The Athletic Hockey Show - Shane Pinto suspended 41 games for activities relating to sports wagering

Episode Date: October 26, 2023

Hailey, Max and Sean discuss the breaking news involving Ottawa Senators restricted free agent Shane Pinto, who has been suspended for 41 games for activities related to sports gambling.The crew comments on NHL owners voting to decentralize the draft, and if there will be one last event held in Vegas this June? Plus, they analyze the somewhat questionable team names which have been proposed by the PWHL, and we stick tap Jack Hughes and his insane start to the season. Subscribe to The Athletic Hockey Show on YouTube: http://youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowSigning up for Chime takes minutes. So join the millions of other Chime members and sign up today. Get started at http://chime.com/nhlshow. That’s http://chime.com/nhlshow. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is The Athletic Hockey Show. All right, what's up, everybody? Welcome to The Athletic Hockey Show. It's another Thursday edition of the show. Haley, Shong-Gin-Tilly, Max Boltman here with you. We actually have some news to talk about this morning, guys. In a weird week where there was one game on Monday, one game on Wednesday, and 16 games on Tuesday, we were like, do we just talk about Frozen Frenzy for an hour?

No. We've got some news. guys, Shane Pinto, suspended for 41 games for activities related to sports wagering. Feels like we should just get right into it. No need to ask about your day. I'm fine. Thank you. Wait, you didn't. You specifically didn't ask. Okay. I'm doing better than Shane Pinto. I didn't get suspended for 41 games today. This is a lot of wreckage to sift through already, right? Like, it's a, it's a complicated situation. It's a, it's a complicated situation. It's we just watched a lot of it unfold in real time, whether it was the insiders like

our Chris Johnston and Pierre LeBron and Elliot Freeman just kind of making their way through the bits and bobs of news that come out of this because it is. It's complicated. We've seen it from other sports in the past. We've seen it from the NFL specifically when a gambling suspension or wagering related suspension happens, there's a certain level of gasping and guesswork that takes place initially because it is still shocking to see even though we've lived in this world for a few years now where sports wagering is omnipresent and obnoxious and inescapable. Whenever you see that an athlete gets pinched for something related to it, there's that moment where you're like, oh, man. And so for the last hour or whatever it's been, we've kind of been

tracking the fallout. It's fascinating. Right. Right. And just I guess for a peek behind the curtain, we were scheduled to start at noon. And I think like 10, 15 minutes before, we are going to record, we got like the rumblings that a suspension was coming. And then the official NHL stuff starts coming out between 12 and 1230. So it really has just been like, all right, let's, let's wait for all the official stuff to come out before we get going. And before we get to Max here, just say from the NHL's statement, the league's investigation found no evidence that Pinto made any wagers on NHL games. But this brings in almost more unknowns because the only thing that we found laid out in the CBA is that gambling on any NHL game is prohibited.

The league's not going to be going into any more detail at this time and they likely won't as the statement says they said, the NHL considers this matter closed absent the emergence of new information. We will have no further comment. So it's kind of like, okay, so we didn't wager on NHL games. They're not allowed to wager on NHL games, but Shane Pinto is still suspended for 41. Max, what do you make it?

Well, that in itself, I think, is a problem that we're not going to get more clarity on this. Yes, for us lowly podcasters, of course, we want to be able to tell a little more than this. But actually, I think for the players, right? Like, when I'm coming to you live from Detroit where James Gate has been playing out over the last several months. And if there is any, you know, upshot that I took away from all the NFL stuff is that all the NFL's rules and nuances of this, are laid out very clearly. You know that you can't bet on anything at the team facility, even if you can bet on non-NFL games at home on your own time. You know kind of those little ins and outs. With the NHL, the rule is so narrow that as we go looking for this, yes, perhaps to

do a little bit of digging that the NHL would rather not be done. I'm sure they give their players a little more information than they give the public, but I still think it serves everybody, the players for it to be rampantly out there. This is what you can do. This is what you can't do. This is what this suspension will be. With the NFL, I can tell you that if you bet on your own game, it's two years. If you bet on an NFL game that you didn't play on, it's one year. And if you bet on something else at the facility or whatever, I think it's two weeks. I know that. And I don't cover the NFL. We should know what this is for the NHL. Right. And I will say this seems like this should be something, you know, coming out of what's happening with Shane Pinto.

So like regardless if there's any kind of appeal that happens, like even if Shane Pinto just takes the 41 games, like I think the next step for the NHLPA is to go to the league and say like, we need to put something, you know, we need to update this policy. Like there should be some feedback to the league saying like, hey, there needs to be more than one thing in here that's outlining this because that's something we saw in the NFL this year, right? It was in September of this year. The league kind of ratcheted up its harshest punishment. a lifetime ban. If you're betting on, if there's like match fixing, like betting on your own games, like, again, if you go out and say, I'm going to

bet on us losing and then you drop a bunch of passes, your ban for life. But it also reduce its penalties for betting on other sports while at team facilities. So the one thing that the NFL did well is they laid it all out there. So players and fans, the league, everyone knows where things stand. We don't really know that with Shane Pinto.

They laid it all out there with Jameson. William specifically, when he was suspended, we knew straight out of the gate that he placed a college football bet or whatever, a non-NFL bet at the team facility. So he got X games. We knew that from the jump. And then over the course of the appeals process, when they decided, you know, and Jameson Williams also far from the only, you know, involved, player involved in something like this, right? There's been plenty of NFL players or a handful of NFL players over the last couple years who've gotten caught up in this in the wake of that after making it very clear why he was suspended for the amount of time he was suspended the next step was changing the policy and now haley like you said the punishment is

less strict for betting on baseball games or college football games or whatever and it's more strict for betting on NFL games and it's way more strict for betting on games that involve your team Your band for life. It's clear, right? And I think as, because let's be realistic. It's 1244 on Thursday as we're recording this. If you're listening to this on Friday morning or Thursday night, there's a decent chance that like more news will have come out and we're going to have some, maybe some more clarity,

maybe some more reporting, whatever, because that's just how this stuff tends to work. But if we, so whatever, talking about Shane Pinto specifically and whatever happened with him specifically is pointless. The bigger point, the bigger upshot is that whenever this happens again, because God knows it will, because it's impossible not to, given the prevalence of gambling in our society, which is a whole other conversation. This is going to happen again.

And whenever it happens again, there needs to be some extra added clarity and specificity involved because this is no spot-free ambiguity, even if it's public. I'm not saying we have to know everything either, but there needs to be a degree of honesty and clarity here because of what it involves. It involves gambling. It involves money. It involves competitive integrity and all that sort of stuff. And again, I don't want to get into the whole gambling conversation because we can talk, we can sit here and argue morality about that for as long as we want. But when you're talking about the competitive integrity of the league and also just the overall desire to stop this from happening, moving for. forward and prevent NHL players from getting suspended for gambling related issues,

like we got to have a better idea of what is allowed, what isn't, and what the penalties are going to look like for the varying kind of categories of offenses. Yeah, I think we all have a little bit of sympathy for the players in this new frontier of figuring out, okay, I can order Chipotle from my phone at my apartment and I can place a bet on an MLB game or whatever. In the case of the NFL, at least, we don't know the NHL's policy on the I can place a bed in an MLB game from my apartment.

I can order a Chipotle on my phone from the facility. Why wouldn't I be able to use my phone for this? You're figuring this out in real time, and it's going to take a couple guys getting burned. Learning the hard way, right? Like, absolutely. But if that's going to happen, don't let it take 10 guys getting burned before you make a specific clarifier. This is what you can do. This is what you can't do.

Put it out there, like, as publicly as possible, just so that it reaches as many of your, your own people as possible. And in some regard, I do feel bad for Shane Pinto because he's doing what Austin Matthews and Wayne Gretzky exhort him to do on television a million times a hockey game, right? And that's the other door that we don't necessarily need to walk through, but it is.

It's a tough situation. And it's the new world when it comes to it, when it comes to this sort of stuff, even though we're on whatever, the third full season of it being part of the process. I mean, I'm just going to come out and say, it, I think that's a steep punishment, especially when we consider how much betting content is shoved down our throats in the year of 2023.

Totally. How much money does the NHL make from those bet MGM ads? How much money does, like, SportsNet and ESPN make from their sponsored betting content? Everyone's like getting money from the spawn con with sports betting. It's everywhere. So, I don't know. I think when you've got a Wayne Gretzky bet MGM commercial every 10 minutes during a hockey game, I think slapping a 41 game suspension on a guy for not betting on an NHL game when the only rule is that you can't bet on NHL games is a little crazy to me.

We don't know all the details. We don't know exactly what happened. But I'm going to go out and just say it at this point in time at 1245 on Thursday with the information we have, I think that's a really steep fine. Go ahead, Max. What I will say, though, Haley, is that if you're the NHL, I'm sure, you'd probably, you'd, you'd, prefer, I assume, that these guys just not bet at all, right? You don't get to have that kind of control over your players. Like, you only get to have control over the competitive balance parts. But I can understand why the punishment would be this hard because you're trying to set an

example to these guys. Like, don't line step, don't guess. Don't, you know, don't take any chances on this because the punishment, even on something that, like, we'll see what it turns out to be. But the punishment can be severe no matter what it is. So, like, don't take any chances. I get that. I guess I'd rather just know exactly what happened before we can. I know I just said I'm going to go there and say it's steep, but, you know, it's hard to, it's hard without knowing exactly what happened here. And we should say,

this is the first suspension for gambling and hockey in 75 years. It's also one of hockey's lengthiest suspensions for off ice conduct ever. And it sounds like, this is according to Daily Face Off, so from Frank Saravale, the league's investigation centered around a sweep of gambling partners that revealed a Pinto connection to a third party better. So that's from DFO.

Yeah, the level of technology that these books are operating with and using can't really be overstated, right? Because we saw it, again, not to keep harping on the NFL examples, but we've seen it, you've seen it in that league. Like, they know. They know when it's coming from players. And that's part of the layer of, I'm using like air quotes here, that layer of, you know, um, protection for in the name of integrity that, that, uh, that the

NA, that sports leagues tell themselves makes this okay. You say like, well, we have, we have tech, we have tech advances A, B, and C that, that'll help sound alarms in case our players are involved. That makes it okay. That makes it okay to take money untold from an industry that, like, encourages the rot of American society, basically. I'm not a, I'm not a, not a, not a gambler all that much. And I done, I definitely don't appreciate the level of pervasiveness that it has just across the board. But if you're going to take that money and you're the NHL, you got to, you got to

make yourself feel better in one way or another. And being able to say like, hey, we can catch people when it happens is a big part of that. So whatever you need to sleep at night. If you want, if you want to make an omelet, you got to break some eggs. And I think that's sort of what we're seeing, what we're seeing here. making an example of Shane Pinto. It's not just the NHL enforcement, though, that that's a factor in that, right? Vegas has a big interest in tracking this because for their betters to have any confidence, you know, in placing bets, they got to believe and they got to know that, you know, these games aren't in quest.

There's no competitive integrity. I don't believe for what it's worth that, like, a professional athlete at this level would do something like that, right? But I'm saying, like, bettors have to have that confidence. Yeah, because a big part of all the money is based on better confidence. And we're seeing with the NFL every week now. So in the Atlanta Falcons game, right, Bijon Robinson, Falcons running back, doesn't show up on the injury report. Turns out he was sick all week.

And then, you know, basically doesn't play on Sunday. People lose their minds over this stuff. And it happened because it does. It affects money publicly, legally in a way that it just didn't before. I started Thatcher Demcoe and my fantasy. see hockey league, but he didn't actually start. Call it in. Why?

On Saturday, it wasn't it back to back. Why? I've got questions for Rick Tucket. Why did you do this to me? I lost all of my goalie points. Why did you do this to me, Rick Tocke? This was also from the daily face-off report. The senators were believed to have been close to agreeing to terms with Pinto on a $2.2 million

contract in recent weeks before the organization got win. of a league investigation. In a statement, the senator stood by Pinto and said in part, he's a valued member of our hockey club, an intelligent young man who made poor decisions that have resulted in a suspension by the NHL. We know he's remorseful for his mistakes. They said they fully support the NHL's rules on gambling and remain committed to Shane and will do whatever is necessary to, quote, provide him support to address his issues. He's also getting credit for time served too, right? Do we know that to be a fact?

Oh, it's retroactive to game one of the season, yes. So he's six games into his 41 games, if that's, if that's indeed what ends up being. He'll be able to come back, he'll be able to come back on January 21st, it looks like. And another thing that's important to say is the December 1st rule for free agents, RFAs doesn't apply to Shane Pinto because he's a group two restricted free agent. That's according to all the insiders. I think Pierre, C.J. and Elliot Friedman have said that.

So if he signed after December 1st. Yes, he's not a group two. RFA. So if he is signed after December 1st, he can still play in the season once he's done serving his suspension. But I guess the part about the contract talks, we should apologize for hammering Pierre Dorian last. Right? That's the other bizarre variable here is like of any player league wide two days ago.

Like we, or if you'd have known that this happened, it'd have been like, what's, what would the most interesting case of a half season suspension, you know, being doled out like, well, who would it be? And he's like, oh, it'd be wilder. Sheen Pinto randomly got suspended for a half season. Yeah. Because of his, because of his, because of his, because of his contract. Because of, yes. Why the hell can't Pierre Dorian get this over the finish line? It's because of his contract status, because of what he means to that lineup long term. you know, because of all the heat

that Dorian's taken back back to when he signed Vladimir Tarasenko and, you know, change the cap math for this season for them. It's wild.

It's, it's crazy that this happened at all. And it's very, it's even crazier that it was Shane Pinto. Did we curse the Ottawa senators? I think that's the question. Did we curse the Ottawa senators last week?

The three of us, personally. Well, we almost did because it looked like Brady Kachuk was like, almost seriously injured. And it was like, oh, no, that's the injury to get Shane Pinto to sign. He came back and was fine.

But that was like, oh, God, what have we done moment for me? It was like, you know what? This was from the first season of the athletic hockey show and it was still Ian Mendez and I on Mondays. And we had Keith Kachuk on. And we were laughing about how Brady and Matthew like the chew on the mouth guards and they do all that stuff. And Walt made some joke.

like, if he ever loses a chicklet, like, I'm not paying for it. And then, like, two days later, Brady Kachuk lost a bunch of teeth. And I was like, oh, oh, no. Craig and I had one of those with Jack Hughes. We talked to Jack at the beginning of, oh, God, I don't even remember what season was. It was when he separated his shoulders. When he separated his shoulder. Shoulders.

He has three shoulders, too. He's a biological marvel. we basically had it we were like yeah we had a great interview with jack it was after he threw his stick into the stands and all that stuff had a great time he goes out and gets hurt immediately Tuesday boys curse RIP this is this is the Thursday boys with Haley salvian with only two z's Thursday boys two zes with your host haley salvian I think just just to wrap on the on the Pinto thing though. Wait a second.

We're not, we're done talking about serious stuff here. No, I was going to say, Max, do you have any final thoughts on Pinto before we had to break? It's just that I wouldn't expect this to be the last time that we,

we're going to find what the lines are here, it seems like, by trial and error. And that's going to be a tough situation for a lot of players. I have a lot of sympathy for not even knowing what happened. I have sympathy for Shane Pinto. Just because with how it,

How did the roll out of this, the suddenness of this, he is in the demographic that is going to be finding the lines here. And he's not going to be the only one. And so I got a lot of sympathy for the players. Doesn't mean that I think the punishments aren't going to be necessary because that's how the lines will eventually be drawn. It sucks for the players, but it's the reality that we're in based on the direction of the league and the gambling status in our continent has taken. Yep. Well said. All right. Let's head to a quick break when we come back. Does anyone actually care about the NHL draft other than the media people who are booze bags during that weekend? We'll discuss. All right. So the other bit of news, really good timing for this podcast, guys. We're getting some newsy stuff in here. So yesterday, this is from our new NHL insider Chris Johnson at The Athletic. The majority of NHL teams support the decentralization of the draft, according to a league memo. Essentially, this would just the draft, like the NHL draft has been a pretty unique event in

terms of major sport drafts. Everyone's there. You get the draft tables. It's a, you know, two-day thing. But under the proposed decentralized model laid out in this memo, the league would use a 5,000 to 10,000 seat venue, have one or two representatives. representatives from each club. Prospects would be greeted by the commissioner and a team rep on the draft stage, photo op, and then, you know, go with their family to the club's home city after finishing the broadcast. Like, it would just, instead of having everyone be at the draft for two days, it would be a much more scaled down version, kind of like the NBA NFL. The question I have for the fans, for our dear listeners, I should say, like, do you care about this? Do fans care about the draft? I'm not sure. We'll wait to hear their answers.

Like, Max, what do you think? You're like a, you have more to do on draft day than Sean and I. I didn't do anything last year. Sean did. Sean live blogs. Yeah, I was wandering around the arena with Mac and do it for the second consecutive year trying to find stuff happening. Things to talk about.

But like, Max, what do you, what do you make of this? You asked if fans care about this. I think that this is not a decentralized. draft is not going to make fans care more about the NHL draft. When you look at the big drafts that I think are like kind of appointment viewing TV, you're talking about the NFL draft and the NBA draft. And I can understand the argument that those are not like the whole league is on site drafts. The difference is those players are going to be on those teams that year.

And in most cases they are going to be playing big roles, especially in the first rounds. The NHL is much more like the MLB draft. And you're not going to see these guys for three or four. four or five years in most cases. And so therefore, I don't think that the, and certainly you don't have the lead-up, the same NCAA football and NCAA basketball to have the familiarity with these players. You're mostly drafting guys that the majority of non-diehard fans aren't super familiar with.

And now that's the whole draw. And they're not going to be there for three or four years. So I think this is a whiff on the NHL's part. I get it. I'm in the media cohort that loves to have my week-long party. and Nashville and Montreal and hopefully Las Vegas, right? But I also do think it's a missed opportunity because you get those draft floor interviews. The most recognizable people at the NHL draft certainly are the GMs that talk after their team picks for like 30 seconds to Emily Kaplan and Elliot Friedman.

And I think losing that is a bigger loss than is maybe being given credit for. I wonder if fans will now be less apt to travel to the draft, right? where like in Montreal is a great example or Montreal and Nashville either either are those those the two ones that are still fresh in my mind yeah we saw local fans there but it also you know was a vacation destination I think in some regards for other hockey fans from right other hockey markets I don't know if that's going to change now I right because like on one hand part of what made the NHL draft different is because you could go and see GMs and front offices and coaches and this huge media cohort. And I think that maybe was to some extent part of the reason that it was such a big deal.

But if you're a diehard fan to the level that you're going to make a trip, a special trip to Vegas or Dallas or Columbus or wherever, I don't know if it matters to you all that much that like the full front office of your favorite team is there. So I don't know. I'm on the, I'm on the fence with this. It's bad for us. It's certainly, it's certainly, it's bad for media people. That's undeniable. It's good for the host cities too. Like, let's, as you said, Sean, like it's locals, it's tourists. Like, there's a kind of a big boon for local tourism given how many people like show up to that city. We filled up a hotel in Nashville, the athletic alone. All the teams do, fans do. But again, it's one of those

things where it seems like for an NHL team, for your entire staff to not have to go to the host city, like two days before free agency, like I can understand why teams are saying, like, I don't, I don't want to have to do this. But at the same time, like, the NHL has something unique in the way that they do the draft. I think a lot of, I wonder how that would affect trades. Like maybe we're overthinking how much activity happens on the draft floor because these GMs can just pick up the phone and call each other

instead of talking on the draft floor. But we do see a lot of trades. Either conversations start at the draft, happened during the draft, after the draft, I wonder how that would shake that up. It's probably, they'd probably just call each other. Well, also this past, like Nashville was kind of

a dud on the trade front. Like, there wasn't that much action. Like speaking, at least in comparison, since the last couple. I mean, there was nothing, nothing wild went down.

We had the, you know, there were a handful, like Riley Smith was the first one to come to mind because I had to write that trade grade from my hotel room

or whatever, but there's, I don't know. I wonder, because it's like, now the league's fine, the league's fine with doing it,

you know, the majority, the majority of league is okay with, you know, the decentralization. I wonder if, if Nashville was a little bit busier

and if there was some more big business that got done on the floor, if maybe that would be enough to change a few team's minds. It's like we're coming off a draft that is much fun as everybody had partying in terms of trade action and all that sort of stuff.

It was sort of flat. So I don't know if that's like the one that's freshest on team's minds. So they're like, ah, there's not that much stuff going on. Like, I don't know. It's interesting. It is, and it is kind of a bummer.

Honestly, selfishly, it's a bummer because that was not just a fun night not just a fun stretch to go out and get you know get silly with with your with your colleagues but it was you know a good networking opportunity when you know that every agent every front office person and every because it was really easy to run into people and talk to them and you know start building relationships that way so selfishly i'm bummed by it again not to be kind of the annoying like travel anxiety planner person of like trying to get all these things done if you're an NHL team like think of how many people's flights

got messed up trying to get out in Asheville. My flight was delayed by like nine hours and I didn't I had to get back to you know cover free agency. I didn't have to get back for you know to start signing players. So I can imagine just the logistical nightmare. And what was it? I think LeBron had a story where he essentially just asked different NHL execs what they think about it.

And Lou Lamarillo. I mean it's a great point. He's like you had the draft last year on the 28th and 29th, qualifying offers are due on the 30th, and free agency was on the first. So you're, in a period of four days, you're trying to get pretty important information and decisions crammed in, and you're taking the risk of weather, travel interruptions and all these things that you can't really control. So it seems like just from a scheduling, doing our jobs standpoint, a lot of GMs are like, yeah, we're all in. And also we had weather

this past year, too. Getting out of Nashville was a shit show. It was, it was, it was, I just said that. specifically about Nashville? I don't know. I don't remember what stuff you say on the pod and then what you said before we actually recorded it when it was just the three of us talking. I just said it was a nightmare getting out of Nashville. I was just daydreaming about what a nightmare

it was getting out of Nashville. Yeah. Max, do you have a thought? No, I just, I get it. It's inconvenient for the teams, but I think it's worth the hassle for the increased spectacle. You don't want to be the baseball. Of all the drafts, that's the one you don't want to be.

And you're trending more that way than the other way with this move, is my opinion. So I don't know. Do we get the big pop in Montreal if it's a decentralized draft? Do we get the moment where it's like... The Slavkovsky. Which was like, that felt like a WWE event, honestly, with the way... And the gasps. when Leo Carlson

go second. I was like, oh! I think the diehards will still go to Sean's point. I think we still get that. It's the grow the game thing. It's like you want to,

you're on ESPN. Give them as much reason as possible to not change the channel. Give them faces or names that they know and remember. Sean McIndoo is not an overly excitable dude. He's pretty even keel. I have never,

and I've known for a long time, I have never seen him get more excited in person than when it seemed like the haves were going to keep trading back up so they could take Shane Wright after taking Slavkovsky. Like he was, he was, it was like a 15 out of 10 for Mac and do.

It was, it was as, it was as, it was as, it was as, it was as, it was as, it was as, as I've ever seen him. I'm going to miss that. If that's what we've lost, I am, I am strongly against this.

Because for as funny as he is, and for people who listen to, who listened to him on the athletic hockey show or puck soup, or like know him. Sean Maccad, like talking to McIndo is different than reading McIndo,

which is like a very funny thing. He's so dead fan. Yeah. He's so good fan. It's like, oh. When I first met him, I was like, oh. I'm telling you, man. In that moment, in that moment, in that moment, the idea of the Canadians somehow

trading their way back up to get right, he was losing it. Yeah. And that's another thing about moving the draft. That dinner that we were both had with Macandoo after, whichever day of the draft that was. I think that was after the second day of the draft.

That's the first extended time I've ever spent with the man. I never would have had that in a decentralized draft. So for my sake, you've swayed me. We need to put a stop to this. Keep this. Was I at that dinner? Yeah.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. There was several of us there. Yeah, you were there. You showed up late because you were breaking PWHL news about the merger. Oh, yeah. Remember this? Yeah, I showed up.

I went to Tutsis at 2.30 in the morning after I finished writing that story. story with my little kitty cat shirt. The shirt with the shirt with the cat that was crying with the cowboy hat on, I spent $50 on that. Where's toots? Where's Tutsis? I've never heard of Tutsis. Ford Nashville specifically. Economic stimulation. Is anyone getting this? Like, we're buying fits just for this draft. It'll be good for the economy.

March Simpson is that you? Oh, just buy it. You don't have to justify everything. Anyways, listeners, us now, do you care about this? Did we just talk about something for 10 minutes that you don't care about? If so, what else is new? If so, if so, learn to care about it because you should. If so, just go and watch the video on my Instagram at haley.salvean of Jeremy Rutherford walking through the drive-thru ordering burgers and milkshakes for everybody. It's really funny. I think you'll appreciate it. If you need a reason to care, DM me on Twitter. I'll send you a

photo of myself from after the second night of the draft that'll make you care. Max. Me on a Nashville rooftop. I was a good boy all weekend. I didn't do anything irresponsible. Would you have to say it like that? It's very strange.

Nothing. All right. Well behaved. Okay. All right. We're going to take another break. When we come back, we're going to talk about some actual hockey stuff for a moment. I feel like we should talk about Jack Hughes.

Jack Hughes. Seems like a good plan. We'll be right back. So there's only one. one game on Wednesday night. Washington Capitals beat the New Jersey Devils six to four. Bit of a wild one. Devil score three goals in less than two minutes in the second period to come back against the caps who were up in the first and then the caps come back in the third to end up beating the devils. So I guess we should probably apologize to Washington for saying that they were essentially terrible last week.

Kind of a fun game. I won't. I think they're terrible. Yeah. I think. I think they're terrible. Yeah. I think. I think. I think our good friends, I noticed our old friend, Sarah Sivian, tweeted the other day, is Washington bad? He was like, yeah. Sims on it, they're terrible. They're going to be very bad. You might be right, girl.

Who's not bad? Yeah, yeah. I think the main reason we want to talk about that game is Jack Hughes, three assists in that game last night to get himself up to 17 points, the first six games this season. for the devils. Do you know who the other players to do that are in recent history? This is from SportsNet Stats this morning. The most recent players was 17 plus points in their first six games of a season. Jack Hughes, Marilymue, Wayne Gretzky.

Thoughts? I have him as the second best player from that group. Should we ask who is? Oh, I don't think you'd be to ask here. He's from Pittsburgh. Sean Gentile from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. What do you think? Jack Hughes is American and Mary Lemieux played for the Pittsburgh Penguin. So you can just draw your own conclusions from those two little data points. Can I just say as a really funny aside that when I was in high school, I had a first date with somebody and my dad asked him before he allowed me to go on the date.

Who do you think is better, Mario Lemieux or Wayne Gretzky? and the guy said Mario Lemieux and my dad was pissed. And what happened? We went to the movies and we never spoke again. Whatever became of that fellow. I hope he's listening to this.

That'd be really funny. If you listen, hey Mark, if you listen to the athletic hockey show. How you doing? Anyways, Jack Hughes, this was another stat from Amanda Stein. I don't know why I just said that.

I'm so embarrassed. last night was Jack Hughes's 250th career game his career stats 91 goals 133 assist 224 points and that is including a rookie season in which people were so mean to Jack Hughes what do we think he's a game break yeah like what he's a game like have we even seen this is such a lame podcast question but like have we seen his ceiling yet

well that was a question this last off season People were wondering, you know, 99 points or whatever, people were like, okay, sometimes you do see, and I don't think anyone thought we've seen the best of Jack Hughes, but sometimes in terms of just points, that marker happens at like age 22, 23. And I think it was a question people had, and he has answered it so far and that he is going to continue, I think, to find this level. I mean, it's a great team. It's a great offensive team. That helps, like, that his team just keeps getting better around him. but I'm not saying we need to put him in like the McDavid dry sidel guys you can count on to score 100 points without fail kind of thing

but he's getting there's that's really who else is in that group right now you're like at the start of a season you're like 100 points ding count it well that's mac and do's thing right like when he when he does that thing it's pick a non-Edmonton oiler who's going to score 100 points on like actually on the on hit on the preseason on the preseason poll. I was going through that. Like, I don't. Yeah.

Matthews. It gets tough. It gets tough quickly. And that kind of conversation, you know, drops down to maybe the next level of player. Maybe that's where we're talking about Jack Hughes or if we're talking about Tim Stutzlow. 90 points is really hard, right?

It's tough. And for those guys consistently staying in that neighborhood is no small tasks. There are great players in the league right now who can't get there. And I had that discussion about Sebastian Ajo specifically where it's like, we love Sebastian Aho,

but the dude is not, you know, he hasn't been a 90-point score or a 90-point pace guy, right? There's been injuries and whatever else. It's really, really tough. Forget 100 points. Like, even still, in the NHL, if you are a reliable 90-point level person,

90-point level player, Like, that's something to be proud of, right? And we're watching Jack, it seems like right now, you know, level up even from that. It's rarefied air. So he's the other thing I love about Jack Hughes is he's a showman. Yes. You know, he scores these goals and he plays to the crowd. And I think in the era of ESPN and drawing people in, he is exactly what the league needs.

And Zegras has a little bit of it too. but he's not on that Jack level where you can expect that you're going to watch a game Jack's going to do something incredible. We also saw him connect with Timo Meyer last night too. I think that that was a nice little

bit of added value for the devils because Myers his start to the season was slow. He got benched at one point now all of a sudden because he's getting some time there like his production's backup where it needs to. It's like a rising tide lifts all boats kind of situation.

Yeah. He might be the most entertaining player to watch to start the season or at least one of them. You know, so we don't upset the West Coast crowd. I'm sorry, I haven't watched that much of the Oilers this season because those games have not been fun. I apologize. I'm very sorry. But he's got, as Max was saying, he's got game-breaking talent and he's like leading his team and in the league in so many different categories, like primary scoring chances created, rush offense. created like for the team he's leading the team in ice time shots on goal um obviously he's leading the league in scoring right now like this is just an electric player and it's interesting we do these season predictions every year um at the company right and sean and i and shana and jessie kind of do the write-ups after but everyone on staff um you know puts in their predictions and i feel like we probably underrated jack hues in like the heart trophy or art ross

conversations. I don't think he got many votes. It was mostly like Connor McDavid, Austin Matthews. I know it's only six games into the season. But should Jack Hughes have gotten a little bit more love in those categories? I think part of that just stems from us being it's difficult. Like he was unbelievable last year, right? Jack Hughes had 99 points last year. Right. So you look at that and I think it's natural to say, okay, is it reasonable to expect a player to do better than 43 goals and 56 assists over the course of a full season. Like it's a tough leap to make because not that many players have done it. So I think that was maybe part of the reason that, you know, in polls like that,

that he didn't, he didn't get that level of love, right? But it's in hindsight, you know, six games in, it feels like an oversight. There's also that kind of catch-up factor. Like, you know, I voted for Nathan McKinnon. No, I think, I don't know if I voted for McKinnon and McDavid, but I vote based on, I think, Partly, these teams that you know are going to be so relevant and there's a little bit of a catch-up factor. The devils are going to be President's Trophy contenders this year. And if Jack Hughes has like 110 points on a President's trophy winning or contending Devils team,

I think that that has a better argument for the hard trophy than even like a McKinnon who plays with, you know, Kail McCarr, who is going to get some hard consideration too. Yeah. And we should also consider McDavid's outright. right now is one to two weeks. Is he going to catch up to Jack Hughes when he comes back and is healthy? It's possible that dude is insane. But there is a scenario in which McDavid doesn't league the NHL in scoring this year.

And it ends up being, if it's not Jack Hughes, it's someone else. So I feel like this is one of those years where just by virtue of McDavid not playing a full 82, that it might open up the window for somebody else. Like that's how good that guy is. Like you need McDavid to not play for, for a week for him to not be the guy when it's all set and done and he still might be. Hughes is also playing 22 minutes a night. He was just under 20 last year.

He's into that 22. That's what it's going to take is that kind of usage to it. I think it's like a principle that we've seen, particularly in the NBA, when you have like a generation, a true generational, true transcendent talent, like the Michael Jordans, the Shaquille O'Neal's LeBron James At a certain point voters get tired

of voting for the same person year after year after year it might not be fair but it happens there's a level of fatigue that sets in when you have someone who on balance

is just the number of the unquestioned best player in the league obviously that's Connor McDavid right now and it wasn't barring something bizarre it will be for the next

you know for the foreseeable future that doesn't mean though that there aren't individual seasons where if you're a voter, you say like, oh, Connor played 71 games, and you start poking holes in the candidacy because it's just human nature to get tired

of that level of greatness. Whether it's right, whether it's wrong, that is what happens. Because again, to go back to the NBA, Shaquille Anil should have won a half-dozen MVP trophies. He just didn't because people got sick of the concept. And I think that that could be, you know, the sort of thing that opens the door for Hughes to really make a legit heart run this season.

Like you're seeing stuff kind of start to slide into place, whether it's McDavid's injury, the devil's team like leveling up as a team. Like it's possible here. And we should mention too when we're talking about the devils. Like I know Jack Hughes is, is the star and he's the main part of the conversation here. Tyler To Foley looks great on that team as expected. but like everyone kind of knew that was one of those moves

or it was just like Flames probably should have tried to get more for him but also like yeah great job this is this is perfect Tyler Tully is going to slot in great on one of those wings

and he's been unbelievable I think he had like what two goals two goals four points or five points last night in that game so that team looks like they could be a wagon he looks like a perfect like supporting piece with Jack

100% fit is could not be better to Sean's point about one of the best naturally gifted goal scores in the league right now too. Second in the league right now and individual expected goals too. So that's a, that's a product of him. Tyler Toffoli. That's a product of him knowing where to go.

That's a product of him knowing where to go and a product of Jack Hughes being able to find him. He's a 30 goal guarantee guy and he's on the wing of one of the best centers in the league right now. That was always going to work out. to Sean's point about the voters too, like, I am one of these voters. I don't know how you guys feel about this. Like, I am a literalist with the Hart Trophy, like, most valuable to his team. And I know some people hate that.

It should just be like the most outstanding player. But like when you look at Jack Hughes, like he is the most valuable to his team right now based on how this season has started. I don't think that's a hot take. But like, that's going to help him too. Like when you think about some of the competition that he'll have, you know, he, I think he stands out from them as how central he is to their success. and that's going to work in its faith. 100%. This might be a tired conversation because it's been a few years since his rookie season,

but I don't know if there's a better example of why people need to chill out on teenagers playing in their first seasons in the NHL than Jack Hughes. Like this, he was 18 years old. No, he didn't play great. But like he hated, he said, I hated it. His rookie season, he was like miserable. and it's like an overwhelming period and like people were naming this kid at 18 years old

the biggest bust ever to hit the league. He's not. So. Remember it with Connor Bedard. I mean, it's a similar thing. People are not as mean. To Godard least.

That's because he's Canadian and there's an anti-American. And he's had better numbers to start. He has. But like he will find the similar challenges, I think, like in terms of being a slight guy who is coming into this men's league, having only played junior hockey, and having to learn new ways to do it. But they are both so good. Jack was obviously so good that he learned those ways.

And now you would have never called Jack Hughes. I don't think a like surefire 40 goal scorer in his draft year. It was the playmaking. It was the speed. He scored 43 goals last year. He's going to top that this year, I think. Bedard is the goal scorer. Coming into last year, it was like the goal scoring is going to come like it.

Like we'd seen enough, I think, in the, in the, preceding season to say like, okay, he's more of a finisher than we thought he was. He'll score 40 goals someday. And someday was last season, right? Like, he's there. Isn't that the tweet from Dom, like, when Jack Hughes learns how to finish, like, it's over for you folks and it's just like, oh my, he did it. I thought it would take him until he was 24 or whatever, and it hasn't. He's here. Yeah. Yeah. So it'll be the same with Bedard, I think, to some degree. I think he'll, he's not going to have 21 points in 60 whatever games like Jack did, but if it's not a point per game immediately, like remember Jack Hughes.

Okay. Absolutely. Thanks, Max. All right. Final thing before we wrap up the show today, a little bit of news that came out before we started the show on my end, potential names for the professional women's hockey league's original six franchises have been revealed. So I'm going to give a stick tap to Detroithockey.

dot net, that website, they were the first ones to find this. So essentially one thing that I've been doing throughout this process is just checking the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office website and just looking up PWHL to see if there's anything new. And they beat me to it. So yesterday, the PWHL Holdings LLC, which is the group that's been filing trademarks for the league name, the logos, et cetera, filed applications for some team names. And they're not great. I'm just going to be honest. Applications for the Toronto Torch, Montreal Echo,

Ottawa Alert, Minnesota Superior, Boston Wicked and New York Sound were filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on Wednesday. I found this out Thursday morning. We have a story on The Athletic about it. Before we get into this, we need to say trademark applications don't necessarily mean that these will be the team names when puck drops for the season in January. We've seen this before, like when the Seattle Cracken, the Vegas Golden Knights, like there were other things that they filed before they officially said we are the Seattle Cracken.

So let's just put that out there before we say, I really hope that these aren't the final team names in some of these cases. because we've had like so many iconic, I would say iconic women's hockey franchise names in the past. I thought the Toronto Furies was like lights out, loved that. Honestly, I don't love the whole like Lady Bruins, lady penguins, lady leaves thing, but Leigh Canadian de Montreal was fire. I loved it.

The players loved it. Like the Boston Pride, Minnesota White Caps, the New York Riveters, Calgary Inferno. Like those were all objectively better than what we have right now. it's not great. What? You don't like the alert? What is that?

Is that a, is it a restaurant? How about this? Hey, here's my. That was, no, no, no, no, no, no. That was the name of the first ever pro women's team in Ottawa, like years and years and years ago. Like, that's like a nod to some like old women's hockey history, which is kind of cool. But the name still sucks. Okay.

It reminds me of a red alert. Someone's gone missing. The Boston Wicked? is that a Boston like Bostonism joke? Absolutely. Either that or it's a reference to New England witch trials when they burned women when they were, you know, upset. Whatever. It's insane.

It's really bad. Okay. So it's like it's just a slang reference. Like I want to sit here and say that the American teams have better names because you know what they're referencing, right? New York sound. New York sounds bad. I think the New York sound... What are the mascots for these things?

It's a blue note. It's like the volume button on your computer. Well, because they're playing in... It's just going to be like... They're playing in Bridgeport. That's where they're going to be primarily located. It has not been reported at this time, but... Potentially primary...

But I can say, I can say that I do believe that they are going to be playing. I do believe that they are... They will be playing some of their home games in Bridgeport. Bridgeport, Connecticut is on Long Island Sound. So in the Bridgeport Sound Tigers have been, they're no longer called that, but they were called the AHL team in Bridgeport was called the Sound Tigers for quite a while. Great. Minnesota Superior, Lake Superior.

Starting to get dodgy. Boston Wicked. Like what? It's just like, the. Boston mass holes. That might as well have been with what they call this team. It's brutal. I don't like it. Brutal. And I think the pride,

like the Boston Pride with the Lion logo, like that was pretty cool. I understand that they want to, like if the league wants to start fresh and not take stuff from the C-dub or the PHF, original NWHL, like they want to just have something new, but. It's hard to name things, right? It is. Yes. And trademarking is a pain in the ass too. the process of that, like that sucks, like to get over certain hoops.

Like, God knows how many random rugby soccer hockey football teams are called something cooler than the Toronto Torch so they can't have it. I can't get past Toronto Torch. It should be the Toronto Scorch. Bring back Scorch. Please. They should have a team in Calgary. So that she just call the Calgary Scorch. Oh my God.

That would be so great. So I don't think Max, so this is the segment of the show where Sean and I tell Max some mascot history because Max only knows that creepy friar guy. Friar Dom. Friar Dom. So Scorch was the mascot of the Adirondack Flames,

the former affiliate of the Calgary Flames. And he was just, a little flame. He was just like a fire. And they announced him in a video where like he killed a firefighter. Overpowered a firefighter, I think is probably the best, the best way to put this.

Like they announced him with this like video and then immediately had to apologize and like scorch. Scorch died. Like scorch went away. This is like they. Scorch died. The firefighters got the revenge. They, the scorch.

Just, you know, he... Extinguished. Yeah, Scorch was extinguished. I hear, this is in 2014. I did a post about this. I just like bit the microphone. Sorry. This was in 2014.

I wrote a post about it at my old, old workplace, was Sporting News.com. The story from this is that Scorch was a remaining ember from a fire that destroyed Glen Falls, New York in 1864. That is like the mascot bio. and that they pumped up whenever they're like, here's Scorch

when he fights, you know, fights a firefighter. It's wild. Lasted it lasted a couple days. We're extinguishing scorts. The Flames president said back then. The misjudgment we made was such that we came to that decision.

Like, but he'll live on forever. In our hearts for sure. In our ranks. Fryer Dom, Scorch, Bluey. Bowie.

I like Bowie. Oh, yeah, booie. Bluey. Bluey is not a mascot. Bluey is a children's cartoon character. Okay. Sorry to Bluey. Wait, you like Friar Dom?

Friar Dom's number one. I thought we were afraid of Friar Dom. That's why we love him. I'm a Bowie guy. I think Bowie's cool. I don't like, I think I don't like Bowie. What is Bowie done to you? This is the second week in a row.

I just think Scorch is the funniest thing I've ever seen. And I would like to apologize to end. any one in the firefighting community who was offended by Scorch. What's Booy's battle record? Scorch is one-on-one. Bowie's a bridge troll, so he's definitely

done some things. But like light pickpocketing at best. Isn't that the whole thing? Like you have to cross the bridge if you can answer my riddles three. You just got to pay the troll toll. Yeah. He takes your gum

Your lunch money RIPE Tuesday boys Oh was that your whole thing Oh to get into the comment section Thanks for bringing it up To get into the comment section on Thursday Hashtag Tuesdays 1Z with Haley You have to

Pay Bowie a toll Actually could we take submissions I'd love to learn a mascot per week No I don't have some interest Not NHL I want to learn a mascot a week I said before last week

I don't want to talk about mascots So now here we are. Two weeks in a row. We're going to run these power rankings. Fryer Dom, Scorch, Bowie, and we're going to add to him. What about the dude who fainted? The Denman Nuppets mascot. Number one.

No. I don't know him. I don't know. Next week. Save it for next week. Save that for next week. I don't want to know anything until next week. Max. I must have been on my phone.

Oh, my God. Okay. Well, I'm going to end the show. You watch Sean send Max the video. Will I do the out? out. Max actually watched the video. Why does nobody listen to me, by the way? Max didn't listen about the Denver guy.

Sean repeated the things that I said at least three times. Oh, no, no, I remember this. I forgot that that's who this was. No, I remember this. I forgot that this was. Yeah, it's fine. This was great. Rocky, the lowering his body.

Not sure if he was like unconscious the entire time or if he fainted halfway through. Either way, it's very funny. Anyways. things got off the rails. I don't know if we should talk about mascots anymore. Anyways. Not until next week at least. Yeah, save that for next week.

In the meantime, the athletic hockey show returns on Monday with Ian Mendez and Julian McKenzie and just a reminder, subscribe to the athletics. No, it's the athletic NHL. I do this every week. Subscribe to the athletic NHL's YouTube channel.

You can keep all this in. It's fine. You don't have to cut this out. at YouTube.com slash at the athletic hockey show. Thanks, everyone.