The Hockey PDOcast - Miro the Hero

Episode Date: May 10, 2023

David Castillo joins Dimitri to break down the first four games of the Stars vs. Kraken series. They discuss Miro Heiskanen's huge performance in Game 4 after returning from injury, how Dallas can better optimize their lineup, and what Seattle does offensively to keep giving opponents trouble.This podcast is produced by Dominic Sramaty. 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. 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.

since 2015. It's the Hockey PDOCast with your host, Dmitri Filippoven. Welcome to the Hockey PEOCast. My name is Dmitra Filippovich and joining me as my good buddy David Castillo. David, what's going on, man? Nothing much. I'm just super honored. It feels like getting an accidental invitation to the Oscars. Oh, don't be silly. And sort of, you've been a big inspiration. Like, hopefully it doesn't sound like Grobblin. I think it's... Yeah, David, you're already on the show. usually people do this to get their foot in the door to actually come on the show. You've already gone your invite. You're already here. We're set. Well, I'm pumped. Thank you. It's awesome. I feel great.

You're making your Pediocast debut. I've referenced your written work at D Magazine various times this season generally with my conversations with our mutual pal, Sean Shapiro. And so I figure, you know what? May as well just go straight to the source at this point and just talk to you directly as opposed to just kind of referencing your work and passing. I've also been micro-dosing listeners, I feel like, with Dallas Stars content throughout this postseason. Like I've been sprinkling it in into almost every show, I feel like here or there,

but I haven't really done a full deep dive into it. And I feel like now is a perfect opportunity with the series tied to going back to Dallas. It's been kind of a fun back and forth that's been a good encapsulation of all the good and bad stuff of round two postseason hockey. in general this year. And so now that it's kind of narrowed down to this best of three, I figured, let's get you on, let's fully and properly deep dive at this series. And so I don't know,

what do you think is the most sort of interesting component of it so far you've seen, whether it's most recently from game four or whether it's kind of the theme of this series as a whole? I'm still sort of taken aback by you kind of almost like sort of underhandedly comparing yourself to kind of the Timothy Leary of hockey podcasters. But, kind of getting back to this whole concept of microdocin, right? Anyway, I didn't need to explain that reference, but in terms of the difference, like I sort of, to me, the thing that I always kind of go back to is this sort of, now I don't know if I'm getting ahead of myself, but you kind of mentioned on Twitter to me

sort of Dallas's kind of style and how they've scored and how there's this kind of oddly even distribution of like goals that are scored and off the rush, but also off the cycle. And I think that's what makes the stars interesting because I think they're kind of a case study and sort of designed versus operational efficiency. DeBoer wants them to attack off the rush to take advantage of that seven second window where most goals are scored. And you see that were last year. His vaguest squad that even depleted was eighth and shots generated off the rush and

seventh and shots generated off the forecheck. But he doesn't have the blue line beyond mirror to initiate that kind of attack. So they kind of relies on picking up on whatever rush opportunities or opponent. give them and then trying to kind of keep the play alive in the opponent's zone. And the kind of numbers bear that out. Like in the regular season, Dallas was 16th and shots off the rush and 11th in shots off the cycle slash four checks. So not like super amazing.

But I think it explains why they were also kind of an average shooting team. And so I think these swings are kind of encapsulations of Dallas kind of being really like an offensively buoyant team. But they'll sort of explode here and there because they have like an. amazing top line and some depth that I think is starting to kind of come together finally. Yeah, certainly a lot of the moves they made of the deadline have really paid dividends already in this postseason. And yeah, it's interesting because maybe I'm just, you know, just viewing it through the lens of what we sat through and watched with this team

last year and a year's past under Rick bonus. And so maybe like it's kind of everything after that has been just very encouraging. But part of what I like about this team and why I've been high on their outlook this postseason has been their ability to kind of beat you any way you want to play it, right? They can beat you in different ways. They're not necessarily while they do ideally want to attack you off the rush. They're also very comfortable working the puck down low than getting it back up to the point and kind of getting that layered approach of tip shots that we all know about. And so that's been reflected in this series as well where to kind of highlight what you were just referencing there, they scored 16 goals in these four games, seven of them off the rush,

seven via either a tip or rebound kind of right in front of the net and then one, you know, shot off a face off by Anya Haq and Bine Garbage Time of Game 3 and then an empty netter the seal game four. And so it really, I think that captures very well kind of what this star's team wants to do offensively and how they've been able to execute so far in this series, despite there being some challenges along the way. And just to kind of add to that, I think there's also this really kind of unique sort of styles kind of make fights, sort of, kind of phenomenon at work where, like, systems-wise, it's also a lot of fun. And I think it also kind of explains why there's this kind of unique distribution of,

like, how the goals are scored, where Seattle kind of runs a little bit of like a passive, like defensive zone coverage. Jack Con calls it the box plus one. And I think it's sort of, it's allowed sort of, of Dallas's forecheck to almost kind of like sort of take over the series and a series that looked like was going to be taken over by Seattle's forecheck. Like game one was just Seattle just absolutely blitz in Dallas. And Dallas likes to attack behind the net. Now that without bonus, they're actually thinking about designs for offense. So they do attack behind the net. And I think

the biggest key to that is not even so much systems, but the addition of playmakers. Dallas is, I think, actually second in the playoffs right now in high-dangered chances, and they've outchanced Seattle 46 to 35 in their favor so far. And I think a lot of that's because, as mentioned, even though they don't get a whole lot of press, guys like Evgeny Dundonoff and Max Domey are sort of exactly that, which is, you know, for better, for worse, they are playmakers. They're not perfect, but they are exactly kind of what Dallas's depth needs. even if there's still some sort of disarray

and kind of how the lines have been formed. Yeah. Well, and I think Y. Johnson probably accounts for about a third of those high-danger chances at this point, despite only having the two goals or whatever. So I remain steadfast in my belief that those goals are coming. But, you know, when I open this conversation,

I kind of gave you the floor to tell me what you thought the most interesting thing was I was almost certain we were going to start off talking about Mero Haskin and the game before he had because maybe that's just the thing that's most fresh in my mind. But coming away from that, felt like sort of his return and his reminder to us all of kind of what kind of singular impact he can have on the game and on the Stars team was the story of Game 4 from from my perspective.

Oh, you know, it's so funny you say that because so I don't know if you've been following Michael Blake McCurdy, but he's been, he's kind of been in a little bit of a sort of Twitter war with Stars fans because I did point out last night, despite the kind of narrative, analytically, he got caved in. And the sort of shot attempts were just lopsied in sales favor. And I haven't really looked at Miro's numbers, you know, because I just always assume that, well, he's, he's brilliant, which is, yes, that's the case of, you know, Mero is, I think one of, I think the most unique defenseman of the game because he's that first and foremost. He's a defenseman. And, you know, what he does offensively is really just

kind of house money. And maybe that's not like the best. way to think about him. But I do think that as great as he is, I do think Seattle's forecheck is kind of creating, you know, like more issues than maybe Starz fans would kind of like to admit in part because he's still in that kind of weird hyper space of being occasionally, I realize he's kind of switched back and forth the times, but, you know, still kind of forced on to his weak side, which is something that like for years I complained about. And they finally did it this season, and brought him back to his strong side. And then they went back right before the playoffs

and put him on his weak side next to Ryan Sutter. It seemed like Heisken and the Colin Miller pair were great. And then they just got abandoned, which is fine. If it helps them win, cool. But I think there is some debate there. I think we need to apply some necessary context to that performance, though, right? Because he... So, okay, let's set the scene.

In game three, second period, he takes a puck to the face. and upon his arrival to game four where I think it was clear that he was going to play and he probably could have come back into game three just knowing how insanely tough hockey players are for better or worse if that was a close game but they just sat him out for the rest of it but still you know pita bora comes out with these comments of like yeah he's having trouble eating and sleeping and it's understandable because you see him walking into the rink and he's looking like some combination of the Joker and like Sidney Crosby when he was pretending he didn't have bumps based on just how inflated one side of his face is.

And, you know, someone pointed this out to me. I'm sure it wasn't far of this because, you know, just traveling for these two games. I'm sure they just has like a set set wardrobe already. But he did come to this game wearing kind of like a a burgundy slash purple suit, which was really on brand for the Joker comparison. And I kind of selfishly, I hope that he was in on that bit, although I'm sure it was just a coincidence. But, you know, he shows up and he's wearing this massive fishbowl. And I think part of he's had a bit of few issues here and there with Seattle's Forge, which I don't really hold against him because they do that to pretty much everyone.

In this game, he could tell he made in game four a few mistakes just because he was wearing this like very uncomfortable fishbowl. It was clearly affecting his vision and his ability to kind of navigate with the whole. puck in his skates. And so there were a few mistakes there. I think the other thing is when you're playing the types of minutes that he is in this game, he plays 31 minutes and two seconds of a 60 minute regulation game, bumping him up to 30 minutes per game on average if you remove that one he got injured in. You kind of have to pace yourself a little bit and pick your spots as well, right? And it's kind of ironic because that was the whole Ryan Suter conversation throughout his

prime years in Minnesota, where it was like, I'm sure he could. be conceivably more effective if he was playing 22 to 24 minutes as opposed to 28 to 30. But because he's out there, he's sort of picking and choosing and maybe not going full blast on every single shift to maximize his kind of a efficiency and energy and keep some in the tank for later in the game. And so I think that is also what's happening here. I'm sure the Miro's numbers, his underlying metrics would look better if he was playing a bit less.

But for this team, he needs to be playing these types of. of minutes and he's sort of also uniquely equipped to do so. That's a great point. I feel like any Stars fans kind of listening, just like totally stripped away whatever credibility I had as a sort of Stars writer and just transferred it over to you. Here's another thing I will say though, David, to Micah's point about, you know, what the metrics looked like last night. I do believe that through the first two periods, Mero played about 21 minutes or so in

those two. and at that point in time, the Seattle Cracken had five shots on goal in those 21 minutes. And then I think the team in general started to sort of white-knuckle it with a big lead, just trying to see the game through to its conclusion,

which happens due to score effects. And so that was an extreme example of that last night towards the end of it. I think that sort of distorted it a little bit because I believe, especially through the first two periods when the game was close, like they weren't getting anything of,

substance with them on the ice. Yeah, and that's a fair point. And by the way, I should say that I was kind of speaking more towards, if you kind of look at sort of Murrow's kind of performance like in the Seattle series as a whole, I do think you're right. Like with those extreme minutes against so many like Seattle's just lines one through four, you know, he's probably not going to look, you know, analytically, he's probably not going to look the best.

But yes, in terms of just him as a player, just kind of broadly speaking, you know, kind of distance from this specific series, which I think is going to challenge Dallas in a unique way. Heiskenen is kind of like, to me, the only sort of defenseman that I think really can play that kind of perfect game night in, night out, where it's from one zone, from like the defensive zone to the neutral to the offensive zone, it's just capable of just kind of, you know, and that's not to say he's the best defenseman like in the league from shift to shift, just that he can make, like those perfect nights are something I think unique to high skin and I think unique in the league as a whole.

Well, and I think you could also see when I mentioned the impact he has and part of this is inflated by, you know, Jake Audra probably had a few shots there that he could have saved that maybe the score line looks better. But once Miro goes out in game three, I don't think it's an entirely coincidence that it just things just immediately go off the rails for Dallas, right? The Cracket and just proceed to score three goals in like four or five minutes. at stretch. And in the manner in which they do it specifically highlighted why he's so important and valuable in how he almost tricks us into thinking this stuff is easy or should be this way.

And then when you strip him out of that equation, the crack can have this like stretch pass that immediately leads to an easy rush goal for them. Then Ryan Suter is trying to do the heavy lifting getting the puck out of his zone, gets hemmed in. They score off of that as well. And it's all these things where if he's on the ice, those probably just aren't happening. And we kind of take that for granted a little bit because, you know, it just, when he's out there, it's not, it doesn't happen. So we have nothing to compare it to. But now finally, once you remove him from it, it's like, oh, yeah, maybe we had it. We had it good all along. And that was one of the things that really worried me about this team, you know, like, even when they were doing really well in the regular season,

like going to the playoffs, just kind of my thing was always, yeah, sure. Like, I think Jim Nill did a really good job of building John Klingberg in the aggregate with the additions of Mason Marchment, bringing a White Johnston, Niels Lundquist, which is his own story. I'm in a great mood. I'm not going to, so I'm going to stop talking about that right here. But anyways,

and sort of, but you know, sort of kind of backing up, like I just kind of felt like, man, without sort of John Klingberg, who yeah, yeah, has plenty of faults and flaws, but nonetheless is somebody that can initiate it's an attack. And that's something they just don't

have beyond Highskin. And I think it also kind of explains why there's like some kind of odd discrepancies in Dallas that, yes, I think they're an elite team. I think they're a contender. But, you know, they're not like sort of, they're not like just supernova when it comes to kind of some of their offensive numbers. And they that kind of just stems from the fact that for all of what DeBore wants to do with attacking off the rush, just doesn't have the blue line for it. And that's why Highsonan's presence just kind of further highlights that. Now, that is kind of changing with the presence of Thomas Harley, but perhaps that's its own episode.

No, no, we're going to do a full Thomas Harley episode right here. Don't you worry. I just want a final note on Miro. I think what he demonstrated in that game is just this, and it's a tough thing to, I guess, you could probably describe it more eloquently than I can with your words while I'm stumbling over this, but there's just like a calming influence to his game, right?

Where especially when Seattle, who likes to attack downhill with that speed with their forwards, he's able to sort of uniquely angle those puck carriers out of harm's way to low danger areas and just like neutralizes them and almost tricks them into thinking it was their choice to do so, right? It's not through sheer force. It's kind of this is just like gentle nudge and he gets them out of the way. And I just thought that, you know, in totality, regardless of what any metrics you could pick or choose, it was a defensive clinic particularly through those first two periods.

But let's segue into Thomas Harley now. And I think it's an important conversation to have because I know that, you know, we're well past the point of beating a dead horse regarding Ryan Souter's usage at this point, certainly. I just think, though, that if this team is serious about making a long run, about potentially competing for a Stanley Cup, and I do think they're capable of that because of the personnel they have, they need to optimize their lineup. And this is where the conversation of how they're using Souter,

or how many minutes he's playing, and then some of the other possible options really comes into focus. I think Thomas Harley is, when you look at the 22 games, like with Corey Schneider's, for example, like his data last season in just the 22 game sample size,

like his microstats were amazing, sort of being able to exit the zone, being able to, you know, transition through the neutral. And we're seeing that just kind of times too. Like my sort of comparison to Thomas Harley is like a trustworthy Jake Gardner because he has sort of that skate in

and that offensive ability, but he's actually quite responsible. And it's been incredible just kind of watching him sort of handle Seattle's Forecheck where other experienced defensemen who quote-un specialized in defensemen cannot handle it. And I think that also kind of speaks to how important offensive skill is in the defensive zone,

being able to handle the puck, being able to skate away from Dane and just kind of, and to be fair, credit to like Dallas's staff, even though I've been critical of Dallas's sort of development plan for kind of some of their prospects. And it was a topic of discussion with Lundquist, I do think they did a really good job of telling him, hey, like, we know what you're capable of. We want you to just focus on defense while you're in the HL and get comfortable, get accustomed, when you're ready, everything, you know, all the other, all those offensive instincts that make you special, those will come out now.

And that's exactly what you're seeing in these playoffs. You are. And what I like about him in particular, I mean, it was on, it's been on full display, I think, for, for this series. But especially in game four, it's his ability to play off of, you know, you're kind of highlighting the defensive part of things and in defensive zone. I think for me, the, the interesting part, it comes in the offensive zone because his skill set is very, I think, capable of meshing well. with what we talked about earlier where Dallas has this sort of two-pronged attack, right?

They want to attack you off the rush. What we saw in game for Thomas Harley is able to initiate it on one of the goals, where he brings it in, then kind of cuts back, waits for trailers, and then passes it to Hanley, who gets it over to Domi for a goal. And he's also able to jump into open space and when he gets the puck, be a threat with it and scored a goal on that one. But he's also, at various times, displayed a unique ability to, you know, know, get these sort of shot passes that Dallas likes to execute from the point where he's really

not trying to get it on net himself. He's just putting it into space for Dallas forward to, to utilize their own, own tip. He's done that a couple of times, Tyler Segan capitalized on it. So on and so forth, I think Pabelsky had one in his four-goal game as well off of Harley. And so his ability to contribute in that way is, is something that would make me want to feel, like, if I was coaching this team, I'd be like, hmm, I really want to see if I can get this guy out with our top players much more often than they have so far, right? The usage itself in terms of raw minutes is one thing. But I think in terms of who he's playing with, like so far this postseason, he's played with Radic Fax's line at five on five more than he's played with Rupa Hintz's line.

And so for me, that would be when I'm talking about optimizing combinations and matchups. We don't typically think of like forward lines with defense pairs. But in this case, if I have the top line out there, I kind of want to make sure that I have Thomas Harley out there with them. Yeah, which to me makes intuitive sense just because, well, I mean, you know, your top line is also, especially in Rupert Hintz's case, defensive is really responsible, right? So you have a line that can score, but that also can kind of pick up defensive slack if you make those mistakes. But, you know, I think this is still kind of, even though I think Pete DeBore is really, you know, to me, when I think about Dallas's improvement, I always kind of go back to kind of nothing in their improvement makes sense, except. in the light of Pete DeBoer's system, which is complete 180 from Rick Bonuses. And I can talk all day. Of course, I did talk all day, you know, in all year, you know, when he was coach, about my kind of problem.

But I do think that, you know, he's still a veteran NHL coach. And so there is still that sort of, well, he's a young player. And even though you've seen DeBoer, like with the minutes of Wyatt Johnson gets, for example, like leading forwards in even strength minutes, which is fantastic. I do still think like with defensemen a little bit more careful. He's a little bit more conservative and there's that kind of old school coach instinct that kind of takes over where you know what? I'm still going to go with Ryan Sitter in top minutes. I'm still going to spam the Lindell Hock and Paw pair, which is really odd when you think about it.

I think that's kind of why Harley's presence kind of highlights what Dallas is capable of at their best because they're running this odd like defensive. guy with defensive guy pair, which feels so old school. And like, I don't, listen, I'm not, like, I don't think like they're like the worst defensive pair in the world. It's just bizarre to me. And I don't really understand kind of where that came from other than maybe it's to kind of compensate for the lack of, at least before Harley, the lack of kind of offensive initiation in the defensive zone beyond high skin.

Yeah. I mean, Pete DeBurb being sort of conservative with usage of a 21-year-old defenseman is him and every other NHL coach, right? Like, it's just, it's just the way it is. At the same time, though, and I get it. I get the appeal of having a guy like that on your kind of quote unquote third pair. You could kind of more carefully manufacture their minutes. If they can tilt the ice the way Harley has, that is still a massive luxury.

I just think that there's a way to kind of squeeze more juice out of this orange right now. And I don't think we need to wait until it's too late to make that switch, Right. I don't think we need to see more from him in terms of proving that he's able. If you give him those minutes and then he falters or struggles, well, then you can just go back to doing things the way you've done it all along. But the upside of what it could look like would be so tantalizing to me that I would like to see it at some point. And, you know, circling this back to Ryan Suter because I think he's been perfect, like Suter himself has been perfectly fine this postseason, especially in round one. I thought he served his purpose

in that Caprizov matchup. The issue I have is not with him as a player necessarily because you kind of know what you're going to get at this point of his career. It's that the spell that his reputation seems to cast on coaches. And it's happened to other coaches before. And Pete DeBerf were as smart of a guy as he is and as much of a tactician

and kind of thinking about all this stuff as diligently as he does has not been immune to it. Right. And so you get into these situations where part of the issue with having suitor playing, with Miro Hayskinnan isn't the effect it's going to have on Miro, although I'm sure his numbers could look better from an underlying perspective with a better partner, but he's going to be fine, regardless of who he plays with, right?

The issue for me is that by nature, since he's on the first pair, and Mero's always out there, if you're going to insist on pairing them up, well, then that means you're suddenly overexposing suitor and having to play him more than he probably should, and he's playing like five minutes more at five-on-five per game than a guy like Harley. And then you're also having him because they like to match up the first pair with the top applying for pretty much half of Rubei Hintz's minutes. That means that all of a sudden you're getting in these spots where in game four, I don't know if you caught this, but there was like a three on two or something for the

stars where they had this little jailbreak opportunity to go out on an attack on the rush. And Ryan Suter's the guy who's jumping into open lane, it hints passes it to him. And the result is what you'd expect. It's kind of just this like weak muffin into Philip Grubauer's chest. And it's like, all right, well, that didn't really work out the way it could have. And if it's a guy like Harley jumping into that position, all of a sudden, as we saw later in the game, it's a totally different calculus in terms of what type of chance that's going to be.

And so that's why I'd want to try to tilt it in a way where when Harley is out there, it's with the top players, and you're really tapping into what makes this team special offensively when it is clicking. Yeah. I never understood why there weren't, you know, well, I get why for the players, but I never understood why there weren't just like certain players that coaches tell teams, hey, when this guy is on the ice with this guy, make sure the player with more skill takes the shot.

Don't let the guy with less skill take the shot in that situation. And that's kind of like a perfect example. I always sort of like internally, I get frustrated when Ryan Sutter is taking point shots when he could have just like passed to high skin in or whatever. But, you know, Sutter, I think, you know, it's also got that kind of like odd thing where it's like, you know, for all the talk about intangibles and the value

of experience. Like, what about the value of enthusiasm? What about the value of just kind of that sort of youthful, you know, like what Harley kind of provides where, you know, he's, this is a guy that's clearly just having fun in his element despite his, you know, lack of experience. And, and I just, like, I think he's second, or last I checked, he was second among all playoff defensemen and expected goal share. And I realize that's just like an impact metric. Doesn't really kind of speak to his performance specifically. But I think it says a lot about like Harley's presence. And I'm just like, dude, this guy's top for material.

Like, let's play him like that. And to your point, take advantage of that. Like, you know, it's in the playoffs, the margins matter. And I think you're probably going to, you know, this series isn't over. I think there's definitely going to be a common point where Dallas, please play Harley Moore and put them for goodness sake. We can't curse on this podcast, right? No, no.

please for goodness sake put him on the second power play unit right sir does not belong on the second power play unit i mean you can play ryanidensitur however many even strength that you want but do not under any circumstances put him on that second i mean i realize it's a second power play unit and a lot of people kind of feel like oh well whatever you know there's the first unit and typically if they're not going to score a world's second day why even punch chances on the power play unit to begin with i know it goes against everything that we talk about in the playoffs where the margins are low. Every little thing counts.

You got to manufacture goals wherever you can. And then, yeah, you have this, like, even if it's a 40 second or 30 second end of a power play, it's just, it's baffling to me. It's, you know, hearing you speak about the sort of the disposition of the two and kind of like the emotions they generate from you watching them. It's like that meme, you know, like the kid, the kid in the school bus and on the one side, it's like, he's like looking like incredibly disgruntled and sad and he's looking out at this like stormy, storming outside the window. And then on the other side, it's like,

you sunshine and the kids just smiling. That's Thomas Harley and Ryan Zooter for you. So that's how I feel when I watch the two of them respectively on the ice. Is there anything else on Suter or Harley or the Stars Blue Line that you think we've got to get to? Or should we take our break here and then talk more about kind of the offensive side of things and some of the forwards I play? I think that's kind of mostly it. I think the blue line is a real kind of. Beyond high skin, it's a real kind of defense via committee.

And I think with Ryan Sutter, you know, like in fairness, which, I really hope he gets bought out after the summer. But in fairness, he has been a lot better in the playoffs. I think the biggest issue with Sutter is that his physical decline is very clear. So it's not necessarily a case of, oh, you know, the coaches and, you know, what are they doing? It's more because he really wasn't that bad last year. I think it's just more of a case of like, well, this year he clearly hit his sort of, you know, I think physical decline, him just being looser on the puck, him making some baffling decisions,

especially with kind of weak side coverage, but that's, I guess, it's on topic. But I think all in all, they have like a broadly speaking kind of strong group that's obviously without Miro's trash. But, you know, what do you think that's make the same case for a lot of different teams, like, without their best player, like, what are you going to do? Yeah. in this series of 5-1-5, Thomas Harley, 65-15 minutes, shots are 29-19, high-dangered chances, 18-7,

and goals 6-3 in favor of the stars via natural stat trick. Let's get Thomas Harley some more minutes and some better minutes at that. All right, David, let's take our break here, and then when we come back, we'll keep talking about the stars and breaking down the Stars and Cracken series. You're listening to the Hockey P-Docast, as always streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network. The most opinionated Maple Leaf Show out there.

Real Kipprin-born. Be sure to subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, we're back here on the Hock-PedioCast. David, let's transition a little bit and talk Jason Robertson. And I don't want to, you know, fall victim to the kind of, you know, paint-by-numbers analysis where it's like, puck going in, player good. Puck not going in, player bad. But beyond just the lack of production, it really feels like to my eye, he has looked visibly off. so far this post season. He's had some chances, certainly.

But, and maybe part of it is just influenced by, you know, our expectations in standards for him are so heightened from like an execution perspective because he's just so surgical in the way he slices and dices opponents in the offensive zone. But watching him this post season kind of the way he's fought the puck at times, the way he hasn't converted point blank opportunities, it just felt sort of disorienting, right? And it's a testament to the newfound or important. prove depth of the Stars team that they're able to be two-two in round two with the amount of production they've gotten from him. But at the same time, it sure would be nice if a player

who scored 46 goals for you in the regular season go back to doing that as opposed to whatever the one in the last nine games that he's been able to score so far. So I'm not interested in kind of speculate. I've seen Stars fans do this, but I'm not interested in speculating on kind of whether or not he's playing through pain or injury because there's just no way to know. And I tend to think that's not the case because the same thing happened last year against Calgary. And I think the Y is pretty clear. Robertson is a player of impeccable time and space. And in the postseason, there's less space, which throws his timing off. So being a slower player, the game just catches them quicker. And you kind of see that in the numbers as well.

Like so, for example, here's his average over the regular season between shots four per 60, even strength, unblocked shots for and expected goals, which is 9.41 shots four in the regular season, 12.26 unblocked. Fenwick four, I hate using Fenwick, but whatever. Unblocked shots four. Point eight, expected goals per 60 in the regular season. In the postseason, all those drop. 7.29 shots four. 11.32 unblocked shots. You get the picture. And his possession also lowers from this regular season average over the last three seasons,

56% in shot attempt share, 58% in share of expected goals, down in postseason average to 50% in 50% and shot attempts in 50, et cetera, et cetera, I didn't want to like bring up a whole bunch of numbers. But point is like I think sort of there definitely is something within the numbers and within his performance that kind of speak to the increase in pace that really kind of neutralizes in game his game and you kind of see that in one like one of his go-to moves in the regular season is he'll break wide into the zone and then he'll like to cut right into the middle to sort of drop the pass off to Pavlsky or to a trailer and that just that move isn't there in

you know against Seattle and really you know to a lesser extent in Minnesota and I think that also kind of speaks to, listen, in the playoffs, teams are also scouting the hell out of you. And this is a point that Sean Shapiro kind of brought up in my little kind of Discord channel for the Stars fans in sort of his discussion with scouts, which is you have to adjust. And Robertson just hasn't adjusted. Yeah, he seemed kind of, especially at the start of the Wild series, I think less so now, but he seemed almost in those first couple games to be surprised by the physicality they were throwing his way, right?

Like it just as a result, he kind of seemed a bit, you know, hesitant, was playing a bit more to the outside than you're used to. And yeah, he wasn't able to kind of get to his spots the way that you mentioned. He's gotten, you know, what should be encouraging is I've got him down for eight individual scoring chances in the four games in this series so far, which, I mean, it needs to be higher for him. But five of them have come in just game four. And, you know, that coincides with them finally. We're reuniting it with Pelowalski. you see on the first shift, Velsky forces a turnover,

gets it out to him, gets a nice chance, got one after a Yanni Gore turnover, I believe, like right in the slot about as good of a look as you could ask for. And we're just used to him burying those.

And he hasn't yet, for whatever reason. He's played 140, 5-15 minutes in the postseason. He's got zero goals and zero primary assists with just a one secondary helper. And so it just needs to get better.

And you would think that based on the quality of player that he is, what we've seen from him, how ruthlessly efficient a score he's been, even though some of those circumstances in the playing environment has changed, as you astutely pointed out, you still have to feel like eventually

some of these shots are going to start turning into goals, right? Like he's just too talented, not too. No, I agree. There's definitely some regression that's going to be doing. Like, I think also sort of both of these kind of teams have sort of presented kind of different sort of waves of attack to kind of rattle him. Where Minnesota just try to kind of bully him, Seattle,

it's all just about the kind of speed, speed, speed. And so, listen, plenty of slow players excel in the playoffs, right? Like, I don't think Robertson is going to, he's not someone that I consider. He's not like a choker or anything like that. I think this is just kind of a young player that's not so much like, yes, getting used to the pace and that's difficult for him. But I think also somebody that kind of just needs to figure out how to kind of adjust you know, sort of the way he attacks.

You know, it's, I think Scott Wheeler kind of always just had once to kind of describe Robertson as, you know, sort of a power forward that kind of plays a small man's game. And, you know, maybe sort of that kind of needs to change to a big man's game. Where instead of trying to kind of be clever like he always is with kind of how you find that open space, hey, you know, reverse hit some guys. You can get away with anything in these playoffs, you know. So if you need to elbow your way to, to an open, you know, get an open to. slot, it's not like the referees are going to call it. So, you know, Robo, like, you, you have carte

planch for whatever. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure it's a some combination of two, right? It would be helpful if one of these points shots just bounced in off his butt and went in. And then all of a sudden, maybe the conversation starts to change a little bit, right? As we've seen, you know, it's not necessarily always a meritocracy in the postseason in terms of process, turning into results. And so he's gotten a few chances eventually if some of them start going in, maybe the flood gates open a little bit. And that'll be huge. But yeah, they've been outscored five to four with him on the ice of five on five this postseason. And last year, it would have been unthinkable that they'd be in this position if that were the case. And if you told me that even in the regular season, I'd be like, that's probably not a good omen for this stars team.

But the fact that they've been able to survive it to this point should be at least encouraging at least a little bit. I'm trying to draw a silver lining there out of that. Do you want to talk a little bit about the Cracken specifically here and sort of some of the challenges they pose? particularly offensively, because it's sort of been a, um, kind of a bugaboo so far this season, right, trying to figure out what they're doing,

how they're able to, to be this efficient, how they're turning such a high percentage of shots into goals. And throughout the regular season, they led the league in 515 shooting percentage of 10.3. So far this post season, they're at 10.2. Um,

and so it is kind of carried over. And I think we, they've shown us certain things in this series. where they've made Jake O'Dinger look human at times by things they're doing in terms of how quickly they're attacking, particularly on some of these neutral zone regroups that I think are interesting to me. I don't think it's necessarily purely a thing that they're just getting lucky. They're clearly executing a game plan and doing it well.

And so I think that's an interesting component of this series as well, right? Because we focus so much on Seattle's depth and how many different goals scores they've had and all that, but in terms of what they're doing actually specifically from a tactical perspective is kind of not being talked about nearly enough, in my opinion. It isn't. They deserve like a ton of like sort of, they're kind of like, maybe this is like a sort of a lazy comparison, but it really kind of feel a lot like the sort of Florida Panthers of the West, where they're just kind of this scrappy underdog that analytically is a lot better than

they're giving credit for. And I think, you know, kind of speaking to the tactics, I think the biggest one is that I kind of notice is, so Dallas was actually led the league in sort of, I guess, successful zone exits, if you will. However, there's an asterisk to that, right, which is that, well, they led the league in basically exit the zone without turning it over, but they didn't actually exit with possession a lot. And so when I watch kind of Seattle, the thing that really kind of jumps out is how well they've scouted out the fact that most of Dallas's defensemen, except for Highson and Harley, are looking to just use the wall or dump the puck out. And so they sort of do a really

good job of, yes, attacking with speed when Dallas is in the defensive zone, but also kind of making sure that players are positioned in a neutral to just flat out take the puck over. And so really haven't given Dallas an inch in that regard. And like that's what makes me kind of feel like this series is going to go seven games because I think as great as Dallas looked, at least for two and a half periods, you know, in game four, I don't, I feel like with McCann back, you know, this is a team that can still roll four lines that has three strong defense pairs that also do not seem rattled at all by like, you know, getting punched in the mouth. Like they're going to come back at you and wave after wave again and again.

and I think that neutral zone battle is kind of really the, I think, center stage for kind of how this sort of series is going to kind of tilt in one team's favor or the other. Yeah, they flip the ice really quickly. I think just like how lightning quick they are in those regroups. You can almost visibly see that opposing defensemen are a bit surprised by it because you're sort of programmed to once the puck gets out of the zone, you kind of like have this gentleman's agreement where it's like, all right, we can either go off for a change or, we can kind of just like exhale for a second here before you come back in the zone and attack again. And in this case, they don't really allow you to do that and it catches guys out of position. But also the point you make about four lines is an important one here where it's not just necessarily the depth. It's the fact that all four of those lines play a stylistically similar game, right?

Like there's varying levels of skills certainly and qualities to the individual components on those on those lines. but with the speed not really presenting any sort of drop off between line one and line four, that's really been heightened in this series, especially when you compare it to what Dallas's fourth line has looked like and what they've been able to get out of them offensively and just adding, you know, Jared McCann to that group in game four upon return. I imagine we'll see him bump back up the lineup at some point, but it was hilarious seeing like him playing on the fourth line and being like,

oh, they have like him and Donato and. Tanev and then the other side is, you know, if Rect Fox had drew that nice penalty, though, they kind of helped Dallas in that game. But for the most part, offensively, they just, they haven't gotten anything out of that. Facts of Glendening combination. And that's the comparison between those two has been sort of impossible not to, not to fix it on. I'm constantly jealous of Seattle's fourth line. It's the kind of thing where if Dallas and Seattle traded fourth lines, Dallas would just be

beatable. Like they'd be up four o in the series. but, you know, kind of kind of jumping off the point that you made. I think that one of the things is kind of really speaking back or getting back to that kind of design versus operational kind of efficiency. I think that's a thing that a lot of teams kind of struggle with because sometimes they don't always have the roster to play to a coach's system. Where Seattle from line one to line four, defense pair one through, they can play that style. And so you have this just really like deep consistency that you just don't get with other teams. And like it was, I can't remember when it was second period.

I don't know if it was like, I think it was even on the power play. And Rup, like Hints like has a straight line for a breakaway. And Alexander Winberg just catches up to him, just casually catches up to Hintz and negates like a potential shorthanded chance. And that's the kind of stuff that you just will not see with other teams who can just kind of goal like player after player that can, that can, that has so many interlinked skills one another, as opposed to like a vague sense of chemistry, which is kind of what I think defined Dallas for, for many years before DeBoer came along. Well, Dallas is also, I mean, their fourth line is generally, and it has been for years.

It's like very specialist, right? Like they get extreme defensive zone employment and that deployment of that allows certainly their thought players to get to do more fun stuff in the offensive zone. but it's not very ambitious in terms of kind of what their objective is and what you're asking him to do. And so I almost feel bad. I know he missed game four because he was sick or whatever. I feel bad lumping tied to Landria into that unit because I think even at this point of

his career, he's just shown, I'm just like steadfast in my belief that he has significantly more playmaking upside than he's been allowed to show because of the way he's been to use and the players he's played with. And that might benefit Dallas in the long run because he's up for a new deal as an RFA this summer and I imagine he doesn't have a ton of leverage. And so they'll probably be able to get him, especially long term at a very team friendly figure moving forward. And so that might work in their favor financially. But it feels like, you know, it'd be nice if a player like him in the present was being put in a position to succeed a little bit more. But that's kind of just the way the

cookies crumbled for him this season. And by the way, I think Delandrie was, I feel like sort of really undersold by stars fans who kind of felt like, well, all, you know, for most of the year he was with Jimmy Ben and Wyatt Johnston. And that was a really effective line. But when you look at his, a lot of it is like, for example, his high danger chances, like via passing and his passing efficiency, he was up there with some of Dallas's best forward. So he wasn't just a passenger. And that's kind of sort of the unfortunate thing about, yeah, him having the flu, but also about him being stuck on the fourth line, which is, I think he's a guy that,

you know, even though he still needs, you know, he's still a little rough around the edges because I think sometimes he kind of leans too much into that sort of, oh, I'm in the bottom six. So let me throw the body around and let me, let me grind and muck it up. And I'm like, listen, you have talent.

You're good enough. Like, don't pretend to be something you're not. And I think, I think once he kind of leans into kind of his real identity as, as not just a two-way player, but a two-way threat, then you'll have that sort of players who can play up the lineup on their fourth line, as opposed to, as you mentioned, these role players who can do nothing but just like, you know,

sit there and grind it out. And they really, I don't like that. I really don't like that philosophy of sort of, you know, let's accept that offensively, these players will just punt offensive chances, but we can put them on the PK. Like, it really, it's all about first principles thinking, right? What is a forward design to do? Well, you need them to score. They get closest to the net.

So let's have players that can score it. Yes, defense is important. But my goodness, like if a guy just can't score it all, the way Glenn Denig has not been able to do or faxia, then please, like, let's figure out another way to kind of help them or just trade them. Not now. I mean, like rat a fact is playing a good game last night. Yeah. Yeah. No, just in general, like a general philosophy.

I'm right there with you. Yeah, well, I'm really hopeful that we're going to get some more competitive games, let's say, here down the stretch. Like, you know, round two in general in the postseason, it feels like every game has been almost contractually obligated to have one team going up 5'1 at some point in the game and then the other team trying to bound a furious rally. This series has not been immune to that.

we've seen a couple goalie changes now. I believe the last eight games in the entire postseason actually have featured one team switching goalies at some point a couple of times due to injury, but just sort of reflect the types of loft-sided scores we've seen. And so it's almost difficult when, you know, the motivations are necessarily equal and one team's pushing clearly much harder than the other to try to get back in it. It's tough to take too much out of these games or analyze them. and at the same time, though, it has made for interesting kind of back and forths from one game to another, I guess. So that's been one silver lining of it. But I'd like to see the rest of this way, whether there's two or three games left in this series. And I'm with you, there's probably going to be three more.

And I would expect this to go seven. Hopefully we see some games closer to what game one look like compared to what the past few have been. Yeah. And I'm pretty confident that it's like I always kind of go back to like I would sort of, I think sort of Seattle's offense is going to have a much harder time with Miro and Andger than say like Dallas's offense will have with, you know, Gru Bauer and Seattle's defense, which is very good. So like I still feel like Dallas is the better team and will kind of prove that to be the case.

And also I just think they're kind of, you know, Dallas, you know, even though I wasn't like intensely bullish on them to kind of start the season, like I really kind of felt like early on they established that, yes, this is a proper contender. They might not kind of check all those, you know, hit that sort of checklist, you know, Dom's checklist of what makes it kind of true contender. But I think close enough. And I also think, you know, Toronto is the center of the universe, right? So we can talk about the Maple Leafs.

Mm-hmm. Of course. I think the stars are also kind of a case study why Toronto is maybe not always a contender because they have this homogenized group of players whose impact is greatest when they're generating offense, whereas Dallas is a very diverse group. whose impact can be on offense with the top line, but also in shutting down offense with Miro or Annette with Ander. And that's not like a Toronto needs more offense, more grinders argument.

It's a Toronto needs a greater diversity of obstacles for their opponent's argument. And that's, I think, what the stars have and why I think they're legit. Like, they're not particularly special or deep, but they have special players at key positions who have different hockey solutions, didn't even a problem instead of, like, different aspects of the same hockey solution, tend to give them a problem, like in Toronto. So I still say stars, I think I said stars in six when I did my preview, but I'll still stick with that. Yeah. Well, I'm looking forward to it.

I will, I'm planning at least on being in the house for game six in Seattle. So looking forward to that. David, I'll let you plug some stuff on the way out here. Let the listeners know where they can check you out and kind of what you've been working on. Well, I mean, you know, it's sort of my hobbies beyond sort of hockey or just kind of more riding. So yeah, I mean, D-Magazine is the place, of course, compliments to Mike Palucci, my editor, and Mark Gottich who sometimes, and it's my work. So if you're interested in just kind of stuff that inspired me, like, sort of faint Filipovich impressions in terms of like hockey analysis,

but with the Dallas Stars bent, yes, you can check me out of D-Magine. I also kind of write do hockey writing at my own substack called Puck Salvos. I haven't written in there in a while, but nonetheless, it's, it's pretty free hand, sometimes a little kind of foul mouth, but I enjoy writing it stack. And of course, Defendant Big D, which is where I kind of got my start. And every now and then I'll contribute because, yes, Defending Big D is still alive and well, despite what happened with Fox and SB Nation. Awesome, and it's at David Castillo AC on Twitter, right?

Let's get you some more followers. Appreciate it. All right, buddy. This is a blast. I'm glad we finally got to do this. I'm sure we're going to do it again in the future. Thank you to the listeners for listening to us today. We'll be back tomorrow with another episode of the HockeyPedio cast,

as always streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network.