The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 301: Crossroads Teams

Episode Date: June 23, 2019

Jonathan Willis joins the show to discuss the teams that figure to make the most noise during what promises to be a busy draft weekend filled with lots of player movement. We discuss the teams that have already been making moves, the teams that have moves left to make, and the different stages of an organization’s cyclical ascent from rebuild to contending. 4:00 How the Jets backed themselves into a corner13:30 How the Avalanche and Hurricanes take the next step22:00 How the Rangers rebuilt in 18 months 29:15 How the Sharks keep contending45:20 How the Flyers blew through their cash48:30 How many teams think they’re the next BluesSee 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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And joining me as my good buddy, Jonathan Willis. Jonathan, for them, this is the first time you and I have ever met up in person, recorded face to face, which is amazing, considering I lost track of how many times you've been on the show, but it's been at least 15 to 20 times. So this is the first time I'm asking, while looking squarely into your eyes. How's it going, man? It's going really good. It's nice to put a face to the voice on the telephone.

It's a bizarre experience. I mean, I only know you as a voice in my ears. Yeah. No, it's good. hopefully, hopefully it lives off to the hype. Hopefully it's, it's going to be good. I mean, I'm excited. So many people are in town here.

We've already talked about some of our experiences off the air, but it really, these events, and now that it's in Vancouver, it's in my hometown, it feels awesome that like the entire hockey world is kind of congregating into one place like this, and there's going to be so many cool networking, experiences, and meeting people and putting faces to names that you only really know from online.

And so I did a show yesterday, which went up this morning on Thursday morning, which was like a mock draft that I did with Cam Robinson and Nufi Bodeen, and people can go check that out if they haven't already. But I know not everyone is fully invested in the draft or doesn't necessarily care that much about her. Maybe their favorite team doesn't have a high pick. So you and I are going to focus more on some of the transactions we've seen.

We're going to focus on maybe stuff to watch over the coming days in terms of the higher leverage teams we've identified that either have made moves already or are names to watch because it feels like they're about to get frisky. Well, and the beautiful thing about it is if we're wrong, people will find out right away. They won't have time to forget what we were wrong about. It's true.

And I mean, it's a tricky time for the evaluation and analysis game because it feels like there are so many moving pieces and you never know when the next big trade is going to happen. And so it's obviously an exciting time, but it also puts the shelf life on some of these shows and tweets and articles of ours to pretty minimal. Yeah, and it's going to one of those moving pieces is obviously the salary cap. so we're in the same boat as NHL GMs where we don't know what the number is going to be and we have to kind of make things up on the fly and hope we're right. What a Mickey Mouse League sometimes this NHL is.

I mean, the fact that we still don't know, it sounds like we're going to find out by Saturday, I guess, but that's really kind of putting GMs in a pretty precarious position in terms of like you kind of go about it thinking it's going to be one thing. I think there were times where people thought it might be as close as possibly 83 million for next season and now we're finding it's probably going to be under 82 and we'll see how low drops but for some of these teams that are pretty up against it like that does make a massive difference that we're going to see i think it's going to lead to a lot of movement because if it is as low as we think it could be all of a sudden there's going to be certain teams out there that

are going to have to shed pieces that they might not have otherwise just because they have to do that to become uh cap compliant yeah it's uh it's going to be very interesting and i think we're going to see a lot of movement that we would not otherwise have done i i think most of to NHL GMs go into the summer aiming for, you know, having a conservative estimate of the cap and coming in, you know, a million lower, a million and a half lower. And so it won't catch those guys in so much trouble. But if you're a team that, you know, you look at Tampa Bay, Tampa, you look at Winnipeg, you look at Toronto, where you need every dime, it's, oh, it's going to be scary and it's going to force you to do some things you otherwise would not. Well, and that's when

the league is at its best. Yes. So I'm looking, I mean, it's bad for the, uh, for the owners and the GMs, but for us, it's going to be fun. So, okay, so I've highlighted a number of teams here that either are interesting for a variety of reasons. They're kind of at a crossroads point. Organizationally, they're either poised to make moves or they already have. And let's start off with the Jets because I just have this one big question here written. It's like, how did they back themselves into this corner? I think they're the latest example of how fleeting success in this league can be because I don't

necessarily want to be writing their obituary right now and thinking it's going to take another decade for them to win another playoff series. But if we were having this conversation this time last year, I think everyone was universally very optimistic. It took them a while to get here, but they have this amazing regular season. They make it all the way to the conference finals. They have all these young pieces. We figure they're going to get better and are going to grow together.

And then all of a sudden now, for a variety of reasons, the opinion on them has flipped and for a good reason in terms of the optimism heading into the future, both in terms of just how poor and underwhelming this past season was for them, but also what their roster is going to look like if they have to keep shedding pieces here and making moves. And so I don't know, how do they get here and what do they do moving forward to try and remedy the situation and get back on the train tracks? Well, they're in that very difficult situation where you have half the team

that is part of an older core, not that the Winnipeg Jets older core won anything, but they have, you know, Blake Wheeler, Dustin Bufflin, these are real players, and they're being paid like real players. but there's a massive age gap between them and this crop of young RFAs coming up. And I think it's a tricky thing for any NHLGM to manage that gap to transition from your older players while keeping them in place to support your younger players and figuring out who's going to age out well and who's going to age out poorly. And Winnipeg, this is the year where everything hits the fan where they have so many RFAs

and they still have these big money older player deals. And trying to negotiate that is very, very tricky. you know, their opening move with Jacob Truba does not inspire confidence. I know they were forced into it. They had some bad things going on. But even so. Don't give them that. They weren't forced into anything.

No team in this league is ever forced into anything. That was their own doing. They dug their own grave there. Well, and the problem is, I mean, you look at the trade return. Are they any worse off if they flip them at the trade deadline as a rental? I don't think they are. I love the trade for the Rangers because it's a zero risk move. If you won't sign with New York, well, you know, we'll rent them out to you and we'll get

back exactly what we gave, maybe even a little bit more. So you look at that, it doesn't inspire confidence, and you kind of listen to the rumor mill. And if I'm shedding salary in Winnipeg, Nikolai Eilers is nowhere near the top of my salary shedding list. And I will see what they do. But if that's the road they go down, you kind of go, no, if you're going to shed money, start here, here and here, don't start with the one guy who's really undervalued and is definitely going to bounce back next year. I mean, they fumble. The reason why I don't feel bad for them, and I critique them for the Jacob Truba trade, was it did really feel like it was kind of by their own doing, just from the start, right?

Like, he comes into the league. They're pairing him with guys like Mark Stewart. They're not putting him in a position to succeed. And then all of a sudden, he comes up after his ELC and they're haggling over what they want to do with him. They wind up kind of flexing their financial leverage to make him take this bridge deal that is obviously going to wind up paying him less than he's probably worth. And so they burned bridges there and we kind of knew this day was coming. And then for a team that considers itself a contender, I imagine, heading into the next season.

I don't think they want to take such a step backwards that they're going to be back to the rebuilding phase. Losing a guy like this for what they got, as you're right, as you said, at the deadline, if the season doesn't go the way they wanted, I find it hard to believe they couldn't get a back half first round pick from someone and a project slash AHL defense. Like the whole Neil Pehunk thing and some of the comments that came out from Kevin Sheldayov, it's like, why did you like him? What does he do well? He competes. He competes hard. Like that's a red flag that if you can't identify any actual skills and compete level is what you're talking about.

Like that's pretty dicey on my end. So I don't feel bad for them for that. And then they kind of forced themselves in this position. It's not like they couldn't foresee this scenario where Patrick Lianney and Kyle Connor were going to score a bunch of goals and warrant higher salaries. and they still chose to give Brian Little his extension. They chose to go out and spend a bunch of money on Dmitro Kulikov and free agency. So it was just kind of a lack of planning and foresight on their end. And that's why I think ultimately Kevin Sheldayoff and the Jets organization deserves as much flack as they're getting from people

because it's not just a matter of, oh, we have too many good young players. We can't afford them all. It's you probably could have afforded them all if you played your cards better. Well, and I think the Truba in particular, because how long have the rumor has been going around that Trubo wants out of Winnipeg, that he's not going to sign a long-term extension. Last summer, they certainly knew about it. They probably knew about it well before last summer, to be honest. And you look at that, and the contrast that I come up with is with what happened with Matt

Dushain in Colorado, because Joe Sackick has been lauded for being patient with Matt Dishain, for waiting until he got the fit. And that's, it's what he did, but it's what Winnipeg didn't do with their time. Because if Winnipeg had been really pushing for the last year and a half to get the best possible long-term fit for Jacob Truba, you would think that they would have got a lot more than they ended up with. It seems like they kind of knew this was coming, but they put it off, put it off, put it off. And then at the last minute, even though they had a year and a half or two years or however long it was to prepare, they traded him to, you know, one of the handful of teams he was willing to sign with and got the price they'd get if he didn't sign anywhere.

So, you know, Shevel Day off's a guy who gets credit for a lot of patients. I don't know that that's actually the case. To me, it looks more like procrastination. It does. It definitely does. He had an exam coming up here this summer and he did not prepare. He waited to the last possible day to open that book. And then we get into this situation.

So, okay, they realize we're not going to have Jacob Truba back. Let's get whatever we can for him. That's fine. I definitely think the return was very underwhelming and they could have just waited and gotten it later on. But you move Jake. of Trupai, you acknowledge that he's not part of your future solution. Then all of a sudden, they're freaking out this whole Tyler Meyer sweeps takes with, you know, here locally in Vancouver, they've been heavily rumored and linked to him in free agency.

It's like, he's looking for seven years, seven million per. I'm like, are we talking about the same, like Tyler Myers? And like, it's like, he won the caller trophy. It's like, how long ago was, are we still citing that as something, an accomplishment of his? You know, those six foot seven guys take a while to develop. He's still six foot seven. He has not shrunk yet. into his late 20s.

And so they're freaking out about potentially losing him to kind of go along with losing Truba. And then all of a sudden, if you're missing two top four defensemen there, it feels like they are going to, which you alluded to, cover one of those holes by creating a bigger hole up front, trading Niklai Ehlers for a defenseman.

And if I'm another GM, you know, I constantly say, know who you're playing against, who you're playing cards against, and always just target the fish, always just pick out which GMs and just keep calling them. And it feels like Kevin should,

shovel day off right now is primed to be taken advantage of from that perspective of there's a certain desperation in the air and they clearly there's been so many rumblings that you feel like there's some substance to it it's not just sort of media generated rumors and nikla euler's probably isn't long for winnipeg and after a down season for them to be selling low on him to get a defenseman to make up for these other mistakes they've made it's it really is like the definition of patching up one whole by creating a significantly bigger one and worrying about it later and and i'm fascinated to see how it plays out, but I figure out, I figure it probably will not be a positive development for the Jets. Yeah. Well, and the other option the Jets have, other than trading a forward, because I mean,

to me, if I look at Winnipeg's roster, it makes way more sense to trade Kyle Conner than Nikolai Eelers, because you've got to think of these guys as stocks that go up and down. There's a true underlying value, the fundamentals, and then there's everything else that's driven. And Eelers is a guy who's worth more than he appears to be worth right now, and Conner's a guy who's, you know, they're both very good players. Don't get me wrong. But Conner, to me, as a guy you can sell and maybe get more than that true underlying talent. But the other option they have other than making a trade, I mean, they could just go with an unbalanced, the strong forwards.

There's an argument for that. But the other thing they could do is sign Myers, which, you know, is its own minefield. Wow. I didn't even consider that as an option, but you're right. That is something they could do. And, well, I remember, I remember reading a story about Bob Gooden now back in the day before the salary cap when the CBA negotiations were contentious in like the early 90s. And supposedly the story that I read, he loved the idea of unrestricted free agency being really limited

because it guaranteed there'd be a shallow, shallow market every year on July 1, and all of those guys would get massively overpaid. And it was a way to inject money in the system while seemingly doing teams of favor by limiting player movement. And I think we've seen, I mean, it doesn't work the same under a cap system. But the basic function's still there. You look at Tyler Myers. I mean, if you need a defenseman, a right-shot defenseman, Tyler Myers might be your best option in free agency.

Right. But that doesn't mean you need to sign him. Maybe you don't sign a free agent and you just say, you know what, we're going to live with this hole because he's going to get paid way too much money. He is. I would definitely let someone else foot that bill. And, you know, from Nikola Euler's perspective, and I think that's a great point that you brought up there that isn't being talked about enough.

It's you have this guy locked up now, what, he's making $6 million per for his age. 24 to 29 seasons, which is like the absolute meat and apex of his prime. And he had a down season. He missed, I believe, 20 games with injuries. He once again didn't perform up to people's expectations in the playoffs, albeit a six-game sample. And so people are freaking out and wondering whether he's overpaid, whether he is expendable. And it just blows my mind because when you watch this guy play, he is in complete command of the neutral zone. He's one of the best transition players I've seen in today's game. He's like your perfect winger in the modern NHL in terms of getting the puck from point A to point B with possession. He's a shot generation monster. He had a down season this

season, but it really does feel like we'll see what a potential return for him is, but I can't imagine you'd get actual fair value for what he is as a talent and what he'll probably be doing next season in whatever destination he's in. Well, the other thing is style, like you mentioned a lot about what he is stylistically. The other thing about him that that maybe gets, that's undersold is he's kind of a chaos forward in the way he generates his offense in the offensive zone. Like he's all over, he moves, he moves a ton. And that's really valuable. A lot of teams really like that. But, you know, a lot of teams also kind of get stuck on the whole north, south, meat potatoes, and they don't like that kind of chaos, even from their own guy, even when it's

generating stuff. And so Eilers, to me, I mean, I have all the time in the world for him, but I think you have to be a team that's open to, you know, letting him be creative, letting him do his thing. and I wonder a little bit if that hurt. I don't think it'll hurt the market for him much because teams are smart enough to realize he's signed through his prime years. You've cost certainty. I mean, you look at what free agents are getting,

six million bucks for that player. Even if he's a 65-point guy, and I'm very confident he's going to be more than that. That's good value. That's great value. And just in terms of the 5-15 effect and that chaos leading to him drawing just an insane amount of penalties all the time.

And, you know, we'll talk more about the hurricanes here as a high leverage team for us that we've had But they've been linked to him and they're like stylistically in terms of that pace they want to play at dominating the neutral zone being one of the better file on five teams in the league. He checks so many buckets there for them and is kind of like represents that talent infusion for them without necessarily paying an absolute premium where you can step right in. You know, they're going to pay more for them I imagine than what they paid for Nino Nita rider. But like adding buying these guys on the cheap while their while their value suppressed and them coming in and whether it's playing with Ajo or whether it's playing with

Martin Nekash and Svetikob next year, like all of a sudden, they're going to find creative ways to to get that talent infusion. And that's a very exciting proposition if you're a fan of the hurricanes that a guy like that could potentially be on your roster next season, assuming these rumors have any substance to them. Well, and I talked a little bit earlier about the difference between patience and procrastination. And I love what Carolina did with their defensemen because everybody thought last year Carolina was going to move one of the right shot guys. You got three right good right shot guys. That's too many. You got to move one of them. They kept them all year. And I mean, the best way to get a really good deal is to prove you're willing to walk away and they proved that you know what we can

run this as long as we want this year i think there's a market that is screaming for right shot defenders even more than a year ago and they're going to be able to cash somebody in at a very high price yeah i'm very curious to see what they do i guess we can get into the hurricanes right now like i lump them and the abs together as two teams that um you know this year really took a step um they had they both enjoyed playoff success uh the hurricanes one two series made of the carmen's final abs or one goal away from doing the same out west. And they're both teams that have a bunch of young pieces. They have kind of their nucleus in place.

They have financial flexibility. I don't know how much money they can spend in terms of getting actually fully up to the cap ceiling. But they have room to play with if they get creative. And they have assets, whether it's draft capital, whether it's prospects to potentially really push their chips in and consolidate their success here. And so that's one of the, you know, there's so many different stages for a lot of these organizations.

One of them is sort of the start of that rebuild or tearing down a, a, uh, a, group that used to be a contender, then there's kind of that ascent upwards. And then arguably, the toughest part here is going from being that like trendy young, fun team to becoming a contender for the next however many years. And I know we just said it runs counterintuitive because we just said with the jets how fleeting it can be and how like that step of the development for them was so expedited and seemingly it lasted for like a year. But if you're the hurricanes or the abs, this is such a high levered spot because if you nail this next summer or maybe in next two years, this window really sets you up for being good for the

next however many years. But if you sort of like sell yourself short and half acid and take half measures and sort of get safe guys into the roster, all of a sudden maybe you're limiting your ceiling. So I'm really curious to see how they approach it and how aggressive they are in trying to build off of it and be at legitimate contenders as soon as next season. Well, I don't think it is at odds with what we said about Winnipeg at all, because to me, Winnipeg's an example of a team that had this opportunity and really hamstrung themselves by not making the most of it. And now Carolina and Colorado are in that position, like you said, where this is the critical moment where you either you fly or you sink. And the hurricanes, the only thing with them is you wonder how much money

they actually have to spend and whether it's possible to, you know, be a $65 million team or whatever it is and have that sustained success. That's my only caveat with them, but they've been very smart about things. And to me, I, like, I know there's been discussions about maybe extending Justin Falk, but he's one of those contracts that has a reasonable cap hit, but a high actual cash output. Right. And so they have some flexibility. If they trade him, it's going to have a bigger impact than it even appears on the cap. It's going to give the free up some money to put everything in place. it's going to be a great summer, well, it's going to be a very interesting summer for them. And, you know, bringing in, you know, need to ride or some of their recent moves,

you have a lot of confidence that they're a team that can assess these things in an intelligent way and make good bets, whether they, those end up paying off or not. See, I would, I would heavily explore trading Justin Fall. Yes. I think. Well, he's so valued right now after that playoff run. He is. And the funny thing is, like, I don't, I don't know how the phrase is necessarily, because I do,

think like he has a positive value from an on-ice perspective. But I do think he is overvalued because like that one skill of his that shot and sort of what he could represent on the power play. Like their power play was horrendous and probably the reason why they lost so easily to the Bruins in the conference final. And it was atrocious all postseason. And it's because it was just so catered around just Justin Falk shooting from the point. And I remember like, well, it was it two or three years ago. He scored a bunch of power play goals. And I feel like that kind of like empowered and emboldened both him and the hurricanes to be like, well, this is a weapon. from the point. And just in today's game, like, we just see the bread and butter of the best

power plays is those cross-eam east-west passes, kind of setting up behind the net and working it out front. And for these teams, like the predators, the hurricanes, the Canadians who had the worst power plays in the league, the common denominator is like they all feel like they have one defenseman who has a big shot. Or two defensemen. Exactly. And so they're like, well, we need to cater our power play around this. And it just, it's really tough in today's game to have a successful power play going that route. And so for them, and not to mention sort of the 5-15 and the foot speed, like they have the defenseman in place where they can promote some of their younger guys, whether it's calling

Jake beat up from the H.L., whether it's finally giving Hayden Flurry a longer look to internally replace Justin Falk. And then if they could get a Niklai Euler's type forward or someone else for him there, like I just, I think the ceiling for that team increases so exponentially with a move like that. So that's something I'd be targeting. You know, a guy like Peschi, I like him a lot. Maybe I'd be a bit less reluctant or a bit more reluctant just because his contract is so good. And he's, as much as teams do seem to like him and appreciate that defensive type of

defensemen, I still feel like the value provides them is probably better than what they're going to get in a trade. Yeah. And I think if I'm Carolina, as tempting as it is to make that deal, both Pesci and Slavin, they have cost certainty for so many years. They're in their primes. If you're a budget team, those guys are worth their weight in gold. Yeah, no, I agree. And so I would be exploring the fog thing.

So we talked about the Jets and we talk about Trubo. Let's kind of pivot and talk about the Rangers, who I feel like we're both going to be singing a much different team. Wow. So they are, I mean, first off, can you imagine being a GM of another team now that's been rebuilding for a handful of years? And then your owner seeing what Jeff Gordon just accomplished in 18 months or even less,

and having to explain why you're still in year seven of your five-year plan of your rebuild. Like that must be a really tough sell. And I'm happy because it's going to, I hope stuff like this is going to lead to more accountability and sort of some of these questions being asked as opposed to just kind of blindly burying your head in the sand and being like, no, my team has a plan. We're rebuilding.

We'll get there eventually. You just got to be patient. You don't understand. He's in New York. Everybody wants to go to New York. I can't bring in the players he brings. in. Yeah, it's, uh, New York's been really impressive. And I, I was interested to see what would happen with Gorton because he did so much for those great Boston teams in a very brief window,

you know, I mean, he was there for a long time as an AGM, but his brief window as interim GM really set up a lot of things that, you know, would eventually lead to the 2011 championship. And, uh, they're, they're in good shape. I'm, I'm a little bit concerned about what might happen on their defense. Like there's rumors they might buy out chat and Kirk. And I, I look at it and I go, really? You're going to buy him out over Brendan Smith or Mark Stahl? Like, I know he's had a bad year, but was it that bad? But, like, they're really well set up.

Adam Fox, I think, is a, and you know what, it is one of those things where you have some advantages being the New York Rangers that other teams don't. But they've taken full advantage of it and they've really constructed and aggressive moves. Like the anti-Ranta Derek Stepan trade, that was one of those moves that moved him forward. they've been able to retool very quickly. And I think it puts a lie to the idea of these five-year plans where, you know, five years from now we'll make the first round of the playoffs. Well, it also lends great credence to this idea of like the value of asset accumulation. Yeah.

Because and I remember there was a weird pushback from Rangers fans at the trade line. I was noting how for the second straight year they were set to have 10 draft picks and how impressive that was. And there was a lot of like, well, you have to, it's one thing to have the picks. it's another thing to nail those draft picks and to get something from them. And it's like, well, that's kind of missing the point because you don't necessarily have to actually make those draft picks yourself. You can come to the draft and you can view opportunities to package a couple of them and trade up if you see a guy you like that's still available. You can wait and use them to get an actual player for your main roster as they did with Jacob Truba and with Adam Fox where they, you know, they gave up a couple of picks for a guy who was probably going to come and sign there anyways eventually.

But instead of risking it and letting it play out and seeing what happens, and him potentially going somewhere else and liking it enough and staying there long term, they had the draft capital where they can afford to package what a second and a third or whatever they was to get a guy like Fox and to speed up that process. And so I think if you're an opposing GM, you know, I just mentioned how you target you, you identify who you want to target and you keep calling them. I would just constantly be betting on other GMs making mistakes that you can cash in on

yourself. And so keeping cap space open, having extra draft picks, having financial and asset flexibility, all of a sudden, when a team does make a mistake, you're kind of john in a spot there waiting to take advantage of it and soak up some of their good players that they just can't afford anymore. And so we constantly keep preaching that and watching the Rangers actually execute it has been really a thing to watch and really enjoyable from sort of a smarter analysis perspective. Well, you make a great point about maintaining flexibility because if you're going to take advantage of situations,

you need assets and you need money. and those are your two main things. And if you don't have those, you know, an opportunity comes up and you can't do anything about it. So, yeah, there's just, there's literally no downside to doing it.

And you know what? If you end up making 10 picks, the whole, well, you know, making those picks correctly and is a thing. And there might not be room to develop all those guys. Well, that's why you're making 10 picks because you don't know who's going to pay off.

You have to go in volume to some point because you're making a bunch of bets. Hopefully you're making smart ones. And if you make 10 of them, you have a better chance of three of them paying off than if you make six. Well, and we talked about how the GMs that have been selling their ownership groups on patients in the five-year plans are sweating it. What about the GMs who come out and go like, listen, what do you expect me to do?

I can't go out and just acquire a top pair young defenseman in his prime. It's like, oh, well, all of a son, Jacob Trouba. Look at that. The Rangers just swooped in and got them. Oh, I can't acquire, you know, a top center. Those guys don't grow on trees. The blues make a couple backwards moves. in 2016, 2017, get a bunch of first round picks.

All of a sudden, they go out. They add the luxury to trade for Braden Shen. They have the picks that go out and the prospects to go and get Ryan O'Reilly when he's disgruntled in Buffalo. And all of a sudden, as long as you keep your assets and you keep room open, there's always going to be opportunities to present themselves. And that's what I keep preaching. I understand the sort of incentive for GMs, especially with a short leash or feeling like like on the hot seat to have moves to point to and have.

have guys they can trot out for press conferences in front of the media and go like, well, this is our new guy. This is what we're doing. But sometimes just waiting and patiently biding your time in this league can be just as important, if not even more beneficial. Well, I think a great example of that last year was Doug Wilson with Eric Carlson, right? Because they put their chips in the John Tavares basket. It didn't work out. And then he didn't make a panic move. But I don't think the Carlson deal came down until September, but he had the ability to make it at that time. And the idea, like, Truba is maybe not the best example just because I think there was a real perception that he was only going to go some places and not every team could make the trade.

But you look at some of the players, Ottawa's moved. Carlson was traded, Stone was traded. These are high-end impact guys. Yeah, you can bring those players in. There are opportunities in the market. And the way the salary cap works, there's always going to be opportunities in the market. There's always somebody who needs to shed money or shed assets or thinks Ryan O'Reilly can't win a Stanley Cup. There's always some craziness.

The O'Reilly trades may be the nuttyest of them all because St. Louis managed, St. Louis managed to do it without much in the way of real assets. No, of course. They said, you know, here's our two middle six forwards that are overpaid will make that the bulk of this trade. And I know Buffalo got some futures in there as well. Right. But the thing is, you can make those deals and it does take hard work. But that's why you're getting a seven-figure paycheck is because it's hard work. It's hard work.

Yeah, if anybody could do it, well, you know what, they'd grab Demetri and John and they'd pay a lot less for their GMs, and it wouldn't, you know, I can not bring in a top line center as well as the next guy. Yeah, if you want to cut costing, you want to only six-figure work, we'll take your call. We'll explore those opportunities. And I guarantee you, you know, when I come up with excuses for why I didn't acquire top-paring defensemen, they'll be good excuses. I'll put a lot of effort into them. Yeah, yeah, no, we'll put in the work.

Well, I guess let's pivot to the sharks then. This is why you're a broadcasting professional, bringing them up, and then we can easily segue way, here's my question for you. Why do people still make trades with Doug Wilson? He's like the opposite. If, like, you want to call certain GMs, if you see Doug Wilson's phone on your caller ID, like, just let it go to voicemail. I think it was Travis Yost, it said, hide your wallet. Yeah. You know, don't answer the phone or at least hide your wallet. He used to be Steve Eisenman. Now Doug Wilson's kind of taken that mantle of like, just don't trade with them. Well, and, you know, Wilson, like, not everything Wilson does turns to gold, but consistently in the trade market. Like,

the way he handled Mike Hoffman last year was just insane. I mean, he turned Mickle Bodker's dead cap hit into a bunch of assets just by playing the middleman. And he knew exactly what he was doing there, by the way. Like he knew what he was going to get. Like it wasn't like he acquired Hoffman and then he's like, oh, I can trade him. Like he like before he even had him, he already had a deal lined up. And basically, I mean, he moved out, Bodker's contract, you're right, kind of like a no-name prospect. A 2018-7th and a 2026th.

And he got back a fourth, a fifth, a second, and another fifth. Just for fielding some calls. Well, yeah, and if you were to trade Bodker straight across, what do you get for him? I don't think you get anything. I think you probably have to pay somebody to take his contract, yeah. Yeah, it was insane. I mean, so what? And very opportunistically, right, he swooped in trades for Van der Kaine, re-signs him long-term,

trades for Eric Carlson signs him long-term, basically used that second round pick that he got for the Hoffman trade to get Nyquist as a rental for much cheaper than we thought he'd go for. middleman Hoffman he got a second and a fourth for miracle Mueller before the expansion draft taking advantage of a devil's team that clearly thought they needed young defensemen he gets a second and a third for Justin Braun who has one year left on his deal at 3.8 everyone knew listen all of this is so much about leverage and sort of who has it and the sharks had no leverage here everyone knew that they had to trade Braun and probably even Dylan him coming up and he somehow got legitimate assets for what a 32 year old with one year left

on his deal who has been rapidly declining over the past couple seasons. It's like just the fact that he pulled that off. I was like I was amazed that he got two picks like I would have won I would have been like oh well at least he cleared cash like that's good yeah yeah if you can given the bind that San Jose was in just being able to move the money off the books was advantageous and I mean like brawn was a good defenseman at one point but it has been several years now since he was able to carry the load that, you know, historically he'd been able to do. And, uh, you, like me, look back at some of the trades Wilson's made over the years. Ryan Kloh or Doug Murray for two seconds, I think is the, the, uh, his masterpiece. And he kind of made that trade and I went, okay, well, that was great, but nobody's

going to do that anymore. And, you know, he does brawn this year. Exactly. Yeah. But, you know, he identified, he identified something that teams were overvaluing, which was a, a veteran right shot D who could play tough men or, you know, reputational he could play tough men, or, you know, we're going to see this was I'd say this summer. I think we're already seeing. It's like, This guy can play tough minutes. It's like literally anyone can play tough minutes. It means that they're on the ice for tough minutes. I can play tough minutes for you.

Send us out there. We can be on the ice for them. It doesn't mean we're going to do well. And a lot of these guys don't do well. And I understand it's a tough situation. But it's so bizarre to me when they get cited as a being a skill can play tough minutes. It's like, what does he do with them? If you're not doing anything else.

If you've got to, if you're getting out scored three to two, right? You're getting killed in those tough minutes. So it's no good. I mean, I'm going to get out scored, you know, 35 to zero. Oh, we do worse. But, but I mean, you can take somebody who's not a quote-unquote tough minutes defensemen, stick him in that role and he can suck just as well as Justin Braun does. It's a weird situation.

And I think what it is with Braun is he's a guy who historically was able to succeed in that role. And for whatever reason, I don't know what's up with Philadelphia, but they think he can still do it even after two or three years of being demonstrably unable to do it. Well, okay, let's put a pin in the flyers. We'll talk more about them in a second. I want to finish off on the sharks here because, you know, they're clear, people are worried about their cap situation. And I think Doug Wilson has shown time and time again, he'll probably wiggle out of this and be better off for it. I'm really curious to see what the next dominoes are.

I think, you know, you and I were discussing before we went on the air, there's very few sort of conventionally bad contracts on this team at the moment. It's a lot of functional guys and a lot of their best players are just making a ton of money. I think other than the Martin Jones contract, and I don't want to say anything's immovable, they probably just don't want to move him. They seem like they organizationally like him more than we do for whatever reason, and maybe that's kind of a blind spot for them. But is there a worst contract right now on their books? Melker Carlson, one year left at $2 million.

Like I think that might be the worst value that they currently have on their roster. Yeah, and I mean, if Melker Carlson's a UFA today, I bet you somebody pays them $2 million without any too much trouble. Yeah, San Jose. San Jose is a great example of what happens when you have a good GM under a cap system. You have to make tough choices. You just have to make sacrifices. And that's where the sharks are because they've got Carlson Burns and Vlasic on the back end and they've got all these guys up front. And they're just in one of those binds where they have to make the team a little bit worse because they're out of money. But none of the deals that they have on the books are really problems today.

I mean, I think if you were like really just going to be cutthroat about this and just purely all business, like I imagine what you could get for Vlasic right now would heavily trump what he's actually worth as an on ice player at this point of his career and based on the contract he has as well and how you expect that's going to age considering the term on it. But I just don't see that move happening right now for them unless they get super desperate. So, you know, teams that make these commitments. They do make these commitments because they believe in the players. And so you don't usually see them cut. Because, I mean, I think you can make the same case about Brent Burns. You've got Carlson under contract now. How much, you know, I don't think there's a lot of demonstra.

I mean, maybe Burns and Carlson are good enough that it's an exception, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of demonstrable value in having two elite power play defensemen on the same team. Right. You can, but, but again, you know, teams make these commitments because they love the players and they believe in the players, so you don't expect to see the move. Well, speaking of making the commitments, like, it's funny because Doug Wilson, understandably is clearly going all in with this roster just based on where they're at

and the personnel they have. It's funny because it's like similar to sort of the Dean Lombardi thing we saw. Now Dean Lombardi won the two Stanley Cups for the Kings. So I think people can't be too upset about it. But it was like very clear as it was happening and some of the contracts that are being signed, it's like we're going to go for these cups and then afterwards it's someone else's problem. And now it's Rob Blake's problem. But it's clear that's clearly what's going on with Doug Wilson.

And he does, he only has the one Stanlil's. the final appearance to show for it here. And we'll see, I think, heading into next year, assuming nothing crazy happens, they'll once again be one of the favorites out West. If this happens in the next couple of years for them, while these guys still are, at least in the latter stages of their prime, no one's going to care. But it's pretty clear. Like, what, Douglas in 61, he's been with the shark since 2003.

Like, he's, he doesn't care about what's going to happen in 20, 23 when these guys are in their late 30s. He cares about what's happening right now. Well, and it's not even, I can't even really argue with the mindset. Like, obviously, you have to have to. have one eye on the future all the time, but you're trying to win. That's the objective. And if you, if you're in a position where you think your team's good enough, and San Jose to me is a lot like St. Louis, where they've been so good for so many years, it hasn't paid off in a championship,

but it's not one of these teams that's going, you know, oh, well, you just got to make the playoffs. As soon as you make the playoffs, anything can happen. No, they're a legitimately good team. They've been a legitimately good team for a long time. All you can do is support that core and, uh, and do the best to win. And, and the one thing about Wilson that I'd add is, it's been very interesting to watch San Jose continue to be competitive as guys like Joe Thornton in that older core age out because, you know, we think about Burns and Blasick and Logan Couture is sort of this older core. You know, those guys were the young up-and-comers and maybe maybe five years from now. We'll be talking about San Jose still going for it with their their ancient

core and, you know, Kevin LeBank and Tim O'Mire, they're getting up there. They're past their primes now. It's one of those things where they've been able to keep sustained success through what should have been a rebuild cycle. Well, yeah, they had, what, the one top 10 pick in this time, and it got Tim O'Meier for it. Yeah, yeah. And obviously, getting a guy like hurdle and whatever they got, like, in the back half of the first round certainly helps a lot.

But, you know, that's what the next steps here for them are fascinating, because I think, speaking of, like, emotionally distancing yourself from the situation, I understand what Pavelski means to that team and organization, having been there his entire career and being the center for them and this kind of inspirational playoff run he had where he went through some really brutal injuries and still came back and still bruised for them. But I mean, he's turning 35 and this idea that you're going to pay him market value at this point of his career with the other contracts you have on that team.

Like, there's one thing to go all in with the team you have, and it's another to like just a poison bill contract because that's what I think paying him whatever, seven million or whatever he's probably going to command on the open market, regardless of term, even if it was for like two or three years, it would just be really tough to reconcile at this point, considering their needs elsewhere. Well, and you know, you mentioned Dean Lombardi before. That was the real issue with L.A. I mean, yeah, he made some big contract bets to win right now,

but he also made loyalty contract bets after they won. He said, you know, this guy helped us when we're going to pay him this. You can't do that. And Doug Wilson, I mean, I think it's hard to be really cold-blooded about this stuff when you're in a GM shoes. He's been pretty good about it. And one of the advantages San Jose had, and we've seen it with Joe Thornton, is they haven't been afraid to sign guys on short-term deals,

banking that they'll be able to resell. find them the next year on a one-year deal. Yeah, I mean, what we saw with Paddy Marlow where the Leafs clearly valued his sort of like veteran presence and all that. And the Sharks were like, okay, you guys can have him. It sucks to let him go. But what are you going to do? We just can't do it.

And I think that is what going to happen here because. Well, and if they want Patty Marlo back, they can get him back right now. I'm sure. No, yeah, easily. I think the Lees would love that. But, no, it's, I mean, I don't mean, like, Belski can still go. He's still a good player. I just think, especially if he hits the open market at this point, like, there's going to

be someone out there that's going to be willing to pay him more than he's actually worth just because of what he represents and kind of that infusion of a veteran who can still play for you in the top six right so like it just seems like from the sharks perspective that's going to be someone else's problem and then they shift their attention to mire and leban who both need deals and who are both kind of open as rfas and we'll see if any of these offer sheets come to fruition this summer but mire is i think mire is like my favorite offer sheet candidate from the perspective of like the most realistic scenario where it's like So if you give him, because they recently released the compensation list, right?

And if it's between 6.7 and 8.4 million, it's two first, a second and a third, which seems steep. But if you're getting a 23-year-old who is already, I'd say he's a star. He's going to be, I think, a superstar based on the way he's trending. And if you actually started giving him full-time power play minutes. And if he gets an $8 million average salary, like, I'm curious to see how the sharks make that work. Whoa, whoa, whoa, that's, that's Kevin Hayes money. Let's, uh, let's not go crazy here. Yeah, yeah, no, you're right.

No, but it's funny. And I, I'm really curious to see what happens with offer sheets. Because every year I'm like, oh, you know, this is the year we could have offers. When you live with dry siddle, I mean, like, the oilers just open themselves up where pre-dress rally is like literally like, I don't care what it is, we're going to match it. Yeah. And no one called him on the buff and no one forced them to even sign him for more than he was probably worth. Well, I think a lot of the second contract inflation we've seen has been a

result of the dry-siddle deal because you you pay 12.5 million dollars for connor mcdardt david sure whatever nobody's going to be able to say well connor macdavid got 12.5 clearly i'm more but leon dry-sidle at the time was coming off i think a 77 point season on mac david's wing yeah if he's worth eight and a half what's vladimir teresaenko worth what's all all these uh players that are worth now um with offer sheets i think the shift might be the the reason i think there might be a bit of a shift this year. I'm not betting on it because I never bet on it anymore because they've so, teams have shown themselves so reluctant to engage in offer sheets. But you look at what Jeff Skinner went for. You look at what Kevin Hayes went for. I mean, you know, if you can sign a 29-year-old

for $9 million bucks in free agency or you can sign a 23 year old for $8.5 million as an RFA, but give up a pick, I'd much rather have a guy signed from age 23 through age 30 than a guy signed from age 28 through age 35, even if I'm giving up the additional assets, and especially if I'm saving a little bit of money in the bargain. Yeah. I mean, the two firsts are tough, but at the same time, like, I don't know, just from a value perspective, that is an interesting proposition. I mean, we're talking about a guy who's 23. You're right. He was 17th and 5-1-5 goals, and 20th and 5-15 points, and fifth in shot rate at 5-1-5. And it's like, just because of how stacked that team was at how many offensive weapons they had, he didn't really get any

power play time. So his actual box card numbers aren't necessarily as great as his 5-1-5. production was and there's no reason to believe that he can't be a dominant 515 producer as well with his sort of frame and skills around the net. So it's, I don't know, I want to be fascinated to see he, it does seem like the sharks are vulnerable because there's only a limit to what they can go to match. And he is a player who still seems like he has room to grow while already having shown enough for us to believe that it's not kind of just like pure speculation. Like you kind of know already that he's going to be very good. It's just a question of, I guess, of how good he's going to be. Well, my colleague at the athletic, Daniel Nugent Bowman, was talking to Ken Holland about what it would take to trade the number eight pick.

And I think he said something along the lines of, you know, a good 22 or 23-year-old NHLer. So you think about it in those terms. And yeah, a lot of times you trade even a good pick for, you know, you trade a top 10 pick for an NHL or like that. If you're a middling team or you're a middling to good team or, you know, you're a good to great team, the idea of trading two late first-round picks for a guy like Timel Myers, it's an easy decision. have the cap space. And I think this is a clear area. Somebody at some point is going to exploit it. Who knows if it's this year. But you have these teams with cap space that go out and sign third line guys to four-year deals. No, stop doing that. Go get somebody who can really help you. And why not put the screws to your divisional rival? Like if you're in, if you're in the

Pacific, yeah, hit San Jose. If you're in the Atlantic, yeah, hit Toronto. Hurt these teams that you have to go through to get to the playoffs anyway. It's literally a no-lose scenario for you. Two-step program that I want to see. One, Colorado Avalanche first signed Miko-Ranton so they don't expose themselves to retribution. And two, sign Timo Meyer to an offer sheet. And that's how they get the sharks back for that Landis Gogh outside call in Game 7. But think about it this way. From the abs perspective, we were talking, we were talking about hurricanes and how they want to take this next step to being from good to great. And we like what we saw last year. And they have all these assets. They have the financial flexibility.

If you're the abs, they've got the fourth and 16th overall pick this year. So you're already basically loading up your prospect pipeline. So future picks for you and assuming you're going to be as good as you think you are don't necessarily mean that much to you. You have the cap space. And imagine just adding a guy like Tim O'Meier to the ranks to play with the McKinnons, the Landiskovs, Randons of the world. Like something like that, it seems ambitious because I just don't think it's going to happen

and with, especially with conference rivals. But like this seems like it's the perfect spot for a team to just go like, you know what, screw you, we're going to do this. No, you know, you're thinking about this wrong, Dimitri. The correct approach is the Flyers approach where you bring in Justin Braun and Matt Niskenen and trade for the rights to Kevin Hayes. That's the way it's done. That's the way things are done at the big boys at the National Hockey League. It's, yeah, you know what?

I understand about retribution. I understand not wanting to expose your own RFAs to that. It's a legitimate concern. But if you've got things taken care of in-house, and especially if you're hitting a team that's vulnerable, this is a much better use of your cap space than signing middle-tier or even upper-tier-free agents given the age. considerations. Yeah. Yeah, no, definitely. If you handle your business in-house, you don't have anything to worry about with the retribution thing, really. Okay, let's end with the flyers then, because they've been very active. Yes. It's old school Paul Holmgren flyers where they

buy us for action. They somehow took on 15 million extra dollars of cap space for next year before even knowing what next year's cap is. I understand they had the room to do so, but it's pretty funny to think about that we don't even know what next year's cap is going to be and we're still, what, 12 days or 11 days away from free agency. The draft doesn't even happen yet and they're just like, no, we're going all in. We're making stuff happen. And on the one hand, we talk about the sharks going all in, considering the ages of Zhu, Boracek, some of their forwards, I understand the idea behind it. I just think the execution of the actual players that they got in, I think it's really tough to make the argument that the flyers are significantly better

now than they were two weeks ago, considering that they just took on $15 extra million dollars of cap liability. Yeah, they're not nearly improved enough for the money they spent. And the point about where the cap is going to be is a great one because if it comes in at 815 or something like that, all of a sudden there's going to be new opportunities in the market. And because you spent that $15 million in cap space you had, you're no longer in a position to take advantage of them. It's baffling. And it's especially baffling when you look at how the flyers are structured. Like Ron Hextall was super pay. It's crazy to think about Ron Hextall. When you think of him as a player, you know, holding back the crazies and Phillies

front off. It's going, no, no, no, be patient. Think about how quickly his patience was undone here. Yes, it's, it's crazy. And you look at their D, like you, you know, you Proverov and Sanheim, they've got a good young defense. Gosses bear?

Yeah, Sean Couturier is in the prime of his career. Like, this is a good team. It's a team that should be good for a long time. And, I mean, I, like, I'm pro Matt Niskinan, but that's too much money. And you've retained on Radco Gutas. And, you know, you're replacing him with Justin Braun. Like, this is, this is,

this is not a recipe for success. It's, I have a little bit more time for Kevin Hayes. No, he makes their team better, certainly. Especially down the middle, you know, I think they're still unsure of what Nolan Patrick really is. They don't want to play Giroux in the middle. They want to play them on Catrari's wing mostly.

And it makes sense that Kevin Hayes is kind of your prototypical playmaking, second line center. It's similar to what Winnipeg, Winnipeg wanted to do last year at the deadline to bring him in and surround some of their shooters with his passing. I get it. But the investment and sort of the opportunity and sort of the opportunity. opportunity cost of what else you could have done is upsetting, I guess, considering the pieces in place gave them so much upside,

considering how patiently they were reloading and then now this is all they have to show for it. Well, and you know what? If you have $15 million in cap space, spending $7 million on Kevin Hayes, it's defensible because he's a guy who can legitimately make a difference in the present. Yes, you're overpaying, but if you're going to win in the future, you want to win today. That's the best way to win tomorrow is to win today. But if you're also spending the $8 million on Braun and Niskin, then it becomes so much more difficult. Because you can't just say, well, we have the cap space to work with

because you've used it all now. And, yeah, Hayes alone I would have been okay with, but the other deals they made, it really undermines them. Okay, well, sign off with this. Here's your question of the day. How many, and I love asking hockey people with this, and it's going to be my next thing for the summer, how many teams this summer are going to make regrettable mistakes

thinking they're the next St. Louis Blues? because we always talk about this being a copycat league and we've already seen teams come out and go, you look at the blues. They were in last place. They were in last place. You never know. This is a league full of parody.

You never know. And I think there's going to be so many GMs, so many owners that talk themselves into them being the next team that just sticks around long enough. They can get over the hump. And they're going to double down on that. And I'm very curious. I don't know who it's going to be.

It might be the Flyers with the way they've approached this summer. It might be the Minnesota Wild. I don't know who it's going to be. to be, but there's going to be teams that set themselves back for however many years just because they think they're the next St. Louis Blues. Well, if you're an NHLGM, I get saying it. You know what? Look, anything can happen.

Buy tickets. Buy tickets. Of course. But if you believe it, it goes back to what we were talking about with Eilers and Kyle Connor, you know how there's that true underlying value and then there's the ups and the downs and you don't want to sell a guy in a down point. You don't want to buy a guy at an up point. You want to buy them at true value or lower.

To me, you look at St. Louis and how bad they were at the start of the year. year, St. Louis's true value was never last place team in the league. They were way underachieving. You know, and so the fact that they, you came back, win the Stanley Cup, if you're Edmonton, if you're Vancouver, it doesn't mean anything to you. You're not St. Louis. You are legitimately a bad team. St. Louis never was. So it's, but yeah, GMs are going to make big mistakes. I mean, it's the nature of free agency and especially the teams that are bad or tend to be the teams that make the mistakes anyway. The Blues are a team.

If you look at their skater group, that patiently built up this group that was all pretty much in their prime, and they just needed a coach who knew what he was doing and a goalie who could make a save. And all of a sudden, that was a difference for them. It wasn't size and grittiness

and hanging around for long enough. Well, I've said this a few times, but when Chicago and L.A. were two really awesome teams. Chicago didn't beat L.A. by outgritting and being heavier and bigger than L.A. And L.A. never beat Chicago by being smaller and faster and sneakier than Chicago. L.A. beat Chicago by being L.A. and Chicago beat L.A. by being Chicago.

So don't go try and be St. Louis. Be whoever you are. Right. Beat them with the strengths you have. You don't have to be, you don't have to be big and gritty team. You don't have to be small and fast to be a small and fast team. You just have to be good, get good players. And that's something that St. Louis, that's the real lesson of St. Louis. They got a lot of good players. Do that. Yeah. All right. Jonathan, let's get out of here. Plug some stuff. What are you working on this weekend? I know it's a busy time for you. It is a busy, busy time.

The draft, who knows? I'll be responding to news. I'm going to be doing a great big post-mortem on the 2019 draft should come out. Hopefully Monday. We'll see what it's like. It's going to be long. And hopefully add some insight. I've got some really good quotes already.

It should be a fun piece. Nice. Well, I think the oil is going to be busy. I think they're going to be trying to do something. So I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be an interesting weekend. All right, man. I'm glad we finally got to do this in person.

And hopefully you can do it again sometime soon. Definitely. Before we get out of here, I just wanted to quickly give everyone a big thank you for making this amazing 300 episodes of the Hockey P.D.O. cast feed possible. It's crazy to think about it. It's so, so many hours of myself and countless others talking about a game. But the fact that you all show so much support and love to it is incredible and keeps the show going and makes me look forward to the future and to hopefully 300 more or many even more. after that, assuming we could still keep this going. So for those of you that have went out of your way to give the show love and support, I thank you for those of you that haven't yet done so. Please consider taking a minute to go on iTunes and leave the podcast, the rating and review, spread the word, go share it on social media, do whatever you can because all that goes

obviously a long way to ensuring that the bills are paid and that this podcast remains. on the air. So with that said, you know, hopefully you guys enjoy these two shows that we released back to back. There's the mock draft episode 300 with Cam Robinson and Uffi Bodeen. Just did this kind of NHL bounce around hot topics with Jonathan Willis and we'll see. I think with so many people here in Vancouver for this weekend, I'm going to try to do a couple more. We're going to certainly do a draft recap and a draft weekend recap, which might include some trade analysis, hopefully, if that happens over the next couple days. And then next week, we'll be gearing up for the free agency period.

And we'll be doing some previews there as well. And then we're going to transition to the offseason. But don't worry, the PDOCast is going to keep going. It's going to keep popping up with new episodes on your feed throughout the offseason. Maybe in July and August, it'll be more like once a week or once every two weeks. But we're not going anywhere. We're going to keep the good times going. And so I'm looking forward to all that.

So thanks for listening. Enjoy your weekend. Enjoy the draft weekend. Hopefully your team gets the players you want. and make some smart moves, and we will be back soon. So with that said, let's play that outro music. The Hockey P.D.Ocast with Dmitri Filipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovic and on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com slash hockeypedocast.