The Hockey PDOcast - NHL standouts with Shayna Goldman

Episode Date: November 1, 2022

Dimitri welcomes Shayna Goldman of The Athletic to highlight the most notable performances in this young NHL season. She also runs through the top players to add to your fantasy hockey lineups.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.

Progressing to the mean since 2015. It's the Hockey Pediocast with your host, Dmitri Philipovic. Welcome to the Hockey Piedocast. My name is Dmitri Filipovich. And joining me on today's show is my pal, Sheena Goldman. Shana, what's going on? Hey, thanks for having me. So here's a plan for today.

We're going to bounce around the league. We're going to talk about a number of notable performances, both good and bad. We're going to highlight some players that are worth investing in after they got off to strong starts for those of you playing fantasy pools. So stick around for that. I wish fantasy hockey was more of a thing just in general. I enjoy playing with friends, but I also play fantasy football and it's so prevalent. You write about fantasy hockey for the athletic.

I wish it was like a thing that everyone cared about significantly more because it would make covering the sport more fun, I think. Yeah, I think when you have something invested, whether it's your fantasy lineup or even like placing bets now, it definitely gets you a little bit more engaged around the league. It helps you learn about players, learn about trends. you're looking out for things that you probably didn't care about before. I mean, the average fan, not nerds like us, don't care about watching, you know, 32 teams play. But if you have someone like Tage Thompson on your team, you're going to now be invested in the Sabres and what he's doing right, what he's doing wrong, is it sustainable and all of these things. So I think it makes the game a lot more exciting. And there's ways you can do it without touch a commitment like daily fantasy and those are fun too.

But it would be nice if fantasy hockey started getting the appreciation of fantasy football. does. It's challenging in its own way, but I don't know. I think it's really fun. It's nice to be invested in something that's not once a week. Yeah. Yeah, I can be a grind in terms of the daily format, just keeping up with everything and there's so many changes in the ins and outs. But it's funny you mentioned Tage Thompson because yesterday I tweeted out his stats from his two most recent performances. And it felt like the most common replies I got were actually people talking about how he was crushing it for them in fantasy and whatnot. So maybe the tides are turning a little bit there. Yeah, it's really interesting too because like not always,

When a player transitions from wing to center, sometimes they struggle because they have more defensive responsibilities and, you know, playing up the middle is a little bit of an adjustment. And they have to be the play driver unless they have an elite winger because that can happen. Like, I think Chandler Stevenson and Mark Stone, like, Mark Stone's a play driver right there. But for Thompson, like, that's what he's become. And last year, you know, a lot of us had questions was this season out of nowhere. Did he finally figure it out? Is it possible that moving to center is what his game needed all along?

And, you know, there's the coaching aspect of it too with Don Granato. but I like that he's showing already that last year wasn't a fluke, and maybe it's a little bit of a carryover and high shooting percentage and stuff, but he's showing like, this is who I am. Yeah, maybe he doesn't go against the perfect aging curve. Maybe he's developing a little later, but that can happen. And he's showing that he's like a legitimate player to watch in Buffalo, and I think it's so exciting.

Yeah. Well, I was going to save it to later, and I don't necessarily want to spend too much time on it here today, just because we recently did a full episode on the Sabres on the PDO gas, but I guess while we're here, we may as well get to Tage Thompson. And I think it's the biggest story from last night, right? He went just absolutely nuclear.

He followed up a two-goal, one-assist performance against the Blackhawks on Saturday night with three goals and three assists last night versus the Red Wings. Over his past three games now, he's managed to fire off 40 combined shot attempts, and he got 25 of them on net. And the reason why I think he's so interesting, you mentioned kind of his later development, sort of this arc he's on. There were clearly a lot of eyes on him heading into the season after the Sabre's sort of preemptively threw a $50 million extension at him this offseason, even though he was already

under contract and they could have conceivably waited to see how he followed up that 38 goal campaign he had last year. But they clearly believe that that was replicable or that he was going to be an impact player. And so I think people were surprised in terms of the timing of it. And it is a very unconventional story that a player at this point of their career kind of develops into this type of an offensive force. But I can't help watching him play that it really seems like he's very legit. He's such a unique weapon in terms of the way he moves around the ice and kind of how he can create using both his frame,

but also the nifty hands he has in tight. Yeah, because he has the size and strength that everybody wants. And if you actually can have size, strength, and skill, you're going to be a general manager's favorite right there. And for him, it's the shot volume. It's the shot quality. And now it's the finishing talent. And it's interesting because, you know,

you look at Buffalo and you don't see a ton of superstars just yet. You see Dahlini who could become one. You see, you know, Thompson who could become one. And Skinner, who I'd is like a tier below superstar who's kind of on the downturn. But that line of Skinner, Thompson, and Tuck, you have three threats right there that maybe not everyone's immediately going to register them as threats. But if you have the three of them on the ice together, it does give you a little pause

on who to pay attention to because you have three players who can beat you in different ways. And I like that Thompson still is breaking forward as, you know, the threat. And the early contract's interesting, of course, like did they need to do this? I think with early contracts, you could see a player like Robert Thomas. if he repeated his season, he was going to make more money. And Tim Stooklow, there's a million reasons why you could say he's going to build on what he did last year, pay him early. Thompson is a little bit tricky because if last year was a fluke, they just paid him for nothing,

hoping he would repeat it. But I guess he's showing them very early on that this is who he is, this is who he's going to be, and they just got themselves a really good player for a long time. Yeah, it's funny. He started the year a bit slow in terms of the production, but I thought he was creating his fair share of chances, and now he's back up to exactly that 15% shooting clip that he was out. last year when he scored the 38 goals. And if he keeps generating looks at this rate,

I have no doubt that they're going to goals will keep coming, and I'm just a believer in his talent. So I really like Tage Thompson. Okay, the next guy I want to talk about here with you is Eric Carlson, who is having a bit of a renaissance start to this season. Here's a fun stat for you on Eric Carlson. So the sharks have played 205-5 minutes with Carlson on the ice this season. In those minutes, they're breaking even in goals. They're tied at 11, and they're slightly ahead in shots at plus six, which for, I think, a team that's where the sharks are at, collectively, is highly encouraging. Now, in the 325 minutes that Carlson hasn't been on the ice, they're outscored, 17 to 5, and they have a 39% shot rate. It's remarkable that they've managed as a team to generate

five goals in 325, even strength minutes without him. But I guess that kind of speaks to both how good Carlson's been so far and also all of the other problems that are kind of surrounding this team when he's not out there. Yeah, it's interesting how everyone views Carlson, I think. He's this generational defenseman who everyone acknowledged what he was in Ottawa. When he went to San Jose, the injuries piled up, and I think the fact that he played through some of them definitely hurt what could have been, but it was where they were at that moment.

And now this is one of the worst sharks' teams that they could have put out in a while, and yet he's really taking the team by storm, and it's nice to see because they did get rid of Brent Byrne. So you had these two offensive defensemen that it felt like we're pushing for the opportunities each other had, like especially on the power play if they were using two defensemen on it, when we know that four forward one defenseman powerplay units are better, or one was getting power play one and not the other. So now that Carlson has a little bit more room to be the number one, he's really jumping out of it.

And he has such a great influence on the team's offensive generation. among, you know, number one defensemen. He's one of the best already with how he's, you know, impacting the team. Shot generation, quality chance generation relative to his teammates, that's really, you know, that's really strong. And, you know, now that he's scoring goals, everyone's noticing he's good again because there was that discourse a couple of years ago that he wasn't as effective because he wasn't scoring goals,

even though Puckter's Sauruition is, you know, that huge strength for him. But the other thing, and sorry to ramble that. No, no, no, go for it. I'm loving it. David Quinn, you know, his coaching has been interesting at the NHL level between New York and San Jose. And I think that there's a lot that we can point out that he's done wrong with forwards. But it does seem like he really does know how to manage, you know, puck-moving defenseman. If you look at his time in New York, you see that Tony D'Angelo played, we strictly focused on the ice, some of his best hockey under Quinn,

because he really knew what situations to put him out in and how to maximize his game and let him play to his strength. And the same with Adam Fox. He really did develop well under him, too. And we could say that Adam Fox is an elite talent would have happened anyway. But there is still something to say about it. And now you see how Eric Carlson is thriving under him so far. So I'm interested to see if maybe this coaching change is going to benefit him more than most in San Jose.

Yeah. I mean, listen, they scored only 24 total goals across all situations the team this season. He's been on the ice for 17 of them. He's gotten a point on 11 of them. And he scored six of the goals himself, as you mentioned. and it's not even like it's a byproduct necessarily of him sort of inflating his production because they're just using him with Hurtle and Meyer at all times and kind of supercharging one unit in that regard.

It really haven't even been that good when they've been on the ice together. It's just been actually purely Carlson who's driving a lot of his production. And I think the biggest revelation to me here just watching him play is how much better he looks physically, like just seeing the way he's gliding up and down the ice again, how he's taking the puck for solo rushes when there's space out in front of him, as opposed to sort of passively not being confident in his own physical ability and trying to pass the puck up instead. It's honestly the best, I think we've seen him look since maybe like 2015 or so as crazy as that is to say. Like he's been effective since he clearly had that historically great 2017 postseason where he almost single-handedly willed the senators to basically one goal away from making the Stanley Cup final.

But even at that point, he was kind of hobbled. He was playing on one foot. He was hurt. He wasn't necessarily using it through pure physical domination. It was more kind of guile and craftiness and skill. And now all of a sudden, I don't know what happened this offseason, whether he's just finally healthy or what it is a coaching change, just whatever else is going on around him.

He clearly looks like a different player physically, and I think that's been really, really awesome to see. Yeah, if you look to last year, too, he had such a strong start to the year. And I think that there were so many things he was doing right below the surface that was so encouraging. And then his season was cut short by injury and something completely unrelated to the groin that bothered him for years.

It wasn't anything with his legs. It was something so different. I wonder how much, you know, the fact that it was an upper body injury. I think what was the torn muscle in his arm versus something with his legs, that he could keep training his legs even if he wasn't in a game setting. And that had to help him, I would assume, this year, keep that jump in his step because he looks great. And if he's physically there, we know that he can be so dominant. And yes, like going back to aging curves, we know defense in 10 to decline.

but we have to remember when someone's level is so high and his is, this is, you know, someone who is an elite defenseman, a total game changer, their lower level is still going to be above average. So I would wholeheartedly expect him if he's healthy to be an above average defenseman, and I really do hope that he can sustain it because he's such a fun player to watch. I really do as well. I guess if there is a big takeaway here moving forward beyond just it being great to see him healthy and producing again, you know, the sharks team, regardless of how well he plays,

it's pretty, they've been pretty deliberate in terms of their attention, intention of where they're at as a franchise. I think they're going to make everyone basically available, except for, I guess, Tomas Hurtle, who they recently resigned to a big extension. And so I wonder, as good as Carlson's looked, he's still, you look at Cap Friendly, he's on the books for four more years after this one at 11.5 million per. And I wonder, like, regardless of how good he looks, do you think there is any sort of market or possibility for a team talking themselves into going out, inquiring, acknowledging that it's probably going to take a massive salary retention

and probably the Sharks even taking bad salary back in return just because of how little cap space most teams have right now. But I do wonder, it's such a shame if he is going to play at this level, not to put the cart before the horse after only just 10 games or so, but I do wonder, like, it would be nice to see him playing on a team where it was actually meaningful at this point. That would be really nice to see. Like, this isn't some depth defenseman who would get traded for a second round pick

or something ridiculous. You know, like, this is someone who could be a game changer. I think a good example, too. Like, we're seeing Brent Burns get off to such a good start after he's had a couple tough years with the hurricanes, and it shows how important surroundings can be and maximizing a player and finding the right partner for them. So, you know, there's life after 32 for a player. If they started at such a high level, which Carlson did, it just is going to be a matter

of making the dollars and fence work. And, you know, if San Jose wants to turn this around quickly, they do need to be aggressive. They're in a really weird position because they did choose to, keep hurdle and it feels like a lot of their moves have taken them back and forth a couple times already so now with the Meyer decision they have to figure out do they jump at the chance to move someone like Carlson and make the salary work and try to turn it around take bad contracts back and bring in a bunch of assets for it maybe that'll turn it around or do they have to make the decision you know to keep to keep my or keep the cap high and then you try to figure something out around

Meyer hurdle and Carlson like that's a good. going to be really tough to do, I think. I think one big contract is going to have to go one more big contract, and if it's Carlson, you're losing a very good defenseman, but it's cap space they could use, given their situation, and I'm sure most teams are in the league to use someone

of Carlson's caliber on their blue lines. Yeah, it's just tough to see a realistic fit. I feel like it would probably have to be one of these kind of younger upstart teams who are on the way up but are necessarily fully contenders, just because they'd probably have a lot of productive players on ELCs right now as opposed to having high price players,

so they might actually have some financial wiggle room. Whereas you look at most contenders' cap sheets, it's going to be tough to even at 50% retained make that work. But I think it's pretty clear from the sharks. I mean, they retained $2.7 million for the next three years on Brent Burns and got essentially nothing in return for him just to shed some salary and get his cap hit off the books. They've bought out Barton Jones and incurred a big cap hit as well along the way. Like I think they've been pretty clear about,

what their intentions are and what they want to do. And I imagine they'd be interested in facilitating something like that. But it might be wishful thinking on our part to actually make the money work for anyone involved. Yeah, it might be. That's why we need, we have to just keep manifesting creativity from general managers to find ways to make it work. Because, you know, there's ways to maneuver in a salary cap league. If anyone's going to figure out something like that, it would be a team like Detroit or Tampa Bay Bay to have something so spicy that's going to annoy half the league.

like that would be the kind of deal to happen or somehow Vegas finds a way to make it work and dumps out like half a translo styler. It has to be totally off the rails, which I think we would thrive on that. So, you know, if anyone wants to make it happen, please, but I doubt it can. Yeah, yeah, I would love that. All right, let's do our Tammy Panarin. I know you wanted to talk about him. I'll give you the floor here to start.

Okay, so last year, it was interesting to watch Panarin, especially before the deadline, because at 5-on-5, his numbers weren't great, and he's someone, you know, his game score wasn't better than his point-totals, which his game score has his point-totals in it. You would hope that if he was driving play enough that his game score would be much better than his point-totals on a nightly basis, and it wasn't the case. Some of it was that a lot of the scoring was just power play scoring, and his 5-on-5 numbers weren't great,

or that he'd have, like, a really bland game and then have two seconds of brilliance, and he'd turn a game on his head because that's from the elite player can do. after the deadline we did see that change you know getting capable line mates it really showed that as much as in years past the rangers could get away with panorin strome and whoever on that you know right wing you know it was someone more defensive

it's still to be someone who could keep up with them and compliment them and it seemed like they really struggled to find that until they added cop so going into this year it's a different story you have a different center now for the first time in panarin's tenure you have trocheck there who i think is a better player on both ends of the ice in Strom. I think Strom peaked and, you know, it really wasn't his best last year. And now they have Alexei Lapinej on the right wing there.

And you can see on a nightly basis what a difference maker Panarin is. I just think he looks so rejuvenated this season. There's that jump in his step. There's the creativity. There's the way he's possessing the puck and out muscling opponents and outsmarting them. And it's everything that we know he had in his game that just wasn't there consistently enough last year to start this year. So maybe we had some concerns like, is he?

aging. Is this what it is? You know, he's obviously getting into his 30s now, even though he has less NHL experience at this point, that, you know, less wear and tear from it on his game. But I like the start he's getting off to because it's showing like maybe last year was just kind of a flaky year, a step back. And when he started trending up at the deadline, that showed where he's going from here because he's having a great start and adding a lot of like pop to the Rangers at even strength that they were missing. Yeah, I mean, he's got what, five goals, 11 assists in his first 10 games. I tracked the four games right off the bat for them. He had set up teammates for 30 shots and 13 scoring chances of their own through his passing.

So everything was really flowing through him. It's interesting that you mentioned the 5-1-5 because that has been such a big question mark for the Rangers. I actually wanted to talk about the power play because I think their statistical profile there is so fascinating right now where they're not only first and expected goals at a 12.4 per 60, which is the best figure this year and the best figure that we have going back to 2007. they're first in shots generated and chances generated and they're only quote unquote scoring at a 12 highest rate because their shooting percentage is kind of in the tank

and that's after a year where last year they were amongst the league leaders in that regard and you just look at kind of where they're generating shots from how they're how they're clicking at this point and I can't help but feel like there's so many more goals coming as well if they keep playing that way with the man advantage yeah I think you're right on that like last year you know a lot of the shots and chances were coming from ultimately coming from that net front area because it was Chris Kreider finishing off everyone essentially passes to him. Their shot passes, you know, he was getting in the way of everything and finishing at such

a high rate. And his scoring was so hard because the team was shooting the puck at a higher rate than they had in years past. This year, it's a little bit different. They're still going with the units that's four right-handed skaters, which last year, that was a bit of a problem because you saw Ryan Stroma points was in the right circle, and the shooting angle wasn't great for him. And his speed of shooting the puck when he was receiving it was a little bit slower than

you could want. so goalies could read it, you know, penalty killers could read it, and it didn't always work out for them. And then they adjusted things to have Panarin on the right. And you knew he was in a passing position, so it didn't always make enough sense, and you knew it was going to be Zabanajad really shooting and Kreider in front.

This year is a bit different because you still have Panarin on the right. You still have Zabanjan on the left and Fox at the point, and Kreider has been at front. But you have the Nitrochev now in the spot, and he's a much quicker shooter than Strom was. he's still right-handed, but because he gets the shot off a lot quicker, it's been working out for them. So now they have three shooting threats right across the way, and he's been good at passing. So it just feels like there's a lot more potential for this power play unit.

And they have options if they need to mix it up, whether it's Lepenay or Kaka to get a left-handed player there, which I don't really think is going to happen. It's, you know, the way it's been in years past, that top unit is that top unit. So unless there's an injury, it's probably not changing. But it just feels like this year there's a little bit of a different look to it. Sabanajad's sparring on all cylinders already. Panair is making the passes happen a little bit more than last year, and he's been a bit more willing to shoot. And then Trochak, I think, is just really changing the composition of the powerplay from before,

even though there's so much consistency in the players on the unit and what their roles are supposed to be. It's funny, though, you look at, if you look at Micah's website, and what he has got, like, the heat map for where they're generating their shots from on the power play, and it's just one big blob, kind of exactly where you'd want it, right? it's like the middle of the ice and the inner slot. It's the net front where Crider is, and then it's the left circle where Zabinajad's posted up for one-timers.

And the reason why that's interesting to me is because at the end of the day, everything does flow through Panarin's brilliance and his ability to kind of read the opposing defense, pick the opposing penalty kill shell apart, and then get the puck to where it needs to be. And so he's kind of like the maestro for that. But where he occupies on the ice is kind of actually the one region where they're just not shooting from, which might be the good thing because ultimately you want him passing it to guys in more ideal scoring positions as a person.

opposed to him being the triggerman. Yeah, exactly. Like, he, look, he can be a very effective shooter, but the best strength he has is passing. And last year, if you look at the same heat mat, you would see net front shots and shots from the left circle, but you weren't seeing as many from the point. And this year you are, whether it's because players are a little bit more, are rotating a bit more, they're not, you know, standing still as much. You know, that obviously helps.

It's Foxx shooting a little bit more. So now it's Fox as a passing and a shooting threat and Panarin as the passer. of like looking at it when you're killing a penalty going, well, we know neither one of these players is going to shoot the puff, we can cheat the Benadad the entire time. They have to think about it differently because you have Trocheco will shoot and you'll have more from the middle. You have

credit, you have the bandage ad, and now Fox will shoot it a little bit more. So there's still it's not, you know, the most dimensional power play unit because you have Panarin in the passing position, but there's a lot more dimension than years pass. So I think that the goals are just going to keep coming for this top unit. I'm so interested in just the general

kind of philosophy of optimizing power play efficiency and scoring efficiency in that regard, because it's clearly the one area where you literally have one extra skater around the ice, you're typically spending most of your time in the offensive zone. So it's your highest leverage opportunity to actually turn shots into goals. And I wonder if teams have spent enough time kind of accounting for that and then acting accordingly in terms of their planning. I know you recently wrote about how, you know, we're seeing yet again an increase in usage of four forward one defensemen setups on on teams power plays. I guess beyond that though, I'm so curious if there's other ways that teams can be going about

increasing the likelihood they're going to be scoring on the power play, considering how hard it is to generally score at 5-on-5. Yeah, that's really interesting. Like if teams are going to start making more adjustments for that. And, you know, some of it is fewer shots from the point. You know, a lot of teams lie on a shot from the point and some net traffic in front to create some chaos and make something happen, but have that primary shooter in the circles. And we know a lot of teams have always had that. you think Stamcoast and his, you know, him from his office, Alex Ovechkin and obviously Mika's

Abanajad, but the more teams are focusing on their best shooter shooting the puck, the better that's going to be, I think. And it'll be interesting to see, you know, we know the basics, right? We know that it helps to have a player on their off wing from the circle. It helps to have lateral passes that are going to challenge your opponent. But if everyone's running the same thing, is it going to come to a point where everyone has to start getting a little bit more creative? Like, is this going to, this way going to start trending in the wrong direction because penalty killers can account for it a little bit more? Is it that teams being willing to use more offensive players on the penalty kill are going to change things for anyone

because they can read the plays a little bit better because they're making the same ones themselves? Like, I'm really intrigued, like, how power play scoring keeps going up if there's going to be, you know, any sort of shift or this is just the optimal way to do it and it is what it is, good luck trying to beat it. Yeah, yeah. I think fighting against predictability is going to be huge for teams power plays. And I'm a big proponent of trying to attack off the rush more as opposed to sort of allowing the other team to get set in their defensive shell. But, all right, Shana, we're going to take a quick break in the conversation here. And then when we come back, we're going to keep chatting about a variety of topics. So you are listening to the

Hockey P.Ocast streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network. All right. We're back here on the Hockey PDOCAST of Shana Goldman. Shana, I want to talk about Jonathan Huberto. So I'll ask you the question, how worried should we be about his start to his flame's tenure? I mean, the flames are still clicking. They're still winning games. So I don't think that there has to be total panic just yet. If the flames were floundering, it's a different conversation.

But, you know, it hasn't been a perfect start. You know, they're definitely not getting lucky bounces. It's not a matter of not having goaltending, sinking them or anything like that. It's just that, you know, the flames need him to be the play driver on that line. And when he was in Florida, you could look at the combinations that worked. It was players like Sam Bennett and Anthony's a player. It's not like he was playing. all the time at 5-on-5 with Barcoff, which allowed him to get some softer matchups,

which is better for his game. And you think that a player like Lysolin Home works for him because, you know, he's a defensive forward. He doesn't have to take top matchups because they have a third line that can take that on, and he's a frequent shooter. And even a player like Tepoli, in theory, works with Euberdo because Tafoli at his best has a good pastor with him. But they're just going to need some more from him.

And obviously, it's an adjustment. but, you know, to start the year, obviously, they probably were expecting him to hit the ground running a little bit more than he has. There's still time for that to happen, obviously. There's, what, 90% of the season left. Yep. But, you know, there's a little reason for concern,

and it might start forcing them to change things up a little bit more than they thought they'd have to with their combinations to figure out where he fits best, and, you know, you find your most valuable players where they're supposed to fit in the lineup, and then you can let the chips fall everywhere else, I guess. Yeah, I was being overly dramatic. It's, or seven games in, of course.

Like, I don't, I don't want to, you know, go overboard here. I do think it is an interesting topic, though. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, listen, I think it's worth pointing out. He's played nearly 85 on five minutes so far this season in those seven games. He's got just one point in that time, which came off of this weird broken play where I believe the puck just bounced off of an official's leg and, like, right into the slot with the clock winding down in a period and got over to Tifoli and he put it in. he's always going to profile as more of a you know you mentioned they need him to be a

play driver I think I kind of classify as more of a creator for that line just because with Tofoli and Linholm they're both fine players but they're kind of ideally would be more on the receiving end and you kind of need him to create more at the same time Hubertos still going to need to get his own shots off and even his shot rates have plummeted so far where I believe he's only got like 13 shot attempts or something at 5-1-5 this season which needs to increase as well um I'm a little bit worried about that line just because they haven't scored yet. At the same time, as you mentioned, the flames are 5 and 2 so far this season.

And I think there's just something weird going on in general where if you look at the team's offensive output, Nazim Khadry, who's off to a great start in his flames tenure, leads the team with 4-5-15 points so far. Do you know who he's tied with two other members of the flames? Do you know who those two members of the flames are? They're tied for the team lead in 5-55 points? Is Backling one of them, which is like the very unlikely... No. It's going to be someone that's very unlikely, actually. Hmm. I'm going to guess. Gosh, that's hard. It's going to be like Brett Richie.

Yes. Yes. Maybe it's not due by, if it means you're Ponny? It's Brett Richie and Michael Stone. Oh, so there we go. Yeah. I'm impressed that you got Brett Richie, though. So there you go. Yeah. So, you know, we're still at the point of the season where stats, like, that are a thing. So I think that's kind of an important thing to note. I guess what is interesting to me is the way Daryl Sutter is using his forwards, though, where it seems like he's been, I wonder if it's kind of just easing into it. They clearly have a lot of new personnel, so just kind of

figuring out where everything's going to fit. But especially the forward usage for him at 5-1-5 has been so evenly split. Where Backland, as you mentioned, leads a team with 12-13 per game at 5-15. And then Milan Luchich, who's their 10th most used forward, is at 10 and a half minutes. So pretty much everyone else is sandwiched kind of in between that tight gap. And that represents a big change from last year where that top line of Linholm-Gadro and Kachuk was clicking so well for them that Sutter was just understandably leaning on them and playing them 14 to 15 minutes a night at 5-15. And so I wonder as that line gets going potentially and goals actually start coming for them, if that's going to change a little bit. But it's been a rather innocuous start for both Hubert O and Lin-Holm considering kind of the productive years they had last year, respectively. I wonder if, you know, some of the line of deployment, too, like the forward lines getting more even ice time is, you know, an idea for players to clinch on to the systems because we know Calgary is so focused on their structure.

You know, a lot of teams, when you have offensive talent, it's, you know, concepts over systems a little bit more, not the Marty St. Louis extent that I think we both want to be go across the entire league. But with the flames, you know, first line last year, you had three league players, you know, playing together that, you didn't need as much structure there, but since now you're not going to have any line combination with that makeup that I guess the structure is a little bit more important. So I'm curious to see how it takes out. And I know they're going to tweak the lines it looks like for, you know, their next game, and you're going to have someone like cadre playing with Euberdo and Mangyipani. And I think it makes the line of just too top heavy and maybe this is how you get them going

to start and then, you know, you can start moving things around once players have a little bit more confidence and things like that. But I wonder if that'll help because, you know, Manteapani is someone who is a shooter above all else, but he brings more contributions to it. He's not completely slanted, even if the scoreline is for him. And someone like Kadri, who is a great volume shooter, is a dual threat at this point in his career too. So maybe that will help Huberto get going because he has someone who could set him up that if Kadri can, you know, pass him the puck, and he obviously has two players he can send it to,

maybe that's going to help, but I just don't think that's the long-term answer for them. if you have players like Leuchich moving up to your second line. Like I think that they need a little bit more of a threat where they're going to have a similar situation to last year where they were very top heavy and we saw that in the playoffs, hurt them a bit when, you know,

this off season we're all talking about how the flames have a much more balanced approach and how this is going to work out better for them. So I wonder, I mean, the other thing too is though they have assets to move that they really wanted you to bring in another forward. Like they have more than enough defense than right now, high end defenders.

So if they did choose to make a move up front to bring in another player if they see, well, this is the answer. To bring a more lineup balance, they could change it if they wanted to by moving a defender out. Yeah. But that's like jumping to gun. Well, I think a top six right winger is going to happen at some point. It's a necessity if they actually have Stanley Cup championship aspirations. But I definitely don't think that, you know, top loading or loading up the top line with both Huberto and cadre is a long-term fit.

I do actually kind of like the idea of Mangiopani with Huberto to get them going, though, just because he plays with so much more pace than guys like Lynn Holman and, um, and Tofoli where he actually kind of, you know, he can be sort of that engine in that regard where do like a lot of the dirty work in terms of just motoring up and down the ice and allow Huberto's playmaking to kind of shine a little bit and just get him to the puck in space. But yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, listen, Huberto's on-ice shooting percentage right now is 4.3%. It was 11.4, 9.9.9 and 10.1, the previous three seasons. So I think we have a pretty good track record to indicate that even if this is a

slightly different offensive environment than that kind of high-powered, you know, high-octane offensive attack that the Panthers had in those years. I still expect it to be closer to that than 4.3. So eventually the goals will start coming. But it is kind of crazy to think that in seven games so far, like Elias Linholm hasn't been on the ice for a single five-on-five goal four. And after he had scored 42 goals last year, it's just, it's a weird start considering the sort of the expectations on all these guys, really. Yeah, and that's a hard part of it because, you know, any other situation, maybe there wouldn't be those high expectations on them. It would just be like, all right, go play and figure it out from there.

But like in this situation, after the season someone like went home had last year and after the magnitude of the trades Calgary made over the summer, like the expectations heightened with each move and rightfully so. So there's going to be, you know, a lot of attention on it. But it'll be interesting to see how they do over this next stretch. And, you know, like tonight they're playing the crack. And so maybe you could think this is an easy enough opponent, but, you know, they do have upcoming games against teams that are performing better than expected. Like, you know, the Predators should be an easy one for them, but then they have games against the Devils and the Islanders. So it's going to be interesting to see how they handle it, especially once they take that road trip east. You know, just like we talk a lot about teams making the Western road trips now tough they can be, the flames are going to have their own challenges when they go east.

So I'm curious, you know, how they figure this out, you know, at home before they go on the road. On the big time silver lining is I think the 515 infrastructure and kind of Darryl Sutter system there is in place. The silver lining is that the power plate does look legitimately awesome, and I think that was part of the logic of what Huberto would bring to the table for this team. And I believe they're sixth in power play goals per 60, their fourth and expected goals per 60 there. And I've noted before, like, I love the kind of the motion that they're using. We talk before the break about what power plays could do to kind of differentiate themselves or increase the level of optimization for scoring. and I'm always so frustrated when each of the five guys is assigned to one specific area on the ice

and they just basically stand there and it allows the other team to know exactly where the shots are coming from or what each guy is going to do. And this flames power play so far you've seen Hubert O basically on both flanks. You've seen him kind of go towards the goal line and be a distributor from there. You've seen Lynn Holman-Cadry alternate being in the bumper and in the slot and going back and forth. And so given the other, given the opposing penalty kill different looks is really important. And that's something they've thrived off already. So while the 5-on-5 has been a work in progress, I actually think I really like what I've seen from their power play.

Yeah, I agree with you on that. And with Hubert-O-2, like, if we didn't see the power play scoring, then it's time to panic. Because if you look at his game and all this passing, like, a lot of it's patted by the powerplay. And, you know, that's fine. When, you know, in the grand team of things, it really isn't that big of a problem when you're talking about the MVP discussion is a big deal. But, like, in the grand scheme of things, it's totally fine that he's a really good power play performer. And that's something that does age well, too, which Calgary should be banking on, given the contract. they just handed out.

But it's nice to see that movement. A power play's the most dangerous one is in formation, but you can't be too predictable and you can't be too stagnant. You can't just be standing in the same spot, making the same passing plays. That's why my biggest frustration with like a five on three power play is how much ice that there is and how everyone can get so stuck where they're standing. So it's nice to see that movement and that's something that, you know, opponents should be taking note of and going for.

Maybe that's something we can try to replicate too. Maybe that's something wrong with our power play that is that we stand still too much at the time. And if the flames keep going, other teams will take note. That's how it works in the league. Yeah, yeah, I love that. All right, let's close the show here. Let's do a little little fantasy tips section. We're going to give the listeners who are playing in fantasy leagues, either players they can buy a low on or sneaky pickups who have been producing with increased opportunity. I'll give you the floor. Who's the first player you kind of want to identify here as someone that people should be going out and investing in?

I'm going to say Marty Naches, and he's someone whose ownership keeps rising. And we talked about him a few weeks ago how he finally is playing to his strength. And it looks like, you know, he has, he's carving out that role for himself. And he's been so good with Svetchnok. So it's nice to see, like, you can't always get elite players in fantasy hockey if you don't draft them or make some big trades. So you have to figure out who is playing with them, who is clicking with them. So you could go the Krakhan Yama route, but, you know, Naceous is available. And I think, like, 60% of leagues or 55% of leagues that he's the player to jump on. And, you know, when you look at the schedule the fact that the hurricanes play for games this week.

Well, now they're down to three, but three more games this week. And including on lighter nights, that's going to be really helpful. The NHL scheduling is less than ideal. So you have to look at nights like Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays to figure out who's playing those games. Because on Tuesday and Thursday, you can add a player, but your lineup is probably already full. And if it's someone you're adding, you probably don't want to knock out anyone you already have.

It's probably not so if you're adding someone, they're probably not going to be much better than who you already have. That's like the depth that you're heading to. So Naceus is a really good player for that because he'll be genuinely useful to you as a player who, you know, is playing on the lighter nights, is playing often, and he's producing a ton. Yeah, and I think Rod Brindamor has definitely taken stock of how well that line has been playing because they are their three most heavily used forwards at 5-1-5. Marty Natchez actually leads the team in all situations. Ice Time for forwards, which is quite a development after he was underutilized and bumped down the lineup for large stretches of last year.

And we did talk about him last time I think you were on the podcast at the start of the season where I think it was after actually the opener where he looked so good against the bluejackets and we were noting about his creativity and ability to cover large areas of the ice and with that reach and that long skating stride and how fun it was to see him kind of playing freely again. And that's carried over through these nine games and he's been so productive. And that has been their best forward line with him, Svetnikov and Gott Koniemi. and all of a sudden, man, has that ever looked, that bridge deal that they signed him to

this offseason, it's looking like it's going to be a massive bargain for them for these next few years because if he's going to be this player, he's a legitimate difference maker for them. Yeah, exactly. Like, it's a good thing to have. And if you can, you're in a keeper league too, that's another consideration or a salary cap league, things like that, like to find players who you might want to keep around for more than one year. Like a lot of, a lot of leagues have keepers.

And sometimes it's like you can't have a keeper who you picked up in the first couple of rounds or you need someone that you have to commit to for a couple years. Obviously, we're only seeing a small sample of NACIS and you can make that decision at the end of the year, but it helps that he's off to a good start. He is a younger player. There is a lot of potential there. So if you can get him at the right time, he might be one of, like, the mainstay players that you realize you want to keep for a while.

Yep. All right. I'll give you one. Kayle Addison. Okay. That's a great one. So in their nine games, so far, he's got seven assists, five of them are primary. I think the most interesting thing to me is his usage because the Wilde so far I've played about 49 minutes or so this season with a man advantage.

And him and Caprizov as their top unit have been out there for 38 or so minutes of it. So the Wild have been pretty much exclusively leaning on their Power Play 1 unit. Addison is the one defenseman on that unit with Caprizov and Zucarillo and the crew and Boldie quarterbacking it. And so I love his playmaking ability on there. I think he's shown that we talk about how we don't want point shots from our quarterback defenseman there. He understands that and he's looking to get the puck to the playmakers, which he'll benefit from on the stat sheet as well. And so he struggled a bit at 5-15 in terms of, you know, the underlying metrics are fine in terms of shots and chances and expected goals. They were getting outscored, I believe, 10 to 2 with him on the ice at 5-15.

But it wasn't really his fault. It just that they weren't getting saves. and I was worried that Dean Eveson would see that and all of a sudden punish him for it because young defensemen typically don't get as long of a leash with their coaches. But his ice time has been fine. He actually played nearly 25 total minutes

in their most recent game, which I believe must be a career high for him in the NHL level. And so if he's going to keep getting this kind of usage and basically be their number one on the power play with that high-powered attack they have, I think he's going to basically sleepwalk his way into a ton of points this season.

Yeah, absolutely. Like, you know, when you've driven, you have defensemen or you have defensemen on your team for like from a fantasy standpoint. You can really go two ways. You could want them to be the players that check off the more physical categories, whether it's penalty minutes, hits, blocks, and all of that is important. You know, at the end of the day, you know, here's the coming from a nerd. Week 1-0-0.27. It's like, they might be a little too soft in a league that has

hit and blocks. Right. But if you can have someone that contributes power play points, they're extremely useful because right there, you're checking off multiple categories. You're getting power play points than either a goal or not. assist from them. And if they're shooting the puck as well, that's another category checked off. So it's one of the most valuable things to have at power play points. And for Addison, he leads defensemen in the percentage of time he's playing on a power play with, you know,

79.8% of the available minutes. So that's really important. And it's not on some bland power play. It's on an incredibly good power play that, you know, even if they don't sustain this high of a level, we would expect them to be a threat considering who's on it. You know, anytime you can get a lot of minutes right there with the player like Carol Caprice off, you should want it. And, you know, the even strength scoring is going to come, I'm sure, and, you know, he'll keep it afloat. And the fact that his minutes haven't dwindled and he hasn't gotten knocked off the power play is a good sign. So if you can jump on that, absolutely go for it because it's really hard to find a power play quarterback outside of the draft, you know, for a top unit.

Yeah, it's interesting you mentioned that. You totally have to sort of separate your rational kind of analyst mind from just trying to accrue as many fantasy points as you can based on your format. I play in a league where you get points for block shots. And so I love, like, David Savard is my favorite player in that league because he's just blocking like eight, nine, ten shots in some of these games where he's getting buried in his own zone. And I'm watching this as an analyst and going to like, oh, my God, this is a horrible process.

Like, he is really just drowning out there. But I look at the, I look at the box score on my fantasy page. And I'm like, damn, David Savard had a great night tonight. Yeah, you have to think of it totally different. And, you know, it's tough because on the website, like, if you go through Yahoo, you're going to sort it through blocks and you're going to sort it through shots and you're going to sort it through hits. But you do have to think about it a little bit differently. And it helps to kind of get an indication of who's doing well in their minutes, you know, who's blocking shots at the highest rate. And you can kind of go from there like, oh, if they're doing this, I can hope they can get more minutes.

It's a player like, you know, Zach White Cloud last year was shooting the puck at one of the highest rates among defensemen and blocking shots at one of the highest rates too. and normally you're not going to get someone like that outside of like the higher end picks. It's going to be like the John Carlson's the league and Jacob Troop is of the league that are so reliable in that way. But if you can find someone who you're like, oh, maybe they'll get a little more, you know, a little more ice time or they'll be really good in their minutes that they contribute to it the entire week instead of just it's Saturday and you go, oh my God, let me pick up

Ryan Reeves real quick so I can get, you know, bank a couple hits. It's like a better and sustainable way of thinking. Definitely. All right. Give me another name. Let's rattle through a couple more here. to hopefully help the listeners out before we sign out. Let's go with Jamick Stevenson.

He is not someone you probably think of as a dynamic fantasy player because you think of the bigger guns in Vegas and that's the Mark Stones, the Jack Eichols. But guess what? He's playing right in between them. So, you know, that's the best option you can have is someone who's going to piggyback off those points and, you know, keep contributing.

He can shoot the puck. and he can collect points for you. Those are two really great assets to have, and the Vegas power play is going to be trending up in the right direction under Bruce Cassidy. So it's another benefit there. And something else that works for him is that he has more than one position for Fancy Hockey, which is one of my favorite things

because you want it that your core players, your best players, are the ones you automatically slot into your lineup, and for the rest of the lineup, you need it that they work around that. So if they have a little bit more versatility, then it's a great thing to have because you have two options, like, oh, my center slots are taken because I have McDavid and Matthews right now. He's not bumping one of them for Stevenson, but now you have a right-wing slot that you could put him in.

It's really helpful to have that. So his ownership has been trending up since they stacked that line, and since they're performing well, it doesn't look like that line's going to come apart just yet. So I would jump on that one sooner than later. Yeah, he's been remarkably productive. What a story in terms of we were talking at the start about Tage Thompson, whether it's, you know, development or kind of, you know, taking along or to get to the, peak of his career, but he was basically like 25 years old or so when Vegas acquired him,

and that deal was a bit of an afterthought, and all of a sudden they plug him in there, put him up the lineup, and he's thriving in a great spot playing with awesome players, but still nonetheless looks every bit apart and uses his speed so well. I'm doing a deep dive on the Pidiocast tomorrow with Jesse Granger, so I'm sure we'll be talking plenty about him there. Okay, I'll give you someone, Jake DeBrusk, who has three goals and four assists so far in games. I think really importantly, he's finally playing big minutes where he's over 18 a game now after kind of settling in that sort of middle six, 14 to 15 per game for much of his career in Boston.

Looks like an entirely different player from, I think, from a confidence and aggression perspective. His 20 high danger chances so far are 13th most in the league. And I think most importantly, you know, he started the year with Marchand out playing full time on Patrice Bergeron's left wing. Marshan comes back, and instead of bumping him down the lineup, they just move them over to the right side and keep those three together. And I imagine that's going to be one of the best five-on-five lines in the league. And if he's able to kind of ride shotgun with those two guys, there's going to be a lot of points in his future this season. Yeah, absolutely. And maybe last year there was a little more hesitant to either, like, grab him because you might be wondering, like, how long is it going to be until Poshanok's right back in that position.

But the Bruins have obviously realized the best thing that they can do is keep Poshnock and, you know, Mar-Shan and Bergeron on a different lines. so you have a better one-two punch. And Jake DeBrusc has really filled the role so well. He's shooting the puck way more, and you could see, you know, a lot more confidence. And I have to think that the coaching change helped him out. You know, we talk about players who maybe they don't get the right opportunity and they have to go to a different team or something like that. But sometimes it's just finding a different, you know, voice to either way to see something

in a player maybe that Cassidy didn't see well enough or to see a way to unlock his game, you know, differently. And it just really seems to be clicking with him. he's shooting the puck aton. He looks more confident. He's benefiting from really good teammates. So it's all of that's a great thing to have the, and he's on the top power play unit right now.

I don't know if that's going to last for him, you know, when Craigie returns, but it's something to have in the meantime. Like, why not if you can thank any points off that top unit? Like, that's why a player, like, you know, if you stick with Boston, like, Hamphus Linholm has become really good from a fantasy perspective because he's on the top unit too. You wouldn't think of him for offensive minutes generally, and you could see how his five-on-five offensive play was on the ride last year in Boston

because he played with McAvoy versus where he was in Anaheim. But now you're legitimately going to see it with tangible points and categories that will help you with Linholm because he's on such a great top unit that was already doing amazing and is even better with Marshandback. Yeah, I think you need a certain level of skill to actually take advantage of your opportunity and stick there moving forward. But getting that initial opportunity to play up the lineup and play in these premium scoring roles is such a big part of the battle, which is why someone like Brandon Mondeur, for example,

who's just basically assumed Aaronick Blad's role in Florida with him out and is playing all the top minutes and all the top power of play minutes. Like, if he's somehow available in your league, he needs to be picked up. So that's my final suggestion. Okay, Shana, we got to get out of here. I'll give you the floor here to plug some stuff. What have you been working on? Where can people check out your work?

So you can find my work at The Athletic. I am working on a couple of fantasy things for this week, actually. And next week, I have some devil's content, and something about what really is the best defense and how a good offense in today's league, how that can be like the best form of defense. And the rest of my stuff you can find is the Two May Men podcast.

And we have new shows coming out every Tuesdays and Thursdays. Awesome. I love it. Looking forward to that. Looking forward to reading that piece as well. Shana, we're going to certainly have you back on the PEOCast soon. Thanks for taking the time and coming to chat. Hopefully people enjoyed our conversation.

If they did, go smash. that five-star review button on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. And we'll be back tomorrow with more. So thank you for listening to the HockeyPedioCast on the Sportsnet Radio Network.