The Hockey PDOcast - Episode 412: An Offer Sheet You Can't Refuse

Episode Date: September 3, 2021

Arpon Basu and Andrew Berkshire join the show to help unpack everything you need to know about Jesperi Kotkaniemi's offer sheet. We discuss what he's shown so far in his career, what he needs to do to be worth the money he's now being paid, Carolina's motives for going after him the way they did, and the big decisions ahead for the Canadiens.If you haven't yet, please go take a minute to leave a rating and review for the show. If you're busy and don't feel like writing anything, it's all good. Just hit the 5-star button. Each one counts, and helps us out greatly. If you're feeling extra generous though, you can also leave a note about why you recommend people check the show out. Thanks for the help! 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.

On a beautiful run through the park, on a pleasant day, you can easily get lost. No, no, no. She didn't kill him. Huh? In your true crime podcast. It was the pool guy. So obvious. Whatever motivates you works for us. It's all about letting your run be your run. And Brooks is here for every runner.

Doing the research and sweating the details to create gear that works for you. It's your run. Brooks, run happy. progressing to the mean since 2015. It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri. Welcome to the Hockey-PedioCast. My name is Dimitri Philpovich. And joining me is my good buddy, Arbun Basu.

Arpin, Bacierpon. What's going on, man? Dimitri, I was wondering why you called. It's an out of the blue call from Dimitri. I love it. Yeah. We'll figure out what we're going to talk about today. But also joining us on this call is Andrew Berkshire.

So I guess we probably should talk. about you know, he's barry, Gakenemi in the offer sheet that he signed. It seems like a reasonable topic for us. Andrew, uh, how's it going to go up, man? Pretty well, pretty well. Just, uh, you know, doing chores on days off. That's the whole summer, right? I got a, I got a preface. I was really enjoying my summer. July, I don't know for you guys. It was, was crazy for me. I was trying to cover everything with expansion draft and the entry draft and free agency and everything. And so I was like, I'm going to take all of August off. And for the first 26 or 27 days or so, like, every morning I'd wake up and I just like pop open my Twitter or

see what happened. I'm like, oh, not the Jack Eichael hasn't been traded yet. Nothing's happening today. And I just put my phone away for the day. And I was actually camping for a couple days over this past weekend and very limited cell service. And so I decided to do my afternoon check in on what was going on in the hockey world. And I was like, oh, there's an offer sheet. I better I better get home, get out of the woods and maybe record a podcast here because I feel people are probably going to be pretty interested. So I'll start with this, Arp. And you can go first here. Just sort of like the timing on this, obviously you covering the team on a full-time basis for the athletic and everything. It seems like for the most part, you know, we heard reports that we're wondering what Cartagam's future, I guess, what the Canadians was,

especially after the way the postseason ended with him being scratched in the Stanley Cup final and meeting a new contract and sort of potentially being on the outs. And then I think Pierre LeBron reported that the hurricanes had even tried to trade for him before eventually executing this offer sheet. I guess from your perspective, were you kind of surprised by sort of the time? timing of this. So that this happened at all in the first place because it seems like for the most part, it was pretty quiet. And then all of a sudden, this kind of dropped out of nowhere. Yeah. Well, there is kind of a, there's, there's some sense to the timing of it. You know, a few days earlier, the hurricanes locked up, uh, Svetchenikov on an eight year deal, gave them a better idea of what their finances were going to look like. Um, you know, there's the obvious revenge factor

here. Uh, that is that, that, that the hurricanes have made no attempt to hide. Um, but I don't think that's the only thing at play here. I mean, they did create an offer that makes, that makes it very difficult for the Canadians to match. The whole thing of the hurricanes trying to trade for him, I mean, that's pretty standard practice, you know, I mean, like, correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe when, when Brian Burke acquired Phil Kessel, I mean, that was the same dynamic was that if you, if you don't trade him to us, we're going to offer shoot him was kind of the context of that whole thing. So I think that's what was happening here, is that, listen, we're considering an offer sheet if you want to work out a trade,

maybe we should do that. I would imagine it was based around the first and third pick that would go as compensation and say if you want something extra, then we can do it that way. I don't know that to be a fact, but that would make sense to me. So yeah, timing-wise, it does kind of make sense. Carolina had taken care of their biggest ticket of the summer a few days earlier. There had been rumblings and just talk that Tom Dundon was waiting for the first opportunity to go after someone on the Canadians,

that Cocheneh was probably going to be that guy because he's the first of their young players who comes up as an RFA. So it wasn't that shocking. I would have preferred it not happened on a Saturday evening. Not only did it ruin your camping trip, it kind of ruined my dinner plans that night. But yeah, I think other than that,

the timing's not all that shocking. And frankly, you know, my initial reaction was like, wow, it actually happened. Like, this is something that had always been in the background that was a possibility. I personally didn't think they would actually. do it, but they did. Well, I guess the interesting wrinkle to this for me, I mean, there's so many, but one of

them is we hear often how offer sheets don't happen in the NHL because teams fear retaliation against their own restrictive free ages in the future, right? Where it's like, okay, well, if we go after another team's young player, when one of our guys comes up, we're really exposing ourselves to the potential here. So there's this kind of like unwritten or unspoken agreement of everyone to just let their, let themselves handle their business internally with their young players. And so the fallout of this was, oh, man, like the hurricanes actually followed up on the potential idea that they would retaliate here. And I wonder how this is going to affect future offer sheet scenarios and whether teams are going to be even more reticent, if possible now, to go the offer sheet route.

And, you know, we're going to talk here about Kotkinami as a player and the angle for both the hurricanes and the Canadians and what the Canadians should ultimately do. But I don't necessarily view this one as like, oh, this is so disastrous from the Canadians. and regardless of whether they let him go or keep him to the point where if you're another team, you're watching this and play out and say, oh, man, I'm scared that this is going to happen to us, so we're definitely not going to offer sheet now. Like, I feel like this isn't that extreme of a scenario. No. Well, it's not in the sense that, you know, I look at it two ways.

If teams are looking at the Aho offer sheet and saying, well, man, they shouldn't have done that because look at the problem they're in now, what I would say is a GM, I was like, wow, they should have done a better job of offer sheeting. It's really what it comes down to. And then you look at the Carolina offer sheet. And if I'm a rival GM, I'm like, that's how you offer sheet. You don't go after the top guys. You know, in this market, you know, that would include like Erasmus Dahlin or Brady

Kachuk or the two guys in Vancouver. Those guys are going to be hard to offer sheet. You're going to have to pay a ridiculous amount of money to get those guys, you know, in the eight figures. And so what you do is go after the next year. or even the tier below and grossly overpay those guys. And that gives you actual chance to acquire the player. And that's what Carolina's done here.

You know, Cocheneh is not worth $6.1 million right now. Could be in the future. And you could make the argument that, you know, it's a calculated gamble for Carolina, but it's really not that huge of a gamble. It's you pay them a lot of money this year. You give up the two picks. It doesn't work out.

You know, you just don't qualify the guy. And then you cut them loose. So it's really not that huge of a risk. It's a bit of a bigger risk for the Canadians because there's a lot of politics attached to whether they would cut a guy loose or whatever. But from the Carolina standpoint, and if I were another GM, I would look at what Carolina did and say, how can we do that to acquire a promising young player who could potentially grow in our organization having already done three years of development with someone else? Right. the whatever, the 6.1 or whatever that they came to was just conveniently under the threshold of costing them another second rounder in terms of compensation. So it was very clearly mapped out

accordingly. Andrew, how much of the decision to go after Kotkanami here from the hurricanes is actually borne out of a thirst to get revenge for that offer you? Because that's obviously sort of the first kind of reaction to this. And then obviously the fact that Waddell basically just copy pasted the Berzaban quote after that and the $20 signing bonus and everything. Like there's clearly part of that to hear in terms of the drama and the pettiness and the revenge factor. But also the dialogue has been so centered around that that I feel like there's been a lack of actual kind of conversation of how much the hurricanes themselves value Kockenemy as a player

or what Kockenemia is as a player. And like just the fit there, it's been so centered around, oh, them just trying to get revenge. And it seems so bizarre to me that that would be kind of the leading discussion point of this. Well, clearly revenge is a part of it. There's no denying that. I think the starting point was probably we're going to take somebody from this team, you know, like we're going to throw a wrench in this team. But they obviously clearly believe in Kocanymi as well. And I think that a lot of people are looking at like the center line of the Carolina hurricanes and saying like, where does Kocanami fit? Is he even going to play center? And I think you have to look not at this year.

you have to look at down the line trochecks the ufa next year uh jordan stall is a ufa the year after so this is probably a move in terms of their thinking they're going to overpay for now and then he becomes a piece going forward when they're going to lose at least one of those two guys and clearly they do believe in him because they you wouldn't send this kind of money out to a player that you don't believe in at all like you still know that there's a chance that you're going to get this player and if you do, you are also giving out picks in a very good draft year. So there's definitely, like I've had the opportunity to talk to somebody in Hurricanes management and they fully believe that the Montreal Canadians should match this offer.

That's how much they believe in Kokenei. So they think that he's going to be a good player. There's clearly issues with Kokanyami still. He has some issues with his first step, acceleration. He has some issues with like putting his skills together on the ice where, you're like essentially marrying his skating and his passing and his shooting all together into like smooth motions. But overall, I mean, we may see Kokanyami and judge him more harshly because we've seen him too much. And I know there's a lot of people who are saying like, oh, he shouldn't have been in the NHL at 18.

I think a lot of that is like it's a bit of a logical fallacy like the post hoc ergo proctor hawk. Like if somebody was in the NHL early, they shouldn't have been if they haven't worked out really quickly. But like we don't actually know how their development would have changed if they'd stay. and longer. And there have been lots of guys who've stayed out of the NHL who just don't make it that we don't factor into that conversation, right, of like what's the best development strategy? So a lot of it is you see somebody who marinated a long time in the HL or in the European leagues have success and you just assume that that's the best way when a lot of people fall through the cracks that way as well. I think that Kokanyemi, if anything, would be better served by getting

some linemates that play his style. I thought he had a pretty decent play. playoffs last year, but obviously not fantastic. But he was playing with probably two, two of the players who were the worst possible match for him. Byron and Anderson are both guys who generate a lot of scoring off the rush, but they're individual players. All their offense is generated off their own sticks, right? Like they're not giving go guys.

Neither guy passes really well. And Kokanymi, first of all, can't keep up with them skating wise just based on like, they're guys that capitalize on transition plays, right? Puck turns over. and they're off to the races. They want to drive straight lines into the offensive zone, cut in at the last second. And he doesn't really do that.

So he likes to generate offense either on the net front, through the cycle or through the forecheck. Neither of those guys do that effective work in any of those respects. So he's got nothing to work with, right? So it's an interesting situation that they put him in. I think that if he were to stay in Montreal this year, if they do match, the most likely scenario is he plays with Brendan Gallagher,

who's like the center whisperer. I think we'd have a very different idea of what Copenhamee is capable of he spends a whole season with Brendan Gallagher. Right. As a disclaimer, we should say we're recording this on Thursday afternoon and by the time people listen, we might already know what the Canadians are doing. So I kind of wanted to get this out there and frame it as like, you know, we're going to set the seed. We're going to talk about all the potential angles. And so even

after the fact, you know, whatever the Canadians wind up doing here, it'll still be useful to listeners. I think, Arpin, like, Andrew made that point here of how the hurricanes internally view caught kanyemi i have no doubt that they value him highly as a player beyond the fact that they signed up to the zabrasuit because they did structure it so meticulously to the point where it does put the hurricanes in a tough spot like i think you can kind of tell sometimes whether something is done out of pettiness and arranged and how much of it is them actually wanting this player and it seems like we'll see what the what the canadians wind up doing here

but i'm leaning towards them walking away walking away from the player and letting him go just because it seems like it'll be so onerous for him to keep him. And so that makes me think of the hurricanes, the way they structured it, really do want him. Yeah. I mean, they didn't, you know, listen, I understand Tom Dunden has made of money, but you don't just throw six million bucks at a guy for a few tweets, you know, for the benefit of, like, being able to own Twitter for an afternoon or an evening or whatever. Like, that's just kind of the gravy or the, you know, the cherry on top that they do.

And I think as Andrew pointed out, you know, there are going to be holes in their lineup moving forward. Kaki Mee is pretty tight with Ajo and Tara Vinen. They skate together in the summer. And so that's another kind of added side bonus to this from a chemistry standpoint. He's probably heard a lot about how life is playing for Rodbreddenmore and Carolina as well, Kakami. I mean, I mean, so yeah, I think this was a legitimate attempt to acquire a player and is one of the more effective offer sheets we've seen in that respect. having said that, yeah, my initial inclination is also that the Canadians should consider walking away.

But that is all dependent on whether they're able to find a suitable replacement out there. And that's really what we're waiting on this week. I'm pretty sure Mark Bergevin and his management team have spent the bulk of this week looking around the league to see if that extra first round pick and what is considered a deep draft, as Andrew mentioned, coupled with a few of the one. or two of their own picks, you know, not necessarily the other first, but maybe even the other first, depending on the caliber of player we're talking about, if they can convert that into a suitable not only replacement for Cochanyamie, but someone that they consider an upgrade in the short term because what was clear from the Canadian standpoint is that they did not feel that Cochamie was ready for a top six role in Montreal based on what they had seen over the last

three years. Whether that's right or wrong, I think that's debatable. I was, I was, kind of of the mind that this is an opportunity, even if he hasn't displayed that he's necessarily ready for that. This was an opportunity for the organization to say, look, we've invested in you, we believe in you, we're going to give you this opportunity, we're going to give you a shot at this second line center role. You take it and you run with it because we believe in you and we've already invested so much in you because we believe in you, we like you as a player.

And Mark Bergervain's exact words were, you know, we believe in his potential. We like the peak of his game. The problem is that the peak of his game did not show up. up often enough for their liking. While in the same breath mentioning that he just turned 21, I think he turned 21 the day before the Stanley Cup final ended, and he was watching from the stance. So, you know, I think Kockenemy has his share of responsibility

for how things have gone over the three years in Montreal. You know, he hasn't been consistent. He hasn't necessarily fulfilled the role that he's been asked to play. And ultimately, as a player, that's your job in the NHL, is to adapt to what you're being asked to do. But I think the Canadians also have a role to play in the situation being what it is. And Cockcanemey's willingness to sign this offer sheet that is not an obvious path back to the Canadians. Like Ajo signing the offer sheet with the Canadians was different in that you could very reasonably,

if you're Sebastian Aho say, okay, I'm going to sign this. I'm 99.9% sure the hurricanes are going to match this and I'll be back there. I don't think Coqueniami could be saying that right now. This was obviously signed with the realization that this could very well result in him going to Carolina. And I think the relationship is frayed somewhat because I believe the Canadians have not shown that unconditional belief in him that I think he's seeking and that the Carolina Hurricanes have actually shown by dropping this offer sheet on him. Right. But so Aho, I mean, his was obviously no-brainer because he basically isn't burning UFA years on his offer sheet and he got a crap ton of money that the hurricanes weren't going to willingly post. pony up in terms of signing bonuses, especially in like the basically first calendar.

Oh, and they weren't going to walk him to UFA either. I think that was the big one. Like walking him right to his first year of UFA was the big sticking point there. I think Carolina actually wanted to get his name on an eight year deal at that time. It's just a question of buying those UFA years and how much you paid for those UFA years. That was a problem. So by signing the offer sheet, Ajo got the bunny and he got walked directly to his first year of eligibility as a UFA. So it was a win-win for him, totally.

Right. But similarly with Wakakami, I've already seen as expected him sort of portrayed as kind of like a selfish villain here where it's like, oh, he's not falling line as a team player. He's like looking out for himself. And I think similar to what we just said with Ajo, if someone's offering you 6.1 million on a one-year deal, if you're in his current situation, I think in good faith, it would be completely unreasonable to expect him to turn that down from any team regardless of whether it meant that he wouldn't be able to. come back to Montreal and regardless of his feelings about the franchise. I mean, I just don't think anyone in their good mind, we can have a full conversation here about him as a player and his development path and what he could be worth down the road. But I think evolving hockey had him as like 1.5 million projection on a one year deal. If you just look at some of the similarly sort of

young, high draft pedigree centers that have signed similar bridge deals, Dylan Strom signed like $3 million for two years, Philippeal 2.5 for two years. Like I think everyone understandably so expected that type of a contract for him. And so if someone comes to you and says, hey, we're going to give you three times that and you're going to have all of this future leverage. I just find it impossible to turn that down.

So I wanted to make that clear where I don't blame him at all for this because it was a perfectly reasonable move that I think every one of us would have similarly done. Absolutely. If somebody's going to pay me like three times what I'm supposed to be getting paid, I'm going to sign on that dotted line right away. Yeah, and not only three times what I'm supposed to be getting paid, but like set me up to be paid three times what I'm supposed to be paid next year as well.

Like, I mean, it's- Or walk straight to UFA. Yeah. Like it's really a no-brainer for him. But I think, I do think, you know, the situation in Carolina looks appealing to him. You know, he's, he's seen two of his close friends thrive there. Not to mention the guy who was picked right before him in the draft. So I think, yeah, your point is very. But I think the destination also had something to do with it.

The team that he's going to and watching how they trust their young players and put them in situations to succeed was probably pretty appealing to him as well. Andrew, do you think like, I think there's such a fascinating Barrett Convo to be had here about the way we've been conditioned as fans and analysts following the NHL to just expect RFAs to basically take these team-friendly deals that box them in. And then by the time they're 27 or 28 years old, then they can finally cash in for what they earned throughout their career. And it's always been so bizarre to me because you could very fairly argue that the next four to six years of Kotka Kenemi's career are going to be easily his most productive ones where he's going to provide the most value to his team. And so he should, as a young player, get paid.

Every young player should get paid accordingly to that as opposed to sort of biding your time and waiting for five years or whatever when he can find. finally cash in on the open market. Like it seems like there is a bit of a, not necessarily a reckoning, but a bit of a change of the dynamics of the way we view RFAs and what they can get on their second, second deal. I just didn't expect Octavia, I guess, based on his production to be a player that could warrant and kind of wield that type of leverage.

But I do think that is something we're going to have to consider more moving forward. Yeah. I mean, I think teams are getting more wise to the fact that you want players in their early to mid-20s, right? And you look at the way the NHLs trended over the past decade or something. So things have changed a lot. Like I had a conversation recently on my own podcast with Mary Clark talking about which like teams in a single season would be like the best today.

And we talked about like the LA Kings that won in 2011 who were like an unbelievable, unstoppable juggernaut. And in today's NHL, they probably wouldn't be that great because most of their game revolved around volume shooting from the perimeter, right? Like and tipping pucks and all that. And that style of play has kind of been killed. Everything's about getting pucks in tight, shooting from high danger areas, moving the puck across the goal crease. They'd be great defensively still because they did all that in terms of preventing it.

But in terms of scoring, they would really struggle in today's game. The game changes really fast. And I think that's kind of the advantage of hockey being a bit of a niche sport in a lot of ways in like for the last 30 years or so where like things have changed dramatically. Goaltending has changed dramatically over my lifetime. and things evolve, how we view things, how we view young players, and the players as well as management are getting wise to that and maybe executing their leverage a little bit more efficiently.

I wonder if this whole RFA reckoning would have gone a bit faster if the whole Mitch Marner situation didn't get so blown out of control and everyone now criticizes Kyle Dubus for giving out those gigantic contracts. But I think if you remove that for, from the equation, most of the RFAs who've established themselves in their, like, rookie contracts are now getting big contracts. And I've been arguing since the playoffs that the smartest thing the Canadians could have done is right after those playoffs ended, extended both Suzuki and Kokonemi to eight-year contracts. And like, yeah,

you're going to pay more than you want to right now, but you're going to save over the course of the, like the prime of their careers. And they've been caught previously with the bridge deal things. And sometimes it makes sense to do a bridge deal. But when you're constantly pushing these bridge deals, you can get caught if that player breaks out and say wins a Norris and then you get stuck with an arbitration hearing that you're really not comfortable with. So betting on the young kids, if you actually do believe in them, I think is the smartest thing you can do as a manager. Well, Arpin, Andrew talked about the usage here for Kockenami. And you've talked about sort of the landing spot for him potentially on the hurricanes and what they could get out of them. I guess that's the big

determining factor here for me and the thing I'm trying to figure out. Obviously, I think people are going to point to the fact that he's 21 years old, that he is a former third overall pick and that you don't want to write off a player at that point of their career because they still have so much room to grow. We have seen him in NHL for the better part of three seasons now. And I'm so torn on my evaluation of him as a player because when you watch him, you can sort of see the tools that people fall in love with, with the vision and the playmaking and the touch and the passing and the reach and all that. But then I know I've seen like my colleague David St. Louis right about this and Jack Han kind of breaking down the technical side and the mechanics of Konkini's skating stride

and whether he possesses that dynamism to actually sort of consistently separate himself from defenders and really become a top tier playmaker and live up to that potential. So how much do we attribute his production and his numbers so far to sort of the situation he was in, whether it be the players he was playing with, you know, the environment in terms of the system and the way the Canadians want to play where I wouldn't, I'd argue there isn't necessarily a ton of latitude for, you know, creativity and freelancing and East West action and stuff like that. It was much more of a sort of, you know, bland meat and potato style of play. and then how much of it could actually sort of in a new different environment get more out of Coquanamie versus this is just kind of who he is even though he is only 21 years old. I think a lot of what's happened with Coquanemi over the first three years of his career based on just a lack of physical maturity in a lot of cases. I know that what was starting to frustrate Clujilian with Cochanemi is that he couldn't stay on his skates. He was falling down a lot.

He would get knocked off pucks relatively easily, especially in his rookie year, and especially as his rookie year went along, not early, but later on, you know, you had an incident in his second year where he went into a corner with Nikita Zedorov and wound up, you know, getting flipped onto his head and suffering a concussion. And it was a pretty scary looking thing. And that was, you know, that was a question of strength. And he was 19 at the time. It's kind of normal.

So, you know, there was, I think there's been, I think he's shown enough. I find him to be a very smart player. I think he sees the ice very well. I think he understands the game super well. So, like, his brain is really his number one selling point. There are some mechanical issues. As I mentioned, the strength issue. The skating's never going to be a strength of his at all, ever, even though he's working on it.

But the way he understands the game, the way he sees it, and the way he processes it is a very strong attribute of his and something that's going to continue. Like, he's never going to lose that, you know? So I think there's a certain amount of. assurance that he's going to be able to use that to make smarter, quicker, better decisions with the puck and without over the course of his career. And that will only improve as he physically matures and has the other mechanical issues that you mentioned, which I think are valid, gets them corrected. So, you know, how much is on him?

I don't know how much is on him. Some of it is on him for sure because he wasn't able to overcome those certain developmental deficiencies that he still had in his game at the NHL level. Did he ask to be thrown in the NHL at 18? No. That was decided for him based on one strong training camp. And as my colleague Mark Antoine Gooday pointed out on our podcast,

which I hadn't even thought about, if you think back to his first training camp, that was a training camp where Max Domi, he succor puched out in Aaron Ekblad in an exhibition game and got suspended for the rest of the exhibition season. So basically, Kakkanemi walked into that. spot and played every exhibition game as a center. And with every game got better and better and

better to the point where the Canadians really saw no reason to cut him. And from that point on, I mean, he had a good first half of his rookie year. But then, you know, Clod Julian scratched him in Los Angeles. I remember clearly that day because we had just spoken to Cochaniemi in the dressing room about playing with Jonathan Drouin in that game because that's where they, that's who he practiced with that morning. And then Clodgillian came out and said he's going to be. scratch tomorrow. So it was, and from that point, it got, it just, it just started to be this series of, of misses with this kid.

But I think his rookie season by and large was a success despite that. But that, that really did impact his, his confidence and his, and, you know, he was left wondering why that happened, you know, I mean, he really didn't understand what had happened and how things had fallen so, so drastically for him to become a scratch. And then from that, but from that point on, it's been, it's been a lot of, relatively few highs and a lot of lows for him in Montreal so far. Well, Andrew, he's had really strong defensive results in two of his three seasons, especially as a rookie, albeit in a sheltered role and playing with wingers that would

help him with the defensive metrics and kind of alleviate a lot of those adjustments to a new league and a new pro league for a teenager. He had really good results defensively. And I wonder how much of this is just baked around like the Canadians envisioned him being a certain type of player, which is this sort of defensive center and how much of it is he's actually just should be positioned as more of a skill playmaker and sort of pushed in that direction. It seems like, you know, he kind of got caught in the middle trying to figure out what he's going to be as a player, which is perfectly reasonable for a guy who just turned 21 years old.

But it seems like he's kind of been miscast or maybe there's still an uncertainty about what he actually should be at this level. There's definitely uncertainty. I think there's definitely some diametrically opposed opinions between Koke Niemi and the Canadians on what kind of player he's supposed to be. I don't know if that's necessarily over the defensive side of it. I think that he's fine, like being a good defensive player. I think that comes to like where they want him to play in the offensive zone.

And he seems to see himself more as a playmaking guy and the Canadians want him to get like into the net front and smash home goals and stuff like that because he's got a big frame, right? he may not be strong physically yet, but he's got that big frame that when he fills it out should create some opportunity there. But you look at when he got sent down to the American Hockey League and he absolutely dominated down there

under Joel Bouchard. And he was full on a playmaker, right? I don't even think he scored a goal. He just piled up tons of assists with the LaValle rocket. And then he came back up to the NHL, expecting to, you know, play the same way. And he kind of got put more of in a shooting role again.

And it just, didn't fit. You know, like when you're constantly pulled in two different directions, it doesn't really make sense. And I think this is something that Canadians kind of have an issue with

overall in terms of development is they seem to be one of those teams where they're like, you're going to play this way, sink or swim is up to you. And there's some value to that, but I think the teams that work with players to consistently develop skills

to enhance what they're already good at and also work on their weaknesses seem to do better relatively consistency. And I consistently. And I wonder if the Canadians who get a lot of crap, I would say,

for their poor drafting results over the last decade or so, if they had a more comprehensive approach into how they build their prospects up, we might be seeing a different result from their draft record, right?

So much is about development versus who you actually pick. And I think that that's an underdeveloped story in terms of like what we can cover because it's just not something that teams really want to talk about in the first place anyway.

They don't want to tell you how they're developing a player, like what they're doing specifically to get them to work in a certain way or like what their plans are for them. They like to play things pretty closely to the vest. So you have to kind of look at the background and figure out what they're doing on your own and fill in the gaps yourself. How do you feel about that sort of disconnect between maybe the way the player

viewed himself or way you wanted to play and the way the team felt he needed to play to be successful? because I'm trying to sort of wrap my head around what the path for him being a $6 million player is here. And it's going to be a massive improvement offensively, I think. Right. Beyond just obviously the empty calories of putting up points, like just in terms of being a prolific playmaker, like it seems like that is the most realistic path here towards providing legitimate value for whether it be the hurricanes or the Canadians. But it seems like a big leap based on what we've seen so far.

Yeah, I mean, you look, I think the big disconnect with Kokanyami, and it's one of the reasons I cautioned against some of the folks who are using like Wins Above Replacement to value him and over the last couple of years. And a big issue with Wins Above Replacement is that it heavily values like on ice goals for and goals against, which is great in terms of evaluating what a player brought in a specific season, but not great for a predictive value. and Kokanami's goals impact has always been much smaller than his impact on shots and expected goals. So I look at a player who's got a lot of things going for him, but hasn't really figured out how to translate that yet into like the actual end goal. And I say there's something there. Somebody's going to figure it out. But I do think there is stylistic issues.

Like the Canadians do out or underperform their expected goals consistently, right? Like that's been an issue for years now, whether it. style of play or lack of finishing talent, we could argue. But I think there's a lot to like about Kokanyami, even if he never puts up like a crazy amount of points. I think that he will become an impact player in terms of like pushing play the right way. He reminds me a little bit of Lars Eller in that Lars Eller was a guy who consistently drove play, but always seemed to win the puck was on his stick at the very moment when you

wanted him to do the right thing. Oftentimes he would think too much and do the wrong thing. And Kokanyami has that as well. where he just like gets in his own head. And if he can just kind of get confident enough to stop doing that, things might change for him. I think, yeah, that's the difference between him and Eller is that I agree that Lars Eller

was oftentimes his worst, you know, his own worst enemy in the offensive zone. When it came to crunch time on, on what to do or the decision to make, whether to shoot or pass and where to shoot and what to do with the puck at the very last, you know,

the final piece of the whole sort of misos saying of a scoring chance, he tend to freeze. I don't feel Cochenehmi does that nearly as often. And when he did do it, it's because he's being pulled in different directions. I think there is something to be said that the Canadians wanted him to learn to play a certain way before allowing him the freedom to play his own way. But there's certain aspects of the game that you need to get into your game. If there are two guys deep, you need to be the third man high.

like the little adjustments that you just need to make when you're not necessarily the best player on your team. And this was the first time, you know, aside from his draft year when he was playing professionally in Finland as a 17 year old, this is basically the first time he'd ever played on a team where he wasn't one of, if not the very best player on his team. So that's normal. But it's true that, you know, I remember one time I was joking sometime in his second year, I was joking with him that, oh, he gave me like some cliche NHL answer. I was like, oh, listen to you. You're like this big time NHL. You're like an NHL veteran.

And his answer is like, I've gotten some pucks deep in this league and walked away. I was like, so, you know, it was like, it was a bit of a dig at like, you know, what he's asked to do. Like it was, it was totally innocent, you know, but that's what he's asked to do. Like it's get the puck deep, go in there, forecheck, you know, recover it. And then you can create your offense that way, whereas he would probably prefer a controlled entry where he can kind of survey the scene, stop up. catch a trailer, whatever, you know, what he would prefer to do. But, you know, to say that the Canadians forced him into that, I mean, I think they just wanted to get that part of his game sorted

and then allow his natural abilities to flourish once that part is settled. But I would say that I think the Canadians do have a tendency to focus with their young players to really emphasize what they don't do well, as opposed to what they do well. And this is something that they've had going back many years, going back even past coaches. But really, during Bersivay's time and even maybe even before that, you know, Alex Galcenaic, that was the thing. Everyone talked about what he didn't do well. P.K. Suben, what he didn't do well.

Even Large Eller, what he didn't do well. I mean, there are many examples of young players in this organization where instead of focusing on what they do do well, that the focus immediately became the opposite of that. and that A, I think hinders your ability to develop that player. You know, instead of always focusing on weaknesses, try to enhance strengths too at the same time. And B, impacts the confidence of the player, which leads to what Andrew was alluding to,

where you might find yourself in situations where you don't know what to do because you're not allowed to, you're not relying on your instincts. You're thinking of everything that you've been told. And all of a sudden, your instincts aren't good enough. And that's when confidence becomes a real issue. Which one of us hasn't gotten pucks deep at some point or our careers? Yeah, but not in that league.

Not in that league. That's the difference. He's gotten puss deep in that league. Yeah, exactly. Okay, let's take a quick break here. And then we're going to finish up this conversation. Champions aren't born. They're made.

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Cost per application pricing, not available for everyone. Need to hire? You need Indeed. All right. Well, we talked about cockney. We talked about cockneyed me as a player. We kind of talk about the contract. I think from the house perspective here, the route they go is obviously the big last

pillar here for us discuss. I think the most logical move, if you just remove a motion from it and kind of look at the big picture and try to kind of piece everything together, it would be, I think you have to almost just take a step back, let him go take the picks, especially in this loaded draft coming up, and either weaponize those picks to go and get a potentially better player than God Canami or take a step back this season and use those picks at the draft, potentially could be a lottery pick and see where you go from there. You know, they've been linked to Christian Toborak. Thomas Hurdle's name is coming up.

Obviously, Jack Eichel is still out there. Arpin, like, what is your sense here in terms of the appetite for this organization? Obviously, you'd say in any normal year for the Canadians, there's pressure to be good and competitive and no one's going to want to just throw a year away. But especially coming off of a recent sort of Cinderella run all the way to a Stanley Cup final, So it feels like there could potentially be some added pressure here for this team to not just openly take a step back and actually try to kind of go for it again as much as they possibly can. How much do you think plays into the decision here, especially, you know, factoring in that Philip Denno has already walked this off season and at the center depth beyond Nick Suzuki is pretty bleak at this point of Kockenami is not on the roster. Well, yeah, there's a lot of mitigating factors.

I mean, you know, the one obvious one is the one you mentioned that they did go to the Stanley Cup final last year. I think everyone can recognize that that was a unique circumstance. And frankly, the Canadians recognized it, as did a bunch of other teams, that this is going to be a unique opportunity. I think Toronto made some moves to that degree, knowing that this is going to be probably an easier path to get to the final than they would ever see. Canadians took the exact same sort of thought process on that and loaded up last offseason in an attempt to do what they almost did. But there's other mitigating factors here. you know, Mark Bershavain's future as general manager is very cloudy.

He is not committed to going on longer than his current contract, which expires at the end of this season. And on top of that, you know, I still don't think Mark Bersivant is going to allow his own contract status to impact any decision that he may or may not make. But, you know, there's a bunch of players who have committed long term to this team in the last calendar year or so with the expectation that this team's going to compete. Joel Edminson, Jake Allen signed an extension, Josh Anderson, Tofoli, Gallagher, Petrie, like all these guys who are not necessarily have tons of runway left to win. I'm not sure how that group would look at

the Canadians almost intentionally taking a step back this year in order to kind of do another reload in the draft. You know, because to an NHL player, draft picks mean nothing. I mean, you know, they mean a player maybe two, three years down the line. and if you're Kerry Price, two, three years down the line is way too late. But even if you're Brendan Gallagher, if you're Jeff Petrie, if you're all the guys I mentioned,

two or three years, they're going to be out of their prime. So I think there are a lot of pressure points here that make this even more complicated in the sense that, yes, I think under normal circumstances, if there weren't any of the things that I mentioned or you mentioned that the Cinderella run last year, it would probably be a lot easier of a decision and it would be an easier sell to your players and your fans that, listen, this happened, we're going to let them walk, we're going to take the draft picks, we're going to use those draft picks in a very good draft and we're going to be better sooner as a result. That's a tough sell right now.

To your fans, yes, but I think most importantly in his own room, that would be a difficult sell to the players on the team on the Canadians right now. I just, I think though, Andrew, like, not that this makes it easier to sell, but I'm not sure it necessarily matters one way or another this year in terms of Kotkanemhi or Dvorak or whoever would be the second center. When you look at the strength of the division, you look at the four teams that I think everyone in their projections is going to have ahead of them. It's going to be a very, very, very uphill climb even more so than it's been years past. And I just, that's what makes like just not that retaining Kotkenyemi here, obviously, is a one-year contract, but you're sort of, if you do retain him and you don't let him go to Carolina, you're sort of betting on him being that future second center for you, and it's more

than just a one-year decision. But I don't think that this coming season should be one that you're making any short or short-term kind of misguided decisions based on just because the outlook is pretty bleak heading in already. Yeah, they're playing the most top-heavy division in the league, right? Like, there's killers in that division. I think the one open spot might be that Boston starts to fall off a little bit because at a certain point, you expect maybe the age of their top players starts to impact. And, you know, Rask is out for who knows how long if he ends up signing again after his surgery.

I like Linus Allmark, but I don't know if he's equal to that task. And then you look at just the losses that they've taken on D over the last couple of years. There's room there where I could see Boston declining, especially considering you look at their trend over the last four years or so. And each year they've actually gotten worse in terms of like all the analytics. So there is there's an opening there if the Canadians were to put things together. But there was this was going to be a step back no matter what. Shea Weber's gone. Right. Like that's a huge hole that they have no ability to replace. There's just you're not finding that level of defensemen at all in in the summer. It's just not going to happen. So even if say like things break

perfectly for them and that Norlander comes in and he's superb. top four guy. I still think that they're in a very struggling situation. And I also have severe doubts about what Ben Chirot can bring to the lineup without Shea Weber as his wingman. You look at his results in isolation and they're just really not great. You know, he kind of turned it around a little bit in the playoffs last year, but started out awful. And at times has dragged Weber down. You know, so even a guy as good as Weber has been drugged down by a guy who they've committed a lot money to. So it's a team that doesn't have as much mobility as some other teams that are in that competitive window. And they also have players like Arpin mentioned like Kerry Price, Jeff Petrie,

who are in their mid to late 30s that they need to compete now. And I think draft picks are just not an option for them. Devorak, I think is a good player on a value deal. So it makes sense that he's a guy that Bergen-en is eyeing up. But I don't think he moves the needle. I think they're in a situation right now where they have to make a decision of whether they're going to blow things up completely and try to build around the young players for like four or five years from now or if they think they can get it done in the next couple of years with those young players accented by veterans. And if they think they can, they have to make a big move. At a certain point, you've got to stop stockpiling things and stop relying on excuses of like,

oh, no one wants to come to Montreal or no trade clause. Everybody has a no trade clause. put on your big boy pants. You're an adult. This is your job. Convinced people to come. You know, have Thomas Placanic call up Thomas Hurdle and say,

listen, this is a great place to play. They will love you here. He has a crazy no trade clause. I think it's only three teams that he's allowed to, or that he can put forward. He can waive a no trade clause. Anybody can wave a no trade clause or a new movement clause.

If he actually wants that to San Jose, they should be knocking down the door. Eichol is a bit different story because there's so much of a risk there with the injury and the surgery. You don't even know if he's going to play this year. So that's probably not as attractive to them at this moment in time. But again, if they're thinking the next couple of years, having a star center is a big deal. I think we'd probably be viewing this whole situation much differently if the Canadians

have retained Phil Donough. But if they lose Phil Dono and Kokonimo in the same off season, I just don't know that there's a feasible thing that they can do to be competitive this year. the problem here is that it's okay for like we can talk this way you know we can look at the situation realistically and say you know and you're right i think boston might be the one vulnerable team and the four teams that dmitri was was sort of referring to earlier but i think everyone's going to have in various orders you know Toronto Boston Tampa and Florida in whatever order you want to put them in you know probably Tampa first Toronto second I would go you know

Boston, third, Florida to fourth, or maybe flip-flop Boston and Florida. But either way, it's going to be hard for the Canadians to crack that. But as a professional sports organization, I mean, this is what I think we're all guilty of all the time is that we're looking at it from 10,000 feet and we can say, well, realistically, you're not going to make. I mean, athletes don't think that way. And maybe management should think that way. And they do think that way more than athletes do.

But there are, you know, most of these general managers are former athletes. and they do have a certain, like, you know, this is why we play the game's aspect to them or attitude to them, which is not entirely wrong. You know, I mean, I think. I mean, look at this last playoffs. Exactly. Like, that's why you play the games and the Canadians got the ultimate proof of it. So, you know, I think the last playoffs gave everyone on the team a taste of what playoff success

can look like. And it's, they're going to be really reluctant to just sort of delay that way. the age curve for too many of their important players doesn't allow for a delay here. But so are we talking you right now, though, in a frame of this way, about the appetite to walk away from cockadeemi or the appetite to actually keep the first and third they get as opposed to flip them for another center because we're talking obviously about a 20 year old player, 21 year old player who could conceivably get much better moving forward over the next couple years, but he is also a player they were willingly keeping out of their lineup and was playing

third line minutes for them even when he was playing. So to frame it as this guy is the linchpin for them acknowledging their holes down the middle as the difference between them going for another run as opposed to taking a step back seems a bit bizarre to me. Yeah, I mean, they definitely don't feel like he's the linchpin, right? I don't think so. I don't think so. I don't think so either. They don't think he's the lynch. Well, they do think, okay, well, here's the thing, is that no matter what the organization thinks of Yisperi Kaki Niami, I mean, he was and is part of their long-term plan to be a competitive team. Him and Nick Suzuki are the sort of the building blocks of their forward group.

They just didn't feel that Kockenemy was ready for that immediately, but they definitely had a belief that he would be that guy. So it's not that he's a linchpin for their success this season, but I do think that the organization sees Kockenia somewhat of a linchpin for their success down the road. So that's why this decision is complicated for them, because if he was that linchpin already, it would be a no-brainer. You match and you move on and that's the end of it, but he's not that linchpin right now, but the canaan still do think he will become that. So, you know, what do you do? I mean, otherwise, if they didn't think he was going to become that,

then it's clear you don't match. And if he was that right now, then it's clear you match. But he's in this in-between phase, which Carolina, you know, quite smartly is exploited. at the moment with this offer sheet, but that's, you know, the Canadians have to, for a team that has had, let's call it, development issues, player development issues over the years, they're going to have to rely on their player development projections and figure out if they can get Yaspari Kokkiyemi to the finish line of being a second line center, even if he's not one right now. And if they do, if they believe that, then I do think they should match.

But the thing is, is that I'm not 100% convinced that they believe that. I'm not 100% convinced that they know that. Let's say if they believe it, that's one thing. But I don't know that they know that they can get this guy to where they want him to be. And that's why it's such a difficult decision for them. Yeah. That's like that's the kind of the toughest thing, right? Is if they don't believe that he's going to be worth his like minimum qualifying offer two years or a year from now, they can't match.

Well, if he's not going to be worth 5.1 to 5.5 two years from now, there's no way that they can match it because that's just it's too much that they don't believe in, right? I do wonder if we had seen Kokanyami play with somebody who had fit his style a little bit more often last season. If he'd spent more time with Tofoli because his numbers with Tofoli were actually really stellar. If the opinions of the organization would be more solid. But I do completely empathize with them that it is unknown whether he can reach that potential. We haven't seen the consistency that he can show that he can do that. Right. And I think it is, you kind of alluded to there, it's an important distinction to make.

Like right now, he would be a $6.1 million player. I believe they're not beholden to that as a figure, though, right? I think they can go through arbitration the following year and bring it down to five point two considerably. I don't, I still, regardless of what he did this coming season as a second line center, I don't see how he would be awarded more than that at this point, barring some sort of a remarkable leap. in production, but there is also, it could be a move point if you negotiate a longer term contract and bring that figure down as well. Like, there's a lot of moving parts there. I do wonder, like, we've been talking about kind of the optics of this and the message for

Bergerand to sell and stuff. I think part of it is it's a really tough pill to swallow in that this is the highest pick they've ever made. They don't have a track record of mailing first round picks. And it also looks like the hurricanes and Kharkinemi, to an extent, are kind of strong arming him here, which is funny because he's got literally the strongest arms in the entire league. So for Berzian to be strong. it's a story of the rights itself. But would you agree that there's a massive competitive advantage still right now, like in a league that is, it is at a snail's base, but it is getting smarter and the

competitive advantages are becoming harder and harder to find. I do still believe that being able to critically evaluate your own players, especially young players, is so important in the sense that if you acknowledge a mistake and you can move on from a young player before other teams realize they're not necessarily what they were built to be. Not saying it cockyami fits this, by the way. I'm just saying as a theoretical here for the Canadians, just as a general principle, it feels like teams are so beholden to draft status and, oh, this guy, like, you hear it all the time. Kakiami is a former third overall pick just three years ago. Like, what a tough pill to swallow for them to move on. But if he's

not that type of a talent and you can move on and still get a decent return without, you know, picking up the tab on this next contract of his, like, it's, yeah, it's a bad look optically. but I do think it saves you a lot of headaches down the road and still gives you a chance to kind of pivot here, as opposed to just kind of doubling down on the mistake just because you did already spend that third overall pick. Like the fact that he was picked third overall, I guess speaks to the theoretical talent he has, but is completely irrelevant to me in terms of describing it was a player at this point of his career. Would you agree with that? Well, it's almost like it's a doubly hard thing for the Canadians to do, right?

Because he was a reach at that spot. So they were already saying like, hey, we're smarter than everyone else. we know something that everyone else doesn't know, we're going to take this guy really high. And now to be able to three years later walk away from it, I think that's just, it's a very tough thing for them to do organizationally because it is,

it is admitting not only that he isn't what they thought, but that they weren't smarter than everyone else, right? So I think that's a doubly hard thing for them to do and why I kind of expect them to match. I mean, yeah, I don't know how much of a reach he was by the time the draft got there. I think he wouldn't have made it past five. So, you know, I mean, five was Barrett Hayton to Arizona.

I'm pretty sure they would have taken Cochneumie if he was there. So, I mean, he did shoot up towards the end of the draft cycle, if you will, after his U18s with Finland where he was really good. But to your, I think to your greater, to your overall point, Demetri, I agree with you that learning when to trade away potential and get the return on potential is, is probably the next great frontier. What I think,

where I think the competitive advantage would be in establishing not only that, but just in making sure that you, like, teams that understand their players on a personal level, like teams that, teams that are able to tailor make their, the way they handle players based on that player's specific needs.

Like those teams are the ones that are going to be at a real advantage because they're going to be able to do what you just mentioned, which is identify when it's time to cut a player loose and when a time, you know, when you understand that a player is just not going to be what you think he's going to be, but the rest of the league doesn't know that and you could trade that player

and get something in return. But also, before you get to that point, maybe you can identify the problems before they become problems. And you can cut them off at the pass. And you can, you know, listen, I cover the Canadians. I don't cover any other team all that closely.

But I do know that oftentimes in the last few, years from talking to these players, the communication hasn't been great. And sometimes they're left in the dark. When Cockney, he was scratched in Los Angeles. He did not understand why for months. Like, really, even after his exit meetings, he didn't fully understand what it happened. So that's a problem. You know, like, that's an issue that that I don't think is unique to Montreal. I think, I think there are a lot of teams that have this issue. And I agree that that would be a competitive advantage on both sides of it, on making sure that the players that you spent a lot of draft capital on fulfill that potential that you saw in them. And also in realizing that,

you know, okay, it's not going to work out with this guy. Let's try and get something for him and get more for him than we will if we just let it drag on and let him just sort of be this middling player for another year or two would be another way. But I mean, I do think that there's a general disconnect between management and players at the NHL level that that needs to change. And that's that's probably something that we're going to see change over the coming years because I think more and more teams are understanding that this generation of players are not the same as even seven or eight years ago they were. They've changed a lot in the last little while. Yeah, Dimitri, are you saying that the big skill in the NHL is to know when to hold

them and when to fold them? I really wish you to say it that way, actually. Now that Andrew mentioned it like that would have been way cooler well actually no order to be cooler it actually would have been awful but still after my strong arm joke about bergivan i feel like i uh that that one was enough for me but no i i do i really do believe that that's kind of an under talk about thing because we're so often you know you're like you're looking at the trade market and you're looking in free agency you're trying to uncover these gems from other teams and trying to poach talent and and improve your team that way but i do think it's a lot more difficult to fairly evaluate the players you already have in place, especially if you've invested in them already.

It just, see, time and time again, the teams are so caught up with this draft status idea of where a guy was taken years ago, even if he's not necessarily that player anymore. And I do think there is an ability to capitalize on that if you feel that he's not going to live up to that potential. So that's kind of the point I was trying to make the argument. Yeah, I mean, look at what the Blackhawks just did with Bogfus, right? Bokvus went eighth in that same draft as Svetchnikov and Cook-Kee. I mean, they go, they get Seth Jones, listen, you know, the contracts.

terrible, but fine, they used Boquist to go out and get a premier defenseman. No matter what you think of Seth Jones, what you're talking about is what the Blackhawks did. I think they incorrectly evaluated Bochrist in that case. Maybe, but that's, but that's

doing, but that's the risk you have to take, right? Like, I mean, we don't have the information that they had. Maybe they didn't incorrectly. Maybe we'll see what happens. You know, I mean, it's like, but it's, that's the move that you're talking about. And that's why teams are reluctant to do that because if both of us goes and becomes a better defenseman than Seth Jones in Columbus, then Chicago has egg on their face. And that's why I think most teams hang on to their draft picks longer than they should because they're worried. And right now,

I'm sure that conversation is happening in the Montreal front office. If Kockenemy goes to Carolina and rips it up, we're going to look like idiots. And we can't have that. Well, and I think that goes on in too many front offices, frankly. Kockenemy, to be clear, if he goes to Carolina, he will look better than he's looked so far. Like I think regardless of development or anything, they're going to put him in a better position in that system with the talent around him. Well, and they want to look smart too, right? Yeah.

I personally think if Kockenumi stays in Montreal, he'll look better than he has so far as well. Like he will be given an opportunity and he will be given the best opportunities had. And so he's reached, you know, he's entering his fourth NHL season. He's 21 years old. It's a very unique set of circumstances with this player. There's not many players who can say that. that. So I don't, you know, it's, it's not, I think the situation in Carolina might be better for him,

but I do think that if he, he were to stay in Montreal, I think he would have the best season he's had so far. I don't, you know, the bar is low there. So I don't, I feel very comfortable saying that. Whether he'll be worth $6 million this year or next or the year after, that's the question. That's different. That's a whole different conversation. Uh, Andrew, do you have any, any closing thoughts on, on the situation or Kotkanami or what have you at Arpinu as well. I feel like we've kind of covered most of it here, but is there anything we've kind of omitted so far? No, I think the main takeaway that I have from this whole situation is that

the Canadians kind of put themselves here by not figuring this out sooner. They probably could have got things done a little bit earlier with Kokenei if they weren't playing such hardball. And I think that teams have taken advantage of having all the negotiating power with RFAs that don't have access to arbitration for too long and being comfortable that teams aren't going to offer sheet and maybe that'll change. But also, like, credit to Carolina for tendering this offer sheet in the first place. Like, this is of all the offer sheets that have taken place over the last decade or so,

the one that seems to put the opposing team in the worst position. Like, in a lot of ways, I think you could say that no matter what the Canadians choose to do, it's a bit of a lose-lose situation. Yeah, what I take away from this is that it is absolutely skis candlest that no one offer sheeted any of the Tampa Bay Lightning players over the last three years. Yes. Yes. Especially Eric Chernak for sure. Eric Chernak is the one that just, I mean, let's, okay, I take that back, that no team convinced

a player on the Tampa Bay Lightning to sign an offer sheet in the last three years. Yeah, we don't know. But Eric Chernak was the poster child for that. This year was Alex Barry Bullett, who it would have been an interesting one, would just, you know, just this lower, you know, a contract at $2 million a year, losing a player on an offer sheet of $2 million a year would be interesting. But yeah, that's what Carolina has done to Montreal. Tampa Bay has been vulnerable to for years.

And no one has touched them. And it's a miracle. I don't know what they put in the water down there, but either the players are so are so bought in to the chance of winning a cup, which is probably a very real and actual factor for them. But it's pretty miraculous that they haven't been, they haven't been targeted by anyone. I think it comes like, just like without a whole,

just like now with Kakiami, like they literally, like the hurricanes made him an offer he couldn't possibly refuse. Yeah. I think it boils down to that. Like, like, yeah, of course, players have sort of agency here in terms of if they like their situation or they want to stay or they want to figure it out long term in their current destination. You can't force a player to sign an offer sheet.

But I don't care what Montreal had done. If they had played him on a first line for, for years, if you're getting offered $6.1 million for one year when your market is probably $2.5 million. and like every single player in the league is going to take that deal. And so that's what kind of boils down to for me. That's why he'll be welcomed with open arms in the Canadian's dressing room if ever they match. Like they won't,

the players won't care. The players will be like, you know, fist bumping him left right and center. Nick Suzuki is going to be fist pumping for sure. Yes, absolutely. Well,

who just got the most negotiating power in the world is Nick Suzuki, especially if they don't match, like just line up the money truck for Nick Suzuki. Yeah, Ryan Suzuki is. If they don't, if they don't match, then Caroline is coming after Suzuki next year.

Oh, man. All right. I'm looking forward to that. I'm going to pencil in that podcast for next season. All right, well, this is a blast. Arpin, I'll let you go first, plug some stuff. Where can people check you out? What are you working on these days?

And then, Andrew, I'll let you go after that. Theathletic.com. We have a 50% off sale for new subscribers, as we do from time to time, as NFL season is upon us, and NHL and NBA training camps are coming up. So if you click on any athletic story written by anyone, basically you'll get an opportunity to subscribe 50% off

and enjoy our coverage of every major sport in North America and English football in the UK. So really a great deal, a great price. Give us a shot for a year. All right. And I've got my cross-check NHL show on the Locked-on podcast network. And I've got something else that I can't actually talk about yet. But watch my Twitter in October.

You can't do that, man. Come on. I know, I can't talk about it. Give Demetri and exclusive for crying out of loud. Watch my Twitter. What a, what a line. Yeah, I can't think of a less appealing thing to do than to just watch your Twitter for an entire month. Thanks, Arpa. That sounds terrible.

All right, guys, this is a blast. I know it's a busy time, so I appreciate you taking the time of chat. And we'll see how this goes. And we'll have you both back on the show sometime down the road. So until then, enjoy the rest of this off season while we have it. as we head into next season. Suzuki Offer Sheet, 22. All right, that's going to be it for today's episode of the Hockey PEOCast.

Thanks, as always, for listening. Hopefully you enjoyed our breakdown and deep dive of the Asperi-Cockenami offer sheet and the situation around it. Certainly a lot to unpack there, and we tried to do our best to kind of cover it all from all angles as we approach Montreal's decision here on whether they're going to match or not. It was a weird month not doing the PEDOcast in August. I certainly needed a little break.

after the hectic end to July with all the coverage we did here on this feed. So hopefully you yourself enjoyed the little break in action and the summer and the off season. And hopefully you're ready for another hockey season here and are going to follow along and join us for the ride. So the plan for those of you wondering moving forward is the rest of September, we're probably going to do kind of the usual one podcast per week here on a variety of different topics.

And then as we approach the end of the month and head into the start of October, we're really going to ramp up the preview content. We're going to do all of the usual annual preseason staples that we do here on this feed. So looking forward to all of that. And yeah, it's going to be a fun, fun ride. So looking forward to getting back into the swing of things. If you either miss the PDO cast over the month, those off, or are happy it's back now, or looking forward to the coming season, please consider helping the show out by leaving a quick little rating and review on the show's feed. You can just hit the five star button. You can just hit the five star button if you're feeling extra generous or extra happy that it's back and the season is just

around the corner you can leave a little review and either let other people know why they should check out the show if they haven't done so already or what you enjoy about it and yeah a lot of you have done so already and i really appreciate each and every one of you that have and hopefully the rest of you that have been holding out are going to do so here soon and yeah that's going to be it for today's show we're going to be back next week with another episode and after that it's going to be back to regularly schedule of programming. So looking forward to it. And it's good to be back.

Dmitri Filipovich. Follow on Twitter at Dim Philipovich and on SoundCloud at soundcloud. At soundcloud.com slash hockey p.docast.