The Sheet with Jeff Marek - On the Sheet: Brian Burke Breaks Down the Vancouver Canucks Locker Room Issues

Episode Date: January 4, 2025

Brian Burke joined Jeff Marek to tell some Dion Phaneuf and Phil Kessel stories, discuss the Hockey Canada collapse, and gives his thoughts on what the Vancouver Canucks should do about the JT Miller and Elias Pettersson situationReach 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.

Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were gonna be fun. On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and yours? You're gonna die. Don't shoot him! We need him! Y'all need a pilot?

Flight Risk. In the meantime, it is Fridays and that means our time with Brian Burke is now here. Burke, how are you today, my good friend? You are on the sheet with your favorite broadcaster, yours truly. How you doing bud? I'm doing well. It is the story of the day. It's been the story of the week and I want to get to some NHL issues and I do want to talk about Vancouver with you, but your thoughts on on on Canada and another quarterfinal exit at the World Juniors At the women's level of Canada is still number one at the para level

It is still number one as Steven Ellis just mentioned, you know, it's you know, you 17 still successful Hlinka Gretzky still very successful. It seems though There is this pocket here at the World Juniors the us, where Canada seems to be having a hard time. What did you make of Canada's performance? Well, I may be a little more optimistic than some of the people that watched that tournament, but they were three minutes away from winning that game last night, in my view. I thought they were out playing the Czechs very badly in the third period. They looked like themselves. They

looked like they were free of constraint and free to play and they looked happy and they looked intense. They looked good. Then they took a dumb penalty and people would argue about whether that was a good penalty or not. In my view, based on the standard of officiating in this tournament, I don't think it should be a penalty, but it was. And that's what derailed this thing. Otherwise you'd be talking about, in my view, Canada being the checks of overtime. You know, it is interesting.

One of the people that I was talking to, and there was like, listen, there were a lot of moments where Canada stepped over the line and you have to know, I mean, you know this, Berk, you like the standard for officiating in the IHF is a lot different than it is in North America. We all know that, Berk, you like the standard for officiating in the IHF is a lot different than it is in North America. We all know that like that gets baked into the pie. Coaches will tell their teams, you know, this is not like playing in the OHSL. This is not like

playing division one. This isn't like playing in the Western League. This is the standard for, for, for penalties is a lot different internationally than it is in North America. But the one thing that Canada used to always have, and I've been using Steve Downey in 2006 as the example, when Brent Sutter puts Steve Downey on the team and was able to get to him and still he still was aggressive in the tournament. That's when the tournament was in Vancouver, was still aggressive in the tournament, but never stepped over the line. It was whistle to whistle.

I mean, you remember how the Americans went at Downey. It was a rabbit punch here, back of the head, cross check, all trying to get Downey to do something dumb, and he never took the bait. It seemed at this tournament though, and this like, we also had Dave Cameron freaking out about penalties. It seems as if at every single turn,

Canada led with their emotions in a negative way. Is that a fair criticism? Yes, but I think it's a problem for both North American teams. Canada and the U.S. are both guilty of that in almost every tournament they play. There are stupid penalties taken by both North American teams. It drove me nuts with Team USA. It still drives me nuts with both these teams. But the penalty standards, whatever they are,

are not being met in North America in my view. They have to adjust. You don't say, okay referees, you have to adjust your standard of efficiency to us, how we play. What you said is we have to adjust to them. It's like we tell our players all the time, you don't have to, we don't have to make you fit in here. You have to adjust to them. It's like we tell our players all the time, you don't have to make you fit in here,

you have to fit in here. So to me, the notion that, oh, somehow it should have been called, that last call was a penalty. The way the referee is being applied is a penalty. And that one specific call was established in the first period. And if anything, I was kind of expecting them to throw a nickel at it and say that's a five. If anything, I was listening to the broadcast on TSM. Mike Johnson's analysis, and he's Canadian by the way, and other people rubbing their forehead saying, oh, here goes Brian Burke again. But the fact of the matter is, Mike Johnson said

the second call, if anything, is closer to a nickel than the first call, which was mistakenly assessed a nickel. I think that's the right standard. He got away, it should have been a two, and it wasn't. This should have been a five, and it wasn't, but it had to be a two. Had to be a two all day long. Let me, you know, now that we're on the topic of penalties, one of the things that when we work television together, that we turn this into a feature, it was a Berkey's first call, something like that. One of the things that you've always

gone out of your way to talk about, and it's really changed the way that I've watched officiating was how the first call of the game is the most important call of the game. Like I watch for this every game, whether I'm watching my kids, whether I'm watching the NHL, whether I'm watching the world juniors for our listeners slash viewers. Can you go into the idea of the first call being the most important call? Well, it wasn't my view.

Like I'd love to take credit for that concept, but that concept started with Brian Lewis. When I worked for Gary Berman at the NHL from 93 to 98, I would go to training camp with the officials and Brian Lewis is the one who taught them. The first call is the most important call. So if you blow that call, that call's gotta be the right call because if you blow that call, now you're swimming. If they score on that power play, you and Jeff still enrich one team, now you gotta even the score somehow. No one tells the referees to do that. It's human nature. They figure they owe these guys a goal. So the first call is critical. Where do you get into the soup?

I used to tell you when we did these games together, Jeff, look at that first call. It's a bad first call and the New York Rangers scored in the power play. Now we're going to be swimming all night. It's bad call after bad call trying to even it up. So I tell them two things I used to tell officials. One is don't watch for penalties. Look for penalties. In other words, your job is to, or don't, you got it backwards. Don't look for penalties, watch for them.

Call what happens. Call what's organic in the game. Don't look for calls. Say, I'm gonna, I gotta find a penalty. Watch for penalties. That's number one. And number two is the first call's gotta be right. Or else you start chasing it.

And we've seen that happen with officials before. You have a final thought on the remain, you know, actually, one more thought, one more thought about the World Juniors from you, Berkey. Team USA is looking to repeat. We know that in Canada, we make a lot about this tournament, rightly or wrongly. We've seen some young men have their careers catapulted.

We've also seen a lot of players that have been really damaged by poor performances And I think of a player like Maxime Comtois or the netminder Mark Vicentine going back to 2010 when he fell apart against the Russians and in Buffalo From an American point of view and actually this tournament goes to Minnesota How does how do the majority of Americans view this tournament? We tend to look at it and say, this is an audit of where hockey is in Canada,

when really it's a developmental tournament for U-20s. How do Americans generally, wide brush, how do Americans feel about this tournament? Well, American hockey fans feel the same way Canadians do. They appreciate the importance of this tournament. They understand its relevance. They understand what a big stage it is. They understand what a huge step is for these players. They get it just the same. They don't have a national day of mourning when they lose, but they get it. Same thing. They get it. So to me, a hockey fan in the US is just as sophisticated as the hockey fed in Canada.

There just aren't as many of them, perhaps. But the emphasis is still the same. Uh, okay. On the NHL page. And we'll see what happens now. We're all, I think, expecting a USA Sweden final. And speaking of USA and Sweden, there's one American player on Vancouver and one Swedish player on Vancouver who can't seem to get along. And it's gone from whispers behind the scenes to coaches talking about it, to former coaches talking about it, to general managers giving interviews about it, to former teammates commenting on it as well, despite denials from both the participants, JT Miller and Elias Patterson. Now, very specific to this is the Vancouver market,

which you know, Berkey, very well. If you were running the Vancouver Canucks right now, and again, you know the city, you know the people, you know the organization, the meaning behind the logo and all of it, how would you handle this situation? Let's begin there,'m I'm guessing you've had situations like this before on on some of your teams. Yeah, I have. Everyone has. You can't play.

I played for a championship team in Maine. We didn't all get along. Talk about playing PlayStation. We didn't even eat dinner together. Some of us get along. We want to call the cup together. You don't have to get along. Just got to respect each other as players. So to me the shocking part of this is not that there's discord or friction. The shocking part of this is that it's just public. This is wrong. This is not something that's associated publicly. This has gone too far. The people involved, you know, the coaches tried to calm us down, the GMs tried to calm us down, Jimmy Rutherford tried to calm us down. It's still out there. It's gone too far.

I blame the players involved for letting it get this far. But this is not anything unusual. This is routine for hockey clubs. What is not routine is how the broadcasting of it has been. You know, one of the things that's been interesting, because listen, I've heard these whispers as I'm sure you have going back a couple of years, and you know, I think, you know, and Bruce Boudreau weighed in on it not too long ago and said, you know, when he was there, there was a belief that it had died down. But the one thing that I wonder about here is, because Rick Taukett has talked about it recently. Patrick Alveen has talked about it recently. You know, there was the moment where Rick Taukett,

you know, separated them on the power play as if to prove the point that this looks ridiculous. Like, do you think that there's a part of all of this where management and the coach have gotten together and said like, look, this isn't getting any better. Maybe if we publicly shame them, because we're talking to saying, hey, why don't you get these guys at why don't you request the players and ask them about it? Don't ask me about it. Like, is there an element of the organization saying this isn't getting any

better? Maybe if we just air it all out, it'll shame them into fixing this issue. Yes, I think that's clearly clearly you're talking about very impatient people. Jimmy Rutherford's an impatient guy. That's why he's successful. He would have called them in and said, you got to fix this. So he would call both players in. I would have called the players in separately and say, I'm not trading anyone. You two sort this out.

I would have had them in separately. I want to brought them in together and say say you want to grab a case of beer somewhere Go drink beer and solve it do it that way you want to fight They want to go out to practice and fight solve it that way but solve it fix it I'm sick of hearing about it and then Patrick Albino would have done the same thing Jimmy would have done the same thing It's not working So now the best thing is to let it shame themselves shame them into making it work and see if you can move on. The good thing is teams have distractions too. A fight will happen where players rally around

the team. Something will happen that will get the team to rally around them and forget about this. But right now it's a major problem. You know, one of the things that I find really interesting about this too is like, I'm with you like, not to sound like I'm some kind of shaved ape, although I got a picture of a monkey behind me, but once upon a time, just two guys would roll up their sleeves and settle it, and then it would be done. It would be over and it would be done with,

and everybody would just move along. But like there's a sort of generation gap in between these two as well. Very, very different personalities. Like I can understand and I actually like when veteran players get on younger players and push them to be better in things like in practice and finishing checks and all types of things that involve the game. But it seems in this case, you listen to Brad Richardson talking about, you know, JT running Elias Pedersen real hot when Brad Richardson was on the Vancouver Canucks, it seems as if this was more than just, you know, expectations of the player on the ice, which leads me to believe

if they can't get this thing settled, do they have to trade one or the other? Like, is it incumbent? That's a last resort. At some point, it will come to that. You're talking big contracts on guys who because of the tension are underperforming. You're not going to get full value right now. I would love to, Leos Pedersen is not going to fight JT Miller.

No. Someone has a lot to do with it. Someone else will have to grab JT after practice and say, I'm sick of this garbage. Let's sort it out now. You know, you're too big for this guy. You're too good a fighter, but I'm not. I'm good and I can take you out.

Let's see what we can sort it out. That might be what it needs to be. Some trial by combat thing that sorts us out. That might be what happens. You're right. When I play, we would fight to solve this. It's not a good method of resolving disputes, I know. I know a lot of people scratch their heads saying that he just said he should fight. Yes. I fought Kevin Gaffney. I remember my first training camp in Providence. I fought a guy who was a junior, much bigger than I was, tough as nails,

had a great fight with friends ever since. First time I met Paul Holm when I fought him, met friends ever since. So sometimes it's exactly what you need to do. How does the Vancouver market, I'm gonna get off this topic, but I do want to ask you about Vancouver since you know it so well. How does the Vancouver market factor into this? I mean, in some ways it's not unlike any other Canadian market. Anything hockey plus conflict equals explosion. But is there something specific to Vancouver that just can't,

like it seems like every day there's just log after log getting thrown on this fire. Is there something there, Berkey? Yes. It's a unique market. It's a great market. I loved working there. I worked there twice. Both times our teams got better. Both times our crowds came back. I loved working in Vancouver. I really missed when I left. I loved it. I loved every minute of it, but we didn't have the social media then so much That's a new development certainly since I worked for Pat Quinn and certainly a second term was just coming on But social media has made this a market where they tear each other apart Everything is second-guessed. Everything is criticized. It's wild to watch and it's unique

everything is criticized, it's wild to watch and it's unique. They will tear you apart there. No question about it. But I think Rick Tocket has done a good job of saying to the players, ignore the white noise. Like the social media, if you don't learn anything there, you're not going to learn anything about our team or what makes things better. Just a bunch of nuts. So just put it to the side. He's done a good job doing that. Mainstream, mainstream media in Vancouver excellent

Excellent, you know one of the one of the interesting things here is this is in a lot of ways a Sidebar to want it to the real issue in Vancouver with this team now again They almost squandered one last night and let Seattle beat him. We'll see what happens with the Thatcher-Demko injury. But as everyone talks about Elias Pettersson and JT Miller, it does seem to me that what's getting ignored here is the big problem with Vancouver right now or the big issue with Vancouver is a better way to frame it. And that's the injury to Quinn Hughes. Like they are night and day a

different team with him in the lineup or out of the lineup. And in some ways, Berkut kind of reinforces his heart trophy candidacy. Like you can see it. Like Vancouver is a completely different team when Quinn Hughes is not in the lineup. When he's's in the lineup things are great. It's awesome A lot of the mistakes get erased, but when he's out you can really see it This team is profoundly different that is outside of the soap opera of JT and Elias here That is the big story should be the big story in Vancouver. No Well, I agree and what's amazing is watch the impact his absence has even when he doesn't have the pot What's amazing is watch the impact his absence has even when he doesn't have the puck. Like his impact as a player is profound.

His impact when he's not on the ice seems to be equally profound. The players seem to be looking for him for direction and guidance at all times, which is really unique for a defenseman. Very few defensemen have that impact. So I think he's been, he's a wonderful player. He's a great kid. Yeah, that's your damn goal getting hurt. Quinn is getting hurt.

And this friction, you're talking about a formula that could flush the season right down the sewer. But I don't think that will happen with Rick Tocque and Patrick Albini and Sarge. You know, one of the things that's come out of this, interestingly enough, one of the things that's come out of this, interestingly enough, one of the things that's come out of this situation with JT Miller and Elias Pedersen is other players are starting to comment

about friction that they saw on their teams. Like I've, that's enough talk, plenty of Brian, you and I have talked about it on the old Hey Berkey series about, you know, Bob Gainey in search of art and the animosity there and that bled into when they were managers, et cetera. Again, no stranger to the hockey world, but I wanna play a clip from you. This is one of your former players.

This is Jay Rosehill, who hosts a show with Nick Alburga here, league's morning take. And he was talking about a similar situation that he saw and had, not personally, but other players, with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Here's Jay Rosehill from a couple of days ago. It reminds me of Dion Faneuf. When he got to Toronto, he would, he'd be hard on guys

and he'd, he'd, he'd chirp and he'd always talking and he'd get under guys' skin and sometimes he'd pick a guy that didn't like that and would shy away from it and he'd smell blood and he'd go after that guy all the time. And you know, not to the point where guys are in tears, but like damn close, like they, you know, you can go too far, you can push too far

and instead of motivating and challenging, you get to be putting down and I'm not saying Dion was doing that, but some guys just don't respond to that and more than ever nowadays, some guys just don't respond to that. And more than ever nowadays, these younger players don't respond to it. I remember when I was leaving North American hockey going, these 20 year olds, if you say one thing about them that might be like, a little bit of a challenge

or a little bit of a, do you agree with that? Does that motivate you? And they're just like, how dare, like no one's ever said that to me. My mom's always said I'm incredible. My agent says I'm incredible, my dad says I'm incredible, my coach says I'm incredible, like what do you mean, and you just shut down, flabbergasted, just very mentally weak and I'm not saying that's with Elias Pettersson necessarily, but there's definitely an element to an old school guy like Miller and maybe a new school kid like Pettersson and is not jiving well,

which is obviously unfortunate for the Connect. You made Deon from the captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs. I know you love them as a player, love them as a person as well. Not the first player to challenge younger players but do you have a thought or does anything resonate there from J. Rosell's comments? Well I had Rosie too, he played for me. I love Rosie. I go on a show all the time But I think the criticism of Deon's going too far. I'm not gonna let that take place while I'm watching this show He was tough on players, but we weren't very good and we needed that guy to make us better and he did make us better I loved you. He's a great guy and he said he was a great leader on our team I think Rose is taking a little too far for his points the right one. There's a great guy and he was a great leader on our team. Anger Rose, he's taking it a little too far,

but his points the right one. There's Dion Challenge players. He said, we're not good enough. I'm gonna challenge everyone to play better, challenge themselves to play better. And that fits on people's nerves sometimes. I welcomed it. That's why I brought him in there.

We had a loud voice. We liked him to have a loud voice. I can find people who are me. I can find people who don't say anything. I can find people who are me. I can find people who don't say anything. I can find people who are followers. I wanted leaders in that room, and that's what Dion was. But Rosie, he was a good guy on our team too.

I don't want the things that I always respected about Dion Founauf is, and you would always make this point about, Jeffy, you'd be surprised how many Canadian players have all Canadian markets on their no trade. One of the things that always impressed me about Dion Founauf is not everybody wants the stage in Canada. It takes a certain type of person to embrace what comes along with being on a stage in the Canadian market. And here's Dion Faneuf who embraced it in Calgary, who embraced it in Toronto, loved it in Ottawa as well. Like what is everybody, what did, what did everybody miss about Dion Faneuf in Canada?

Well, the average Canadian player is worried about his tax bill. So he's taking home $5 million instead of $5.5 million. He's worried about his tax bill, not how he's treated. I used to tell our player, I told Matt Stajan this once, in Calgary, so you guys will look back on your career

from your retirement, and the best times you'll remember are when you were in Canada. You will remember you were loved, you were respected, you were revered. You won't feel that anywhere you play anywhere else. So I'll just tell the players, DM loved that. He loved being in Canada. I'll tell you a story about DM. Sure. He went in after a game and I had these two people that bought lunch with or dinner with me for Special Olympics, I think it was, and I brought them in a dressing room tour after the game. So after the game, Dion's doing his weights, he comes out, there's two complete strangers there in suits, they're

walking by and I said, Dion, like to meet you know, Mr. Jones and Mr. Smiths, so special, oh, hey nice to meet you, nice to meet you. He turns to me and barks, we need to get bigger, goddammit. Right in front of these two guys. So these two guys said to me, your GM talks to you like that? And I said, yeah, he does. But that's the odd, that's the odd.

He's got no filter, but all big heart, all the right reasons for everything. Do you remember I? Always believe that it was a camera who it was that he fought but there was a game Against the New Jersey Devils and I can't make a goal and he fought someone I always I was always under the belief that that was the moment that in your mind He was gonna be the captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs Do you remember if that was accurate and if not was there a game or a moment where you said, we got to put the C on that guy?

Well, Ronnie Wilson, I talked about it, so they made the trade and that was an obvious candidate for us. We both felt that. But yeah, there was, I forget who it was he fought, but he fought someone tough and beat him. Had a goal, had about six big hits. And so yeah, it was someone in my door. Sorry. That was the turning point. But yeah, that was that's a true story. Okay. Meach VB on our, in our chat is asking for Phil Kessel stories. Everybody loves Phil Kessel stories. I still maintain that everybody loves Phil Kessel, one of the most lovable players in maybe the history of the NHL. Do you have a favorite Phil Kessel story, Berkey?

Well, I remember one time he was getting hammered in the media, just getting fired. Phil's very polarizing guy because Phil doesn't care what you think. He doesn't care what the media think. He doesn't care what I think. He only cares what his teammates think. That maddens people. It's aggravating to people in the media who's right. When I hammer Phil Kessel, he should be apologetic. He should care. And Phil's like, I don't care. So one time he's getting a beating in the media and I called him in. I wanted to sat down on the stall and then address it. And I said, Phil, you're getting a beating here, you want me to brush the flies off and bark at him for a couple days? He said, Berkey, look around this room, the only people in this room are the people I care about. I don't care

about anyone else. So that's what drove people nuts. They thought he should care. He should care more that I don't like him as a player and it should bother him and it didn't bother him and that drove the media even more nuts. So I loved having him as a player and having him back again tomorrow. You know, one of the things that, you know, I always maintain that when you're a team that has to grind for every single goal,

games are tough. And the luxury about it, I always looked at Phil as like this incredible luxury item that he could come down the wing, snap in two goals, and you know what it's like when you have someone that can score easy goals? Pressure's gone. We don't have to grind to get back in this game.

We don't have to grind to get this goal. Do you have a thought, Berkey, on Phil Kessel and his ability to just get a team back in the game easy, because he always had that shot that could bring a team right back into the game. Like what a luxury for any team to have. Oh, people forget that Phil is one of the strongest guys on the team. So when you lift weights with a team,

and you look at, I started this with training camp with the New Orleans Saints. And so you go in the offensive linemen and have one set of weights set up, and they do all the heavy lifting, the offensive linemen lift together, then the linebackers lift together at the next set of weights. So they don't have to change the weights all the time.

The only two guys who can lift the heaviest set of weights for us with the Leafs, Dion Van Uf and Phil Kessel. People are shocked at that. This guy was a physical specimen. Now, his conditioning wasn't great all year. We would slip a little bit of zero on. But he would start the season in great G02 max, throw the weights around like a madman. People realized the preparation that he did to get ready for the season. And everyone says, oh, Phil Kessle is lazy. He wasn't lazy at all.

I would have him back in a heartbeat. Part of three cups, two that really counted. Really good player, really good guy, really good leaf, really popular leaf. Okay, a couple more things I want to ask you about here. I don't want to get on the Ovechkin page in a couple of seconds, because you've seen his entire career.

Zach LaRue of the Nashville Predators just got suspended for three games for a slew foot on Jared Spurgeon of the Minnesota Wild. When I think about all the penalties in the NHL or all the things you could get suspended for, for me slew footing is right up around the top. Like that is the one that I look at and I say I have nothing but contempt for players that slew foot other players. Like zero, I have zero understanding. I will not even have the conversation about well he didn't mean it. Like to me slew footing is the ultimate dirty vicious play in the NHL.

I know some will say, oh, cross check to the face. To me, slew footing is just ugly. No one's expecting to get their feet taken out from under them. We all know how fast the guys can skate. We all know how the boards don't move. And this was all in concerts. Spurgeon's going in to chase a puck that's deep in his zone. I hate slew footing.

I'm disgusted by it. Do you have a thought on that particular infraction? Yeah, believe it or not, I'm with you. I don't believe, but I don't agree with you all the time, Jeff. But on that one, I think it's the most dangerous, one of the most dangerous ones. When they cross check a guy in the face, at least he's got some chance to see it coming and deflect it. Right. A slew foot, player's unprepared, he's battling for the puck, he's off balance,

he's not ready for the hit and he gets thrown backwards. I agree with you. I think the league made the right call. I love the Norster or the Wilds response. I love Yakov Trenin's response. Yeah. He jumped in there immediately. And that's what I love about our game that there is still self-policing and self-help. So that to me was, yeah, he deserved the suspension. I don't like sleut footing. I don't see any, for one thing, there's no positive purpose to it. Most fouls, you take a roughing foul,

you're trying to body check somebody. You might cross the line, but you're trying to do something useful. might cross the line, but you're trying to do something useful, slew foot, just a dirty play. You know, that leads me to wonder about another thing with you, Berkey. At the beginning of the season, would you ever talk to your team about things like slew footing, or here's the other hot button one, diving.

Would you ever talk to your team or coaching staff about these infractions? Yes. What would you say? I would say I don't encourage either one of them. I don't like either one of them. I tell our players, we don't dive. We don't respect diving. We don't want to see it. And if a player did dive, I would call him and even see if he could find for it and say, we don't do that here. We don't do that here in Toronto.

We don't do that here in Vancouver. We don't slew foot people. We don't spear people. We wanna play the right way. We wanna play hard. We wanna play the right way. When you were the sheriff's badge in the NHL and you had the role we now know as, you know,

the head of the department of player safety, what was the easiest suspension for you? What was like the one that you looked at and you're like, okay, this one's simple, this is open and shut? Well, there were a few of them that were open and shut, but there was the one, I'm trying to think, St. Louis. We cross-checked, drawn a blank on his name. One of them was the Pebblebury one I let go, that was one Shane Turla. Shane Turla, yeah. Get away with

that one and that was one that people talked to most about about the one I blew the worst. But I'd say Shane Turlala, he called me about, Chris Churla has called me about a suspension that had occurred in a game with no one sent in. And Chris Churla said to me, I just got the, I just got five games for the same thing Shane Churla just did in that game. So I watched the game, it was right, I gave the same suspension. That was easy to me. That happened about two weeks before. It wasn't that well known, but it got widely publicized after I suspended him. But I took one look at it and I said,

Chris Tellos, you're right. What Shane Trill just did is an exact mirror image of what happened to you. You got four years for it. That's what he's gonna get too. Let me, we've got a couple of minutes left here. I want to ask you about Alexander Ovechkin. Um, chasing the record obviously for, for the Wayne Gretzky goals record. He's 23 away after scoring last night against the Minnesota Wild. You know, telling Marc-Andre Fleury he needs

another one and Fleury says, no, you already got one. Nice little moment between two guys that went up against each other in those Washington Pittsburgh Penguins games. But you were there from day one. 2005, his first season, he scored 52 goals and it's not as if he has a murderer's row around him. It's Dynas Zubres and it's Chris Clark and Brooks Lake and Jeff Halpern and these types of names around the Washington Capitals. When you go back and look at Ovechkin in his first season, now take us back to 2005, I think we're all blown away by the power, the shots, his physicality, the way that he didn't give up on Pucks going to the net, we all remember that Coyotes goal. When you look back now, like what did you think of Ovechkin at the time? And was there any thought that he was going to be, cause no one thought he was going to

catch Kretzky, like get that out of the way. But was there any thought that we're watching someone who's going to be the best goal scorer of this generation? Is that fair? No, I thought, I thought he was a bull of a player. I liked him right away. I liked his physicality. What I like about Alex Ovechkin is he celebrates goals by his teammates as much as his own. He gets as excited when a teammate, when Tom Wilson scores, he gets as excited as when he does. I love that. I love that enthusiasm for his teammates. But I love the fact that he's played hard. I never thought he'd break Bretsky's record. Anyone who tells you they did is lying. He's 40. He's gonna be 40 this year. He'll be 40

years old. He's still chasing the record and he's having a great year again. So no, I think he's been great for our game. He's knocked down one barrier. A lot of people didn't like Russian players, now they like him. I think he popularized Russian players after they won the cup with all of his antics in the pool. He's just a great guy. It's always interesting the way that, oh, you'll never win with this guy until you do. And, you know, I've, I've always maintained about Ovechkin Brick.

I don't think I've ever talked to you about this one, that what he was able to do for that Washington Capitals organization, you know, not just the team and the wins and losses, but how that building, it was sell out after sell out after sell out after sell out. You know, we talk about the salary cap and the max you can get is 20%. When you look at what Ovechkin did to that team,

what Ovechkin did by way of selling tickets and jerseys and invigorating the Washington Capitals brand to say nothing of what he's done for the National Hockey League and this Wayne Gretzky chase, if you could ever make a case for someone who should be exempt from the salary cap and just pay him whatever he wants. I'll also put Crosby in that conversation too.

Ovechkin would be one of those players. Where are you at on the effect that Ovechkin had in Washington and around the NHL? I think there's, you're talking about players that are generational players, which I hate that term's over, but even more than generational players, not just the best players of their generation, but revolutionized the sport and saved the franchise.

And that would be Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin. Those are players that went in and single-handedly rescued a franchise. So I look at what Alex Ovechkin has done. I've told the story before. I didn't see Alex at the Olympics in 2010 after my son had passed away. Once the world championships that year, even though they were eliminated and played in the Olympics, it was the Olympic year, he still went and played for Russia and the world's in Cologne. And I went to, I walked by the dressing room and Alex was in there. And I said, Hey, Alex, I walked by and he'll burpee, burpee. I went and sat down next to him and he put his arm around me and said,

I didn't see you in Vancouver. I'm so sorry about your son. Now this is not a guy that I knew. This is the guy that this is not a guy that played for me somewhere. The guy had just met that I respected. We've been friends ever since. So this guy's been great for our game. I love the fact that he's gonna break this record.

I hope it's this year. I'm not convinced it's gonna be though. I think teams are, they're on a great roll now in Washington and teams are working on to that now. You know, if it's not this year, then they'll have an entire summer to plan for it and really get the celebrations started. If they'll have an entire summer to plan for it and really get the celebrations started. If they can have an entire summer's worth of marketing heading into next season, we'll

see where that one heads. Listen, Brian, thanks as always. Have a wonderful weekend. Let me after one sec. Sure. Ovi and Timo Salani, you know, remind me very much of their same careers. Okay. 13 or 15 years, some great individual success, no team success, then finally won their cup.

And I feel those two players are very much alike in terms of the impact they had and finally got rewarded at the end. Love to hear it. You're great, Brian, as always, thanks so much for stopping by Fridays here on the sheet, really appreciate it. Best of the new year to you and your family,

health and happiness to the Berks, and we'll catch up with you in seven days My friend. Thanks Jeff. Thanks Flight risk