The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 118: Turning Over a New Leaf

Episode Date: November 30, 2016

James Mirtle joins the show to discuss who's pulling the strings for the Leafs behind the scenes, why Roman Polak is still in our lives, and the importance of squeezing the most out of every single roster spot. We also talk about how fair it is to expect our readers to have a certain baseline understanding of the subject matter, and his new gig at The Athletic. Here’s a quick rundown of the topics covered: 1:00 How much are readers expected to already know by now? 4:45 The Florida Panthers are now a team run by "computer boys" 8:01 Who's making the personnel decisions for the Leafs? 13:27 Why are Roman Polak and Matt Hunwick still a thing? 16:21 Mike Babcock's blindspots as a coach 20:30 Optimizing every single spot in the lineup 23:00 Dougie Hamilton's name in trade rumours 27:40 Mirtle's exciting new career news Every episode of the podcast is available on iTunes, Soundcloud, Stitcher and can also be streamed straight from this website. Make sure to subscribe to the show so that you don’t miss out on any new episodes as they’re released. All ratings and reviews of the show are also greatly appreciated. Thanks for listening! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

Are you ready for the most ridiculous internet sports show you have ever seen? Welcome to React, home of the most outrageous and hilarious videos the web has to offer. So join me, Rocky Theos, and my co-host, Raiders Pro Bowl defensive end, Max Crosby, as we invite your favorite athletes, celebrities, influencers, entertainers in for an episode of games, laughs, and of course the funniest reactions to the wildest web clips out there. Catch React on YouTube, and that is React. R-E-A-X-X. Don't miss it. This podcast episode is brought to you by Coors Light.

These days, everything is go, go, go. It's non-stop hustle all the time. Work, friends, family. Expect you to be on 24-7? Well, sometimes you just need to reach for a Coors Light because it's made to chill. Coors Light is cold-loggered, cold-filtered, and cold-packaged. It's as crisp and refreshing as the Colorado Rockies.

It is literally made to chill. Coors Light is the one I choose when I need to unwind. So when you want to hit reset, reach for the beer that's made to chill. Get Coors Light and the new look delivered straight to your door with Drisley or Instacart. Celebrate responsibly. Coors Brewing Company, Golden Colorado. Regressing to the mean since 2015, it's the Hockey P.D.O.cast with your host, Dmitri Filipovich. Welcome to the Hockey Pee-Ocast. My name is Dimitra Filipovich.

And joining me as my good buddy James Myrtle. James. What's going on? man. Oh, not much. A little new job action after 12 years at the Golden Mail. That's new. Yeah, I feel like people, when I generally ask them that, they just say not much, and it probably applies because a lot of the days seem to kind of blend together here in the fall. But for you, in this case in particular, I feel like that's not a very truthful answer. I feel like you are definitely up to quite a few things. Yeah, it's busy, man. There's a lot going on, and I know we're going to get into it and talk to talk about some of it here soon.

I'm, we'll save it for sort of the latter half of the show at the start here. I kind of want to talk to you a bit about the Leafs because there are the team that you, you still cover down there in Toronto. And sort of our responsibility is media in terms of covering hockey. And I think it's a good place to start is what happened with Austin Matthews here over the past couple weeks where there was that stretch where he went 13 games without a goal. And it brought up an interesting dilemma for myself personally, because on the one hand, I think that most people,

I'd like to think most people reading my work at this point, understand the concept of shooting percentages and sort of sustainability and understand that, you know, if you're riding too high or low, things will eventually even out. So when you're writing about a guy like Austin Matthews, like, do we at this point still need to say stuff like, you know, this obviously won't continue? Or can we just assume that our readers are smart enough

and sort of have figured that out for themselves already? Well, I guess it depends where you're writing in part. Like if I was writing in the Globe Mail, I would probably make sure that I said something like that. And I mean, the crazy thing about Matthews is like if you watch the games. Like he had, everyone kept saying it, but like he was their best player on a lot of those nights. And it just showed that, you know, he was missing, he was hitting the post

and then the teammate would knock it in or whatever. And it's like, okay, yeah, he got an assist. He didn't get created that goal. So stuff like that was happening over. over and over again. I think we probably still do have to point it out just because I don't feel like the idea of regression and sustainability has permeated everywhere, but it's getting there. You know, the mainstream acceptance of a lot of this stuff is a lot deeper than it was even two, three years ago. I mean, 2014 was what they called the summer of analytics. And then we

kind of had a backlash the year after that, it sort of felt like. And then this year, there's seems to be sort of acceptance at least. Yeah, I've sort of reached like a little bit of an overload in just like having to, I can just basically copy paste the same caveat at this point of the year into every one of my articles where it's like, you know, or it's early in a season small sample size

so that, you know, it's sort of like protecting yourself from someone overreacting so dramatically to something you write and then it wind up not being the case. But like it's tough because as you mentioned, it's not even really like a mathematical concept here. I mean, people are very familiar with, you know, if you just watch how Matthews was playing, like that he's quote unquote due, right? Like you see he's shooting the puck a lot.

He's getting a lot of scoring opportunities eventually that even out. But on the flip side, I think it is important to remember that, you know, the people we interact with on a regular basis most frequently might sort of be very like-minded like us and think the same way and approach viewing the game the same way. But there are a lot of maybe more casual fans out there that expect us to sort of just like spoonfeed them what they need to know about everything involved. Well, and you're probably like me, and once you've written about this for a certain period of time, it's like, okay, I want to write about new things. I want to write about different ideas in hockey. And I've gotten a little bit frustrated the last, I don't know what you call it, year, year and a half.

I just wish we had different data. I wish we had different concepts. Like, it was when all this stuff was coming in about sustainability session and all, there were all new numbers, and the audience was very much in the dark and didn't know. anything about this. I mean, it was really interesting when that was having that conversation and watching an unfold and watching teams ride PDO waves and come down. And, you know, I mean, we're talking 2012, 2013 when we were talking about that kind of stuff. Now it's like, what's the next thing going to be that everyone is going to get excited about and talk about? And I just, I don't know,

it feels like we're almost waiting for something like that. Well, and I mean, it's a good, bridge here. I mean, it seems like any time a team kind of dips their toes and into the the waters in terms of, you know, hiring younger people that are going to, quote unquote, analytics guys, everything all of a sudden kind of becomes an indictment against analytics and analysis in that regard. And we're seeing it sort of with the Panthers right now with this recent Gerard gone firing and sort of, I think that moving forward, everything that they do is going to be really watched on a microscope in that regard, which is kind of frustrating. But I imagine it was sort of like that with the Leafs, too,

especially until they brought in a guy like Lou La Marello. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I mean, there was that one year. I think it was, was it 13, 14, where they were off to their really hot start, and it went all the way till, yeah, it went all the way to Sochi until the All-Star break, where, and I had been writing the whole year that they were going to, this wasn't sustainable, it wasn't going to happen, and they did it for whatever it was, 55 or 58 games or something ridiculous, so I was getting hate mail every single day with people saying, you're an idiot, you've been saying this for months, of course, this is sustainable, and then, as everyone knows, I can't remember, they won like two of the last 14 games or something like that, and it all fell apart. And that's when they brought Shanahan in, and that's when they brought Cahoulubis and the analytics in, and that's when things started to shift for the Leafs. So a really interesting test case here,

because the story I did on the Panthers that came out a couple of weeks ago, I actually did a lot of the research for it in the summer. The Panthers were the most interesting NHL team from a data perspective, just because the people they had interested. charge. So I spent a lot of time in August on the phone talking to the owners and the CEO. I talked to anonymously to people that were working in the front office, people that didn't appear in the article that just had some interesting information about what it used to be like under the last regime, what it's like now. Steve Worrier and Eric Joyce. And, you know,

it's, they're the example of the biggest change we've ever seen in terms of a team going all in on analytics. When I say all in, I don't mean like every single thing they ever do is based on analytics because that's not the case. But they're trying to go, they're trying to incorporate it more and more and more into player personnel decisions and scouting decisions and what they're doing at the draft. And it's, it'll be fascinating to see if it works or, or, or, or, you know, if, if, if, if it's harder than, than it seems, I think, especially for guys that, I got the sense that some of those guys didn't start picking up hockey analytics until relatively recently. So they're trying to, you know, it's not like they're math PhDs that have been writing about it, like,

like Tim Barnes, who's working for the capitals, who he's been writing about it since like, what, 2007 or 2008? It seemed like the Florida guys started learning about it a little bit more recently. And I think it's different just reading about it and learning the concepts and applying it to actually building a team and applying it to your hiring. And, you know, there's not really a roadmap to do that. So it's uncharted. And they're trying to do a lot of things that we haven't seen before. And there's going to be a lot of, you know, kind of pitfalls with them trying to do that. Yeah. Well, I think, like, the common misconception is like, obviously, you know, every single move they make isn't just going to be like, they're not just going to pull up Corsica and just sort by,

you know, who are the best possession players are right now or something like that. And it's like, oh, well, we need to get all these guys. Like, that's not how this stuff works. It's a little bit of this and a little bit of that. And I mean, I think the Leafs are a great example of that where they have all these smart people making decisions they've brought in over the past few years. But then, you know, you use some of their moves this summer and maybe you can speak more to this than I can. But I thought it was pretty surprising when they threw a bunch of money at a guy like Matt Martin and then brought back Roman Polack and, you know, a lot of a guy like Peter Parentho just walk for no reason. And then they bring back, you know, Ben Smith to play

on their fourth line, even though I'm skeptical that he really does anything well. So it's just like, One of these things where you'd view all those moves is kind of being surprising for a team that you'd consider to be more progressive, but there is a lot of certain kind of things working at once that you've got to factor in. Well, yeah, and I think the Leafs aren't, they're not an all-in team, right? They're a team that has that element in the front office, but the question here always seems to be how lot of a voice do they have? And I think the answer is that Lamarillo and Mike Babcock kept a lot of his voices and then probably Mark Hunter's next. and then the analytics team comes somewhere down the list. And so if there's a debate over a player like a Matt Martin

and the analytics guys are saying, no, we don't want him. And I'm not saying for sure that we know that, but let's just assume that they were saying that. Or they were saying, no, we don't want to trade these high picks and give a big contract to Frederick Anderson. And like I said, we don't know for sure that that's what they would have said. But let's assume they probably lose out if Lou Lamarillo or Mark Hunter or someone else in the front office disagrees with that.

So where's the difference in Florida? Florida is that ownership all the way right up to the top to Vinnie Viola, the billionaire owner, I mean, he's the one that's saying, let's go big on this, let's work for him in business. That's not the situation that the Leafs are in. And, you know, it would be, it'll be fascinating to see what the right way to go is. Right, but I mean, at the same time, like, you know, a guy like Tom Roe, for example, who's now who's working as their GMN, is now going to work as their coach is a quote-unquote hockey guy, right? He's been around forever.

He played in the league for a long time, and he's been part of this. So it is like you do have to sort of kind of take all this stuff into account. It isn't just completely cut it, kind of dry it as you can be all in on it and sort of respect it and approach it and use it for all your decision. But there's you're going to factor everything in as well. Yeah, my sense with Tom Rowe is like they want it, they want hockey guys that are willing to buy in kind of to their ideas as well. Like to buy in the idea of puck possession and certain ways to play. Like everyone's made it the story with George. or whatever. I think it's almost like a style of play kind of thing.

You know, everyone's saying that Glant really liked, you know, Eric Good Branson and likes that kind of harder straight-ahead style. You know, I think it's almost just a stylistic thing, and they want a coach in there that can try and do some of the different things in terms of, you know, the way they exit the zone and the way that special teams sounds like it's going to be a big focus for them. And, you know, so it's not old school versus new school. It's also that they didn't get the chance to pick the coach.

and in order for them to try and make their vision for how the team's going to play, I mean, let's face it, they got, they're kind of different than the Leafs in that they lost a lot of quote-unquote grit and brought in, you know, skilled puck-moving guys, and you can see why that wouldn't work for every coach. Yeah, no, for sure. Well, and, you know, the Panther situation really reminds me of, oh, that's seen in Moneyball. I know that Moneyball is sort of a tired, a cliche,

shade example in situations like this, but it really does harken back to it where, um, that, you know, um, Brad Pitt, Billy Bean really wants, uh, certain players to be in the lineup and, and the manager just like, is like, you know what? I'm the manager. You stay out of here. Like, I'm going to handle this. So he just has to like, wind up trading the guys and making all these moves to sort of force his hand. And it seems like a lot of that is happening in Florida. Yeah. Yeah. That was, that was my sense that, that was happening. Yeah. So, I mean, It's not to say that I think Galant's going to get another job. I mean, I think he did a decent job.

It's just you need the coach aligned with the front office, I think, more and more, because it's not just about getting players that are, quote-unquote, analytics players. It's about, I mean, like we saw in Pittsburgh last year that they had the same players, or largely the same players, they changed the system dramatically, and the results changed dramatically. So, you know, the coaching is a big, big part of puck possession and all these things that we talk about. It's a huge factor.

So they're just looking for buy-in. And what they're asking someone to buy into is a lot different than I think what a lot of coaches are used to. Right. Yeah, I'm a big believer. I preach this all the time that all these things are sort of inputs and then the output is the end result. And you can really maximize it by changing certain stylistic things and stressing various things. Okay. A 30-second answer from you on this.

why is Roman Polack and Matt Hunwick still a thing? You know, at least they're a third-paring thing because there was a while there where they were getting big minutes. I remember early November, first half-November, Polack was averaging pretty close to 20 minutes a game, and it was killing them. You can see you've seen the Leaf's possession really slide. I want to say the first month, I don't even know if it was that long,

the first two, three weeks anyway. their possession numbers were really good. I mean, they were running at 54, 53.5%. And, you know, everybody online that follows this stuff was going to start playing a little bit better, and they've got something here and the offensive firepower that they've got.

But that's been sliding, and some of it is the Hunwick-Polak pairing was playing a lot. Some of it is the fourth line's not very good. That Bozac line is, despite how good Mitch Marner has played, and then despite the points that they've put up is not a good possession line.

They've kind of, and they've mixed and matched deep pairing so much that they've really struggled to figure out who the second pairing is. And the funny thing is, if you look at the data all year, the answer has been the same. It's been Jake Gardner, and it's only recently they've started to go to him in bigger minutes. Against New Jersey,

he played 25-5-5, I think, is most of the year, most on the team that game. And it's, possession results are fantastic. And I think Connor Carrick is a guy that deserves more of a chance too. I mean, he's had some games where he's sat out, which means that more minutes are going to Hanwik and Polack and Martin Morinchen, who's really struggled this year,

despite being typically thought of as an analytics kind of player, I think if they settle in and Zytev has played his way under the top pair with Morgan Riley and Gardner and Carrick look like they're settling in as the second pair, I think we're going to see better results in terms of the shot share and controlling play. And it's a bit of an unorthodox look to a top four because none of those guys are very big. You know, none of them are, you know, they're all kind of offensive defensemen what we would think of. But that's the best top four that the Leaves have. And I think that they have the best chance of winning games, the more that they go with that group.

Yeah. Yeah. I get sort of the thought process behind like you don't want to necessarily put all of your eggs in one basket in the sense that, on a hockey team you generally want different players who can do different things and bring different stuff to the table but you watch how fun, young, exciting and fast most of this team is

and they play the highest pace in the league at 5-1-5 and then every time Roman Polack and Matt Hanoha come on the eyes it's just like everything just like it's like you know the record just comes to a screeching halt and you're just like what am I watching right now? It's kind of a bit jarring just aesthetically speaking.

Yeah it's I'd be interesting what you think of this I mean, I sometimes wonder if Babcock, like he did this in Detroit as well, where he had his, he had his players he was comfortable with that the results in terms of analytics and things like that aren't necessarily there. Like he really liked Luke Glenn Denning and Dan Cleary, and I know it drove some of the Red Wings fans that follow the stuff nuts, that he would play these players and really fly on them, not to the extent that we saw with, you know, Jay McCleman and things like that under Randy Carlisle. but just that some of Batacock's roster decisions frustrating. I mean, he's one of the best coaches in the league.

I mean, I wouldn't never take that away from him, but I really like these heart and soul kind of guys like Hanwick that he knows on a personal level, and he's got a comfortability with them, whether it's, you know, a lot of the minors guys are getting our defensive minutes or penalty kill minutes, and he's still of the mindset that you need that kind of, gritty, I guess,

a hard player. And so, yeah, I mean, this is my question for you on Babcock. Sometimes I wonder, like, is he stuck in where he was in 2008, 2009? And, like, did that make more sense back then with the rest of the team he had? He had such a stacked Red Wings roster? Did it make more sense that you could make some of those guys in? Is where the NHL has evolved to now with teams like Tampa and Pittsburgh,

really rolling three skilled lines. is Babcock missed that a little bit? Should he, you know, that's what I wonder sometimes watching the leaves. Yeah, I think that, you know, it's not a unique thing just to him in the sense that I think most coaches out there, in fact, probably everyone has these sort of blind spots that they just can't seem to avoid or get past for whatever reason. Like a great example for me is I think that Allen vinyo in New York is a really good coach. But, you know, the kind of running joke for years has been his infatuation with a guy like Tanner Glass and Dan Girardi. And it doesn't really seem to make sense, especially for a guy who seems so progressive and well thought out and everything else that he does. But I think that the key thing you mentioned is at least a guy like Polack is playing on the third pairing and Ben Smith is playing on the fourth line.

It's you want to limit your exposure to it and sort of, you know, maximize everything else. and you'll kind of take the bad with the overwhelming good. And I think that's the case here. It'd be a much different story of Polack was playing like 22 minutes a night as like a top four guy. Like then I would have a major issue with it. So I think it's just one of those things that with an NHO coach, you sort of have to just live with it.

It's not ideal, but it's better than the alternative in terms of other coaches. It'll be interesting to see when the Leafs have more and more skill coming into the lineup. You know, people think that based on what's happened with the Marley so far, that Kisbury Kappanen, and Brendan Leipzig and, you know, some of the young defensemen like Andrew Nielsen have had really good starts. You know, as that skill comes in, you know, do the leaks move away from some of these pieces?

And do they go, are they going to have a more skilled fourth line at some point? Are they going to have a more skilled third D-paring? And that's one of the things I think that they're looking at in Florida is, I mean, what if you just built all four of your lines are skilled lines? You know, I know they were looking at C. VOR and Marcheseau. when they were healthy, we're going to be depth guys, and they've had to play higher in the lineup because of the injuries to Huberdough

and Bukstad and stuff like that. I think more teams are contemplating, building different kind of looks to their lineups, and I just wonder where the Leafs will fit in, because the pieces they have coming. And they're going to, you know, I don't know what they do with Matt Martin when they get to that point. I mean, he's going to be

kind of a fixture on that fourth line, no matter what, I guess, and stylistically, he doesn't look like he fits in, and you've got these good young kids coming, and, you know, maybe they're going to be prevented from going to four skilled lines. Yeah. Well, I think there was once a time, like maybe even as recently as five, ten years ago where there just wasn't necessarily enough talent around to fill four skill lines.

So out of necessity, teams had to devote their bottom six or their fourth line to being these sort of grinding low event types that could just come in for five, six minutes a game and throw the body. But now we're seeing that, you know, in the HL, there's all these undersized guys that very conceivably, just like Jonathan Marshis-O is doing this. year could step into a lineup and produce if they've given the opportunity and I think that it's it's silly for teams to be wasting roster spots on guys that can't really play when there's better alternatives for even cheaper like it's it is a little bit of a nitpicking thing because

it's ultimately not necessarily going to completely submarine your team or take your team you know from being a bubble playoff team to being a championship contender but we spend so it's so close and it is a copycat league where teams are following each other and it's going to be interesting to see over the next couple years how many teams are quick to realize that that for these next few years before everyone else catches on, they really can get a bit of a leg up on the competition just by optimizing every single lineup spot on a nightly basis.

Well, the way I look at it too is there's so many injuries every year in the league and the average bandgames lost is in the hundreds that if you're one of those teams where you have, like Florida, where you have a couple forwards go down, And if you've decided to have a lot of skill in your 11, 12, 13, even 14th forward, maybe that changes the conversation. And then if you lose a Uber-Doh, well, you can test drive this Marcheseau guy on a top line. And then there's a chance that he can do it, whereas if you just had grinders in your lower-hand forwards,

you wouldn't have a guy that could come in and do that. So that was really interesting when the Leafs waived, Seth Griffith, who's another one of those guys are really small. Produced huge numbers in the HL last year as a pretty young player, which typically says to me, depending on age, but if you're in your early 20s and you can produce well over a point of game in the HL, that usually says to me that you're an NHL player. He hasn't really established himself yet.

He only got three games with the Leafs. I thought he looked pretty good. I mean, he was creating more in the offensive zone than anyone else that's played on that fourth line this year for the Leaves. but it was interesting that the Panthers jumped on him right away when he went on waivers because I think it's just a different mindset there than what the Toronto's doing right now. Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. I generally don't like to rumor mong around this podcast, but I am curious,

is there anything to these Dougie Hamilton trade rumors, or is it just one of these things where it's being a bit blown out of the proportion just because it involves the leaves? Well, I'll ask you, like, has anyone really reputable said that this is potentially happening, or is it just because Tree Living was in the press box here, or, I mean, that's what with true. I always look for, like, the guys, there aren't that many of them.

I mean, there's only, like, 10 or 15 guys in the media that you know have lines in with GMs around the league, and then they would be the ones that know. If it's coming from other people, generally speaking, it's just spec not a whole lot. So that's what I look for. I mean, like, if Bob McKenzie or, you know, even someone, like, not going to name names,

but, like, there's lots of guys that you know that have inside him. info. If they're floating stuff out there, then yeah, there's something to it. But with this one, I think it's just everyone knows the Leifesneed another top four defensemen. Everyone knows, there's been a lot of talk about this, that Hamilton hasn't really integrated very well in Calgary, and that, I mean, I've heard that they wouldn't mind moving him. So, I think that is fact that Calgary would potentially move him. Where we get into the gray areas, whether or not the least are interested, if there's been conversations, you know, if there's even

to fit there. I'm not even sure what Calgary would want, but he's an intriguing option because that spot on right D is going to be really difficult to fill, and right now the Leafs only, they're weak on right D. I think Zyte's probably a better fit on the second pair than the first, so if they can find someone that can play on that first pair, that changes things for them. Well, the only reason I do bring it up is because there are a few other examples like this in the league but it feels like doggie hamilton has sort of been rumored in these trades or trade speculation for a while now and i've never really understood it just because he seems like one of these perfect players where his underlying numbers are really good and if you're into that sort of thing and you can

look for them you'll be impressed but just also just purely from the eye test just watching him like he seems like a player that every single team would want and the one that has him would never let him go right like he's a young, big guy who can skate and who can shoot and who can pass the puck and who isn't afraid to be physical and he basically does everything well. So I just don't understand where this sort of stuff is even coming from that Calgary wouldn't be quote unquote like sort of happy with how he's immersed himself there. Like it just seems bizarre to me. Yeah, well, what happened in Boston?

I'm sure some of this came out is kind of like the, just that he had trouble integrating with the team. But I think a lot of us just thought maybe that's because. you know, the Bruins are an older veteran team, and there's an established identity there, and all these other things. I mean, Calgary doesn't have that, so, you know, I don't want to throw the guy into the bus or whatever, but it sounds like in Calgary that they're the same kind of, you know, trouble integrating with the team, stuff that's happening off the ice.

And not that he's out partying and ending up in jail or anything like that, but my cohesion there, they're not sure if there's a long-term fit there with the player. So I don't know. I mean, if that does turn out to be the case, I don't know. I mean, is that just old school hockeyism, you know, a guy that's a bit different, a guy that everyone says, well, Doug Eildy, he's a very smart guy. You know, he's a bit of an egghead. Does he just rub people the wrong way personality-wise?

And is that the wrong reason to trade a guy, or is there something to that? Because, as you said, I mean, he looks good on the ice, and his results look good. And Calgary's off to a tough start. so they can't really afford to lose that trade. Yeah, yeah. Hockey culture can be annoying in that way where if you don't fit in with how you're supposed to be as a hockey player or as a hockey type, you sort of get like kind of a label as an outcast, you just sort of get all these, you know, character issues and stuff

like that and it is very frustrating. But I think that if he really is available, I'm pretty sure that every team should be constantly calling the flames because he'd be a perfect fit on 29 other teams. I guess 30. We've got to start saying 30 now that the Vegas Golden Knights are right on it. It's going to take some getting used to. I think everybody has been on the Las Vegas Golden Knights right now. I think they'll take anybody because looking at some of those expansion rosters

and they're not that pretty. I mean, maybe they're a little bit better than what Minnesota and Columbus and some of the other teams had, but not a lot. I mean, I think that's a bottom three team. Yeah. To be fair, at least the defense will look like it'll be pretty good. But yeah, no, Dougie Hamilton will be great everywhere. Before we get out of here, let's talk a bit about,

the tease we had at the start of the show. You have a new job. Tell me all about it. Tell the listeners all about it. Yeah, I'm going to be running a new site called The Athletic. It's launched in Chicago. It launched already in March, and they've been building a team there.

Basically, the idea is, and you throw questions at me after this, but basically the idea is take the sports section in a newspaper. Let's say it's a really good sports section, a really good newspaper. If, you know, seven, eight, good writers, some freelance people, take it out of the newspaper environment, take it out of being in print, take away the deadlines, take away, you know, word count

lengths, and, you know, the limitations that the physical print paper gives some people, make it digital only, have an app for it, which we do, which is cool, and I encourage people to look for it and download it. and what's happening at the Globe of Mail is for online content it's you know 23 $24 a month instead of charging that to read the content just have the sports section and charge $3 or $4 a month and that's if you get enough people that's enough to sustain that little sports section online that that kind of like hardcore be covering the Js and the Raptors and the Leafs very very closely and if we can get enough subscribers

You know, really how big our little sports section is going to be is dependent on how many people sign up. So, you know, if we get 10,000 subscribers, then we might get a little bit bigger. But if we get 20,000, we can get a lot bigger and we can bring in more and more good people. And then more people are going to want to subscribe. And so, you know, I think the hope eventually is that it's going to kind of snowball in the right direction for us. Well, I think the first follow-up I have is I'm a little excited for you because I've been fortunate enough working at sports. Sportsnet. My editors have been great in terms of giving me the freedom and the flexibility to write about whatever I want and not having to necessarily kind of dumb it down or write these

sort of fluff pieces just for the sake of appeasing people that might be reading it. But I know that you had some frustrations with that in the past couple years. And I'm excited to see what you can do now. You can just sort of basically write about whatever you really want to, whatever your heart desires. Well, it's like going from general interest to like the opposite, right? I mean, like the thing about something like this is that I can, you can almost narrow cast in a way, and, you know, I can write some things like getting into really nitty-gritty stuff, and if people aren't into it, then they just don't have to read it. But I think that for like the really hardcore consumer, and I know that there's enough

of them probably out there that they're going to want some of the stuff that they want the next level kind of coverage. So, you know, the advantage that we're going to have is that we're going to be credential with the Leafs and the Jays and the Raptors and we'll do some stuff on TFC and stuff like that as well. But, you know, these are legit journalists that have covered teams before, but it's kind of like unleashing them a little bit from some of the things that I talked about. And, you know, I look at what Eric Carine is doing for us on the Raptors, and it's, he's got such immense freedom now that he can write whenever he wants, he can pick the topics he wants, he

could pick the format he wants. You know, it's not like he just has to file 800 words at the buzzer after a game. I mean, he can write three things, and one of them will be a list, and one of them will be a Q&A with a player, or, you know, he can do all kinds of different things. And we're trying to kind of in the media figure out what the next thing is going to be, what the next business model is going to be, and this is one idea. And, you know, I hope it works, because I think it's, as you said, it's going to be a lot of fun to be helping steering the ship on something new like this.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm cautiously optimistic that it'll work. I do sometimes wonder just, you know, you do see this pushback from people being like, oh, like, I have to pay for this, blah, blah, blah. But, I mean, good content is worth paying for. And as you mentioned, it's going to be such a small fee compared to what you'd be paying otherwise at a big newspaper.

And I think the other thing you have going for you is that, you know, especially with the the Leafs now, they're this young, exciting team with, and they're going to start winning more. and I think that's going to drive interest in the fan base, whereas you know, you're not writing 2,000-word profiles on Jay McCleman. So I think that you're kind of off to a good start there just to begin with. Yeah, and the interesting thing, too, is it, like I said, we're launched in Chicago, and they're going to launch in more cities as well.

And if you subscribe to us, you get the other cities. So, you know, I think there's going to be more high-profile people, you know, even on the hockey side, they're going to get hired in some other cities. And then it's going to be, you know, your three or four. $4 a month is going to go a long way. And if we can scale up and grow and hire more people and these other cities can launch and do the same thing, you could have a decent percentage of the really good hockey riders and really decent sports writers in all these different markets.

Let's say eventually we get to 7 to 10 markets, then all of a sudden you're $3 or $4 a month is you're getting a lot of content. You know, right now you can get hardcore content for the Blackhawks. And when I join, we're going to have lots and tons and tons of leads. content, but it's a different equation when you can add in all these other different markets. So, you know, it's an interesting idea. And I'd like to see it work. I know it's working at Pittsburgh with what Dejan Kova Sevik is doing there.

They've got like 35,000 subscribers and it's really taken off. And so it's, we have seen it work before. It's just a matter of seeing it's going to work in Toronto or not. Yeah, yeah. Well, listen, man, I'm hoping all goes the best. I'm rooting for you. I'm excited to see your coverage back there. And for everyone, just check out the...

athletic T.O. on Twitter, and you can kind of get more information there and hopefully become a subscriber and check how James' work. So I think that's it. Did you have any other plugs you wanted to get in before we get out of here? No, that's the big one. That sounds good. Yeah, cool, man. Well, thanks for taking the time.

I know it's a pretty hectic few weeks for you here making the transition, but I'm excited to see where it goes, and we'll make sure to get you back on once you get fully acclimated in your new surroundings. Okay. Thanks for having me on. Cool. P.doCast with Dmitri Filipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovich and on SoundCloud at

soundcloud.com slash hockey pdocast.