The Steve Dangle Podcast - Elbows | June 30, 2021

Episode Date: June 30, 2021

On this episode, of The Steve Dangle Podcast, the Montreal Canadiens drop game one to the Tampa Bay Lightning (00:00), Gary Bettman and Bill Daly speak to the media (15:00), the NHL Awards are handed out last night (25:00), Simmonds re-signs with the Leafs (43:00), do you bring back Frederik Andersen (49:00), we have to keep the pressure on the Blackhawks (1:01:00), ESPN announces its full lineup (1:04:00), the NHL signs Josh Richards (1:12:00), and Farmer's Only returns! (1:26:00). Originally aired: June 30, 2021 Watch the full episode here: https://youtu.be/QbKacSaFTqc Visit https://sdpn.ca for merch and more. We've joined The Athletic and you can too! Hit the link to subscribe: https://theathletic.com/sdp Visit this episode's sponsors: https://www.betterhelp.com/sdp https://ca.manscaped.com/ https://betmgm.com/dangle 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

for the first time since game four of these playoffs the montreal canadians looked like how we thought the montreal canadians would look and we let them off the hook and we let them off the hook don't forget they lost uh they got demolished by vegas in their first game i I think it was 4-1. That's true. Fine. But this is 5-1. It's different.

Yeah. Bigger. Numbers much bigger. Completely different. Huge. So, like, what did we say about that? Did Tampa Bay just beat Tampa Bay? Oh, they certainly beat Tampa Bay,

but I don't think the beatdown was as pronounced as it was on the scoreboard. Although the third period, Tampa did seem to find another gear and go, all right, that's enough of this nonsense, because after the 2-0 lead, Montreal gets one, and I thought they mounted some pressure. There was that Shea Weber partial break. How did they get a 2-on-1 with the two guys with busted hands?

Brendan Gallagher to Shea Weber. I don't get it, but it's true. Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow. I know. It's like the worst possible 2-on-1 that team could have had, but they got it. It was a scoring chance, and they come pretty close to tying it, and Tampa just said, nope, nope, that's enough.

From the moment the puck dropped in that game, it it's nothing against Montreal it's just everything we said last episode they have not played a team this good yeah well and pretty tough to play a team as good as Tampa like of course one team as good as Tampa they're the reigning champions they're literally the team to beat I thought I thought through the first seven or eight minutes it was pretty like back and forth even the shots were even uh Montreal looked like they had some good forechecking pressure although I mean listen the balance was in in the favor of Tampa but what I thought was interesting was the body language after that first goal went in and it was there was it like

because you felt like Montreal to that point was really in it and then as soon as that goal goes in they shoot a couple Montreal players faces and it did seem they seemed like oh no because you know they're going to have trouble scoring goals already they know that was there a player in particular I don't remember specifically no because I you know I have terrible memory with that sort of thing because there was for me okay please carrie price interesting cernak got that goal and it was just like he just sort of stood there he did that like uh maggie simpson in a snowsuit uh just uh starfish thing and he was just sort of you could tell there was a moment where he's like oh the leafs didn't do that shit the jets didn't do that vegas didn't even do that

Like it's, it was a lot taking a hit to make a play and Cernak off the rush. Like, like you talk about all the guys you're worried about scoring on you. Like Cernak's probably not at the top of the list when it comes to Tampa. I don't even know if he cracks the top 10 and he flies in there. Uh, they're a different team, man. That's a different beast. I, uh, Montreal showed enough in that first game, particularly in the first have to you know they they prove they can hang boy i don't know how you win four to seven against

this bunch yeah especially when tampa's at home because for me on the ice the game was lost with the uh with the line matching especially with toffoli and suzuki and caulfield because the plot um point and kucherov line there were three nothing in goals like they were the responsible for three goals against that specific line and that's just great coaching on john cooper's part And Luke Richardson and cameraman Jeff Ducharme, when he comes back, they're going to struggle in any game in Tampa just because John Cooper is going to send that line out each time as he did in game one against that other line. And if it's three nothing in the first game, like who knows how much of that's going to pile on through games two and then five and seven. You know, to that point, Jesse, I was wondering about the the line matches when they get back to Montreal. all by the way it looks like from what i'm hearing it's looking like they're going to get 10 000

people into bell uh the bell center which is cool and full crowd tonight in tampa no restrictions on any seats amazing that's great progress um i think uh i think what the the thing is is though like if you're a montreal head coach and i'm not sure if it's ducharme or richardson at this point what do you do even at home like you obviously line match somebody but okay so you line match Brayden Point and Nikita Kucherov then and then look right look what else you know and that's that's gonna be that's gonna be a real challenge I thought there was one player on Montreal that I thought had it going in the first at least and and obviously scored a goal was Josh Anderson like that he was good although I mean everybody was making a big deal about all the hits that

he threw like three out of five threw him right out of the play like completely made him absolutely they're even showing it at the intermission like look at all the hits he's thrown I'm like yes but the puck is three lines away I'm not sure that's not adding value but he did have the attitude the force the you saw how tall he was there's when Josh Anderson's on you feel how big he is he's like Eric Lindros NHL 99 just the the best thing he did physically was uh the Habs only goal he took Mikhail Sergeyev who's not small and he just went my net yes this belongs to me now and that has to be the Habs game plan for game two they gotta crash the net and they gotta move bodies Ben Chirot also I thought was great for the Canadians he had a post it and then it was

his slapper that was the the goal for the Canadians there off the uh off the bounce and he had a couple nice hits like crushed they look good gotta be smarter uh smarter against Nikita Kucherov when Nikita's selling a call though yeah well uh that was that butt in fake to this I mean Nikita had a couple but the one where it looked like Sherrod hit him right in the face and he went down play after it was like yeah missed him did you see that Steve uh man you know I you were on the screen I know so the first the first penalty the Canadians took was Sherrod right and there was the he had pushed Nikita Kucherov and Kucherov sort of ducked down and was like hit me right here and then didn't and then Sherrod didn't even hit him but Kucherov

went down down as though he had and it was a i mean it was a good sales pitch it was it was but he whiffed like he didn't hit him at all he didn't went down it was yeah you know nothing nothing gets by habs fans so let's see if i can find it on twitter here yeah it's actually spectacular uh if you were if you're a habs fan and you had kucherov on your team and he did that to another team you'd be thrilled i mean it's a it's a good it's a good move well and then and then the slash from Weber, which absolutely was a penalty and then later became a fine, doesn't get

called. So maybe even on that front. Yeah, there's your makeup call from the refs because they don't do makeup calls. No, Jesse, you can't call it that or they get kicked out. We retire them if they do that. Also, Gallagher's head getting smashed into the ice.

Maybe you should leave the game for a little bit. You got your head smashed into solid ice. I couldn't believe he got up. Okay, so so here's my question did he get was there concussion protocol enacted at that point he was on the bench the whole time as far as i know on the venture so that's that's the thing for me like of course the player's gonna stay if you're the player you're gonna stay but the nhl is not gonna no adam it's the stanley cup finals concussions don't matter it's not it seemed odd

does it not seem odd to you yeah it was sketchy as hell in the moment because even even initially when he was on the ground I didn't think he was going to get up he was all he was all like keeled over and then the ref comes over to him and then he gets up on his own powers I'm skating over the bench and like at that moment you probably take away that power from him and you send him off to a room so it's Gallagher

fighting with Mikhail Sergeyev who got the penalty who was involved a lot by the way oh yeah somebody on Tampa who was completely out of the play Blake Coleman for removing Gallagher's helmet the judo flip was fine the judo flip is totally fine face washing is fine you can't take the guy's

helmet off bro yeah that's wrong no which which i do agree but the rest it's just funny to me that they were like listen what caused this was the lack of helmet i i think i think what's interesting though is it's one of the most black and white calls you can make as a ref that is an instant penalty adam best officials in the world best okay okay all right we'll talk about that press conference i know but like i'll i mean i'll give the refs this there is so much gray area in the nhl for calling penalties and what you should call what you shouldn't call and how the game changes from from regular season playoffs the helmet off penalty is an easy one it's like puck over glass it's an automatic i i know what to do there that's easy there's a

penalty rule book is gray area like slashing doesn't exist in some instances you can't you can cross check guys in certain areas of the ice but you can't in the others you know hooking only applies when it's egregious like you know what is ruined hockey not ruined hockey for me but i notice it all the time and it bothers me and now it's going to bother you is apparently you're not allowed to shove a guy offside so like let's say there's a guy straddling the line and players shove him so that he's offside sorry you gotta leave him yeah you gotta leave well i mean i suppose you could make contact well no if he doesn't have the puck no you bloody can't and what you certainly can't do is shove him offside you're not allowed to do that

and i see it every game every game now several times a game never seen that penalty called in my entire life i'm starting to think i was lied to and it's just fine you're allowed to do it It's just fine. I've never seen it called. Or there's a lot of, you know, you sort of stumble into a guy. I didn't mean to. I stumbled on that. We play a sport on ice, and I just knocked him offside.

Sorry about that. Sorry about that. Are the picks also illegal? Like, you're not allowed to set, like, a pick for a guy? Yeah, it's interference, right? But guys set imaginary picks all the time where you just kind of skate around somebody, and it cuts off the defender.

That was a big thing in the 2019 series, Lee Spruins. chara used to very not subtly do that and then lay a hit so like that's just a hit guys like you it's a late it's interference is what it is and eventually they called it and we were all like there's no way to at least fuck this up and then they did but you know what for a while it looked pretty good it looked for a while it looked pretty good you are you're there's again no one's asking you to completely rewrite the sport we're just asking you to call the really bad stuff yeah yeah So here's the thing, and we can base this on nothing at all except for game one, I guess, because we have to move very quickly today with all the topics ahead of us.

What do you see tonight, guys? More of the same. Habs come out tighter. What is it? The Habs are usually great in game two. That's where they usually – I think it was Anderson who said in his postgame they usually watch game one, and they usually fall behind because of that. and then game two they come out and they play a lot harder so i think i think you see a really

tight game tonight but i'm still gonna take tampa yeah tampa man the one thing you saw the montreal's penalty kill had not seen a beast like tampa's power play let god they just cut through defenses like butter with their passes um i still think it's it's tampa's game to lose it's tampa series to lose you're gonna have a hell of a time beating them at home but it's gonna be way way way tighter i think from both teams i thought the habs got a lot of got a lot of chances probably more than john cooper would have preferred um but tampa tampa just got way too many it seemed like every save price made was amazing i think the habs got to get one and i think they're and i i said they're going seven but i think they got to get one and i think they're going to get it they got to get it

tonight if they don't we're looking at a sweep like i feel like you you get you let tampa get rolling you're in trouble huge huge huge trouble to steal a line from adam wild if if they win tonight if tampa wins tonight it's over i i think i think it is i honestly it's they just looked that much better that's all that's all i gotta say could be wrong now uh let's move on because we got a lot to get to steve did you want to say something about brain point quickly or do we want to move on uh yes no okay so i had a mini rant that i was going to do on twitter and decided uh better of it so the tampa bay lightning they get braden point because they're geniuses geniuses that they did not pass on five foot ten 183 pound dirty lying braden point

you're neither of those things and his draft year he was probably much smaller than that maybe that's what he is now tampa bay lightning such a good drafting team right they're so good so so good so smart in 2014 their seventh rounder has not played in the nhl they had a sixth rounder has not played in the nhl their fourth rounder was a guy named ben thomas he played five games this season those are his only nhl games they had two second rounders jonathan mcleod never heard of him hasn't played in the nhl dominic mason masson i have heard of him has never played in the nhl their first round pick from that year 19th overall tony d'angelo who is tony d'angelo and in the third round 79th overall brayden point they lucked into brayden point they fell

ass backwards into brayden point they got brayden point to spite themselves and i hate it the nhl allowed this to happen someone was eventually gonna pick them a broken clock is right twice a day and they nailed it on this one and i will never forgive the rest of the league never never they've done well finding guys in the late rounds but like even even 2015 right you get a guy like anthony sorelli third round again 72nd if tampa has a pick in the 70s oh they're gonna nail it they had two second rounders that year mitchell stevens 45 games matthew spencer hasn't played first third rounder that draft dennis yan hasn't played anthony friggin sorelli some guy i've never heard of followed by matthew joseph that's good

and then nothing nothing nothing i hate it i hate that the national hockey league allowed tampa bay to luck into braden point they did i'm i give them no credit none none braden point according to most bloggers was a first rounder and they're like okay and they got him in the 79th i'll never forgive the rest of the league for this i'll never forgive them done did you like that well in keeping with your happy mood let's bring up gary betman and bill daly um now you see this was a half an hour press conference of lawyer speak which okay so we find out that uh that the olympic schedule they're not exactly thrilled about the fact that the olympic games are going to be in beijing and uh we've got a worldwide pandemic and you can

understand why they would think that and i get that point so the schedule they asked does the schedule include the olympics and at this point they said we don't know we don't know okay i can see them not wanting to commit to that they know they know but but i can see them not wanting to commit publicly to that here's where they got me okay this is probably five or six questions in from the amazing and friend of the show katie string uh from the athletic questions them and says hey guys when did you find out about the chicago blackhawks allegations by the way of the five questions one of them's about the olympics the other ones are about the blackhawks i think it was six of the first seven were about the black do you have it jess and cj by the way uh

let off the conversation so shout out the fourth member of the show who initially uh started all the blackhawks discussion sdp and notable it's so the uh so katie asks so when did you find out where and when and bill day and gary bevin goes well this seems like it's a question for bill daly and to paraphrase bill daly he goes well i can't tell you when all i can tell you it was fairly recently you couldn't have told me that there gare and and uh i can also tell you that it was the black hawks legal council and that was it that's all we know so fairly recently has to mean what could fairly recently even mean we don't know that's the point it has to mean before these filings were made right because you have to give the other party the heads up i believe

that you are filing this against them depending on what you're talking about you could refer to 20 years ago is fairly recently yeah you can refer to five years ago three what's the cutoff i don't know yeah we're talking about human development 20 years is fairly recently it's fairly recently you know how many like like ancient civilization scientists are listening going hell yes that's that's a good one now skip over all the hockey talk and get to history corner now talk about mesopotamia no i uh i i hated every answer they gave and deliciously like if if you had to encapsulate bill daly like in a gif um when they announced mark lazarus's name he did what i did but in reverse when i heard mark lazarus's name i went all right

that's the chicago writer they're going to continue grilling them on the blackhawks and bill daly goes all right he's a blackhawks writer so i'm gonna on camera go yeah i got a lot of faith that they're gonna handle this well that they're acting like a third grader getting assigned homework yeah no they're gonna handle this really well who doesn't trust gary bettman and bill daly come on come on now national hockey league best hockey league in the world come on they did they were talking about you know all they did was name all the stuff that we did in the last episode they're like yeah we've uh and that the blackhawks retained something in jenner whatever the uh the

law firm that we mentioned on the last episode and they're uh they're a law firm that's basically what they're like and that's what they do it's like genuinely taxing individuals taxing that's why they get paid what they get paid though remember that yeah that's why they've been in power as long as they've been in power their job is to piss you off so that the owners don't piss you off the owners have business interests elsewhere and they don't want to be in front of the camera so they elect gary batman and they pay him at eight million dollars a year you know i i would say they pay him just a just a hair above william nylander for uh for press conferences like that and listen eight million sounds great but you wouldn't want to be gary

batman for eight million bucks would you it's a shitty job that's a shitty job imagine having to regularly call eugene melnick to calm him down i don't think so not not for me thank you very much he's been doing it since the early 90s can't be that bad some people are meant to be uh it ain't me that'd be like somebody listen there's people that have been that went to you know that actually signed up to be leaders of countries fuck that why would anyone who would ever want to do that no terrible job um so anyway long story short i think this is what these guys do i'm not totally surprised by it uh but they did say something interesting about women's hockey and this is something that, uh, we've talked about with Haley Salvian before. Um, basically that, you know,

somebody said like, where, where are we at with that? Cause you had mentioned that you wanted to play a role in this and Gary Bettman to his credit said, well, we'll play a role in as far as we're invited to play a role. Right. But at the same time, and I think he correctly stated it would be better if both sides got on the same page. Now I I'm curious about what's going on behind the scenes with the pwhpa and the nwhl i wonder if either side feels like they've made progress and if they do then there's no reason for them to give up what they're doing but if they feel like hey we're not making any progress here i think we may see progress between both sides and i don't imagine that the union between the two or the at least the agreement between the two is going to

be perfect in the future. But I would say that, and I don't think it's hard to imagine why, that these two organizations somehow finding some common ground and then getting it started with the NHL is going to be the path forward. We just don't know what that looks like yet. Is that fair? There's going to be a day in the future where we're going to sit here and we're going to talk about how the nwh uh l and the pwhpa came together and they formed one league and there's going to be one league where all of the best uh women's hockey players in the world play that's going to be the get paid a livable wage too and they get paid a substantial amount more than a low a little right because that's what they deserve because they're going to be professional

athletes going to be playing on the biggest stage and there's going to be one league where all of the best women's players play and we just have to get from now to that point because that's the an admirable conclusion for this whole thing and we're not there yet and clearly by betman's uh statement and his comments on it uh it's not it's not that maybe they're not close but there's still work to be done but that's that's the end result of this whole thing and we're just kind of waiting uh for the two parties to come together and the right right pieces to be in place for that world for those worlds to collide and that one great league to be made the one thing the nhl has always maintained that is no matter what they're not going to go compete with another women's

hockey league meaning that they're not going to start one when one already exists that's what they've said they could change but that is what they've said in the past and i you could see why they don't want to go in first off it divides your market right you can you divide you subdivide a market hockey is a niche sport as it is women's hockey needs to be developed properly and if you have competition in that arena it can cause a lot of issues beyond that you look like life coming in crushing david like you literally it's like a steamroller it's not it's they're not equal playing fields and the nhl doesn't want to be seen to be crushing another league so i'm curious with with betman saying that i'm not sure it changes anything but it did make me wonder if

there had been a fairly recent conversation between the three parties the nhl the pwhpa and the nwhl maybe not directly with each other but i'm curious if is the one thing i wanted to know is has anybody sat at the table together yet or sat on a zoom call together yet just to see is there anything common here because i don't know for sure because we're because if there is that's real progress i'm sure if you get them in the same room i'm sure there's got to be something where we that there's enough there between all three that we can figure this out i don't i don't know if uh they've had something like really formal like a summit or a barbecue meeting i don't know if they've had anything like that but publicly like at least you know sort of

scouring twitter and how everyone's interacting there does seem to be more friendliness between the two parties than than there perhaps has ever been and you'll always get you know people on you know the nwhl side or the pwhpa side who go oh i have i have friends over there and i have friends over here and we've always been friends and it's no problem we're just doing it two different ways and they can say that publicly but i know what i've heard i've known what i've seen i know what i've read i know i i just know um there has been animosity but i i thought i thought the comment was interesting from gary because uh it seems like they're getting along better than they have in quite some time and his progress and i and i wish that had been highlighted but it's not

like maybe he doesn't want to start anything and then he doesn't go back that's the thing right that's the thing so if it was a non-lawyer speaking perhaps they would highlight the fact that hey nwhl has taken some amazing strides pwhpa both you know have adapted during tough times and and have uh you know bolstered a robust business model and they're incredibly talented and this and that and that but you know i hope they get along that's all he can muster unfortunately and maybe that's all he can concretely say and maybe there's something high level i just made me hopeful is that weird no i thought okay well like he's saying it so that means he said it to them which means everybody knows sort of what has to happen here he was i just yeah i know it was

good. I thought the questions asked were very good at that press conference. Two in five Canadians will hear the words, you have cancer. That's why every step and dollar raised matters. On September 19th, join thousands in Toronto for the Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation Walk. Challenge yourself, friends, and family to walk 21 kilometers in support of life-saving research. Together, we can carry the fire and help create a world free from the fear of cancer. Register today at pmcfwalk.ca. 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. Don't miss the new season of North of North starting September 8th on CBC Gem. As I have to move us forward as quickly as I possibly can here, Jesse has valiantly offered to step forward as tribute. and he is going to explain to you why mark andre flurry got the oscar in the revenant

so jesse can you explain your thoughts on mark andre flurry and his vesna trophy win this season announced yesterday well last night uh there's probably only two stories that came out of the nhl awards conor mcdavid is the first unanimous uh heart trophy winner since wayne gretzky and then uh mark andre flurry wins the vesna over andre vasilevsky which uh as adam reference is exactly like the leo's leonardo dicaprio's revenant win uh in the 2015 oscars because it wasn't it wasn't that he won for his best performance or that even he was the most deserving that year or even the movie was good or even the movie was good you know um but it was more of a lifetime achievement award yeah and especially when we uh when we look at the stats

this year uh the basic numbers 31 10 and 1 for vasilevsky 26 and 10 for flory uh shutouts were 6 5 for flory there you go a safe percentage flory got it in 928 vasilevsky 925 but if you look at the play you look at uh goals saved above average which is essentially the war for goalie goal goalie goals uh like how many goals you saved above the baseline of zero vasilevsky was 20.96 uh flurry was only a 20.12 and then if you go to like really bad starts this is from hockey reference they do an amazing job with these advanced numbers they have this little category it's called really bad starts it's when you start a game and you finish with a safe percentage below 8.50. Vasilevsky

did it zero times this season. How many? Flory had three starts. And by the way, Martin Jones led the league with 12. Oh, my God. Martin Jones is bad. Goalie share points as well. That's the number of points

contributed by a goalie due to his play in goal. Vasilevsky was first in the league at 9.6. Flory was fifth with eight. So the numbers are very close. Are you saying that Vlasileski has the edge? The numbers are very close. And that's why Marc-Andre Fleury was able to get the Vesna this year.

But the edge that was given to him was the fact that he's 36. He hasn't won a Vesna yet. And that when he walks into the Hall of Fame on his resume is going to be a Vesna trophy. We're running out of the number of years where Marc-Andre Fleury could win a Vesna. so in this year where it's so close and the fact that there's ways to justify his victory the tie goes to the guy who's probably not going to be up for the award anytime soon again because his career is ending and the 26 year old as opposed to 36 year old loses out by a hair so here's the question then are we going to give it to the best goalie or are we going to give it

to a guy who's played really well for a long time what does the nhl want to do the award is voted on by the gms so that's i feel like that's important in this uh instance because it's not by the hockey writers or the coaches or anything it's specifically the 31 gms get the 31 votes for the award and if i think if we're being honest in this conversation i feel like they would lean to towards more the lifetime achievement award for the vesna that would go to flurry and like it's it's very indicative of the voting for the the all-star teams that came out last night too, because Vasilevsky was voted to the first team all-star team.

He was the starting goalie for the starting five there. And Marc-Andre Fleury was voted to the second team, all NHL team. So I'm not, I'm not too upset about this, but the only category Jesse mentioned there, the only category you mentioned that, that Marc-Andre Fleury had the edge was shutouts.

Yeah. It was six, five. That was the only one. Yeah. And like save percentage, he was ahead by three percentage points. It was 928 to 925. And they're both on first place teams.

So I think I found the problem. What's the problem? So I'm looking at the voting, the Vesna voting. Myrtle posted it. So one, two, three, four, five. Five different goalies got a first place vote. Simeon Volomov got one. Connor Hellebutt got two.

And Philip Grubauer got two. And Grubauer was nominated. I look at the points. Fleury had 108. Vasilevsky had 99. That's actually not that far apart. Fleury had 14 first place votes. Vasilevsky had 12.

So that's pretty close too. Fleury had 11 second place votes. Vasilevsky had 12. That's pretty close. Fleury had five third place votes. And Vasilevsky's had three. Hey, that's pretty close. wait a minute 12 plus there were four gms in the national hockey league that did not have

andre vasilevsky as a top three goalie in the nhl this year i hope they're not running my team i sure as shit hope they're not running my team there was one gm in the entire nhl who didn't have flurry on their ballot assuming there were 31 i don't assume i don't think francis would have gotten a vote there were 31 votes 31 so four general managers do not think andre freaking vasilevsky was a top three goalie in the nhl that's scary okay question do we know which ones like i know lou lamorello was the one that gave simeon varlamov the first vote place vote not that he didn't deserve it but we know that that was that's a no i'm saying that but that's an islander self-vote so we we can we can knock that off the record my question is is you know like the

professional hockey writers association which posts who voted for what does the nhl post who voted for vesna no we just have the numbers we don't know which gm specifically voted that would be really telling yeah i was really curious about that uc soros received eight votes no first place he had one second and seven thirds get down to who got who's in number seven and mike smith with two third-place votes. That's an abomination. That should not happen. Why is Mike Smith

on the Vesna trophy voting? Because he started the season 9-0, Jesse. Okay. That's why. 6-0 or whatever the hell it was. It doesn't make sense. He's already got one Vesna, I believe. He was robbed

of a second one, and I feel like it just needs to be acknowledged that when Marc-Andre Fleury goes into the Hall of Fame, nobody's going to remember that the year he won his Vesna, he probably shouldn't have won it. But Vasilevsky, your trophy is waiting for you in the future.

And it's still, it's Jesse, it's not the worst Vesna of all time. What is that? Definitely not. Jesse Theodore? I've brought it up more than once. I'm going to do it again. Every now and then they just decide, you know what? We're bored of this guy winning all the time. Let's vote for

someone else 94 dominic hashek 95 dominic hashek 97 dominic hashek 98 dominic hashek 99 dominic hashek did you notice me skip a year yes that's because in 1996 they decided to give it to jim the net detective carrie who had a 906 save percentage and just a kind of good record on the washington capital he was 35 24 and 9 which is good which is good it's good it's good not 40 wins it's good what's dominic hasik jim jim carrey won a vesna in a national hockey league that had dominic hasik martin brodeur patrick waugh curtis joseph are are you are you serious ed belfor all five of those guys were playing and he won a vesna during that time it's the worst it might be the single worst

um award ever awarded on the national hockey league no jerome mcginley not getting the heart trophy in oh four so there was an argument for theodore now i don't know if these these uh you know what we'd actually be able to find this out on hockey reference but it might take too long to do it it'll take too long all right so i think hockey reference has the votes theodore had a very very very good season you know mcginla had a very very very good season but the allegation that i've heard many times uh out calgary way is there was a writer allegedly a montreal writer who left the gimla off their ballot entirely oh that's why he lost and okay that's part of the reason you've told that before probably part of the reason why we have writers who now have to

put their results out there right yeah and you know kudos uh frank cerevalli i think is the head of the the pro hockey writers association and today he tweets he's like hey here's here's the full you can check out everyone's vote everyone's vote and i i appreciated andrew berkshire's tweet did you see that one well okay yes it was bob ross athletic was talking about how there was an anti-penguins bias that Crosby wasn't going to win the heart show now I don't know that Rob I don't think Rob got a vote this year did he get a vote I I mean every member of that organization puts it in their bio let me say let me see keep going anyway long story short uh the heart trophy voting obviously unanimously McDavid because of course it was um even the

Pittsburgh writers were on board with that no one no one can doubt that by the way I just want to remind you that connor mcdavid hasn't won the heart trophy against certain people in the past and that's going to be a travesty this should have been mcdavid's third heart trophy instead it was only his second because he should have won the one that dry side of one and he should have won the one that hall won he should have won the uh calder that panarin won yes yes i don't remember the hall year the hall year was 2017 and the reason he didn't get it is new jersey made the playoffs and the edmonton oilers didn't and people use that as a legitimate argument as to why conor mcdavid was not the most valuable player to the oilers what a fucking joke that was

i think mckinnon should have won that year not mcdavid i think that's where my stance landed i thought mckinnon yeah i remember that year i remember this can eat me conor mcdavid rob rossi is not just in the phwa but he is the eastern conference rep so i'm going to assume that rob rossi did not give sydney crosby a first place vote for the heart nope can you imagine okay if you want to commit to the bit can you imagine can you imagine how great it would be today if mcdavid had 99 and crosby had the one and it was rossi rob rossi you know what i want to ask him why i want to ask him why he didn't don't you want to ask him i want to know i think we know you fight very trots because we all remember that video too ever you've internalized

hatred of Pittsburgh. Oh, man. You know, that's the problem is that Pittsburgh just does not get enough attention. We do not talk enough about how talented the Penguins are and have not for the last 15 years.

Per capita, Pittsburgh gets a ridiculous amount of attention. Yes, yes. For what is, quote unquote, a small market team, a very successful,

talented, incredible small market team. Sure. But they are a small market team in comparison to the rest of the teams in the NHL. Hey, listen, we got to move on.

Matthews and McKinnon were two and three in hard voting by the way i was actually surprised to see matthews above mckinnon but good for him great great accomplishment it's going to be tough for austin matthews to win uh anything in the conor mcdavid era you got mckinnon dry sidle for some reason i think i'm still i'm still struggling with the dry sidle over mcdavid stuff but you got mckinnon dry sidle uh mckinnon that's good sorry mckinnon dry sidle mcdavid you're gonna have a tough time winning trophies but good for him good for mckinnon at two and three the other thing is this is how mad toronto fans

are and if you're not from toronto you don't understand the self-loathing like every time we talk about this uh people like yeah at least suck we're like we fucking know man we're mad about it too we'd like to we'd like them not to suck um the leafs have extremely talented pieces mitch marner first team all-star in any other year except for this one that would be front page news people like local boy we have a local boy who's one of the top five players in the nhl first team all-star and then we have another guy top five players in the nhl he's he's top top right winger because top right winger good enough you have two centers on the first place though right close and then you got a centerman centering number two so we got it we got you know

because mcdavid's at number one always and forever stapled to that first team all-star matthews at number two on the second team all-star that's amazing two players from the same team that's incredible and no one cares no one cares here's how jaded i am um first team all-stars vasilevsky and net adam fox the norris winner and uh kale mccarr on d mcdavid marner marshand on forward second team all-stars mark andre flurry victor headman dougie hamilton austin Matthews, Mikko Rantanen, Jonathan Huberto. The second team beats the first one. You think so?

In a playoff series? Fuck yeah. Absolutely. In a playoff series, they absolutely do. They absolutely do, 100%. 100% I put money on it. I'm taking McDavid, Marner, and Marchand. That's my theory I'm taking. I think they probably have the edge in

forwards, but that defense, that's tough. I was ready on Monday before the award voting to come on here and talk about how Adam Fox got robbed for the Norris. I'm so happy he won that. I was

afraid it was going to go to Hedman the way it went to Dowdy that one year in the way that, hey, it's the name attached to it, but Adam Fox well deserved for that Norris trophy. It was awesome. Adam Herman had a good tweet and he was basically saying like a lot of that

vote had to do with pressure from Rangers Twitter like going, hey, Adam Fox, take a look at this. Take a look at this. And they hammered it every time he did something good. And he did it long enough that they voted for him. How upset are you if you're a Calgary Flames fan who've lost Adam Fox and Dougie Hamilton in consecutive years?

Well, Adam Fox, wasn't Adam Fox for nothing? Yes. I never even thought about that. The Adam Fox trade is low-key the worst move since Sod for Panarin. It's the worst move since Sod for Panarin. The New York Rangers, Jeff Gordon announced today the team has acquired defenseman Adam Fox from the Carolina Hurricanes in exchange

for their own second round pick in the 2019 entry draft and a conditional third in 2021. But then there was the trade that sent him to Carolina. Noah Hannifin and Elias Lindholm for Dougie Hamilton, Michael Furland, and Adam Fox,

who wouldn't sign there either. Because he was in college and didn't want to sign there. He wanted to go to New York. You got a number one center out of that deal, though. Because Lindholm last year was their number one center, right? I mean, if a guy doesn't want to sign with you, it kind of is what it is.

It's shitty. The mistake to me was prior to that. Why didn't you want to sign here? Is it as simple as, I want to play in Calgary? I mean, I hope not. Possibly. Could be. I mean, those university guys, that was one thing we should have maybe talked about

a little bit more when we were having that major junior discussion the other days. You have more agency. You're going to control your destiny a little better, yeah. Zach Hyman is a Leaf because of that. Yeah, he wouldn't sign in Florida. Remember when everyone's bidding for Jimmy Vesey?

And then he didn't sign with the Leafs. Hey, Jimmy, we got you in Nashville. No, you don't. And where did he end up? The Rangers! They always seem to get these kids. Well, I think, isn't Adam Fox a native New Yorker? Isn't he from there? Let me look.

I thought there was something to that. Maybe that was Shatner. Jericho, New York. Yeah, there it is. So he wanted to play in New York. So he's playing in New York, and now he's won the Norris Trophy for the Rangers. I just think, man, I mean, Carolina,

I think in the Carolina trade with New York, I think they knew that they weren't going to be able to sign Adam Fox. So it's like, okay, we'll take this asset. We also get Dougie Hamilton. We're happy to see if we can get something for it. That's second and third. Oof, my own. That's real bad.

It's not great. No, I think the Calgary trade's better. At least you got something out of that. I guess. Okay, but you lost Hamilton and Fox in the same trade. Yeah. There's going to be a conversation that we're going to have on this podcast this summer about how the Hurricanes are screwing themselves with some of these players.

Because they're apparently unwilling to shell out any money for these guys. And they could be losing a whole bunch of their UFAs this year just because they're unwilling to pay them. apparently martin nook's dad was on facebook saying my kid's done here yeah i was like oh that's a statement but i know that they're from what we've heard svechnikov was at least offered was it eight years at seven and a half so at least an rfa so they have some control there yeah but i mean it'd be interesting to see what happens in carolina we're gonna have to i i think they're one of the most fascinating franchises in the whole sport they have this crazy fan fan base that you know for years and years and years people like oh how are we going

to get people to caroline how are we going to get people at the games then then they win a cup then it's like you know cam the cam ward years where you're like oh boy we're just mediocre we're gonna keep signing cam work and then cop cam ward here but the tom dunyan years have been amazing but off the ice it's like we're gonna grind you for every goddamn dollar and it's damned if they i mean maybe this is the right tack maybe the leaf should learn a few things from this but they grind their stars they really do on you know on their rfa deal so it's very very interesting i do want to sorry go ahead well no i just i was looking at their cap friendly i'm like yes but surely they've mortgaged the future nope they have almost all their picks right i

hate my team don waddell man gm of the year every year okay he's fucking awesome um the uh uh the dude what i do want to talk about here quickly is some leafs news obviously you heard spezza resigned simmons for two years at 900 000 per season um thoughts on that you know basic kind of thoughts um uh the entire leafs organization should be paying attention to how mad everyone is like the the fact that that signing was received poorly is mind-blowing to me it's 900 grand it's isn't isn't league minimum 750 now yes it's 150 grand over minimum for wayne simmons a guy with all the over a decade of nhl experience we all agree he looked good prior to the wrist fracture which he didn't even get because of the type of rough and tumble player he is he accidentally

blocked a shot i believe from his own teammate and was it the same after but he was a spark plug those first few games yes and the team was obviously worse without him yes those first couple weeks where like they just they didn't play the same at all no and keith talked about that and bench was quieter and you talk about all the things the toronto maple leafs lack they do not need less of wayne simmons so i get some of the criticisms like well you know where does he play and and how does running the same team back make any sense he's making six hundred thousand dollars less than he did last year and coming back for two years there's no problem here it's a good deal it's a good deal and i tell you what if it's a shit deal it doesn't matter because it's just

$900,000. You can bury that. You can bury the entire thing. It's silly. So you think the Wayne Simmons deal says more about Leafs Nation than it does about Wayne or the Leafs? Well, the reception to it. No, it's he wants to play here.

You're telling me Wayne Simmons couldn't go somewhere else and get more money? It's the National Hockey League. Of course he could. Of course he could. But his priorities are he wants to play at home, and he's got an air similar to Spezzo where he feels like it's unfinished business and that's amazing and also for anyone who signed a one-year deal with

the leafs this year i like for example joe thornton it it will be a personal shame for him because he never got to play in front of a packed barn as a member of the toronto maple leafs that's a shame that is a shame that's a shame and now simmons will get to do that i don't know when but sometime in the future he'll get to do that spets has already done it he'll get to do it again uh i think that's really cool uh everyone is getting they're getting too ahead of themselves someone uh tweeted something they used my formula for um remember i did that video where i made next year's leafs out of guys who are already signed yeah so someone used that formula and they tweeted out the team and everyone's like this team is dog shit and i'm like guys there's

an entire offseason to get through first relax robertson marner on the first line patan taveras neilander mckay of spezza simmons engvall brooks anderson that's your joey andrew joey yeah and the left wing is a million dollars in cap space yeah and that he used the same thing that i did which is where we assume kerfoot will be taken by seattle the defense is virtually the same the goaltending is campbell and hutchinson what they can't have hutchinson as the backup they won't chill there there's an entire we have until october guys yeah but you was your first season you literally did this to the people but then i said over and over again you're and no that video is like 30 minutes long i watched every second of it it's about you

making a roster out of the Leafs that are currently signed. You had it on in the background. You had it on in the background then. What, were you folding laundry? Why are you getting mad at other people for doing it and reacting to the roster? I can get mad at whoever I want.

You made a whole video where you made the team and then reacted to it. Stop getting mad at other people for doing the same thing. I said they're going to, the point of this exercise is to identify weaknesses. And if you looked at the left wing and said, that's dog shit you're right that's why they're going to address it i hope that nick robertson by the way has the same season his brother had in dallas because he was on the all-rookie team

and uh jason robertson wow uh i'm i'm hoping that we get a little of that from nick and it looks like we could looks like we could right i right i just hope he has a little bit of luck like a little bit of health luck for god's sake no kidding now um one of the things we did find out from pierre lebrun of the athletic uh today other than there's a potential kale mccarr offer sheet and the abs and philly or sort of philadelphia are in yeah that i'll believe that when i see it philly and the abs are in on seth jones which isn't totally surprising um i uh i did find out we did find out too that the leafs have reached out to claude lemieux who is um frederick anderson's agent and that there is some mutual interest like would you come back and and the answer is yes

but we don't know if they'd be able to find a number i'm not gonna lie i'm shocked yeah i am too i am too so my question is and i think that's the least keeping every door open what's an acceptable amount of money to bring freddie anderson back at money in term oh boy is it two million over two years two million two million that's a huge pay cut two times two uh they know how healthy or not healthy he is right so they also know how good he can be the team you can trust the most with a freddie anderson contract is the leafs so i will say that um he is nothing but question marks at this point so if the leafs brought him back i would have confidence that they're at least correct about his health like you know say what

you want about their complete lack of success in almost everything else um they've they've had some pretty pretty good rehab projects guys who have recovered from injuries quicker than usual guys who have rehabilitated their entire careers take a tyler ennis for example so you know i i would be i'd be encouraged by that but you have this there's an excuse built into every transaction they make they're top heavy right and to have jack campbell be your starter which i think he more than proved he's capable of to have him be your starter is a situation you couldn't you couldn't ask for you couldn't ask for a better situation than having a starting a quality starting NHL goaltender for the same

price as Ilya Mikheyev at 1.65. So you're going to now bring back Freddie Anderson. You're going to force that player to be backup. I like you bring Anderson back. He's the starter right? Freddie Anderson

is a starting goaltender. Well, no, not at all. Then you don't bring him back. Well, no, that's possible. No, no, Steve. That's not true. You can say to him, listen, Jack Campbell is the starter. If Anderson is willing to split the net With Campbell, we have an agreement And if he wants to negotiate

For more than Campbell, absolutely You've had a longer career You've proven more than him But your stock took a hit You're not getting no $5 million And you're probably not going to get term I think anything longer Than three years is

Three years is the max for me Three years sounds long Can I read you something from the article? three times three is interesting but yeah sorry jesse uh it is nevertheless revealing that the conversation happened and that lemieux told the leafs that anderson is absolutely comfortable coming back and sharing the net with campbell that's from his agent that would be a wonderful situation and tell you what you want to share the net here's three million dollars i would give that three million is too much you can't afford you can't afford that i don't think you can afford

to spend five million dollars on your goaltending i don't i don't know that they can afford three million dollars for backup what if freddy goes here's here's what could be a wonderful financial decision for him what if he goes okay i spent a lot of money this season with my performance and with injury trouble no one has any freaking money anyway and no one has any cap space anyway why don't i sign in toronto for a year maybe two at a low price say two and a half all right we'll meet in the middle two and a half and then once you prove hey i can still do this you go and you're making money when the cap goes up a little or at very least if the cap stays stagnant people have you're good but if you're a good goalie there's money for you absolutely but like he's

just an enormous question mark anyone giving him term after this past season but is uh i i i that's his age all the rehab starts the rehab starts were terrifying anybody that watched those marley's games no no no no there's not an asterisk on those they were awful he wasn't ready he wasn't ready he tried it he tried to be ready for the playoffs and he wasn't ready i don't care as good as your last game i i i don't see it i don't see he's willing to split the net with jack and take a massive haircut welcome back freddie with okay and like it's at the three million dollar number it's 4.6 total on your goaltending like i think that's very reasonable when you have a team like montreal who's spending 13 million on two goals i agree with that i just think that with with the other

goaltending candidates available i think you can spend that three million better i was guys i'm i'm telling you go back and watch those marley's games yeah but who are you getting for three million dollars out of the ufa pool you're not getting group hour like why don't you and like okay like big save dave is a name i was looking at as a guy who could split the net with campbell he's not as good big save dave healthy i don't think is as good let me run down the ufa uh goalies just real quick grubauer smith reimer brian elliott well here go slower go slower go slower so start over go slower philip grubauer too much mike smith too much james reimer uh interesting brian elliott no tuka rask not going to be too much chris trigger

interesting peccary might be too much too much jonathan bernier interesting yaroslav halak interesting interesting lenis allmark very interesting probably he'll probably get too much more than three mil i'd give him four i'd spend five million if it's lenis i bet he's gonna get i think he's gonna get five so then it's six six point six on your goalie's total that's not bad that's not bad all mark though all mark in a bunch of those names they're not signing to split the net with jack campbell and i don't think making jack campbell your backup again makes any sense i i think you can i think it's more i think they're going to be chasing dollars i think you can save them listen do you want to make this money or not yeah but if you if you give nobody's

got the money to sign you what do you want to do if you give all mark let's say five million bucks though he's coming in assuming he's going to be your starter no you have the conversation you have to earn that but no what the i'm a unrestricted free agent i don't have to earn shit i'll go somewhere else then go play in buffalo again enjoy yourself okay well i'm not going to go to buffalo and if i do i'm gonna take all the money from them i'm gonna go somewhere else and i'm gonna be their starter okay that's how unrestricted free agency works like the if if i'm one of the top guys i have the position of power here you're not telling me how this is gonna be if you tell me how it's gonna be then i don't sign with you okay oh you're gonna split the

net with jack campbell what the do you want did you see how good i was on the goddamn sabers and what i would say is did you see how good jack campbell was yeah right sounds like you got a goalie already sounds like you got a good goalie already why don't you play him well why don't you play why don't you play 35 games and we'll see where that gets us no okay you gotta remember you're dealing you're pretty good you're negotiating with someone who's you're assuming that this is going to be a huge buying market which you've said on previous shows it's not No, but the top guys get money. Linus Olmark is not a top guy.

He's one of the top free agents this offseason. He was the only goalie when I was running down the list, and there's four more on the list I wanted to give you guys, but he was the only one that sparked your ears. So that's interesting. Okay. And the last couple were Laurent Brassois, Peter Morazic,

Devin Dubes, and Antti Ranta. that's interesting and then the next pool is like the Rittich and the McElhinney can you keep Antti Ranta healthy that's my key well there's a guy you could sign for value if you wanted to up like if let's say you're going you're doing a big press for a big defenseman the Leafs could do that and they go try to get Dougie Hamilton he's like I got a million and a half bucks to spend okay Antti come here we've got a great medical staff kick some ass in Toronto and go make your money in free agency next year i i promise this is related to the goalie conversation

the the having so much money wrapped up in three guys i'm leaving nylander out of the conversation having so much money wrapped up in three guys you leave so much up to luck john tavarez getting hurt was bad luck but it bad luck happens it's hockey so there's some bad luck also if you want to go cheap in net you're relying on luck jack campbell's a little bit of luck i'm sure it was due diligence but i i don't think anybody knew he was this good you thought he was going to win 11 straight games are you sure no nobody thought that nobody thought that right so now you want to sign another guy to like you know let's say it's ranta so you're relying on you're going to be the team after over half a decade he's finally

this is where he's going to be healthy you know what i mean well that's why you say to him 30 games you get 30 games ranta oh boy and now you're giving 50 to campbell which is fine i hope so at a certain point you gotta you you do have to take a risk and the least have to decide where their money's gonna go you can't have it all right montreal decided we're the goalie team we got goalies Leafs decided two seasons ago we're the forwards team we got forwards so you do have to find you have to find value somewhere else Jack Campbell gives you a lot of value for the contract he does you need to figure out what to do with that defense to make it even better than it was last year and it was very very good it was much better much improved and then and then you got

to find some value in goaltending I don't think going out and here's the thing Linus Olmark to me is i mean maybe he gets obnoxious money fine but you got to find value buys lena's old mark to me is a four or five million dollar goalie that you're like okay you split the net with campbell fine that's that's worth it they get them yes a hundred percent but if if not then you have to go after guys like ranta because you can't go and spend three million dollars end term on a guy like freddie anderson you just cannot do that or you sign a guy you sign a guy knowing you're going to lose jack hamill next year yeah well then it's lena zolmark or freddie for five years or freddie i i cannot say i i i cannot wait to see how kyle duvis gets me re-excited about this

team it's got some work to do because even the good scenarios lead to bad scenarios like oh we get a good goalie we lose jack hamill like give me something man give me a reason give me a reason for the love of god we have got to quickly mention a couple things here first off rick westhead tweeted this yesterday why does it matter that the nhl pledges to ensure the unredacted findings of an investigation into the blackhawks are into blackhawks management or public people move on and public pressure fades he's right you need to hold leagues accountable for promises like 2019 nhl player or nhl pledge for a new abuse hotline for players a source close to a key value told me today that some 18 months later, they are still waiting for the results of the NHL's

investigation into his racial abuse and career derailment. Now, beyond that, and this is crazy, there was another, this is, I'm just bringing up the tweets here, so excuse me for a second. Ben Maciles, you guys, I don't even know if I'm pronouncing his name right. He said, I can confirm this is true. The NHL attorney generals told me they were completing the investigation over a year ago and have been non-responsive since that time they haven't even scheduled interviews with key witnesses we've told them about very disappointing conduct so this blackhawks thing you do if you're in a pr situation that's a nightmare like the nhl and the blackhawks are right now play for time playing for time is the best uh pr strategy here because

at the end of the day we all love hockey and uh we like hockey and we want to watch hockey and so public pressure on these things does fade the only reason the black hawks hired anyone is because of public pressure in the first place so if you take as long as you possibly can people sort of forget about it even in the days of twitter and facebook and instagram tiktok all of it so don't be surprised if they play for time on this one just throwing that out there it's important games always take over every every news cycle right when it when it comes to sports and i think the blackhawks are just trying to make it to i would say american thanksgiving that's that's where they're trying to make it it's up to the public

like i'm unfortunately it's up to the public i i like i have i have the utmost respect for the people who cover the sport and you know you saw some of the people who were on that press conference with bill daly and gary betman but titans titans of hockey journalism but are six out of the first seven questions in that press conference about the blackhawks if it's not for public pressure pressure i don't know are any of them i don't know good question it's a very i so we got to keep this up we do um and lastly espn has announced their announced staff uh notable names include uh steve your co-worker cassie campbell paschal as well as to nobody's surprise ray ferraro as well and uh no i'm joking and then longtime friends of the show uh greg wushinsky

is also but he's been a part of espn's hockey coverage for a long long time now keep his job yeah so there's uh i mean he's still there yay so often in this business it's uh well i have a sad tweet to say uh rick ricky pietro will be on on this hillary knight will be a part of this emily caplan who is already with espn leah hextall who was a former sports net uh former player brian boucher ryan callahan um there's some really interesting names here and And the name that we do definitely need to talk about is Mark Messier. Gretzky got TNT, Messier, ESPN. What is the best cookie shop in Bristol, Connecticut?

That's a good question. Because we need to know and we need to order him cookies from that cookie shop and ask him to take a picture with those cookies above his head. Listen, I'm interested because ESPN and TNT,