The Hockey PDOcast - Film Club on Zach Werenski

Episode Date: January 17, 2025

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Jesse Marshall to break down the tape on Zach Werenski this season, showing why he's been such a unique driver of offense from the defense position, and how everything the Blue Jackets do flows through him. 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.

Progressing to the mean since 2015, it's the Hockey P.DioCast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the Hockey PEOCast. My name's Dimitra Filippovich, and joining me is my good buddy, Jesse Marshall. Jesse, what's going on, man? Happy New Year. I don't know if it's appropriate to say that on the 17th, but this is the first time I've seen you this year, so I'm going to do it. I think we're way past it being socially unacceptable to do so, but I appreciate it all the same. And it's the first film club of 2025 as well. And you know what? if there was ever a sign that it is truly a new year, it's me and you picking a defenseman to break down.

We've been doing forwards all year, even stretching back to previous seasons, but we finally decided to pick one. Now, I will say we're doing Zach Wrenski today. We're going to break down the magnificent season he's having all the tape that he's put out there for us to enjoy. It does feel like cheating a little bit because as we're going to discuss, when we talk about Wrenski's game today, you go through it.

and he's really stretching the definition of what a quote unquote defenseman is, and that's not meant at all as a knock in terms of thinking of him as being defensively irresponsible or lacking in any way. It's just that he's pushing the envelope offensively so much and creating so much offense for this Columbus Blue Jackets team that he's really serving as a forward forward out there for them in a lot of these instances at least functionally. And so he is a defenseman in terms of position, and he will be in the Norris discussion.

But man, this guy's playing like one of the best forwards in the league right now. He is, but I'm going to deviate from what you just said and also give a munch to his defensive game, which has been extremely good. I think that's something that surprised me when I went into this footage. I watched Columbus play Pittsburgh a lot this year. But when I sat down and watched the full slate of the games, I was kind of shocked at how well he was standing people up in the defensive zone. He's almost sort of like this positionless midfielder in soccer

that just traverses the middle third of the ice and it turns a lot of destruction into offense. He is faster than I thought. And it takes a while for him to get there. But I think let's start here, Demetre, the most fun part of the tape is him skating straight at people. This is like, it's a very straight line. It's almost like he's playing a game of chicken, right, with the people that are trying to defend him. I'm bringing the puck right at you, right in the center of your mass. So what are you going to do about it?

And I think as a result, he catches a lot of people flat-footed, right? I think that they back up and then they get to a point of sort of the line is drawn in the sand where you have to either act or he's going to go by you. And by the time you realize that you've lost your forward or reverse momentum and he's just giving you a little shoulder shake, right? It's not like he's going east-west here. It's very linear. It's very direct.

But when the wheels get him that up to a little. 100% speed. It's frightening, right? Because he's got a lot of mass. He's a big guy. And he can move pretty well for a big guy. So the terror that he is sort of raining in the middle third is to me the most fun to watch, right? He's standing people up, turning that into offense. I think if you looked up the definition, you know, like I say this on the show all the time. People throw out the word hockey sense is like this coverall for when they can't think of anything else to say sometimes, but for me, it's on this film. And it's the recognition from Zach Rorensky of knowing exactly when and where, right? Where am I in the course of this game,

in this moment, when is the right time to pinch? When's the right time to fly the zone? When's the right time to sneak in the back door, the play, and make myself available on the far side? All of those decisions are sound and mostly correct all the time. And it's just that that's what hockey sense is. the understanding of where you fit as a puzzle piece or a chess piece in this greater scope of this chaotic game and when those points of attack are best suited for you. And he's mastered that. It's just, it's phenomenal to watch. And I think that that's the definition, right, of the word hockey sense is that sort of ethereal grasp of the game that allows you to sort of fluidly move with the pace and the direction of the hockey and make yourself available, as you said, is sort of

like this extra forward option and doing it in a way where you're not you're not making yourself vulnerable defensively because your timing is just perfect. You're not the only one that's surprised by how fast he's moving. You can tell that the opposition is in a lot of these clips as well that we're going to watch. And I think part of it is what I noticed. He is a very sort of unassuming stance, I think. Like he's very upright a lot of the time. And I think people see that and they feel like they're going to have a chance to react

accordingly once he gets into whatever skating stride he's going to be in. And so he gives them that false sense of a timeline to work within, except that out of that stance, he's able to just reach his top speed and then keep gliding at it, essentially. And so what you see is, like, it looks very different than a lot of the powerful skaters traditionally you see in the league, especially forwards, where, like, you watch Nathan McKinnon,

and his shins are basically hitting the ground when he's, when the ice, when he's skating, because he's solo and in such a traditional athletic stance, whereas Wrenzky does it in a bit of an unconventional way. Do your point on the defensive stuff? And I'm glad you brought that up, and I'm going to highlight this, and then kind of encompassed in a larger point about his full impact.

Spor Logic has a lot of individual defensive metrics. When we did our celebrini tape, we talked about his puck battles won and some of those other metrics. According to Spor Logic, they have Zach Wrenski, third in the league in total defensive plays made behind Jacob Slavin and McKenzie Weger. Now a lot of that is volume in terms of usage and being on the ice as often as he is and being as involved as he is and it encompasses stats like block passes. He's third behind Adam Fox and Jacob Slavin.

Defensive zone denials in terms of breaking up entries. He's top 10 in the league. Stick checks. He's six. Loose puck recoveries. He's first and he has about 30 of them per game. he basically does essentially everything in that regard of this bluejackets team. And I think when I watch him play, what I marvel at is just the motor he has in terms of his ability to sustain this for as often as he's playing.

Right. Like he's eating up 2640 per game this season, which is nearly a full minute ahead of second place, Mikhail Sergachev, and that's out of necessity because Utah didn't have Marino and Dersi this entire time. He has five games with 30 or more minutes played so far. season, I suspect we'll see that get into the double digits by season's end. And so all of those defensive metrics in terms of involvement and activity and then everything we want to talk about offensively, just the level of effort, I think, it takes to do that, right? And not really be compensating or trading off at one end. We see a lot of guys who are either quote unquote defensive defensemen and they're high in a lot of

these defensive stats, but they just don't offer anything offensively because they just get to rest up essentially when their team is in the O zone. or guys who create a lot from this position in the offensive end, and they do so by taking themselves out of position and not really being back in the play defensively. And you don't see that from Werenczki at all. He's essentially covering all three zones with the same amount of volume and frequency. And I think that's incredibly impressive in testament to obviously his cardio and conditioning,

but just the sheer effort and energy he's outputting in every single game. Yeah, if you asked the question, how does a defenseman in 2025 take over a game and drag a team by the scruff of their neck to victory, put any number of blue jackets games on and watch number eight because it gives you a great example. And it's not just the, you know, as a forward to me, I don't think there's anything more frustrating in the world than being dispossessed by a defenseman that you then have to chase around. That's just, that is demoralizing in so many ways. And that's what it's all about.

his ability to keep play moving in the right direction vis-a-vis his defensive actions blows me away. And what I mean by that is, and you'll see it on the video when we run the video later, for those of you who are watching, he can poke check as a means of passing, right? So he angles a forward off on the boards, takes a whack, makes contact with the puck, and sends it right to a winger, right? And these are intentionally deliberate plays where there's a loose puck in the corner, right? He goes in one-on-one with somebody. It's a battle for that loose puck, and he takes a stick and wax it. And you think, what's he doing? There's a forward there.

Right. So he's playing his role, right? And doing the direct responsibilities of a defenseman in a manner that also acts as a springboard for his offensive friends. Right. And so, like, it's almost all, the whole mindset that he has in every situation he's in is how do I, how do we keep this play going? And, you know, we'll talk about a shot. We'll talk about, you know, the movement he exhibits and the way that he could sneak around out there. But the puck distribution is unbelievable.

And we talk about the speed and, you know, he's taking people by surprise. He's got this sense of when all eyes are on him. That's the moment he makes the pass, right? And he sort of has that feeling for when everyone's drawn to him and is paying attention to that north. South Spidey as, and he's thrown a lot of beautiful cross-ice feeds inside the offensive zone at a head of steam this year that are difficult passes for forwards to execute, right? But it's that, again, that hockey sense, that awareness, his head is always up, and he seems to be planning out his moves to two and a half steps before he's at the puck,

right? And if you don't have your decision made at that point, I mean, he embarrasses a lot of people. He embarrasses a lot of forwards and a lot of defense. by again manipulating them. The note I made was deliberate manipulation of the puck in a non-traditional fashion to keep play progressing. That's the best way I could sum it up because that's what he's doing. Sometimes that's chips off the wall.

Sometimes that's passes. He makes Dimitri at an angle off the boards that just hit somebody right in stride, right? It's a nice little bank off the pass. It's the cross-ice feeds. And again, it's even just these chip plays where he's in puck battle situations. it's remarkable behold. And when you tie all these metrics together and you look at this big picture, the whole piece of the cake or the whole cake instead of one piece here,

everything he's doing defensively is sort of done under the guise of immediately creating. Right. So I love that he has that, like take care of business here first focus, but the way that he can pivot it is just almost lightning fast. It really is. Sometimes you don't even know it's happened, but he's planned it out ahead of time. and is well executing, you know, these sort of hockey sense thought out plans.

We're going to run the tape now, and that's a good reminder that you made there. You can watch along with us on the PDCAST YouTube channel. So if you're listening, you can see some of the clips we're talking about the way we're seeing it, I guess, and we're going to talk a little bit about it. If you are just listening to us the way you normally do, don't worry, I'll post a lot of these clips on Twitter and on other social media, so you can check that out there later. I'm really glad you brought up that concept of him kind of strategically or purposefully turning defensive plays into offense.

Because today, Mike Kelly, using the Sport Logic Dad, tweeted out this very insightful stat that I think tells you a lot about both Werensky and the Blue Jackets this year. And it's that they lead the league in 68 goals scored within 10 seconds of a turnover. And they also lead the league with 27 goals scored within five seconds of a turnover. And that's exactly the concept you're talking about their quantified, where oftentimes you see him turn a potentially chaotic play into a successful one for the blue jackets. And I think that's also why, and I'm going to give you a few of the splits here, why he's been so successful in tandem with that top line of Marchenko and Voronkov. He's played 340 minutes at 515 this year with Marchenko.

The blue jackets are up 21 to 5 in that time. all their metrics are in the 60% range. With Varankov out there with them, 192 minutes, they're up 14 to 3. And that trio in particular, they've had Monaghan there with them, now Fantilli more recently, and Fantilli's speed and ability to ramp up the pace

is even more intriguing to me moving forward. What they do is they create chaos and they create miscommunication off of those turnovers, right? All of a sudden, everyone scrambled out of position, and then they thrive within that. Their movement and interchangeable, is so dynamic and unique. And so that's what you see on a lot of this stuff.

Like, Marchenko is so willing to just put the puck in a space or put it into a defender's skates. And all of a sudden, you're like, all right, like, he lost the puck or he lost control of it. That was a bad play. And then within a second, he's in a better position on the ice. And all of a sudden, Werenski's sneaking back door and they create a passing play off of each other that way. And it's just so fun to watch. I think that's why I've been so captivated by them. I think why like people are noticing that this Blue Jackets team,

especially with their top players out there, is just so much fun to watch this season. Demetri, I think that Zach, this is like a, it's like a generational gap type of a comment, I think. But like, I think it's cool that Zacharency's kept things with him

from when he entered the league that other people aren't bringing into the league with them anymore. Like, like, touch passes. Like that's sort of like a phased out thing, you know, a little bit. I think you don't see that a lot anymore. And he's sort of mapped, like he's still doing it super effectively.

up at the top of the point. I can't tell you the number of times I saw Columbus score a goal because he just one touched something over to somebody. It's just like I there's there's these remnants of like this almost previous iteration of hockey that are still within him and still are paying dividends. The back door pinches the other one right. I mean like we that was like something that became super cool in like the early 2000s and like remember like started like see defensemen do it all over the league and he like he's still executing it as perfectly now. as he was when he first came into the league as himself. So I'm, that goes back to, I talk about this Hockey Sense piece,

but the timing is so perfect, right? And he's gotten so used to these guys now and has come so comfortable with them that the off puck movement from him and the read-based movement from him is, he's the fiddle playing the violin, right? I mean, he's the guy out there that's the conductor and is orchestrating all this stuff. And it's his runs and his timing. A lot of times it's his zone entries that are getting this stuff. started, I think now you're starting to see, especially with Fantilli, this connection between

them on stretch passing. Adam Fantilli is realizing he could get behind people quickly. Freelance, let's be honest, freelance a little bit on the breakout where appropriate, not in an irresponsible fashion, but Zach Werencki's going to find him, right? And there's been, especially over the course the last couple weeks, a lot of home run passes from Marensky to Fantili. They've just been beautiful. Crossing two lines, like full length almost, you know, behind the own net to the blue line sometimes. And I'm, like you mentioned, I'm excited to watch that relationship blossom more because every time you look, it almost seems like there's this new wrinkle they've added or something

else is happening now that they, you know, have mastered to make opponents frustrated and cough the puck up. So, yeah, it's, you know, it's, I don't think, I think he's done a phenomenal job of adapting to how hockey is being played in 2025, while still keeping a little bit of, uh, remnants with him from when he came into the league, I guess, and sort of a previous generation of defense him that he grew up watching, right? My favorite clips of these are the ones where the puck's on one end of the ice and within the camera shot, Zach Wrenzki's not even in the frame.

And it looks like the blue jackets are almost playing four on five in the offensive zone. And then all of a sudden, he darts back in and times it perfectly exactly as you said. And I think you made this note on the Celebrini show and you see it from Werenci as well. and I think it's a trait you're seeing from a lot of the top offensive players in today's game, he'll willingly take himself out of the offensive zone and then kind of get lost, get the heat and attention off of them, and then time it to come back in, slide into the back door in the blind spot, and then all of a sudden be in a great shooting position,

and with that chemistry evolving, they're able to find them. And I knew as soon as I watched that, I was like, all right, I feel like this is something Jesse's going to really like to see. So it's cool that you are already kind of talking about that. Yeah, and I go back to the, famous quote from Wolf of Wall Street, I don't ask people to judge me by my winners. I ask him to judge me by the losers because I have so few of them. You don't see him getting in trouble, Demi.

Correct me if I'm wrong here. You watched just as much tape as I did here. I did not see it like, never, but the amount of responsibility that he exhibits, right, the unselfishness of his style of play, his willingness to give it up, his willingness to live to fight another day, his understanding, again, of where he fits in, whatever is happening in that moment is unmatched. I mean, it's just, it's, it's what's driving this whole thing. And, you know, you sort of get used to when guys are pinching or when they're getting active offensively, you get used to having to drink a little bit of bitter juice with that because

turnovers are going to happen, right? Like, people get a little too confident sometimes. Mobile defensemen have a tendency to try things that they shouldn't. This is just, it's just so well done. I mean, and there's certainly times where it doesn't go well and he's got to scramble back. but more, you don't, you're not getting that heaping scoop of like bitterness with this, right? Like there's, it's more often than not, it's working out really well. And the chemistry seems to be unbelievable. I, I do want to, I want to point out that I think when we talk about that, that lack of selfishness or that like intentionality around his game, I go right to his shot. If you look at most of the goals, he's scored this year.

He's taken something off, right? he's not looking to just send this thing through the glass. He's getting a lot of power without the sacrifice of any accuracy, right? There's an intentionality between what he's doing. And I think that it's been fun to watch. It's been really fun to watch. What you're seeing is a discerning shooter as a defenseman, right? That's the way I would word that it's a discerning shooter as a defenseman and a guy who's not just going to wind up and let him rip.

He's going to get as much power as he can without losing that finesse. right? And I think that's something that some people never pick up, right? And they just want to let them rip and that's the way it works. And they're hitting the area behind the nets got so much rubber on it. You can't even see the ice. So I think that there's a lot of discernment on his part, not only again, and when he pinches, making responsible decisions, but how he shoots, right? Not putting it into people's pads and causing turnovers, not, you know, trying to pinch into compromising situations, maybe shaving a little bit of that speed off of it to get more from a problem. placement perspective.

That, you know, that sort of intentional shooting has been fun to watch for me. And also just getting it on net or in the vicinity of the goalies pads or in the crease is such a valuable asset when you're playing with a guy like Dmitri Broncov because he's so good at coming away with whatever loose change is around there that I feel like just giving yourself a fighting chance of getting the puck closer to the net and then letting him cook from his office is such a valuable component of this. you mentioned the shot. So he's got 15 goals, which is first amongst all defensemen.

He's hit the post or crossbar another 15 times, which also leads the league. He's got 51 points, which leads defensemen, 28 515 points, which is more than Quinn Hughes's, 22, which is second at the position. He leads the position, 178 shots on goal, which is 40 more than a car, and 347 shot attempts, which is also first. I mean, I think that's what I keep coming back to. And I don't want to take away from everything you've said and everything we've highlighted about his defensive acumen and how he's creating a lot off of that end of it. It's just, I think what's made him so unique and so special, and we've spoken about this in the past, it's just really difficult to drive offense consistently as a defenseman in today's game. Like if you distribute the puck, you can get into advantageous positions for your forwards, but ultimately they're going to need to do the heavy lifting. in terms of creation and ultimately finishing

for you to actually create off of that. And so a lot of defensemen are very vulnerable, or I guess beholden to their environment. And if they're not, they don't have the horses around them, they're not going to be able to drive offense. Werensky's obviously gotten the boost of a new coach in Dean Edison this year and guys like Marchenko and Voronkov

and Kent Johnson taking their games and new heights at this point of their career. But ultimately for a defenseman to just be driving offense the way Werenzky is right now is really, really exceedingly difficult to do, and you only really see it from essentially McCar and Hughes right now. And maybe even he's doing it to a greater extent than those guys, because oftentimes everything that's being created is as a direct result of something he just did. I don't want to take anything away from Kent Johnson at all,

but he is getting fed some meals this season from Zach. I have fed some supersized meals fed to him that have enabled him. And, again, kudos to Johnson. He's got to finish them, right? Like, this is not a one, it takes two to tango. But he's, again, to your point, right? Like, everything he's doing is seemingly benefiting the people around him. And the people around him are getting better at handling those situations and finishing them.

So, yeah, it's unique to me, I guess I would say again, that to see someone who can do it from anywhere, right? born from any situation, any time. I think he's, you know, the threat level he presents, you can see start to wear on teams within the course of a game, right? And then there's more room for him to inch closer and closer and closer and sneak in more, more and more. I think people back off, you know, they get a little nervous. They try to respect him, give him time and space that he then uses to just create more

downhill motion, right? I mean, everything is with the intent of getting closer to the goal and getting himself into a more prime scoring opportunity. So, yeah, you know, and again, deceptive skating. I think that it's bizarre to see someone his size with as short of a stride as he has, take as long as he does to get to top speed. But then once he's there, it's, you know, again, it's just freezing people. It's leaving them completely paralyzed in that transition game.

All right, Jesse, before we get too far in the weeds here, let's take our break. And then we come back, we'll jump right. back into it and we'll keep chatting about Zach Wrenski and everything we're seeing on tape from him this season. You're listening to the HockeyPedio cast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network. All right, we're back here in the Hockeypedo cast. We're chatting about Zach Wrenski here today with Jesse Marshall. Jesse, here's what I'll say. He's their number one defenseman, obviously. I think just as important of a role for him, I think he functions as

their number one center. And that's not to take away from the year Monaghan was having before he got heard and now what fentany's been able to do on that top line. But when you watch these clips, how often do you see him either be the one carrying up the puck up the ice in the middle or even if he's off the puck if it's a two on one or if they have an odd man rush opportunity? His role sprinting up the middle and executing the center lane drive and pushing guys back and creating those pockets in the intermediate for guys to make cross ice passes and stuff with is what allows all of this to click.

right so i think traditionally what we think about with these roles is like the fencedman gets the puck in their own zone they pass it up to their forward center skates up the middle wingers attack off the flanks in this case what you're seeing is warrenski is doing the most of the sprinting right i think now it's been a bit of a new dynamic with fantilli's north south mentality and his skating ability he's able to do some more of that off the breakout and kind of get behind the defense and allow uh wrenski to be more of a traditional distributor oftentimes you're seeing Werenzki leading the charge or being directly involved in a lot of these rushes. And that's so rare for a defenseman as well, right? Generally, it's kind of like a secondary wave of offense.

You see defensemen involved in the rush. In this case, kind of like McCar, he's the one who's actually taken the puck and being like, all right, now we're moving. Or if he sees the puck on the wall and a guy's ready to break out, he's just dashing up the middle. And that creates so many attacking opportunities that they're then kind of turning into scoring chances themselves. Dimitri, in the last minute of video, we've been looking at that he's had two breakaways.

And in both of the clips, he was behind the defenseman whenever the play started. And he wasn't cheating on the play. And it's not like he was cherry picking or poaching. Like, he saw an opportunity and he just got on his horse and sprinted up. Caught up. Right. Caught up to the play, drove wide. The defenseman shifted to where the puck was.

They made a pass. He comes across the blue line with possession and he's in on the net one-on-one with by himself. There was another clip in there against Carolina where he split the, they gave him enough room for him to drive through and he went right up, right between them. No contest whatsoever, just dusted both of them. And they just left enough space for a Zach Worensky-sized human to fit.

And that's exactly where he went. So it's, I mean, you're right. You're 100% correct. I mean, the support he provides on the breakout and what he does to add to that presence of, again,

driving right down the middle, right? going straight ahead, backing people up and creating time and space. And the ability he has, again, to make those reads because you're seeing on a lot of these clips, he gets the puck and in one motion distributes it, right? There's no screwing around. It's a deliberate redistribution immediately to somebody else who's open on the far wing. And you end up with these cross-ice passes that he's the vector of, right?

They're going to him and he's immediately distributed him five feet, ten feet over. And the ability he has to be this sort of like conduit between offense and defense is hard to miss when you watch the tape. Something that sets him apart from a lot of his peers too is it's not just getting up the ice, but his comfort being in positions where I think you're just generally don't see other defensemen spend time in. Like when he does that center lane drive, he doesn't peel off once he gets that hash marks and go back to his natural position along the point. Like a lot of these clips, he'll hang around for a couple seconds and wait to see if there's a rebound or a one touch opportunity or some sort of a redirection play. And then once he has to, he gets back defensively. But I think that's a part of this as well.

I'm curious for your take on it and whether that's something we're just going to see more of, right? Because there's been all this talk about positional interchangeability or just position as hockey in general and defensemen playing the roles of forwards more. And that sounds good in practice. but what you still see is a lot of players in a very still conservative league, defensemen are so scared to be caught up out of position where the next day they're reviewing the tape with the team and the coach is like, all right, this defenseman was caught up the ice and that's why we gave up this rush opportunity and goal against and that's why we lost. And so they often see them just pulling the plug early and getting back defensively.

He's just so willing and comfortable to be in certain areas in the offensive zone. and you can see that it catches the other team off guard, and then he's able to score or get a good opportunity from there, not to mention that it allows guys like Marchenko to then occupy other areas of the ice, similar to the interchange we see between McCar and McKinnon, and I think that's really cool. Do you think that's something that we're just going to see more of

and it's going to become commonplace around the league? Do you think we've already seen enough of that? Are you surprised that it hasn't necessarily caught up yet, despite the fact that we keep talking about how the game is so offensively we're into now? I guess not surprised in a sense because, you know, there's a lot of old dogs that don't want to learn new tricks, I think, in the world of hockey coaching. But, you know, I think the way I'd phrase it now, Demetri, is like, don't trust your guys to your own detriment, right? Like, that's what it comes down to to me.

Like, if you want to put a cap on something like this and stop this from happening, you're doing so to your own detriment, right? And that's trust is what it comes down to, right? And I think that there's still like this, you know, school of thought and hockey that, like, you know, got to play defense is more important than anything else. We've got to take care of the red line, like back up, right? You know, like, keep it in front of you at all times. And, like, that's, you know, that's all well and good. But I think teams like that aren't going to let this sort of thing happen, right?

They're not going to create an environment where you could let a Zach Werenski do this, right? And I think that's what stinks is that that's really what it comes down to is do you have that kind of environment. You know, I obviously, you know, me, I'm in Pittsburgh, I cover the Penguins. They have a really terrible version of that environment and that it's just wide open and nobody cares about it. So here's a balancing act that you have to play here. But, I mean, look, you have to trust your guys to take care of this, right?

Like, that's what it comes down to, is giving them, I'm going to use the term blank check because there's, there does, when you watch this video, Dimitri, in organic game, I know we're showing highlights, right? But when you watch it in an organic game state, there's no restriction here. You don't see, like, Zach Werenski backs off when he doesn't think that it's a good time to pinch. That's not a system-driven decision, right, where you can see it affecting pairing one, pairing two, pairing three. That bubbles not here, right? So I hope that as time goes on, you know, coaches are going to look around.

They're going to watch this video and say, wow, how do I recreate this? well I probably got to remove a few filters first right like that's that's the issue is I've got a governor on my motor and I got to find a way to take that off now not everybody has a Zach warrenski right like that's also requirement here is that you're going to have a defenseman that's willing to do this kind of thing but but even if you have them that doesn't necessarily mean he's got the right environment to allow it and I you know I look forward I hope to more of these sort of like young dynamic skating talents that allow us to like challenge the traditional sort of views of like what a left wing does,

right? Or like what I'm a center bound by these rules because I have to take care of my own zone and, you know, et cetera, et cetera. Like they're tropes, right? That's what they are. They're tropes. And how do you destroy a trope? Well, you do something like this, right? You have a guy like Zach Werenski who's playing like he doesn't have a position. And the more we see it, you know, it being a copycat league, you do hope that that sort of thing catches on. I just, I don't, I don't mean to give it such a low vote of confidence, but there's a lot of things that we've seen catch on before that haven't sort of matriculated their way fully through the league or caught all the way on. So, you know, I think, again,

the more teams do it, the more it's going to be hard for some other people to say no. You're right. I'm stealing this concept from our pal Jack Hahn. He's talked about that he wrote about this years ago and now you're seeing Zach Wrenski do it in full full full. I brought it up to you, I think, in the Celebrini show, and I think this gives additional credence to my theory that he's their number one center. It's his work in that kind of middle funnel, right? Like you look at the routes he takes. And sometimes on the rush, like, he'll do a traditional defensive move of like kind of like drifting to the outside near the wall and kind of throwing a muffin on net just to kind of and then getting back into his position of the blue line. But look at his play against the wild for those watching.

like in the offensive zone he's the one behind the net here he's got three forwards back supporting him and he comes back up the middle between the dots he's able to intercept a play keep it going and that's what you're saying like all right that's not a highly real play it didn't lead to even a scoring chance or a goal but he does that all the time like he's between the dots when he goes behind the net or he gets caught on a rush he'll just work his way back up the middle realizing that so much of the impetus for the other team is to get the puck into the middle ice so they can break out themselves. And so he gets all of these additional turnovers and plays.

And I think that's why he's able to recover as well because he's essentially cutting off the play at the head before it ever really can burn him down the ice. And so I think that's something you could really take from his tape and integrate. And I think that's probably why he drives so much offense as a defenseman as well, because he's working the middle of the ice better than a lot of his peers. And really unlike how I think a lot of defensemen are trained to play, like certainly on the blue line on the power play, you see a guy like Quinn. gravitate to the middle of the ice and then try to get a point shot from there

because it increases the tip opportunities and the screens and all of that. But he's just integrating that into his game in all facets. And it's so cool to watch. Yeah. And you just saw it there in another clip we're watching. He's working up the middle. Exactly. His ability to just get low and cut down low quickly is it changes the defensive structure.

It changes the way that the defense has to play. They have to back up. They have to give it space. It creates lanes. And again, the way that he, there's very little east-west in any of this when you go through this tape. There's very little east-west in any of it. It's just him barreling down the tracks head first, again, with a full head of speed.

You know, just very, and I want to go back to something I mentioned earlier, but it's the way that he aggressively presses in the offensive zone, right? When they have possession and he does get the puck at the top of the middle, at the blue line, he's walking it down low. I mean, you rarely see him, you know, I mentioned the touch passes and stuff like that, Dmitri, but there's always this few steps forward intentionality behind what he does when he's at the top, right?

You rarely see him get the puck at the top of the blue line and stay there with it. He's almost always going to take at least two, three steps forward and drive closer to the goal. And I think it's that, you know, again, it's that mindset of constantly going north that benefits all his teammates and mitigates a lot of the risk that we said earlier, right?

We talked about how he's not making a ton of mistakes. This isn't sloppy tape. You're not finding him having to constantly recover from situations that he himself created. And I think that's one of the reasons why is he's not wasting a lot of space or taking the puck through areas where it doesn't need to go and sort of like tempting turnovers. And I don't want to bemoan East-West movement here because it's obviously effective in creating space circumstantially. But when you're as intentional as he is in getting north, I think it's just, it can, help mitigate, you know, the puck's not traversing a lot of areas that doesn't need to. It's getting to where it needs to go and it's getting there quickly.

Yeah, there's an economical efficiency to all of his choices. And I think that's what allows him to play 27 to 30 minutes every night and get away with it without decreasing efficiency. I love the interchange as well, like I was talking about earlier, the movement in the offensive zone. You see it in particular with that top line or off of a lot of face off plays. They're running stuff now where the puck will run back to Marchenko. he cuts in Werensky sneaks down the wall behind him. He gives it to him and all of a sudden Warenski is crashing down the wall, attacking the net,

creating all sorts of dysfunction that way. It's just so fun to watch these guys play. It is such a modern game. And I think we've got to give Dean Everson credit as well, right? Because you mentioned a lot of this stuff like on the one hand isn't a system. It's a tremendous individual player taking everything into his own hands and creating off of it and having success doing so. And then I think any normal human being would want to,

watch that and be like, all right, let's do more of this. Not only is it fun, but we're winning. And so let's keep playing this way. So that allows them to do so certainly. But I think going from Brad Larson and Pascal Vincent and kind of how they wanted to rein everything in to all of a sudden, Dean Eveson, who didn't necessarily come in with a rap of being an offensive genius by any means, but in Minnesota, he had guys like Carol Caprizov and he allowed them to freelance and do their thing. And that's probably already in the top, whatever percentile amongst NHO coaches of willingness to let your top players do what makes them successful. He's coming to Columbus and done that.

And I think everyone has benefited from it, right? And so I think in terms of environment, I think that's helped quite a bit. And I think it's emboldened them to keep kind of going down this route. And now you watch them. And every single night, it feels like they're tapping into that more and more. And so it's, you know, it's convenient that we're doing this with the Blue Jackets, riding a six game winning streak. But I think it's more legit than not.

Like if they keep playing this way, there's just so much good, creative beneficial stuff to tap into that I think they're going to keep enjoying the, I guess, the fruits of their labor. Yep. You watch this version of Columbus, like, again, juxtaposed with some of the previous versions of Columbus. And it's all like the way I would word it is systematically speaking. They're no longer conceding, right?

Like you almost got the sense that like these prior iterations of Columbus, the system was saying, we know we're not as good as these other teams. We're going to try to be as opportunistic as possible and create as. much fortification defensively as we can. But all that really did was invite pressure, right? Like you open the door up, you let people in, right? You let them come and set up their lawn chair and have a beer in the offensive zone. And this, in this, Vien-Evesant system is very, very much like a full court press in a lot of ways.

It's got elements of Florida in it and what they do on their forecheck and how aggressive they are up at the top of the ice. I think that they're no longer making that concession, right? And they're no longer saying, like, we don't, we're no longer accept that we may not have the most talent on our roster. No, we're not going to play like that. Like, we're going to, we're going to make you adapt to our style. And they really work hard, I think, to control that middle third. They're really good in between the blue lines, and that's really where they do their

best work. The forwards are bought in. They're back checking. They're creating turnovers. That makes life on a guy like Zach Werensky a lot easier and allows him to participate. I think more in the way that he does. So it's a fun style of play for sure. And you can see in a lot of the clips, too, it's frustrating, I think, from the opposition's

perspective, to have to kind of go against this and shift after shift. You know, that pressure is sort of always there. And they force you to make a lot of plays that are area plays, right? I think sometimes on the breakout when you're trying to have the time and space to make your nice little breakout pass, like they want you to get it to an area so that they can beat you there, right? And I think that's sort of the goal. And it's been a lot of fun,

it's been a lot of fun to watch them play it. That's for sure. Yeah, I mean, they're out of the six game winning streak. They're up to first in the, in that wild card, or the first wild card spot in the east. They're fifth in the league in scoring all situations, second in five-on-five scoring with only the capitals ahead of them. And so what they're doing is working.

They've become appointment viewing for me. I'm tuning in and back on Worensky. If you look at the Norris market, it's really interesting because it's been Hughes and McCar up top all year, and I think deservedly so. But the gap is shrunk between those three. They're all quite close in terms of the betting odds now all of a sudden. Werenski is still third, but he's closed that distance. And then all of a sudden, it's like you go from Werenski and then the gap between him and fourth place, which is Josh Morrissey, is an absolute abyss in terms of the Norris voting. And then it's like guys like chikrin and so.

and so forth. And it's become such a clearly defined a three-horse race. And I think that is ultimately just a testament to how Good Wrenski's been. Because we know the McCarren Hughes that as long as they're in their prime and they're healthy, they're probably going to be one, two, in some order. And the fact that he's actually made that a conversation between the three of them is such a cool development, in my opinion. Yeah, 100%. Yeah. He's forced his way in there. For sure, there's no question about it. And I think that all the habits that we talked about today, I think regardless of whether or not Columbus is playing well and winning hockey games, I mean, there are habits that are going to allow him to keep accruing points

and turning that attention towards himself in that race all the way up until the end, right? That's stylistically the way this is working for him. And the absolute role that he plays in what Columbus does offensively, combined with the minutes that he's getting, and the simple amount of puck touches he sees in a hockey game, you know, he's going to be, he's going to be in there all the way up through the end. And if he has his health with him, I think that that will continue to stay at three horse race. But when you contextualize it like that, right, I think you're 100% correct.

I mean, it's, it's, it's, we're used to this. We know what, we know what, you know, Quinn Hughes does and what the Canucks look like when he's not on the ice and the case that he's made for himself and that. But, you know, the fact that Rorensky was able to come really out of nowhere, right? because I didn't, you know, I didn't expect this from the beginning of this season. I don't think anybody did, right? I mean, I think you would have expected him to rebound. I wouldn't have been shocked at that. I would have, I would have expected him to have a good top guy year, top pairing guy year over there.

But this is, this is on another level. And again, it's really, it's a really nice amalgamation of all the things that I think that he's taken with him over the course of his career so far, sort of tucked into one, one little package. part of that is the health as well and knock on wood health permitting but he plays all 82 games in 1819 and then since then five years misses 721 14 69 and then 12 games and so the fact that he's healthy and I think the you know what's in very exciting as well is as well as he's playing it's a style that I think has even more room to grow in terms of the players around him getting better and more comfortable playing with him and then kind of being where he wants him to be and then them being able to riff with each other with the age of a lot of these players, then being in

their early to mid-20s and just getting better and more comfortable in that system, I feel like it's something that stands to even get better as we move along, right? It's kind of almost difficult to envision Zach Wrenski being more productive and more eye-popping than he's been so far. But I feel like as they get more comfortable just playing with all those guys together, it actually is logical that it would do exactly that. And so I think it's it's incredibly exciting. You got any parting notes here, thoughts or anything that we missed out on your list of stuff you've seen on, on Wrenski State this year? It's all my notes. That's it. All right, man. Well,

we'll, we're doing these about once a month now. So we'll see in February. We'll have some time, especially with the Four Nations and the NHL schedule slowing down a little bit to revisit it. I think, honestly, with the way he's playing, maybe we keep this trend of defensemen going in 2025, and we might have to do Lane Hudson next because I feel like what he's been doing. That would be a good thing. It's a lot of similar concepts, but he's been playing at such a high level and that Canadian team as well

has really joined the blue jackets in this wildcard race kind of out of nowhere. And so maybe we'll give them some shine. You got any stuff that you want to plug or you want to direct the listeners to in terms of checking out? First of all, that's top pairing Lane Hudson to you, first of all. I wrote about Joel Blumquist for the athletic this week. Obviously, the big news out of Pittsburgh's Tristan Jory era is over, and then the nightmares behind people up there for that.

I knew you had a certain glow and energy to you today. That's it. That's the flu, actually. My daughter got me sick, but I appreciate it. There might be the fever. I'm battling, but I appreciate it either way. But yeah, that's it. That's out now.

So looking forward to what he might be able to accomplish and kind of looking back at some of his HL tape. Awesome, man. Well, looking forward to that. I know that you spent a lot of time grinding Penguins goalie tape here recently. So whether it's the deliriousness off the flu or just being excited with the fresh start or just like getting to watch a lot of Werencki clips. This was a fun one.

If you're watching along with us on the YouTube channel, help us out by subscribing. And by smashing that thumbs up button, the more love we get on these. I think the more Jesse and I are going to be just grinding them out and putting together film clubs moving forward. pop into the PDOCAS Discord, which Jesse is in as well. You can tag him there and chat with him if you want directly. A lot of fun conversation going in there. That's going to be all for this week. We'll be back on Sunday with Trans for our usual Sunday special.

I hope everyone has a great weekend. And we'll be back. Thank you for listening to the HockeyPedocast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network.