The Hockey PDOcast - More and More People Are Saying “Awooo”

Episode Date: December 8, 2023

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Craig Morgan to talk about the Arizona Coyotes, how and why the organization's approach heading into the season changed, and the key contributions driving their feisty start to the year. 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.

2015. It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filipovich. Welcome to the HockeyPedocast. My name is Demetri Philipovich and joining me as my good buddy, Craig Morgan. Craig, what's going on, man? Well, you know, I'm covering the coyotes, Dimitri, so you know what comes along with that. It's usually arena news. Hopefully we'll talk as little as possible about that today. No, I'm kidding you. I realize we have to broach that topic, but it's getting a little exhausting talking about that topic. Oh, well, I imagine. And it kind of does unfortunately hang over everything or at least kind of provide some sort of a shadow. But the good news is the reason why we're having y' on us talk about the on ice product because that has been fun, I guess last night's performance, notwithstanding, because I thought that was a pretty lethargic effort against the flyers on Thursday night. And I provided a bit of a buzzkill when I was, I knew I was going to have you on all week. So I was watching back the games. I was making these notes. And I had all these jokes about how, you know, they've been in the fast. the past five cup teams, but they won't be able to beat the 2024 cup team because that's them and and all this stuff. But, you know, we have to put that on pause a little bit, but still, I think that five-game heater that were on gave us a good excuse for getting together and

talking about the coyotes and the way they've played the season and all the on-ice stuff. And so that's going to be the focus of today's show. And I'm excited about that. Here's where I'll start with you, because they're currently sitting at 13, 10, and 2, right? there, I think just ahead of the Blues and the Predators were fourth in the central, seventh in the west. The last time I had you on, and it was in the lead up to the trade deadline, we did like a full Jacob Chikkiman episode where we talked about him and landing spots and his game and everything. I was very adamant at the time that after the trick and trade, the next domino to fall

would be Nick Schmaltz being traded at some point in the offseason because I just looked at the way that the coyotes had operated previously. You looked at his contract details where his cap hit was one number which was 5.85 and then another number was his salary which was escalating the next three years and was going to become significantly more than that and they weren't in the business of picking up the tab on deals like that and so it seemed like from a business decision good player but someone that they can probably justify trading to a team that will mind paying that salary

and getting a good return that's going to help add more picks at a treasure chest Now, after that conversation happened, the season unfolds, and then we get into the offseason, and there's a story that comes out about how the coyotes are changing their approach, right? They are not going to be a dumping ground for contracts anymore. They want to add players instead. They want to be competitive and help their young players and insulate them and provide that supporting cast. And I was a bit skeptical at the time, but then action speak louder than words and you see them go, they trade a second for Sean Dersey. They sign, they bring back Nick Buestad and Troy Stetcher,

they sign Jason Zucker, they sign Alex Kerfoot, they sign Matt Dumbah. And all of a sudden, it's like, all right, this is an NHL team. They are, they are bringing in talent, they're bringing in proven players, and I want to see how this unfolds. And so I'm curious for your take on sort of the timeline of that, kind of what the mandate was, how that approach, and the change approach and direction all came together and sort of what guided that because it was clearly a significant pivot from the way they'd been operating for the past couple years. Yeah, a couple things to note on that. First of, I would say that in terms of the timeline that Bill Armstrong had always laid out, it made sense, as he said, to shift into phase two of the

rebuild. We knew that the coyotes were trying to accumulate a ton of draft capital. They have done that. They have executed a lot of that with picks. They have a pretty good prospect system at this point. If maybe still missing a top end piece or two because this franchise never has any lottery luck. But they have a lot of guys in the system. They also have 13 picks in the first two rounds over the next three drafts. So Bill's goal all along was acquire a lot of draft capital. Make sure you've got it extended out several years for sustainable success. You want a constant pipeline of prospects coming through. I think he's done that. I mean, when you look at the draft capital, they've accumulated. I'm not sure any team in NHL history has done what the coyotes have done.

So that's piece one. The other piece is a little more interesting and probably much more underreported. You mentioned the Jacob Chikrin trade. Well, Jacob Chikrin wanted out of here because he didn't want to be a part of rebuild. Well, if you continue to extend this out and say, well, we're not going to be a playoff team for the next five years. What are you telling your core, guys like Lawson Krause and Clayton Keller, who probably don't want to spend the prime of their careers in a rebuild? There was some pressure exerted from agents. Most notably Clayton Keller's agent, Scott Bartlett, saying, hey, what's happening here? Especially when, you know, when the attempt of arena fails, like, where is this franchise going? We need to see some progress, or Clayton Keller could

be the next domino to fall. He may be the guy that requests to trade. And you can understand this. Again, as I said earlier, who wants to spend the prime of their career in a rebuild? Players play to win. That's one of the biggest reasons they're in this game, maybe the biggest. Money, obviously, a factor as well. So I think there was a little bit of pressure from that camp for Bill to say, okay, we need to add some pieces. We need to be more competitive on the ice. We need to at least be in the playoff conversation. So I think that played a major role in some of the moves that they made. Now, when you look at the guys that they brought in, however, that's also in keeping with what Bill Armstrong has done in the past here.

They're all character guys. And I know that's an overused term, but I mean, you talk to guys like Jason Zucker and Alice Kerfoot, Matt Dumbah, Nick Bugstad, all these guys. Sean Dersie also developed a great reputation with media and fans in L.A. They're all really just quality guys, so they blend well in this room anyway. Then you hand him to Andre Turin, who was apparently this master relationship builder, and you get what we have now. Yeah, that's interesting. It's a good framing of it because I forgot there was that stretch.

I'm not sure about the specifics of it, but right, there was like some reporting that Logan Cooley might be heading back to college. Then there was that saga where Clayton Keller's dad tweeted stuff, but then was like, oh, no, I was actually hacked. And then it was like, okay, what's going on here? This could go south really quickly. and that's sort of around the time when things kind of changed a little bit. I don't know. Is this a good, it was part of the logic or motivation as well here to like show that if you have a competitive fun product that has players that can score goals, get into fun game environments,

provide a viewer-friendly package that illustrates the viability of pro hockey in Arizona and kind of ties all that together. Like is that part of the logic here? Whereas like if you're just constantly having this sort of shell product where it's players who are very expendable or just coming in are going to be showcased and then traded and never actually part of the end game, it's really difficult for fans to get involved, to get invested to care, right?

And so all of a sudden now you watch this team, there's reason to be excited. Like I'm talking about them on this podcast all the time. They're fun. There's a lot of fun. personalities, a lot of fun games they're playing. And the crowds, obviously, albeit in a limited capacity, have been really good at the mallet. People are interested in this team. I imagine that's part of the logic here as well, or the motivation for why this was such a big sort of crossroad season

for this organization. Sure. I think that's a fair characterization. Like when you look at it from the ownership angle, they're trying to get an arena yet again. It doesn't hurt the franchise if you're you're having success on the ice. It certainly makes you more palatable to potential, you know, whoever you're dealing with, whether it's politicians or a private land sale or a state trust land sale in the current case. I'm glad you mentioned Logan Cooley, by the way, because Scott Bartlett also represents Logan Cooley. So there you go. That was an interesting one to watch because, okay, you put a more competitive product on the ice or Logan Cooley may go back to Minnesota for another year. We'll see how that plays out. They're all tied together. The Bartlett agency

held a lot of the cards. And I'm not saying they were just manipulating it and being hardcore. You probably dealt with that agency. They're really friendly guys, but they did their job. They made sure that their client's wishes were somewhat exceeded to this offseason. And again, and now we've got a competitive team to watch on the ice. Okay, well, let's talk about a competitor team. So I've got a series of key characters here that I want to talk about with you. Let's start with Connor Ingram, because I think when you're talking about this success of the team, this five-game winning streak, they were on, everything kind of begins and ends with him and his play in there. And the reason why I say that is because they start this year with this rotation in that, right, where they're

alternating starts. It's him and Karel Vamalka. They're splitting it up evenly. And I think it helps that Vamalka struggled himself and has only won two of his 10 starts or whatever it's at at this point, whereas Ingram playing well, then has that key game in Vegas with the shutout, and then they give him the net, right? And he's played ever since, and he's played really well in doing so. And so he's such a fun sort of success story, right, based on the journey he's been on getting to this point now. And he's been so good. We can get into all the stats, and neither you or I are necessarily goalie guys. I know that he is a Kevin Woodley certified. goalie, like he loves his game and he's been talking about him for a while. But just in watching him

play, like you can sort of see that even with untrained eyes like ours, there's like a commonist, right? There's been times where an opposing player gets in one-on-one against him and is in tight. And there's like no wasted movements in his game, right? He almost, he just like sizes them up, squares him up, and just absorbs the puck. And when goalies play like that, to me, that's a testament to like they're seeing it really well, they're feeling it, and they're in the zone. And that's That's what you've seen from Ingram here of late. Let's talk a little bit about him and kind of how he got here in the Wazer and playing and what he's meant to this team success the season. Yeah, first off, you can't discuss Conneryrim without his struggles with mental health. Yeah, he checked himself thin for OCD, I believe it was obsessive. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Anyway, he's dealt with mental health issues. He's talked about them openly.

Adam Vingian, I got to give him a shout out. My former athletic colleague wrote a terrific piece on him a few years ago. It's been the subject of stories again. In fact, last night was Mental Health Awareness Night at Mullet Arena. So he talked about it on a video that the coyotes recorded. So you go through that. And I've talked to people who said, like Bill Armstrong said, that was the only thing ever holding Connor Ingram back was himself with his own inner demons, his own battles. Once he got through that and got to a better. better place. He's always been an elite goaltender, and now you're seeing it. You talked about the calm. There's a, there's a meme going around our Discord channel of Conor Ingram as a Buddha. And it is so apt right now because you mentioned how he, he seems to be just always in position when a shooter arrives. I tweeted this the other night. It's almost like he knows where they're going to be before they know where they're going to be. And so he makes some of the most casual-looking saves. You know that they're not casual. He had to move east-west on a play the other night, like literally post-to-post on a guy in tight, but he was already there, and it was literally

one of these where he just put up the glove and caught the puck. Nothing was happening. It's amazing to watch how calm he is right now. Andre Turin, you talked about it. Golly coach, Corey Schweldt talked about it, that's just who he is. He's not a guy who gets flapped by much. So, I mean, we can talk about all the technical stuff if you want to. I just dove into this with Kevin Woodley, who had some great insight on him. And you're right, he's been, he's been banging that drum for a couple years now. He knew that Ingram was ready for this, and he was, he was right because he's been elite so far. But when you're talking about the coyotes on-eye success right now, that's where it has to start. I am surprised at how long the coyotes coaching staff defended

the goalie rotation, which they rode for 20 games this season, which I think was like the six longest. Any team had ever done that since 2000. It was apparent to a lot of people, and I'm sure it was apparent to his own teammates, that Karel Vemalka was not matching Connor Ingram and goal. All the numbers, whether they be the blunt force tools that the NHL.com uses, which are mostly team-oriented stats or the granular stats you'll find at some of the analytics site. Conor Ingram was just outplaying him.

It was clear to all of us that he needed to be a net. And as you mentioned, the shutout in Vegas made it impossible to deny him anymore. of all goalies are going to play after a shutout. Secondly, you just shut out the cup champs on the road. Yeah, you're going to get the net again. Yeah. Well, plus 11, this is before last night, but plus 11.2 goals they will expect it is behind only Thatcher Demko, 925 overall save percentage in 16 games, only behind Aiden Hill and Cam Talbot. And, you know, mentioning Aden Hill there, I know you've spoken about this quite a bit on your show, this like, this goalie tree here under Corey Schwab here over the past, however many years in Arizona.

and whenever I have Woodley on, we seem to talk about one, either current or former Coyote's goalie, and it comes up. And when he starts speaking about Cory Schwab, I can see the affection in Woodley's eyes because like for all the all the goaliards and everyone who understands the technical stuff behind the scenes and has all these conversations, uh, within our circles, his name always comes up and there's like a growing lore there. Yet Woodley can't seem to actually break through in terms of telling me what's happening, how they're doing it, right? Because once it's, once the-coy what Tesson's talking about it. Yeah, and there's like this cloak and dagger element where he's like,

I can't really tell you how they're doing it, but I can tell you everyone loves it. Have you been able to chip away at it at all, or is it really as cloak and dagger, as Woodley makes it seem? It's a little bit more like Corey does not like to talk tactical stuff on his goalies. He doesn't like to give away those state secrets. But if you bring up something that you've noticed already, okay, now it's apparent, now it's out in sunlight. Corey will talk about it then.

But yeah, he doesn't like to. Usually he reverts to platitudes. You know, he's just playing with confidence. Corey, we can see he's doing more than that. It's not just confidence. Confidence certainly matters. It absolutely matters in a goaltender's play. But, you know, Woodley outlined some of the tweaks that he's noticing.

He can't confirm them with Corey, of course, but a couple of things like shuffling instead of using the, T-push that's allowing him to stay narrower in his stance and allowing him to change directions. And also that thing that Linus Allmark discussed last year, I can't even remember the term that Leetus used to. It's like a recoil. It's almost like something. Yeah. Yeah, recoils is exactly the term he used out. But it's almost this backward drip that instead of just coming out and, you know, getting set on the shot, dropping down, you're actually moving back because there's so much East West play in the NHL these days, it actually gives you a little momentum. So if you need to

change direction, you can do it more easily. Little tweaks like that. He's noticing in his game, but there's probably a lot more that they're working on in practice that Corey just isn't divulging. The bottom line is Conneringham, as Bill Armstrong and Andre have both said, he's an elite goaltender right now. There's no question about it. All the stats say so. And when you watch him, you just see it right now. Yeah. Well, the lineage speaks for itself, right? But yeah, you're right. He's playing confident out there. Let's, uh, let's see. And by the way, you speak of a lineage, the Nashville training ground too, right?

That's another really good training ground for goaltenders. And that's, he's a product of that, even if they didn't, even if they didn't see it in him at the time. I mean, he was viewed as their number three. And the coyotes, of course, pick them up as a waiver pickup. So there was literally no acquisition cost now potentially arriving Ilya Brzegalov as the best waiver pickup in franchise history. Well, and not only that, but after seeing the, what, he played 27 games for him last year. And the numbers were good, certainly, but like getting him on.

on that three-year extension in the off-season as well, under $2 million per year, looking like a nice piece of business there, right? And you're right, like the whole story and the journey here for him, like the, this isn't like it's out of nowhere, right? Like he's 26 now. He's obviously in a great place himself personally, but is a player who was a third-round pick who was in destinations where there was always someone in front of him as well

that was kind of blocking the path to meaningful NHL-Star. and then had the numbers, had everything, but I needed to put it all together, right? And it's cool to see that it's finally happening for them, and it's been a great story. Okay, number two on my list, Clayton Keller and Nick Schmaltz. So we mentioned Schmaltz and earlier, the undeniable chemistry between the two of them. Now, at 515, I think it's been a work in progress, right? They were a lot better and more effective last year than they have been this year in that regard, where the production has come down quite a bit, but they're making up for it on the power play. And just watching the way they interact off of each other and the way they play together is so fun to watch.

You can see that that undeniable chemistry of moving off of each other, right? And then one guy goes and then the other one sort of follows or goes in open space and they're looking for each other. And I guess that's most exemplified on the power play. But just watching the two of them play is they're right up there in terms of duos for me in terms of just like aesthetically pleasing the way they pass the puckabongs each other and make stuff happen. And it's really fun to watch. Yeah. And you mentioned at the top Nick Schmaltz and the possibility of a trade.

Well, I mentioned, you know, some of the things that Clayton Keller's camp needed to see. I was told basically that their cap came to Bill and said, if you trade Nick Schmaltz, you might as well trade me because who am I going to play with at the time. So that might be one of the reasons that Nick Schmaltz is still a coyote. But you're right. They have undeniable chemistry. And I would say that the drop in five-on-five production probably relates to the loss Barrett Hayton to an injury. He is really important to that line. He doesn't get a lot of credit.

And he certainly doesn't produce as much as he needs to do as a first line center. Let's not hide from that truth. But what Barrett Hayton does is he goes to the net. He goes to the so-called dirty or greasy areas. He creates space for those two to operate. Both of them, if you watch the way they play in the offensive zone, they love to circle up high in the zone. There's a lot of motion. It's basically like a cycle high in the zone. They're in constant motion. They're both so skilled with the puck that they can get the puck to each other through traffic

or make difficult passes. But they like to keep the defense just in motion. You like to create cracks, holes in the defense because they're having to move all the time to adjust to their movement. When you don't have Barrett down low, the defense, I've noticed it in the last few games. The defense is coming up higher in the zone

to defend them now because they can because Logan Cooley's on that line and he just doesn't fit right now. They haven't found the chemistry. So I would say that's a big reason for their drop in production at five on five, but you're right, the power play's still been dynamic for them. And they have undeniable chemistry. They just work so well together. And they'll both say it. You work, you can play a long time and not have that kind of chemistry with the player. So when you get it, you're obviously really excited to be with that guy. well just in terms of like nerding out on on how fun it is there was the game was it it was the capitals game right where they just had that explosion barrage of goals on the first period and keller had i think three primary assists in it or in the game um but the first one got most of the sort of attention from fans right it was like the back door pass over at least one stick about multiple defender sticks to logan coolly for the tap end that was really cool but let me tell you craig the one to Nick Schmaltz was so much more subtle, but that's one where he executes that play.

It's like him, Jack Hughes, and maybe Matt Barzow in terms of the specific play where left-hand shot coming down the right wall on his back end. And it's this little flick where, you know, his blade almost doesn't even move. And it sucks it up and it's functional, not beyond looking cool. the functionality of it is it allows the puck to hang in the air for long enough and then fall flat so that Nick Schmaltz can get into the one-time position to hammer it as soon as it lands, right? And which wouldn't be able to be accomplished if he's actually passing it along the ice. And so they execute that and the timing on that play, it's not as flashy as that first assist, right?

Where it was like, all right, that was ridiculous what he did. But the fact that he's able to execute that same play on the second one time and time again and the way it shows the relationship between those two. That's my personal favorite player theirs, I think. So I wanted to shout that out because I think both, depending on your interests are cool. But for me, I think the cyclone was actually even more impressive. That's fair. Yeah, and I think I'd describe that as casual rule in my tweet, but it was.

It was just so subtle. It just flipped it back and, yeah, right on the stick, right on the tape for one time. They are special to watch each together. There's no question about that. Okay, so you mentioned Cooley there and sort of out of necessity with all their injuries down the middle, right? With Hia out, even Jack McBade, he's been thrust into this role where he's having to play between them in a feature role, especially a 5-15. And the 5-15 numbers for Cooley are not good. And as you'd expect for a young player making this transition from NNCAA and especially playing this type of role, like all the underlying metrics from shot shares to chance to expected goals, they are low and they're suppressed right now.

Now, I think when you watch him play, like the skill is in such abundance and you can see it that it's not really a concern to me at all for his future. But the reason why I bring it up is because, and this ties in the coaching and Andre Tierney and what you mentioned earlier in terms of this relationship building and him being the person for this job, I was watching your show on your great YouTube show where you had our friend Charlie O'Connor on recently to preview the Flyers game. and you were talking about the coaching tendencies of someone like John Tortorella and how that relates to like his handling of a Morgan Frost, right? And compared to other young players on that team where he's so set in his ways now that he has his guys and then if you're not one of those guys, life is going to be pretty miserable for you. And he's had success doing so and he's doing a great job with this career and Flyers team. But for a coach like Andre Turney where you are dealing with so many young people,

players. You have to create this opportunity for them to make mistakes, to create a runway, to figure out what they're going to be to kind of flush all that out. It would be tough for him to look at what cool he's doing right now and go, all right, well, you're turning the puck over. I don't like your puck management. You're struggling a 5-1-5. I'm going to punish you. I'm going to bench you. I'm going to scratch you. I'm going to limit your minutes. You're even seeing that with Adam Fantilli in Columbus, right, where there's games where all of a sudden he played 10 minutes tonight. It's like, that's kind of weird. This team's rebuilding. They're not necessarily a cup contender. Why would they do that with a top prospect? And we see young players handle that way all the time. Now,

part of it might just be out of necessity because they don't have very many other options, but we haven't really seen that with Cooley. There's been a couple times this season where his ice still was around 11 or 12 minutes, but for the most part, it's been pretty consistently above 15, 16 minutes at the very least. And so I think in the long haul, those repetitions and that consistency are going to be really good for him. And I think that's a testament to the coaching staff in terms of understanding the big picture and kind of weighing that versus the day-to-day frustrations and sort of taking a long review as opposed to being sort of classic hockey coaches, right? And sort of punishing them every time they make a mistake. Yeah, a lot to unpack there. Yeah, you're right. The limited

options is certainly factoring into this with Hayton and Jack McBain and even travel. Travis Boyd out of the lineup. Travis Boyd played between Keller and Schmaltz two years ago for basically an entire season. They just don't have a lot of options, which kind of underscores the fact that they just beat five. They won five straight against former cup, recent cup champs. It's just amazing when you look at their center ice position. But with Logan Cooley, you know, we speculated a few shows ago about what happens if Cooley doesn't show improvement in his five-on-five play. Would the coyotes consider sending him down to Tucson to the HL to just get some time away from the pressure of the NHL and work on his game. I asked Andre about this, and he just flat out said he's not going to Tucson. We'll work on this together.

We'll continue to talk. We'll continue to progress together. We expected this from him. He'll get through it. So that's their attitude. Now, go back to what I said about Scott Barlett earlier. I think that's factoring into this as well. Logan Gouli probably came to the coyotes with the understanding

he's not going to the HL. A lot of guys will stay in college a second year to make sure they bypass that. But that might have been part of the conversation as well. And yet, you have to go back to the way Andre Turney approaches his players. Again, I know I keep saying this and I don't want to overstate it because there are other coaches who certainly develop relationships with their players. But that's been his biggest calling card. That was his calling card when he arrived here. And when you talk to the players, just to a man.

They'll cite that, and I don't think it's hyperbole. I don't think it's them saying what they're supposed to say about their coach. Because you catch little glimpses of things that you didn't see with previous coaching staffs. Clayton Keller, for instance, walks into the ice den early in the season. It was before the season even started. Andre's standing there, walks up to him and gives him a hug, just a big hug. I did not see that with Rick Tocket, and I don't think it ever would have happened with Rick Tockett. It just speaks to how close he gets with his players.

So there's a trust level that, yeah, listen, Andre's hard. You can hear him barking on the ice sometimes. He is hard on these guys. But I think there's a trust level that he's going to be honest with him, and he's going to allow him some of them, some of those mistakes, some of those growing pains. I think that's what's going to happen with Logan Cooley. Obviously, the Coyotes are hoping that at some point soon the light bulb goes on because

you're right. He is turning the puck over. Puck management has been an issue. It wasn't for like a three-game stretch. It was last night. defensive reads at times are an issue, and I don't think he's quite figured out NHL time and space yet. The things he was able to do with the puck on the rush in the NCAA, he can't do here. He's still learning that.

He just hasn't mastered what he's capable of doing at this level yet. Maybe that will come over the, like I said, the next 20 games stretch or at some point this season. Yeah. There's a few other coolly notes that I want to hate with you, but let's take a break here really quick while we still can. And then when we come back, we'll do that and we'll wrap up this conversation about the coyotes. You were listening to the Hockeypedo guest streaming on a sports star radio now. All right, we're back here on the Hockeypedo guest, Craig Morgan, talking about the coyotes. Craig, before we went to break, we were speaking about Logan Cooley and sort of alums he's taking.

And his transition here at the start of his NHL career, it was been a lot made of his individual shot rate, right? and how much he's been shooting the puck himself and how that probably needs to come up a little bit. I think he's always going to profile more as a playmaker, right? Like he's going to want to have the puck on a stick and then make a play for someone or set someone up. You reach a point, though, where I think you need to keep defenders honest. You need to at least pose the threat. And he certainly got the shooting talent like you'd like to see him use him more. I'm kind of curious for your take on how that's coming together in terms of how much of that is just,

You mentioned the timing of the NHL, right, and kind of figuring out how to time and space and how things are going to work here. Obviously, they just don't have the puck nearly as much at 5 on 5 because the shot share is so low and there's certain elements of that. How that's coming together for him and sort of what we should expect from it, both for the rest of this season, but also moving forward in terms of what that's going to look like for him when he really puts it all together. Yeah, it's definitely been discussed with Andre, with the coach staff. As you mentioned, Logan is more of a playmaker anyway. I think that's his default setting. But you see this with so many rookies when they get to the NHL. They want to defer. They're playing

among veterans. And especially now he's playing with Nick Schmaltz and Clayton Keller. So that's a little intimidating. So I think he never wants to get in a situation where he looks like he's a puck hog. But we, in a recent game, we highlighted three glibly. shot opportunities for Logan Cooley, where he tried to make a low percentage pass instead. Like, he's literally in the scoring area. And in one case, all alone, and he tried to pass the puck instead. Yeah, I think all of those things are coming into play. He's used to passing. He's deferring to others. And maybe he's lacking a little confidence because he's struggling in some other areas of his game. But as I mentioned to you before, Andre said, we're just going to continue to work with him,

going to continue to bang on the same message. And hopefully it comes at some point. They are definitely encouraging him to shoot more. They're even using Matias Michelli as a guidepost for him, because Matias Michelli was the same thing last season during that great rookie season, where somehow he finished fourth and Calder Trophy voting. Don't get me started on that with finishing behind Stewart's getting her. But Matias Michelet wasn't shooting the puck. He wasn't even averaging a shot per game. So they've been hammering at home every time I talk to Mattias now this season, he's saying, I know I need to shoot the puck more. Everybody's telling me to shoot the puck more. I think the same thing is happening with Logan Cooley.

I mean, you mentioned the goal that Clayton Keller set up on, that just basically spoon fed, you can't do anything but shoot in that situation. But he has to take advantage of more of the opportunities that he gets. There are times still where he can create a shot for himself simply with his ridiculous speed and skill. He needs to take advantage of those opportunities. Micelli's a great note. I had that here as well, where last year he was 480th out of 503, qualified forwards with 7.8 shot attempts per hour. That's up to 13.7 this year. And that's

kind of more middle of the pack. And that demonstrates that evolution, I guess, in comfort with the way the NHL games played. Cooley himself is 359th now out of 410 forward. So kind of following a similar trajectory. But that's also part of what makes this coyote's team so interesting to me offensively. And we're going to talk a little bit more here about, you know, the story that is Michael Garconi and we're talking about Machelli and Logan and Krause's uh you know loss and Krause's goal scoring streak in November and all that stuff part of it is you look at it's like all right on the surface a lot of their public metrics offensively they don't look that great they're just I think third in the league and five one five shooting percentage and that's kind of what's driving this

but then you look and the sport logic data has them as what really high up there in passes into the slot and that makes sense with types of players they have and especially with how much their offense runs through Clayton Keller, who's amongst the league leaders in that very stat, it makes sense that that's the way they play, right? But you watch them with some movement and with what they're trying to accomplish, it's not necessarily household names from that perspective of equating it to that playing style, but that's sort of what they're doing and they're getting good results out of it. And so it's led to these games where, you know, we mentioned the Philly game, that one doesn't necessarily apply to this, but there's been

these crazy game environments, whether it's the Nashville game earlier in the year, or 7-5 or St. Louis where they lose 6-5 or the back-to-back Kings games where sometimes when the passes are connecting and when the opponent is ready to match them, they can get into these really fun up-tempo, high-scoring games. And that's certainly not something that we think of when we think of Coyote's hockey, but that has been the brand for stretches of this season. No question. Yeah. And we mentioned the depth that they added the forward group. They haven't had this sort of depth before. They have three legitimate, when they're healthy, they have three legitimate scoring lines on this team. So it has been a heck of a lot more entertaining as a product.

Going back to Machelli, I'm not sure what you wanted me to ask about him, though, but in terms of the willingness to shoot, Andre Turney had a really funny thing that he said to him last year. He said, Matias, you don't have to shoot, just pass the puck to the mesh. That has been his message to Logan Cooley as well this season. I didn't really have any questions on Michelli, I just wanted to shot him out. At the start of the season, I did a... He is such an elite bastard. Oh, he's such an elite passer.

Yeah, he was on my list people. Well, he was on my list of players. I'm like my guys this season, quote, and go to the start of the year because I just fell in love with his game last year. And I referenced at a time where it's like, he never shoots. It's exclusively passing, but he's so good at it that I almost can't blame him for it. Now he's incorporated a little bit of that in his game.

He's got the 14 assists in 25 games. 10 of those are primary. He's like top 20, I think, in his assist rate on a permanent basis this year. And, you know, Krause is certainly getting to the right spots and, and in this hot streak. I don't want to take anything away from from his finishing in that regard. But when you watch some of the plays that Richelie's setting up for him, it's also like even the goal last night against fires, you watch it. It's like, this is a pretty good spot for someone, especially with that skill set, where you're a big guy and essentially go kind of around the net, have your stick on the ice. and Machelli will probably find a way to eventually get the puck to you.

And that's kind of exactly the formula they followed. And you know what? It's a pretty successful one. Andre will tell you that's been their best line all season. It's not Schmaltz and Keller. It's that Nick Bukestad, Losson, Proust, Matias, Michelle Lyley. He loves the way they play. In all three zones, they're responsible.

Krause is a great two-way player. Yeah, and I definitely don't want to take anything away from Losson Kraus. When he signed his extension, there was a lot of criticism nationally that they had overpaid. I don't agree at all. I watched this guy on a nightly basis. I also know what he means in that room. Andre calls him the caretaker of the leadership group. He's the guy who's calling everybody to make sure they're okay, driving the new guys around to get them familiar with the city. He's an incredibly valuable player. And listen, whether you get to the right spots or not, scoring goals in the NHL is the hardest thing to do. And Lawson Krause is scoring. I think he's been worth every penny of it. And you talk about chemistry between Schmaltz and Keller, Matias Machelli, and Losson, Krauss absolutely have that chemistry. They love playing together and it shows. Yeah, I do think. I think you and I could probably have chemistry with Machelli, though. You know what's interesting about that? When you start looking at the primary assists on Loss in Krause's goals, you'd be surprised at how few of them are Matheas Macheteas Machelli, like Nick Bust. Basically as many. So I dove into that in a story I wrote on Krause and it actually surprised me as well, because Kraus is the one saying it himself. All I got to do is just get to a spot in Chelly by

me with a buck, but a lot of other people have set up Lossing Krause as well. That's a good point. No, I mean, I think Cherney's right on that because a note that I had was I was amazed to find that Keller and Schmalt had the same number of 5-1-5 points as Travis Boyd, and not to take anything away from Boyd, that's good for him, but that's also not what I expected heading into the year. And really, it has been Machete and Kraus and Karkoni here, who he's tied for the league, lead in 5-1-5 goals with Artemmy Panarin, Kyle Connor, and Zach Hyman. He's got 12 of them in, or 11, 5-1-5 goals, 12 total in 24 games. And we were talking at the start about, you know, Connor Ingram's story and how long it took to get to this point

and all that. I mean, Carcone, he had seven years where he primarily played, or in the NHL. I mean, undrafted guy, obviously undersized, but finally 27 years old and having this type of production. A lot of it, I mean, crazy shooting percentage. I don't think anyone's expect he to score 12 goals for every 24 games he plays. But that doesn't take away from how fun of a story it's been. And also, like, he looks very good out there. And so, quite a fine for them. And, and I mean, those are the guys who have been carrying him at 5-15 now, which on the one hand, you're like, you don't want to bank on this, but on the other, that means you'd expect that the top guys would get better at 5-15. And once that happens,

all of a sudden, and I think that's going to cover for a lot of whatever regression you'd expect from some of these other shooting percentages. Yeah, and maybe when they get healthy, too, when Hayton and McPaid are back in the lineup, that can help as well. But Carcone is a fascinating story too, right? It just got it one way. He was so ecstatic to be on that one way and not think about going back to the HL. I wrote a story on him.

I think it was the start of last season where at one point, Michael Carcone was his own agent because he didn't have representation. So he negotiated his own contract, which is just insane to me to think about in this day and age. but there's a guy that's just clearly so driven and it has dealt with so much, worked so hard to get here. Whether he's on an unsustainable pace or not, you can certainly see Michael Carcone getting to 20 goals this year. And I don't think anybody would have seen that coming when this season started. I think we were talking about Carcone being one of those guys that probably shuttled in and out of the fourth line on this team. And that was probably the ceiling for him.

We were incredibly wrong. Can you Keller and Cooley hook them up with some representation? I mean, come on. Let's get my car code. I'm an advocate. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, all of a sudden, those three are going to become a pack.

He's got yours that's now. You're going to bump in his tires here. He's a fantastic. I like Scott a lot. But yeah, he holds some sway over this organization. That's awesome. Okay. Let's look forward here.

So the question that I have for you is you look ahead to next year. And by my calculations, the coyotes currently have just under $36 million in cab commitments. If you look at the blue line, they obviously have Jersey, Moser, and Balamacki's RFA rights, but not a single one of their NHL defensemen is currently under contract for 2024-25. We mentioned the draft capital, right? They have three seconds and three-thirds at the 2024 draft. They also have another seven second round picks between the 2025 and 26 drafts. And no organization has this combination of cap flexibility and treasure chest of assets moving forward, right?

And even with all the, we mentioned this change in approach and all the guys they signed this summer, I think Kerr Fitz was a two-year deal, but a lot of them were one-year deals, which also maintains that flexibility, right? I'm kind of curious for your take on with the start they've been off to and with that in mind, what does the rest of this season and then heading into next off season look like for this team in terms of motivation, incentive to add, how aggressive they're going to be targeting certain types of players, like what is the play here for this team assuming that it's not just a fun story but also one where you get to March and all of a sudden there's still fourth in the central sevens in the west? Like if that is the case and that's the landscape, what is the

What's the play, I guess, for Bill Armstrong and the Coyotes. Yeah, he's mostly spoken in platitudes on this that the team will dictate it, but I've gleaned some insight from him recently. The Coyotes are not going to be in the market for a big-name rental. I can tell you that definitively. They're not going to give up a lot of capital, whether it's prospects or draft, to acquire a guy who's here to help them make a push in the playoffs, a big name. Like I said, maybe a filling guy.

I could see a rental in that instance, particularly on the blue line where I think they could use a little more help. Maybe they'll make an addition there. But I think what Bill is focused on more in terms of opportunities is finding a guy like a Jersey who can grow with this core. It's not a guy who's, okay, it's just for the short term. Who can we bring in that can grow with this core? You've heard the name Noah Hanifett out there. And yeah, there's a possibility there, provided the acquisition cost isn't too high. I don't think they want to give up top prospect. so that may take them out of the running in the end. But that's a guy who's at the right age, right,

where he could grow with this group and be around for a while. So I think that's what he would like to do most of all. But if this team is in a playoff spot and they feel like they have, here's a piece that we could really use for the playoff push. Maybe they'll go and get that complimentary piece and give up some of their, you know, ridiculous wealth of draft capital. I think they're willing to do that. Yeah, I think they're definitely uniquely positioned to leverage.

It's similar to what you said with Jersey and maybe even to a greater extent. The Haniffin one, I'm not even necessarily worried about the acquisition costs. I'm more worried about the fact that he reportedly turned down like a Devon Taves like equivalent extension, which would put him in $7 million plus. About the Arizona Coyotes here, right? Yeah, we're talking about the Coyotes. The Capp floor team. So what does a contract like that do to your cap structure? If you look at their cap structure, you, I know Clayton Keller and Nick Schmaltz at one,

point we're viewed as bad contracts. Nobody's talking about that anymore. You can't find a bad contract on this sheet and they have to be really responsible with the money they spend. So yeah, that's a very big concern to think about one thinking about bringing Noah Hanifin aborted. Well, do you think that changes though if the rink gets sorted out head of the team is still as competitive as it is? Like, do you think that there is at some point going to be an influx of resources into this team? Is that a realistic thing? Is that a realistic thing? or do you think we're getting kind of ahead of ourselves by thinking that? I think we're probably getting ahead of ourselves because first of all,

they've got to get the rink settled in. I know there's another potential site, but we'll see if they can actually close the deal. And then how long does it take to build it? How much money have they lost in the process playing at Mullet Arena? How happy or unhappy is the board of governors and other NHL teams with, you know, continuing to dole out money through revenue sharing to the coyotes? There's so many things that I think about when wondering whether they're going to start spending more money at some point.

I just don't know yet. I think it's premature. Yeah, I think I get the fit with Anathan. I think actually, you know, Jersey's been so good for them. And like him and Moser have been really good. I think Hanifin would be a perfect if I was actually thinking in a lab of a partner for Jersey long term. And if it would make a lot of sense. But yeah, it would take quite a commitment.

I was thinking, you know, of this team's center-depth, and they'll certainly get some of these guys back at some point. But a guy like Adam Henrique, for me, makes a lot of sense, as I think the acquisition cost will be relatively low. I know last year we were talking about, like, oh, the ducks could potentially get a first for him. His play has dropped off a little bit, and now you only get the one year of it as an expiring.

But someone like that makes a lot of sense for me, where I still, even if they get Hayden and McBean back, I'd still like to see them add someone who could play in more of a top six role just so that, even if it's a complimentary one, just so they're not necessarily relying on coolly to do all of that at this point and give them a bit more depth there. But yeah, it'll probably be something more on the margins. But the reason why I frame it this way is because I do think, like, with the state of the West and particularly the central division, assuming they're going to get anything resembling this type

of goaltending from Ingram moving forward, and we've seen no signs to think that's not going to be the case. this team will hang around. And so we are going to get into a point in February, March, where we're going to be like, all right, what are the coyotes going to do here? Because I think their calculus has changed compared to where it's been in previous seasons. Yeah, and I think it's fair. The picture in the West is such a big part of this because they're just, there's such a divide.

You've got the top teams. And I think I was so wrong on the LA Kings. I didn't think they were ready, but that's an elite team. So I put LA, Vegas, Colorado, and Dallas in that top tier, past that at? I mean, I don't even think Winnipeg's that good a team. I'm not convinced that that's a good team or a playoff team. We'll see. I think they've taken advantage of poor West as well. But there are a lot of teams in the mix.

Edmonton is heated up. Are they going to keep that up? Is Minnesota going to go on or run the team that everybody probably expected to be a playoff team? Or have those teams fallen off? Can they make, can Edmonton make up that much ground up? And there's a lot of questions. There's just a lot of sort of, meh, mediocre, or maybe just slightly above average teams in the Western Conference past those top teams. So there is absolutely opportunity this year to get into the playoffs. The question, you know, I don't know how you feel about this, but a lot of coaches,

executives will talk about the value of playing playoff games, just getting in and getting that experience. How much value is there if you make the playoffs and you have to face Dallas or Vegas or Colorado in the first round and just get your clock cleaned? Is that good for a team's long-term growth? I don't even know. I'm not sure there's a definitive answer, but that's the Coyote's path.

If they get in, it's going to be one of those three teams, and I don't like their chances in any of those situations. Yeah, me neither necessarily, but I will say I selfishly want to see playoff games in the Mullet, Craig. So let's make that happen. And I'm glad we got to connect finally. I was good to have you on.

And you know, you were mentioning your Discord earlier, The PDO cast Discord has just been blowing up with Coyote's talk this season. So I'm sure that the listeners are going to be happy that we got to do this. And it's been a fun product and a lot of stories that are worth paying attention to and watch and moving forward. I'll let you plug some stuff during the way out. Let the listeners know what you got going on and where they can check you out. They can find me on, I have to say X, don't I? Formerly Twitter.

At Craig S. Morgian. P.H.N.S. is the website. You can find all of my content there. just wrote something, a deep piece on Connor Ingram, as we've been mentioned, with the great great insights of Kevin Woodley. And I like to check in, as we talked about a lot of the, a lot of the coyotes narrative is about the future. So I like to check in on the prospects a lot. I'm going to be doing a check-in on one of their key prospects, Connor Geeky, a center prospect who has just been ripping it up in the WHL, going to talk to Lee Stembeak, their director of

player development a little later today about him. So some things upcoming on PHN exports. Awesome. We'll keep up the great work, Craig. hopefully we'll have you back on again soon we're going to let you go here because you got to get to the ring the beat never stops and we'll take a break ourselves on our part and when we come back we will end the week with our mailbag show with Ryan Lambert here on the Hockey P.Dio cast streaming on the SportsA Radio and I do. Thanks for you.