The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 321: Big Coworker Energy

Episode Date: October 31, 2019

Emily Kaplan joins the show to discuss storylines from the first month of the season, the early returns on big offseason moves, and a whole lot more. 3:00 Business as usual for the Bruins8:50 Islanders proving last year was no fluke13:45 Can the Panthers buy a save?17:20 Life after Panarin for the Blue Jackets24:00 Alex Ovechkin continues to do his thing32:00 Secondary scoring for the Avalanche37:20 The Blues without Tarasenko40:30 The Predators identity change45:00 The Rangers and Blackhawks rebuildsSee 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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Welcome to the HockeyPedioCast. My name is Dimitri Philopovich, and joining me is my good buddy Emily Kaplan. Emily, what's going on? Not much. Good buddy and co-worker. Can we say that now? That's true. Oh, what do you mean? Can we say that now? I mean, that's been true for the past, like, almost year now. I think I started off with ESPN back in last December. So, yeah, we're coming up on the anniversary here soon. What are your thoughts on the word co-worker? I don't know if there's a Canadian connotation there. I used it the other day, and someone was really offended by it. They thought it sounded like rude or a little sterile. Would you prefer colleague? Yeah, maybe. Yeah.

I mean, you said buddy, so I think buddy and co-worker is good if we loop them together. Yeah, well, I mean, buddy can kind of have like a negative connotation too. You know, it can kind of be a little low-key hostile if you're using it. I guess it comes with like a certain tone, right? Yeah, like a buddy. Yeah, a little condescending. I could see it. Yeah, I'm not your buddy, pal.

Yes, that's it. That's it. All right, so this is, this is exciting. Today we're going to keep up with the theme of the week here on the Pidioka. I had Mike Johnson on in the most recent episode and we sort of bounced around. and talked about teams that have either exceeded or underwhelmed their early season expectations so far and kind of what's stood out for us. And we're going to keep that going today.

And I'll open the floor to you and you can pick whichever team you want to start off with. And we'll just go from there. Is there any teams that you've been kind of keeping an eye on or have really had your eyebrow raised because of their performance, either good or bad? Hmm. And you know, this is probably a bad one to start with because I think they're, matching expectations, but the Bruins look really good. I would love to talk about the Bruins. Yeah, I had them number one on my list actually, too. So it's like, yeah, we're, we've got that

big coworker energy going on right now. Yes, yes, ECE. Yeah. The Bruins, you're right. I mean, they technically don't fit into this because I think everyone went into the season being like, yeah, they're going to be pretty good. I mean, they were within a home win of winning the Stanley Cup last year and they had similar expectations heading into the season. But I think what's stuck out to me, is I don't know if you feel this way, but I just have so much respect for like how surgically they execute their game plan. Like they have this proven formula and they just stick to it. And it's the same as last year. It's the same has been in the past. And until further notice, I just expect they're going to keep doing kind of turning it over and doing the same thing. Obviously the same names are still

there. But I feel like with the kind of system and structure they have right now, aside from like Bergeron, Marshan and Pasternak, you could kind of fit in all the other pieces around them. And I feel like they're just going to, this well-old machine that's just going to keep churning out victories and churning out dominant performances like they did the other night against San Jose. Yeah, totally. The big thing for me, firstly, I think Pastornak would be probably at least top three for me in the early votes for Hart. He's having a terrific beginning of the year.

For me, the big question is that top line and as it pertains to depth scoring because we've seen them have issues before with the top line when it's clicking is so freaking dominant. And that's when it's been right now. And then behind that, they're getting a hard time with second. secondary scoring. And it was really difficult for them, I think, early on when they had David Critchie out. And then you have Crachie come back in that San Jose game. And then all of a sudden, like, whoa, you get valid scoring again. You have all four lines contributing to the score sheet. So I'm curious, and Bruce Cassidy talked to me and Greg about this on our podcast, ESPN on ice.

He said that once Crachie was out, he didn't feel comfortable breaking up that top line just because of the chemistry they have. But when you get Crachie back, he can move around a couple things, maybe play Pastor Nack with him. So I'm curious over the next, you know, a couple games, even couple weeks, what they do with that top line. And we saw that last postseason where I felt like Pastor Narc was moving around a little bit as they tried to get him going. And I think he was hampered by that thumb injury he had. And he wasn't the same. And we've kind of seen what Pastor Nak firing on all cylinders is so far this season. But you're right.

I mean, we did see last year with Charlie Coyle as the tradeout on acquisition with Marcus Johanson, and just how important getting that kind of reliable secondary scoring was for this team because you'd know what you're going to get from that top line. And once you add reliable goals here and there from secondary sources, all of a sudden, they become that much more difficult to face. But, I mean, like when I say that formula, you know, you just look at like the goaltending, for example. Last year, a big story for me was how they managed to Carrasque's workload and how fresh you look come the postseason. And they did so by starting them only 45 times in the regular season.

And so far here, through 12 games, we've got seven starts for Rask, we've got five starts for Halak. And it looks like they're going to do a similar thing there again. And the defense in front of them, I mean, must make life so easy for them just from like what they limit in terms of the passing lanes and scoring chances. And they're once again top two in pretty much every single goal in shot suppression category. So I mean, it's one thing like the Pasternak's offensive totals and how good their power play is. That's one thing. But also just what they do on their own advice, that's kind of like their bread and butter. Yeah.

The last thing I'll say on them and maybe we'll move on for everyone who thinks that everyone has a Boston bias to begin with. is too much time on them. But the goaltending split. And you know, you mentioned I totally agree with you. In last year's playoffs, Tuka Rask mentioned it a couple times. Like, I feel fresh, and this is why I'm playing so well. And Cassidy told us that their team ran some data, and they found that

Tuka Rask is better when his workload is smaller. And it's a lot closer to 50 games, and it is 65 games. And because they have such a good backup in Yoroslav, Halak, and they did before that in Kodobin, they feel comfortable doing that. So I think it's a trend we're about to see across the league. I really do. You know, you see a team like Chicago going out and getting Robin Lanner because they knew that

Corey Crawford probably needed a better backup than Cam Ward was last year. But this is something that I feel like we're going to see more and more. And Tuka's honestly putting up Vezza to numbers right now and I just don't know if would win the award with the workload he's going to get. Yeah, but I think the counterpoint is if everyone around the league starts embracing it and every goal he's just starting around 45, 50 times, then maybe it might become a bit of a mood point. But as the dog in the background agrees, a little whimpering. I was about to say this is probably a good time to introduce my secondary,

your secondary guest, little did you know, Red, the dog I'm dog sitting is here to contribute as well. Well, welcome to the show, Red. I'd ask you how you're doing, but I don't think we're going to get a satisfactory answer. He's pretty ball-focused right now.

Yeah. Yeah, with Rask, though, 9-51 save percentage so far, almost plus six goals saved in just those seven starts. I mean, really building off that, remarkable playoff performance. So I think that's going to continue. And one final thing for me on the Bruins before we do move on from them,

their power play. You know, clearly it was like their main driving force last year offensively during that run to the cup final. And we talked a lot about it, especially in that Kane series where it just really took over. They're once again first in efficiency in both goals and conversion percentage. But for me, what I noticed with them, and it's kind of carrying over from that postseason run is,

and I implore people to watch this when they're watching these Bruins games, is how they get it. it done because I believe last I checked like 10 of their 13 power play goals or so so far, maybe even 11, have come within 10 seconds of establishing possession either off of a faceoff win in the offensive zone or entering it off the rush on a zone entry. That's wild. So just like they are, and it kind of runs, it's in a sense, it's intuitive because it's like, you know, you want to try to score quickly, but also we see teams sometimes like pass it around

on the perimeter and try to soak up that full two minutes and sort of give the, give their team a little bit of a break in terms of defending and not necessarily pushing the pedal to the medal and trying to score. But for them, like, they don't want to let the opposing penalty kill sort of settle and create that shell in front of them. So they just, as soon as they get in, they're quickly firing it around, trying to get it ultimately to pass your knack on a one-timer. And it works. And we talk all the time about how it's a copycat league and how teams are sort of taking what's successful from others. And I think that's something that the smart team should be paying attention to because even if you don't have, you know, Pastor Nagmar, Shain,

Krug, and Bergeron, you can make it work by just attacking quickly and sort of not letting opposing defenses rest and settle. So I think that's something that really interesting that I've noticed. But beyond that, I mean, the Bruins are what they are. It's kind of a given. We all know what to expect from them. So they're not that particularly interesting. You know, a team that has surprised me a little bit this year is the New York Islanders. Dude, I was literally going to bring them up next. Yeah. Well, and I guess maybe it's not surprising from the perspective of they were good last year.

They swept the penguins. They kind of brought back the same formula this year. Now, I guess you could have viewed that as a positive or negative because I think a lot of us identified them as a regression candidate. And we were hoping that they'd add more of a scoring punch and kind of diversify their portfolio there. But they just rolled it back and they basically looked like that same team again. And they are similarly a well-old machine in terms of they do a certain number of things very well. And ultimately, that's enough for them to win a lot of hockey games. Yeah.

I was obviously interested in this team of what the goaltending would look like because last year that was the huge storyline, right? Like you get troughs coming in with his system. You get, who's that goalie coach? Why can I think of his name right now? Mitch corn. Mitch corn. Thank you. They get Mitch corn in there.

And then all of a sudden you've got a Vezna, Candid, Robin Lanner. They obviously, they didn't think that Lainer was going to keep it up, and they felt like their system. They're so confident and they could bring anyone else in. Thomas Grice has looked pretty good, you know, in his six starts. And Barlamov, I think, has looked okay. Pretty good, probably about as expected. I think still Lainer is a better goalie, but that was the financial decision that they decided to make. Another thing that really interested me about this team, though, is the fact that they're trying to bring these kids up.

We see Noah Dobson is on the roster. He only got three games in. I think one of them was that game that they played seven defensemen. and if you listen to Lou Lambello talk, like they'd love to play him in the A right now, but can't because of his status, you know, he's a junior hockey candidate. It doesn't sound like they're going to bring him down there.

So I really feel like they need to get him into games. And then Wallstrom's another guy they have up. He's got five games. He's been scoreless since. So if they've been able to do this so far without contributions from those young guys, I wonder as as the season goes on and then incorporate them and they get some confidence,

how much better they could be. Yeah, I've actually been pretty encouraged by Wallstrom. You mentioned that he hasn't scored yet, but from what I've seen, like, he's flashed that incredible shot of his. And I bet he's going to be one of those guys where once he's in the offensive zone, it takes like one split second of the defense resting up and he all of a sudden puts him back of the net. And so that'll be a huge development for this team, clearly if they can get another sort of easy source of offense through his shot, if that does develop as the year it gets going.

But the other thing that I've noticed that I've been really impressed by and that I think elevates his team's ceiling is it really does feel like Trots is finally either fully trusted or is like taking the training wheels off Matt Barzal. Yeah. You know, last year he played 1358 at 5-1-5. This year it's up to 17-17 per game, and only Connor McDavid's playing more than him at 5-15 amongst forwards.

And so, like, on one hand, like maybe we shouldn't be giving them too much credit. It's like, oh, you're playing your best player a lot of minutes. Like, congratulations. But it is a big step, I think, for both Barzell and Characin, in their partnership in terms of that trust and in terms of clearly, you know, he's doing enough defensively out there for Trots to trust him to send him out there. And so he can create offense for them as well.

And he's been terrific. I think there's no surprise that or no coincidence that during the seven-game winning streak of theirs, Barzal, has five goals and eight points. And he, for a team, you know, Brock Nelson, hashtag Brock Tober has been awesome once again. And they have certain guys that do certain things well. But I think Barzal is one of their few players that can sort of single-handedly, take a game over offensively and create for others as well as himself. And so the more they play him, the better I feel about this team creating enough offense

to support that defensive structure and that goal tending that we can know we can rely upon from a Barry Trots team. Totally. And the last thing I'll say on them is just that reliability of the defense. I think it's interesting, you know, as you've seen them start the year and to where they're at now, it's only a month in, but we've been really consistent with the deep hearings that Barrett Trots has put out. He loves having a left hand side guy, right-hand side guy.

He really hasn't mixed them up much. And they've been solid. And I really feel like at the end of the playoffs or their playoff run last year, especially as they beat Pittsburgh and really shut down Sidney Crosby and their top scores, Adam Pelick and Ryan Poolock are an underrated top pairing. And they're only going to get better because they're so young. Yeah, they actually do have, and you mentioned, you know, Dobson earlier and how they haven't been able to get them into games.

They're one of the few teams that has like a surplus of competent defensemen. It feels like there's a shortage of that in the league, but they have so many. And it's, it's, you don't have kind of the household names or the star brand name players, but they just have a lot of guys who are good and reliable. And so it goes a long way for this team. Okay, so we've done the Bruins, we've done the Islanders. Who else do you have on your list? Should we talk about the Panthers?

Yeah, let's do it. I have them on my list. All right. So obviously the big story when you just look at the Panthers start is Bobrovsky, right? They spend a ton of money on him and his numbers just are terrible. He's pretty much sucked all through October. I wrote down his numbers because it's under a 900-safe percentage. I know that.

But the interesting thing to me is what is going on with this offense and how they're going to look under Joel Quenville. And, you know, they've been really dependent over the years on kind of the sneaky depth of the top six. And they've been without Trocheque for a bit, which is, you know, kind of shuff them around. But they really need guys like Hoffman, in my opinion, to be a little more consistent. And he's someone who I've seen in his short career already in Florida, just kind of be a a streaky guy. He started the season off strong and now is not so much. So I'd love to hear your take on that. Yeah. Okay. Let's do the Bobrovsky thing and the defensive thing first because I think that's obviously what sticks out with his team. I mean, the other night, they just got absolutely

blitzed by the Canucks. And we can talk more about the Canucks later. Yeah, the offensive juggernaut, Kinnock. Yeah, exactly. And so, you know, year one of a $10 million per year deal, 70 million total for Abrowski. He has an 870% percentage and minus 8.6.6%. And minus 8.6 goal save, which is only ahead of Jonathan Quick this season. And so that's bad. Now, what I will say is, I don't think Sergey Bobrovsky suddenly forgot how to stop Pucks overnight and just completely fell off. And, you know, we saw this a bit last year as well, where he had an 882 say percentage in 7 October games. And then he comes back in November 932. And he was up and down throughout the season. But we, we know that when he gets going, he's one of the best goalies in the league still. And all concerns about

the contract aside and how he's going to age and what it's going to look like in years four or five, six down the road. I still believe in him this season and I think he'll eventually turn this around. The defense in front of them, you know, last year, it was easy to point blame at Rymer and Luongo and say they weren't good enough and, you know, they certainly weren't winning them a lot of games, but the defense in front of them was so bad as they were just kind of going for broke offensively that I thought there's only so much they could do. They've been a bit better under Quenville. The numbers still aren't great, but, but Brovsky keep playing like Sergey Babrovsky is going to go a long way towards fixing all of that.

Offensibly, that's one area where I really don't have very many concerns about this team. Like, you know, Sasha Barkov, I believe still hasn't scored yet, but he just has a ton of assist and he'll eventually get going. That power play is so good. The top six is going to get its share of goals. So when I come back, when I think about this team, all I think about is like they just need to stop being like the 30th ranked team in terms of goals against and save percentage and they'll be fine. now in that Atlantic maybe there is a bit of an opening with Tampa Bay and Toronto starting off so slowly

but Buffalo has been kind of the team that's capitalized upon that so maybe this first 10 game stretch is a bit of a lost opportunity for the Panthers to bank more points but I'm still relatively optimistic on them moving forward just because there is so much talent there and it feels like they've underperformed relative to what those guys could do at the top of the roster yeah they've already withstood what like two or three Barkov injury scare as we felt like we were going to miss him

for some times. So as long as he's out there, they're good. But you're right. There's other guys that are contributing. I mean, Daddanov is a guy.

We probably don't talk enough about him. I'm pretty sure he's leading them in goals right now. And I think they also made some decent ads to their bottom six. You know,

Brett Connolly is probably a guy that gives them that veteran leadership a bit. And Nola Chari, I mean, last year in the playoffs, he was so good defensively for the Bruins,

especially on the penalty kill. So I don't know if enough has been said about him. Yeah, with Connolly and Frank Petrono, like they have a lot of scoring. It's just going to be if they can defend enough, especially against some of these best teams in the league to hang in there. But I still like the chances moving forward.

Now, here's a team that I have on my list, the Columbus Blue Jackets. And they are a fascinating team for me. And I don't know how many people have ever said that about the Columbus Blue Jackets that don't live in Ohio. But I was on the corner this summer and this. preseason they're going to be better than people thought. And so far, you know, the results have been mixed. They've been up and down. I think the most recent showing against Philly where they blew a lead and kind of did what Philly usually does against Philly, which was interesting to see where they

just completely imploded. But I still think this team has a lot of stuff going for it. Now they don't have the sort of top of the marquee names and they're going to struggle to score offensively. They're 21st and goals this year, their 25th in shooting percentage, and really if it weren't for a high volume of shot generation, they'd be even worse. But that's what I do like about this team, where they don't have that high-end talent, but they have a lot of depth. They come at you in waves. They have an identity where, and I'm sure John Torrula kind of relishes this, probably, like, I'm sure he'd love to be coaching Artemie Panarin and Matthew Shea now, but in a way, it's kind of this underdog mentality of just being annoying and difficult to play against,

playing teams tight. And so I've actually enjoyed watching them a little bit this season, despite the fact that they don't have those guys that pop off the page. For sure. One of the biggest concerns for me heading into the season when it came to the Blue Jackets was goal tending. You know, you had two total, Elvis was an unknown and Jonas Corvassallo,

like really hadn't shown us much over the past few years to give us confidence. But I think he's been just about right above expectations. And I think he's done probably as well as he could have. obviously he had that meltdown in that game that you were talking about and he swung his stick. I had to apologize to his team for it. But I think it's okay. And, you know, I think when you're talking about that offense, Pierre Luke Dubois is a guy also, again, without Pierre Panarin, rather, we were concerned, okay, how is he going to perform? He's looked okay.

He's leading them with goals right now, which I think is a positive development. But the one thing with this team, and I just don't know why they can't figure it out. This has been a, like, multiple season-long problem is their power play. It just sucks. And when you're talking about the Bruins power play earlier, like the way they move it with purpose to find a good shot, like it feels like when I watch Columbus's power play, like they're just moving it because they're panicking and nobody actually wants to take the shot. And it just, they're giving up a lot of goals. I mean, they're not scoring a lot of goals. They're actually giving up some shorthanded goals. And I know that Tortarella has been steadfast defending his assistant who's in charge of it. But I feel like something's got to change. I know they tried Martin San Luis at the end of last year. He's gone back to coaching his kids now. But they've got to figure something out. Yeah, I mean, and they were bad last year with Rami Panera, and you think with a playmaker of his skill set, he'd be able to move the puck around and create some of that offense for them. And he wasn't, and unsurprisingly, they've struggled even more without him. Yeah, it seems like their game plan is like, all right, let's just not get scored on for two minutes here.

And it's, I think having a purpose is a great way to put it. You know, you mentioned Dubois. He leads the team with seven points. Now, that's not impressive considering seven points in 12 games and some sort of earth-shattering paper. but it kind of highlights what I like about this team where they have nine guys between five and seven points. And, you know, when I say they play teams tight, four of their 11 games so far I've already gone overtime, eight of their 11 games have been one goal games. And I think that's something that's going to continue.

It could be a bit frustrating for Torterella and for fans of this team in terms of there's going to be stretches where they do struggle to score. There's going to be ups and downs. But I think they're going to be a team that's just going to hang around a lot of games. They're going to be a good five-on-five team. They have a strong defense. They don't really have any noticeable kind of dead spots in their lineup. And so I think for opposing teams, when they see the Columbus Blue Jackets on the calendar,

maybe their fans are going to kind of make fun on them and poke jokes and be like, oh, this is going to be an easy two points. But I guarantee you that opposing teams when they see the Blue Jackets on the schedule are not relishing that opportunity because they seem like they're just a nightmare to play against. Totally. sponsoring today's episode of the Hockey PEOcast is Seatkeek. If you feel like ticketing websites make getting to the event difficult on purpose, you're not alone. I've found in the past that it's a really stressful process.

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Nice. I just did my power rankings this week for ESPN. I voted, and I have them as number one, especially after last night, the way they ended that road trip. You know, some of their early concerns about Brayden Holpey. He's been good lately. He's 401 in his last five games. Obviously, all we can talk about is John Carlson, who can't stop scoring. But I saw that stat that you tweeted out about Ovecgen today. If you want to share that, that was incredible to me. Yeah. His production this season?

Yes. Yeah, so he's got 11 goals, which is tied for second with Alston Matthews, just behind David Pastor Nex-12. He's got 70 shots on goal, which leads the league. He's got 139 shot attempts, and second place is Romadiosi with 95, which is just crazy to me. He's playing 20- That was crazy to me. I'm just going to interrupt. Yeah.

I and everyone in Toronto media wrote about John Carlson this week because they were in Toronto. But one of the things that was interesting to me is like, hey, how is he getting all these shots, right? Or how is he getting all these points? Is he taking more shots on goal? It is actually not. He's on pace for not a lot of goal shots. Wow, I can really speak English sometimes. But, you know, when I looked at their shot attempts, Ovi is by far shooting more than anyone on that team.

It's incredible. He is. And I guess that's not surprising considering his career track record, but just, the fact that he's 34 years old now. Yeah. This week he's going to play his 1100th regular season game. And he just has no, he's showing no real signs of slowing down. Like, in a way, he is a little bit because it feels like he's fumbling the puck a bit more than he has in the past.

He kind of looks human on occasion. But he does, with the things he does well, he does so well. And the capitals do such a good job of putting him in a position to succeed as well. Like, the team's averaging around seven power play minutes a game this season, and Ovechkin's playing over five of those. And so they're getting him out. in those opportunities where he can use his shot. He's going to be in high danger of scoring areas. And he's going to score a ton of goals.

I would still bet on him to win the Rocket Richard this year, despite the fact that Pastor Nax on this tear, despite what Leon Drey Saito is doing, Austin Matthews. Like, Ovechkin's shot generation and his consistency there and the fact that he's not going to miss any games unless he gets arrested here or there and how vital he is to his team's offense. Like, I just think that makes him such a strong bet for that award yet again. the fact that we're just talking about that and we take it for granted a bit right like what him and crosbie are doing at this point of this career uh we can kind of become nomin to a little bit but we really should appreciate what he's doing because he won't do it forever we're doing because he won't do it forever we totally should and you know as i said i did write about carlson this week and i talked to him and he said something interesting too about um you know one of the reasons he thinks his team is different this year and one of the things that todd weirden is kind of implemented and that's they talk about it all the time in team meetings is not taking shots just to take shots taking shots taking really

quality shots and they feel like sometimes they were just throwing it on net and making easy saves for the goaltender and giving him confidence. And it feels like the only guy really immune to that strategy is Ovechkin, which kind of feels poetic because for so long he's just kind of been doing his own thing. But man, I was watching their game last night. I just, maybe you can explain this better than me because I know you study tactical hockey better than me, but how can so many times he be open in his office on the last circle? Like, why doesn't someone just put someone there? It's tough. I think like the Rangers did this in the past with Dan Gerardy and teams have tried to do it.

The issue is, especially on the powerplay when you've got a man advantage there for, versus five, they have so many ways to beat you that if you do lean that way, then you're just leaving T.J. O'Shee wide open from an even better scoring area right in front of the goalie. You know, you got because Nets off Backstrom's going to find those open guys. And Carlson, to his credit, people can kind of take for granted his production and be like, oh, anyone running the point and quarterbacking that power play would put up these numbers. but he does such a good job of having a threat as a shooter,

but kind of doing what you were just saying there in terms of not just throwing the puck on net for the sake of throwing it on net, but actually kind of holding onto it, sucking in the defense, and then passing it off to either Baxter or Ovechkin to do something themselves. And so they just really have this beautiful connection there between five guys who kind of know where each of them is going to be, know what they're great at,

and do an excellent job of getting the puck to them right, they wanted. And so it's really fun to watch. And it's no surprise that year over year, they have one of the, whatever, three to five best power plays. Yeah. You know, we pay so much attention to Ovecgen, but watching their game last night, I really thought their best line was the Cousie, Tom Wilson and Brana line. And they were playing, you know, a lot of even strength time against even Alston Matthews line. And they looked really good. And, you know, last year was a bit of an off year for Cousnetsov. And I feel like he's the guy that's kind of the sleeper here. If you can revert back to the form that he had two years ago, this team's going to be extra dangerous.

Yeah, well, you know, we mentioned how big of a driving force of Etchen is for them offensively, and that's true. But I do really like this team's depth, and I think it makes them much more dangerous to deal with as the season gets going here. Because, you know, even with like Eller and Hagelin on the third line, for example, they're going to get Richard Panic back. You know, Brendan Leipzig on the fourth line has given a little bit of a juice as well. And so they have guys down the lineup who can play. and there's very few weak spots. And the blue line, I think, is really well constructed now in terms of having at least one sort of play driver on each of those pairings. And so if Brayden Holby can be, you know, 90% of what peak Braden Holby is, this is going to be a really, really good team that has very few flaws.

And so I'm really curious to see how the season gets going as the season gets going here, sort of how it goes for them in terms of managing Holdby's workload, in terms of keeping all their top guys fresh. because it's pretty clear that you don't want to take the regular season for granted, and especially in a wonky Metro Division where there's so many good teams but no real great teams, you don't want to just kind of, it's not a foregone conclusion that you're going to make the playoffs. But for this team, it's pretty clear that they're thinking about what they're going to look like in late April, early May, as opposed to what they're looking like here at end of October. Yeah.

I'm curious how many games they're going to give to Samson off because obviously they made that decision early in the season. It was slightly financially, even though they didn't save a ton of money, but they were really counting the cap at that point. But, you know, putting Phoenix Copley and waivers and giving this kid a chance. And especially as Brayden Holpey's contract situation boils up and we're unsure if they're willing or able to commit to him on a long-term basis, like maybe they're going to want to see the kid in a couple more games than, you know, just the average backup would get. Yeah. No, I mean, I think they will, especially, as we mentioned, with teams shying away from giving

their goalies, the starting goalies, the usual 60, 65, 70 games of run in the regular season. The Carlson thing's interesting because, you know, he's been clearly great. I mean, 23 points in October for defensemen is just absolutely obscene. And he's really continues to somehow improve at this stage of his career, which after they gave him that contract, I certainly wasn't expecting. And I thought it was a mistake. And he's clearly proven me wrong. But it has been funny to see, like, now as the Capitals went to Toronto and with all the media there, it's like, it seems like everyone just wrote there like, holy crap, John Carlson's really good. and should win the Norris this year article.

So that was pretty fun to see. It seems like this really is his year in terms of both the play being there, but also the storyline or angle for people to push in terms of, well, he's never won it before. So let's give him one. Well, I just take a little bit of pride, and that was all Tuesday. But here in America, we wrote that story on Monday. Yeah, you guys are one day ahead.

Yeah, exactly. Especially when it comes to our Americans, we really take pride in when they do well. It's true. Well, he is an American hero. Okay, is there a... What other teams do we have here? I've got a couple. Do you want to rattle off some of them?

Yeah. How about the avalanche? Yeah, let's do it. Yeah, I have them on here. I guess, you know, it's weird to say that there's a silver lining to losing Miko Ranton and Gabriel Annescog because they're two great players. And I just love watching the two of them alongside Nathan McKinnon just do their thing with a puck. But A, I think this is...

you know, McKinnon's chance to really shine in terms of proving his individual greatness and not having those MVP votes kind of cannibalized from him because it's like, oh, well, how good is he individually? If Mikorantan is also a 90-point player, it feels like if you can drive his own line now, there's going to be a lot of momentum towards potentially even discussing him as the best player in the game. And the other thing is, you know, they've had good secondary scoring so far. All of the additions they made this summer with Brokowski, Khadry, and Don Squay of Penn,

out, you know, Tyson Jost has a hat trick in Tampa Bay. And if him and J.T. Comph, we can get going here, that'd be a huge development for them as well. But I assume some of those guys are going to get bumped up now to playing with McKinnon. And even if they haven't gotten going so far, I'm sure playing with him will do wonders for kickstarting that offensively. And so it gives the Avalanche a chance here, assuming they can kind of hold the fort and keep their heads above water until those two other guys come back. it gives them an opportunity to really figure out what they have internally and whether they can rely on some of these guys to do more than they've already shown so far. Yeah, I was thinking the exact same thing, especially as this team we're starting to talk about in the context of Stanley Cup aspirations.

Like, this is the long game for them. And, you know, yes, it's amazing when that top line is clicking. And it sucks to see Landisga seems like his injury from what I've read might be a little bit more serious than Rottenance. which is crazy because Rantonans looked like the grossest injury I've seen in the wrong time. And it was non-contact, which sucks. And, oh, anyhow. Yeah, it's all about these deaf guys for me. Like, I look like a guy like Berkowski, who's not getting a ton of ice time.

He's getting about 14 minutes a game. It still has nine points at 11 games. Like we saw when he was in Washington, it was really always a confidence thing for him and who he was playing with and how much faith the coach gave in him. So he's a guy that I really, you know, keep my eye on. And you mentioned the new additions, one that, probably never gets enough credit and while Red really wants his ball is Pierre Edward Belmar. He just is so good defensively and I think probably a really good leadership guy in the locker

room. And he's put up three goals and three assists already. So I think he's another great signing by Sackick. He is. And this team and the reason why I've given Joe Sackick so much credit for assembling this team is they have maintained a lot of financial flexibility here, but also with their assets in terms of all the draft picks they've accumulated, how well they've done drafting. And so they have a bunch of capital here to if they need to add someone, they can. And if the season gets going here and these guys start coming back and they keep winning games and they really are firmly in that Stanley Cup contender discussion, like they have a lot of avenues for also improving their team as the year gets going beyond just some of these young guys internally improving. And so that's a great

position to be in because you can see many different paths for the avalanche being even better than they have been at full strength, their early season. And that's scary for opposing teams because they have been really good so far regardless. They totally, totally have. Should we move on to another central division team that having injury issues? Well, you know, here's one question before we move on in avalanche. Kail McCar. I know we did the whole thing without mentioning him. Yeah. So he came into the year clearly based off of his postings before. performance, expectations were through the roof. I think he started off a bit slowly, but I have noticed the past couple of games.

He's really gotten going here in terms of jumping in on the rush, doing crazy stuff with a puck that defensemen typically don't do, especially young defensemen. And so where is he at right now in terms of the early calder discussion, in terms of the rookie race for the most impressive young players we've seen so far? I think he's definitely, if not this week, next week going to catapult Victor all of for the Calder favorite. You know, he's going to be the guy that we're talking about for sustainable success. I think Olson's cooled off a little bit.

But honestly, and this is something that I love talking about. I know this is like my wheelhouse. But I've just been so impressed by how he's done off the ice handling all of this pressure. Like, you know, this is probably a little inside baseball. But at the player media tour, that's where the teams are supposed to send their best player every year, right before the season for like a car wash and meeting with all the big outlets. They didn't send Landisoggi actually went over to Sweden. They didn't send McKinnon. they wanted to give a break. They didn't send Ron to them. They send this 20-year-old kid, and

you know, they're pimping him out there with all these video content. And he's just leaning into all of it and embracing all of it. And I really feel like that kind of stuff that we're seeing off the ice is translating on the ice is just the way he's playing in his composure. Yeah. It's remarkable to see what he does, and especially playing off of San Gerard as well, some of the stuff these guys do in terms of sort of probing and winding up on the ice where you're typically not used to seeing defensemen is one of my favorite things to watch. So the avalanche certainly aren't short on exciting players, and I'll add those two guys to the list. Who was the other Central Division team with the injuries piling up?

Yeah, well, and I don't even know it's piling up, it's just one big one, and that's the blues in Teresenko. Yep. You know, he's out, they say, minimum five months on when he's going to be re-evaluated for shoulder surgery. That sounds like pretty much the whole regular season, that minimum. And, you know, Doug Armstrong entered this year telling us all, like, look, we're going to win it. And that's when he went out and made that trade for Justin Falk. They weren't setting back. He's like, this is our window and we're going to try to contend again.

And they're going to be really tested about Teresenko. That's a guy that they count on to score big goals, a lot of goals. And I know that it's a deep team and that's what got them to the Stanley Cup last year. But that's not an insignificant piece to be missing for that period of time. No, certainly not. I wouldn't expect to see him the rest of the. regular season just based on that timeline. And it's weird because we went to the season expecting that the Central Division

was going to be incredibly packed. And it'd be really, you know, potentially with no bad teams and certainly five playoff teams. And so far, the stars have really been sputtering, especially offensively. The wild look really, really bad, in my opinion. We say this after their own goal. Yeah, we have on Tuesday night. I mean, yeah, that was the stars hadn't scored five goals.

in a single game all year, and then they give up five goals, and then they score five goals in the wild in the third period alone. And so that kind of tells everything you need to know about both those teams. And the Blackhawks, if we're talking about bad, Tuesday performances, just look absolutely dreadful against the predators. And so, you know, with the Avalanche having their own injuries, with the predators, and we could discuss Nashville more here in a bit, but they certainly haven't been fully healthy themselves either.

Like, the Central Division is much more sort of open and there for the taking than I thought it was. and we haven't mentioned Winnipeg and they themselves look really bad defensively. And so there isn't a team there that's really kind of head and shoulders above from the pack and really separating themselves. And so for the Blues, it's tough not having Teresanko's offense and not having them all year. But it's not the worst case scenario because they do have enough depth there and they're good enough defensively that they can probably cobble together in different areas enough to sort of make up for some of that loss that they're going to experience offensively from him.

Yeah, the guy they're going to look to is Thomas. Robert Thomas didn't have a ton on the score sheet during the Stanley Cup final, but kept being one of the more impressive guys through that playoff run, and he's young, and they have such high hopes for him. So I'm curious to see what he'll do with a bigger role. Well, you know what I'll say, Robert Thomas? And it's kind of a really tough thing to quantify, although I guess you would expect that over the long run, it would manifest itself in, like, good possession numbers and on the score sheet.

But he is one of those guys early in his career where, it just feels like he's always like involved in the play like whenever I look up and it's like oh there's the puck and there's Robert Thomas it's like I don't know if it's a good hockey IQ awareness I don't know what it is but it just seems like he's always in the right place at the right time and I think that bodes really well for his future success even though the scoring as you mentioned hasn't been there yet yeah so you mentioned the predators I'd love to talk about them um they look damn good they you know pecker Rene is 37 see 37 you He's old, 34.

Whatever he is, he's playing probably some of his best hockey. I saw an interview that he was drinking. Less post-game beers, and that's one of the attributes he was giving to a success. So good on him. Maybe he's drinking Trulies or White Claws instead, less carbs. But honestly, the most impressive thing for me is their offense. We talked so much about how they had sputtered on offense last year. We were just too dependent on the top guys.

They've been without, I'm Philip Forsberg for a couple games, and they're still leading the league. with four goals a game. They're tied right up there with the avalanche. And that to me is great. And I know so much attention is going to be paid on Matt Duchesne and, you know, that number two center that they've always wanted to have and now finally do have. And I do think he's having a really good start of the season. But it also proved that they really might not have needed P.K. Suban after all. And, and, you know, this balance that they've created now is now the correct balance, at least for right now. Yeah, it has. It's worked out pretty much exactly as I think that David Poil on the

redderers were envisioning. They've really remade their team. Like I thought that towards the end of last year, they got into this funk where it felt like it was kind of like, it was just like dry and stale. And whether it's Duchenne, whether it's, you know, empowering guys

like Yossi and Ellis to play more and to be more integral parts of their offense, whether it's, you know, just kind of that change. I think it really kickstarted this team and it's changed that dynamic and they're playing so much faster. where, you know, shooting 12% as a team certainly helps.

And I think that's going to come down a little bit. But considering that there are first in the league in scoring, as you mentioned, even if that comes down a tad bit, there's still enough wiggle room there for them to be a high-powered offense. And it's just a complete kind of 180 and identity change from them. I thought, I think it's a really important development. And, you know, with Yose's extension that just came down the other day, you know, eight years, over nine million per season.

What did you think about that deal? I think it looks great right now. I think the term and the no movement clause were interesting to me because we've got a guy that's hovering around 30 years old right now. And that's a long term to give him. And, you know, he's announced on the same day that the predators are in town and the Blackhawks are there and Brent Seabrook is getting scratched. And he's another guy with a contract that didn't age well monetarily.

So this to me just shows that David Poil is thinking about right now. this is his window he wants to win and i also can't help but think that david poyle is 69 years old and it's like well maybe if i just win then this is somebody else's problems after me it's true i mean i guess ultimately they kind of had to they'd really back themselves in here i mean they trade away suban this summer uh they are in that kind of window to compete right now as a franchise and also i mean they had yosie on like the team friendliest deal i think for a non-elc guy where he was making four million per season over the past seven years after they kind of gambled correctly on him as a young player. And so he was due for a payday. And, you know, he's a captain.

He's so fond of watch. He's such an integral part of that team that I think they had a very little leverage there. But you're right. I mean, he's going to be 30 by the time the contract kicks in. And for a guy who relies so primarily on his skating, that's a concern. You could argue that because he's such a fluid skater, he's not taking as much punishment. And physically, he's going to age better into his 30s. But I think it is a concern there. And I ultimately, you know, from Poil's perspective, you cite his age there and sort of where they're at as a franchise. And I don't think they ultimately care what that contract's going to look like for five years from now if it reopens or sort of elongates this window for them to get back to where they were just a couple of seasons ago. Yeah. The new movement clause is the one that struck me because that's something that David Poil typically doesn't give out.

So this almost felt like him just saying, F it. Here we go. Let's just go for it right now. Yeah. I give up. All the rules go to the trash. That is certainly fair. Is there any other teams on your list that you wanted to talk about? I mean, there's some of the bad ones, like, you know, the Blackhawks, the Rangers, and they're interesting in their own ways, but I just thought, like, we went into the year expecting it to be bad, and they've proven us to be correct. So I'm just not sure what there is to unpack there from like, wow, this is groundbreaking information perspective. No, I think the Blackhawks and Rangers, though, are interesting when you group them together. And I've been saying this for some time. But at least for the Rangers, you know, we see their deliberate plan, how they're acting towards a plan, how it's coming to fruition. And, you know, last night was a good example of that. You know, they had that probably one of their best wins of the season against the lightning, even though they're out without Mika Zabedad. You've got the young guys stepping up.

It benchmarks all. You see everything coming into fruition. And then you've got a team like the Blackhawks, which put a bunch of Band-Aid fixes on this year. You know, they slightly improved the defense with Calvin DeHan. They slightly improved their bottom six with a couple guys there. And you wonder, would the Blackhawks have been better off if they just pulled what the Rangers did and said, hey, we're just going to cut the cord, you know, tear it down for two to three seasons and then go all in on the rebuild and hopefully capitalize the end of the window for Taze and Kane. And for the comparison that Taze and Kane would be the lung quest for the Rangers. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, it's easier said than done, obviously, I think with, especially with like how good Kane and Taves were last year. I think that empower them or emboldened them a bit to be like, oh, well, if we improve some of the stuff around them, hopefully we can make it work. But I think that's a bad bet from their part. I mean, they've looked just as bad, I think, defensively as they were last year, despite all those upgrades. And, you know, if it weren't for Robin Lennar having a remarkable game, like he had at least, I'd say, 10, like, just beautiful point blank saves. if it weren't for him standing on his head like that, like that game could have been into the double digits for the Predators

based on how they were dominating with over 50 shots and about 20 scoring chances. And so I think there's going to be a lot more of those performances and maybe having Leonard there instead of Cam Ward and Colin Delia, like last year is going to keep them in some of those games. But it's just not a formula that succeeds in today's game where it's like, oh, we're just going to give up this much and hope that our top players can outscore you.

I only see that process taking them so far. And, you know, they got a top pick last year and we'll see how Kirby Dog turns out. And so maybe they can kind of keep playing, entertaining, high scoring hockey while sort of low-key going through that rebuild and accumulating topics. I assume that's what they are trying to accomplish, even if they're not publicly admitting it. But, yeah, there's a lot of turmoil there with the Seabrook benching, with all the stuff going on. like it's it's a weird time at chicago i'm not sure what direction they're currently headed in no and you know you mentioned kane and tays i do you think one other thing going in their favor is they have two guys in the generation slightly below that and alice de brinkett um definitely and

dylan strum to a slightly lesser degree um that looked like they can be really really um good offensive stars and and you know Alex de brinkett was one of quietest 40 call scores last year and you're right i think they do have enough weapons you know you really only need two or three guys spread across your lines to dominate offensively. But the defense, man, it's just really, really bad. And, you know, they have a surplus of guys, but a surplus of guys they don't want. And you're right. I think Lainer can steal them maybe one or two more games than they got last year.

And that seemed to be a wise move. But other than that, they need a complete overhaul. Yeah, they do. I mean, it is interesting sort of pairing them as a parallel alongside the Rangers because the Rangers have clearly gone about it in a different, more aggressive way. They've been a fascinating team to watch this season because I think they've, in a way, been exactly what we expected, where they got all these new shiny toys. People were excited about them.

I think they're going to certainly have flashes and they're going to be more fun to watch offensively. But I'm not sure how much of it is the coaching with David Quinn, how much of it is just having a young team, how much of it is having all these new players. but there's been certain moments where they look like catastrophically bad defensively. And in a way, I do feel for Henrik Lundquist, I know no one's going to cry themselves to sleep about a guy who's that handsome, making that much money, getting to live in New York, and actively, you know, not allowing them to trade him because he wants to stay in New York

and he wants to stay in that market. But there's going to be a lot of long nights this season where he's still facing 40, 45 shots. And at this stage of his career, given his age and all the mileage, like it's a pretty rough spot both for him and for the Rangers to be expecting him to kind of hold up under that kind of pressure. Totally. Their defense is so leaky. And they just give up way too many shots. Gorgiev has been good, though.

And, you know, there's some nights where I wonder if, you know, I think they are working on load management with Hendrik this year. But I'd love to see Gorgiev get a couple more stars. I thought he looked terrific last night. The thing, though, is the offense and the young guys. And I think for them, it's all about confidence. You know, Chidal is a guy that they tried bringing up last year. It didn't work. He said back down this year, you watched him last night.

He was like a man-possessed. He looked terrific. Like, if he played like that all the time, he should be in the lineup. And, you know, Kako had his little bit of a stretch where he was being emo and thinking that hockey was not fun for him anymore. I thought he had a great goal last night. So, you know, I really feel like this is the transition year. And as long as, you know, they don't totally lose confidence in David Quinn's plan and stick to it. you know, maybe one or two blue line additions away next year and you've got a competent team.

Well, they do have a lot of, especially in the blue line, a lot of young guys in the pipeline that they've drafted high and that there's pretty high expectations for now with young defensemen. You never know how they're going to develop what that trajectory is going to look like at that timeline. So we'll see. But I still think, yeah, it's, and I'm guilty of this myself because, you know, you want to see immediate results. But I think it's okay with especially this team and how they've been assembled and how good of a job they've done in short order of accumulating assets to like just view this year for what it is, which is another year in this rebuilding process where they're going to be more fun to watch. They're not going to win

a lot of games. But if they get another high traffic out of it and develop some of these young players long the way, then it's ultimately a success of them in New York. Totally. Are there any other teams that you wanted to get to? I think that's it on my list. Yeah. Yeah, I think so too. I think we covered all the all the big ones. We didn't do the Canucks, but I'm going to have, I'm going to do a bit of a Canucks slash Pacific Division Deep dive next week. So I intentionally didn't want to get into them here. But yeah, I think we covered all the main ones. Plug some stuff. What are you working on these days? Where can people check out your work? What's going on in the life of Emily Kaplan? Yeah, I've got a fun story coming out next week. I'm really proud of. It's an anonymous players poll. I pulled about 50 guys on some pretty interesting questions. And there's some awesome. illustration. So that will run next week on ESPN.com. You can listen to me and Greg Wischenski's podcast, ESPN on ice, and just check out all for stuff on ESPN.com because we do a damn good job, don't we, DeBitre? We sure do. I've been writing up there quite a bit recently

myself, so maybe we're a little bit biased, but I do think we are doing a good job. And yes, for those of you wondering out there, ESPN does in fact cover hockey, which is exciting for the both of us. I've really enjoyed your work this season. and last season, obviously, as well. But I think, you know, you and Craig Custin's are right up there as, like, the two people who seem to get the most out of some of these players. And I understand from their perspective why when they're not really incentivized to say anything particularly interesting, because if anything, it's just going to get them in trouble and it's going to rile up old media types and opposing teams and players, and it's going to get sort of backlash and criticism thrown their way.

But it seems like you just get all these amazing nuggets from some of these players, they just, like, open up to you and say, interesting stuff, which is very rare for hockey players, especially during the season. Oh, thank you. Honestly, I'm just flattered that you put me in the same sentence as Craig. I went on this podcast this summer. That man makes people feel so comfortable. I totally see why they open up to him. I was oversharing like crazy. But yeah, I think, you know, maybe it's just being in the league a little bit longer or whatever people are starting to know me, but I'm really loving what I'm doing at ESPN. I'm a new Monday column, which I'm excited about. Every Monday

I just have like a kind of newsy thing of the week and the kind of feature thing and empty my notebook and I'm just having fun doing it. Well, Emily, thanks for taking the time to come chat. Red, thank you for cooperating and only having a couple of hours. I really appreciate all that. And yeah, this was a blast. Let's definitely do it again as the season gets going. And we'll chat soon. I appreciate it. Yeah, much an upgrade from the smoothie machine of my first episode. But at least we're getting objectively cuter. Yes. Have a good one, Emily. Thanks, Dimitri. follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovic and on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com slash hockey pdocast.