The Hockey PDOcast - Playoff Luck, Trade Ideas, and Other Mailbag Questions

Episode Date: June 13, 2023

Ryan Lambert joins Dimitri to answer listener questions about how good vs. lucky the Golden Knights have been, Connor Hellebuyck trades, Clayton Keller vs. Alex DeBrincat, and how aggressively teams that missed the playoffs should act this coming offseasonThe 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.

It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filipovich. Welcome to the Hockey PEDEOCast. My name is Dimitri Pilipovich, and joining me is my good buddy, Ryan Lambert. R.L. What's going on, then? Oh, not a lot. You know, just getting ready for this potentially decisive game five tonight. Yes, this could be the last game of the 2023 NHL season. Because the game is tonight, I don't really want to talk.

that much about it specifically just because by the time people listen might have already happened so it's not that great for a content perspective we'll obviously touch on a little bit as we go along here but i thought it'll be more fun to do a listener mailback today um so we got some questions on twitter from the listeners they came through as always delivered the goods and so we're going to uh try to get into as many of them as we can't so let's start with this one here from uh from demos 75 asks Vegas is on one hell of a pdo bender right now where does this rank amongst recent cup teams. I feel like every cup team goes on one of these in one way or another, but Vegas feels like they've been more quote unquote lucky than a typical winner. Is that true?

Or are we just paying more attention now? Um, you know, it's interesting because, uh, I think it was Dom wrote an article about how, uh, how lucky the two teams here in the, in the cup final have been, uh, over the course of the postseason. And I like, I kind of push back honestly about, Florida, I think it's like indisputable, all the one goal wins, seven and O at overtime or whatever they are, a ton of road wins. I think that's kind of indisputable. But with Vegas,

like it's not like they're winning a bunch of games won nothing because they're shooting, whatever it is, 12 and a half percent. They're killing everybody. They're just putting up like five, six goals pretty casually on a regular basis throughout these playoffs. And they're not giving up a lot of goals at the other end.

And I think especially when you look at the talent they have at the top of the roster and what like Bruce Cassidy systems do for goalies in general, obviously Aiden Hill's punching above his way. He's like Dominic Ashik right now, right? But I think this is like not luck so much. Like obviously they're getting bounces and all that kind of thing. But it's not like Florida or like Montreal a few years ago or whatever. Yeah, that's how that's how I feel.

feel, but I mean, obviously, I think that in general, the conversation of, like, how lucky is this team that's two wins or one win away from winning the Stanley Cup is ultimately irrelevant from, like, an actionable perspective, right? Like, everyone embraces that part of the fun of the playoffs is you obviously have to be good to a certain extent to get here and to benefit from the luck, but if you're actually going to make it through all of these different obstacles, you need luck in some fashion, right? Whether it's high shooting percentage, high save percentage, injury luck, bounces along the way in a specific game officiating. Like it comes in many forms, right?

So for Florida, as you mentioned, 7 and 0 in overtime, they've won 10 of their 13 games this postseason by one goal and lost just two of them, I believe. Like they've really been threading a needle here along the way, right? Like it feels like that is much more of a less repeatable formula of its team just winning a disproportionate amount of these coin flips. whereas for Vegas, at 515, their shooting percentage is certainly quite elevated, right? It's nearly 12%. There's 3rd highest.

All situations third highest in the playoffs ever, or at least since 0708, I should. Well, the point where I was going to make, though, and that's exactly right, is it's 11.8 at 515. It's 12.5 overall because before this Stanley Cup final, where their power play got cooking, it was a disaster for the first. three rounds. And then their same percentage is 941, 515, 919 at all situations. And that's because in the second round, Edmonton's power play just roasted their penalty kill, right? And so, I don't know, like, I just, it's certainly elevated. I don't think this is like a 12.5 true talent shooting team. Nobody is, right, of course. But it is also 21 games worth of data as well, right? Like if this was happening for 82 games, I mean, obviously then you'd be like, all right, what's,

what's truly going on here, but also that would be an entirely different thing. I think a team shooting 12.5% for 21 games. If it happened from what, like December through January, no one would really care that much. Like they'd probably be on a winning streak, but no one would be like, wow, like, this is the luckiest team ever. It would just be kind of like, oh, this happens in an NHL season. Just the fact that it's happening on this stage is obviously getting more attention. Yeah. And, you know, the other thing to say, again, is like the top of their lineup is really deep and good, you know, like if you have Jack Eichel, Mark Stone, Jonathan Marcia, so, you know, go down the list, all these guys.

You're like, oh, yeah, that's their whole top nine is like top six forward. So, you know, again, not this good over a long enough timeline, but this is like completely plausible. Well, and also the, uh, the point you made about like how the fashion they've been beating teams in is I think an important part of this conversation as well, because they've afforded them themselves such a cushion, right? Where they haven't necessarily, I guess, necessarily needed to use it. But when you're outscoring teams by 29 goals at 5-15 in these games and 25 overall, it's not like you're like, oh, man, we just got, we won this game because we shot extremely well and otherwise we would have lost. Like, a lot of these games, they come out of it with high

percentages, but in reality, they didn't even need most of those goals just because they won by such a significant margin. They've won by three or more goals eight times this postseason. the rest of the pool of NHL teams has won 28 times by three or more goals this post season. Like they've accounted for nearly a quarter of those, quote unquote, blowout victories. Like, what they're doing is really impressive in that regard.

And I think that's an important part of this where they, because they've been so dominant, they have such a large margin for error that I really think it eliminates a lot of the conversation about how high any of those percentages may be because it's not like they're what's fueling their victories. That's right. Yeah. All right, let's move on our next one here.

It's the last one we're going to do kind of about the Stanley Cup final. And we move on into some fun offseason speculation and other assorted topics. Jonathan N. Jane asks, is the NHL season too long? Is the fact that it's going this far into June now a problem? It feels like there's a lot more interest in coach and GM changes and trades than the actual Stanley Cup final this season. well part of that is because the Panthers have been getting killed throughout this

this round right like that's the real problem the Vegas has a chance to wrap it up at five a lot of the games like weren't especially competitive for big chunks of them and then you know Florida came back to make them interesting a couple of times but

I'm you know you see this all this complaint all the time from people and I here's me I don't care. I like Hawk. They're just going to stretch it out as long as possible to make the offseason short. Oh, that works for me.

What am I going to, you know what I mean? Like, I just, I just can't get worked up about it. Now, if I, you know,

was one of these like guys on TV who's like, yeah, I'd love to get to the cabin. I got, you know, I got that million dollar lake house or whatever. Oh, I'd be going like,

can we get this wrapped up in April? You know? But I'm not just sitting here. I have a normal house. You know, it's not on a lake or anything. and I don't know, I want to just watch hockey. Yeah, I'm with you.

Subi, I enjoy watching playoff hockey games. It's the more of them, the mirror. No, I think there's certainly, listen, it's June 13th today as we're recording. If this series went to seven games, it would finish June 19th. Like, it does seem a bit aggressive in that regard, just because, I don't know, it's weird. Like, it's nice and sunny out. I was a weird flex by you in terms of like the air conditioning component of your house and being able to keep it cool this time of year. But it's weird. It's sunny out. You know, you kind of want to

get out. It feels weird that you're watching ice hockey games. But at the same time, I'm not complaining because I really enjoy the product. And so I wish we could watch it year round. So I get it. But I don't know, it is a bit just disorienting, I guess, going this far into the summer and these games still happening. And I get that for a lot of other fan bases, if their team's been out for a while now, it's understandable that you're already an offseason move. Yeah. And I mean, that just circles back to the ultimate problem the NHL has, which is like, you know, most people don't want to see anybody but their own team, right? Right. Yeah. And, you know, it's, it's not like it's that much later than, like, I just, I just pulled up the composite schedule for the 15-16 season.

that ended you know what was that the the the penguin's uh shark series that was six games right right

and uh that ended you know uh June 12 so it's not like it's that much later it this this whole series could end tonight and then it's like okay you know it's one extra day

I can't I can't get worked up about it yeah what was I remember the the rematch of uh penguins red wings when the penguins won that was like the year I was graduating high school. And I remember like the last game happened on like graduation day, which I feel like probably was like end of June. I'd have to look up the actual dates.

Since here, 612 also. Oh, okay. All right. Well, maybe it happened earlier than I remembered. But yeah, I don't remember mid mid June. You know, this could be the last game. I'm not too upset about it. If anything, I wish we had more hockey.

But I also wouldn't mind if the season started a bit earlier and it ended. Like end of May and then we got on get on the get on the international schedule all the all the European league start in September yeah NHL should start in September but then they're like going head to head against the first couple weeks of the NFL season and they don't want to do that understandably so right okay Brandon Ryan asks what would be a good fit for Connor Hellebuck and how much should a team pay for a goalie given the volatility of the position let's we can take them both obviously, but it's kind of focus on the hellabuck perspective of this and kind of the appeal of him, who you think is the most interesting landing spot, like how this situation is going to shake out over the next couple weeks. It seems like it's going to shake out with him being traded from the Winnipeg Jets if they can

get a decent enough offer. And whether that's, you know, this summer, like at the draft or maybe right before the season starts or even sometime during the season. I can't imagine they would let him walk for nothing. He's one of the best goalies in the world, right? So the question is what's like a team that needs a Connor Hellebuck style goalie? I mean, most teams, honestly, you know? Well, the fact that he's 30 with one more year left on his deal eliminates like a good portion of those teams though, right?

Yes and no. Well, like the team that I think I've seen a couple. will people say, oh, you know, it would be a good fit is the Los Angeles Kings. You know, they're they're not necessarily in win now mode all the way, but

they can maybe make something work if they can find somebody to ship out that maybe makes a little too much money or something like that. I guess they don't have that many guys who do. But I don't know, it's interesting. Like I don't, because the only other teams I can really think

of that would be kind of in that same zone about like we are in win now mode it's like Edmonton is Edmonton no they can't they can't make that work really um like who else is the devils are interesting not necessarily in win now mode in the sense where like it's Stanley Cup for stanley cup robust for them and it's like a one year window where you're pushing all your chips in but i don't think any goalie but especially one in hell buck's position where he only has a one year left would commend such an exorbitant price where it is is an all-in move, right? Like, I think people might be surprised by how little he goes for based on his pedigree

and, like, how good of a goalie he is just because of that. Like, if a guy, like, UC Soros was moved this summer, I would expect a significant package in return because he's a bit younger. He's got the extra year and his deal, right? He makes less as well. It's $5 million compared to $6.17 or whatever. Like, it's easier to talk yourself into paying a premium for that. I think certainly if you're a good team, like the devils, you could talk yourself into

that may be paying even a bit more just to get Hellebuck because you feel like, all right, we don't have to deal with this Vanichick, Schmead, Blackwood combo anymore, right? It's like now we have like a legitimate guy that's just going to play 60 games for us next year and we don't have to worry about it. And we're also not worrying about what the future holds. Like if we win a cup next year, cool.

But if we also just make the East Final, that's also cool too. So I think they make sense. I think the Kings kind of make sense from that perspective as well. So, yeah, I don't know. I think there's quite a few teams that are interesting. like a team like Carolina might make sense because of the contracts of their own existing goalies right now. And they don't need to commit to hellabuck in a long-term deal, but also like they're not really a type of team to go out and pay a premium of like a bunch of picks and prospects to add a guy who's one year from free agency either.

So I don't know if that. And Carolina just gets like good quality outings from goalies who aren't going to cost a ton of money this summer or, next summer, I guess. Some other teams that are interesting is like Buffalo, I guess. Would Buffalo, because they obviously, they have a ton of caprum, they have a ton of capital that they could trade,

but they have so many RFAs coming up next summer and even UFAs that like, do they want to add another guy to that mix, especially if Devin Levi is who we all kind of, at least, you know, the people

who watch a lot of college hockey, kind of think he can be, although, you know, he's on the smaller side. But, um, like Pittsburgh probably doesn't have the, the capital to, to make it happen, but they, of course, could use a, a Connor Hallibuck type.

Um, and other than that, like, I'm going, I'm going down the list of like, decently good teams. And I'm like, they, seems like they're all set in goal. Yeah. Whether happily or unhappily, like, you know, I'm sure St. Louis would love to get their hands on.

a Connor Hallibuck, but like their goaltending situation is such that I, you know, are the Jets going to take anything back for whatever? Yeah, but Buffalo is interesting. We'll talk more about them with another question here later on the show. For them, they just have like because of where they're at and also how much capital they have, I would almost prefer to see them push even more chips in for Osoros and like force national to make that trade happen and then just have. I think we've talked about this, right, have the two undersized stud goalies and just make

that your brand. Yep. So I'd be more interested in that, but like, I certainly think they're going to be feisty this offseason. I don't, I'll have Kevin Woodley on soon here and we'll get more into the weeds from like a technique perspective. But a point he's been making was like while Helibuck is an all world goalie, he benefits much more from like controlled environments where because his technique is so solid, like,

if he's just able to like square up a shot and know where shots are coming from. he's so, so good at that. But all of a sudden, if you start getting in these chaotic, and this is true for most goalies, right, but if you start getting in these chaotic scramble environments where he's having to go east-west a lot, and he's not, like, the most athletic guy, whereas, like, Soros actually is.

So taking him and putting him in a horrible defensive environment, like a Buffalo was last year, I don't know if that's going to give you the results you're actually looking for. If he went to an L.A. or a Carolina or New Jersey, he would be phenomenal there. But for those teams that also, like, like you said for Carolina, if you're already getting average to above average goaltending for like no dollars and no investment in those guys, what's the point of paying a certain,

like an extra cost to get a guy who's not going to be that much better than those guys because of the infrastructure you already have? Yeah. Um, you know, but Winnipeg, Winnipeg is interesting to me. Oh, actually, wait, one more point on hell about before we move on to Winnipeg here. Um, what do you think about his shelf life? Because he's 30, he just turned 30. He, I guess, came into the league when he was, what, like 23, 24 years old out of college? That sounds great. The gross goal he's due.

So he hasn't necessarily been around for that long, but at the same time, his workload ever since he came into the league has been outrageous. Yeah. Like, he, since his first full season in 2016-17, he's played 419 games. Next best is Vasilevsky with, like, 35 fewer. and then if you go down the list of guys who have been used most in that window, the top 10 is the two of them, then Bobrovsky, John Gibson, Freddie Anderson, Jacob Markstrom, Martin Jones,

Mark Andre Fleury, Cam Talbot, and Jake Allen, which is certainly a list of goalies. And the point I'm trying to make here is I don't think, like, that's not a list of guys that have a lot of juice left. Now, a lot of those guys were already kind of like established veterans by the time he'll have a year league, right? So they're at a different point of their career, but it also speaks to how long he's been around how much he's played in that time

and maybe the fact that this might not be a thing. I know goalies age differently than skaters, but just because of the workload, like potentially the deterioration and performance could be expedited because he just played so much the past couple years, right? Like it is a bit scary to invest in that beyond next season. Yeah, I guess the thing to say is he does seem to be durable, like it doesn't ever get hurt.

Right, right? and his, I'm certainly not a goalie expert, but having seen him many, many, many times over the years, he's not a goalie who's like particularly like, like throwing himself all over the eye.

Like he just kind of stand still and the puck hits him in the chest or whatever. And so, you know, you wonder how much of that is like, like does that add to wearing tear? Does it subtract, I'm not a goalie expert, you know?

but intuitively I'm saying to myself that probably like means it's good right like you're not you're not putting all this stress on your joints and stuff like that and he's like a big guy obviously but he's not one of these like six foot seven goalies who seem to get injured yeah who just punishing his joints every time he gets up and down exactly yeah so I you know I don't I don't know the answer to that but as you say like this is a goalie who granted there are plenty of goalies who who can just play play every night and it's fine. But like you say, do you want to take that risk? For a guy who might cost like $8, $9, $10 million over seven or eight years at 31, I wouldn't be making that bet personally, even though I think he's, again, one of the best goalies in the world. Yeah, I'm honestly much more intrigued than just inquiring him trying to win a cup next year for the one year.

And then just be like, all right, it was just a one year run. and that's cool and not talking yourself into picking up the tab on the next deal because you traded for him, right? Yeah, I mean, he had a Sport Logic out of him at plus 17 goals able to have expected last year, which was behind only Saros Hallmark and Philip Gustafson. So he hasn't shown any signs of slowing down. I just thought it was an interesting thing to think about, you know, from Winnipeg's perspective, though, there are a team to watch in the sense that there's a lot of smoke now of like everyone wanting out. aren't kidding, right? And so

they're looking at the situation where they're one year removed like the 2024 off season Air Luke Dubois, Blake Wheeler, Mark Schifley, Connor Hallibuck, Nino Needer Rider, Dillon, and Brendan Dimmelo and Brendan Dillon will all be UFA's next summer. And so they have all of these guys where

they can, I assume, trade pretty much all of them and immediately change their entire organizational trajectory because they could just get a treasure chest back of assets, right? That would help them quite a bit. And they would be a young cost-controlled players and prospects that they really like

because they can keep them in Winnipeg then for five, six, seven years. The issue, though, is they've shown as an organization no willingness or appetite to actually do that to the point where they put out, like, threatening videos, telling their fans that they needed to keep coming to the rink and support their team. Otherwise, they leave. So, like, that doesn't strike me as an organization that's all of a sudden going to go, we're going to trade every single one of these guys for a bunch of players who will help us

five years from now and just bite the bullet and suck for the next four years. I don't really see that as what they're doing, which is disappointing because this is the time to strike and they could have such a productive offseason. I just have no real fate that that's actually the road they're going to take. Yeah. Man.

Interesting summer coming up. Want me to pitch you on a peer Luke Dubois trade that I've been a I've been yeah let's do it boy speak they they just said him for L.A. too just half the Jets are going to L.A.

well that's my that's my trade actually so okay so here we go and this is obviously assuming that he would want to sign in L.A. and isn't purely one track mine from Montreal right which I think the reports are still kind of unclear on that so L.A.'s problem

right now is they only have seven million left in cap space after all of their moves last week and they still need to bring in a goalie right so you don't necessarily you're not in a position unless you're shedding significant money going back the other way where you can just add bear luke dubaugh and then already pay him for his next deal so the way to work around that is you get wednipeg to sign him to his one year six million dollar qualifying offer they trade him to l.a for at a retained price for come up with whatever package you want Gabe valardi Alex Terracott

picks. Sitten byfield, yeah. Well, no, I would, I, I think, well, you'd have to get extreme with potentially even like a hell of buck trade included in that and go for an extreme blockbuster if that's happening. I, listening to 32 thoughts yesterday, they were saying, like, if you're bringing in Pierre-Luc Dubois, are you keeping Byfield to be your number four center behind Copa-Dubois and, uh, Dineau?

Well, let's, let's play this out. So, this trade happens, right? Yep. You have a handshake deal in place where once he's eligible, you give him his long-term extension in L.A. to kick in the following year, right? So you get him for this one year at a much, at a reduced price. The reason for that is next summer, they're clearing 17.5 million in gap space, most of which is Anzee Kopitar's $10 million deal.

Now, right, of course. Popatar still has a lot left in the tank, right? And I presume he's, as long as he wants to play, he will play for L.A., but it won't be at a $10 million price. No, of course. Sure. And so in that case, I think this is like a great transition plan of you've got to know, you've got Pierluke d'A now. You still got copayor he can play a reduced role.

And I would keep eye-filled in that case because not only can he play wing for the next year or whatever, but I think it's good to have more options. I don't think you'd go like, oh, well, we have Pierloog Dubois and Denault and we're set. I think there's a way to make that happen with some of the auxiliary pieces they have, like a Volardi and Turcotte that I mentioned, to facilitate that now if you want to get truly crazy and add Hellebuck into that and just do one of these like video game trades where everyone is moving all over the place, then that's a different discussion.

But I said, I actually think L.A. makes sense. L.A. makes sense. And I think as trading partners, they make quite a bit of sense too. Yeah, no, I totally, you know, I like both those fits for L.A., both the hell of a buck and Dubois. If we want to do both of them, hey, why not? I love it. All right, Aral, let's take our break here.

And then when we come back, we will close up the show with a couple other listener questions. You were listening to the HockeyPedio cast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network. Breaking down the top stories in hockey and Elliot Friedman every day. The Jeff Merrick Show. Subscribe and download the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, we're back here on the HockeyPedocast, joined by Ryan Lambert, we're taking the listener questions.

Our, let's, um, let's keep it going. So here's one from, uh, from at Joe D. 113 asks, who would be a better fit for the Detroit Red Wings style of play? Alex DeBrencat or Clayton Keller? It's an interesting question. That's why I picked it. I mean, and that's why our, our listeners are so good. I like, uh, I like to bring it more as like the trigger man kind of a thing, you know,

or like you just get them. the puck and you say shoot it immediately and he goes okay no problem i can do that he did that three times you know um i don't know if that's necessarily like i think that can be the detroit style like this is the kind of player that if you if they don't really have a guy where they can go if we just get you the puck you can put it in the net right and they and he goes yeah but they could play that way you know what i mean mm-hmm whereas like i don't know it's like i don't know it's I guess what I'm saying is maybe Clayton Keller fits their style more currently, but Pierre Louvreux,

or Pierre Luvue, Alex Debriggott could really find a nice style that they could grow into, for lack of a better word. Does that make sense? I mean, I think both guys would certainly help, like what we saw for the Red Wings last year, both would be massive improvements, right?

it's kind of personal preference, I guess. I lean towards killer making more sense because I think that with the pieces they already have in place, they need more laymaking ability in terms of guys who can set the table and create shots for others, right? Like the types of players who can really bring others along for the ride from them, as opposed to a guy like the brinket who's a good player. And I think he has much more utility beyond like standing and shooting. right, but a lot of his appeal from his most productive seasons in Chicago was being the trigger

man from Patrick King passes, right? Exactly. And so I'm sure he could be productive and score goals playing in Detroit, but it feels like if you're bringing him in, you're bringing him in to play with Dylan Larkin, right? 100%. And that's great. Like, Dylan Larkin needs good players to play with, but that's not really Detroit's biggest problem right now. Like they need someone who can create other further shots, like when Dylan Larkin isn't on the ice at times. And I don't, yeah, the brain shed is that player, whereas Keller is. Like, he was so good last season. And I think a lot of it, understandably, right, playing for the coyotes. No one really cared. But if you look at it, like, he was tied with Miko Ranton and Mitch Marner in 5-15 scoring. He was 11 in the league in

primary points, like just behind Jack Hughes and Elias Pedersen. He was wildly productive, but also did it in such a fun style of play as well, right? And so, man, he's going to be more expensive because he comes also, like he's signed $7.15 million for five more years, which happened to be his age 25 through 29 seasons, which is like the most appealing window you can have a player signed at that price for it, right? Whereas the brinkets already 26 has that $9 million qualifying offer.

You're buying more expensive years as well. So Keller will certainly be more expensive via trade, but I think for Detroit, it actually makes sense to pony up and pay that because, you know, we mentioned before the break how I liked Winnipeg and L.A. as trade partners. I love Detroit and Arizona as trade partners because what does Detroit have? A ton of draft pick surplus. They have picks 9, 17, 3 second rounders, including the Canucks and Blue second rounders, and then Boston's 2024 first as well to go along with all of their own picks, right? And so that would all be highly appealing to Arizona, not to mention the fact that Detroit has

$30 million in cap space this summer, which they can also, you know, they can just absorb money and potentially even take other money off of Arizona's hands to lighten their own bill. Like, I just think that is such a fascinating way to go about it and such a valuable trade idea for Detroit that the more I've thought about it, the more I'm like, of course it's Keller. And absolutely, that should be something that they should be priority. right now. Yeah, my only thing with Keller, and I guess it's true to bring it to a lesser extent, is that when guys like go psycho scoring on a team that's insanely bad, I'm always a little

dubious of that where it's like, well, what's you going to, they don't have anybody else who's going to score on the power play. Right. And look, like I said, I really like Clayton Keller. But. and I take your point about you know you want someone who can score when Dylan Larkin's not on the ice. Yeah and Detroit is also certainly in a position where

not only should they be thinking about like using all their capital and stuff like they should be doing it. They shouldn't have to be thinking about it. But and I guess the other thing to say is obviously Ottawa and Detroit are the same division. So that is also a problem. And, you know, De Brinket is a like Detroit guy in general. So you might just get him for free next summer. Well, not free, obviously, but you know what I mean. You don't have to give up anything for it. So there is all that to consider as well. But I'm just, you know, I guess the question is how valuable is Keller on the second line and maybe not getting all the offensive opportunities

that he did in Arizona versus DeBrinkeet on the top line being the standing there and shooting guy as you say. Yeah. I think it's close. I could go either way on it, honestly. Well, the other thing beyond being in division is like, I presume Ottawa is looking to not necessarily recoup the draft capital they gave up for DeBrinkechat, but turn it into other players who can help them right now because that's kind of the position they've structured their roster

in. And so Detroit just doesn't make sense as a. trade partner from that regard, whereas Arizona would just be like, please give us all the draftics you can. And Detroit's like, oh, we have a lot of those. Yeah, I don't know. Well, like the Keller thing, I'm sure in a different environment, he wouldn't necessarily put up this many points, certainly.

I just think like in terms of watching him play, none of it struck me as, wow, this guy's lucky to be kind of getting all of these garbage time points, right? A lot of it was like, he came to doing something incredibly cool against the other team's best players and then Arizona cutting the deficit to five to one. But still, it was a cool play. He got full marks for getting that point. The other thing for Detroit is, like, I got lost a bit because, right, they were very competitive for half the season, right, before they decided to pull the plug on the year

and become sellers of the deadline. And that was smart that they did that. But it sort of masked the fact that they were 28th and 515 goals as a team, and only the Blackhawks generated fewer a 515 expected goals than them. Like, if you look at their shot chart, it's just an abomination. They got no shots from anywhere dangerous in the offensive zone. And so I just think they, I mean, the answer is they probably need both, right? They probably need Keller and a brinket and then even more because that's how far away they were offensively.

But if you have to pick, I just think Keller makes a bit more sense from an upside and stylistic perspective. But an interesting thing to think about. I'm curious to see how aggressive Detroit is this offseason because while they have all of these resources, Steve Eisenman's comments at the deadline made it. seem like he was pretty sour on them in terms of like acknowledging how far away they were in the fact that teams like the Sabres and the senators even had sort of leapfrogged them in their own division. And so I wonder if they'll take a bit more of a reserved approach compared to last offseason where they just, they'd burn through all their money.

Okay. Andrew 49 here asks, what team that missed the playoffs this year are we watching most closely this offseason to see how they can ramp up for next year? I mean, we mentioned them earlier. You even alluded to this when we were talking about it. Like, this is the Buffalo Savers. This is like everything, you know, the savers had going for them last year. They were like,

but they entered the year with an awful goaltending rotation on purpose. Right? They didn't think they would be as good as they were last year. And so, the idea is that they will go out and get a goalie and probably some other help too and it's interesting because they play in an insanely

difficult division. Toronto Boston, Tampa, Florida. You've got to knock out one of those teams in all likelihood or whoever is like fourth in the metro I guess. And can Buffalo do it? They came kind of close this year honestly. So,

but I wonder again how much of that was just the same the same stuff we've seen out of Columbus or even Buffalo in the past

where it's like, yeah, we can be really good for like three months and then like we can go on a big run after the trade deadline because no one cares

about playing us anymore. Or they're actually good. It's kind of a binary thing. I don't know where I land. on it. Yeah, honestly. I think they're actually good. I think it wasted so many points that were there for the taking particularly kind of not, they started off well and then they had that stretch where

they had like a 10 game losing streak or something. Yeah. And they had some injuries, right? And they're running this goalie rotation, which wasn't giving them a chance to win. I think it's a lot of fixable stuff. Now, there's an interesting conversation to be had about like, you know, you're mentioning the Keller thing about playing on a bad team that's losing a lot and I'm just racking up points. It's kind of similar here where like when you're playing that sort of like very uptempo, high event style where you're comfortable just, all right, we're going to lose 5'4, but we're going to look really fun doing so. And then trying to actually segue from that to all right, now we're winning games 3-2

and making the playoffs. Like that's two kind of different things. And I'm not sure they can necessarily keep just going to, way they have. I think it's an important part of their organizational cycle to like have this stretch. Yeah, I mean, the decisions are are kind of obvious, right? I think they're going to bring in a goalie to pair up with Levi and probably go 50-50 split, I'd imagine. And then a defenseman to play with Owen Power. And this depends on what these teams want to do. But I think my two favorite guys for that spot are probably either Chris Hanev, if Calgary makes them available,

or Dylan DeMello if Winnipeg makes him available. And so I think both teams probably should, but it's unclear on kind of what direction they're going to go in. But if those guys are on the market, they're like very obvious one year fits to bring them in, see how that works. And you're not necessarily committing a ton of future, but it gives you that chance to actually see what you have with this group next season.

So I'm incredibly fascinated to see what they do, but I think their upside is legit. It's a tough division, of course, but just with the building blocks we saw last season, and I think it's fully justified to be really excited about this group. Yeah. So one, two last things I want to say is like all their,

all their underlying numbers pretty much are like a shade below 50%. And so does a defenseman help with that for to play with power? Yes, definitely. And then obviously, again, the team goaltending thing. you go get a goalie, you don't have like an 890 team save percentage or whatever it was, right? Um,

and then the other thing that's worth noting here is I saw a lot of Buffalo fans during the season kind of banging this drum and it's something that I really want to like keep an eye on was when Matia Samuelson was in the lineup, all their underlying numbers were insanely good, or not insanely, but like solid to good. and when he was out of the lineup and he was out of the lineup a decent amount last season, I'm gonna pull it up now, but you know, he only played like 58 games or whatever it was,

let's say. 55. When he was out of the lineup, they were terrible. Like the underlying numbers were insanely bad. And so if he can just stay healthy, how much does that help?

Probably a decent amount, you know? But also he's like a guy, who's never really played a full NHL season, so who knows? And that's the thing that kind of underscores the issue, right? Because I believe when he was out, they were experimenting a lot with playing Daly and Power together

and just didn't really have other pieces that they could fill that spot with. And so, like, adding a, like, a similar player in that regard to give Owen Power as well and also, like, insulate yourself from one injury like that, all of a sudden just destroying everything else you had going for you is, I think should be a priority this offseason.

And I don't think trades like that are necessarily like I get the idea of like Kevin Adams wanting to sort of slow play this and acknowledge that it's like, all right, we're not just going to make like one or two moves this off season and suddenly be Stanley Cup contenders. But I don't think these types of moves like are going to be that pricey where like you can accomplish them without sacrificing your long term view, I guess. Totally.

The other team, well, I had two other teams on this list that I thought were interesting to know just because I'm very curious to see how they approach it. One is the flames and then the other is the penguins both made big front office changes this office. Yeah, and the flame changed their coach as well. Just in terms of how they view their result last year and whether they use that as an excuse to go in the other direction and become sellers or whether they are like, oh, well,

we made some changes here with the coach in front office and we feel like we're a bit unlucky. and so we're actually going to push forward. I think for Pittsburgh, it's a lot easier to do that because you have Crosby and Malkin and Lattang, right? It's tough to be like, all right, you're actually going to become sellers now with those guys and the level they played at last year. But for Calgary, they're sort of similar in the similar shoes as the Jets, where they have all these guys who are unrestricted free agents next summer. And so how they approach that this offseason is going to be one of the big stories for me.

Yeah, especially with Calgary, just because, you know, them hiring Ryan Huska as the coach instead of like a more established guy because you heard for a little while that they would be in on like all the veteran coaches you would think Gerard Gallam whatever you know go down the list but then they hire Ryan Huska who's never been an NHL head coach before and obviously knows the team very well having been an assistant for however many years there but is that kind of like a tacit acknowledgement of we're not going to be able to retain some or most or all of these veterans. And if that's the case, what direction do they take it? Did they ask for help back? Like, okay, we're going to give you TANF, like you said, right? We're going to give you TANF, but we need an NHL player back. It doesn't necessarily have to be a defenseman.

Or do they go, and it's time for the kids? Because if that's the case, they're going to get worse, right? but they all, you know, if they're, if they're trying to pull up all the veterans, you know, like, I don't know, like, is that just a thing of we all hated Daryl Sutter last year? And now we now we want to actually give it a shot with Huska. I don't know how they approach it. It's really interesting. Yeah, I mean, there's a pretty easy story to talk yourself into that not only just hating their coach,

but like how many one goal games they lost and how strangely bad the goaltending was where like how many times did they give up a goal in the first shot? I think it was almost 10 times over the course of the regular season. Like there's a lot of weird events that happened that aren't necessarily representative of how good that team is. And so I could talk myself into it, but here's the thing, Backland, Linholm, DeFoli, Hannahfin, Tanev, Zedorov, all UFAs next summer. Yeah.

And the other thing is all of those guys, are like their current cap hits are you could argue like lower to much lower than they're actually worth so if you were if like it which is very appealing if you are going to go the trade route to other contenders who don't have much cap space to facilitate trades whether you're retaining or just trading them straight up for other players you can get really creative like pretty much any contender can take on any of these guys right it's not a type of situation where it's like well we have this 11 million dollar player who's really good and a lot of teams want them, but none of them can actually afford them. Like, in this case, everyone can add any of these

guys. And so all of a sudden, if Elias Linholm's available at 4.5 million or whatever for one more year, like, every single contender in the league is going to be lining up for that. And I imagine that drives up his price quite a bit. So sure. I don't know. I guess the fact that they, you know, they're bringing Conroy and Huska, I wonder if that's an acknowledgement that they are going to take a bit more of a longer term view or the fact that they didn't go out and like spend big money to bring in kind of higher profile, bigger names means that they don't want to, like, they're worried about money and they don't really want to get into the business of, of just punting away a full season. I don't know. I don't have the answer to that, but I,

it's something to watch for it because the direction they choose, like, if they become sellers, all of a sudden, that makes this an incredibly fun off season. 100%. Yeah, totally agree. The reason why I had the penguins on here was because I feel like, you know, they obviously bring in Kyle Duvus. And you could argue they didn't really even have a GM last year because it seemed like Ron Hextal was kind of like asleep at the wheel and then someone woke him out two days before the deadline.

And he's like, oh, Michael Granlin. I've heard of him. Yeah, let's get him for a second. I think they're going to be very aggressive and creative in trying to fix what was wrong with them last year. And the thing is, a lot of their issues were like very fixable things in terms of bottom six players and stuff like that. And there's no reason why they should they should be drafting 14th overall in a couple weeks of this year's draft.

There's no reason why they should probably even keep pickering who they picked last year in the first round. Like they should be trading all of these assets to get the most out of Crosby and Malkins last couple of years. And if you if you go, all right, we're unanimously going in that direction, all of a sudden it opens so many doors for Pittsburgh to be in on pretty much every one of these trades. Yeah, no, they're Like they have one mission Under, under Kyle Dubus And I guess we'll Which is comforting, right?

Because a lot of these GMs were like Trying to balance multiple things at once It's like, well, Oh, sure. You want to be competitive, but we don't want to sacrifice the future, but we also want to win games, but we don't.

Like, it's whereas, well, It's like, everything should be on the table to try and be as good as you can for the next two years. Of course. I guess what I'm saying is the building up of the top six

that didn't really go so well in Toronto obviously in the regular season it did you know I don't want to get into the whole like oh run around whatever but you know the rounding out of the top six in Toronto over the last few years or the bottom six rather over the last few years hasn't been like

oh they're nailing it you know they're taking a chance on on Wayne Simmons and Nick Ritchie and then they're like whoops uh-oh, shouldn't have done that, you know? And, you know, I'm sure, I'm sure guys would take a discount to play with Sidney Crosby or whatever, you know. But I just don't know how sustainable his approach for Toronto would be in Pittsburgh, given their cap situation. And I would like to see what other approach Kyle do is or whoever he hires his GM, who would presumably be on the same page.

what would take with improving that top six or bottom six. I keep saying top six, bottom six. Well, I would also assume that he has learned a few things over the years and would not necessarily make the same mistakes, right? It's like, I,

I'm bringing that up because I think I've, I've come around to this with coaches, right? Like for players, we talk a lot about how, as they progress in their career, they sometimes change as players and pick up different habits and improve or get worse,

right? For coaches, I've started thinking about that as well where sometimes they could pick up, you know, become a bit more progressive or open to different ideas or change their tactics. Like they're not necessarily just going to be the same person throughout. Maybe if they're already, have been around for 30 years or like in their 60s, that's probably who they're going to be. But if they like start young and they've had a few 10 years, like it's possible that they could change. I feel that same way about a front office executive. And so I'm very curious to see what they do. But I think, I think there's a lot of moves to be made.

there. When he got hired, I saw a lot of like, wow, can you believe like the position Pittsburgh exam? Look at their cap-friendly page as a disaster. It's like, it's really not. It's fine. Buy out Granland. Try to convince Jeff Carter to ride off into the sunset, like trade him to the ducks or something, sell him on going back to California. There's plenty of ways to open up money. And with the resources they have in terms of draft picks to trade, this team could be significantly better next season. So I kind of wanted to highlight them as a team here. all right, Ryan. Let's get out of here. I'll let you plug some stuff on the way out, let the listeners know where they can check you out and what you've had in the works recently.

Yeah, etrinkside.com. All my articles, many are saying so. And not that I had anything to do with it, but the elite prospect's draft guide came out last week. And I think they said it's 1,700 pages. And that's just on the 47th ranked prospect alone. Okay, but like legitimately like 400 plus prospects get a write up. And even if you're not, if you, you know, let's say you're a Penguins fan and you're like, oh, they're picking 14th or whatever it is. I guess I don't really care.

No, you get it so you can read about the guys your team picked after the draft. That's why. Okay. So that's a big brain move right there. That's exactly right. And so yeah, you go, you go to EP Rinkside or elite prospects.com. You can sign up for an annual subscription. I believe if you use the code

2023 draft guide all capital letters they'll knock 50% off your off your subscription for a year. So can't beat that. And then Patreon.com slash puck soup for all your podcasting needs that aren't the PDO cast.

Love it. All right. Yeah, highly recommend the EP ring side in particular just because I will be writing about the Stanley Cup final once it's over there do a deep dive of that. And then me, you, countless other staff are going to be covering this offseason, not just the draft, but all the trades and signings and everything and create detail as well.

So if you enjoy the show, you're going to enjoy that. And this is a good time to subscribe if you've been holding out. And we'll be back tomorrow with another episode of the HockeyPedio cast. As always, streaming on the Sportsnet Radio Network.