The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 238: Show Me The Money

Episode Date: May 24, 2018

William Kawam of Orr Hockey Group joins the show to discuss his time with the New York Rangers (1:05), and where they go from here with their rebuild (8:36). We also discuss using analytics to show the more subtle value of players without big point totals (16:46), how a No Move Clause can be used as a bargaining tool (23:40), going for a bridge deal versus a long-term extension (27:05), the pros and cons of tracking data from a player perspective (34:30), and how the success of the Golden Knights will impact players getting buried on their team's depth chart in the future (41:00). 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. 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.

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My name is Demetri Filipovich. and joining me is my buddy William Kewam. William, what's going on, man? Not much. How are you? I'm good. I'm good. I'm glad we're finally recording this. We were supposed to record the other day, and it's been a hassle getting it done, but we're finally here, and we're going to have a good chat. I'm excited about this because, you know, I'm so deep in the NHL playoffs and just that consuming all my time and thinking about it. Obviously, we're focusing on that on this show most days, so the fact that this is going to be a bit of a reprieve, and I'm going to talk about a bunch of random

NHL topics is going to be a nice little change of pace. Yeah, I'm excited about it. Yeah. So let's start with your sort of background or your path towards getting here. That always interests me. And I'm sure our listeners would appreciate the fact of getting a little bit of a back story here. And you and I had a chat on the phone before we started recording this. And you were telling me a bit about your time with the Rangers and some stories there.

And I thought, you know, if you'd oblige, it'd be kind of fun to talk about that now that we're actually recording. Yeah, absolutely. So how I got my start with the Rangers was quite funny. I was a sophomore in college, and I really didn't know what I wanted to do. I knew I wanted to get into the NHL somehow, but I really didn't have a path, and I didn't really have any connections in the business. So I get this internship with Banff Hockey Academy, which is a small little hockey academy out in Banff, Alberta.

And it just so happens that Glenn Sather, that's where he spends his summers. So I kind of get this bold idea that I'm going to get the internship and I'm going to go up to his door and I'm going to knock on his door and I'm going to say, Mr. Sater, I want to work for the New York Rangers. it's going to go great. And so I get the internship.

I'm in BAMF and I go up and I knock on his door. He opens the door and he looks at me and he goes, what do you want? And my heart is just pounding. And I didn't even know what to say. And I was just like Mr. Sater, my name is William Kewam. I am interning right down the road at Banffi Academy.

And my goal is to one day work for the New York Rangers. And he just gives me like this dumbfounded look and says, yeah, good luck, kid. And I was just like, oh my God, I had no idea what to say. Here's a question. Did he have a cigar in his mouth at the time? He did. Okay, good, good, okay, just want to make sure. Yeah, and it just makes everything even more intense.

the dating, right? So I just kind of splurred out. I'm like, Mr. Sater, I'm really passionate about the hockey business. I really want to work in the NHL one day, and I'm willing to do whatever it takes to show to tell you that I can do this. And he goes, all right, meet me at my house at 7 a.m. on Saturday morning. So I leave his property, and I call my dad, and I'm like, you know, what do you do at 7 a.m. on a Saturday morning. We're at breakfast. We must be going out for breakfast. Like, this is going to be an amazing opportunity. And I show up Saturday morning. I have my dress shoes on. I have like a nice pair of jeans and a collared shirt. And he's standing there and he hands me this laundry list of things to do. And it's like, mow the lawn,

wash his car, clean the gutters. It just went on and on. all yard work. And that's how I kind of got my start into the business. I did that form like every other day for the whole summer. And, you know, during that time, some days I was working with him and I was helping and some days, you know, completely by myself. But that's how I kind of got my relationship with Mr. Sater, just by helping him out around the house at the end of the summer.

He looked at me and he said, if you do the Banffockey Academy internship next summer, let me know. I'm definitely going to need some help. And I came back and I did it again for my whole junior year summer. And then going into my senior year, I applied for a job with the Rangers and hockey operations. I got the position and that's how it all kind of came to be just by the luck and fortune of knocking on his door one day. You must have really been good at Moines the lawn. That's my big takeaway from that story. I was probably, though, no, he, oh my God, he would, I think the first time I moat it, he looked at me and was just like, yeah, you need to do that again. That's awesome.

Yeah. People think, people think working in the front office is all, uh, it's all rainbows and lollipops and all good stuff. And you're, you know, you're having these fancy meetings and you're watching games and winning Stanley Cups. But no, it's a lot of, uh, lawn mowing and a lot of doing the dirty work. Yeah, it completely is. And when I started working for the Rangers, that was a really eye-opening experience because, you know, you kind of pull the curtain back to the NHL. And like you said, you think it's going to be this big spectacle, right? And it's really not.

It's a long hours, a lot of hard work, a lot of egos. But, you know, I wouldn't change anything. It was working for the Rangers was an amazing experience. And everyone treated me so well there. So what year was that again, you were saying? It was like 2014-15, I believe? Yeah, yeah. The year that we went after Jimmy Veezy.

So, yeah, 2014-15. Right. So what kind of stuff were you doing for in this season? Because obviously, you know, was such a big organization. But at the same time, you know, I think it's changed quite a bit now under Jeff Gordon. and I imagine, you know, things are being run differently and it's much more progressive. But at the time, I imagine that, you know, the league as a whole, not even just the Rangers, but things were a step back from where they are right now.

And so I'm kind of curious, like, what was sort of going on there behind the scenes and what kind of stuff were you doing for the Rangers? Yeah, so I was really just a jack-of-all-trades kind of guy. I mean, my, if you want to call it specialty, you know, I wouldn't call it a specialty, but I kind of focused in on analytics. I thought that's where I could bring the most amount of value to the organization. And I was working under a guy named Jim Sullivan, who's their director of analytics. But you're right.

It was, you know, kind of the changing of guard. You know, when I was there, Mr. Sather was starting to take a step back. He had just handed the reins over to Jeff Gordon, who was now the GM. you know, Chris Drury was now in the mix. He wasn't the assistant general manager just yet. I believe he was the director of player development at the time. So really there was kind of like a change of guard. And it was interesting to witness.

But my specific role was really just a jack of all trades kind of guy. I did a lot of work with analytics. I did, you know, analytical breakdowns on unrestricted free agents, on our own players. If I wasn't doing that, I was helping out with depth charts. You know, we had this massive board, you know, for every single team. And we were constantly updating depth charts. You know, if players were in the minors, if they were in the NHL, if they just signed a deal,

how long was their deal signed for? But, you know, I also did video breakdowns. We were, like I said, we were going after Jimmy Beasy that year. So I watched a lot of video on Jimmy. But I also dealt with the CBA a little bit. So I really was a jack of all trades kind of guy. It wasn't like super specific. It was wherever you can, you know, try and help and add value to this organization,

you know, do it. The Rangers fascinate me because, you know, that market and sort of their history of really spending money and not being hesitant in the free agent market to make big swings. You know, now they're in an interesting spot here where, you know, this year they wrote that letter to their fan base. basically saying like we're going to turn to a new chapter, we're going to embrace a rebuild here. And they made a bunch of really smart moves acquiring a handful of picks. I believe they have three first rounders, two seconds, and then potentially two firsts again next year if the Lightning win the cup.

And they don't really have any bad money on the books either after the next couple seasons. So it's like it's a chance for them for a clean slate and potentially doing this thing the right way and kind of embracing a long-term rebuild. At the same time, you know, Henrik Lunkwist is still playing, not necessarily the, top of his game, but he's still on a above league average goalie, and that's going to make it tough for them to fully bottom out while he's still there. And now you're hearing all this stuff about, you know, they're potentially in on Ilya

Kobochuk. And it's just, with the Rangers, it's always you think, hey, they might actually be kind of doing this in a more reasonable drawn-out way, and then all of a sudden this summer, they could easily, very easily flip that switch and just go complete the other way. So I'm very curious to see what happens there. Yeah, and to be

honest, I am too. you know, they have such a great staff. You know, Jeff Gordon's a really intelligent guy. And Chris Jury, you know, he's really amazing. You know, he treated me so well when I was there. But I think you're right. And, you know, when I was there, there was always the topic of conversation of, you know, how do we get back to the cup final?

You know, how do we have this opportunity again? And you always had different opinions of, you know, do we need to go younger? you know, what pieces are we missing? So, you know, I agree. I think it's really going to be interesting. You know, there was one time we were all having lunch together. And, you know, I'm obviously at the bottom of the totem pole. So I'm sitting at the end of the lunch table.

And, you know, we're just talking trades. And, you know, somebody broaches the question, if we can trade one player right now, who do we trade? And everyone kind of gives their opinion. it gets to me. And I think this was like week three or week four. And I was like, yeah, let's trade Henrik Longquist. And it just goes silent and everyone looks at me. And Jeff Gordon looks at me and he goes, yeah, that's not going to happen.

And I was like, well, I was like with all due respect, you know, if like we're talking about rebuilding this thing, you know, he's maximum value right now. Like if you look at him, he just came off the great season, he's getting older. There's no doubt in my mind that he's going to start to regress, which really hasn't happened all that much. He's done a phenomenal job at his job as he's gotten older and age. But to me, I always thought, you know, if you could, you know, get rid of a player at maximum value who has an opportunity or is going to have the chance to regress over the next couple

years because he's getting older in age, you know, to me it was, yeah, you're going going to take a hit from the fan base. You know, you're losing the king, which, you know, it's going to hurt. But, you know, if you're able to get really valuable pieces back and really grow the thing, then I always thought that that was going to be a huge value for the team. But, yeah, you know, it's interesting. I think what Jeff Gordon is doing is great. I thought he had a great spring.

I thought the letter to the fans was great. and, you know, I'm really pulling for my OPE gets the boat back on track. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I'm just looking at their page-on-cap-friendly now, and it's a bit of a unique scenario where, you know, like a team like the Detroit Red Wings, for example, like it's tough to envision over the next couple years, them pulling out of this just because they have so much bad money tied up in players who don't project to get any better with this Rangers team other than, you know, the Shaddenkirk and stall and I guess Lunkwis deals. Like, for the most part, it's really just a younger group that isn't on the books for a

long time. So it's like, Judge Gordon really is going to have a clean slate here, so to speak, to build this team the way he wants to, and the way he envisions it. And it's not something necessarily that he just, you know, fully inherited. And now his hands are tied behind his back. So it's a great opportunity for him. I imagine with that market, though, there is a certain amount of added pressure that it's not, you know, one of those things where I don't think, I mean, when you're running any team, you don't, you don't envision it being bad and irrelevant for four to five seasons, but I imagine there, especially, there's sort of an added pressure to capture people's attentions and be relevant on the mainstream radar as soon as possible.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. It's a brutal market. I mean, as great as New York is and how great the fan base is, you know, you go to a game and they play bad and they're on you. And it could be, you know, you could just have one bad power play and they're billing you. And, you know, you make one wrong move or, you know, you have a. couple bad years and the fan base, you know, they're relentless. So, um, like you said, the, the reins are now in his hands. And I'm really excited to see what he does because I think he's

fully capable of doing and making some great moves there. Okay, William, let's, uh, let's take a quick break here to hear from a sponsor and then we're going to pick up this conversation on the other things. If you're a member of the New York Islanders and you're struggling to adjust and adapt to life in the Lula-Marilla era and all that it entails, uh, let me help me help that process a little easier for you by introducing you to my friends over at harry's razors harry's is great uh their motto is you know they're looking to deliver a close comfortable shave at a fair price and as someone who has used their products for a while now i can definitely uh vouch for that um i just love the sort of convenience of it all uh you don't have to waste any time walking around

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these days with Warhockey Group and more agent side of things. I think this is an area that really fascinates me and I'm glad to have you on because typically we don't, we don't get to have a lot of these discussions in here from people in your line of work. And if we do, it's usually generally kind of puff pieces where the agent is sort of just talking up their clientele. Whereas you and I hopefully we'll get into a bit of a discussion here about the minutia

and sort of where things are headed and how they've progressed and all that good stuff. Yeah, absolutely. So one topic that particularly interests me, I've been fortunate enough to do a bit of work over the past year or two with certain agencies and with certain players in terms of trying to exploit market inefficiencies and figure out ways to paint players in better lights and sort of uncover hidden value or sort of prove that where that value exists. And, you know, when you and I were talking on the phone earlier, a topic that I really found interesting was, was that exactly that.

And it's sort of how analytics has a very big use here in terms of, you know, a guy like Connor McDavid, for example, being his agent is very easy. You basically walk up to the negotiation table and you just get a blank check and you fill it in and you sign it and you go cash it with a guy who might be a third or fourth line player or a third pairing defenseman. You know, first all, the sample size is smaller, but also it's much harder to identify their value when they're not, you know, racking up the points or the goals. So you sort of have to dig a bit deeper and maybe pull back a few layers to sort of prove like, hey, this guy, you know, might not be obviously great, but he's doing all these

little things in more subtle ways to create a net positive for this team. Yeah. So I completely agree. Yeah. when you have some of the top end talent, you know, the contract is you're not necessarily negotiating it. You're just kind of agreeing to, you know, all right, what is the term, how many years, and then, you know, what is the dollar amount? So, and it can be quite easy. But like you said, the real work goes into the second, third, fourth line guys because that's where you really have to dive in a little deeper and say, okay, what are the metrics behind this player?

What makes them successful? What does it make him successful? where are his deficiencies as a player. And, you know, that's kind of where you have to take some risk. And you have to ask yourself, you know, if a team comes at me with long-term deal, with a long-term contract on a player who is a second or third liner for small dollars, you know, do you take it? And, you know, like you see David Poyle does this phenomenally with Nashville.

You know, he has a talent. The talent will hit RFA and he'll sign them long term to relatively small dollars, hoping that in the first, you know, first two or three years that that player starts to outperform his contract. You know, you see it with Victor Arvinson and other players in the lineup. And, you know, it's a genius move and it's really worked out well for him. But, you know, from an agency side of the business, it's really all, you know, what are the numbers saying, you know, where is this player from

from a talent evaluation perspective, you know, where is this player from, I guess, an analytical perspective, you know, you have to ask yourself, is what this player doing repeatable? And then, you know, where is the organization from a cap and cash perspective? So that's kind of where we start and how we, you know, start to, you know, paint the whole picture on a certain player. Yeah, no, the predators are a fascinating example here because obviously, you know, they took a bit, a bunch of gambols on their young defensemen, you know, at the time guys like Roman Yossi and Ryan Ellis and Matthias at Holm. You know, I had high pedigree and everyone was excited about them, but whenever you're committing to someone, whatever, six, seven years down the road and they're still not a finished product, it's always a bit of a risk. But then obviously when it pans out, you look at how they've managed to sort of have those guys locked up long term at

suppressed average annual values and that's a huge home run and then that allows you to sort of, you know, sign a guy like Kyle Turris or maybe overpay a guy like Ryan Jhanson a little bit because you have all those savings. And, you know, you bring up Arvinson and he's a fascinating one because I remember last summer when he signed his extension, people online were freaking out there like, well, what is his agent doing? What's Victor Arvinson doing? Like he's taking way below market value after this great season and if he can prove that he can do it again, all of a sudden he can make so much more. But at the same time, I had a bit of pushback from people in Sweden going like, listen, like this guy's from like a small little humble town in Sweden. And when you,

especially like an undrafted free agent when someone's like, hey, we're going to give you $30 million. That is a very, very tough thing to walk away from. And I can understand when even though I might advise on myself personally, when it's not your money, it's a lot easier. Whereas for a guy, that type of financial security and a sport where there's tons of injuries and unpredictability and anything can happen, I'm sure it goes a long way. Yeah, and you bring up a lot of great points there. Like, people think that it's as easy as, you know, kind of one, two, three. You get the contract or you get the deal from the team, which a lot of people don't know. So typically, you know, the team, I'd say 95% of the time hands you the deal, right? They start off the negotiation. And then you kind of

work off that. But you have to also realize that you're dealing with people. And you're dealing with some people who have come from humble backgrounds. Some you're dealing with people that sometimes don't want to take risk. You know, you get that $30 million, you know, number in front of you and that's guaranteed money. And it's hard to say, okay, well, you know, we've seen what you're able to do. Is this repeatable? And if it is repeatable, why don't we take less years, maybe at a little bit more money and kind of let's roll the dice. Let's try to make a good educated bet here. and say if it's repeatable, you know, you put up another couple 30 goal seasons, all of a sudden instead of looking at 4.25 a year, you know, you might be looking at 5.5 a year,

maybe even six. So it's definitely a gamble, but you also have to ask the player, you know, where are you happiest? You know, if he has a girlfriend or a wife, you know, he loves his teammates, he might love Nashville, he loves, you know, the situation he's in. You know, there's so many different leverage points that can go into a negotiation and can go into a contract that, you know, Victor might have saw the dollars and said, yeah, I know I'm going to be getting underpaid. I know that, you know, people are going to leapfrog my contract in one or two years. But I'm okay with that. You know, I have, you know, $30 million guaranteed and he's fine with it. So it's definitely a negotiation. And I think that's where the onus is on the agent to say,

you know, are you willing to take a risk? You know, where are we allocating the risk? And just giving the player as much possible information as giving him as much information as possible so that he can make an educated decision. Well, another interesting factor here is the idea of a no-moo clause or no trade clause. I remember a handful of years ago when the Canucks were still relevant and still good and being run by Mike Gillis and Lawrence Gilman, I remember at the time as a contender they were doing a really interesting job of sort of making all the pieces fit financially by basically just giving everyone a no move clause or a no trade clause in their deal.

And then that type of security and a lot of people that were signing with the team wanted to stay in Vancouver at the time, obviously, and wanted to control their own future. So you're willing to take maybe less money to get that provision in your deal. And everyone at the time, no one was really complaining because the Canucks were so good and they were able to keep retain all their players. And then when things kind of when the bottom fell out a little bit and then all of a sudden, you know, was no moves no moves in the contract all of a sudden started handcuffing the team a little bit and making it tougher to move away from some guys then all of a sudden everyone started you know yelling about what a disaster was and how could they make that happen so i always find that sort of fascinating as well because in these negotiations you know sometimes you have to obviously you get

in the all information as an agent from the team and about the player and you sort of present that to your client but then there's also this sort of give and take like with any negotiation and push and pull and you're sort of all sorts of different things to factor in. So I find that area fascinating as well. Yeah, it definitely is. Yeah, it's all leverage, right? Like you might want certain dollars. You might want, you know, $30 million over five years.

And a team might not be willing to pay that, but they might be willing to add in a no movement clause or no trade clause for less dollars. So, yeah, there's all different types of leverage points. and, you know, it's all a trial by trial basis. You know, you look at certain teams and how they, they deal with players and they have a blueprint for success. Like, you look at Steve Eiserman. He has a blueprint on how to deal with entry-level contracts and then how to deal with restricted free agents and then how to help those players as they enter unrestricted free agency. And then you look at some teams, then every player's different.

You know, you see it with Schedule A and Schedule B bonuses. You know, for the longest time, Toronto did. didn't even give those that entry level contract players. And, you know, then you get Austin Matthews and then all of a sudden that changes, right? So it's all a trial by trial basis. It all goes by leverage. Yeah. So, okay, here's a bit of a thought exercise for you then.

Let's say you have a client and you're sort of deliberating between how you want to go about future deals and they're coming up off their ELC and you have an option to either go with a bridge deal or a long-term extension. How much is the fact that, you know, we know that the cap is going to spike a little bit here this coming season, and we presume that although it hasn't happened in the past, if the sport's going to continue to grow

and it's going to continue to thrive, hopefully, the cap will as a result also continue to store, which obviously means more money for everyone. So how much of that factors into the decision-making and whether you want to take a deal right now that's going to maybe provide you with that financial security versus maybe taking a shorter two, three-year deal where you can continue to prove yourself and all of a sudden, when the cap does rise, really cash in.

Yeah. My personal opinion is always probably to go with the bridge deal. I'm a big fan of bridge deals. And I think the reason why is it because from an analytical perspective, and that's kind of where my background is, it allows me to collect a larger data sample of what this player can do. in the NHL. Now, if he's coming off of his, you know, RFA deal, he's obviously a younger player. He's still in his prime. So, you know, to me, there's an opportunity for, let's get the data sample a little bit bigger. Let's see if what you're doing is repeatable. And if it is,

let's cash in on your UFA contract. Now, you know, that's my thought process, but it's my job to lay out every single avenue for that player. You can do this. You can do X, Y, and Z, and then have him make that decision. Obviously, you know, I'll have my opinion, and I'll give the player my opinion on what I think is personally the best, but ultimately it comes down to what that player wants to do. I don't really like long-term deals unless they're almost overpaying the player. And the reason why I say that is because, like you just said, the cap is growing. So you're going to get a percentage, you know, your deal is going to be consistently less and less percentage of cap.

And then, you know, from there, you're also dealing with the ego of the player. And, you know, as great as it is to have that long term $30 million deal or $40 million deal in years, $45, 6, 7,8, you know, and you're getting significantly underpaid for what you're doing, it's not fun to show up to work every day knowing that you're getting underpaid. for what you're doing. And that's just kind of going over to the ego side of the business where, you know, no one likes to be underpaid, you know, and all of a sudden you might be putting up, you know, 30 goals a season and you're getting paid X amount of dollars, but the guy who's putting up 15 is getting paid more than you because the caps rose, right? So you kind of just have to give all the information of the player,

but, you know, my opinion is if I think the player is a special talent, I think he, you know, if you look at the player's body type, you know, if he's not prone to injury, if he's not a smaller player, you know, how many concussions have he had, you know, how many injuries has he had, you know, if he's not, you know, percept, if he's not prone to injury, you know, then to me, I say, you know, take the bridge deal and let's really try to see what we can do here. Yeah, with this stuff, it's always fascinating to me, you know, if there's a contentious negotiation, going on or the player and a team are stuck between a rock and a hard place and can really come to an agreement. It's always fascinating to me how fans tend to pick the side of the team and they

always complain about the player because I really do think like the players do get the sort of a raw deal here with the system and it's not necessarily different than other jobs and other industries, but you just look at sort of the pay structure and how things work. It's like now that we know that players tend to peak maybe younger than we would have thought in the past and it's more so in your early 20s at least from a physical prime um those are the years where you know they're sort of uh ceiling for potential earnings is capped because of uh their entry level deal and then their rfa status and then guys hit the open market finally when they're 27 28 29 years old and then they're getting these massive long term deals where everyone looking at it from the outside is like oh man

that is one going to be one of those where and the long. latter half that's really not going to age well. And, you know, we're going to see that every summer. And we're going to see that again this year. Um, just if you look up and down the free agent list, it's a bunch of guys who are sort of around that 30 year old barrier. And it's like, oh, man, the number of four or five, six year deals that are going to be handed out is just going to be, make me sick. But at the same time, like, it's sort of, you're kind of like paying it forward where it's like, oh, there was probably a bunch of years where this guy was woefully underpaid. So it's all kind of evening itself out in a weird roundabout way.

Yeah, I'm not a big fan of our collective bargaining agreement. You know, I think things need to get rewritten. And I think that's one of the biggest areas. You know, I think analytics, like you said, have shown that, you know, the league is becoming younger and younger. And, you know, that, you know, players prime years are really in his entry level and RFA years. And during those years, as you know, the team has all the leverage for the most part. So, um, so yeah, like you said, you know, you finally get to UFA and, you know,

you're kind of getting paid back, you know, back dollars because, um, you know, you've, you've performed probably undervalue for so many years that now you're going to sign a bigger contract where all of a sudden when you're 34, 35 years old, you know, you're really hearing it from the fan base because you're not producing at the level that you once were. Yet you're getting paid, you know, that six, seven, eight million dollar contract. Um, but I think, you know, I think it's really interesting because I would love for the, I would love for a bunch of different clauses to be rewritten, um, in the collective bargaining agreement, you know, so that we can kind of get out of this. You know, I would love, uh, you know, one, one thing that I know a lot of agents are playing around with right now is an opt out clause, you know, because when you sign that eight year deal, you know, you're locked in, right? And that's why we constantly see buyouts. Um, because GMs make mistakes. and agents make mistakes.

Right. And, you know, I would love to see, you know, if you sign a long-term deal, let's say six, seven or eight years, you know, halfway through the contract, there can be an opt-out on either the organization side or on the player's side. You were like, we were talking about, you know, Victor Ardinson, you know, he signed, I believe it was a seven-year deal. So, you know, we'll say after the third year, you know,

he puts up another 30-goal season and all of a sudden it gives the player to opt out and say, okay, you know, like, I'm outperforming. my contract, I can get more either with Nashville or potentially on the open market and kind of go from there. So I mean, I would love to see that. Will that ever happen? Probably not. Yeah.

Yeah, well, it's fascinating because you look at some other leagues, for example. I know like the NBA has opt-out causes and they have all these player options and stuff. And it does seem like it's, you know, not necessarily more evenly balanced, but it does seem like there's a bunch of other different wrinkles going on that give the players more leverage and also create various other opportunities. So I would definitely be all for that. But, you know, I've learned with stuff like this as much as sometimes people have good intentions. The NHL is very slow to adapt to stuff and not necessarily the most progressive or creative. So it could be a long time before we actually see any sort of fundamental changes there. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, it's going to be

interestingly see what happens over the next couple years and see if there's another lockout or if there's a strike on the player's side. So I have a couple other things. I have a couple other things here. So, okay, one, you know, we saw at the World Championships, they were playing around with this player tracking data and it's something we've been talking about for years and years. And there was a report other day that, you know, they're going to, I think, put a tracking chip in the puck and we're going to see where that goes. And I think, you know, my thoughts on this are very on the record already. I think it's long past due that we have this stuff. And I think it's really going to change the game in terms of what we know and how we approach analysis.

But something I found interesting is that I think there's been a bit of a pushback from players where maybe having access to some of this stuff in terms of how much ground they're covering or how fast they're moving or what have you. Anything you could think of with all this unique player tracking data might not actually be sort of a negative for them or might expose certain flaws or certain awards they might not want available. And we know that players are typically creatures a habit and you don't want too much change and I get that. But it's fascinating to me because on the one hand, you could sort of go like, oh, well, this could actually really shine guys in a good light and potentially, you know,

make them a lot of money. But at the same time, there is a pushback from players where they might not actually be that into it. Yeah, it's interesting. I think it's all about how the NHL decides to kind of convey the information, right? Because you have to convey it in a way that gets the players excited. And, you know, when the players first started hearing about analytics, they hated the idea, right? But now, more often than not, you know, you have players constantly wanting to learn more and more and more and trying to make themselves, they understand now that they can use it in a way to make them more valuable to an organization, which hopefully, you know, gets to the more dollars on their contract.

And I think that this is, this is probably going to be the same thing. You know, you look at, at first, they're probably scared of it. You know, they think that this is probably going to be a negative for them, you know, if they have a certain deficiency in their game, it's going to be exposed. And when a deficiency is exposed, you know, the organization has more leverage. But, you know, I think it's all in how you convey the message and how you flip it and make sure that they're understanding that this can help them, obviously just as much as it can hurt them. But if you take, I guess, more of an approach where, you know, I'm going to use this information to become a better player to figure out what my deficiencies are and then get better at those deficiencies. I think it's only a plus for a player. I'm really interested when you say, and I know that in your current job capacity, you're working with players in terms of, you know, you're crunching a lot of tape, but you're also using the numbers to sort of help educate them a little bit and help grow their minds.

But, you know, I always, I never love it when reporters go into the locker room or something, whether it's after practice or before a game and sort of, you know, just throw analytics questions at players because I know all of a sudden it's going to, you know, be. met with an eye roll and it's going to be that same quote about how, you know, they don't actually capture everything and all that. And, and we've heard it before. But there is obviously, um, a value in terms of, especially from a coaching staff perspective or from a training perspective, you sort of, um, you look at areas of strength and weakness and you sort of look at how the game's changing and potential areas where you could exploit certain matchups and stuff like that. And as you said, um, that could obviously increase your production and potentially lead to a higher payday. So what kind What kind of stuff are you doing in that regard in terms of when you have certain information

and you're working with a player? Because obviously, as you said, how you convey that message is super important in terms of how they're going to greet it and whether they're going to be able to accept it and actually utilize it. So are you, I know you have to kind of be careful with the vocabulary you use. And I know that, like, I tried whenever I speak to anyone in the game now. I never really use courseier fan. I make sure to take shot attempts because I know that as soon as I do, their eyes.

you're just going to completely glaze over. So I'm sure it's like little stuff like that that you have to factor in. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, when I started to do this with the Rangers, Mr. Sater used to always tell me, he was like, listen, you could be the smartest person in the world. But if you can't convey that information in a relatable way, then none of these players are going to listen to you.

And I really took that to heart because obviously the goal is to get the players to listen to you and to try to help them in any way possible. So I use a lot of video. I think video is the best way just because they get to see themselves. And even if you can't use the video like on a specific player, you can use it on a relatable player. So, you know, if you're talking to, let's say, a goal score and you're looking at shot attempts, you know, you might not want to use him because it's a little bit, you know,

tough to say, okay, like this is where you're doing it wrong. But you can show it as another player. You could say, okay, like here's Austin Matthews. you know, this is what he's doing wrong in his game. Do you see, like, are you able to visualize it? And kind of get the context around the analytics, right? Not just the numbers, not just the metric, but specifically video and understanding the context around

of what I'm trying to say versus just showing them the numbers. Because if you show any of these players the numbers, for the most part, they're just not going to want to listen, right? Like you said, their eyes are just going to glaze over. But what I have found is kind of the new generation of hockey, players, they are kind of growing up with it, right? So they want to know everything. You know, you look at the younger players in the league and just specifically from personal experience, you know, I'm getting called all the time from players saying, you know, like, what am I doing

wrong? You know, where are my metrics good and where are they bad? You know, how can I improve versus the older players? They didn't really come up through the NHL with it. It was kind of the old guard. So it's kind of, you know, the two guards right now. But the younger players I can say right now are at least the younger players that I personally dealt with, you know, they're always looking to get better and they're always trying to find deficiencies in their game. And, and yeah, so.

Yeah, when they're not playing video games. Yeah, when they're not playing Fortnite. So one other potentially interesting wrinkle here that I thought of was, you know, now with all the success Vegas has had this season and everyone's trying to make sense of it and how it happened and how we all missed it and sort of what the takeaways are from it and how what impacts it's going to have on the league, you know, one potential thing I see is, you know, I imagine, and this isn't necessarily anything new, but if you're a player around the league and you're sort of looking at that and you're like, oh man, like I'm buried on my current

team's depth chart and I'm not necessarily playing enough and I'm not getting the opportunity to thrive and then you sort of look at all these guys who were in a similar spot as recently as last season and they go to Vegas and they get the sadder opportunity and all of a sudden they have career years like I imagine um one takeaway from that is definitely going to be like it's it just shows that you know sometimes there are these areas to grow and obviously it's not necessarily going to be uniformly like that and you can't just expect that every single player that's playing bit minutes on every team right now is ready for a huge breakout season. But at the same time, it does sort of show how there might be hidden gems around the league and how, and that's maybe why we look at stuff like rate stats and on a permanent basis, because it might show that where guys who aren't playing enough right now might be ready for more opportunity down the road.

Yeah. It really is interesting. I'll tell you when I was, so when I was with the Rangers, I was doing, I did my unrestricted free agent analytical breakdown. It really was just more or less a cost-benefit analysis of, out of all the unrestricted free agents, you know, where can we get the most benefit for the least amount of cost? And Jonathan Margesel was at the top of our list. It would be really nice if they had locked him up. But, yeah, you know, I think you look at, you know, you look at the league and you look at specific organizations, there's always players, you know, that for one reason or another, they haven't gotten the opportunity that they deserve. You know, they might have burned a bridge with a coach, an assistant coach, you know, a general manager just might have somebody else that's, you know, a little bit higher on the list.

But I agree. I think, you know, every general manager right now is probably scratching their head and saying, you know, like, how do we repeat what Vegas just did? You know, who in our organization is undervalued, who in other organizations is undervalued that we could potentially trade for and really trying to find, you know, the next William Carlson, the next Jonathan Margesil, you know. So yeah, I absolutely love what Vegas did. I love what they're doing, and I'm absolutely pulling for them right now. Well, I'm fascinated from the agent's side, though, because, you know, obviously Vegas is such a unique opportunity with a clean slate and sort of there was nothing already established there.

So everyone is kind of starting from scratch. And you say, like, oh, you know, that's a flash in a pan. It's a one-time thing. But then now with Seattle potentially entering the league on the horizon the next couple years, like I imagine that there is going to be an incentive there where if you are one of those players who's buried or, you know, if you're their representative, you might be pushing for that player at all of a sudden potentially get their chance with Seattle based on how things have gone in Vegas. Definitely. Yeah. You know, I don't want to, Seattle is going to be interesting because

I think, one, you know, you're going to have general managers take a lot harder look at their at their lineups. And they're definitely not going to make the same mistake twice. But also, you think you really have to give Vegas credit. Gallant is an amazing coach. And I think it's really an amalgamation of things. You know, if you don't have Galant, isn't the team still as good? You don't know.

All you hear about these players talking about is, you know, I love playing for this guy. You know, he's such a phenomenal coach. And we heard that all the way back to, you know, when he's with the Florida Panthers organization. So, you know, from a player perspective, absolutely. You're always trying to find ways for the player to get more ice time and more opportunity. And then all you're hoping is that once he gets more ice time and that opportunity that that player executes. Otherwise, it's just a wasted opportunity. But I think, you know, from Vegas's standpoint, is it going to be replicated?

Can Seattle replicate it? I don't know. It's going to be hard to tell, you know. But I think so much of the credit has to go to the players, but also so much of the credit has to go to the coaching staff and to the front office. Because you can see these players and you know, you put them in maybe a different situation. And maybe they're not as successful. But when you have a team that's completely just banded together the way they have under a phenomenal coach,

you know, a coach that allows them to make mistakes, you know, a coach where they don't feel, you know, like they're going to get scrutinized for every mistake that they make. It's kind of a beautiful thing. And, you know, coach, having the proper coach is just, is so huge. You know, I don't know if you, if you listen to that Spit and Chicklets podcast, but Ryan Whitney, you know, he always talks about how hard it was to play for Claude Julian, right? Like every single mistake he made, the coach was down his throat. So, you know, when you're in an environment like that, it is so difficult to play because all you have in the back of your mind is thinking, oh my God, what's going to happen next?

You know, am I going to get yelled at for this? Am I allowed to make this rush? Am I not allowed to make this rush? Should I play more conservatively or should I be more offensive? And when you're thinking like that, you can't be successful. And I think what Gerard Gallant has done with that organization has just been absolutely amazing. You've got a bunch of really good players and you've allowed them just to flourish under his system

and under his philosophies. Yeah, well said. Okay, let's, oh, before we get out of here, so what, is it, did we miss anything? Is there like, what, what's on, what's in the horizon? What is sort of the next big thing or the next, you know, like, what's the big thing you guys are talking about these days or what are you looking forward to? And, and I didn't really want to talk about this potential upcoming lockout. It's a depressing topic, and I'm sure listeners are going to have plenty of time to hear

about that on this podcast, so I kind of wanted to stay away from that. but is there like any other stuff that you guys are sort of bracing for or trying to adapt to or looking at that it's sort of occupying your time most these days? I wouldn't say that there's anything that's like specifically occupying a lot of our time, but I know one thing that is on the back of our minds is traumatic brain injuries. You know, you see what's going on. You see what's going on with the NFL right now. And, you know, you see all the headshots that are currently.

happening in the national hockey league. And, you know, in my opinion, I, it might not be too long until the NHL is kind of right there. So I know that's one thing that we're, you know, as an agency, we're always looking to be, to add value to players and to add services that are going to bring value to them. And that's one area that we're really looking at right now. You know, how do we make sure that we're providing the best value and services for our clients and, you know, brain injuries and making sure that they're getting the right help and, you know,

making sure that they're not getting hit in the head, you know, or something that we're really looking into right now. Yeah. Yeah, I know that's, wow, that's a very, very heavy way to end the show. You asked me. Usually they end the show like, oh, like, what are you working on, D's if I'm talking to another media member and they're like, oh, you know, I've got this article coming out. You can follow me on Twitter.

You're like, yeah, we're talking about traumatic brain injuries, and it's like, oh, okay, that's something to think about. Sorry, I didn't, I didn't mean to end it on a negative note. But, yeah, it's, you know, it's going to be a big issue. You know, you look at, you know, especially in the playoffs when the rest kind of dial it back a little bit, you know, when they let some, some things fly that wouldn't necessarily fly during a regular season. you're looking at some of the some of the hits of the head and you know it it's bad you know you don't

you don't want players to get concussions obviously and and you know you're looking at the data that shows multiple concussions can lead to you know CTE and you know from an agency perspective and not only that but from an organization perspective as well

you know if you have a talent you want him to play as long as he possibly can you don't want him to be hindered by concussions and by injury So I just think, you know, the whole sport science is really probably the next big thing in the NHL and in the agency side of the business. You know, what can we do for these players that make sure that they can have a long and successful career? And I just that's that's where we're, that's where I'm probably occupying or focusing a little bit of my time right now. Yeah. But sorry to end the podcast.

No, no, no, that's good. I mean, it's an important subject. And, you know, the league would be better off if obviously if the higher ups acknowledged it and, and sort of, We had a more bigger dialogue about it as opposed to just pretending that everything is okay and sweeping it under the rug because as you mentioned this postseason and all year we're seeing all this stuff. And really it's kind of coming to a head here, no pun intended. And it's, yeah, you say it's going to be an issue. I think it already is. And it's a really good thing to be investing your time and trying to figure out and make better.

So I'm all for that. Yeah. I listen, I really appreciate you having me on the podcast. Oh, William. It was a blast, man. I'm glad to have you on. I'm glad we could have a conversation about all this stuff. And, yeah, so I guess you don't have anything to really plug.

Everyone, go check out our hockey group. Yeah, you can go to our Twitter is or hockey group. That's where we pretty much put all of our information about our players. So you can find all that stuff there. If you want to give me a follow on Twitter, you're more than welcome to. It's just William J. K.wam. But I don't really tweet too often. but I'd say if you're going to give anything a follow,

give or hockey group a follow. Awesome, man. Well, thanks for coming on, and let's do this thing sometime again down the road. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much. I had a great time. Cheers, man.

The Hockey PDOCast with Dmitri Filipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovich and on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com slash hockeypedocast.