The Hockey PDOcast - Tanking for Bedard, Avs struggles, and Meier fits

Episode Date: January 6, 2023

Harman Dayal joins Dimitri in studio as the guys talk about Connor Bedard's record breaking World Juniors tournament for Canada, and the logic of tanking for a generational talent like him. They also touch on the Colorado Avalanche and Timo Meier's struggles. This podcast is produced by Dominic Sramaty.  The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate. If you'd like to gain access to the two extra shows we're doing each week this season, you can subscribe to our Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/thehockeypdocast/membership If you'd like to participate in the conversation and join the community we're building over on Discord, you can do so by signing up for the Hockey PDOcast's server here: https://discord.gg/a2QGRpJc84 The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Media Inc. or any affiliate.

dressing to the mean since 2015. It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Filipo. Welcome to the Hockey PEOCast. My name's Dimitra Villapovich. In studio with me on this lovely Friday to get ready for the weekend. My good buddy, Harmon Dile. Haram, what's going on, man? Nothing much, man.

How are you? I'm good. I'm good. You know, another week in the books here. It's been good getting back into the rhythm. You know, the holidays always throw things off. I took a few days off there. And obviously, we didn't have games.

over Christmas. So now it's fine. We're kind of like settling back into a rhythm, so I'm excited about it. And I mean, I'm still buzzing a little bit after that, the World Junior Championship gold medal game, right? How much of the tournament do you get a chance to watch?

So I took the last week at December off. So I mostly kept up via highlights. Yeah. To be totally honest. Well, that's the best way to watch a game. Exactly. And I've already had so much hockey in my plate. You know, you can't miss what the Vancouver Canucks are doing

in that grade A hockey, you know? but no in all seriousness that was a fun sort of tournament to just even generally keep up with and there were points where I don't know if you expected Canada to

come out and top in that tournament given the way that they obviously lost initially to check you and just they didn't look like if it wasn't for Bedard's magic I think there were some shaky moments and some question marks around them

so the way that they were able to kind of build that 2-0 lead and then all of a sudden blow that lead and then the overtime winner that was uh that was pretty dramatic yeah it was dramatic and it also felt like i think generally a common critique of the world juniors is how like non-competitive it can feel at times right like and we certainly had a few blowouts there where we're can't it just you know 1-11 nothing for example and one of the preliminary games but for the most part when it mattered it felt like a lot of these games were really competitive and tightly played and even you know there was obviously like overtime drama and and all that.

So I think there's pros and cons clearly with using tournaments like this, which are kind of like one-offs to build like scouting portfolios on, right? Like I think we've seen time and time again, there's been so many mistakes made over the years where especially like the most high profile, sort of scouting showcase like this, if you just like base everything off of seven games or however many they play, you're going to wind up wondering why certain picks were made. And we've seen teams kind of fall into that trap before. Now, I don't think anyone's basing their opinion on Connor Bredar just based off of these seven games.

There's everything that comes before it. But it was kind of cool seeing him on the biggest stage flexes muscles in that way and kind of show like just like how superior of a prospect he is to any of his peers, really. Like you rarely see a guy who's draft eligible like that put up the type of performance that he did. Absolutely, and it was pretty crazy, especially because I think a lot of us thought that, okay, Badard might have a chance to be the best tournament, the best player at this tournament, but I don't think anybody would have expected him to clip at what, like, four points a game or whatever it was. And it was so dominant that it stole the spotlight from a guy like Logan Cooley. Right. Who was having a great tournament in his own right, but Badard had almost double the points that he did. Well, here's the stats.

Seven games, nine goals, 14 assists, a 23 points total. Canada scored 42 goals as a team, so he factored into 23 of 42, a stat by our pal Cam Robinson for another podcast. Conradar had 23 points. No other first-time draft eligible skater had more than six. I think Leo Carlson, I believe, who is also a consensus top three pick. It feels like at this point, probably third, had six points. And had a good tournament himself.

but it kind of just shows you like the gap in a way and some of the plays like he didn't even you know off off the score sheet in the final but there was like the play where he's like diving and gets it over to a team for a great scoring chance like it felt like he was just he was so electric and i really felt watching more extended um segments of connor bernard because he when he's playing in his of his club team you see the highlights you see the stats but you're not really following it that closely watching them on this stage that's shot my goodness like it's i i think that plays immediately like i think like oh yeah from a physicality perspective i'm sure there would be growing pains if you just dropped them into the nchl right now but i

i really do feel like he could score 30-ish goals right now just purely based off of getting that release off and goalies just like nchl goleys similarly will wind up looking foolish just like a lot of these major junior goalies are right now yeah i mean i wouldn't even be surprised i don't think this is the most likely outcome. But if he comes in as a rookie and scores 40, it's not going to be a huge shock to me just because of how deceptive that release is. And the other interesting component is I think the World Juniors was interesting because we also got a chance to see him with elite talent around him.

Whereas when he's playing a junior in the WHL for the Regina Pats, he doesn't have a lot of help around him. There's a lot of Connor Bedard, magic, gets his fifth point of the game and cuts the deficit to 7.6. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. No, that's like the deception is a great point. It really feels like, I mean, I don't know really how you play it because you almost can't, you almost get frozen because you can't really play for the shot because he's such a good playmaker.

And as he showed, he'll burn you with like crossing passes and easy backdoor tapins. but then if you don't respect the shot, then he'll just step into it, pick his corner, and beat you that way as well. It's going to be a real problem. And I really think, like, yeah, it's going to play right away. It's very rare. I'm generally skeptical of, like, prospects,

regardless of how good they look at lower levels coming in and making a dramatic difference right away, I would be stunned if he's not scoring a ton of goals as soon as next year. I just don't know how when he's at his prime, you're going to be able to defend him one-on-one because of that ability to, like I can already imagine so many scenarios as a defenseman

where you think you've gapped up on him and he's coming off the rush and you think you're in the right position, you've got a stick in the lane, you've got a decent body position, but the way that he can just curl and drag almost Matthews-like and just alter the shooting angle last minute

to find that hole and get it through traffic, that's just like you're going to have to, as a defenseman, be right on him and there has to be zero breathing, room because if there's any wind of opportunity, he has the hands sort of be able to manufacture even given the smallest daylight and he's going to be able to sort of take advantage of it and exploit it. And that's really, really dangerous to think about if you're a defenseman. Well, your colleague at the athletic, Dom Lus Chishin, put out some projections.

Now obviously there's a lot of gray air here and most of it is based off of NHLE, which is subject to air. But it's kind of the best we have to work off of. He has initial projection for Euro 1 of Connor Bardard and the NHL is 72 points and 2.6 wins added which are very, very elite rarefied error numbers

and then sounds about right. I don't think it's outlandish. Like obviously it depends on kind of which team he goes through the situation he's in. There's a lot of time between now and then but yeah, if you're projecting out ahead, it's kind of in line with what I'd expect.

Yeah, like if he ends up on a team that Columbus and he's on a lot online with Johnny Goodroll all of a sudden, then why not, right? Of course, if he's on Arizona, it's a bit of a different story in terms of the talent around him. But yeah, I mean,

that sounded about right when I read that article. And I think the biggest sort of question with Bard I've sort of been pondering is, and it's been interesting because seeing different draft evaluators, I'm not a prospects expert, so I tend to lean on the ones who study these guys

for a living. Exactly. And it's been interesting seeing the sort of differing opinion on, well, who is he the best prospects since? Is he the best prospect since Matthews? Is he the best prospect since McDavid? I even saw someone say he's the best prospect since Crosby, which I thought was this. Okay. Let's relax. I think that's a stretch. Yeah. But that's what I've been wondering. But that's the company he's keeping. Yeah. And like, I'm curious to, you know, kind of get your opinion and perspective, where do you think he slots compared to say in Austin Matthews? I don't know. Like you said, I'm in the same boat as you where I haven't put nearly the amount of work in in terms of like not only watching these guys at the lower levels, but like thinking

about this stuff. I'm more so I'm just giddy about the opportunity to watch him every night at the NHL level starting with next season. And so like that's going to be appointment viewing no matter where he lands. So I'm just not to give you like a non-answer because that's, not very satisfying, but I don't know, he's right up there. Like, he's in that group. It's, it's, it's a distinguished group, and it's like, it's something that I know every year we kind of, we go, it's cyclical, right? Like, there's like, oh, this is going to be a good draft or this is going to be a bad

draft. And then you have, like, ebbs and flows throughout the draft year itself where, depending on how guys are playing or producing at the moment, you can talk yourself into any number of guys. And it feels like, as we get closer to their draft, everyone is just so excited about the, like, the possibilities and the realization once we know who's picking where and where these guys are going to go, we just kind of like talk ourselves into every draft is good, right? And certainly every draft, I think what distinguishes a good and bad draft is like the predictability or confidence

we have in terms of the top. Right. Whereas like every year it feels like we're no matter how good you think the draft is, there's going to be at least a handful of guys who five or six years out are going to wind up being difference makers in the NHL. They just might be drafted in the teens or the 20s or like second or third round as opposed to all being stacked at the top. But there's a This is about as for as long as I've been doing this professionally, this is about like as confident as I've been and a guy stepping in and being awesome right away. Definitely. And the interesting thing with kind of just looking at the draft as a whole and especially with what this tournament kind of did was I feel like every year in the lead up to the draft, there's like when we get closer, there's always this discussion of the, the, oh, is the consensus number two, should he be ranked ahead of the consensus number one?

And there's that contrarian perspective where I don't know if you remember even in 2016, for example, the outside push of like, oh, should Lining go number one? And it's like, that was starting to build a little bit with Fantilli. I think everyone still had Badard as their number one. But it was at least a conversation with how strong Fantilli was looking at the University of Michigan, even if it's just to, you know, for people, in the media just to create conversation and discussion but with the type of

performance that badard had like you can't even have that you know no one can have that contrarian opinion anymore leading up to uh leading up to june like like we usually do where it's like oh could this number two guy is is he a potential challenger like there's no like there's no question at this point it's such a slam dunk

well i think under different circumstances if mad vetschkov was playing in his tournament and there was like no uncertainty about his NHL eligibility. If he was going to be there from day one, I think there'd be a bit more wiggle rumor latitude in that debate. But still, I mean, it's it's badard. And I think we don't need to like, fake interest or drama or talking points to be like, I don't know, this guy's doing pretty well not to diminish the prospect status of any of these guys because they're obviously all great players. And I think that that actually does loop into what I want to talk about next, which was

this idea of like tanking for this guy and and how. the bottom of the league is going to wind up shaking out because, you know, under the, under the newer or adjusted draft model, if you finish last 30 second in the league, you're guaranteed a top three pick. And it really does feel like that top three or four this year is really kind of lifting itself head and shoulders. It goes badard and then like two or three more. And then there's a drop off.

And so I think it adds even more, not pressure, but importance for some of these teams to be as bad as they possibly can. Now, I've heard a talking point has been, oh, well, does this performance that you've seen from Breda to this tournament incentivize teams even more to really, like, do everything they can to improve their draft lottery odds? And I think if you're just starting to come around to that, you're probably a bit late to the game. I think, I mean, the Blackhawks have been doing a pretty spectacular job of committing as fully

as possible to that. And I think at this point, the Blue Jackets are pretty close. I have it here. The Blackhawks have 20 points in 37 games. The Blue Jackets are 24 and 37. And then Ducks are down at 26 and 39. It's going to be pretty tough, I think, for anyone to catch the Blackhawks at this point in terms of pure badness. And just, like, I think they're going to be a runaway favorite in terms of finishing 30 second.

Now, that only gives you 25.5 percent. or yeah 25.5% odds and I guarantee top three pick but that's huge right like if you look at the odd distribution 25.5 13.5. 11.5. 9.5 8.5. And it keeps going down like that. I know for it's like a tough thing to to wrap your head around because this far out it's like a couple percent here or there like it's important right. I think that's how important that's how foundational and franchise altering this draft could be for these four. or five teams at the bottom of the league. Like, yes, you should be losing every single game you possibly get.

And it's because of what you mentioned in terms of it's not just Bedard, right? Yes, you, if you're a team like the Blackhawks and you end up finishing 32nd, you not only get that 25-ish percent shot, that one and four shot at Bedard, but you're basically guaranteeing that you're going to get one of the really upper esterlone guys, like whether it's a fentanylian or Carlson. And even those guys in their own right look like, they're going to be franchise changing sort of players. So in a way, you're securing yourself a franchise player,

like you're guaranteeing it in that sort of spot. And then it's just a matter of, okay, could we also land the borderline generational talent? And I'm with you in terms of, I don't think anyone's going to catch Chicago. Yeah. Especially the run that, you know, they had the surprise first 10 to 15 games.

I know. Look at these scrappy blackhug. It's incredible to think how bad it could. it would be if they didn't have that. Yeah. Right. And Steylock was just unbelievable in that, in that early season stretch. And I'm sure Kyle Davidson was going, what the hell?

I brought in two goalies that I thought would, you know, it would be okay. It didn't want anyone stealing games here. But the losing streak that they've been on since, and especially with some of the pending UFAs that they sort of have, that they'll probably ship out at the deadline, whether it be a max domy, obviously, Patrick Kane and Jonathan Taves, their futures are up in the air. Andreas Athanasiou, they're such a bad team and they, I mean, other teams are in a situation where they'll be selling, but you're still looking at the worst team in hockey who's been on an unbelievable losing stretch peeling even more assets off the roster.

Yeah, yeah, the competition is very, very strong this year. No, I mean, it's weird to think about because I think heading into the year, it was kind of a joke, but I think it was based in reality. it was like, oh, the coyotes are really, really going for it, right? And you looked at the roster they had and it was like, yeah, this is not, like, it's pretty clear what they're trying to accomplish here. And they're only 28th, I believe, in point percentage right now, right? Like, they've got 31 points and 37 games.

And I keep thinking back to this. Like, it's an awesome, like, I love Karel Vemalka and I make my Karel to Threl Joke's, and he's been excellent. If you're the coyotes, though, it's like, it's getting to the point where he's, he's too good. Like, he's too good for you. I mean, he has plus 7.4 goal sale about expected, which is 13th best in the league. And that came down after they got thrilled a bit by the Flyers last night. Like, it was in the double digits before that.

905, save percentage despite like a horrible defensive environment. And he's 26. He's on a pretty good contract, right? He makes 2.725 for two more years after this one. So it's not a matter of like you necessarily just wanting to get him out of town because he's a legitimately good asset for you moving forward. But it's really running counter to everything you're trying to call. accomplish the season and he's almost single-handedly

submarine. He's having like a Connor McDavid-David-ish season from the perspective of carrying his team despite everything around him in a weird way, right? It's like almost the opposite of what they're trying to accomplish. Exactly. And that's actually when you mentioned we were going to talk about

the idea of tanking. That was exactly what I was thinking about with Arizona was, first of all, how motivated are they going to be to expedite, for example, the Jacob Chikrin, it's been such a long saga and they'll say, like, yeah, we've got, we've got time and they're going to be patient in terms of they have a really high asking price and they want someone to meet that.

But how much could the tank race and how far some of these teams are separating themselves influence whether they want to move on from him quicker and create a longer runway for them to be really bad? And especially with Vamelka, I did wonder, like, Yeah, you don't have to move him and he's a really valuable asset, but not just strictly from the perspective of tanking, but we know in today's NHL that premium goaltending is at a shortage. And I think it was Eric Duhatchik who had a really interesting sort of idea of,

you know, what if a team like the Kings wanted a package deal for Chickren and Vamilka? And like, what could you get for Vamalka and cash in on that asset? Well, yeah, I think Elliot Freeman also has. that in a 32 thoughts recently. It's ironic because the two teams that I've seen most closely linked to Chickren as landing spots have been the Kings and the Buffalo Sabres

as emerging as a second dark horse. And Krell of Malka would probably be more valuable to both of those teams. At this point, especially if he can keep up this level of play. Now, there's obviously much more volatility and uncertainty involved than with any goalie, I wouldn't

feel much confidence saying like, all right, we should just trade for Krovala and he's going to keep this up the way he's played in Arizona. But I'm skeptical. This came up with when Rana was on waivers the other day. And there was this idea that these tanking teams couldn't afford to pick him up because it would affect their results, right? And in terms of like maybe getting them wins they don't want.

And I just think we overstate how much most skaters are actually worth when everything around them is that bad. Right? Like I really, even for Arizona, I'm kind of dubious that as well as Jacob Chikrin has played since he came back from injury, that he's going to be the differentiator between winning and losing a lot of these games. Now, Carl Vl Malca stopping 39 to 41 shots he faces and standing on his head and beating a legitimate contender will. And I think so I think it's almost like, they're two separate things. I don't, I wouldn't trade Jacob Chikrin just for the sake of trying to be bad this year.

Like I think they're totally in the right to win. weighted out and hope that someone panics and overpays. But Vamalka, I actually feel kind of kind of the opposite. Like, I feel like they almost need to, they need to maybe send them for like an MRI. And be like, oh, Corral, we're a bit worried about your physicals here. I think you might need to take a couple weeks off. He already got us through your contract to start the season. He's fine.

You got a sword back from carrying us. Like, yeah, maybe you need to breathe her. Creel, are you going to go away for an all-star break? I don't know. It's a couple weeks from now. I'm not thinking about it. No, you should get a head start on that. You should spend some extra time in Florida.

We'll pay for it. Exactly. Yeah, the other one that I had here was the Ducks who, they're behind the Blackawks and the Blue Eyck jackets right now in terms of point percentage of the 30th, which is a tough break for them because they're last in the league in regulation wins. They're last in the league in goal differential. They're 31st in offense and 31st in defense,

yet somehow there's two teams that are ahead of them in the tanking race right now. And if I, like, everything has gone about as poorly as it, could have ran a time so far and they're probably due for a bit better luck and better performance and Gibson stealing them a few more games down the stretch here and so like that's gonna I wouldn't even expect them to be as bad as some of these teams as horrific as their defensive structure has been and everything but given how the first 35 to 40 games have gone like you would think that they'd be a lock right now at 30 second and somehow they're not even it's almost a testament to just how bad the black hawks have been yeah and I think it's a testament to how many teams have purposely tried to be

bad, right? I think the ducks. Yeah, because they didn't go into this year, right? They spent, they, they brought in Clemberg. They strong, Bertrano. Like they, they, well, I mean, part of it was also, they had to get to the cap floor, which, um, which, you know, that's never stopped the coyotes. That's a blackhawks are going to have to do next season as well with, you know, cane and taves and all this, you know, even domi and Aftanusseu coming off the books. But you're right. The, the, the ducks kind of had their fire sale at the last deadline, but I don't think a lot of us looked at them especially because of the first half that they had last season. I think a lot of us looked at them and thought, oh, they're going to be in the

Connor Breddard sweepstakes. And yet, like, the lack of that purpose is kind of why, like, it's just like, there are too many teams that are purposely trying to be so terrible that no matter how bad the ducks have been kind of on accident, that it's, it's kind of just like, well, it's too bad for you guys. unlucky there. Well, that's why every time I bump into our pal, Tom Durantz, whether it's here in the studio or whether it's just on the streets of Vancouver

where he's ranting and raving about some college basketball parlay that he's not going on. He's just trying to tell you about how the Canucks need to be losing as much as possible to join these bad sweepstakes. And I have some bad news for him. I think this Canucks team stinks. These other teams are so far ahead of the game in that regard that it's going to be tough. Now, I think it's possible to get into that 7.5, 8.5% range, least if you fully bought them out and that's better than nothing but it's going to be pretty

tricky at this point like these teams have such a big head start and and i think really is going to be kind of like a three or four team race although we should say like the montreal canadians we're looking pretty frisky there in the first 25 30 games and they've really they've expedited the process the past five games are getting outscored 30 to nine they're uh they're they're they're entering dark core status here in terms of like potentially shutting guys down and just really fully embracing this down the stretch. Yeah, it's even the Flyers. I'm just surprised. Well, they also similarly started much, like they've been too many wins at the start. Yeah, but it's just crazy to me that a team like the

Flyers that's that, that's, you know, that bad. And I know they've tried to actually be competitive. They haven't intentionally tried to be bad. It's just, you know, Chuck Fletcher kind of doing his thing. Yeah. But looking at that roster without Couturier, without Atkinson, the injuries that they've had and and kind of just the lack of talent that they have up and down that entire roster. It's crazy to me that they're only, what, like the sixth, seventh worst team in hockey right now? Like, that's kind of nuts to me. Yeah, I saw this pointed out because they played the ducks the other night and handled them pretty, pretty easy, and they also just wallop the coyotes, as I said.

And so it was pointed out, like, this is the difference between a really bad, like, well-coached team meant a really bad poorly coached team. And the ducks are just like such a mess structurally and everything. And for everything you'll say about John Torrell and I obviously completely agree with a lot of his philosophies and thoughts on playing skilled hockey and this and that. Like there's no doubt that like he's there to try to win as much as he can at this point of his career and whether that's good or bad for the organization and whether that all, like they're still going to lose a lot of games.

But like guys are still playing hard and being held accountable and like they're trying to maintain some sort of a defensive identity as opposed to just like fully just being catastrophically bad at everything right and so it's uh the gap between those two is is is thin but also pretty massive in the grand scheme of things so all right that was 25 minutes on being bad at hockey well no we talked about bad who's really good at hockey which is why it's motivating for a lot of these teams to be as bad as they can uh harm we're going to take a quick break here and then when we come back um i've got a few other fun topics that are going to be more encouraging and optimistic, hopefully, for us to discuss.

So you were listening to the Hockey Pedyocast on the Sportsnet Radio Network. Harmon, let's talk about the abs. We watched them play the Canucks on Thursday night. We also, when we started this show here in the studio, we had a replay of the game going. It's over now, so we can't reference the tape anymore in that regard. But I want to talk about them because they are reeling a bit here. They're 19, 15, and 3 on the year now.

They're down to 7th in the West in Point, in point percentage. Now, it's pretty tightly packed between, like, them, the flames, the oilers, the predators, even the blues. Like, there's this kind of, like, jumble of teams that are on the fringes of the playoffs in the West. And fortunately for those teams that the West is so much better or so much worse than the East this season because they might be in serious trouble if they were in the opposite

conference. But on the one hand, I keep saying it's impossible to fairly evaluate or judges team just because they've lost so many man games to injury, especially with, like, key players, not just random fringe guys, like legitimate, valuable players who would, who would be, like, completely soul-crushing for pretty much any other team in the league, yet they've still managed to win games. But it's just so far off of the standard that we've seen them said in the past and what our expectations were for them that I feel like we do need to talk more about what's going on,

because we keep saying, well, let's wait till they get healthy, let's wait till April, May. but if things keep going this way it's going to get diceier and diceier for them I think Yeah and they're going to have to make an assessment pretty soon on how aggressively they push at the deadline too Because you can't trade as a contender

Your first round pick every year You can't give up a huge package And I You know I think this next month or so Will be huge in telling management How aggressively they can push their chips into the middle of the table because if they continue to stumble

and there's some uncertainty because keep in mind I've for most of the years sort of been with you in the sense that you can't you know you can't properly evaluate them with the number of key injuries that they've had and it's remarkable that they've stayed in the race period

but you also can't discount how difficult it can be to when guys get back it's going to take them time to get back up to speed It can take time to sort of build team chemistry, really gel, find your groove as a team. We saw it with Vegas where they were hammered with injuries for most of the year. And then, you know, they started getting guys back like Eichl and Stone. Yep.

And they never really took off. Yeah. Even in the, you know, a couple months that they had with, you know, most of their top guys back. So there is a bit of a worry there. Well, you know what happens with guys coming back off of serious injuries? Sometimes they get re-injured. Yeah. Right?

Or other guys who have been healthy in the meantime wind up getting injured, right? Like it's, it's tricky because, yeah, all you can really do is kind of just hope and wait and be patient until those guys come back. But you're also working under the assumption that once they do, everything is going to be smooth sailing. And we know that in the NHL, like, that's very rarely the case. Yeah.

And there's also so much uncertainty. Like they'll probably get Nukushkin and Manson and Rodriguez back sooner. than later, but there's still a lot of uncertainty about Landiscag. Yeah. And Byram. And Byram. And with Landiscag especially as their captain, and that lost stings especially because they also lost Cadrean Berkovsky.

So they've already kind of been too reliant on that top line to drive the bus for them. If there's uncertainty about, well, is he, like, when is he going to come back? Is he even going to be healthy for the playoffs? What's he going to look like? if they're not confident, then when it comes to the deadline, for example, everybody's been linking the idea of Horvatt to the abs. And that seems like a perfect fit on paper. But if there's still so much up in the air about Landiscaug,

can you really afford to sort of give up a king's ransom for a rental? Or would they be better off than sort of going for a more modest acquisition, a cheaper one? like maybe if Sean Monahan gets healthy again and he's he's clicking like could they go for a second or third tier sort of option and more sort of add around the fringes rather than going for the home run swings that that I think we thought that they'd probably be going for. Yeah, it's tough. I'm generally a proponent of when you have at least in theory or on paper the type of talent

this team has windows to compete and be good and while all these guys are in their primes are so short and fleeting. Yeah. And especially as a defending champs, like I'm generally all for just going for it as hard as you can. But I mean, it's been like a cursed year for them, right? And you look for the season,

their 30th in 5-1-5 scoring rate. Only the Blackhawks, who we just spent 25 minutes talking about how much they suck. And the ducks similarly score less frequently than they do at 5-1-5. Like that's wild. Even with all the injuries, they've still had good players. playing and you look last night it really showed not the talent efficiency they have but how

reliant on those top players you are they are where you look at the ice times and like macar's over 30 minutes randonins at like 26 and then you look throughout the production now we should say like Dennis Mald got her like a minute into a game or something and they're addressing Curtis McDermann for some reason as a forward and he's basically a zero like he's a placeholder in name but not an actual production but Only five of their 12 forwards got a shot on goal last night. And a lot of the games played on special teams. And there's a lot of context there involved.

But like it's wild just how reliant they are basically on like three or four guys to do everything right now. And that's tricky because we just talked about how, okay, you're kind of trying to buy yourself time until guys come back and get healthy. But it almost runs counterintuitive then to be riding McKinnon and Ranton and McCarr and Taves to the, this degree in the meantime because it feels like you're playing a pretty dangerous game of potentially putting them in harm's way if they're playing such an aggressive amount of minutes. You know what I mean? Like it's you're not really ensuring that you're going to be ready to go once some of these other guys come back if all of a sudden the healthy players right now are going to wind up

being hurt. Especially because they have the shortest off season of any team in the league. Yeah. So you're already coming off of a deep, such a deep playoff run where you pick up all those bumps and bruises and you you miss out on two months of of offseason recovery, which great. It won you, Stanley Cup. I think obviously every team would take that exchange. But then you're riding them so heavily.

And it showed last night. I thought that was, it was shocking to me how Devon Taves looked. And look, any player can have an off night on any given. Yeah, he's tired, man. He's tired, right? Like you saw the giveaways, even the whole, the whole sequence. where the connects scored three goals in 2.30 or so to come back and win that game. It started with Taves, there was an icing where Taves had such a clear sort of leg up on Jack Stadnika.

And Taves, I think, just kind of like put it in cruise control. And Stadnika beat him to the call. Taves takes a penalty. Kuzmiko scores on the ensuing power play. And it was that sort of really rude. routine, such an elementary icing that Tave should have won that started that whole comeback. And he just looked like a shadow of himself.

Even McKinnon, like I know he's coming back from injury. You could tell he was like trying to dangle through four guys. And you could sense the feeling of no one else on this team other than my line is going to score. So I've got to do it all myself. And that's, it's fair for Taves to be tired. And it's fair for McKinin to feel that way because that's kind of the reality. of their environment right now. Like you look at the season,

McCarra's averaging 2714 per game. Taves over 25. Miko Randton in 23.07, which for non-McDavid-Drysaito forwards basically is, I think you gotta go back to like the primalia Kovalchuk days to find numbers and to find totals in that kind of caliber. McKinnon over 22 minutes, right? And that usage is, is on the one hand,

a necessity for them right now. But coming into the year, it's completely the opposite of what I thought their season would look like. I thought we'd see a lot of load management, a lot of like sitting on back to back because they played so late into last summer because they have Stanley Cup aspirations again and because they're a smart organization, right? Like they, I think they're taking a bigger picture of view of these things. And so I really didn't think we'd see them leaning on McCar for 30 plus minutes a night consistently the way he has in the past couple weeks. they have no other real choice. Like I'm not sure what Jared Bednar really can do. Like I think he clearly needs to find some way to manufacture

positive shifts and positive minutes for some of these other guys and figure out a way to do so to put him in a position to succeed because I don't think this is a sustainable alternative. Like I don't think they can keep going this way. But it's tough. I mean, I highly recommend checking out Miko Rantonin's game log because it's wild. Like here in the past 10 games he's played,

here are some ice time totals for him. 26 minutes, 27 minutes, 26 minutes, 29, 26, 29, 27. That's all in the past 10 games. Jesus. And he's having an unreal season. Like, it's wild to me that he wasn't Colorado's All-Star. And it's Camel Carr is just like, with these things, it's a popularity contest

and it's exciting to have him there, and Camel Car is awesome, like, no doubt. But Mikorantin has been their most important player this year. You look, he's got, he scored 25% of their goals this season. He's got a primary point on 40% of the goals. Like, he has been the team for a lot of these stretches. It's not great to be in, what, what is, what is, what, is, now January. It's not great to be halfway through the season and being like, all right, Miko, let's get back out there for 29 minutes tonight where you have to attempt 17 shots on goal and we need you to score two goals or we're not going to have a chance to

win. Like, they have to play that way right now, but I've, they need to be figuring out some different options, I think. Can you imagine to how this season could have gone if they didn't nail their goal-tending decision in the off-season by bringing in Georgiev? Right. He's obviously slowed down a little bit over the last five games. No, but him in France, he was healthy.

Both were playing really well for the game. Exactly. And especially in the first, you know, stretch of the first, you know, a few months, he was really up until the last five games. Unreal, like outstanding, not just, not just the sort of goaltender really where you like it. Oh, okay, he's been good, considering the environment or whatever or you know

Colorado has a reputation for whether it's been you know Grubauer or in the past they can just sort of like prop up a lot of these a lot of these goaltenders but he was genuinely terrific and in a goaltending market last summer that was very challenging to navigate around a lot of teams had to you know take really risky bets we're seeing the jack campbell signing for example blow up in Edmonton's face for Joe Sackick to have nailed a third sort of goal-tending decision by bringing in Giorgev and him having the season that he's had, considering Giorgiyev had never really been a start of previously in his career and was coming off a year where he was below 900, save percentage-wise

for the Rangers. That's really impressive. Yeah, you're right. I mean, yeah, you look at the cap percentage they allocate to their goalies compared to a lot of the other teams. Like, they have to do that because of how much they're paying some of the other players, but it's also the way to do it, as it turns out. All right, that's enough on the abs.

Let's end the show by doing a little thought exercise that I presented to you before we started recording. You were like, oh, I want to drive in. I'll be there in 15 minutes. I'm like, I want you to spend that time. Of course, driving safely, keep your eyes on the road. But also, while you're doing so, try to in the back of your mind,

try to think about where you want to see Timelmire. Yeah, pull up my phone while I'm driving. Sort of out of cat friend. No, do not do that. I advocate for safe driving. But I was like, think about where you want to see Timel Meyer. Let's talk a bit about Meyer. I'm curious for your ideal landing spot for him because, I mean, he's an awesome player.

So, like, there's any number of teams that you could pick. And I'd be like, yeah, I would love to see him there. But give me your number one spot for him because I think this is a topic that's going to heat up quite a bit over the next, like, whatever, five or six weeks. Yeah, I'd love to see him on Calgary. I just think that's the perfect fit for, well, what they need where they were where i like their top four markstrom is generally i know he's been inconsistent this season and he's he's had even previous years like the 2021 campaign where he can be high and low but i think he's generally a good goaltender so i feel confident in their ability

to prevent goals but manufacturing offense has been a real difficulty with the loss of gudrow and kuchuch especially with uh huberto um sort of misfiring and and being on pace for 57 points or whatever it is, him being a huge letdown. I think they really, really lack a dynamic game breaker. And that's exactly what Meyer would be able to add to the table. The flames are bottom 10 right now for offense, for goals scored. And it feels like they're having to, like they can control play and they can sort of create chances, but they don't have that ability to just in one play sort of like throttle the

opposition just like that. And that's, I think, what Meyer brings to the. table and on top of that I also think stylistically he gives them speed which which they need I think that obviously an older sort of veteran squad that that can be a little bit slow look a little bit slow at times but then he also has the size and the physicality to sort of like darrell Sutter's going to look at him and be like great like this guy can be a physical a beast for us as well and I just look at that fit and obviously they're going to have to make make the math were cap-wise.

Right, that's a tricky part. That's going to be the tricky part, definitely. But if San Jose can retain and Calgary, you know, figures out a way to send another contract back, I think it's well worth for the flames looking to sort of navigate around the math because given the age of some of the players on their team and some of the contracts that they have, like whether it be Markstrom, Tanev, Coleman,

guys like Tafoli, obviously Cadrean, now. Yeah, Hubert-Oh, yeah. I mean, the cocklin, like, these are, like, the time to win is within the next two years before a lot of these contracts start turning ugly. So I think it makes sense for them to kind of push their chips into the middle of table and go after Meyer. I like that one.

Well, okay, let's set the scene where people. So he's 26. He's playing on a $6 million A.AV right now, which will be, is good because it'll allow San Jose, assuming they go this route to facilitate a lot more deals, because especially if you're retaining 50%, like, that's much more. measurable to fit in than a lot of players of his caliber if you were trying to acquire them right now. The trick is he's got that $10 million qualifying offer and I imagine any trade that involves him will come with some sort of extension in place or at least it'll be talked about.

Or they may even look at him as a rental. I think a team like the Flames may just straight up look at him like a rental or even a team like the Leafs if they're interested in adding scoring help may just look at him as a rental. Yeah, no. I didn't even really think about it through that lens because I thought, about it as like, I think you're going to have to blow away the sharks with whatever package you put together for him. And that's going to be tough to justify unless it's like, we're paying a premium for this guy, but it's because he can help us compete for Stanley Cup now.

And we're going to have him for the next four or five years of his remaining prime, as opposed to just like, we're going to give you every single interesting young asset we have right now and just go for it for the next 30 games. The qualifying offer also hurts, I think, the. Sharks is Yeah, it does. Like that's, 10 million is,

it's a lot. Well, the thing with the sharks, though, is like, and I think part of what's complicating is, is we're working under the

assumption that they're going to trade them. Yeah. I was on working on the assumption they were going to trade Tomas Hurtle at the trade that last year. And now he was an impending UFA without this qualifying offer hanging over him, but I was like,

given the status of this team, there's no way they're going to pay this guy who's even older than Meyer. then they just gave him a mega contract offer to basically stay there for the rest of his career. So I'd like to think the Meyer will be playing on some contender down the stretch, but I feel like it's still up for debate in terms of what they're trying to accomplish, how they do things. Now, you know, it's different like Mike Greer has come in in the meantime,

and he's kind of inherits a clean slate, right? So he's not really beholden to what they did last year or any of these existing contracts they have. He can do whatever he wants. But the team that I had was the New Jersey Devil. which is kind of the obvious pick, but the more I think about it, the more that I need to see this happen because I do not want to watch any more shifts

with Erycala playing with Jack Hughes. And Eric Hala is a fine player. I think they brought him in with the idea that he'd be like their third center. And he fits the identity of like the pace they want to play at the tenacity. He's a highly useful player, but he should not be Jack Hughes's most common line made this season.

And this came up during a press conference or a post-game media a session after their loss last night where Lindy Ruff was asked like why does Eric Hala keep playing with Jack Hughes and Ruff gave the answer essentially along the lines of like well we've looked at it and when he plays with him they have possession more he helps he helps recover the puck make sure that we're not spending Jack Hughes's shifts chasing the puck and that it's useful and I agree but I was thinking about this like a creator of Jack Hughes's caliber right where like every time he's on the ice

the devils get some sort of scoring chance basically it's good that they have that they have guys who can do the dirty work and get the puck for him I want to see them surround him with more high level finishers though right like he's a type of player where he's creating some of these like

great A opportunities time and time again and it's so frustrating to see them flub them or not make the most of them and then us go back to the drawing board and be like oh well listen that was a that was a a high expected goal total for that scoring chance right there. If they keep doing this, it's going to go in.

And it's like, oh, well, we've been, for the past year and a half, he's been surrounded by guys who I just think don't have the skill level, other than when he's playing with Jasper Brat. But if they want to spread the wealth and kind of diversify their forward group, and he's playing with Eric Halle. Like, I just, it's disappointing. I want to see more. And I don't know, do you think that, do you think that's fair to say?

I like that. I really like that, especially because, earlier in the summer, there was a lot of talk about the devils and do they need to add another sort of top flight forward. That was a lot of the discussion, even when, for example, it sounded like, well, could the Canucks move J.T. Miller? It sounded like New Jersey was one of the dark horse teams there. And Meyer also gives them something a little bit different, too, in terms of his size and

his strength, his ability to play on the inside. because I think one of the criticisms I've heard from sort of other teams around the league is that they maybe lack that physical element a little bit that, you know, are they a team that can be pushed the outside a little bit

and Meyer would certainly give them some bite and some real muscle in addition to that dynamic skill and that finishing ability. So I really like that fit. Yeah. Well, so Hala is, as I said, he's his most common line mate this year. He's played 505 on five minutes.

He has one goal on 118 shot attempts. Now, I'm sure there's some regression of all. He could have a hat-trick next game, although probably not. But, yeah, I mean, and like Jack Hughes himself is scoring a lot. He's going to have like 100 points of the season. He's an unreal player. I just think the ceiling is even higher based on how much he's creating. And I think it would behoove them to, like, maximize that as opposed to being happy

with what they're getting and being like, oh, this is good enough. Like, I think shoot for the stars, right? with Meyer you touched on this and like the reason why he's so interesting is he would fit on Calgary he would fit on like the islanders playing on Matt Barzow's wing

if they could somehow facilitate that he would fit on his devil's team because he's so versatile yeah like any way you want to play he's big enough and strong enough where if you want to grind out sustained offensive zone possession cycling the puck around

and you know controlling the game that way he can play that way if you want him to take the puck from the defensive zone transported off the rush and create a rush look for himself or a teammate, he can do that. If you want him to stand and be the trigger man on a power play,

he can do that. Yeah. And there's very few players who become available, who can check all those boxes. Generally, it's like, well, this guy does this one thing really well, and this team needs that, so let's pair the two together.

In this case, it's like anywhere you want to play them on any team, on any line, with any players, I feel like Timel Meyer is going to get his, and that's a pretty cool quality that I think makes him so appealing as a guy for a lot of these teams. the reason why I like the devil's fit in particular is

they have a lot of money coming off the books this summer now they're going to have to allocate some of them to Brad and some of their other RFAs but they really should be like all right we've stumbled upon an amazing nucleus here what are our next five years going to look like as opposed to just worrying about this year or being like oh we don't care about this year

let's take a really distant view I want them to find a nice balance between those two and I'm I really check so many boxes for them and that's kind of why I identified them as my favorite fit Yeah, no, I, the more you're talking in it. Let's send it into the league. Yeah, especially because the New Jersey long term is so stacked on the blue line already. And they're going to have Luke Hughes and Simone Nemich. Second overall picks are coming in over the next couple of years.

So knowing that you already have this top four that you're already pretty comfortable with, you're already getting reliable two-way play from that back end and knowing that there's going to be even more talent on the way. you can afford to sort of make your big push on making your top end offensively up front even more explosive. Yeah, because they've got Hamilton, Marino, and Seganthal are basically set. Yeah. Right? And then like Graves and Severson are playing good roles for them, but they're kind of

in that like $3 to $4 million range and they're expiring this year. And so they're like luxury items for them and it's great. But if you want to get creative and add a guy like Meyer and then pay whatever his long-term deal is going to look like. You can still do that and retain Brad and all their other RFAs and basically just plug in your third pair with guys on rookie deals and shelter the, shelter the living daylights out of them, right? So someone to think about, I'm certainly interested in.

I think the devils are in good shape still. They're sputtering a bit, though, right? They're 3-8 and 2 recently. They're fine. They're still ahead of the curve. But that metro is such a meat grinder that I feel like the margin for air is dwindling. So like doing something aggressive and meaningful is what I want to see from them. And so all right.

Well, harm, this is a blast. We didn't even get to talk about J.T. Miller. I had a full section that I wanted. But you know what? I feel like you're probably tired of that by now. I'll let you plug some stuff. What have you been working on and where can people check out your work? Yeah.

People can check out my work at the athletic. And just yesterday I wrote a piece breaking down every big offseason, Every team's biggest offseason acquisitions is the biggest one to three. And sort of just analyzing which ones have worked out really well and which ones have been Eric at Branson. The scale of good to Branson. I love that. That sells itself.

All right, man. Well, this is a blast. People, my only plug is if people have been enjoying the show, they can go smash that five-star button and help us out by leaving a good rating interview wherever they listen to the show. And otherwise, another week is in the book. here on the PDOcast, we'll be back on Monday with more.

So until then, thank you for listening to the HockeyPedogast on the Sports Night Radio Network.