The Steve Dangle Podcast - Dysfunction in the Desert | February 18, 2021

Episode Date: February 18, 2021

On this episode of the Steve Dangle Podcast, who wore the crown? (00:00), Leafs take 3 of 4 points from the Sens and Nylander vs the world (07:30), Katie Strang of The Athletic joins the show to talk about the drama in Glendale (24:00), a bit more on the Coyotes (47:05), why doesn’t junior and mid-level pro hockey work in the GTA? (1:07:00), and the press conference: gold helmets & David Ayers (1:16:00). Read "Dysfunction in the desert: Finger-pointing, fear and financial woes roil the Coyotes organization" here: https://theathletic.com/2390146/2021/02/16/arizona-coyotes-investigation-toxic/ Originally aired: February 18, 2021 Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/FTBogploJsY We've joined The Athletic and you can too! Hit the link to subscribe: https://theathletic.com/sdp Visit this episode's sponsors: https://ca.manscaped.com/​​​ http://betmgm.com/​​​ Follow us on Twitter:@Steve_Dangle, @AdamWylde, & @JesseBlake Follow us on Instagram:@SteveDangle, @AdamWylde, & @Jesse.Blake Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

man i told you i told you the leafs would be sitting pretty if they had just won that game in montreal because even with the overtime loss they've they've still now taken they've taken three or four points from the senators but i wouldn't even say that they lost or they lost a point against the senators they just gave it away they gave it away i'm gonna be harping on this forever harping on this forever but before we get into that guys we have a huge show ahead we're gonna get to who wore the crown in just a second but katie strang from the athletic i don't know she kind of had a big story this week something uh biggest story in hockey i'd say uh i think it might be the biggest story of the year like i don't know if i've ever seen an

expose it was remember michael russo went deep inside the i think it was the fenton administration with the minnesota wild every year there is one hey check out this mess article it's not even every year you don't get one like this every season uh fenton was that i think it was two years ago now and katie strangs uh with the arizona coyotes it's a doozy it's a podcast as well and i think it's only getting started there you go there you go so uh we're gonna get to katie in just about 20 minutes here let's get into who wore the crown and we'll see if jesse actually gives the crown back to william nylander uh steve simmons certainly doesn't but in the meantime uh steve kicking it off with you no no not yet sponsor adam people paid good money to sponsor

this segment and you have the audacity wow not read their liners adam we're trying to keep the lights on here we're trying to pay some bills that old coming up around the corner come right back and pay some bills i would love that one what was it tj tj said yeah i've locked my boss out for like rock radio guys i've locked my boss out but i'm still gonna play some commercials play what i want except i'll play some commercials yeah there'll be radio jocks that'll do that yeah lock my boss out today play whatever i want to play give me a call and here's some commercials by the way so uh jesse who is our sponsor airports so i got an email from the airports around the world they said we're not we're slowing down traffic over the last uh 12 months we need

some more we need some more business we're going to sponsor this who are the crown segment and get some more traffic towards the airports well i mean otherwise people wouldn't know about airports who wore the crown brought to you by airports the next time you need to fly to an island i mean or go to an island why not fly not why not but do fly fly not until covid's over right yeah yeah anyway why not take an airplane instead of a a ship that'll take you six to eight weeks f l h y fly not all right steve i don't feel good about myself who's got the crown who's got the crown um you know what i'm gonna give it to a guy who was real bad in that six five overtime loss to the Ottawa Senators but he has otherwise been very good recently including in the Leafs

second of three games against the Ottawa Senators but he's been battling to get on the score sheet and that's John Tavares he just he's never gonna get it he's never gonna get the accolades that well I mean Matthew scores friggin four times a game it's ridiculous Marner's is so fun to watch he's he's not a rough and tumble guy he's not a speedster but he's just a gronk who works hard uh john tavaris he's he's been i i love his game you have to watch him a little harder to appreciate it than matthews but he's working through it and he's gonna bust out he's been the this surprising we'll get to it right after uh this segment's done but the criticism leveled at him has been just unbelievable lately i guess if you're going to be a leaf that's what's going to

happen eventually uh but my crown like the fourth most criticized leaf yeah it's true that's true my crown goes to Justin Hall for the beautiful setup with Austin Matthews and of course you know they did a really great job during the game yesterday of saying like here's I think it was was it uh it was during the intermission show and they were talking about hey like Morgan Riley didn't spot Matthews in overtime last game had he that probably would have been a goal and you could see from matthew's reaction how much he wanted it how excited he was by it and the real the thing is is that like when you watch um when you watch any show like the michael jordan documentary is a perfect example if you're on the court with michael jordan you know who's getting

the last shot right and that should be the way it works here in hockey and i know everybody's like well it's a different game it's a different game sort of but not not really uh when you have a shot like that if alexander ovechkin's on your team alexander ovechkin's getting the shot right yeah he's getting the shot he's getting open he's getting the shot matthews open got the shot and scored and you know i don't think people give it enough credit that was a pretty tough angle to score from and the fact that the puck was already on the side of that ice justin hall is on the right side of the ice austin matthews is on the right side of the ice there is no way that the goalie has to swing from side to side normally that you see goes bing right in and that i think

is the reason that Justin Hall deserves that. He spotted the guy who's going to score the goal, and he made it happen. Jesse. That was a really pretty goal. I haven't seen anything like that in a while. It's amazing. It teleported.

Yeah, it was cool. It was true. I got to hit up the Twitter account of Mike Kelly, Mike Kelly NHL on Twitter. You took it from the broadcast. I love it. We'll get to that. I'm sad that he made the broadcast, but we'll get there.

So Mike Kelly tweeted, Nylander doesn't spend very much time in the places where Matthews and Marner score. So that is a quote from Steve Simmons's article yesterday in The Sun about how William Nylander and John Tavares are garbage. So he quoted Steve Simmons and he said, false. Half of all goals scored from the inner slot net front area. Nylander was fourth in the league and first on the Leafs in shots and goals from their last year. And if you remember that, we brought it up on this podcast several times throughout the entire year. We're like, he's a net front player.

That was a running joke. Bro, like once an episode. He was a net front goal in front of the net last year? Yeah, it was crazy. And he's fourth in the league, first on the Leafs. Mike Kelly continued. He said, Nylander hasn't been getting there as often this season, but is still fifth on the team in inner slot shots.

ahead of Marner. Preconceived notions don't trump facts. So this week, or this episode, Nylander gets my crown because of Steve Simmons' terrible article that somehow made the front page of the Toronto Sun and had everybody's shaking their fists yesterday in Toronto.

And then- There was a lot of fists to shake. It made the broadcast of the game, which I thought was very strange for Sportsnet to show that. Let's pause on this for just a second. I need to wrap up this segment, then we'll jump right back into it.

Is that okay? Yes. I do want to talk about this. This is really important. Wrap it up for the sponsor. Yeah, yeah. So who wore the crown brought you by airports? They get you where you need to go.

Maybe you want to drop Stephen Simmons off on the other side of the world, and that won't stop him from logging onto the internet. But why not try? Why not? I'm kidding. Steve actually, it's funny with Steve Simmons, super nice in person, just probably the worst hockey takes in the history of man. And I think what's really important here is that you understand what he's doing.

We talk about this a lot. There was no reason. First off, there's no reason we need to be talking about him again anymore. But he was trending across Canada because people were so outraged that Steve Simmons said something that Steve Simmons always says. This is what Steve Simmons does. if you want to know who steve simmons audience is and who he's writing his articles for toronto baghead that's who he's writing it for who's not even real who's not even a real guy can you

explain to what that is for people who don't know so basically okay we always joke about your uncle hating william nylander right it's always the thick your uncle oh he doesn't work hard but i can't put the pieces together whatever else and objectively it's untrue but you can't tell him otherwise because joe at work told him that and matt who's in his family told him that and they sit around the table and they bitch there's always got to be somebody right that the the the people bitch about on the team it's like for some reason bruins fans didn't like tuka rask we who didn't have a goalie for a decade and a half were like seems pretty good to us the 2011 canucks into the stanley cup finals twice what the hell the 2011 canucks were literally perfect but they had they

needed one so they had mason raymond exactly every fan base who is like really engaged has one and i think we need to stop reading what steve simmons says you're not going to agree with it he's not going to offer anything in terms of objective analysis even if it's subjective opinion that's going to matter to you if you are listening to this show chances are you're not a regular toronto son reader for steve simmons there are reporters there who are brilliant steve simmons is an editorialist he is going to give you an opinion that gets him one thing he doesn't care about anything other than this and that is your click and if you clicked on the article if you shared the article and said how outrageous is this he wins and every time you do this he wins can i ask

you guys a question are you disappointed in post media for giving him a platform oh man why is it the front page the day after they didn't even play because they had nothing else to talk about guys they're listen post media on the list of what you mean the list of post media people that should not have a platform does not start with steve simmons okay yeah there's a lot of there's a lot of really questionable shit going on with that newspaper there is and that's the point that's what it's supposed to be it's a tabloid but you mean at all jesse like at all giving front page just the attention like because i i saw a lot of that because everyone's like oh don't give him the attention but like his his bosses are the ones who give him the platform on the website

and in the in the physical paper which doesn't really exist anymore he gets the front page of that so the the people were upset at him having the platform you're not upset with him you're upset with his bosses right i well yeah you know we we just we just uh we did a very big wrestling show when edge came on and there's baby faces and heels and the heels always go back to the same thing they insult the local sports team and they take uh they take a number one baby face and they cut him down or her down um and i think they just played the hits um and if it seems lazy to you why'd you respond stop stop expecting it to be anything else maybe it is lazy and it works maybe your marks to borrow a wrestling term your rage marks what what have we talked about before

cape baiting because you show up with your william nylander cape and go what no one is allowed to say that and then you fly you you know and you get back into a telephone booth because you got to go back to your job after saving the day like steve i i feel like it's a little disingenuous for the guy who made his living off of yelling and screaming about his favorite hockey team oh yeah to be uh criticizing fans for coming to the fence of their favorite players and teams i'm merely i'm letting people know what's happening i'm letting here's what's happening they're they're they're they're goading you is what they're doing because like here's the thing a uh pro william nylander click or anti william nylander click is a click they don't care and so

so they put them on they put it on the front page because they know what's going to sell they put it out there prominently on their twitter account because they know it's going to garner a reaction this is all money based guys that's the whole point steve makes steve simmons makes a lot of money to do what he does and you're falling for it every time what do you want him to write about jimmy vc no one gives a shit no one cares like if honestly no one cares and that's why he does it he goes you know what who's the easy target i'm punching down let's go and that's what he does and that's okay there's a there's room for that and like and and do i fault post media for doing it no they're a company that makes money off advertising if i was running

post media i'd be like throw steve simmons up there every time every time why because he garners clicks and it makes our advertisers happy that's all i give a shit about and that's all they care about so just there's evidence in mind there's evidence that i don't have access to but i'm sure they do that proves this works yes that's why they're doing worse of course proves this works do you think the new york post was upset with larry brooks the other day no no that doesn't make the article good but a lot of people clicked on it jesse what did you say last show what did you say last i didn't i didn't i didn't click on steve simmons's article i didn't click on larry brooks's i don't click a lot of people did and also when you click on the article

and then share it publicly you're still encouraging people to click on it oh i i screenshotted it and i shared it well people are going to be like well then i'm going to go look at the whole thing stop just and depending on the information just cut it off depending on where you clicked it you're also encouraging different algorithms to show you it more oh that's true you are if you click it on facebook or instagram which is owned by facebook and no one seems to want to talk about that uh it's oh no instagram's this other thing don't worry about it no it's not um yeah it works that's why they keep doing it and i guess what he's gonna do it again he is and ready next next week william nylander still sucks and the

conversation is so broken around william nylander because he was super criticizable um and people took it to the umpteenth degree then last year he's awesome and he turns into this net front god and has over 30 goals in a season that ended up getting cut short could have scored 40 he could have realistically scored for he had a chance he did have a chance an outside chance but he had a chance um and then people made it an eat shit parade uh for the past couple years and now there's no middle ground there is none there are only two extremely opposite end of the spectrum factions where you can't even have an honest conversation about you know neil anders looked off for like three games that's all i said and i got people yelling at me i'm like i did

i'm not your uncle i'm just look at him you looked and like now you don't even believe your eyes the evidence of your eyes and ears you don't even believe it and then uh in the 2-1 winning against ottawa you look better there is no you can't even there is no truth anymore with william neilander whether he's bad or good there's no more truth there's just what you happen to believe it's it's it's here's here's the probable explanation he's pretty good yeah he's usually pretty good usually pretty good he's got off nights and flaws uh but that's why he makes seven million and not 11 million yeah he's probably worth around seven million dollars yeah i would say he's worth about seven million players players you know goals become their oxygen

we've talked about that and willie's been taken off the top power play unit to great effect by the way not for him but for the team they have the best power play in in the league i think or or at least they did for some time in terms of percentage. So taking him off the top power play has worked for the team, but for him, it seems to have sort of thrown off his swagger. But last game, he seemed to, I think he read a thing or two, because more realistically, he was yelled at by Sheldon Keefe, and he tried much, much harder.

much because it's for me like to even criticize ah he doesn't go to the spots where matthews and go forget the fact that that's objectively false uh i don't think that was the thing i saw in him that i didn't like um like for me it was like going into the corner not even having like a vision of body contact in your head like you just sort of flail your stick around like a musketeer uh and it and it accomplishes nothing and like there are there there was a criticism i saw a few years ago that kyle dubas i think liked on twitter and people were like shade um where he's where the someone said william nylander does things so effortless effortlessly that it looks like he's not trying and i've taken that to heart as i watch him and

i'm like yeah no it looks like he's not trying but he is it's not untrue you know it's not untrue but the past few games i'm like he's straight up just kind of lazy it's not an excuse it's not an excuse for his lack of play at times but it's also not untrue in how he plays the game you know there's also there's a little middle ground with it if i tried to be funny on my own people might laugh if i tried to be funny around steve people are going to be like who the fuck are you and and why the reason i say that is tavaris and nylander and the and the criticism they've taken people are taking them and they're comparing them to marner and matthews and i think it's an unfair comparison you know John Tavares did have seasons where he's in 90 close to 100 points or whatever

and his first year here had a great start or you know 47 goals or whatever he had the the whole idea that John Tavares is somehow not an elite point producer anymore is I think that's a little bit of a stretch considering we're pretty early and he still had a pretty good year last year even though it was a down year I think the other thing is when you are playing with Matthews and Marner and you are making the same amount of money in them as them um you're going to be judged against how they do but the reality is that's not what sean tavaris is in here to do on the same level and he's not 22 and he's not like he's he's so many different things i think it's really unfair to take a guy like that and compare him to martin

and matthews because they're a whole nother level right now i have a comment and a question sure my comment is adam you are funny funny looking the question is do you guys hear what we've been talking about for the past 10 minutes we've been talking about william neil anders lack of production and john tavaris's lack of production the catalyst for this conversation in the market was the Leafs were up 5-1 and blew it. And we're talking about the second line's offensive production. You know, John Tavares was a part of that. He was.

That's not what was criticized. Do we need to also, can we also just admit that Freddie Anderson's just not as good as he used to be? Can we finally admit that? I don't know if that's the case, because I don't think he was ever what we think he was. you know i think this is what freddie has been for the past was it four years now like when i

look at the where he was on the breakaway in overtime was it overtime he looks smaller yeah the ot was in ottawa because his blocker was blocking his own pad i saw that on twitter too it's like i'm not a goalie coach like i don't know guys i don't know the technical of what's going on there one thing is for sure in my mind he's not back next year he's not no they're not resigning with that so what what do you have now to take you forward into the playoffs and steve i think you made a really great point last episode i know we're running out of time you said hutch is gonna have to start one of these three games you're probably right he's freddie's probably exhausted right played 15 out of 17 and and the whole exciting conversation

heading into this year is not only do the leafs have a backup that can play and win games but their starter is going to be even better because he's going to get rest well now freddie's played all but two games that's not good enough and i understand the reason why but now you have a back to back against the league's worst team and you're in first place play your friggin backup play your friggin i don't care if you lose even i don't care you're 12 3 and 2 you can lose a game i would say it's even better to lose a game potentially put yourself in a position to fail um by setting yourself up for success in the future by letting your goalie rest you're right i don't want freddie playing three and four with number four coming against the habs yeah i should have when i have

the option you were bang on you were bang on when you said you're absolutely right nailed it you nailed the montreal game though because they win that game and that i mean i disagree with the wrapped up thing but they're sitting pretty you guys they're they're 12 three and two they could be what are we complaining one and two they should be they could be 16 or whatever no they should be 17 i don't know they should be 56 to know at the end of this year anything else is unacceptable i want to win the regular season i want to win the regular season i want to win whatever trophy losses that's ridiculous what is the expectations here not expectations they went every every fucking night jesse yeah that's that's absurd

mentality they grind all right sorry you're right you're right you're right the 12 12 32 freddie's good don't you wish you could just hit skip on the worst parts of your life you know the same way you can skip an ad i get it i'm siaya and i live in ice cove i've made some questionable decisions that didn't end up the way i planned and today i'm still figuring it out somehow things usually get worse before they get better apparently that's how i roll so bundle up and come along for the bumpy ride stream a new episode of north of north tuesdays on cbc gem so you're having a nothing week huh yeah it's been a bit hectic there have been glasses of wine that have been drank do you um i i've always wondered this like it's sort of like

i was we're in on my on the other show on the radio this week we were talking about the song beat it and we were like do you think that Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones knew that that song was going to be as big as that song was uh before they released it when they were the only two people in the world to have ever heard it did you know that this article was going to send shock waves uh well beyond the state of Arizona uh right through hockey about the Arizona Coyotes before before you wrote it or not before you wrote it but before you released it no not quite the magnitude that it did. And here's why, like, I think I was working on that story for so long that it really distorts your ability to see like the forest through the trees. Like I had to ask my editor

and the sort of couple of days before it ran, I'm like, like, is this story even good? Like, am I saying something here? I'm saying something right. Like this reporting, you know, really reveals some themes here. Right. And he's like, you're fine. You've been doing this for far too long you need to go take a break did you i i want to know about the the construction of the article because it reads like a horror movie to me because the beginning of it you're you're bringing me in gently you're but you brought the reader in gently like oh there's this new owner and here are some nice things that he tried to do and then every item that you placed in the story made me more uncomfortable than the last yeah no kidding felt like the murder mystery where they tell you like

oh the guy was a nice family man and then he ends up murdering his family joke with my friends like that the murderer next door so i was like seemed really like a nice quiet guy kept yeah trash out um no i mean that wasn't i mean yes that was I will say this I have a wonderful editor um George Dorman who is an incredible investigative journalist um he won a Pulitzer at some crazy age like 26 or something he always makes me feel really shitty about myself but um he's a terrific editor and his he's really good at um structure and that's not a that's not a strong suit of mine so we're a good team in that way that he tells me kind of how he envisions putting together the information that I had. But, you

know, I did think it was important, actually, to the story to kind of share, you know, some context and some background and the fact that, you know, there was quite a bit of hope and optimism about this guy when he bought the team. Because I think that really shows, I think there's quite a contrast once people started to see what his philosophies would look like once they were implemented and how drastically different they felt about the ownership um you know once they began began making more of their philosophical imprint on the organization um the article by the way and we should have shouted this out right off the top but you know we're a mess so uh dysfunction of the desert finger pointing fear and financial woes royal the coyotes organization

This is in The Athletic currently, and it blew up. So, Katie, I mean, we got everything from here, from the Mitchell Miller stuff to potential sexual misconduct allegations to we're talking verbal, you know, verbal abuse allegations. There is a lot here. And it's funny because every time you hit like a picture or something, you think, oh, that's got to be the end of the article. And then it's something else. And I guess, I don't even know where to start, but I would like to start maybe with the thing that people understand the most, and we've heard the most about, which is the Mitchell Miller stuff.

I mean, that was sort of a really big story. And then obviously, John Chayka leading into that, which we can get to in a second. But you mentioned it in the article, and without giving too much of it away, it kind of gets into explaining not only just that situation, but a mental health trainer who raised concerns beforehand, correct? Yeah. So my understanding, what my reporting revealed was that, you know, there was obviously significant upheaval in the front office between the scouting department's final draft meeting in June and when the draft took place in October. And so under the previous regime in June they had had this big draft meeting as most teams do and they discussed

Mitchell Miller who was you know skill-wise considered to be a top prospect and there were a number of concerns raised about him stemming not only from this issue but I should add his lack of transparency and what they felt was perhaps a lack of remorse about the situation as well um and in totality kind of combining those things with the act itself that he was um convicted for racist bullying and taunting of a black disabled classmate in middle school they took him off their draft board they said like we're not going to draft this kid that's that um and sometime in between that to you know there being significant um turnover to the draft in october um you know a lot of teams also made that deduction that they were going to take him

off their draft board and then obviously the coyotes made that very fateful pick and so it led to a lot of finger pointing um in this like daily sense of shifting blame for you know who was responsible for that and you know what you saw was a very dramatic about face um in terms of the front-facing communication from the organization about that pick you know if you remember that when the pick was first made, it actually didn't get a ton of traction. The Arizona Republic did a great story on it a few weeks later. There was massive outcry, and the Coyotes originally kind of tried to spin it as, you know, this is this, you know, we talk about inclusivity and diversity, and, you know, this is an example of us willing to be open-minded and work with this individual

to in a sense, rehabilitate him or, or make him a sort of productive, you know, member of society and help him seek help and, you know, treatment or whatever. But then the outrage, I think just got too, too much for them and they cut bait on them like a day or two later. Right. Right. And then there's, there's the John Shaka situation, obviously, which they, you know, you get into a little bit, but really you know, when you're, when you're talking about the, the ownership group they have, they seem to stress family and then do exactly what you wouldn't want your family members to do. Sure. Yeah. I mean, I, I, this quote didn't make it in the piece, but I remember asking a current employee, you know, for all this talk about family, like, what do you make of that?

And he was like, shit, this is a pretty dysfunctional family. And, you know, I think that is one of those, you know, that's sort of Alex Morello's underlying ethos that he preaches, not just within the Coyotes, but with his other business endeavors, too, is this idea of family and that, you know, we're in this together and we need to treat each other like we would family. And that notion is what many employees, both current and former, find, you know, offensive, disingenuous, laughable, etc. They, you know, a lot of people said to me, like, when he's saying that he means his family and that the people that are within his inner circle, but we are not being treated as family. this is not how families operate. This is not how you would treat someone like you would want your family members to be treated. You know, Katie, I'm very confused because you mentioned current employees of the Arizona Coyotes. And I heard from a very reliable source called the Arizona Coyotes that it was only disgruntled former employees. Did you actually talk to

current employees of the Arizona Coyotes? I did. And, you know, that was, I think, conveniently overlooked by them, you know, when they were assailing my reporting. You know, I think to try to chalk it up to a few disgruntled employees is pretty reductive. And I think, you know, you know, the appropriate thing probably would have been to be a bit more introspective and reflective of why there were, you know, current and former employees who were sharing this information and sharing their experiences with me and what that says about their experience in the workplace as it stands. Um, but you know, I, I, I put the work in there, which is that, you know, I spoke to over 50 people, um, and that includes current and former

employees, um, as well as people that, you know, have longstanding business relationships with the team who regularly do business with the team who interact with the team in a variety of different capacities. Well, okay. So I know that you did speak to one current employee because it's confirmed at the beginning of the article. That current employee, we know, lectured you on journalism, if I'm not mistaken. Is that correct? Yep. That's correct. And his name is? Bill Armstrong. Right. So when you hear from a general manager like that, on a personal level, is that jarring? I mean, that conversation was definitely jarring. That's an appropriate, if not generous characterization of that. So I would say it's not uncommon to hear from GMs who are either upset at

what you have written, upset with your like sort of avenues of inquiry when you're reporting. Like that's very typical stuff. I've dealt with that, you know, throughout my career and especially more now as I do more, you know, the bulk of my work now is investigative work. And that often leads me kind of to the underbelly or the more sordid, difficult subject matter. Like I don't write about rainbows and unicorns. So it's generally something that is going to piss people off. So that is not uncommon. I would say the nature of that phone call and the tenor of that phone call was pretty wild um into the sense that like i i definitely like made a bunch of calls afterwards and was like that was very um unusual and you know i i don't he insinuated you

were stealing and he insinuated you would go to jail correct no no actually that's initially what i thought he was saying and i kind of tried to clarify that with him because i i did initially think he was accusing me of committing a cyber crime um but then I think he seemed to believe that someone um internally was stealing his information or externally was stealing his information and funneling that information with me I'm not quite clear if he thought that like I had a sort of direct role in that or was just the recipient but he made it very clear that he was unhappy that he thought that was happening and that he thought that was wrong. Um, I made it very clear to him that I felt he was bypassing a pretty, um, obvious explanation that was much

more plausible, which is that I am a good reporter. Um, we did not seem to think that was a viable explanation. Um, and so I don't typically, you know, include interactions like that in a story just because I'm loathe to inject myself into any story. But the reason that I did is because I felt like the behavior was germane to the story itself. You know, when you are writing about paranoia and fear and bullying and threats and intimidation, and then you have people, you know, who are extensions of that organization exhibiting some of those hallmark behaviors, I do think that is instructive to include in the piece. And in some ways, I think you can learn more about an organization by the way they act and the way they react to what you're looking into than by getting

any sort of like exclusive one-on-one interview. And so that's why I included it in the piece. I thought it was important for people to know what is the response from the league been we know the the coyotes released this statement trying to denounce the article but has there any been like internal talk from the owners or batman specifically about the what's written in the piece i would imagine there are some conversations being had i have not been in contact with the league about this i can tell you that last week i went to the league to let them know that i was going to be publishing the story this week that I felt like there was significant content that they'd like to, you know, weigh in on or comment on. They politely declined to do that, which is

their prerogative. And I circled back with them on Monday, the day before the piece published, and I did present to them a list of very detailed questions, laying out some specific elements of the story that I felt warranted a response. They again declined to comment. So it's hard for me to know exactly what the dialogue has been, you know, among league officials or, you know, with the league and the coyotes or with the league, even in, you know, other owners and the board of governors. So I don't have a great answer for you on that. You know, I'm very curious to see how the league will handle this um but i don't have any firsthand information at this point of how they feel going back to bill armstrong for a second i i correct me if i'm wrong i think one of

the things he mentioned was what if i went around the league and told other gms uh you know about your methods of reporting and etc etc have you heard from any other league executives since the story has been released oh yeah yeah I've heard from quite a few um and like universally supportive and um you know I think there were some people that were really upset to hear that you know that was his approach and you know there's some people you know just kind of let me know that they read the story and that they were not pleased with what they um had read so you know that was nice but that was never a concern for me you know that that to me was that would never deter me and I think you know it was such a sort of a jarring moment and I was so so kind of taken aback by

some of the things that were said but you know I from my recollection of it I do remember you know saying that I felt very confident with my reputation around the league and that you know I work very, very hard at what I do. And I think that's reflected in the quality of my work and that I don't think any, you know, he could tell DMs whatever he wants like that. I, but, you know, I think most know how I operate and the extent to which I go to, to do my due diligence and to provide fair accurate nuanced thorough reporting and to be clear you have not received an apology from him no okay and i and i don't need like honestly i don't need i don't need no i i didn't think you did but i i do want to i did want to say like he's had an opportunity to cool off and

think about this and i just want to know um you know and here's what i will say just like both about sort of the the statement in which you know they came after myself and my publication and and that incident is like you know I don't need I am a big girl believe me and like this is not the first time I've gone through something like this and it sure as shit will not be the last but what I can tell you is that like you know when that statement was released like I would rather have them come after me or come after the athletic, then, um, go after employees or retaliate, um, in any ways against their employees, because those are the people who are really in a tough situation right now. And I wouldn't have written this story if it weren't for, you know, employees

who were in a really tight spot in a precarious position and who felt like they had zero form of recourse you know besides talking to a reporter because things were you know in their mind so toxic and dysfunctional um and there was no help on the way um just a couple more questions for you katie because i mean this it's just such an unbelievable piece and there's so many angles on it but i have to ask like what even tips you off to start something like this like what's the what's the thing you go you know what i gotta look into that a little further yeah so i think because I like deal in some of the more underbelly type stories. I think, you know, people come to me a lot with tips and which is wonderful. And I'm, you know, buried in them sometimes. And I wish

I could give all of them the appropriate amount of attention that they deserve. But what tips me off to this, and I don't generally do pieces about like, you know, financial impropriety or anything like that, like missing bonus checks to players, things like that. So that is actually what tips me off is i had some i had heard some generalized grumbling in the playoff bubble that um players weren't getting per diem and that there were some weird things going on and so i just kind of like put that uh you know filed it away and put it on the back burner and then i had heard that players were missing like we're not getting paid their signing bonuses on time which is like no small thing right like that's something that the union will hop on right away because that's

part of a standard players contract it's collectively bargained it's not like it's not a suggestion like when you pay a guy his signing bonus like he needs to get it on a certain day so once I started kind of pulling string there and and reporting that out I found out that there was a large outstanding balance with their arena management company that was several months overdue And so I started to maybe kind of think, what else is there that I don't know? And so I would just kind of keep following these facts and talking to people and asking every single person who else should I be talking to? And I'll tell you that we almost published this story at multiple different junctures. And invariably, every time that we were on the precipice of publishing the story, something else wild would happen. and so we would hold off and we would kind of push it down the road and it became one of those things that like you know I've given birth to two children and this kind of felt like a third like

it lived so long that um it was a bit of a relief to get off my plate I felt like people thought I was like just stalling and procrastinating and and I wasn't it was just a matter of like we knew that we had to kind of keep going and we owed it to the story to keep going and that we would know when the story was there and it just it took a while it took probably five months wow wow um we we learned a great deal from it uh from your work have you learned anything since yeah that's a great question yeah is there a coyote too there are definitely there are definitely elements of that story that i want to dig in on further and I plan to do so. I can tell you that they had a town hall meeting with their employees after the

story ran that day and they told them, you know, hey, we want to really stress like that there's an open door policy here. We want to be transparent and stress honesty and we want to be here to hear your concerns, complaints, criticisms. On that same call, they also said, you know, we also want to reiterate that speaking to the media is grounds for dismissal. So, you know, I think there were people on that call that, you know, may have been sort of heartened by some of the intentions of this idea of like transparency and honesty and really kind of digging deep to think about some of the things that were expressed but then you know kind of felt like it was window dressing and so right you know i mean that just kind of gives you a glimpse into into what's going on

because if you're an employee and you come forward they're going to be like oh they've got questions and concerns they probably spoke to the media like it sort of puts a bit of a target on you don't you think yeah i mean it's not just that it's that like you know people this is a workforce that has been whittled significantly over the past year and especially exacerbated by covid um and so there's like this fear that if you're going to be a squeaky wheel that you will be shown the door and you know one of the parts in my piece like that I stressed was there's this never-ending like specter of litigation too that people are scared of like getting sued this is a person of ample means and resources like no one wants to take that on that's scary like especially

in a pandemic when you're relying on paychecks and like health insurance to feed your family and so you know there are a number of things that I would like to follow up on some of the financial stuff I would like to dig in a little further I will say that I heard from several employees that I did not talk to who said hey you know I just want to let you know that even though I didn't talk to you for this piece I really saw my experience at the company reflected in your piece and I wanted to reach out just to thank you for that and that made me feel really good. Like that even, you know, I cold called a ton of people, right. And like, you know, some people hang up, some people don't talk, some people do talk. Um, but that even the people that

I didn't get a chance to talk to felt like they recognize their experience in the piece. Wow. Well, it is a, and I don't think, um, anybody will disagree with me here, Katie, this is a breathtaking knock you off your feet piece of journalism. Like there's just, there's no other way to describe it like i don't think i've ever read anything that that blew my mind in terms of just the the depth and the breadth of this story so um uh congratulations on telling the story the way it is and hopefully it creates meaningful change right because when these things are uncovered oftentimes uh it can lead to to good changes although it sounds like they're up to their old tricks um and based on the culture that you that you kind of showcase

in the article um it doesn't seem like there's a desire to want to change they seem to be perfectly happy the way they are but all the same hope that there is positivity that comes out of this one way or the other and you are a phenomenal journal journalist and we just needed to to say holy shit blown away incredible like wow so thank you for making time for us today it's been an honor to have you on of course thank you so much for having me on guys thank you katie you know i meant what i said there like i could never read anything like that adam you've clearly never read this team is ruining my life man but what happened at the zoo jesse tell me there's so many chapters on the zoo if you there is exactly one chapter

wait no there's two and then i love that jesse's like page 197 oh yeah by the way i started a podcast ad but jesse you're fine if i'm ranking journalism if i'm ranking like oh writing awards it's like okay this team is ruining my life is up here down here everything ever written in the athletic and like third is like shakespeare and all the rest but like i don't even understand shakespeare when is he gonna speak english you know what i mean everybody am i right don't forget to buy steve's best-selling book this team is ruining my life i can't wait for part two because there is such a there's such a where it ends is like oh man

because i was there it's like this is where things got going this is where they got it shit got really exciting so i hope there isn't talking about like sports net you know yeah he doesn't even get in there yeah well and now like so much like what what i keep telling people oh when's part two coming i'm like let me live my life i need to live some life in order for there's like six seven years of good stories there though man well i started examining it and i'm like oh okay yeah no there's a bunch of shit that's not in there so yeah it's i'm excited keep cool my babies so uh yeah again i want to shout out that article katie strang um dysfunction in the desert finger pointing and finger pointing fear and financial woes to royal

the kind of coyotes organization and it's one of the just one of the best pieces we've ever read and honestly uh wow what a what a moment it was you know what's interesting too is there was such an attack on her once this came out and you've got everybody in the industry regardless of uh whether or not they are affiliated with the athletic like tsn sportsnet people all going holy shit katie well done right it's they they took the coyotes and their response appeared to take the anti-media route which will work on a lot of people but i i did appreciate the industry as a whole going katie strang that's your target are you out of your mind yeah and i'm so Adam I'm so not surprised by your reaction because the second I saw it I'm like oh my god

this is gonna answer every question Adam has ever had about the show we were just talking about them our first effing show though our first show ever one of the topics was when are they folding the coyotes and moving them and it's not not not because of the fans it's because they've never ever had a successful organization there and it's sort of like you wonder if the reason they can't find a good owner is because it's not a good investment wow it's because good owners that's very that's very clear at this this time that they've been trying to make hockey in arizona work and for 25 years it hasn't worked and i'm not saying it couldn't but it's sort of like at 25 years you don't even have a rink like you know we're not even in phoenix okay well

So that's the issue for me is that like there's been a lot of puts and starts and, you know, I'm probably painting a bit of with a broad brush here and I'm not targeting Coyotes fans because they know honestly to be a Coyotes fan has got to be the hardest thing in the world. What an impossible organization to want to hand your money over to right now and forever since the dawn of time. But the reality is the reason a good business person and really a sports franchise is a play toy. It's a thing to say, look at what I got. yeah right that's a you've made it you're in the billionaires club when you own a sports team in north america or in europe or wherever else but if you own the coyotes it's sort of like well we fucking we found someone thank god no one tell them and don't show the books don't and and in the article talks about how they had a two-year path to profitability uh whoa

i mean even on the financial methods the uh basically it you know we we talked about with katie them paying employees late uh it wasn't just about that there were certain vendors who allegedly were not only paid late but when they said something about it they're like all right let's negotiate yeah work with us on this yeah and they'd get like no no pennies on the dollar yeah yeah and they uh there's a whole thing about napkins in there it's fucking wild it's just wild oh not expensing like cab rides and and it's just infuriating it's every what's relatable about it is it's it's it happens to be about the arizona coyotes but for you the listener or you the reader it's every bad boss ever like it's every bad workplace ever they pay

late they uh you know they they haggle for your pay uh they make you feel like shit like it's just it's every bad workplace ever right right well it's uh again like i said i hope it i does it does create some good change there i mean whether uh whether they change because they had to or not hopefully it changes something because obviously something needs to change and i i also think honestly guys if it doesn't work out with uh the murello group um i don't think it's going to work and it seems to be um to me anyway uh there is a there is just something rotten they don't have and i think if you were to look at the way the nhl did it back in 1996 when they went from winnipeg to arizona i think if gary betman knew then what he knows now he would have set him up

like vegas not that they were an expansion team but he would have been like well who's the owner and what's the rank and what's this and what's that where's this all what's all happening here and you look at the success of the vegas franchise and you go the nhl gets it with relocation and expansion now and i think the kraken are a good example they've got an incredible ownership group led by the light wikis who we know well in toronto and los angeles knows extremely well they're incredible like what a group um i think it's only a matter of time before this team moves guys there's just no other way you'll never get a straight answer from betman but i wonder what he would say behind the scenes because you brought up a great point betman was only like four years

into being the commissioner or something like that when the coyotes moved like i'm sure he's learned a lot since then and he's probably got regrets well and you look at certain certain uh markets that are great on paper i.e atlanta are just not going to be the markets that you want them to be and that doesn't mean that hockey couldn't come back to atlanta in 10 years and succeed but you have you can't do it the way they tried to do it with the thrashers and they tried to do it with the flames before that you can't strangle the the baby in the in the in the cradle right you have to actually give them a shot at being successful right away so they can make a bang and i don't think i mean i think the coyotes team that showed up in phoenix originally

was a pretty good team but you you had never had a good management group never had a good ownership group never had a great fan base outside of the hardcores because you never had a specific place where they were playing all the time and i look at it like look at what kansas city and quebec city have they've got they've got a place to play do they not yeah they both do quebec isn't um quebec isn't technically i don't think it'd be it wouldn't be up there with the nhl standard it'd be like winnipeg level right yeah it's about 15 000 because the thing is the winnipeg group doesn't matter, right? They can lose money hand over fist. It really doesn't matter. They're insanely rich. But my question is, okay, if you want to keep 32 teams in the league,

which they do as of next year, do you want, let's say, let's say there's no market you can move the coyotes to that's profitable. I would ask you this. Is there a market I can move the coyotes to that's less in the red? Meaning if I'm going to lose $20 in Arizona per year, but i'd lose 10 in kansas city or or 15 in quebec city wouldn't i then want to move them there well what's keeping them afloat right now is tv money and arizona as we've talked about many times is so key uh to the tv money so i i don't think so man i don't i don't know if there's a solution here other than like you know we we talked about like the financial issues of the coyotes and that doesn't seem to be the big issue here the issue is stop treating people like shit well they're

missing payments though all right yeah but that seems like it's by choice because they know they can mismanagement yeah it's okay it's miss it's doing wrong by people i don't like mismanagement is i think when you make a mistake this this if you read katie strang's article it certainly seems intentional and built into their business model which is wrong i also don't hate the idea of houston yeah the market i feel like it's not talked about enough because it's in the same general area and i think the you might get a because of the higher population you might just get more people who care and isn't it like six seven like like sixth or seventh in the entire united states in terms of amount of people that are like in population they're top 10 really big

it's it is top 10 yeah yeah so um i think there there are other options like you get it you get into a little bit of trouble when you try and take an american franchise and move into canada just because of the dollars and the amount of money it brings in in the local the canadian dollars but i think there there are options outside of arizona just because it's you've tried for 25 years maybe it's time to stop trying and that's like we said it's not it's not about the fans it's about just hey this experiment didn't work like you at some point you have to admit that it didn't work if it's going to continually not work yeah i get what you're saying guys i think the solution here is just the owner needs to not be such an asshole right

yeah that helps you try again with another guy i i mean they've been trying this long they've been trying this long it's like me with relationships i also i also feel bad like now because now i'm invested in arizona like because we ragged on them and we were like oh just move them already and we heard from enough coyotes fans that i'm now cheering for them oh yeah you know what i mean i'm cheering for the we heard from the coyotes fans they why hey hey you with you we did we and it's not again it's not the fans fault they didn't give them anything they didn't give them a arena to cheer in like what are they even like the heyday of the coyotes is when gretzky was their head coach like that's the peak of the franchise right now

and when we look at their history right in terms of relevancy in terms of relevancy i was like bro they made the final four what i think in terms of hey when people cared about the coyotes it's when gretzky was there and i oh well like if at that point like that's if that's your peak it's at some point got the court i would say probably 2012 because was that for the they uh the conference final yeah yeah um they did really well the building was full and they had something that atlanta never had what you know the the thrashers correct me if i'm wrong but i don't think the thrashers ever won a playoff game yeah i think you're right they won the shitty shitty very shitty southeast division one year and played the rangers in the 3-6 matchup

and got swept because john uh sean avery drove yulia kovalchuk out of his mind remember that yep i'm looking i'm just looking now because yeah here's the coyotes that i think when they were at their absolute like best best um game after game after game year after year after year to me um they probably that was probably the kachuk janny ronick happy boolean years wouldn't you say briere briere was great and obviously shane doan was there the entire time yep um and this is this is the funny thing when an article like this comes out they were good when they first got there you know it's it's it's gotten into toronto people's minds about austin matthews ever since brian burke made that comment on the fan about well after the five years he's going

back home uh do you think he's going back home to that i don't think so uh you know if the coyotes were a well-run slick good operation with a great arena and lots of i mean it's an incredible lifestyle to live in arizona i mean all you have to do is follow any other players and they're like sitting on their uh their rooftops and watching the sun go down because it's such a gorgeous place to live it's a beautiful area of the world it's a uh like the golf is amazing the the lifestyle incredible um but if you think that a player like that is going to actively go yeah you know what i'm going to leave the toronto maple leaves to go to a an organization that can't pay its players on time or intentionally doesn't pay its players on time i mean you're dreaming and and berkey knew

i think berkey must have known that when he said it like i think he knew the coyotes were not a really well-run organization even back then when he made the comment pre this ownership group and nothing's changed so whenever somebody says that it's like do you know what team you're talking about here it'd be different if it was the rangers like if he'd grown up in the bronx and was austin matthews and was like well he might be a ranger i'd be like oh i'm inclined to believe you if he grew up in boston if he grew up in in any of the california close to one of the california teams i would be inclined to believe you but the arizona coyotes i don't think there's any question are probably the worst run um organization in the nhl right now and very

interesting in there is what tipped off katie strang as she said was the signing bonuses being paid late to players and i think part of the reason that became public and became such a big stink the players have a union the players have a union that will protect them and stick up for them all these other vendors in the article if you haven't read it yet you have to all these poor other small businesses what are they supposed to do they don't have a union who's going to stick up for them yep it's a it's bleak it's i mean it's a depressing read but like i said it's structured in a way that really does bring you down uh the rabbit hole and there's also she did a podcast too uh well she actually just did ours so maybe don't listen to the other one

from oh what was it 96 from when they moved from winnipeg tonight uh in 1996 until 2009 all the coyotes did was lose money and then 2009 the franchise had to file for bankruptcy and then the nhl bought them and then the nhl owned them for four years the league owned the team and then they finally sold it in 2013 and since then all they've continued to do is still lose money yeah i don't know what the solution is here revenue share up nhl franchise is just continuing to lose money well and look at this too because they had a really good start they lost in the quarterfinals each of their first four years in arizona then they then they went bankrupt and then they lost in the quarterfinals like i'm not i'm not talking about their win

loss record i i get oh i know what you're saying but i'm adding on to that point which is if you were to look at it from a 2002 perspective this is a team that's made the playoffs five of the last six years and in fact if you go back to the jets it's six of the last seven so it's a it's a it's a shame because they did get a running start with the quality of the team that was there and if it wasn't profitable in that in that time frame when you got a playoff team five or six years i don't know and it really when you look at steve when you talk about the the nhl tv deal you know regional in the states is mattering less and less now because of the digital age right at one point it was a huge deal but now it's sort of like well people are watching from around the

world like you can just take that audience and the streaming audience whatever and that's why things like blackouts eventually will disappear um i still don't understand i don't understand them either they do they serve no purpose other than piss off fans which are already pretty mad But I would say that if I'm looking at the next TV deal and my TV deal hinges on the Arizona Coyotes existing or not, I don't think it's a good TV deal to begin with. And I think you have to, you know, nobody's watching the games. Nobody's watching.

They get no ratings. So what do you need it for? You know, and when that disappears, the impetus to keep the team in Arizona will disappear with it. Meaning that, if that is what's propped up the Coyotes franchise, which missed the playoffs, I want to say from 2002 to 2003, they made the playoffs since 2002 and 2003 three times. Since 2002, 2003. 2002, 2003. Since then?

Since then, they made the playoffs three times. Wow. The impetus to keep them there beyond the billionaire that currently owns them is gone. And how long does this guy want to lose money for? Because it's COVID. We're all going to lose money. We're all losing money. Everybody's losing money.

But it's okay, Adam. Their future is very bright. Their first pick was 142nd overall this past draft. If you take out Mitchell Miller, their first pick was in the fifth round. And don't they lose? That's a joke. Isn't the renounced pick this year their first rounder?

let me look I think you're right because they'd already traded their first rounder yeah their GM was not even there anymore so they got no first they do have two seconds but no third you can do something with two seconds

you can do something with two seconds you can draft great players in the second round what they got oh the second they got for Anthony Duclair I see I see I thought I saw Derek step on in there and i was about to faint um it's uh it's it's bleak it's not looking good man

bleak and it's a shame it's a shame because there are people there that are extremely passionate you would have to be yeah like right i tell this story all the time when you're uh when i flew in arizona uh when i was there one of the first things i did when i went up to the kiosk at enterprise was say hey um uh where's the uh where do coyotes play and uh because i'm like how far away is glendale from they're still in glendale right where the hell are they now anyway the person that you're talking to at the desk usually knows their way around the area pretty well and the woman had never even heard of the coyotes oh my god i don't know what those are what do you mean like what what are you talking about what are the coyotes what group is that and i said

it's the hockey team she said no idea that's like it's one thing like not to watch but not to know who they are does toronto have a professional indoor soccer team because i feel like you might have you might as well have asked that we probably do i feel like we do or did i don't remember jesse's looking it up right now he's on it uh the mississauga metro stars dwayne d rosario played for them oh that's cool they don't exist anymore they were founded in 2018 and dissolved in 2019 so they had a good run good run historic historic hey by the way i want to let you know too before we get into the press conference here uh officially as of like an hour ago uh the echl's brampton beast have folded oh wow man well i know covet obviously but

i why can't they make hockey and brampton work what is it because there's there's been the battalion there's been what other teams have been out there well the battalion had to move to north bay sorry jesse you were gonna say something no go ahead well they can't they can't make it work they can't make it work and miss a leaf game well but like mississauga has been a tough sell too like i was i was with the steelheads and it was a challenge getting people in the seats but there were some weren't uh the popular like i know cherry had a huge influence on it but they were never a draw no like your population of brampton it's it's the greater toronto area for anyone who's like jesus brampton's population is over 600 000 i did not know that which would put them

just outside of the top 10 in canada mississauga is in the top 10 again yeah i think mississauga is the sixth largest city in the entire country it's bigger than winnipeg yeah and it's so it's so weird because in terms of the sports landscape neither really has an identity which is wild as someone who grew up in mississauga it's not like you don't associate with mississauga sports teams because toronto's right there like we're i'm a toronto raptors fan i'm not gonna i don't really cheer for the 905 you know like we don't consider ourselves um like the the ahl teams the the d league teams the triple a baseball city like we're no we're still in the major city because we're so close to toronto and it's just so accessible when i go to blue jays game i'm going to leafs game i'm

not going to see the ice docks this isn't a perfect comparison but like saskatoon and regina are able to have uh their own sports identity one's got the pats the other has the blades but then i was thinking about it wait a sec toronto doesn't have a junior hockey team either so what's going on there it's almost like like toronto cannibalizes like leafs other markets but also itself yeah yeah the leafs are that big like i don't i don't know how to quantify it for people like it's And Jays. The Leafs game is on. And Raps.

Sure, sure. And TFC. But it's like when the Leafs are on, in terms of if you're a hockey fan, I would give up tickets to the Brampton whatever. I'd give up tickets to the Marlies if the Leafs were on. I'm watching the Leafs. If I'm from Oakville, if I'm from Burlington, the Leafs are my city's team.

Yeah. It's not whatever is going on in my local city. It's, no, Toronto, that Leafs team is my team. that Raptors team is my team that Jays team is my team and Steve you often talk about the imaginary border between the United States and Canada because really it is it's just a line on a map and the culture to be the culture changes like that it's weird but it does um but between Toronto and Mississauga and Brampton and Scarborough Scarborough's not Durham region whatever you want to North York um all of those regions don't have that invisible line in the same way that like

culture changes when i go to mrs saga there's all those seven million people let's be honest exactly toronto proper is like two and a half but the greater toronto area is the city doesn't end right it's like new york new jersey long island they're they're they're connected but they're vastly distinct i have an extremely unpopular opinion for a lot of people but i'm gonna say do you have a ghost station you're part of toronto okay well niagara okay two and a half hours away as part of toronto i think i'd have to pump the brakes on that one but don't put that one into this is ruining my life too like that'll make the urban sprawl though

is so crazy it's uh it's very weirdly constructed here like hamilton i think can have its own sports identity but even them they've really they've kind of struggled they have the thai cats i know they have a cpl team uh what was that adam they love the thai cats yeah they have an ohl team now they can support an ohl team um but like that's that's way over there yeah hamilton you start feeling like okay the different stuff is going on here like this is its own kind of identity but like brampton mississauga combined are like 1.3 million people and they there's not even a there's one junior hockey team yeah we associate with toronto we're not we're not ahl we're not i know but like mississauga is big enough to have its own identity and it's got

like a weird shape building and that's it also the uh the paramount fine food center is built in the worst part it's not near anything yeah like they should have built things near uh like square one area or if you want to go even a little west but it's out like towards the um the 403 there and there's nothing else there it's on its own place and it's the worst and there's no exit from the highway it's it's terribly city planned and if they if they ever decide to build a new arena they need to they should just build it on top of square one there's enough room cool like why not yeah like madison square garden is how many floors you could you have to understand and if you're if you're not from this area and you're listening to this going

i don't know what the fuck you guys are talking about i want you to imagine for a second which is fair right um i want like square one is not a mall it's a neighborhood it's enormous it's so big and it's like one of the last super malls out there because a lot of those malls have closed it's the largest mall in ontario you could put a hockey rink on that no problem and you wouldn't even see it from the other side it's so so big so maybe they should do that you know what disney cartoons where someone's wandering the desert and they see an oasis out of nowhere like that's what downtown mississauga looks like yeah when you're driving past it no kidding oh my god you're just what is that oh that's the entirety of downtown mississauga and the rest of it is just houses

calling it downtown mississauga is even like aggressive like there's no downtown it's just kind of houses and houses and schools my my favorite ever jesse is i was driving through halliburton and on the the sign that says welcome to downtown halliburton is uh in a grocery store parking lot let's do on that note let's do the press conference also they just closed palladium So maybe convert the Playdium into the Raptors 905. I also, I want to see, yeah, there you go. I also want to throw this at you a stat from John Shannon before we get going in the press conference here, Connor McDavid,

a hundred points in his first 92 games, his next a hundred points happened in 82 games. His next a hundred points happened in 68, his next a hundred in 67, his next a hundred in 64, 500 points for Connor McDavid. Not bad. it's absolutely better and better and better connor freaking mcdavid everybody he's gonna have a thousand points before he turns 30 oh i mean crosby reached 500 points in the exact same amount of games

man and think of the help crosby had like we can talk about a good team yeah we can talk about who the better all-around players are um to me i think it's crosby like i'm talking prime crosby um but connor mcgavid is the the pinnacle of hockey offensively no one's been better i i love the reply by the way that was a john chanin tweet and the first response to it you guys ready the mcgillney of his era without the lone cup an amazing talent who will also get forgotten by the hall of fame someday for his inability to play on a good team yeah yeah connor mcdavid is not going to make the hall of if he retired tomorrow he'd make the hall of fame okay Let's get away from the bad tweet.

The only of his errors? Legal read was a mistake. First question. Holy shit. First question comes from Justin Merrilees. I don't know how to say your last name, Justin. I apologize. He wants to know,

how many goals did Steve score on David Ayers yesterday? So Steve, Jeff Merrick sent out a photo on his Twitter account. This is what Justin is referring to. Jeff Merrick tweeted out a photo of you, David Ayers, and himself on Merrick's backyard rink. What the hell happened, and where is this going? So, I can only tell you so much, but as you know, the anniversary for David Ayer's NHL victory on February 23, 2020

is coming up, where he suited up for the Carolina Hurricanes and defeated the Toronto Maple Leafs because goals from John Tavares and Pierre Angle made him the goalie of record. We went to Jeff Merrick's outdoor rink, which has become a de facto studio for sports net because ron mcclain was there the other day as well um but i was i was there with david ayers the david ayers we met for the first time uh distance masks all that stuff um and we shot what we're hoping is going to be three different

features all digital one or two of them might go on tv uh and in terms of did i or didn't i score a goal you're gonna have to wait and see oh i love it so excited for this that better it's so fucking cool steve like what a cool thing it was really awesome it was really cool it was really cool yeah i i yeah i have a very silly life i'm i'm well aware it was as i was uh driving there i'm like this is a very silly thing i'm about to do and then i got on the ice i'm like this is really this is stupid it was it was a lot of fun it was a lot of fun and that's all i'm gonna say i'm not gonna spoil it the next question comes from phil uh at l no i'm gonna try and read how bad are those vegas gold helmets what do you guys think of them i think they're great i love

them oh i said in my dang it's video that they look like the door section in home depot like they just look like a bunch of doorknobs like they they look like a bunch of brass doorknobs i think i appreciate that they're trying something new and you know what i think a crowd would make it way better the vegas crowd would get into it not only would they get into it but the vegas crowd is unique to vegas there's something about it that makes it feel like vegas and now they're just a bunch of dicks skating around an empty building i think if the fans were there it would be way less corny but right now i think it looks stupid i love it i'm here for it stupid yeah i think it's super cool and you know what like uh i i think this debate is about as important

as the debate about whether advertisement should be on helmets just let people enjoy shit no but helmets are sacred though oh yeah yeah it's great no yeah everyone complained about advertisements on helmets. No one gives a shit that they're shiny. What the hell? Anyway. Final question. It's from Normie Chomsky. To piggyback on Edge's

Devils fandom, do you guys have a second team you cheer for? I think Adams is Tampa. Or is it Nashville? Tampa. Tampa. Do you root for them? Yeah. Were you happy when they won the Cup?

It was like that with Calgary, too. It was like 2A and 2B. Calgary was the first hockey game I think I ever saw. Tamaratchi was in that. And my grandfather was obviously was there the whole time and was a flame season ticket holder. And, you know, I obviously lived in Calgary for a couple of years, loved it. I think, yeah, but I think it's Tampa.

And just because, like, it's such a great experience when you go see things at Amelie. Like, you can go to a Tiki Hut bar before a playoff game. Like it's pretty, pretty awesome for a Canadian to walk down there. And there are so many kids. I mean, that was the place where I swear I saw David Steckel's dad. I know. Cause you saw a Steckel Jersey.

Cause I saw a leaf Jersey with Steckel on it at a Nashville or Nashville Tampa game. I'm like, that's Dave Steckel's dad because he's old enough to be number one, number two, no one's buying a Steckel Jersey. What? And for sure was Steckel's dad. I got to find out where Dave Steckel's from. oh my god well he could be from anywhere and his parents just living in tampa you know like

you imagine and be like wow i really like that's my face off king dave steckle i knew it milwaukee wisconsin really no yeah whatever people people retired to florida from all over so i think it i i love tampa i think it's a great city lots of cool places to eat and and uh doesn't get the credit it deserves so that's my second team i do not have a second team but i did have a second team uh well i really really got behind the calgary flames when they were in the cup final in oh that's that's why they lost um and also jerome again law obviously and the the the stormy jerseys the the with the with the with the black and the horse some people hate those i think they're friggin cool they're cool but my my only true second team when i was younger was the detroit

red wings uh because of it started with chris draper um because he was from the same neighborhood he visited my school and everything draper's brother yes but it was it was the story that followed them because i my introduction to the abs wings rivalry was everybody else's but it started with a guy who my teacher was already like instilling in us like this this guy is achieving and he came from this neighborhood and then he gets hit from behind by claude lemieux so now i hate claude lemieux and i hate the avalanche and then they win the true sign of a good heel is they win they have to win they have to win and then next year uh blood feud happens the huge brawl i was so into that and i was cheering for the red wings then they win the cup

and i'm cheering for the red wings the tragedy happens with the big car accident vladimir constantino i was in a wheelchair and i'm cheering for the red wings i'm cheering for win it for vladi i think i still have the newspaper that i bought at sugar plaza adam um and uh yeah no i love the red wings i wore red wings hats i had the championship hat and everything i still do um i used to love the red wings there you go yeah it helps when team wins the cups i remember staying up for number two uh when they swept the caps uh and that was the first time my parents let me stay up on my own and expected me to turn off the tv shut off the lights and go to bed by myself i i still remember clear as day game four uh there's a fan in the

stands um and he's holding up a sign that says we remember the 1942 leafs and i had to ask my dad what the hell that meant oh that's funny yeah because they were the they were the first and only team to come back from three nothing down in the stanley cup final see the least used to be the team coming back you see yeah stupid yeah and that and you know the coach of the caps adam who who lost never heard of final ron wilson never heard of him never never peter bond let's run fire that playoff by the way holy shit they were good and only the goalie was good it was good it's very good very very good until the end but i like the end the end the end sucked because the trap robbie fatoric and the new jersey devil

trap era was the worst through you new jersey yeah but the leafs like did well so i looked past it for a while true good point all right any more questions jess no i'm good all right well listen with thanks to katie straying for for sharing your time uh what an unbelievable article and thank you so much for listening and of course we will be back on monday you guys so be ready for that um the leafs to obviously have the game tonight against ottawa quickly jesse steve will freddie anderson start tonight in three two one no wow you guys both think hutch is in shelton keith has not committed yet will not say publicly so we'll see uh and then we obviously got the montreal canadians game to obsess about on monday because that is happening on saturday

night again super duper you know what i do love this season there's some pretty damn good matchups there's a lot of stuff that we didn't get to get to with apologies to florida panthers fans and their jekyll and hyde goaltending the chicago blackhawks i wanted to get to today who honestly who are doing well question mark remember i was like oh they got no goalie i was looking at the wrong goalie oh uh dog armstrong talking about team kenneth listen these will all be stories next week that we will get to on the steve dangle podcast and we will see you monday the steve dangle podcast follow the guys on twitter at steve underscore dangle at adam w y l d e and at jesse blake connection complete

Thank you.