The Hockey PDOcast - Takeaways and Trends from Draft Week in Nashville

Episode Date: June 29, 2023

Sean Shapiro joins Dimitri to talk about some of the key takeaways from draft week, and what people were talking about in Nashville.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.

It's the Hockey P.D.O.cast with your host, Dmitri Filippovich. Welcome to the Hockey Pee-Ocast. My name's Dimitra Filippovish and join me live from Nashville. It's my good buddy, Sean Shapiro, Sean. What's going on, man? Live from Nashville where I'm going to, I told the guys within the EP Rinkside group that I have to give this to you, like live from Nashville where we could have been sitting across from each other doing this in person right now with planning and somebody you've had. And so this is, I'm going to have to give you a. Yeah, so we could be doing this in person right now. We could be.

Well, we could be. Unfortunately, we aren't, but we're still going to make the most of it. We're going to chat here for the next hour or catch up. You're going to give me the lowdown and everything that's been happening there, and I'm going to try to live vicariously through you. And, you know, you've been kind enough here to, you rushed back to the pad after the, after the festivities at the rink, the draft ended. And you're kindly taking a break from all your gallivanting and,

enjoying beverages with various team employees under the guise of quote unquote networking. I don't think I'm not familiar with your tricks. So we're having you on here. We're going to talk about everything that's been happening. You know, obviously neither you or I are prospect evaluators or draft analysts and kind of perish in this time of year. And obviously both you and I by association of work with the tremendous gold standard crew, in my opinion, at E.P. Rinkside, we sort of like, through osmosis, get a lot of information from

them and build that up over time. But I'm going to save the actual pick analysis and kind of how teams did with the picks they made for tomorrow when I have Mitch Brown on because he's uniquely qualified to like give us the intricacies of what makes the 157th best prospect in this class special. So I'm going to say that for him. Instead, you and I are going to kind of focus on a big picture conversation hearing kind of what teams did, maybe not just over the past couple of. days, but this week, because obviously there wasn't a particularly large amount of trade activity the past two days. I don't know. What sticks out to you from this week that you spent in Nashville in terms of conversations you've had, kind of topics that kept coming up, what people

were really fixated on and interested in, kind of what's the general takeaway from this week with the entire NHL sort of converging in Nashville? Yeah, I mean, for me, one of the biggest things for this week, and it's, first of all, on the draft itself, you make a really good point. The guys who cover the drafts the prospects all year, they do a great job. Like, it's our boy, Eric, from who's putting every single pick into elite prospects right as it happens. Like Eric's, Eric should be a, Eric should have cult hero status, honestly. He's got like people, the tool that everyone uses. And so many people, myself included, we end up just like kind of, as you said, parachuting in for the draft and cover and

prospects and we come in with our hot opinions on what a team should do at 12 or 13 or whatever and then and then we kind of just let it go and but so it's I like to I think I'd like to having Mitch on it would be great

and that's how you should break down the draft the people who kind of focus on this the 24-7 for me the biggest thing at the draft outside of players getting selected is the we're seeing the real hard crunch of the cap not going up, it's only going up a million dollars,

and the impact of just the randomness of this year being everyone's convinced themselves. And I think it's admittedly a weak agency class in general, but everyone's convinced themselves that like, well, I don't want to make the mistake on this class because of this and next year. all of a sudden it's everyone is kicking tires. Everyone is becomes, if you're going to improve your team, it has to be done through the trade market. And a lot of it can be a lot of fun speculation.

And there's sometimes smoked that fire and everything like that. But some of it also leads to, with so many people interested in making moves, I think at the same time, it also leads to a little bit like a little bit of almost paralysis about it, where there's so many things being talked about, So many things where like, oh, I don't want to make the wrong move. Like, I honestly think that's one of the reasons why we didn't have a trade on day one at the draft was because I think so much of the like, oh, well, there's things are bubbling, things are moving, things are moving.

And I think people were like, there would be conversations and be like, oh, well, I can get a better deal than this. And then eventually time would just pass. Like, I think that's kind of, we've kind of seen the collision of that right now. certainly i say there's been kind of like a gridlock in that regard just because it feels like so many people are trying to accomplish very similar things right like it seems good in theory to be like all right well you know uh we're going to explore the trade market because everyone acknowledges the free agency's poor this year but if everyone is there and trying to do the same thing it kind of leads to this holding pattern we're in now to be fair i think the couple days leading up to the

actual draft itself over this week did yeah not necessarily fireworks right but we saw the here, Luke Dubois trade. We saw some movements, certainly, involving the avalanche as well. So, like, we did see players moving. We saw some fun stuff and we were to talk about that here, but maybe not exactly what we were expecting. And hopefully that still will come over the next couple of days. But, yeah, I think my takeaway to kind of jump off of what you're saying there is being just really reinforced how a winger in particular with money attached to them, whether it's an actual dollars for one year or especially if it's term beyond that is the worst asset you can have.

Obviously, you know, there's a sliding scale in that regard and it's still a good contributor for you and you need them to compete. But if you're in the market of trying to especially trade them out, it's you pretty much are taking pennies on the dollar, right? And I think people keep being surprised when you see the return for some of these players being moved who we associate with like being good hockey players right and so you're like your program when you're trained to see that and be like well that player is at least worth something of value and then instead and sometimes it's quite literally for nothing it's just absorbing

the contract but another times it's like a third round pick or something and people can't see i keep seeing tweets like i can't believe that's all it took for that player that team got robbed and it's like no that's kind of the reality of the situation so if you're a team that has a bunch of these deals and you're trying to move them on like good luck to you because because that's basically the worst place you can be in as a team in this current kind of financial landscape. Oh, yeah. It's, I mean, it's cap space is king, right? It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's an easy, cliche and things like that. But the teams that have the cap space have a lot of power. The teams that are willing to, it's, it's, it's easy to sometimes to be like, oh, well, a guy got traded for nothing. Well, it's not necessarily that. It's more and more of the ability to free up the cap is, so much has become so much more than nothing because of this environment. And I think it also just shows the healthy fear that because of how the CBA mechanism works and everything like that,

it's not like, and I do think the cap will, like next year it's only going to go up a million. I think the year after it'll go up. I think it'll worse, right? Like fourish. Yeah, like four. I don't have the exact number in front of me or what it can, but there's only so much it can go up. It's not like, it's not like we're going to get a like well all of a sudden two years from now it's going to go up $20 million like we're not getting like all of a sudden like a massive slush fund that's just going to come in and I think that's kind of part of the reality where people are just kind of now trying to how can I be how can I maximize and balance my books so I can make a proper bet on something I'm like it's a perfect example of like the Riley Smith trade where this Riley Smith trade

is Riley Smith's not getting traded if the cap had been continued to escalate without COVID. And essentially came down to the point of like, okay, Riley Smith wasn't traded for a third-round pick. Riley Smith was traded for the cab space because the team wanted to pick Ivan Barbashev in his cap space and said. And maybe even Aiden Hill, which we keep hearing, that deal is going to go through. And maybe that's a mistake. I think that one is a mistake. But it's more and more of it's opening up that space for what else you can do. And I think that's how we have to look at a lot of these moves.

And I think that's how we have to judge some of these moves as opposed to just the actual trade return. And whether it's a nothing of a pick or even nothing and it's a future considerations, which really is nothing because that's really just a term that means nothing. Yeah, I mean, there were a couple of examples like that, the Smith, is obviously really good, especially since we just most recently saw him be a very valuable contributor on whether you want to classify them as Vegas' second or third line, like the combination of him William Carlson was incredibly valuable to them winning the Stanley Cup, right? And then you see him for 20-24th or not even won this year. And it's like, wow, that's all you can get. But, you know,

we saw what the Tyler's a Foley trade, for example, and that's a bit of a unique circumstance because Calgary is facing the situation where all these players essentially, like in unison said, we want to be traded and we're a year out. And so they have leverage in the sense that like they're still in their contracts so they can wait this out until someone becomes desperate and gives them something they feel is valuable. But you look at DeFoli, what he had 34 goals last year, 73 points. His 5-1-5 impacts were like off the charts. He was one of the most effective forwards in the league beyond obviously like the superstars that you think of. And he goes for you were Sharon Govich and a third. And the, and my as well was the initial reaction

to that was like, I can't believe that's all it took. And then you think, okay, well, I imagine every single contender around the league is interested in Tyler Tofoli. How many of them can actually facilitate just taking on $4.25 million without like significantly changing their roster around, right? And the answer to that is very few teams. Like a team like the Rangers would have traded a significant capital for him, I think. But they literally, They literally cannot even retain their own full team right now unless they figure out this Barkley-Grodrow situation. And so for them, they just couldn't even entertain that. And that ultimately really shrinks your leverage and your market. And that's kind of how you wind up with that deal. Right. And credit to the devils for because of the way they've handled this financially, they're one of those really good teams, but they can still make a move like that. Yeah. And the teams that have cap space too, it's become even it's the, we're starting to see a little bit more of,

they're feeling the pressure of how do I, if I'm going to help facilitate a deal or whatever, they're feeling the pressure now of how do we wait for the next right deal? Because you only get so many retention spots. Like it's like there's not, like there's a, you can be a mechanism to retain or help or do something like that. But I think the teams that are teams that are in the process of either helping to broker a deal or maybe make you do some shed some salary themselves or whatever. I think this kind of, I truly believe the coyote's getting stuck with eight years of a retention spot by Ekman-Larsman. I think it also kind of like, it's one of those things where it's like it just starts to scare people where it's like, I only have so many of these spots,

and it's the same reason that like, it's the same reason that like by that people hoard like, well, I have, I have three beers in the fridge. I'm not going to drink that last beer because I might need it for a rainy day. Like it's the, it's, it's, I think it's, it's, it's, I think it's, I think we have more and more of that where the people who, people aren't using all of the tools available to them because they're scared of, well, what is the better move is three months from now, six months from now, tomorrow. I think we're just seeing so much of that right now, adding to that gridlock. Well, I will say, though. That's obviously, I get what you're saying. That specific example, I don't think the coyotes were too upset with them.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's not like they're going to be maximizing all of their financial capabilities. regardless. I don't, I don't, I don't think the coyotes are upset about it. My point is it's the other GMs who look at, it's the other GM. It's one, one few of the move that you could theoretically do. Correct. Correct. Yeah, I mean, you saw it today, right? One of the trades we did see on the draft floor was Kayla Yamamoto and Klim Koston, like quite literally going back for the, uh, the proverbial future considerations, bag of sticks. Um, and I did see some people being like, wow, what a, what a, what a great job by Steve Eisen

making this happen. And I think you could probably evaluate it from both teams separately in the sense that the Red Wings are one of the teams that has so much cap space available.

I don't think they're in a rush to tie it up long term the way they did last summer with veterans. And so in this sense, you're like, all right, well, we get one year

of Kaili Amamoto, 3.1 million. Doesn't really matter. We'll see what happens with him. He's still youngish. And worst case, we can kind of move on

from that after the season. Klim Koston, we'll see on that as well. He's an RFA with arbitration rights, but if he doesn't get paid, accordingly, he could just go to the KHL if he wants. I think it's going to take a certain contract to keep him here. So that's totally fine and reasonable from the Red Wings perspective to take those shots.

But if you're the Oilers, that's like a slam dunk trade in my opinion, because you clear $3.1 million, which you had to do. You don't pay for Klim Koston's 20% shooting percentage season, which they have gotten in trouble doing in the past as an organization. and you don't have to give up any picks to do this. Like I think the Red Wings did old Kenny Holland quite a favor there in allowing them to do that because they're one of the few teams that could. And so it's fine from the Red Wings perspective,

but I actually thought like that trade was and transaction was a perfect microcosm of what we're talking about. And the fact that the Oilers were able to do that without giving up a future second or something is a huge win for them. Yeah, I thought it was a good trade for Edmonton, obviously, as you kind of laid out right there. You got out of some problems. You got out of you, I think you actually were self-aware that there is benefits of playing with the best playing on the team with the best player on the planet.

I think there are certain guys who you can now pay less to do a similar job next year. And I think the Oilers, it is a smart move by Edmonton. And from a Detroit perspective, like you have the cap space, you do it and everything like that. But to me, it's not the, like, 4D chess. Like, it's sometimes you get like, oh, Steve Iserman's playing 4D chess. Trust the Izer plan. Like, to me, this isn't that. This is a, if, if, this is a, all right, well, you were, you allow, you allowed your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, your old, yeah, like, yeah, yeah.

scale, right. It's three point one million. It's not, yeah, yeah, anything massive. But for the oilers, that's very valuable real estate. So, yeah. Um, there's two teams that I want to talk about here. And, and they're obviously on both extremes. Um, but they help highlight this trend we're talking about.

One is the devils. We mentioned them kind of with a Tyler defoli transaction. Yeah. And then the other is the Blackhawks who obviously have the most cap space. I guess not anymore, but they did heading into this past week. Yeah. Which one of them do you want to start off with first? Because I think their moves were both kind of interesting.

Yeah, let's, let's start with Chicago, I guess. Yeah. So, you know, heading into the offseason, my pal Thomas Drenz kept messaging me with, like, all of these scenarios where, because he's like so all in on the Conradd experience and rightfully so, like, I think. Thomas, Thomas, Thomas, Tom, Thomas, Tom, Thomas, who was wearing a suit today from the Arizona Coyotes. Oh, was it from the Maroon line from the Bram. Yeah, Durantz was definitely wearing it not, wasn't, it looked like he, it looked like he may have shopped at the same store as coyotes from the night before. so I love that she's been like obsessed with them leveraging all of the space they had heading in which was like 35 million or some obscene amount of cap space into essentially taking advantage of the current landscape we're talking about here where there's like teams like the Bruins and stuff that had all these players that they can't afford to keep and you can essentially just go and cherry pick whichever ones you want for free and potentially even get features in return but like build out a team of competent NHL players at least.

So you're not as embarrassingly bad and downright tanking as they were last year for Bardard and actually put him in a position where you can succeed somewhat and be insulated in his first year in the league. And so he's like, all right, they should sign Alex Killorn and get Matt Grizzlic and take Connor Garland from the Canucks and do all these things, right? And I kept trying to throw cold water on it being like, well, I had temper expectations in terms of like how ambitiously they're going to try to do that, especially in year one or year or two. Like, I think that's probably not going to happen. And we certainly see them make moves,

but I can't help but feel underwhelmed by like how they've monetized that cap space so far. And how they still have 25 million or so left to go. But they've essentially spent 17 million now this summer on Taylor Hall, Nick Folino, Andreas Atheniseu, and Josh Bailey's buyout. And so I don't think that's necessarily according to Drans's plan. We'll still see what they're from here on out. Well, they mean, they also did the trade for Corey Perry's rights today. Oh, yeah. So like...

And I assume that all will come with an AAB significantly higher than anyone else in the league would have given him as well, which makes sense because he probably wants to compete for a Stanley Cup and they want to have him there as sort of a veteran presence. So... And that one also feels like such a weird, like one where it's like you sign him to a one year Aavie that's reasonable. And then at the deadline, you retain and you buy your... And you buy that pick.

You buy that pick like, I think they traded a seventh for his rights, right? I think. And then you buy that pick back for a fifth or something like that from some team at the deadline. Like very similar to like Verbeek basically signing Klingberg to buy a draft pick. Like that's almost what the Perry deal feels like for me. Well, I'll tell you what, Sean. People around the league are, I guess, irritated by like how they are monetizing their caps piece in the sense that it sounds good in, but I don't think anyone believes they're like actually using that utilizing it to its full capability

in terms of extracting that value, right? We talk about cap weaponization and all this. And they take this $5 million deal off the Islander's hands in Josh Bailey and buy him out. And it comes with like less actual salary, right? Like they're not actually paying that much themselves. But they get this 2026 second back for him. And there's people around like, man, that's that is not the going rate for this. type of transaction. And so it's interesting to sort of see. And, you know, they did it with Petter and Razik

last year at the draft as well, where they get this like minimal trade up to take this bad contract off the leaf's hands and throw them a life wrapped as well. And it's, it all sounds good to have this much gap space, but then I don't think, like they obviously had a fantastic draft, right? They come away with Connor Bred, Crown Jewel. They come away. They get all of more dropping to them as well. Like, that's all well and good. But in terms of like actual optimization, here can't help but feel a bit underwhelmed by the way they've they've acted so far well i mean they got a jam he said he says he said some people think he doesn't know hockey there's a really some guy out the street yeah yeah yeah yeah scale one to ten how well he's no hockey he's put it as a

four so i think that's uh i think if we use that as a proper scale i mean it's probably fine i mean yeah they got they got that they got what uh yeah the 50th best 14 year old right now for Josh Bailey deal essentially like 26 second Yeah yeah yes For five million We're not not too long ago Patrick McClewell's 6.25

cost the Leafs 13th overall Which wound up being Seth Jarvis I don't know They just made some trades that I thought were a bit strange But in the grand scheme of things Not that big of the only devil's on the other part though What a week for them right

Oh yeah obviously yeah Previously they retain and extend Just for Brad for eight years That a really good figure and I thought They trade for Tyler to Foley. They extend Tim O'Meyer for $8 million as well at $8.8. I mean, really, really nice piece of business. And all of a sudden you look at that team,

and obviously they're going to be a very trendy Stanley Cupback, and they're still in the rumors for the Albuke sweepstakes. But, man, that four group of particular is really coming together nicely. Yeah, they did a really nice job. I mean, obviously part of it was go as from, you had to complete the job from signing, from trading for Meyer mid-season. and then signing and everything like that.

But, yeah, that, I mean, I think the devils are really, really nice job just kind of understanding, I think, that you have to be willing to take some of, not risks, but be willing to build an assert way, that you have to be willing to, in to go in a cup, you've got to be able to do this. And I really like the way they tackled some things. Now, the Hellebuck thing could be really interesting.

Like, if you bring, if you bring, if you bring, goalie like that in all of a sudden we're having a really become a very very trendy pick yeah it's I I like what New Jersey did this week and I like the way they kind of moved around and everything like that I ran it I saw it's kind of one of the funny things at the draft today where the Pete the the the devil's PR guy was walking out and so like e teams when teams come to the draft

they have to bring all of this crap with them they have to bring all these jerseys they have to bring all these gloves and for the pictures and so teams will typically bring like 15 jerseys just in case, right? Just in case they're all there. And like, so a perfect example of how New Jersey operated outside of the draft world, only two of their picks were actually there. So Pete's carrying like to leave the draft today, he's carrying, he's walking off the floor with like a heavy bag that still's got like 13 jerseys in it

and gloves and everything because just in case he had to bring it with them. And it was a net bag is a good representation of the PR guy having to carry that bag. It represents the other bag that the devil's got. So I hope I connected that one. That's hilarious. I mean, that proof that they have now, I assume the lines will shake out. I mean, they can experiment with all this, but something like Timelmeier with his shear and then dogs and mercer.

Yep. Just for Brad, Jack Hughes, and now Tyler Tofoli on his wing. I mean, what a top six there. And I guess part of this as well. And the lesson from this is the reason why they're in this position to pounce on a to Foley and make a lot of these moves they've had is they acted so decisively in signing equal his year, but particularly in Jack Hughes coming off as ELC. And so now they have essentially the best non-L ELC contract in the league now that

Nathan McKinnon is making his 12.6 or whatever. It is Jack Hughes, right, his figure. And so because you have those two guys where your top two centers locked up long term at those figures, even before the cap goes up, they're able to build around them and add around them and be aggressive in adding to their team. And so I guess that's the thing. It really is sort of that lesson of there's a certain time where you have to bridge a player or you have to or you want to give it more time to see. But if you initially evaluate that it's like this guy's a star or a superstar, the more years you can buy up the more quickly, that's probably going to age pretty well for you, right? And that's kind of what's going on here with the devils.

I also like that there was like there was kind of at one point people were like oh well they've got the internal pay structure and all that stuff like I like that was not a reality because I think if a guy signs a contract it signs a contract and I get to leverage their on Brad a little bit and getting under it I was surprised they were able to get him under eight for eight years the way they did but yeah

the Meyer they obviously went above yeah no but like that was the whole thing where people were like oh well this they have this internal pay structure and it's going to limit what they can do and I think I think internal pay structures are incredibly incredibly stupid. So I'm glad that they did not I'm glad that they did not stick to that because I don't like what teams do that.

Okay, let's take our break here. And then when we come back, we'll talk about some other main takeaways from these two draft days and some other stuff from this week in Nashville. You're listening to the HockeyPedio guest 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 Hockey Pedyo guest of Sean Chippeara. Let's talk a bit about the Predators this year's host of the NHL draft. They were clearly looking to be very active and make a splash, right, leading up to the day one of the draft. We heard a lot about how they were pretty aggressively floating out Yaroslav Ascarov and the two firsts they had to try to move up, particularly. into the top 10, but even five potentially, I think, was most rumored, or linked to them with the

Canadian inspect before they took David Reimbacher there. Let's talk a little bit about them and kind of that direction and sort of how that didn't come together and where they go from here, because now obviously Barry Trots, even though I guess he's technically finally taking over now, I think he was probably acting as the GM regardless for a while now and certainly like helping shape and influence their moves since the deadline. What kind of stuck out to you there and sort of what's the general feeling in terms of the way they approached? I keep wanting to say this weekend, but it was a Wednesday, Thursday.

I'm so used to the draft being kind of over that, like, oh, yeah. I mean, like, where it's, it was weird to be, we're, we're recording this at what, three o'clock on a Thursday right now or something like that, or sent locally, three o'clock on a Thursday. And it's, to me, it was, Nashville was the, there and it was a big want to make a splash or make a big move and and you do it at home and that's exciting and you kind of make a like develop a marquee moment and everything like

that and I think they really wanted to do that. It was just kind of just optically speaking that's fun. That's a nice like if you make that move that franchise altering trade or change and everything at your home draft that's the thing where your franchise lore can be built on that and that stuff so um i think they really wanted to i mean we we know that they were willing they wanted to move into that top five the they wanted to the canadians pick was the one was one of the picks they were after um they wanted to do you think it would have taken do you think they would have taken mitchcock with that or do you think it was to to grab i think someone else I don't know for certain, but I think it was to grab Mitchcove.

I think that was the, I think part of Barry Trots' timeline in his head on this as he looks at kind of Mitchcov's arrival timeline is probably the timeline when realistically he can build the rest of the roster to be competitive. I think that's kind of the two align pretty well. So for me, and just once again, just breeding tea leaves, not knowing anything for certain, I think it was more on the concept of you can get Mitchkov, you can, you make that trade, you get Mitchcove, and you bring in something you don't, your program doesn't have, you bring in something that's going, someone who's going to be the dynamic franchise player, and it costs a lot to do that. Like to move up in this draft and people weren't moving and everything like that.

And I mean, they were willing to, we saw the reports and we heard that they were willing to package Yarslav Ascarov, the goalie from their pretty good goalie prospect who played this year for the Milwaukee Admirals with both first round picks and move up. And I think there was even one of the things that Trots said afterwards. Like he almost, maybe like maybe he was almost even thinking about giving up too much to get to get up into it. It's overgiving. Yeah, like overgiving. Like, um, and I, I, I think with where the predators are, it's like he's in the, he's in a very, trots is in a very interesting spot that most GMs, I think trots has a, like we talked about Detroit earlier, I think trots actually is a similar kind of like lifeline that Iserman has in

Detroit, where you have done so much for an organization in the past. You're kind of be given the keys to like, just rebuild as you want. And like, I think Trots knows that he gets the time to build this slowly. It's just all that it's lacking is in Detroit, it's the Eiser plan. But in Nashville, we don't have like a fun moniker for, for whatever Barry's doing. Like, Barry's business, Trot shots. I don't Trots shots come. So, I mean, yes, I know, I agree with that. I think he's inheriting a much better situation in terms of like how little. Oh, yeah.

Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I agree with that. They didn't really necessarily have to tear any down, right? But it was an organization that, and I remember you and I did a show like right after they meet that series and the move series of moves at the deadline. And we kind of talk for 15, 20 minutes about how they were stuck in the middle for so long as an organization, right?

Not necessarily wanting to take that calculated step back, especially aggressively and kind of just hanging around. and ultimately winding up in a pretty tricky place in that mushy middle in the league. And so now, you know, they make all those moves where they trade everyone out. They grab a bunch of draft capital. A couple days ago also moved John Henson, right, and clear out $4 million this year and next time of that as well. And so there's been a lot of house cleaning there. I get the desire to make that splashing move, and especially if it is with the direct,

with the expressed interest of using it the draft Mitchcove, because that's the type of offensive talent that they've never really had in franchise history, right? Like Philip Forsberg is probably just the most, like, gifted offensive player they had. And I love Philip Hobitch Forzberg. He's phenomenal. But this upside or this allure of what Mitchgov could be as a goal score is just sort of this next level thing they haven't really experienced. I was looking at it while we were talking.

I mean, over the past 20 years, the Predators have had two top 10 picks. And one was in 08, right? they took Colin Wilson, seventh overall, and then in 2013, they took Seth Jones fourth. And so I get that, like, fifth in grabbing Mitchcock. I do think, though, and maybe this is me just being on the higher end of Ascarab evaluations, but him 15 and 24 to move up is, that's quite a bit. I think Barry is right. That might be overgiving.

I think it's overgiving. I also am not going to let you book buy it because you kept talking and intentionally bought in the full Filipovich Forsberg so I'm gonna I sprinkled it in there as a little nugget. Yeah, that's

yeah, yeah, no, but it's, it was, if I let it slide without pointing out that I heard it, that's going to be

problem. So, it's a slippery slope, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so, yeah.

Okay, Filipovitch. I mean, here's the thing about Askrod, because you, you wrote that feature on it,

right? Yeah, yeah, first year in North America, which I think you can't, uh, you can't overstay, like what a big adjustment that was for him and clearly started playing better zero went along and did I believe he had like 60

games under his belt between the regular season and playoffs in the HL around a nine, 10th, say a percentage. And I think based off of all the physical tools and also sort of this like intangible kind of like swag and energy he seems to have clearly like I'm all in on the ROS lab and scroop experience moving forward. And I know that might be surprising to hear me say that because generally I don't have too many thoughts on goalies because it's like I totally agree that they're generally pretty replaceable and what you have in front of them matters much more and all that, but just considering he's 21

and on an ELC and with this type of runway, I actually do view him as an actual piece and not just, oh, another goalie. And I look at, like, I have a big believer in Ask Krofto. I think the, I think he has the, there are definitely strides that need to be taken in his game. I think there's a you talk to

you look at kind of his game and I think there's a bit of the refinement of the focusing up of it almost where and not that he doesn't focus on the game but he's such a he's such an intense athletic goalie and I

think we see and you see that come out where when the puck enters the zone he gets so dialed in and everything like that I think he's right now in that spot where it's finding the kind of even keel of how are you dialed in, but your muscles aren't jumping all over the place when the puck's in the neutral zone. And I think that's something that can grow with maturity and grow with time in the league and time in North America. So I'm a big believer

in Ascarov. And I do think that I do think trading all of that for, Mitchkov, I think it would have been a lot. I think it would have been, it would have been a bit too much. I mean, I think Mitchcov can be that player that Asheville has never had it forward before, but there's also no guarantee of that at the same time, right? It's when you're talking about giving up a more proven asset, now it's a goalie, there's some viability there, but you're talking about giving up a more proven asset and trading two lottery tickets for a lottery ticket that's got a little bit more of a high that has could be a little bit more I think you're give I do think you're giving too much up for that and I also think it's a trade where by not doing it the predators

probably saved themselves from putting everything into all of their eggs into one basket and because all of a sudden if you move Ascarov there and he becomes the guy somewhere else. Like it's just it becomes a tough narrative to fight if that if he doesn't become the best. If he doesn't, if he doesn't truly become the second best player in this draft, if he doesn't become a superstar, if he doesn't do that. Well, at the same time as we transition here, I don't think the, I mean, I don't think the flyers necessarily did put all of their eggs in that basket. No, the fires did a great job.

I do love them taking that swing at seventh overall. Yeah. And the story in particular of, you know, there was sort of alarm or like eyebrows raised when that practice facility tweet being closed was sent out last week. And it winds up turning out obviously, as we know now that they're like sneaking Mitch Cobb in there for meetings and all this stuff. Like, I don't know. What are you sort of hearing about that and what were people saying? on the ground or behind the scenes.

Let me tell an unrelated story because I don't know, an unrelated but related story about this. Because I don't know. So the best stories. I don't know for sure if, if Matt Veimichkov was in Philadelphia, it was in Philadelphia. That's why they closed facility.

I don't know. Maybe it was, but I do know. I think it's been reported by now. I think we know. But I do, but one thing I do know when I was covering the Dallas Stars and it was the summer of Joe Pavelski's recruitment, of free agency. There was one day they canceled.

It was during development camp because it was development camp was before July 1st. And there was a day they canceled. They were like, oh, there's no media availability today. The guys are just doing some light stretching. No one needs to come to the media. You don't need to come to the rink.

We're just kind of doing some stuff. I was the only person who went to the rink and I actually walked right into Joe Pavelski getting a tour of the facilities and I got a bit of a kind of a glance from Stars PR. because I was like, well, I'm not here to talk to guys. I'm here to just watch guys skate in circles and that's okay.

So teams do this, right? Like, there is, there's... I think the circumstances of this are a bit more unique, right? Considering no one being able to speak to them. Exactly. But I, but my point being is like, this is the type of thing that teams are willing to do. They're willing to change other schedules to bring guys in and do things like that. And I think the other.

thing that Philly did. Philly did this, and I don't know, I don't have the full list of this. I would love to see which teams did this, but Philly, I know Detroit did because I spoke to Chris Draper today, and I know that they had their, they actually kept their scout in Russia, but Philly is also a team that kept their scout in Russia all season, too. And so they were a team that had actual physical eyes on them when a lot of teams ended up pulling scouts out. of Russia after the invasion of the Ukraine. So Philly was, and it was the secret cloak and dagger meeting in Philadelphia.

Like, I think more so of this was Philly, this was kind of one of those things where Philly was angling for this the entire year. They were always keeping eyes on Mitch God. That's what they were always doing. And it just worked out that the cards kind of fell into their favor, that everyone else kind of got wrapped up in this factor of a fear of whether this of fear of the other stuff about this kid

yeah I mean I get it there's certainly some risk involved I think just on the upside especially for a team that's in the position that the flyers are in right where they're looking at such a long road ahead they like after years of putting it off and doubling down on one mistake after another finally cleaned house and like are you know aggressively now shopping out every single veteran and even if it means taking on a bunch of money for the next couple years in in like Kevin Hayes for example they just want to basically clear the deck and

start over almost right and so that represents such an organizational change and that is actually so refreshing and reaffirming right because they bring in pretty much all of these old flyers who used to play for a team and they're initially spinning it as all right this is a fresh start it's going to be different. It's going to be a new era at orange or whatever their slogan was. And it's like, it feels like kind of more of the same, right? But we're like, all right, at least give them a chance to see what the moves indicate. And so far, so good, I think. In that regard, yeah, the Michiglav stuff is interesting, too, because I heard a lot. I was watching this, like, NHL Network interview during Rouse 4 or 5 or whatever, Danny Breyer was on. And at least five or six times, he, he, like,

reinforced how happy Mitch Gob is to be a flyer and like how I guess he was saying that he wanted to go play there or whatever. I don't know how much of that is posturing or what or just selling it. But he was just going so above and beyond even more so than I think the usual GM speak that I found that kind of interesting. Yeah, the Mitchcoff stuff is interesting too. Just kind of the I've never I've covered athletes of translators before. So I've never seen the double translator game of telephone I've seen with Michkoff where um and I don't know if this will be the setup for perpetuity or if this was just the draft and you're being careful I don't know but it would be you would ask the media would ask a question one translator would hear it repeat the question in Russian

mitchkoff would answer in Russian and then another translator would then translate mitchcoff's answer into English uh so like it's it's oh wasn't this you mean it wasn't the same translator no no no there was too like it was there's he's sitting in the middle yeah it was two telephones where question comes in and it's so we don't really know like what mitchkoff actually said and believes and everything like that i'm sure someone who's russian probably could listen and give a better idea but as an english speaker and listener i i don't know exactly it's hard to tell tone it's hard to tell what what was conveyed exactly throughout that that that information dialogue um but obviously brier's going all in on this i don't blame brier at all i think it

It's a smart play. One of the things that randomly popped into my head as you were going, as we were talking, and it made me think on this. Like, you mentioned cleaning the deck and starting from the bottom. And we talked about, we talked about like Trots basically kind of trying to do a little bit of that right now too, where he's willing to basically, he's just, they're getting, getting into Johansson to clear up the $4 million in cap space, each of the next two years and everything. I wonder.

And this is a theory I'm literally developing right now, so people can tell me if I'm wrong, that's fine. I wonder if the appetite for owners to be on boarded with it has changed because of what Seattle and Vegas did, where Seattle and Vegas came in and they were a clean deck. They were a blank slate. Right. And no bad contracts. No bad contracts. And I wonder if, I wonder if from an owner perspective and the Flyers owner's compast spectacore, if I'm getting the name completely. right. A lot of times there's a huge pressure from ownership to you can't do that. We have to find the path right now. And I just wonder if seeing what Vegas did, seeing what Seattle did, all of a sudden made it much easier for NHLGMs to when you're the new guy coming in. And I think that's kind of a key thing. That's like Breyer's the new guy coming in. And like when you're the new guy coming in,

you get a little bit more of that, hey, we have to tear it down so it's completely at the bottom. And I just, I wonder if what Vegas and Seattle did did that. This is, this is truly a working theory where I'm throwing crap against the wall as I'm bringing this up right now. So I don't know, but I'm just, I'm thinking trying to, trying to get into an ownership mindset where normally forever it's been, well, we have to compete every year. We have to get one of those golden tickets to the playoffs. We have to do or the closest thing possible to maybe, well, hey, VIII. Vegas went complete, obviously it was complete Plague State. In five years they went, in six years they won a cup.

Seattle was final eight, right? Or whatever, whatever it was, right? Like, I just, I wonder if all the ownership GM dichotomy has changed because of that in some places. 100%. I mean, obviously in both cases, I think more so Vegas than Seattle, considering, like, you know, when Seattle had their, I mean, not that Vegas's expansion draft was that heralded in terms of the actual roster players they got back from teams. Because I think nobody expected them to have the initial success they did. right but especially with Seattle there was a lot of like head scratching decisions in terms of players

they took from teams when they had other alternatives in place but the biggest value they had of being that expansion team was purely just not having bad contracts on your books right and getting that fresh start and so that's immensely valuable and often I think that is a good point because often we place a lot of the blame on GMs because they are so forward facing right and they take both the good and the bad and when it's bad they take a lot of the criticism but usually you do have a higher up in front of you ahead of you that you have to answer to and it comes down sometimes to what you're actually allowed to do with a team and so in this case it's very exciting that they're getting this sort of green light to do this now you know what was interesting

and this is sort of besides the point from a hockey ops perspective but just as a as a storytelling tool during the last weekend right during all of those trade rumors coming out where it was like literally just drop by drop we were being given like little breadcrumbs of who could be going to st louis who could be coming back before we eventually found out that it was like tory crook and he didn't want to wave and everything right there was this like six hour period where we were just getting an immense amount of information in the slowest time possible in real like as slow as possible in real time and it was like how like what is like what's happening here how is there so many how is there one leak that's either so strong or so many different leaks springing that this is all

coming out and then they go and they had this sort of like as you mentioned in cloak and dag or ever like this like rogue mission that no one knows about in mitchkhov coming to their facilities and not reported at all until they actually draft them and so what a flex on their end to like after all this criticism of like these leaks they had and how all this was coming out the most important move of all literally no one had any word up until it was already executed I mean it's it's it's kind of In our end, it kind of, you start to, you try to reverse engineer and you try to, like, play the, like, you can't help, like, wonder, like, okay, well, if the Philly kept the Mitchcove appearance so far under wraps and everything like that, okay, do they do that for everything? Well, it's intentional. Like, I mean, the skeptic in me could be like, you know what?

Maybe Philly's intentionally leaking it so they could do the other thing. Like, it's the, like, that's just the skeptic. me or the conspiracy theorist of me too, but it's, it is, it is impressive how, how much it was never, there was not the insider tweet of like, like, we would hear like, like, oh, Michkov, like, Mitchcov, uh, met with the blues, but Doug Armstrongster refused to call it an interview. Like, we would get little things like that, but we never got like, oh, by the way, they literally had Mitchcoff in the facility in Philadelphia. I think we, I think we learned that they, that they had met with them, but similar to like the, like,

like we knew the haves met with him, right, and stuff like this. But it wasn't obviously to the extent that it wound up coming out after the fact. Okay, do you want to quickly talk about the stars here? Yeah, let's do it. As, you know, Jim Nell coming on freshly minted as the GM of the year. You had the tweet where he said that he's not planning on or not going to use. I don't know what the terminology was. Not planning to at this moment.

You think he's monitoring? I actually don't think so. I don't know what the end game is there because I don't think someone's going to take Ryan Suter off of him. So I don't think I think Ryan Suter plays for the Dallas stars this year. I think as a I think as a team they are to I think there's a there is a belief and reliance and faith in the coaching staff in in Ryan Suter. and I think they are a little bit scared of the risk in their mind of rolling a defense that's got a Yadi Hock andbah coming off of injury and a Thomas Harley who, by the way, in my view, Thomas Harley proved himself in the playoffs. I don't understand why all of a sudden now we have to treat him with kid gloves again,

but that's my own view. and and and uh and and and then a nils lunquist who you essentially are he was your first round pick and the stars have said this very publicly on the record where they used they traded a first to the rangers to get lunquist last summer and they didn't have a first round pick this year and and there are things like well he's he's better than any player we'd be able to draft with that pick and he's already you can tell him so so now they have to use them and then they need to if they're going if they're going to see but i think there's also a they're scared of the risk of not having the veteran defenseman back there that play

a solid minutes and I'm using intentionally hockey person terms. I'm doing that on purpose right now. And I think for all of those reasons, I don't think this is posture and I don't think there's a buyout coming. I think it's going to be one of those moves where I'm going to disagree with what the stars do and that's, and it'll probably lead to a conversation I have with some somebody about it at the draft next year. I mean, you mentioned there, like the coaching staff has confidence in him. I completely agree with that. That's kind of a problem, unfortunately.

An overconfidence it is. Yes, of course. Yes. Yeah, I mean, I had this fake trade for Carlson earlier. Oh, my God. Yes, yes. And that just sent to her Twitter. It's a dizzy and a downright frenzy.

and people were saying that it's too risky. Like that contract is so risky. And then I'm hearing you say that about not having Ryan Suter as being so risky. I just, I guess it comes out of perspective. But I view the opposite risky. I view wasting these like championship window seasons by being, I love to be risky. I love your trade.

Like I was like, I'm not saying you are. Oh, no, no, I know. Starz fans being like, we can't take on this contract. It's too risky. And I just don't. I mean, you can't take on that contract. It's too, I mean, it's, it's, you want to compete for a Stanley Cup or do you just want to be? Do you, do you want to win a Stanley Cup?

That's, that's the question. Do you want to win the Stanley Cup? If the answer is yes, then you make trades like the one that you proposed earlier this week for Carlson. And I, from a, I, you people get so attached to prospects, right? they'll be like, oh, well, what if this, what about this guy? Like, we're going to do this and we're going to hold this up and everything like that. And I think from a Dallas fandom, just putting a pulse on the finger of things, because, and I feel like I'm more qualified than most people to do that.

I think part of it comes from the early, like, they're like, they see what happened when the stars did not trade Heishinen for Carlson, when that was the holdup then. And you know what? That was the right move. But the stars don't have another Miro Heskin in then as all of a sudden. It's not like it's not like they're tried. It's not like you're giving up Miro Heskin for Herrick Carlson in this trade. And I think there's a try to understand the fan psyche is like, oh, well, last time we tried to trade for Erickerson, we didn't do it. We got our franchise defenseman.

You don't have anyone like that you put in that trade rolls. No one like that is all of a sudden. I'm like, well, I've now given up generational assets. Like, it's, it's, you've given up some scratch off tickets for a guy who, you know what, is probably the one of the, still the best defense, offensive defenseman in the NHLs. Yeah, I shouldn't have opened this can of worms this late into the show because I feel like we could have done a full episode on this. But maybe we'll have to revisit this at some point in the audience. I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to do so.

Sean, we got to get out of here. I'm going to let you go, enjoy the rest of your time there in Nashville before you had a home yourself. Thank you for taking the time. Everyone should go check out your substack and your own podcast and on your Twitter at Sean Shapiro where you tweet everything. And we'll be back tomorrow, as I said, with Mitch Brown to talk about the draft. So until then, thank you for listening to the HockeyPedio cast streaming on SportsAid Radio Network.