The Athletic Hockey Show - Rasmus Sandin signs extension with Toronto Maple Leafs, Trevor Zegras injured in preseason game against Arizona Coyotes, and can the Colorado Avalanche repeat?

Episode Date: September 30, 2022

The Thriday show returns with Hailey and Sean discussing Rasmus Sandin's contract extension with the Toronto Maple Leafs, and the injury issues the team has faced in its first week of training camp. Also, Trevor Zegras gets injured by a hit in a preseason game vs. the Coyotes Wednesday night. Then, The Athletic's Peter Baugh joins the show to discuss the Colorado Avalanche's chances of a Stanley Cup repeat, and to wrap up, maybe some more secrets. Save on a subscription to The Athletic: theathletic.com/hockeyshowSubscribe to The Athletic Hockey Show on YouTube: https://bit.ly/3BKz27u Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. What's up, everybody? This is another edition of the Friday show. My name's Haley, and along with Sean Gentilly. Again, this is our Thursday night, Friday morning, version of the athletic hockey show. Second week we're doing this. What's up, Sean? What's up, Haley?

Why do you say wait? Did I do something wrong? Yeah, yeah, wait. Where's your microphone? You don't have a microphone this week. There's a microphone in my laptop and inside of my headphones. So if I'm coming to you and I'm sounding a little fuzzy, I'm sorry, I'm out of town right now, and I forgot my microphone. And that is something I will never, ever do again.

You know what? Maybe you should just take the reins. You can wear the, you know, the hat of the first chair. You can host the show. You can talk the most because you sound the way. because you sound the best. I don't get paid to run this. It's not my job.

I don't get paid to run this either. Hate to break it to you. I don't, I don't, that's neither here nor there. But you know what? This week, sound a lot more professional than you know. Then I think you should take it for the team and host the show because you have a better microphone than I do. Hey there, everybody.

Welcome to Salviate and Gentile. It's 3.45 AM on the East Coast. How we doing? Hales, what's going on? What voice is that? Where are you from? Wacky morning DJ. But like coming to you from where?

Was that like a Pennsylvania? 345 in the morning or whenever this drops. I think everybody is lucky that we didn't call an emergency podcast for Rasmus Sandine signing for whatever. Yeah, because you're not on the American show anymore. So you have to talk about the Toronto Maple Leafs. We didn't go all in on the athletic business model. which is talk about the Toronto Maple Leafs at any and all opportunities.

I don't think that's much of a secret. We were talking before the show. It is such a bummer that now, since I don't have like the Americans gimmick to fall back on, that sometimes I'm going to have to explicitly talk about the Toronto Maple Leafs. And if I have my way,

it would be like, it would be a Voldemort situation. They're like, don't say his name. No, they who shall not be named. And now it's like, I have to at least like, I'm like, oh, God, we're recording today. The Rasmus Sandin situation has been resolved. Thank God. Thank God. But that's a relevant thing.

I feel like you're just handing it up for people who think that you're a Leafs homer whenever they're ranked high in the power rankings. So if anyone who reads the power rankings and you want to call Sean a Leafs fan, are Leafs Homer. I think you, you should listen up because I, this man hates the leaves. Well, I don't know if that's true either.

I think, but I think like it's, yeah, be careful. I feel the same about every team. I like, I like, just like every team,

the exact same amount. I hate everybody. It is legitimately bizarre to me. The people, it's Dom's fault, like most things are. Absolutely. Right?

He sucks. Not to tell me twice. So people, yeah, he's a note it leaves Homer. He's open about it. Yeah. And with the power ring stuff, I'm just like, I'm stapled to him for that, right? So it's like if one of us says something in there, it just kind of gets attributed to both of us. And a little part of me dies each time I see some in the comments be like, this is just typical Homer's shit from Sean Gentilly.

You're like, I'm from Pittsburgh. I don't. There's plenty of stuff you could tag me for being a homer. Cries and what is it, Yenzer? Cries in Yenzer. I'm as far from being a homer for the Toronto Maple Leafs as I could be. If anything, like you said, I am biased against them. So the fact that I have to sit here.

He wishes they were bad. Life would be a lot easier. The fact that I have to sit here and pretend that I, I care that Rasmus Sien signed for $1.4 million a year, whatever it is, for two years, it's like part of me is dying. Right. So let's just loop people in. By the time this post, it'll be not old news, but we'll know that this happened.

But yes, the Tronomey beliefs resolved the contract stalemate. We can call it with Rasmus Sandin early on Thursday morning. I guess it was what about 10 a.m. Eastern, 9 a.m. Eastern. Yeah, like I said, the alarm went off and all hands on deck situation because we've got to record immediately. A number four defenseman for the Maple Leafs has agreed to. Okay.

Enough. I'm upset about this. Right. I don't think anyone raised the alarms. I think it was just Rasmus Sandine assigned to your contract extension. I got a, I got a nine. I got a nine one. Can I mention what I'm saying?

9-1 text from James Myrtle. No, you didn't. Oh, yes. Really. Really. Yeah, it's true. That's why you wrote something about. Yeah.

Uh-huh. Yeah, your background's blurred. So is your cell phone. Can I finish what I'm saying, please? Enough. The Toronto Maple Leafs and Razma Sandine agreed to a TIR contract extension with the $1.4 million average annual value. You know, essentially this is the Timothy Lilligrant deal.

I think the Leafs always believed that Sandin. and Lillegrin were deserving of the same two-year contract. Lilligran obviously signed that deal a lot sooner than Sandine did. I always thought it was strange that Sandine was holding out, given he doesn't really have a ton of leverage. He doesn't have arbitration rights. He doesn't have a huge NHL sample size. It's not like he came out and was a number one defenseman last year and lit it up in the

regular season and the postseason. I think Sandine is a fine player, but the kind of leverage in the situation was always a bit strange. I do think some of that leverage started to shift a bit when, but this is, again, the interesting part. You would think that, like, some of the public-facing comments we've seen from Sandine's camp has been, you know, he watched Kelly Yarncrow play defense and, you know, watched his team the other day with all these injuries on the blue line. It was like, I got to come to the table. But then you signed the deal that the Leafs wanted you to sign the whole time. Is that, I mean, is it literally, is it literally the Lilligrine deal? Like, is there a

any the QO for next season's higher? Is that it? Yeah. So the one thing. So the two deals were two years with a 1.4 million dollar AAV for the purpose of the qualifying offer though year two is a 1.6 million salary year one is a 1.2 mill. So I I get I'm not totally sure if that's exactly what Lilligrin has in terms of this year two qualifying offer and I can pull this up quite quickly. But I do know for Razma Sandin, his QO after this contract is up when he has arbitration rights. So he will be due a $1.6 million qualifying offer after the second year of this contract heading into an arbitration. So these are, I mean, they're functionally the same. Like there's some maybe some tweaks around the margin. And it took months. Yeah, one point two base salary,

one point six base salary in year one year two. And let me pull up Timothy Lilligern really quickly. Well, you talk about your love for the leaves. The leverage thing is... Sorry, sorry, sorry, I found it very quickly. Timothy Lillegren is 1.4, 1.4. Yeah, so it's the same. So they have the same A.A.V, but, you know, Rasmus-Sandine is going to be owed a $200,000 top-up on that qualifying offer.

That's amazing. He just, he just, like, didn't sound like... There's statistical profiles are very, very similar, and that's why the Leafs were saying, like, these they get identical deals because their stats this point are basically identical. Rasmus Sandin had 0.3, 2 points per game in 88 NHL games averaging around 16 minutes, whereas Timothy Lilligrant averaged 0.32 points per game in 74 games with around 15 and a half minutes per game. So they're statistically around the same with around the same usage. Are they at the same, do they have the same amount of years before the same amount of Barbiers left, too?

Like, this is, it's just fun in a minute. Liligrin does, uh, Liligrin is also one year away from arbitration. Yes. So. That's amazing. And what the bummer of it all is honestly that we're not going to see Callie Yarncrook get more run at right defense or at Marner practice there today. Like they were really on the verge of, um.

Well, the Leafs, I know you don't like, you don't want to talk about the Leafs and nobody wants to feel bad for the Leafs. They have had a ton of injuries a week into training camp. It's wild. John Tavares is out with an oblique strain. Timothy Lilligrant is out with an ankle and foot. Lilligrin had a sports hernia. Pierre Engval is out with an ankle and foot injury.

Jordy Ben, who, so basically, it's not funny, but basically the Leaf's plan, the guy that they, the guy that they brought into. They were hoping to help out on the blue line with the Liligrin injury and the Sandine contract stalemate also got hurt the other day. The insurance policy got hurt. You know, that's what Calliard Croke ends up playing defense the other day. And Mitch Meyer takes a run at defense and at the skate. Like there's a ton of guys hurting on the Leafs before the season even started. Even prospects like Fraser Minton and guys you've probably never heard of unless you're a Leafs fan are injured in Leaves training camp right now.

Adam Gotet. Adam Godette, who I was poking around on. You know, he's all into crystals and sage cleanses. And I was like, I'm going to talk to this guy because that rocks. He is a full sleeve of Star Wars tattoos. Do you understand how important it is to me to find out if there's a Grogoo tattoo on that sleeve? I haven't an idea of how important it is. Shoulder injury.

So the least are going through it. Yeah, I mean, so hard. It's part of the game, but it's like, holy, this is the time of year when you want everyone to be healthy. fit and you're trying to see who can crack the roster and who can fit where. And now the Leafs are like, I guess Callie Yarncroke is, I think there was some Leifes fans who were, you know, questioning why you bring in Callie Yarn Croke when you have Alex Kerrfoot. And now you're kind of like, oh, well, I guess it's a good thing we have Callie Yarncroke because he can play as a second line center, your third line center.

He can play defense. He can be a spare defenseman. Yeah. That's like, I think the through line for the last couple, whatever, first couple weeks of camp has been injuries. Like, yeah, maybe the Leafs are the highest profile because Tavares is maybe in the midst of the start of the season and whatever. Like there's higher profile stuff going off the Leafs. Well, this is the second show that we've done. Last week was like, let's talk about the Philadelphia Flyers.

like let's feel bad about Couturier and and Ryan Ellis who is apparently week to week now doesn't actually need back surgery not sure I will believe it when I see I've talked I did talk we talked to Charlie on me and Craig yeah you stole my idea

I said we should have had Charlie O'Connor on the show and then you went ahead and had Charlie O'Connor on the show what can we say that's bullshit Charlie made a choice but the big one is Zegris Like we watched Trevor Zegris, I mean, out with an upper body injury, you know, whatever. Of course he got it in a in the neutral zone in a, in a meaningless game against the Arizona Coyotes.

I don't like that. There's been a lot. Look, I think people are sort of dissecting that hit when it happened on Wednesday night. It's a bummer to see guys get hurt in games that don't mean anything. But at the same time, like, you look at that play. He's going across the middle against like a spare defenseman for the coyotes. Jan Yenik, I believe his name is. And he's like a whatever, a borderline dude, right?

He's an HL guy who's trying to make the team. He's a Tucson guy. We all love Tucson guys. Yeah. And Zegger has tried to nutmeg him and the dude, you know, got his arm up in the NutriZone. It's ugly. It's like worst case scenario, I feel like, for a, for a, for a for a preseason game to see a guy like that, get an injury like that. Yeah. I mean, that's such a hit for for the ducks who, you know, I don't think they're quite in a space where they're going to be taking the next step in the next year. So at least it's not like, this is the year. The ducks are going to be good. And oh, shoot. Our best players potentially out. However, you know, this is a guy who knows Calder finalist, you know, one of the bright yellow.

young stars in the game. People love watching Trevor Ziegress play and you you hope that it's not a long-term thing. Again, we don't want to be, you know, get too ahead of ourselves because as of right now, this was from the Anaheim Ducks and their coach, Dallas Eakins. Zegris left last night's game with an upper body injury last night, meaning Wednesday night. We're coming to you on Thursday evening here. We're sending him for a more in-depth look, and hopefully we will have those results by the morning. So we are in a holding pattern on that. So right now, Trevor Zegress is still, his status is up in the air. But by the time this podcast is posted, perhaps early Friday morning, there should be a bit more information on his status. But goodness, I mean, he didn't skate on Thursday.

It's not good. It's a reminder that not much good can go. Not much can go, not much good can happen in the preseason. This is the interesting thing for me, though. Sorry to cut you off because as you're saying this, it's, there's so much that can go wrong if you play in the preseason. But look at the NFL and how much goes wrong on week one for teams who don't play their guys in the preseason. Like there's got to be a middle ground of, because like, I mean, the Denver Broncos are probably a bad example because they're probably just bad. But like, I don't think Russell Wilson played a lot in the preseason. season and he was terrible week one. I mean, he might just be bad. But I think you can see in the

NFL like a lot of the Bengals, they didn't look very good week one. They made a ton of mistakes. They don't play a lot of their guys in the preseason. Russell Wilson's problem is he's a washed up dork. That's I'm diagnosing. What was the one? There was the one thing that people said about Baker Mayfield that Baker Mayfield is less athletic. Russell Wilson. but now that Russell Wilson doesn't look as athletic anymore, he's just like old bad Baker Mayfield. He's old bad Baker Mayfield, old worst Baker Mayfield. I mean, who would you rather have as your quarterback right now?

Right now, Baker Mayfield or Russell Wilson. This has been an episode of the Athletic NFL show, the athletic football show, excuse me. I'll co-host. I'll go on there and talk about. Back to the Bull Burroughs never done anything wrong. I'm not actually not going to say that. Never once in his life. Never.

He's perfection. The wild thing about the Zegaris hit, because, like, again, we have nothing better to do than, like, overanalyze this stuff. Hell yeah. You know what I actually want to talk about is why the Calgary Flames' top line needs to work on their chemistry. Oh, no, thank you. It's week one. What are you doing? Zegris, it happened against the coyotes.

You remember who got Matter at Trevor Zegris last year than anybody did? It's the Arizona Coyotes. Is that a word? Matter. Angrier? more mad more angrier saltier whatever they filled their they filled their diapers farther than over Trevor Zegris than any other than any other team did and then you have a guy who's like on the borderline with that roster like I don't know I don't know yeah who knows

I think I just the interesting thing with that though is like what is he's supposed to do I know you can watch that clip back and people who've listened to week one of this show know that you know, I'm a huge Trevor Zegris fan. But if like the elbow, it looked like he maybe lifts the elbow a little bit, which is bad. But I think he makes a lot of contact right to the body. And it's like, what do you want Yan Yinnick to do? Do you want him to just move to the side and let Trevor Zegris nutmeg him and scoreball in the preseason? He's, he's an HL guy.

He's fighting for a job. Like, I don't think, I don't think. My initial reaction when I see that hit is like, this is so unnecessary. You don't need to obliterate the guy in the preseason, but at the same time, the position that they're in, in that moment. And like, you know, what's he supposed to do? Just get out of the way. Apparently, yeah. I don't know.

And again, I hope that Trevor Zegers isn't hurt. I hope it's not a long-term thing because I think it's, you know, I want to watch him on opening night, you know, two weeks from now. I just want to get to actual, like, stuff that matters. Legitimate hockey games because, like, I don't know how much longer I guess. can do this. What? Preseason previews? It's brutal.

Like I have it. How's it going? Also, okay, wait, we should say, um, Sean did initially want to tell you guys the secret of who was coming out next, but then in the post production of the week one, our wonderful producer was like, should I leave those out?

Like, that's hilarious. That's a way fun. So we'll see if we share any secret. It's in Segment three. But that was hilarious. Speaking of previews, you know, one thing that's happening with the athletic hockey show and all of the shows that are running throughout the week is we're trying to look at the top 10 storylines across the league through every show.

So on Tuesday, I think Sean and Craig, you guys had Charlie on to talk about the Philadelphia Flyers. I believe you touched on the capitals. No. We are going to touch. We just talked about the flyers. My bad. I think there's a secret.

Okay, so on Tuesday last week, they talked about this week. Jesus Christ, I'm all confused. Anyways, there's been different storylines discussed throughout the week. If you listen to the shows, Tuesday was Philadelphia. This week, we are going to be joined by Peter Baugh into the next segment of the show to talk about one of the key storylines of the season, which is, can the Colorado Avalanche repeat? So that's going to be coming up once we're done chatting here when Peter joins us.

Peter at Bah is very famous now. He wrote a book, so we'll see if he big leagues us. You know what Peter's going to say whenever we ask him if it's possible that the abs repeat? I think so. He's going to say, no, they can't. It's impossible. It can't be done. We'll see about that.

Does anything else you want to talk about before we bring a little sweet Peter in? I think we should throw him under the bus for what he did at the draft. I already, I've already talked about this. podcast before. Oh. Dirty Shirley's. Yeah. Have you talked about the dirty Shirley's?

Yeah. Peter's, Peter's favorite drink is a, is a Shirley Temple. Shirley Temple. That has vodka in it. It's just, I think once you listen to Peter, this next segment, I think it'll all make sense.

It all makes sense. You'll hear it and you'll maybe see a clip and be like, yeah. He's perfect. Anyways, let's bring in Peter Baugh. I think he's standing by. So we're going to bring Peter Baugh in next with the three. Friday show. The athletic.

Oh, it's so nice to be joined by Peter Baugh. Colorado Avalanche Beat Rider. It's in the process of moving. Very barren, very barren apartment behind him. Also, the foremost dirty Shirley fan that I've ever met in my life. I'd actually never heard somebody order those before. Pete, why don't you tell me about what motivated you to start ordering those in bars across this great condos hours?

I actually think Samantha Pell, the capital, the Capitol Writer for the Washington Post. She was in Denver for the Cup. And she mentioned Dirty Shirley's. And I was like, wow, that sounds lovely. And they've kind of become a staple of my going out diet. Also, to clarify, I'm not moving, I'm still going to be covering the ads. I'm just moving within Denver.

Yeah. Yeah, you know what? Actually, Peter hates Denver. And he's leaving immediately. Yeah. He said, you know what? I think they might go to the Cup final. and I can't do this shit.

Yeah, I need a shorter summer. I, no, plenty of good, good dirty Shirley spots in Denver, so we're still good here. It's amazing. I think my favorite part, you know, to really set the scene for everyone. We're in Montreal. We're at the draft. We're at an Irish pub. I forget what it was called.

The server, very rude. I did not. She yelled at me. She yelled at me for no reason, I recall. because I got up to say hello to somebody who was sitting at a different table and I got scolded by the server because she thought that I was going to order from the bar.

And I was like, no, I was just going to say hello to like Frank Saravali who was sitting across the room and I got yelled at by the server. Anyways, I recall Peter being like, do you have dirty Shirley's? She was like, what? He's like, you know, like a Shirley temple that's like spiked. She's like, hmm. She might have happened to her credit.

made it happen. She did make it happen, but she was very, like, taken aback by the request. She said, do you know where you are right now? This is an Irish pub. We have beer on tap. Hey, I'm Irish. I'm Irish. And Irish people are allowed to like dirty shirt. Yeah. The only other time I'd been to that very specific place. So I'm celiac. People, I think, who've listened to enough, know this. And I remember I ordered. I was like, the last time I went to this place and I was in Montreal, I said, can I just get whatever your house red is? Like a glass of your house red and I was brought in amber ale. I love that. That, that, that actually is a great, like, Irish pub. Like, that's incredible. And I was like, oh, I'm so sorry. Like,

I'll keep this. Like, someone else will drink it. But like, do you have, like, red wine? She's like, why wouldn't you say wine? I'm like, I'm sorry. I thought, I thought a glass of house red was a universal. But anyways, I won't be going back there. I'm glad you got what you wanted, though, Peter. Yeah. I'm not sure if this will make it into the pie. If it'll be cut out. But my friend has a great story if he was in Ireland and he asked, he was at this pub and like, he'd gotten a drink, but he was, he needed some water. And he was like, can I, can I get a glass of water too?

And they're like, yeah, there's a fucking river out back. It's kind of awesome. Perfect. I think that makes the cut. That's great. Yeah. We can bleep it out. We've already bleeped out things before.

Peter, you wrote a book. Yes. What? I didn't realize this was coming. Sell your book. Maybe we can, maybe we can goose up your sales. What's the deal with those? Well, thank you for, yeah, thank you for giving me the platform. But it's kind of a book that I'm hoping will appeal to more than just Avalanche fans.

It's obviously very Avalanche focused, but it's kind of a book about how they built this team and kind of the roster construction and different players' backstories and pretty much how they all kind of converge. on this team and ultimately won a Stanley Cup. So there's some really interesting stories that people told me just about kind of like inside the team and even things like kind of the process of scouting Kail McCarr in junior A hockey when he was playing in Brooks, Alberta. Different things from that to, I don't know, like Landiske's contract extensions this past off season. I think we kind of delve into a lot of different topics there.

And I'm really grateful to all the players who kind of. talk to me throughout the process and gave me some some good insights. So it was, it's definitely, I don't know if the avs repeat, I do not think that this book writing process will repeat. I might need more than an off season to write another book. I might have been a bit ambitious, but it was really fun. And yeah, I'm excited about it. That's so great. When does it come out, Peter? So it should be up by the holidays. I think the tentative plan is late November. Okay, awesome. Well, congratulations. I think I sent you a text about it. You did. Yeah. So it was very... Okay. Got to check myself there.

I just waited. I just waited to do it on a podcast. On a part. I'm doing this. Yeah. I'm doing... A very performative content. Exactly. This is totally funny. I'm just... Sean does actually care. Nope. Just continue to have inferiority complex about not writing a book. Comes up with me and Craig all the time because he's written book and I haven't. It's not that big deal. Don't worry about it. Well, Sean, you wrote the intro for the... book that Peter actually wrote the whole thing for it. Wait, I have it right in front of me. They should have zoom in on the face. Okay, so this, we have carry me home from the athletic,

which they put out, which is great. It's like a very cool idea. And the table of contents is hilarious. I don't know if anyone's looked at this. So it goes, this is very visual for everyone. If anyone sees this on the YouTube, there's introduction by Sean Gentilly. And then, then the rest is by Peter Bob, Peter Bob, Peter Bob, Peter Bob, like the whole book is Peter Bob, but Sean wrote the intro. It was a good intro. It was a good intro. Yeah. There was very, I didn't read it. Okay, it's, there were very specific instructions given to me about what to have on that, on an intro, whatever. That's fine. They should just let you write that too, just giving you 100% of it.

I remember like, they said during the cup, they're like, oh yeah, Sean's going to write the intro. I was like, that is fine. I was so, I was like scrambled. So it's like, that works for me. Yeah. Yeah, you, no, you were, you weren't. I'm a little tired. Yeah.

All right. So are these, are they, where are we in camp now? How long have you been there a week? It's like a week. I don't know. Time doesn't matter. It's, it ceased to matter. It's a construct.

It is. I mean, it's right. What are we even? Yeah. It's very philosophical pod. Time is. Yeah. I'm feeling a little bit.

anxious all of a sudden. The work day. The work day is a capitalist construct as his time overall. That's true. So are Pete I think something fun about always or interesting about

checking teams out after they win a cup is like getting a vibe for whether they've managed to like flip the calendar like really actually turn it over and mentally physically whatever start to come to terms with the fact that they just get to come out here and try to do that again.

Is that the vibe that you've gotten from Colorado or is it still, you know, is there is there a hangover sense or are these dudes sincerely ready to roll? I think they're, they're pretty ready to roll. It's tough. I mean, the, the cup run definitely has impacted how they've approached this training camp just in

terms of tactical ways. Like I think a lot of the players who played heavy minutes in the cup run haven't appeared in a preseason game and probably won't until the last two. Nathan McKinnon, Cal McCar, they're probably only going to play two preseason games, the final two. I think you see obviously very like things like Gabe Lanneskog is still out with an lower body injury that's undisclosed. But I mean, we saw in the, he had knee surgery back in March and then was at points in the playoffs grabbing his knee at different. Like you can put two and two together kind of. I don't know for sure that that's what the injury is, but it certainly seems like it's a something, a lingering effect.

from the long cup run. You got Darren Helm missing time with an injury that he had dating back to last year. Valerian Atushkin is just getting back to speed after playing game six of the Stanley Cup with a broken foot and different things like that. So you kind of, I don't know if it's necessarily a championship hangover in terms of mentality, but just in terms of availability and kind of where people are at with things, not everyone is going to be ready to go at the start of the season. but from what I've seen, Nathan McKinnon still is very good at hockey. At least that is what my eyes tell me at training camp. And Bowen Byron and Kel McHard and DeVontes and Samuel Gerard and they're all going to be good defensemen this year. Like it's it still is the same team and I think there is still that hunger to do it again.

Yeah, I would not expect them to regress. I mean, maybe they're they don't have as much depth as last year, but they're not going to regress to the point where they're not a cup contender this year. And it seems like they have enough where, you know, look, I don't even want to use tread water in the sense. Like, this isn't the Boston Bruins who has like, you know, five really important players out until, you know, November or December, right? But it seems like with some of the guys who still are nursing things, like the abs are going to be okay to tread water enough that. I mean, they went through McKinnon being out for the beginning of the season and all those injuries last year. Like, I think this is a team with a core that is used to being able to like, let's just.

get through the stretch and we're going to be okay. That's not a new thing for them, right? Yeah, they started four or five and one last year. I had people in my Twitter mentioned saying that this is not a playoff team. Let's calm down a little bit. Let's relax. So, yeah, I don't think they're going to like flinch too much if they get off to like a 500 start through the first 10 or even 20 games. Like it's a mature bunch and they kind of know how to go about their business. And also they have really good players. Yeah, well, one of those players that I'm really curious about. And I think, you know, in all of my free agent boards and what the flame should be doing list, like Evan Rodriguez has been on that list for a while.

He's a super intriguing player and I'm really interested to see what he's going to do in Colorado. I saw they're down to one group at camp already, which is actually quite interesting that they made enough cuts to be down to one group. but it looks like he was second line left wing today. And again, that could shift. But like, what kind of role do you see Evan Rodriguez playing in Colorado? Yeah, I think definitely a middle six role. But he's kind of a nice player to where he can, he can kind of, if you need him to play second line center, he can do that.

Right now with Landisog out, they're giving and New Hook having the first go at second line center. He's been on the wing more. But he looked great in his preseason debut. He was really willing to fire shots on net. and just kind of let it rip. And I think he's someone that knows how to play with skilled players. He played with Crosby on the same line in Pittsburgh at points.

And I think that there was a practice earlier this camp where Mika ran and took a maintenance day and Rodriguez was on the top line with McKinnon and Lackett. So he's someone that I think they can trust defensively. And when he's scoring it, when he's on his game offensively, he can score at a really high rate, which Pittsburgh fans saw the first half of last year. He tapered off a little bit towards the end, but he's someone who has offensive ability, and at the very least is going to be worth the $2 million the abs are paying.

The avs are a team who can absolutely, like, squeeze out that kind of offensive juice from players. We've seen that for sure. Yeah, and McKinnon had a good, McKinnon had an interesting point where he talked about. He was like, we're at a point as a team where guys want to bet on themselves with us. and I thought that was really interesting. And you saw that with,

you see that with like Tampa the last few years. Like guys will sign a one or two year deal there to try and either boost their value or cup chase or do whatever they want. So I thought that was an interesting play. Yeah, it's funny that that's where the abs are in their lifespan as a franchise at this point. Like you're like, all right, I need to rehab my value a little bit

or whatever, get gused up. And yeah, because you mentioned Navon Rodriguez in Pittsburgh, the Penguins were that team for years, right? where guys were just signing one-year deals and just hoping to get their numbers up to a point where they would end up getting more. So the off-season, just overall, not just the Evan Roder, you guys signing.

I feel like the abs kind of couldn't have done better than they did, like all things considered, with the McCar extension and bringing back Natushkin. Yes, of course, they lose cadry, but I think people were, I would imagine, we're generally resigned to, to that happening. Is that the vibe you get from them? Like, is there, is there like palpable, you know,

happiness or, or satisfaction with the way the offseason went? Because it seemed like they were, like they were going to maybe get picked over a little bit more than they were. Yeah. Bring it back a lot of guys. I think they did kind of pretty early on. It was clear they picked the guys they wanted to bring back. They weren't going to be able to bring back Katry.

There was a brief stretch where it took. him so long to sign and kind of if you were putting the pieces together it was kind of like has he not gotten the offers he's wanted is it possible that he just he wanted to stay in Colorado like he was very open of like I want to be back here I love it here um they wanted him back financially it was going to be really really difficult to make that work and it ultimately didn't work and I think people were not surprised by that so I think that was like a disappointment but an expected disappointment around at least um I think it was yeah I think it was a solid off season, but it was mostly just kind of standing path and then kind of bolstering when they could

and they bringing in someone like Evan Rodriguez. And they're going to, I mean, they have a little cap space left, which they can accrue and then and use it the deadline, which I think is probably ultimately their plan. This team isn't a finished product. I think it's kind of interesting to look at, is this team right now better than the avalanche were going into the regular season last year. And I think you can make the case that they are, or at least are on par. So, so I think it was a solid offseason and they're going to continue to try and make moves up until the trade deadline. Is there like a one for one, is there like a one for one for cadre? Like, like, who is going to take over his minutes? Who's going to take over his role? Is it, is it, is it, is it, is it, is it,

New Hook? Like, who is the, who's the, who's the swap? I think New Hook will get the first shot. I mean, this is a guy who, he was a first round pick in 2019. He's, he's shown offensive flashes. He's been pretty good. And now it's kind of a time to see if he's ready for that next step. And if he's not, then they'll probably move someone else to second line center or they'll try and try and sign him or to train for someone else. New hooks, obviously, a part of the team's long-term plans. It's just, it's a lot to ask a 21-year-old to be the number to center on a cup contending team. So he's going to get a crack at it. And depending on how he does, he might fill a lot of cadres minutes or they'll continue to assess their options.

What about the goaltending position, Peter? I know, you know, they let Darcy Kemper walk in free agency traded for Alexander Georgiev and then right away signed him to that three-year contract. He didn't have a great year last year. And I'm not sure he's been a number one guy before. So is that kind of that one big question mark in terms of the aves this season is, is their goal tending going to be good enough? Yeah. I mean, for me, it's a really big question. I think that it's kind of an interesting dilemma because I think what the abs maybe saw last year was.

And to no fault of Darcy Kemper's, he had a stick stuck in his eye or well, not in his eye. But it like, he could barely see like. He wasn't great at points last year. So, yeah. He had an awesome regular season, and then in the playoffs, he was good, the first two games against National. Then the stick incident happened. And he wasn't right until game four of the cup. I mean, he had a shut out in game two, but that's allowed like 15 shots.

But the, so he's a guy that, or so I think the abs probably saw, okay, last year we won the Stanley Cup with average to points below average goal. attending. So if we can just get that out of Alexander Giorgiyev and not spend two million dollars more a year on Kemper, who's both older and he signed for five something in Washington, which can earn that. But I think they saw this as a place to save some cap space and they're relying on their defensive structure to make life easier on Giorgiyev. Because Giorgiab wasn't very good last year. He also was playing for the Rangers who defense. offensively allowed a lot of chances. Igor Shisterkin saved a lot of those high danger chances.

But Giorgiov isn't a Shasturkin level goalie, but he could be good enough to get this team to where they want to go. And they have Pavel Frensos, who won them the Western Conference Finals when Kemper was out. Yeah, it's good point. I think it's interesting, you know, if there's a team that's going to bank on their defensive structure and the personnel that they have on the back end to ensure that their medial, or goal attending is going to be okay.

I'm not sure how many other teams you would want to bank on in that case than Colorado slash Kail McCar. I mean, you look at like, I mean, Philip Grubauer came to Colorado and had great numbers. You look at Kemper. Everything went going great for him,

by the way. I think he, I think he, like, made Dom, like, short circuit. Dom was, like, broken last year.

He's a broken. man because of Philip Grubauer. The financial hits were coming fast and furious. I like Gruberra. I think he's better than he showed last year. Yeah. He can't be worse. He really, really, really struggled.

So you look at like kind of the abs have had goalies that they've brought in. Gruberauer is kind of a similar point in his career as Georgiev, where he hadn't really been a consistent starter. They bring him in and then he's a, obviously none of those ass teams got over the the hump, but he was a starting goalie on some really good teams. I think it's like I'm just looking at the abs payroll. And I think, you know, I don't think giving Darcy Kemper, you know, $5 million would be prohibitive in signing Nathan McKinnon to the contract that he just

signed. But like when you're talking about guys who are making $9 million and $12 million, et cetera, dollars, like saving $2 million in terms of the goaltending position, that stuff matters, that counts, especially when you're trying to continue to build a Stanley Cup contender. Don't look at me like I'm a psycho or captain obvious here, Sean. I'm not. No, no, no, no, no, no.

I'm, I'm not, I'm agreeing. Like, if you, no, you say, you say, you say, you say, two million, you say, two million dollars on, on, on bringing in Yorgiav, and that's probably the difference between letting, letting the, you know, letting the chiskin right now for 12 point, whatever. It's the difference of having Evan. Rodriguez and not having other Rodriguez. Yeah, good point.

Smart, Peter. I try. I think the overarching question too here, and that we kind of teased at the beginning, but we haven't actually asked yet. And it's one of the top 10 storylines in the league that we're previewing on the athletic hockey show.

Can the Colorado Avalanche repeat a Stanley Cup champions? Do you want me to answer? That. Yes. Okay. All right. No, no.

No, you don't let's shut up. The answer is, yes, they certainly can. I don't know if they will, but this is a team that should be up there with the favorites in the league. They still have a ton of talent. They're, I would imagine, going to make moves at the deadline to kind of bolster their roster. Is it as good a team as last year? It's going to be hard to be, I mean, last year they were 16 and 4 in the playoffs and tied the record for most wins, regular and postseason combined ever. So it's going to be hard to match that.

But also, like, there's probably some margin for error. If you go 16 and 4 in the playoffs, you can probably afford to get a little bit worse and still be a contender. So it's... Ooh, Peter. They're... Right. I mean, they're definitely not as deep as last year, but I think they've still... They've earned the right to be a contender, especially now that they've gotten over the hump and I've actually won.

What's your favorite Nathan McKinnon story? Ooh, I wrote about this in, well, when he complimented my hat. That's my favorite. Okay, can you walk us through this? I feel like we're going to need to get like the social team to splice this in here. Sure. I feel like I saw the thing on Twitter and I was like, I need the video of this immediately. Well, so what happened was I was in Nashville. Oh, I know about the hat. Yeah. Oh, oh, wait. No, continue. No, please tell us everything. So I was like, I'm getting a cowboy hat. So I got a cowboy hat.

And then some of the like abs like people around the team were like, oh, you should wear it to the game. And it's like, eh, I don't know. And then I finally did. And then they were kind of like when the abs won, it was like they won the series. They're like just where it's the press conference. It's like, eh. All right.

Why not? Was this like team staff? Well, it was like the like ads.com writer and like. And also some of the other writers. of the other writers. Yeah, it was Chris McFarlane being like, Joe Sackettick telling you to wear it that way. It was like, I need to see this hat here. No, but so I wore it to the press conference and then I asked Nate a question and his answer

was like, or I asked him like what the turning point in the game was and he was like, it was when we started thinking about your hat, Peter, which was very funny. But my actual, I think, favorite Nathan McKinnon's story, there are a few. but one I really love is he went to Shattuck St. Mary's in Minnesota, and he and the goalie in his year, Danny Tyrone was his name, became really, really good buddies. They did a lot. They worked out together.

They were very focused on fitness, on eating healthy. They refused to eat desserts on their birthdays. The like dorm mom made them yogurt parfaits because they didn't want cake, all that stuff. But they also had, they went and made, they were going to have a knee hockey tournament. And they went and got the dorm mom, who is super nice woman. Her name's Jody Cook. She took them to Walmart and they like bought like all the,

they pretty much all these arts and craft supplies and they make this giant trophy for the, the Breck dorm knee hockey tournament. And this is Nathan McKinnon and also the starting goal. So they're like, we're going to win and we're going to, they glued a Stanley Cup to the top like a little. mini and they were like so certain they were going to win and then they get they get beat um and i i got the sense it was like it wasn't in the finally like that was kind of early on and just were livid like like had to be like separated like Nathan had to be sent away to calm down Danny had to be sent

away to calm down they were just so angry at themselves they were so sure that they were going to win win this this trophy that they made um but alas they did not they came up for what they did do to the trophy. The other, I think, uh, I think actually the Dormon still hasn't, but the winning team got. Oh, okay, okay, okay. They just needed, what needed to happen was they, you know, needed to lose the Dorm Hockey tournament early, a couple years in a row. And that helped, that helped push them over the hump when they finally, they finally beat

the defending Dorm hockey, or the defending knee hockey champion. Well, I think what people don't realize is that when Nathan McKinnon said, I haven't one shit. He was thinking not about losing to Vegas. He was thinking back to the Brecht door. Me, hockey. Yeah. But yeah, there was, I had a lot of good Shattuck story. I did an article a couple years ago about his time at Shattuck. And it was so funny. Some of the hearing about younger, younger Nathan McKinnon. That's awesome. I feel like Sean talked a lot about him at the, the player media tour. He was great. He was on he was on Tilt in Vegas. He was. He's, He's been in a great mood.

He's been tired of reporters every day. Yeah, he's not sick of us yet. No. It's early, though. Yeah. Thanks, Pete. Awesome. Well, yeah, thank you.

I feel like that's, that's all we had for you, Peter. I'm really glad we talked about your hat. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you for giving it the opportunity to shine. It met the Stanley Cup over the summer. Really? I think I.

Did you wear it to like Cole Harbor, Nova Scotia? No, I wore it to the media party. and uh okay yeah it got to meet the meet the cup there she put the do you put it like in the bowl yeah i can send you i feel like that's yeah let me see can you ask you please yeah i think that's i i think that's on the right side of like ethical behavior yeah yeah with the stealing cup it's funny you're allowed to do that yeah it was it was it was it was the media cup party before anyone i was it was just yeah good time i had a dirty shirley that thing hell yeah Full circle.

Amazing. Yeah. Amazing. Thank you so much, Peter. Yeah. Thank you for having me. It's always great to have Peter Baugh on the show in your life on the phone. He's great.

I'm a huge Peter fan. He covered Missou football before he moved over to the NHL group. And I remember when he first joined, I just moved to Calgary. He just moved to Denver and, you know, we would we would have little phone calls and chat about, you know, life and in him being new in a new city and being new to hockey. He's great. So I'm just so happy to see everything that Peter's done. Moving to the Rocky Mountains. Yeah, both of us bonded by the American Canadian Rocky Snow.

But like, you know, just a couple of years ago, him, you know, calling and asking questions about being new on the bead. things to do in the NHL vertical and all this. And he's just, I mean, he doesn't need my help with anything anymore. He's just great. Did you write a book? Absolutely not. I'm going to ask him for tips on how to do my job soon. But he was great.

That's always good insight. I think, I don't know if there's anyone who's, you know, better to talk about the Colorado Avalanche right now than Peter Baugh. He's awesome. He's really ingrained himself in with that team and in a good way. So that was a good chat. Do you think the ass can repeat? Yeah, of course.

They're really good. I mean, I'd be worried about Yorgia if I were, if I were them. But I think Pete's kind of, he sort of, I think he, we're on the verge of, he's sort of like, he alluded to this that Yorgiav looked worse last year, I think, almost by comparison to Shisterkin. Because what Chisturkin did for the Rangers last season was just next level. Yeah, everything looks. Yeah, next level. Look a downgrade. Yeah, it was next level weirdo shit from him pretty much.

And that was a bad five-on-five team for huge chunks of the season. Yeah, they turned it around near the playoffs. Well, it's because they added a bunch of good, they added Andrew Cop and they added, you know, a bunch of Frank Vitano help. They added play drivers at five-on-five, which is what they didn't have. So, Yorgie have, you know. Where did a cop sign this summer? I'm having a brain fart. Detroit.

Detroit. Right. Right, right, right. He's great player. The Red Wings are like, I know I feel like I've just brought this up constantly, like in the first two shows. But the Red Wings are a team like as I've been working my way through these previews, because again, this is just like dominating. They're interesting. There's a time of time.

Every moment of my, every moment of my waking life. And when you write these things, like by the end of it, you're like, oh, yeah, I'm really interested to see what's going to happen with the predators or, you know, the flyers or the star. I'm sincerely fascinated in what's going on in Detroit this season because of, because I hasn't been clearly had, I hasn't been clearly had enough, right? He was like, I'm not, I'm done,

I'm done sucking. Well, it was the right timing too, though, right? Like, it's one thing to say I'm done sucking. It's another to have,

you know, some of the right puzzle pieces in place to be able to say, let's do something about this. Totally. There was no point in tanking anymore because they were, they were too good. they were too good to tank. It's really tough to tank if you have

more at cider and a legitimate first line with like, you know, Larkin and Bertuzi and for sure. And Lucas, in Lucas Raymond, who by the way, Lucas Raymond? I have finally like internalized the fact that his first name is Lucas

and not Mason. I called him I called him Mason Raymond. Yeah, that's terrible. That's worse than you always called Brandon Tannove, Chris Tannove, didn't you? And that doesn't even make any sense because you covered the Brandon, not the Chris. Well, I mean, but Chris Tanov was, it's been, was in the league for seven years before Brandon made it. So it's like, I only have room for one dude with, with a given last name.

I've been around Leafs. I was around Leafs camp. And I was talking to Chris Cuthbert, who is one of the play-by-play people with Sportsnet. He's awesome. I'm a huge fan of CC. And we were talking about some of the debt players in Toronto and what might happen at the bottom of the lineup, blah, blah, blah, top of the lineup. And I just, I couldn't stop calling Nick Robertson and Jason Robertson. And he kept correcting me.

And he was just like, I'm probably going to go on air tomorrow and call him Jason Robertson now. He's like, stop talking to me. You've planted the seed. And it was, I was with the flames, I watched Jason Robertson in the first round of the playoffs. I talked to him. He's awesome. And I'm like, I can't, my brain can't understand that there are two people who are their own humans on different hockey teams. Anyways.

Jason Robertson still unsigned by the Dallas Stars. Possible bridge still can at $7.5 million. Like this is like the way my brain is working at this point. How was he not signed yet? That's crazy. I don't know. Like I can just feel myself becoming. Not enough money.

Got to save that for the depth players. I can just feel myself becoming like a less well-rounded person. already. Like that's just the mode we're in with all this preseason show. Like I haven't paid attention to barely paid attention to the news. Certainly haven't paid attention to anything you know, TV or movie or music related for the last for the last for the last couple weeks. Yes. Because I've had to sit there and figure out, you know, whether Philip Tomasino's going to score 20 goals this season for the for the press. Yeah. If anyone didn't know, Sean's doing the season previews and he'll talk about how they're taking over his life any chance he gets

it's that and then all these uh and then all these all these all these podcasts that i have to record with people who watch it tall rate i would say Craig healy Ryan Lambert just a bunch of people who's yeah right can vaguely kind of deal with has anything happened in the last few days should know about. Are there internet things I should have paid attention to? Yeah. I feel like Ryan helped you with that. And I'm not the right person to help with this either because I don't pay attention either.

So the one thing that I did see that neither of us knew existed, but started looking at before our hockey show. It was this top 100 greatest TV shows of all time. I think that brings us to our secret for this segment is that Haley Salve. is wearing a Bobby Bacala t-shirt. So remember how we said last week that we had the third segment if you make it this far? You have a secret. Well, yeah, this is your secret.

This was the best $30 I've ever spent in my life. Haley's. It's Bobby Bacala, my favorite. So if you want to know something about me, this isn't even really a secret. I love Bobby Bacola. Why? I just think he's a sweet man. You know, my dad is a huge Sopranos fan.

Like we have all the DVD box sets, you know, when you used to do that. When, you know, it wasn't on Netflix. So you would buy the DVDs and watch them all. So there's, I've all the Sopranos DVD box sets in my house whenever I go home. And I grew up watching the Sopranos. But I watched it in bits and pieces. So I was like, I knew all these different things that happened. And I knew somebody once told me that I looked like metal.

soprano also and I was just like oh god which was great because the sopranos is great but meadow also kind of sucks just hold on you're gonna don't spoil anything for people I'm not I'm just saying there were certain things that happened that I knew about and there was one thing that I is this really a spoiler no no no no no no no no no no no no okay whatever don't don't bring that up

he's just the best okay just watch the show he's the best Steve Sharipa blocked me on Twitter the guy that played follow me on I caught that I caught that block from the man himself Were you also blocked by Bobby Flea for a while? Yeah I probably Bobby Flay probably could have called the cops on me if you wanted to Honestly at one point

We'll just we'll just leave it at that Supranos number one show of all time According to Rolling Stone that's the only thing that's That's the only thing that's the segue into the secret is that I'm wearing a Bobby Bacola shirt and the Supranos were named the top show Yeah, it cost $89.99 on Etsy. 89. This was $30.

With delivery and taxes included. $30 bucks. $30 bucks well spent. Absolutely. Let's get to the user comments and get the hell out of here. Why did you even bring this up? I mean, we're, how long are we supposed to talk? I have a podcast where I talk about the Supranos for three hours on end.

Like, I don't, I don't need another one. Whatever. Okay, fine. Let's get to the comments. We got a lot of them. Some of them were a little bit strange. We can just, we can just skate past those. One of the questions here from Ariel R was praising me for giving you a hard time because you're, you get away with too much and that's not okay. And I'm not like Craig. I'm not going to allow you to do your bullshit. Is that what Ariel? She could be reverencing a lot of things in my life. I feel like she's talking about it. I don't know.

She says, I don't really like Sean. Haley, you should talk more. It's not correct. Just kidding. Ariel, Ariel,

please check back in and say. Just, you know what? Can you let me finish reading this? Oh, wait, stop it. Are we also going to be getting regular updates on women's hockey?

Oh, yeah. The show is great already, and I can't wait to see where it goes with the season. Cheers. Yes, we will do some more regular updates on women's hockey. We'll try to do, you know, we'll try to mix in with some of the NHL player and coach

and exec interviews, some women's interviews as well. I think that's really important with the job that I have being a national NHL and women's hockey writer and we'll want to make sure that that's reflective on the show. You know, one of the updates we maybe didn't talk about off the top of the show in terms of news was Sammy Joe Small being named the new president of the Toronto Six with the premier hockey federation, the PHF. I did have a great chat with Sammy Joe today, Thursday afternoon. That's going to be used in a big story that we're working on, you know, for the for the National Women's Hockey Vertical.

So that's something you can look forward to in the, like, print medium. It wasn't a podcast interview, but definitely we'll have some updates and we'll have some interviews with women's hockey people as well as NHLers. because guess what? Sometimes they're way more interesting. Sometimes. Yeah. Guess what?

95% of that time. They don't speak in cliches and they actually appreciate media coverage. Lots of love the new show here. Hey, this is a good. It's from Donny H. What's a question you wanted to ask a player slash coach

that was shot down by their PR or your editor? Do you have one of those? Because I have a couple. If you have some, go for it. I've got to think. A dumb thing that me and Russo we're going to do at the Vegas tour was we were going to have people draft Halloween candies. And we realized early on that that was just not the vibe that that was weird.

So like Jeremy Swamen, Jeremy Swamon from the Bruins came out first and he would have been able to be like, oh, like, Reese's cups. It seemed like a funny idea when we were going into it. And I was like, that's not going to happen. But that could have been really fun. It would have been fun. Because then it's just like if like, if the guy who came after you'd be like, you can draft a Halloween candy, but it can't be Reese's cups. Yeah. Well, we're not like, we're going to seriously going to like, we were going to print out. like a list so people could cross stuff off. And we realized early on that just that was not.

That would have been really fun. I was disappointed. Because you could have got some reaction from guys being like, God damn it. It didn't. I really wanted Reese's cups. It didn't match the vibe. What's your favorite Halloween candy? Wait, I have another answer here.

The other thing, this wasn't really shot down by anybody, but it was something I took shit for was after, this is when I worked for the Pittsburgh Post-Cazette, after I believe it was, no, it had to be their second Stealing Cup when they beat the Predators in 2017. Those guys were several of them were very obviously like pissed drunk during the

parade. They started early, it was really funny. Those guys were having a great time. In Olimada after the parade passed out on the roof of his apartment building, like passed out on the condo

and somebody who was sitting who like lived across the street from him in downtown Pittsburgh like took a photo of Oly just kind of like sprawed out on on porch on like you know porch furniture on on his balcony he wasn't wearing a shirt his jersey was just like was just like laying over there in the day after that they heard or a day or two later they had their breakup day

when they packed up all their stuff and went home and I just asked I asked Oli like basically like what what the hell happened out there chimp and they're There were other dudes on the beat who I'm not going to name who I may or may not have worked with at the time who were livid. They were so, so mad. I don't know. They're like, why aren't you asking about his contract status?

It got back to me after the fact that I made, like, all he didn't, all he didn't care. He's hilarious. They just want Stanley Cup, lighten up. These are dudes that cover the team and they were pissed. And that's always the thing That young Sean coming in and making the mockery of us. Yeah, that young 31 year old guy coming in and, you know, is very, very, very obnoxious. And that's always a thing I think of when you like, because everyone's a spoil sport in one way or another.

Yeah, that's super lame. Media, media players, PR execs. But that was self-policing by the media. I got, I got dimed out by some by some. That's lame. That would have been a really funny story. I wrote it. An inside look at Olimata passing out on a rooftop.

The story that I did was like... What else are you going to talk about in the summer? It was like an assessment basically of their drunken like parade day pretty much. Like here's sifting through the fallout. It's fun. Yeah. It's like innocent fun. Who the hell cares?

You're allowed to have fun with this shit sometimes. Apparently not. Anyways. Chris E. He says as national writers, do you have any trips planned for the season that are particularly exciting? And as for unsolicited travel recommendations, if you're ever in Dallas, I recommend Lockhart's Smokehouse for barbecue.

And some great coffee shops are Wayward and Peaberry down in Oak Cliff. Okay, so when I was in Dallas, I don't know if I said this last week, though. I forget the name of it. There was a coffee shop that I went to every single day when I was in Dallas for the first round of playoffs. and it had the best matcha latte. It was an iced strawberry matcha latte.

And it was delicious. I walked about a mile every single day, mile there, mile back to go to this coffee shop to get this strawberry matcha. And it was so good. And there was a sweet green across the street as well. So I'd get my strawberry matcha

and I'd go and get my sweet green. And I don't remember the name of this place. But it was so good, and I bought. Very helpful. And I remember buying a cup. It's a coffee place across from a sweet green in Dallas. So if anybody knows that. I'm trying to scroll and find it.

It was delicious. And I remember, like, I love buying mugs and stuff when I find coffee shops that I like when I'm on the road. And I bought a mug from this place. And then I broke it. because the water was too hot or I dropped it or something, which was devastating. But I don't know. Do you have any exciting trips coming up?

I think I might have a couple, but they're unconfirmed at this time. It was in the Main Street District. I'm looking at a picture of this coffee shop. I'm looking at a picture of the matcha. This is unbearable. I don't have any trip. coming up. I went to Vegas a couple weeks ago. Other than that, I don't have anything.

I don't know anything set, but I don't know. I'm, I might be trying to get down, do some, do some work on the Panthers at some point. That could be fun. As she goes to South Florida for for work. I don't think that's ever happened before. Are you still looking this up? This is unbelievable. There's a picture of the, I have a picture of the Devin Booker sign out front of the sweet green. I don't have a picture of the coffee shop. This is so upsetting. Wow. Our buddy slarms McKenzie, who's a staple from the...

Yeah, just move on. It's fine. I, whatever. Somebody has to say something. No, we're done with this. I don't know the name of it. I'm sorry, everybody. While you're combing through maps of Metro Dallas.

No, I'm looking at my photos. Just whatever. Move on. I'm sorry. If you're ever in Dallas and you're in the main street district and you're near a sweet green, look across the street.

We need to move on. Slurms is here. Since we're not allowed to ask about repatriating Austin Matthews, let's hear your best trade scenarios that put Brady in Tampa making the Battle of Florida the Kachuk War. It was Merritt Coffee in Deep Ellum. Oh, for God said.

Okay. Say it one more time. Merit Coffee in Deep Ellum, Dallas. Okay. And it was the strawberry oat milk macha iced latte. We can't talk about this anymore. This is, that's enough. Okay,

wait, but I just have to say in terms of Dallas barbecue, I went to Katie Trail Ice House. And I had, I'm looking at the receipt right now, I had queso and chips, they were bomb. And then I had a taco plate,

which was incredible. And I had an 18 ounce frozen margarita. You're like going out of your way to talk, more slowly than you normally do. No, I'm explaining. You know as much as much time on the- I'm explaining very clearly what I had and why it was good

if anyone is in Dallas and wants to go do something cool and fun. You're being, whatever. Go back to the Kachuk thing. Slurms wants our best trade scenario is to put Brady Kachuk in Tampa so he can play against Matthew in the Battle of Florida.

Brother, I don't think that's happening under any circumstances here. Not for another six to eight years. I do wonder what a trade like that would look like, though, because you got to have long-term. You got to have long-term money going back out. Like, if they both didn't sign those eight-year contracts, then maybe. But I will say that that is a really great fun thing. Like, I'm sick of talking about the Kuchucks being on the same team.

I want to see Matthew back in Calgary and Brady on the Oilers. Or Matthew on the Oilers and Brady and Calgary. or just Brady and Tampa Matthew Kachuk on the Toronto Maple Leafs and Brady Kachuk with Ottawa Senators Yeah right

How does this question that slurms ass affect the leaves We should have asked Peter How the Nathan McKinnon deal affects Austin Matthew's contract extension I don't know Peter would be like

I've got to go Yeah boy Doesn't seem like he likes conflict. It would have to be, it would have to be Brady Kachuk for Braden Point, I think. Yeah. Or, Sean, somebody asked how much shrimp you ate at Red Lobster. Great question. I ate five orders of shrimp.

They bring you out two to start. And then we reloaded three times after that. I believe I ate an entire basket of, cheddar bay biscuits on my own too as well. In two large beers. And I live to tell the tale. Jesus. Travis says,

you can't tease the next four teams in the preseason rangs then bleep them out. Guess what, Travis? We can. We can do whatever we want. This is our show. It was really funny. You don't understand how funny we found that. It was Daniel's idea. We were like,

yeah, that makes it a hundred times. Daniel Rocks and it's hilarious. And I was giggling the entire time I was making it happen. Yeah. I can imagine you just doing the like edits of like, uh, well,

but I purposely, because the way Sean read him out, he read him pretty quickly. And it wouldn't have been as funny to have like one long bleep. So I actually spaced out. Yeah, it's like bleat,

bleat, all right. Okay, wait. Let's get, let's get serious. The, this weekend we're running the, and,

okay. Everybody, everybody enjoyed. Wow, that means the fs are going to be really high. This is so stupid. Is that it? Is that it? Is that the end of the... I think we're done here.

Volume two of the Threaty show. I think so. I have also got to say I am both thrilled and deeply disappointed in Danielle leaving the three attempts I made. to exit the show last week. You will just like do your best here. Get us out of here. We can move on. We can move.

I believe in you. Let's go. You're right. Everybody stare. Time to say goodbye. Thanks everyone for listening to volume two of the Friday edition of the Athletic Hockey Show. If you're not an athletic subscriber, you can join us at theathletic.com slash hockey show.

It's got an annual subscription for $1 month for the first six months. months. Once again, I'm Haley Salvia with Sean Gentilly. Thank you so much for listening to The Friday Show.