The Athletic Hockey Show - Who won and who lost NHL free agency?

Episode Date: July 2, 2025

The day after 121 deals were made, and $672 million was spent, Gentille, McIndoe and Frankie Corrado take a look at the winners and losers of NHL Free Agency 2025. The guys wonder where Nikolaj Ehlers will end up, and look ahead to what we expect will be a busy July for trades made in the NHL.Hosts: Sean Gentille and Sean McIndoeWith: Frankie CorradoExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff Domet Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. What up, what up? It's the Athletic Hockey Show Wednesday edition with Sean McIndoo. I am Sean Gentilly. We are also joined from what appears to be his home, Frankie Carrado. Buddy, as a TSN employee, I was under the impression that they just handed out cottages to everybody. And that's where you would be pressing from today. Yeah. It would be the case.

It looks like you're at the crib. No, I'm home, boys. No cottage for me, although I know for a fact, there were multiple people right after that show that went directly to their cottage and other people who are probably currently driving up to their cottage. So I don't know at what point you get one. We'll see. We'll see. Stay tuned. Yeah, Nick Eilers is going to sign today and we're going to have no idea because all of the people who break news are gone until mid-September. Yeah. They dealt in the lake with their phone in their pockets by accident. We definitely have had Bob McKenzie over the years send photos of news, like also attached to view from the, view from the lake side too.

Yeah. Like he's definitely done that, which is one of the all-time, one of the all-time flexes from the all-time grades. Since we're on the subject, yeah. Congrats to Bob McKenzie on an unbelievable career. No one did it better. The integrity, the class, the details, everything about Bob was first class, the way he treated people. That is an unbelievable career. And I think, you know, I know left such a lasting impression

in such a positive way on so many people. He's the greatest to ever do it. And I think, you know, we all grew up watching Bob and, you know, following Bob on Twitter. It is a, it's a sad day that he's done, but a remarkable career and wishing him nothing but the best in retirement. Yeah, I'm old enough. I even before he was a TV guy and he was at the hockey news or the Toronto Star. I mean, Bob McKenzie's been part of my hockey fan life for decades. And even beyond that, I mean, we had a little tribute piece go up in the athletic where a few was chipped in.

I quite literally am not here today if Bob McKenzie doesn't pump my tires way back in the blogging days when? Let's be honest, a lot of, a lot of, you know, media stars back then viewed the, you know, kind of these, these young punks with their blogs and social media as competition, as threats, as, uh, uh, you know, something even worse than that in some cases, maybe not nervantly. Who victim, who victimized you specifically? Who is the rudest? Let's name names. Oh, I, I can go a few, but I still carry a grudge against against a few. But I'll say hockey was always surprised me at how many of the veteran hockey guys were cool about that.

I remember the very first thing I went to cover. It was like 2013, 2014. And I ran into, it was probably Wish or somebody like that. And they were like, hey, you know, we're going out afterwards. And I said, okay, I'll find you. And then I ran into Bruce Arthur, a buddy, my. who was, you know, doing the, doing his Toronto Star back when he was a sports writer. And he was like, oh, well, you know, the sports writer, Bruce.

Yeah, he was like the newspaper guys are going to this bar. You should come. And I was like, oh, geez, I don't know what side do I pick? Like, what do I do here? And I ended up going with Bruce. And I got to the bar and it was like the same bar. Everybody was just hanging out and chilling out. But the number of people who have like a Bob McKenzie story of like, I was nobody and Bob

helped me out. Bob, you know, whether it was, I mean, you know, you go on down the list. When I wrote my first book, they're like, hey, man, we want you to write a book, but nobody knows who you are. So we need some famous names to put it on the front of the book. And my agent reached out to Bob McKenzie and said, would you write the foreword? And he did. Why not? Why wouldn't he do that?

Why would he? I mean, there was no reason for him to do it other than he was Bob. And he just liked helping people out. And there's a hundred other people out there who have a story like that. So did I ever tell you I bought that book? I bought your first book. You were the one? Yeah.

That was cool, man. It's on, it's on a bookshelf downstairs. All right. You got to write you. You got to write one too thick. No, we're good.

I don't need you to sign anything. It was like, Sean, you said it, man. Everybody has Bob stories. And we're talking about this because he's, he's retiring.

I don't know, I don't know if he said that's off, off the top or what. He's officially. 100% retiring rather than being semi-retired. Everybody's got a Bob story. And even the small ones, even like me, you know, this is more than 10 years ago. I was, it was during the cup final, I was at a bar.

I was definitely with Bukhinsky. Bob comes up, talks to Greg. I'm just like, I had never had any kind of one-on-one conversation with them outside of the internet. And Bob, like, the fact that he knew who I was, because I was, I was just kind of like trying to blend it in with the with the furniture and and and not really saying much and then he was like he was like oh jinteli like blah i was like holy hell bob mcenzie knows my name like we've climbed the mountain here we're good the other the other big day and i'm and i'm

sure this is true for a lot of american fans huge day late in college for me when we realized we could rig up the TSN feed for trade deadline, like, and watch it in my, in my crummy apartment on whatever internet connection we had, we realized that we could find, you know, illegal feeds and follow free agency that way. And I all due respect to all those guys that are involved with those broadcasts, I have even more appreciation for him now than I did then.

God knows. But that was because of Bob. We're like, we want to see what it was. He is saying. Was Bob McKenzie's coverage back then? better than the Outdoor Life Network, whatever they were putting up there's, I don't think there was anything

because I'm not, NHL Network if it existed was you know, available you know, on gas station pumps and in cabs only. It wasn't actually, we couldn't actually watch it on Unreal TV. So yeah, we had to come up with something and we were just hell bent on

on finding some way to watch to watch the Bobfather and Dregor and whoever else. It was a big day. So, yeah. Salus the one for one. He's the best. That's the greatest. One for one, man.

That really stuck over the years. And that's, you know, like, Bob, the other thing that comes to mind is, you know, we don't have the draft anymore at TSN. Bob had so many details on every player that was getting drafted. You know, like there was no boilerplate stuff. Like, oh, good mobile puck moving defensemen, you know, 15 times throughout the draft. He had specific stuff. You could tell he really dug in.

and did it every single year. I was very fortunate to do a couple panels, a couple leaf panels with Bob sitting right next to him. Kind of intimidating the first time when he walks in. You're like, that's Bob. Like there's no stumbling. There's no fumbling this around tonight. Like,

you better be on your A game. You're sitting next to the legend. But that's, you know, that's just the kind of presence he had. But in the most, you know, nice, gentle way, he's, yeah, it was a true honor to get to know and work with Bob for the short time that I did. And just like from a from a work standpoint, too,

and you kind of alluded to this with the draft stuff. To analogize Bob, like maybe in a way that American fans can understand a little bit more if they're not people who watch TSN coverage, you know, all the time like me, it's like if someone combined Adam Schaefter, like with the insider stuff, with Mel Kiper,

which is the draft stuff, and then added gravitas and empathy and authority on on big on big topics too like like what he's what he says goes still in a way that we don't see from insiders in in modern sports that are just waiting for their phones to go off and just you know retype text from agents bob never did that and i i think the fact that he blended so many aspects of that job so well is what made him is what made him the king he's also incredibly funny and that's and that's important too and that's something god knows the three of us appreciate because we are not we're not serious people the the the whole trade is one for one thing that only bob could have tweeted that because anyone else he would have been like oh that's

they're making a joke or they've got it wrong or whatever but it was like oh geez damn mackenzie said it that it's got to be it's got to be true and hey full credit to the n hl also they uh to recognize bob mackenzie they they gave him pretty much the whole day off yesterday by not having any... That's a Corrado transition. Let's go. The best segue of the year right there. From the top rope, are you kidding me?

I'm trying. I'm learning from the best here. That is Bob breaking the Tomish hurdle trade at 3.01 p.m. a couple of years ago. That's what that is. That was a year and three months ago, by the way. That feels like it was on another planet. Boys, 121 deals signed on the first day of free.

agency, $672 million spent. That sounds like a lot of money. It isn't actually. There was more than a billion spent last year. I think that kind of encapsulates a lot of it. You know, if you go year over year, there's just, it was just not that busy a day for good reason. But Frankie, man, you were, you were on ground zero for this.

You were putting together the board. You're standing up there. Very expertly navigating the interface on moving stuff around on the board, which is making, I was nervous for you from the jump. What was that like in the building when, when you guys showed up at work in the morning and we're like, all right, thank you to the Florida Panthers. Thank you to whoever else. Like, we're going to have to, we're going to have to fend off scraps here. Man, well, first of all, we should have done the show on Monday. Um, and second of all, like we had, we had our list and we were going through it and names would get knocked off. And

then we would have these conversations. Okay, who moves up now and who moves into our top 50? And it was happening again and again. And it got to the point where I just kind of chimed in and I'm like, let's just talk tomorrow because we can't do this all night. And then we get our board and we kind of came to the realization like nine, nine out of the 10 guys or nine out of the 12. It's something like that.

Stayed. Stayed where they were, like signed extensions. and that got me thinking like a bigger picture, you know, forgetting about yesterday, which we'll get more into yesterday specifically, but I wonder because the cap is going up the way it is and there's just only, there's only so much, you know, kind of game changing needle moving talent available out there. I wonder if we're just living in a world now where this is going to be July 1st moving forward, where teams say, I don't want to take my chances with the one player that's out there.

that I got to fend off from 30 other teams. I got a guy that I think is pretty good. He probably wants to take market value. And I'm just going to make the move to extend them. And for agent frenzy is going to become, there's a handful of guys that might be able to do something for your team and a bunch of guys that are just regular old players that fill out your roster.

Because that's what it felt like yesterday. And, you know, the cap's only going to go up more. So it feels like we're going to, we might have the haves and the have-nots. and if you have them, that's great. And if you don't, man, buckle up because you're going to have to draft well for the next five years and hope that you can strike at some point in a trade or if you can catch the big fish somewhere along the way. Yeah, man, because that's the piece that we all missed, right? The cap going up, we all looked at that and said, my free agency might get crazy

because there's going to be so much money out there. But the flip side of it is you did not have that group of free agents where teams had looked at them and said, we like you, we'd love to keep you, we just can't afford it right now. We do not have cap room. We are capped out and so we're going to have to let you go to market. That's usually a pretty big chunk of the free agent class. And we didn't have that this year, A, because teams had the cap space to bring those guys back. And then it became like a self and reinforcing thing because each guy that signed made the July one day look worse,

which maybe made teams go, hey, man, maybe the B minus that we've got right now is better than gambling on, can we get a C plus on July 1st and pay too much for it? So, man, a shout out to all the fans of teams who spent the last year talking about how the cap is going up and the cap's going up and we've got a plan and we're going to have 20 million to spend and it's all going to be fine on free agent day. Turned out it wasn't. There's a lot of teams still sitting there with 20 million or 10 million. or 5 million that they didn't spend. And the others really not very much even left to spend it on. We're seeing that,

I think, on the priority that teams have placed on RFAs over the last few days, too, I think. Like, that's, it's, has less money been spent,

like, absolutely. But we've also seen a little bit of a shift towards teams handling RFA as like, not, and, like, big name RFA is his priority one,

right? or big or long deals for r fays is probably the best way to put it like yes we have noah dobson and yes we have iven bouchard and kandre miller and these guys who are who are toplining that stuff but you also have the martin for harvaries of the world and you know nicholas haig and these players who are who are a little bit further down the lineup i'm not demeaning the work that they do but they're signing you know long-term relatively expensive extensions and i think that's where we're seeing the cap jump come into play. And that's where we're seeing teams being able to say,

all right, we're going to have money. We have money that's open now. We have more that's going to open up in the future. Rather than pick off guys and overpay them on the UFA market, we are truly going to prioritize locking down the guys that we have in the fold already. Bingo, 100% because,

if you think about it, so many cap casualties in years past, a team like the Florida Panthers, they had multiple cap casualties from winning a Stanley Cup because everyone's cashing in and everyone's getting paid. Well, all those guys go back to Florida. And now you don't have those pool of guys heading in and you have guys that are RFAs and you're like,

you know what? Instead of just trying to put the squeeze on them because that's what would happen. You're going to go out, you're going to try and get your headliner, then you put the squeeze on your RFAs because you could. Well, guess what? Your RFAs just became way, they just became way more attractive. because the UFA pool is not great and it's guys that are older and guys that maybe you're weary about attaching a lot of term to.

So those are the guys you have to prioritize. It's a shift. Like it's a complete shift now. And I like it for RFA's. Like I think it's about time that they didn't get squeezed the same way. And there's still guys that made a lot of money, man. Like there's still, you know, Ivan Provarov got $8.5 million. Cody C.C. got $4.5 million.

He makes more than John Tavares with the same term. It's just it wasn't. as, you know, it wasn't as egregious, I guess, as maybe we would have thought, like, it was just going to be this, you know, true frenzy and sweepstakes where money was getting thrown around. I think teams, another thing that comes to mind with this, this year specifically now, the teams that were maybe on the bubble, yeah, what are we going to do? It's too early to start selling off pieces.

Let's, let's circle back to those teams two months into the regular season. Oh, yeah. Because if they start going on, a four-game losing streak, win-one, five-game losing streak. And I'm looking at teams like the Boston Bruins, you know, like the Pittsburgh Penguins, maybe around U.S. Thanksgiving, all these teams that didn't overspend yesterday or just spend money just to spend money, now they're in a good position financially. They have some flexibility and they can strike on a trade and get someone they actually want

or need and not just spend just to spend yesterday. And that is something that we heard a lot this summer is the idea that nobody is actually tearing it down right now. It's just, and I don't think that is because of the cap. I think it's just a weird cyclical thing where, you know, in the NHL, there are some teams contending, some teams are tearing it down, some teams are trying to move up in the middle. I just think we are at a weird situation now where there's almost nobody tearing it down. There's probably a few teams that should be. but for various reasons, almost nobody is doing it.

That won't last a month into the season because some of these teams are going to be six points out of the playoffs on November 1st, and now it's time to do what you should have done in the summer when it was a seller's market, and it probably still will be, but maybe some of those guys, some contract shake-free in a month. There's a lot of teams that are trying to exit,

it rebuilds right now. And there's a lot of teams that are still on the fringe of the playoff discussion. Like the Calgary Flames are a great example of this, right? Because they, you know, we all thought that they're going to be one of those five worst teams in the league last year. Didn't turn out to be the case. They're in the playoff hunt really until the better end. Now, there's a lot of that.

I mean, we know a lot of that. A lot of that's on the back of the goaltenders, but, you know, points count, right? So they're in it until the end. in a different world, you know, where things go a little bit worse for them last year. We're talking about them as tear down candidates, right? We're talking about where's Nazim, where's Nazim Kodry going? Is somebody going to take a roll the dice on Euberdo? Rasmus Anderson, like, actually does get traded rather than just being discussed as a trade candidate on and on.

They have players who, you know, in a different set of circumstances, get sold off. Well, their results were such last year where it's reasonable for them to start the season. and say like, hey, let's see, let's see where this stuff takes us. So yeah, I think that's a big part of why we saw, you know, relatively little action. Yeah, I think if you're kind of looking at yesterday and you're trying to pick winners and losers, teams that did well, teams that didn't do well, I think I have more just question marks than just saying that team lost the day. How can we say that a team lost the day? We really don't know how the landscape is going to shape out, you know, before the puck drops. but I mean, how do you not look at what happened to the Edmonton Oilers yesterday and talk about that where, you know, Corey Perry's out, Victor Arvinson's out, Jeff Skinner's not back, Connor Brown's gone.

And I get it. Like those aren't your core guys. Evander Cain's also gone. You know, are the Edmonton Oilers any closer to the Florida Panthers today than yesterday? No. And in fact, the Panthers, I think by bringing everyone back, they somehow took another step because, there's no one really that closed the gap there. There's just more like wait and sees, I think, for me than just calling teams losers.

I would even say, you know, I know you want to jump in on the Oilers. The Los Angeles Kings, that is a wait and see for me. That is a different looking blue line. And I saw the reaction. It's like, here it goes Ken Holland again, bad contracts, bad players, yada, yada, yada, they can't get out of the first round. So whatever they were doing wasn't necessarily working. So why not try something a little bit different?

They had money to spend. They didn't get the headliner. They didn't get Mitch Marner. They couldn't get anyone else. So they just got big players that are essentially kind of hard to play against. Let's save some of that for seconds. How much worse can it get? They don't get out of the first round.

Let's save some of that for segment two. Let's save like the team specific stuff for L.A. and Edmonton. I'm sure they'll come up again. We'll get into some version of winners and losers after the break. Stick around. we're back in a second. All right, we're back. And after spending a couple minutes there at the end of the segment

talking about how maybe it's not the time for traditional winners and losers and whatever else, which is true, I agree. That's still exactly what we're going to do here. We need to find a way to stratify this. We need to find a way to bring order to it and talk about some specific teams rather than just like the big picture stuff, which is ultimately more important. But, you know, we got it.

What would the show be? if we didn't somehow mention Tanner Geno or what have you. We have to because otherwise, how are the listeners going to send us links in six months after he has a goal and an assist on Hockey Night in Canada and go, this is well. In a six three loss to the Ottawa senators or whatever. Yes, exactly.

I have a conspiracy theory on the Tanner Geno contract. You guys want to hear it? Let's go. So because it's a five-year deal, the Buffalo Sabres, the Boston Bruins are going to play poorly to start the season, and they're going to realize we probably need to tear it down a little bit, and they're going to try and get a really high pick. Is it Gavin McKenna? Maybe, but there's no guarantee that you get that player, but you'll get someone, get someone really good. and now you have a very highly sought after enforcer to protect your young top five pick for the next five years and you don't have to go out and acquire that player. That is my conspiracy theory.

Don Swedey playing six-dimensional chess on signing Tanner to know for as much money as, you know, Andrew Mangi Apani got or whatever. Yeah. We love it. I felt like that was the one deal where, like, I don't know. don't think GMs are getting smarter. I think GMs are getting more afraid of getting savaged for the obvious bad deals. Like I follow a few people on Twitter that are like history people. And so they'll do a lot of on this day in history, blah, blah. So on July 1st, you get all of these like on this day, Milan Luchich sign. It's like him standing next to your rally with like the jersey. And you're going, oh yeah, remember that. That was terrible when we were given like broken down power forward seven years. And on this day, David Clarkson sign. Oh, man. And you don't see those as much anymore. I don't feel like the flashback to that.

Like it was just like the hockey gods were like, we'll give you one. And we'll let Gentilely jump on the, on the signing grades for this one. Like a dog on a, like a starving Rottweiler. I was nice on that. Roll a bone. Yeah, you were nice. You went what, D minus instead of F, I think was what you said that. We know, it's like, look, here's.

Here's why Tanner Geno's stuck out so badly is because to some extent we have seen, regardless of the motivations, we've seen GMs learn from mistakes. And I think Tanner Geno is the example of that, like, it couldn't be more perfect. It couldn't be more. This already happened. The Tampa Bay Lightning already thought he was like a difference making long term piece on a bottom six. And he wasn't. And they had to, you know, cut bait and send him to L.A., where he also was not a difference making piece on a bottom. sick. Like, Tanderno is an NHL player.

I like, whatever, put them, put them on a fourth line. You know, it's, it's all, it's all good. And ultimately for Boston, it's not going to matter because that team, that team's going to stink. So paying Tanner Geno's 3.5 for the next five years is not going to be any kind of disqualifying mistake. That's not going to why they, why they make the playoffs or miss the playoffs, but just the idea that someone's like, oh, yeah, no, that, like, he's, we think he can, he's going to be a 20, a 20 goal guy on, on the bottom six again.

It's like, we already did that. It's not, it didn't work. Yeah. No, but hey, credit to him. He's winning. He's cash and checks. And you know what? I was looking for a contract that might be comparable because you're like, how do they pull that number?

Like, how did they just say this is the number for him? And then I remember Jordan Greenway signed a two year, four million dollar per year ticket with Buffalo. I'm like, bingo. There you go. There you go. Right? Like, Jordan Greenway is at four million? Tanner Geno's at three point, what is it?

3.5? No, 3.4. So I guess there is some, you know, precedent that was set. He's a winner. I'll take you through like Florida Panthers winners. Vegas Golden Knights. Say what you want about Mitch Marner. You got the big fish.

You know, like I think the Vancouver Canucks bringing those guys back, Garland, Bessor, and Demko, that has to be considered a win. Because if, if we'll see what the health status is of Demko. But getting Garland back two years ago, you wanted to trade them and you couldn't. You called everyone around the league and no one wanted to take that contract, but he's become a good player for you. Brock Besser, you know, not the perfect player, but a very good goal score, helps them, they need to score goals. Ultimately, they need the best version of Elias Pedersen,

but having the fellas back certainly doesn't hurt the Quinn Hughes dilemma that is coming down the road for them. So I have to consider that a win for them. Montreal Canadians, you know, that's a win. I love. Let's let's talk about the game. Zach Bulldoch is a good, good young player. Like, I am very high on him.

And I think he's just scratching the surface. Like, that is a significant win for the Montreal Canaan's. And that's not to disparage Logan Mayu as a player. I think he's got a bright future ahead of him, right shot, offensive guy. But this Zach Bullduke, like when Jim Montgomery took over, he skyrocketed. Like top five in rookie points from that point onward. This is a really smart move for Montreal. And here's what I liked about what Montreal did.

just philosophically, how often do we see a team do the tear down, do the rebuild, which they did, and granted, they made the playoffs last year unexpectedly. So maybe you make the case that they're already a step ahead of where a lot of teams are. But how often do you see teams like Chicago right now, like Buffalo for a decade now, spin the wheels and you do the tear down, which is important, but it's the easiest thing a GM can do in big picture is to send talent out, get the picks. And then suddenly you got all these picks and you got all these prospects. But how do you get it moving forward?

And very often when you point this out about a team like a Chicago, you inevitably hear from their fans going, well, what do you want us to do? You want us to go and sign, you know, some 35 year old. That's going to get us into the playoffs. Why would we do that? No, this is how you transform a team. You don't go out and get 35 year olds, but you go out and say, who's a 25 year old. Who's a 23 year old? Who are some guys that we can move, pick some prospects for

right now that still have a future that still fit in? They're not just about winning right now, but they're about winning now and in the next few years instead of seven years down the line. And I feel like Montreal is set up really nicely, especially in a division where, you know, some of the teams, Buffalo, obviously, Detroit, I think we could talk about, haven't made those steps forward, haven't been able to. Boston's plummeting. Now you look at Montreal, a team that even when the season ended,

I kind of thought, you know what, great for them they made the playoffs. I don't think they'll be back next year. I think they'll take the step back. Now you start to look at it and go, there's a path here that they're a playoff team for the next few years with a path to being even more than that. The only thing, the only concern I have for Montreal

is how do they replace the penalty killers? Savard's retiring. or Mia's gone, DeVorex gone. So that's just a minor thing, but I totally agree. Like Noah Dobson moves the needle for them. Not a perfect player by any means, but you're talking about like Dobson in Mayu out, Bullduke in, Heinemann out. Yeah, you lost some of your free agents, but that has to be a big,

like that's considered a big win for me for Montreal. Well, the Dobson trade in a lot of ways set up the Bull Duke trade, right? because you have in Dobson, you have a long-term piece on the right side. That's what that's what Dobson is. You have them at the top of your lineup. It makes it way easier if you're Kent Hughes and Jeff Gordon to say, we can send out like, yeah, Logan May you tell is, you know, got clear talent. He's a right shot.

Those are always in demand. We can send him out now. We can deal from more of a position of strength where we can find a team like St. Louis that has, you know, frankly, the amount of wingers that St. Louis has in the fray there, I mean, I, Bull Duke might have been the best of the guys who was on the verge of breaking through, but they, but they could afford to send out one of those guys too, to bring in a guy like May you. So the fact that you bring in Dobson sets he up, maybe down the, down the road a couple days for, for another, for another pretty consequential, you know, impressive move. Yeah, I love,

I love what Montreal did. Yeah. And okay, so we said Florida, we said Vegas, we like Montreal. And if you stay in the Atlantic, you know, Buffalo, where are you at? Detroit, where are you at? Like I get the John Gibson thing. Someone had to go get John Gibson. I am shocked. I am shocked it was not the Edmonton Oilers.

Yeah. I can't believe that basically their answer is we'll just wait and see. I get it. Edmonton's still going to be a good team. It's hard to not be a good team when you have the two best players in the world and you re-up Evan Bouchard, $10.5 million. All good, man. But like collectively the last two years,

your three wins away from a Stanley Cup, you got to do something that puts you over the edge. And goaltending is that position. I guess I'm surprised at that from Edmonton's point of view. Definitely. I mean, I think it's of a type with what we've seen from Edmonton over the years is that I think on some level,

they mistake the greatness of Drysidal and McDavid for some other larger, you know, organizational plan. Like, like, that's like the, that's why they're good. They're good because of those guys and they're good because of, because of Evan Bouchard. That's, that's, that's, at least in the regular season. Right. And, you know, yes, credit to, credit to Ackholm and nurse and in, in,

whatever. But I, I think there's, there's just, there's some amount of complacency, I feel like, that sets in when you have those guys at the top, because whether you, or you realize it or not, you know they can bail you out. And I think they sort of act accordingly. It's, it's silly because they go on and they sign Andrew Manji upon, like they had money. Everyone, everyone acted like they were just capped the hell and it wasn't going to happen. And then all of a sudden they find space for a debt player.

Well, exactly. I kind of thought as the day was going on yesterday, we're talking about Edmonton and we're like, okay, everyone's out the door, yada, yada, yada. But you're like, hold on a second. You know what? What if they just kind of clear things out a little bit? What if they say, we're going to, we messed up. We messed up letting McLeod go, Fogel, Holloway, Broberg, because you know what a lot of those guys could and should have been,

the pieces that are there consistently under, you know, under team control with cost certainty, that allow you to be what McDavid talked about, a team that can compete for a Stanley Cup year over year. Instead of what we're kind of seeing from Evanston, where it's like, sign four or five guys, see if we win a cup. Those guys didn't work. They're on the merry-go round, man. Yeah, sign. Get them out.

Sign three, four more guys, see if we win a cup. That is not what Connor MacDavid wants. So I thought, okay, clearing guys out, clearing money out. They're going to put back those pieces in place. So McDavid could look at it and say, we're going to have a little more of a cleaner slate, and we're going to become what I hope we should be, except then they sign Mujapani after.

So maybe he's part of that, but I think there's, still needs to be a little bit of a little bit of a clearing of the deck because if I look at their roster today, I'm like, it's just, it's just literally kind of what you did last year, but not really, hoping for a, for a different results. I'm just looking at the, yeah, Dom's winners and losers, a disaster class for the oilers, he says. That's not good.

I got to throw another team into the loser pile and I kind of hate to say this because I've been rooting for them, but the Columbus Blue Jackets come into the season, come into the off season with a bunch of money. They're kind of being floated around as, you know, don't sleep on these guys as potential destinations. And in the end, they basically don't get anybody. They lose some guys. And the one guy they keep is Proberov on a deal that nobody seems to like.

And it just felt like that that. that the payment of the Columbus tax on that deal just really kind of highlighted how tough these guys really do have it as far as how do you build something there. And they got a great season to build off of. But yeah, this was, I don't think, this was not where anybody wanted to see this team on July 2nd. It's funny, though, because all these, you know, there's a bunch of teams that fall into this category, they're going to be aggressive and they got a ton of money to spend. It just didn't happen.

Like, maybe because it wasn't available to them and they thought better of it. But like only one team could get Mitch Marner. You know, only one team is going to get Nick Eilers. Brock Bessor really didn't hit the market. So I do. I get it. I just, I wonder if you're sitting in that boardroom and you're like, well, we'll just, we'll take our chances at a different point.

Do you think the jackets are, are going to be in on? Eelers? Like, does that, assuming he'd want to go there and obviously he's got the control over what destinations he wants to score. It seems like it would be a good fit because, you know, going by with, you know, dregs and some of the insiders have been talking about, I think he wants something quiet. I think, you know, like, I think Toronto really likes them. But that's, that's noisy.

It's more noisy than Winnipeg. Oh, is it? Is that an issue? I didn't. Thanks. Yeah. Thanks, Frank, Captain, obvious. I think Columbus would be

That would be a good fit actually It's been so weird With the Eler's discussion Where people like yeah You want somewhere more quiet So that's why he's going to leave Winnipeg Like I like Like as if Winnipeg is some kind of

You know Intends be able Come on The big market pressure of Winnipeg, Manitoba And then Columbus might be the other option there That room is Marat and a couple other guys Like it's fine

It's going to be okay Yeah, well, Dan Robertson, he's very intimidating. Very intimidating. Marat. Marat, Marat, absolute savage, that guy. He is, oh, man. Mean, just a cruel, cruel person. Marat, he's mean as his snake.

That's what I always say about. You know what, actually what Eiler said? He said, if John Lou's retiring, I'm out of here. I'm out. He's like the day John Lou retires, I'm gone. One thing I do find interesting when it comes to Eric Tulski and the Carolina Hurricanes, when they acquire a player via trade or free agency, I always raise an eyebrow because I'm like,

they know what's under the hood. And we know what we see. But most of the time when they bet on a guy, and I think the Rantanin thing would have worked if he was there longer. Obviously it didn't look great for the time he was there. But I'm talking about Kiannra Miller, who like didn't love his year in New York,

but a lot of guys didn't play well in New York this year. I think there's probably a little bit of his game where he's not exactly sure what he's supposed to be yet. Is he an elite puck mover? Well, not in terms of like the rest of the guys that are elite puck movers. He's big, but it doesn't play overly hard or physical or edgy. So he's kind of caught somewhere in the middle. But there's Carolina trading for him, giving him, you know, $7.5 million.

And I'm like, Eric Tulski might see something there. Like maybe he knows something that we don't. But I wonder how that turns out. Isn't it fascinating that and how can I put this in a way that's not going to get me yelled at? Don't you feel like if Buffalo made the exact same move that Carolina just made on Gondry Miller that we'd all be going? Classic Buffalo. Classic overpay. Didn't even watch the guy last year.

They gave up so much all this money. But because it's Carolina. Because they're a bad organization. Because they're a bad organization. is a bad organization. Carolina is not. So we all kind of go, they must know something.

That's right. They probably do. Carolina's earned that. And to be honest with you, Buffalo's earned what they've earned as far as their reputation with players. It's the Tulski effect, man. I'm like, I see Kandre Miller go there and I'm like,

huh, okay. Let's see how this plays out because he might know something that we don't know. Because he's hit on all these, he's hit on all these guys that he's taking chances on. The effect of the team, like all those guys that watch. out the door a few years ago, whether it was Peschi or Shea or Gensel or Tara Vinen,

Nason, they're all good players. And everyone that came in, you know what happened? They got back to the conference finals. So as a team of it worked on Orlov, though? No, they did not. And that feels like one word, like, and Orlov didn't hit on it because he took, guys like me are always saying, why don't players take shorter term deals, especially when the cap's going up.

but this is the counter example, right? Because two years ago, he signs a two-year deal with a great organization and we all go, man, this guy is going to cash in in 2025. And, you know, doesn't really, hasn't yet. They just gave Andrew Miller $60 million to replace him, basically. That's what that, and that's what that is. And gave up, you know, a first round pick plus plus. And, you know, some of that was the spoils of the Miko Rent in,

flip. But one last team that I don't like. And we've talked about teams that haven't done enough and were just sort of said, well, you know, they wanted to, but it just wasn't out there. This team doesn't even sound like they wanted to. What's the plan in Chicago right now to have this team not be 29th overall as a ceiling? Because it's, well, I mean, it seems like the plan right now is just not to do. I mean, even a week before the draft, we were getting reports saying it's going to be quiet summer.

They might not do very much. Really? This is what we're going to do. Andre Brokowski is the guy that's going to take them a level up and in their rebuild clearly. I understand that you don't want to sign a half dozen pluggers that are going to clog up the lineup from all of this great young talent that you've got. But like we've said on the show before, all that great young talent isn't going to hit. You don't have a full future roster here. And so with all this cap room and all this opportunity out there to, it sounds like to intentionally say we're going to sit it out.

I don't know. What's what's the path? What's the path to get to where Montreal is right now? Considering you and Montreal were starting from the same place a year ago, it felt like. back when Sweet Lou Lamarillo was in his prime, he used to do something like this. He would sign Daniel Winnic to a one-year deal and Winnie would play until the trade deadline and he'd flip them to Washington and get some picks. Yep.

And it's like, hey, Winnie, you want to come back? Hey, Polack, you want to come back? Let's do the same thing. It might not be very good this year, but we'll move you at the deadline. And if you're Chicago, why are you not doing something like that? You sign guys on one-year deals and you say, you know what? Yeah, we're not going to be a good team, but we're going to keep the machine moving here. I'm signing whoever, pick a name off the board.

It's a one-year deal. You make good money because we need to entice you to come here. And if we're a bad team, which we're going to be at the trade deadline, going to try and trade you to a contender. I think there's multiple opportunities missed there by the Chicago Blackhawks. And I think they're stuck right now. Like they're stuck where they are. and I don't see it getting better for them in the foreseeable future.

Look, maybe, and maybe that's the plan. Maybe they're doing the thing that, that I often say you should do, which is you unplug the phone for the first 48 hours, and then you circle back. You don't have to worry about, does this guy fill a need? Because you have a dozen needs. You just find those guys, get them the short-term deals. Maybe that is the plan. And in a few days, I'll say, okay, maybe we see the vision.

But what concerns me is the messaging out of Chicago all seems to say, no, this was the plan. quiet summer. We're already done. See you later. Renew those seasons tickets and we'll see in September. At some point you have to try. You got to try to win hockey games. And I'm the flip side of that coin, I think, the flip side of the blackpox discussion. This isn't a, this isn't even a contract that I like all that much because it's a lot of money. Macaule-Granland and Anaheim. Like, was he overpaid for sure?

I don't, like, is McIlewell, going to make $7 million a year on a good? team, no. But if you're Anaheim, you recognize the fact that you have one of the worst groups of wingers in the league last year by the numbers. You have endless cap space and you're trying to get out of the mud. Like at some point, also, because they're cores in place in a way that's at least somewhat similar to Chicago. Like theoretically, they should be able to say, all right, the guys who we're going to win with are already here. Leo Carlson, Mason McTavish, hopefully one of the defensemen, Cutter-Goti, whatever.

You say, we've already done that. We have good players in the fold. It would be problematic for their development and the overall health of the organization, them to go out and stink again. So let's go get someone who can help on a power play, play some, you know, but maybe Grahamland ends up playing with Leo Carlson,

maybe not. But he's a productive, in terms of points, he's a productive player. And you sign him for three, years, you overpay him a little bit, down the road, like whenever Michael Greenland's 35 or 36, and they want to get rid of them, like, the contract will be over. This isn't a seven year deal. It's not a seven year deal. And people always say, you know, very often when you, when you see teams, and I'm sure some Chicago fan is queuing it up right now or some Buffalo fan, go, like, what? Is Michael Granlin going to get us back in the playoffs? Is he going to be the different? No, you missed the playoffs by 20 points. No player is going to do that. Connor McDavid wouldn't get you single-handedly into Stanley Cup contention.

At some point, you've got to try. You've got to start adding some pieces or else you're just, you know, I know, look, if I'm a GM, I'd love to be on a permanent five-year rebuild with no pressure to ever win anything. But at some point, you're supposed to be trying to do that. The Chicago Blackhawks, as they are, are going to be the team that you look at and say, that's why I'm afraid of a rebuild in this new NHL. ecosystem with the cap going up and so many teams trying to and being able to retain their own talent. It's like the light at the end of the tunnel, it's not necessarily there the same way

it used to be. So that's the team that you're like, I don't want to be that. And I think that's going to force more teams to not enter the full rebuild. And fans of teams that keep, they keep, you know, they crave the rebuild, strip it down. I think it's, it's a retool now in the NHL. It is not the full-fledged rebuild anymore because this is what you could be. Way to go, Kyle. You've ruined it for everybody. Damn it. Yeah.

All these GMs are saying, I can't just keep selling hope for seven years now. They're so mad at him right now. They're like, dude, we had a good thing going. What are you doing? Yeah. And it's like,

whatever, sign some guys that are going to stop you from circling the bowl again, right? And that's what the McIlewell grandlins of the world do. I got time for. And also, credit to McIleggle for, my man,

my man's $21 million richer than he was 48 hours ago. He's a good player, man. Is he a $7 million player? Maybe not today, but like when the cap goes up a bunch, sure,

why not? Who cares, man? You know what? You need to spend money. San Jose sharks aren't even at the floor right now. They're not even at the floor right now. They need like $10 million on the books.

Wink, wink, nudge, is Carrie Price's contract? Gary Price. Oh, no. Let's leave, Let's leave on that. That's a cliffhanger to close up.

This next year, next summer, congratulations to San Jose Sharks goldender, Kerry Price on his induction to the Hall of Fame. The first active San Jose Shark to be inducted. Yeah. Frankie, it's been fun, man. This is, this is it for the three of us. I think me and Mackin do have to have to pop back in on the feed at plenty of points over the next few months. but you're, you're donezo, brother. Congratulations.

That's it, boys. This was a lot of fun. Thank you guys for all season long. This was a fun show. I look forward to it every week. Thank you to all the fans for watching, engaging with us. And boys, have a great summer. If you're in the Toronto area, hit me up.

We'll go for lunch and see you guys soon. Something tells me I will be. I think odds are. I'll be up there at some point. Awesome. Take it easy, bud. See you fellas There goes Frankie

It was normal It was normal home Not his TSN cottage It's unfortunate man Now we're stuck talking to each other Sucks Yeah this is rough What have we learned Sean

You know who else had it rough Who's that? I think we need to all Take a moment To think Send some thoughts and prayers And maybe some apologies To the real

victim in all of this. Kelly McCriman. Yes. The GM of the Vegas Golden Knights, who was very, very upset that he had to tell some of his players that they weren't being traded because of all this fake news, Sean, all this made up rumors about guys potentially being traded and Thomas Hurdle and this and that. The GM of the single most cutthroat organization in the entire.

League. He's shocked. Shocked, I tell you, to discover that people are, are speculating about potential trades. Yes, Kelly. Why, why ever would we raise the possibility that you would send out to Moschardle or Mr. Mr. Loyalty himself. Mr. Oh, why would it, why would that ever happen? And nobody asked him about tampering. So we won't know about that. This all came from the Mitch Marner welcome event, the initial one, which I have to say I found kind of amusing that Mitch Marner who did not get enough respect in Toronto where he was treated like sort of a god. Sort of a god. Is now in Vegas getting standing ovations from 14 bored looking Vegas Golden Knights employees.

Like surrounded by cubicles. I hadn't seen that until this morning. It was, I mean, I know it's the summer and what are you going to do. But couldn't you just imagine, like, who was the intern that had to, like, run around the building and go, like, everyone who's here, we need you down here and you need to clap very loud for this guy who's here right now because we have to make him feel very, very appreciated. I'm on a call. Leave me alone. Yeah. Like, I'm having lunch.

No, no. Put the lunch away, man. you're going to come down here and you're going to clap for Mitch Martin. Kelly McCriman, by the way, he did have to tell Nicholas Roy that he'd been traded. Yeah, that's interesting. Still had to break that sad bit of news, unfortunately. How could any of us think that the Vegas Golden Knights would be involved in a trade? It's, you know, we're sorry, Kelly.

You haven't done anything to earn this other than literally everything you've done as a GM in your career. what I've learned is that Kyle Dubus's decision to hold firm on Rickel and potentially Brian Ross at the trade deadline seems like it might have paid off. I think if you're, man, think of it this way. You know, we haven't talked about Nick Eelers all that much. I know Frankie brought up, you know, the leaves like them and what have you. Whenever he signs, it could be in five minutes or two days. There's going to be so many teams out there that wanted some kind of, you know,

even second line presence to add and missed out. Whether it's him, you know, obviously Marner several layers above that, but there's me plenty of teams that are holding the bag. In Pittsburgh, Kyle Dubas is saying, um, uh,

Columbus or Carolina or whoever Nicolars doesn't sign with. Come get Ricardo Kell. Come get Brian Rust. We have, we have the, it is insane to think this, but those are realistically, those are probably the two best forwards that

seem like they'd be in play, whether it's now or, or, you know, who knows what the deadline looks like. But this summer, those guys are the, are probably the best pieces that you can easily add. It's time to flip that agency board back to the trade board and, and see. And if I'm hearing correctly, what you're saying is everybody in Pittsburgh is available. Everyone in Pittsburgh is every forward. We can talk about that. Sure. Let's close on, let's close on something that Bob McKenzie did yesterday because it was one of his last acts on air i loved it loved it loved it loved it appreciated it for a million different reasons bob's doing the quiz for the last time and the question was a true or false raised to everybody frankie was not was not part of this thankfully

because i didn't want to have to yell at him over this true or false sydney crosbie plays in the playoffs in 2026 lots of trues from the panel And to be clear, this was not people saying true because they thought the penguins were making it back, right? Yeah. Bob, first off, took some issue with the way the question was worded because it was like, will Cindy Crosby accept the trade? Sidney Crosby accepts no trade. Sydney Crosby maybe forces a trade. Like that's the only way he ever leaves town.

And Cidney Crosby has said a zillion times. whether it's himself, whether it's through his representatives, whatever, that he is not interested in being traded at this time. Like, we'll see what, I'm sure things change, whatever else. We are getting to the point where it is disrespectful to Sidney Crosby to keep doing all this nonsense, tweeting photos of the Denver skyline with eyeballs, all this, all this BS. The dude deserves to be taken at his word. And he has said over and over and over again that it's not something that he wants. And Bob, of course, as the voice of reason, as the, as the person on the panel with more gravitas than everybody else combined was the one who was like, what are we doing here?

And at the time, I didn't know that Bob was retiring. We knew that it was his last quiz. They brought him in with that. We didn't know that it was his last free agent frenzy broadcast period. And I was, of course, as a semi-reformed homer, I was standing up in my living room. in applauding the Bobfather for bringing some reason to the discussion and one of his last acts on the air with TSN. So kudos of the man. There you go.

Salute. Oh, God. What are we doing next, man? Me and you're going to have to talk to each other. It's something going to be again soon, right? That's how it's going to work. Something like that, yeah. Are you going to your cottage?

I don't, I don't have one. We don't get those. Yeah, and I don't get the invite. I keep, I've checked. the spam filter so many times, but I just, I'm not on peers list, I guess. I don't know. You know, it sounds great. Summer vacation in Pittsburgh. Ooh. Bring everybody. All right. Bring, if I come down, we can hang out, right? There's hotels around. Figure it out. Thank you folks for listening. I know this is the end of

the busy season, but man, the show's going to be around all summer in various combinations. So look forward to that. We look forward to talking to you whenever that might be. So enjoy the rest of the moves. Enjoy forever Nikolai Ehlers and Jack Roselvic and whoever else end up. We'll talk to you real soon.