The Steve Dangle Podcast - All-Canadian Division | October 18, 2020

Episode Date: October 19, 2020

On this episode of The Steve Dangle Podcast, Eric Engels joins the show to talk about Brendan Gallagher's new deal (00:00), Celebrate with Frosted Flakes! (11:30), Thornton to Toronto (15:00), Saku Koivu's legacy (21:00), more on Thornton & Simmonds (27:00), the Jake Allen deal (31:00), the all-Canadian division (35:00), the Zach Bogosian deal (47:30), Chris Johnston joins the show for a Leafs lookahead (52:00), the Joel Edmundson four-year deal (1:08:30), what does Tyler Toffoli bring to the roster? (1:18:00), Max Domi's exit (1:26:00), is Patrik Laine still being shopped? (1:35:00), and was Matt Murray to Ottawa a bad deal? (1:56:00). Originally aired: October 18, 2020 Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/pne4fLgU0SU Merch: https://teespring.com/en-GB/stores/fancydangleshirts Follow us on Twitter: @Steve_Dangle, @AdamWylde, & @JesseBlake Follow us on Instagram: @SteveDangle, @AdamWylde, & @Jesse.Blake Subscribe to us on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/steve-dangle-podcast/id669828195?mt=2 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

and joining us today eric angles with his grateful dead sweater on eric thank you so much for coming on um you know it's it's uh it's funny after we did uh you know last episode um talking about brendan gallagher and the stalemate that apparently was happening with Montreal Canadiens. And it's funny, I was tweeting out about, I think, I was tweeting about how I thought it was really strange that they'd given all this money to guys that had never played for the team, but somehow they were going to grind Brendan Gallagher on a couple hundred thousand bucks. And of course, like a minute later, Eric, the news breaks, six and a half million. He's going to be there a long, long time. Can you tell us about like the, what, was there actually a

stalemate or was it just something like you know the agent was throwing stuff out there and like how did what happened here the agent referred to it as a miscommunication and Mark Bergevin later said that it would be more accurate to describe it as a miscommunication and in the 24 hours in between I wrote something quick for Sportsnet just basically saying you know there's no reason or actually I should say he signed and then I wrote something because we were speaking to Gallagher the day after he signed which annoyed me but I would have preferred to have had his and Bergebet's words attached to it before I started writing about it but sometimes you don't always get what you want and I had kind of suggested in my piece that you know for a player that wanted to be here

long term and for a team that wanted to keep him here long term and for two parties that are somewhat in love with each other let's like just put it in that kind of phrasing there was no reason for there to be this lingering idea in the air especially in the public that uh there was any resentment between both parties because i i felt that there was probably going to be a common middle ground for them to find here they seemed to find it a lot quicker and mark bergevin later explained that it had nothing to do with public perception perception and i took that to mean that you know and especially with the way mark bergevin got emotional talking about brendan gallagher and much he means to his team I think he wanted to clear up Brendan Gallagher's first perception

really quick and um you know Gallagher said that there was that it had run through his mind that you know he was starting to contemplate what life might be like without the Montreal Canadiens and I think Marc Bergevin made a smart move making sure they didn't think about that any longer you know so we've had bad luck with breaking news in this show but like our Mike Babcock one for example we talked about him all show then he got fired and we were like now wait a sec would we change anything that we said and the answer was no so we left it brendan gallagher as soon as i saw the news breaks i'm like we couldn't have been more wrong about anything like we had it we had it completely blasted he made way more money than we thought um you know mark bergevin

turning the screws on him he was crying he was holding back tears this dude who's like the biggest meme about him is that he's jacked and but one thing that we did get right we sort of talked about the religion of the Montreal Canadiens and all things with this team it's not the same it's not the same as the other 30 so what is it about Brendan Gallagher's relationship with Marc Bergevin that would drive Marc Bergevin to the verge of tears well it's you know it's interesting because uh you know you talk about saying things that you'd possibly regret you you guys know it was a really busy week in Montreal. So I was on the radio all over the country and in being asked what I thought

would happen with Gallagher, especially when I was called from Vancouver, you know, they wanted to know what the story was and whether or not it was a possibility that the Canucks could trade for him. And I just said, listen, like they're going to solve this. And it has everything to do with the way Mark Bergeman feels about Brandon Gallagher is that, you know, for since 2013, team since he's dressed in a canadian's uniform i've interviewed every single prospect that's

come through the system and all the ones that play forward say they want to play like brendan gallagher um that is the the it tells you how deep he runs in the culture of the team and it tells you that everybody who wants to emulate him there's a value to that that could mitigate somewhat some of the market dynamics that were you know in the situation because of covet um he got a deal that he deserved i don't know what it's going to look like in year five or six and i don't think the canadians really care um when you have players like that you don't let them contemplate leaving your team and you don't let them walk away for nothing and um you know the canadians did a smart move locking them up like i said he deserved and you know his whole life he's

been everybody said he's never gonna make it and oh once he gets there he's never gonna last with the way he plays like he brought it up himself and I've had conversations with him about it I mean the the longest period of time that he's missed in his career is because he blocked a Johnny Boychuck slap shot and broke fingers and then he blocked the Shea Weber slap shot and broke fingers so it's not like he suffered all these terrible injuries and and like everybody predicted he would when he first came into the league seven years ago eight years ago so it's this is a guy that you know what you're paying for they knew what they were paying for when they gave him his first six-year contract and everybody else around him was getting bridge deals um they just said you

know you know what you get with brendan gallagher so that's i think that's why mark bergeme was was emotional he said uh one of the things i liked that he said was there's there's high maintenance players there's mid maintenance players there's low maintenance players but brendan gallagher is a no maintenance player and it's it's true this guy never asks anybody to do anything he wouldn't do himself and he never asked for anything outside of just being paid to do his job and now he's going to get paid for another six years and it's under contract for one more on what i would consider to be possibly the best value deal in the nhl what um for anybody that's not in montreal and doesn't follow the canadians as closely as you do eric you know when you talk

about what brennan gallagher brings off the ice and that's a big thing in montreal right montreal is very very invested uh personally in this hockey team i mean obviously you've got instagram accounts dedicated to just following the players around like people don't understand the intensity of being a Montreal Canadian we talk about Toronto all the time I don't think I don't think anywhere compares to Montreal to be honest um and so you know he seems to have you know there's lots of players that go to Montreal there's a love in and then they sort of get revealed where Brendan Gallagher has been revealed as just a great guy all the way around what does he bring in the dressing room what does he bring to the community and why does this city

love him so much well what's funny like to get to the dressing room part which is which is actually pretty hysterical is that like i remember when shea weber was was named captain and the lead up to that decision gallagher was obviously one of the names floating around so did a lot of time asking certain players in the room about gallagher and when the captaincy came up like there was some guys really laughing about it saying yeah he's too much of a kid for that he's like you know And he is he's he's like a competitive little kid. I can't even explain this guy's personality. Like people athletes like to say they hate to lose. I mean, this guy will rig the game any way possible to win. Like he will not he he will be so bitter about losing a game of ping pong that like, and that that that is where like the culture becomes pervasive. But yeah, I mean, the fans, why would the fans love this guy? Because he's willing to run through a brick wall to win for the team. like you look at any player that's ever played in this market or the one that you guys are in and anybody who's willing to block a shot with his face has a spot on on the fans team that's

for sure like legends row yeah i mean this this this guy like brennan gallagher there's nothing more to it than what meets the eye you know exactly what he is and uh he's never gone he's been remarkably consistent too like I was looking back the the first time they signed him to a six-year deal because that was a big thing at the time like everybody was getting a bridge contract Alex Kalchenyuk was scoring at a more impressive rate got a bridge contract this was you know in the third year of the entry level deal and it was at a time where Taylor Hall and Ryan Nugent Hopkins and Jordan Eberle broke the bank and everyone could see two years later that like that was a mistake like they everyone else was

bridging everybody but because those guys had stars they handed the keys over to the team and there was no veterans around to insulate them and it turned into a disaster down the line but it was foreseeable it was like a gradual slow build that the minute those contracts were handed out you were saying to yourself like i know they're great players and they're gonna put up their points but there's a lot more to being a like a reliable quality player in this league at that age and be willing to to go six seven years down the line with them and know what they're going to bring and know that a winning team can be built around them it's like they gave them the keys they gave them the big contracts and just said go ahead run and it didn't work and Gallagher was a you know two

years after those those the first two of those deals got signed and he was the first guy really to get another six-year deal and and I remember asking Marc Berge you know like why no no pause on this and he just said because i there's no surprises with this player there's never going to be a surprise i know exactly what he is and i i kind of led him there anyways because i knew that was going to be the answer like i said there's not much that's behind the scenes you can see it it's it's playing for everybody to see gallagher is a fun loving guy he's a guy that all his teammates love they love to rip on them they love to hang out with them they love to play sports of them in games or whatever it is and they love to have him on their team because he's willing to

do anything he uh he came to my bachelor party oh that's right i forgot about we were actually at the same no we were just we went to a 10-1 canadians win in that really awful year they had and i think 17 and uh but they beat detroit just beat the brakes off them and it was so much fun and then we went to a club and of course galley's in the corner and uh just minding his own business not doing anything guys but remember that i was like yeah brennan galley was at my bachelor party It's like, oh, that's Brendan. Yeah, that's definitely Brendan Gallagher. And there were a couple of Canadians fans there

trying to harass him. I think a couple of us, including myself, started yelling at the fans to leave him alone. A couple. What's that, Eric? What kind of club? It was a high-end burlesque club, actually. It was sort of like they had dancers hanging from the ceiling.

It was amazing. It was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. Like acrobats, literally. So, yeah, I don't remember what it was called, but it was like, it was a beautiful place. Gorgeous. And we had a, we had a really great time. I just, I just, I looked at the bill the next morning. I was like, Oh God, that was, that was a mistake. But we had a really great time. So yeah,

I don't remember what it was called. You guys, any idea? No. Called Adam's really fun bachelor party place. Andrew Berkshire was there. He might remember. He was. What a random hodgepodge group that we had. It was fun. And we're wearing Jerkshire jerseys and Leaf jerseys just to beat arseholes. Yeah.

So this is something that we got to do with Chris Johnson last week, which we get to do with Eric Engels this week. Instead of going back into Steve's memory, which is spotty at best, except for when it comes to things about hockey. Eric, we're going to go to you on the Kellogg's Frosted Flakes Selly of the Week. Obviously, we've got no hockey right now. So we want to know about the best on-ice goal celebration

you have ever been present for you've seen a lot of nhl hockey up close uh what's the best one that sticks out in your mind you go oh my god that was a magic moment okay so i just want to qualify this because my favorite celebration has always been the joe sackick just skate right back to center ice like i don't i'm not going to celebrate this is what i do for a living like i've been there before they expect to do this like that was classic for me and i love that i thought that was like the that was just the ballsiest like best kind of celebration but the funniest celebration i've ever seen was eric cole uh breaking down the wing scoring a goal going around the net and the referee put his arm out to signify the goal and cole skated by and gave him a high five

i forgot about that that was great i i can't remember which team they were playing i he was with the canadians at the time i can't remember how the goal went in but i will never forget him skating by the ref and high-fiving the ref is one of the one of the great moments of the last two decades ottawa ottawa march 14th 2012 if anyone wants to look it up was it in montreal or in ottawa it looks like it was in ottawa nope it was in montreal sorry yeah so i was i'm sure i was at the game and that was pretty hysterical we that would have been about a year before this podcast started right steve we were 2013 yes all right all right just trying to get my bearings um eric that's a great great one i forgot about that that was so good and i forgot frankly that eric cole

was a montreal canadian and quite a good one yeah some people would have would have liked to have forgotten that time wasn't a particularly good team he put up 35 goals um he was he was i wouldn't say he was the most loved teammate uh for that team some guys had a hard time with him okay he's he put the puck in the net that's for sure dead it sure did and that's selly gotta give it to him for that one eric so i would is is this fair to say carrie price is the montreal canadians best player shay uh shay weber is the montreal canadians best leader and brendan gallagher is the montreal canadians identity does that make sense is that fair yeah no i i actually think that makes perfect sense uh it's very well put because the way they play they're an in-your-face

relentless annoying team to play against and that's exactly what gallagher is as a player and um they're good too he is too uh you know it's funny like you asked me about culture and how important it is and this and that and it's a big factor why Gallagher got the deal that he got um and you mentioned those guys like Carey Price, Shea Weber, Brendan Gallagher it's that's a very good foundation to build your culture around it's it's pretty healthy and it makes me think about what happened in Toronto over the last couple weeks because last time I I remember we spoke, you know, I was saying that it's time to get Matthews and Nylander and Marner and Riley into a room and say, like, if you guys aren't leading in every single way, not just on the ice, then this team isn't going to go where it needs to go. And now it seems to me that they brought these guys in specifically to help show them really how much it takes.

and it's not enough to just have John Tavares that Joe Thornton's there now and Spezza obviously was a good guy to have around. Simmons is another that, you know, he's going to bring people into the fight. And that's, you know, I don't know how those moves are being reacted to in Toronto right now. I think they're a weaker team in terms of where they'd be in the regular season. I think it could cost them a win or two. And that's dangerous because if it ends up being an all-Canadian division,

I don't see much separation between the teams outside of Ottawa, but at the same time, you know, I think they have enough on the top end to make the playoffs. And once they do, I think they're a team that's better suited to play playoff hockey with the guys they brought in and we'll see how it all shakes out. You know, like I know people are making jokes about how the fourth line will be able to get up and down the ice, but if they bring in the room,

what essentially has been missing there and like, let's face it, it was clearly missing in the bubble. That could go a long way. yeah it's funny um in in watching the the joe joe thornton press conference today um and just getting a sense of like you know we all sort of knew his personality but just in his sense of how this will fit and you know and i think wayne simmons did like eight or nine interviews the second his signing was announced um and and what he brings there's an intensity that that wayne simmons brings there seems to be a levity that joe thornton brings that this team was sort of missing there wasn't they didn't seem like they were having a lot of fun and uh and we will

get back to the canadians in a second but the last year and a half you know the last season and a half i guess the leafs just you know they looked like they were having fun when marner was a rookie when matthews was a rookie neil andrews rookie it's like okay they're these guys seem like they're enjoying themselves they haven't there hasn't been a lot of joy on the ice it doesn't seem and you know there could be a myriad of reasons for that contracts coaches whatever else that goes into that pressure of playing in toronto but it seems like a guy like joe thornton is able to kind of keep it keep it pretty level-headed no matter what's going on i mean he's been there he's lost in the stanley cup finals uh he's won gold medals um you know eric you've had the chance

to talk to him i'm sure but before and you know what what's your sense of obviously joe's playing days this could be his last season but what does he bring off the ice specifically that you think now that could be good phil leaves well i mean you kind of nailed it he's a light-hearted guy he's a funny guy um but he's he's he's a serious competitor too and i i think you know he was counted out over the last couple years i understand he was minus 19 on a pretty crappy san jose team like let's face it uh wasn't obviously at the heart of what they were doing a lot of young players to integrate and he was playing down the lineup and i would say he's 41 years old I Joe Thornton's career to me has been remarkable I mean people really were giving up on him in

Boston he went to San Jose and became a hall of famer every year moving forward after that and I I think you know he is the classic example that I turn to when something's not going great with a draft pick or that like that player is being you know short-shifted like I think of is very cockney i mean actually in montreal and you know there was a point last year where people were wanting to kill claude julian for not playing cockney emmy enough and he's playing 10 minutes and he's oh he's a healthy scratch and oh it's a disaster and like joe thornton was a was a top pick who played i think in his rookie season he played five minutes a game in in more than 80 of the games like he had seven points in 54 games yeah there you go he he didn't score

he didn't play uh there weren't there was honestly there might have been six games the entire season he played more than six minutes like and you know he turned out okay it's to me it's and it's the same thing with ryan paling like ryan paling wasn't getting into the playoff roster for the canadians and i saw his name trending on twitter in quebec every game and it's like it's okay like he's 21 years old and he has barely gotten his feet wet in the nhl and it's it takes time and he's going to develop he's going to be fine so i just think joe thornton is always a great not a caution whatever the opposite of a cautionary tale is and he's uh you know what he's done since right like he's he's just been an incredible player throughout his entire career it's unfortunate he never won

with san jose they certainly had a good enough team to do it and i think anybody that would point the finger at him and say oh he's the reason they didn't is not you know no like in boston he had some really disappointing playoff runs in particular the one that got him traded out of boston was against this guy behind me and uh saku koivu played with the same exact injury as thornton in that series uh and the canadians won in seven games and koivu led the canadians in scoring, he had torn cartilage in his ribs. And Joe Thornton had one point in the whole series and was playing with torn cartilage in his ribs.

And so I think that just really put a terrible taste in the Bruins' mouth to the point where they made arguably a top five worst trade in hockey history. So I think, you know, I think the Leafs will be happy to have him. And at $700,000, they're not risking anything to bring him in. You stole the question right out of my mouth. though i was gonna ask when did you start covering the canadians i started covering the canadians in 2007 2000 so it would have been after thornton's famous i think it was goose eggs actually series against uh the montreal canadians in 2004 is there anything else in particular you remember from that

because i just remember joe getting carved well i just i just like i said i remember how good koivu was in that series and i remember i think that i don't know if it was that year pretty i'm pretty sure it was that year that kovalev and surrey bumped into each other and the canadians went down kovalev got slashed yes he stopped playing on the sequence he's wringing out his hands surrey bumps into him and glenn murray steals the puck goes down the ice and scores on a breakaway um the canadians were down in that series they came back and won it and uh yeah I mean those are the things that that pop out to me and Brian Rolston, Glenn Murray, Joe Thornton uh Bruins had a good team they had a really good team but they were they were outdone and and you

talk about like playoff like Saku Koivu to me was one of the greatest players I've ever watched play in the playoffs I mean he's just he took his game up an entire level when it came to the playoffs and I'll never forget when he when he came back from cancer the year he came back from cancer uh it was with a couple games left in the season they clinched the playoffs and they were the last seed in and you know he we had what we were watching him he was doing these uh plyometric workouts in the middle of like in between chemo sessions and he was emaciated and he looked just sick and um you know he was not given a very good diagnosis non-hodgkin's lymphoma and told that you know chances you'll ever play hockey again are minimal and chances you'll live

are you know about 50 50 and he said you know i'm gonna play hockey again i'm gonna play hockey again this year and he managed to do it and uh the fact that he led the canadians in in scoring in the playoffs that year was it's one of the most legendary things i've ever seen in the sport people forget that i think i i remember that happening but i definitely think that that's overlooked sadly uh not a not a story that comes up much you don't see it in the top tens or top fives or whatever that um that that you know make any list uh whether it's you know the end of a sports highlights thing or or down goes brown or they remember the ovation they remember the ovation when he came back which was obviously a very moving moment it's one of the top moments

in hockey history is his first game back and a 10-minute ovation that kind of almost surpassed what they had for rocket richard when he passed away but what i'll always remember is that that playoff series that playoff run and him leading them in scoring in the first round i think he led the whole i think he led the nhl in the first round of the playoffs in scoring i think he was one of the top three guys if not like it it was i'll never forget it i don't think people in montreal will forget it anytime soon but he's he's he's a legend and uh it's funny because it'll always be like a debate in montreal as to whether or not he deserves to have his jersey retired how is that a debate i'm surprised well it is i i don't think he should um you look at

the guys that have their jerseys retired in montreal uh multiple championships they're all hall of famers they're all you know thousand point players they're the greatest players that have ever played the game pretty much um i wouldn't put koivu in their class but i would say i would put a statue of him outside the bell center um just not only because of who he was to the Montreal Canadiens and how beloved he was and the fact that he was the longest-serving captain in history tied with Jean Beliveau, what he did as a Montrealer should be commemorated.

He donated a PET scan machine to Montreal General Hospital at a time where you had to drive two hours out of town to get a scan for specific types of cancer. So that contribution, which came from his foundation, but also straight out of his pocket, um it's to me he's one of the greatest montrealers of all time so i think he should be commemorated that way but wow here's the retirement so you wouldn't put him in the jersey retirement although i you know honestly even he says he doesn't belong there so i mean right like he doesn't

really you look at the names that are there if you go through them it's you can't compare his career to those guys i like that mentality because it it illustrates that championships are everything for these guys on the ice and it should be off the ice and that should be expectation from management and owners and players and fans if you win then you get honored and it's not it's not just hey you played really well and you're a big part of the team it's hey did you win i'm so with you jesse and also like people have said the same thing about andre markov and i understand andre markov had a great career but like there's there's no chance that he should have his jersey retired like not even close and as far as being a montrealer is concerned he's not

in the same league as Saku Koivu so yeah and and I will say this it's just like Joe Thornton it's not Saku Koivu's fault that the Canadians didn't win while he was here if it wasn't for him they would have had virtually no success he did some great things with some really not so good teams and um I was rooting for him when he went to Anaheim that's for sure I thought he had a much better chance to win there and it was really sad to see him go it's it's I feel for San Jose fans actually um with joe thordon out the door because you know yeah he never won there but he he he did everything short of of winning the big one for them and it wasn't his fault that they didn't 15 amazing years there really i mean they were perennial playoff team perennial like second

third round team right and it's not easy to do that in the salary cap era but they managed it uh with that core that they had and and you know um there were players like um players that rolled through town in San Jose. And I always found this interesting, Eric, when you hear Jeremy Roenick talk about in that, remember that book he put out and he talked about how he had to haul Patrick Marlowe aside and say, you need to whatever. And he said, whatever he said, you know, he didn't have heart or something like that.

I don't know what it was, but it's funny, you know, Jeremy Roenick's a guy that was in there in town for like a year there. Those guys were all there for, you know, eight, 10, 12 years. They were there a long, long time. And the guys that are still there, Brent Burns and, you know, Logan Couture and, you know, Joel Pavelski until last season. It seems like they did have plenty of heart and soul, just a little bit of bad luck.

And hopefully some of that rubs off on the Leafs. Yeah, I mean, if that's not why you're bringing Joe Thornton here, I mean, I don't think you're going to get a reincarnation of the guy that was – 101 points? Yeah, that had 90 assists, you know? Yeah. 25.

that's not who he is but you put him with some you put him with some pretty good players in toronto and i think he could do some good things and if you suffer an injury down the middle to one of your top two guys you can certainly moonlight in the position i look at simmons i mean that guy is going to shake up that room yeah for me you know i love i love his comments to the media he made some good quotes obviously uh you know talking about how tough of a player he is Functional toughness or whatever he said, but, or he said he could, what did he say? He was going to punch your head off. Yeah. You got it like that.

There hasn't been enough players like that in Toronto in recent time. But I think Wayne Simmons is a real one. Like I spent 40 minutes sitting down, talking with him in New Jersey in February before the world turned to shit. Am I allowed to say that? Yeah. You should have said it louder. literally right before the world turned into shit but um i had a really interesting conversation with wayne and i like he's he's hardcore you know he he he believes in himself um i thought he got a really rough deal in philly you know you look at what he you talk about

brandon gallagher right off the top and kind of hard and sole player that he is and deserving to get paid and play in Montreal and potentially have the opportunity to retire as a Montreal Canadian like go through the list of injuries that Simmons went through in Philadelphia and played through and the type of things he was willing to do for that franchise and the fact that you know he was he was a critical player in their market a player that there were times where they had the opportunity to trade him or his value was tremendously high um but he he he had a a major footprint in that franchise and not just because of what he was doing on the ice, what he was doing in the community was just as vital. And,

you know, he was reaching the specific segment, the black segment of the population and bringing them into hockey in Philadelphia in a place where sports like baseball and basketball and football were much more dominant. Simmons was a big bridge for them and they loved him, you know? And, and I think when Ed Snyder died, I think, you know, know I think if Ed Snyder was still around he he would have said you know if it if we have to pay one more year five million bucks for Wayne Simmons we're going to keep him here we're not going to

let him go to New Jersey or wherever it ends up being it's and I just I talked with him about that and I think he was really hurt to be treated that way and understands it's a business and understands that he was declining and that he wasn't going to be the guy that scored 30 goals and put up 30 assists and fought everybody but you know culture matters like it's it's a huge part of everything and it's a huge i look at the culture that's in montreal and yeah they may not have the talent of some of the some of the other teams or maybe they didn't before they made four key offseason additions but there's a reason why they went into the bubble and shocked everybody and beat pittsburgh quickly and there's a reason why they should have beaten philadelphia but fell

a little bit short because the talent wasn't quite there what it needs to be but they they outplayed them in virtually every game so i think they look at themselves as a team that if they get into the playoffs again um they're going to do some serious damage with the components they just added well i think rightfully so so i there's a couple other things that we haven't really talked about with you eric um specifically uh jake allen's extension um which seems like a pretty reasonable number uh for an established backup like Jake uh any idea though why Mark Bergevin felt the need to do this now rather than at the end of the season see how Jake Allen even works in Montreal or is it hey you know this is also expansion fodder you know you got to expose one

goalie like what what what's the rationale behind that that signing yeah I think you know what you know what Adam like uh my first reaction to that signing was what was the urgency in that I don't understand he hasn't even played a game for the organization why would you rush out and give him another two years at 2.87 million dollars whatever it is as a as the cap it um and then started to think about it i took a look at a goaltending market next summer and it's uh you know the backup goaltending market is kind of a barren wasteland and and then i took a look at i i think the reason why it was signed when it was is because mark burgeon had a number that he was comfortable with you know he basically said it's not too much it's definitely not too little but

the quality of goaltender that jake is um to wrap him up for three more years to give caden primo more time to develop in the organization to give carrie price the adequate rest and have a guy who can actually start games you know he's going to be going to be 33 when the contract expires um so he you know for whatever reason price gets hurt he's actually a legitimate like starting candidate he's had a job as a starter for every year up until this last one where he put up his best numbers as a backup you know he played 24 games and get a 928 save percentage it's it's not a bad investment it's it's a good insurance policy if they end up losing him in the expansion draft which i don't i don't think they will um but they have to expose certain people he would be exposed

i think the guys who they will they're probably going to lose noah julson or kale flurry a couple young defenseman that will will prove much more uh attractive to seattle than than a backup goaltender who who could be a 1b type guy so yeah i don't think it was urgent but it does address a need and one that they don't have to go looking for next summer when they have to sign a bunch of other players what if it was urgent on jake allen's part because everyone was talking like you know this guy he's thrilled to be in montreal he's thrilled to play for the canadians i believe he grew up a Montreal Canadiens fan maybe you can correct me on that maybe he's just like screw it this is where I want to be here's a good number I I don't think so I think it's business I think

it's you know he he saw an opportunity like Anton Hudobin right is is 34 4 34 you just signed a three-year deal in Dallas he saw what his importance was to the organization he brought them to the Stanley Cup final in Ben Bishop's absence and we know who Ben Bishop is right he's kind of a perennial besnick candidate over the last couple years and potentially moving forward and that you know we know what the schedule is going to be it's going to be extremely condensed at least this coming season and probably for another one as they play catch up on a regular schedule and carrie price is 33 like he's not getting younger you need like the fact that he started more games than anybody in the league this year was ridiculous um but it was out of

necessity because they didn't have anybody to to to relieve them and and keep their hopes alive of staying in the playoffs because it's funny right like the canadians had two eight game losing streaks um before january right they did yeah holy but they were never out of the playoff picture like no the fact that they were still in it turned it into a situation where well now we really have to play catch up and so the idea of resting price became there's no chance they're going to do that you know you see how important it is to have two good guys and uh definitely saw it in toronto last year what do you oh sorry i tell me about it that was the first thing i thought of when you said that i'm like yeah maybe it's a good idea to get a good backup

what do you what do you think because everyone's just sort of whispering about this i want to have an actual conversation what do you think about the idea of a seven team all canadian division because the more i think about it the more i'm absolutely in love with the idea i think provided i don't i don't do anything stupid it maybe provides me with a bit of job security uh well i mean we all do stupid things i think i think roger sportsnet might be interested in that and they do have a say in how it gets settled um oh yeah i i i you know i love the idea of the canadian teams playing each other almost exclusively i think it would be extremely entertaining especially for the people of canada who who run this game and own it and are the

reason it is what it is but i you know like i wonder how the teams view it like i wonder how a team like montreal who made all these improvements um because like that's it's a strong division if it's that you're only playing in like do you i don't know how you guys see i i kind of see toronto at the top of an all canadian division but but like marginally and even if they even if it's debatable or even if it's not debatable whatever it is like what's the separation level between Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton, and Montreal. Not huge. It's not a ton.

You can rank them however you want, but the separation is negligible. Yeah. Well, especially with Vancouver, you know, yes, they got Nate Schmidt for a bag of pucks, but they still have holes to fill up front, I think. Like, I'm not sure Vancouver got better. They got worse. Like, there's not even a question.

They got worse. They got worse. The thing is, they do have Elias Pettersson, and they have Brock Besser and they have Quinn Hughes. Like the Oilers, you know, the Oilers made some good moves at the bottom end of their lineup to get some kind of depth, whereas they had, I don't want to say none, but certainly not enough. But, like, can you – it's one thing to slog through the regular season

on the backs of a couple of, you know, real racehorses here, the dry side on McDavid, but when it comes to playoff time, I mean, you can't win with just two players who are great or even better than everybody. It's not enough. So, I don't know. I think Montreal – first of all, to answer your question, Steve, I love the idea of it, but I think, like, some of the teams,

like maybe a team like Montreal who made all these additions and is under so much pressure to make the playoffs might look at it and say, wow, like, we've got to play against five other teams that are just as good as we are. Or if they're a little worse or a little better, it's still going to be a slot like it's still going to be extremely difficult so i don't know it's going to be difficult either way no matter who's playing who and we don't you know we don't have any choices in this thing this is this is where we're at right part of me wonders uh if

this all canadian division happens obviously there's going to be some inter-division games uh so at some point they're going to have to cross the border and go into quarantine or whatever but uh uh i'm i'm curious about how they would do the points on this one because i feel like if they have these divisions and they're just playing each other what's to stop them from seeding the conferences without a division do you know what i'm saying so if instead of having no idea what you're saying sorry so is jesse drinking so if you have so like you're the atlantic leafs canadians the atlantic division right

If you're in the top spot in the Atlantic division, you automatically get in no matter how shitty your division is. And if you, you know, the top three seeds in both divisions will get in and then there's a couple of wild card. I wondered if it wouldn't be a good idea to, OK, sure, we're playing the majority of our games within our divisional bubble or whatever it works out to be. But wouldn't you just want then to see the Eastern and Western conferences as how the teams do rather than how they do within their division? you know we throw the division concept out the window a little bit here and just put the best teams in no way no well i think i think if i think if they broke it into four regions and those regions are playing exclusively within that region against those six or seven teams that are in that division then the best way to make a playoff picture is the four best teams in each

division go to the playoffs right like i don't know it it's it's hard to wrap your head around any of this like it's such foreign concepts and like everybody asks me everywhere i go what's the nhl going to do when are they going to start and how are they going to do it it's like the nhl doesn't know well and the nhl shouldn't know right now what they should be doing is making two or three really sound plans and going with whichever one they're allowed to when the time comes because the fact is the most important developments developments are going to happen a medically and be on a political side of things, it's not so much what they want.

It's they have to go with the reality that best suits the one they're allowed to go ahead with. Right. So I don't know what's going to happen. I'm as curious as anybody. I do believe hockey will start in January. I hope it's by the first and I hope training camps are going by December and, and maybe there'll be shorter Eric. Cause I know how much you love month long training camps, your favorite thing i'll take whatever i could get to be honest yeah at this point yeah not having you know eight preseason games i think that is a total waste but i don't know what what

the owners are okay with right i don't know what i don't know they have to get really creative about how they're going to generate revenue this year because whether or not they start in january they're not starting with full buildings no matter what it's politically or medically so it's i i i thought i saw a press release i didn't really read through it quickly but i saw verizon was teaming up with maybe the nfl nfl to do some sort of interesting i probably shouldn't have brought it up since i didn't read it no but they're gonna be the name of the show welcome that's our brand active there are some interactive plans um to customize the viewing experience for the fan at home and to make to kind of bring them into the arena i got i don't

really know how they're going to execute it but they have to get creative this is a time for the nhl to really look at itself and say we haven't done a good enough marketing marketing job over the last two decades but now is the time where we have to invest in all that stuff more than ever before from from a competitive from a competitive uh competitive standpoint i was tweeting about the Canadian division and how I love the idea and people are like well doesn't that limit how far certain amounts of Canadian teams can go and I'm like we're well past that the Vancouver Canucks made it the farthest this past year and it was the second round in a seven game series where they were outplayed probably five of the seven games we're well past that so from a competitive

standpoint I want to see like clear cut this is the best Canadian team bragging rights and then you go on and try to win the stanley cup yeah and you know what you're dipping right into the marketing element that the nhl should be exploiting but also like it's everything is too bad so sad now right like yeah like we're gonna take what we can get and we're gonna do what we can do i i right now without any knowledge and without speaking to anybody in the national hockey league about this i do believe that the best plan forward at least to start is the canadian team staying in Canada and playing each other and not going to the United States and not having the U S travel to here. It doesn't make sense to me.

So I don't know where it's going to go, but that seems like the most logical option as of this day. Got it. And you know, it would make things so much fun competitively. Like if you're seeing, if you hate, you know, there's a, if there's a hate on between the Canucks and Leafs, like there was a couple of years ago and it's like, well, we're not going to see them again for another six months. Right now. We'll see them every six or seven games. It's built in. Oh, that would be fun.

All Canadian markets hate each other. It's built in. If David and Dreisaitl were doing a Canadian tour, it would not be something that people would mind too much, I would think. And if for whatever reason there are just a few fans allowed into the buildings, say the buildings are a quarter capacity or whatever it is, people might pay the premium prices for those tickets to watch those two guys or to watch Quinn Hughes and Elias Pedersen roll through town.

Or, yeah, there's a few guys on the Maple Leafs that didn't be superstar quality. No, they suck. They suck. They're terrible. And if you're looking to inflate the TV ratings, it's not a bad idea at all because every year playoffs, you see the drop-off when the Canadian teams are eliminated and we see the Stanley Cup numbers always pale in comparison

to just Leafs numbers. I might keep my job. Exactly. Us too, man. Jesse, this is no disrespect to any Lightning fans watching this, but the ratings that came out for the Stanley Cup final i wonder how many canadians walk in the street right now if you did a socially distance interview would actually know who the reigning stanley cup champions are i'm not sure it's i'm not sure it's

more than 50 i don't think so i love i love that series because i was the only sports net analyst who chose those two teams to be playing each other in the final hey good for you aren't you i had dallas winning though so oh okay well you had to pick radulov no like listen they would have They would have won, but they lost their best checking center and their best checking win. Those are strong words, but you know what, man? Dallas was messed up. For as messed up as Tampa was, Dallas was missing some very integral parts.

I picked them for a reason, by the way. I picked them because they're built to win in the playoffs. They have 10 forwards that are over 6'2 and over 220 pounds, and they all skate like the wind. So it wasn't that – you know, it was funny. I know Colorado and Vegas were sexy picks in the West, for sure. And the fact that Dallas beat both of those teams, you know, Jim Nill is a damn good executive.

And that's the way he built that team. He built that team with a bunch of huge, fast, physical forwards. And what they have on the back end is not bad, obviously, with Heiskanen and Klingberg and Lindell. What a team. I thought the playoffs were absolutely amazing to watch. I loved every minute of it and the finals which unfortunately suffered for what time of year it was on and two teams that ended up there and those types of markets versus some others obviously and

you know it's it is what it is but the hockey fans were well served at least the ones who we know or love the sport got an unbelievable show yeah it was good built for the playoffs is such an interesting term because we're starting to see more and more that there's two distinct forms of hockey there's regular season hockey and then there's playoff hockey and then every year we see that the Leafs kind of lack that way how to play they don't know how to play the playoff version of hockey and Dallas did it so well like you said well in Tampa I write so like you if you're in Toronto you're watching what happened in Tampa and they had superstar talent for the last five years and everybody would every single year there would be more analysts picking the 10th

bay lightning to win the cup than any other team in the league and why are people saying they won this year yeah braden point was incredible and and headman was full value but people are saying they won because they were willing to give up a first round pick for a guy who had never scored more than nine goals in a season and barkley could draw because they brought blake coleman in because they built a checking line with yanni gourd that would be about as fun to play against is going to get root canal so I love that play but that is you know if you were Toronto watching that so like what how do people react to I got flamed on Twitter for saying I really like the Zach Boghossian siding in Toronto as if people like didn't watch this guy play in the playoffs

right this is what you're not building for the regular season and oh how are we going to get 110 points this year you need to actually win in the playoffs and you do not win without having guys who a if their defensemen like to play defense and b are nasty they're physical and nasty and not fun by the way speaking of that uh i don't know if you guys have looked closely at the montreal blue line it's gonna be fun to play against well so i was gonna i've got i want to bring up to foley and edmondson actually at some point with you eric well that we have you um but quickly on Bogosian you know he played minutes with Victor Hedman like this is a guy that can play up and down and I what I like about the Bogosian signing is you know our impression of

Zach Bogosian is what we saw in Buffalo and that's not a fair I think if our impression of Ryan O'Reilly is what we saw in Buffalo then it's not fair do you know what I mean everything that's everyone I'm saying I don't care if the guy gets scratched for 50 of 82 games as long as he's there in the playoffs and he's physically healthy he's going to be a guy that people don't want to play against right because that style of game is not fun it's and like how many guys on the leaf blue line play that style of game one his name's jake muzzin and he's undervalued by the fan base so you know you need guys new jersey this year like they didn't have one guy on their blue line who as like plays defense the only guy was andy green and they traded him to the new york islanders like

everybody else wants to go go go and play offense like you cannot win without guys who play d and real d and that's why maybe that's why kyle um you know took such umbrage of people ripping on cody cc non-stop and i'm not suggesting that cody cc is a good defensive defenseman it's just not he's not i'm not saying he is i'm just saying like those style of players are one of the things that this team was missing and good for them for actually recognizing it and making a move like signing Bogosian for nothing for a million bucks I shouldn't say nothing I wish I had a million bucks but but those are the moves like you know whether it's him and Simmons and Thornton I don't I don't think any of those three guys make them that much of a better hockey team in terms of collecting

points in the standings and they're you know you lost Johnson and you lost Kapanen and you're not getting offensively better with Simmons and Thornton and but that's not what it's about no it's about building enough goals that can that can win in the playoffs and they haven't had one yeah and they and they're a team that does score enough goals Eric I mean they they do score enough that we don't it's it's not at a certain point it becomes it becomes a bit self-defeating guys going back to that 8-6 Carolina game and I know the fans loved it I know they were like wow look at marner just score that goal they just score three goals in 30 set they should have lost that game yeah 15 to 2 they played so bad it was it was a joke i was watching i was texting

colby armstrong to say you should destroy them right now on the air for how they're playing joke like and i watched the one the one game that stuck out to me more than any other game this year the least games that i watched there's lots to pick from was the one in um was it was it san o'shea or la they were on the west coast i know they lost all three of those games yes they had a game where they played it was either san jose or anaheim whichever i think it was anaheim and jack campbell was in the second period he stopped maybe like 15 odd man rushes and they lost the game in overtime or whatever it was he was great on that and they they gave him nothing uh i think they gave him anaheim and san jose and for some reason didn't let him play his former team without

whatever it was it was one of those two games and he was ridiculous in the game and they lost in overtime and he came out after and took the blame for the loss and it was just like if this guy was not playing the way he did they would have lost by 10 goals like it was it was a joke and if you don't have any commitment to defense i'm sorry you cannot outscore your well i don't need to explain it to you guys you guys want no kidding yeah we're we're gonna uh we're gonna bring chris johnson on this is a first we haven't had eric and chris on at the same time so we're gonna bring uh chris on to the show who is celebrating his birthday right now chris johnson it's a great picture chris what a pick can you hear us chris oh there he is there he is there

he is he's going on boys he's in someone's backyard right now happy birthday chris what are you doing to celebrate uh i'm watching the nfl in my buddy's backyard from a safe social distance so oh that sounds great oh he's got the projector does he yeah no he's got like a tv set up he's got some outdoor heating and he's even got a tent which we haven't set up because it's not raining yet so beautiful beautiful um those those it's pierre lebrun i guess i can say that i mean yeah oh yeah lebrun's house yeah my peers house in the backyard two cowboys fans you gotta him to put on the uh goalie equipment and get into that net or uh take a couple shots i was playing some basketball with pierre's son mark earlier so oh beautiful that's a nice backyard he's got

going on there hockey it looks like a full hockey rink yeah downtown toronto this is like a primo backyard um i mean he's earned it um nice nice backyard and all but uh any fun recent signings to talk about there chris well of course we've talked about that because there might be no bigger fan in the media of joe thornton than pierre so for this for him this is like an emotional thing that's happened where did he where did he hear about it first well i think pierre is a big listener to the steve dangle podcast so he was listening last monday and huge got up to date i am i am i'm gonna go on a limb and say he probably does not have time for our nonsense what uh but i'm glad that the that eric eric does and i'm glad that cj does

so cj you know one of the things about this thornton deal that's really interesting uh when we were sort of texting back and forth and and uh eric i'd love for you to weigh in on this too is the fact that when you're over 35 and you sign a contract there are performance bonuses that are that you can either have included or get rid of them. Basically, kind of like a rookie contract in reverse. Joe Thornton said, I'm not going to take those. Can you tell us why? I guess there's no way he fits under the cap without him.

But beyond that, it's a pretty big move on his part, no? I think so. And look, guys like Joe Thornton get those bonuses all the time. If you look back at the deal Justin Williams signed with Carolina last season, you know it was 700 000 base and and up to two and a half million you could make you know teams like those because you can push the bonuses ahead of year so you can actually be over the cap in the current year and and push any bonus money into the next season but you know in this case i think the leafs basically just went to joe and said hey we have lots of cap problems they're well documented

look at you know go to cap friendly you can see uh what our issues are here and if you want to sign with us you can give us the most amount of flexibility by taking the league minimum it's what jason spetz has done and you know look i don't want to speak for joe's financial picture but i think he's he's done pretty well in his career i think he's at 110 million give or take on the career earnings so you know the leafs were able to get him as part of that i think that was always the deal that was sort of up front what was discussed and you know it helps toronto out because even every hundred thousand is going to matter for them next season and and um you know I guess what you have here is a guy who wanted to come and play in Toronto.

I don't think he considered that many other places. I don't know how many other teams are interested beyond the Leafs in San Jose, but you know, this was either a come home and try to win a cup kind of thing or, or stay where you've always been in San Jose. And he, and he chose Toronto. Do you think the reason he chose Toronto and Eric, sorry, Eric, let me get, let me get your thoughts on that too. Do you think from the, from a Joe Thornton perspective, you've, you've interviewed Joe as well.

And you've, you've, you know, obviously tons of time with him. Is he the kind of guy that when he comes to the city, is it I hate doing this because every time Toronto signs a free agent of note, we tend to turn on them. Like I think back to like when how excited I was when the Leafs signed Larry Murphy and how, you know, he came in and I know that Joe Thornton is not in his prime like Larry Murphy was. And then Larry Murphy was bounced out of town and then won a couple of cups with Detroit. And then you had, like, I remember when Dimitri Christich came in and wasn't good, fans turned on him, moved, you know. Is it weird to bring up the fact that, like, I know Jumbo's Jumbo, but I'm a little freaked out about the expectations

that Leaf fans may have about him. And are we, at the end of the season, going to be, are Leaf fans going to be like they were with Patrick Marleau? Love the player, just not a fit anymore? 700,000 bucks. 700,000 bucks. I mean, you know, you're getting a player who's a Hall of Fame player, And at the end of the day, if it doesn't work, then you'll say goodbye and you'll walk away amicably, I'm sure. But I think what's interesting, actually, in getting back to something CJ just said is, you know, here's a guy that if he decided he was leaving San Jose, it's because he believes he can win in Toronto.

And if I'm a player that's in that room, having a guy like Joe Thornton actually have that belief that he's willing to leave the lifestyle that going back in time and certainly beyond last trade deadline, I don't think he wanted to leave there. I know that by the time it got to last trade deadline, he did want to leave there and was probably disappointed that he didn't. I think Elliott Friedman reported that. I think it should really mean something to the players in Toronto. And I think they'll do everything they can to make sure and help him in his transition to their team. And I think it's $700,000, guys. It's a no-brainer. He's going to be a good player.

even Leafs fans, even the ones who are least adjusted, will have a reasonable expectation for what the player can actually bring. Is that a shot at Steve? Hey, quit calling Dangle out that way. Come on. This is his podcast. Hey, Chris, do you think – Least adjusted.

I love that. That's a really well-put comment. That's Steve in a nutshell. Chris, do you think that the Leafs are – Uh, do you think they're actually like, cause Dubas always plays his cards coach close to the chest, especially when it comes to trades. We rarely hear about them before they're about to happen. He says in the press conference today, uh, there, he would be surprised if they added in anybody of note or of impact. Um, do you really think they're done? Are they going to be able to fit McKay of and Dermot's contracts underneath the, I guess they've got $1.4 million. They're saying, um, like how is that? How is that going to work? Um, do they move someone else out? is Kyle just playing his cards close to the chest? Because I think that surprised a lot of people. I don't think he actually is in this case.

I mean, because one thing he also said is that they might carry a 20-man roster. And so if you take this down to 20-man roster, I think even with the Mikheyev sign and Dermott sign for whatever they signed for, and look, I think they're both somewhere in the million-dollar range on a short-term deal. I think you can make the numbers work,

but what that's going to mean is they're going to have to put players on waivers. They're going to send waiver-exempt guys down. it might mean that Nick Robertson isn't part of this roster next year, at least to start or as a full-time member. I mean, there's still some unknowns because we don't totally know what the American hockey league is going to look like.

I don't know if the Ontario hockey league is going to get up and running as it intends to in January. And so that might affect how you handle someone like Robertson. So, you know, I think he's being truthful in the sense that, you know, that they don't have to trade guys and certainly they're not in the market now, I don't think for other players, but this is a weird year. I mean, I'm curious to see how this develops in terms of our teams carrying a taxi

squad is the HL just sort of functioning as something like normal where you, you know, have normal waiver rules in terms of sending players up and down. But I think the Leafs wanted to get a little bit more depth this year because they feel as though with the compacted season and perhaps some different rules that they might be beneficial to, to have as many NHL players as they do right now. The Habs are doing that by the way, they're, they're,

they're in the same spot for once the first time in half a decade, They're standing all the way to the cap and considering going with 19, 20 players on the roster. And I think it's going to be a lot of daily management to be compliant. They have a player in Cale Flurry who's ready to play in the NHL, but likely is going to be in the American hockey league if they're playing just because he's waiver exempt and they're going to risk losing a guy like Noah Juleson,

but maybe in a year where teams at the beginning of the year are going to have a very hard time claiming players. I don't know how that's going to go, But I can see that I guess Toronto and Montreal will probably not be alone in carrying less than a 23-man roster for a lot of the season. Is there a chance, guys, that they enact some sort of taxi squad concept where, you know, players are able to, say, practice with the team but wouldn't be considered, you know, on the cap? So you can have, say, like, let's say there's no AHL and there's no CHL, which is very possible at this point, right? You know, those are gate-driven leagues. I don't know how that they I don't know how they would plan on making money if you can't get fans into the stands.

If Nick Robertson can't play in the CH or the OHL or wherever and he can't play in the AHL, you know, do you let him go to Europe or do you let him or do you can you have a guy like him? And I hesitate to say this name, but, you know, Martin Marincin is going to be hanging around guys that have guys that are depth pieces that would still be able to practice with the teams. get some ice time in um and be called on when needed uh but teams would then be able to remain cap compliant like are they going to make any adjustments to that well you're talking with a great unknown here i mean i wish i had a crystal ball i wish we knew what the season was going to look like what what this was going to look like you know one thing i've heard discussed that i think is very possible i mean look we all know the all canadian divisions basically lock if only just because the government's foreseen on the nhl it's not that the nhl feels that this is some

perfect solution to any problem but but if you can't have american teams travel into canada then you have the canadian teams play each other well i think one thing that's been discussed is to have the ahl teams essentially travel with their nhl teams and and play at the same time so if a team like the leaps goes to vancouver you bring the marlies with them and and you know vancouver is going to have the utica comets have to be in vancouver now because you can't have teams operational in the u.s when you want to call players up and likely the marlies will play the Comets as part of that same series, whether it's earlier in the day or on the off day between games or what have you.

You know, I think that that's what's likely going to happen. I just don't know what all those rules will look like, because those are all very important questions, especially for teams like Toronto, Montreal, which are going to operate close to the cap ceiling, which are going to have to have transactions back and forth with the HL. I don't know if the reserve team, if the HL team, the taxi squad, whatever we're going to call this thing. I don't know how that's all going to work,

but it's going to be huge for teams like especially Toronto Montreal that are that are going to be dancing that sort of hula hoop under the cap ceiling. For me, it's such a crazy thing in general, just because you look at different player situations, like a player like Nick Robertson, like you need this guy playing games. He's got to be playing. I mean, you just saw Montreal loan Isperi Kakuniemi to his hometown team. And I don't know what they're planning on doing with Nick Suzuki.

And I don't think it's necessarily the same situation, But the last thing you want is for these guys to be sitting for such an extensive period of time. I think of a guy like Alex Romanov who came over while the Canadians were in the bubble and he got to practice and get exposed to the organization, albeit in Toronto and not in Montreal. But, you know, here's a guy that his season ended in the KHL in March and he hasn't played a game since.

And he's expected to be a really important player for them next season, even if he's starting on the third pair. you know bergevin has talked about him as a guy that he sees as a top pairing defenseman down the line how much does that process get slowed down and another thing that a buddy of mine brought up is like if we're looking at the length or the career span of a player is it possible that not playing games for a long period of time helps create that longevity that hasn't been there in the past there's so many of these unknowns and do they balance each other out i don't know but i wish i wish we had more answers because people keep asking me and i'm sure they're definitely

asking cj a lot more than me and i it's we don't know where we're going and we just hope we just hope that when we get there it's that the games are getting played we we don't have any answers when might we get some oh okay all right cool cool because you have to you have to work backwards right and like that that's how this always works you know i'm expecting the next season to start around february 1st so that would mean if that happens training camp has to open by january 15th give or take you know we're looking at roughly two week camps maybe three week camps uh you know so then at what point if you can work backwards with me you know what when would the league have to let the players know they have to be a training camp by january 15th or january 8th you know

that's somewhere around the start to the middle of december i think that's when the answers are coming honestly you know the league and the pa have a meeting uh scheduled for this upcoming week to start talking about these things like i don't think they're out of conception conceptual stage yet you know everyone's aware of what this might look like and what could happen and a lot of the things that eric and i are discussing here but no one has ever has actually put any roots down and made decisions and and so i'm thinking we're not going to hear until mid-november to early december and maybe even a bit later in that what's going to happen with the next season so we're kind of in this weird nuclear fall where i just think it's going to get really quiet for the

next month, honestly. I mean, there's still a few free agents out there. There's some trades that will be made. But other than that, I think it's going to be a quiet next four to six weeks. And then hopefully by somewhere around the start of December, a plan starts taking shape and we can start looking forward to the next year. You got time. You should run a marathon. Yeah. I might just do that. We'll see. CJ, it's your birthday. We want you to get out of here. but one more one more question before before we let you go if if if you are Kyle Dubas right now how are you grading yourself this offseason did you get all your goals accomplished based on what your goals were from the outset uh what would you give yourself a b c d f

well Kyle's probably hard on himself because he's a young high achiever but I think it's a b and and maybe even a little bit above that I mean I know that they feel good about what they've done But, you know, anyone who's been in pro sports enough, anyone who's run a fantasy team, like my football fantasy team is breaking my heart here. You know, you think you do a good job of the draft and then it doesn't always work out. So, you know, I think that they they're not doing any touchdown dances in the offices. But, you know, I think that they they managed to get some players on cheap contracts that they feel are going to change sort of the conditions around what the young stars have to deal with. And I know everyone wants to make fun of that online and, you know, all of us believe in analytics to a certain degree. But I think what the Leafs feel is that they didn't have enough veteran presence around their young stars these last couple of seasons.

They saw what happened in Dallas in particular, where the additions of Joe Pavelski and Corey Perry and some other players there, you know, made things better for that team when it came to the playoffs. And so that was the bet they made. And they brought a lot of these guys in on reasonable deals. I think they bet on value with someone like Jimmy Vesey if it doesn't work out much like Joe Thornton how mad can you really be it's a $900,000 contract they can send it to the minors it doesn't impact their cap if he isn't on their NHL team and I think that they are cautiously optimistic they think their team's good enough to win honestly I mean they felt that about this year and everyone's gonna laugh at them until they do it or or not and so I think that that Kyle feels good about where the team's at and I think he's happy with the offseason

because they didn't know for sure they were getting Joe Thornton in particular. I mean, that's come to pass since we talked about it last week on the SDP. But, you know, it's been a good few weeks, I think, for the Leafs, a team that didn't have a lot of cap money to spend. And, you know, we'll see how it works out. Well, Chris, from all of us, thank you for your time. And happy birthday and enjoy number 29, man. You're getting older now. It's crazy.

Oh, my God, I'm 39. I don't even know how that happened. So I know, I know, I know your listeners are out there and they're all much, much younger than me. I'm telling you, it's going to come up on you quickly too. It does. It does. Chris Johnson, Sportsnet. Thank you so much for your time today.

Appreciate it, buddy. All right, guys. Be well. See Eric. Eric, I got to ask you about Joel Edmondson and Tyler Toffoli. And I want to start with Edmondson because he happened first and you, you kind of mentioned it before we brought CJ on about how they're not going to be a fun defense group to play against.

And they weren't before. Like it's not fun to play Shea Weber at all, ever. uh but Joel ever tried throwing a broken stick at Jeff Petrie it's awful never works that's true it's so true um but yeah especially yeah do that when Hutch is in net for sure definitely a good move um but I I do want to know you know what is Montreal love about him this is another guy that never has not played a game for the Canadians uh played obviously very well with uh with Carolina and it seemed like somebody there was going to be the odd man out so it happened to be him what does he bring to this roster do you like the signing uh and long

term do you think he's a fit in montreal uh he's kind of how do i put this he's like right he's the prime example of why the canadians i think hit it out of the park this offseason in the sense that they didn't just add players they added specifically what they needed they they got a guy who compliments Jeff Petrie's skill and buys Romanov time to find his way on the third pairing and if for whatever reason Romanov blows it out of the water and ends up on that second pairing and Edmondson moves down even better sure great you know here's a player that the analytics don't look that favorably upon um but he's a player that is 6'4 and he plays like it and he skates really well and his puck movement is not his best asset and I think you look up and down the

canadians blue line that's not their best asset either but they play in a system where the the play is to get the puck up the ice as quickly as possible you won't see them making a ton of d2d passes it's go north as much as they possibly can whether it's off the glass off the boards or through a direct pass um and they like to break out through the middle the way claudia system is run um so there's just balance there there's size there's balance there's physicality venturat if you watched him in the playoffs was just nasty he just cross-checked everybody he's a he's a bastard to play against he's terrible oh i love okay full disclosure and i said i love the way they play i love talking to the guy i love ben charade is one of the best guys i've met in the

nhl he's just a great guy he loves hockey more than anything he's a hamilton guy who grew up loving the leafs and ended up on the canadians and it means something for him to play in the original like it means there are players that say stuff like that like it really means something to him like the reason he signed in Montreal is to be a part of HockeyNet in Canada and put on that sweater and that feeling that he gets going on the ice and he he plays like it I mean he in the playoffs uh I asked Sean Couturier what how it felt to be playing against Weber and and Sherrod and he was like it's a misery and every game I mean every time he was anywhere near either one of them he was getting cross-checked or punched in the head or whatever it was and it's it's dirty

it's nasty but it's that whole dynamic is prevalent throughout the entire blue line um and I know you guys want to talk about the other guys they signed but like he he checks a box Bergemet said he had four big boxes he wanted to check in the offseason one of them was getting a defensive component one of them was getting a backup goaltender and the other was getting a power forward and getting some scoring and so it's such to me whether it works on the ice or not we're going to find out but and and chris was just saying the same thing about the leafs and i look at the leafs it's what i said to you guys earlier they didn't just add anybody and they added players at minimal values right they're not going to get crushed one way or another if those moves don't work but they've

actually added something that they need i'm a huge believer in that the veteran presence thing I spoke to an executive from the Leafs two years ago when it was really expected that they take off in the playoffs and be really dangerous to play against. And I remember the very first thing he said to me was, don't forget all our best players are really young. Don't don't have expectations that we're all of a sudden going to like, we want, we believe we can win and everything like that. But you know, they're really young players.

They're really young players and we'll see if they're ready for, for this. And I just think you need to insulate these guys. People are, I'm hearing nonstop positive stuff about the Ottawa Senators. Look at what they did at the draft and look at these players and this and that. Like I watched the Ottawa Senators and I saw that they traded away Jean-Gabriel Paggio

and they lost Mark Horvitzky for nothing. For something that they easily could assign him for. And potentially Duclair as well. Yeah, Duclair is a different story. The point I'm making with those two guys specifically is you can have the best young players in the world and if you give them the keys to the franchise you're gonna end up end up like edmund like if you don't have the proper insulation if you don't have the proper guys around to show them how to be professionals and everything that

entails and it's it entails much more than just going out on the ice and playing and doing the things you're supposed to do as a player it's we're talking about culture like and that culture is not going to get created by a bunch of guys who have never been there before and have no idea what all the different elements are that go into being pros and i'm i'm worried about ottawa i'm worried because they have some incredible young players that are coming they have a couple that are already here whether it's kachuk and shabbat um but look what happened with shabbat the last couple years like they put him with no one to play with and he got eaten alive for for a lot of it And it'll be experience that hardens him and makes him a better player.

But you don't want to do that with all your best young prospects and young players, and then you end up 10 years down the line without having won anything, and you're trading those guys for pennies on the dollar because you need a culture change. I'm worried about Ottawa, and that's the reason why I like the moves that the Leafs made this offseason. It's the reason I like the moves that the Canadians made because they already have that culture, and now they're adding talent.

So I think that's essential. I don't believe in the strip it down and go full rebuild kind of model. I don't think it works. I think Boston set the template for the way to do it. And you keep, you have a core that has that culture instilled already. Then you just keep adding pieces to it and you, you work away on the fringes until you find what you need and continue to

draft and bring in that young talent. And I'm, I'll say it again. I'm, I'm worried about the Ottawa senators. I know there's a lot of positive that came out of this off season for them, But if they don't start putting a value on players like Pajot and Borwiecki, then what's going to happen with all those young players?

You know, it's funny that you bring up Ottawa now, because now that I'm thinking about it, I mean, they are a bit of a wacky organization for a variety of reasons. There's a way to describe it. Yeah, top down. And we acknowledge that. Listen, I think one of these days we're going to realize that Pierre Dorian actually does an amazing job. it's just the parameters that he has to work within he's a great amateur scout oh yeah yeah the parameters he has to work within are kooky but all i can think of is the between two ferns interview that borrow had to do a couple years ago and i can't help but feel like he was just like

i'll jump on this grenade who's there to jump on grenades now for the ottawa senators exactly and who's who's going to be there to do it when the expectations start to rise yeah right and you guys have seen it for for three years straight in toronto it's it's not that easy you know pre taveras this was a team that their their very best players did not have that type of insulation and they had a shockingly great season and went to the playoffs and they got barely though barely made it a beat in a in a in a heartbreaking way you know like yeah they barely made it but they made it way ahead you know wait well that was Washington Washington was okay it was heartbreaking though you guys you guys I mean if anybody's gonna get it it's you guys you guys are gonna

understand like it's this year just look at this year specifically right like Tavares and we talked about this last time I was on with you guys like Tavares his leadership on the ice if you're not following that guy something's wrong with you but you know and I'm not I'm not in the room with him so i can't speak to what he's like in the room but i have come to know his personality quite a bit he's a subdued guy and i don't see him as the guy you know walking up to marner or matthews or neilander or whoever and getting in his face and and screaming at him like i don't i don't think that's happening but yeah i like the way you put that steve of falling on who's gonna fall on the grenades like like we what did borowiecki sign for he's with two years a million a million bucks

yeah a lot like he would have been great i think toronto would love if he shot right-handed i'm sure toronto would love to have picked him up this year he's because he's the exact type of player that they were looking to add there were rumors there were rumors yeah that was out there yeah i don't know i don't think kyle was going for it personally you know they have the cap floor yes ottawa well so so that the thing is you know and i want to you talked about culture and i want to do a little quick compare and contrast with montreal and ottawa eric because the one guy we haven't talked about is tyler toffoli which to me of all the of all the hits that um that mark bergevin managed uh this offseason to me that's a home run uh you know four years of this guy

less money than you know per year than he was making previously um and and frankly a another sort of power scoring forward to go along with Anderson and and Gallagher and I mean he's been a very very consistent player and it's crazy that like again that he's the hole that Vancouver is now going to have to try to fill uh what do you think Tyler Toffoli brings and then and then I want to get to Ottawa after that because I do want to ask you a little bit more they just made a signing as well versatility um the fact that he signed the exact type of contract that you want to give to a player like that instead of the ones that we've seen go to players like that um you know that's that's the upside of a very terrible situation with the pandemic um affecting side the

money wasn't there for him you know like the contract that he wanted wasn't there for him and i don't think anybody else was offering the type of term that montreal did so they got him and they secured him and uh you know i what he brings is putting people in the right chairs and he brings the balance and depth to the you know with anderson and him both there now uh player like jonathan drew and he was you know he took a big step last year but then was inconsistent and then you know he was disappointing in the playoffs and then all of a sudden he was great with nick suzuki like if you're inconsistent this time around for a game or two games guess what you're not going to play on the first line or the second line you're going down and somebody else is moving

up like that's what the canadians didn't have if you look at the main reason they missed the playoffs before they were actually gifted an opportunity to play there they had byron out and drew out and it sunk their entire team i mean that shouldn't happen but it did and it did because they didn't have the proper depth to deal with injuries or with inconsistency from certain players and now all of a sudden they do and i just think to fully i love what i saw from him in the playoffs i didn't know much about him on background in terms of what kind of character he is i spoke to nate thompson who's one of my favorite people in the nhl um and just said what kind of teammate is he played with him in la and he said he's a great teammate great guy

trained with him uh very dedicated and the guys in the room are gonna love him and he he would know because he was here for the last couple years and knows the room quite well and the one thing I knew about the Canadians prior to this offseason regardless of how things went they had a really good room and I've been you asked me Steve before how long I've been doing this go back to 2007 I've been covering the Canadians I've been in 13 of their rooms and the one they got going on even like this last year where things were not going well is a really healthy dynamic and i think it only got better with the guys they brought in so and that's what happens when you have carrie price and shay weber and brennan gallagher and philip to know we didn't even

mention this yeah there's there's some such quality character guys and people overrate that but it's i don't i've just been around hockey too much to know what it means and that's why i keep harping on what toronto has now and what montreal has and what ottawa's kind of missing and and just let walk out the door for free perception's a funny thing because my perception of the Montreal Canadiens has nothing to do with the team that finished 24th and everything to do with the team that took Philly to six and yeah the bubble yeah have the Montreal Canadiens dramatically changed course you think from let's say March until seeing the result in the bubble Yeah. Yes. And the biggest reason for that, and I think people automatically point to Suzuki and they point to Kakuyama and they're not wrong.

Obviously, when you have two young centermen suddenly at the foundation of the team, being who at their top end people would expect they could be, that's a huge difference. but it was just as important for everyone to see what Carey Price looks like at his very best and what Shea Weber looks like at his very best when the chips are down like honestly for the

two rounds that they were in Toronto there was not a better player than Shea Weber in the playoffs and if there was his name was Carey Price like Shea Weber was I always ask those games I mean he was just just an animal he was he was just an animal and he was putting up points and scoring key goals and

he was just everything that has been said about jay weber about how you know you never you don't want to play against it like it was a nightmare playing against him the pittsburgh forwards you could tell that they wanted to go be have nothing to do with him and price maybe that's the biggest reason why they're transformed here is what price showed because a lot of people were wondering like what's he going to be like as he gets older because he's under contract for six more years just like Weber is and well um you know he he was he was unbelievable I guess he was and we saw some pretty good goaltending in the playoffs throughout whether it was Tampa or Dallas or um you know even Toronto at points during that one series at Corpus Allo and there's there's a

lot of good goalies in the league but when Price was in the bubble I don't think anybody was saying oh yeah somebody's playing better than that guy no he he was he was obscene so they were they were a fun team to watch it was a um i i said it in the first round they're the they're the i actually said it started in the playing round i said they're my favorite team to watch like just they're just the way they played were my they were my favorite team to watch you knew they didn't have they you knew that they knew that they didn't have the same skill as the teams that they were playing you know high end wise but you know i think they showed everybody outside of montreal and even in Montreal what they have in their room that's like you saying that tells me that I can sit here

and make the point that they have a healthy room and they have a good culture and they have these guys at the at the foundation of it that make it so but everyone saw it they fell on the ice because nobody was looking at their roster and saying yeah these guys are going to beat Pittsburgh you know they're gonna like I thought it was a three and out I bragged about Dallas and Tampa the final but i had montreal winning one game in the pittsburgh series not beating them in less than five yeah um i did say though that i thought you know you figure they're going to win one game if it's the first one watch out and sure enough they won the first one and watch out they they won the series but they should have beaten philadelphia like they if you watch that series

they were the better team for every single game pretty much except for one of them so they lost and six so five or six games they were the better team but not only that the reason i think they should have beat philadelphia is because their style of game was the one that was being played in that series not philly's and i think that's the reason why philly lost against the islanders and i said the same thing i i remember texting uh nate thompson in the middle of the series and said like when are you guys going to start playing flyers hockey because you're playing the way you want to play this and you're not going to beat them doing that like and he said i know like we we got it we got to step on it the players always know where they stand so yeah i i gotta ask eric

before we move on ottawa because i want to talk about ottawa i want to talk about winnipeg there's a few other things that i want to get your opinion on uh and i'm again so grateful for your your time today because it's so great to have you and be able to throw all these questions at you when we talk about um we talk about montreal one of the things one of the major changes this offseason was you know there there seemed to be when max domi came to town there was a gigantic love in between the fact that he you know his dad was a leaf great you know very very popular leaf and the fact that you know he jumped on board and wanted to be a canadian and you have ty out there on the ice in a montreal canadians jersey and wearing matt sundin's number for the canadians um what happened

between that and what we saw last season which was just max not it didn't seem like max was max there were rumors and he refused to comment on them uh about his relationship with cloud julian uh what do you think happened behind the scenes there and um you know did a change need to happen or was this was this something where they thought well we can get some great value and we'll get more of the player we need in josh anderson yeah there's nothing so dramatic and nothing that couldn't have been salvaged if max domi had to stay in montreal and be a player it's like uh the way some people talked about it's like oh you know they traded max because he had this issue with chloe julian is they traded max to get josh henderson that's that's why they traded max they

traded max because is very cockney emmy and nick suzuki emerged up the middle and proved to be better options as top two centers and he certainly wasn't going to take philton o's job away from him so if they're going to keep him he's got to play on the wing and then they're in a situation where they're got to they got to pay him even on a short-term deal like the one he signed in columbus which walks into free agency it's getting over five million bucks are you going to continue to pay someone to play where they don't belong doesn't really make a whole lot of sense but like i said they weren't trading max because they wanted to trade max and there was a problem with max they were trading max because they had a chance to get a player in anderson who fills a box that

has been vacant since 1994 they haven't had a player that looks and plays like josh anderson since john leclerc was in their roster so you know i think the fans love domi he he brought very passionate player um I really have a lot of respect for Domi for the way he plays and how much he cares and his teammates in Montreal absolutely adored him um they loved him unconditionally as far as what happened with him and Claude you know like I said those three centers were kind of immovable and they looked they wanted to get a four-line situation going so they plugged him in on the fourth line center and said okay let's let's roll our lines the only way we could beat a team like pittsburgh or philadelphia and you know it's kind of hard to get a guy who scored 72

points a season ago and ended up with 44 and 71 games which is not nothing to sneeze at uh 17 goals and say hey you know you're you're our fourth line center now all of a sudden and and not only that like if you're max like with respect to yasperi kakuniemi like you know he sucked this year he He had a brutal year. He'd be the first guy to tell you he had no business being and playing, you know, gaining more trust with the coaches and playing more ice time with the way he was playing. And it was injury riddled.

There was a lot of stuff that was out of his control. He came to camp with an injury and then got injured early in the season, then got injured again, and it was a rough year. But if you're Max Domi and you show up to training camp after getting assurances that you're going to be safe as a type 1 diabetic in that kind of environment, you're locking yourself in and taking a big risk. And just because you were gone for a week, all of a sudden Kotkaniemi came to camp and he looked great and he's in your spot.

Are you going to be thrilled with the coach? Like, I don't think so. And if you are a player that's happy about that situation, there's something seriously wrong with you. And then I would suggest that you should be the type of player that a team wants to trade away just for the sake of trading them away versus to actually fill a need that you have. So all that said, it would have been easy to resolve had he stuck around here. They would have said, Max, we love you. We know what you can do. We'll find a way to get you where we believe you should be,

which is in the middle of the ice. But it might take some time, and we need you to come and play better at the wing than you did this year. And we're going to play you with good players. And they would have solved it. They would have figured it out. So I take umbrage at the suggestion that the Canadians traded this guy away just because he had an issue or this it's nothing that they couldn't solve and right and and because

it didn't get solved because it wasn't resolved because it ended with max only being traded to columbus you know he's got a lot of questions obviously that haven't been answered and they didn't really have those discussions and didn't get to that problem solving uh phase so it is what it is based on your description it kind of sounds like this move might not have happened were it not for the bubble i think a lot of the moves that the canadians made might not have happened or not for the bubble you know like people say oh there was such value in this to see what cockney emmy and suzuki could do and then the positive you know to have a different taste in your mouth than what the canadians left you know and finishing 24th in the standings when

the season was paused but the real benefit was that bergevin saw what he had you know he saw what he had and he was going into an off season with 14 15 million bucks in cash space so you know it's one thing that he could have set up you know this is the year i gotta make moves anyways but and he also said you know josh anderson joel edmondson jake allen and tyler toffoli are four players that have been on their radar for years and they tried to trade for tyler toffoli He didn't admit this, but they tried to have Tyler Toffoli in a trade that got nixed by Max Pacioretty at the draft. So that was the Toffoli.

Okay, interesting. Listen, without Bergevay saying that that was indeed the case and without Pat Brisson saying it, I'm quite certain based on the people that I've spoken to that Tyler Toffoli was going to be in that deal. He wasn't in the end. And it's understandable. like he was a restricted free agent looking for a new contract he was in a similar situation as

Alex Galchenyuk I remember both represented by Brisson and Pacioretty was being represented by Brisson as well and you often see these situations where players who are repped by the same agent end up in a trade you know Josh Anderson Max Domi are both repped by Darren Ferris so anyway so all roundabout but Joel Edmondson is a player they had their eye on Jake Allen is a player they had their eye on for for a long time and josh anderson is a guy that everybody but specifically the canadians have been dying to acquire you know like uh they almost went down that road with milan lucic and they got saved by peter shirelli making an offer and by by lucic saying himself you know as much as i'm willing to consider doing this i don't know if i

could dive in and actually play for the canadians that would have been gross that would have been gross but i don't want to compare lucic to anderson and i want to compare david clarkson anderson i think that's all stupid i don't know how it's going to end up it is a huge risk i will concede that i think they took a big risk here but bergman had zero leverage and then in this negotiation he didn't just trade uh domey in a third round pick to end up in a situation where a power forward that he's coveted for virtually the eight years that he's been in Montreal walks out the door a year after he's landed so it's I think they had no choice to to sign him and plus they made their bet the minute they made the trade it wasn't in making the signing their

bet was made when they made the trade because they knew the minute they made the trade that Anderson got all the leverage that he had lost in Columbus with that bad season uh he was going to a place where they actually wanted him and gave something up for him so I I'm pretty sure that's not going to end up like those other two guys i don't think it's going to be like milan lucic and i don't i definitely don't think it's going to be like david clarkson and maybe the biggest reason for that is because josh anderson's best asset is escaping yes i don't think he's just gonna fall apart but uh he's got to produce and he's going to be under pressure right away and i asked him it was the first thing i asked him was you know you grew up in burlington ontario you were

Leafs fan you you had a pretty good sense for what it's like playing a market like this it's not just what have you done for me lately it's what are you doing for me right now and why isn't it enough so I hope you're ready for that because it's it's coming your way if you go three games without scoring a goal you're not going to be able to not hear about it he seems well aware of that and I think he's going to want to live up to this contract he just signed well to surpass Clarkson And by the way, he's got to score more than 15 goals in two seasons. It's a bar. I think he can do it.

I think he can do it. Patrick Laine's name is back up again. We thought a week ago, Eric, that Patrick Laine was going to stay in Winnipeg. And now all of a sudden, end of the week, Thursday, Friday, we start to hear it again that the Jets are looking to unload this guy. And this is a guy with 50 goal potential. I don't think anybody can deny that. Yes, he comes with his warts.

But, you know, hard to find guys that can score like Patrick Laine does. How does Winnipeg get better by moving on from Patrick Laine? They don't. There's no chance. So why do they do it? Well, I mean, what they were trying to do initially was obviously get a top four defenseman with upside that is around the same age and get a second line center that makes them that much better and a more rounded team. um it's not like they're weak on the wings they've got wheeler there they've got healers there they have a lot invested in this plan that essentially got blown up by a couple of defensemen

leaving and one retiring uh that sucked i mean that's brutal for winnipeg because they're right they were right in their window and set up to be in it for a few years they can redeem it um with some help on defense and the only way to get it and to get like an elite guy at that position would be to trade line a to do it the problem is is that in the interim that that that they were considering those things um patrick linea and his camp said screw these guys like if that's the way they feel because i don't you know i think it was going to be a tough negotiation anyways whenever linea's next deal comes up and whenever the next one comes up after that if he's not a ufa is you know if he wasn't going to line he's been in a situation where he wants to play in the top line

in winnipeg and wheeler's been there he wants to play with mark scheifele and now becomes a natural time to do that for them but you know at the same time like it's they're in a tough situation with him i don't know what they're going to do and they don't get better trading him i never i never would trade that guy i would i would one year him from here to unrestricted free agency if he really doesn't want to sign a long-term deal and stay because in a bad year he had 30 goals and 50 points i mean i don't that's a pretty major talent um and and at this point eric like who's got the assets to acquire him is there are there teams lining up for him yeah i mean like people i know philadelphia is at the top of the list obviously but i don't see what they have that they can get

a deal done where it makes sense i i don't know and patrick well they seem ready to to move on from goss despair so that might be part of it no one patrick doesn't solve that issue and change goss despair was a healthy scratch for half the games that philadelphia played in the playoffs even if that package sucks year and yeah you know people are mentioning carolina they're not giving up jacob slavin in the deal so uh like brent pesci is that going to move the needle is that going to change winnipeg's situation and what they've lost dougie hamilton they don't want to move on from him Dougie Hamilton's amazing.

He's a great guy. How old is Dougie Hamilton anyways? 31? 30? No, he's younger than that. 28. 28. Still.

I mean, it's... 27. You know what? 27. Before the Canadians made their moves, I think what happened... I'm sure what happened... I'm not sure.

I'm sure in my own mind. I think what happened is that the conversation between Kevin Sheveldayoff and Mark Bergevin was very short because if you're Kevin Sheveldayoff and you're trading Patrick Leinick and you're not asking for one of Nick Suzuki or Sperry Kakuniemi, you're failing

and if you're not asking for Alex Romanov you're failing and Mark Bergevin will not move any one of those three players to get that guy and that's why he made the moves he did afterwards because it never got anywhere if

Sheveldayoff was willing to accept a package that looked something like Brett Kulak, who's a really good value defenseman and just played the best hockey of his career in the playoffs, he could be a top four defenseman if he's used that way. He's proven it over the last two years, and he's under contract for two more years at a really healthy number under $3 million.

That would have been one piece. Cole Caulfield, a future 30 to 40 goal scorer, would have been another piece that would have had to have been in the deal. um and then you fill it out with domi and uh and a first round pick you know that that's the kind of package that if i was mark bergman i would have said i'm willing to do this you know i'm willing to give you a guy who could potentially replace line a scoring down the line i'm willing to give you a guy who could be a top four defenseman i'm willing to give you a guy who could be a second line center and domi and you'll get a pick too but if you're the jets and you're

making that deal you don't want could be you you you want i want alex romanoff who's guaranteed going to be a top four defenseman i want nick suzuki or sperry cockney i mean who's pretty much guaranteed to be a top two line center and whatever the other pieces are i'm fine with you know like i just don't i wouldn't trade them i would just say you know what we control your rights from here until you're 27 and we're gonna take advantage of that because we need you and And those things, those relationships can be repaired. We've seen that before where players have almost been bounced and then they turn around and are very successful with the team.

I don't like the agents telling people that it might be better off that they trade him. It's going to be hard to repair that. It could take years, which is why if you have to go one year, one year, one year, and maybe you have a different conversation with him. So what needs to happen this year is he needs to play with Mark Scheifele. If they do that, then it's going to change how he feels, I think. No, says the Winnipeg Jets.

Yeah, they brought in Paul Stastny, though, because I think Laine and Stastny had good chemistry in the 17 or 18 playoffs. I want to play with Mark Scheifele. We have Mark Scheifele at home, and it's Paul Stastny. It's just not the same, man. you know there is something to lament about this is that it used to be you you earned that and i'm not saying that line a hasn't earned it because his production has been massive since he's come in and he does something that very few people can do it's just like i don't like i i don't want

players on my team that are 20 years old and demanding things it's like i i'll i will give you what you earn but if it takes a bit more time than you want it to like i'm happy you're hungry but don't don't knock on my we're coming back to bergman saying high maintenance mid-maintenance low maintenance no maintenance like red and gallagher who broke into the nhl at 20 years old would you know he scored 15 goals his first year in abbreviated season it was 48 48 game season and he was great he was playing he was playing third line minutes with galchenyuk and uh crust if that guy came to my office and was like hey like i could really help us on the power play and maybe put me in the second line with Klecki

I'd be like why don't you get the fuck out of my office alright fair enough but that's the world we live in now I mean that's these young players that have come up and I'm not look culture changes and usually for the better

but one of the sad things about this generation and not just the players you kids nobody nobody and i'm just like cj i'm 37 years old okay but like you know we were the last generation we're like it was okay if our parents raised their voice with us like it was all right nobody had a had a nobody would give them a sideways glance about it you know like it's these kids have a hard time dealing with any of that they if if a coach you know oh well i'm

opening up a can of worms you're allowed to have an opinion eric it's okay don't worry don't worry this is on the internet no one will see it yeah that's that's one of the beliefs to play a certain way everything he did was about making them play in a way that would be successful in the playoffs and i understand he did some things along the way that were absurd and like whether or not you want to question whether or not it was fair or this or that it wasn't entirely logical or gonna or gonna result in a good result like the thing with marner that just made no sense why would you do that you put him in a really shit situation with all of his teammates and you and if you were trying to teach him a lesson of like look how this guy works I mean that would fall on deaf ears so it's not

our parents never went here's a list of your classmates and I want you to write them from like hardest working they never did that I know but at the same time like this stuff didn't just come out of nowhere and I'm not saying it's not we're not better off for shifting the culture I think we are actually but there is there's something in between in the balance here that's lost and it's it's that a lot of these players they can't take even somebody trying to show them something they take as a personal oh does that mean like you're criticizing me about this or you think i don't do it the right way or like like i know like uh i've been told stories about certain younger players in in a league where somebody's tried to show them something and like

they've literally skated off the ice mid like and like the guy went to that younger player and was like hey like if i just did what you just did when i was coming up i would have gone straight to the minors like i don't know what you i like i have no incentive to help you do anything i'm helping you like he's like well yeah like you're not they take everything as though it's criticism the minute it's something that they don't like to hear so it's i it's i don't want to generalize because there are a lot of players even of the younger generation who were raised the right way and aren't that way but you know patrick line a i'm we're looking at a guy who his personality has been out there from from the start as a guy who truly believes in himself and

should but he also can stand to be a little bit humble and accept that there's some pretty good players in winnipeg that deserve to be playing where they were ahead of him in that lineup at over the first couple of years the reality is if he scores 55 goals they're gonna put him on that line like i i it's go and do it the reality is they did it right like wheeler was there and and they moved wheeler to the middle because they had an issue but anyways like this is this is how things evolve this is how teams get better and like the fact there's red flags all over that whole situation the fact that winnipeg would use him as bait is a red flag the fact that his agents would come out afterwards and say like uh you know like he doesn't i he they might be better

off moving him is a red flag and i i don't i love the player i i would take the player any day on my team knowing that like in a bad year he had 30 goals and 50 points but that stuff would concern me and i'd want to make sure if i was a team getting him that he's coming into an environment where there are certain players around like the players we've mentioned over the last couple hours that could pull him aside and be like, this isn't how it works. If you need evidence that you can repair a relationship with a young, high draft buck European forward

on the West Coast, just look to Yessi Pouliarvi. They just did it. Yeah. You know, he went over, they had a bad relationship for a year, and then now it looks like he's going to be in the lineup whenever hockey restarts. Well, look at how they did it.

Look at how they did it, right? They let him just go sit in the corner for a little bit. You want to go? You want to go? Take care. yeah i wonder how much money that cost them too and when you when you realize how this actually works we'll welcome you back with open arms and look it might have been might have been a good thing for him i think the best thing for him was when he was originally here if they had just

parked him in the hl for a year where he didn't belong in the nhl at the time he was there and it's anyways we'll see where it ends up we'll see if he ends up being a good player with the players that are now there in edmonton but i don't know there's there's a lot of smart guys and older guys that are in this league that are worth listening to and some of these young guys would be smart to to open up their ears wow that's that's its own huge thing um and definitely true i've i've been railing against this because i'm like if you're winnipeg i don't understand how you replace Patrick Laine's talent or become a better team but I want to know because it plays against another force of nature that we've talked about on this show where there were PK Subban

rumors for the longest time and we said the you know the hospital that says no trade clause and that ended up not being true and there were Alex Galchenyuk rumors for the longest time and after years i think of the rumors or at least a year and a half uh the trade finally mercifully happened and it just seems like one of those things like there seems to be mutual interest in a parting of the ways how do they how much longer do they continue to resist that force of nature because i don't think patrick line is going to be a winnipeg jet for much longer just the the forces are pulling them apart and if you based on those two situations that i just mentioned with suban and gulch do you think it's preventable or do

you think it's just done it's just a matter of when oh it's it's hard to compare all three of those situations but the one common thread and you're right is like if you can't get on the same page what will inevitably happen is you will sell at a loss yeah i don't think winnipeg was prepared to do that this summer otherwise he'd be gone already right or this off season i should say it's not summer anymore like if they were prepared to to trade at a loss right now he'd be gone but that's the road they risk going down if they can't figure it out and it's i think when you do end up in a situation where you're mulling or considering trading a player and he ends up staying with your team you continue to go at it with with a glass half full mentality that you will find a

way to salvage it then oh you know maybe you're more under his belt and he's going to figure it out he's going to get it he's going to understand why we're being this way with him and what you know you hope or you change your approach the canadians changed their approach with alice many times you know that they tried various things to get the best out of him and they and they i don't want to give them full credit for it because they failed in a lot of ways to get the best out of him at a time where they could have gotten more you know there's just some things that are that are hard to figure out and time doesn't necessarily heal that situation and i i think you're bringing up a good point steve because inevitably if you can't figure

out you end up selling at a loss and when you sell at a loss with a player in the quality of of lining or suban when he was traded you could you could set your franchise back significantly the big issue for winnipeg for me is like they really got screwed like they they're right in the thick of their window and like they lost the left side of their defense and bufflin retired yeah and they still have so many great quality pieces that keep their window open and just they know that unfortunately they can't take advantage of it if they don't if they're not solid up the middle and on defense like they have their best pieces are on the wing right now and that's why line ended up in this situation it's not because not because of any of

the stuff we're talking about around the situation because you know he's cocky or because he he thinks he deserves more than he has or because they can't get on the same page it's it's more to the point that he can help them address the two needs that actually keep their window alive with hellebuck and and shifley and wheeler like it's so it's i don't know these i don't envy the managers in the salary cap era because in one way or another you've got to be compliant with that cap and it means you're going to make very hard decisions. Yeah, absolutely. Line A is getting traded.

That's what I got from that. I do want to quickly mention Ottawa. Like prior to the season starting, you think? Oh. That I don't know, but it does definitely seem inevitable. Patrick Line A to me is a guy that maybe moves at the deadline when one of the GMs on the hot seat gets desperate and is willing to really get going.

Maybe. It never seems to happen that way. It would be more exciting. I just think with the flat cap and everything, the ability to move him at the deadline is going to be a lot easier. I think the opportunity to move him is gone now.

As far as this season is concerned. They're not going to get a deal. Now if they get to the deadline and they're terrible and they've just had a miserable season and things are all wrong then chances are he hasn't performed

and they can't move him. So it's like... I don't expect he's going to move i think their best opportunity is already past us and and like i said you know like it wasn't because they don't like it it's because he's their best opportunity to fill certain needs and you're not going to be able to do that between now and season it doesn't happen it doesn't happen in any other offseason i know this is different here but once we pass free agency in the draft like the thick of it the big moves are done like they're they don't they don't

get done from this point forward and yeah some some money is going to move now like uh obviously between now and the beginning of the season we will see player movement because teams have to get find a way right but i don't know the big ones like they're locked in with them they better hope he plays well they better give them an opportunity to play more significant minutes with more significant players and hope that it stimulates them continuing to keep their window alive and they they go through that plan of going short with him and short with him until they find common ground or trade him awesome well eric quickly or steve jesse did you have anymore on on uh on winnipeg before no jesse all good i'm not in winnipeg i didn't want to move to

i did want to move quickly to ottawa but did you have something else you wanted to go to steve well it's it got lost in the conversation but uh here's how i know the montreal canadians are getting a true montreal canadian with tyler toffoli um i you know i i have this book i don't know if you know that uh it's called this team's ruining my life sold very well lots of uh well attended book signings the worst one by far was at the costco in oshawa there were like 20 people maybe so for most of it i was just standing there like a lemon except this man walks up aren't you from yeah i live there now i'm from scarborough and live in oshawa a lot like the to foley's so this man is walking by with all la king's everything and i'm like there's no way

that's not apparent yeah and it turns out it's tyler to foley's dad and he even goes hey i know you and you know we talked for a brief minute and he goes i'm mr i'm tyler to foley's dad i don't think he introduced himself as mr to foley he introduced himself as tyler to foley's dad and then you know what he did did not buy my book and that's how i know the montreal canadians are getting a true hab he didn't buy this leafs fans book yeah what a surprise right away i was like your kids in the nhl you have the money oh oh well and then i stood there and got free samples um online already steve you made a really good point about uh about who's gonna fall on the grenades in uh in ottawa this season as as presumably they get better i i think michael

tracos maybe overstated the point when he's like well leaves better look in the rearview mirror i don't think they're there yet maybe in a few years yeah yeah i love tracos by the way oh yeah i'm a big tracos fan that was it that was a take though that was aggressive michael tracos is really nice too like really kind guy i remember when i was working at 590 for that little bit he was so kind about everything uh but that was a hot take supposedly of all the writers pundits he's like one of the best players oh like hot like actual physical hockey players yeah supposedly he's sick there's a lot of pretty good ones yeah yeah there is ken campbell though not so good i'm calling you out ken um no not so good eric are you i'm not all right uh i i gotta ask though

That was it. Matt Murray and Dadunov in Ottawa, both players that no one would have picked Ottawa to pick both of those guys, to get both of those guys, or to Dadunov, sorry. Are those guys that are going to make a huge difference in Ottawa? Dadunov's a good signing. You're not crazy about Matt Murray?

Really? Interesting. Really? What is it about Matt Murray? Not at all. I hope Matt Murray somehow gets a hold of this and I think and just says that guy Eric Engels is an idiot and I'm going to do great

I don't understand given what the goaltending market this year why they would give up any assets at all futures to bring a goalie in other than the idea that potentially they felt that nobody would sign with them you got a lot of money

and then given the contract i hope matt murray first of all matt murray is a good guy and i hope matt murray bounces back from some horrible injury situations over the last couple years that seem to derailed kind of the the the um the arc that he was on but i haven't i haven't seen it since then as i don't like what i saw from him in pittsburgh over the last year i had no idea why steve sullivan was starting him in the playoffs i thought it was sorry mike sullivan excuse me apologies to steve and mike um i thought it was a huge mistake i thought it was a huge mistake to go with murray

to start that series against montreal and i felt that if he stumbled in the first game they were going to jerry in a situation where you're putting extra pressure on a guy who had never started a playoff game before whereas he had the better season than murray he was the starting goalie He had stolen the job. He was a Vezina candidate for two months of the season. And like they were in a situation where start, start with Jarry and you could bring Murray in because a, he's used to coming in side and stealing the job.

And B you're not in a situation where, Oh my God. Like if you lose that first game to Montreal, you're, you're under so much pressure in a five games because everyone thought you were going to smoke them. like and then you're going to put jerry in that situation where there's all this extra pressure there and it's all to say that like murray just he hasn't had it he hasn't had it over the last

like he was objectively bad in the playoffs and he still got upside he's still young but and it's really less to do with murray himself like the entire mart like how many cool tenders were on the market many how wouldn't be a better move than that like yeah i yeah i if you're gonna i want to see that well you i want to see murray flurry in ottawa yeah here's the other thing like if it was flurry instead of murray you're kind of checking two boxes one you're getting a guy who wants to be a starting goalie who can still be a starting goalie and is a pretty excellent one and i really don't care what his numbers were this year i know they weren't that good i think he was around 907 for the year i i watched him play about 10 games with vegas

because i do enjoy watching vegas he was their best player on the ice when he was playing and he was great in the playoffs i'd bring that guy in to check that box but i would also bring him in because everything i was talking about having good veterans around your young players like he's the number one guy on that list he's if there was ever a player you wanted to have around your young players it's mark andre for so helps you hit the cap floor if you're ottawa yeah so so there's every reason you could think of that makes sense unless mark andre flurry has ottawa on his no trade list and they can't figure out a way to make it work but i don't know i just it just seemed to me that there was a lot of options and that matt murray wasn't the best one and they dove all in

with him and and they signed him to a contract where how long is the contract is it four or five uh i think it's four it is one two three four is four okay so it's four seasons uh and so is he signed for next year and then it starts um so no it's uh it begins next season and it uh gets harder to trade as it goes on. He was an RFA. Yes. He makes four, six, seven, eight. Great. So he's there for four years

and presumably if they've done this whole thing the right way, he's got to be the guy when they're actually ready to start winning hockey games. Well, they're supposed to have a cup within four years, as Eugene

said. Oh, boy. do you guys well maybe i have a vision problem but i i don't see it it doesn't make sense yeah i i had less of an issue with them giving up assets just because they had drafted so many guys and they felt you know good about themselves but what what blows my mind how many goalies were on the market right like the the two cups it's hard to ignore but the sheer fact that there were so many goalies and markstrom was the most high profile one and he was a ufa and murray got more per year that's wild to me i think you're paying an ottawa tax at that point though

i think you are going to calgary yeah calgary's a great no it's no no calgary's in a much better and different position they have i was talking from the tax perspective no i'm talking about the playing for the ottawa senators tax right now is that they they dealt for an rfa and they dealt him to and he went to a market where nobody wants to sign and he knows that so i think he ground them the agent ground him on that one i think you know because they're not going to trade for matt murray and let him sit even though they didn't give up all that much to get him um he got he got the leverage because well you obviously want me you traded for me yep 100 that's what i think happened but uh and i was and it's funny on the record i was like pro

leafs going after matt murray so this is very interesting eric that you don't see it at all you got to see him up close you know do you guys watch him play this year i just thought like there's a pedigree there they could i don't know i'm the last guy i i hate when people on twitter whoever fans report who say this guy sucks like i i don't think anyone sucks anybody who plays at this level yeah to me is is you can't leave suck yeah and like there are players that have bad seasons or whatever it is but I just he wasn't good he wasn't good this year and he hasn't been the same player since he suffered a couple of bad injuries a concussion among them or a couple of them and I didn't see signs that tell me he's coming back to being the

guy that he was when he won a couple Stanley Cups like I I get it and I and I get why Ottawa would trade for him and sign him i just don't think it's the right move when they had 20 others that they potentially could have made it's and and again you probably eliminate a few of those maybe they maybe they say to themselves can't find a guy that fits what we need age-wise and a guy that will sign as a free agent um to a deal that makes sense for us but they may as well have dealt with murray as a ufa he was i guess he's 26 in his last year of rfa or whatever it was it just i watched him play i just i don't i don't see it i just don't see it and you know what i hope that i'm wrong i i do hope i'm wrong i'm always rooting for guys to come out and prove

people wrong and show that they can be something better than people ever thought of them and i i've seen it happen with a lot of players and those are the players i don't cheer for any teams but i really cheer for those players i cheer for players where they're in a market and the fans are all over them constantly saying they're not this they're not that and they end up playing great and everyone says shit i was wrong and i'm cheering for those guys so matt murray if you're watching i hope you play great next season in ottawa i just i i think there was a lot of risk in that especially for a team that is on the up and up with all the young moves they've made and needs needs certain components in there to help bring those players along he's gonna have seven

shutouts against the habs next year the all canadian division i don't know if adam was cheering so much for matt murray leaf starting goaltender as much as he was just cheering for matt murray fun story yeah and also i i love jack campbell i'm a big jack campbell how much heat how much heat is uh fred anderson under this year like how how much more heat i think it'd be more heat if he had an extra year on the deal um but i think everyone's looking at this is like this is probably it um and last year you think so yeah i know it was objectively bad for one month of the season and everybody, including the

reporters, were all over him. But I also watched the team play in front of him and they... Awful. Awful team. Honestly, it's hard to get above 9-15 with that. You can't. If you're playing nowadays, if you actually look, if you look at the 10 guys that are

still left in the league that play as a number one and a bonafide number one, and there is no 1B behind them, every single one of them has one month of the season where they suck. The only difference between the ones that have truly pitiful numbers and the ones that have average ones over that month is that about two weeks into them sucking, the team in front of them pulls it together and helps them dig their way up.

Andre Vasilevsky. It happened this season. Anderson, in the month of February or January to February or whatever it was, if that if the team can't find a way to pull it out in front of him you're you're you're digging the grave for him like you're two and a half month hangover after price november this year was bad he was just he was just bad and it's two novembers in a row that he's been bad and the team at this very same time that he was bad played its worst hockey and it's not chicken egg it's like two things happening at the same exact time that are just a roadside collision that you can't look away

from and it'll stay games in a row and it's because both those things happen like if you don't have a great backup goalie you're stuck in that situation and that's where now with the parity in the league a season gets lost right it could happen in toronto yep oh yeah there's no guarantee That team was making the playoffs. I mean, they didn't make the playoffs, but had the season gone on, right? If the Leafs hadn't built up a strong record to start with and that started happening the way it did in February, if it had happened two months sooner when they were getting out of the gate,

oh my God, like total mess. Yeah, total mess. I can't even imagine Freddie Anderson being under more pressure than he's already been under, but it's about to get real hot there. it sure is and you know what i think it's going to be hot for mitch marner austin matthews and william neilander as well i think there's a lot of people especially you know mitch marner took a lot of heat just because of how his agent handled that negotiation eric but i think uh i think it's it's and and you know what it is sort of time like these guys are four or five

years into the league now it's sort of like okay like now now we need to see some wins and i don't think anybody in toronto is going to get too excited until they start to see this team in the playoffs and that means making the playoffs and that's going to be really tough in this all canadian division if it happens so um anyway listen we we gotta wrap because uh because it's been a two-hour show already but eric thank you so much for your time like this is amazing that you'd give up a sunday like this uh we love having you on every time love your insights on the canadians um and thank you for unembarrassing the last embarrassing show that we did uh and giving us some real insights we really appreciate it and it's always fun being on with you guys i love

being on with you guys are a lot of fun and the truth is i played 36 holes of golf yesterday so wow wow that's a gem and i just wanted to say really cool painting behind you well my wife my wife uh had never painted my wife paints she's an artist she's great with everything artistic and um about we've been together for 13 years which is as long as i've been covering the hab so she's a big reason i do what i do uh she hates hockey she really sports in general but one once upon a time she said you know i can paint you something like hockey wise this was like over 10 years ago and i said oh yeah that would like that would be amazing i would love that man and she's like okay pick a picture of something and i'll paint it

oh i found a picture of koivu uh scoring this goal on andrew raycroft of course Oh, it's Ray Croft. I thought it was Kudrow the whole time. That's funny. I don't remember how or why this painting was in the background of a hit that I did for SportsCenter or whatever it was. But Ray Croft follows me on Twitter and saw it. And I said, hey, my wife says sorry. But it's a great painting.

he's got a he's got a true likeness of both players in this bait and one lying on their stomach trying to stop the shootout well what was he surprised they found a picture of him getting scored on in a leaf jersey does he follow you guys on i don't know i don't i don't think so uh i wouldn't there's usually for him listen now with us there's it's a funny thing with us there's like a uh we know that there are people listening but they would never publicly acknowledge and or follow because we're less than legit when it comes to like we don't you know what i mean most things yeah so so i think that there's like yeah we listen but they'd never like chris said a couple shows ago that you know executives will go you know why did steve say that or whatever

because you know uh but they'll never nobody's gonna follow us whereas you know you're a legitimate broadcaster for a legitimate organization um and i could see how andrew maybe would want to you know but if he's not going to follow us the the question by the way about the painting right before we started i saw that it was koivu scoring on a leaf goalie i couldn't tell which one and i said hey eric nice stupid painting but he goes thanks my wife made it i did not feel good about it so it's it's actually sick that's really good um eric thank she can uh she can do more of this and we can get them signed and stuff and we can figure out a little business platform where we give some money to charity or you know love we'll figure

it out we'll make this because i'll throw a picture of steve like and pause it like right parts of his videos and be like this and then we'll have steve just sign it and we'll auction it off to the highest bidder it'll probably i don't know i give you so so little to work with i don't know should we just have a series of paintings that are the canadians dunking on the leafs like just various canadians destroying the leafs of it in history because there's been a lot of those moments so not the right promotional vehicle for you this show or my twitter feed or whatever it is max don't be getting them out there yeah me looking over at capitan that one of the best chirps of all time caught that was amazing as a camera ever more point

blank god way to go captain you fucking idiot you can you can read every syllable on his lips beautiful um eric angles thank you so much you can obviously follow eric on twitter find him at sports that you know i mean if you're watching this show you already follow eric angles uh you know obviously falling for the hockey but also for the food because he posts some of the best food i've ever seen and they cook it themselves damn it i'm so jealous of the way you guys eat it was all it was fun i'm sure we'll do it again absolutely eric please uh please and thank you we'd love to have you back on as soon as possible the steve dangle podcast follow the guys on twitter at steve underscore dangle at adam

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