The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 379: Breakout Candidates in 2021

Episode Date: January 12, 2021

Andrew Berkshire joins the show to discuss potential breakout candidates for the coming season. Topics include: What we're looking for when identifying potential breakouts Jack Hughes coming back stronger for Year 2 Andrew Mangiapane in Calgary's Top 6 Nick Suzuki building off bubble performance Matt Grzelcyk taking advantage of opportunity Brady Tkachuk's underlying dominance Rasmus Dahlin reminding everyone how good he is Andrew's pick out of left field Kirill Kaprizov's KHL resume Juuse Saros' time is finally here Young defensemen finally being unleashed If you're interested in the Blue Wire Hustle program discussed at the top of the show, you can submit your application here: http://bwhustle.com/join 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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With your host, Dimitri... Welcome to the HockeyedioCast. My name is Amitra Pilipovich, and joining me is my good buddy, Andrew Berkshire. Andrew, what's going on, man? Not much. Just excited to get back on the Hockey PDOCast because it's been a while. It feels like it's been forever since hockey, but I guess it hasn't been that long, but I don't know. It feels like it's been a year. I think it actually has been about a year. It's been a while.

Let's get to have you back on, though. And I feel like we do our best work here in the preseason before the games actually start and prove everything we're saying to be horribly wrong. So hopefully we'll be able to continue that trend here and have some fun with it. I thought the plan for today's show, a good one for us would be. to go back and forth and get into our favorite breakout candidates for this coming season. And I gave you some homework. I gave you a list to do.

And I think it should be fun. I think like, you know, the most recent home run breakthrough that everyone, I think, had on their list certainly wasn't alone. It was Kevin Fiala who completely just went off down the stretch last year. And thank goodness that he did, because I don't know if I could have gone another year with having him on my breakout list. So it's good to get him off, create some space for some new names and some new faces. And so we're going to get through it.

I think here's a good starting point for us. What are we looking for when we're identifying or earmarking candidates that kind of fit the bill of a breakthrough candidate? Like, is there a particular type of either statistical resume or player type that you're kind of keying in on or that you seem to gravitate towards when you're kind of thinking about this concept? Well, I think, like, for me, usually I look for offensive breakouts, right? because that's what's going to catch people's eyes anyway.

Like if you say somebody's going to have a defensive breakout season, they could have one and nobody will notice. So it won't even be that big of a deal. And you won't get the credit after, you know, you want to be right. Like when I said that Yarm or Yager was one of the top wangers in the game still at 48 years old or whatever. But yeah, I'm looking usually at younger end of the spectrum. I look at who maybe did the right things but didn't get rewarded for it in the previous season. Sometimes, you know, like a rookie season that didn't work out the way they wanted. And sometimes you got to just go out of left field and just bet on talent, right?

And I feel like Fiala, like the first year or so that he was on there, we were like, okay, he's doing the right things, just not getting rewarded for it. And then like the longer it went on that he didn't actually have his breakout. I was like, okay, his game's kind of deteriorating a little bit, but I still believe in the talent. And then he got traded and he was like, okay, I got this. Yeah, definitely. I think certainly like circumstance and environment and just getting the opportunity can go a long way. Yeah, what I'm looking for is some combination of a history of success at lower levels,

so whether, you know, especially if it was at the HL, I think when you're talking about NCAA or major junior, that can be very misleading, especially if it's an over-eague. player but obviously if you've seen them do it at other levels it can give you more confidence that they actually have the skill level to get it done um i would also say you know uh encouraging results in in limited actions in hl actions so it's usually on like a permanent basis if they're per 60 stats are looking really good and you're thinking okay if this player gets in his coach's good graces steps up in the lineup and starts playing with better players this could really take off and a repeatable translatable skill set so i just kind of that's i guess the i test i guess the i

right just seeing if a player just checks out if they're skating is really good or if they do a certain thing well if they shoot well if they you know any number of things but i think kind of using those as a good checklist has generally led to pretty good results i've i've been doing this for the past four or five years in terms of kind of kind of getting like five or six names out there and um you know we've had some hits for sure whether it was like victor arvinson a couple years ago or all over Rick Strand, Jonathan Marshes. So some of that kind of obvious candidates, I'm still waiting for Charles Hudon and Mark O'Dano

all these years later. Those are a couple of the misses, but you know, you're never going to have 100% success rate, but I think it's just a good sort of entry point conversation for us to talk about some players that might be slightly less heralded. Or, you know, when I pitched you on this concept,

and I really left the definition of it very loose because it is kind of subjective, and I didn't want to make it too restrictive. So I think, you know, generally I'm looking at players that maybe their underlying numbers are really good, but, you know, they haven't necessarily crushed it in terms of the box car stats. And we know that, you know, point totals are usually something that are more casual fans are equating to being a good player. And so if a guy doesn't have ridiculous through the roof goal or point totals,

maybe they're not getting the national attention that they actually deserve. And so that's kind of a good way to look at it and frame it here. So as the guest, I'm going to open the floor to you here. Who's the first player that you want to talk about on your list? Okay. See, I've got some players that I think we'll probably both pick. And I'm going to save one in my pocket because I think there's probably very little chance that you have them on there. So I'm going to save that one.

That's going to be my surprise at the end, unless you pick it and then I'll be super upset. But, okay, so my first guy is going to be Jack Hughes, which is not exactly a hot take. I think he got a lot of criticism last year. He obviously had a very terrible offensive season. But, you know, when I was able to work with Sport Logic data, which I can't anymore, but when I was able to looking at his season last year, like almost everywhere that you want to see a young player succeed, he was doing the right thing.

You know, his underlying numbers were solid. And, you know, not star quality solid, but very good. And I think that New Jersey was just such a tire fire last year. he had nothing really to work with on the wings. Like at the beginning of the season, I think he was with Wayne Simmons, and Simmons had a really good start to the year, and then faded overtime,

which is, you know, par for the course with a player, his age with his injury history. But I just think Jack Hughes has so much to give, and you look at what his brother was able to do in Vancouver. And I don't think Jack is going to be as good as Quinn Hughes. Like, I don't know if it was just different draft year strength levels or what.

But maybe Jack got the benefit of being the second brother drafted where he went higher, like what usually happens. But I think he's a really good player. I think he could be a number one center for that team. But last year, just nothing went right from. I think he had one of the worst on-ice shooting percentages in the entire league. And he was among the lowest by evolving Wiles numbers for actual goals to expected goals. what he actually should have got compared to what he did get.

So he's my number one pick as breakout candidate of the year. Yeah, he wasn't on my list, although it's a very good choice. I feel like I've talked about a bunch on this show this offseason. The devil shot 5% or so with him on the ice at 515, and 7.7 overall, you know, his own shooting percentage was also similarly really suppressed. and yeah, he created a ton of chances, especially, you know, when the game opened up, whether it was

on the power player or when he had some space in the neutral zone, you saw the talent that got made him the first overall pick. I think, yeah, having better players to play with, and they do have some interesting wing talent now on that team is a plus. He spent the past 10 months getting a lot stronger and adding a bunch of muscle, and so I'm sure that'll help as well. And yeah, I think it's it's only possible to go up from here right he had uh seven goals last year or something like that i think uh yeah at 5-1-5 they got outscored 33 17 with him and part of that was that on a shooting percentage but um yeah just a better environment also him just taking time to develop which is a surprise we we knew that that was probably going to be the case heading into the year and into his

rookie season and and that's perfectly fine i think we've been spoiled by young players coming into the league as teenagers and right out of the gate thriving and it's okay to take some time to develop and not necessarily be the best version of yourself right out of the gate. So I think that's a good pick. I think certainly a very dynamic player and just thinking about potentially down the road, them having Alexander Holter's shot who they just drafted high in this past draft next to him as a playmaker seems really appealing. But for the time being, whether it's Kyle Palmieri or Nikita Gusev or Andreas Janssen or Esper Brad or whoever they put on his wings, he'll have some skill to play with.

And with Lindy Ruff as his coach, I think he's going to get the opportunity to keep trying to do stuff with the puck and make mistakes, even if it leads to defensive breakdowns going the other way. So I think just from a sort of creativity perspective and building off of it and just trying to get better out there at the NHL level, I think he's in a good position to succeed heading into the season. Yeah. And I think not to compare them at all, because I don't think they're anywhere close to the same player. but you talked about like young players coming to the league and not always finding immediate success and it was a different era as well but like people forget that joe thornton had seven

points in his first season you know in his second season even like it was a breakout but he only had 41 it wasn't until his third year where he was really you know like a top line player so some of these guys that get drafted first overall even it takes some time and uh then of course there's patrick stephen yeah i think you know i don't want to completely hand-wave the shooting percentages because, like, at some point, part of it is lock, obviously, as we know, and I think he's going to regress something higher, but certainly needs to work on his shot, and we'll see it and has time to do so, and it seems like a very identifiable skill that he can work on, so I'm not worried about that, but I do think just when you

watch him, like, it's very clear that he can hang in the NHL in terms of the skill and the speed necessary in the game in 2021. And he didn't look like kind of like a fish out of water when you watched him play. It was more so when the game kind of bogged down a little bit when in the offensive zone, when defense and were able to kind of lean on him a bit more when the game became a more of a kind of slow it down pace. But that's to be expected. And I think getting stronger and getting older and getting into his 20s is going to help

sort of rectify a lot of that. So I'm not particularly worried. If we'd watch them and it was a clear. that, you know, he had just been dominating at lower levels and then he wasn't fast enough to compete here, do what he was doing before, couldn't get to his spots, then I'd be much more alarmed than, than I am based on what he put on tape last year. Yeah, for sure. And like you said, the shooting percentage, obviously, if you're a bad shooter, that will

bear out over time. Like, I don't know how many seasons it takes for you to be, like, a little bit highly, like, questioning whether it's bad luck or bad shooting, but usually for me, I give it, like, three or so. If it's like happening in the third season in a row, I'd be like, okay, this is probably something. Yeah. And especially if it's a teenager, right? You give a little bit more of a, you know, you could just be like they're not very strong compared to the adults playing the game.

It's funny, you know, as you get older, when you're that age, you're like, I'm an adult when you're 18, but now you're like, they're just children. Yeah. Yes, definitely. Okay. That was a good first one to get us going. I will I'll give you one. He kind of did start to break out towards in the last year,

but I think he fits the bill of. I think there's another gear to hit, especially in terms of sort of recognition and in terms of the indicators that people generally latch onto. And it is Andrew Manjapani for me. I like it. The other breadman.

I think, you know, he had to pay his due and wait for a long time because he's undersized. He was passed up in his draft year. He was a sixth rounder in his draft plus one year. All he's done is produce everywhere he's played. He had 210 points in his final 127 games in the OHL. He had 104 points in 120 AHL games after that.

He didn't really become a full-time NHLer until I think around 23, 24 years old. But last year we saw he basically forced their hand into bumping him into the top six full-time as the year got along. And he was playing alongside Backlin and Kachuk. And in 3505 minutes together, they had just sparkling underlying metrics. I think they controlled like 60% of the high danger chances, 54, 55% shot share. And so I just think that it can only kind of go up from here because whether he plays with those two or as we've seen in the preseason where they've been playing him

with Goodrow and Monaghan, he's going to stick in that top six. and I think that just everything he does is going to lead to future success. And whether he counts as a breakout candidate because he already kind of started to break out towards in the last year, I just think there's another level for him to hit, and that's why I had him on this list. Yeah, yeah. The opportunity for him is just going to be so much larger, right? Like the way that Calgary has kind of restructured their forwards a little bit, obviously they're trying to spread their center depth a little bit to give,

some more depth have a third line that actually functions instead of just kind of like trying to hold the fort with their bottom two lines and Mangapane is probably going to get a lot more power play time which is going to help a lot. I know a lot of people are really high on Dylan Dubay there as well

but I would be surprised if he was able to like come in and supersede what Mangapani has already shown. Well the thing with Mangipane and kind of like the motor he plays with whether it was fitting in with backline a chuck in their ability to kind of just grind teams and especially kind of they were looking for that third wheel with them after years of Michael Frolek shooting like 7% uh which is a good sort of uh bringing

you back to what we're just talking about with Hughes after like four or five straight years of Michael Frolek wildly underperforming his expected goals and shooting percentage it was like okay this is probably just the player that he is um so he's able to kind of convert on more of those opportunities but even if he's playing with goodermanahan like I think um his ability to just kind of be a menace and retrieve the puck more and maybe create some more ozone touches and opportunities with possession for them could help get them going because I think if they're kind of viewing how they can unlock this team like it's clear that they need those two to be more productive than they were last year where they were outscored when they were on the ice together

at 5-1-5 and that was kind of unacceptable considering their stature and how they important are to the team and so I don't know like I think with manjipane like he had 15 points in his final 18 games last year and was basically playing on Calgary's top line. And for the year at 515, he had one fewer point than Goodrell and he had four more points in Monaghan. So like, you could argue that he already did break out if you're looking at certain metrics. But I think as a total package, just because he started the year playing like 12, 13 minutes a night, I think it's flying a bit off the radar in terms of how good he was. And I think it was, you know, the flames this year had an interesting decision to make with him where in the off season, he was an RFA and decided to go

with a two-year bridge for him. And he was the type of player that I would have liked to see them lock up long-term because he's that ideal candidate for, like, good underlying metrics will perform much more favorably offensively in these top six minutes moving forward regardless of who he's playing with. And so I think the price tag for him is only going to go up from here. So I think they're going to wind up regretting that when they have to pay him more two years from now.

But, you know, that's a good position for Mangipani to be in kind of betting on himself because I think, you know, it's a much, it's an upward trajectory before I'm moving from from this point on. Yep, fully agree. He's a really good player. I'm excited to see what he can do with more minutes. It's always fun to see a guy who just, like, works their way up and never really gives up.

It seems to often be the smaller guys, right? They have to work harder than every other guy to get there. But he's earned his spot. And whether he sticks with Goddrault and Monaghan or the, they reunite them for the, to make the new 3M line. I think that's two really good spots for him. Okay. Who's next on your list? On my list, the next one is

I'm going to do the hometown thing and do Nick Suzuki. And I've seen a few people talk about how Nick Suzuki might have a sophomore slump this year. And I'm not really seeing it because you look at where he produced last year and most of it was actually on the power play until late in the year.

He didn't really have that great of a season at 5 on 5. His defense numbers were there. They were really good, but offensively, he didn't create a lot. He was not able to get it going for the full season. He had a really big step down in the middle of the season as well, where he was kind of getting his minutes dropped a little bit as well. So I look at him what he was able to do in the playoffs,

how he's diversified his game, the way he attacks the game with creativity, and the fact that he's now going to likely have a ton of powerplay time, because putting him on the power play in the playoffs for the Canadians made them have a functioning powerplay. Like it was that big of a deal. He's going to have penalty killing time because once again they put him there and he was fantastic. So he's going to be a dual special teams player. So the even strength minutes will probably not be as heavy for him as you would expect for like in a normal season because he's going to have special teams like crazy.

So I expect him to even if he struggles at even strength for it, to be as big of a noticeable factor because he's going to be playing so much power play time. And I just really expect him to figure out the offense. You look at what he did in the playoffs as well, and it's a short sample size, of course, but the mechanics were there. He was figuring out how to create against good teams. And down the stretch in the regular season, he was just, everything's pointing into the right direction for this kid.

And I think he's just so smooth and everything happens in his business. brain, right? He's got hockey skill for sure, but he's just such a cerebral player. I really like the way that he plays the game and I think he's bound for a ton of responsibility. His coach loves him and the fact that he already brings some pretty excellent defensive acumen to the game means that he's going to play all situations. He won't get benched very often. His coach, like I said, absolutely loves this kid. So big opportunity for him. Yeah, on my list, I expected you to have him as well. So I was going to give you that one. A super trendy pick considering his play in the bubble, but I don't think that necessarily

means that it's wrong to expect that. True. In that if you look at the playoffs, seven points in those 10 games had that clutch game winning goal in game five against the Flyers accounted for all of their offense in the elimination game in game six. In terms of his coach loving him, only Brennan Gallagher played more than him at 515 per game, and only Dano played more than him overall for all haves forwards in the bubble. So that certainly, if you have

Claude Julian's, you know, trust that's going to go a long way. I think if you look at what they did this off season, they added a bunch of talent on the wing. So whether it is Tofoli or Josh Anderson or even Jonathan Druand, who was obviously there last year, he's going to be playing with good players who can play up in pace with him. And, you know, last year, he did have a lot of minutes with, like, you know, Lekan and Cousins and Nate Thompson. And I think it's just to step up in terms of the talent he's going to be armed with. And it's interesting that you mentioned that his best work was on the powerplay

because that's like such an anti-Habs player in a way, right? Whereas like all their players seem to just destroy at 5-on-5, especially in terms of the possession metrics. But their point totals, especially for that top line, I guess, are suppressed and kind of make people think that they don't have the high-end skill because they're just not scoring on the power play at all. But, you know, I think a lot of the performance. indicators were there for him.

Similarly, another guy who I think he had a 6.4% on ice shooting percentage of 515 that's going to go up. And so playing with better players, playing a ton, I think the sky's the limit for him. And he will, you know, he's going to unlock this Habs team in a way, right? We kind of know what we're going to expect from that top line with Gallagher, to Tar, and Dano. And if Suzuki can really step up and make that a one-two punch with a second line and get the most out of all the wingers that they added,

then I think it's really going to alleviate a lot of the concerns about this team in terms of we all know they're deep, we all know they're going to be really tough to play against, but do they have the high-end skill to match some of the other teams in North Division? I think they do, and I think Suzuki taking that next step and breaking through is going to all but kind of ensure that that's the case. Yeah, and that was one of the thing that I wanted to mention, but kind of forgot was the addition of the wingers that they brought in, right,

is they've got, they always had depth, but they had a lot of good guys who were like good two-way players that couldn't really finish. And neither Tofoli or Anderson are like sniper level finishers, but they're both above averageish finishers. To Foley sometimes is below, but like just a hair below. Kind of like the same thing as Brennan Gallagher in terms of finishing ability.

So that gives a lot of extra opportunity to put some goals in the board. And, you know, like I really like Archer Lekid in as a player. I think he's great. But in terms of finishing, it just ain't happening. You know, Armia has these like streaks where he'll score like five goals in four games and then go 30 with one. So they needed some guys you could put the puck in the net. And I think they did actually address that for once in the offseason. And it's going to be interesting to see how much that translates for the young centers because I think they do have quite the little core there of like, who's going to break the doors down like an awesome Matthews or Connor McDavid, but all through

the like each line. I like the guys that they have on there. Yep. Yeah, a ton of depth. Very few wasted minutes. So, yeah, but Suzuki taking that next step in terms of just the scale level is going to go a long way. All right.

Next on my list, Macrislick. Ooh. I like it. So many minutes out of the door on the blue line for the Bruins this year. And I think, importantly, high leverage ones too, right? I think Krug was playing nearly four minutes per game on the power play for them on the top unit. Chara was playing like north of three minutes per game on the penalty kill as their top penalty

killer. I'm not saying Grizzlik is going to step in and do either of those, but it just shows that there is going to be more high leverage usage to go around. And I think they made it pretty clear that they similarly believe in him too, where, you know, they committed four years, nearly 15 million doing this offseason, and I think it was a really good litmus test for who's paying attention because you look at it and it's like, okay, 15, 18, 21 points and it's three years in the league. 1908 per game was his ice time high in 2019.

I think a lot of people were like, why would they commit so much to this guy who kind of profiles as a third pairing defenseman? But I think they're really keying on him this year to take that next league because they didn't address any of those names that left. they're kind of hoping that some of their young defensemen they've drafted the past couple years will be able to step in. But I think Grizzlik they're identifying as a guy who can step up and whether it is playing with McAvoy on a supercharged top pairing or playing with Brendan Carlo and a more defensive assignment. He's going to be playing some big minutes with those guys. And I just think the skill level there and the opportunity is there to match it now as well.

And that kind of checks a lot of the boxes that I'm looking for for putting people on this list. yeah he has the potential to put up some serious points this year like without crook there i mean obviously i don't believe anybody on that blue line can match krug offensively but there's a lot of minutes like you said on that power play that they're probably going to put a defenseman on maybe the bruin's will go with a five-forward power play you never know they've got some forward depth to spare but uh yeah there i mean even charley mackaboy right like he's a Dominal defensive defenseman who hasn't put up crazy defensive numbers so far in his career. Fourth year, he could be a guy who all of a sudden gets a ton of power play time and goes from two power play points last year to like 15.

And how does that change how much like how people look at him, right? He's kind of like an analytics name, but not necessarily a household name. Certainly. And I think, you know, Grizzlick was fantastic during that 19 playoff run for them. and I was tracking the neutral zone stuff for them at the time, and he was a rock star in that regard, and both defending the blue line and also breaking it out. I think if you just watch him,

he's got tremendous poised with the puck, and I think he actually would be a good option for them on the Powerblade because he's one of those defensemen that doesn't shoot the puck just for the sake of shooting it. He's very poised and patient with it, and I think when you have people like Marsha and Bergeron and Pasternak out there, you probably want more of the opportunities to go, go towards them as opposed to just bombing away from the point like Brent Burns. And so that'll be

interesting to see. In terms of the 515 usage, I'm very curious to see what they do because I feel like traditionally Boston has really preferred to mix and match stylistically with their pairings in terms of having a smoother skating undersized defensemen paired with a more plotting bigger defensemen that can kind of compensate for what they're lacking physically. And so in that case, it would seem like, they would probably prefer to play him with Carlo, but in the limited time, Grizzlick and McAvoy have played together. They've, you know, expectedly been tremendous together.

So I'm really curious to see what they look like, but it will be a step up. Not that he was necessarily sheltered as more of a third pairing defenseman by usage in the past, but just in terms of the volume and sort of the expectations and the pressure of what he's going to be asked to do on this team, you never know how a player will respond to that, but just in terms of like all the, all the checkpoints that he's needed to hit along the way so far in his career he's hit them. So I'm really curious to see if he's able to make the most of the opportunity that's clearly there for in the season.

Yeah, I'm excited to see that too because like you said, this is a situation where the player's already done. Like he's put up the good work already, but the opportunity has now come knocking. And it's one of those situations where you recognize employees with custom ink. Show customer appreciation with custom ink. outfit your teams with custom ink. Easily add your logo to your favorite products and brands at custom ink.com. Make custom ink your custom gear partner with great customer service, quality products,

and all in pricing, along with personalized help when you need it, and an easy-to-use website when you don't. All backed by a 100% satisfaction guarantee. Do it all today at custom ink.com. I wonder whether the defenseman is a very good, third pairing guy and can't handle more than that or they're just waiting for that opportunity. You know, like, is he a Mark Barbario or what's an opportunity, what's an example of a guy who was third pairing for a while and then broke out?

I'm trying to think now. I'd say Nate Schmidt. Yeah, Enichmidt. That's a good one. So Mark Barbario or Natechman? The skill set in terms of just the fluidity and the ability to play a scale game, I think, is there for Gerslick. So I'm confident that he will be able to take that leap, but certainly shouldn't just take it for

granted. All right, before we get into the next name on your list, let's take a quick break here to hear from our sponsor, and then we're going to finish up our breakouts. Hey, everyone. I want to tell you about Blue Wire Hustle, a brand new program where you can host your very own podcast here at Blue Wire. Hustle was created to give everyone the opportunity to take their podcast at the next level. Or, if you always wanted to host a podcast but never knew where to start, hustle is the

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So whether you're starting from scratch or have an existing show that you want to grow, hustle is an open door to leveling up your sports experience. Acceptance in this program is limited, so get your application in today. To apply, go to BWHustle.com slash join. Check out the description box for this podcast to find out more, but that's BWHustle.com slash join. All right, Andrew, let's keep going. What, uh, who's next on your list?

This is going to sound a little bit like cheating because everybody knows this player and he's already had two good seasons under his belt. But I think there's a whole new level of finishing coming from this guy, and that's Brady Cachach. son of a gun. Was that yours that you had? I had the exact same preamble, too, kind of the disclaimers. Did you?

Why, it was kind of cheating to put him on this list. But, oh, I had him as number one on mine. I thought I could sneak him by because he wouldn't have him, and you just swiped him right from my nose. Right at the end there. That's a, yeah. So, he is just such a monster at the net front. The number of high dangerous scoring chances this guy puts up is ludicrous.

and for the first time in his career, I think he actually has a decent playmaker on his line now in Dadanov. And I think that, like, Dadanov is not a guy who's necessarily a gamebreaker, but at the very least, he's a very competent, offensive guy. I think he's going to help with their power play. I think he's going to help get Kachuk the puck in the right spots where there's a little bit of pre-shot movement now, instead of him just trying to hunt for point shots to tap in in front. I am very excited to see what he can do when he is the guy and all the goal scoring is going to be funneled through him on that team. And as much as he's not necessarily a big time threat at even strength right now,

and I'm very in doubt of where his career is going, I think adding a guy like Alex Galciniak to their power play as well also gives a second shooting option if he plays in the same unit that could buy Kachuk a little bit of extra space in front too. So I see a lot of goals in this guy's future. And I'm pretty sure, like last year, I predicted that he was going to score 30. So I'm going back to the well here and doing the Kevin Fiala dance. But I think this year, Brady Kachuk could score 30 or more, maybe 35.

Yeah, well, maybe not pro rated for the 56. Yes, yes, pro rated for the 56. That's what I mean, yes. I keep on forgetting that it's not an 82. I mean, in his first two seasons, what, he had 22 goals. goals and 21 goals, 45 points, 44 points. Which is great for a teenager, really. I guess he wasn't a team last year, but.

It is. And I think, you know, he went forth overall. He came in with a ton of pressure considering they chose to keep the pick and select them and then give away the item protected pick in the following draft. They wound up being born by him. So there was a ton of pressure in that regard already just heading into the league on him. And so I think it is fair to have him on this list because he sort of fits the idea. of a guy who underlying metrics have been amazing, passes the eye test, hasn't had the kind of

superficial scoring stats to match it, and I'm a perfectly okay, sort of planting my flag here and being all in on that coming, whether it is this coming year or sometime down the line, because there's so much to like here. At 515, only Brennan Gallagher generated high danger chances more frequently that he did. Only Gallagher, Patruetti, McKinnon, and Ove Etchen attempted more shots per minute than he did. So he's got the quality and the quantity there. The underlying numbers are remarkable for him in terms of how he was able to keep the senators afloat when he was on the ice, especially considering how bad the team was

when he wasn't out there and sort of the difference he could make in terms of those impacts. And so playing with Datenovna, I'm still really curious to see who his center of the future is going to be. And I think that's going to be a big question mark for them to figure out. but, you know, I've been talking about this on the podcast recently. Like, this is, his ELC is coming up after this season and barring some sort of a crazy breakout where he scores, let's say, 30 goals and not even pro-rated. Like, let's say he just, the shooting percentage climbs incredibly and he starts converting

on those opportunities and banks a ton of goals. Unless that happens, I would be perfectly content if I were advising him to take a bridge on his next deal because I think that once he gets into his early to mid-20s, his offensive production is going to skyrocket, especially as the talent around him gets better. And his asking price or his market value is going to be significantly higher than what he can probably leverage right now. And so unless the senators are viewing it as like, okay, we already paid Thomas Shabbat. Everyone thinks we're incredibly cheap and can't keep our players. We need to make a sort of statement here by just throwing a ton of money at Brady Kachuk just to ensure everyone that we actually are going to spend money and he's going to be here long term.

barring that, I would certainly play the long game here if I were him and just wait because the goals and the points are coming for him. Yeah, like looking at it from each side, it's one of those situations where like usually teams want to low ball young guys, but if you're the senators, and say that Kachuk doesn't break out this year and he still scores at, say, like a 25 goal pace instead.

Well, I guess both of his 22, 21 goal seasons were in a 71 game season. So say he scores almost the exact same pace but the shooting numbers are the same. or like get even better. Like last year they got slightly better. You want to lock that guy up for eight years, right? Like you want to get every last bit of savings you can while you can because it's going to happen.

You look at his shot, it's not, he doesn't have a bad shot. He's going to score at the very least as like a 10, 11% guy during his prime. And if his shooting numbers stay so rock solid, like looking at evolving hockey's numbers, he actually was their number one guy last year in an individual expecting goals with 34.2. That was above Ovechkin, above Sebastian O'Hoh. He was like that's 13 more than he actually scored and it was only in a 71 game season. So that's pretty dang incredible. I think he's a guy that, you know, maybe he doesn't have the overall game as some of the, like,

better players who've been taking that high in the draft. that might come later in life or he's a winger so it's not as big of a deal but in terms of goal scoring this kid's going to be a star yeah he shot 8.1% last year 9.1 for his career I find it hard to believe that that is his true talent level

especially given the quality and where he's getting a looks from I think only according to natural statuary only Brent Barron's generated more rebounds than him last year like he's just living around the net and he's going to have a spike season one of these years and that'll probably be become the new norm for him. So, you know, another thing to consider is, like, just think about it.

So on his rookie year, his most common linemen is Mark Stone, which is obviously a great position for him to be in. They trade Mark Stone at the deadline. Then last year, he's playing full-time with J.G. Pajot was having a great year. They trade J.G. Pajot. There's been a lot of sort of, you know, inconsistency there in terms of, like, just getting his, his best linemates taken away from him. He spent a ton of time the past two seasons playing with either Cody Cici or

Nikita Zaitsev and that's not good for anyone's numbers and so I just think as the Sends team adds talent that they've drafted and they've been kind of a stockpiling as the pieces around him get better he's going those numbers are going to start looking much better so um I'm mad at you for stealing uh my favorite picks here but I'm glad we could uh we could agree on it we could talk it out um all right I'll give you my next one Rasmus Dahlian oh that was one of mine So the issue for me here is that I don't really have too much of a statistical case to make. Like some of the names we've talked about already, it was very clear to identify. This is much more of a, he's clearly wildly talented.

He was the first overall pick for a reason. He's still super young. He still doesn't even turn 21 years old. I just feel like he probably spent the entire fall watching people just shower, Kail McCar, Quidd Hughes, and Meryl Highson. skin in with praise and talk about how great they are and how they're the future of the league. He's just basically went 10 months now between games. Sounds like similar to the Jack Hughes.

There's been stories coming out about how much muscle he added and how much stronger he got and how much he was preparing for being a workhorse defenseman for this team. I'll need to see it to believe it because for whatever reason, Ralph Kruger still keeps playing Rasmus is just aligning an incredible amount of ice time. So, you know, last year, Dahlene was their fifth most frequently used defense men at five-on-five. He was playing like two full minutes per game less than the Ristaline and Montre pairing. And so I just, I need to see it in terms of Ralph Kruger actually playing his best players the right amount and sort of figuring out what everyone's true talent is and acting accordingly.

But this is just a bet on the actual talent of Dahlene because it's pretty clear when you watch him that despite his downseason. and relative to his rookie year, it's not like he suddenly forgot how to play hockey. So I think if he gets used more, there's a lot to like here in terms of him kind of bouncing back and enjoining that tier of young defensemen that's viewed as sort of the next generation of NHL superstars of the position.

Yeah, I'm a bit surprised at, like, how much the Buffalo Sabres changed over the offseason. And I just, I really wonder if there's potential here for this team to be really good. or at least much better or if they got if they made these additions at like the wrong time

because like I remember when I looked at it for for Sportsnet Eric Stahl there are some warning signs from last year right like it does kind of look like he started to fall off the cliff but at the same time

Eric Stahl at center is better than anybody but Jack Eichel that they've had in a few years right and then they brought in Taylor Hall as well and like Taylor Hall can actually skate with Eichel like speed-wise he can make plays off the rush with Eichael.

That's pretty incredible. So they've got these two big time assets, at least name value that they added, but two guys who had really kind of down years last year. I know Taylor Hall had some decent underlying numbers, but overall, nothing close to what he put up the year prior. So it's like that extra depth should help them a lot,

and it's depth at the top of the lineup. up. And then you've still got Jeff Skinner, who is in one of the years where you expect him to have like the 40 goal season because he seems to alternate between doing nothing and scoring on every shot. So like there's lots of opportunity there for a guy like Dahlene to just facilitate everything, right? And he's played with Montour in camp.

So you expect him to get more minutes this year. He has so much talent. It would just be crazy to me if he did, if he didn't break out this year. But I can also see, like, if they added these guys at the wrong time, if Skinner has another poor year, if Tage Thompson doesn't put it together, like they think he's going to,

that this season is just like another Buffalo season where they just spin their wheels, you know, and nothing really happens. I can see this team being so boom or bust. Yeah, it's a tough division. I will say, man, the Ristel Heinen Monter pairing It was hilarious last year because the team had a net positive goal differential with them on the ice. And I think it kind of emboldened them to be like, oh, this is actually a good thing.

Then you look at it and they had a 950 save percentage and shot 13.8 as a team with them on the ice. It's like, oh, this seems very, very legit. Yes, this makes sense. I'm curious because you would think that it's an interesting fit, right? because Eichel, his best attribute, is his puck carrying. Paul at his best, I'd say similarly, although he is a more versatile player than people give him credit for in terms of kind of being a grinder and going and retrieving the puck and just kind of being tough to play against.

And Dalian as well, you'd think that part of what makes him special is his ability to skate with a puck and have these rushes. And so it's like, yeah, they can certainly, I think, would be benefited to just play fast and play in a much more track meet system to take advantage of the skills of those guys and increase the number of possessions and kind of take advantage of their ability to play with pace. But also all three players are probably best suited with having the puck on their stick and getting it from point A to point B. So I'm really curious to see how that works.

But, you know, it's not necessarily an issue. It's just kind of an interesting thing to consider when looking at their individual skill sets. Yeah, it's one of those ones where you wonder, like, is this a situation where because you have so many outlets, teams like really have trouble containing them, or is it a situation where like because, you know, like, Eichel always wants the puck on his stick, part of Hall's effectiveness is neutralized. And like the other parts of his game still contribute, but he's not peak Taylor Hall kind of thing.

So it'll be interesting to see because this is one of those teams where there's so many questions around it for me. And I fully believe that Dahlian will break out this year. But there's just so much potential for everything not working out that I'm really interested to see how it shakes out. Yep, me as well. All right. Who's next on your list? All right. My next is I'm going to choose my one that I don't think you had on your list.

And that is the L.A. King's Austin Wagner. I know. People are like, awesome. Give me your Austin Wagner spiel. Okay. So Austin Wagner, believe it or not. is this unknown guy who played for the LA Kings last year because nobody watched the LA Kings last year. And he is one of the NHL's leaders in per minute high danger scoring chances.

He was by sport logic data. He was by evolving hockey data. He is just incredible in front of the net. He has a lot of opportunity this year to move up the lineup, I believe. He's not a great all-tools player, but offensively, if he can get some power play time, I think he's got a real situation that he can take advantage of. And I think that specifically guys like Martin Firk and Jeff Carter who's often injured and Andreas Santa Thanasiu and Adrian Kempay,

they're all players who are currently ahead of him on the depth chart, but all have reasons why they might get knocked down. I'm not sure why he's on the second line in camp right now. he just hasn't proved anything to me so far. But I think Kempe has just not really figured out his offensive game yet. This could be his breakout as well, but he needs some work there. And Jeff Carter kind of on the decline now. Offense is fading away a little bit.

Injuries have really hurt them. And then you've got guys like, their wings are just not great. They've got Iophalo and Kempe is a great two-way player. But like Dustin Brown is he. really going to stay on the top line all season again. They need goal scoring so badly in L.A. And they've got a kid who just, like, fires pucks on net like nobody's business. And I think he gets an opportunity higher up in the lineup this year.

I don't know how many goals he's going to score. But I believe this kid can score a lot of goals. I like it. That's the type of niche analysis to the PDO cast prides itself on and delivers the fans. Here's the guy you've never heard of. I like it. I like it going from Brady Cachuk to Austin Wagner. insanely fast.

I feel like just turn on Kings like every other night you just see him just randomly create a breakaway out of nothing. It's interesting that they added like it was worthwhile

because it was such a low risk move but they added Andreas Athenisiu and I'm like just curious to see both those guys just flying around very similar in terms of their speed. Never entering the defensive zone. No and they don't need to

because they're not planning on winning a lot of games this year. But I will say this is true. um you know i think the future is very bright for the kings they have the best prospect pipeline in the league and uh they're going to be adding a ton of talent into the lineup in the coming years it feels like this is probably one more a year of kind of just bridging the gap and waiting it out and uh and so yeah the opportunity is certainly there and you know especially as the year went along last year, Todd McClellan had them playing good hockey.

And not necessarily just in terms of winning games, but in terms of you just looked at the statistical resume in terms of their underlying numbers and the fact that they, for a bad team, were in a lot of games and kind of holding their own. They just didn't really have a lot of actual talent to convert those opportunities. And so just in terms of like the sort of structure they've got there and the fact that they're probably going to be put in a position to just use their strengths and use that speed. I think Austin Wagner is a good call in terms of a guy who could just randomly score like 15 to 20 goals in this, well, probably not 20 goals in 56 games, but so just have a big scoring

spike if he starts converting on a lot of these opportunities and people will go and like, where the hell did this come from? And then we'll go like, well, you should have listened to the breakout podcast and the PDO cast because that's where it came from. Exactly. That's where all the best information is. Okay. I'll give you, I'll give you, I'll give you. I'll give you. you one. Not nearly as off the radar. Oh, these are the left field picks right here.

No, I don't really have any super left field picks. I think mine are actually pretty traditional in terms of names that you'd expect. But I'll give you an oldie, but a goodie.

How about that? UC Soros. Had to have a goalie on this list. It's tricky because I think even in a normal year, projecting future goalie performance is very hit or miss. You know, young goalies typically don't get a ton of looks, and certainly UCSarrows has learned that the hard way over the past couple of years.

And in this year's condensed schedule, I think it'll be tougher for a goalie to truly break out just because you have to wonder how much they're actually going to play in terms of a workload. And so we'll see on that. But, you know, we've been waiting for him to take the keys over from Peca Rene and be the number one for the Predator. for it seems like ever and out since I started this podcast. It happened last year. He started 18 other

final 23 games, including all the four of their playoff games. And he was pretty much the main reason why they got there into a bubble in the first place, because in that time, he had a 9.40 say a percentage and three shoutouts, and he was ridiculous. And so he enters this year now. He's 25. He's an RFA after this year. Peca René will presumably retire, but they also did just spend the 11th overall pick on Yaroslav Ascarov. They've got Connor Ingram in the system who had ridiculous numbers in the AHL last year. And so his window to be the number one here and the wiggle room he has might not be as as wide as you would have thought when he became a trendy breakout pick like three years ago. So this is a big year in terms of leverage into being the number one for them for at least the next couple of years.

And I think he's got the skill to do it. I mean, all he's done wherever he's played is put up. good numbers. He's never had a season in NHL with a negative goal save above expected, and so I think given the opportunity, he's going to do just fine as his team's number one. Yeah, there wasn't a guy who I felt

worse for in the playoffs last year than UC Soros, because he had such a great regular season. He's just like slowly built up this resume where he finally takes over for an iconic goaltender in Nashville and Pecoran. And you know, like it's a difficult

decision for them to make that call because Renee is so beloved there and he's a leader in the dressing room still and Renee's off year last year was pretty much entirely due to the penalty kill. He was just awful killing penalties for whatever reason specifically right in front of the net. His inner slot saved percentage was second worst in the league after Jack Campbell and it was it was something ludicrous like 50%. Like it was just garbage. And it was this group of like 30 shots, I think,

that just tanked his save percentage from like above average to garbage. And so it was, I think for anybody who would be within that organization, they probably know that. So they knew that Renee wasn't necessarily struggling so much as this small sample size single issue was hindering him. So going with Saros was likely a tough decision going into the playoffs. and then in the playoffs, or I guess the play-in round, didn't go so well for Soros.

And I just felt really awful for the guy to finally get this opportunity and then post an 895 in four games while his team gets eliminated while they're playing decently well. It was rough to watch. But I'm with you. I think that he has the, at 25, you don't want to say potential anymore, I guess, but he's got that potential to be a starting goalhender in this league. he was a 1A last year and he'll probably be well probably be one a again this year because of the condensed schedule but the year after he'll be one with a bullet right i think that's the

writings on the wall there yeah it's interesting because i think people typically think that young players take this very stepwise trajectory in terms of getting slightly better and getting more usage like each year progressively and it's not always the case but for him his games played by year in the league 19 23 2734 that's hilarious how they've been like steadily spoon feeding him slightly more and more and we'll see how much he plays with the 56 games but I imagine it will be um more than half of them and he's got a 918 say percentage for his career in the league like he is an above average goalie and I'm really curious to see what he does with opportunity so um I wanted to include a goalie on this list and it's really tough to find uh young goalies that you believe are going to get an

actual chance to break out. And so he's kind of right on that borderline of he still hasn't fully kind of become that guy, but I feel like he's still young enough where he could qualify. So I wanted to include him. Do you have any others you want to contribute to this list in terms? Not goalie, just anyone else on the breakup? I have one that has no statistical backing whatsoever, but I just believe it'll happen eventually.

And that's Capo Caco in New York, who was, for my money, like, a bottom five player in the league last year, which I think shocked pretty much everyone. But you look at his resume coming into the league, I mean, this is a really good player. And I don't know what it was, if it was just an uncomfortable situation in New York

where he's moving to a foreign country for the first time. And, you know, there's a lot of adjustments to be made. But I think this year he's going to get more opportunity to sit in that top six. New York should be a lot better adding Alexei Lafranier.

You know, I don't think Mika Zabinajad will shoot nearly as well this year. So there might be some more power play time to be had. Maybe he won't be like Bogarting all that, so more of the offensive time. I don't know if it'll happen this year, but I just, this kid is so talented. It would be shocking to me if he was that bad ever again. Yeah, he won't be as bad.

He was, you don't want to say catastrophically bad because he was a teenage rookie. and so right but trying not to judge too harshly no I'm not when you say that I think people can kind of read into it as oh you just think he sucks and he's never going to get better and we're clearly saying that's not the case I think I think there were fewer positive indicators

than there were for Jack Hughes for example in terms of him looking like he belonged but you'd think that the the skill set will went out I actually had as an honorable mention on mine his teammate Philippeitel who you know I assume based

on logic will play with Lafranierre out of the gate, it seems like. They're going to have kind of like three scoring lines. And so I think he's an interesting guy because he's, I think, 21. This is going to be year three for him. He had 13, 5-on-5 goals in like about 700 minutes or so last year, which was a really good rate. And he spent a bunch of time playing with Kako, who was really bad. And then like Brett Howden and Philip D. Giuseppe and stuff.

So, you know, I think playing with Lafranier and maybe. maybe an improved caco is going to be an interesting spot for heidel and i think they they need him to break out because if you look at this team that has a lot of interesting and highly dynamic pieces one of their weaknesses is down the middle where beyond zabinajad it's like okay is ryan strome really going to be your number two center of the future i think they're hoping that that will be philip heedal one day and so um this is a great opportunity for him to to take take a step up and break through the season. Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, has anybody ever been as blessed as Ryan Strom to go from the Edmonton Oilers to having Artemian Panarin on your wing? Yeah. That's a pretty nice situation. Okay, I have one more big one that I wanted to hit here. And similar to Kachuk, it is a bit cheating because he's got a high pedigree. But I think also maybe more casual fans aren't really following the KHL super closely.

But I think Kirokapriza was going to have a monster rookie season in the league. Under 6 foot, I could see why he was a fifth round pick, I believe, by the wild.

But, man, the past couple years, actually pretty much ever since he got into the KHL, all of his numbers are right in lockstep with all of the players we've seen. take time to marinate at the KHL level and then come over and immediately step into the NHL lineup and succeed, whether it was Ivgeny Kuznetsov or Artemi Panarin or, you know, Radjelov, Teresenko,

you name it. He's right there with all those guys and even exceeding them in terms of performance and just watching him and watching some of his tape, like, it's incredible how strong he is on the puck and how quick his release is. And so I think, you know, he's going to be fly under the radar a little bit because he's going to the Minnesota Wild, but the combination of him and Kevin Fiala is going to make them must watch, in my opinion, this season, and we haven't been able to see that up in the Wild since probably Marion Gabbrick

was there. I was going to say Gabbick. It's a little bit cheating because I think he's like a very trendy pick to win the Calder, and we don't have any NHL data to go off with him, and it is always a bit of a projection to just assume that someone is going to come over from a different league and thrive right away, but there's no real reason to believe

he won't be incredibly good offensively right out of the gate and so I wanted to highlight him as someone to just be excited about yeah I mean it's bold of you to assume that anybody on the minnesota wild will put up any offense but uh if anybody's going to it's going to be him and fiala right like i'm looking at their forward group right now and there's a lot of defense that's the best thing they can say about them it's it's very clear why the the wild didn't go very far in the playoffs yeah and it's uh you know They can really do well at one end of the ice. Well, now with Capriza and Infiela,

they'll be able to do well on the other end too. So I'm going to watch for it. I've got a couple other names, and I'll let you pick which one we talk about. I couldn't differentiate between Dennis Gariano and Ruppe Hince. I put them together as one, or DeBontaves. Ooh, those are both really good. The only other one that I had on my list was Tyson Ghost.

Yeah, yeah, he's interesting. I wanted to have someone on the abs on this list because I think they're just going to have a breakthrough as a team. Like they're going to put up a lot of points and a ton of offense and win a lot of games. And so I wanted to include someone here, but most of their players have already broken through our establish. So, like, I thought putting Borokovsky would be cheating because he scored a lot last year. But yeah, yeah, I think last year counts as a breakthrough, especially when you realize how a few games were actually played. Yeah, yeah, he had 45 points of 58 games. That is a, that is a breakthrough, in my opinion.

All right, so would you rather do Taves or, uh, or are the Stars guys? Let's do Taves because I know, like the Stars guys, I feel like everybody's talking about them, right? Especially after their playoffs, right? Especially for Geryana, I'd say, considering the magnitude of the goals he scored, like an overtime winner to get them into the Stanley Cup final. I think people are aware of Gariano. So yeah, let's do Taves. All right, let's do Taves because I know less about Taves. So I'll let you take the lead.

Okay, well, so. I don't even know what the equivalent would be going from the aisle system to this Colorado Avalanche team, but for a player who can skate and move the puck and would presumably thrive in a more uptempo system, it's like just adding a jetpack to him. The Av stole him from the Islanders, just get going to afford them, and then they paid him four years, 4.1 per. So they clearly value him. I assume they're going to feed Ian Cole, and Ryan Graves a lot of defensive zone starts

and more defensively oriented usage because it seems like they have paired up Kail Makar and Devon Taves as kind of just all out attack defense pair and so I just I don't know like it just if you look at the way that the avalanche used

McCar last year like he was out there for about half or even more than half of his 5-15 minutes with McKinnon and if you're telling me that DeVont Taves is going to be out there with those guys for that amount of time. You know, generally a good formula for success in this league is being on the ice as often as possible with great players. And, you know, we can talk about Devon Taves' own individual skill set.

And I think Dom had him in like the 75th percentile or so in pretty much every underlying metric. And so he certainly, you know, had a really good resume of his own the past couple years with the islanders. but I just feel like taking him and putting him into this supercharged offensive unit in Colorado is just going to completely exceed anything he's done to this point, and he's become much more of a sort of household name just based on the production he's going to have as a result. Yeah, and I'm trying to think of a good metaphor for going from the Islanders to the avalanche, like you said.

It's like you're used to driving a very reliable pickup truck, and then you get a Lamborghini. Yeah. You know, like, it's just, it's going to be such a change. I think the pace of games will be, I mean, I'm sure he's capable of making that adjustment and probably already has just by practicing with them. But the change in how the games are played is going to be crazy. I do wonder if maybe without the way that the Isles played defensively, he gets a little

a little bit exploited on the defensive end, but there isn't really any sign that he's particularly awful defensively in any. way, shape, or form. I think he's a pretty good all-around player. I'm just shocked at what the Colorado Avalanche were able to, like, acquire him for. Like, it just seems like, I know that the Islanders were up against it and trying to save for the Barzal extension, but at the same time, he was arguably their best defense has been last year by the end of the year.

Maybe Pollock was better, but overall, I don't know, teams don't normally give up their second best defenseman for almost nothing, you know? Yeah, certainly most dynamic. I mean, and he was playing his most common partner last year was Scott Mayfield. So I think that's going to be a massive step-up playing with McCar. And I don't think he'll get exposed that much defensively just because if they're on the attack and in the offensive zone the entire time, I think he'll be just fine, especially if they strategically just use that McCar-Tave's pairing to just crush.

And just look at what happened last year. Like, I think Macar's most common, partner was Ryan Graves and obviously he had insanely inflated percentages but uh led the league and plus minus got a nice contract has like randomly is listed on the Norris odds for this season so just in terms of uh what uh being in that role can do for uh your kind of mainstream uh notoriety or attention level um i'm just kind of using that as an example of what could happen at taves just if he's in that role full time. And I think his skill set is going to is going to mesh really well with the way this avalanche

team wants to play. And clearly they identified him, very smart organization in front office. And, you know, they identified them as, as a person they could target for a reason. And I think they're going to use them correctly. Yeah. It's going to be super interesting. I think that there's very little about the Colorado avalanche that concerns me, like maybe, maybe gold-hending.

But even then, I think Grubar is solid. and I mean, after Gruberauer, I'm not too confident to everything they have there just based on what happened in the playoffs, but man, this team is just so deep. Everywhere you look, they've got good players, and good players who are not just offensive stars either. I mean, this team is obviously going to be a kill-you-with-offense-style team, but it's hard to score against them, too.

And McCar gets a lot of credit for his offensive skill, and, you know, obviously he's a young rookie, so he's not going to be a great, amazing shutdown player. But he gets back into plays too. He's, his speed is such an asset. And, yeah, we haven't even talked about Sam Gerard and Eric Johnson, who are a pretty decent pair in and of themselves. I mean, I think Johnson is only okay as a middle pairing guy at this stage,

but with Gerard, that's pretty excellent. Yeah, and Bowen Byron on the way as well. Yes, no kidding. good players. I had some other young defensemen on this list. Like, I think people are probably tuning in and being like, oh, they're going to talk about Vince Dunn. I assure you, I had him.

He already broke out. He already broke. Well, he broke out, and I'm also not entirely sure that they're going to use him any differently. It seems like they view him to be the type of player that he is. And I disagree with that, but there's no real reason to believe that he's going to get a massive step up in usage this year. You know, like Noah Dobson would be interesting,

kind of filling in for Devantaves, we just talked about. but we'll see in that in that system and if trots trusts him yeah so there's some young defensemen certainly but it's just always tricky to project them and you know common theme here is opportunity is is a big deal and so yes you got to be confident in that um all right i think that's going to be it for today's show we got through is there any other names that uh that you wanted to touch on or that you had on your list at the bottom not that i had written down so I think we're good to close up shop. All right.

We'll plug some stuff. Where can people check you out? What are you working on these days? Give us all that before we get out of here. All right. Well, for right now, I am just at the Montreal Gazette. I'll be writing there covering the Montreal Canadiens for the rest of the season, which was just confirmed this weekend that I'm signed on.

You're on the full-time Nick Suzuki Beat. Yeah. Well, not so much full-time, but yeah, I'm on there. And I've got some other irons in the fire. So I guess just watch my Twitter feed at Andrew Berkshire and I'll probably have some announcements soon. Cool. All right, man.

I'm glad we were able to get back on the show. I'm glad we did this and we'll see how these guys turned out. Me too, man. It was always fun. Cool. All right. Well, uh, start of the season. Maybe, yeah, we'll have to figure out a way to do some, some more stuff this year.

Awesome. Have it going, man. The PDOCast with Dimphilipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovich and on SoundCloud at soundcloud.com slash hockey pdocast.