The Hockey PDOcast - Marty Necas’ First 7 Games in Colorado, and How He’s Fit With MacKinnon and the Avs

Episode Date: February 7, 2025

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by AJ Haefele to talk about what we've seen from Marty Necas in his first 7 games with the Avalanche, how he's fit playing alongside Nathan MacKinnon, and how the early returns have been even more fun than we could've possibly imagined. 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.

It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the Hockey PEDEOCast. My name is Dimitri Filippovich. And joining me for today's show, the final show of the week here in the PEDAOCast is my good buddy, AJ. Hey, Jay, what's going on in? What's up, my man? This has been love when the timing works out on one of these. So I'm excited.

It really does. The plan today is we're going to go deep on Martin H. the first seven games of him in an avalanche uniform, break down everything we're seeing. In the aftermath of that big trade, the blockbuster between the hurricanes and the abs, we did a big show on our Sunday special, breaking it all down from every angle.

And we spent, I think, a disproportionate amount of the time talking about ranting ins fit on the hurricanes and why the hurricanes did it. And I think that was fair. It makes sense. It's so rare for a player of that status to get moved like that in season. But I also did so because I knew in the back of my mind

that you and I would get together once we had a handful of games to break down and talk our way through everything we're seeing from NACUS on this team. We've got those seven games now and as you said, the timing is just perfect. I love when the subject matter cooperates. I've had plenty of occasions where I plan a show with a guest

and the player gets hurt the night before or has a miserable game and you have to come on here and still talk positively as if it didn't happen. But in this case, we're coming fresh off this Thursday night performance in Calgary where NACIS and the Aves top five-man group really just, eviscerated the flames. They create all four goals. Nature scores two of them. They were an absolute buzzsaw, kind of a continuation or a full extension of what we've seen for the majority of these

seven games. But you and I today are going to break it all down. Went through the tape. What we're seeing from nature's, what we're seeing from the abs, how he's fit, playing with McKinnon, the results they're getting, all that stuff. What's stuck out to you as a starting point here for us in terms of watching them, maybe something that surprised you or something where you expected it, but then you're still blown away, just seeing it in action. I mean, if you know anything about Martin Aches at all, it's speed, right? It starts with the speed. And coming to Colorado, it's so easy to say, oh, you know, he's going to fit in really well.

He's going to be fast. He's going to be able to get up and down the ice and do the things that the avalanche like to do. but it's the way that it is fit next to Nathan McKinnon, and it's probably just a result of a decade of watching McKinnon alongside Gabe Landisg and Miko Ranton predominantly. He's never had a guy this fast before on his wing, and to see it is it's almost shocking to see a guy that's keeping up with him and the way that it is stressing defenses out.

But the comment. of natures's speed and hook handling ability particularly through the neutral zone and going into the offensive zone with control of the puck. It has changed to how teams have to try to defend

because I think everybody had gotten comfortable. All these teams had gotten comfortable defending the avalanche top line in its previous forms of, okay, we're going to try to force McKen. out wide, he's going to pull up and we're going to try to sort out our transition defense because he's going to try and make a play.

And now with both NACIS and McKinnon able to do that, it is that speed element of it has been, it looks like it is refreshed Nathan McKinnon. Yeah. A lot. But it definitely, I think that's been the thing that has taken me by surprise the most is what I thought were redundant skills has just turned into world domination skills instead. Like it's the way that the way that nature's speed is playing alongside Nathan McKinnon has caught me off guard in a way I just did not expect.

I think that's very fair. Last time you and I spoke, we had Megan Angley join us and we were speaking at the end of that show about how McKinnon was in the midst of this sort of bizarre season individually. where he was still leading the league in points. He was on pace for about 130 points. He's scoring over and assist a game. And so it's tough to kind of quibble with it because it's a remarkable season

that pretty much any player in the league would love to be having. Yet by his standards, the way it was playing out was just strange because if you were watching on a nightly basis, he wasn't necessarily going through the motions because he's such a max effort guy at all times with his skating stride and his intensity and all that stuff.

But especially in the power play, there was a little bit of staleness, I think, or predictability where it seemed like he was so hyper-fixated on passing cross-seam to set up those rantant and one-timers and passing out of potential shooting opportunities that he previously would have just taken and hammered himself. And now all of a sudden you got this injection of pure adrenaline with Natchez where he's a running mate who can keep up with him. He's also a guy who is fast enough. dominant enough on puck that McKinnon can actually justify playing off puck a little bit really

for the first time other than when Kail McCar does his solo act. And so now all of a sudden, he's got more space to operate. He's getting lost in traffic a little bit because once you don't have the puck, everyone just is fixated on who does have the puck. And so he's allowed to kind of skate a little bit unattended and all of a sudden just has all of this newfound ice to work with. And so watching him on the fly kind of adjust and fill this new role has been really interesting. It certainly necessarily be a surprise. I knew there would be an adjustment period and especially in the first game or so. You could kind of see that the overlap and skill sets between the two was going to take some work

in terms of preferences of where you want the puck, the shooting pocket, kind of sometimes occupying each other's space, especially on the power play. But pretty much from the second game on in New York against the Rangers, they've sort of figured it out. And it feels like there's this new level of fun. it's kind of happening in these games. And I think that's incredibly important thing because when you compare it to what we're seeing from Ranton and the hurricanes

right now, and we'll talk more about that later on in today's show, obviously when the puck's not going in, everyone's going to be kind of miserable and things are going to look worse than they might actually be. But in this case, it would have been pretty easy, I think, for McKinnon and for the Aves and for Aves fans watching

these games to have this little bit of a sort of emotional letdown here, right? Where you trade a guy who has been around for so long has been such a staple, such an integral parts of an organization, such a running mate for McKinnon. And I think it's natural to kind of be disappointed by that and be like, wow, I don't know, the shock of it had actually happening when it was a possibility, but it actually happening is something we have to reconcile with and it's going to take some time. And there hasn't really been any of that because I think just immediately nature has come in and just totally change

dynamic. And I think that's an incredibly important kind of piece of this because I think it could have gone south if he wasn't this. exact type of player. Yeah, I mean, how often do you see a legendary player, a player who's accomplished what Ranton and accomplished in an avs uniform leave? And the guy that he gets traded for comes in and struggles because he's trying to fill those shoes. He's trying to step into that role and he's being held to that standard.

And he's being compared directly to this, you know, to this All-Star that just left that he got traded for and he's the main piece. And the pressure of it is so high. I mean, that was one of the things that we all talk to me. He's going to have to handle this pressure because in Carolina, he could just be one of those guys. But in Colorado, he was going to have to be the running mate next to Nathan McKinnon. That's a very different level of expectation. And it hasn't remotely bothered him.

And through seven games, you're like, oh, my gosh, they should have done this a year ago. What is this? This is insanity. The level of dominance has been shocking. And it's not even overstated. You know, I think sometimes we can get a little too excited about stuff, especially when we're talking about small samples, which, of course, they've played seven games together.

We're inevitably doing that, right? But the dominance here, it's a shocking amount of dominance. And so I do think that with niches, I just, it almost breaks my brain. Like I will DM you in the middle of an avalanche game and just say, oh my God, or LOL. And I know you'll know what I'm talking about because it's just such a different level. And the, the, he's just been a bolt of lightning and energy into that locker room and into how they're playing the game as a team. Because it's, it's been a trickle down effect, that top line, the way that they're skating, the way that they're retrieving pucks, the way that they're attacking teams, it is carried down to the other lines. The other lines aren't scoring goals, but the way that they're playing as a group has been so different over these seven games. It has. So you talk about the sample size. We've got about 112 minutes, five-on-five action with NACIS and McKinnon on the ice.

Shots on goal are 87 to 45 for the abs, high danger chances are 38 to 19 with a nice 69% expected goal share. Now, 59 of those 112 minutes have been with Lekinen as the third member of that. line and he really is in so many ways the perfect player to play off puck with two puck dominant options like this. The goals are four nothing in that time. They're generating north of 50 shots on goal per hour and north of six expected goals four per hour, both of which are tops in the league for any line that's played 50 minutes so far together. And obviously they just barely cross that threshold. But there's this feeling of kind of inevitability where they just start teeing off with chances and like endless waves of offense and it must be terrifying for the other team even the game

they got shut out the other night of Vancouver there was that 90 second shift or whatever where keel mccara had like two or three absolute great a chance is i think he hit the post that one got a remarkable saves by thatcher demko but it felt like a near miracle that the canucks came out of that without giving up a goal and then they wound up kind of closing it down and winning that game but throughout this all it's just felt like every time they're out there even if they have a shift where not that much happens

it feels like you're bordering on the precipice of something special happening right and more times than not we've seen them sort of build on that as the course of these games go along and it must be just be an incredibly difficult thing especially with their usage and we can talk more about the ice time and how much NACIS is being used compared to how much he was

in Carolina but having to defend against that for somewhere between 22 to 25 minutes out of the 60, seems like an almost impossible feat for most teams on any given night. I know that we talk a lot about these percentages, but just the raw scoring chances in their 111 minutes together. It's 1157, but 90 to 36. Are you kidding me?

Like, these are two. bad defensive players. And it doesn't matter because they're rarely playing defense. They have the puck. They dominate, man. It has been really fun to watch. I will also

just getting back to part of this that has really caught me off guard. On paper, it was curious how it was going to work because as you mentioned, two puck dominant players. One of the great things about why Miko Ranton worked so well next to Nathan McKinnon,

is that he could touch a puck five times in a game and walk out with three points. Because his shooting ability was so special and he could just make it work next to a guy that he just didn't need to play with the puck on a stick all the time. Natchez is different in that he needs to touch the puck. He needs to feel it. He needs to play with it a lot because his off puck play has always been kind of iffy. But next to McKinnon, I didn't know how this was going to go. There's only one puck on the ice.

somehow, these guys have made it work because they have it all game. So both of them get to play with it plenty. There's no issues with it. Neither one of them feels like they're not involved in it because the other team just doesn't touch it. And the Boston game where they didn't produce a goal and that Vancouver shutout that you referenced earlier, that game, it almost felt like a crime against the, the hockey humanity that they didn't produce a goal with some of the quality chances that they were able to conjure out of thin air. It was a spectacular, especially in the first period,

a spectacular start to the game for them. And the, just the numbers that have piled up between these two, it really is like, it's so hard to stay grounded and on earth about this and believe that this level of dominance won't continue. It never does. It doesn't continue with anybody, right? Like these numbers are, they're too good. They're going to go through a downstretch here. It's just, it's inevitable.

But until we see what that looks like, until, you know, until we see how they handle the adversity together, this is all we have to work with right now. These seven games of these two being special together. In a combination, you throw Arturie Lekinen in there, And it's like, I don't care. Edmonton, Vegas, Dallas, Winnipeg, whatever.

I don't care what line it is. They're going to feel very comfortable walking into any playoff series with that first line. Yeah, Natchez has been averaging, he's played 2256 per game in these seven in Carolina. That peaked for a full season in 22, 23 when he played 1824. his previous single game career high was 2343 that he played that year. He's already logged 2415, 2442, 2451, and 2507 in his debut in four out of the seven games he's played. I'm fascinated by this, you know, because once this trade happened, we all felt like the fit from a speed perspective would make sense. And he'd be the type of player who would thrive in the altitude, in that downhill momentum, the way is,

especially McKinnon wants to play. I was curious to see how the second puck transporter would work because a lot of what McKinnon does that's so unique and makes him such a special player is just being able to take the puck from point A to point B and regardless of what obstacles are in front of him and make it happen, he's obviously an immensely skilled player

with his passing ability and his shot and all that other stuff that he doesn't necessarily need to be limited to that. But that's kind of what separates him from pretty much everyone other than Conner, David in this sport. Natchez has almost sped him up in a way and I've been fascinated seeing how McKinnon has deferred at times to allowing him to build up that kind of full head of speed through the neutral zone and carry the puck in and then allow McKinnon I think almost in a way to conserve a bit of his energy so that once they get into the offensive zone he can then

spend the rest of that shift and sometimes these shifts have been like a minute and a half of the sustained zone pressure but he can spend the entirety of that then complete the doing his tank just doing all of his crazy twitchy just moving in a million miles per hour stuff in zone and I feel like that's also made them so much more dangerous right it's not only the predictability but I feel like it's created this whole new set of problems for opposing defenses where all of a sudden now kind of the geometry of the ice is changing a little bit because McKinnon used to be kind of in his few spots that he prefers on the ice and then now all of a sudden you're watching these plays and he's just moving around

in whole new areas and that's allowing them I think to kind of attack through different venues and maybe they had access to previously a great example of what you're talking about the goal that they score against the islanders where

Nettches walks in through the neutral zone comes into the zone gets about halfway into the zone and curls up and all of the islanders defenders start to move towards him while this is happening Nathan McKinnon

is standing at the blue line he's literally standing at the blue line along the wall not doing anything he's just waiting and as the Islander's

defense is trying to sort out what to do with him what to do with lecken in front of the net what to do with Devon Taves and Keil McCarr

out there Nathan McKinnon's just standing there and then as the defense starts to move away from the net because that's when that just turns

and curls pulls the puck away and goes towards the blue line, that's where the defense goes. They go with him. And then McKinnon just walks into the space that they all vacate. Nett just hits him, and it turns into Artori Lekanin scoring after he falls down. And that, to me, I watched that goal and I was like,

Nathan McGinnon has never had this luxury in his career. Even with the players that he's gotten to play with, he's never been able to do it like that, where he's not the focal point when they enter the zone, where the defense is not saying, we got to get that guy. We're focusing on him because he's always been the zone entry monster. With Natchez, now being able to do that,

it has created those problems for the defenses, and it has allowed him to conserve some of that energy. And you get to see a little bit of that creativity and that freedom for McKinnon to do other things. It's also why Colorado's power play has gotten a little bit better because, again, the bad habits baked in of McKinnon forcing passes across the zone across the seam to rant in it. It's gone. And we see Netsches and McKinnon stand like three or four feet apart. Yep.

On that half wall on the same side. And they like they will they will just switch constantly until they're able to create something. that they want and it worked out last night. They did exactly that. McKinnon got an opportunity on a one-timer and Nettches just snuck in front of the net, put the stick down. It was one of those shot passes that goes off of Nettches a stick and for a goal. Like their creativity and their freedom to play like free flowing hockey,

it's so different than what it was. So much of the pressure has come off of McKinnon. to constantly be on the puck and to constantly be at the epicenter of all of this. He's no longer the center of the universe. He's the biggest planet in the universe, but he's not at the center of it anymore. And that, I think, has been the part of this that I did not expect. I did not expect for the offense to look a little more cohesive. Because at the end of Ranton's tenure in Colorado, it had gotten really stale.

they could make individual plays together that were spectacular. Of course they could. But it just did not feel like they were having fun anymore. And which is another thing that you had mentioned, these guys look like they're having a great time playing together. And both of them look like, oh my gosh, the presence of this other player is allowing me to do things I've never gotten to do in my career before. And at the moment, it's really serious.

special and at the moment seven teams have tried none of them have been able to come up with a with a good quality way to bracket them to keep them from creating really quality looks even boston when you know that just had been an av for 14 hours yeah and they still weren't able to keep them from creating really good looks and they had no idea what they were doing out there they were literally just, that was just some schoolyard nonsense. So I do think that they have given each other that freedom. And they definitely, the minutes part of this is something that I, for me, it's a great frustration because I think this is a Jared Bedner bad habit baked in for years of spamming

Nathan McKinnon. He just fixes my problem. I know I'm going to get a good shift. I know it's going to be dangerous. But they get to the postseason and these guys get worn down. second round and that effectiveness goes away he can't help himself and with this level of success he's really not going to be able to help himself yeah yeah in preparation for today's show i went through all of natures and shifts so far in those seven games i put together a mixtape on

the pdo cast youtube channel it's 11 minutes of just pure cinema all gas no breaks the entire time and in watching it something you'll really notice as a tendency that i think works so well within in the system. It's not just the puck carrying and the zone entries and the rush attack and all that, but it's the specific way in which NACIS initiates a lot of his offense off of those entries where he stops up. Like sometimes he'll bring it in and he'll curl all the way around the net, but then kind of accomplish the same thing just in a more roundabout way. But it's the quick stop-ups and kind of cutbacks and curl that you were mentioning where he'll work his way back up to the blue line. He'll attract a lot of attention, especially within

this system where a lot of these shifts are with the kale-maccar devon taves pair, the weak side defender in this system has the green light always to fill that lane, jump down to the circle and make himself available as a shot threat. And especially when it's Kail McCar, that is an incredibly high-danger opportunity that you should try to create every time you can. And we've already seen countless examples so far in just these seven games where Nages will bring the puck in, do that little curl, and then all of a sudden, cross seam to the weak side defender and get that shot off as kind of like a delayed form of rush offense. And I find that to be such a satisfying play. And it's so fun to watch. And all these

pieces work so well together. And it's just really cool seeing how it's not just the speed, but then the intricacies and details within that in terms of his East West passing. And what he's looking to do that was probably, we spent years talking about how it was probably stifled and limited to some extent in terms of the ceiling of it in Carolina because that's not really the way they play. They started doing so more so in the second half of last year after acquiring Gensel

and then this year as well, and we saw Natchez's points rise accordingly. But now it feels like this is the kind of the final level or the fully realized version, I guess, of what we wanted to see from them all along for all these years. Yeah, I mean, this is Marty Natchez

Unleashed. He got to I mean, can you think of a better team for him to go to that was going to be able to utilize what he does well and put him with a center that he's going to be able to his game is going to immediately fall in sync with like it's just it it's gone so well um with him that it it just it looks like you remember at the end of aladdin when the genie gets freed and he takes the takes the braces off and he's so excited excited and he's looking around. He's like, oh, my gosh, I'm free. That's exactly what Marty Naceous looks like right now in Colorado. He looks like he just got out of, you know,

however many years of being stuck in the lamp. He's free now to go and do, to be who he is, to play the game the way that he wants to play because he's on a team that encourages it. And he's on a team that has the kind of talent around, like, no effect, Carolina's great. But there's not a kale McCar there. There's not a kale McCar really anywhere outside of Vancouver. So the talent that he's going to be on the ice with and that he has been on the ice with for most of his Colorado tenure, it just, it, it turbocharges his process and all of the things that he is doing well. And right now it just feels like this is the best case scenario, obviously. Like we're talking about this.

Oh, my gosh, is all the hyperbole, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's great. But there's, I think there is the finishing can be better. But right now it's, it's really hard to complain about what these guys have been able to create together. Yeah. He was made in a lab specifically for this environment. I feel like right now, if you're making a short list of the most exciting. plays in hockey in terms of the ones where you see it happening and as it's materializing you're like

moving towards the edge of your seat just waiting to see what's going to happen it feels like it's him doing that thing where he kind of like circles either in his own zone or in the neutral zone to build up speed and then gets a short little pass from a defender and then starts to carry it up the ice because you're just like I can't wait to see whether he's going to weave through the entire defense what's going to happen here the anticipation of it is so exciting I will say and and watching all these shifts as well. Devon Taves, and we spoke about this last time you're on, how he was banged up early,

he wasn't really playing up to his level. He played the 33 minutes the other night in Vancouver. He is popping off on so many of these because in vintage Devon Taves fashion, he's cutting off a lot of these plays where he's stepping up either in the neutral zone or at the blue line, and he's causing changes of possession or disruptions that are then feeding into these quick counterattack transition opportunities

for Natchez. And so it's awesome, of course, that he gets to play with McKinnon and McCar. But I feel like the fifth guy in that five-man unit, Devon Taves, that isn't obviously the flashiest of the bunch, is facilitating so many of these because quick little changes in possession all of a sudden create all these attacking opportunities for Natchez. And I feel like a high percentage of a lot of the clips you're going to see are just Taves making a quick little play where he knocks the puck away. And then all of a sudden, Natchez and McKinner off. And so I wanted to shout him out because obviously you and I are incredibly high on him and have been historically. But I feel like watching him play at this level and how he fits into what they're accomplishing with this five-man unit is such an important piece of the puzzle.

It's huge. Just the way that they go and go and look at the two-on-one that they create in Vancouver where Nitchis hits the post in the first period where their speed, you make. One mistake, you fall asleep for one half second against these two guys together. And the next thing you know, they are flying down the ice creating problems for you. You're going to have to, the other team's puck management is going to have to be elite. I don't know that other teams are going to be able to, or are going to want to carry pucks in against them because Kail McCar and Devon Taves are so good with their sticks. and at disrupting plays and changing possession, like you're talking about,

these neutral zone reloads that they've got going on. They need to be getting to center ice, they need to be dumping it in, and making Colorado's defenders turn their back to the rest of the ice and go chase it. Because if you give them any kind of a counterattack opportunity, they're going to use it, and they're very dangerous with it.

Yeah, there's a certain fear factor that not only affects you defensively, but I think it's going to bleed into what other teams are doing offensively, and that's obviously going to help the abs in sort of trickle down ways as well. AJ, let's take our break here. And then when we come back, we'll finish up. And I've got a few more notes on this. And we're going to get to that. You're listening to the Hockey Ocast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network.

We're back here in the Havley with AJ Havelie. We're talking about Martin H's on the abs, what we've seen so far. I think you hit on this while we were speaking before we went to break. But I just wanted to bring it up again and kind of put a bowl. on this conversation, the power play, where at the time of the trade, they were 19th in goals per hour at about 7.5 per. We've only seen 22 minutes so far with the man advantage of this five-man unit of McCar, McKinnon, Natchez, Likinen, and Druin, but they've already created four

goals. And I think most importantly, looked much more unpredictable and dangerous. And I was worried about the hand-edness overlap, right? Because on the one hand, I didn't like how much they were spamming that cross-ice one time at Arantanin, but there was still undoubtedly a very efficient way to try to create a goal. With the two right shots in H.S. and McKinnon, I was wondering how that would work. They sort of, as you talked about,

been on the same side a lot, alternating and kind of interchanging, trying to stretch the defense with the goal line and the flanker. We've even seen, I think, importantly for McKinnon, kind of like how McDavid will do on the Oilers power play or even how McKinnon does at 5-1-5, not necessarily being beholden

to just kind of standing at that left circle when they get set up, but being able to kind of, with nature standing there, freelance a little bit, by skating around, trying to exploit opportunities, maybe just cause chaos or miscommunication

with the opposing P.K. We've seen that as well. And so I think unpredictability is the word we keep coming back to, but it does feel like there's a certain element of that now where there's just different ways they can create their looks. They're not necessarily.

necessarily just having to go from point A to point B the way they were previously. And so I think that's been a really fun piece of this so far as well in terms of the way these two guys are interacting when they're on the ice together. Oh, and the nature's one-timer, I also think is a big part of this because they have immediately leaned into. He likes to do it. It's a really big weapon for him. And it's not a great weapon for McKinnon.

It never has been. He's worked on it a lot over the years. and it's gotten better. But you can see that he's still not super comfortable with it. It's just never been like a big part of his game. And you can see that they are very comfortable getting to that with Natchez, that they want to utilize that as a weapon. McCar's got a pretty good one time or two.

So the Aves trying to kick it old school and bring this thing back, I guess. But with McKinnon, it has. has freed him up to kind of wander around the zone and do some other things. So the power play definitely looks liberated from its previous iterations where that was extremely stale. That thing was bad. The one thing I don't like, and this isn't Marty Nature's fault. This is an altitude broadcast thing. But I've voiced my displeasure with the.

state of the broadcast and many times this season and it will continue to do so, but I think my least favorite part of it is these power plays where they use that drone cam that immediately gives me vertigo and makes me feel nauseous. I don't know why they keep doing it. I guess there's people that might like it because it provides a bit of a different vantage point, but I find that at the moment in game where it's most likely that their team's going to score a goal, it also makes for the roughest viewing experience. So I just as a personal pet, I wanted to point that out as we're talking about this powerplay where in watching these games all of a sudden you're like oh my god I can't even see what's going on right now because this cameras just moving around at this aerial view and so

please for the love of God just eliminate that from the broadcasts to be honest with you I'm a dissenting uh opinion on from you on this one oh no a j I will take sky camp just because it means the puck is on screen at all times which is altitude's truly biggest challenge They are awful at keeping the puck on the screen. So I will take Skycamp just because I can see everything. It's just always at this weird angle, though. I'm like, oh, God, it's like I'm having such a tough time, like, re-centering myself. And by the time I do so, the puck's moving so fast. And I just find it, it's so much more difficult to track it.

I understand the complaints. It's just, I think things are so much worse with their broadcast most of the time that I'm like, hey, look, I'll take this. that's fair you got any other notes on on hs or this team i kind of wanted to focus our conversation around that specific part of it i feel like we could probably do and we talked about this the last time you and i spoke about middle stat struggles and the second line and some of the lingering concerns for this team there is a bit of an element i know you mentioned how just from a sort of playing style and energy perspective there's been an infusion and a trickle-down effect on on the rest of the team certainly there is still an element to me of the meme with like the Bugatti park beside the mobile home though

where it's like when that five-man unit is out there it's the most intoxicating beautiful thing in hockey right now and then the rest of the time you can probably go and grab yourself a drink or go to the washroom if you need to because you won't miss that much i think as long as they're not bleeding stuff themselves that's fine because you know that that five-man group is going to create more than enough offense. But I just still find that especially as you talk about, all right, if they keep playing well and they leap-prog Minnesota for third, setting up a round two or around one rematch against the Dallas stars and their depth, it's the elephant in the room. And so as fun as this is in terms of like the impact or how meaningful it will be in terms of the Stanley Cup picture,

I think that's maybe a different discussion. I don't know if you want to get into that too much today, but I do feel like just watching these games, especially in comparison to how fun and now it's, you know, if it's going to be 25 out of the 60 minutes, it's a smaller piece of the pie than it probably is for most other teams and their top line versus the other three lines. But still, it does feel like by comparison,

it's pretty drastic. Yeah, I think, look, it's hard to believe Colorado has made four trades already this season. And they have at least two more that they need to make. if they're going to be somebody, a team that I think is serious, a serious contender to get to at least a conference final. Their path is tough. And I'm just not, at the moment, man, you're right. They're just, they're not good enough.

Jack Drury has done wonders to stabilize a third line for them. But the YOL Kivirontah and Parker Kelly are not meaningful contributors. on a fourth line of a deep playoff team. Maybe one of them playing on the wing, but for all the things that they do well, they have no puck skill, and their try-hard does not manifest in a way. Like, yeah, they, you know,

it's more like a good effort, though, champ. Not like, man, I really love that. You know, they're not throwing the body as much. They're not, they don't make it harder for opponents to play. They just shut it down and play. and play really low event hockey, which is fine. But having them be like as important a line as they are is a problem. Miles Wood is not good.

So that's a problem. Ross Colton, all the goal scoring fun that happened at the beginning of the season has long dried up. He has barely produced any kind of offense. So that's a huge problem. Jectory. as a line, Wood Drury and Colton have really helped kind of push the puck in the right direction. Things look a lot better with that line. You look at their possession numbers defensively.

They were horrible in their first game together. But they've gotten a lot better since then. And there's like some hope there. Wood is holding them back a little bit. But Ross Colton needs to do more. He has three assists in 39 games. for a guy that has played quite a bit this year. This isn't, oh, well, look who he's played with.

Look, you know, look at the time up. But he's averaged 1549 this season, and he has three assists in 39 games. That's insane. Those are Chris Kreider numbers. That's, yeah, exactly. Like, we're talking about a Sigh Young candidate here, and that's not good enough. Obviously, Casey Middlestack continues. I felt so bad.

Casey Middlestadt makes a really nice play last night to, to help create a Sam Malinsky goal that gets pulled off the board because Jonathan Druin is a foot offside. Like, I feel bad for the guy. It feels like he's snake bit in that way. That would have been seven points in his last 10 games for him, which is kind of like, hey, we're sneaking up on. I like that a lot more.

That's moving in the right direction. His game is moving in the right direction. But when it's bad for middle stat, holy Moses is it bad. Uso Parsonin is not a guy in a top six that scares any other contender. They're not worried about that. That's okay. Replacing him with Valenetucyan coming out of the Four Nations break is going to be a big thing. If he can move down and take the place of Miles Wood, that helps them.

Like that makes them a little bit better. There are some iterations, but really they need another. They don't score enough. Jonathan Durant is not, can't be like your primary line driver on your second line. KC. Middlestat and Jonathan Durant are more likely to pass the puck 18 times. between each other before ever shooting themselves. So you need somebody that's going to actually be a trigger man there. I know fans in Colorado love to talk about the fantasy of Marty Natchez as a 2C.

They should stop. He doesn't do that. It's going to go really poorly if that happens. And why would you want to break up what has been an unbelievably good top line? I know that there's balance and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But when you're talking about arguably the best line in the NHL, since it got put together. Just let it be.

Let it ride while it's still that, while it's still like that. The team, the team is just, the defensive depth is Josh Manson. Ugh, awful. Awful. And now hurt again. I know he's been battling injury pretty much since the season started.

Their third pairing has been really inconsistent and bad. It's just, the depth is just not very good. It feels more and more like we're creeping up on a lost season where this is sort of a transition year. They could get, into summer. They can spend Landisog's money because he's going to be done and they won't have this ranting in thing looming over them anymore and they'll know what the cap is and they'll be able

to spend money a little more comfortably than they were able to last summer. It feels a lot more like this is a dangerous team in the summer and next year than it is right now. If I'm, look, if I'm, if I'm Dallas, I'm not losing any sleep over the avalanche right now. This version of the avalanche? No. I'm not scared. Yeah, I think you're a little bit worried just because of what we said, the idea of having to play 27 minutes on any given night against that five-man group and then just creating four goals the way they did on Thursday night and that being enough for the abs to win. So that's always in the back of your mind. But I'm with you. And I think that was obviously part of the logic here as well in terms of extending things for at least another year, right?

When they just sign next season, having a bit more flexibility financially, obviously the other. assets and jury and the two picks that you got and so that was certainly part of the calculus for the abs do you want to quickly we got another handful of minutes here do you want to end talking a little bit about what we've seen from ranted and carolina so far um especially in terms of like the contrast to what we've seen from natures obviously an even smaller sample i believe he's played six games for them so far the seven that we've seen from natures has just the one goal and the one assist. Predictably seeing a lot of, you know, eye emojis and victory lapping early on, as you typically

do. I'm not too concerned because he's so skilled, as you mentioned, in limited opportunities, there's going to be goals. And he's gotten those opportunities so far. He's set the post a couple times. He's had his looks. He's set up a bunch of others. It just hasn't gone his way.

It's very on-brand that a player would come to the hurricanes and score. one goal in their first 40 shots. The way he has so far, it's going to come for him eventually, but I do feel like especially in terms of painting this picture of what's happened for Nages in Colorado and then the contrast of it, it is at least an interesting storyline. Yeah.

It's, I mean, you look at he has 21 shots on goal. He's hit multiple posts. Like the fact that he has one goal right now, like, hey, he's just kind of going through it right now. The guy is a 16% career shooter shooting 4.8% right now as a hurricane

like Nico Rantanin is a lot of things but he's going to score goals for you. I do think that Carolina has been introduced to kind of the howdy man baby version of Rantanin

where you know he gets a little he gets a little pouty and he's kind of a bad body language guy and he can kind of, I don't know, as younger folks might say, he's got that negative aura when he is not going right. It can get a little, it can get a little pouty with him. And he usually bursts out of it in a big way.

You'll see a three-goal game. You know, he'll have a five-point night, something like that. Like, it's always been that way. But without Nathan McKinnon, it is, this is the fascinating part of it, is how does he bust out of this without Nathan McKinnon driving it for him? How does he make it happen for himself? How does he make it happen for the hurricanes? How does he make it happen when he's playing three minutes less per game?

And that's the part of it that I am. I'm curious to see how he responds to it, but I'm not worried about it. He'll be fine. The guy is supremely talented. None of this has changed that reality. obviously people on the internet want to jump to as quick a conclusion as they can everybody in Colorado wants to take that victory lap oh it's a CMA masterclass oh okay like we feel fine in Colorado with how things are going with netches and drury that's and great great that's wonderful

but everybody in Carolina should feel fine too it's going to come for this guy and I would play him a little bit more just because you know it's his comfort zone but he's a he's he's a special talent and he's come so close already that i think he'll be just fine yeah and as you have you noted even this year in colorado how much of his production was concentrated into a couple of games where he just went off and had hatrix and every goal score is streaky but i think that's an important thing to keep in mind where you know you can go through that stat of two points and six games or whatever but all it takes is one one of those types of games and all of sudden he's back on track to what you'd expect and the dynamic feels different. I will say

they had that game last week against the Kings at home and a lot of the team was sick and they were dealing with the flu passing through a team and all that and so they were at less than 100 percent. But I found it amusing that he was on the ice. He played 21 minutes. Shots on goal were 18 to 1 for the hurricanes in that time and they got outscored 1-0. The one shot against was a goal against and they did not score on any of those 18 shots. They, had and I was like man this is so on brand and the fact that it's happening right away is is tragic but he will shake it I will you know I will say man yep the playing playing with Alexander Georgiev in net earlier this year prepared him for those kinds of nights

well I was watching the game against the wild on Thursday night and as you were mentioning like the body language doctor and he was watching and I was like he looks miserable right now. But A, it's understandable considering the fact that they're not scoring at all and he's been very unfortunate and also be even at his best when he's thriving. It's still not the best in terms of body language. So I'm not going to evaluate him on that. But yeah, it's been an interesting start so far for Miko Ranch on the Hurricanes. All right, AJ, we got to get out here. I'll let you plug some stuff on the way out. Let the listeners know where they can check you on and what you've been working on lately. Yeah, speaking of Miko Ranton. I wrote a big feature on some of the inside stuff on how the Miko Ranton and trade came to be. And you can get that, if you're interested in that, it's over at the DNVR.com.

We made that one free. So if you haven't checked it out, feel free to do that. You can follow me on Twitter at Return of AJ. Mostly I make jokes and whine about officiating like everybody else is on hockey Twitter. So, you know, that's really it. D&VR Avalanche, where I do the serious stuff,

if you're interested in any of that. All right, buddy. We'll keep up the great work. It was awesome to check in with you and do this show. We're going to have you on again soon, I'm sure. Thank you, everyone for listening to us. That's all for this week. We'll be back Sunday with another edition of the Sunday special with our pal Thomas

strands. Hope everyone has a great weekend. And thank you for listening to the Hocopiodeo cast streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network.