The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 35: The Analytics Don't Say Anything

Episode Date: December 12, 2015

In this episode of the podcast we eventually get around to adopting both the Coyotes and Capitals as promised. But before we get there, we take some time to discuss Alex Semin's departure from the NHL and how his brief stint in Montreal is hardly an indictment against analytics. There's a meaty conversation about roster construction, taking calculated risks, and how easy it should be to incorporate underlying metrics into your analysis in there too. You can listen to every episode of this podcast on iTunes, Soundcloud, or stream it from our website. Make sure to not only subscribe so that you don’t miss out on any new shows, but also leave us a nice review (if you think we’ve earned it!) Please also consider chipping in to help support the show (www.hockeypdocast.com/donate). A handful of you have done so already, and we greatly appreciate it. We’d love to be able to improve our equipment and cover some of the housekeeping costs associated with running this podcast. Thanks for listening! See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

Are you ready for the most ridiculous internet sports show you have ever seen? Welcome to React, home of the most outrageous and hilarious videos the web has to offer. So join me, Rocky Theos, and my co-host, Raiders Pro Bowl defensive end, Max Crosby, as we invite your favorite athletes, celebrities, influencers, entertainers in for an episode of games, laughs, and of course the funniest reactions to the wildest web clips out there. Catch React on YouTube, and that is React, R-E-A-X-X. Don't miss it. This podcast episode is brought to you by Coors Light.

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And joining me today is Travis Yost. Travis, what's going on, man? Doing right, hanging in there. Another week in the books. How you doing? I'm good, man. I just, you know, I wanted to let the record show that we're recording this on a Friday night while two games that classify as having high potential for wow factor with the stars,

flyers, and Jets, Hawks are going on in the background. But we're still taking 40 minutes or so here out of our night to, give the people what they want and record a show. So just remember that. I don't know what you're talking about entertaining. They just opened up the third period in Pittsburgh. Matt Cullen taking a draw against Anzacopatar. Is there anything more terrifying than going head-to-head with Anze Copatar?

I don't know, playing against the stars. Guess what happened? L.A. scored in within 30 seconds of that power play. And then the L.A. broadcast immediately went to technical difficulties. Yeah, no, it's, Anzicotas are a pretty frightening individual. We're going to get to our initial scheduled programming of adopting the coyotes and the caps. But before we'd get to that, I figured we'd take a little time here to talk about some transaction news that happened in the NHL this week, particularly the Mark Fane and Alex Semen, I guess demotions, if you will, they were both put on waivers. And I think both cleared.

Fain went down to the HL, Semmins' contracts. was terminated and he went over to the KHL. Well, they waived Thomas Fleischman too, right? Oh, they didn't. Okay, so before we get into Alex Salmon, okay, let's get into this first. Okay, Alex Salmon, do you view his career, assuming this is like the last time we've seen him in North America and NHL as a disappointment in any way? I saw this question being kicked down around a bit.

I would say yes, because I, I don't know that that you're going to necessarily take that side. Like, I think there's, when you set that kind of a benchmark for that kind of talent that you have, when you fail to clear that, then I agree that. Like, not all disappointments are treated equally, right? Like, it's in the same manner that we don't evaluate Alex Semen, then we evaluate your fourth line grinder. Like, we just hope that guy sticks in the league for Alex Semen. We have legitimate goal scoring expectations every single year. And, I mean, let's be honest, his numbers tapered off.

probably three, four years in a row consistently. And there was some injury stuff that were floating around one year that I think really crippled him in Carolina. But beyond that, he had a good career in the NHL. I don't even know if we've seen the end of it. I'm assuming so. But I still think it's fair to say that he's been a bit of a disappointment because he was so good for so long. And then it just went out like a light. And I don't know, if you don't count that as a disappointment, then I guess we have different,

different levels, different benchmarks that we anticipate certain players to clear. I think he's definitely been a disappointment just as you said based on kind of the level of play we'd seen from him during certain sustained stretches. Like it wasn't even where he'd have like a good week or a month. Like he had like a couple of their seasons there where he was legitimately just like a nightmare to play against for other teams. And I don't know, it's all relative, right? Like he made a ton of money and he scored a lot of goals.

And I think he had like over 500 points. his career in NHL. So it's kind of like silly. I'm sure there's so many NHL players who would like love to have the career Alex Semen had, but it's all relative and based on kind of the just raw ability he had as a player. I feel like he definitely, you know, maybe he reached that ceiling on occasion, but it just wasn't sustained enough for sort of to view it as like, you know, something that was, that should, it didn't really play out the way I think it should have or could of and that's what's disappointing for me. So I don't know.

I'm with you there. I feel like maybe people, when they were tuning in, weren't expecting us to talk about Alex seven in this way. I definitely thought you were going to disagree with me. I thought you were going to be the dissenting opinion here. Oh, let me just say, I hear, this isn't a cut and dry argument. I would hear the other side of it that he wasn't a disappointment because he filled it in for so long.

And I guess trying to play devil's advocate for a minute. Like, if he's a disappointed. then is Chris Phillips not a disappointment or any other? Like a guy who basically stuck around in the league for years and years and years and was nothing more than your average whatever player. But he was there forever. But he had this really high draft pedigree and everyone expected him to just dominate. And that never really materialized.

I don't know. I guess it is subjective. So we're kind of throwing semi-guided darts here. But just how dominant he was and how quickly it just evaporated. and you can go in and post hoc explain away some of his struggles in the last couple of years. And the injury point is a real one, is a real one, especially in that one year with Carolina. But beyond that, like, it just kind of went out like a light. Like, I expected more.

Right. And he was a great value. I remember, I think it was the lockout short in season, right, where Carolina signed him to that one year deal where the annual, where the salary was really high, but it was just that one year. And he was amazing. And I don't know, like the tricky situation I find myself in whenever we talk about a guy like Alex Semen here, It's like, it's so easy to, you know, talk about all these kind of narratives about how he was like a contracture guy, for example, and, you know, he was lazy and he didn't really care. And some of that stuff may very well be true, but I just, like, always feel sort of, like, uneasy talking about it because we don't know nearly enough to, like, actually say that with any certainty. And it just sort of seems like character assassination at this point.

And it's easy to do. And I see a lot of people doing it. And I'm glad that we might be like the one show that's not going to kind of stoop to that level. So I guess I'm happy with that. Why don't you ever hear about Dave Bowen's contract year? That's what I want to know. Like that go if you Google Dave Bowland in contract year, it's just going to say no results found. Right.

But if you Google Alex Semin contract year, you're going to get like 3,000 pages of search results. And again, this is, I get it. We have different expectations for different players. You can't evaluate them every player or really any two players really on the same plane because every situation is just a little bit different. But like I think it's, again, not to harp on the same point, but I think it's fair to say that I anticipated more from Alex Seventh. Like the last few years, even if the point scoring, I guess actually that's probably

the large reason. We expected him to be a really good goal scorer. And it would taper off over time, but he had this unbelievable shot that even if he couldn't create on his own, other players could get him into those positions. And I remember a few weeks ago, we were talking about, like, Ilya Colvichuk and like him being like the best shooter that I've seen, at least in the last since I've really become a hockey fan. And like, I think people had like seven pegged as that. And like I know they're not the same exact player because Colichuk was a massive freaking body who would just absolutely destroy you if you wanted to. and Semen was more of a finesse player, but like, just speaking on pure, like, shooting ability, like, they were in the same universe, and one player is probably still one of the best shooters on the

planet, and the other player can't seem to buy a goal for a couple of years now. So it's, it's been an interesting development to watch. Right. And I think that, you know, there's the injuries, as you mentioned, and, like, you know, sometimes it just happens with age where you just sort of lose it and for every reason. And I find out it's not just necessarily like, oh, he's a lazy bum who, you know, was out, like, out to do it for just the money and didn't really care. Like, I don't know. That stuff seems so silly to me. I can't believe that in 2015 people are still sort of talking that way.

But that's a good segue because the second point I wanted to get to on Alex Semen was an interesting little discussion I saw Mark Specter having with someone on Twitter. And I'll read you two quotes here and then we can just touch on them a little bit. I don't want to spend too much time on it. Are you going to draw parallel between a player getting those checks and maybe someone outside of the NHL also getting those checks. Just listen to these two quotes, okay? Attention everyone in the analytics community who assured us of

Semin's great value. You're playing for the KHL boards in an hour. And then someone tweeted back at him and he replied, Semin just can't play bottom six in the NHL. Those players are expected to battle, check and play responsibly. He just can't do that. Okay. I'm trying to compose myself here.

The second point is, I think, the interesting one, because people still sort of think this way that, you know, you have your top six guys that are skilled guys who are going to be asked to score goals and produce offense. And then you have your bottom six guys who are going to play more defensive roles and, you know, play like a grinding game and maybe not, maybe like, you know, throw some hits or something like that and do stuff in limited time that might, you know, raise the energy level or something for their. team and and I know you're on board with kind of doing the uh like the top the top line middle six and then the bottom line right like I feel like kind of separating it into top six bottom six just seems like a very like strange and arbitrary way to to set a lineup I think the reality is it's pretty easily defined you know who your best forwards are you know who your worst forwards are and your middle forwards usually some of them will be very diverse. Some of them will be able to play up in lineups and others will have to be pushed down in

lineups in certain spots. They're very dynamic in that sense. But yes, there should be no divide between any specific line other than, like, I guess the one divide is kind of a gray area line. But to get onto a first line, you've got to be one of two things, really good or on a really bad team that's void of talent. And if you don't really meet those criteria, I can't imagine you're playing on a top line. But beyond that, like even that is pretty subjective. I never understood, like the whole point of line assembly and building a team and building an organization that's trying to compete for Stanley Cup is every single player is supposed to add individual value. And as a three-man unit or a defensive pairing, a two-man unit, you're trying to create the most goals and the most favorable goal differential for your team when you're on the ice. So ice time should be allocated in terms of the players who can create the most favorable goal differential to the players who can least create the most favorable goal differential.

There's really no other factor that would drive into that. Like a guy who throws checks, like I don't care. Does he create goals from my team or does he mitigate goals? Or what does he do? I don't really care if he's a hard checker or he's got a great shot. Like all of that goes into the end goal, which is do you drive favorable goal differential? That's the question. Yeah.

Like, what's the point of having this guy who does all those random little intangibles if ultimately he's getting caved in and you're giving up way more goals when he's on the ice than not? I don't understand how it makes no sense to me. You see it in other sports too in football, for example, where you like, where commentators talk about the running back, for example, like, oh, this is a type of guy who really needs like a lot of carries to get going. And as the game goes along, he like wears down his opponent and he's just better, like, he's better with more volume.

And it's like, you don't need to play 20 minutes to make an impact on the score sheet and and generate offense and goals. Like, if you're a skilled guy who plays 10 to 12 minutes, I feel like you can still have an impact by keeping the puck on the other end of the ice and not getting scored upon at the very least and getting some shots on it and maybe drawing some penalties. I don't understand why you have to be this like a big player who just throws checks and fights to sustain as a fourth liner in the NHL. I feel like as far as we've come, there's still that divide. And I just like, I'm wondering at what point we're going to sort of get past that and teams are just going to, you know, ice four lines that can always. all play. I feel like the really good team is in this league do that where they don't waste any

any lineup spots on guys that can't play and I just keep coming at you in waves. And that's like impossible to defend because that means that you can't really hide any of your players because there there's no real kind of soft spot matchups. So I don't know. I think that yeah. I'll make this point to my larger point about all we care about is gold differential. You can I am I have all the time in the world for discussions about what does this player do well? Because like that matters. You want to know why they add value. Essentially, you want to know how they're going to create this favorable goal differential. But knowing the inputs behind that, like, that's valuable. That's why you have an army of scouts and ideally quantitative analysts who can try and arrive at a mutual conclusion

on this. But like, just from fourth liners across the league, you have all different types of fourth liners. You have a guy like David Moss who's like physical and annoying. And this might be, let me, let me calibrate this or caveat this by saying this. Let's go back. like two years or so to when each one of these guys was really in his prime. That way, it's very clear cut. A guy like David Moss, very, I guess by definition, gritty, quote, physical, annoying down the middle of the lineup. And guess what? His goal deferentials were mint relative to a fourth liner. And he was just so annoying for even like first line and second line talent, which you could see they visibly did not like playing against him. Right. Guys like Thomas Fleischman

and Sean Bergenheim, they had that agility. element to their game where they could beat you on the wings and kind of harass you down the end of the lineup. And there's, okay, they're speedy, their fleet of foot. They create opportunity. And then you have guys like, let's say, Eric Conjure, who, okay, I would say he is extremely, his spatial awareness is extremely, extremely high. He always seems to know where he is on the ice. These are all subjective, qualitative things that I'm sure scouts have written up time and time again about these players. But go down the list. Go through those four forwards I just named and go see where their goal differentials rate relative to their fourth line forwards. It's insanely

above 99% of them. Right. And that's kind of the frustrating part. It's like, okay, I can box in each one of those players by just that one criteria that I mentioned. But the reality is, that's what scopes them. That's what makes them good. They don't have to check off every single box. They just have to do certain things well. And if they do those certain things well, they'll be able to be given those 10, 12, 13 minutes a night where they can play. Right. There's very many different ways you can be an effective player in the NHL. Unless, you know, that's translating in some sort of tangible way to helping your team win, then like that's all that matters.

Otherwise, you're just like, if you're throwing out all these kind of buzzwords that don't really actually mean anything, then that's like where you sort of need to question what you're doing with those lineup spots because you just can't really afford to waste them in 2015. Can we also mention that we've lived through five or six Edmont-Toyler's rebuilds now? And I have seen every single recommendation from the local media there about the need for physicality and the need for certain things. And usually the recommendations are so ridiculous.

It's not like we need a physical, functional player who can, you know, I'll even simplify it as much as this, win faceoffs, kill penalties and doesn't give up, but doesn't bleed shots and short scoring chances against. Like they never say that. It's, I remember we need an enforcer period. I remember the, we need a big, gritty. forward who will just smash a guy through the boards. That's been going on for like eight years.

I have been through the We Need Milan Luchich, which I saw come out last night as one writer's most preferred player in the entire league, which is, I mean, it's just comical that Milan Luchich would be the first, I don't know, 50 names that you would come up there. It's never been, we need this type, we need a functional player that it can bring this dynamic or something that effect. It's always about like one of these things about grit or tenacity or like, like, like he's, you know, he's so willing to block shots. It just seems like these players get placed in a certain box.

And the reason why the local media in Edmonton, more than anyone else, does it, is they have an aversion to players on their current roster or players in their farm system or whatever types of finesse skill players just because they've been through a rebuild and they've had skill players on their first line. They think they can't have skill players on that fourth. I don't know. It's very puzzling. It's very weird to me the whole thing. Right. let's get to the second quote I said there. And I don't know, like I feel sort of bad kind of just like, you know, putting this all on Mark Specter because he's hardly the only guy out there that does this sort of stuff and takes these short of sort of pot shots at analytics.

But like I don't understand how, okay, first of all, let's retire the phrase the analytics say. The analytics don't say anything. That's not a thing. That's complete bullshit. Like there's no such thing as the analytics say. They're not telling you anything. It's all about the person who's viewing that he's viewing the numbers, first of all. and is kind of spinning them in a way that makes sense and trying to make sense of them to, like, tell a story.

I don't, like, no one, no one claimed that Alex Semen was going to be this, you know, great player who was suddenly going to produce like a topliner and, you know, make all the difference in the world for the habs. It was a calculated risk. There was a reason this guy was available for one year, one million, because he was a risk. And they took the same sort of risk on Thomas Fleischman, and he's probably going to score, like, what, like 50 points this year for them and earn himself a lot more money. And the smart teams kind of take as many of these flyers as they can and knowing that, you know, maybe even only just like one out of four or five of them are going to work out.

But if one of those guys pops, it's such a massive value as opposed to kind of, you know, spreading contracts out for guys who you know exactly what they are and that's not very good players. Like, I don't, it just like bugs me so much when people kind of view stuff like this and say that, oh, this is a, this is an indictment against analytics because they, like, they'll, like, those. guys over there in their mom's basement said that Alex Semen was going to be this great player and he wasn't because he's a lazy bum and, you know, analytics can't tell you about heart and stuff like that. It's just like, how are people still saying this stuff in 2015? I don't understand. So you've got how many PA P.A. P.A. Prentos can fit into Dave Bowlin's contract in Florida. So now let's be clear here, right? The alternative to what you're saying is basically what I've read from these exact media types

who are so averse to just numbers. First off, I'll also even go a step further. I hate saying the word analytics because it's just not, it's so, it's such a bad way to describe what people are suggesting, which is scrape your numbers, do your own analysis. The idea is not that everyone comes up

with the same opinion, right? So maybe like 80% of people, I don't know, I'm just applying a random number. Maybe 80% of people thought Alex Seven was a great buy in the, quote, analytics community. But maybe there was a 20% who did it. Like it's not, there's not this unilateral judgment court where everyone, where 12 minds get together and bam and gavel. And they say, this is our decision on Alex Seven. There is dissenting opinion frequently.

And I mean, there are guys working for teams full time now that I'll bring up something and then they'll say, Why do you think that? Or I disagree with you because of this. And then I will either listen to what they have to. I always listen to what they have to say. And I may change my opinion. I may not. They may change their opinion based on what I say.

But the idea is not we reach a common goal no matter what. Sometimes we just disagree. And that's probably the most frustrating part of that is that there's this idea that there's one singular decision based on every player. The other part of that is the opposite of that would be. what they've recommended for years. So I'm just curious. They're poster boys. Wendell Clarkson, Dave Bowling.

Right. Andrew McDonald. And not as much in fairness because, you know, usually it's a guy who has 200 hits a season, so I get it. But this is those two players really, and there's a dozen or so more. Oh, they're great signings. I mean, let's go back to just that Leavesfront Office. They signed McLaren and Ore, and it was, that was, they were literally using them as a reason why they were going through that losing stretch. Not because they were terrible. It's, they lost their fourth line element, two face punchers who could not even remotely play hockey.

Well, don't even forget Mark Fraser who was riding like a crazy, aw nice, either shooting percentage or save percentage and had like, it was like a plus 30 or something. They were like, oh, this guy is such a great defenseman. And then next year it dries up. And they're like, oh, I don't know what happened. My point is not to name all of their mistakes. And there have been so many recommendations. Well, we don't have enough time, honestly. Yeah, we just don't.

It would take literally weeks. But my point is this. For all those players they named, how many PA Parenthos and Thomas Fleischman can you fit into that group? And there's an awful lot. And so it's just odd to me that we get to, oh, seven didn't work, so tough shit.

You guys lose. And it's, it is, you have to really have your head. I mean, you've got to be licking the Earth's core. Just see it. Travis, you got to have your head up. Just say it. It's beyond that. It's beyond that.

And you know what it is, though? It's the same five people. It's the same five people every single time I read it. And you know what it is? It's a preferred ignorance to what's out there. Right. Mike Kelly, I mean, this guy. Oh, my.

Okay. Mike Kelly, so I'm not, look, I'm not going to get into this. But this is a perfect example of someone who doesn't want to know what's going on. They would just prefer to cut snippets out of hockey fan boards websites and go to truthers' web pages and just pull random anecdotes. They don't care about what the actual people are saying that are credible to do this stuff.

They don't care about real numbers. They would rather just sit in their little area and just cite off random trivia. That's their wheelhouse. Trivia, trivia, trivia. This is what I know. I can go and find out what happened to this thing in hockey. Power play split. who's better at home, who's better on your road.

Great for you. And that's a great spot for you. I'm sure, like, good luck to you in life. That's a great, that's a great spot to be. But this brings me back to one final point. I have to mention this. So much of this whole discussion, what spans this whole discussion, is growth mindset, fixed mindset.

So I can't take credit for that. This is somewhat something that people have talked. to me in the past about and the difference between the two. But I like to point to it like this. What do these people think I was doing, call it eight years ago? I wasn't doing hockey analytics. I can tell you that right now. In fact, I had zero idea of what it was, why it mattered, so on and so forth, even though there were about 10 or 12 people just going through this stuff that I couldn't even begin to comprehend back then. And they were doing it in the most far away corners in the internet in freaking Alberta GeoCities websites, right? Like I didn't know about it.

You didn't know about it. And then I started getting in pretty early, maybe 2009-ish. So I was really, I was lucky that I got myself into basically what I would call the ground level, where I could pick up very quickly to what the two or three or four very credible people were doing at the time. And I could kind of work with them bouncing back and forth. And I remember the first year I was getting into stuff. I was just reading like comments, like just trying to understand it. And I remember at the time thinking, I don't know if it mattered, but I felt like I would be a total idiot if I ignored something that could be so meaningful. And I would basically spite myself for the purpose of I'm lazy and don't want to learn new information. Right. And lo and behold,

we start conducting all these analyses and finding out that, yeah, some of the stuff is just not repeatable. It's not relevant. Why are we shouldn't track it anymore? And some of the stuff was great information. It was super valuable. And like we could apply it to team level, player level. We could come up with way better forecast than what was currently out there. And I was like, wow, it's so cool. We have so much better data. It's like we can do all these different nice, interesting things about for player evaluation, team evaluation. And I just, I look back and I'm like, what if I was what they did, which is ignore, ignore, ignore, ignore. Right. And it's just, these are the, these are the types of people who stay where they are and, like,

life and other people tend to rise up and benefit from trying to learn. And every time you try to learn something new, it might not always be great or fun. But I promise you, even just the process is value added. And a lot of times you'll pick up really valuable information. And this is not just a hockey subject. This is a all-encompassing life topic. Well, okay, it just boils down to this, right? Like, I completely understand that a casual hockey field, fan who works a nine to five and comes home and just wants to, you know, crack open a beer and sit on the couch and just watch a game for two hours and not really worry about any of this stuff, views it a certain way. And I totally respect that and understand. But at the same time,

like, if your job is to write about hockey or talk about hockey on the radio or TV or whatever the hell Mike Kelly does, like, I don't understand how you can just like dismiss stuff that would help make your job easier and make you more effective as an analyst and help, like, prevent huge mistakes where people are retweeting hilariously wrong things you said after the fact because- What? What do you mean? This is the 1067 PDO is the result of what the Avalanche do well? Yeah.

Like, I'm honestly at the point where I'm considering printing it out and, like, framing it and hanging it in my wall, in my office because, like, it's just like, it makes me smile every time that he, it's not even that he was, like, so wrong about it. but that he hasn't learned from those mistakes in however many years it's been to, what, two years? I don't understand. Yeah, this is my point. They don't.

These five people, they don't care. They don't want to care. And I, look, I'm never going to change those, those mindsets, right? And I will tell you right now, so the one really cool thing about working in media, I guess, for the last year and change is somehow that made me instantly credible, right? What I was doing before, I was just a blogger. But now, so the big positive, I would say, is that people who I know for sure could care less about this stuff two years ago have sent me frequent emails, just trying to understand. And I'm not going to name names because I don't think that adds any value to the conversation.

But there are really, really prestigious, awesome hockey writers who are great journalists. They're not quants, though. they're not guys who open up Excel's and run an open up workbooks and run an MPV analyses or anything that effect. But there are people who just want to understand to make sure they're not making big mistakes or making dumb mistakes. And they want to just understand the foundation so it helps improve their job. And they're not they're not stat writers or anything to that effect. And they're not going to be working for teams as quantitative consultants. But they are journalists who just want to know as much as out there. And there are so many

out there and they deserve all of the praise because they have worked their ass off their entire careers. And I guarantee you, this isn't the only instance where something new challenged them in life. And they said, okay, I'll try it. I'll see what it's out. I don't know how much value it's going to add it to my life. But let me see what, let me see what it's about. Let me see if it, if it makes sense. And then there are these five people who just don't care and they will just constantly talk it down no matter what. And look, I mean, I could be, I can make, the same comments they would make about me. Right.

If they had a podcast, but some of them aren't working right now. Listen, that was a nice one. But listen, this is what it boils down to because I completely, you know, I'm cognizant of the fact that it's easier to pick stuff up earlier in life, the younger you are. And I personally picked up some of this stuff, like, even later than you did, it was, it was 2012 or so. And I was still, like, fairly young in my, especially, like, as a hockey fan. And it was a lot easier for me to soak this stuff up.

think about it more critically, but you don't need to be like scraping data off of websites or putting together convoluted graphs, not to sound like a, like mouth breathing, knuckle-dragging idiot who talks about hockey in a really idiotic way. Like, I think there's a middle ground there where you can just like think about it logically where, yes, having, you know, the puck more often than your opponent is a good thing because chances are you're going to, you're going to be less likely to get scored on and stuff like that. Like, it's not, it's not really rocket-sum. and there's no need to make it too complicated. Like I understand some people are paid to try and come up with new ways to get really complicated for it and more power to them.

I mean, hopefully better our understanding in the long run of the sport. But I think there's like a very simple, basic approach to take to just sound like you know what you're talking about and to be like at least just like aware of these things and willing to learn and not like sounds so condescending and patronizing. So I guess that that's really all it boils down to. And these people have never formed a critical thought in their entire life. So they only know one way. And if you even remotely try and engage them on the topic, very often, they will block you. So let me make this one additional point, because I don't want to sound like this guy who's just talking from the bookbox. But there are people, and again, you could go down this list who for years have disagreed with a

stat-based analysis, based on what's happened in the last seven, eight, nine years, whatever. Right. A lot of these people, I just find unbelievably, they refuse to entertain the other side of the argument, but I will say this. At least they continue to engage. And I know that sounds like the most ridiculous small compliment ever, but by forcing them to engage, it forces them to at least attempt to recognize the other side of the the argument, even though they very rarely do a lot of them.

Oh, my God, these five people, it's just the same thing over and over. And I was reading this a couple days ago and just, you know, I used like three years ago, I would just freak out. But truthfully, and for a variety of reasons, it's just not even worth it anymore. So, I mean, it's, look, you want to be ignorant to everything going on. You want to just, you know, punch the clock nine to five every day. Good night. That's, when that's the way you want to live, then that's, I mean, who am I to, who am I to,

who am I to say how they should conduct their business. But I certainly have a different approach to things. Yeah. Well, let's move on because I feel like we're at this point, a lot like preaching to the choir. I feel like anyone that's really listening to this show is probably like aware of all the stuff at this point. They're chanting, beat that horse.

That horse is beaten. Kick it one more time. All right. Let's get to adopting the coyotes. The first question I have is how do people feel about us calling them the Yotes? The Yosts? The Yosts. That's a good one. Yeah, man. If you were, I guess, hey, do you live in Arizona? Yeah, I went to, I did my undergrad at Arizona State.

Oh, man, I feel like, yeah, I don't know why people don't call the Yost. So my only experience when I lived in Arizona, I went to a few coyotes games. And my biggest takeaway was two things. One, nice arena. Two, holy shit, it is far away from civilization. And it's in this, I don't know if you've been there, but it's in this super little cozy, nice arena district in Glendale about 20 minutes away. But it's just such a pain in the ass to drive there. And actually 20 minutes might be generous depending on what side of town you live in. Right. My God. It makes me so, look, we're not going to talk about their whole long-term futures.

We're actually going to talk on ice, yeah. Yeah. But I will say this. the one thing, the one thing I am sympathetic to the organization is whether they screwed themselves or they got screwed into it or whatever the case may be. It is, they put themselves or the league put them or a combination of both into a really tough spot to try and build an interesting team that people go to see like crazy with a building out in the middle of nowhere. Like you can't like and if you notice the Vegas team, which we talked about at length last week, they are building it right on the strip. I mean, it's an interesting parallel there. Right.

Well, okay, so I feel like we were kind of putting this off for a while, and it's a shame they've sort of come back down to earth a little bit. So, you know, it's not as captivating a story as it was maybe two or three weeks ago, but at the same time, like, I feel like early in the season, like before the season started in our prediction show, we were all in on the coyotes are going to be, you know, heavily entrenched in the Austin Matthew sweepstakes. And that's still, I guess, may be true if they completely fall apart as the year goes along.

but like they seem that they're at least competent enough that spend the pacific division i guess is bad enough that they're going to kind of hang around there here for a little while so i don't know like it's it's interesting i'm i was looking at the numbers and there isn't really much there to point at and be like aha like this is why they've been better than we thought like early on uh obviously guys like domi and du clair were we're lighting the world on fire but they've come back down earth a little bit and and their underlying numbers aren't good by any means so like i don't know i it's What do you make of them? Why have they been able to exceed our expectations, I guess? Well, random variance has been pretty favorable.

I don't think, I think they're very much a clear-cut team of they've got fun, interesting talent who can spike a shooting percentage over a 10 or 12-game stretch, and there's a little else there. And look, that's where we kind of expected this team to be. So I'm not sure why anyone should be sweating that. But that's kind of the bottom. that they've put themselves into and look they're totally rebuilding right now and uh they're in a spot now where they can build off young talent like domi and declare who've been really good um the

i i would say they're above my expectations both of them individually and collectively uh shooting percentage or otherwise um i think they offensively have a nose for what to do there i like i i think sometimes certain players, especially young players, they get frustrated easily. And maybe it's the whole, they rode the great shooting percentage early and now they're, you know, confident with the stick and confident with the puck on their stick. And maybe that's part of it. But like when I watch them, I don't feel like these guys are going to turn their sticks into sawdust. They're squeezing them so tight.

Like, they just, they seem both very creative. And like, this is important because this team badly needed cornerstone talent to develop. and it seems like they're getting, and we should talk about the trade, though, right? Like the trade that between them and the Rangers that really started a lot of this. Yeah, yeah, it's the Keith Handel trade. I think that, I don't know,

it's fascinating because obviously, like it was a great trade for them and you do that 10 out of 10 times when you get a guy like Duclair to sort of help issue in this, like, new era of the team. But I feel like, you know, for Rangers fans, it wasn't like a terrible trade. I feel like if you're a Rangers fan,

you also kind of, do that trade 10 out of 10 times just purely because Keith Yandall's a really good player. And the fact that he's been sort of misused in New York is a whole other debate, I guess. Rangers fans do not seem to love Keith the, like I can't get a read. I know he's a good player. I mean, there's no reason not to. He goes, he has like, he'll have like one weird play game where you're like, all right, what the hell is Keith the handle doing?

But largely I think he's effective. So I don't really, I'm on the same page. But I don't know. I thought that trade triggered a lot of, uh, and, Beyond Keith Handel, too, in the Duclair trade, Dave Tippett's a good coach. Like, I like Dave Tippett. There's a reason why he's basically tenured, as long as tenured you can get at the NHL level. I think this team would do really well for Austin Matthews.

That makes way too much sense not to happen. I wonder if they kind of set themselves back a tiny bit with that early wind stretch and see if they can chase down that last spot. I know that early windstretch had them thinking, oh, we can hang around and division. It's not great. I'm looking at it right now. Yeah, they're 26 in terms of score of just a possession, and they're shooting,

they've got the highest shooting percentage overall at 5-1-5. So, yeah, that's definitely one of those things that. Is that true? They're higher than the Rangers? Yeah, at 5-on-5, their fourth highest overall. So, yeah. What are they shooting at 5-on-5? Oh, I don't know.

I don't have it in front of me right now. Like literally, the last time I remember checking in the Rangers were shooting like, and a half percent and it was I think it had fallen down a bit. Yeah. I'll look it up right now while we're talking. But, okay, so let's talk about the big elephant in the room

because I feel like this Mike Smith situation is interesting because this is basically the second straight year where he's struggling to kind of hang above 900, 900% percentage, and he's still got three more years at 5.7 mil after this season. And I can't envision a scenario in which Arizona is going to, you know, pay him to go away, but I also can't really envision a scenario in which someone's going to take him. So, like, I don't know, like, what do you do you just sort of ride it out?

Like, three more years is a pretty tricky position to be in. And that 2011-20 season where he had like a 9-30 say percentage looks like just like an insane outlier right now. By the way, one of the two most underrated seasons we've probably seen in years. The other one being, like, he was so good. And I don't think it was, maybe it was talked about as much back then, but I feel like it wasn't. And that season was like Carrie Price last year good. The other season being Joe Pavelsky in 1314. It was, I think, insane how good he was.

But look, the Mike Smith situation is real. It's a problem. The guy is not a good goaltender. The team, from their point of view, they have been adamant that he is either not totally, I guess a better way to describe it is he is fixable. I know they've went through a series of different coaching regiments. for him and just a lot of different maneuvers to try and get him right at him back on track to where he was a few years ago. But boy, it is starting to seem like that run, at least

earlier in his career, was a bit of an aberration because he just has not been able to piece together much of anything. Yeah. Look, the thing that kills me too is sometimes I feel like he makes it harder on himself. Like, he's an adventure behind the net sometimes. He's always going to draw contact. He's always flopping around, yeah. Yeah, not like, okay, draw your penalties. I get that, but I feel like sometimes he takes himself out of position too, and he's very prone to the bad goal. And look, I'm no goaltender specialist. I defer to a lot of other people's opinions who study a position a lot better than me. But look, on the other hand, I don't really need a big, a multi-million dollar consultant to tell me that he's not great because I can just look at the last three or four years of his number and say he is not great. And that's ultimately the best. big question because for a team that traded for Chris Pronger, I don't know how they're going to resolve his contract problem. Yeah, I don't know what they're going to do there. Honestly, I feel like they might just sort of have to bite the bullet and ride it out. I don't know.

Like, it's such a shame that it's three years because ideally you'd like to think that the, they're going to at least be sort of like relatively competitive within three years. And it's going to be tough to do that for them if Mike Smith is eating up so much of that, of that cap space. I don't know what they're doing. Maybe he puts together a nice little stretch and they can convince some sucker to take on his deal or something like that.

It's not, it wouldn't be like completely inconceivable. But at this point, it just seems sort of tough based on like how pedestrian he's been. It's not even that he's like average. He's like just so significantly below average. Wasn't he getting, I feel like he was getting hockey Canada

or some like international attention like less than a year ago. What was that for? Was it for worlds or was it for? it was for something like fairly I don't want to dare I say I don't want to say world's is important but I feel like it was some international event maybe even the last year maybe in the last Olympics

that people were saying is Smith uh is Smith Canada's guy is there a second or third guy and I'm like what I'm like look player the guy's not even top five yeah well it's funny and he started off the year really well I remember he had like four or five really really good games and people were like oh this is a whole new Mike

Smith he like worked on some stuff in the in the summer and he turned around and it's all this like post hoc analysis and then I haven't been hearing much about these adjustments he's made in the past month or so. So I should point out quickly, our producer Matt points out to us that the coyotes are shooting 9.4% at 515 and the Rangers are down at 9%. Wow. So the Rangers basically probably have not scored in a full week.

Yeah, yeah, pretty much. The good thing about the coyotes, though, is we mentioned... Is Nicholas Grossman's like the second leading defender in Iceland? Not that. I'm talking big picture. We talked about the Duclair trade. And the fascinating trade for me that you didn't mention is the Antoine Vermet trade at the deadline where they basically turned, what, three months of Antoine Vermet into a first, which they used for Nick Merckley, who was generally thought of as a really high, like a high end forward prospect. And Klaus Dahlbeck and remains to be seen whether he'll be like a regular NHL defenseman. But at the very least, like, they turn. turned this rental into just two younger assets and remit wins a cup comes right back to them in free agency. And I don't know, just got me thinking, like, why don't we see stuff like this more often? Like, I understand that, you know, there's a lot of complications here with family and such and you don't really want to have guys totally uproot their lives for just a few months

just so you can get another asset for free. But like, I feel like we should see this sort of stuff more often. Like, there's nothing really in the, in the CBA that prevents it, is there? No, I'm sure that it would be hard pressed for me not to believe that Vermet and the coyotes didn't think that that was a very real possibility that he could come back to the organization. And look, when you when you're in a position, that that was a win-win for everyone involved, right? Even if we think the team or Vermet mutually agreed, it's, hey, look, we suck. Go take your chance at winning a Stanley Cup. We're just going to sign you right back anyway. we're going to trade you for multiple assets and you'll have fun playing with

freaking Blackhawks for three months and we'll still be here, we think. And then look, the whole situation resolved and it was a huge win for Arizona. And like it didn't come at the super, I guess you can evaluate the trade from a Chicago perspective and say, oh, they gave up way too much for just a ever met rental or you could say, oh, it was fair value. But regardless, those types of deals are more like, oh, team gets a rental. And then the team that's trading way the player gets. the long-term benefit

at the short end long-term benefit, really. I don't know. It made too much sense. The one time I remember this, I remembered it sort of vaguely in the back of my head that the Blues did this a couple times in like the mid to late 2000s. And I looked it back,

looked it up. And sure enough, they traded Doug Waite to the hurricanes and he won a ring and they re-signed him. And then there was the great Keith Kachuk trade, which we talked about, I think last time with the Thrashers, where on February 25th, 2007, they traded him to the Thrashers for a first, a third and a second the following year.

And then on June 6th of that same year, they traded back for him to get his exclusive negotiating rights and sign him to a two-year deal. So that trade worked out really well for the blue. So I feel like this sort of stuff, just like, while it's sort of sketchy in terms of how how you can get a player to like

agree to it, like it obviously needs to be a sort of like an under the table hand shake agreement. But like if you can pull it off, I feel like it's a genius move. Daniel Linick, too. Yeah. Yeah, it's a good point. And that was another valuable player. that it made a lot of sense for him to take his shot. And he was young enough. Toronto was like, hey, we're just going to resign.

You're good. Yeah. So with that in mind, obviously these guys aren't really the player Antoine Vermedges, but I was looking at their roster, and if they do sort of fall apart here as the year goes along, I'm kind of curious to see whether they're going to be able to get tangible assets for guys like Kyle Chipchura and Boyd Gordon, who are impending UFAs.

And I feel like those are the sorts of players that generally fetch a far greater return than they're actually worth at the deadline because they're like guys that can play down the middle and you know they're sort of like reliable thought of at least as reliable tough gritty guys who would look good in like a in a playoff series for a contender and and maybe they can get some more like young assets like that and and they've shown up propensity for um you know making good calculated risks in that way like i was looking at their draft history and obviously we don't really know what any of these guys are going to wind up being, but they took guys like Connor Garland and Christian Devorak in like the later rounds and there are guys who are lighting it up in Major Junior. And I'm always like,

is he related to Radic? I have no idea. Honestly, that might be a good thing for us to this is a wealth of my prospect knowledge, my junior level knowledge. Radic Dvorak, excellent. I can I can note last names and know if they're related or not and ask you. But it brings up, it brings up an interesting point that I feel like people still don't really realize in the sense that like it always kills me when a team drafts a guy. that projects as a fourth liner with a really with like a fairly high pick like not understanding that most good bottom six players in the n hl are like sort of you know failed formerly highly regarded prospects that didn't really pan out but wound up sticking around in the league and and changing

their game right like i don't drafting a big guy who's sort of doing okay in in major junior or in college or whatever and being like oh this guy's for sure going to be our fourth liner just like generally doesn't work out. So I'm fascinated to see if it works out for them, kind of taking gambols on on these guys who are putting up really high point totals and seeing if they can convert them into NHL players. Yeah. Look at Jared Cowan. He's really carving himself a mission on that second pair. Yeah, perfect. Look, I think the coyotes are going about this rebuild pretty sensibly. I think they have a really good coach. I think that they've got a bunch of, definitely have a bunch of interesting young assets.

Like there's something there in the cupboards. I don't think that they're good this year. So despite those early games, which were fun as hell, by the way, they were very up and downish, and it seemed like Arizona couldn't stop scoring. It reminded me of that Avalanche team from a couple of years ago where, look, you knew they were fake,

but at the same time, like they were fun as hell to watch because they would just counterattack like maniacs and, you know, sequential passing. right into the offensive zone. And generally I'm optimistic about the team. The thing is, and this is this, you want to talk about the elephant in the room, there's always going to be a cap on what that team can spend.

So it's so important to them, probably more than any other organization that they draft and develop well because they are just not going to be the team that prize any fish at a free agency. And the fish they do pride, they're probably going to be overpaced for. So this organization is so, look, if I was them and I was very cost conscious, I would be dumping my resources into my junior scouting and maybe a couple of stats people.

I believe they have already hired one. So this is the exact type of organization that needs to exploit inefficiencies at the junior level and at the NHO level to, one, stay competitive, but two, really stay competitive under a self-reesome. imposed internal cap because they're never going to be able to spend. I think the cap next year is already rumored at $74 million. They could have a hundred season and not spend $74 million. So it's a tricky spot. But look, I think they have, I think there's reasons to be optimistic. I think there's talent there.

I agree. All right. Let's move on to a team that is really competitive this year in the Washington Capitals. And the first question I'm going to pose to you is one that I've been thinking about quite a bit over the past handful of days. and it's what we think of John Carlson. And it's fascinating because I was watching a game against the Red Wings earlier in the week. And Pierre McGuire went on this rant about numerous times, not just one time, of course,

because in classic Pierre McGuire fashion, you can't make a point once. You need to talk about it at least 10 times. And he brought up how he thinks that John Carlson's undervalued and no one really gives him the attention he deserves. And then I looked it up and he finished 10th in Norris Trophy voting last year. And I think he's a perfectly fine player, and he's in his physical prime. I think he's only 25 or 26 years old, and he's a really interesting offensive weapon for them because I like his shot, and I sort of like his instincts and the way he moves around on the ice, and he's a minutes eater for him, and there's value in that.

But I don't think that he's in that upper echelon of defensemen that we talked about a few weeks ago when we did our Golden Age of Defenseman conversation. There was a Canadian publication. and they did like their preseason Norris picks. And I think Carlson outnumbered Carlson. Two to zero, two to zero in the Norris Trophy winners. And not the right Carlson had two votes.

I'll say that. But to your point, it's funny that you bring him up because because he's on the caps. Maybe a week or 10 days ago. Maybe a week or 10 days ago when we were talking about Ryan Nugent Hopkins. I got a lot of pushback. Someone had asked me if I would trade, if I were Edmonton, if I would trade Ryan Newgen Hopkins for John Carlson. And I was like, no, not even close.

And a surprising number of people. And I'm not just saying to people with egg avatars, like, there were a lot of people who are like, you're wrong about this. John Carlson is that good. I don't think I would trade him for Ryan Newgen Hopkins. And maybe our evaluations of John Carlson weren't that far apart. maybe our Brian Agent Hopkins evaluations were, but to my point, there are a lot of people who think he's really good and really dominant. And I think he is a good defenseman who's got himself in a really the perfect setup, like with the perfect assembly of talent around him, the perfect allocation of minutes. And that is not a knock against him in any way, shape, or form.

That's no one's knocking Drew Dowdy for that. And that guy gets played with Anzay Kopitar every night. So I'm not, no, that shouldn't be. a slight at all against John Carlson, but I don't think he's in that upper echelon. It depends where you would draw that line. But if we're talking top 10, 12 defense, but he's just not fair. Yeah. It's fascinating, though, because I can, like, definitely see why people would become infatuated

with him, right? Like, every time I watch the caps, he, like, he's sort of one of those players that just, like, pops off the screen. He, like, does a handful of things, and you're like, wow, that was really impressive. And he's sort of, like, a physical, like, it's an impressive physical specimen. And the good thing is, like, it's not that he's just, like, banking on that. Like, he's not one of these guys that totally matched the eye test and is, like, a complete disaster numbers-wise.

But there is a divide there where he looks like he should be one of the best defensemen in the league, but just there's no sort of numerical evidence that he really is. Like, he's been paired with Brooks Orpick for most of this year, and his numbers weren't that great. And there was a lot of thought, like, okay, well, Brooks Orpick sucks. And he's probably dragging him down. But Orpick's been out of the lineup for a while now. and the numbers haven't really gotten better.

So I'm just kind of wondering if John Carlson is just sort of stuck being this player that he is, which isn't a bad thing by any means, but it's probably not what some people paint him to be. Well, I think a lot of it too is, I can't remember what player we mentioned this about a few weeks ago, but he is a player without flaw. Like there's no part of John Carlson's game when I'm like, ooh, that sucks. And that is really difficult to say because there are things, and I'll just talk about, when we talk about Eric Carlson, we say, okay, he's the best offenseman in the league. But his, like,

Eric Carlson's pivoting off of the rush, off of a counterattack when he's defending the run of play. It's not great. Like, I can point to that and say, yeah, he could probably improve that. And, like, I don't know that there's anything that I could, like, John Carlson could improve, obviously, generally as a player. But, like, I've never watched him and thought, man, that's an obvious. Right, he's no, like, physical limitations. Right, right, exactly. And I think a lot of that drives why we think.

man, this guy should be a top 10 defenseman in the league. And maybe that flaws what we see in him and what we don't see in him. Because look, let me be clear. I would take John Carlson on my team any day of the week. He's a very valuable defenseman. He does a lot of things really well. But again, I point back to the situation he's in. And the Brooks Orpick thing was amazing.

But to your point, his numbers, even multi-year, they've always been good, not excellent. And good, not excellent is a great place to be. if you want to be in the NHL for a very long period of time. But there is a big line between good, not excellent, and you're in the Norris conversation. And he's just not crossing that line. So that's kind of why I thought it was interesting. I mean, would you trade Ryan Nugenthalchon for John Carlson if you're Edmonton?

I don't think I would, honestly. I think that it sort of, you know, we had this discussion when we talked about in that podcast where if you're going to trade a guy like Rujin, Ryan, Agent Hopkins, you really need to get a guy back that's going to totally move the needle for you and just like make everything better. And I don't think that maybe we just spent five minutes talking about how John Carlson probably isn't that guy. So for me, it's tough.

You definitely have to think about it just because at least Carlson is still like in his prime. And there's reason to believe that he's going to be a good player for like many more years. But I wouldn't do it. I think that you're selling yourself a little bit short with that move. Okay, do you want to swoon over Alex Ovechkin next? Yeah, my next point was, uh, how much, okay, instead of us just being like Alex Ovechkin, is really good because I feel like everyone knows that. He is quite good. Yeah.

How much longer can we realistically expect like this sort of level from Ovechkin? And the only reason I ask that is because he's basically been like a 50 goal score for the past three years if you kind of pro rate the lockout short in season. And I don't know, he's in his 30s now and

the track record for people in their 30s to come near that 50 goal mark isn't really very promising. Like we haven't seen it very often. I think that I looked it up and the last two times we've seen it were like a gin line 08 and Yager and 06 or something like that. And yeah, Rick and Ash scored 42 last year in his 30 year old season. And I don't know, like obviously there's, there's plenty of room here for him to decline a little bit as a goal score and still be pretty much the best guy in the league in that

regard. Like, I feel like if he's scoring 40 goals, that's nothing to kind of frown about and shake your head at. But it is interesting to just like look big picture and just wonder like, when he's done, how many goals is he going to have for his career? Like, I think that's an interesting debate. Yager already broke the European aging curve. Yeah. No one gets, when you get old, it doesn't matter. It doesn't phase your abilities anymore.

I was watching hockey. I was watching a Panthers of a couple games ago with my old man. And I pointed out to him that was Yomere Jager on the ice. He's not a big hockey fan. He's like, holy shit. Yager's still in the league. So, I mean, this is, no, but like, the thing about Yager is, he has for years and years and years.

He's always had that ability to just take over games. And I think a lot of it is because he's such a big body. And he's so physically imposing. And he's also got a great shot. And I look at what has made Yager so pervasive, I guess, year over year in terms of his skill and repeatability. And I look at Ovechkin and I'm like, why do I suddenly think this will dry up for Ovechkin? I mean, people think he's like the greatest shooter in the world. He is insanely, he's an insanely good shooter.

I mean, there are not a lot of goalies who can stop the shots that he's firing, especially when he's in his wheelhouse. But the thing about Ovechkin is he does it with volume too. Like the guy just takes a ton of freaking shots. There's a great quote about Kobe Bryant. I feel like this is the second time we brought up Kobe Bryant, but it's so pertinent. I remember then there was a lot of criticism about Kobe when he was this pure volume player

and starting to depreciate a few years ago. and I think it was Rick Carlisle, who was a really sharp guy, really sharp coach, said, look, Kobe is taking a ton of shots. Do you know how difficult that is to take a ton of shots in this league? You know, most guys, if you tried to get the volume of shots up that Kobe did, they would have half their shots blocked and their legs. They would just be drooping over the floor by the end of the game. And it's a testament to how skilled he is, how well he can create on his own. And even on those days of years back where Kobe would have those cold shooting nights, you still take a 24, 24, 20. 25, 26, 27 shots.

And I think it left coaches in all. Like, holy hell, how is this guy just continually able to find himself on parts of the court where you can take these shots? And that's like the same exact logic with Alex Ovechkin. He constantly creates himself opportunity. Now, for years from now, you may need the more playmaking or still have the need for a playmaking center in the middle of the lineup and playing primarily with Ovechkin to get the puck into those areas.

He's going to need help. some point in his career. But, like, I just think he's so dynamic and so dominant that it's, even if his shot was a little bit of muster, like, you're still talking about a guy who's the number of shots he puts up a season is ridiculous. Yeah, we haven't really seen too many guys like him. And I definitely agree that even when he sort of, you know, comes back down to earth physically, because like, even still now, as a third year old, he's like just like such a unique specimen. We haven't really seen many guys like him. And even if he kind of comes back down earth a little bit in that regard. His shot, especially on the power play, is still going to be such

a weapon that I, like, see no reason to believe that he can't be at least like a 30 goal score, like four or five years from now. And I don't know, then he's going to start, you know, approaching that, that's 700 goal mark and maybe even more and quickly becoming like a top five guy all time. And I guess it's just pretty cool to have been like around for a guy like that's full career, right? Because like, when people talk about people like Gretzky and stuff, and even Lemieux for me. I wasn't around for that stuff, so I can't really comment on it. I've seen grainy highlights and stuff like that, but I don't have any personal experience with it. But like, I'm going to definitely remember, you know, seeing Alex Havetchkin's career from start

to finish. And I think that's a pretty cool thing. One of the greatest players ever in the NHL. I mean, period. It's not, there's not a question mark at the end of it anymore. Basically, any half credible analysis that looks at players and adjusts for scoring over. the various eras and periods in the NHL says Ovechkin is a one of a kind almost unparalleled goal score I think I hate when people always say it's time we start appreciating this player or whatever

but it's so true with him like we went through like a four year stretch where it was like eh Ovechkin or Crosby and then Crosby was just so freaking good it was like say he told you Russian guy he's just good he evaporates in the playoffs and what kind of voice is that that's that's something that is the that is the grainy low media voice that just that's how I envision that's how I read it when I when I see those quotes

on Twitter or when I see the columns that's the voice exactly that I read it in because I try and think of the most annoying voice possible and um but to to my point though I mean he's just so he's been so dominant for so long and look we went through the the pointing out how dominant Crosby was especially in the peak of his career but like the fact that Ovechkin's been able to sustain this for so long is just so ridiculous. And look, I think you are a full one year younger than me. So I am very much in the same position. The grainy highlights of Mario Lemieux are basically all I've seen. It's not, there's not much else out there. It has been an unbelievable pleasure to watch him. Like he, he's one of the big reasons why I got so into hockey because I remember,

I mean, just some of the goals he was scoring younger his career, it's like, this is exactly why you watch hockey. It's so entertaining and so fun. I should bring up the last point to that. How can we talk about Ovechkin and Yager in the same discussion and not talk about the time Ovechkin nearly killed Yager? Was it the 08 Olympics where

Yager was doing his thing in the center of the ice against Russia and Ovechkin just comes out of absolutely nowhere. Freight trains Yager and just keeps going and they immediately score on the counter. I thought Yager was dead. And that was seven years ago. Yagos's all gotten better. Okay, so here's an interesting thing that I think we should talk about, and I'm not sure there's necessarily a right answer,

but maybe that's what makes it interesting. If you were coaching the caps, would you consider splitting Ovechkin and Baxirma up at 5 on 5? And I understand that they've had so much success together that it seems like sort of a sacrilegious thing to say. But early in the season, Baxir missed a few games. Then when he came back, Kuznetsov and Ovechkin were playing so well together that they kind of put back someone on the second.

line with Williams and Johansson, I remember, and that combo was ridiculous. They were, like, plugging along at, like, a 60% possession rate or something like that. And I don't know, it made me wonder if that just makes them so much more dangerous where, like, you really can't load up on the caps. You can't be like, okay, we're going to try and eliminate Ovechkin's line here because, okay, well, here come Baxerman Williams, and they're just going to, like, wear you down and probably draw a penalty, and then Ovechkin's going to score on you on the power play. Like, I don't know. I don't think there's a right answer here, right? Like, I feel like Kuznetsov is, is talented and good enough at this point that he can probably carry that second line himself,

and you can just keep that backstrom of Etchen dynamic going. But I don't know, it's a luxury that they haven't really had in years. And I think that's what makes this version of the Caps team so much more dangerous than ones we've really ever seen. Because that's not so good that we're almost to the point where I'm like 6'1 away half a dozen another, right? Like that's, it is a unbelievable luxury to have where you can, I mean, let's just talk about if you lose one of those players. it's like it's not the end of the world because you got one of these guys going right down the line up and moving up in the lineup and picking up ice time but um i what i what i do think it does is i think it gives a coach options and options are always a good thing to have that way because

you see what happens when you don't have options you see coaches doing crazy shit and trying to figure out how to get this a hl call up onto the second line you know all this like and like this is just such a logical plan b right like oh Oh, Backstrom's not working here. Let's try and shuffle them up a little bit. And sometimes the whole shuffling discussion is probably for another podcast, whether it works or not or whether it's value added or not. But to the extent that every coach does it and every team in the league does it,

like that's a nice alternative option to have, right? Like it's a second wrinkle. You can split it up a bit. And we've seen it at least in spurts and it worked. So I think Backsham is probably the fit for a fetch. I mean, there's something to having played so many thousands of minutes together. it's like that that kind of chemistry is unparalleled but right you know again this is a nice second option to have yeah yeah no you're right especially come like playoff time because this team clearly has

a long playoff run aspirations and kind of giving a guy like trots who is a good coach kind of a few options here to tinker and and you know prevent other teams from just loading up on them and showing down that one line and then and you know the rest of the team screwed like this cap seems pretty set and I can't help but think that this might be I don't know it seems weird to say but this might be the best version of the cast we've seen in the ovechkin era just purely because brayden holtby is a monster I think he's well that's exactly he's pretty clearly a top five goalie I think we've discussed he's like he's right there with schneider and and two karas like right behind lunkwis and price in that next tier and the team in as in general is just it seems like it's such a you know

They have a recipe for success here. They're really good at suppressing shots against, and they have a really, really good goalie, and they're going to have a really dangerous power play, and they have a good possession team 5-on-5, and there's no reason to believe this team isn't right up there with the habs in terms of the best team in the East, right? Yes.

So having the best shot, or one of the best shots to emerge out of the East, though, I think is a bit of a different discussion than is this the best team? have had. So I have no idea which one of the two you said, but I'll, I think both are up for discussion at least. That capitals team was so good. Yeah, but their goalie was like Jose theater, dude. I know, I know, but it didn't, it didn't matter. Like, I'm not willing to discount the fact that it didn't matter because of how many goals they scored the regular season. Like,

let's, let's not, let's ignore, let's not ignore the fact that they fizzed out of the playoffs, but at the same time, I mean, there was a reason why they went through 82 games and were almost unstoppable, especially that one season where it didn't matter if they gave up three goals. You were never winning if you only scored three goals against that. It was ridiculous. Okay, let me rephrase it then. Is this the best chance of Etchkins had at winning a cup? I think that is a more, I think that is an argument I'm more willing to embrace because I think,

look, I mean, let's just look around the east. Tampa Bay, I still have full. confidence in, but they're not playing as well as I anticipated. Montreal, same story is always what Montreal. They're going to be there. I don't think they're a dominant team. The Rangers are annoying. That team is just not good at five on five.

But, like, again, you have an answer for Hendrik Wonkiss. Please let me know because no one else does. And that's pretty much it. I mean, I don't think any other team is going to beat them. I mean, maybe Pittsburgh rally, like a healthy playing well, Pittsburgh team. They looked really good. I don't know if you saw any of the Pittsburgh, L.A. game tonight, but that was awesome hockey.

A ton of shots. That was like Stanley Cup caliber hockey. But we haven't seen that a lot from Pittsburgh this year. So, like, I don't know. I think you can very well make the case that Washington's at the top or very near the top of that list in the east. So I think I would be more willing to accept that, yeah. Okay. Yeah, I think we're on the same page there.

All right, let's wrap this up. For all the people that have been kind of crying for us to do longer shows than the 35 to 40 minutes we usually do, we just gave you guys. 70 minutes. Yeah, no, this was a marathon. Do you get a per diem? No, but it's Friday night, so we're allowed to have a drink now. I'm going to sleep. Maybe you are more than a year older than me, honestly. All right, next week, you know what? Maybe we won't do it on the first show we do next week, but the second one, let's adopt the Kings.

I feel like for whatever reason, we haven't really talked about that much on this show, and they're doing a really, really good. impersonation of the dominant king king's teams from years past so i think it's time that we kind of give them some love yeah including shooting five and a half percent again at five and five which is a thing by the way yeah no it's definitely a thing all right man um we'll be back next week with a couple shows so uh people can check that out and until then Travis have a good one man all right man the hockey pdocast online at hockey pdocast.com subscribe on iTunes soundcloud or follow on Twitter at Dim Filippovich and at Travis Yost.