The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 213: Devil Worship

Episode Date: December 21, 2017

Arda Ocal joins the show to discuss the new look New Jersey Devils, how sustainable their surprising start to the season is, and ways to improve hockey broadcasts moving forward. Sponsoring today’s show is SeatGeek, which is making it easier than ever before to buy and sell sports and concert tickets. They’re giving our listeners a $20 rebate off of their first purchase. All you have to do is download the free SeatGeek app and enter the promo code PDO to get started. Also sponsoring today’s show is Harry’s Razors. If you sign up with them today using the promo code PDO, they’ll send you a trial shave set free of charge that includes: 1) weight ergonomic razor handle, 2) 5 precision-engineered blades with a lubricating strip and trimmer blade, 3) rich lathering shave gel and 4) a travel blade cover. All you have to do is cover the shipping cost and that starter kit will be dropped at your door for free. Every episode of the podcast is available on iTunes, Soundcloud, Google Play, and Stitcher. 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 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.

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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 Drizzly or Instacart. Celebrate responsibly. Coors Brewing Company, Golden Colorado. The Hockey P.D.O.cast is brought to you by Get Down BP, which brings people together with a goal of getting blood pressure down in a fun and interactive way. Regressing to the mean since 2015, it's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the Hockey PEDEOCast.

My name is Demetri Filippovich, and joining me on the other line is my good buddy, Ardo L. A Rado, what's going on, man? I'm doing really good, and I have to say that I'm really excited to be on the Hockey PEDAO cast, which has been regressing to the mean since 2015, and I've probably been listening about as long because I'm a big fan of the podcast. but I've been really concerned leading up to this interview, Dimitri, or this conversation, I should say, because I have no idea how I'm going to follow the likes of the Andrew Berkshires

and the Tyler Delos and the Uncle Jeff Merrick's of the world. So I've been stressing. I'll be honest. I think you'll be fine. And definitely don't view it as an interview, view it as a conversation between two pals. Don't worry about it. It'll be good.

I know you're not necessarily a huge analytics guy by any means or anything like that, but you definitely follow along. And I mean, you listen to this podcast. I know you constantly reach out and ask questions. So just the fact that you're exhibiting that type of curiosity tells me a lot about your interest in the product. So that's a good start, if anything. An emerging hockey analytics guy, I guess, is the best way to put it.

There you go. Through my journey, it's coming. It's coming. All right. So let's, I haven't introduced you yet, really. I hope most of my listeners and all of you, but what's your official? title because I know you have, you're a man of, wears many different hats. I feel like you

do all sorts of things. Yeah, so right now, I work for MSG networks. I host a program called the MSG hockey show. It basically is the postgame postgame show. The MSG has the rights to the Rangers, Islanders, Devils, and Sabres. So basically our show, which is live usually after Rangers or Devils games. It'll air after all of the postgame shows for the other properties as well. And it basically covers the league. It's more like the lighter side of hockey kind of thing and anything that's happening around the league. And also I host a podcast for the Devils called the All Access podcast with Amanda Stein, who is their new All Access host this season. And that's every week. It's a lot of fun. We bring in people top to bottom in the

organization and talk to them. And I appear on some broadcast. So that's where the analytics part comes in is for the second season, I've joined the devil's broadcasts on TV. And I'm basically hitting the ground running, bringing analytics to the broadcast, which they previously didn't have much of. Yeah, I was going to say, I was tuning into a devil's broadcast the other day. I forget who they were playing. And lo and behold, I'm watching it on my laptop, on my game center app. And all of a sudden, I see you pop up and you're some dropins of knowledge.

So that was pretty cool, see? Exactly. which I probably obtained from you. So thanks. Oh, wow. I didn't hear my name mentioned on there, so you didn't give me a shout out or anything. So I don't know about that.

I have told them, in all fairness, actually, I have told them to check your tweets so that they can post them up whenever a good one comes up. Oh, God, that's the worst thing you could have done. I don't want anyone, I don't want anyone checking out my tweets. They're horrible. What are you talking about?

Especially the ones that blow up. I love it. I love seeing that. It's hilarious. All right. So let's talk a bit about, the devils, since you've obviously been following them much more closely this year. What's the general vibe around the team? And I'm speaking both internally, since I'm sure you talk

to people who are actually working with the team and the players, but also it's fans because you obviously, now that you're in the broadcast, I'm sure that, especially on Twitter, you interact with them on a more regular basis. So, like, how are people feeling about this team? Because obviously, it's a great story so far. I don't think anyone expected this type of success early in the year. But you sort of always also have to kind of manage those expectations still and you don't want to get carried away and wind up, you know, trying to speed up the process too much or getting carried away with how good you think this team actually is. So are people just kind of taking it for what it's worth or are people letting their imaginations run a little

wild? I think it's a little bit of both, really. I think that internally there's certainly a tempering of expectations. There's optimism on both ends, whether it's in the organization or whether it's the fan base. Certainly there's optimism. And it's come as a pleasant surprise. I mean, going all the way back to when the devil's got the first overall pick and they picked Nico Hishier, I mean, that's where the excitement really started. It really felt like the reset button was pressed on the organization after several years of missing the playoffs and futility, you know, at the Prudential Center. It was finally like, okay, we can exhale now and this is the beginning of a new era with the New Jersey Devils team. So when they won their first three

games and then they went on like three separate three game winning streaks to begin the season that you really started to feel that optimism, that positivity flowing in the arena because the team was doing so well. And all the young players were such a pleasant surprise. I mean, all of them hit the ground running. All of them contributed early and often. And they still are. You know, the likes of Nico Heshi or Jasper Brat and Will Butcher, they're contributing to this team in different ways, which is very good to see. Yeah, I mean, definitely. It's all kind of come together. We're, what, 40% of the way through the year now, and they're sitting third in the Eastern Conference. They're just two points behind the capitals with two games in hand for the Metro Division lead. And obviously, especially considering how prestigious and hotly contested that division in particular is, that's a pretty remarkable testament to the wins they've been piling up and banking here. Yeah, it's tough because, you know, as an analytics guy, it kind of, I feel obligated to point out when, you know, know, people are getting a bit carried away and when there's flaws in a team or a player's game.

And obviously, the devil's profile this season is a bit weird because while they've been racking up all these wins, the underlying shot metrics in particular don't necessarily reflect that glowingly upon them. But then, you know, you dig a little deeper and you sort of find that there's certain things going on in the numbers that, you know, make you think about how much is actually a concerted effort on their part based on the system they're playing and how much of it is just one of those things where it's, you know, still only 30 or so games in a season and by the end of the year we'll kind of regret pumping them up too much because they'll come back down earth.

Well, as anybody listening to this podcast would know, the devils have a more favorable PDO at the moment. But really, their puck possession is low, right? Their coursey percentage is really low, one of the lowest in the league. And that's consistent across every game that they play. I mean, there's only a handful of games this season or even periods where they've had a higher than 50% puck possession. So, I mean, that's a thing. I mean, yeah, you look for the full season there, you know, the 28th in shot attempts, 25th and unblocked shot attempts, 30th in shots on goal.

Like, it's, it obviously doesn't just by looking at that look like a team that should be winning as many games as they are. And then a big part of it is the fact that, you know, their fifth in shooting percentage and that obviously helps. Their 15th in state percentage. And obviously, Corey Schneider returning back to form after that weird season last year for a him helps a lot. But, you know, you also watch these games and it's tough to balance and wonder how much of it is real and how much is not, because it's pretty clear it at least is a bit of a concerted effort on the part of John Heinz, their coaching staff to play a certain way, right? Like, it looks like they're prioritizing the counterattack game quite a bit and playing

off the rush and utilizing all the speed they have, particularly up front. And it looks like when they are in the offensive zone, they're trying to get around the net as much as possible and maybe wait for some better looks as opposed to just firing the puck on net. Now, I should say that every year it feels like we have a couple of these teams that we say the same things about and then eventually the numbers game catches up to them. So that's why I'm kind of tempering my expectations here and kind of try and shred lightly because I don't want to talk too glowingly about them. But at the same time, there clearly is something else going on here.

It's a bit deeper. Well, you're right about the shot attempts because if you look at the heat maps, that's one of the things that I've been incorporating in the broadcasts, thanks to our friends at natural stat trick who do a great job with the heat maps. I bring them in and you can see a typical devil's win, most of the concentrated dark red is right around the crease. And that's the majority of where their shot attempts are coming from. And oftentimes there's not much else red in the offensive zone.

No shots from the point. You know, there's a little bit a smattering. But really it's a deep circle right around the crease is where. And when that happens, when they are able to concentrate their shots like that, that typically translates to at least a winning period or a winning game. Yeah. And, you know, speaking on utilizing that speed and playing more of a rush game, I mean, the reason why I remember back in the preseason and in the start of the year, I did the watchability rankings my pal Craig Custin's. And I had the devil's... His book is awesome, by the way.

I'm going through it right now. Oh, it's tremendous. It's wonderful. Like his stories are great. I love the story with Bilesma and Ray Shiro. I want to bring it up to Ray Shiro where Bilesma's like, so can I get a bonus if I win the cup too? What a great.

I mean, it's such a great nugget of just, it's great. Yeah. No, no, the book's tremendous. I definitely highly recommend checking it out and checking out the podcast I did with Craig where we did a little bit of deep dive on it. But, you know, when we did our watchability rankings together at the start of the year, I'd already had the benefit of seeing the Devils play a few times. So I base my opinion off of that, but also part of the rationale for having them

You know, I think I had them like, I'd say 20th or 21st in the league, which, you know, it doesn't sound necessarily all that great or optimistic, but based on where they've been in past years and sort of general belief about the style of game they play, I think that was, people were surprised at how optimistic I was about them. And part of the rationale there was, I remember the start of last year, they definitely seemed to be prioritizing playing a faster, more uptempo back and forth band of hockey, and then, you know, Taylor Hall got injured, Corey Schneider was really struggling and all of a sudden it felt like John Hines sort of just as a way of survival devolved back into slowing the game down and trying to grind it out so they wouldn't become

exposed too much and I was hoping that with better health this year maybe they'd get back to playing that type of way and so far so good so I feel a bit of indicated based on the fact that you know even if you're not necessarily certain how good this team is or whether they'll keep getting wins and bunches like this at the very least they've become very watchable which is a big step from where they've been in past years. And not only that, but they have had a little bit of the injury bug on key players, right? I mean, Kyle Palmeary's been out for stretches of time with a broken foot. You had Marcus Johansson in the whole concussion situation.

Travis Zajak was gone. He was supposed to be out for four to six months and he came back much sooner than that. Mirko Mueller. I mean, they have some key players that you really thought would be big contributors going into the season, going down to injury. and that really showed that the devils, in fact, particularly on offense, had a lot of depth, which certainly led to the Votnan-Henrique trade because the organization felt that they had enough depth, particularly with the youth movement at Forward, to be able to pull off a trade like that

and be able to land a guy like Votnan. Yeah, well, Vatnan certainly, you know, there's divisive opinions based on how good he actually is and whether an added role where he'd get more opportunity playing with fewer talented defensemen like he was in Anaheim, then maybe he could kind of spread his wings a little bit and show that he has more to his game than just being kind of a power play specialist. And the thing that I like is while his performance so far has been up and down and mostly down, I'd say for the Devils, at least he sort of profiles as the type of guy

that can move the puck and play a bit faster. And, you know, one stat I like to look at in particular is, just a regular shots for and against combined as sort of a proxy for pace and how fast teams are playing at 5-1-5. And the devils this year are 22nd, which doesn't sound that great. But they've been 30th in the league every year since 2008, 2009. So the fact that there's teams that are playing slower than this season is huge in my books. Yeah, no kidding. And Vottenen also, I mean, you go back to, of course, the quality of players that you're playing with with the ducks in there,

loaded defense core in Votnan having the benefit of playing with these defense pairings. He had three consecutive seasons with greater than 50% puck possession. And I really felt like other than this season and last season, I really felt like that might have been one big reason to bring Votan into Jersey is to help with that possession because as we know, the devils are among the worst in the league. Like we just said, in puck possession, that's not the game that they play. And their shooting percentage is extremely high. They have two players that are above 20.

Like Brian Gibbons is a perfect example of this, right? The biggest surprise on the roster is Brian Gibbons. And one of the biggest reason he's been scoring so many goals is, well, first of all, he's putting himself and his teammates are giving him the puck in high scoring situations. And he said that when we interviewed him for the All Access Podcast, he said, I'm finding myself in high scoring opportunities and high percentage scoring opportunities. He's shooting at over 26% right now. Right.

But are not. Do you think like, obviously I think even Brian Gibbons, if you gave him some truth serum, would acknowledge that a certain amount of puck luck is coming into that as well, right? Like, it's one of those things where when you talk to these players, none of them are going to really acknowledge, like, hey, like, what are you or your teammates doing right here? Why are you having so much success? And Brian Gibbons would never come back to you and say, man, I don't know, I've been getting super lucky. I've just been closing my eyes and firing the puck and it's been going in and I hope it continues. Like they never say that.

It always seems like sort of this hindsight explanation for why it's happening. And obviously, like, listen, it's a great story so far. But I personally actually get kind of annoyed by it because whenever I, if I'm writing something or I'm looking at the most prolific scores in the league, it's always like all the usual suspects. And then it's Brian Gibbons's name near the top. And I know that as soon as I put it out, put a chart out there with it, someone's going to go, wow, this status, dude. But look, Brian Gibbons is the top.

How good could it be? So he's like really just throwing everything for a loop in my mind. Well, if you ask John Hyman, he'll be the first to say that Brian Gibbons, this may be the first year in his professional hockey career where he's been able to get these sort of opportunities, like they know each other from the Penguins organization. And this may be one of the first times,

definitely at the NHL level, where Givens has been given these sort of opportunities to show himself. But I will say this too, Dimitri. Brian Boyle is also shooting above 20%, but he's also 6 foot a million. So you can go ahead and tell, him that, or call him on it, I won't be doing that. Well, also, based on what he's gone through off the ice this season, I feel like getting

some on ice luck is in the books. I'm all for Brian Boyle continuing to shoot well over 20% for the rest of the year. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. All right, let's take a quick little break here to hear from a sponsor and we'll pick up this conversation on the other end of things. If you've been tuning into Hockey Central the past couple Fridays just prior to the start of that night's games, you would have seen a couple things. You would have seen myself in front of the podcast, Jeff Merrick, having a casual conversation

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what else is there to talk about this team with really? I mean, like, we haven't really talked much about Corey Schneider yet. I think he's a fascinating name to discuss because he obviously, you know, it was like him and Henrik Lundquist as the gold standards of just consistency he had a position that is so volatile. I mean, you know, some of it was obviously as a backup in Vancouver where he wasn't

shouldering the brunt of the starts, but he had six straight seasons, and that was roughly 250 starts or so, where he was in that 920 to 925, say, percentage range, and had really just become kind of a lock for that. And then all of a sudden, last year, he takes a big nose dive and he's dealing with some lower body injuries and, you know, just he's playing at a level that we hadn't come to expect from him, and it was really jarring. and there was a lot of questions about whether he was on the way down or whether it was just a blip on the radar. And this year he appears to have righted the form.

And honestly, I think this is the year that people were pointing to. Because when you look at it, the last five years have really been disappointing for the devils. Not making the playoffs since that 2012 Stanley Cup run and just being a team of futility for those years. And when we come into this year, Corey Schneider was coming off. what you could call the worst season of his career on the ice. And you could tell. I mean, when you talk to him in the locker room and when you hear him speak, it just felt like he was buying into the whole reset of this organization.

And he was going to be among the people to lead the charge because he's been here. And he's seen the downs. And now he's ready to make the playoffs with this team. Now he's ready to be a part of a winning franchise in New Jersey. and his numbers are, I mean, look, when you look at his numbers, 2.6 goals against average, he's 14 wins and six losses, right? So at the end of the day, the 14 wins is what matters the most. And that speaks more to the way that the devils play than, you know,

he's facing a lot of shots. He is. But he's saving a lot of shots. And that's the thing. So they're really relying on him between the pipes, but he's delivering at least at this juncture in the season. Are there, how have you listened to, haven't I talked and taught you enough and haven't you listened to any enough episodes of the show to know not to cite goals against average?

I mean, what do you, what do you, what are you doing here to me? It's a journey. It's a journey, Dimitri, okay? I'm going through you. I, listen, I put together my list of the best right-handed defenseman, my top 50. I thought that's what we were doing. Yes, that's the next show. We're going to do that on Christmas Eve.

Yeah. That'd be a very, very hockey p-do casting. I'd do, very niche. So what would you say? What would you say regarding Corey Schneider? I'd love to get your thoughts on that. Well, I mean, obviously his play so far is encouraging, especially the fact that he went on the injured reserve earlier in the year,

and it sort of made you think that, you know, wow, this could be a recurring thing, all of a sudden they could really be in trouble here. So the fact that he's come back, he's shown he's healthy, he's stopping the puck at a 920 rate again, which is his career norm, is huge to see. I still think that, you know, it's tough, because on the one hand, I empathize with GMs and players, as you mentioned, this sort of journey he's been through in New Jersey and all the losing and how now finally the team is playing better.

I'm sure he's relishing in it quite a bit and, you know, he's meant a lot to this organization since getting traded for a first round pick and arriving there. But at the same time, you do have to kind of take a step back and view it from a more critical business-like approach. And, I mean, you know, he's 31 right now. He's turning 32 in the spring. He's still got four more years left on his deal at $6 million a season. And as good as the devils have looked so far in the win-loss column, I still think that, you know, they should be viewing this as a step in the process and not necessarily viewing it as a finished product. And I wonder, you know, with Corey Schneider's age and contract length,

does he fit into those plans? Like by the time they're actually ready to turn the corner and be legitimately good and be competing for Stanley Cups, what age is he going to be at? What's his performance going to be like? So I wonder if he makes more sense as a trade chip. but obviously that's a tough thing to do right now in season. So I think if you're the devil's management, you're sort of riding it out this season,

you're hoping he stays healthy, he keeps performing at this level, and you go on a little bit of a run this season, and then maybe the summer you reevaluate and you see if his stock is risen and if he's a valuable trade trip that someone will pay a premium for. So that's what I would do personally with him.

You know how I know that you're a member of the Canadian media, Dimitri? You're calling for trades as soon as possible. Hashtag Eric Carlson. I mean, listen, it would certainly make my life easier if he got traded, so I had time to talk about it. I'm not sure how he'd personally feel about that. But, you know, I mean, I think as long as he keeps playing well and keeps showing that he's healthy, like only good things can come other from the devils, whether he's still in the team or not in the years to come.

So it's been an encouraging sign to see, and I'm kind of curious to see how it plays out. The funny thing is, I mean, we just, the devils just went through a major. trade in Henrique and Vatnan. And it's been interesting to see how Henrique has acted after this trade. I mean, he has been really a heart and soul player for the devils. And, you know, you see him on Snapchat following the, like, he posted something like a week ago where he was like following the devil's game. He's like hashtag checking in on the boys. And when he was, he had his big return to the Prudential Center on Monday night when the ducks were in town. And after the game, There was this whole funny thing on social media that him and Keith Kincaid did where Kincaid at the start of last season put out a contest on social media on Twitter saying, hey, I want a new pad design. Can you guys help me out?

And Adam Henrique's design idea was to put Stephen Gianta in the pad like a pads of seduction like a George Costanza pose. So he's like, why don't you put this on the pads? I think this is a great idea. So finally things came full circle after the game. There was a giant package waiting for Adam Henrique outside the locker room, and he opened it only to find the actual completed pads of seduction. And Keith Kincaid waiting with it. So I'm glad we're all very glad that the pads were finally created, is what I'm getting at.

Yes. Yeah, no, I mean, obviously Henrique, anyone that follows him on social media is a pretty good character. And he certainly had his little bit of a revenge game in that game you were mentioning, scoring what arguably could be one of the goals of the year. I mean, especially doing it against Vaden and himself one-on-one, was I imagine he enjoyed that a little bit. And the funny thing is, is that the Prudential Center crowd enjoyed it too. It was like the perfect game for the New Jersey Devils fan base

because they got to see their old favorite player and Adam Henrique score this highlight real goal that is like, yeah, the goal of the year for sure. It's unbelievable. The Alley Upe to himself and then beats Schneider backhand top shelf. And then the Devils end up winning the game. So it's like they get, they get every, they had their cake and ate at two on, on that Monday night. Yeah.

Yeah, for sure. Well, okay, so let's talk a bit about Taylor Hall because, I mean, obviously the fact that you sort of, you came into this gig and now you started to fall on the devils during the years where he's here and still at his prime is, uh, it's pretty fortunate on your part because I, if I was coming up with a list of guys that I enjoy watching play, he'd be right up there near the top of it. And I thought it was Brian Gibbons. well Brian Gammond is number one and then Taylor Hall number two obviously got it okay okay just wanted to clarify yeah um and and the thing I also really like about Taylor Hall is you know he's been pretty open with the media and he seems to sort of not take himself too seriously and he's having a bit of fun with it and you know sometimes that comes back to bite him I wonder how much of it is the fact that he's not playing in Edmonton anymore and now he's playing

New Jersey so maybe it has a bit more freedom but I remember last year he maybe it was in the off season when he was talking about how it hurt to watch the Oilers finally play in the playoffs after all he'd been through with them and you know this year he was talking about the edmonton media and how it can affect your confidence and stuff like that and i always i always enjoy when players are a bit more open and willing to talk with the media i understand it sometimes gets them in trouble but i mean it's just it's just showing that kind of personality and actually acting like a human rather than a robot that just you know spinning out cliches is always a refreshing thing in my opinion how interesting it is that taylor hall last season said he uh had to watch his

former team play in the playoffs while he sat in the sidelines. And this season, it could be the opposite. And nobody would have predicted that, by the way. Let's be honest about that, particularly with the Oilers. But this is one interesting quote from Taylor Hall that has really stuck with me this season. There's a lot of camaraderie in this locker room. They went to West Point Academy, which is a military academy, about 50 miles north of Prudential center in New York State before the season started.

very common for sports teams to go and do things, especially at West Point in this area. I'm sure, if not all the sports teams, many of them have gone to West Point. Just to hear from, you know, the cadets that are there and inspirational stories and team building exercises, like they do obstacle courses. It just, it all looks like a lot of fun and they get to bond. But the key thing that John Hines and the leadership staff with the Devils has really been pushing is they are building a brotherhood, not a neighborhood. And everybody buys into the overall success of the team.

And consistency is key. And when something goes wrong, the coaching staff addresses it, either a player becomes a healthy scratch or they have a meeting with the veterans to pass on the information. But usually that communication is well received and corrections are made. And it usually happens. There's only one time this season the devils have gone a two-game span without picking up any points. And really it's because that communication is flowing very well and changes are being able to be made on the fly. Now with Taylor Hall, one thing that I find very interesting is he basically said that, I'm paraphrasing here,

but he said that last season he felt like a hockey player playing in New Jersey, whereas this season he feels like a New Jersey devil's hockey player. And I feel like he's among those players that are really, even though he's still young in his career approaching his prime if not in his prime, he's still, he's one of those players that people will look to for leadership and to lead the charge. And he's certainly done that. Yeah. I mean, that discussion about, you know, team building and culture and all the stuff in the room is always a fascinating one to me because it's the ultimate sort of it's the sports equivalent of the chicken or the egg. right because it's like on the one hand um i imagine that enjoying uh you know who you're playing with and who you're around on a daily basis just like any job would make your life better and you'd probably

perform better at your whatever your job is at the same time um winning kind of cures all right and it's like it's much easier to be invested and be all in and be a team for his guy when you're you know relevant and competitive and you're constantly playing in these fun games as opposed to when you're headed for another lottery finish and playing meaningless games that no one is watching so it's it's kind of tough to know sort of how to weigh those things and which one comes first and which one's more important. Like you sort of need a requisite baseline level of talent and then you also need some of that other stuff as well. And hopefully if you get a nice marriage of those two, you're going to have a successful winning product. And you could, I mean, listen, at the end of the day, even if they didn't go do this bonding trip,

maybe they would still be winning and maybe they'd still have the season they had. But you could say that it certainly contributed to the mood in the locker room. And you could certainly say that it contributed to the player's mind. said at the beginning of the season where they won, they had three straight, three game winning streaks. I mean, that's, you could make a, you could make a correlation there. And some of those players have made that correlation. In fact, their locker room award is a camo jacket from West Point.

And they don't give it to the best player. They give it to the player that stuck up for their teammates. It's a little bit different of an award. It's not like, hey, you were the best player. Here's the hard hat. It's more, you block this shot. at a pivotal point in the game, or you finished your check here, and it was very important, and we noticed, so here's the jacket kind of thing.

Right. I mean, if they were giving it to their best player in the game, I imagine they'd all get sick with just seeing Taylor Hall wearing it, so. He's been, hasn't he, I mean, look, he's, we were talking about highlight real goals. I mean, whenever he has the puck, it's almost one incredible move that he does a game, at least. Like, he's just terrific with the puck, and he's a joy to watch. and he really often makes defensemen look foolish,

which is a lot of fun to watch. Yeah, he's remarkable. I mean, that goal he scored the other night against the Kings where he basically simultaneously embarrassed, Drew Dowdy, Jake Muzzin, and Jonathan Quake, and one quick little move, it was like, yeah, that's very few people on Planet Earth could do that. And just the speed that he enters the zone with

and sort of how he plays and how he maneuvers through the neutral zone. And I just, I love it. I mean, he's like the prototypical sort of normal. South player that just constantly pushes the possession and is remarkably fun to watch. And I, yeah, it's bizarre to me whenever people watch him and blame him for not doing enough for being the reason why the team is struggling. Like, I feel like if your team had more Taylor Halls, you'd probably be doing better. I agree.

And also the fact that he's playing so well, I mean, for the majority of this season, he's been on a line with Nico Hesier and Jesper Brett, who are both rookies who haven't played in this league. so for him to be able to improve their situation being one of those players, you know, the John Tavares type, where the players that he's playing with are elevated because he is on their line. You can certainly see that there. Right. And I wanted to give his year a bit of love too because obviously, I mean, if you look at just his superficial counting stats, they're not necessarily all that impressive, you know, especially he's not scoring a ton of goals, but you look a bit deeper and you just watch him

play. And it makes sense. I mean, he's one of the league leaders, if not still, the league leader and penalties drawn and penalty differential and kind of make sense with the way he plays and how difficult he is to defend that, you know, defensemen are constantly trying to having to take him down and hook him just to slow him down a little bit. And, you know, he's generating a ton of chances. I believe that while his shooting percentage is a bit lower now, which is ironic, considering he's one of the few guys in this team who's underperforming in that regard, he hasn't really shown us any reason to this point to believe that he's going to be one of those guys for the rest of his career. So hopefully if that regresses a bit and he gets a bit better luck,

the goals and the points will start coming and then maybe people will start talking about a bit more, right? Because it feels like it's weird to say for a guy who just went first overall in the entry draft, but he's definitely getting overshadowed by the seasons. Guys like Brock Besser and Matthew Barzal are having and obviously those guys have the benefit of being older from different draft classes, but it feels like his year is flying under the radar a little bit and that's not a fault of his own because he's been really good, just maybe in more subtle ways. Yeah, in fact, a funny story to come out of, we did an MSG hockey show from Prudential Center, and one of our guests was going to be Ken Danico, Mr. Devil, he's obviously one of our color guys

for on television. And before he came on the air, he got a text message from a number he didn't recognize. And it said, the text message said, hey, Dano, please tell that number 13. I love watching him play. it's an absolute joy. The devil's played the Oilers that night. And Dano responds. He's showing me this text message. And he's like, I don't know who this is. I should find out.

He said, I will do that, but can you tell me who this is? And the response came 99. Wow. That's pretty high praise. Yeah. Not only, yeah, not only. And my first question was, why don't you have Gretzky's number in your phone? I mean, I have so many questions.

And one of them is, I can't believe that Kandanico texts. That's amazing. I would have, I mean, does he, does he have like, does he have a smartphone? Is he, like, I, I, I, I figure he'd have one of those, like, old school brick phones that we used to have. And he's, he's on Twitter. He's on Twitter. But, you know, as part of the reboot, uh, we also made sure Mr. Devil, uh, send text messages. That's, that's, that's part of the season reboot. Oh, my God. I love Ken. Honestly, um, you need, you, you need to tell him that. I know, I know, you interact with him quite a bit and you, uh, and you've had, you had him on your podcast in the past, but he, uh, he's one of my favorite guys, especially sort of the chemistry.

have on that broadcast. It's always kind of comical to look at. He's always towering over his play-by-play partner. And as a person myself who sort of, you know, when I'm not thinking about it, reflexively, I kind of look like I might be angry or I might be kind of, you know, grimacing or whatever. I enjoy watching Ken because he always just looks like he's very angry. But then all of a sudden, you can just sort of tell that either the producer is telling it to him in his ear or he remembers that he's on TV. So he like gives this quick smile. And I just think it's like the most endearing thing in the world. So I'm a huge, I'm a huge Ken fan. Yeah, me too. He's, it's funny to see them interact because on TV, Steve Cangelosi is the play by play guy. He also does the, the Red Bulls

in the MLS for MSG. And he, he's very like prepared. He is your, you know, your prototypical play by play announcer, has everything in line, has, has pages and pages of notes, you know, all the things that they teach you to do in, in media school. Steve has it down to tea and he's like one of the most well-prepared broadcasters you could meet. And meanwhile, Dano just knows the team inside and out because he played with the team for what, 20 plus years and one of those Stanley Cups and just knows the team, right? So it's funny to see that dynamic because in fact, the last interview we did with Dano, he was talking about that. He's like, yeah, you know, Steve's always prepared and, you know, it's always a joy to work with him on the air. And then we ask

him, so do you, how much do you hang out with him off the air? And Dano's like, never. Yeah, I imagine if they're not talking devils, they don't have much to talk about. He's like, no, I just relate to, you know, we hang out when we have like, you know, hang out with the staff, getting a drink after the game or whatever it is. But it was just funny the way he responded so quickly, he's like, never. Well, I'm going to work my, you know what? People ask, Demetri, what are your, what are your ambitions? What are your goals?

What do you want to achieve in this industry? And my new answer is becoming texting buddies with Kandankaniko. Yes, and we will make that happen when you make your next trip to New York City, and I pitch you to be on one of the devil's broadcasts, and you take my job as the analytics guy, because you really should. I was actually very happy. Actually, I saw that on social media, a picture of you and Uncle Jeffie there on Hockey Central. I was like, yes, it's about freaking time. Like, come on, get this gone TV more, please. Yes, I mean, it's been a blast. We've done the past couple Fridays, and hopefully that's going to be a recurring thing. So I'm looking forward to that.

And obviously, you know, we'll talk more about TV here in a second, but it's a completely different animal. And having someone like Jeff Merrick guide you through it is a pretty good start. Let's take a quick little break here to hear from a sponsor, and we're going to talk more about the media game and TV and broadcasting and all that good stuff on the other side. Anyone can develop high blood pressure. Fact.

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they'll also grade every ticket available based on value to help you immediately identify the best seats to fit your budget. And you can rest easy knowing that you'll be getting exactly what you're paying for, fully guaranteed. While you're there, make sure to tell them your friends over the PDO cast sent you by using the promo code PDO. And by doing so, you'll get $20 off your first Seek purchase, which would come in handy with all the money you'll be shilling out during the holiday season. Now, let's get back to the show. All right, Arda, this is the part of the show, and I know people enjoy this quite a bit because, obviously, I feel like I have a very vast demographic, but I also have a pretty significant portion of my listeners and followers who are, you know,

similarly like-minded younger individuals who are hoping to one day crack and burst through into this industry and do similar stuff to what we're doing. So I think they always appreciate kind of hearing because everyone has a different career path and how they got to this point and stuff they had to do and hoops they had to jump through and all that. And I think you're the perfect person

that has a discussion with because before you were on the MSG hockey show, I mean, you've done a million different things and you took a very unique path to getting there. So I think it would be a fun conversation for us to have. Yeah, so I mean, in a nutshell, basically I did what the likes of Jeff Merrick and Jackie Redmond did to become successful in hockey,

and that is start off and become successful in professional wrestling. And that's the key. If you want to be big in hockey, be big in Peru wrestling first. It's that simple. That's it. That's the secret folks. You don't got to go to school. Don't have to do anything else.

Just become a big WWE analyst, and then you'll just make. your way to hockey. You used to do stuff for like the weather network too, stuff, weren't you? Yeah, you've been everywhere. Well,

this is the thing. So this is the thing is that like, uh, so I, yeah, I mean, I, even before that,

I was doing a lot of hockey too. It's just, unfortunately, Twitter didn't exist at that time. So I couldn't build up my hockey, uh, Twitter base when I was, uh,

doing stuff with the OHL and the AHL. But yeah, I did that for several years. I mean, really how I got into the industry, honestly, I don't have a degree in broadcasting. Uh,

I am one of those people, that I will openly say that you don't need a degree in broadcasting or media or journalism maybe so if you want to be a hardline journalist. But to be in television, I don't think you need a degree that pertains to television. It can certainly give you an edge, but it is not an essential requirement to the job. How I got into the industry, Dimitri, honestly, I just volunteered and I paid dues and I interned, I worked for free. It's not the most desirable route, but it's worked for me and I went the Rogers TV route. So after going to university, I went to the University of Waterloo. I grew up in Toronto. I caught the bug at university by working at the local

campus radio station. And honestly there, I just, you know, organized tapes and whatever and did some sports updates and whatnot. And then when I graduated, I had a normal job. I was a project manager for a few years. But then nights and weekends, I went to the local Rogers TV station in Peel region in Mississauga. And I basically went there and I said, hey, I want to learn everything there is to learn about television, what can I provide in exchange for that? I mean, I knew they weren't going to pay me, but I needed to give them a value. And they said, do you have a driver's license? I said, okay, well, why don't you drive the community cruiser van to events? And I said, okay, no problem. I'll wake up at Sunday at, you know, 5 a.m., grab the van and go to the local

5K charity run and set up the spinning wheel that kids can spin, and then it lands on the pen, and I give them a Rogers TV pen. And I did that for two or three years. And I was fine with it because then I got to go and shadow all the producers, the directors, audio, video, floor directors, the hosts, the station manager even. I mean, I was able to get an education in the real world. And I found that to be in value. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, listen, it's, you never really know what opportunity is going to be the one that that helps you kind of get your foot in the door. I mean, I've actually told you this story when we reconnected, or I guess connected for the first time, was it maybe a year ago now,

and you hadn't really remembered it, which is totally fine. But I'm going to say it again here for our listeners, just because if they haven't heard it, but back in the day, and this was, I'd say, maybe like 2010 or so, so it's been quite a while. I was sort of trying to figure out, I was still a university student. I was trying to figure out, you know, how I'd get into this industry, how I knew that I kind of wanted to talk about sports and random stuff.

And at the time, podcasts weren't that huge, but I always thought they were kind of a cool thing to do because obviously didn't have access to like a radio station or a radio show or anything. So I had to kind of just do my own thing. And my best friend and I would get together and we'd record these podcasts where we talked about all sorts of stuff, whether it was, you know, NHL stuff.

I mean, the Canucks were really good at the time and being locals here in Vancouver, that kind of helped. And, you know, we'd talk about CFL and we talk about wrestling. and I remember, you know, you were pretty active on Twitter at the time with all the wrestling stuff. And we were, I think, like, a WrestleMania or something was coming up. And we were like, hey, let's see if we can get a guest on this show. Maybe Arda will do it. And we reached out to you.

And I think we had maybe like 10 followers on Twitter at the time. And you had, I'd say, like, 50,000 or something like that. And he was sure enough responded. And you came on our show. And it was super cool. And, you know, I imagine literally no one listened other than like our moms. But it was still, you know, a good sort of, we got some. reps under our belt and it was I just I love the adrenaline rush of recording a podcast with you and I

thought man this would be such a cool thing to keep doing full time and I just kind of I kept doing it until it eventually paid off and I broke through so I don't know that's that's that's sort of my story about how I got into the industry I love that I did and I feel like such a loser for not remembering man I mean so like how many interviews would I possibly have done that I wouldn't have remember doing. And the best part of the story is, and you reminded me of this too, was about at the like hour and 45 minute mark, I finally stop and say, so what is this for again? We were talking for like the longest time. I was honestly like it was approaching two hours or something, which was a ridiculous. And we're doing it. And then you're like, yeah, so, uh, where is this

going? Like, can you, can you, uh, can you tell me more about it? And I was like, um, yeah, it's, uh, you know, it's a, it's a local independent website. It's, uh, I can't guarantee. see we're going to have a lot of people checking it out, but I'm sure they're going to enjoy it. And you're like, all right, that's cool, whatever, man. And, and yeah, I mean, it was, listen, I definitely kind of am trying to help out in my own way now that I have a bit more of a following myself because, and I get cons, I get people asking if I can come on their show or if I can help them in any way. And, you know, the fact that you took the time while you were already into industry to do something like that was huge for someone trying to just learn the ropes and get in there themselves. And obviously, it's very easy for you to just ignore that message or not help out, but it goes a long way if you do. Yeah, it's all good vibes.

And, hey, you repaid the favor when I launched a podcast on MSG. You came on and we did a whole Analytics 101, which is awesome. Yeah, you had me, you had Candanico on. I mean, you know, all the usuals. Yes. All the luminaries. I'm just creating best friends is what I'm trying to do. Actually, you know what?

Speaking of people that have been on this podcast, I haven't told this story before. So Uncle Jeff actually has helped me in my career too. So I was at a crossroads probably, I want to say, 2009. I was like at Rogers TV. I'd put a lot of years in. By then I had done a few years of when they still were in Brampton, the battalion. the battalion with the OHL. So I saw like Matt Duchenne and Cody Hodgson and Voitek Wolski come through there.

That was like the era in which I was calling games. That was a little bit later, but those were the names that I definitely remember doing games of with the battalion. And then as well as the AHL after that with the Marleys and whatnot. But I had a little bit of a crossroads. So at one point, you know, it's feast or famine, right? So after years of trying to find an opportunity, one finally came my way in Winnipeg at a Kojiko. It was going to be a paid position as a sports reporter. And literally, the next day, I got a call from what was then the SCORE television network on their hardcore sports radio.

They had a serious radio station for a long time. And they said, you can join us as a sort of like a full-time intern, but like leading to a part-time position. but it wasn't guaranteed. It was one of those kind of things. And so I didn't know who to reach out to. I didn't really have many mentors at the time. So I literally cold, uh, added Merrick to Facebook. I was like, I look up to this guy. He has a very similar, uh, path, uh, career path to me. Like he was very successful in the wrestling space. He moved on to the hockey space. I admired what he had done. So I literally just added him to Facebook and he accepted my friend request. And I just, I sent him a message. Like I didn't know how else to reach him. So I sent him a message and I said, hey man, like this is the, this is what I'm dealing with. You've been in the industry a long time. Do you have any advice for me? Like, what should I do? And he, I'm paraphrasing, but he basically said, you know, that's a tough decision.

But, you know, make sure that you don't regret the decision. And also, you know, if you stay in this market, anything can happen, basically something along those lines. And so that's why I made the decision not to take the job in Winnipeg and continue on here. And it did work out for me. So, but like just the fact, like, just going back to like giving back, right? Like, he didn't have to. First of all, who's this random person adding on Facebook? Right?

And second of all, then he goes so far as to respond to a message. Like, yeah. That's why he's a cool uncle because he provides sage advice like that. That's right. Exactly. Exactly. And all the dad jokes that he has on the podcast. There's a lot of them.

So, you know, one final thing I did want to talk about you with is, how do we like how do we improve some of these broadcasts and in terms of you know i feel like you you have quite a bit of fun with it and you know obviously i mean you're working in studio with former NHLers so you sort of you have to kind of craftily speak their language and you can't just start you know throwing numbers and facts at them and and and you know because it's just like over your head and as soon as you start talking to a hockey person about coursey and fenwick you you can like visibly see their eyes glaze over and roll in the back of their head so like how do we how do we have more intelligent conversations while also you know keeping them entertaining of

course but you know there's helping the people who are watching at home learn more about the sport and the product and trying to adapt and and you know telling a better story so basically putting it all together the number one thing that i would say and i make sure to follow this every single time is is the language and i'm going to bring this back to wwe so i worked at w w w e for a couple years as an announcer and one of the first things that I learned was there's actually a list of, I guess, banned words, so to speak, words that you don't say on the air and there are replacements. For example, it's not a feud. It's a rivalry.

It's not a belt. Yes. It's a title. A belt is what holds up your pants, right? Like, things like that. So there are certain things. It's not pro wrestling. It's sports entertainment.

Anybody who's a wrestling fan probably knows a lot of these sort of terms that there are different words to use and the reason that is is because yes though the hardcore 10% audience know these terms and even use them in conversation with the other 10% the other 90% don't talk like that even even if they are fans of the product they don't talk like that and so the product that's being presented to them is to cater to as wide an audience as possible and so I never I do my best not to use the terms, Corsi, Fenwick, PDO, when I'm on a broadcast, because that is for everyone watching. So I will say puck possession. I will use synonyms that are more easily digestible.

I think that's the number, the first thing. Unless you're doing a whole education for these terms, if you, if, if, if the edict from the station is, we want Corsi to be a thing that everybody says. Yeah, but there's no way around it. But to me, that's, that's going to happen. But to me, that's no way that's going to happen. So to me, it's softening the, there's, as a, one of the biggest jobs of a broadcaster is just saying the same thing, 10 or 15 different ways, literally. So, so once you're on television, you have different sentences in your head that essentially get the same point across.

So you should be able to say, well, you know, Sammy Votnan's coursey was 62% in his game against the Anaheim ducks the best since joining the devils. Well, I don't need to use the term course either. I can find a different way to say that. Right. So like things like that, little things like that, I think, is certainly a starting point in terms of better presenting the analytics. And I like the visual component. That's my second point is I, I use the heat maps because I like, I think predominantly people are visual learners and they like to see a presentation. So when you use heat maps, I feel, for example, it's able to tell a story. I can tell them, the New Jersey Devils have given up their most goals this season

between the hash marks and inside the circles on the same parallel. And I can show you that from several games. Here's examples, five on five for several games. Yeah. So like I find that to be beneficial and I think that that resonates the most. I completely agree with that. I mean, it will also help, you know, if you have the luxury, the benefit of stretching it out

and actually having like a full show as opposed to doing these sort of two to three minute quick hits where it's like there's only so much you can jam into that and it always feels like it's a race against time and you have the producer yelling in your ear counting down and all of a sudden before you know it it's over and it's like there's only so much you can say and you've got to kind of try to make the most of it and a lot of it gets left on the cutting room floor so if you know if there was more time to do it maybe you could do more with it as well but that that's the thing it's like it's almost as if when you are on tv demetri right like you have established yourself on

Twitter and in the hockey community as an expert in the analytics field. People look to you, they follow you on Twitter and they read your stuff on Sportsnet and they are consuming your content. But when you are on TV, it's almost like it's an advertisement for all of the work that you do. You know what I mean? Because it's such a short amount of time. So you have no choice but to talk in sound bites because that's how people consume television. So you will only give maybe your one or two biggest nuggets of information and you will find a very interesting way to say them.

You know, what, what, analytics should we look for here in this game and you will have one thing prepared and you will find a nice way to say it and it will take 10 seconds but then somebody will look at you on TV and say, wow, that was really informative and not like something I've heard before.

I'm going to go find this guy on Twitter and I'm going to go read his stuff. But I will say like, you know, I love taking stuff from different sports and seeing how they're doing and trying to bring it into hockey. And if I ever have any say, in this regard or any poll one thing i'm going to definitely try to do is have more hockey shows um on tv or whether it's even you know streaming on the internet or whatever

that are more kind of casual just like a half hour sit down where people are just talking about the sport and random trends and topics and observations i mean like you had you had this at the score when you were doing uh aftermath for example and you see it NBA NFL baseball like they they all have these sort of studio shows which are much more kind of comfortable and relaxed and people just talking about sports and for whatever reason it seems like the NHL as a whole doesn't have too much of that and I feel like that's something that could really bring more fans in and become more relatable as well. Well, I think that's why I'm really proud of the MSG hockey show because I find I find it as a low barrier to entry for anybody. We often come on after Knicks games

actually live and in fact the last show that we did we came on after a Knicks game and the first conversation was hey, if you've never watched a hockey game before, we're going to tell you what we love about hockey the most to entice you to maybe catch a ranger's game or a devil's game coming forward but on that show we debate topics like i mean the what else did we do on that show we did uh shout out to wischinski we did jersey fouls right like mark and randre flurry came back to pittsburgh uh and somebody had a split jersey of matt murray and marrory and marrory and so we're like what what do we think about this is Is this acceptable or is not acceptable?

Then we just had a whole conversation about that. Was there a conversation to be had about it? That's despicable. That's psychotic behavior. I think that's completely unacceptable. Unacceptable. Are you kidding me? That's craftsmanship.

He went to great lengths to put together that jersey. You got to commend a man like that. No, you're on the no train. Watch list or something. That is, that is dangerous behavior. Well, not only. There we go. I guess conversations like that.

Yeah. Exactly. That's the thing. Right. And people can relate. to that because everyone either owns a jersey or can contribute to that conversation. And I think those sort of entry points on a show like ours is what makes it, is what makes people want to watch because if we were to put advanced analytics on a show like that, we would either

have to be very creative with it and make sure that it's easily digestible to the audience, especially in a format like that. But if someone who listens to this podcast, wouldn't you say that we do a decent job at that where it's like you you can kind of tell that a lot of what's going on and the conversations that are being had are coming from a place where you know me and my guests have put in the work and put in the time and looked at all the stuff and evaluated it and we're coming from you know making logical conclusions based off of it but we're not like I don't open up an Excel spreadsheet and just cite off numbers like it's you can have a conversation about this stuff while also keeping and entertaining I feel like and I think that that day is coming

I mean, I feel like you would be able to, and you'd be able to make it funny too. You'd be able to add humor there. I think humor is the great diffuser. If you were, if you literally like just even, even being very self-aware, suddenly you put on a pair of glasses and you open up the laptop and you're looking through the spreadsheet. But then you have like incredible facts that are like really, really like you can really sink your teeth in them. I think that like to me that screams winter. I would need the incredible facts part first to make that happen though. I definitely have the glasses.

In fact, I already do wear them on TV and I have a laptop. I'm using it right now to record this podcast, but I need the incredible facts first. Yes. I think that could be your gimmick. You can have like a catchphrase that you use getting into the, that's it. That's all you need, Dimitri is a catchphrase. Anyone listening to the PDL cast right now, please suggest Dimitri Kow. Or maybe you got to use regressing to the mean on TV and just get a little.

I found my cat's How's it going, man? My sign-in. Come on, that's, that's two basics. That's basic, man. Come on, you can do better than that. We'll workshop that. Ardo, plug some stuff.

Where can people find you? Where can they follow you? Check out your work, all that good stuff. Yeah, I'm looking. I'm on the MSG hockey show. You can find clips online. If you happen to watch your New Jersey Devils broadcast on Game Center

and you happen to see me, feel free to say hello. I'm on Twitter at Ardo Cal TV. And please tell me how I did on the PDO cast because I have to say I listen every week I'm a big fan of the guests that you bring and of course of you Dimitri so I really appreciate it's getting that's good right that was a conversation more so than an interview oh yeah no you're you're a buddy so it's it's it's very very easy I need you to come back to New York City though okay we'll make something happen at some point

and in the meantime yeah send in all recall all uh all kind of tips or whatever for uh for a for a new catchphrase for me and we'll uh we'll work on that as well in the meantime and uh Arda it was a blast and let's chat soon yes thank you The Hockey P.DOCast with Dmitri Filipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovich and on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com slash hockeypediocast.