The Sheet with Jeff Marek - Playoff Ready ft. Brian Burke

Episode Date: March 14, 2025

Jeff Marek is joined by Brian Burke for another Burkie Friday. Discussing the Connor Bedard/Rooney interaction, the battle for the Atlantic Division between Florida and Toronto, Goodrow and Dickinson's fight, Burke's HHOF Ring story, and much moreShout out to our sponsors!👍🏼 Fan Duel: https://www.fanduel.com/👍🏼 Tim Hortons: https://www.timhortons.ca/rollupReach 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.

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I have all day long to think about this program before we hit the airwaves. You think I'd be a little bit more prepared. Welcome to Friday. Happy Berkey Day. Let's get ready to grumble. Ryan Berk is aboard. Put out the call earlier on social media. The sheet at thenationnetwork.com, the email.

If you have questions for Berkey We got a few in our hip pocket now ready to fire off to Berkey when he joins us Hey Zach, you know what can tell you story Of course about Berkey before we get into a Bedard slash Rooney Okay The first time I went to Berkey's house Okay.

The first time I went to Berkey's house, you know the first thing I noticed was, like I've always sort of prided myself that like, when you come over to my house, you would have no idea what I do for a living. I like that. Like you'll wander into the basement, like okay, like got the whole set up here, okay, get it, you work in hockey media.

But like if you walk into my house, you'll have no idea what I do for a living. I really, really like that. Berkey's house is kind of the same. This is when we was, um, living in, in downtown Toronto. Um, and when we were working together and I thought you were going to say like the complete opposite and there was going to be a photo of him in the sedines in the front lobby or something. Yeah. Pictures of him and Carlton, the bear just like all over the place. Carlton, the bear, the sedines as a Hartford whalers, jerseys all over. No,ton the bear the sedines as Hartford

Whaler's jerseys all over no no no quite quite quite the opposite it was really cool I don't know if he has it in his house now but what I really liked about it is all over the all over the walls he has all these old maps like Berkey I'm gonna ask him about this Berkey is fascinated with maps and we had this conversation because I'm like I'm interested about this. Berkey is fascinated with maps. And we had this conversation, because I'm like, I'm interested in maps, but Berkey's like fascinated by maps. He's like the guy that'll like stare at maps for hours.

And one of the conversations that we had is one of my favorite things on like ancient maps. Ancient map makers, before like the whole world was discovered I suppose there's an area on the on the map that hadn't been discovered yet ancient map makers would write on the map there be dragons I always thought that that was like the coolest thing in the world like I want a map in my house that's so old that on the map there's an area in the world where the map maker has written there be dragons because you just

don't have any idea and so that must be where the that must be where the dragons are there be dragons people talk to Berkey about there be dragons can you tell it's Friday can you tell it's Friday and I'm just like in a really good mood here looking forward to the weekend. The weather's taking a turn here in southwestern Ontario. Everyone's in a good mood, except for Maple Leafs fans. And we're going to get there in a second because I am going to turn the recreation over to you. And by the way, you and Carter Hutton last night postgame on After Dark were particularly strong,

just eviscerating the Toronto Maple Leafs after that performance last night. But here's what I wanna kick off with. By the way, I didn't get to watch all the early games. I had a meeting last night, dinner meeting in Toronto, and I came back and caught the lates, caught the last period of the Maple Leaf game, and then watched all the other ones.

You know what was really entertaining game? San Jose and Chicago. Like you might've looked at it and said, oh, potato chip game. Sure, it's but our diverse celebrini but like okay empty calories someone's got to win is a win really a loss it's one of those games right if you win are you really losing and if you lose are you actually winning eyes on the prize and one of the more contentious moments in this one? It's Connor Bidard gets an abusive officials penalty

from Chris Rooney Ten minute misconduct abusive officials. I Maintain I Maintain so there's Rooney talking to Bidard But ours not having it Says something and he gets a Dixie thrown at him. What? What? What? So it's 10 minutes, okay?

So here's what I believe happened. And here's what I believe is actually a favor at that moment for the Chicago Blackhawks. So first of all, I did check around about Chris Rooney today. is actually a favor at that moment for the Chicago Blackhawks. So first of all, I did check around about Chris Rooney today and he doesn't have the reputation amongst colleagues in the industry for doing this, for throwing the abusive officials around, throwing the 10 minute misconducts around at all.

What I believe happened was that Bedard was, it wasn't just an isolated moment that had been happening throughout the game and that was like, okay That's it final moment. I don't know how many warnings maybe Rooney already gave him but I don't believe that it was just that one instance and that he was just too touchy about it and Ended up throwing the Dixie at Connor Bidart. I think it was an accumulation. And then at the end, Rooney does the Chicago Blackhawks a favor. He goes right to the 10. It's a one goal game.

It's under 10 minutes to play. And instead of giving him a two minute minor and a power play for the San Jose Sharks, which probably just would have ended the game. He goes right to the 10. I know you're taking Connor Bedard off the ice, but if you're gonna do it, I could make the argument that Rooney actually did the hawks a favor

by going to the 10 and keeping it five on five. Does that sound plausible? Does that sound plausible to you? five on five. Does that sound plausible to you? I think that, I have a little bit of a hard time believing that it was to do the hawks a favor and do it five on five. I get where you're coming from, like I don't say no, that wasn't the case.

I would kind of take the first part of what you said and think it's more of him saying like, I've told you, you've come at me all day, knock it off all game all night. Stop. Dude, I told you, and then he does it again on the bench. And it's like, okay, how many chances do you want? How many chances do you need? And you know what, on top of that, Jeff, like, we've seen especially over the last couple of weeks here, frustration, whatever, maybe it's the way

their season's gone, but we've seen a few times of him chewing out refs. Not necessarily Rooney specifically, but it could just be a thing where they know, and it's like, hey dude, you haven't gotten it yet, here's your little slap on the wrist and say don't do that again. But I know he's taking, like, once you've made

the decision that there's going to be a penalty, just put yourself in Rooney's head space here. Once you've made the decision that this is going to be a penalty now, you can do one of two things. You can give them a minor and put the Sharks on the power play,

or you can give them the 10. Now I get it, you're taking Conor, you're taking Conor Bernard out of the game for 10 minutes. Get that. But they didn't hand the San Jose Sharks a chance to end it at that at that moment. That's why I say it's kind of doing the Chicago Blackhawks a favor in some regard. You might say, well, you want to do the Blackhawks a favor, like don't call anything, just grow thicker skin stripes.

But I don't think we know the entire back story on what maybe the conversation was throughout the game anyhow I just thought it knows it it was a really interesting game and Dickinson and Goodrow threw down after Dickinson went at When a Macklin sell a breanie and that was a spirited spirited bouts We'll talk a lot about the Hawks and oh we got it. Okay, let's say this like You expect this from Barclay Goodrow now Dickinson's had like about eight or nine in his career. Not as experienced as Barclay Goodrow, but he does great. Look at Drew Remenda

there in between the benches with his perfect tie. Get back to Drew. They go back to Drew. I'm sure his tie looks perfect too. Oh there's Drew, but you don't see the tie. And they're just swinging and going for it. Like, and I don't see the tie. And they're just swinging and going for it. And I don't know about you, but good on Jason Dickinson. Not only did he hold his own, but won the fight. If I told you yesterday on the show as we signed off, oh, by the way, San Jose Sharks are facing off against the Chicago Blackhawks, and Dickinson and Goodrow have already worked it out

that they're gonna scrap. How do you think that fight would have gone if I said that to you Philly? Yeah I'm taking Barclay Goodrow. Yeah. That's a good fight. It's good to fun to watch. He had to answer for what he did to celebrate in there so I get it but those ones are just two big boys and they're just like willing to throw them like that. Sign me up every time. What's the line that you said where you have to, said you're gonna have to stop fighting or else you're gonna have to have bigger stadiums? That was that how it goes.

That's a con-smite line. We got it, we have to put an end to all this fighting. We're gonna have to build, make bigger buildings. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. And it's never going to, I'm never gonna skip past a video of two guys who are throwing them like that. Yeah, no one's clutching the pearls and running for the exits

All right coming up on the program today daily outlines presented by our friends and partners of FanDuel North America's number one sportsbook app Provider and coming up on the program today Brian Burke will be aboard here in about five minutes time. We have questions from the week for Berkey. I'm gonna ask him about maps. And also your emails at thesheet at thenationnetwork.com. Should probably also ask Berkey about the Berard, Badaard, Rooney event from last night. And maybe have an extended conversation about the relationship between officials and coaches

and the officials and players as well. I've got a Sidney Crosby story for you about that relationship. Listen, Dickinson did a really good job last night. Dickinson is one of those sneaky good players that all teams love to have on their squad. So is Barclay Goodrow, and they exchanged ideas yesterday. We have emails coming up at the sheet at nationnetwork.com.

I already mentioned that a couple of seconds ago. And there's your snappy show for the day and Before we get Berkey on unless he's already there Let me ask you What happened with your maple leaves last night Okay, this is kind of no ecbola I talked about no Martian No, Kachak This is kind of like the oilers going into New Jersey, and it's no Hamilton. No Segen Fowler. No Hughes

maybe the biggest problem was no Markstrom because Others have always been kryptonite for Markstrom, but nonetheless what happened you may believe last night Philly Look, I'm going to go a little extreme, a little talk radio on you. Okay. But I think what we saw last night, I mean, it doesn't, it doesn't mean the season's over cancel it. There's no point of playing the playoffs. Things can happen and things can change.

But what we saw last night is effectively what it feels like I have watched as a Leafs fan for the last eight seasons of this group being here. You've changed the coach, you're getting better goal attending, this is probably the best defensive group that you've had in a long time. And at the end of the day I think it was Matthews and Marner combined for three shots on goal. How new to hockey is that bad? Not only that, well when they make 13 and a half and 11 million dollars.

Is that a lot of money? I don't know. Is that a lot of money in hockey? They need to be better and part of it is you can look and say okay yeah sure you got some depth contributions and oh you know what Stephen Lawrence needs to pitch in more. No the guys who are making all the money they need to be the ones to step up and they need to be the ones to take over in a game. Because you brought it up there, Jeff. Who was missing? Marshawn, Ketruc, Ekblad. Well, you know who steps up and scores the goals for them?

Sam Bennett. He says, get on my back. We're going to find a way to win this. He scores two goals for the Panthers last night Mekala depth contribution, and it's fine if you don't score goals It's fine if you lose those games like it's not that big of a deal But last night just was the perfect encapsulation of what this team has been in postseason this past Special teams killed you you went over three yet to penalty Sorry to power play goals from the panthers scored against you if you're the Leafs you are below 900 save percentage and when I say

that I want to also clarify I'm not blaming Stolarz for that loss like at all but it's just reality you look at the box score after below 900 save percentage and where were your big boys Nylander point Tavares point that's par for the course for the playoffs. Where was Matthews and Marner? I mean, we're still looking for them. Search party of two. We're looking for Matthews and Marner, Jeff. I don't know.

This thing could go differently. I love what Bradshaw Living has put together and the ways it changed this and shaped it, but those things scare me. And I watch a game like that in this big game where worth four points and an opportunity to jump out first in the, or excuse me, tie for first in the Atlantic. And it was like, you can't find them. You just can't find those guys.

That's the most frustrating part for me. Wash, rinse, repeat. Philly. This is this is this is not this is nothing new. Again, but there are just some teams at the beginning of the season like I can't even in some ways I can't even pretend to be like outraged or surprised because I don't think that anything outside of just making the playoffs, matters about the Maple Leafs until the playoffs start. Like that's it, like that's where all the answers

to all the questions are, playoffs. It's not in the regular season. Like Leafs is just one of those teams, like just get the regular season over with. Like what we need to do is in the playoffs, no questions in the regular season. Let's get to, let's get to Berkey. Brian Burke standing by our Friday mainstay here

and we'll, Berkey we're gonna talk plenty about hockey, I swear. But the one thing I wanted to ask you off the top, I was telling a story about your love of maps and how the first time I went over to your place, one of the things that I loved was all those maps you had all over the walls and there's the, there be dragons area of the ancient map makers.

Where does your love for maps come from? I was a history major. And one of the first things I learned in studying history at Providence College was we had to study maps and made sure we had a working knowledge and all the maps, all the areas we talk about. So I kind of fell in love with them then. And so you collect now? I haven't bought any in two years. I bought like five of them when I lived in Toronto downtown. And I found a dealer, bought some maps that I really like, had them framed.

I still have them up. That's awesome. I love it. All right. We got some questions for you from the, from the, some civilians. Some civilians have emailed in some questions for you from some civilians. Some civilians have emailed in some questions for you, Burki.

We're gonna get to them in a couple of seconds, but a couple of hot button issues from the week. So I don't know if you stayed up to watch San Jose in Chicago last night. I mean, it wasn't the most riveting game on paper, but the game itself was really good. And at the end of the game, Connor Baddari got a 10 minute for abusive officials, just running his mouth.

Chris Rooney sat him down for 10. I still maintain that Rooney kind of did the Blackhawks a favor by not putting the Sharks on the power play, but nonetheless, it gets to the question of young hockey players and their relationships with the officials. Now, I think I've told you this story before about Sydney Crosby. of young hockey players and the relationships with the officials. Now, I think I've told you this story before about, uh, Sydney Crosby. When I talked to him at the NHL players tour once, I said, what do you regret about your, your early career years? And he said, man, I've spent a lot of time apologizing to officials.

He said, because I was awful with officials early in my career. Would you ever talk to any of your young players about what to say or even to talk at all to referees? All the time. I used to tell my players, unless you have an A on or a C, unless you're one of the leadership group, do not talk to the officials. You don't know nearly as much as they do.

We used to, when I worked for the Leafs, we gave an officiating test during training camp to point out to the players, they didn't understand the rules nearly as well as the officials did. So I told them, I told the coaches too, do not argue with the referees, do not argue with the Lionsmen,

and if you do, be respectful. Hang on a second, back that up for one second. I've always wondered about that, I've always asked the question, how well do NHL hockey players actually, and I'm not saying this as an insult, but like there's a lot of rules in hockey, how well do NHL players understand the rules? Clearly they don't understand them or know them as well as the officials do. That's their job. But like, what would the test be like? Is it like case, are they like, here's a situation, what what's the call or you just go through or you just go through the

The the rules book. No, no, it would be specific Questions about this happened in this game and this I give full credit here to Ron Wilson Ronnie Wilson started that process. I'm giving an exam to the players during training camp. It would be like, okay This is what happened. What's the proper call? And they got less than half right. Also. So I'd say to them, you don't know what you're talking about. Don't talk to them. I didn't like young officials arguing or young players arguing anyhow. Shut up. You're just your first and second year in the league. You don't have the right to argue with anyone yet. But I always will gave, I also gave my coach one free toss a year.

I said you can get thrown out at least once a year, they seldom did. You can get tossed out once every year, I'll pay the fine. If it happens twice, I won't pay the fine. I gave him a free outlet. The nature of the relationship between officials and players and officials and coaches, and this is true of all sports. This isn't exclusive to hockey. It's all changed. And once upon a time in hockey, I'll go back and watch old videos and I'll see like John D'Amico talking to players while he's breaking up fights.

I'll look at Ronnie Asseltine and Hogarth and everyone. As the game is going on at the whistle, there's constant talk between the officials and the players. We don't really see that so much anymore. There's a funny exchange a couple of games ago, Washington, Anaheim, Carter Sandlack in between Strome and Wilson was pretty entertaining, but we don't really see that anymore. How have you seen that relationship change over the years, Berkey? Well it's very different with two referees. There was one referee, the guy had to work the whole game, he knew all the players.

They all knew him. At the start of the year it would be three or four new guys maybe on a team. But he would know all the players. So whether it was Billy McCreary, he was the best referee I ever saw. He wouldn't like, he didn't like to talk to players, but he would once in a while. But like other guys, you mentioned Hogarth, he would talk to the officials. Yeah. And they, I think you can bring the temperature down if you talk to the officials. You can call them in and say like, Devo. Devo used to talk to the officials. Call them in and say, I'm banging the next guy that does something.

It's getting out of hand. I'm letting you play. You're not taking advantage of me. I'm banging the next guy. And it brings the temperature down. When you were aware that, for lack of a better term, when you were the sheriff in the NHL and you were the head of what we now know as the NHL's Department of Player Safety, you were the guy handing out the suspensions. Would you have any conversations with the officials about the temperature out there? Yes. And what were you making for those combos? Well, I felt it was my job to correct them if they were getting out of hand.

They knew more about refereeing than I did. And I respect that group. I loved working with them. They were great to work for. They listened. They wanted to get it right. They always try to get it right. If they make a mistake, it felt terrible. But I would tell them, look, like Devo, the playoff game, the Rangers and Flyers, and Devo let them play and turned it into a rugby match. And I went to him after the game. I said, why don't you bang one of them? And he said, you know, call a penalty on one of them. And he said, well, I didn't want to influence the game. I want to let the game play out after that game.

Mr. Snyder got in a bumping match with me like an umpire yelling and swearing at me. And I just said, just one guy, you one guy, a penalty. That's calmed down Calm down now last night What happened was I think it was bulldura And mr. Bernard said something he shouldn't have said and he didn't get put short-handed what you should have Really got him to break Rudy's a good official. It's a good guy. That's how I'm saying Rudy did Rooney did the Hawks a solid on that one?

I know really is getting carved in Chicago if he throws a minor penalty at the Hawks that game could have ended right there on a Shrek's power play I think There's a few words you don't use I'm guessing you use one of them. Watch Bull Durbin if you're not sure what I mean Well, you know just checking around today I wonder if it was an accumulation throughout the game and maybe Rooney already put up the stop sign like, okay, you get a couple of freebies, I get it, blow off steam, release valve, all of it. But after that line had been crossed, maybe there was just no going back. It's like, dude, you put me in this position. I got to do this now. It had to be that either one of the words you don't say or it had to be cumulative. There's Chris, he's not going to bang a superstar player

like that for no reason. You know what I hear about that for the rest of his life? He probably gave him a look. They don't put up their hand, like go away. They give you the look. They flash the look at like, okay, I'm done. He choir, I'm done. They give you the look. And if that doesn't get through to you, you're going to sit, wake up. You know, one of what am're getting on official talk here, but a couple more things, we'll move onto the games. Paul Stewart, former tough guy, minor league, WHA, NHL. When he officiated, one of the things that I always, I was kind of admired about Stewie was,

I mean, he hated scrums. Like for Stewie, it's either like, you're either gonna fight or he just go to the faceoff, like one or the other, like no push shove, stinky glove in the face, like all that. And he would pull Einsman out. What did you think of that? Like I remember watching Stewie pull Einsman out of scrums

and then you found out like who really wanted to do it and who was just a pretender. Yeah, Paul Stewart was one of the most embarrassing moments in my professional career, my brief and unspectacular professional career. We were playing in Maine and Paul Stewart came off the bench. I think we were playing badminton to fight Dave Hoyter, the late great Dave Hoyter played with me. I tried to get in front of him.

I stepped in front of him and embraced him and still he had orders to fight me and only me. I tried to get in front of him. I stepped in front of him and embraced him. And Stewie had orders to fight me and only me. So he went right around me and he fought Dave Hoyt and they had a good fight. Afterwards, Bob McCammond, the late, great Bob McCammond, our coach gave it to me for about 10 minutes. Why'd you let Stewie? Dave Hoyt, the hammer was his next man. Hammer was tired. He let Stewie fight him. you're gutless and yelled at me in front of the whole team. It was so embarrassing. I tried to fight him or I should have done was grab him. I didn't know any better.

Wow. You know, one day I want to do the, uh, the main Mariner stories here with you, cause, uh, I know you've got a ton. Um, but there was an interesting week in the NHL and this is, uh, after trade deadlines. So we're looking to players in their, their new uniforms. And sometimes you need to do the, the eye adjustment, like the NHL, and this is after trade deadline, so we're looking to players in their new uniforms, and sometimes you need to do the eye adjustment. I think we all have the same experience. Bricky, the first time that you saw, and he hasn't played a game yet,

but the first time you saw Brad Marshand in a Florida Panthers uniform, or maybe more specifically, when you saw Brad Marshand not in a Boston Bruins Uniform like and you've seen players change jerseys all the time But that one was harsh man like that was like I gotta clean my glasses. That was a tough one to watch Well, Matt Sunday the first time I saw him in his sweater. There wasn't a leaf sweater, you know, I played elsewhere Yeah, it's I'm a sweater wasn't a leaf sweater

I couldn't believe it same with Jumbo when Jill Thornton came back in a sweater, it wasn't a Leafs sweater. I couldn't believe it. Same with Jumbo. When Joe Thornton came back in a Leafs sweater, I couldn't believe he wasn't in a shark sweater, even though he had played for Boston before that. So no, it's a shock. The thing about Marshawn is the reason people identify with him with Boston so much is because of the blue collar work ethic image that he portrays. The way he's a nasty player, the way he'll do anything it takes to win. And he's a skill, highly skilled, great player, but also has that nasty edge to him and has endeared him to the fans in Boston. It's going to be real hard for him to watch him play in a Panthers' uniform. Although the thoughts of that line, Sam Bennett, your guy, Matthew Kachuk. When you talk about miserable lines to play against, that's exhibit A, your honor.

Sam gave me a hard time after the game last night. He said the media overheard me call him grumpy. He came out of the, after the game, they skate. I said, Hey grumpy. He came out through me, he's having his protein shake after the game. He came out to me and said, you keep calling me grumpy in front of the media. It's perpetuating the nickname. I said, you don't mind the end.

He said, no, I don't really mind. Here's the grump though. Great kid. He played well last night. He really did get a pair of goals and Florida over the Toronto Maple Leafs were mentioning it earlier with Zach Phillips a second ago. Speaking of the Florida Panthers,

big story this week, 20 game suspension, Aaron Ekblad, for failing the NHL slash Clareters Association drug policy. I failed drug tests 20 games here. It's not as if this is the first time we've seen this. I think the first one when they introduced the drug policy was Sean Hill. Nate Schmidt a few years ago, got popped to. When you see this, what goes through your mind, Berkey? Well, first off, I thought it was refreshing that Aaron didn't protest his innocence.

Like a lot of these players just try to lie about it, just say, well, I don't know what happened, someone must have slipped me something. He took a banned substance. Now, it doesn't have to be something that performance enhancing, it's on the band list. And rule number one is you don't take anything into your system that the doctor doesn't approve. You go to the team doctor and say, I got this new

supplement, it's barley, or some special grain thing, I want to take it, can I take it, and they check it. And it's not on the list of approved substances, they will test it and approve it. So if it's a mistake you cannot make, and it's not on the list of approved substances, they will test it and approve it. So it's a mistake you cannot make and it's a mistake Aaron made. I thought he was honest and forthright about it and took the punishment and moved on. It's not negotiable. It's not something you can discuss with the PA, the NHLPA and the players or the league have agreed to this collectively.

So it's not like you get an appeal. Take your medicine and move on like you did. I thought you did a good job. You know, I was talking to one player earlier this week and he brought up the point he talked about, he said, look, and especially in Florida with all the different medical clinics that they have, and this is a perspective that I hadn't really thought about

a whole lot, Berkey. I tend not to do the what's inside the gym bag with my career. But, um, the point that this player was making to me is like, look, like we get approached by all kinds of people all the time about all kinds of different things. And you look at like all the different medical clinics in Florida and all the things that they're pushing and no, you're not going to get caught and this is how it washes. I do very much understand the temptation. Everyone's looking for an edge.

Everyone's looking to, everyone wants to win the Stanley Cup. Everybody wants a big contract. Everybody wants all these things. One of the pressures about being a player, and this is an interesting perspective I got this week, one of the pressures about being a player is being approached with these things all the time. And no matter where you are, these guys are all gym dogs, these guys are all around a lot of gear all the time.

Like would you ever have in your past had someone come up to you and say like, you know, there's this guy kicking around the team and he's pushing this stuff on the guys. And I really, I don't think he should be around the, I don't think he should be around the squad. Well, I never worked in that field before. I worked at the NHL and we started testing.

The first thing the doctor told me is the limits are set high so that it's very hard to get caught by accident So if you get tests for anabolic steroids the limit that that triggers the warning or triggers a positive result It's like four times over what a normal person would have anyway, so they set the bar pretty high You can't get caught easily for drug testing and this stuff here with supplements is a banned substance. The players know you have to give tape whatever it is. The guy says, I've got this new thing, take it to the doctor, he'll approve it, she'll approve it and move on. It's real simple. You

can't get in trouble unless you mean to or really, really not paying attention. So someone says, take this, it'll slip through a drug test. That's not a good thing. So if someone says, take this, it'll slip through a drag test, that's not a good thing. All right, a couple of things here. I wanna get to some questions from the civilians. Maybe that's what we're gonna brand this segment with you. Questions from the civilians for Brian Burke. So here's one.

This is from Colton. I have a question for Burke. I've read Burke's law plenty, but unsure if this was ever brought up. What's the one thing he was told by a mentor at a young age getting into hockey ops that he's carried with him throughout his whole life? That's from Colton Davies. Well, the late great Bill Tory asked him once, I said, Mr. Tory, could you tell me what it takes to win the Stanley Cup? I thought he'd blow me off. I was just a kid. But Mr. Torrey was a brilliant man and a great man and a real good teacher.

He said, you need to win four rounds to win the Stanley Cup. One, you're going to play a big team. So you need to be big enough. Two, you're going to play a special team's expertise, a team that thrives on special teams. So special teams, that's good enough. Three, you're going to play a fast team. You're going to play a team that will win, will beat your team, will beat a speed team. And fourth, there's going to be a hybrid of those three. So that's what you need to do. So the lesson I learned was, I look at the Islanders team, wrote down their players one by one, all four cup teams, went through and said, it's like the chart in my book, Burke's Law, here's the components you need to win a cup.

And that was from Bill Torrey, right from a genius's mouth. I'll never forget it. Remember where I was when I talked to him. Wow. You know, I only spoke to Bill Torrey a handful of times before he passed, but I always maintained that he did one of the most impressive things

I've ever seen a manager do, and that is he started from a blank piece of paper. You know, like Bill, Bill Torrey started with this. You know, this was the Islanders with Bill Torrey, and he started from zero and turned it into a dynasty. You know, Bricky, one of the things that you've always talked about is the idea of managers sitting on the shoulders of those that came before and you've been quick to point out like

listen I might be on the stage here taking the bows while the audience is clapping but there's a lot of people that aren't in the theater that belong to be on that should be on stage or taking bows with me. When you think of Tory though like you can really make the point like he started that organization from zero and turned it into one of the greatest dynasties the games ever seen. Yeah, and he was such a smart man. He could say no in 17 languages. But as an agent, I go to him and I say, Mr. Tory, where about this? Can you pay 85,000? And everyone else to a counter and bill Tory, Mr Torrey would take a long pause.

No. Come back and say no. So at some point you got to say yes to something. And he never swore. He was a gentleman. Like we're in a business where we swear like longshoremen. He never swore once in front of me. Time's running out to take advantage of Wealthsimple's best match offer yet. Thanks for watching. days to get your cash bonus. And remember, March 15th is your last chance to make the most of your recent contributions. Minimum $15,000 transfer, additional terms apply. Learn more at Wealthsimple.com slash match. Gentlemen, and I can't look at a bow tie and not think of Bill Torrey. I'll say one, one thing that was brought up on TSN last night. Your name was brought up on TSN last night, by the way. I don't know if you've, you've heard about this. So I was at the game.

I didn't see it. Okay. So the Florida, the Florida Panthers dropped off a Stanley Cup ring at the hockey hall of fame and you were referenced that it was your idea in Anaheim to give a Stanley cup ring to the hockey hall of fame, thereby igniting a tradition. referenced that it was your idea in Anaheim to give a Stanley Cup ring to the hockey Hall of Fame, thereby igniting a tradition. Can you go back to the genesis of another Berkey idea, dropping off a ring at the hockey Hall of Fame?

Yeah, I read a book or an article about the Cooperstown. They were talking about the baseball Hall of Fame. Oh, every year they had a ring going back 30 or 40 years, not all the way to, you know, baseball is 100 years old or 150 years old. Going back at least 30 or 40 years, they preserved a ring, presented a ring to each team that won the World Series. I said to our owners, Henry and Susan Sanmiglieli, we should do that if we win the cup. And Henry said, if we're lucky enough to win the cup, I'll spring for a ring. So we had an extra ring made. It is

official. It meets the requirements of all the, we gave out seven categories of rings that year. The number one ring is the one the players got and the owners got the people whose names are on the cup. They got one ring. Then there's an identical looking ring that's different for players, the ones that weren't players. It's a lesser ring, it doesn't have some engraving on it, the other one has and so on. Kind of the real cheap rings that they use to some of the hourly employees. But they all got a rig, which was wonderful. So we presented our ring in the gift box, they gave a beautiful gift box with it. And they came to the hockey hallke All-Fam and presented in person. And we started a tradition that everyone's done

since then every year. So the Panthers just did it, it was great. That's fantastic. I absolutely love that. Okay, question from Lonnie, civilian Lonnie. Is it true that Berkey, I love this story. I will never tire of you telling the story.

Is it true that Berkey was responsible for the Hartford Whalers jettisoning Brass Bonanza as their goal song? Also was Berkey behind changing the Whalers' colors from royal blue and Kelly green to navy and gray? Lonnie. Yes, both Lonnie. Thanks Lonnie, you're a good guy. Thanks for bringing those up. to Navy and gray. Yeah, honey. Yes, both. Lonnie. Thanks, Lonnie. You're a good guy.

Thanks for bringing those up. I'll give you a pass on. 80. It was a baby. Boo was a fantastic fuel color. Go to Utah. That's the should be Navy blue. It looks beautiful. But I thought that we had Roger Stalbach was a consultant, good friends with Richard Gordon and on our team, he was around the team at Fairmont. And he was the one who said to me, you should have Royal Blue, Cowboy Blue, and Uniflunk. And I remember thinking, which we should. No one else had Royal Blue or Cowboy or Navy Blue. So we changed it, but we also got rid of Brass Bonanza. Now, So we changed it, but we also over to Brass Bonanza. Now Brass Bonanza is a great song.

People like it. Our players hated it. Our captain came to me and begged me to get rid of it. So I didn't really reveal the name of Pat, the, Pat for Beat, the culprit that begged me as captain of the Whalers to get rid of the fights on Brass Bonanza. But they reinstated it as soon as I got out of of there as soon as I left for sure back in. People still think of Hartford Whalers when they hear that song. So thanks Lonnie for nothing. Okay, let's uh, let's go to this one then this from Ian.

Hey, Berkey. Was there anyone you were close to acquiring in your time with the Maple Leafs, but it fell through at the last minute? By the way, love for enough is a leaf, thanks to you and Dave Nones for acquiring him. That from Ian. Anyone that you were close to getting as a Maple Leafs manager, but just couldn't get it over the goal line? Jumbo.

We were in on Jumbo on Joe Thornton. And this is disputed by the GM at the time, Michael Connell who says this didn't happen, but I was in the room and Bob Mervin was in the room too when I made the offer. We tried to get in at the very end. That was Anaheim. He was asking was there ever anyone in Toronto? I know in Anaheim you guys tried to get Jumbo.

I know Connell had a very limited amount of people that he was talking to. Was there anyone in, Ian's asking about the Maple Leafs. Anyone that you were close to? I always, hang on, can I ask you a question? I always thought you were gonna try to get the Sedenes in Toronto. I always thought that you were gonna try to get

Henrik and Daniel. The only black mark on my record as the GM was the tampering claim about the Sidneys. On July 1st, I flew to Sweden to try and sign the monster. Gustafsson, yeah. Yeah. I went to wherever he's from, Gothenburg, I think I went to. Never went to Stockholm, never went to Orchard Street, never spoke to the twins.

But Vancouver filed a tampering charge. I heard it was in Sweden and I must've been wanting to get the twins. I never spoke to the twins about coming there and never tampered. That's the one black market against me. So, you know, I never tried to get the city. I always thought in the back of my mind, cause I know A, how much you love them as players and B, how much you like the big move. And I was just like, Oh, this is going to be like a Hollywood move for Berkey.

Watch. I loved that on Deon. Deon is going to be like a Hollywood move for Berkey. Watch. I loved that one. The end was, Dan was a great player for us. She's a good captain and a wonderful man. Still have a close friend. All right. Here's one from Patrick. Berkey, what was your approach to building a successful team? How did you balance trades, free agency and drafting? How far in advance did you project

your team's salary cap structure when looking at making a trade or signing? Two years, five, 10? And what advice would you give to someone looking now to grow into the hockey world that helped you achieve your goals? I know there's a lot there. Well, the second part of the question is simple.

You've got to get a start somewhere. My first job, I worked for the flyers that you get paid. I scouted for the late grade Walter tennis. I worked for the flyers that had no budget for me, but they wanted me to learn how to scout. So I went and worked for nothing. Didn't get paid a dime. Not even my parking when I ran into a game.

So if you have to start somewhere and work your way up, that's the way to do it. Work hard, pay attention, listen, build ally ships, and you'll get there. As far as the first part was, yeah, that's a very complex question. It's more than I can answer here, it'd be a half hour answer, but the answer is salary cap.

My first year was 39 million, if I'm not mistaken. 39 and 21. $39.21. $39 tops, $21 million was the floor, $39 was the upper. $39 million. So we got up against the cap real fast. I remember the first year I had Tame when I paid him a million bucks. So I said I'm going to spend the cap but I got to have you cheap. Besides he's coming off an injury.

So he had 48 goals that year. I think he earned his money and then we got a big raise out of it. But that he had to manage the cap. Once it came in, the good news is I worked for teams where money was really tight anyway. When I worked for Pac-Man, the money was tight. We watched every penny. So the cap wasn't a big adjustment for me. It was we watched all the money Anyway kept very good track of what we spent on

Scouting on sticks and everything. So wasn't a big adjustment for me to go to a hard cap What would be the one line item as a manager? Like I've always always joked like you're never a general You're not a general manager to you complain about the stick budget whether it's NHL or OHL or wherever but is there a one-line item that fans would be shocked at how much teams pay? Oh, let's just imagine so hotels yeah. See we used to stay when I did travel for the Canucks back in 87 I went to to the players and said, where do you want to stay? And they wanted to stay at Western hotels in Canada. They wanted to stay at Marriott's in the US. So that's the level of hotel we stayed at. Nice hotels,

good hotels, not four-star hotels. And then one team, I think it was Mike Gillis with Vancouver, he stayed at the park four seasons or some like luxury hotel and then the players turn to us and say, how come we're staying at the Westin Harbor Gaston, which is a great hotel, but it's not the park or whatever. So that started an arms race and everyone started paying hotels. Then they negotiated single rooms for everyone, but a handful of players. Now you should spend, you know, an average of 35 hotel rooms, and you'd have 30 hotel rooms at 200 bucks a piece, or 300 bucks a piece, plus some meals,

which have also gotten expensive. Now you got 40 hotel rooms, 45 hotel rooms at 500 bucks a night. Not cheap, Bertie. No. Not cheap. Time for a couple more here quickly and then we'll let you get on with your day. What do you think of the Montreal Canadiens these days?

Like I look at, I always look at, okay, what are the playoffs gonna look like, sound like, and you know, you want a mix of like some surprise teams that are in there, a couple of small market teams, but you want heritage teams and great buildings and crazy fans and Philadelphia is like that and you want Philly in. I look at Montreal and say,

man, if the Montreal Canadians can somehow sneak in, you remember that run during COVID when they allegedly didn't break any fire regulations at the Bell Center and everything was on the up and up and the building wasn't actually packed. But you remember what it was like? Like I miss that. I miss having Montreal in the playoffs.

You think they can do this? I don't think they can do it this year. I hope they can. I'm with you. I like their management team. I like their coach. I think they made some really solid moves. I hope that they're good enough to get into the class this year.

It's a, it's a pretty high bar for those last group of teams. They're right. Listen, there's a dog fight, right? It's, I mean, Ottawa is running away a little bit here with that first wild card spot, you have Columbus and the Rangers and the Habs and the Redwings finally won a game and they're still relevant. Boston's thrown in the towel, but this one's gonna be

a dogfight right to the end. Let me close on this one. Ottawa Senators have now won five games in a row. Like Ottawa Senators are tucked real nicely into that wild card one position. The Dylan Cousins trade early, like it's it's paying off. Josh Norris for the Buffalo Sabres unfortunately after a couple of games is injured again. Your thoughts on what we're seeing from the cents and can they do

this one? Alomarq's been great. They're not comfortably anywhere at five points up if I'm not mistaken. That's not comfortable. Not with that many games left. They're still very much at risk for missing the playoffs but they're and and Everyone wants Winnipeg to do well. Same thing with Ottawa. Everyone will like Ottawa to do well. And everyone's pulling for Columbus too this year, in light of all that happened within the Drow family. So I think there's some sentimental favorites. Montreal will be on that list. I don't think they can get there. Let me, let me close then and ask you about the Winnipeg Jets. Like the questions will remain.

Like I mentioned before you came on, there were some teams at the beginning of every year where it's just get to the playoffs because there's no, there's no answers in the regular season and Winnipeg is one of those teams. Like just get to the playoffs because that's where the ghosts are or as we started this conversation when it comes to the playoffs for the Winnipeg Jets there be dragons. Your thoughts on the Winnipeg Jets? I like them. I like the moves they made at the deadline. I think Luke Shannon in particular is going to really help them kill penalties and give them a physical presence. I like

the moves. I like the way they played. They played solid hockey from the start of the year. Their goaltending has been terrific. They're tough enough, I think. They're big enough. I like their team a lot. I hope they get there. I hope they get there and I hope they get home ice and manage to win or win around plans this weekend, Berkey Ottawa tomorrow night. Oh PWHL no Senators Leafs. Oh you're going? Yeah

Awesome, cuz they're last night too. I'll be there Monday night for Calgary too. You scouting now? No, I'm a civilian. I was gonna say you don't have enough black in your wardrobe to be a scout. As Colby Armstrong always calls it, oh here are the guys with their scout fits on. Bricky, you be good. Have yourself a wonderful weekend. We'll talk in seven days. Thanks for having me on, Jeff. Time's running out to take advantage of Wealthsimple's best match offer yet.

With our big winter bundle, you'll get a 2% match on qualified RRSP transfers and a 1% match on other eligible accounts. Just register and initiate your transfers within 30 days to get your cash bonus. And remember, March 15th is your last chance to make the most of your recent contributions. Minimum $15,000 transfer, additional terms apply. Learn more at wealthsimple.com slash match.

There he is, the one and only Brian Burke. On behalf of the rest of us civilians, we always appreciate Brian coming on the program today. Hey, you know what? There was one question in there about mentorship, Zach, that I wanna pick up on. And I'm really curious, let me just indulge me here, everyone listening, watching in the chat, indulge me here as I have this conversation

with young Philly. When I started in the industry, I'm gonna sound really old here now, 1995, when I started, I had a lot of people help me along the way. Like people that like, like program directors. Um, the late Bob Mackowitz was a major, major mentor for me. His successor Nelson Millman, who once fired me with a note on the fridge.

I don't know if I've told you that story before at the fan. Um, I'm going to tell you that story. Okay, pause really quick. You guys will have to hear that my first job and it seemed before I really wanted to get into media. So we can overnight show with it was me, George Strombolopoulos and Bob Mackles jr. And we're doing an overnight show. We did it for about a year. It was on from 1am to five and we got the princely sum of $30 to split not like 30 an hour each 30 bucks okay we

have $30 that like we would go to France after our shift at like 5 a.m. and have like eggs and hash browns before we went home that was our $30 that we that we got for that shift but anyhow so after year, they fired me and Bob. George stayed, they wanted him to work at Barry Davis and do basketball. And he was really valuable and everyone knew George was gonna wanna be a star. I get a call from Strombo and he says,

hey, did you talk to Nelson yet? Nelson Millman, our program director. And I said, no, I had just gotten home home I was working at a cemetery in the west end of Toronto Park Lawn. Harold Ballard's buried there, Conn Smyth's buried there. Just some hockey cred there for you, really just some hockey cred. He said you should talk to Nelson. What's that? He said watch your toes. Yeah so Wayne Gretzky always said, don't drop names. Robert De Niro told me the same thing. He said, you talk to Nelson. I said, no, why would I talk to Nelson? He never talks to me. I'm like, no one at the radio station. He said, because he just fired you.

I was like, what? He fired me. He goes, yeah, there's a note on the fridge in the cafeteria I say effective immediately the services of Jeff Merrick and Bob Mack with sir no longer be necessary No longer needed the show game has been disbanded George will remain on and work basketball at Barry Davis and continues a board operator Etc on the fridge now Nelson that same person that fired me on the fridge Went on to become one of my great friends and great mentors in the industry. And we still laugh about that moment to this day. But I always

wondered, like that was such a different industry then. It was so different for people to break into to media at that point. You always have a lot of people around you that that would act as mentors. It's almost like, okay, this is what we have the obligation to do for younger people in our industry. almost like, okay, this is what we have the obligation to do for younger people in our industry. Do you have the same thing? Because anyone that you can point at and say like, this is my mentor, this is someone that's like helping shepherd me through my career. If anything like that kids have that anymore. My I don't know, I don't know, I can't really speak to too many other people. My story is like a little bit different. I don't know if we've ever know. I can't really speak to too many other people. My story is like a little bit different

I don't know if we've ever talked about it. So I have like a different perspective people have asked me Hey, how'd you get in the industry and stuff where I've asked people have asked me to get on calls with them It's like I can help you but I didn't go the normal route I didn't think that this was I didn't even know how to get to here to be completely honest with you Like I was in high school. I thought it was gonna be awesome to be in sports and I wanted to play pro hockey and stuff all like all of that as everybody does and I was doing this thing at Bill Crothers where I was I don't know if they still have it it's called Colts TV you'd make they still have yeah once a month yeah so

doing that my 2010 goes there Phillyros. So I was doing that. It was fun, I liked being on camera, I liked making things, but I just was like, I don't know. And then one of the teachers basically was like, ah, don't go in that, there's no career in that. So I was like, okay, screw it. I went right down in there, I was like, that's it, I'm done. I don't know what to do here.

I remember one time actually, I went to TSN on a school trip. I showed you one of the photos of it. I had some of the worst hair of all time. But I remember going through TSN and walking through and it was like, I don't know exactly which one of these jobs I wanna be. I don't know if I wanna sit in the room editing

or whatever clipping all this kind of stuff. I was like, I don't know how to get here. I'm just gonna go and do business. And then basically I started a podcast for fun, started DMing people, got cool guests on and stuff. Like I just kind of built that. And then one day somebody reached out to me and was like, hey, do you wanna do a post game Leafs show

or a Leafs channel? I said, sure, started that. Left there, started my own. And then I got a DM on Twitter one day from Amal and he was like, hey, do you want to have a conversation? And now here I am. Like I didn't have very, you know, set pathways and mentors like that. So I was thinking about that a while ago. Like right now, like I always say to kids now, it's like the way to get in now is easy. Just like start a podcast.

Just start a podcast, start writing, like make all your mistakes. When I remember, I would always have people say to me like, well, why would I want to do that? No one's going to listen. I'd always say good. It's great if no one listens when you start because you make all your mistakes when no one's listening and then figure out how to do this. And by the time you're ready, then you know, it's like the old, the old saying

when the, when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Um, and then when you're ready, you'll have made all of your mistakes and you'll learn how to sound like yourself. I think you're right. Like, I think because people get into this just by starting to do it by themselves. Like when I started, you had to get hired by a radio station. That was the way you did it. That was like entry level and you had bosses and you had to go to really

super small markets and send out demo tapes all over the country to try to find somehow some way to get on the air. Now doing a podcast, the easiest thing in the world, you know, having a YouTube channel is the easiest thing in the world. So I catch myself and I say, well, of course you don't have mentors because they're never around a station. They're never around people. They're doing this on their own. I'm not saying it's a bad thing. I'm not saying it's a bad thing. I'm saying it's actually a really good thing

because you don't have the same, as much as you may not have like mentorship, you don't have the same railings that I had around my career when I started. Because you just go and do it. Figure out what works and what doesn't. I think now is probably the closest I've been in my career to having mentors. Like with people like you and, I mean this is the one that's gonna scare you,

Al Berga and all my friends. Good Lord, man. But like giving me input and helping me out and getting me to understand the industry and being part of this stuff. This is probably the closest I've been to that. I've always had helped people, I would say, and I don't want to discredit them,

but people who gave me chances and trusted in me to do those things. But as far as mentors, not necessarily. This is probably the closest where I am you know how close I was to becoming a stonemason really like knocking on the door and then was gonna buy a pickup truck this is what happened I was applying everywhere everywhere and I was landscaping full-time I was in my second full season I had done it a couple two and a half full seasons and I was like,

I'm applying everywhere. I can't get anything. I'm just doing this leaf show. I was working six days a week, 12 hours a day landscaping, working towards becoming a stonemason. Had a pickup truck at the dealership ready to go, went to go and buy it. I found it online and they told me, oh yeah, yeah, we forgot to update the website actually, it's not available anymore, I decided not to buy the pickup truck, I went home, found just a regular car, and then I just, I thought about that a few times, like what would have

happened that day if I bought the pickup truck? You know, because I might have just been convinced at that point, like okay, here, I've got it, I'm already all the way in. Maybe this is what I have to do and what I'm going to become. And it's not like getting a different car. Like, it was like, oh, no, I can't do this anymore, but I just didn't buy the truck that day. You know, it's like something always weird in my head and I'm like, I wonder, you know, if I did, where would I be in?

I'll tell you, man, I was prepared to to just work at the cemetery to just work in park lines I've always said like when this thing is all over for me. I would go back to working in the death industry like that Like that. I love really funeral home. Oh, yeah dude recession proof Recession proof fair. Yeah, okay, any stream of customers cemeteries great like my recession proof. Ah, fair, yeah, okay. Daddy's stream of customers, cemetery's great. Like my old foreman Keith used to always say to me, like if I were having a bad day, he's like, how you having a bad day?

Like, look at this, like we work at a cemetery, what's the worst that could happen? They're all dead. Yeah, that's true. What's the absolute worst that could happen here? Everybody's dead. Like Keith, you know what? Yeah.

That's a really, really good point. I do wanna answer, I was just gonna find it here in the checks. I do wanna make a comment about it. Tommy T comments about Arash Madani in his 15 plus years at Sportsnet. Arash is a rare treasure. Arash Madani is an outstanding generalist,

but a generalist who could always go really deep, whether it was Wimbledon, the Super Bowl, the Stanley Cup, the World Series. Like he could cover all of it and go really, really deep. I know that he'll land on his feet. He's too talented not to, and has such a great reputation in the industry. As a hard worker and a really smart and respectful guy, Amel wrote some really nice things about him on his on his Twitter ex feed.

What I always thought would happen to Arash was, and I don't know if he even would have wanted to do this, but I always enjoyed it when he went in and either co-hosted or filled in for Bob McCown. I always thought that whenever it was it was time for Bob that Arash Madani would have made an outstanding host of primetime sports. Like if they just would have kept like that primetime sports branding and would have been with Arash Madani and similar vibe, similar guests, similar structure, I thought Madani, because every time he filled in, he was great.

And Arash, you know, I've talked to this before, really calm, easy to listen to broadcaster. So talented, so good. I wish him all the best in the world. Wonderful guy, incredibly good broadcaster. He will be fine. The Greater Ashmedani. What are we leaving on the table? Now that we detoured through a little media chat, turn this into a media complain about our careers. Then back in 2003 this donkey calls me up and okay sorry go ahead.

I was just gonna say I'm enjoying the weather starting to change here. It's not like it's beautiful in terms of like the sun and everything outside, but like this time when we had started the show in December, it would have been pitch black already. Not the case anymore. I'm feeling good, Jeff.

Like the weather's changing, playoffs are coming. I'm not really in the best mood because, you know, like it feels like an early exit for Toronto, the Blue Jays stink, but like the other things are okay. It's one game against the Panthers. You and Carter Hutton yesterday, holy smokes. You guys were like Dexter. You guys were like freaking Dexter

going through the Toronto Maple Leafs roster yesterday watching this show. When I get home from dinner, I watch it, I go, ah, let's see what the boys are having. It's like, holy smokes, they got scalpels and rubber gloves on, cadaver jackets, just carving up the Maple Leafs. Like, holy geez. Okay. So, Hutts usually comes on and he's like, especially because he's goalie, right? So it's like, oh, it's one game, like move on.

And normally I'll, I can get like fired up. You saw that a couple times happen on the post game show. And I know there's a bunch of people like Randy Workman is in here right now who've come over and watched my post game show now. So you've seen it. There's times where I've gone on and I've just been like the most miserable human

of all time and Hudson's like, ah, ah, it's okay, don't worry. Last night I would be like, what do you think about this negative thing? And Hutz would just respond with, yep, you're right, Dennis, no, tell me I'm wrong. Tell me I'm wrong, stop it. But yeah, it was an interesting one. Yeah, it was a tough one.

All right, we got six more games tonight to get fired up and get anxious and angry about because that's the default setting for hockey fans. We have two settings for hockey fans, anxious and angry. March 14th game, we got six of them this evening. FanDuel proud to connect fans to the major sports moments that matter to them. Roster updates you can check out at our daily faceoff, fantasy Twitter slash ex feed. This evening, FanDuel, proud to connect fans to the major sports moments that matter to them. Roster updates, you can check out at our daily FaceOff, fantasy Twitter, slash, X feed. We've got Detroit and Carolina.

Hey, anybody want to point out the Carolina Hurricanes that won five games in a row, a couple of them without the services of Miko Rin? And in the spirit of not cheering for teams as much as players, I really want Logan Stankovic to go off With the Carolina Hurricanes. I really really said a lot the trike coming off a big win against the Buffalo Sabres To end their losing streak. We'll see if they can make it two in a row here as they scrambled to stay relevant in this race Lenovo Center is the place. Josh Norris I saw is injured too.

Yeah he is. He did not skate here today. He did not. Dude. I know, you hate it, but I mean, what did you think was gonna happen? You know, it sucks, it sucks, but like, like look, it's really nice outside right now, where we are, southwestern Ontario, sun's out, it sucks, but like, look, it's really nice outside right now where we are in southwestern

Ontario, sun's out, it's great. If I went to the park right now and I was sitting on a bench just enjoying the sun and I said, I'm going to go walk over to that water fountain and have a drink and I left my wallet on the bench and I came back and my wallet was gone. I think you'd look at me and say like, yeah, that sucks, but what did you expect? What did you think was gonna happen? That's kind of how I see this situation. Left your wallet on the bench, you went and got a drink,

you came back and it's gone. What did you think was gonna happen? And look, we can remove as well. And I wanted to separate Josh Norris, the conversation about him. I think he's a good player. He's an excellent player. Josh Norris. You know, this is a Sabres conversation. Like, you know, that's the problem for me. This is no disrespect to Josh Norris. This is a Buffalo Sabres conversation. You want to add something positive about the Buffalo Sabres organization as we conclude the week? Like something positive?

They got palm trees? No, they don't. But you know what? I was told that there was the Buffalo Sabres. So after that disaster press conference by Kevin Adams with the Palm Trees, which is not going away anytime soon, there were plans if they had turned things around

that the marketing department for the Buffalo Sabres had like big plans to do like something involving Palm Trees with the Buffalo Sabres. As they should. And they should, right? Like it's kind of an obvious one, but like there were plans and the problem is they just never had that winning streak. Like they were never able to get, able to get, you know, hockey ops and marketing sort of together on that one to, you know, win a few games here so we can do this palm tree activation and kind of have some fun with it. There was no fun. Could you imagine you know the shark head when they used to skate when they

skate out of that it's the palm trees and there's like a little sun above it. God feels so good. Instead of the swords on the jerseys or on the t-shirts their palm tree is crossing. I want to see something positive about the sabers damn it. Let me do one thing that's positive about the Sabres. You know what's awesome right now? The Rochester Americans. American hockey league team is excellent. That team and Noah Ostlund is someone like Lance Losowski. We were talking to him the other day. He's right. Like we need to talk more about that guy. He's been fantastic for Rochester. Rochester might win the Calder Cup.

Like put it this way, Hershey's won a couple here. Laval's got a really good team. I want to see the Rochester Americans. Heritage AHL team, I want to see the Rochester Americans win the Calder Cup. Let's just make Rochester Americans our team on this show. How about that? Something good for the Buffalo Sabres.

Let's just like all Rochester here. Brett Murray's doing those Michael Merch goals. The Triangle and Rochester. Yeah, anything good happens to Roch, send it along to your boys. Come on, Roch. Let's go. All the way to the Culver Cup. Well, this is facing off against the Islanders.

Once upon a time, this was the clash of dynasties. It's that transition. Whenever I see these two teams on the ice, I always think of the early 80s. And that was mid 80s when the transition happened from the Islanders to the Oilers. Dallas facing off against Winnipeg. This one should be a doozy Philly.

This one should be really good. Jake Otton just starting for your Dallas Stars. Connor Hallebuyck starting for your Winnipeg Jets. Lee and Bischl is out with the illness. Brendan Smith draws in. I thought Brendan Smith was going to get a lot more playing time this year from Pete DeBoer. Just seemed like a Pete DeBoer style defenseman.

Not like he's going to play up like he's going play up like he's gonna be like a 1-2 or a 3-4 I just thought that they would do more with Brendan Smith just knowing how much that Pete DeBoer appreciates a defenseman like that nonetheless Dallas Winnipeg tonight I very much look forward to that one as we look forward to Colorado and Calgary Calgary coming off a tough one against the Vancouver Canucks. They did pick up a point Dustin Wolf versus Scott Wedgwood off a tough one against the Vancouver Canucks, they did pick up a point. Dustin Wolfe versus Scott Wedgwood. We didn't mention Conor's area with the two-game

suspension. Do you have a quick thought on that one? That one seemed just to be the sweet spot for me. It was either gonna be a two or if there was a significant injury it was gonna be a three. No, I honestly I wish I had more to add. You kind of laid out everything that I would have thought about that one I pushed back on the if there's an injury you add more because I think that it should be punished More so my point is you should be punished Regardless of the outcome if the act was the same if that makes sense like you know

You're doing the same thing it shouldn't just now you're trying to say I just but I just think that if it does produce an injury you gotta add I get it yep and I get I get what you're saying with that but I think that that's I think that makes sense like I saw it two games like yep don't even bat an eye keep it moving Nashville Anaheim at the Honda Center. We saw last night like again this is still the NHL. It's funny I was watching this game last night with my my son and he's on the he's on the bike and he's watching and I walk into his room and just you know shoot the show with him a little bit and watch a hockey game like oh you're

watching Chicago San Jose. I go you know a couple of bottom teams but still the NHL. I'm like yeah I should shut up like you know what he's right still the NHL. And I'm like, maybe I should shut up. Like, you know what? He's right. Still the NHL, dad. Like, dummy. Like, you know what? You're right. So Nashville facing off against Anaheim tonight.

Still the NHL, according to my son. Utah, Seattle tonight. The Delta Center, still the NHL. Actually Utah's got a lot to play for. They're gonna hunt here for a wild card spot. Okay, anything to add, anything you wanna promote, anything you wanna plug? Leafs Nation vacation, anything there?

Oh, I know what we gotta do. We gotta mention our friends at Tim Hortons. Sales are down on those. Hang on, hang on, hang on. I wanna mention Tim Hortons for all of our friends that are sipping this weekend. Canada, your favorite contest is back. Roll up to win is back at Tim Hortons for all of our friends that are sipping this weekend Canada your favorite contest is back roll up to win is back at Tim Hortons That means you could win millions of amazing prizes with just one swipe of a thumb

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Rules apply, Canada only, no purchase necessary. Visit the Tim's app for details. I am a medium black guy. What are you for your coffee? You a coffee guy? Yeah, I drink like three a day, three, four a day. It's probably really bad, but if there's a lot. You don't wanna know how much coffee

I drink during the day. Do you have it? Black coffee. You're a black coffee guy? Yeah, just black coffee. You drink a proper cup of coffee There's no you don't do you ever you'd never done the Gretzky Know that I know I know

No, it's I can buy a cream and sugar No, I don't I can't I can't even like Fathom that's just like pouring nine cream to nine sugars into a cup and then whispering coffee Another girls on tik-tok who go famous here What a viral cuz they do like the the mimosas and it's like all champagne and they put the little splash of orange juice That's that's the same. That's what that's what that is. It's the same. Just drinking cream and sugar. It's all you'd whisper coffee over the top of it. Okay, listen, thanks for joining us this week.

It was pretty eventful. Wanna thank all of our guests and today, like Brian always makes himself available on Friday afternoons. Philly, I think we should take more questions for Brian every week. Just turn that into a thing. We gotta do something with civilians

with Brian questions from the civilians. I don't know what kind of branding you want to work on, but you're the tall forehead on this show, so you come up with the idea. How about that? Yeah, I'll come up with something. I'm just going to ask people here and if you come up with stuff at any point, middle of the night, first thing in the morning, on the weekends, I don't care, send it to the sheet at the sheet, sorry, at the nationnetwork.com. We'll filter through all the emails.

If you have questions for Berkey, just label it in there. It's a question for Berkey. I'll save them for Fridays. Pile those up. If you have questions, comments, anything throughout the remainder of the week that you want, send them in as well. I will also keep those and just bring them up

Monday through Thursday. So send them over. The sheet at thenationnetwork.com. And Jeff will try to come up with something fun. You're the only one that works on the show. It's all up to you. Spunky. Yeah.

That's the spirit of our show. Especially Fridays. Got some spunk. All right. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening. Thanks for being for watching, thanks for listening. Thanks for being in the chat if you were all week long or today. Thanks for listening on your favorite podcast platform.

Or watching us on YouTube, we really appreciate it. Don't forget after the weekend, the first voices on the network you will hear. Johnny Lazarus, Colby Cohen, Morning Cup of Hockey. On our daily face Face Off YouTube channel that's right here. 9 a.m. Eastern Daily Face Off live at noon and then our act returns on Monday. Got it, civilians? We're here to be proud. We'll talk to you on Monday. Have a great weekend. I slept 16 hours last night, every day this week, every day this month I can't get out my head, lost all ambitions day to day, cause you can call it a rut I went to the dark man, he tried to give me a little medicine, I'm like, no, man, that's fine.

I'm not against those methods, but it's me, myself, and how this gonna be fixing my mind. I do want to break up. I turned on the music. I do want to break up. I turned on the music. Thanks for watching!