The Hockey PDOcast - Teams That Are on Tilt Right Now, How They Got Here, and What’s Ahead for Them

Episode Date: January 12, 2026

Dimitri Filipovic is joined by Thomas Drance to go through 7 teams that are on tilt right now because of the way their season has been going lately, while breaking down what's gone wrong for each of them, and the big decisions they have ahead.  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.

since 2015. It's the Hockey PEDEOCast with your host, Dmitri Philipovich. Welcome to the Hockey PEDOcast. My name is Dimitri Philpovich and joining me as always on a Sunday for our Sunday special. My good buddy Thomas Trans, Tom, what's going on, man? Dmitri, coming to you live from Montreal. I've been, well, you know what? I've at least gotten to see a lot of the teams that we'll be talking about today. A lot of, you know, a lot of variance in the NHL right now because we've talked about it a lot. There is really, really, parody if you're not an elite team right i mean i do think there's eight teams that are clearly a cut above and i suspect that those eight teams like you're going to feel comfortable in the first

round except in the matchups where those eight teams are playing one another picking those teams like i think they'll be favored too like i think you'll see it reflected in the betting markets those teams are a cut above but man everyone else is so mid and when everyone else is mid you know you're going to get these crazy and explicable runs, like the Maple Leafs getting hot with William Nealander out of the lineup, that confuse people when, you know, it's actually not that difficult to understand that once Austin Matthews got going again,

the Maple Leafs were far more imposing, regardless of what the rest of the cast looked like. Like, that's not, you know, some sort of quantum equation to solve here. That's Austin Matthews is dunking on people, every shift again, which by the way, also huge deal it feels like to me for the American

Olympic team. Like he's rounding in the form at the right moment. Point being, because of these little things that are shifting results so much, it just feels like the line between being hot and being on tilt is as fine as it's ever been. And so what a great topic for us to zoom in on and focus in on at midseason. Now, this is a show that some are calling, quote unquote, one of hockey's most popular and sophisticated podcast. I hear this. I personally wouldn't use those words to describe us. I'm a bit more humble than that,

but the best team in the world sure did. And so that is very exciting for some referencing this week's formal announcement that we had been teasing by the Aves for the upcoming analytics conference. They're hosting in March. And we're going to, we'll talk more about it as we get closer to that day, but we've got a lot of fun plans ahead with special guests while we're in town there, including a live show, a couple in-person viewings of the Aves, who at a ball arena are 19-0-2 now.

with a plus 60 goal differential after their latest beat down of the Columbus Blue Jackets on Saturday. And so very exciting for not only us, but our listeners. Yeah, I also, you know, they lose two games in regulation, doubling their total of regulation losses last weekend, right? Through the state of Florida, a humbling vacation to the state of Florida for the Colorado Avalanche. And then just absolutely unload on the senators and blue jackets and quick succession. And, you know, those are legitimately. good two-way teams. They have some sketchy goaltending, but like,

you know, that they're legitimately good defensive teams and Colorado's just such a buzzsaw. It was a funny moment where right on the verge of thinking that, you know, this is the smartest and most sophisticated hockey team in the NHL is on the verge

of being humbled. They remind us, oh no. Oh, no. We are the wagon. Absolutely. Okay, so the abs are living their best life as you teased off the top, a lot of teams in the league aren't right now, though. And so we thought a fun exercise for us here today on this Sunday special would be to

kind of go through our, not rankings necessarily, but just our list of on-tilt organizations, ones that are obviously going through a tough time right now, especially considering their expectations, I think, heading into the season, but also for our purposes, kind of identifying them in terms of how they got here, in terms of learning from it a little bit. and then also monitoring and moving forward because, you know, it's been, aside from the Quinn Hughes trade and a couple kind of moves on the margins, it's been a pretty quiet lead up to the trade headlines so far. And I wonder if we'll see something before the Olympic roster freeze.

But based on the state of these teams, it feels like we're approaching a potential powder keg moment for some of them where they're just like out of desperation or panicking, going to do something that's going to be consequential. And so we're getting ahead of it now and talking about. about it and seeing how it shakes out over the next couple weeks. I had seven teams that I wanted to talk about specifically with you, but I'll give you the floor to kick us off with which one you think is the most interesting and we can work our way through them over the next 50 minutes.

The Devils, I think, have been on the tip of the tongue for a lot of people because of what's happened to that team, really since the failure to land Quinn Hughes, what that's meant, the Dougie Hamilton report from Elliot Friedman, and just the sense, I mean, you go look at their puckes, page or their cap wages page. And even think about it from the perspective of being like a predatory rebuilding team, going to them and trying to extract value or assets in order to solve their problems. And it's difficult to even begin going about that process, right?

I mean, they're so hooped in terms of, you know, just all of these inefficient deals or full trade protection deals or full NMC deals. I don't even think I really realized it until, you know, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the huge failure came about. But looking at it, I mean, Connor Brown and, and Stefan Nason, I mean, like, really, bottom six guys that, you know, can significantly inhibit their ability to just move, like, just like make moves solved problems, you know, the, the, the amount of machinations involved and just activating Jonathan Kovacev from waivers, right?

Or sorry, from LTIR was preposterous. I mean, the extent to which they were bogged down, the extent to which it appears to have impacted team morale, the C-monster, Sheldon Keith interview, post-game interview, which was hilarious, right? The lighting on that was incredible. Steve Dangle, A-plus caption, one of the greatest hockey tweets of all time in my opinion.

Um, yeah, I mean, it just, they've struggled to score all year. Their depth minutes have been brutal. Their star player got into a, uh, or got injured at a steakhouse. I mean, all of this season hasn't made sense. And they're paying for it. It's, it's honestly, not just a mess. It's like one of the most difficult messes to solve. I mean, I really can't even sort of make smart suggestions.

because unless you have a real sense of what guys' lists look like and how you'd navigate it, I mean, it's really tough to sort of figure out how you'd even begin to go about carving the flexibility required to do stuff that I think they should do. Like, you know, add another physical winger or like, you know, add some scoring juice. And it's not a bad roster. It's still a talented group. It's just they're so handcuffed by a variegluft. by a variety of the moves that they made, you know, to the point where it's like,

really the only player you could deal in his straightforward fashion would be Dawson Mercer, who you really can't afford to deal because he's too important to your team, you know, or one of the young guys who are too valuable and their salaries are too small to sort of make a huge impact for you. It's a wild spot that they found themselves in. And it's not just on the ice, right?

It's also in terms of what their options are and the reports of, you know, there being some acrimonious fallout as a result of the corner they've painted themselves into. Yeah, especially in light of where they were at and the way we were discussing them,

what, two and a half years ago after that magical 22, 23 season where they were one of the most fun electric offensive teams in the league wind up winning a very spirited seven game series against their rival Rangers and lose to the hurricanes in a humbling fashion.

But I think we were viewing that as a step in the right direction and we were talking about how they were positioned as well as pretty much anyone in the league to scale this thing out to contender proportions moving forward, right? With the age of their core players, with the competitive advantage they had in terms of having his year and Hughes under contract of the numbers they did with the cap going up, it was all very exciting.

And now you compare it now where, I mean, they're going through the week from hell right now, right? It starts with that 3-1 loss last Sunday and against the Keynes at home where Luke Hughes scores on his own goal twice, gets booed by the home crowd. They go play the Islanders the road, get Schallack 9-0, lose 4-1 in Pittsburgh. As we're recording today, they lose on the road to the Jets again. They're 9-17 and 1 now since November 18th. There's six points out of a playoff spot. And I want to get into the Dougie Hamilton of it all with you, as you'd say, because that's

obvious on the front of mind Saturday afternoon. We get news that they're going to scratch him to facilitate Klobis Havich's return to the lineup, and it's followed by this amusing back and forth using Pierre LeBron as a mediator essentially between the agent and the GM where they're putting out statements and he's tweeting them out. It culminates with the second wildest statement from a GM this week. And we're going to talk more about the number one on that list later. But Fitzgerald goes through his thing where it's like, no, this is actually a lineup decision and it's not anything to do with business. And then he caps it off with, this is business, business over our lineup with an exclamation mark, which is a perfect capper to that on hinge statement.

And listen, like this has obviously been bubbling for a while because go back to our offseason, we were talking about how this is the most logical move in terms of clearing salary with all the guys they have on the books. They tried to trade on San Jose, as Elliot Freeman reported, and he nixed that with his trade protection. They're going to try to clear the $9 million cap hit he carries in the process somehow. What do you see as the most kind of logical resolution to this, I guess, because I can't imagine it's going to linger too long. I certainly hope for their part that it doesn't. Yeah, I mean First of all, you wonder if you think

he'd feel the same about San Jose today as he did in the summer? I would certainly hope not. I mean, not only are they in a playoff spot, but they're very fun to watch. And I think when you watch them play, especially, like we've talked about what Klingberg, when he's been available,

is meant to them, but they need their defensemen, the sharks do, to just be more of a threat in the offensive zone. And teams just aren't really respecting that right now can kind of converge down low on their top forwards. And so Dougie Hamilton would look awesome in that environment, I imagine. So I'd like to think that he's seen this progress

and he either have some regrets or would revisit that if the sharks are interested. Listen, it's been an undoubtedly disappointing season offensively for Dougie because he's got 10 points in 40 games. He only has 4-5-1-5 points in nearly 700 minutes so far. He's turning 33, makes 9 million, as I said. So you put all that together and I get the frustration. context is important here though in terms of especially for a team

thinking about acquiring him to decipher how much juice he has left at this stage of his career he's been playing primarily with Jonas Seganthalor in the toughest defensive minutes on the team they've given the PP1 minutes to Luke Hughes he's been very unlucky in terms of the percentage of points he's gotten in terms of devil's goals when he's on the ice

the team's shooting percentage with him out there I think there's going to be some regression regardless Listen, so it's a big cap hit, but I don't think it's nearly as onerous in terms of what he could provide from a value perspective for any team that was thinking about acquiring them right now. I mean, I think he could be a really helpful addition. I mean, there's a few teams that have needs on the back end. He'd be an expensive one. But, you know, you think about the sharks. I mean, for me, that's like a beautiful fit if it was something that could be revisited.

But I'd add, too, like, you know, I mean, you think about the Dallas stars as an example, obviously, right? The Dallas of among the like real contender to your teams, you know, feel to me like the team that could benefit the most from bringing in a credible top four right-handed upgrade, you know, sort of seem as like their version of the Seth Jones edition, right? The sort of embattled, overpaid, quote-unquote overpaid, because I think Dougie Hamilton's still a top lineup option.

But quote unquote, overpaid, you know, right-handed guy who, look, you put him in that environment and give him a partner like Thomas Harley, I think it would benefit both of them. It would. I've given this probably more thought than I should. I really need to get a life, but I've given it. Like a sicko level of thought? A lot of thought kind of mapping out all the machinations. And I do think a trade to Dallas is clearly the most logical resolution to this, because the stars are uniquely positioned if they rule. Tyler say again out for the year and he's not going to be back for the playoffs to just fully absorb that

9 million for the rest of this season and it's the cleanest path to meaningfully improving their team for the rest of this season um especially since they're already down so much draft capital through the trades they made last year and so they're not going to be able to add a player of this caliber in a normal situation using futures so they bring him in play them with harley not only does that bump an inferior player down the depth chart, but it hopefully throws a life raft to Harley. I was watching the stars a lot this week, first against the hurricanes and then against the sharks on the weekend,

and the minutes when he's out there with either Petrich or Lubushkin or just such a mess, because those guys cannot do anything with the puck. And so they just wind up being stuck in their own zone. The stars play out this year with that as their second pair. They try to win the cup, and then this summer they pay him his $7.4 million signing bonus. That leaves Dougie with just $6.25 left over the next two.

two years of his deal. And at that point, the stars are going to need the cap space to extend Jason Robertson and do other stuff. But they'll be able to trade him because I think his value is going to go up playing in a better situation. But also with that money owed, there's going to be so many teams out there that have the cap space to take on $9 million and are going to value a guy who makes much less than that in terms of actual salary. And so in the process, the stars can get some draft picks back, use those to facilitate future deals to improve their team in the summer. and it's such a win-win, or I guess mostly just a win

from the star's perspective, but kind of two birds of one stone in terms of the right now and also future seasons for them. So I think that's a no-brainer. And I think it's a win-win. The devils just need flexibility. Like they just need to find the solution

and getting off of Douggy Hamilton's contract at this point allows them to explore other options to improve their team, which they need to do. I mean, you know, they're on the clock with these deals for Hischer and Jack Hughes. And, you know, I do think there's like as much as it's really inexplicable that they've painted themselves into this type of corner that they've been, they really haven't been mindful enough about keeping value incoming. Right.

I mean, that's really partly what it is too. When you look at their potential solves, it's like none of their prospects are trending well. Right. Like there's just not a lot that would be enticing, but that's sort of, you know, surplus to requirements that they have in their system or on their books. But as much as all of that and as much as you want to point a finger at management or anything else, it's like Luke Hughes is having a really difficult season, right? Nico Heeshire is not playing at a Selke caliber level.

Yes, for Bratt's goal scoring has dried up. And Jack Hughes, once again, hasn't been available frequently enough, right? And, you know, I think this is also going to be a theme as we go through sort of the tilt rankings where it's like in a star-driven league when your stars are carrying the team, like they need to, right? I mean, you know, as much as we talk about, for example, the depth, the return of Norris and Benson in December and what that meant for the Buffalo Sabres and the fact that they are attacking teams with probably nine top six caliber. forwards depending on, you know, your mileage for Noah Ostland, right? And they've got Byram and power stepping up and, like, for all that we might say that that stuff matters, like, Russ was Dahlene right now is playing like the best defenseman in Eastern Conference.

Right? Like, that matters more, right? And so I, as much as I don't think Fitsy's done a good enough job, I think he massively flubbed not being prepared for the generational buying opportunities. that was the Quinn Hughes sweepstakes that he couldn't find a way to win. As much as all of that's true, I still think,

and again, I think this will be a theme as we go through the list of teams on tilt. At the end of the day, it's like you need your stars to carry you, and I don't think the devils are getting that right now. They're not. And the poster child as exercise is probably their coach, Sheldon Keefe,

who kept Markserman for all nine goals against the Islanders, then that Penguins game, just pretty much gave up, like didn't even entertain the idea of pulling the goalie late to get an extra attacker and try to get back in it. And now they're going to Minnesota to play Quinn Hughes on Monday. And so I'm curious to see how it goes.

But it's certainly trending in the wrong direction. Do you want to get to the Rangers because they were next on my list? I mean, of course. So they're coming off a 10-2 spanking in Boston on Saturday. They're down at 25th in points percentage. They've already played 46 games as well. they just have no offensive juice, right? They're 29th in goals per 60th, 30th in slot shots, 30th and rush chances.

Their entire offense flows through her tommy Panarin right now to a shocking extent, in my opinion, like if they're going to get a scoring chance or a goal, it's going to be because he either scored it or set it up for someone. And the on ice metrics reflect that. Like with him on the ice 515, they're scoring about three goals per hour, which is good. No other forward in their minutes away from them is over two, except for like four liners like Eustle, who they bared in the HL and only played 14 games and Adam Edstrom who's been out

since the end of November. And that's obviously deeply alarming for the Rangers and organization because Pernet Pinaran set to be a 35 year old UFA this summer. And so I think now the possibility of them pivoting and trading him and trying to kind of quote unquote retool on the fly is a very realistic possibility. And I'm fascinated to see how that plays out because I wasn't even really entertaining it as a possibility. I thought they'd just kind of keep plowing ahead this season and bring him back on a deal.

But now all of a sudden, throwing that wild card into it in terms of what it could look like on another fun contender. I'm pretty excited about that possibility. Well, first of all, you can't really stop Merat Kusnidinov. You can only hope to contain him. And the Rangers did not on Saturday. How much did you love J.T. Miller's power play goal to cut the deficit to 42, Chris Ball style? That was pretty good. That was pretty good.

And then, of course, he gets knocked over and leaves the eyes. He wasn't going to get back into position to make that play anyway. I actually thought that was a little harsh, the criticism of him over that one play. But, yeah, I mean, I've seen that movie a lot. The game ends and JT's on the statute in a, you know, dispiriting effort for the team. I've seen that movie before many, many times. More like an HBO series, like a 12-episode arc. But the, yeah, so the Rangers for me really boils down to, I shouldn't notice it as much as I do every time Noah Labba is on the ice.

Like, every time No Labba is on the ice, it's like, oh, wow, they have a guy who can skate with the puck through the neutral zone and kind of cook and transition a little bit. and in all of their other minutes, it feels like, honestly, it feels like Mike Sullivan's Penguins last year, which is not, and I'm not bringing this up to be a critical of Mike Sullivan. Mike Sullivan's not out there skating through the neutral zone,

but it's like a half-core team, like a team that just didn't have enough team speed to get the puck moving sufficiently. And so as much as they were doing interesting systemic things or being sound structurally, like once the game turned into a, you know, 200-foot game, like once you're going back and forth, it feels like they can't keep up.

And that to me is where those no elabom minutes just stand out, stick out like a sore thumb. They need like three more forwards that can scale like that. And, you know, I don't even think they need to be great players. My colleague Vince Mercagliano at the Athletic reported that they were interested in Kiefer Sherwood, which doesn't make sense for them to buy at this point, obviously, but that fit makes sense just in terms of giving them another, like, counter attacking throughout another guy that can reliably transport the puck through the neutral zone and,

you know, getting quickly enough to give defenders at least something to think about on retrievals. And right now those two phases of the game, it's way too often feels like the Rangers are stuck in the mud. And I think it's a personnel issue, like raw personnel issue. I just don't think they're fast enough. They certainly aren't. My last note on Panarin and then we can get into more Rangers stuff is because I've been given some thought this weekend now that, especially after that Bruins game and just how this is deteriorating. I think the lightning would be an unbelievable. Oh my God. And now it would require rerouting Bjorksrand's $5.4 million to a third team essentially to get more draft capital or futures going to the Rangers as part of this trade.

And they'd have to retain 50% on Panarin, but they could make the money work if that happens. and then as we've talked about the lightning would enter the offseason with 15 million in cap space with only Panarin and Darren Radish to pay and I think that's doable and then you're just looking at the situation of having Panarin as a right shot on the left flank

PP1 with Kutjurav work in that and then you could even load them up and play point Kutjurav and Panarin with like 60% offensive zone starts at 515 and it would just be unbelievable. The issue for that if they go that route is even if it's the right move move, Zabinajad will be 33. J.T. Miller will be 33. Trochek 33, Gavrakov, 31,

Chasturken, 31, and Adam Fox 28 next year. And they have two firsts already for the 26th draft after the Kjandre Miller trade with the Hurricanes pick. Yet, if you're viewing that being a route to getting this back on track, has there been an organization that's been worse over the past decade of developing the players they've drafted into meaningful roster players. I genuinely think Will Cooley is probably the most impactful guy. They drafted since and developed since 2015 other than that one Lafranier's season

when he played with Panarin. Yeah. Well, and even there, you know, Will Cooley hasn't taken the step forward that I would have anticipated this season. You know, and then there's just an awful lot of guys. I mean, even a guy like Caco,

who's pretty damn useful in Seattle. I mean, he's not going to live up to his draft pedigree, but you can see the down low playmaking, some of the intelligence on the wall. Like, he's a handful. He's getting stellar two-way results. He has chemistry with Maddie Baneers. Just felt like that was never going to happen for him in New York.

You know, Lefrenier, Braden Schneider, right? Schneider's, like, already hit that moment. It's such a funny thing with that type of defender, the big right-handed, like, really great asset type defender, where you get to a certain point and it's just, oh, he's a five, six. And all of a sudden, the value completely falls through the floor, right? Like, we saw it with Rasmus Ristelainen back in the day with Buffalo.

You have to be so mindful of those, you know, flawed but talented and have all the attributes to fill a premium spot players, you know, organizations, especially on the back end, those non-needle-moving traitsy defenders, like if they don't figure it out, it's just kind of like they're just a guy. And it almost flips overnight. Like, I don't know when it did with Brayden Schneider, but it definitely has. So, you know, I think there's lots of examples up and down their lineup of guys that haven't developed or taken that next step. And then, you know, you get to Adam Fox no longer being talked about as a Norris guy.

Their bevy of 30-plus-year-old forwards, all of them still useful, right? But together, they've all lost like just a little bit, just a couple clicks off their fastball. and in a collective sport like hockey, it's had a dramatic impact on the environment that this team's playing in. Specifically, it's rendered them a half-court team where two years ago, this group of players would have been elite, right?

Like, they would have absolutely been a top five team in the East, but life moves fast, especially in the NHL. You know, I do think, too, there's a contrast, there's a contrast that's worth dwelling on between the Bruins, right, and the Rangers, where you get that, you know, that three-month stretch where the Bruins just are so aggressive in grafting young players

and future value into their lineup, right? I mean, the coil trade, the Brazo trade, which returns Kuznadinov. You know, there's like five or six deals in there. But by the time they're gone, the Brandon Carlo trade's a huge one because Fraser Mitten's a nasty boy. And,

but, you know, there's five or six trades in there, and it's not like they tore it down. I mean, there's no, like, a radical tear it down rebuild

of the sort that someone with no skin in the game on the internet might suggest. It's, you know, they still have two Lindholmes and Zedorov and obviously passed in on and on. You know, but,

You graft a whole bunch of that future sort of value into your, into your club. And I think it matters. I think it, like, you could feel, you can feel the difference between teams that haven't necessarily torn it all down, but have at least made some of the moves that you really have to make to be mindful of staying young, getting fresh legs, avoiding committing too much money in turn to older players, netting the sort of assets that give you a shot to recoup value. And I think, like, the Penguins and the Bruins are both examples of teams that have done this and haven't necessarily gone as far as some people say they maybe should in terms of

like rebuilding hypothetically. I mean, the Penguins soft, Crosby, Latang, Malkin, you know, what is Marcus Patterson, Gensel, and Drew O'Connor? Like those are their main seller trades. It's not as if they've gone scorched earth here, but you can feel it when you watch them play that there's some youthful exuberance, some promise. And then of course some asset value, right, that they just didn't have two and a half years ago. It just feels to me like if the Rangers do, you know, retool on the fly is a loaded term because it implies mediocrity and, you know, for good reason.

But, I mean, making some moves to graph some future forward value into this organization to add some fast legs, even if those players are a little bit less proven, to shed some contractual commitments to get a little bit younger, you know, it's not the fix necessarily for where, Chris Drury has arrived, but man, a little can go a long way. And I think we've seen that with a variety of teams that, you know, I don't know that they're like building toward having championship level ceiling,

but by simply being disciplined for a short stretch of time in terms of making future forward moves, they've changed the complexion and feel of their, of their lineup. I guess just even with those moves, even if they're obviously the right ones in the long term, I'd have no confidence in the short term that those players would materialize into, success stories based on this track record we have right now. And so I think that's probably the even bigger, deep-rooted issue with the Rangers. Tom, let's take our break here. And then we come back.

We will jump right back and we'll keep going through our teams that are on tilt or either rapidly approaching it. You're listening to the HockeyPedio cast streaming on the Sports Night Radio Network. All right. We're back in the Hockey-Pedio cast, John, for a Sunday special. Tom, let's keep it going. I think we've got to go senators.

And it's actually kind of surprising that we didn't start off with them. After the week they had, in particular, the Thursday, night they had, which is difficult to truly describe unless you were just kind of following it in real time. The 8-2 thrashing in Colorado was a second leg of a back-to-back against an angry Avs team that had experienced their first pair of regulation defeats in a long time, but nonetheless, a pretty ugly performance. And then right before the game, the public statement coming from the team's official account about the Allmark rumors, you obviously have a history as a PR guy for a team. What was going through that and kind of following in a real time?

What was your take? So, you know, you always do your best in that chair to advocate for the best course of action, but you fundamentally are not deciding on what gets said. You're not fundamentally saying it most of the time. You know, if you are, you're being quoted as a team spokesperson, not, you know, the character that you are. You're mostly an advisor. And that one read to me like something that stumbled.

couldn't be talked out of. Because it was wild. I mean, it was wild. I think it gave a lot of life to a story that really was only, had only existed in a dark corner of the internet, right? And it is a dark corner of the internet. And no one or team should have to deal with that. It's absolute BS, but that doesn't change the fact that, you know,

once those rumors start getting spread, like, unless we're talking legal consequences, like unless we're talking about an Ian Cole type situation that's going to require, you know, a suspension without pay and become a P.R. suspension with pay and become a PA matter or what have you, like with an investigation. And obviously this was never going to rise to that level. I just don't think like the moment you put the statement out, you give the in to everybody else to start talking about it because you've got an official comment. It's really difficult to surface even if it's being talked about in that. ether it's really difficult to surface it like for example for an entire hockey night in Canada headline segment without quotes from the players and the general manager itself so they call it the straysand effect i think that's exactly what it was and um yeah i mean i didn't understand it i don't know what purpose it served as for their performance on the ice i mean you know i still watched that senator's team play and and you know i think the like i think the kitchucks sanderson minutes are

genuinely impressive. I think they're a pretty solid overall two-way team. I think their drafting is really catching up to them, right? The, you know, the Pierre-McGuire draft with Tyler Boucher and they lost their pick for this year. They feel short both a top four defender and a top nine forward. And that's tough. Like, those are not small things to be short of, especially when you're short both. I nonetheless think that their overall defensive play and two-way play has been pretty good. And, you know, Almark ended up in the center of some of these whispers and rumors and, you know, unfairly because I don't think, I don't think he deserves this to be on his play as he's away from the team and clearly seems to be a difficult situation. I heard Tim Stutzla

had sort of mentioned it as having a mental health angle. But we don't really know, and I don't really want to speculate on it beyond that. But, you know, the truth is, is that they do need saves. Like, that's been, you know, I think the long and the short of it for them in terms of their struggles for much of the season. You know, they just haven't had good enough goaltending most nights. And I think it's, I think it's hidden a lot of the good things that they're doing, structural. I agree. I mean, they have an 8, 72 team save percentage this year.

They're 31st on the PK, given up over 10 goals an hour. And then another two against Florida on Saturday and that loss. And the defensive metrics, via Sporologic, you look at it, much like last year, third and expected goals against ninth and fewest slot shots allowed, third fewest defensive zone time spent. And they're getting these awesome Sanderson and Stutzler seasons, right? And I think that's obviously very important because those are the pillars and the building blocks and the guys who are going to move the needle.

yet they're coming out of this, you know, rebuild era and did so last year, make the playoffs, have that series against the Leafs. And then now you look at it. And even with the steps those guys have taken into becoming stars, the routes they have available to them, especially in light of not having their first round pick this year, to kind of meaningfully level up even further and have something of substance to show for all those years in terms of improving in the coming years, especially in comparison to some teams in their own division, like the HABs or the Red Ways. or the sabers, I think would be pretty demoralizing.

And so we'll see. I think it's certainly a better team than the results indicate, and getting a couple of saves would help, and you'd expect them to reach some level of stability there moving forward. But I can't imagine, like, I'm very curious. I'd love some truth serum for Travis Green right now and kind of, this must be driving him crazy based on everything we know about him as a coach, certainly, and the way he prides himself in terms of what he wants

his teams to look like from a results perspective. For sure. And yeah, I mean, you know, I'm sure he likes the structure that his team's playing with, right? Like, I'm sure that's, you know, what he's looking at. And I think anyone involved with the senators or even just watching them regularly has this sense that, you know, to bring it back to the rule of if your star players play like star players, a lot of this feels a lot more manageable. You know, if Linus Olmark is out there performing like an average goaltender, right? just an average goaltender. This team is probably in a playoff spot in their division. And right now, instead, there's six points back of the Leafs for fifth in the Atlantic. And that doesn't seem like much, but it is, especially with the way that the Leaves have been playing recently.

The Sabres, the run there on the top three in the Atlantic. And so you're getting into some dicey water, certainly. All right, I got the Blue Jackets, Kings, Ducks, and Jets that I wanted to get through here. And you could add the blues as well, though I don't have them and notes on them. But I'll give you your choice of the litter there in terms of which. which one you want to go to next. Let's do the Jets quickly. They win today.

Yep. Back to back to. So kind of Rangers West, right? Except with a much better track record of player development. But I really do feel like that's what we're seeing here, just in that it feels like a fundamental personnel issue where they just don't have enough team's feet. Yeah.

I felt like they had to be included in this and qualified just because they're staring down the barrel of, going from winning the president's trophy last year to their 31st or whatever and we're 32nd earlier this week in the standings. Yeah. And how jarring that is, they had an 11 game losing streak, which they finally and mercifully ended with that win on Friday against the Kings. But I don't really, for the idea of this, I don't think they necessarily apply just because they've got Schifley, Connor, Valardi, Lowry, Morrissey, Sandberg, Hellebuck all signed for the next handful of years. and so they're in a spot where it's pretty cut and dry in my opinion in terms of

they have this list of impending UFAs that they should definitely try to trade every single one of and get whatever they can back because I'm not even sure that they'd get worse on the ice rest of season subtracting all those guys and just playing other young players or whoever you wind up getting in return for them the most interesting part of it is where we go from here with Colperfetti right because the player we've spoken about about a lot. He's the one that doesn't fit this bill because he's an RFA this summer, 24 years old. They have to kind of figure out what that structure is going to look like. And he had a slow start coming off that high ankle sprain, an injury. And I know it can really

linger. It can linger, but it can also like, even when you're back out there, you just don't have the same skating juice you previously had. And he's not a guy that necessarily was already using that to begin with. But now all of a sudden, the past handful of games, they're playing more minutes, playing with Filarty, throwing a bit of a lifeline. And he just looks way better. I thought he looked awesome against the devils today. And so that's encouraging. And given their cap situation where they are flushed with plenty of it and aren't going to be able to use it necessarily in terms of big name guys in UFA

or even via trade who have trade protections, it seems like a very logical route to just pay him as much as it's going to take to get that done long term and add him as part of that core and then revisit it this summer and hope that this is not necessarily a one-off because I think the team speed stuff is very legit. but moving in a bit of a different direction and not necessarily allowing this to linger beyond this season. So I don't think they really should qualify

compared to some of these other teams we talked about where there's like legitimate big picture stuff where you have to worry about and also try to figure out what to do. Like I think theirs is much more routine for the most part. Yeah. And look, I think the Jets have actually pulled off some pretty impressive stuff,

I think, from a team building without rebuilding standpoint. point. And I think their reluctance to rebuild is the most justified of any team in the NHL, given the business realities of their marketplace in terms of size and the corporate base of the Winnipeg market. But to pull it off, to have it both ways, you know, they require sort of two things to be in their favor. They either need to be absolutely nailing it at the draft table, right? Or they need to be keeping their guys. And for the most part, you know, across, what, let's say, certainly a decade, certainly since like 2016, right, where they actually

had a meaningful contending team for a couple of those seasons too. You know, they've managed that decline without necessarily being out of the playoff mix for too long. But, you know, since Since Perfetti, their first round picks are Lucius, McGority, who they already traded, Brad Lambert, right, who's been on the trade block, Colby Barlow, and Sasha Bumadien, who's, you know, not too young to sort of factor into this analysis is X, Y, or Z. But the point being that they haven't had the new body coming.

And then compounding, you know, a bit of a glass jaw punch, right? a skater of Eelers's speed and dynamism. It was kind of like the hit they couldn't take, right? The punch they couldn't withstand. And so, look, I still think overall, like, they are not in the tank battle. You know, their last 10 games where they've lost five times in regulation, right? In our two, five and three, they've only been outscored by five goals. Like, for context, and to bring it back to the Vancouver Canucks because I'm a sicko,

The Vancouver Canucks are two, six, and two. So only one point worse over that same stretch of games. And are minus 21. Like, you know, minus five shouldn't usually be, minus five over a 10 game stretch. You shouldn't usually be like 500, maybe 550 point percentage over that. Instead, you know, because of a bunch of distribution, like a real inability to hold leads in particular. It's looked worse. It's looked worse for the Jets than it probably is.

I don't think I'm going to be surprised if they reel off, you know, 12 wins and 18 games or something like that and get back even into the playoff race in the West. I don't think that's out of the question yet, although they really have put themselves far behind the eight ball. I still sort of think that their overall execution and infrastructure is sensible, but they really hit sort of a perfect storm of departures without young, cost-controlled labor to sort of backfill those spots and in particular

the lack of team speed I think has really hurt them this year and you know that's going to have that's going to be an area that they're going to have to fix both at the draft table but also in terms of just like finding some UFAs finding some guys that can help in free agency. They don't have to be the best players like

but you need to find some guys that can move and can just add team speed to what this what this team's bringing every night. Yeah. desperately needing some infusion of juice. The abs are only have twice as many points as them this season. So it's not that bad. Oh my God.

The Blue Jackets are fascinating in terms of their inclusion on this list because unlike some of the teams we've talked about so far, I don't think they necessarily entered with the same level of expectations, although we were excited about them after the progress they made last year and how fun they were to watch. They're dead last in the east right now. The reason why I did include them is because I think they're entering a fascinating crossroads moment here from like an organizational build slash contract structuring perspective. And we spoke a couple weeks ago after the departure of Josh Flynn joining Yarmouka Kalladin

and in Buffalo about some of the brain drain and some more concerns there. They replace his spot in the organization with our guy Lawrence Gilman, who both you and I think very highly of. And the task in front of them is going to be very intriguing because assuming the rest of the season keeps going this way, and as I said, they're dead last in the east and it's going to be an uphill climb. They've got guys who are very desirable rentals in terms of, especially from like a player prototype perspective, Charlie Coil, Boone Jenner, Mason Marchment. Then they enter next year with Marchenko, Veronkov, Kent Johnson, and Denton Mutecic all entering the final years of their deals.

Now, all those guys are still going to be retained as RFAs, but they're all going to be arbitration eligible. And in the case of Marchenko and Voronkov, one year out from unrestricted free agency, which significantly limits their leverage in those talks. And so how they approach that and the job Lawrence Gilman does, I think, is going to be very fascinating. So in terms of like a crossroads perspective for any organization, they might be entering one of the most fascinating ones as soon as this trade deadline, but in particular come July 1st when these guys are extension eligible. Yeah.

And I think of this as sort of a bellwether, right? So we're probably entering a world where buying power, in terms of cash spending, more so even than cap spending, is going to dictate the gap between buyers and sellers or haves and haves have-nots in the NHL and potentially even be an avenue that shapes player movement, right? Whereas in the past, we'd have contending teams losing players because they couldn't afford to keep that to make hard decisions as a result of the cap. We might be in a position where smaller market teams lose players because they have to make difficult decisions in terms of their ability to pay them fair market value,

right, especially if salaries begin to inflate proportionally with the sort of cap growth that we expect. And I'm really curious to look at Columbus then as sort of ground zero, right? There's a really experienced hand in Gilman going in, you know, who's primarily like, like his primary specialty or calling card is player negotiations and and cap management, the bookkeeper. And on an awful lot of the rules, too, that we now, like the NHLs, for example, the LTI, LTI, LTI a guy until the playoffs thing, right? Like that was the Canucks that did it first.

Everyone remembers Patrick Kane four years later, but that was Gilman's Canucks in 2010-11 that really pioneered some of those strategies that people have been belly aching over for 15 years since. So looking at the Blue Jackets from the perspective this summer of like, how does a team that may in time struggle to spend to the cap view this opportunity and sort of place their bets in terms of locking players up, right? Like, is there going to be an element of bridging guys? Because I'm sure most players are not going to want max term unless you're paying a premium for it,

given sort of the dynamics of this cap growth era and what that might mean. And on the other side, like, I wonder if a team that's in a less established hockey market, right? And I'm not saying that dismissively of Columbus, a super vibrant hockey market in its own right, but there is a difference in the value of like their corporate sponsorship holdings. and those are the Toronto Maple Leafs of Montreal Canadians, right? There's a difference between their broadcast rights deal and their radio rights deal and that of the Vancouver Canucks. Like, we know this. I shouldn't have to explain it, but just in fairness to what they've built in Columbus, I want to say it.

But the, like, did they view this as an opportunity to pay guys early? Because, you know, are they willing to pay the premium required? to buy max-term deals, especially for the, especially for the Fantilli and Ken Johnson class. Because I think they should be. And I think it's going to tell us a lot about how,

you know, some pretty smart operators think about this from the perspective of a team situated to maybe be in a budget crunch going forward and sort of what's in their best interest. Like to make the cash investment now may end up being something that saves you down the line, but also gives you the wiggle room or the valuable pieces to sell for cost effective labor, right? If we end up in a system of unequal

spending, which I think we are poised toward going to over the next three to four years. Yeah. I think they're entering some dangerous waters, though, in terms of an urgency perspective. in particular with Werenski, right? Where after this season, he's got two years left at that 9.58 or whatever he's on, and he'll be 29, and he's playing like a top two to three defenseman again in the world. And in terms of, I guess just the urgency of the approach in terms of what the timeline is and what that's going to look like. And I like a lot of the players there.

I didn't like the offseason they had previously. And that felt like a bit of a fast track one where they had all that cap space you were referencing. And so they make the Brindley trade, which obviously, looks bad now despite the fact that the coil has been very good for them and Miles Woods giving them more production than I expected. But they're going to have a lot of options available to them and I guess which route they go is going to be very telling and could be really bad or could be very encouraging.

And so it's a bit of a preemptive one here, including them on this list, even though they're low in the standings, but I'm definitely going to be monitoring it very closely. Yeah, I just think they need to, I mean, they are, they should have the cap space depending on the level of growth, maybe they're motivated to get off Merz-Leakins for the purpose of

maximizing what they can spend. But you've got Branson expiring. You've got Heinen, they added, who's expiring. You've got Jenner expiring, coil expiring, and Marchman, right? So they've got a fair bit of money coming off their books here, plus the growth. Like, you know, Kent Johnson's offensive struggles,

that's a buy low. that I think they've got to seize. Denton Meteichick, you know, Denton Meteichick's an awesome player as a standalone guy, but also as a insurance policy on Werensky uncertainty. Like, he's a guy I think you go long on. And, you know, I think Fantilli is the most slam dunk of that, right? Like just an absolute thoroughbred at a premium spot. You know, I'd honestly extend it too to Marchenko and Varancov, right?

Like, well, you know, it might be more difficult to do. But I think across the board, you know, if you're willing to do a cash outlay now, which, which isn't easy, you know, I think it's, I think it's worth, like, I think it's worth doing it. In fact, I think they have to do it because I think it's going to matter more for them to have a lot of control over these assets, you know, for the purpose of giving them flexibility. and, you know, with an eye toward where these marketplaces could end up over the next few years. I mean, their highest paid forward right now is $5.5 million. Like, that's going to be the price of a third liner, you know, in probably two years. And so I think they need to structure it accordingly. No, they're still set up well. But ultimately, if they cannot convince and retain Marchenko and Varanco of long term,

I'm not sure it's going to matter. And that would be very upsetting, I think. So those will be very telling this summer in terms of how that plays out. Do you want to end with a quick little jaunt through California? Let's do it. The Kings, man. We regrettably have to talk about them. They get smoked 5-1 on Friday night in Winnipeg,

just a completely lifeless performance. And then they go into Edmonton and salvage the back-to-back on the second leg of it, holding on for a shootout win. They're holding on to Wildcar 2 spot in the west. yet they're 29th in the league in regulation wins and regulation overtime wins. They have seven wins this year out of 44 games by more than a one goal margin.

And while we've talked a lot about, especially his past off season's direction they chose to go and the commitments they made, unfortunately, I think what we're seeing from Clark especially because I had some questions as he approached coming off his ELC and what that future was going to look like, I'm still very upset in terms of his usage.

and there's no situation where he should be sixth on the team in ice time the way he was in Edmonton and still having Drew Dowdy in 2026 playing 26 minutes in a game. But he is so much juice and he's so good and I think he's going to be a legit star, if not already on a permanent basis. And the quicker they go about orienting everything funneling through him, I think this is going to turn around a little bit byfield similarly. There's times where I just wish he would shoot the puck, not to be the fan banging the glass yelling shoot,

but I'm watching in Winnipeg and he's just passing out of glorious opportunities for no reason and isn't scoring goals this year yet doing everything else. He's almost one of those like 95% players where he does 95% of the work to get you to the finish line brilliantly carrying the buck up the middle of the ice, drawing penalties, setting teammates up, and then he just cannot convert on his own this season. Still 23 though. And those two guys I do think provide hope assuming the organization sees it that way and as a direction they go in starting next season.

Yeah. Oh, man. I mean, they're not like the Jets or the Rangers because they do have your Fiala, Kempai, Byfield, Clark Tier of Guys, Mikey Anderson, right? Who can move it.

But there's depth minutes where it feels like a half-de-court game. And that's in contrast with what they looked like when they still weren't able to get over the hump. right in the playoffs. But at least they were able to sort of defend with speed and, you know, like you lose Gavrikov and bring in your Dumlin, C.C. Edmondson tier guys.

I mean, it feels different when you watch the play. It feels far lower ceiling. And, you know, they probably make the playoffs. But, you know, I guess there's a commonality in some of the teams we've talked about, which is not exactly nailing the, the sort of trade assets for better players stage of the rebuild,

the hardest thing to get right, the thing that makes what Vegas has accomplished so successful. I think it's funny that the Washington Capitals are the other great example of a team that really nailed that most difficult step, and most of the teams that we're talking about have done a trade with Washington that was part of them not nailing. this phase, right? The chickering deal for Ottawa and obviously the Dubois. I mean, they lost the Dubois trade twice. The Kings did anyway. And so, yeah, I mean, I just feels like, it just feels kind of like there's two separate thoughts on this roster. There's the bones of a team that, you know, I think could have had a lot of juice and been youthful and interesting and then grafted onto it as just a very old group of like good players, youthful. guys, but they have so many of them that it really limits their sort of downline-up team speed

in certain matchups in a way that I think is costing them on an awful lot of nights. I think I'd be way more excited if I had hope that the organization would like fundamentally transform itself in terms of the vision and the mandate, right, from top down. Yeah. Because a lot of those players you mentioned, I do think have a certain level of juice at some of these other teams we talked about don't possess. And Clark in particular, like just to bring this hope. I think he's been so good this year.

He's third on the team in 5-15 points, despite the fact that he doesn't play as much as he should. 14 of those primary, they're crushing the minutes with him on the ice. He's almost playing an entirely different sport than any of their other defensemen. And so that's answered a big question for me that I had heading into the year,

and now I just want to see more of it. Let's end on our ducks, because we're so excited about them early in the year. And after this loss in Buffalo on Saturday, that's nine straight losses, eight of them in regulation. They're down to 25th in point percentage, yet they're still maintaining like a 40% implied playoff probability because it's the Western Conference

and there's still just three points out despite this stretch. Yet a lot of our concerns in terms of the defensive environment and the playing style, which was so fun, the bottom's fallen out on it. They've given up 56 goals against in their last 11 games. They're a bottom two to three team across the board in every defensive metric. The goalies aren't covering for it anymore. They have an 837 percentage.

during this time and maybe it's as simple as that. I'm not worried about Leo Carlson's short-term struggles here. I think he's clearly too good for this to be a fatal flaw and he's going to bounce back. Hopefully the couple, the goal and then the primary assist he gets

in garbage time against Buffalo gets him going a little bit. I still think the world of all the young players, the defenseman certainly, but Seneca, Goce, even Terry, who's a bit older than those guys. But the veterans they went out and inquired

who looked like they were being rehabbed are getting pounded now and losing those minutes. And I included them on this list of tilt teams because they still have so much upside long term. Yet, based on the direction they chose to go, bring in in Quentiful in the offseason, then trading for and signing these veterans and then the state of the West and the opening that's presented to them in the Pacific, them not taking advantage of it. If they keep spiraling,

I do wonder what that's going to look like heading into the offseason if it plays out this way. Yeah. My gut on the ducks is that they play a volatile style of hockey and we've seen them overperform it and now underperform it. And the truth is, is I think they probably are just a fringe playoff team in this Western mix, but a fringe playoff team with way more upside and juice, but also, you know, they play riverboat hockey. I mean, there's no question about it. And we could tell that even when they were winning. All of their games were breathless affairs.

I mean, it's must watch, but it felt, you know, it felt. like they were just hanging on. It's a high wire. A lot of nights. It's a high wire act. And I think it lends itself to, you know, runs of both success and failure. Like, I honestly, I think it's less predictable because the mistakes and the openings on both sides of the rank

are just like shocking, right? I mean, they're 1890s quality scoring chances, which like, please, sign me up. I want every game in the NHL to look this way. But also, you know, I'm not sure. shocked that they've run into the sort of stretch that kills a team's playoff hopes. I do think a lot of this is goaltending, right? I mean, 8.30, I don't care how defensively responsible you are.

830 is probably not going to last. Lucas Dostal is too good for that, even though, you know, maybe there's some hangover from the injury that he's sustained in November. But, yeah, I mean, on a true talent basis, there can be no question in my mind anyway that this Ducks team is one of the eight best teams in the West. my gut is is that the goaltending will normalize and that their absurd style of play which like absurd said in a very complimentary way

is just going to be prone to higher highs and lower lows than your average team. I think we're one of the lower lows and my guess is it'll even out and they'll be in the mix. I don't think they're going to fade over the balance of the season. I think they'll be playing some meaningful games in March. That Doc Sabres game on Saturday that was a fascinating watch because obviously two teams going in completely opposite directions.

in terms of the way they're performing right now. And the Sabres just had this like immaculate, at least until garbage time, just like professional business-like game and just did everything they needed to hit all the checkpoints and were up comfortably. And the ducks have struggled in that element. But similar to what we said about Columbus, right?

They've got Carter, Goce, Leo Carlson, Minchikov, and Zelweger all his RFA's this summer. And they only have about $63 million on the books. For next year, then the following off season, so much better. money's coming off with Crider, Chlorin, and Strom expiring. So the opportunity to kind of, I guess, strike while the iron's hot

in terms of leveraging that to set yourself up for the future is still very visible for them, similar to close. And honestly, far more important given their overall positioning. I mean, if this season is a step forward where your team,

you know, all of your young guys took a step, you were one of the most exciting team in hockey for the first two months of the year, the limitations of playing that way became apparent, everyone learns from it, and you get a bunch of deals done with the long term in mind with this core group. I mean, you know, that in some ways that's a totally fine outcome for the ducks this season, even though it'll be disappointing given the potential that we saw.

All right, buddy, what's the early part of the year? What do you want to promote on the way out? Oh, you know, I'll be reporting on the Vancouver Canucks. Do you know they've only led for eight minutes in their last nine games? it's that high? Yeah. And envision them being up on the scoreboard at this point. Well, David Kemp scored a first period goal against Philadelphia,

and by the three-minute mark of the second, they were down 3-1. But yeah, I mean, so anyway, I'll be writing about them at the athletic, and I'll be talking about them on SportsNet 650. And you're in Montreal, as you said, off the top. I believe it's a prime game again, right? Very excited. Very exciting.

Well, friend of the podcast, Thomas Hick, he's going to be there I'm sure, so please give him my best. Give us a five-star review wherever you listen, subscribe to the PDA cast Patreon. We've got a jam-pack week of shows coming, join us for all of them.

That is all for another edition of the Sunday special. We'll be back here on the feed Tuesday with our guy Kevin Woodley. So looking forward to that, and we're going to go from there. Thank you for listening to the Hockey Pediocast streaming

on the Sportsnet Radio Network.