The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 129: Hockey's Equivalent of a Chess Match

Episode Date: January 10, 2017

Jack Han joins the show to discuss how the conventional forechecks team use have changed over time, and how the breakout schemes to combat them have adapted in turn. We also discuss the concepts of 'total hockey', how a coach can tinker with pace depending on the players available, and what to look for when breaking down film. Here’s a quick rundown of the topics covered: 1:15 How different forechecks have changed the transition game 8:40 Gabriel Landeskog's stunted development 14:08 Putting players in positions to succeed 17:30 Playing slow vs. fast 25:00 What's the next area for us to focus on? Every episode of the podcast is available on iTunes, Soundcloud, and Stitcher. All past episodes can be found here in chronological order. Make sure to subscribe 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.

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My name is Dimitri Filipovich. And joining me is my good buddy, Jack Hahn. Jack, what's going on, man? Not too much. I'm Matt McGill right now, so look into some video and, you know, try to figure things out for our team. You're always working, man. Every time I talk to you, you're always grinding. You know, I had you on this summer for people that may or may not remember.

And since then, you've blown up a little bit. You got featured by the hockey godfather, Bob McKenzie. You're writing some stuff now for the Bloss. something athletic and you're still as you mentioned working for the university of mcgill women's hockey team yep um trying to stay busy and you know doing hockey full time now so so very exciting got some some really good stuff coming up at mcgill we're um you know we're we're definitely gutting for a national title this year we're we're all in and uh so hopefully we can we can execute well okay let's let's get into it because we've been kind of discussing back and forth uh in our messages

sort of what we wanted to talk about here. And I think that it's a good opportunity for us to just get a little bit nerdy and discuss systems and fundamentals and stuff like that that we don't typically get to. So much of it is just sort of numbers-based analysis and we never really kind of get it to dive into the minutiae of it. So I'm looking forward to having this chat with you. Yeah, absolutely. So I think that, you know, something that's near and dear to my heart is an area of the game that I feel like for a while was underappreciated, but now it's definitely starting to gain more traction and steam and and recognition for how important it is as the product's evolving. And that's the transition game from your defensive zone to the neutral zone and hopefully

all the way through to the offensive zone if you do it right. And I know that you know you have some thoughts on certain forechecks and sort of how to break those and how to get out of your zone cleanly. So I don't know. Let's just like get into it. How do you think we should start this discussion? You know, you mentioned that very good article about. D-to-D passing from the Boston Bruins.

Yep. Yeah. So that was Fluto Shenzawa at the Boston Globe. I think it was a few weeks back. And he basically just kind of laid out the idea that the D-to-D pass in the defensive zone is becoming a bit phased out as teams are, you know, as opposing teams are moving from the 1-2-4 check to the 2-1-2 alternative. It's making it, you know, defensemen are doing that less and instead opting to either kind of

get it out of the zone themselves or moving it up to their forward. Yeah, so, you know, excellent point. He were a really good article. I generally enjoy the things that he writes about. And, you know, if you think about forecheck schemes, you know, the 2-1-2 is really, it's popular at almost every level of hockey now. And how that works is you send your first two forwards, F1 and F2, and they just go, you know, balls out.

And your F1 goes in the puck carrier full speed and your F2 goes on his partner full speed. And you're trying to force is you want that defenseman with the puck to play the puck up the boards. And because what happens is in hockey generally when you play the puck up the boards, you give a possession. So that's really a great way to get the puck back.

And at the same time, your F3, you're one in that 212. he'll kind of, he'll hang back, he'll read the play. And if he can get a turnover, if you can get that puck and go, he'll do that, right? Whereas, you know, a few years ago, what was more popular, the one-two is your first guy, your F-1 cuts the ice in half. So he takes away that passing lane for the D-D. Your second player tries to go on the puck carry, and then once again, your third guy is reading.

But 2-1-2 is a little bit more dynamic, let's say, you know, you want to take time, way and that's what you'll see mostly when you watch NHL hockey these days. So you think that most teams these days are sort of doing that more modern high at F3 where they're kind of playing that sort of forecheck? I mean, it's really hard to say where that high F3 concept comes from because the F3 really what he's doing is he's connecting the two four checkers and a defenseman. So if your F3 becomes too aggressive, all of a sudden, You have a huge gap and you can give up very easily an on-bat rush.

Whereas, you know, if your F-3 is nice and patient and he reads what's happening and he can get the puck back and he can start to attack. Well, I think this is the sort of stuff that really intrigues me because it is like the ultimate game of chess here. And I think that finding the most efficient ways to move for one point of the ice to the other without giving up the puck is huge. I mean, hockey already just by nature has so many of these 50-50 puck battles, especially deep in the, the zone along the boards that I think if you can limit the number of them when you already have the puck like there's no need to kind of start another one of those rather than trying to just pass it off to your teammate and get something going that way and I think that you know you watch a team like the penguins for example and we hear all about how is a copycat league and and if someone's

doing something well teams will eventually start to take it for themselves and I mean they've had a lot of success of the past year or so under mike Sullivan with this sort of a breakout scheme where they basically just whoever retrieves the puck deep in his zone, just flings it up in the air and lobs it into an open sheet of ice in the middle of the, in the middle of the ice and just gets their speedy winger to get it. And, you know, when you have guys like Carl Hagelin, for example, or Phil Kessel retrieving the puck, I think your odds of completing it successfully probably increased, but I'm not sure how, you know,

sustainable of an option that is for a lot of other teams out there that aren't blessed with those types of players. Yeah, I mean, you actually see quite a few teams doing that. you know, Montreal does it quite a bit, maybe a little bit less now, and they're having a little bit more success. I find they're using lateral pass a little bit more, but, you know, Calgary does it.

I think the Rangers do it quite a bit. Let me think. I mean, you know, most teams will kind of go for that long pass option because they know that the other team is sending two four checkers. And the thing is that, you know, tactically, I find most teams play similar, but because of your, you know, some teams just don't have the talent. and they can't make it work for them.

And that's how you see a lot of icings, a lot of uncontrolled exits, you know, a fairly poor coursey at the end of the day if you don't have a good team. So, well, I mean, where are you out of that? Like, if you're coaching one of these teams, would you, like, I'm of two minds of it because on the one hand,

I understand why teams are doing it. Sometimes it's at a necessity. You don't have any other options. And, you know, there are certain ways if you have the right players and you're doing it at the right times to increase your odds of successfully completing it. But I'm never a proponent of just giving away the puck just for the sake of doing it.

It seems like I understand that hockey is a conservative nature by sport. And by nature, and teams generally like to just get it out of their own zone and out of harm's way and kind of worry about stuff later. But I think that it'll eventually come back to bite you if you just keep giving the puck away off the boards like that. Yeah. And I mean, I think tactically, you know, there's probably like a most efficient way to play the game.

But it really depends on who you have. and how they prefer to play, right? Because I'm sure that there's some people, you know, whether it's fans, media, or, you know, those working in hockey even who consider Chris Russell and Brian Campbell to be very similar players. Because they're undersized guys who are lefties and, you know, move the puck in a certain way.

Right. But, you know, you and I both know that if you, if you tell Chris, Chris Russell to play the same way as Brian Camble and vice versa, you know, you're probably not going to like the results. So I think if, and that's where, we use analytics a lot at McGill is to value our players and track their progress and see, you know, how can we help those players find themselves in good situations to express their skill sets?

Yeah, I think that's something we don't really, as a community, spend enough time considering and walling over when analyzing, you know, just the raw production of players. It's how the role and the skill set of the people they're interacting with and playing with most frequently and the system their coaches using affect these numbers. And I think this is a perfect segue to a discussion we wanted to have about a guy like Gabriel Landisog, for example, who has been in the headlines recently as a name, the avalanche are either openly shopping or if not, then they're at least fielding a high volume of calls on. And he's an interesting player because, you know, he's always been a positive play driver

in the sense that his team gets a larger share of the shots whenever he's on the ice versus off of it. And that's a good thing. But I find it a little bit alarming that his individual shot rate for himself is ratered each season since his rookie year and we're at the point now where it's nearly half of what it was in that rookie season. So I don't know, it's always tough to evaluate with guys like that. How much of it is, you know, how much he's responsible for and how much of it is his game just not developing as much as we would have thought early on in his career and how much of it is just he's been put in a, in a tricky situation and maybe it might be the players he's playing

with. I mean, you know, I don't know his situation intimately, but, you know, he's not getting old. He hasn't been... Well, we're all getting a bit older, Jack. Yeah, yeah. But, you know, by hockey, even by hockey standards, he's still fairly young, and he hasn't had any massive injuries that kind of prevents him from playing his game, not

that I'm aware of. But, you know, I mean, if you look at Colorado as a whole, I mean, you know, that team as a whole has been trending down for what, the past three, four years. Yeah. So, so, you know, like, it's, like, I would much rather look at

the, you know, his surroundings then just say, okay, well, he's trending down. Right. Well, it's interesting because in that rookie season, he was playing a lot with a guy like Ryan O'Reilly, for example, who is more of like a prototypical center in terms of a guy that wants to distribute the puck and is very good at retrieving it. And I think that for playing with a guy like Lannisog, that lended itself well to him being a high volume shooter because he was put in a lot of situations to do so. But since then, he spent a lot of time with, you know, for a while he was playing with both Dushain and McKinnon at the same time and since he's been playing a lot with McKinnon. And I think that's an interesting discussion in and of itself.

Like if Landis Gog is just deferring a bit because, you know, he does sort of play that that style of game where he can go and retrieve the puck and get it to a guy like McKinnon. But at the same time, I'm not sure if I was coaching that team, I would be telling him to do so considering that McKinnon's quietly been one of the least efficient volume shooters in the league since he came into the NHL. So I think that, you know, how much of that is responsible for it is also an interesting thing to consider.

Yeah, because the thing with McKinnon is, you know, like I had the opportunity to watch him live in December. And, I mean, he's probably one of the best skaters I've ever seen, like, you know, on zone exits, zone entries, he's amazing. But once he gets into the offensive zone, I just find that he doesn't, like,

he's a good shot, but it's not incredibly accurate. And I don't think he has, same nose for the scoring areas that Duchenne or even a gillistowe has. Well, it's tough because obviously you don't want to just write off a guy as saying this is just going to be the way everything's going to go for the rest of his career, considering McKinnon's like 21 years old still. You'd like to think that he'll eventually figure it out and find better ways to use his speed and get into those areas.

But we're going on, what, three, almost four years now of him being like an 8.5% shooter. and you know everyone's going to point to a guy like evander kane as also being a similar type of player where like you watch him and sometimes he scores these goals and you're like he should be much more effective than he is offensively but then you look at the numbers then the season and there's just there's a there's a gap there yeah and for me like i don't really think a player's ability to get into positions to get shots and his ability to bury shots are necessarily you know the same skill at all because i think McKinnon, you know, he puts himself in good spots. He can carry the puck. He can win the battles. But if you just look at him from a shooting point of view, you know, his shot is, it's okay. It's nothing amazing.

Right. But I mean, he should conceivably not be like one of the worst shooters in the league, though. Like, I'd be like, even if he was like around league average, that would be a pretty dramatic improvement for his goal total. I mean, I don't have any difficulty believing that he's at least a league average shooter. So maybe it's just the case where, you know, magically next year he's going to shoot 10% and we're going to forget about this whole discussion. I hope you're right because I'm a fan.

So for a guy like Landiscag, I mean, if you're a team like the Bruins has been rumored to be in on him or maybe the Kings or whoever, like I wonder how much of it is one of these things where it's very correctable. If you just put him in a better situation with players that'll be more like get him in a better position to succeed, how much his career will wind up kind of revitalizing itself or whether it is just something. where he's just going to be this type of player and we just maybe overestimated how good he'd be early on. I think so because, you know, if you're saying that he had a really good rookie year with Rino Liley, who's,

you know, a past first player, who's really good in transition, who's also really good at winning battles, and all of a sudden he's not playing against, he's not playing with that kind of player anymore, or Paul Statsy, for that matter, you know, if you just put him with a player like that, I have a very hard time believe that he's not going to improve, magically, you know, being on a line that kind of plays more to the strength.

Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Well, I mean, just that entire concept of putting players into positions to see. That's something that I know is near and dear to your heart as well. And you sort of touched on it, at least briefly, in your most recent breakdown video when you were discussing Thomas Vanek and how he's been succeeding in Detroit just based on the position they've put him into. And it's very similar with the drum of it beating regarding what Columbus has done.

with Sam Gagne this season, it's that, you know, these guys are basically hockey's equivalent of a designated hitter where you're not asking them to do much defensively and you're not really relying upon them much at 5-1-5. But once you get into areas where you can score, particularly on the power play, you send them out there and they can actually be a net positive for you. Yeah, exactly. And I think hockey's trending more toward being a generalist kind of sport, you know, where it's very, like a lot of people, especially on Twitter, they're always asking you know, like when is total hockey going to happen? Like, when are we going to have five positionless players?

Well, it's going to happen when all five players are good at roughly the same things, which mean that, you know, like, in that kind of world, like, there's no place for a Thomas Vannick or for a Sam Gagnan because, you know, they can't play the fast F1 role or they can't play the physical F2 role or, you know, they might not be smart enough defensively to play F3 or, you know, and they definitely can't play defense, so where are they going to play, right? So it's kind of like we're diverging a little bit here because if you look at a team like the Maple Leafs, and I think they've done a really good job of, you know, getting the young players into offensive situations,

but also teaching them how to play F3, how to cover for a defenseman who pinches, how to move as a five-man unit. So, you know, when you watch the least play, like that's what you're going to see. You're going to see five guys who, if you didn't know them at all, like you wouldn't know who's the defense and who's the four. you know like jake gardner will routinely go down deep in his own and you know Mitch Martin or austin matthews or uh william neilander they're getting better and better at playing the high f3 and staying up near the points and diving down only when there's an opportunity yeah and i think

that that's definitely like the future of the league right as as as teams become smarter and evaluating and as i mean you know players are just becoming more and more skill than more and more versatile and it makes sense that eventually, I don't know when that'll be. It seems like with hockey, it takes a long time for this stuff to sort of, for us to see these actual changes, meaningful ones at least, to take effect. So I don't know when it'll happen. But I think that eventually we'll basically just see that where it's just, you know, five guys who are just very interchangeable and all can do pretty much the same thing.

Yeah, like if you watch like high level minor hockey or if you watch like US high school hockey, like you'll see guys like, you know, the forwards can play defense. the defenseman can jump up into the attack. Like when I play high school hockey, like it wasn't a super high level, but we literally had guys who couldn't take a slap shot or who couldn't pivot backwards or who couldn't take a one-timer

or couldn't lift the puck in their back hands. But now like the kids, they're so good at, you know, learning from what they're seeing on TV, learning from YouTube, getting specialized skills coaching, that you're seeing less and less of that. And that's probably, you know,

why the game is changing from a grassroots level as well. Okay, something else I wanted to talk to you about while I still have you is this idea of playing slow versus fast and how the construction of your team should affect that. And I think that, you know, we still have very rough estimates of what quote unquote pace is because we don't have something like synergy stats or something like they have in basketball where we can measure it more accurately. Instead, we're using stuff like shot rates, which is open to a lot of error based on obviously

is scorer bias, but also like, you know, a team like the Arizona Coyotes, for example, is third or fourth in the league in terms of pace if you look at shots for and against. And a lot of that is just because they're just getting absolutely buried in shots against. And, you know, their own shots four aren't necessarily that high. So if you're a really bad team, you're probably going to wind up looking like you're playing pretty fast, even though you might not actually be. But on the other end of things, I think an interesting team is the Canucks where, you know, I think on most nights, it's fair to say that they're playing.

probably going to be the worst of the two teams, at least in terms of ability and skill throughout the lineup. But they're playing the slowest pace in the league right now this season. And I wonder if that is something they should be doing because it makes sort of intuitive sense that you decrease the number of meaningful events that are taking place. You increase the chances that, you know, you get a few bounces here or there and all of a sudden you opportunistically steal a win as and while you're like decreasing your exposure to other team's skills. So I don't know, Like if you were coaching a team that you knew was going to be playing an uphill battle every night, like is that something you'd want to sort of instill, just kind of slowing the game down and grinding it out,

as opposed to leaving yourself open to kind of a back and forth track meet? Yeah, like I don't know if any coaching staff consciously, you know, decides at the start of the year that, okay, we're going to play a slow-paced game in terms of shots. Certainly you have certain players. Let's say, you know, the Sadiq is like they like to cycle, right? Like when you cycle the puck, nothing happens from a shot point of view, either for or against, for a while, you know, because you're on the, you're on the sidewall for like 30 seconds. You're moving the puck back and forth. And I mean, I can see it from that point of view. I don't really know about the rest of the lineup. But like on that note, like one of the great coaching jobs I find in the modern NHL era, like maybe, you know, since we have analytics since, you know, 2007, I think the greatest coaching job out of it. of any team in that era was what Babcock did his last two years in Detroit. So that's between 2013 and 2015, correct?

Yeah. So what happened there, you know, is, you know, they had a great team for many, many years, and they played, you know, like a medium pace, maybe a little bit faster than average. But then in his last two years with Littstrom gone and Zetterberg slowing down and that took slowing down and crawlwall slowing down and, you know, like their core generally becoming older. and not as good.

They started playing this really low event game, and they maintained that coursey, kind of that positive coursey, and they were able to win a lot of games just by slowing things down. So, I mean, like when I watch them, they were just generally a very sound team

in all areas of the ice. You know, they had good D zone structure. You know, they played a high F3 as well. They were very disciplined. But, you know, is there anything that really really, jumps out at me that says this team is consciously trying to play slow, I don't know, because it's a small gap.

Well, I think, you know, you're not necessarily telling your team, like, okay, we're going to go out there and take a bunch of shots here and really speed things up, or we're going to just kind of hold the puck up against the boards for 40 seconds at a time and not let anything transpire. But I think, you know, you can sort of definitely see certain teams are more willing to open it up versus others. Maybe a lot of that is just sort of the chess pieces that you have and the way you can play with the guys you're afforded.

but I think that, you know, you look across the league and there are, I feel like there's certain teams that would be better suited playing a different style of game than they are playing based on the players they have. Like you mentioned the Jets, right? Yes. Yeah. I mean, the Jets are like, I think they're 28th in the league in pace right now. And I mean, that makes no sense to me when you look at the lineup where they have all these young, skilled, fast guys both on defense and up front. And they're just kind of grinding these games out. and that doesn't make sense to me,

considering that they should, like on most nights, they should be in an advantageous position to sort of play that fast game against their opponent. And I don't know if it's something Paul Maurice is doing consciously or what's going on there. I haven't really dug into a deeper, but that's one of the teams that really jumps off the page to me.

Is it because they don't trust their goaltending by any chance? Because, you know, if I coach a team and I didn't trust my goaltending, I'd probably lean toward playing that kind of style. So it's interesting. I think that, you know, unless I'm mistaken or I'm mixing it up, I think that the year they made the playoffs and they lost it a ducks was the year they like really slowed it down and Pavlick started playing better or started at least having

better numbers. And they succeeded for a while there. And I don't know, maybe they're trying to kind of recapture that. But I think that it's a little bit ill-advised, especially since I think that, you know, while Connor Haleboyke hasn't necessarily had the eye-popping numbers, we would have expected him to have. Like, he's perfectly fine, and at least you know that he's not a complete liability back there like Pavlik was for so long.

So I think if I was coaching that team, there's a lot of hidden value there and just them kind of opening up the game and trying to get into a few more track meets here and there. Mm-hmm. Yeah. All right, before we get out of here, I wanted to ask you something that people ask me pretty frequently, and I think that, you know, you're as qualified to answer this as anyone I know considering it's your job. When you're watching tape, or how do you go?

go about doing it. Are there certain things you're looking for or certain, you know, if you look at maybe trends that are going on in the numbers, then you kind of go to the tape to see what's going on or just what's your process in terms of breaking all of it down? Yeah, I think the stats are, they're a really good first step for me because I think I mentioned this before, but like the perfect video analyst has 500 pairs of eyes because, you know, otherwise you just can't see a big enough sample size when you just look at video. So what I would do is, you know, if I think, let's say if Winnipeg I think is playing really slow,

well first I have to look at the stats to see whether they are playing really slow. Right. Right. Because if I just go straight to the tape, then I don't have enough time in the world to really determine whether they're playing slower than let's say, Pittsburgh or Montreal. So, you know, so, yeah, so the public analytics databases I use a lot just to kind of narrow down what I want to look at. And then afterwards, you know, that gives you an idea of what I want to focus on. So, but I mean, are there certain things you're prioritizing or focusing on more than others? Or is it just sort of you go into an open mind and see where it takes you?

It's hard to say. It's depending on the area of play, you know, I kind of have an idea of what most HL teams are able to do or prefer to do. And then you just try to figure out how often they get to do that. Right. Because the NHL is purely, like I would say, like everybody is able to execute everything, but the difference is the best teams execute it more often. Right. So it's purely evolving league in terms of, you know, what kind of plays are able to generate.

So I guess an interesting, like a relevant follow-up question than that, or maybe a better way to put it is like, is there, we've obviously made a lot of advancements over the past handful of years in terms of both stuff we know and stuff we recognize, but also just like merging all of these different, uh, tools together with video analysis and, and data and everything, so on and so forth. Like, what do you think is the next frontier, the next sort of thing that we should be focusing on? Because like, as I mentioned earlier, for some, for me, um, you know, stuff like zone entries, for example, has gotten a lot of attention for a while now, but I think that, uh, improving, uh, the way you actually exit your

zone to begin with is something that is still has a lot of hidden value. Like, if you, could improve that or maximize the way you're doing it or as you mentioned the volume just how frequently you're able to succeed doing something uh in that category like you could definitely improve your overall performance a lot is there is there something other than that that you're looking at that like you think that you know if if a team got better at this or prioritized it a bit more or even on a player level uh it could do wonders for their overall output well like one thing that's very salient for coaches um is how often as a team team, you're able to switch sides on the ice.

Let's say that you're breaking out, right? And you have a lot of foretick pressure coming in. What happens is most NHL teams will tend to want to play, you know, four skaters on one side and really overload that side of the ice. So as soon as you're able to kind of beat that pressure by moving the puck, you know, laterally D-to-D or, you know, reversing the puck, then all of a sudden you have a lot more open ice to work with. And that's something that I think you would find some interesting things if you try to

capture that, you know, see which teams are able to go cross-ice better in the D-Zone to break out and also obviously to go cross-ice in the O zone to create scoring chances. Because the NHL players are so fast that, you know, most coaches are able to get their players to, you know, flood one side, one-half of the ice with big numbers, but then as soon as you're able to kind of get to the other side, then, you know, you start creating opportunities. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. All right, Jack, where can people find your work

And what can we expect from you moving forward? I know that you've been banging out these one-minute videos pretty frequently And they're always a must-see What do you have on top? I don't know because I make them pretty much as a Whenever I feel like basis, you know, whenever I have some time from Miguel Or even, you know, if there's something that I want to illustrate to our players Or to our coaching staff, I kind of, you know, I shared that with the point

public, but also I use that internally with our coaching staff sometimes when I want to make a point. So that, that's helpful. So my Twitter handle is at ML underscore H-A-N. And I write for the athletic on a, you know, once every two-week basis. So, you know, I'll be using like Maple Leafs as an example for a lot of the, you know, the fairly simple tactical concepts that we have in hockey and trying to tie it back as well to analytics and how that really drives results. Yeah, I enjoy how you blend those things together.

I particularly enjoy the sort of real-life analogies you use for some of this stuff. Before I get you out of here, I mean, I feel like you need to share with the listeners. I remember you told me that story about, like, it was something about horse racing or something and your grandfather or something like that and how you could apply that to hockey. I kind of want you to share that with everyone before you go. I mean, it's kind of, it's like a long and complicated story if I just kind of share it like this. but Bob McKenzie, they're right about it. So I'll send you that link and you can share it

because like written out it makes a lot more sense. But basically this Chinese general about, I want to say, 3,000 years ago, he invented line matching, right? Like the hard line match. He invented that in a horse racing context. So, you know, so whoever invented line matching to hockey,

you know, he was probably 2,000 years too late. Yeah, he stole it from him. Like all the best. is. Jack, man, it's a pleasure. Hopefully we can get you back on as the year goes along here and break some, we should like break down some video together and just kind of do some more outside the box stuff like this. Yeah, for sure. All right, man. Talk soon.

Thanks to meet you. All the best. Wanted to get to just one more bit of housekeeping before we do finally end this episode of the Hockey PEO cast. I want to remind everyone one more time that if they've been following along and enjoying the episodes, we've been putting out, you can go to iTunes and leave a rating and review. It only takes a minute or two. too, but all of them are greatly appreciated, and they definitely go a long way towards both bumping this podcast up the charts and keeping my bosses happy. I asked you guys to do so a few shows back and a bunch of you went ahead and did it, and it was awesome to see, so I greatly appreciate that.

If you're not using iTunes to listen to this podcast, that's totally cool too. Your downloads and listens all count the same, and that's ultimately all the matters. So as long as you keep listening, I'll keep recording these and talking away. And if you've got any particular guests you'd like to see appear on here in the coming weeks and months, I'm always open to suggestions too. So you can either just tweet at either Dim Philipovich or The Hockey PDRCast on Twitter, or you can email in at Demetri.philipovich at gmail.com, and we'll see if we can make it happen.

So anyways, with that out of the way, we'll be back later this week with another new episode. And until then, here's some outro music to put a bow on things. The Hockey P.D.O.cast, follow on Twitter at Dimphilipovich and on SoundCloud at SoundCloud.com. slash Hockey PDOCast.