The Sheet with Jeff Marek - Extensions & Retirements ft. Pierre McGuire

Episode Date: August 25, 2025

On this episode of The Sheet, Jeff Marek is joined by Pierre McGuire for a jam-packed conversation covering some of the biggest stories in hockey. The guys dive into Tyson Barrie officially calling it a career, Sergei Fedorov finally getting his jersey retired, and what the recent contract extensions for Frank Nazar and Marco Rossi mean for their respective teams. They also break down Bill Daly’s comments on the possibility of a shortened NHL season that could even begin in September. Plus, Jeff shares an exclusive clip from his sit-down with Oilers president Jeff Jackson, where they touch on Connor McDavid’s future in Edmonton and what his next contract could look like.#TheSheet #DailyFaceoff #JeffMarek #PierreMcGuire #TysonBarrie #SergeiFedorov #FrankNazar #MarcoRossi #ConnorMcDavid #Oilers #JeffJackson #NHL #HockeyNews #HockeyTalk #NHLRumorsShout out to our sponsors!👍🏼 Fan Duel: https://www.fanduel.com/👍🏼 Simply Spiked: https://www.simplyspiked.ca/en-CAReach out to [e-mail] to connect with our Sales Team and discuss opportunities to partner with us!If you liked this, check out:🚨 OTT - Coming in Hot Sens | https://www.youtube.com/c/thewallyandmethotshow🚨 TOR - LeafsNation | https://www.youtube.com/@theleafsnation401🚨 EDM - OilersNation | https://www.youtube.com/@Oilersnationdotcom🚨 VAN - CanucksArmy | https://www.youtube.com/@Canucks_Army🚨 CGY - FlamesNation | https://www.youtube.com/@Flames_Nation🚨 Daily Faceoff Fantasy & Betting | www.youtube.com/@DFOFantasyandBetting____________________________________________________________________________________________Connect with us on ⬇️Link Tree: https://linktr.ee/daily_faceoff💻 Website: https://www.dailyfaceoff.com🐦 Follow on twitter: https://x.com/DailyFaceoff💻 Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dailyfaceoffDaily Faceoff Merch:https://nationgear.ca/collections/daily-faceoff Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

ACAS powers the world's best podcasts. Here's the show that we recommend. Feeling disconnected in this noisy, over-scheduled world? Well, you're not alone. That's exactly why we're here. I'm Dr. Jody Carrington and on my podcast, Unloanly. We're tackling the loneliness epidemic, the most pressing issue of our generation. In each episode, I sit down with the most incredible experts who share vital insights.

and critical strategies to help reconnect us all. You see, in the history of the world, we've never been this disconnected. So let's get Unlonely together. Subscribe to Unloanly wherever you get your podcast, and we can't wait to meet you over there. ACAST helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. acast.com. Okay, welcome once again to the program here.

The weekly program, soon to be a daily at some point here. Continues. All throughout the summer, Pierre McGuire, coming up in a couple of moments. You will hear also from Jeff Jackson, the CEO and president of the Edmonton Oilers Hockey Operations Department, commenting on the Connor McDavid contract extension. In the meantime, I want to remind you, as always, this show is presented and brought to you by,

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And amongst the things that I want to get into today, I'm going to talk to Pierre McGuire about this one, and we'll talk about contracts and extensions and free agents that are still left on the board. Zach, were you as best bewildered, as a lot of us were, when in the new CBA, the details were revealed, that there was going to be no more double retention of salaries. Well, there is, but there's a time period that you have to wait.

I think we all looked at, at least I did. said where does this come from and i've never heard anybody grouse about this before i've never heard anybody complain about it before either owner's side or player side it just seemed to or team side or players it seemed to come out of nowhere like this one shocked you too right i think we're all on the same page right yeah it felt like they were trying to create a solution for a problem that didn't exist and i guess maybe in a way getting ahead of it but it was also kind of like it created foreseeable issues like lack of movement and lack of excitement around the trade deadline. I was like, well, now people aren't going to be able to flip guys as fast.

And you're going to have to plan way too far in advance. I didn't get it when I saw that that was a part of the new CBA. So this has kind of been a white whale of mine for the summer. As I've tried to figure this out, like, where does this come from? And I haven't quite nailed down the specific person that it comes from, the specific either manager or owner or owners where this idea sort of originated, but obviously it's risen to level that now it's in the CBA, the collective bargaining agreement. But what I'm told is the philosophy behind it goes like this, where you might believe that there are a lot of

large market owners who are only concerned about themselves and there are quote unquote large market issues. I'm told that that's not necessarily true. Now, certainly there are some organizations that are only concerned about things that directly impact them and can't see the forest for the trees and are only interested in what makes their bottom line more sizable. And it doesn't matter what happens to the other 31 teams in the NHL. But there are some teams and some owners that do see the big picture to all of this. And this is the driving force behind it. It is a small market versus large market issue. Or should I say this is a large market helping small market issue? And the theory behind it goes like this. Small market teams, as we all know,

are crucial to the success of the NHL, even large market teams, because the greater market share that small market NHL teams get and the more fans they bring in, the more money they bring in, the more successful they are, what goes up in turn? The franchise value of larger market teams. Small market teams succeed, large market teams succeed. Okay, so let's keep that in mind. And the feeling behind this, and I would imagine that both Gary Batman and Bill Daley would be, you know, very much, you know, in tune and on side with this feeling amongst

some larger market owners in the NHL is that if you allow double retention in the way that it currently exists, what you'll have is, or you have a scenario whereby small market teams can use double retention to make it to the salary cap floor. And what you don't want are small market teams in this endless cycle of using salary cap retention. We've seen it before, folks. Salary cap retention just to make it to the floor. This way it de-incentivizes, or rather it incentivizes smaller market teams to actually compete and not just use levers in the CBA in order to pay the bare minimum.

I'm told that's the issue. And that's why it's in there. Okay. Again, like everything else that I always talk about on this show and always have and probably always will, as long as there is a CBA and a relationship between ownership and players the way we see it now. This is once again about franchise values

because the more competitive, the smaller market teams are the larger market teams benefit because their franchise value goes up. I surrender the floor. I'm glad that we have smarter people on the show than myself like Pierre coming up later and you tell me why I'm missing pieces here

but and that all makes sense I completely understand that and this does seem like the let this to me seems like a short term solution to that that creates bigger long term issues i.e. trades

excitement around player movement and that kind of stuff where this would then provoke, hopefully, what you've been pushing for in as the term you've used, and I'm going to steal it from you because it's a good one, taking the training wheels off of the salary cap, because that has to, Jeff, it has to come on the other side because I get it in terms of making sure that the lower, lower end is lower spending teams are not just trying to get to the floor. It solves that. But now you have another issue.

that will come about more prevalently in the future where it's going to be like, oh, now we can't trade because we can't fit the guy and we can't retain. Now what? There's got to be some other end.

First of all, with the increase in the salary cap, at least the next three seasons and how much is going, I don't know how much double retention we're going to see in trades anyhow. Like when everyone's right up against the salary cap

as has been going back to the COVID era of the NHL, yeah, sure, you need help from other teams to help facilitate some deals. I'm not so sure that it would even be that much more prevalent, given how much salary cap space all 32 teams are about to walk into. And we started to see the beginning of that this past summer. So maybe that's why maybe you look at it and say,

yeah, you know what, it's not really going to be an issue here. So let's make sure that teams are actually spending on players to, again, incentivize teams to spend on players as opposed to dead cap space. I mean, how many teams have you looked at? I mean, the old Phoenix coyotes were looking your direction. Did you look at and say, like, they have like $30 million in dead cap space here? Like, this is ridiculous. How many retired players do they have to have that's a lot of contracts expiring on their team?

I think this is a way. There was a point. This is a way where, you know, you try to mitigate that. There was a point where you could probably go on to EA sports. And if you just, like, manually unretired, everybody on the Phoenix Coyotes, you would have like a Hall of Fame roster. It's true. Like Shea Webb or Pavelt, Datsuk, Marion. These guys are just coming out of nowhere on these.

And it's just like, how did that guy end up there? Oh, yeah, I get to the floor. But Jeff, again, back to the point. To me, it feels a little bit like, because, again, that's why I said, you're smarter than me. You remind me of these things. Opens it up. Salary cap goes up. Spend more.

Okay, yep, open it up a little bit. But then when everybody spends more, whatever. You know what I mean? Like, it kicks the can down the road a little bit, probably open up. opens it up, and then all of a sudden, you and I are going to get on the show five years from now, we're going to say, hey, remember that conversation we had about taking the training wheels off? Yeah.

Maybe it's time. As much as, and I know he's sort of, you know, one of, I mean, he's, the Jacobs family has been around the NHL seemingly forever, certainly all through Commissioner Betman's tenure. And I don't know that this is his, this was his idea they brought up, but just to give you a sort of sense about, you know, you may have a perception. about one owner and just think like, okay, Jeremy Jacobs is only interested in his business, his bottom line, but I'm told like him, and there are some other owners like him as well that are very much like big picture.

Like no one likes spending revenue, sharing money and help. But there's like the idea that, you know, I don't mind this. And apparently Jeremy Jacobs is very much someone that even though it might hurt his team in the short term, Jacobs is always someone who's taking the long view on everything. just for some balance for how people feel about, and again, this is just like one example, but Jacobs is very much like that. Anyhow, coming up on the program, so that's what I've been able to clean so far from what the double retention issue is in the NHL. More on this in an upcoming episode of the sheet. In the meantime, I don't know if that was any good. I hope

people understand. Daily Outline, powered by Fanduel. This show is, of course, brought to you by Our friends at Fanduil make every moment more with North America's number one sportsbook Fanduel. And coming up in a couple of moments, you're going to hear from Jeff Jackson, the president and CEO of Hockey Operations for the Edmonton Oilers commenting on the Connor and McDavid contract. But also, Pierre McGuire is going to stop by our longtime buddy here on the program. Pierre has worked and played at every single level in the game.

So it's always good when you want to do a wide show with a lot of different topics. And we'll bring up that double retention issue with Pierre. in a couple of moments. But amongst things that he will talk about, the Tyson-Berry retirement, congratulations. To honestly, one of the great guys

in this era of the game, just a wonderful, wonderful guy. Loved watching him play. It's a sublime skater. The Federoff jersey retirement has a couple of sidebars to it as well. We'll get into that with Pierre

in a couple of moments. Man, the, some of the contracts have been interesting. The Nazar contract is fascinating. Mark Al-Rossi contract. is interesting. This, Nazar and Ross here are going to be a couple of contracts that we're going to talk about with Pierre McGuire here in a couple of moments. But in the meantime, I want to get right into, so I want to play this clip for you, this Jeff Jackson interview. So last week,

as you know, we are in Muscoca. We did the podcast from there, but we're there putting together a multi-part interview series that we're going to roll out at some point soon, I believe, early September. And one of the people that we talked to was Jeff Jackson. Now, Jeff Jackson, listen, he's worked, he's been a player, OHL, the Alexanders, and NHL, Maple Leafs, and Nordiques, etc. He's been an agent. He's been a manager. And now he's the CEO and president of hockey operations for the Edmonton Oilers. And one of the things we discussed was the situation with the Connor McDavid contract. And essentially, I just wanted to know, where are we at? And why are things so quiet around it so we'll share part of the interview here this is jeff jackson commenting on

the connor mac david contract situation on the sheet if we had been sitting here exactly a year ago i'm going to ask you about connor if we'd been sitting here a year ago and connor macdavid hadn't signed an extension i would have said the hockey world would be would be going crazy right now it would be on fire But the opposite has happened. Everyone's really calm about Connor McDavid and the extension. How did that happen? I'm not sure other than the fact that there's like a certain level of comfort with Connor. He's been in Edmondson for 10 years.

He's been very vocal about how much he loves the city. He loves playing for this team. The team is a good team, which is. paramount to Connor having an opportunity to win I think the conversation would be a lot different if we were struggling and we hadn't been and gone as far I mean as this is pointing as it has been to not win we've been right there for two years in a row and I think although we've made changes this summer I think we have a really good team again and obviously so Connor feels good about all that so it could be the

relationship with Connor and the city. My relationship with Connor goes way back. Connor has a lot of confidence in Stan and has been public about that. And, you know, ownership and Daryl Cates and his family have treated Connor and Lauren very well. And so I think that it's a combination of all those things. And I know last year when Leon wasn't what was had another year left and we were going to extend him or one, wanted to. There was a lot, it seemed like there was a lot more pressure, media talk about. It seems like Leon was noisier than Connor's been, which is, which I never, I never would get. A little bit, but I, I tried to tamp that down last June when we were in the finals. I know

there was like, you know, if you don't get him signed right away, you're going to have to trade him. I was like, well, I don't sure what you're talking about. Like, he has another year. He loves playing at Evanston. And sure enough, we, you know, we got a deal done early September with Leon and I'm super happy about that. So I sort of feel it's the same with Connor. It's not going to be a long negotiation. How quick is that phone call, by the way? Or how long is that, how quick is that conversation?

I think that it won't be, it'll be unlike any other sort of negotiation because it's not really. And I think that when Connor's ready, we'll have the discussion and we'll get a deal done. All right. So if you're an Edmonton Oilers fan, you're probably feeling pretty good about what Jeff Jackson had to say about the Connor McDavid contract extension situation. And again, like that series on the road, we'll start rolling that out. I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, Zach, sometime in early September. Sounds right to me. Okay, very good. With that, let's get to, and that's one of the things we're going to talk about here with Pierre McGuire. Let's bring on our marquee guests of the day. Someone who I would imagine has been enjoying. summer, but it's still making time to talk to a little punk like me. And he is the one and only Pierre McGuire when he joins me on the program. Now, Pierre Salou-Manchum, Zava.

Well, Sama, Saba, Xavier, and Jeff, great to talk to you. And I love what Jeff Jackson had to say. Okay. Because this takes you inside the negotiation of a star player that's happy in his environment. So think about his friendships, Ryan Rujin Hopkins, Leon Dreisadle, Darnel, Murs, Jeff Jackson, Chris Knoblock. So the sense of familiarity for Connor McDavid was there. He loves being in Edmonton. Ownership is treated him fantastically well.

How many times you hear general managers of presence of hockey operations talk about the relationship between an owner and a player not very often? So they set this up a long time ago. And something that people haven't talked about is how proactive Jeff Jackson and Stan Bowman were this past spring after they lost in the Stanley Cup final. they didn't just hang their hats in Eminton. They came east. They met with Connor McDavid and Connor McDavid's agent and they moved forward from there. And so this is not a hard

negotiation. It never wouldn't be a hard negotiation. I think it just comes down to how many years has Connor want to commit to it. I thought that was one of the most interesting things too about the entire and we did more in the interview on Connor McDavid, but the idea that this is a really quick conversation.

Like this is not really a negotiation. It's like okay Connor what do you want like they're a handful of players and you've coached some of them that have all that have been able to just walk in and say like look this is what I want and ownership says okay

or the manager says I'm going to run this upstairs I'll be back in two minutes like Connor's one of those guys Connor's one of those guys yes you are correct and you know what it's not going to be hard negotiation he'll be applying his trade in Eminton for a long time and they're going to be

honestly they're going to be a real good team again no issue about that at all One of the things, though, that I think, and I don't know if this has been said on your show, Jeff, and if it has, I apologize to whomever may have said it. This is reminding me a little bit what's going on in Edmonton to when my good friend Brian Burke was running the Vancouver Canucks. And they had this unbelievable team for a long time. And they couldn't sort out what was going on in goal. And because of that, they can never get past the finish line. And I don't, and this is not a shot at Steering Skinner or anybody else.

But yeah, I think they're kind of in the same position at Vancouver. Given, given, um, given where the goalie market is right now and who's available, most notably, nobody. I, I really do wonder if this is, if, if, and then again, it's not going to solve their problems. But I've mentioned this before and I'm, I want to add another name to it because we saw the situation play out. Interesting. You just mentioned Vancouver. We just saw the situation play out in net with the Vancouver Canucks with Archer Shilofs, who there is no way who's going to clear waivers. And, you know, Lincoln and Demko are the guys there. I, there are two that I wonder about. And again, they would come in as quote unquote backup goaltenders. Now,

there's also a new goalie coach who should point out in Edmondson. I do wonder about Michael DiPietro, because I do not think the Michael DiPietro clears waivers. And I do wonder about Nico Dawes. So I wonder about Boston and I wonder about New Jersey. Waivers are always interesting. And as you very well know, like you've been on so many sides of it, timing is everything for a lot of these situations. But I do wonder if the play here is Edmonton picks off one of those two coaltenders on waivers and it becomes a different situation with a different backup to Stuart Skinner and someone who could probably push him more. You know, it's interesting that you would bring up Boston, and I know part of that is because of Michael

D.P.H. And what he did last year in Florida, he was fantastic. But here's some. Do you remember the days when Boston and Edmonton, Sinden, and Sather who yuck up massed deals, right?

One of the guys who got traded was, you know, Billy Ranford. He won, you know, was a starting goalie for a Stanley Cup winning team. So, who beat his old team to win the Stanley Cup. Yeah. And I'm just wondering, I'm not taking pot shots to anybody because I want full disclosure here.

I'm real good friends with the Bowman family, and I really respect Jeff Jackson a lot. Did they, and they were going through it all last year trying to find somebody to be the GM and eventually Stan got that job. Yeah. Did they miss out on Allmark or did they miss out on Swayman? The only reason I'd bring it up is I was living in Boston, it was volatile beyond belief with what was going on with the bull tank situation. net.

And I just wonder if they didn't miss out on the potential of hitting a home run with Boston to solidify their broken position. ACAS powers the world's best podcasts. Here's the show that we recommend. Feeling disconnected in this noisy, over-scheduled world, well, you're not alone. That's exactly why. we're here. I'm Dr. Jody Carrington and on my podcast Unloanly. We're tackling the loneliness epidemic, the most pressing issue of our generation. In each episode, I sit down with the most

incredible experts who share vital insights and critical strategies to help reconnect us all. You see, in the history of the world, we've never been this disconnected. So let's get Unloanly together. Subscribe to Unloany wherever you get your podcasts. And we can't wait to meet you over there. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcast everywhere. Acast.com. So, first of all, I like Lena's Allmark and I cheer for Lena's Allmark. I want that guy to be really successful. But, and it was a very much a platoon situation with Boston, with Allmark and Jeremy Swamon.

Swamon ended up playing the bigger high pressure games for a long time. I'm not disqualifying the Vesna trophy that Linus Allmark won. But, you know, going into it, when Ottawa made the deal for Linus Allmark, outside of Rochester Utica matchups, where it was Linus Allmark and Thatcher Demcourt, are putting on a show here and everybody needs to see this because they're going save for save and this is incredible, I haven't really seen it from Linus Allmark, like high pressure, big situations, like, well, there's a Stanley Cup team. I know exactly what you're saying, and I really want Allmark to be that guy.

I just haven't seen it yet. So I'm not sure I was telling him about Allmark, though. Oh, but Sleman? Oh, well. Okay. All right. Now you've got my attention. All right.

My attention, too, because I probably didn't speak or phrase it very well. But I was thinking more in terms of the volatility that was around Jeremy Swamett. And you talked about Mr. Jacobs and his family before. And they've been amazing stewards of the Boston Bruins. And people can complain about them all they want. But if you look at their history of success with the Boston Bruins, it's humble. And you said something that was really intelligent with Zach before. And I was just eavesdropping.

You know, you talked about the importance of franchise values. Yep. Mr. Jacobs is at the forefront of all that stuff. I had the honor of being in Board of Governors meetings. And trust me what I tell you, he and Mr. Leopold of Minnesota and the late Rocky Works, there were certain people that kind of drove this whole thing. And those were three of the more prominent ones. But nobody usurps the power of Mr. Jacobs in the league outside of conditional batman.

Nobody is. He, and again, I've never sat in those meetings. I'm just drawing this from various conversations. But he's, he's an owner. As much as he does have his detractors, I understand it. Like, I get it. He's someone that takes the long view. We always talk about good of the game, good of the league, all those types of things.

I've been told there, a lot of, listen, there are a lot of owners that will fall on the side of what will benefit. fit their team period. And Jacobs, as much as he wants to be, and understandably so, be protective of his Boston Bruins, still has a long view. Like, there are a lot of owners that don't like writing revenue sharing checks. And I think Jacobs is one of those guys who looks at it and says, listen, I'm writing revenue checks because the more that the small market teams improve and get more market share, that increases my franchise value. I'm writing this check as an investment for me and other large market teams. That's what I've been told about, Jay.

Just to back you up on that, and I know we're kind of going in a tangent around Swayman, look at what happened with Arizona moving in Utah, and look at ownership that's taken over in Utah, and look at how that franchise was down and out, you can say whatever you want, and believing those, I care about every team as much as everybody else, but that franchise was in para. It was a major peril. and all of a sudden now it's resurgent, it's going to be good, they've got amazing stewardship at the ownership position.

It's tremendous, but I'm going to get back to it. I know that Jacobs don't like long protracted contract negotiations. And when Jeremy Swayman said, I'm not in this for me, I'm in this for all the other goalies. On my podcast I do with Jimmy Murphy, I got to say, I went right on and I said, you know what?

he's in trouble because there's no wait that's the chase I I had I had I had never thought

that you were thinking about Swamen too but yeah if that was the play and if indeed he was like wisdom we've seen

when things go and Joe Thornton maybe the best example when when things go sell the Boston Burns don't hesitate to pull the trigger

on on big deals let me let me ask about a couple of interesting contracts that we've seen. First of all, congratulations to Kevin Magnuson. Agent formerly with K.O. Sports, now he's gone on his own after Kurt went to Wasserman.

And the Chicago deal. Holy smokes. Like the player, a lot. I think he's going to be a really good to see if Connor Bedard remains one C. And I think it's still a conversation, too. Maybe Nazar becomes a one-see here. 53 games, seven years, $46.13 million over seven years, to which Pierre McGuire says what?

And I believe it's front-loaded in almost $10 million the first two years. Correct me if I'm wrong. So that's going to be an interesting thing when they have to do the dance with some of their other players in terms of getting guys at a bunch of you level. Yeah, it's an interesting contract for sure. I hope it works out. I don't want to be mean on this because I think the player is a really good player, too. I don't know them as a person at all.

I respect what Chicago's doing. I think they've done some really good things in terms of bringing it younger, more aquatic, dynamic players. I don't think any of them are as good as Tays or Keith or Tane. And I have no disrespect to Connor Bader, but I don't know if it's Patrick Kane yet. I don't know if you ever will be. But it's interesting what they're doing. my only thing is I'm going to go way back on you here

and I take you on what I'm talking about Rick DPA was a first overall pick Yes he was a really good player Boston University he was he's really he was And when the Islander sign him to that massive deal 15 years Yeah I was doing a presentation In the NHL offices at the time for mass marketing people

and I was shot, Jeff, about the contract. And I said, you know, because you know, I'm going to tell you the truth, whether I like it or not, I'll tell you the truth. And I said, I don't like this deal. I don't like this deal. It's a great deal for the player. I think it's a bad deal for the league. I think it's a bad deal for the team. I got called in with the office.

And, you know, like you, I have tremendous respect to the people at work at the NHL. I've been in a league a long time. I've watched what they've done to grow the brand. It's just been amazing. But I got read the Riot Act. How do you know? You can't say that. You don't know.

And I said, well, I think I do know. And sheer enough, that was a bad deal. And we're going to see whether the Mazar deal is a good deal or a bad deal. But I have questions about it for sure. You know, there's a few people read it because nothing happens in a vacuum. When a contract gets signs, there are some teams that are happy about it, some teams that are upset. There are some agents that are thrilled about it. And there are some that are not. If you, um, if you represent Cooley, Fantilly, Carlson, Goce, Bullduke, probably feeling pretty good, right?

Listen, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're called, attention, Winnipeg, you know, Cole Perfetti's on the last year of his bridge. Like if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're, if you're called perfetti's representation, you're feeling pretty good about, like there's a, there's a, I think this would have been, um, this would have been, um, um, this would have been Gary Betman's first managers meeting. And he was sitting beside Brian Burke and Serge Savard, who was running the haves and Bob Ganey, who was running the stars. Serge had signed someone. I can't remember who the player was. Maybe it was Stefan Riege.

Signed to a contract, which was going to affect how the stars did business with a couple of their other players, right? And it got to the point where, like, okay, like, they're starting to, like, push tables away and pull back. and the guys are rolling up their sleeves and the commissioner turns to Brian Brook and says, what's happening? And Brookie says, well, Gary, you're going to see a fight.

But that's, like, that's how emotional it can get when one signing affects, uh, affects another team directly. Or in this case, a number of teams. Like, if you have a star player coming off an entry level deal right now and you're the agent, hallelujah. You know, this is, this is kind of like, and you remember these years,

years when Bob Goodenow ran the NHL Players Association, and Ian Pulver was his right-hand man. Ian now just signed Marco Rossi to a nice deal with Minnesota. I mean, they had free agency all planned out. Like, this guy's going first for this number. This guy's going second. And it was like every summer, it was like a symphony the way that free agency worked. And the Players Association had it all laid out. Now you have this contract and everybody else is saying, all right, now it's my turn.

to go up to the trough. Have a thought on that idea? The cascading effect, Pierre. Well, because they're allowed to share information. The Players Association of the agents are allowed to share information. Ownership's not allowed to share that kind of information, even though it's pretty easy to access right now. I would like to be Lane Hudson's agent.

Hey, man. Wouldn't sure? I really like to Lane. Oh, yeah. You know, we talked about to start the show, Connor McDavid's negotiation. and it's not going to be a hard one. I don't like Lane Hudson's going to be a hard one either. I don't.

I think there's going to be an easy one. But, you know, I grew up in Montreal, loved the Montreal. I think that Jeff Gordon and Kent Hughes have done a fantastic job. You're going to have to get Lane Hudson signed. Why wait? I mean, just get it done now. Take the pen and adoption internally to kind of set a benchmark for where you can go and you just go where you think you need to go to get eight years with Lane.

Or seven, you're watching it. You can get eight now, but that's, that's, that's, that's going to go the way of the Dodo Bird. Yeah. You know, it is interesting. I'm curious because you've worked in management before and you've sat down with, with deals like this and other deals. Like there is a, and we saw this most recently, I suppose, in Buffalo, where the idea is, identify your core of young players, identify who they are and then lock them up for as long as you can.

Essentially, I mean, it's, it's a gamble. Sometimes it pays off. sometimes it doesn't. I don't think if there's a one-size-fits-all necessarily template for all of it. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't. But the philosophy of identify your core, lock up your kids for as long as you can. You have a thought on that one. Is that always sage advice to manage it?

As long as you don't overrate your prospects internally, a lot of teams now, and I think social media is driving this. They all do, Pierre. That's the problem. It's unbelievable. I'm really comfortable telling you this. Jeff. Yeah.

And I'm not picking a fight with anybody here, but I'm comfortable telling you. There are a lot of teams setting themselves up for a major fall this year because of what they're doing with their social media groups. And it's because they're overrating a lot of their prospects and their young players. Right. And you've got to be really careful. You know, you just can't hand out bouquets before guys have been in the trench. And I think some teams are doing that.

So that's a bit of a problem. But if you have a staff that's really forthright and you trust your staff, and you're not overrating guys, I would definitely do what you just proposed. I definitely would try to lock guys up for volume with good. Marco Rossi. It was a little bit awkward getting there, perhaps, and played a little bit of the waiting game. But a three-year deal, AAV of $5 million, $4.5 and $6,000, the compensation in the three years. So the QO was going to be $6 million for Marco Rossi.

I thought on this one, who seems very much to have, like, physically gotten stronger this off-season. and I remember just to bias the jury here. I remember watching with the Ottawa 67s, as I'm sure you did as well. And I don't know, and Ottawa had like a really good team, a lot of hardworking kids on that team. I don't know anyone worked hard than Marco Rossi. And always has.

Like every team, he's that guy, right? Every team has that one guy who everybody works hard, then there's Marco Rossi. Everyone on Pittsburgh works hard, and then there's Sidney Crosby. He's always struck me as that guy. Yeah, and you're right. Mail button. I think that's one of the things that endeared him to Billy Garon

and it's an ownership led by Mr. Leopold. It's a good contract. It's a good contract for the player. It's a good contract for the team. It's not locking the player up long term, and maybe it's a long term that maybe doesn't fit, and maybe the society does fit. But the truth is that Minnesota is a team that's heading in the right direction.

I think Billy Garan and staff have done some really good work there. They've started to get some young players in. The hiring of Greg Cronan to coach their America Hockey League team, I think is really important. They've got to start getting more young players through the system. I think that will help. Ross is probably the trailblazer for that.

So a lot of good stuff going on there. I think the contract's good. And here's the thing, Jeff. I think you know this too. I was on the show with you probably before the end of the year. And everybody's talking about there's going to be all these offer sheets because of Broberg and Holloway last summer. And I was like, yeah, I'm going to.

There's going to be all this stuff going on. I'm like, I don't know about that. And we haven't seen any of that arbitration cases. There hasn't been one that's gone to arbitration. So I think you and Zach talked about something before And it's all related to what we're talking about now The cap And I'm convinced having talked to enough people

Even though everybody's excited about the cap going up I don't know how many owners Are going to allow their management people actually spend all the way to the cap So you don't buy the argument that the cap's a magnet I don't I think times have changed I think owners are really watching this. I really do based on some of the discussions I've had with different people. You know, you've got to get to the floor, obviously, and you've talked about that, I think, really elephant me.

But I don't know how many guys are going to go right up to that border line and say, I'm going there. I got to go. I don't know. Okay. I understand what you're saying, but then the problem becomes, and you can say, well, we already sort of have that now with some teams or our floors, some are budget and some are cap. then don't you just go right back to 2003, 2004 when the Red Wings had like a $92 million

payroll and Nashville had 21 and you say yourself, how the Preds hang? How did the Preds hang? But the only difference was is back then you didn't have a floor. You didn't have a floor. Yeah, of course. The floor is the great equalizer.

Now, forces everybody to go there. And I think teams will spend to the floor. Zach made the point about Arizona. They would trade for all these dead contracts. Yes, people to the floor so they could participate in revenue sharing. I don't think ownership now has a problem going to the floor. They want to have real viable players. They don't want expiring contracts.

But I think there's going to be people hesitating to go all the way to the top of the cap. Do you, I want to get your thoughts on the double retention thing that I was talking about earlier. But I also want to ask you about market pressure when your team doesn't go to the cap. I mean, the howls from Buffalo Sabres fans specifically is, ah, not spending to the cap. Can't get out of this cycle of mediocrity and we're not spending to the cap. Like, that is a real thing that affects the bottom line, the people that have, you know, the nerve to buy tickets. For example, when that's why I always say, like the cap is a magnet because hockey fans will look at that and say, we have this space. I'm buying these tickets, why aren't you using it with the money I give you for these tickets?

It's a real thing. It's a very real thing. And it's really well said. Here's the one thing it says, if you're winning, nobody's paying attention to that. They got to start winning. They got to get to the playoffs. You know, nobody's talking about that in Ottawa. They made the playoffs session.

And they got a good team that's going for it. They're not spent into the cap. You know, they did. They did. And that wasn't working. Montreal, people are happy in Montreal. They're really excited about their team. So nobody's really paying attention

where I think it becomes a problem if you lose players because you're not prepared to spend to get them. I think that's really good. Do you have a thought on, oh, by the way, I want to ask you about the Buffalo Sabres and just coming off the Marco Rossi conversation. I don't know whether I just talked myself into it

because it made sense, but I really wondered if we were going to see Rossi for Peturga. Now he ended up going to Utah, but it just looked like one of those deals. Like I said, you know what? This one just makes too much sense and the money will probably measure off. That actually did make a lot of sense. And I had heard that from other people, Jeff. This is the first I've heard it from you.

I had heard that. But I see what Buffalo tried to do there. And I think part of what they want to do is they need to get all in power straightened out. And they need somebody to weigh a little bit of wind bigger and vitality. Michael Kessel range, a player that I've been watching since he played at Manhattan from prep school. Yeah, I like him. I like him.

He's not going to be the offensive point guy like he wasn't in Utah because I think his role will change playing for Lindy and Buffalo, but he's going to bring some sandpaper that back in. And that's something I think in Buffalo it could do is. The biggest thing to me, I spent so much time in Western New York, Buffalo has to get their identity back. Buffalo needs an identity. now well you get what kind of team are you going to be and i think lindy can do that but they got to get some guys with some jan and you know i think about barnaby and i think about ray and i think

about man i think about all these tough guys they had for so many years bucklow you know king con corab was like think about all that king kong jerry korab look at you i love it has this is a business there for a lot jimmy shonfell is a good looking guy he's a mean son up with none. Oh, yeah. So they always had an identity in Buffalo. They need to get the identity back. And I think that's kind of what they were.

Don't disagree at all. The other thing that, because I look at that deal, boy, we're bouncing around. I look at that Utah deal and I say, yeah, you know what? Like Utah got the better player in it, right? Was it San Paulik would always say, like, whoever gets the best player. Is it Sam Paul? Whoever gets the best player wins a trail. Oh, Sam, Sam Paul.

Was Sam? Yeah, whoever gets the best player, that, that. That team wins a trade. I think you might have said it after the Gila Fleur deal. Or to get the pick to draft Gila Fleur. It's more. Yeah, from the Seals. A very nice bit of business with L.A. before that.

But that's for the one day the history podcast that you and I do together. But I look at Buffalo and I say they gave up the better player, but they seem like they could be a more balanced team if one thing happens. And that is if Jack Quinn pops. If Jack Quinn can replace the offense Can replace the offense that you're losing in Paturka Then I like that deal a whole lot more It seems like that trade is a bet on Jack Quinn

Part of it's on Jack And part of it's on one of my favorites I had the honor of working with You know I'm a big fan of kids That really are committed to the game And I look at you know Dylan Cousins gets traded You know at Ottawa

And everybody's wondering about why is that deal happen. And why he's that deal happen? All I can tell you is I work with Josh Nars for a year and that guy, if he wouldn't hurt, that guy would be a fantastic player in the league. I think the two guys that need to get this worked out physically, one is Jack Quinn and the other ones, Josh Nars, and both those guys get this thing figured out. I think Buffalo is a better team because of what you just said.

I really do. That's not a knock on Patyrka. I think Teterka is a really good player, but he knows that. He's going to go do a great job out of Utah. but they need they need queen to get to another level and what are they going to do? This is my only question for you on this one because I got so many different people call her.

What do you mean that? What happens with Tage Thompson? Is the winger or center? Great. Well, I mean, they made the trade for him as a winger. They made a Hail Mary pass to put him in the middle and it worked. But then by the end of last season,

Yuri Kaleech was your first line center. Exactly. You have, I would say like you have options. The center is the power position for me. And I still don't know that Yuri Kaleach is a number one center in the NHL. Essentially, what I'm doing here, Pierre, is I'm talking myself into saying he should be in the middle. That Tage Thompson should be a second.

So we're on the same page here. I think he should be in. in the middle. But that's something that Lindy's going to have to figure out with his staff. Because that's a hard one. That's going to be a really important one, too. There was a game that I scouted probably three years ago. Tage was ripping it up. It was in Jersey. The back-to-back games on Saturday and Sunday afternoon in Jersey. I saw Tage Thompson. I'm not kidding. He put on a show. I remember calling Scottie Bowling up after the game. Scottie. This guy's a superstar in a mate. This guy's got size. He can shoot the

puck. He can skate. He can make play. Like, you know, I knew how good he was playing from Mike Kavanaugh at Yukon, but I never saw that lap part of it until I saw him in Jersey that night or that afternoon loud. This guy's got a chance of the superstar. Mm-hmm. I want to ask you about a player that a lot of our audience might not know about right now, but they will over the course of this year.

He plays with the Sarnia's thing. His name is Beckham Edwards. And he announced that he's going to Notre Dame. There's no specific time that he's going. And I don't want to, I'm not necessarily a thought on, on the player specifically, but more of the process. So this is, this is the first season of this new relationship, as we've talked plenty about between, you know, college player, CHL players that are allowed to go play Division 1. A lot of them have caught their teams by surprise. A lot of teams have been left disappointed.

Becca Edwards worked with Dylan Saker, who's a general manager of the Sarnia's thing, where he plays. and the team, Zarnia, and the family and the player and the manager have all been involved with this conversation and with the development plan for this player. There's no, piece out, I'm going to Nodak, peace out, I'm going to Penn State, sorry, and leave a team hold in the bag. It feels to me, once everybody gets done feeling sorry for themselves, and there are plenty of governors that do in the CHL. as you very well know, that are still, you know, fighting a battle that's over, you know. We think of, like, there was, um, Hero Onoda was a Japanese soldier from World War II,

who they found in the Philippines, who still thought the war was on, had to get the emperor of Japan, I think it was like 1971, to go to the Philippines because he would only, you know, he'd only stop fighting when he heard from the emperor. So it's like, 19871 after the war, 20 years after the war, and he'd still fight.

Like, I think of these managers to the C.H. They're governors that are still like, you're fighting. The war's over. Like, it's all done. Now let's figure out how the relationship is going to go. And this is, to my knowledge, you can correct me if there's other examples. This is one of, if not the first example of a player working with his junior team and the college and the family to come up with a plan for when it is right for him to take that step. That's where all this is going, right?

Like, that's where all this is heading eventually. That's how it feels to me, Pierre. Yes, there are very few players that can play college hockey at 18 years of age. They're very few that can dominate it, 19 years of age. So this is going to get sorted out after this year. One of the things, I look at, there are certain coaches in the NCAA that I really pay attention to you because I respect them. I either recruited them, coached against them, or coached with them, or coached them. So I would say that most of them have integrity, not all, but most of them do.

And I think you'll see this thing sorted out after year. This was a trial balloon that I don't think anybody was expecting to be as quick as it was. And, you know, when McKenna decided to leave the Western Hockey League, when Martone decided to lead the Ontario Hockey League, it got everybody's attention in a hurry. And I think probably some of these guys are being, and I'm going to say this right now on your show, Jeff. I think a lot of players are going to be shocked at how good college hockey is. And I think people are going to realize, you know what, it's better to wait.

and be like the Detroit Red Wings used to be with their players. Don't bring them up, underwrite. Make sure they're overdeveloped. And I think some colleges are going to figure this out, and I think some agents are going to figure this out. Sometimes it's better for kids to stay in junior until they're 19. Right. To turn in to college, because a lot of them,

the numbers are not going to be as high as everybody thinks in terms of what people are going to achieve. All right, going to bounce around on a couple of topics really quick here with you. As we finish up the show, I started off the program by talking about, about where the idea of double retention came from and why all of a sudden this is the boogeyman and the CBA and their locks down.

Now, what I've been, I'm not sure how much you're caught from the beginning of the show, what I've been led to believe is this is a way for, this is a way to discourage teams from using double retention just to get to the salary cap floor. That this is, this is, what this is all about is, and there are even some like larger markets that look at and say, like, look,

our franchise value goes up if these smaller market teams are successful. So we need to dissuade them from essentially using, you know, holding on to portions of contracts just to make the floor. We need to dissuade everything away from that. That made sense to me. That was the first that I heard of it. It's only in the past couple of days that I've had conversations with people around it. Does that resonate with you, Pia, that this is essentially a mechanism to make sure that, you know, to Zach's point earlier about the old coyotes with, you know, Weber and that's a host of all these players on it. Is it a way to dissuade teams from just using empty calorie cap space?

Yeah, 100%. And I do think what you just said is spot on. The biggest thing to me is, and again, I've been out of a little while, I remember when a franchise is worth $50 million, a million H.L. franchise. And I'll think about it now. Think about what a franchise value is now. We're talking about $2 billion. That's within 35 to 40 years.

That's an amazing, exponential amount of growth. And just so people understand the business of the National Hockey League, Commissioner Bedman took over. Revenues for the entire league were $500 million. Now they're over $6 billion. That's how big the league has gotten. So the business of hockey is really convoluted, but I think at some point that kind of stuff that you're talking about,

double retention in particular, that has to go away. I believe that has to go away for the influence. I agree to leave. And I do think it will go away. I still like there's going to be a couple things that happen with double retention now. It might be sooner or later. Yeah. Get under the wire quick.

One more year before they do, CBA. That's what's going to happen. But I think after that, I think it's all going to kind of go away. I want to ask you about another, well, you know what? Before we get there, I want to ask you about a topic that was pretty big last week, and that is the number 91. going to the rafters in Detroit, Sergei Federoff.

I mean, I'm always, I've been asked for, you know, give me a comparable. I can't come up with a comparable for what Sergei Fedoroff did. He was, you know, the fastest skater had the hardest shot, could play any position,

winning Selky trophies, winning heart trophies, leading the league in scoring. Like, you name it, he could do it and he could do it better than anybody else and consistently. And this guy used to use him on point. Like,

I don't know what else I can say about Sergey Federov other than he was just one of the most sublime players I ever saw play. As overdue as this may be, and we understand the acrimony with the Carolina offer sheet and the way that he went when he went to Anaheim and the contract dispute that he had him with Detroit, Detroit's was bigger, et cetera. But long overdue, but finally, Sergey Federoff's jersey goes where it belongs. So many people to credit, first of all, Sergey was a phenomenal player. Or secondly, think about the late Nick Palano, who did all the heavy lifting to try to get Fedder off away from Russia at the time, it was USSR. And he was able to do it. And he could never go back to the USSR after that because they told him if he did, he might not come out alive. So the late Nick Palano deserves a lot of credit to me, Devolano, Kenny Holland.

Scotty Bowman, you talked about, I'll never forget the night. Scotty called me. And he says, you know, Pierre, I got to play Federer more because Stevie plays so much. And he wasn't a knock on Eisenman's loved Eisenman, but he needed to find a way to get more minutes for Federo's. I could actually play him forward on one shift and I can slide him back to defense on another ship.

You know, and he told me, and he can't compare it to players, but he said, I would do that with the late Jimmy Roberts. I had Jimmy sometimes play forward in St. Louis or much as St. Louis. Yeah. So, you know, like he, and then they're two totally different players, but he.

I love Jimmy Roberts. Hang on. Didn't Scotty have him in Peterborough too? Didn't the relationship go back that far? For Hope, Ontario, and he battled in Peterborough. And so all I'm saying is, Scotty had done that before, and you wanted to do that with Fedoroff. I can just tell you having coached against him but never coached him,

he was a matchup nightmare because of his size, his strength, his speed. He could score from distance. You could score from in tight. But more than anything else, it could score with creativity. So even if you were one of the best defensive players of all times, you still had a match up against all those other multidimensional weapons that he comes at it every single month.

What a player. Just a tremendous player. I don't, and it's not lost on anybody and everybody noticed right away that the night of the Jersey retirement, the Detroit Red Wings were playing Carolina Hurricanes. Like the Carmanos Cillage issues are

certainly all well, well told, but that one is yeah, that was a nice little nice little touch from Chris Illich and the and the Detroit Red Wings. Let me conclude on this one. Tyson Barry calls it a career. Smooth, skater, great puck distributor. Played for a number of teams.

Obviously, enjoyed some of his biggest success, obviously with a Colorado Avalanche. Do you ever thought on Tyson Barry calling it a career? A lot of thoughts about Tyson. He was always a gentleman, especially when I was working on the TV side of things. But I remember the most about him, the time I spent with him at World Junior. when he represented Canada. He was such a gentleman all the time and a really good player.

And probably the most enjoyable time I had with him was when he was playing not on good Colorado teams, but really questionable marginal teams in Colorado after they had the goal rush out there. And what a gentleman. He was above reproach all time. He would always have a great answer for a question. He was always a gentleman to his teammate. He was phenomenal to the fans.

This is a guy that carried himself above in a problem. positive and proper way and I always had a ton of respect for those and always. Absolutely. I echo what you said about working on the media side, on the TV side of things rather. He was always a delight to deal with. Like, I'm always impressed at the guys that come out after a big loss. To me, the gold, by the way, to me the gold standard, that was always Matt Stagin. I never saw more, more, like, him come out like to do interviews after like horrible

Maple Leaf losses. Matt Stagin answered. Every question stayed out there as you know, long enough for some of the other vets to get out the back doors didn't have to face the cameras. You know what I'm talking about. The agent was great. And Tyson Barry was that guy too. Tyson Barron is, I'm so glad you agree with me on that

because Tyson was all like that. I got one more for you. Mike Madonnell. I got a Mike Madonna one for you. It's a good story. So Gordon Miller and I are in Dallas to do a game and Mike had a tough night. I had a tough night.

Like it happens. It's every two games of the year. You had a tough night. So I kind of punch him in the pants a little bit on the broadcast. You know, saying, you know, we're near what Mike Biddonal usually is and this. And I'm thinking, oh, man, just buttoning up because somebody's going to call him up and, you're going to get me out of here. So I said, I'm just going to jump the cue. As soon as the game was over, I hustle.

You know, the building isn't bad. He also sat down and kept down in the dress room and I waited until they opened the door. I saw the PR people and I said, I need to talk to Mike for a second. Well, shit, no problem. And I said, Mike, just want to let you know. Yeah, tough night in my view. I said it on the air. and I feel real bad about it

but I wanted to get to you first before you heard of from anybody else but I definitely gave you a rough ride tonight well he looked right at me and he said I deserved it I played serve I was like oh man this is and I and I shit the same

and I said I just want you know like no hard fishing no none at all he says I deserved it I think most guys understand the score I think guys know when they're having off nights yeah guys know it's it's really not there But then, like, there are a lot of guys that don't want to admit it. And there are a lot of guys that want to have a laugh at it.

Like, oh, yeah, like, I don't know. I didn't sharpen my skates or something. I was playing my right shot, but I was playing with the left stick. Like, those are the guys you live to understand. Like, no one's bringing it 82 times. No. No. But that just shows you, like, I believe certain guys had high, high standards.

Mike was one of those players. Mike, the standard was just so high all of that. one of my favorite one of my favorite players and was one of those very guys you know who's i said this to scotty the other day too jeff i don't know if you agree me because you brought his name up before okay adam fantilly i said this scottie says who does fantilly remind you but i said i'll tell you right now like matano and he started watching me he says you know what i kind of see what you're talking about now so i i think fantilly could be like mike i really yes it he needs to do it's funny i've mentioned this to don waddell here on on the show last year he said yeah like we're

we're very much aware of it and we're starting to see him do this now. One of the great things that Madano always did and Fantilli is starting to do now is, you know, Fantilli joins the Columbus Blue Jackets coming from playing in Michigan. And you're young, right? But you would see this and Madano, like, put this way,

Madano, when he skated, blow by everybody, right? But you ask all the greats and Connor does, he mentioned Sergey Federoff, he would do this. The greats play with their speed, right? Fantilli was just one speed to every single puck to every single situation. And Columbus, Dean Everson, this year, what they've been able to do to Fantilles is, and Madano realized this so many years ago, Minnesota. If you just play everything one speed, you're a very predictable hockey player.

The great thing about Madano, I always felt, and we're seeing this with Fantilli now, is, yeah, he would kill you on the outside. He was so fast. We had the jersey flap, all of it. But he would play with your, he would play with his speeds too. And once you get that, and maybe it's just because you're a kid,

we've seen kids coming out of college, just kids out of the CHL doing this, where when you're playing college hockey, junior hockey, speed is your best weapon. And then you get to the NHL and you go like, speed's not my best weapon anymore. Versatility is my best weapon. And I always felt like that was,

Madano could do it. but he could also play with his speeds. And that's when you become really dangerous. Think about what you just say because it's so wise. Look at his mentors. Bob Ganey as a coach. He had Andy Murray as an assistant coach. He had Mike Eves as an assistant coach.

He had Rick Wilson. This is in Minnesota when he was baking it. Ben up front. He's got Bobby Smith. He's got Neil Brott. He's got Gabe Gagne. All these veteran guys that can corral him and teach him exactly what you're talking about.

and they really did like back then I remember we played him in the 91 fire on Pittsburgh and you look at the roster that they had and Mike was part of that Brian Bellows was on that team as well yeah like all these guys that knew how to change gears change the face of the game and that's where a kid like that would learn that yeah fantilly doesn't have that luxury right now they just don't have that in Columbus so that's when the coach has to be involved with that and obviously I think they're going to figure it out with this part because he's special. He really is.

This is always great. The time flies. The time always flies in the summer, but like, dude, you may get together on this show. It's just like, the time just flies. Say hello to Jimmy Forme to Murph. Always love the eye test. You continue success, and we will touch base. Man, we covered a lot today.

Thanks so much for going sort of out the door and around the block with me, T.P. I always appreciate it. It's always a pleasure and an honor to do it. And tell Zach to keep up the good work. lucky, you've got an unbelievable guy there. Zach is a home run. You read that just as Zach wrote it. You read that exactly as he wrote that to you.

Well done, Pierre. Thanks, pal. We'll talk soon. on pad. I took the script. I sent it a text right as the show started and I said, hey, can you just make sure to tell Jeff that, that, that read this off to Jeff before

you get off the end. Yeah, so I make sure here's a cue card. Here's a cue card, Pierre. Make sure you, make sure, make sure you read this about it. Yeah. There was a lot in there. Anything, anything jump out at you before we get to the conclusion of today's thrilling broadcast here on

Monday, August the 25th? I mean, it was pretty funny. talking about the lane hudson is you should be happy if you're his agent right now i started laughing cortex baby cortex they're looking at those contracts i mean great for rossi great for uh had nazar like seeing those things come through but if you're a hudson waiting you're going we're going to be set up pretty well here it was just a good point like i always kind of forget to think about who's up next in those situations. I find myself getting very caught up in what just happened here.

Going in the last year of their ELCs just got really happy. Like Leo Carlson and Cutter Goachia in Anaheim, we just talked about Adam Fantilli, Logan Cooley in Utah. All of a sudden, ooh, thank you, Frankie. Thank you Magnuson Sports for that one. Thank you, Kyle Davidson. Kyle Davidson has got a whole bunch of new Christmas cards. Logan Cooley.

He's going to set a Christmas Adam Fantilli if he's sending a Christmas card Kyle Davidson got a whole lot of new Christmas cards Yeah, no kidding It just like sets that It's one of the things

That's always talked about in football And it's very specific to position Where it'll be You know, quarterback sets the new market The new standard The new landscape for the new quarterbacks And it's always a big thing Because they're breaking down that door

For the next guy You don't always talk about that in hockey But these contracts are one of the those ones where it just kind of came up and was like, hey, look what's coming. Look what now has to happen. And I thought that that was just a good point by Pierre and bringing up the happy customers at Cortex right now. Just walk in with that contract and said, okay, so this is where we start.

And from here, we're going up. That's the way it's going to go for our client. One thing I did want to mention because it sort of winks at something that I kind of think is obvious here, I would imagine. So Bill Daly on the 32 Thoughts Pod talking about starting the season in September. So here's the quote. I think the changes we made, we're moving to a 13-day training camp. They're only playing four preseason games and then we're off on an 84-game regular season. I think that will have the effect of creating a dynamic where we can.

can shorten the overall length of our season. I think this is in service of one thing the NHL is really sensitive about, and that is the draft being too close to free agency. If you can shorten the season, then you can take away all excuses from teams who say, we need to do the decentralized draft because it's too close to free agency. I think you want to remove that excuse. So you can do the draft on June 15th and then have free agency on July 1st. I think the NHL understands that they're really hurting something here

that's always been a real bright spot on their calendar as far as a tent pole event. For me, and again, I'm mainly a hockey guy, so you can give me better context than I have just from observing it the few times that I have. but I think that the NHL draft is the best draft of them all. Now, listen, I'm emotionally attached to all of it. I know a lot of the kids, and I just love it. But I've always loved the NHL presentation of it, and I am not in the minority on this one.

This is not a hipster take here, folks. This is like the majority, yeah, we love the draft, love how it's done. Don't change this. And I think that if you start the season in September, as opposed to October, and you shorten it, so we're not getting that deep into June, you open up the possibility of having a mid-June draft which removes an excuse away from teams saying, yeah, we don't want to all get together.

I think the NHL understands that it's really valuable, not just to them, but to the entire hockey industry, to have an event where every single stakeholder, even though we use that term wrongly, every single stakeholder comes together in one place for an extended period of time. And good on the NHL. I'm assuming that that's how the NHL is thinking on this one. And if so, Bravo. Yeah, I think that's fair. I mean, I'll also just pause you on the one part of the drafts.

I'll give credit to the NBA and the NFL. I think that they have a different atmosphere. But, I mean, this is a conversation for a show down the road, not today. The difference, Jeff, one of the main differences is the players that get drafted on those nights, NBA and NFL in particular, they're playing the next year. If you're drafted in the seventh round of the NFL, you're playing the next year, which it makes it a very different atmosphere for the people who show up to the event. But I do agree with the NHL sentiment and how good the draft is.

And having them in person just makes it so much better. And also, I think that the group that was put in charge of running everything for the NHL at the draft last year did the best that they could with the situation. I thought the ideas were great. some of the stuff it just didn't hit I mean I'll just quite honestly say

nobody's really at fault at this other than internet and connection and technology is having that big of a delay when you've got like some celebrity on his phone FaceTiming in we just don't need that

said two guys that do the show remotely said two guys that do the show room here I am like talking about a hypocrite like I'm barking about but how, oh, yeah, we do a decentralized show here. Like, you know, I'm up here in Stowville, Uxbridge, and you're downtown Toronto.

We are beacon at the NHL for not centralizing their product. Position heal that self you do. I'll also throw out, like, when, let's just run through this quickly together, Jeff. Like, when do players normally report to, not camp, I don't want to say camp, when do players normally show up to the city in general? like the city that they're going to be playing in and going to camp they're usually there a week or so in advance right okay and then camp starts and then you push everything off

my whole point is more so just can camp not start a week or two earlier which then moves October start time into end of September like the time's there the sensitivity around all of it and again like in my head I just programmed to me a lot of times and you know you program to like hardcore hockey fans but if you want to grow it as we keep saying grow the game grow that we talked earlier about you know smaller markets and growing the game how benefits everybody the NHL flat out just doesn't want to compete against football and baseball any any more that they

than they already do you want to compete against baseball playoffs how much you want to compete against the NFL. My thought has always been to put your head down, you know, bite down in your mouth card and just like do what's right for your sport. Don't worry about anybody else's calendar. But then you look at the greater context of sports, which I always fail at doing because I'm just a hockey fan. And I understand it.

I understand the wisdom to it, but which is why I always come back to, play less games. But that ain't happening. That ain't happening. I'll take your less games and I'll raise you more games. As a matter of fact, interesting thought, Mr. Merrick, let's make it 84. 82, huh? You don't like that's too many for you?

How do you like 84? Because now Merrick, you could do two things. Nothing and like it. That's what you're going to get. One thing, and I mentioned this on the empty netters pod that I did last week but I think just came out this morning, one sidebar to the Jersey retirement situation with the Detroit Red Wings, once again, what this will do, and I think I know the perfect guess to do it too.

What this will do, I think, will once again raise the issue of Larry Ory. Now, Larry Ory, whose nickname was Little Dempsey because he looked like, you know, Jack Dempsey, great boxer. Larry Ory was the first captain of the Red Wings. He won scoring titles, Stanley Cup. was Gordy Howe's favorite player, the guy that Gordy always sort of model his game after. Larry Ory wore number six with the Detroit Red Wings. And when it was owned by the Norris family, that number was retired.

It was unretired briefly when Larry's cousin Cummy Burton played and they let him wear number six. And then it just went right back into retirement. it. When the Illich family, this would have been, is it 81 or 82, when they bought the Detroit Red Wings, where all the numbers got retired, that were already retired and put up at Joe Lewis Arena, number six wasn't one of them. The number is out of circulation. Nobody wears number six with a Trette Red Wings. I'm sure many of our, many people in our audience have noticed that. If you haven't, it's true.

Nobody wears number six because it's out of circulation and it looks and feels like it has been unretired because it should be there with like, you know, How, Delvecchio, Sauch, Eisenman, Lidstrom, soon to be fetter off. And it raises the question of when you buy a team, can you do that to the history? Like when the Norris family owned the Detroit Red Wings, they retired number six. Now, technically, the number is still out of circulation for the Detroit Red Wings. But can you unretire a number? Essentially, what I'm saying is, do you have domain over the history of an organization that you buy

and can do things like unretiring numbers? Now, Jim DeVallano, former manager of the Detroit Red Wings, always, you know, said, like, we only retire numbers here with the Red Wings for players that are in the Hockey Hall of Fame. And as many have pointed out quickly, well, Jim, the standard for the Hall of Fame is different than retiring a number. But even if that were true, once a number is retired, again, in this case, number six with your Detroit Red Rings.

Do you have domain over being able to do that? Now, this would have happened when John Ziegler was the, it wasn't. commissioner, they didn't have commissioner, then they had president, was the president of the NHL. And I think I have the ideal guest to talk about this. But you know me, Zach. I'm like a pit bull on a pork chop for stuff like this, especially about hockey history. Now, Larry's not with us. He died in 1953, I want to say, 5253, summer right around there. But I'm But I really do feel, like, for his family, for hockey history, for Detroit Red Wings history as well, the number six needs to be properly recognized by the Detroit Red Wings as being a number,

even though it wasn't with Illich ownership, it was Norris ownership, has already been retired. I have in mind a great guest for this topic. And it does The big question through all of it is When you buy a team Certainly you buy the history Can you change the history of that team

To suit whatever philosophy You want that team to follow now I would argue no I would argue most hockey fans would argue no I also say no I think the overwhelming lines share of hockey fans would say, you can't do that. No, that's wrong.

Just because you have the standard now, that's fine. You'll still need to recognize the past of your team, especially with someone like Larry Ory. Number six, your Detroit Red Wings. Petter off, that's great. Doing the right thing. Do the right thing with Larry Ory. I agree with you here

Proper retirement The only thing that just I was going to just fully agree with you But it got brought up by Portuguese Walrus in the chat And you just said I think retirement of numbers for teams is ceremonial The team chooses to take the number out of circulation Why couldn't the team choose to put it back in circulation

You can't I guess No no no It has been retired Just because it was a different ownership And again, like, I still, okay, I've heard like all kinds of people that like whispered things to him about something, Ori and the Illich family, but I don't know. Like, I've never heard why it was taken out of circulation in the, why it was unretired, taken out of circulation, whatever, other than that one statement by Jim Devalano. But even that, to me, that, that swims in shallow water because, again, I'm really uncomfortable doing that with the history of a hockey team.

Yeah. Really uncomfortable with that. that is your team that is a number that has been retired honor it respected the way it i think in a way to with all the respect when you buy it if that is indeed a real name i i think also when you buy it you're buying the history yeah as he's kind of had said like you're buying it for what it is you don't get to change the past you get to now change what the future is like you can have a hand in the future the past is and what you've purchased it for

what it is. Like if you were to buy some company, a restaurant and they got a crappy menu, you can't change and be like, well, the menu is never that, but you can change what the menu is going to be. I agree with you here.

I think I have, I think I have the perfect guest for that. I'm going to talk to this person after the show today and try to get this person on the program to go into greater detail. and more history. Many of you know who I'm talking about. And if you don't, boy, are you in for a treat? But nonetheless, we have a couple of things to take care of here.

I'm glad we mentioned that Larry Ory. Did you know about Larry Ory before, by the way? No, I didn't. Because I find, like, newer fans, like, who's Larry Ory? Man, he was tough, a good player, too. And you ever wonder why you've never seen a number six in Detroit? Anybody? Not a pretty common number.

Yeah, thought about it, honestly. But, yeah, it makes sense. All right. I'm curious to see what you come up with here. Maybe it's a question about Larry Ory and the history of the number six with the Detroit Reddings. I don't know. But the sheet is powered by Fanduel,

home of the same game Parlay. Make every moment more on Fanduel. Fanduel, proud to connect fans of the major sports moments that matter to them. Put on your thinking, Tuk, Zach. What do you got today? This is a new one that was put up by Fanduel, and I'll try to get some stuff come through

as they put more and more. I think this is going to be a big year for Olympic conversation for us here on the show. Oh, yeah? The, yeah, surprisingly. The one that was put up today, or a couple days ago, sorry,

and it's a new market that they've got, is for who's going to make the Canadian Olympic team? And I chose the players who did not make it. So I picked them out of the list. You can bet on a lot of, of different guys and picked through but if you notice here nick suzuki conor bedard robert thomas

and tom wilson all favored macklin celebrini plus one ninety five to make it which would put him on the outside looking in but i thought it was interesting because i just grabbed the ones who didn't make it previously suzuki badard thomas and wilson they're all favored to be on the team for the upcoming season now not all of them would likely make it then clearly because that would be a lot of people coming out. But I just was wondering if there was anybody to you that you thought, hey, that guys are shoe in because that's kind of what we're looking at here

with like a minus 320 with Nick Suzuki to be on the team for next year. First of all, I think it's going, again, like respect to, I don't know what kind of season Connor Bedard is going to have. But that's another one of those players, by the way,

that I wondered about next contract. Is he a $10 million guy? Based on what just happened with Chicago, we shall see. I think Sillabrini is, in for a massive season with the San Jose sharks, but still not there. Tom Wilson is interesting. Tom Wilson had a great year last year. Last Olympic cycle, I'm told that Tom Wilson was on this team. And there were some that watched the Four Nations that I got texts about saying, oh, this is why

they needed Tom Wilson. This is where Tom Wilson would have thrived in that Four Nations tournament. so I wouldn't be surprised if Tom Wilson makes it. I think that Robert Thomas is on the team, and I do think that Nick Suzuki is on the team, too. Out of those five that you just presented, I think Suzuki and Thomas are the two guys. I think it's going to be another tough year for the Chicago Blackhawks.

Jessica, I think it'll be another tough year for the San Jose Sharks. But right now there are more questions, around Connor Bedard than there are around Macklin Celebrini that may change like I had one person from one team say you keep going on and on on your show about oh San Jose Sharks and there's so much fun to watch they're just behind Chicago by a year yeah all the all the awards you're just going to be going over about San Jose Sharks once a novelty has worn off of

Celebrini and Smith etc all the novelty's going over there are one year behind Chicago that's all they are I'm not sure that I buy that but we shall see the thing about Bardard is too like maybe one of the conversations that we have about Badaard this year is, is he a center or a winger? Yeah, fair. I mean, that's for a Chicago guest who's a lot closer to it than we are, but it sounds very much like, you know,

that is probably going to be one of those conversations. But we shall see. You can tell he's frustrated. Like, Macklin-Selabini last year was just like, this is awesome. I'm in the NHL. I'm going to go do a bunch of things. Let's see what happens.

and if you turn into more of a cynical athlete after your first year and your second go around in it, you could see a lot of the frustration with Connor Badar. Like, listen, you guys are such a skilled player. Such a good player. But you can really already start to see some of the frustration.

But again, not just with Badard though. That's the entire Chicago Blackhawks team. We'll see where they go. Anything else? Or are we rapping? Went a little bit long today. That's all I got. All I got for you for today.

keeping all your attention. Okay, so the crusade to get Larry Ory's number officially retired properly by the Illich family, that conversation will continue as much as Zach talks about how we'll have a lot of conversations about the Olympics, we will, and we'll have sidebar conversations about Larry Ory, as Zach, I'm sure, is already starting the campaign to get Larry Ory as proper recognition by the Detroit Red Wings. Now watch what will happen. Someone's going to show up this year and we'll be wearing number six with the Red Wings.

wings and then just like the whole thing it's good for us for socials because it'll just be people blowing up like did you see this guy have you seen what's going on number six wings fans are passionate like wings fans are passionate about everything involving the team but like the larry ori story at various points has sort of flared up a little bit they've mostly been thankfully for the illage family and the reddings contained fires i just wonder if now that you know federa from the jersey retirement is is out there like again the larry story story is going to continue to pop up, which is my way of encouraging everybody to know your hockey history, and this is another example.

Just go learn about Larry Ory. Don't just listen to me. Go do some Internet research and find out more about Larry Ory, who really was a fantastic player for a number of years with Detroit. Okay, that's it. That's it for me. That's it for Zach. That's it for all of us here.

And special thanks to Pierre McGuire, as always, for stopping by the program. and I think we have some social video of the Jeff Jackson clip that we played earlier commenting on the Connor McDavid contract situation and want to thank everybody who was with us last week in Muscoca, both behind the scenes and front facing. All that will be sort of revealed in early September where we'll start to roll out that series that I think you're really going to enjoy, some really dynamic personalities and really interesting people.

in a very, as you saw, relaxed setting. And when people are relaxed, they tend to give you a lot more. And that's what we found last week in Muscoca. Had a really good time being part of it. In the meantime, on behalf of Zach Merrick signing off. Thanks for joining us again here on the sheet on our daily face off YouTube channel.

We appreciate the likes. We appreciate the eyeballs. We appreciate the subscriptions in a big way. We just appreciate having your attention for as long as you give it to us here on all of our properties. So thank you. HL is around the corner, and we'll get fired up on a more regular basis. But in the meantime, we promise to keep it hot, and we're going to keep doing it.

Stay tuned to the socials when this next show will be on. Got it? Tip your Zamboni driver on the way out. We'll be back one day. Soonish. Nice day. I said 16 hours last night, every day this week, every day this month. I can't get out my head.

I'm sorry. day to day because you can call it all right I went to the dark man and tried to give me a little medicine I'm like nah and that's fine I'm not against those methods but new

it's me and myself and how this is going to be fixing my mind I'm doing on the bracket I turned on the page I turned on the music I do want to backer I'm doing on the night A lot of the world's the world's best

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