then. So it kind of does make you wonder, like, I mean, how bad could it have been? As far as, you know, if it was some other coach, the detail to me is it really comes down to whose hand was the phone in. Right? I think there is a world of difference between your boss coming to you and saying, hey, do you have some pictures on your phone that you can share with the group? Why don't you call up those pictures and then, you know, when you're ready, hit the button

and we'll project it up on the screen. And you can show us, picture of your family, show us a picture of something that's important to you and, you know, we'll kind of bond over that versus your boss saying, let me see your phone or you know open up your photos and i'm going to go through your photos with your phone in my hand um which would be very very different and that's that's what what it sounded like when bisonette first described it right i mean that is i think what we all sort of got this idea that he was going to you know calling guys into his office and saying i want to see your phone and i'm going to start going through your phone and you know you know bisonette put

put it, what was it, like, I want to see what kind of man you are or something like that to see what kind of. Yeah. And we all saw that. We went, holy smokes, you can't do that. That's insane. But Babcock, at least in his, yeah, I don't even think it was a statement. I think this was, you know, he said this to the Portsline afterwards.

He said, you know, the phone was always in their hand. They had, you know, this wasn't a violation of privacy or anything like that. This was, this was just, hey, find a photo that you feel comfortable. and put it up on the screen, which again, like, you know, there's still some pressure there. You know, some people maybe don't feel comfortable with it. But if that's the version, I don't, you know, I struggle a little bit here to see where the big violation is, whereas obviously as as soon as it's like, hey, let me see your phone. Yep.

That's a total, that's a total non-starter. Yeah, it's weird, right? Because I think you go back 25, 30 years and if a coach said, hey, do you have a picture of your family guy would put his pull his wallet out. Yeah. Produced maybe a little, you know, tiny wallet size portrait from. Sure. I guess NHLs weren't going to Sears for their portraits.

Some of them might have been. But, yeah. Yes. Yeah. But, you know, you would produce that and it's fine. But there is, there's, like, you've got to be mindful that there's a power dynamic here, right? Like there's a head, the head coach, the boss is kind of asking you.

And, you know, and when somebody asks you something and then there's a power dynamic, you almost feel like they're telling you. They're not asking you. They're telling you. And it's a new boss and it's a rebuilding team. So there is some of that. Yeah, absolutely. But I don't think it's weird to ask about your family. I don't think that's weird because you're trying to get to know. Look, I do a lot. I'm a coach and I also teach journalism students. And I do a lot of one-on-one interviews. And one of the things I do with them is, and I had a couple of interviews yesterday with my journalism students, is, hey, I want to know your motivation for, like, why did you take this class? Tell me a little bit about your story. Like, where are you from?

I would never in a million years say either privately in a one-on-one meeting with a student or within the group of 20 students say, okay, show me a picture on your phone of your family. Because I think that that would be going one step too far. you know, and these are, I'm teaching adults too. They're, they're in their 20s, most of them, early 20s, 20. I feel like that would be a gross violation from me. I feel like it would be weird to ask to see a phone. And I guess the counter that, like the old-timey sports counter to that would be okay, but you're not going into battle with these guys for eight months.

No. You don't have that dynamic of a sports team where it's like, hey, look, I mean, we can do the X's and O's and everything, but. we've got to get this relationship to another level where we, you know, and Babcock has said, like, I'm showing them photos of my family and that, you know, that sort of thing. And, and, you know, if anything, you know, Babcock probably at some place in his brain is going like, wait, I thought I was, I thought this is what I was supposed to do. We're all touch you feeling out, right? We got to, like, it's not just about win the game. We got to care about the person. So I'm

trying to care about the person. And, you know, if anything, you're right, you said power dynamic. And certainly there is. When you're talking about a coach and players, there is that power dynamic. But I will tell you, the power dynamic in Columbus is not the same as it is in other places. Because if Mike Babcock didn't know going into this how much scrutiny he was going to be under, he knows now. And if he's sitting there thinking, boy, I'm going to go in there with my resume and my gold medals and all this stuff. and I'm going to intimidate this group and I'm going to make sure they know it's my way

or the highway. Guess what? It's, they've got, I don't know if somebody there already has it out for him or if this was just kind of a case of, you know, sometimes the stories get passed along and they get ramped up a little bit. But it's very clear here that if at any point that room decides we've had enough of Mike Babcock, I don't think Mike Babcock has got enough power.

to rule over that group with an iron fist because they know that there's there's so many people out there with the knives unsheaved ready to get this guy that if he steps out of line or even steps close enough to the line that somebody wants to you know wants to to push him out hey you know what this is this is what you signed out and again with a lot of people i'd be saying this sympathetically i'm not with mike babcock he's he's earned this for better for worse, you hear enough about the guy. Hey man, this is the bed you made. There's a lot of people who don't like you. And this is, this, this was maybe ends up being the warning shot to kind of tell you what it's, what it's going to be like in Columbus or anywhere else that you try to come back.

Has a coach ever been before he was behind the bench for a single game, been on a hot seat like this. Like, like, I almost feel like the temperature is going to be up pretty high. Like, correct. Okay, this is just my thought on this. I think DJ Smith is on the hottest seat of any coach in the NHL, given the fact that they've missed the playoffs so many years, they've kind of gone all in. They've got a new owner waiting in the wings. I feel like he's got a win right away. And I would argue, I'm not sure that there's another coach on a hotter seat from that perspective. I think Don Granato's got a little bit of slack. I think, you know, pick whoever else you think might be.

Derek Lal is pretty new on the job. Like any of these teams that have been out of the playoffs four or five years, I think their coaches are okay. DJ Smith's on the hot seat. And he knows it. Is Mike Babcock on the second hottest seat in the NHL? Without having coached the game in Columbus. Like, like, like, it might be.

Yeah. I don't know. Who else is even on a hot, like, who else's seat is even tepid? Torts in Philly? I don't think torts necessarily. I mean, Sheldon Key should have been until we got that incomprehensible extension that they put out there. I'm trying to think of. Jake Woodcroft in Edmonton?

Yeah, I mean, that one feels like more of a playoff thing, which, you know, buys you potentially some time. Rick Bonus in Winnipeg? Like, I don't know who's on. Winnipeg, yeah, maybe. But that's Lane Lambert, maybe, maybe. You got new coaches everywhere else that you would really. Yeah, Lane Lambert, but again, he's been on the job for a year, but it's Lou. Yeah, Barube maybe in St. Louis.

Baroube, I think would be in that list. My point is, I think you could put Babcock on the list of guys that's on a hot seat already. Yeah, and the thing with him is it's not even, you know, you talk about DJ Smith. The senators get out to a seven and one start. It's all good with DJ Smith. He's all set. And with Babcock, who even knows what it's going to be? And I'm sure it's an eye-opener for him and for the Columbus organization.

I know they look, I mean, we know where we hired him. He's an accomplished guy. He comes in, you know, it's a young team. It's an organization that's never won anything. And here comes this guy. He's got the cup ring. He's got the gold medals. you know, if you put yourself in that 200 hockey men mindset,

you can convince yourself like, this guy's a winner. He's going to come in here. And I'm sure there's no question. When they're sitting around with their coach vacancy and somebody says, you know, what about Babcock? Obviously somebody puts their hand up and says, man, we're going to take some heat for this. We're going to, there's going to be some bad PR. But you think we can weather that.

And maybe we can weather it better than other markets could. because we're Columbus, right? We're a smaller market. Yep. You know, our fans will be upset, but then we're going to move on to college football and everything. And, you know, it'll blow over. And as long as we win, we get out to a good start, we're okay. And this is, I think, making it clear that that may not happen.

And maybe not. Who knows? Maybe this is a case where the critics have overshot the runway a little bit, and they've gone too hard on something that's not really a story. And, you know, in a way, it kind of, undermines the future concerns or whatever. I don't know. You never know how it's going to turn out.

But boy, it's already off to a rough start. And again, that's even assuming that the NHLPA guys don't find something or, you know, they pull aside Boone Jenner. And he goes, no, you know what? Actually, it did make me uncomfortable. But what could I say? Well, when the PR guys are telling me, I got to put out a statement to support the coach, you know, I did what I had to do. But I didn't really like it. gets, you know, you got a new PA director is looking to make it clear whose side he's on with his players.

It could still go in a lot of different ways. Yeah, going to be interested to watch. What you sign off for when you hire a guy like Mike Babcock who has this reputation and really, what has he done in the last two or three or four years to get himself ready for this opportunity and to change? Is there anything he could have done? does it even matter? I don't know. Yeah.

Again, we'll have to wait and see how this all plays out. But like you said, it feels like there's zero margin for error on Mike Babcock. I want to ask you about the Winnipeg Jets named their captain, new captain this year. And if you want to talk about a team that I think has been kind of low-key dysfunctional, maybe not even low-key, maybe just straight-up dysfunctional. Certainly there's something, there's some degree of turmoil in Winnipegian.

And, you know, they watched the captaincy get stripped away already from, you know, Blake Wheeler, right? And he's no longer in the equation. Shifley and Hellebuck, we don't know what's going on there. And they could have gone, I think they could have gone with Kyle Connor as their new captain. They could have gone with Josh Morrissey as their new captain. And they didn't.

They went with Adam Lowry, who is, you know, kind of your prototypical middle six, third line sort of, you know, kind of guy, classic, a grinder type. I don't think he's ever scored more than 14 or 15 goals. But he's the captain. And I'm wondering, like, is there a message there from the leadership team about the style we want, the sort of way we want to go? And how do you feel about that type of player being the captain? He's got three more years left on his deal. So it's not like he's going anywhere or anything like that.

But, you know, just generally speaking, when you go with that. used to happen more often, doesn't it? Like, not the Mike Keene type of guy. Yeah, like there used to, it used to be not uncommon that, you know, you'd have that third line grinder, the second pair, you know, Rob Ramage type defenseman would be your captain. And it, it seems like over the years it's sort of drifted more and more towards, no, like the captain's got to be, if not the star player, he's got to be a star. He's got to be, you know, somebody who's a key contributor.

And, you know, we've seen a few examples. I mean, Dustin Brown you could point to in L.A. is maybe the most success. Maybe some Kings fans would say, no, Dustin Brown's a better player than that. But, you know, was certainly not star power wise at the top of the list on those Kings team. But, you know, can be that guy to hold it together. Obviously, we never know what's happening behind the scenes. You know, we never know what the scenarios are.

But as far as the message, yeah, maybe it's a little bit of identity. Maybe it's a little bit of going to the Kyle Connors and Josh Morrissey's and wherever else and saying, like, not yet. Like you haven't, nothing is going to be given. You, it has to be earned and you're not there yet. You know, obviously the situation in Winnipeg with, we're expecting all of these changes and then we didn't really see that. And, you know, it's an interesting choice.

It wouldn't have shocked me if they'd even left it, left it empty for another year. It almost feels like this is kind of a transition. captaincy, which we have seen before with guys like this. Like who was it in, who had it in Washington before Ovechkin? Was it like Matt Hendricks or somebody? Wasn't it Clark? Yes. There you go.

Yeah. Chris, no, why am I blanket? Chris Clark? Not Chris Clark. Who was Clark? It was Clark. See, I was Chris Clark. See, I was Chris Clark.

I was right. I was checking, guessing myself. I'm like, wait a minute. Why do I feel like his first name wasn't Chris and all these people are going to be all over me? I was Chris. No, we all, it was Chris Clark. Don't, yeah, never end up. The most famous Clark if you ever play hockey. All right.

That's enough of that. That's enough of you. You're all set. But yeah, where it's that kind of like, hey, or we're going to do this. And then when you're ready, we turn it over to the next guy. I don't know if there is a next guy in Winnipeg the way they're going. But they've, it didn't shock me. But it was interesting because this isn't something we see as much these days.

Real quick, before we get to our pal, Jesse Granger, without looking, So this week, Quinn Hughes in Vancouver and Adam Lowry in Winnipeg are captains. How many teams right now don't have a captain or have it technically vacant? There were a lot in the summer. There was like, I thought, like, eight or ten. So I'm going to say, are there still a half dozen that don't have someone? There's still eight. Wow.

Okay. So the following teams don't have a captain. St. Louis, Seattle, Philadelphia. that's three Chicago Calgary Boston Arizona

and Anaheim there go so an interesting mix of you know a few rebuilding teams in there that maybe just don't have

everyone yet a few teams that have recently parted ways with the captain and and then that fun situation

in Calgary where we're just kind of you know you talk about Winnipeg oh yeah they're going to blow it up and then nothing really happened and sort of similar in Calgary. Yeah.

So far. So far. And if you're Boston, do you go Brad Marchand as your captain? Or do you go, you go a different direction? Like a younger, like a Charlie McAvoy, I think would be. McAvoy would be the guy. And McAvoy is locked up long term. Marchand, who knows what the future holds.

Somebody had a great question in one of my mailbags where they said, If Marchand's the guy, is he the most hated captain in NHL history in terms of every other fan base? They love them in Boston, obviously. But like, guys that are captains of a team where like every other fan base is like, I can't stand that guy. And I think the only one I came up with that maybe was better was Dale Hunter when he was captain in Washington. Speaking of Washington, because they gave him the captaincy after the Pierre Turgeon thing. So he was a villain around the league then. But Marchand would be fun.

I might just leave it empty if I'm the Bruins. Now, obviously, if it's going to be Marchand, he's kind of his career is running at a time too, so maybe you want to go quicker. But it's almost one of those, like, who can replace Patrice Bergeron? Like maybe we just, like, let it sit for a year out of respect. That's one way to approach it. There you go.

We've helped you out with Washington Capitals Captain Trivia today. Dale Hunter. There you are. Chris Clark. Chris Clark. Everybody knows Chris Clark. All right. Time to bring in our pal Jesse Granger for the old segment we called Granger Things.

Brought you by BetMGM, which is the exclusive betting partner with us at the athletic. And pulling the curtain back here for the listeners, because this is an audio podcast. Sean and I were quite shocked to see what we called the playoff beard of Jesse Granger in full form here in mid-September. He's got a full beard and he's taking it into the regular season. Yep, yep, decided not to trim it down. I guess when you cover the team that wins the playoffs, you have to keep the beard going into the next season, I guess is the new thing I'm starting.

They all shaved theirs off. I saw a couple of the players with their beards caught, and it was like, oh, my guy, I almost didn't even recognize them. But maybe they'll be saying the opposite about me. But it was awkward for Peter Bogg, who still haven't, he hasn't shaved yet. So, you know. Yeah.

Poor guy. He looks like Tom Hanks from Castaway at this point. Well, I thought you were going to say Tom Hanks from Big. I was like, wow, that's really going after him. Yeah. So listen, great to have you back in the saddle. And look, I think this is the time of year we get into mid-September where I know Dom has done this. And we start to sort of look at over under for teams and points and lines and stuff like this.

And we love to have this debate. Who's making the playoffs? Who's not making the playoffs? And a team that has been a basically a lot to make the playoffs in the Eastern Conference last handful of years, the Tampa Bay Lightning. I think this is really curious. I think Sean and I are very curious to know. Tampa Bay Lightning, when we talk about Stanley Cup playoff odds, not winning the Cup,

just getting to the playoffs. What are we talking about here with Tampa? Yeah, I was looking through all the teams lines to make the playoffs. to not make the playoffs, you can obviously bet either way. And the one that stood out by far, I don't think there's anything on the board that's anywhere near as shocking, interesting, whatever you want to call it, of the lightning.

They're minus 190 to make the playoffs. So about a two to one or a one to two bet, you'd have to bet $20 to win $10 for them to make the playoffs, which might sound reasonable until, like you look at some of the other teams, let's just grab one, for example, the Toronto Maple Leafs. I would say the Toronto Maple Leafs to me are about the same odds to make the playoffs as the Lightning. The Maple Leafs are minus 700. The New York Rangers, who I would guess are less likely to make the playoffs than the Lightning, are minus 600.

Most of these favorites to make the playoffs, these big favorites that are expected to be contenders are minus 800, minus 700, minus 600. And then suddenly you have the Lightning at minus 190. They're about the same odds as the Seattle Cracken to make. the playoffs this year, which seems insane to me considering the Cracken. Yes, they were good last year, but they were a one-year wonder that came out of nowhere. Nobody expected it. I don't think anybody would be surprised if the Cracken kind of fell back to Earth and didn't make the playoffs this year. I think they're kind of on that bubble. They could, they could miss. So for me, to consider the Lightning in that category, the bubble teams, rather than one of the contenders that's a lock to make

it. Maybe I, I know they've lost some pieces each year. The cap is just chiseling away at that team, and they aren't the same team that won the back-to-back cups. But maybe I need to reevaluate where I think the lightning are in terms of contenders based on that line, unless that line is just way off. What do you guys think? Boy, that's an interesting one, right? Because you're right, you can't make money betting on favorites to make the playoffs typically. And they just set those lines so high. It's clear that like when you see like a minus 700, like that's just the book saying stay away.

We're not interested in. We don't want to take your money. It's not, you know, you would have to bet, you know, if people don't follow. Like if it's minus 700, am I right? That means you have to bet $700 to win $100. Yes. So in other words, you're getting, for every seven bucks you put down, you're getting that plus your dollar back. You're not making, you know, it's a very, and, and, you know, that makes sense, obviously, but, because otherwise, it'd be easy to make money at this and it's clearly not.

The lightning, boy, I don't know that I would put the lightning up right with those favorites, those that feel like a sure thing. I think there are enough warning lights blinking on the dashboard, including the fact that it's a division that should tighten up. And I can see a path to the lightning not making the playoffs. But Seattle, putting them next. The penguins, another team. Another team is the penguins are minus 200. So according to the odds right now,

the penguins are more likely to make the playoffs than the lightning. That seems crazy to me. That, yeah, that is, to me, that's getting out ahead of it. Because the penguins might be the team that would take that spot from the lightning. Right. The flames are minus 180. The flames are minus 180. It didn't make the playoffs last year.

I thought I was down on the lightning. I honestly thought I was a little bit. But obviously the books are way out ahead of me because that's, I can't get, I can't get there. They're begging you to bet. Remember, I don't know how much of it. Like Tampa sputtered down the stretch. I think they won four of their last 12. And if they didn't have enough padding there, look, they didn't have 100 points last year.

Like, Tampa Bay didn't have that sort of season that we expected them 110, 112. Then they get bounced in the first round of the playoffs, right? And if they weren't the team that prior to that had gone to three straight cup finals, maybe we would be questioning them. But at some point, it's going to happen, right? The decline will start. And if they were at, what do they finish with, 98, 99 points? last year.

If they finish with five or six fewer points this year, suddenly they are a playoff bubble team, right? Maybe they are. And we've seen it with teams in the past, right? Where these veteran teams that win a lot and you kind of, you're conditioned as a sports fan to look at them and say, well, I mean, if it goes bad, it'll be a slow descent, you know,

they'll sort of bring, and sometimes it's not, the sharks being the one that really stands out. Yes, right. Off a cliff. You know, off a cliff. When, you know, when the senators had their pick and we all went, oh, great, you got, you got the Sharks first round pick. Enjoy the 29th overall, the 29th overall choice.

And then just, just off a cliff. A lot of us have been kind of waiting for that to happen to Pittsburgh and Washington hasn't quite. But, you know, with Washington, they've certainly reached that point. Maybe it is Tampa. I could get there. I just, boy, I guess the flip side of this is, you know, if I, I, you know, if I, felt like I wanted to bet on them to miss the playoffs. I felt like, you know, I've got a little something here.

I'm looking for better odds than, you know, presumably what's going to be sitting there because I don't know, I still feel like I'm finding an underdog. And you're right. And like this does feel like one of those things were a year from now, if it goes bad, we're going to look back and say, we all saw the signs. Right. Victor Hedman had that off year. Vaselowski couldn't do it forever, you know, and down the list.

But in right now, it's hard. I'm going to go to goaltending. And I think that, like, that San Jose team, they got old and Martin Jones just went from, when they signed him to that deal, it was like, this guy's going to be the best goal in the league. Like he, like, what a goalie when he went on that long playoff run. And then he turned into a pumpkin. Vasilevsky was pretty bad down the stretch last year. Ian missed mentioned how bad they were down the stretch. And then he wasn't very good in the playoffs either.

that was probably the worst we've seen Vasilevsky look. He said he was worn down. So they're obviously going to give him less starts this year, I think, because they've been kind of ignoring the NHL trend of using the backup a lot. They've just been having Elliott back there and they're like, we're just going to play Vaselowski until his wheels fall off. I expect them to dial him back a little bit this year. And the question is like, okay, so are we going to,

I expect us to see the old Vasilevsky, the good Vaselowski. If you're a doubter of the lightning, you're saying, well, now you just have a Vaselowski that's not as good and you're going to play him less. So that's bad. Like, I get you could, I could see an argument both ways in terms of where he goes. Because I really think if Vaselowski's elite, this team's obviously making the playoffs. If he isn't, they could be in trouble. I tend to lean that he's going to be awesome, but we'll see. Just to Ian's point, seven points.

The lightning made the playoffs by seven points, which is, in the NHL, that's, you know, that's not close. And in fact, it was, you know, the lightning were penciled in for a playoff spot all of last year. But, I mean, you felt safe, you know, from November on. Yeah. Yeah, of course they're making the playoffs. So I think maybe that's a smaller gap to work with than some people would think based on just how safe a pick they felt like all through last year. Yeah.

Yeah. And, you know, I remember I had a great conversation with John Cooper last year in Ottawa in, March, I want to say. And I asked him this exact question, and I'm going to ask you about Buffalo and Detroit and Ottawa in a second and their playoff odds. John Cooper told me, he said there's going to be a year in the Atlantic Division, and he said it might be as early as this coming season, where he says, Toronto, Tampa, Boston, I guess to some extent Florida, but all those teams that have been perennial 100-point teams

are going to take a step back. And Ottawa, Detroit, Buffalo, they're going to take a step up. And he said, we might all meet in the middle around 95 points and it's going to get messy. And I thought, what a great, what a great season that would be for all of us as hockey fans. If there were six teams at 95 points, all grappling. So then I ask you this to kind of close out our segment with you, Jesse. Buffalo has playoff aspirations. I think Detroit, by the way they acted in the offseason, I think they have playoff aspirations.

I think Ottawa thinks that they're going to be a playoff team this year. So is there any smart money to be had or put down on any of those three teams or what are the odds for those three teams to make the playoffs? Yeah. So according to the odds, Buffalo is the closest of those three followed by Ottawa and then Detroit. So Buffalo is actually the only one that's minus money to make the playoffs. They're minus 120. And that is obviously they've got some exciting young players. I think everyone is kind of expecting them to make it. And they're saying, well, we're not going to give everyone plus money. on a team that everyone is going to bet to make the playout. Like if they were plus,

that'd be the most popular bet on the planet. So they're minus 120 to make, minus 110 to miss. So basically a coin toss either way, according to the odds. Ottawa, pretty close to that. They're plus 130, so that you are getting some plus money,

but it's still close, plus 130 to make, minus 160 to miss. And then Detroit, little further odds. They're plus 230 to make the playoffs, minus 300 to miss the playoffs. So you're not going to make much money betting the wings to miss the playoffs for however many years in a row.

It's been it's been quite a while after that stretch of not missing the playoffs forever. I really like all three of those teams. I agree with you. It'd be fun for the league if they're all good. And some of those teams drop back to the pack and we see a legitimate playoff race. Last year's playoff race was pretty awful. It felt like we knew the teams with a month to go. So I don't know.

Are you guys surprised? by that order, Buffalo, Ottawa, Detroit, would you have thought it was going to go a different way? I'm not surprised by the order. I'm a little bit surprised that the gap between Buffalo Ottawa down to Detroit, and frankly, if I'm a Wink's fan, I'm a little frustrated that either that I think the odds are wrong and my team's being disrespected or that this many years into the Steve Eisenman plan and they go out and they make the move, they had the busy off season last year, they get to break

at this year and that they're still seen as a distance, you know, so what, seventh in the Atlantic, that would, that would hurt a bit. I don't know that I would see value there on any of those teams. You know, again, Buffalo 50-50 seems about, I guess that feels like on the optimistic side of a realistic range for me, which is to say, like, it's not, I don't hate it, but, you know, And Ottawa probably about the same. So I don't, I certainly, none of that jumps out at me as a big bargain. So how many, how many minus teams are there than do they have in the, in the east?

Because obviously, you know, again, people like, they, they set the odds based on what they think is going to happen. And then there's like a nudge in the wrong direction. Yeah. As far as your view as a better, because that's how these books make sure they make money. then that's why a team can be, like Buffalo, can be a minus bet on both sides of the coin. You say, how could, you know, wouldn't one have to be a plus?

Well, they're taking a little bit of juice off of both of those odds. There are nine teams in the East with minus. So one of them is obviously not going to make it. And then like the two closest to even money are Pittsburgh and Buffalo. So those are probably, you mentioned earlier, like those are the two that, like if Buffalo is going to make this playoff run that everyone's expecting. We were kind of all expecting Pittsburgh to not make it.

Now that they had Eric Carlson, suddenly they're a minus to make it. That Pittsburgh being a favorite to make the playoffs puts a little more pressure on those three teams, Buffalo. Like there's one less wild card spot out there if Pittsburgh is good like everyone is expecting after all the changes they do. And do they, so do they have the Islanders still as a as a minus team to hold their spot? Because they're kind of a forgotten team that everyone's. Right.

The Islanders are plus 100. So even money. They're straight, even money one-to-one bet to make the playoffs. They're minus 1-30 to miss. So they're a slight favorite to miss the playoffs. I like the Islanders. I like the Islanders. I like that defense.

They've got enough goal scores. I think that teams, I think they're making the playoffs would be my pick between the kind of teams that are up in the air. Like, I, like how optimistic, like Ian mentioned, or sorry, Sean mentioned, that's the optimistic view for Buffalo. Like it's basically, you're basically getting the same odds to bet them to make or miss. It's hard for me if I had to make a bet on it. If you gave me 20 bucks and said you've got to bet on Buffalo to make or miss, I think I'd still probably, even though I like Buffalo and I hope they make the playoffs,

I think I'd still probably, at even odds both way, I'd probably still bet them to miss the playoffs. But that's a function of them missing 12 years in a row and we're just conditioned to be cynical of the Humphal Sabres, right? You know what else I think it is? is it's the way these races kind of form over the year, right? We talked about Tampa, maybe not as much cushion as people think, but they were locked in for so long. You know, people remember last year, man, the penguin, the penguins headed. They headed and they blew it.

That Chicago game that ended up being so important, you know, an easy win. And they blow it and that's what lets the Panthers in, whereas the sabres were kind of a disappointment, kind of down the stretch. Yeah, they had a few games where it was like, oh, if we're, we win this game and then the next eight we're going to be in the mix and everything. Right. You look at the standings at the end of the year, Pittsburgh and Buffalo ended up with the same number of points. They were both one point out.

And yet it feels like Pittsburgh was right there and it feels like the Sabres really weren't because, you know, they won a couple of games at the end of the year. But I guarantee as we're talking about this and the Sabres being 50-50 and all, like, their Sabres fans screaming at their, you know, at the devices right now saying like, they were one point out. They were already 50-50 last year, and that was with, you know, and then you add in all the things that you expect to go better because you're an optimist because it's September. They're right in there, but goal-tending all comes back to goal-tending. They didn't have Devin Levi. They didn't have Devin Levi for the whole season. Now they do. They didn't. That's why. If I'm a Sabres fan, that's what I'm screaming at my device. That's what you're screaming.

Devin Levi. And we're screaming back the track record of 21-year-old goalies in the modern NHL is. is not great, but who knows? Who knows? Hey, Jesse, listen, great to reconnect with you, buddy. We'll get you again next week. And, yeah, I'm sure we can probably dip into maybe a little bit more of a Western conference theme or kind of look at like that central division is fascinating to me. We can hit on that next week. But thanks for this and we'll get you again next Thursday.

Yep, sounds good. Thanks for having me, guys. All right. Great stuff, as always. Great to reconnect with our pal, Jesse Granger. Why don't we open up the mailback, John? because we have a ton of questions. I guess some of these may have been kicking around from the summertime or whatnot. The Athletic Hockey Show at gmail.com. The athletic hockey show at gmail.com

or leave us a voicemail at 845-4-4-5-8459. Aaron in Brooklyn has a question directly for you, Sean. Aaron in Brooklyn says, Sean, love your articles. been reading them for several years now, but one thing I never quite got is who is Brown. Why is he going down? Why is this a header that you use in your articles? Down goes Brown.

That comes from Aaron as we kick off a new season. It's a good question, right? I get asked this often and, you know, I kind of fall into the trap of assuming that everyone knows the story. It is the Brown is, first of all, it is not Dustin Brown. That's a lot of people seem to assume that. It's also not Dave Brown, which is one that comes up a lot.

It is Rob Brown. And it is based on a unfortunate decision that Rob Brown made back in the 92-93 season to fight Sylvan Lefeb in the Maple Leafs, Saturday night, Maple Leaf Gardens, old Norris division game. They squared off at Center Ice, and as the down-goes Brown monitor might suggest, didn't go super well for Rob Brown. and Joe Bowen, the beloved radio voice of the Maple Leafs, called it Down Goes Brown, a riff on the Down Goes Frazier famous call.

And it was just one of those things that stuck with Leaf fans of that era. We didn't have a ton going for us back then. So we would remember stuff like that. And so years later, when I started a blog and I was trying to think of a name, think of something catchy, you know, and that's the one that popped in. my head. And I went with that and some people, some people knew what it meant and connected with it. And other people didn't. But it was easy enough to remember. So that's where the name came from. It was also my, it remains also my Twitter handle. And as far as why it's in the headline of the articles, I don't know. The editors used to put it in there. I think I got them to stop doing that. But every now and then, it shows up there.

But it's just a reference to the blog and the Twitter handle and the kind of online thing, which is, it's always very funny to me because the fact that I have this, like, name associated makes people think that it's like some sort of multimedia company that I'm running. And I'll get like a thing like, hey, I don't know if you guys read your emails. And I'm like, I don't know who you guys are. You have run this by the team. And I'm like, there's no team. I don't even have an intern yet. So. Yeah, we got to restart the application. Still got to get on that. That's a long process. For that. Hey, since, again, we're kind of touching on this and maybe people have forgotten, but I feel like I've asked you this, but let me ask you again. This was all based on Rob Brown. Yep. Former NHLer. Have you ever connected with Rob Brown? Has Rob Brown ever reached out to you or vice versa about this? I've had one conversation with Rob Brown. I know he's been asked about it a few times. And I used to, I used to chat with He is a brother who's in the sports media world. And I used to chat with him.

And I would forget until I remember one time he was, you know, we were just going back and forth on Twitter. Like in the DMs, we're just joking around about something. And he goes, you know, I'm enjoying this conversation, but it is very weird that every time you message me, I see a picture of my brother getting punched in the face. And I was like, yeah, I guess that would be a little bit weird. I talked to Rob Brown once. He was doing radio. He had a radio show in Edmonton, I want to say. And they called me up one time.

They said, do you want to do you want to do an appearance on this show? And I said, yeah, I mean, I'll go on any radio show that asked me. But I'm like, do you guys know, like, and does Rob Brown know who I am? Is this like a thing where? And they said, yeah, yeah, you know, Rob's aware and he's good with it. And I, you know, we chatted about a little bit. But as far as I know, he's always had a sense of humor about it. He had a very, very funny line where he talks about like that night in the fight and, you know, going back and I think it was like Michelle Goulet or somebody in the dressing room and being like, you know, him saying to Goulet, like I think, I think Lefeb got me in the jaw and Goulet going, yeah, well, that's where all the blood's pouring out from. So yeah, you're probably right. So he's always had a sense of humor about it as far as I know and has, has never, never complained. And if he ever does come looking at me, looking for me, I would.

will run and hide because I'm not Sylvan Lefebvre. Yeah, he's going to start a down goes McIndoo site after. Down goes, down goes Brown will be the tagline. Yeah. It'll just be me cowering. Yeah. Eric creates in the show. Love the podcast, guys.

As an Ottawa fan, I was excited to see Jake Sanderson get an eight-year $64 million extension. But it did leave me wondering. In the salary cap era, has a plan. gotten a bigger extension with fewer number of games played. Love to hear if anybody comes to mind. That is from Eric. So look, I actually did look this up in the course of me writing about Jake getting the extension.

So obviously in the cap era now, in that 2012 deal, they put in the parameters that you can't sign an extension for more than like eight is the max. Right. So now in the last 10 years, nobody. The only guy I could find that signed even a kind of reasonable extension. with fewer games was Kirill Kaprizov. Yep. And that was the one that I was just looking at. 55 games, I believe.

But he got a five-year deal. Jake had only play only, played whatever, the 70-some-odd games that he had played. And part of that is a function of, you know, he signed in his, you know,

his junior year of college. And when he came to the NHL, he was hurt so he didn't play. Then he played one season. and with one year left on his entry-level deal, he signed the extension, right? So if he had played this year, we're not really having this conversation.

I do think with four goals on his resume, I would think, based on what I, again, the research I was able to do, Caprizov was the only guy that seemed to have a longer, or a decent-sized extension with fewer games played. I don't think there's ever been a player in the history of the game that would get an eight-year deal with four goals on their resume.

Right? I mean, that part, I mean, I think that's fair to say. Yeah, I imagine it would have to be. It's the, yeah, unless it was a goalie and even goalies, I'm not sure. Like, I just looked up Rick DiPietro when he had played, he had three or four years under his book by the time he signed that, that ridiculous deal. I mean, in theory, this shouldn't be that unusual situation, because we do see a lot where guy comes in, burns that first year, you play through second year, and then you can sign that extension before the third year is up. So to see a guy with only one season, maybe unusual, but you'd see a lot of guys in theory

with two seasons where that first season is only a game or two, where they get in at the very end of the college season. I think Matt Boldie fits that mold, right, in Minnesota. Matt Boldie would be a guy that, you know, fewer than 100 games got a big extension. Yeah. So, I mean, you see that, but this few to only have done it for one year, hey, it's a roll of the dice for the senators. But I think it's a smart. It's a bet, but it's a smart bet.

Because the upside is very good. I'm going to tell you this. And people who don't watch Ottawa might think that this is a crazy comment coming for me. I think in two years from now, Jake Sanderson is the most important skater on the Ottawa senators. I really believe that. Really? I had a kid truck. ahead of Stutzelah, had a...

Like, just in the role that I think he's going to play, the minutes he's going to eat, the impact he's going to have in terms of getting 25 minutes a night. I think Tim Stutzler is their best player. I think he's their most dynamic player. But I think when you start to look at the totality of the game and the impact on the ice, I think Jake will end up playing more.

I think he's going to end up being the most important piece on this team. That's an interesting prediction. And obviously, if that comes true, this deal is going to be an absolute steal for the Senate. People said that about Tim Stutzel last year. People said, wow, you're giving him eight times eight. And that guy's a $10 million a year player. He is.

Well, I mean, open market today. If they don't sign him last year and he's now sitting there and he wants to hold their feet to the fire, then, yeah, you're probably right coming off a 90-point season. Alexi in Finland has a question. Alexi gets the daily dose of Pakdoku got me wondering. When you look at all of the teams, what are the players that you should know by heart to pass the quiz, i.e. the Thomas Vanek's Lee Stepniak, Oli and Usi-Y. Kyi. Curtis McElheny, those guys should get you far. Who's on your list of absolute staples that you should have committed to memory? that's from Alexey in Finland.

See, here's the thing. This will surprise some people. I don't even, none of those guys that you just mentioned are obscure, but I'm not a guy who can like rattle off. You know, every team that Thomas Vanneg maybe I could do. But I, you know, for some of these guys, like Michelle Pateen, his 10 teams, Matthew Schneider and his 10 teams. Like, I don't think I could, I could get some of them.

I wouldn't be able to go all the way down. I'll tell you the guys that I use as, my kind of staples, it's, and the reason for this is it's, we're talking all Hall of Famers. So, you know, you're not going remotely obscure, but the guys are Larry Murphy,

Paul Coffey, Phil Housley on the back end, Doug Gilmore, Dave Anderchuk, that's my Lee fan coming out, obviously Mark Recky and Adam Oates up front. Between those seven guys,

and then I could probably pick like two more, God, boy, who would you have as the goalie, maybe a Tom Barrasso, even a Grant Fier if you remember him, get one more guy. And between those nine guys, I think at one point I had looked at it. And if you took those guys, other than the more recent expansion teams, I think they cover the entire league. Every team has had some combination of these guys at least once, if not a couple of times, except I think the Islanders are the weird outlier.

And then if you had Pierre-Turjean in, then you. you get, then you get the Islanders in there too. So I stay with those, like the mega stars, but the guys who played for five, six, seven teams, Chris Pronger could be another guy you could put up there, although don't fall into the coyote's trap because he didn't play a game with them. But those are the guys that I look at. I don't even go. And then my other thing is just as a Leaf fan, I know everyone who played for the Leafs.

I know how they got them and who they traded them to. So that, you know, a lot of times can help me figure it out. But let's rip through a couple more here real quick. Adam in Chicago. To your knowledge, has there ever been an instance where a player was re-signed to the exact same contract he just finished? I.e., if a player finished a three-year deal at a $3 million, A.A.V, he and the team looked at each other and said, yep, that was perfect for everybody. Let's do it again. And he signs another three times three.

I'm sure maybe this has happened on one-year deals, but to make it more challenging for you guys, has this ever happened? in consecutive occasions on multi-year deals. That's from Adam in Chicago. And he's looking for the same term, right? Because like famously, like Sidney Crosby, right, always 8.7, but different lengths of the deals. I mean, it must have happened. There must have been some, although it is, it's probably rarer than you think because it's, you always want to raise, right?

And you sit down for the new contract, especially in the cap era, salaries, caps going up. You want the raise. or your teams comes in and says, we got to, like, we got to drop this down to do. And I wonder what the, let's throw that out as a challenge.

I want to know what's the highest value overall that you can get that matches this. Okay, multi-year deal. And because again, there's probably some guys, oh, yeah, two years,

one million and then re-uped or whatever. But, you know, who's the guy that did like the four times five point five, four times four again? Yeah. I don't know. There's got to be some.

There have to be a few out there. But I can't think of any. Yeah, I can't either. Well, this is why the Down Goes Brown internship program. This is your first test. This is your first immunity challenge. Get out there and grab this information for us. Okay.

I'm going to read one more. And this is going to be a real kind of, this is meant to target your heart strings. Okay, listeners? Oh, boy. Okay. This, remember earlier in the summer, again, it's been a few weeks since we did a show, but we just had a fun discussion about, hey, what's the, you know, the first ever sporting event you can remember attending first hockey, whether it was hockey, baseball, whatever. Like, what's the first time you remember sitting down at a sporting event, watching a game,

maybe with your parents, maybe with a family member, a friend, whatever? This is a pretty interesting one from our listener named Will. I wanted to share this one, end on kind of a high note here. on the mailbag. Will writes in, greatly enjoyed your chat about first games, especially because I just put together some information on the very first baseball game I ever attended. It was 30 years ago at Tiger Stadium Tigers Royals. Storm Davis was pitching for the Tigers at the time. That's how old the story is. Anyway, interesting parts as well, it was my wife's first game too. we were both only seven years old and we didn't meet each other for another 12 years.

Her seat was in the upper deck, left field foul territory. Mine was a few rows behind first base. So it's very unlikely that we even cross paths. However, we both happened to keep our ticket stubs. And though I can't find mine at the moment, I do have the scorecard I filled out to confirm I was in fact at the same game. At some point, while we were dating, we discovered that we both attended that same game. is our first game. We remember George Brett had a good one.

Thanks for letting me share. Your show is always a lot of fun to listen to. That comes in from Will. That's kind of crazy, isn't it? Yeah. It turns out the first ever game you went to, your future spouse was at the same game, and it was their first game.

And, you know, because I'm a romantic at heart, I'm pushing back on this whole, like, we didn't run into each other. We were in different side. You don't know that. You absolutely could have been in line for a hot dog, or maybe like, you know, going in the gate and those old times, they kind of squished everyone

through the same, you know, the same area. Yeah. Sitting on the subway on the way, it could absolutely happen. I love that story. Have you ever seen the one where it's like, it was some married couple and they're looking, she's looking through childhood photos and she has like a photo of her at Disneyland

when she's like four. And in the background, right? Yeah. It's like the guy's like, that's my dad in the background pushing a stroller and I'm in. And it's the craziest thing. but this is this is right up there yeah that's a that's a that's a very cool story and uh yeah you know it was like you said you're a romantic and a couple of seven-year-olds yeah that's me

that's as soon as I said I can see you laughing on camera and I say that you're like no you're not they don't know that though they can they can I'm trying to I'm trying to polish up the image yeah the guy who said earlier in the show that his his phone is filled with pictures of immaculate grid perfect Yeah, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. He's romantic at her.

There's a couple of, I think you should leave memes on there too, I think. Yeah. Okay, let's wrap up real quick. This week in hockey history, it's the middle of September. So we don't have too much to necessarily sink our teeth into. Lots of international hockey. On this week, 1991, September to 16th. So I think this would be Saturday is the exact anniversary of this.

1991, Team Canada beats Team USA 4-2 to clinch the last. ever Canada Cup title. As you recall, after that it was called World Cup of hockey and it's had different iterations, but this was the last Canada Cup. Old Cop's Coliseum and it's the final between Canada of the USA. Remember, Wayne Gretzky gets

knocked out of this tournament because of a hit from Gary Souter. Canada wins this second game, but the game is tied at two in the third period until a short-handed goal is scored by who?

Who, boy. Steve Larmer. Yes. Is it really? I feel like there was a window of time where Steve Larmer was like sneaky good, underrated good. Steve Larmer scored a massive goal. Some people say Steve Larmer is a Hall of Famer, but yeah, that's okay.

You know, and the funny thing is I don't remember that. And I do remember the tournament. Like the Gretzky injury was big. That was the Eric Lindrosse coming out party. Remember? Because he had been drafted. He was only 18, was refusing to play. But he crunched all Samuelson, I think.

It took him out of the tournament and everybody was like, man, this guy's going to be unstoppable. But that's interesting. If that game was tied, you know, in the third, because you certainly don't think of like the Steve Larmer goal as anywhere up there on their, because I remember I wrote a piece a couple years ago. I said, what's the fourth biggest goal in Canadian hockey history? Obviously, you've obviously, Henderson, Crosby, Mario against the Soviets in 87 are the big three. and what would be number four be. I didn't even put Steve Larmer on the list, give you a sense of how little I remember a final that I did.

I watched. I would have watched and been invested in. So that's a bit of a weird one. More Steve Larmer, underrated as always. Empty netter of that game scored by a guy who had, in my opinion, unbelievable tournament. This, again, this is, I remember watching this, however, would have been like 14 years old or whatever.

Dirk Graham. Dirk Graham went off in that tournament. He was so good for Canada. Yep. Emptated that. Dirk Graham was a real good player. Yeah. Yeah.

Last one I'm going to do for this week in hockey history. We're only going to go back three years. This is going to seem really weird. September 14th, 2020, it's game five, and the Dallas stars beat the Vegas Golden Knights in overtime to punch their ticket to the Stanley Cup final where they would take on the Tampa Bay Lightning. I ask you this, Sean, because it only happened three years ago. Dallas scores.

game winner and game five, they're going to the cup, who scores the game winning goal for the stars? This is Steve Larmer. Yes. No, I don't, uh, that I don't. And,

and first of all, can I just say, I, I still, my brain can't process stuff like that. Like in this day in September, to go to this, I'm like,

what did, but only three years ago. Three years ago. Do you have any recollection of who scored the goal, what it looked like, anything? No. Because it's wild because you think of in the last few years, we've had some of these like our Terry Lekan has scored a couple of goals to put his team into the cop.

BXA had one right for Vancouver. Like you tend to remember Alex Martinez. You tend to remember these goals that put your team into the final. And yet Dallas did it three years ago. And I bet a lot of listeners, unless you're Dallas Stars, Dallas Stars fans, you probably don't remember this. I'm going to give you the name. You're going to be like, man, I still don't remember it. Dennis Gurionov

Yeah, that's Wow Yeah, no I don't Man, what a weird time What an incredibly bizarre I feel like it's gotten weird Like remember when you sat down to watch The bubble playoffs and you're like this

Oh man, there's no crowd and everything This feels strange But you know maybe years down the line We'll get no way like it feels like it's getting stranger and stranger every time I don't know Good for them that they got it done but oof, that's... I feel like people don't remember Dennis anyway.

Look it up. Very little recollection. Almost any of it. Three years ago this week, Dennis Gurionov put the Dallas stars into the Stanley Cup final. With an overtime goal to knockout, knockout Vegas in a series that clearly, I don't think any of us remember any of those. Like, I'm usually really good at remembering all of those things, like I said, semifinals, whatever.

2020, it's like, I don't know. It's a man. I think the crowd reaction plays a much more key role in our memories than than maybe we give it credit for it. Because the absence of that, I just feel like, you know, for me, it was like the Leafs go out to Columbus and you just fast forward ahead to like the weird fireworks when Tampa's getting the cup and that's that. Yeah.

All right. We'll leave it there. This was a lot of fun. I want to thank everybody for tuning back into the Thursday edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. We love hearing from you. So you got emails, anything you want to weigh in, whether it was something we talked about today, early in the summer,

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when you visit the athletic.com slash hockey show. You know, Becky also did mention the depth and the bench difference, right? She talked about Marine Johannes. She called her, I think she said she does her work dirty, was Becky's quote. And she called her an assassin. And I think Becky even made like a bang, bang, bang sound that she's in it out before you've ever seen her, right?

Marine got to score eight points. She electrifies the crowd. She doesn't work. And that is it. And that is a punch that really the aces don't have, right? You look at their bench. Sabrina mentioned Alicia Clark. She's been great.

She's been one of the best reserves in the entire league. But at this point in her career, she's not also creating. offense especially in the way that Marine can coming off the bench. So I think you look at depth and this was something that New York, their coaching staff, their front office talked about heading into the year. They believed entering the year that their depth would make a big difference by season's end. Of course, they didn't predict and wish upon the Candace Parker injury. And so that has obviously kind of changed the rotations as Sabrina was mentioning for Las Vegas.

But that is another thing that I think is super, super important here. That New York also has a little bit more punch. And, you know, Sabrina someone, you know, not unlike Chelsea Gray or Kelsey Plum can get going, but we certainly saw Monday night against Las Vegas, you know, Sabrina scored 17 points in the first half. The moment that sticks with me, I think of all the other shots in that game was when Sabrina nailed a three, I think it was her third three right before the half. I think she had 17 points at halftime. Becky Hammond was kind of standing in the corner by her team's bench and she immediately just put her hands on her hip. She called it borderline negligence, basically. It was borderline

negligent to give Sabrina an opening at the end of the half after the game. Becky puts her hand on her hip, the buzzer sounds, goes to halftime. She is the first person to walk to the locker room. She basically left her hands on her hip until it was time to walk to the locker room. And she led the team into the locker room, right? That is a moment that just sticks with me that I think really exemplified just her frustration in the first half especially, but also just the firepower that New York has, that Sabrina can also get loose.

And we've seen it time again this year. So there's just a lot of firepower on both teams. But I think that depth and firepower that New York has maybe gives them a slight edge at this point in the season at least. I keep thinking about the August 6th matchup, the 9961 matchup. And that, to me, wasn't the game that the New York Liberty clicked, but it was the game that was like, oh, that's what a super team looks like. If anyone was questioning it, that's the definition of a super team. They felt they looked so confident and secure in the way that they came out. And it also didn't seem like the aces, it almost seemed as if the aces weren't true, the true aces we knew them to be as like

the matchup competitors, right? It almost felt as if they were playing another team within the league that didn't have the same level of star power and firepower as you all are mentioning. It didn't seem like it was truly a matchup. And if you were a non-WMBA fan and someone's hyped this game up telling you that, oh my God, these are the best two, teams in the league and they're going to go at each other and it's going to be crazy. And then one loses by 30, more than 30. It just felt like it was deflating almost. I'm going to take it from your perspective, Sabrina.

They did have to come back and play again against the Liberty and they did play better, but that game still happened. What do you remember about the takeaway from that game for the team and how they felt? and being able to match up with this team in a playoff situation, for example. We've been talking about these two teams all year as potential rivals, and they have refused to buy into it. And that was the first moment where I got the sense that, oh, they're starting to feel what we feel from the outside.

Like maybe it's just the projection of everything that's causing them to experience a little distaste towards one another. Maybe it's the fact that they had to play four times in the course of a month, and they were just already anticipating the fact that they were going to see each other over and over and over again. But after that game, which I initially wrote off just because Asia Wilson got her bell rung in the first quarter and just did not look like herself for most of the game. When I was talking to Kelsey Plum two days later,

she said, you know, it's funny. There's one game and they act like they won a championship. And it's like, oh, ah, some heat. There we go. Sicy. So this has emerged from because these players are so careful about giving away anything, right? Like, they don't want to express that they're thinking about this team more than others

or that they look forward to these games more than others. Like, you mentioned that these have been popcorn games. Kelsey likes to say that there's popcorn in every game, you know? If you're looking for it, there's popcorn to every game. There's true. So that was the first time that I sort of sensed that, okay, like, whether it's because we've tried to manufacture it or because there is actually a sense that these two teams are going to be facing each other a lot in the upcoming weeks or

months if we get a potential finals matchup. That's when I started to feel the actual animosity building. And I think we saw some of that in this most recent game in New York, too, where, you know, Sydney Colson and Benajolini got into it a little bit. And there's just a little bit of chippiness that wasn't present earlier in the season. And so, I mean, this is not like an entirely basketball thing. But I think, you know, good rivalries rely on a little bit of just distaste, right? Like, teams should not like each other. And there's so much good camaraderie in the WMBA. Like, they're all so supportive of one another. they'll work together, you know, like on the union to try to lift each other up,

that we don't get a lot of this just, I don't like you type of situation. And we're getting some of that. And I'm really enjoying it.