The Athletic Hockey Show - Who are the most under-appreciated players of Round 2?

Episode Date: May 8, 2025

Sean Gentille welcomes Shayna Goldman and Dom Luszczyszyn to discuss the under-appreciated players in the playoffs for the remaining 8 teams, including Logan Stankoven, John Klingberg, Tyler Seguin and Jake McCabe. The crew looks back on the Maple Leafs game 2 win over the defending cup champion Panthers and the force of nature that is Mikko Rantanen who is clearly the best player on the planet right now, as Dallas takes a 1-0 lead over the Winnipeg Jets. Plus, Dom, Shayna and Sean offer their opinion on the Utah hockey club finally settling on a team name and logo, as they pick the Mammoth to represent Salt Lake City in the NHLHost: Sean GentilleWith: Shayna Goldman and Dom LuszczyszynExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff Domet Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic hockey show. What up, what up? Welcome to the athletic hockey show. It's a Thursday edition. I'm Sean Jantilly. Haley Salvean is in New York for work, I think. I've lost track of her. I am in Washington, D.C. for work,

an actual hockey game being played tonight between the Capitals and Carolina Hurricanes. We'll talk about that down the line a bit. But to make up for Haley's absence. I have enlisted the services of Shana Goldman and boy Shanna himself, Dom Nicholas Chishin. How are we doing, guys? Doing great. Bring some more energy.

I'm going to tell you that right now. That was, that was unacceptable. You have, you have to pretend like you want to be here and then I'm not just cashing in on favors. Don, this is like, this is, this is the, this is because you, like, shout it out. your lungs last night at the I assume

in Panthers leaves yeah I wasted a lot of energy at that game you sound like absolute hell like this is you sound you sound worse now than you did when we logged on this is incredible it's getting worse as he goes it's fading the energy

levels are just depleting hop a lozid or something you are a disaster I have a water bottle beside me but it is extremely empty, so I may need to refill that at some point while like Shane is talking or something. I can't believe this unpreparedness.

This is unbelievable. This is my job. Like, you're supposed to be on your shit. You were making Shane look like a prepared one. That is incredible. It's hard to do. Unreal. Look, I even have a water and it's full with fresh ice.

No water. I haven't had a coffee today. It's a disaster class. But I'm riding on a high. after last night. I've been to a fair bit of Leaf Playoff games

and Lefe regular season games. I think the reputation for the arena atmosphere is often earned. I won't lie. It is definitely full of suits, definitely full of people who... Yeah, definitely full of people who

are disguised as seats too. Yeah. That's an old joke, but it's true. Yeah. Adam seat ghosts. Shout out to that boy. But yesterday was probably the best Leafs crowd I've seen in a long time. It felt like the old 2000s crowds. And I think part of it is as much as people say there's always next year and there's always they believe or whatever, there's the sense of 50 year dread that hangs over the entire city.

and the Leafs actually beating the defending champions going up to nothing. I think there was a sense of dreadlifting. And that's the most dangerous point. Don't have it. I'm like, this is incredible. I'm just like letting you, I'm letting you roll here.

Yeah. You're digging your grave. Oh, I, I know I'm digging a grave here. I'm talking about the energy because the belief seems real. And that is the worst time for the belief to seem. real because the defending champions like it's not you're not out of the woods yet right what's so what's

the big what's the big reason for that i i think i think last night to me it was it was it was clear it's it's toronto four uh florida florida three the pushback is is the thing that they saw last night that the goal from marner in in particular like that's that's the sort of stuff that's happening now right i know we love the joke about it and i love i love the rag on you and i love the rag on macandoo and and whoever else. But like there is something to that. And I think the fact that the Leafs came out of that game

where they got outplayed a five on five pretty dramatically in a lot of ways. And but still had enough put from from Marner specifically in that spot. That's the kind of stuff that happens that makes you think like, okay, this actually might, this actually might be different.

It does feel different. I remember game five against Ottawa. There was a sense of, Nope, this is the exact same team that we've watched for a decade. And then they sort of just took care of business. And the same thing that you mentioned about Martin happened then as well, where Ottawa ties it after Leaves Park the bus for two hours. And then they just come back and get a response call,

which I think in past years they weren't able to muster because they just look so deeply downtrodden. And this year, they seem ready to take care of business. They seem to have a different attitude. And we'll see how they handle being up to nothing against who I think we all think is still the best team in the league. Trying to ask, what does the game day fit look like for you? And are you going to wear that outfit every game here forward? There's definitely some superstition to it. Me and my friends, I think, for the playoffs, will rock a jersey.

here and there. And if the Leafs win, usually we'll rock the same jersey. But if the Leafs lose, as they did in game four and five, it'll be like, okay, no jersey is this game. And that'll I don't know. It's fun to be a fan. I feel

like, obviously, it's extremely unprofessional. And it's fine. But I mean, but like the dude the dude I host a podcast with on Wednesday, like he leans directly. And like, who cares? I don't know. Does he?

Because he seems miserable. Because McIndoose has seemed like the most dreadful Leafs fan the last few years. He's got, he's emotionally invested to a degree that is unhealthy. I think, I think we've all established that. Yeah. We got a great Aaron Eckblad quote come out of this game. He said this to LeBron. We're not worried.

It's playoff hockey. Home Ice Advantage. They won two at home. So what? I like, I think I like that attitude from Florida. at the moment. And if, if there, if there,

if there, if there, if there, if there, if there's, into, into this series, it's them.

And I, because there is, there's, you know, they're down to games, not great. But Brodsky has looked rickety, I think it points,

which, which is a, which seems like it's a problem. But also, man, they, they really, they really haven't played that badly,

right? Yeah. No, they haven't played badly at all. Like, you could see at 5-on-5, like they're the better team a lot of the time. And the third period in game one,

Like that's the team you expected to see. And that third line's like absolutely cooking with Marshand and Lusdorinen and Lundell. I think they're outskirts. I think one of them might come up in our in our segment two discussion, which is like underappreciated players on each team. We're going to go through all eight and pick and pick some guys who aren't doing enough shine. I would imagine that one of those guys is going to is going to pop up down the line for us. Sorry.

Yeah. No, no. You're right though. because like they totally are underappreciating like third lines or something that's like it's tricky. You think of like past champs and it's like they can get overhyhyhy board line of Tampa Bay and they were really good. But like the hype kind of takes a life of its own. But hey, they have a reason for it. But the one thing that's getting me with this is the Sergey Bobrovsky analysis year to year drives me up a wall because everybody thinks they're reinventing the wheel and they talk about him.

And like I felt like going into this postseason, everyone forgot what playoff Robosky meant. And for years, that was not a good thing. And everyone forgets it because of the last two years. And it's like, okay, he turned things around. But all of a sudden last night, it's like, well, you know, he's very beatable high blocker. And it's like, well, first of all, that's been discussed through all of his playoff failures before. And also his entire Blue Jackets tenure, which people forgot existed. Like, yes, he has a weakness.

A lot of goalies do. But like, this is something brand new. Like, I can't. I also love, I love that you can beat him high blocker thing because it comes up so often. And it came, well, like, wow, yeah, okay, you can beat a guy high blocker. You can beat a guy on his, like, maybe a guy's got a slow glove hand, whatever. It's like people sniff that out and act like they're, you know, like they've, yeah, like they've uncovered some kind of wild trade secret. Like, yeah, man, if, if, if you shoot high on a goalie above his hand, like, he's, he's going to maybe have some tough times, have a tough time stopping it.

You're not, you're not, you're not inventing anything here. Is there a goalie whose weakness isn't high blocker or high. Oh, no, it's high gloves. Sorry, I think I said wrong. I think he's high glove. It was high blocker with the vassie weakness that everyone like rediscovered last postseason, right? It was high glove for Bob, but still, like the point remains. Like you're right, what goalie doesn't have that weakness? You look at Connor Hellenburg charts and it's like, well, if you beat him high.

Yeah, it turns out it's hard to beat a goalie high. Shoot, yeah, shoot high. It's that easy. Just elevate the puck and beat him and beat him on his glove side of it every time. Easy, easy, peasy. With no space at all, why don't you take a perfect shot to the top corner in the playoffs? I think I should just do that more simply. Like if it were me, I would just snipe high glove side.

Every time, you know, I would skate right to the slot and I would just rip one. I don't know what guys will do that more. It's unbelievable. We found a market inefficiency here. The other game we had last night, we had the continuation of the Miko Ranton show. And this is where Miko Ranton is at. folks like we need to this is an important distinction for him obviously he has an he has another another hat trick stars three jets two second period had he's got points on 12 straight stars

goals which is sick he just beat him he just beat a lemieux record lemieux had points on nine consecutive goals in the 90 for the 92 penguins he's also the first player in staling cup left history obviously to score multiple hat tricks in a single period like shocker that hasn't that that hasn't happened yet And that's from Marat's one of Marat's post-game pieces. But back to my original point, Miko Rinton is now surfacing on a level in the United States where I am getting non-hockey fan friends who are like, hey, who is this dude? Like, that's the level that that's the level that he's hit over the last couple days. I think the, like him, like personally destroying his former team is the kind of story that the NBA gets a lot more

often. Star-powered League, there's a lot of trade movement, there's a lot of spite, and that tends to be a more common occurrence. In the NHL, because single players can't single-handedly dominate a series like that, that doesn't happen a line with the guys who can do that don't get traded. Rattan in doing that was, I think one of the greatest NHL stories we've seen in a long time. the whole saga's been crazy. I'm trying not to be like a prisoner of the moment on this one,

but it feels, it kind of feels that way. This feels like an all-timer story that's playing out directly in front of us. I don't know, maybe last, you know, I hate to say like I needed further sold on it

after a dude has, you know, a hat trick in game seven. Game seven against his former team. In third period. Yeah. But last night, I'm just like,

like I was, I was watching in my hotel room, like with the sound off for the first school. I'm like, oh, I did it again. I did it again. It really is, it really is crazy. This is an all-timer thing that we're witnessing play out, I think, right in front of us. No, we are. And like, I think the fact that he got traded twice, I think it's like the whole lore of

it because how many times, like, when we all heard that, oh, the canes might trade him, how many of us were like, shut up? This doesn't happen. And this, like, just shut up. And like everyone kept any podcast radio. They'd be like, oh, what do you think? I'd be like, I will believe it when I see it. I'm not believing anything.

Everyone's just speaking. Like, let's relax. And then like, who's the idiot now? But it just doesn't happen in hockey. And then for it to happen the way it did, the situation got so much press the entire year. It was talked about so much. And everyone act like, he's terrible, which he wasn't.

Like, nobody wanted to, I'd be like for this like random fourth line guy, I remember like, you know, there's a human element to it. he's got to settle in. But for a superstar guy, it's like, no, he's actually bad. He's actually all Nathan McKinnon. It's like, yes, Nathan McKinn is a big part of it. But. Yeah, he should have been great off the jump immediately with like with no questions asked. And once he wasn't, because I know we talked about about this, the three of us did. You know, he had half of his game, I think, in each spot after he got traded, right? He goes, he goes to Carolina. He's, he's showing the, showing the play driving ability. He's generating the chances. He's just not

not capitalizing them. And then for the first chunk of games in Dallas, after they acquired him, he goes into elite finisher mode and he's producing and whatever, but he's also not generating chances at the rate that you would expect either. So now it seems like, you know, imagine,

imagine this, he needed maybe a couple, a couple weeks to adjust. Now it seems like he's found a way to, you know, marry, marry the two. Because that's what great players do,

right? Like this is like he's, I'm glad we can put this to bed because it was the narrative surrounding Mika Ranton and if, you know, the blues were, or if the abs win game seven would have been, would have been aggravating. But now, now it seems like he's, you know, we can remove that bit of doubt and talk about him a little bit more normally moving forward. It would have been insufferable.

Sorry, Tom, I was just going to say. It just was too much, right? Like, everything about it, like, oh, he's not playing well. And then you forget, like, he was brought into doubt. And they're like, okay, you're going to play Roebbeye Hintz got hurt game one, I think, of them playing together. You got hit with the puck. Like, let's relax.

And then here it is last night, I feel like, as if you're saying, Sean, like, oh, do you need more? He scored two lines with the fourth, two goals with the fourth line. Not even with Hinson and Granlin, right? That, I feel like takes it up a level. You're playing with Sam Steele and you're scoring two goals. Like, okay. And I also, like, you look back to, I think it was 22, 23. and McKinnon and Rantanen and only played like 50% of their minutes together at 5 on 5 versus the usual like 80%.

I remember Rantaninan was going to get some heart trophy love for a bit there. And then I think he finished maybe seventh than voting and McKinnon still got more hype because of course. But like he separated himself a little bit and showed like, okay, I do have this in the tank. I think the thing that annoys me and this doesn't just apply to Ransan and it applies to a lot of players is they'll say, oh, he's just a McKinnon merchant, McCar, just a McKinnon merchant, dry-siddle, just a McDavid merchant. Hushar, just a McDavid merchant.

It's like, it is definitely not that easy. And it's not a black and white thing where it's 100% credit to one guy. And to do what Renton and did beside McKinnon is not something literally anyone can do. You see Jonathan Druin beside him. You see Artury Lachan beside him. They don't score.

110 points. And it drives me up a wall when people say a player is a product of one guy. And obviously there's an element of truth to that. It is easier to be the second guy in a line or a third guy on a line. And Randon had to, I think, adjust to being the guy in the line. And that did take some time. But he's still an extremely talented player. And he wasn't just McKinnon, it wasn't just McKinnon McCar, whatever. And when you do have one of those guys who can be the air quote second guy on the line with the Nathan McKinnons of the world,

you keep them around. And that, like, it's true. Like, if that means, if that means you pay him 500 grand a year more than you're comfortable with or a million more or whatever the number was for Colorado, you say that's, you say fine,

you know, because we have, we have proof of concept here. We know how good this guy is. We know how he works with, with our all world elite megastar center. Like, let's just, let's just, uh, let's, let's, let's bank this, right? Let's not, let's not overthink it.

We know they're great together. Maybe, maybe we like, you know, overpay him based strictly on valuation. And, you know, whatever. We take, we take what we've got and move on. And I always really, of course, this is the way it goes to me. It always relates back to Coney Crosby, right? But like, did the Penguins overpay, uh, Chris Cunits a little bit back the day. Do they overpay Pascal Dupuy a little bit back in the day? Like, yes. Are those guys players

on par with Miko Randin? Like obviously not. But the value that they had to that team, to that line, and just by virtue of the fact that you could say without a doubt that they could produce and play with Sydney Cresby, that's like, okay, fun. Like give them a little bit more money, sign them for an extra year, and then, you know, reap the benefits down the line. And that's the decision going back to what Colorado did that I, the element of that decision that I just didn't, I just didn't get. Like, this is when you're going to nickel and dime over, over, over, over something. It's just, it's just wild, wild to me. The other thing is, like, how many cup teams have won with one offensive forward star?

Like, it's not a long list, and they're so hard to get. And the abs just kind of gave them away for someone who's a fake forward. star. No disrespect to Martin Nches, but like you're not Miko Ranton and you're not in that upper echelon and it just seemed they got they got cute. They got cute. They out they all thought themselves. Yeah. Now they're in now what are they doing?

They're sitting at home and they're watching Miko Ranton and score a natural hat trick in every game. You know, that's the way. It's tough. Yeah. It's hard times. It's like they wanted to get younger and then they opened up cap space to do something. But like it seemed like, okay, for instance, was going to ask for 15 million, then Colorado would have been justified. And that's kind of like how it was painted at the time. And then like the more the story develops, you're like, oh, it was over something so little. And I get it. Like the cap's going up. And I think a lot of people are going,

a lot of players are going to be asking for way more. And maybe they have that internal cap. And it's, you know, Nathan McKinnon's number and things like that. Like you tried to justify it at the time and be like, okay, I can see where the abs are going because maybe they felt the situation is getting out of hand. but also on the other hand like dom you said how many cup teams have these two stars and i remember last year before dry siddle signed his extension the big question was like is he going to extend there is he going to want to be the number guy some number one guy somewhere else and you look through like history of these number ones and number two guys like ovetkin abatrim and taves and cane and parry and get slab and kutroff and stamcoast and you're like how often does the number two guy leave

and it's like they don't they really don't like yager left okay oats left from being with Brett Hold, but nine times out of 10, that number two guy stays. And if he leaves its way after like his prime or it's the number one guy leaving first. So it shows like just how rare it is for that team to not fed on the number two guy. And it makes it look even more questionable. Like we have the benefit of hindsight now and all the reports changing of, oh, it's $250,000 and things like that versus maybe four or five million, which you could make sense of. And it just, it looks a little bit worse. Even if the truth is like somewhere in the middle, right?

Like if it's a million, a million, a million five, whatever. I just make it happen. Like, like go like, like, again, don't get, don't get cute. And again, it came back and it bit him because he's playing right now and they are not. They also could have just like waited. They had, they had seven more months. Yeah. I think one more run with Ranan and McKinnon and Landisog, a line we have not seen.

since they last won the cup. Getting mad about the Colorado Avalanche on a Thursday morning. It's okay to pay Scotty Pippen. It's okay. Also, like, their core is not that big. Like, you look at some guys and some teams, and, like, the core, like, you think of Pittsburgh, right? It's Trosby Malkin and the time.

You're like, okay, cool, like, up their cup years, that's the core. And then everybody else, you have a good secondary cast. Like, this isn't five guys in your core. This isn't six guys. where you're like, wow, you're paying six guys upwards of eight million. Like, I don't know. I feel like it gets overblown. Like, if you're saying these are three cornerstones and we're just going to bet on

them and figure out the rest, like, go off. I don't know. The Leafs have a core four. And everyone's complaining. Why can't you have a core three? We're not, we're not saying the word, the phrase core four. We don't, we don't do that in these parts. Yeah, it's core five now.

Let's go. No, Maddie and I'm sorry. I will not listen to this. I've, I've heard stories of this badness. We got to take a break. We're going to move on the segment, too. We're going to talk about underappreciated players on each of the remaining teams. Stick around.

We'll be right back. All right, you two. We're going to pick some guys off the E-Rosser who aren't getting the love maybe that they deserve or have earned. We're going to start with, let's start with the series I'm covering, Carolina, Washington. Let's go with hurricanes. Dom, who's someone who's someone on the of the Canes group that

I think deserves a little more shine? I mean, since we've been talking about it a lot, how about Logan Stankovin? I knew it. I mean, he's got three goals in six games. I want to believe that is more than Martin Nett just has. He's

looked like a playoff performer and he's still somehow technically a rookie's a perfect Carolina Hurricanes player in terms of just being a little engine of or checking chaos and he's been sick to watch which is a high praise for a Carolina Hurricanes death player that goal he scored in game one it was it was a combination of him him and cook and you know wreaking some havoc deep in the Washington zone they may force a force a turnover from Alexiev.

I had a pretty good view of it happening too. You're just like, it was like, this is peak. This is Pete Cainz. And he is, he is, he is the, he is the ultimate, the ultimate Cainz player. Yeah, we, we love, we love Logan Sanquin in these parts. I feel like him and Jarvis are like, if you had to create a player for Rod Brindamore in that system, you're spitting out those two players. And it's so much fun.

And I like that Stancove and, like, he came in and he scored, like in his first game with the Keynes, too. Because everyone's like, oh, he has everything the Keynes won. Like he four checks. He can do this. He can do that. But he doesn't finish his chances. And he doesn't. I'm like, please do.

But I think it's fun because he fits on that third line to start. Yeah. And I liked seeing him with Martinuk and Stahl, like, just go make life miserable for the devils. And now he's on that second line. And you're like, okay, the canes have a scoring third on the second line. Mm-hmm. So that's. That's kind of huge.

That's pretty big there that the coconut amy line can do something. I think the line matching in that series moving forward is going to be really interesting because I don't know. I don't know if you guys, how much you guys cracked into the results after game one. The Dubois, Tom Wilson. Oh my God.

It was a 252 in shots. Holy hell. I knew it was bad when I was watching it. I don't think I quite realize it was it was to that extent. So like, and that was, that was the Aho. that was Aho's Feshnikov, Jackson Blake, right?

So if I'm interested to see tonight what Carberry does, like do you put, do you put Nick Dowd line on, on those guys? Do you just do what you can to get, to get the PLD line away from, away from Aho? Because that is just, that was, it was foul. Like that's, that is where they lost that. Like, everyone's in a 94, 34, 34 shot advantage, whatever. Like, that's bad.

But it's, 25 of those shots are coming again. one line that's supposed to be good and got a handle going against the best. It kind of only came out of one personnel grouping. Like it was that line and then Carlson and Chickering. If you can figure out something there in your Washington, at least in the home games, like I think I think stuff could change, but holy hell, man. I think if that line isn't going, they are cooked. That is their shutdown line.

They were unreal during the season. But the playoffs are a different priest. and I remember watching that game saying, wow, all that was really just in the offensive zone, all game, and just not really paying mind who's on the ice for the capitals during those moments. And like, wow,

I haven't noticed PLD at all today. Because you think it's going to be like, you know, the Lars Eller line or the Dowd line or something. You don't think that they're going to eat the PLD lines lunch as much as they did. So that's what I'll be watching tonight. Let's just spin in it. Let's just spin directly.

into the caps. Who's someone, either you can take this, but who's someone who's flying out of the radar a bit for them? How about someone who's not playing? How do we talk about Martin Farrari and how much this defense misses him because they have had to change up all of their pairs.

And now you have Sandin and Matt Roe together, and you have Chickren playing with Carlson. And yes, they played together in the regular season a little bit, but they weren't getting top competition in the regular season. Like they figured out how to make Jacob Chick-Rick-Ritch. in Rourke, right? And it's not playing them in those minutes. And I'm, I'm looking at it going, maybe you need to make some changes. And I know Carberry said it in round one, right? Like when it was

Suzuki Strom, like, I'm not going to overthink the matchup game and like kind of stop his guys from playing the way they should be because you're worried about matchups. But it's like, okay, maybe you need to a little bit on that back end because I, I don't know if it's like, oh, it's one player, throwing everything out of sorts is that each pair has changed now. Mm-hmm. Yep. And it's in checkering. Chicken was playing a lot with with Harvey too. And Chickren and Carlson, they're too, they're too similar. They're in a lot of ways.

Like they're chaotic, you know, chaos agents kind of playing with he didn't. Also, Carlson looks, I don't know if he's hurt. I don't know if he got old overnight, but he looks, he looks not good, right? So yeah, man, they need to, they need to figure out something there. And it does, Shay, like you're totally right. I think their problems hinge entirely on the fact that Farby got hurt. it's second to last regular season game or whatever it is and he's out. So Alex Alexev's in.

The third pair is Alexiev TVR, which, you know, who knows, maybe that, maybe that changes. But yeah, they got to, they got to figure something out there because it, it, it ain't working. The, the through line for that series, and this is something that Tom Wilson said ahead of it, is that the Carolina, God bless the Montreal Canadiens, Carolina Hurricanes are not the Montreal Canadiens. That's a different, that's a different team. They're better across the board. And the stuff that the caps got away with against Montreal isn't flying anymore.

And I think a lot of that stems totally from the injured for Harvey and the effect that it's had on the D pairs. They got away with not having them in round one. But I think it's biting them in the butt now. Just to be not mean to Caps fans, Dillonstrom is very nice. Good, good player. He is. I've also come to appreciate. him as a quote.

He is. He is nails. Like he's, he's, he's, he's a hockey nerd. He'll talk about, he'll talk about whatever.

Yeah, he's a, and he's a nice player. He's, he's an example, I think, Strom of, of how good a coach

Spencer Carbri is. Like, he just know, he knows, he knows how to use him. He knows what he's good at. He plays him in the right way. He knows he's good and we'll play him, right?

Yep. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Not bearing him in the bottom six and being like, you're bad. Mm-hmm. It goes a long way.

the other game tonight this game's tonight right Oilers Vegas I had to think for a second playing the other game tonight I don't watch

it's the other game tonight I said this I said this to McIndoo yesterday I didn't watch a I literally didn't watch a single second of that game on Tuesday night because I had to

I did it right afterwards so I don't even know what's going on so tell me tell me something who's it who's an oiler who deserves more credit than they're getting

everyone not name McDavid and Dry Seidel which is absolutely stunning considering the narrative going into the playoffs was holy crap everyone but

Nick David and dry sidel looks not good and I think the king of that is King Kling himself John Klingberg who was a complete afterthought going in the series was sort of an afterthought

when they signed him did not look good during the season looked horrible last year in his comeback to the Leafs but suddenly against all odds looks like vintage John Klingberg, which rules to an incredible extent.

Like, this is what we all love to see. We love seeing a guy who used to be one of the best players in the league come back from injury troubles to look like his old self. He's been dominating games. He's been moving the puck extremely well. He's been the Klingberg, we all remember. And I think it's made a massive difference to the Oilers Blue Line. And it's amazing how him and Jake Wallman have looked, especially.

I think it's important periodically to have a guy like him pop up or maybe like, you know, I'm thinking of Patrick Kane the season before last. It's good to have guys who remind us that sometimes injuries are real and that people can, in fact, return from them. They can rehab them. They can have necessary operations and come back and be some some solid percentage of the player they were before that. I think maybe that's, you know, whatever, we're jumping the gun. Maybe a little bit too quickly on Klingberg. I'm not going to, I'm not, I'm not necessarily expecting him to be, you know, prime Dallas Klingberg for the next three years after he had double hip resurfacing surgery or whatever it was. But, you know, it's a good thing to

remember that, you know, injuries, injuries can affect play and also players can return. return from them and kind of respond and kind. Yeah, I think it's the thing to really remember is just because their back doesn't mean their back. Like sometimes when they return their playing, you just expect them to jump right back into it. I think Tom Wilson is a great example where it took him like two years to get back to the player he was. And you look at that injury, look at his age, and you think, okay, he's cooked, it's fine,

whatever. We don't have to worry about Wilson anymore. and then he is like the horror movie villain that you didn't, you didn't end. And he's back. And we're seeing something similar with, with Klingberg, although it took him a lot longer to get back to this point. It had Connor Brown to that conversation too.

Because like you forget about what was it, Torn ACL when he joined the caps. And you forget just how good he was with Ottawa before that. Like when there was that consideration, was Ottawa going to move him at the deadline? It's like, could this be the next plate Coleman? And that goes on your third line. He's sick in transition.

He can create scoring chances. He can do a little bit of everything and play with top guys or be in your middle six. And it was like guys like him and Hagle getting the hype. And then Brown obviously gets hurt. It took him a long time to get back. You look at last year. We were so easy to be like, what, it took him 70 games to score a goal or something. And, you know, that sucks.

But now he's playing really well. And he scores that goal. He makes Shea Theodore look bad, which a lot of people are doing this postseason. So like I'm not going to. I feel like he hasn't been 100% either, but like there's tears of health, just like there's tears of like speculation, like kicking the tires and things like that, like actually pursuing. It's like, are you healthy enough to play in a regular season game or playoff game? That is a difference. Are you healthy enough to be effective in those games?

There's a difference. Are you healthy enough to be your actual self in those games? So it's a long road back. And I'm sure he had to deal with a lot of stuff in that market too last year of like not not playing up to the level that was expected of him. now it's like, all right, so he's not the guy, but if he can be a good depth guy and show he still has all that speed, that's huge if you have that speed on your second or third line. That's something they lost with McLeod and Holloway. So it's nice that Brown is providing some of that finally.

What are we thinking about Vegas? Because that's, I mean, I don't know who played well in that game outside of Markstone. So we've got maybe go a little bit farther back and think about the first round is, well with them who's flying under the radar for the golden nights. How about Dorothea? Yes. Our guy. Our guy.

We got to go with guys who are not in game one and you see their absence because it's like Jack Eichol in round one definitely wasn't he didn't win his minutes against the Caprice offline. It took him a little and it took him getting, you know, it's Marksstone and William Carlson playing with him, right? Like three shutdown guys put together to go head tab with that line. And it's like, well, the Golden Knights in the early. the series had that huge advantage because it's like,

we have hurdle and Dorothea of playing together and Saad. Like, all right, go off guys. So obviously they still have two of the three players, but I think they miss having Dorofiev. And like, that's going to be a big power play threat that the Golden Knights need because the wheelers, their offense just comes in wait.

Not even comes in waves. It comes in just overwhelming moments with McDavid and dryside all on the ice. And then on the power playing, you're like, okay, you got to figure something out. So I feel like they're definitely going to miss. him, especially if Ikel's neutralized again because he's going to be playing against McDavid and Drysidal. I keep picking Iko to win the cons might because I pick Vegas at the start of it to win the

to win the whole thing. And I'm trying to show some integrity, trying to show some consistency. And I just don't just feel like I screw it up. All right. I feel like we could maybe, we could maybe name this group of players like the Anton Lundell. All-Stars based on what we saw from him last night. Is he the guy on Florida or is, or do we like someone else there?

Like, it's really just a take-your-pick from that line. Not line. Yeah. Yeah. I think people know Lundell a bit. They obviously know Bradley. I think A.T. Lus-Rin is someone who falls extremely under the radar under that team in that team because he is an extremely good defensive player and him and londell

were really cooking on that third line all year and you add marshawn to that and suddenly they add an offensive flare to it where they're controlling the game controlling possession and now they're also scoring on top of that and he has been extremely surprising because I think just even going back to this year last year he didn't seem like he had to had that offensive gear and he has eight points in seven games, which is astounding to me. And they're up 11-1 in his minutes for the playoffs. Just a monstrous performance so far. And it's got to be one of the big reasons that we're not, you know,

there's many reasons that we're not riding off the Florida Panthers in this series. But I think I think the play of that line is a pretty big one. Yeah, no one's writing off the Panthers. They're deep. And we're seeing that play out, especially with that line. Yeah. Let the party begin. The leaves have cracked the code.

They're on the other side of the mountain now, folks. They've got six wins, baby, the most they've had in 25 years. Oh, my God. That's unbelievable. And then, like, just wait. Because when we're talking about this in a week, we're like, so what happens? We're like, well, you know, loose to Ryan. And we said he was really good.

And he popped off some more. And the Max Domi line just fell apart. who saw that one coming and here's your huge advantage but no like i i agree with the luster an hype but i want to give a little more to lindel because i felt like last year his regular season was really underwhelming when i think we all looked at him like this guy's gonna have a breakout year this is the breakout guy and it kind of kind of didn't happen and then the playoffs happened right and he was sick in the playoffs and you're like okay so you're a young player who struggled in the regular season but you could amp it up in the playoffs like that already is a good sign

because you look at other guys like perfetti was scratched for a lot of the playoffs last year White Johnston, like his first playoffs two years ago, you were like, okay, you look like a boy among men. And then the next year, it's like, okay, now you have the great regular season and the great playoffs. Like Lundell was not the way I guess you expected for a young guy. You expect him if your regular season's not there. I don't know if you have it in you to be that good in the playoffs. And he did. And now it's like, all right, two straight years of it.

Sick, go off. Mm-hmm. The other side of that series is the leaves, obviously. And this is actually what made me think of talking about this today. I swear to God I had the thought before I watched Jake McCabe, you know, play goalie there down the stretch. But I do feel like what he brings to that group in Toronto's lost a little bit because maybe it's because maybe it's because everyone loves Christanaev for great reason.

But I feel like I feel like McCabe deserves a little bit adapt to. Is he where you guys are at on the least on the things or is there someone else who, you know, deserves credit. I think I'm there with you as well. I think the logical choice would be maximum patch ready, but because it's Toronto and the spotlight is huge, he's getting all the flowers he deserves. Yeah, it's tough for guys to fly under the radar because it's the least.

McCabe and the top pair have been excellent, and I think a lot of people, again, like to give 100% the credit to one guy, but McCabe was here last year and the year before, and he was Toronto's shut down rock in those two years, and he was a really, I think, excellent two-way defender who can, like he's not a detriment offensively. Obviously, he doesn't produce the way Morgan Riley does or an actually great elite officer player,

but he does his part. He's quiet, and obviously without the puck, he's incredible. And I think that was a great fine for the Leafs. years ago, huge bargain as well. And once you put him with TANF, they have a kind of shut down pair they haven't had in my lifetime, I think. And that's why it's different. And that's why the least are definitely going to win this series and, you know, go on to bigger and better things, clearly. We can only, we can only hope it's now turned from belief to passionate belief. Passionate belief. That's a great way to put it.

The passion is rising. Oh, my God. Dom has the passion. Let's go to, let's flip back to the Western Conference. Somebody other than Miko Redden on the Dallas Stars has to be doing something, right? Right? How about Tyler Sagan?

I did not know a version of Tyler Sagan. We were going to see this spring because, again, he came back before the playoffs started, which I think is encouraging because you get, you know, a day or two to like adjust back to the speed and obviously knowing that it was going to be av stars like that's not when you want to make your adjustments you don't want to come in cold against the abs i feel like but i i think he's looked really good and i think he like resets the lineup and obviously they changed it a bit last night to bring back jason roberts and they were not touching that all thin line as

they should never ever ever do um but that like second line we know of sagan marchman and juchin Like they were, they were the first line for a lot of the regular season when Hinson Robertson weren't playing up to par. So when Sagan got hurt, you're like, okay, you all need to figure it out around him. And I feel like he jumped back into that line. The second line looks great again. And now they have all these options to mix and match their middle six, which is such a strength to have.

Like the deepest forward group keeps getting deeper. And now Ranssen's clicking. And now you have Sagan and now here Robertson that you're like, wow, who can compete with that? So I want to give him that like credit because he's not going to get it with Ransson. and popping off. Yeah. I feel like the Jets are kind of a tough one.

The guys at the top of the lineup, you know, whether it's Kyle Connor, you know, Shifley comes back. I don't think anybody's ever going to say that Mark Shifley is underappreciated. And Hullabuck's been bad. So we can't, we can't act like there's more meat on the bone left for him. Who do you guys like? Do you guys like on Winfegg? I think you've got to go with the defenders who are making Helibuck look good right now.

which is Dylan Sandberg and obviously his partner, Neil Pionk as well. This was their shutdown line all year. I know obviously Josh Morrissey gets a lot of credit, but it was Pionk and Sandberg, and especially once they realized what they had in Sandberg, where he looks legit as a shutdown guy. They really ran with that and threw them the matchup minutes. That was a big preseason storyline with him too, right?

What was he going to look like when he gets elevated? the lineup because they let Brendan Dillon walk partially because they knew that he was that he seemed certainly capable of taking on more of a role and he went out he went out and killed it and he's been he's been great in the playoffs as well yeah Dylan Samberg Dylan Samberg good player great player and I think Piaen got a lot of the hype in that wild overtime game but sandberg is just like a quiet presence just sort of like macape for the leaps as well but honestly I'd take Sanberg he's been just unreal this year. If you don't enroll

someone like that, he's doing it right, right? Mm-hmm. All right. We have an official team name to talk about in segment three. I think that was good. I think that was a good, a good substantive discussion by the two of us. And if you disagree with it,

I don't know. I don't know what to tell you. But hey, we got a nickname and uniforms to talk about in segment three. We'll be right back. Hello, Utah, Memeth. the announcement yesterday, it's official. The Utah NHL team is going to be called the mammoth.

They are going to wear jerseys that are the same three primary colors that we saw from them in their first regular season in Salt Lake City, which is the blue and the black and the white. I feel like the three of us, I have talked about jerseys ad nauseum, I think, and in a lot of ways. let's just start there like what did they did they do this right did they blow this I I think that's I think that's maybe my concern I'm like I'm still

I'm not I'm not sold yet I don't know I think they did okay I like mammoth as a team name I think it's solid it's

I don't it's mammots the Please, please. I hate these. Please, I only want plural names. The plural of mammoth is mammoths. Like, it's not mammoth. Like, come on.

Yeah. Isn't a deadies or whatever. This isn't a cracking situation. They do like, see, like I like mammoth, but mammoths would have been better. I love the logo, but the color scheme probably could have been better. I don't like the black, powder blue and white. Maybe they should have just been powder blue. That would have been sick.

Is there a powder blue team in the league? I don't think so. No. Own that color. We don't need another team wearing a black jersey. And that's the part that I think bothers me most is they had this template jersey and they're like, we're going to keep rolling with it. And if they had, like, I think they had the hats release or they showed it.

And the logo on the powder blue hat looks even better. the logo's fine. It's of its, it's of its time. I feel like that is the exact sort of thing you see from like on TikTok whenever someone's like, hey, we're going to, we're going to rebrand the Pittsburgh Pirates or something. And then it's like, it's someone who clearly has talent, like talented graphic designers to do this, but they rebrand existing teams. They all kind of look the same. And I think that's kind of the vibe that I got from from the logo. Like it's, it's okay. Like it's everything across the board is just like it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, acceptable. It's it is reached the level of acceptability and not not much beyond that for me.

It's a huge elephant with a mountain hat. What do you want, man? I feel like a little detail. It's like the like the that like the that like the that like the range in Utah's in it. I'm like, own that. Like make that the shoulder patch and make a little embroidered hats like that. Like that is the vibe 100% and you can do that on black and it'll look really cool. And even like the Utah with the hockey stick. I'm like, okay, I love that too. I do like the logo. I don't love the name. I'm with you, Dom.

And I'm a hypocrite. I'm going to say right now, if my team wore powder blue, you're not going to see me wearing. I would be like, give me a black alternative. Like I'm not wearing a color and that's fine. That's just me.

But like, this is not about wearability in the public. This is like owning your branding and owning your moment. I think you have a harder time doing it if it's black. I think too many teams are just like coping out and wearing black instead of having a color. But what grinds my gears the most is I feel. like you're not owning your branding by wearing this on the road. At home, you're having your logo. You're going to get that recognition. On the road, it's not like they're not going to see your logo.

It's going to be on the jumbo trend and stuff. But I feel like you keep the Utah diagonally as your alternate as a nod to season one and that's fine. And make that black and go with the powder blue at home. And then on the road, have the same jersey that you're wearing at home in white, match the striping, match the detailing around the neck because it's not consistent. But have that. logo with you because you have a full year to make up for that you didn't have one that you wanted that everybody sees this logo and thinks of you and I feel like on the road is the time to do that. So it just, it annoys me. It frustrates me.

I'm like, that is poor marketing. Like you, you need to embrace this new identity that you didn't have in year one. So why are you not doing it fully? I mean, that's what we saw. I think that's part of it made the Cracken branding work. And I do I think the Cracken is still a trash? Yeah. I think it's stupid.

I think that's a dumb nickname for it. But everything else about their branding about the is, it's incredible. The color palette's incredible. The logo is fantastic. You know, I love the red eye on the on the cracking logo. And they wear it on both of their jerseys. They wear it at home and they wear it away. And they've established that mark, I think, is one of the best in the league over the last, over the last couple years.

But, you know, the flip side side of it for me. Is it the mammoth logo isn't that good? So if your logo is as good as Seattle, lean into it. Fine. Throw that, throw that on everything. Go for it. If it's just whatever,

like AAA baseball grade, like the, like the mammoths is for me. Like, like put it on, leave it off. I don't, I don't really care.

What did you, what did you want to see from the logo? That's a good question. You have to design one now. Like, just, just give us a quick pitch. I can just be a hater.

Would you want a full body mammoth or just the head? I want to like, how about like, I don't like the side, I don't like the side profile. Figure out some way to do a straight on head on mammoth. Okay, I see that. I see that. Yeah, with the tusks like really like, that could be cool and that could be something. Okay, wait, work with me here. Or let's go like predator style.

They're going to skate out of a mammoth head and the tusks are going to be there. I don't know. And that's what you're coming out of consistency. profile a profile it's it's the preds it's the wild like it's just it's like try to do something different I don't know the mountain hat

call yourself call yourself the mammoths for God's sake I can't with that it drives me up a wall like please fake plural or singular plural like good God oh no I'm mad what name did you guys want to see like I was kind

of viving with the outlaws and then I like the allies the fury was the one singular name. I'm like, the Utah Fury, I'm interested. I hated that so much. That felt like a roller hockey league. I liked Outlaws a lot. I think that logo looked like an EA Sports created team logo.

It wasn't. Yeah. The logo wasn't right, but the name was. That was what made me pivot on Outlaws, because that was my favorite from the list. But then see the mockups, you're like, this looks like a double A baseball team. This looks like, or this looks like

EAS sports. Yeah. whatever Madden 2002 you know kind of yeah create a player stuff yeah I wanted to at least got the triple A baseball line it's yeah right it's better I wanted them to have like saloon doors that like the players like kicked open

and came onto the ice and had the outlaws like I'm like this could be a real vibe that's right that's right that's right Salt Lake City home of saloons and outlaws baby that's the first thing I think of it's fitting yeah how much of this is the fact that they just weren't ready with something from the get go.

Who could blame them, though? Honestly. I feel like everyone was so harsh on it. It's like the NHL was like, can you have a team in like two minutes? Thanks. But like he wanted a team for years. It seemed like there were things in motion. It feels like you should have a little something prepared.

And I think having a whole year where you're skating on with a template jersey that says Utah and then you just slap a logo onto that template, I think kind of adds to the feeling a lot of people have. where it doesn't feel they wanted to be the Yeti and they copy the PW well and Haley wrote

the story last year about the PW branding process right and logo design and all that stuff and she talked to a lot of people for it and the big takeaway was basically that this takes forever like this the process is is way more complicated

and way more time consuming than it should be in that in that you would guess so i i try to like keep that in mind whenever i whenever i you know we're like how do this take you why did this take you so long and how is this the end result like i know i know that it's difficult but i still kind of feel that way i'm like i'm like dude you had a year to do this or a year plus and this is and this is what you came up with like it is it is replacement level to me like it's fine it's not bad like yes it's like that incomplete remember like we were when we were doing those like judgments it's like okay four out of six hit but it's like the charge and the frost it's like did you run out of time and you're like like the frost is half a logo mm-hmm yep so i feel like that's where you're at on mammoth yeah the

charge is one of the worst logos in sports i think it is color scheme it should be charcoal with gold accents like please please it would make more sense with the name i hate the red it makes no sense. We're going to bring you guys back just so we can sit here and talk for 45 minutes and be mad about logos. Just have that be the full focus of the show. We don't have to actually pretend to talk about players. That'd be a great show. Players or games or anything like that. Does that work? What do you guys favor logos in this in this league? What do you guys, what's the favorite? Let's let's see where the vibes are at of where the mammoth could have gone. Okay, so we're talking purely logo, not complete branding. Correct.

okay, hold on. I'm pulling up a picture of every logo so I can like, really make sure I don't screw this out. Because I know I will. Well, the sharks are like, the sharks are up there, I would say, for like logo. I feel like there's a perfect.

But that one's fine. It's cute. They've had like, they've had like three quarter looks at times. How about the blues? I think the blues always get slept on. Classic. I don't, I don't know if they're,

I would say slept on for good reason. It's like, it's just okay. But it is iconic. I think that they're back to using more royal blue, I think I've come around with them a little bit more. This is off-season topic stuff. We're going to do this. We're going to do this in September.

Yeah. We can do logos, branding, complete vibes and have a rating system. Talk to you folks on August 26th. They're winning. is it the crackin though? Like I, it might be the cracking. Like they,

that logo like knocked at the park like right out of the bat. I feel like Vegas and the crack and set the bar so high for like, I don't like the racist logo at all. Oh, you don't? I, you like your secondary logo? Uh,

it's, I, I don't like their, I don't like their branding. I, I think that logo is whatever to me. That one seems a replacement level to me. I feel like,

you know what? I think they have. the complete look, especially when they're not wearing the old gold jerseys and they have the charcoal. I'm like, the whole look. I'm like, it works together, but the logo itself, I could see it. The charcoal jerseys basically don't exist anymore. They've been mothballed, I think, in a lot of ways. Yeah, the gold jerseys are. Wear them, wear them rarely. I get it. I get it. I get it. If you're Vegas, go, go all out. All right. This is enough. Enough. Enough of this. I have to go to a morning skate. We'll talk to you guys. We'll talk to you guys later. Thank you for your time.

Love the two of you. very, very much. And I love you, and I love you folks. And I love you folks for listening to The Athletic Hockey Show. Healy's back next week. I'm not totally sure where I'm going to be. We'll see. Prospect series, new show tomorrow.

Enjoy the games tonight. And goodbye.