The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 227: Define The Word 'Fun'

Episode Date: March 26, 2018

Emily Kaplan joins the show to discuss the GM meetings, going down to Winnipeg to write a profile about Patrik Laine, and take stock of where things stand with her individual awards ballot.  1:00 The GM Meetings 5:30 Patrik Laine's personality  11:45 NHL Awards: Jack Adams, Calder, and Selke 27:30 NHL Awards Part 2: Norris, Vezina, and Hart 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. 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 Inn, 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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My name is Dimitri Filipovich. joining me is Emily Kaplan. Emily, what's going on? I'm good. I'm a long-time listener, first-time caller. I'm excited. I've been trying to, on the list of people that I've wanted to have on this year, you have definitely been atop that list. You've been the breakout star in terms of covering the league, and I'm excited to finally have you on the show. I appreciate that. I think I'm probably like still third and Calder rankings, but I'm hoping to, you know, make a push to number two at the postseason. Yeah, well, I think it's open there. I mean, you know, I don't know who would be the Matt Barzal version of hockey writers this year.

I don't know. That could be you, honestly. Yeah, do you know what? I think I'm just giving myself a lot of credit here. I think I'm the only rookie hockey writer this year. So it's unanimous. I win. I'll take it.

Okay, so let's talk a bit about the GM meetings, which happened earlier this week in Boca Ratona. I know you were there. I don't know. From the outside looking in, it seems like it was one of those things where it was basically the GMs decided to go to Florida for a couple days, play some golf, hang out of the beach, and they looked at this thing and they said,

you know what? I think everything's actually pretty good. Let's just carry on with the way things are going. Did there anything actually accomplished over this week beyond just kind of tinkering here and there? That I am not sure of. These events are always fascinating to me, and I give my editors a ton of credit. They kind of send me down there with the expectation that we might not get news, but because I am a rookie hockey writer, it's really great to show face and start to establish these

relationships. I find them hilarious because it feels like you have the same small talk with everyone you are there with. You know, I introduce myself to GMX. He's like, how are you? Great. And then he goes, well, can't complain because we're down here, right? And it's like, yep, I've had this conversation 10 times. I think they all like frattingizing. I'm pretty sure Gary Betman has a house down there. I think that's why they have at these luxury resorts. Obviously, the big topic, though, was cold tender interference. And it was really funny the first day. They were only supposed to talk about it for 90 minutes on the Monday. It ended up monopolizing all their time. It was three-hour discussion. And when the GMs came out, they all kind of had differing views. There was Lou Lamarillo

who was like, yep, change is going to come. I believe it's going to come. And this is a big issue for our league. And then you have Mark Bergevin who's like, eh, it's not a major problem. I'm not concerned about it. So you have varying opinions there. It turns out they did something. I just don't know it's totally addressing the issue. That sounds very NHL-ish. Yes. You know what? I'm somewhere on the, I'd say like I'm a four or five on scale of, okay, let's say one is just complete ambivalence and ten is Dave Lozo's recap on vice, where

he's very, very perturbed by the entire situation. Like, I think as I think fans, that's one way to put it. I think fans should be annoyed a bit just because, you know, looking at what's going on in the league right now and concluding that everything is actually just fine

really seems bizarre considering I think that most people that follow on a regular day-to-day basis would have a similar laundry list of stuff that they'd like tended to, whether it's goaltender interference or offside. So the idea that we're just going to keep things kind of status quo in the way they are seems a bit bizarre to me. Sure. And look, so the big issue is goaltender interference. We've heard coaches, you know, raise their hands about it saying this is crazy this year. Guys like Cam Talbot have been outspoken. The league got really pissed off about

that. They don't like when people within their organization criticize them. I can't believe they would feel that way. And so they came up with all these stats, right? They said there's been 170 instances of video review for goaltender interference. And out of those 170, they said there's only about a half dozen where the league office itself that Department of Hockey operations really disagreed with what the call was. And there was kind of internal debate. So what they decided to do is to send all these decisions to the situation room in Toronto, right? But my whole thing is, okay, if there's 170 and you're really only debating on six,

and that's really what the central voice is going to be, like, that's not really solving the issue. that's only solving a small percentage of the issue. The big problem is that it's a really subjective call. We don't know what that call is. And I don't think this clears anything up for the players, the goaltenders or the coaches. Right. Yeah, I think if you ask people, they'd go, okay, I just want like a clear definition, and I want you to enforce it.

And that seems like a simple, simple ask. But I honestly think the offside thing is more perplexing to me because they basically looked at it and concluded that, you know, we don't actually have that big of issue with it and I watching these games I strongly disagree with that especially with the rule in terms of you know your skate hovering over the ice and how that impacts it like I feel like people really don't know what's going on here with that yeah and this is something that the league wants less review calls on they want coaches to stop calling it well coaches are not going to stop calling it when they can get a goal taken back like that's just foolish to ask them so I think this is something

that was tabled for now but I would not be surprised if they revisit it soon All right. You know what? Enough about that. Starting a show with this kind of chatter is not the way that I want to go about this. Let's talk about more fun stuff. And I know that you were in Winnipeg recently. You're going to be writing about Patrick Lainey. And you mentioned that you were listening to when I had Alex Puerreta on last episode. And he was sort of being a bit coy in terms of what he wanted to talk about for his upcoming articles and not spoiling too much. So I don't want to get you to reveal everything about Patrick Line. But, um, I'm sure you came away with a couple of interesting nuggets you could share. Sure. Well, what really attracted to me is his personality. A little bit of background about V. I covered the NFL for the past four seasons. It's my first year covering hockey.

And something I always found fascinating about Lone, obviously I've been a fan, is during his draft year, he came out and said, I'm the best, right? Like, I deserve to go number one. And in NFL and NBA in the draft process, almost every prospect says it, and it's fine. And in hockey, everyone is like, look at this guy. He's a psychopath. bath. It was a huge deal ever. Like, why would this guy ever say that? What a confidence

he has. And I just, I was so fascinated by it because he really stuck to his conviction. He's a kid who's so comfortable in his own skin. He's really funny. And English is the second language. And you see some of these one-liners that he has. And I just really want to know more about him. So I flew to Win and Pig last week.

I actually DMD because I had this minor nightmare where the night before I was supposed to see him, he gets that he'd take a shot to the leg. He leaves the game. It's a minor incident. So just to preface this, I land in Winnipeg. I go through customs and the first thing, you know, the lady's like, what are you here in Canada for? And I'm like, oh, work. What kind of work do you do? I'm a journalist. What kind of journalism? I write about hockey. She goes, you're here for Linae, right?

And I was like, oh, shit. I guess this is going to be a pretty big deal. You know, Sammy Holfren, who's a Finnish reporter based in Toronto, told me that already in the finished newspapers, there's like Finnish doctors debating the status of this. I saw fans tweeting at the Winnipeg police department asking if they were going to charge Alex Martinez, who had the shot that injured Linae, and they actually responded and said, no, they were not, which I think is also absurd. So, long story short, it finally gets the arena, and Linae has graciously, you know, not canceled because he's not going to be seriously injured.

And I relay all this to him. I'm like, Patrick, like, everyone's super concerned about you. And he just looks at me, he goes, I'll live. You can tell the people I'll live. So I think that's a little bit about him. There's something just so self-assure about him, and he's 19 years old, which is just crazy. Yes. Yeah, I'm happy to see that the NHL and the way it generally goes about his business hasn't really

beaten that personality out of him yet. That was one of my big concerns because I knew in the pre-draft process and kind of getting to know him a bit in around the world junior time. You know, he really seemed very confident and exciting and completely different, just a different cat from most of these other guys. And it seems like it's even escalated, especially with the facial hair of these. days, so that's really good to see. Yeah, we had a long talk about the beard. I also talked to some of his teammates about it. And as you and probably all listeners know, it was just like a bet

with his buddy. But he just stuck to his convictions and is like, I'm going to keep this beard. And the guys get on him every day. He sits in a locker room next day, Andrew Kopp, who is this gem of a personality. I am totally blown away by him. He's totally fun. And every day he comes at him with something new, he's like, hey, Sasquatch, hey Abraham Lincoln. And every day, line, it just, like, gives it back to him. And I kind of love it. I mean, whenever you see a guy like this, you know, he has, he's coming up on 80 goals as a teenager, hasn't even turned 20 yet, as you mentioned, you start kind of comparing him to guys that have come before him and thinking about, okay, what could he possibly look like when everything comes together and he hits his prime?

And I think most guys would typically sort of stay away from that chatter and they'd, you know, come off as whether it was genuine or not, sort of overly humble and go, you know, I'm going to take this one one game at a time, one year at a time, and we'll see how it goes. I'm just happy to be in the league, so on and so forth. With him, especially we saw when the Jets have been visited Washington a couple weeks ago, he was sort of embracing that and then the entire chatter, him versus Ovechkin and the Rocket Richard race. It seems like he actually sort of understands what's going on here and is willing to embrace it. Yeah, there's something about him. I think, I'm not to butcher the quote, but he told me it's like his personal policy not to lie to the media

because he thinks it's stupid and a waste of time. So if there's anything on his mind, he's going to say it. And so, for example, he was on the ice for Ovechkin 600, rather. And he was like, everyone's asking him, like, what was it like? And he's like, yeah, it's great. I can watch the tape and I'll see that I got a minus on the play. But the same kind of, you know, brazen attitude also says, yeah, I really do want to win the scoring title. That's something important to me.

And, you know, the first story I wrote for ESP in the magazine. It was one of the first stories I wrote when I got the job. It was about Austin Matthews. And the crux of it is, why is this kid not a bigger star in America? He's the perfect backstory, right? He's a Mexican mother. A group in Arizona goes all the way to Toronto to be the savior and not only lives up to expectations but exceeds them. But something about Austin that I learned is all the environments around him,

whether it's his agents who are perfectly curating his career and saying no to a lot of the endorsement deals like Gatorade and Nike that, you know, some of the other athletes and other sports would take to the Leafs where they have Lou Lamarillo, who pretty much puts a muzzle on all marketing and won't even put it. put the kid on, you know, arena programs because that's not his policy. He's just kind of following that hockey mold and flying under the radar. Whereas Linae, I think, has been let flourish a little bit by his agents to understand that he's a cool personality and is comfortable in his own skin and just kind of letting it ride to the Jets.

And, you know, being around that Jets room, I see why they're having success in the sense that there's such camaraderie there. And I think a lot of that plays into their personalities. And I love the fact that they're just letting him be Patrick. Yeah. It's kind of a bummer that he went down when he did. I mean, obviously, you never want to see the league's top players not be out there doing their thing. But what, he had 18 goals and 26 points during that 15-game points streak before he got hurt.

And, you know, just watching him play with Paul Stasney and Nick Eeler since the trade deadline has been so fun to watch. It was one of those things where, you know, in hockey, sometimes you never know how this stuff, you know, that makes sense on paper, but you never know how it was going to transit onto the ice. And it really just magically all came together for those three. So hopefully he'll be back out there and ready to go for the. postseason. For sure. And I think the Jets are looking at a situation where I believe there's eight points above them and the central eight points below them. They're comfortably in that two C. There's no need to rush him back. So although he's so close to the scoring title,

I don't think he's going to get it this year, but he'll be back for the playoffs, which is the most important thing. Okay. So, you know, you mentioned you're a rookie writer this year. Do you have a vote for the individual awards at the end of the year? I do. They gave it to me, even though I probably don't deserve it. Oh, that's exciting. All right. So, Let's, you know, let's get into this. I understand that there's a couple weeks left and conceivably, especially for the heart, it feels like, depending on who makes the playoffs and who not,

the narrative might change. But I kind of want to go through all these individual awards with you and hash out some of the discussions and who the front runners are. Let's do it. All right. Let's start with the Jack Adams. Let's work our way up. We're going to get to the heart eventually.

This is a tease. We want everyone to stick around until the very end. Get them the unsexy part first. Exactly. Well, I don't know, some of these coaches. Coaches might do. disagree. John Cooper's very slow. He is.

But he's not on my... He's not on my list of... Not on mine either. Guys. No. Okay, so do you want to do top three or do you want to do like top five here? Because when we get to the Vesna, for example, or especially the heart, I'm going to feel bad just cutting it down to three.

So maybe we could just do... But I don't know for the top five, I mean, I don't even know if there's five coaches worthy of this award this year. So here's my thing. I think in some categories, we got to talk three. In Hart, I think we got to go 10. Norris, like, 12. All right. I'm joking.

I think that's fair. Only have hearted. All right. Let's do the Jack Adams. Let's do the top three then. So it seems like Gerard Glantz basically had this on lock for the past like three months, right? Yeah. I think that in a ridiculous circumstances that he had to walk into, being an expanded franchise, also what's going on in that city.

The fact that he's managed them rolls out four even lines, get all these guys to play career years. has Mark Andre Fleurie on the bench for a significant amount of time. This guy won it. And you know what? We can make all the cab jokes we want, but he's a really good coach. And when you talk to people around that organization, people who have played for him, the one thing about him is he's such a player's coach to the sense that he's just so simple.

He doesn't overthink anything. His practices are really not structured. He doesn't really worry about other team systems. He lets Skies plays. And, you know, it's his time. Yeah. And the thing that I like is, unlike most years, you know, Vegas has been a bit fortunate. in terms of puck bouncing and stuff,

but it's not like we're just picking the team with the highest PDO and just taking their coach here, which it seems like we usually do. Well, it's the PDO cast. You have to do that. It's true. It's true. You know, like I think Glan's going to win it,

and it's deserved. I'd say both Bruce Cassidy and Jared Bednar. I don't know which one I'd have second and which one I have third. I guess Cassidy second just based on how good the Bruins have been, but I think both guys have also done a really good job. For sure, for Cassidy. I mean, you take a situation where they fire a quad Julian and everyone kind of unsure. And this year, he's managing probably the most difficult balancing act in sports, which is contending while somehow rebuilding.

The way he eased Charlie McAvoy in, the way he sustained so many injuries to this team throughout the year. It's pretty incredible. And then as for Bednar, we talk about, you know, outside circumstances, having to deal with the Matthew Shane drama for so long, losing your best player and somehow coming out better. it's baffling to me. Do you have anyone else on this list other than those three guys that I mentioned? I think that's it. I think Paul Maurice definitely intrigues me just because before the year we were kind of talking about him is, okay, if there's going to be one coach that's going to be fired in season,

it's going to be him. Not alone, let's just take a pause and talk about the fact that this is the first year since original six expansion, we have not had an in-season firing, how crazy that is. And it's pretty crazy considering there's been some guys who have been pushing the limb in. I'm looking at you, Doug, wait. I'm looking at you. there's definitely Doug weight. Another one that I found really interesting is Todd McClellan,

obviously, you know, with them underperforming. And when I talked to some people around the league, one of the theories for why he's kept his job is that, okay, the Oilers have been really bad, but their AHL team has been just as bad. So that points to, A, systematic issues, but B, if you fire McClellan, you don't have an automatic candidate to promote as, you know, the guy.

And I think in the age now where you see something like the Rangers, another example where Elaine Vigno didn't get fired, okay, we're going to tear it all down. Why would we want to come hire someone to, you know, energize the group? Like, let's just full tank. And I think to the Oilers, they got past the point of no return. Yeah. Yeah.

And if there's an organization that likes promoting from within, it's definitely the Oilers. Yes. Okay. Do you got anyone? You got anyone else? I mean, listen, I gave you all the goods. I gave you my top three. So I don't know who else there.

I think Paul Maurice is a good one. But it's interesting. You know, you mentioned the sort of dichotomy there between Maurice and Todd McClellan and someone who possibly could have been fired. And it's, as we know, like, a good goalie typically makes a coach look much better than he is. And it's no surprise that we're talking about Maurice so much differently when Connor Halliboyk has the type of season he's having. Whereas last year, everyone was talking up Todd McClellan and the job he's done. And this year, it's, oh, should he get fired? And it's, well, Cam Talbot's performance is probably a big reason why.

Yeah, he's not standing on his head anymore. Yeah. Yeah, it's funny how that works. The Calder. I love the Calder. So it's between yourself and Matt Barzow. Yeah. So look, I've talked to Matt. He's a great guy, but I deserve to go number one. Yeah.

I've decided I've gotten a lot of more confidence since this podcast has started. Yeah, it's really escalated in the past 20 minutes. I still got to give it to Matt. You're doing a great job so far. And I think that in the next 20 minutes, I might have to revisit this. But I know the reason he buys is a thing. But no, with Matt Barzell, I mean, it was interesting there with Brock Bessner. And when he was seen like he was scoring a goal.

every other day, maybe we could talk into it, but now with Besser being out and Barsal having over a point a game for the season, it seems like it's one of the biggest locks in a long time. Yeah, I think this is definitely a lot. But what I'm more curious about is kind of the guys who fall from the two to four range. As you mentioned, it was a race between Barsall and Besser pretty much all year. I would maybe put in a vote for Charlie McAvoy just because of the minutes he was shouldering. And, you know, the role that he had on that team, this is a award that is. historically doesn't go to defensemen that much.

We always just get kind of blown away by offensive stats. But Charlie McIvoys having as good a rookie campaign as you see, Foma Defenseman, I think his injury is kind of, you know, pushed him a little bit out of the race. But then you've got guys like Kyle Connor, who's coming really hot for the Jets. Another guy we don't talk about at all is Yanni Borde. He's actually second in rookie points right now with 58.

He's the centerman for the Tampa Bay Lightning. And I think he's being played by so many of the issues that Nikita Kutjurav is for the Hart Trophy. and Vasilevsky is for the Vazina, where when your team is so good, we just have a hard time giving one guy an individual award. Yeah, and it's interesting you didn't, a guy I would have mentioned there is Nico Hissier,

and obviously, having been the first overall pick, it's not necessarily a surprise, but, you know, he doesn't have the huge counting stats, and it's kind of eliminate you from this discussion automatically, if you don't, but I'm just watching him play, I think he's going to be an absolute monster, especially at 5-1-5, and his ability to just cause havocant drawing so many penalties and just seemingly constantly being around the puck at all times.

And it feels like next year he could all of a sudden take this massive uptick and people are going to be like, whoa, I didn't expect that after his rookie year. But it's been kind of bubbling here. Totally. And a guy who's probably maybe falls without the top five, but I just kind of want to get some credit to because I'm so impressed by him is Alex DeBrinke. I live in Chicago. So the Blackhawks are the team I see most often, usually especially in the second half the season,

it's to see the other teams coming in. But it's pretty incredible. only three players have recorded three hat tricks this season. Connor McDavid, Alex Ovechkin, and to Brinket. It took Kane 623 regular season games before he recorded his first hat trick. Jonathan Taze's 124. DeBringengett has three hat tricks in his first 73 games. And I think that, honestly, his emergence is my case for keeping Joel Quinville

because the way he carefully curated his rookie season, limiting his ice time to right situations. He only plays about 14 minutes a night. He spent some time building confidence on the third line, and also got to showcase his skills with K's on the top line. It's really been fun to watch. So I think he's a player, like I said, that's not going to get, you know, top three Calderaeran Trophy votes. And maybe he's been overshadowed by the demise of the Chicago Blackhawks.

But it's a really fun player to watch. So when did you start covering hockey this season? Have you done an NHL draft yet? Yeah. So the NHL draft is actually the first event because it was in Chicago. They had me go and just kind of meet people. I wasn't actually technically on the job yet. So that's kind of my initiation.

So I don't know if you picked it up or not, but in hockey, especially at drawn draft time, guys who are undersized typically get overlooked quite a bit. And to bring out is a perfect obvious example that I remember there was a lot of consternation during his draft year where he was putting up these crazy numbers in Major Junior. And everyone was like, why are people not higher on him? And it's like, oh, well, have you seen how tall he is? And it's like, uh, do you need height in hockey? Is he grabbing rebounds?

I don't know. What's going on here? Yeah. No, and that's the other thing that I think is interesting because I think over the last two to three years, even we've seen a shift where players are shiftier and smaller and quicker. So I wonder even if Debrink had entered this year's draft if you'd go much higher. You know, to your point on, I was looking up the rookie scoring because you mentioned Yanni Gordon. I didn't even realize that he was second in rookie scoring, which is a fun fact. Isn't that wild?

Yeah. The Bruins have two guys in the top 10 and Charlie McAvoy isn't even one of them. So that's, you know, goes to your point. And Jake DeBrasco goes to your point about the job Bruce Cassidy's done and kind of bringing all those guys along and how, you know, they obviously have the Marchands and the Berserons and the Chara still there. But then they're supplementing it with all these guys that have come up through the college ranks and through the draft.

And it's all coming together for them. Yeah. And Debrus really struggled early. And another thing for them is they couldn't figure out like line made for Crajee earlier in the year. And now they have it all figured out. So just the growing pains they had to endure early in the year to get to where they are now. It's impressive to me. Okay, the Selke.

Ooh, this is a fun one. Define fun. I think it's fun because there's legitimate cases for more than one flyer. Yes, yeah. That's fun. Okay, yeah, that's, yeah, wow. You're very easily impressed. Yeah.

Okay, so who do you have on your list then? Yeah. So obviously, Bergeron was my favorite. I think he was a runaway winner for this award, but the fact that he's missed so much time, he's out for me. I think it comes, or do you agree? Yeah, I think so. I mean, especially at this point, what is he going to, is he even going to get to 60 games for the season?

I don't know. Yeah, he's played 55, so. Okay. I think, I think that's really pushing it. I'm all for, like, if a guy's played like 70-ish games, okay, fine. If his impact has been that good and there's no other obvious candidate, I'm fine with it. But once you start talking about missing this much time, I think, and with other guys being viable for this award, I agree.

It needs to be bumped down a little bit. For sure. So I got two guys that I think are my one and two. Okay. And I'm not going to rank them yet, but it's Anzai Kopitar, who's having a stellar year. And Sean Kuturier, did I pronounce that right? Because I've been working on it. Yes.

Yep, you got it. Good. Thank goodness for the Philadelphia Flyers. And Copatar is such an interesting case. And I've thought a lot about him, especially as it pertains to the Hart Trophy, just because he's so head and shoulders above what everyone else is doing on the Kings. He leads them with points with 86. No one else on the Kings has more than 55.

But those are all cases for a spark trophy campaign. What he's doing really well defensively, it's pretty impressive. And then we go to Couturier, who's a guy who's always been good defensively, but this is his best offensive season ever, and that's why we are talking about him for this award. Yeah. And he stayed healthy, I should say.

Yes, which is a big check for him. It's, yeah, the Kopitar thing. is fascinating. I mean, obviously, we're recording this on a Friday morning, and he just had a four-goal game last night in Colorado. And, you know, he's going to set career highs and everything he mentioned. And he was one of those guys last year where, much like the rest of the Kings, he seemed very unfortunate in terms of the puck balances he was getting. And I believe he led the league in a number of posts he hit and stuff. So it's all coming together for him this year. This award, the reason why I was sort of skeptical in terms of how fun it really is is because we don't really have, uh, a uniform definition on what it actually entails. Like, it's supposed to be the best defensive forward, but it seems like it's usually sort of given to the center who is considered to be the best defensive forward, but also has an awesome offensive season,

which just seems like really backwards thinking to me. Yeah, I guess that is a little twisted, and maybe that's not as fun as I thought. And you're right, like, what are the criteria? Like, we look at coursey, we look at defensive zone starts, and then we look at points. Yeah, it's like, oh, Sean Katrie, who, by the way, is very deserving of this.

award and just discussion and has been for a few years, but it's funny that, you know, this year it's like, oh, he scored 30 goals. That means he definitely is one of the best defensive forward. It's like, well, it was probably true last year. Right, but has his defensive game approved significantly? I mean, I guess you could argue that the puck is winding up more frequently in the other teams net, which means it's not in his own. Right. Maybe, and maybe just because of the fact that they once again have serious goaltending issues that he's much more needed in the defensive end. I don't know. Yeah, it seems like a bit of a stretch.

Okay, let's take a quick break here from a sponsor, and we're going to pick it back up with the Norris Vezna and Hart on the other end of things. Let's chat about Sikh, sponsoring today's episode of the HockeyPedio cast. I think anyone that's listened to the show has probably already heard plenty about Seek, and honestly, if you listen to any podcast, you probably have. But there's a reason for that. It's because their product is so good. and so reliable that you should be using it yourself.

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of guys that are legitimately deserving which is going to lead to a lot of a lot of internet debates were you around for the for the Carlson versus Dowdy debate from a few years ago did you that happen to catch it come on your radar yeah I got to be a passive observer for that oh yeah it was it was something else there were we lost a lot of good soldiers yeah no I'm glad I have no hot to dig up from that.

Okay, let's start rattleing off our names since you're the guest here and then I'm going to jump in with guys, I agree or disagree or add to the list. Okay, ready? Brent Burns. Okay, fair. Okay. I'd say not in the top five. I would probably agree.

Here's my leader, Drew Dowdy. Hmm. Yeah, yeah. No, he's been good. I think he's your leader, really. Yes, and I'll tell you why. He's a possession driver for the Kings. He plays nearly 31 shifts tonight.

His ice time only trials Ryan Souter. It's almost 27 minutes a night. And he's not shy offensively. He's got some pretty good numbers there. Right. And yes. I do like, I mean, he's looked a lot better this year under John Stevens. It seems like a lot of those guys have been kind of freed up to be more

creative and jump into the play and not necessarily be as restricted as they were by a by Sutter system so I do enjoy that um yeah I I can't talk myself into him being the leader but I I'm right there with you with him in terms of him and Burns as being like kind of on the periphery of that sure right so here's an interesting one for you P.K. Suban and or Romanozi yes yeah I've yes I think Suban um is if I have had a list an uh a ballot and I don't unfortunately. I would put him in that top three to five. I think he's been so good this season and, you know, because of his rep, especially from a few years ago, he doesn't get talked about this way, but like there's an argument to be made that he's sort of the preeminent

quote unquote shut down defensemen in today's league in terms of the guy. You just stick to the other team's best for it and he's going to just give him hell for the full 60 minutes. Totally. And there's something about it and it bugs me so much. It's just like we talk. We talk talk about him differently than we talk about other players. But if you just watch this game, it's pretty incredible. Okay, so we, I do have, I have Suban, I have Burns, and I have Dowdy on my list so far. Okay. Keep going.

Well, then here's my, okay. So initially, this was the person that I said about a week ago is my favorite, and that's Victor Headman. And I'd love to hear what you think of him. Yeah. I mean, with him, just like we're going to get to with Kuturov and, and, uh, less so of Asolevsky now that he struggled a bit, but it's kind of tough to say. separate him from the other guys he gets to play with, especially like, you know, you look at the

offensive production and you kind of have to throw in the caveat, oh, well, you know, it's a great team and he's in a perfect position, especially on that power play. But it's tough to argue with the results. And it seems like from a narrative perspective, just like with Dowdy a couple years ago, like he seems like the guy who hasn't won it yet, who is so good that he deserves one of these on his resume. So this just might be his quote unquote season. That's kind of how I felt about him when I was like, okay, there's 12 guys here. Well, Headman deserves it. He's deserved it for some time. Let's just, you know, if no one else is a favorite, let's give it to Vicky.

And then here the next two guys, I'll bring up because it kind of leads to my internal debate about this award. And it's, I feel like we always just give it to the defensemen with the highest point totals. And I think there should be a separate award for defensive defensemen, big at John Klingberg and John Carlson. And what is your take there? Yeah, especially with Klingberg, I feel like, and you know, Carlson's had a great year, too. The thing with Carlson that I'm a bit jaded by is like, I know that he's going to get so overpaid this summer on the free agent market. So I'm kind of like trying to distance myself from him a bit and I don't want to talk him up too much because I don't want to be attached to that.

You don't want to give him more money. You know what? I'm in favor of all these guys getting paid and especially in John Carlson's case, he was on such a team friendly deal for the past however many years that he should go and get every single penny he possibly can. But with Klingberg, he definitely, especially after everything that went wrong in Dallas last year and him playing bizarrely poorly, I'm happy to see that he's rebounded under Hitchcock. And it seemed like that might not be a fit that would necessarily make sense that he might be a bit too, Hitchcock might be a bit too risk averse for how Klingerick sometimes likes to play. But it's been a perfect match and he's been really awesome. Yeah, just back to Hitchcock for a second. I think he probably is losing the Jack Adams just because the team isn't dead well.

but I think there's so many guys on that team like Tyler Sagan is obviously the one that comes in mind where the guys don't on surface don't seem to fit in his system but he's made them work and they've had great years. Right. And that's a good point you raised because with a lot of these coaches it feels like, you know, not to discredit the job they're doing because I'm sure they're putting in countless hours and trying their very best. But it's like it seems like it's a bit kind of interchangeable where you can't really see

the coach's fingerprints on the team or the system they play with Hitchcock just based on how different this team looks. this season compared the years past, like, it's so obvious that he's come in immediately and completely remade it. And so you do need to give him some love for that because you can very clearly point to the impact he's had on him. Sure. All right, I'm going to round out my group of defensemen. I've got no one else who really stands out. Those are some of my favorites already said. I think Seth Jones, I know he's been out for a couple games, but he's really emerged as a guy that should impress. Alex Petrangelo, I think, is a guy that's criminally underrated

always. In fact, earlier in the year, I did a story where I asked, I don't know, I was like two or three dozen players, who's the most underrated guy in the league. And Petrangelo came up more than once. And I remember, I'm trying to think who it was. I think it might have been Jason Speza, who was like, you know, you always look at his offensive numbers, but he's just a good defenseman. And after that, I started watching him a little more, and I was way more impressed by him. Yeah, Petrangelo has always been one of those guys. I mean, just always being on Team Canada and everything, and where, like, it seems like people in hockey have always been higher on him than if you just looked at his numbers, for example, you'd be like, well,

there seems to be a bit of a mismatch here. But no, I mean, he's, he's incredibly smooth and he does so much for that Blues team. And especially early in the year, it seemed like it could be his year, how we were talking about headman just recently, but obviously with the blues kind of sputtering here a little bit and potentially missing the playoffs, it hurts his campaign. I'm glad you brought up Seth Jones because I've recently been talking myself into him potentially being the favorite for this award. Huh. Okay. Convinced me. Well, here's a thing. And it's a bit tough to differentiate him from Zach Werenski. It feels like if you could give it to the best pairing, then I'd feel very strongly about those two.

But with him, it's like how much of it is him and how much it is Werenski? I'm sure they're making each other look better. But he's just been so good. And Columbus has been just taking off lately. And he does every. thing. And if you look at the underlying numbers, the blue jackets are so much better with him on the ice than without. And the offensive production is there. I believe he's up to like 15 goals on the season. It just, it seems like everything's coming together. And maybe it's one of those things where it's nice to have sort of a new name in this discussion. It feels like for the past few years, it's been the same guys over and over again. So maybe it's a bit of overcompensation in trying to, you know,

pump up the tires for a new guy to get some fresh blood in there. But it feels like he should be getting more love than he's been getting. And maybe that's just playing in Columbus. I totally agree. And as a fan of USA hockey, it weeps to hear me say that Seth Jones and Zach Wrenski are the best defensive pair because they would have been really good at the Olympics, don't you think? Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's a few other guys there as well who have come up through that pipeline

that might have looked good. Maybe John Carlson would have been okay with the number three defense fan. It's been a movie bottom say. Yeah, yeah. Don't let's, you know what? We've already done the GM meetings. I think, you know, we don't need to talk with the Olympics as well. It's a not depression.

That's the Olympics for the 800th time this year. Yes, exactly. Okay, so yeah, I don't really have a consensus there, and I'm kind of curious to see how the final couple weeks play out. I think there's a bunch of obvious candidates, and I'm kind of cool with a lot of those guys. I don't think there's one guy on that list where, like in years past, where if they wanted or sort of the media started pushing for them

in their candidacy where I'd really be outraged by it. So, yeah, I'm pretty open to it. I mean, it seems like a very open field this season. Yeah, just me predicting media being media. here's my like bold take on march 23rd i would be shocked if it wasn't dowdy or headman i feel like those are the two guys the media will vote for yeah i i think i think headman uh seems like the obvious choice based on the team success and the fact that he hasn't won one yet and you know what i'm fine with it yeah okay the vesna um so i think i have five guys here um who i think have to be the top five

and I don't even know who the sixth would be. So no pressure, but if you disagree, if you disagree, we're going to, I'm going to hang up and we're not even going to post this podcast. You're wrong. Yeah. Okay, cool. So this is all from moot. Let's hear it. Two or five.

Okay. So I think Peca René is going to win at this season. And I think it's deserved. You know, he got lit up a little bit last night by Toronto, but it's like the first bad game he's had in two months. So I'm going to give him a bit of a free. pass there. And, you know, I know people are going to point to the wins and the goals against average. And that's not even the stuff I'm looking at it. It just, the underlying resume there is there for me where, especially in the past couple of years, it seemed like his pedigree was higher than

his actual on ice performance. And I thought especially last year, he was a bit of a liability for the predators. And this year, it's been the exact opposite where he's been their best player. So I'm all for, I'm all for recognizing that and giving him the, uh, the honor of the best. goalie this season. I have no argument there. We can keep the podcast going. Okay. So now, here's where it gets interesting because I think he's sort of the obvious number one. I think the two to five is fascinating and it's kind of a jumble there and it could go either way in personal preference. And these are the guys I got. I got John Gibson, got Sergey Bobrovsky, I got Connor Helleboik, and I have Andre Baselowski. Yeah, I would agree. And I think we have to

put the disclaimer in there that maybe two of the best movies this year have been Roberta Luongo and Marc Andre Fleury, both at great ages, at the same time, both have missed significant times. And perhaps that's helping their performance a little bit. For sure. And this is one of those awards where, you know, we were talking about with Selki earlier, where if you miss some time, that's fine for me. And obviously, no goal is going to start all 82 games.

But I do credit guys for shouldering a bigger workload here because I do think it's just based on the physical demands and mental demands of the position. I'm always impressed by guys who are able to keep their performance high while playing 60, 65, even up to 70 games. Right. And one of the things that's interesting is if you look at the goaltender leaders today, Carter Hutton's actually, you know, the leader in goals against average and save percentage, but he's been platooning with Jake Allen. So I can't, I don't know how he starts he has, but I don't think it's enough that we qualify him. No, no, definitely not.

So do you, do you have a personal preference between those guys that I mentioned there with Vasilewski, Babrovsky, Hellebuch, and, uh, John Gibson? Yeah, I think Vasilevsky is my number two. You know, he's number two in shutouts. He's actually number one in win above Renee. He's a pretty good save percentage. Actually, no, he's not in the top 10 for save percentage, I see. He's dropped quite a bit since, I mean, you know, winning 7-6 yesterday will do harm to your save percentage.

Yeah, playing the Islanders who can, you know, score eight and give up eight every night. But, yeah, I think he's my number two. Helibuck is probably my number three. And I think just because I look at his overall value for the team, you know, when he emerged as a guy, you know, when they finally had a guy in goal, the team became good. And his numbers back it up as well. Yeah. You know, Bobrovsky, this is an interesting distinction for this award because I think people sometimes think of it as who's the best goalie.

And I think of it more so as which goal he's having the best season. Because I think Bobrovsky's the best goalie in the world right now. But I don't think he's necessarily had the best season out of these guys. guys. I think he should be in this discussion in the top five, but I don't know. I kind of want to give John Gibson a bit of love here. The thing is with Anaheim is, especially early in the year, they basically had no one up front playing. It seemed like everyone was in the injured reserve, and he really kept it together. And then now they're in the thick of this playoff race, and he has like a 9.40 say percentage of past 15 games. So I'm leaning towards actually having him

second in this race, although those five guys are sort of a bit interchangeable. Yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because we start talking about Hart. Some of the cases I make, I look at a lot of guys' numbers from January 1st on. They love to see, okay, when the stakes become higher, how do you play? And the fact that John Gibson, as you said, this is the tightest Western Conference race we've had in a while. I actually got a note from the ducks yesterday. I have to look it up, but it was a pretty incredible stat where they said, you know,

it's never been this tight points this late in the season. So for Gibson to stand on his head like that, you got to give him some credit. Okay, let's finish this up then with the heart. Ooh, yeah. I feel like this. This one's actually fun. Come on. Yeah, it is.

And this is going to be one of those where I feel like, you know, like the Norrisen years past, this is the one that's going to cause the internet to blow up a little bit because it seems like there's a couple divided factions and they feel very strongly about who should win this award. Yeah, this is almost like election season where it's so polarizing, where it's like, how can you not see Alex Ovid? Probably bad example with Ovestkin in Russia, but how can you not see he's number one? Yeah. The overtruthers are out there.

They are. And you know what? Unlike last year where the capitals were super deep, he has had to do a lot of the heavy lifting this season. But I don't know. Like where do you stand with this award? Which way are you leaning? Does the team need to make the playoffs for you to give the guy credit in this award? That's the like is a hot dog a sandwich question for the NHL this year.

It is. I'm someone who says, I don't think it automatically disqualifies you. But I think you have to have one of those seasons, like, where you have, like, 80 more points than the number two guy. Like, you have to blow me away. And so obviously the guy we're talking about here is Connor McDavid. And if you look at, like, his stats are great, but he's not blowing me away from all these other guys

who's, you know, will their teams into the playoffs. Right. And that's where, I mean, it kind of goes into what I just said with the Vesna, where it's kind of the distinction between the best player versus who's having the best season. Totally. Like, if you look at best player, it's probably a McDavid. Yeah. Yeah, it is. But you're right. I mean, I guess this is the annoying thing about the ward where it's like, if we just call it the most outstanding player, I feel like it would eliminate so many of these debates. Oh, 100%. But why would they do that? It's actually good for the league. I think it's healthy to have these debates.

It's true. Yeah. Yeah. So I've been in the camp all that if the abs meet the playoffs, Nathan McKenna needs to win because it felt like he single-handedly will them into the postseason. However, if you watch Avalanche games over the last month or so, you realize how great Ronatitan. Rontatin. Rontaton. Rontatin. Oh, my gosh. It's been a struggle that he's been for that team. Actually, since January 1st, Rontaton also actually has more points in McKinnon now. I mean, it's 47, 46.

Rontin obviously is closed. You know, McKinn has more goals. That's third and fourth of the league, which is pretty impressive. But it's not just the Nathan McKinnon show as kind of the narrative has been. That said, I still think I'm leaning McKinnon, but I'm more as everyday passes, I fall more and more in love with the case for Evangney Malkin. He's actually scored 17.1% of the Penguins' goals. That's a fifth rate in league.

Ovechkin's obviously first at 19.5%. But since January 1st, as I said, kind of one of my thresholds, he leads the league with 55 points. It's crazy. That's just in 34 games. And in a year where they've obviously had goal-tending issues, their defense hasn't been great. Malkin, I think, has really carried the load.

Yeah, I think that's fair. Something I look at, I tweeted this chart out yesterday, but something I'll generally look at for this type of award and this discussion is sort of, I look at the number of team goals and the number of primary points. So basically like just goals and goals directly created through assists and the percentage of that and sort of how responsible you are for your team's offensive success. And the top five guys are McDavid, McKinnon, Sig, and Obetchkin and Malkin. And I think that's a pretty sort of apt snapshot of sort of who has been the most valuable

for their team. And with Malkin, it's kind of tough sort of because of, especially on the power play, how much Kessel and Crosby are involved as well. So it feels like those guys are kind of cannibalizing votes from each other. But he's been stupendously good this season. Sure. And if I want to totally take this way from stats, if we want to do like a total narrative approach, it's like, all right, he's always going to be second fiddle to Sid, right? When we look at that team, we never look at him as the true superstar because he's got Sid there. Well, here's the only year where we feel like he's played at a level above Sydney. And therefore, this is the one year we can give to him. Yeah, I know I like it. I mean, that would certainly get people to get pretty mad online,

although it doesn't take too much to accomplish that these days. I think I think I'm still leaning McKinnon. And it might honestly be, I guess if they don't make the playoffs, then it's between him and McDavid. But he's just been so absurdly good and put it all together this season. And I feel like, you know, if you use these awards as kind of a snapshot of what happened that season when you look back five, ten years from now, like this is going to be, I'm going to remember this is the year Nathan McKinnon finally burst on the scene as one of the top players. Yeah, he's having a moment. He is, and I want to recognize that moment. I want to, I want to appreciate it, I want to embrace

it. I just want to enjoy it. Cool. We'll put it to a montage of one shining glory. I like it. Emily, let's get out here. Let's plug some stuff. What are you working on these days? I know we talked about the Patrick Lineate Post. Do you have anything else on your on your horizon. Yeah, I'm finishing up this week. Another story for ESPN the MAG on Surprise, surprise, surprise Vegas. It's a pretty fun piece, though. I think, you know, I'm not giving it too much away. The crux of it is just however in the league has been overthinking them. And I think that's one of the true reasons for the success. So whether it's where to stay on the strip,

and I've got some funny details from that to, you know, the expansion draft and how to play them. So that's something I'm working up. And as always, you know, Greg Wischensky and I have some coverage on ESPN.com. We do cover hockey and we're doing it earnestly. So I encourage everyone to check it out. I know.

Despite what the internet thinks, ESPN does cover some hockey. And it covers it well. Both of you have done an awesome job this season and I'm really happy we finally got to do this thing and let's do it again sometime soon. I appreciate it. I hope we have a great day.

All right. Chat soon, Emily. The Hockey PDO cast with Dmitri Filipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovich and on SoundCloud at soundcloud. com slash hockey pdocast