The Steve Dangle Podcast - The Steve Dangle Podcast - Apr 11, 2017 - PLAYOFFS

Episode Date: April 11, 2017

On this episode, ALLLLLL things playoffs, pink slip Monday, and a surprise call from Mrs. Dangle. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Panago Pizza presents S.T.P. The Steve Dangle Podcast with your hosts, Steve Dangle and Adam Wilde. Gentlemen. Adam. Happy Clinchmas! And happy Clinchmas to all the teams. All 16 NHL teams. No, no, no.

All 16 NHL teams that matter. And remember, if your team didn't make it, you don't matter Welcome to the not matterville We've lived there for a while There's 17 teams in the league that don't matter That's right, there's 15 playoff teams that matter 15 And 14 non-playoff teams

Are you counting the Vegas's? Oh no, no, I'm talking about the Leafs Because they're swept, guys, they're swept They're going to lose in three, haven't you heard? Haven't you heard that the Leafs Have already lost to the Washington Capitals? Haven't you heard? Well, if anybody's Steve Dangle podcast NHL bracket challenge is done, you can actually predict that happening.

Right this very second. Jesse, can you send me that link, by the way? Because I want to open it later in the online portion of the show. I'm going to do that because I'm chilling with you guys until Mrs. Dangle gets downtown. Because we're going to the Jays game. Home opener. Remember when she bought all those tickets you didn't know? So, yeah, how many tickets to the Blue Jays do you have this year?

It's very unfortunate. She tripped, fell, and bought 30 tickets. So she bought 15 pairs of tickets Wow If the average ticket cost Is $50 Oh I don't want to talk about it 50 times 30

If that's the average No no no No No no no No No But it was more Where are you sitting?

It was three times as much as I thought it would cost Where are we sitting? Because you had three times as many tickets As you probably thought you were going to get Five games is okay Well she said she was Hey do you mind if I buy a flex pack? And I'm like go ahead

because I thought she meant 10 tickets because I bought a FlexPak in the past and it was 10 tickets. They're like six-game FlexPaks. And then I see, yeah, it was like, I think it was like $650 for 12 pairs of tickets. Whoa. And I remember looking at my credit card

and going, what? What is this? I think my credit card got stolen. Yeah, by my wife. And then she bought three more pairs of tickets on top of that. Why? Because she's crazy.

You know what the worst part about this is? I have said a couple times to Steve and SL And then disappointed myself After saying this I've said, you know, we should all Podcast family, we should go to a Jays game But we can't now Because they have so many tickets

And they're sitting by themselves It's just the two of them We can't sit with them Oh, weird, Adam Did Mrs. Dangle make an error In her impulsive thinking? Did she weirdly make a decision

with you guys this year because you've got 30 effing tickets. Did she make a decision without comprehending the consequences? The conversation I had with her the other day

is I get so frustrated when she makes crazy decisions like these and other ones that we won't get into. Like getting a second dog? Yeah, okay, there it is.

She wants a second dog. And so I logically went through why that's not the greatest idea. Right. Not the greatest idea. And I just,

like I had to sit her down and I go, listen, It is so well documented You are the smartest member of this two person marriage Right So when you get crazy like this It's scary for me as the dumb one

Right Because I'm alone I'm alone I am the logical one And you're the non-functioning one And it's not a great way for the marriage to be I like She's smart, I'm dumb

She goes Steve that's dumb And explains and I go dope you're right So, you're being cast in a role that you're uncomfortable with in this particular instance. Yeah. Okay. It's like asking Roman Polak to be first line center. Right. Right.

Here you go. I mean, he'll do it. So, you're saying Mrs. Dangle's playing Randy Carlisle hockey? A little bit. Wow. A little bit. Yeah. Mrs. Dangle has a theory about concussions.

Which is they don't exist. She's had a concussion. Hey, what did he say? I heard that reference the other day. What was the theory about concussions? What was that comment? His theory, if I remember correct, and maybe you can look up the quote, was helmets, your head gets hot wearing a helmet, and that causes your brain to expand.

So helmets cause concussions, Adam. Wow. Use Coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs. I'm actually sort of surprised that that did not get more play. Yeah, me too. It's weird. Every now and then, someone says something so crazy that it doesn't get much play because the journalists are like, I'm going to

leave that alone. Maybe he didn't mean it that way. Maybe he was kidding and I didn't interpret that. I'm just going to leave it alone. Yeah, that was nuts. We're going to go through today and I'm going to get back to doing this a little bit more. I'm going to outline the show, what we're

doing. We're going to go through all the playoff series quickly. Obviously, we're going to focus on the Leafs and Caps a bit because we're a Leafs podcast, but we're also going to go through the rest of the series. the series that matter less, you might say. Oh, 100% less. We're going to talk about Black Monday in the NHL.

Pink Slip Monday. Yeah. Wow. Lots of stuff there. That's crazy. Man, half of my show outline was deleted. I don't know how that happened. Oh, that's good.

So that's fun. Wow, what happened? Are you serious? Yeah. Oh, no. Oh, that sucks because I spent three hours last night prepping the show. That's fantastic. That's okay, though.

I know all my last couple links where it's going to be fun. Okay, good. We're going to live. We're going to live. So we'll start with the Leafs and Caps. Yes. Leafs and Caps, which, you know, I think it was Bobby Cappuccino on Twitter who wrote an entire article about how the Leafs should see this as a failure. And now he's going to have to, you know, worry about who they're drafting at 17th rather than first overall.

What we have here is a pretty lopsided on-paper matchup. Totally. Totally. That is what happens when the team who squeaks in at the very last moment takes on the President's Trophy winner. That's what happens. That's what happens. And it's like this every year.

We have this every year. President's Trophy winner, team that just squeaked in. Yeah. I mean, sometimes it doesn't quite work out that way because East and West, guess what? This year, you got the Leafs squeaking in, and you got the Caps, President's Trophy winners. So, in how many games will the Caps win this?

Well, not so fast, boys and girls. Not so fast. Because, again, you've got to remember it's the Washington Capitals. The good and the bad. The good being they're the best regular season team since 2009, probably. What is it, their second or third president's trophy in that time span? They're absolutely unbelievable, and they have this tendency to screw things up in the playoffs. In fairness, they have the tendency to run into the Pittsburgh Penguins and Jaroslav Halak in the playoffs.

Yeah, that one Jaroslav Halakir where it looked like Carey Price might get traded. Yeah, where they beat the Caps and then the Penguins. Can you imagine that would have happened, by the way? Dude, no. It almost sort of did. It was like, who are we going to choose, Montreal? It was one of the most improbable runs. I know.

It was one of the most improbable playoff runs we've seen in a very long time. And they were defeated by another improbable playoff run in the Philadelphia Flyers. So that was crazy. Another thing, I look at the head-to-head matchup. That is important in this one If we just look at how the teams performed In the regular season Then the Ducks and Flames matchup

Looks really even I think Flames fans hate that matchup Because the Flames haven't won in Anaheim In how many years? It's been a while I don't remember what the stat is But okay The last time the Flames lost in Anaheim

Which was only a week or two ago The fans in Anaheim chanted You can't beat us Or no no no no no You can't win here That's really funny Because they can't Because they can't.

They've had a brutal time. So I think there's more factors at play than just regular season performance. Now, this particular season, Leafs versus Caps. You would never know, based on how people are calling this series right now, that it is 1-1-1. It is the early season Leafs taking on the Washington Capitals, who I think might have been without Nicholas Backstrom this game, so I will give them that.

The Leafs won 4-2. Matt Martin scored on a beautiful breakaway. Braden Holtby with the loss. Leafs win 4-2. Well, I expect Matt Martin to score multiple times on breakaways in Game 1. I absolutely do as well. I think that that's going to happen. I think Matt does, too.

Oh, absolutely. Austin Matthews with that ridiculous behind-the-neck goal to Leo Komarov where he pats Brooks Orpik on the shoulder and says, good job. That was great. Yeah, Leafs cough up 3-1 goal leads in that one. The Caps win 6-5 in overtime. Asterisk, Braden Holtby got yanked after the first period where he allowed three goals.

And then the Lone Leafs regulation loss against the Caps Was second half of back to back In their miserable 5 games in 7 days stretch So I look at the first game I go You give the Caps that one actually

Because I mean anytime you're missing Your number one center that's a bad time I look at the second one and I go Damn that was an even game That was a very even game I look at the third one and I go well you give that to the Leafs Come on. Come on.

Look at the scenario. Come on. I get it. The way I see it, it's a closer series than people give it credit for. Now, you can get swept in a close series, or you can lose it in seven games. You can win it in seven games. You can win it in a sweep. It's the playoffs where dumb happens, where goofy happens, where crazy happens.

Enjoy it. Just enjoy the series. Now, I am so—Down Goes Brown, I think, nailed it with a tweet on Sunday. As always. Nailed it. Frustratingly good He said, he basically tweeted Really looking forward to that Ottawa Senators series

And then checks Twitter Sorry, Ottawa Senators Leafs series Checks Twitter, so glad that series never happened And it's so true 100% It was already starting And it was both sides It was not one side over the other

Just the belligerently stupid tweets Going both ways Now I would love to see an Ottawa Leafs series The Twitterverse though I don't think can handle it I don't think we're mature enough On Twitter to handle that Or will ever be

It was bad People were talking about Isn't it crazy That the Leafs are the only team That make the playoffs And not win more games Than they lost And

Like a whole bunch of And like I think Bonks Mullet On Twitter Was like tweeting a bunch of You know Stuff just to enrage Leaf fans

He's just a big Sens fan Of course I mean he's supposed to do that Yeah He's supposed to So I'm not even gonna get mad at him But it was just It was just like, oh no, this is going to be really bad

Now, what I've noticed from Capitals Twitter Is they're very civil Damn it, they're the nicest people I was on Ian Olin's podcast yesterday The Russian Machine Never Breaks is my favorite team-specific blog And we've had Ian on the show Absolutely Friend of the show, Ian Olin

Friend of the show And friend of me Friend of... I hate this I hate that I have to not like him for like the next two weeks Hopefully If the Leafs did win And this is a question for both of you

If the Leafs did win Besides the pandemonium part Would you feel a little bit guilty For Ovechkin Because this might be the last legitimate shot The man has at a cup For at least a year or two Well and here let me address that

Not to say that the caps won't be great next year But I don't know that they'll be this great No but a lot can change in a very Small amount of time when you retool Which it looks like the caps will have to do We've said this about the Blackhawks two or three times now and every freaking time they seem to come back um i'll feel a little guilty but like one percent two percent the other 98 will be unabashed joy and giddiness and me thinking

that the leafs are going to win the cup which sucks because imagine the leafs beat the capitals the improbable the impossible happens you have three more rounds before you gotta win the damn Oh my god Winning the Stanley Cup Is so hard It's so hard Making the playoffs Is hard enough man

The Leafs had to be The healthiest team In 40 years To make it there What about Roby Dalupil And Horst Shut up

They had to be The healthiest team In 40 years To make it there And now They have to Go through four rounds Steve you were

Reading a stat Before Before we started The show Speaking of health Can you read that same stat Yes this is I literally just

Clicked off Crap Do you have it up? I do My stupid fat Italian thumbs Joe Smith from the Tampa Bay Times Leafs had nine players Who played in all 82 games

Neylander had 81 games The Tampa Bay Lightning had zero So they basically had Ten perfect seasons Yeah Except Neylander missed One game One game

So 11 Yeah No no no It was nine perfect And then basically Yeah Why don't I just say nine And Tampa had zero

And Tampa had zero Now, this is my thing. I'm very happy the Leafs are this good. Incredibly happy. Incredibly happy they made the playoffs. But looking forward, and I hate to already look forward to next season, I don't think the playoffs are a lock. They're not 100% lock.

Because this season we discovered that it's not a lock for anybody. Florida took a lot of grief this season. And they're still taking more grief because they've shuffled again. Which we will get to. of course, but we can't deny that they were derailed by cataclysmic injuries. Not just man games lost, who the man

games were. They were bad. Tampa was what, the most injured team in the league, possibly? Yeah. One of the most. And again, quality of the player. Stamko, and they still, I compared them in a video, I compared them

to a zombie ripping off its own limbs so it could run faster. They still almost made it. Go look at the standings. Go look at the standings. The Leafs slammed that metal door in a zombie movie at the last moment. Tampa missed by one point.

All those injuries they missed by one point. They're going to be a good team. They're going to be a good team. I would argue they're a better team than the Leafs, no questions asked. When healthy. The Leafs were historically unbelievably healthy. Tampa was, oh my God, do they have any players left hurt? They were Montreal Canadiens last year.

A little bit. A little bit. And then Montreal friggin' makes it too Yeah So many things can happen Montreal can fire their coach And be incredible And not fall out of first in the division

And not fall out of first at all Yeah, I know They fired their coach Didn't fall out of first Gerard Gallant gets fired That's outrageous Michel Therrien gets fired I see it

Anyway It's very, very interesting I think watching Florida and watching Tampa Both teams in the state of Florida next year It's going to be very, very interesting to see what they can do. Thank God we don't have to deal with them now. The Atlantic? Not our problem.

For as soft as we've claimed the Atlantic has been this season, I think that's wrong. The Atlantic's no joke, man. When all teams are healthy, it's no joke. And I say all that to say this. So there were the line rushes today. Ben Smith with JVR and Mitch Marner, which is just placeholding for Bozak,

who is clearly battling something and has been for a couple months now. Martin Marincin is in, and Alexey Marchenko is in. Both Polak and Zaitsev were not at practice today. That doesn't mean they're out. Exactly. And Freddie Anderson returned. Most important part, probably. And Levo was playing D.

Yeah. Josh Levo was playing D. Point of game player, Josh Levo. I know, I know. It's insane. Freddie's obviously back. I expect Bozak to play, because this has been what's happening for a month or two now. I expect Polak to play

not knowing his injury because he finished that game Zaitsev I don't know man he was pretty wobbly and now I look at that lineup without Zaitsev in it put Bozak back in put Polak back in

and I go so many things had to go right for the Leafs this year I think fully healthy they give the Caps a hell of a time without even just Zaitsev

that's a tough sell is this an opportunity to considering what Zaitsev is as a defenseman is this an opportunity for one of the young defensemen from the Marlies who are also going into the playoffs to come up and play a role like that I would love to see that

I would love to see that I'll be honest Marchenko has been to me better than Marincin but I haven't been impressed with the play of Marincin very much this year, I was last year I'd probably take Marincin over Marchenko, but again, it's right hand versus left, putting guys on their off side has been miserable whenever it's happened this season. Boy, oh boy.

But it's the playoffs. No one's going to feel any sympathy for you. No, you got to go and do it. Doesn't matter. It's all that would matter. Yeah, President's Trophy, who cares? Injuries, who cares? Go out and do it.

I want the Leafs, again, there's no pressure here. You're playing with house money. No one expected you to make it. you're playing the president's trophy winning caps they have to win you don't even need to win the series to gain respect you lose in six or seven people go whoa it took six or seven for the caps to eliminate the leafs almost like the raps against the calves last year yeah calves in three and all that crap then the raptors tie it up two two whoa and at the end of that oh stephen a smith have even jumped in.

I'm just saying. Now, it would have been much nicer to win that series, obviously, and it was the third round, so slightly different context there. Yeah.

But the Leafs don't even need to win the series to gain a little bit of respect around the league. They don't need to win a single game. They have the respect of everyone around the league.

But they should win. They should. They're going to get... I say Caps in six. I don't want to say that. But Caps in six. I'm with you. Caps in six, I think.

I hate it. I hate it, too. I want, I really, I did, you know, I have to say I was very, very disappointed, as I'm sure they were, that they didn't win on Sunday night. They should have won that game. You know, let's ease into it. Like, I'm with Down Goes Brown. I was not ready for a series with the Sens.

Even though the Leafs have an exponentially higher chance of winning that series, for my heart, for my cardiovascular health, I'm glad it's Washington. Well, are there lessons to be learned from the Caps in this particular series? So let's say you've got a bunch of young players against a group of guys who aren't growing, they aren't tinkering, they are polished. This is what greatness looks like. Absolutely. Well, this is what I wanted for a long time.

I want the Leafs to go through the ringer. This is what the Penguins had to do. This is what the Blackhawks had to do. I'm sure you could go through the list and there's a bunch of other teams. This is what they have to do. You're the young team You think you're great You head into the playoffs

And then you find out What great is And you have to go Another level There's a great story And again Different context Because it's the Stanley Cup final

But The young Wayne Gretzky Oilers Ah this story Are going up against The Dynasty Islanders Who are in the middle Of their dynasty

And the Islanders win I don't remember In how many games I don't remember The year Whatever The Islanders win And Gretzky's walking

By the Islanders dressing room And he sees He expects to walk by a giant champagne party, spraying everyone, drinking out of the cup. No, what he saw was a bunch of broken men on the floor, stretching out and getting iced and just dead from the sacrifice that they had to make to win that series. The crosschecks, the slash, the puck blocks. I mean, Jesus, it was the 80s. Can you imagine what those guys had to go through with their doily pads and wooden sticks

And No penalty calls Crosschecks must have hurt Exponentially more Oh my god Like a wooden Those sticks When I started playing hockey

Those adult male sticks Were huge Yeah they would literally They would just Sculpt On your spine Yeah in front of the net That was fun

That sounded like fun Yeah and Wayne Gretzky Sees Oh It's I thought I was trying My hardest But it's that

It's that And then I think The next year Two years later Oilers play the Islanders again. It was the next year. And then the Oilers win the Stanley Cup. 1984. I'm not trying to compare the Leafs to those teams. I'm just

saying, you think you're there, you think you're at another level, and then you discover your princess is in another castle. Just saying. Right. Or they might beat the Caps. I mean... But here's the thing. So they beat the Caps.

Then they have to play the Penguins. Great. No. They play Columbus. Oh! You think it's Columbus, eh? You think it's okay. That series, that's a rough one. Why don't we talk about that series next? Because that is going to be a slugfest, right?

They hate each other. Columbus is just such a dastardly, pesky team. That is the type of team where you could say, do you think your team is better on paper than Columbus? And you go, yes. And then, okay, do you want to play Columbus in the playoffs? Oh, absolutely not. You don't want to be locked in a cage with them for four to seven games.

I didn't want to be locked in a cage with them for the last game of the season. They took out two defensemen. Damn it. Yeah. They took out, and I mean, I'm not trying to blame Zaitsev. You never want to blame a guy who got hit and hurt, but there were, what, two seconds left in the period when Foligno hit him? When you're running the 100-meter dash, you run for 110 meters.

You run until that race is over and then some, because you might get decked. And maybe there was a little lesson there. The Penguins, who are already a very broken, broken team, now have to take on a team that breaks people? Will Tom Sestito start? No. Because here's the thing.

The Penguins are injured, but here's the other thing. Tom Sestito sucks. So I don't think he's going to play. I mean, it would be interesting if Tom Sestito played. I'm not even kidding. I'm not even just saying that because of what happened with Freddie and what happened with everything else that Tom has done in his career. Do you start them game one just to tenderize the meat?

I wonder. I mean, like if there is. I love this. I love this. We get to talk about the playoffs on this podcast. I love this. This is the first time in the history of our show that the Leafs have been in the playoffs. We've crossed a threshold.

This is the best. I love it. With Tom Sestito in Does that not Does that not create Not necessarily He's going to play two minutes When he's on the ice is it a bit of a distraction

That Columbus goes after him Rather than I don't think you want to be doing that in the playoffs It's too crucial every moment Now Dubinsky gets into some shenanigans after the whistle Guaranteed Who goes after him

Or is it just you have to deal with Brandon Davinsky? Well, I don't know. On Pittsburgh, they're very much a skilled team. They're tough. And if they go with the same lineup as last year, okay, so you drove the Crosby line nuts. Now deal with the Malkin line and deal with the Kessel line. Okay, you drove the Kessel line nuts.

Now drive the Crosby line and the Malkin line nuts. Okay, you drove the Malkin line nuts. Okay, now drive the Crosby line and the Kessel line nuts. You're doomed! But they have no one on defense, and their number one defenseman's out. Well, and this is the thing. Ole Matta.

Oh, yeah, that's true. I think he's coming back. I think he is. Ron Hainsey. But he's obviously not at full health. But he's still Ole Matta. What I can only assume is going to be a pairing of Stuart Percy and Frank Corrado. Damn it.

And then you're also facing the Vezina Trophy winner. Probably. But you got Matt Murray. So... Kahn's Mith winner. I would probably... Yeah, that's true. No.

No, no, no. No, it was Crosby. Should have been Kessel. It should have been Kessel, yeah. Future Calder winner, Matt Murray. So this is one of those, probably. No, no, Matthews, sir. It's going to be Matthews.

It's going to be Matthews. Okay, we'll talk about that later, too. That's part of my links that were deleted. Thanks, computer. Yeah, so again, you look at Columbus. If you're Columbus, you look through your lineup, you go, you know what? Our strength is our goalie can steal us a series.

And then you look at the other goalie and you go, Ah, that's no slouch either. Damn it. That guy won the cup last year. Ah. So it's not just we think. Columbus thinks Bobrovsky can do it. Yeah.

Pittsburgh knows Murray can do it. Right. See the difference? Right. Ah, that's frustrating. I genuinely don't know who's going to win that series. I would have maybe a week or two said Pittsburgh easily, but just the fact that they're so busted.

They're so busted up. I don't know. They did seven regulars out a month ago. It's insane. And they made it. Yeah. And they were, you know, they had, what, 106, 108 points? Yeah, they almost caught the Capitals at one point.

Yeah. Barely missed out. So, every team that makes the playoffs is good. Pittsburgh is elite. But, they're not at their elitist. And they're going to need to be. They're going to have to be. It is interesting that you get penalized for being better.

You know what I mean? They have to hate this playoff format. Yeah, this playoff format, I mean, as much as it creates divisional rivals or whatever the point is, it has to go, right? Well, okay, it would be Washington Leafs. That would still be correct. Then Pittsburgh. Who was the second best team? Pittsburgh should be playing Boston.

Oh, my God. Yeah. You so much prefer that series. The format can stay. It's just you've got to reseed it by one through eight. Columbus gets Ottawa. Yeah. Ugh.

Like, that's the thing. I don't know what was wrong with the old system. I don't think there was a fan out there who said, you know what the Stanley Cup playoffs need? A change. I think they were fine. They were fine. I think they wanted to develop.

Okay, how do you develop rivalries at the playoffs? How do you... You prefer that your rivalries be regional. So they're trying to force-feed regional playoff matches Well, they got that with Washington-Toronto So naturally what you want to do is put two Florida teams in the Northeast Yeah I don't know, but neither of them made it

And also what an unfortunate name for the division Considering it's not even the Northeast Well, it's the Atlantic, but it's basically the old Northeast I don't know Pittsburgh and Columbus got shafted here Big time They did Probably more than anyone else

They did. Well, yeah. Now, I— But on the bright side, us as fans get a bloodbath in the first round. Right, and I think that will be— It'll be like Pittsburgh-Philly three or four years ago, whenever they last met, which was just amazing to watch. I think this is going to be one of those series.

And I think whoever comes out, I feel like it might be— Now, the more that I think of it, it might be Columbus. However, the one thing that Columbus doesn't have for them— It's experience. And I know that we overrate experience. But there is something about that pressure. There's something about being in that situation. You can practice, practice, practice all you want.

But until you've been there a few times, you don't feel comfortable in those shoes, right? It's possible for something to be overrated and relevant at the same time. I've said it a thousand times. I think that was part of, besides the fact that the Bruins were the vastly superior team in 2013, team, part of what they had on the Leafs was they knew what they could get away with. And they knew how to do it. Brad Marchand's a master of that.

And getting fined sometimes. Columbus does have a coach who's won a cup. Sure, absolutely. I just wonder with the... and that will undoubtedly help them. The last time John Tortorella won a Stanley Cup was the last time the Leafs made the playoffs in a full season.

Coincidence? I think not! I guess that means Columbus will win the cup this year. Imagine all the dumping on them We did this summer And then Well they've already

I think they've already Yeah it's like foolish They don't even need to do They don't even Win a game in the playoffs We still look pretty cool The first month of this season Was rough for me man

Why do the Habs go out And get Weber He's like leading the league And scoring I'm like come on Columbus first place No Vancouver went on that run

For a little bit Yeah the four games They won four games in a row To start the season Without holding a lead Yeah, that's right We got 8 points without holding a lead That's crazy

Imagine the Leafs had been able to get 8 points We held leads, we held multiple leads And couldn't get 2 points Oh, and this is the thing I saw someone in the YouTube comments On my, I think it was the last LFR of the season If the Leafs don't cough up

A 4 goal lead to Winnipeg In the third game of the season They get Ottawa Yeah. That was a top comment on that video, by the way. Oh, I know. Hey, you don't cough up a 4-2 lead with a few minutes left to the Chicago Blackhawks, you get Ottawa. If you don't cough up a 3-0 lead, you can't look at it like that.

You can't rewrite history for every team and be like, hey, if you won this one game... If you don't lose in the shootout to Phoenix, or to Arizona, damn it. Or to Colorado. If you don't lose in regulation to Colorado. If you don't cough up a 3-0 lead to New Jersey. How many more do we got? If you don't cough up a 2-0 lead to LA We're 1-8 in the shootout

Take one of those games Is it 1-8? It's 1-8 over the course of the year Hilarious Get one win Go 2-7 If the Leafs were to cut their overtime losses in half And be on average with every other NHL team

Which loses between 7 and 10 a year The Leafs would be a 100 point team So there's where next year is so hard to predict You're not going to be as healthy Probably going to be better in the shootout You have no idea who they're going to sign Trade, lose, whatever There's a lot going on

It's good times We left the Columbus-Pittsburgh series to talk about the Leafs Oh yeah, so that's going to be a bloodbath We're going to take a quick break, we're going to come back And talk about more playoffs And talk about more Eastern Conference And then we're going to hit the West as well I just want to say

Playoffs start tomorrow And the Leafs are in them Let's just talk about that for a second Yay, it's sinking in Boston, Ottawa What kind of series Can we expect from those two Because you've got Boston

That seems to be Hanging in there in terms of Their dynasty might be Or their potential dynasty might be over But they're still a very powerful team It's funny Outside of Pasternak Who's unbelievable

They have a lot of nice young pieces but they don't look, like, on that level. You know what I mean? But they're still really nice young pieces. So I wonder if Boston goes for more of a, like, a retool sort of thing because, like, there's not much point getting rid of Bergeron or Marchant. Marchant, certainly not. You just signed Backus.

Well, that's a rough contract. But you got Chara, who's probably done, but outside of that, you don't have too many, like, seriously busted up graybeards. And then Ottawa's so hurt. Ottawa's so hurt on the back end. Carlson can't be at 100%. Cody Ceci can't be at 100%. Mark Mathot's not even back.

So that's rough. MacArthur just started playing his first games of the season. Zach Smith is out. So you're missing a center against a team that has pretty nice centers on it. I give Boston the edge in that one. But, as Andrew Berkshire pointed out on Twitter, Craig Anderson just has a tendency to

turn into the Megazord in the playoffs once the playoffs start he's just another beast so I think Boston probably beats him with experience and the fact that Ottawa is so hurt asterisk Craig Anderson

not to look too far into the future but I am looking forward to the next Ottawa-Pittsburgh matchup whenever that may be Due to the Sidney Crosby, Mark Mathot Slash Someone's going to do something dumb No matter what

It was a normal looking slash I think that caught him The wrong way I really do There's a million different slashes over the course of a game That could have easily led to that Although none of them do Here's a question Who has the first controversial incident

Of the first week of the playoffs There's always one It always comes some place unexpected I think it'll come from the west I think it would be like the Blues Wild series or something weird like that. Maybe. Wow, I wouldn't have expected that from them. Maybe, okay.

But we'll get to that in a second. Montreal, New York. This is a closer series than I think people give it credit for, considering that the New York Rangers were almost on par with Montreal in terms of points. But the Rangers were so cold since March 1st in comparison to the Habs, who were the hottest team in the East. Caps probably go in hottest team in their last 12 games or whatever, but since March 1st, since basically Claude Julien came on board,

the Habs have been on fire. They've been unbelievable. I give it to the Habs. Really? 100%. How many games? Five or six. I'm serious.

I'm serious. I might be wrong. I might be totally wrong. Again, the Rangers have a lot of guys who have that extra gear. Chris Kreider in the playoffs is just misery. Lungfist finds another gear, even though he's trended downward a little bit this year. Alain Vigneault is a fantastic coach. Yeah, I mean, they're not—

You've got guys that have been there, Zuccarello, Nash, all these guys who have been there. It's a very good conversation, very good combination of youth and experience. Yeah, I guess you're right. You can't sleep on the Rangers. Ah, shoot. It's going to be a very good series, but Montreal just seems to be their boogeyman. I still give it to Montreal.

Okay. Next. New York limped into the playoffs. But they have Andy Ranta if Lundqvist goes down. Although he struggled a little bit of late. Western Conference. We've got San Jose and we've got Edmonton. They've been going at each other on Twitter.

Did you see the San Jose? No. Oh, they have a water-oil rig off in the distance. and then there's like a picture of a bunch of sharks you know and then it's

and then they just So the sharks die then? No well they tweeted it at the Oilers and said we're coming for you or something like that and people started

tweeting them You're gonna bite the Oilers? Alberta's landlocked and they tweeted the pictures of actual oil rigs from like Fort McMurray

and like it was pretty funny but I thought hey man good on the San Jose Sharks for at least attempting to start some Twitter beef

right it's funny Don't well actually their joke, Edmonton. Come on! It's a joke. Just let it be a joke. Jesse's showing me the picture. That's great. That looks like a trailer for a StarCraft movie. It does. I like that.

StarCraft had sharks. That is pretty funny. It's a super butt, actually, but it's pretty funny. There's a grizzled playoff, been there, team, lost the Stanley Cup Finals last year, versus This is a young, almost rookie, first time in the playoffs for most of them team.

This is the old versus the young. If there is any series besides the Caps and Leafs, basically, that is old. I mean, literally, I think the Caps and Leafs are the only one that's more old versus young. But San Jose's older. San Jose's way older. They are way older. I think they're way bigger. And they're way more brittle.

Outside of, like, Patrick Maroon and Milan Lucic, who has started to pick it up a little bit. Here's my thing. So I look at the superstars, right? How do you contain Conor McDavid? Well, it's very difficult. Can be done, but you basically have to, like, triple-team him, and then you've got to worry about his line mates.

Leon Dreisaitl, that's going to be a tough matchup, especially because he's not on the same line. With the Sharks, you get Pavelski. He's going to be annoying in front. Couture I think if he's healthy enough Thornton is much older Much slower and I don't even know if he's going to be In game one because of that injury

How do you shut down An offensive defenseman How do you shut down A guy like Brent Burns who you can't bully You don't want To block his shot and he can set up Whoever the hell he wants at will

How do you shut down Brent Burns Like with McDavid I have a couple theories How you do it It's extremely difficult I'm not trying to say It's harder to shut down Brent Burns

Than Connor McDavid But How the hell do you shut him down? It's a tough It's a tough one You have to I mean you have to Really control your gaps on him

You've got to really Give him zero space I don't know if the Oilers Have the proper answer For Brent Burns That doesn't mean They lose the series And that doesn't mean

San Jose's got the proper answer For Connor McDavid Exactly This is going to be A very interesting one There's not a whole lot between the goalies. Martin Jones, a lot of experience, very good. Cam Talbot, really coming into his own.

You could argue he should even be a Vezna candidate this season. Would experience in this particular case give you, if you've got two teams that seem to be somewhat evenly matched, although I give the skill edge to the Oilers, only because the Oilers are younger and they're faster. I don't know if that still matters in the playoffs. I think it does. I think being faster now matters more than ever in the playoffs.

Especially in the first round. Yeah. When you know your speed is at its fastest. Yes. Yeah, you're not bruised up and hurting and dying. Sluggish, yeah. Slowly dying on skates. Yes.

Would San Jose get a bit, who gets the edge in this series? Is it San Jose because they've been there and they've proven they can be there and they proved they could be there last summer or last spring? Or is it Edmonton Who are this young Upstart Dangerously scary team On offense

Yeah Particularly one guy But Leon Dreisaitl I mean Never gets talked about His 70 plus point season Yeah Yeah he was very good

He Cost Jack Eichel Two million dollars Which we will get to Oh my god That's a very funny story I give it to San Jose Because the Oilers

Although they had a better season Than the Leafs Similarly to the Leafs It's their Rite of passage This is their First year Kicking at the can

You know First time in 11 years And they're taking on The Stanley Cup finalists You know what It's not It's not dissimilar to the Leafs at all They're taking on someone

Who went to the Stanley Cup final Last year Leafs are taking on The President's Trophy candidate Oilers young Leafs young Bright futures Unfortunately

Cinderella usually Leaves her glass slipper At the ball Yeah Now First time she goes I wonder if I think

I think the edge in this Goes to Edmonton Why is that? I'm saying Edmonton Speed versus Too slow? I think I think Edmonton's too fast

Yeah And I think you've got Here The reason you pay Milan Lucic as much As you pay him Is for this Yeah

And you have Maroon On McDavid's line Because A He can keep up with him B He is big And scary That's why they call him

Big Rig, right? I think that the Oilers will have too much energy for the Sharks. I think they are just too much combustible energy. Because of the oil? Because of the oil. And I think the Sharks, because they went to the finals last year, what you often see is a team fatigued at this point of the year. Think about when the LA Kings won the Cup both times.

Were they not out in the first round the next year? One year they missed the playoffs. One year they missed. I think it was Berkshire who pointed this out. The Kings have one playoff victory in the last three years. Yes. Which we will get to. Yes, which we will get to.

Crazy. Crazy. I know. After winning two Cups in three years. One playoff victory. Yeah. Not series. Not series victory.

One game. When two teams are going head-to-head in a series, How much weight do you put in for which team has the best player on the ice? So Edmonton's going to have McDavid, and nobody else is better than them. If you're going up against Pittsburgh, Crosby, Pittsburgh will have the best player. Yeah. How much does that matter? I look at it as more of like a rock, paper, scissors sort of thing.

It's matchups. It's Pokemon. It's water type versus grass type. Even if the grass type is a higher level, or sorry, even if the water type is a higher level, grass type beats water type. Sometimes. Sometimes the level is high enough that it overcomes that And then you get a badge No, I still give it to the Sharks

Sometimes you go to a gym and all their training is sand shrews And they've got sand shrews doing push-ups and flips into water Yeah, but then you take a sand shrew and you bring it to Lieutenant Surge And he doesn't have an answer for it That's right Piece of garbage Unless he's got a man chop He brings out the man chop

Why would Lieutenant Surge have a man chop? Because sometimes they have the strength Pokemon. First of all, it's a muchop. No, it's a manchop. It's a manchop. Manchop. I prefer manchop. Sounds like a sandwich.

That's what Adam is. I like a bar. Oh, you. I'll have a manchop sandwich, please. Oh, you. Oh, you. I'm a manchop. Yeah, that's one of those series where I will strongly argue that Montreal should beat New York.

But if they don't? This one, yeah. This one, I don't think there's much between them. I'm very excited. I say San Jose. I'm so excited to see the Oilers in the playoffs Me too Oh dude

Playoff McDavid Come on This is going to be so cool McDavid but better Come on I want it It's going to be great 100 points man

And I'm excited to see Lucic in the playoffs So again Like I love watching him in the playoffs I think he's fun to watch And I think he's You can't push this team around No And he's such a pain

Like he's such a Like watching him against the Leafs When he was with Boston He was the biggest thorn in the side It was him and Marche That's not fair How did they have Those two guys

On the same team Well look at it this way though Okay so Some shenanigans happens Right Lucic goes after a big guy And they both end up In the box

Well Now The Oilers have like Maroon And the Sharks still have A legion of big guys That's true I don't know

Is Darnell Nurse hurt? I don't know Can we look that up quickly? He's pretty nasty too Yeah He's Yeah It'd be nice to have him

I give it to the Sharks Blues and Wilds I'm very excited Blues and Wilds Why is Whatever St. Louis does In the first round Always the most boring series

I don't know To me This is the boring series You're nuts I think this is a boring series No Oh Damien Oh you

With your high scoring You need high scoring To be interested there Damo That is not a Damien thing Oh stop No it is not Oh stop How dare you

I love the Blues In the first round Well, because they always get Chicago or the Kings. Yeah. And I'm always like, underdog! And they never win except for last year. I was like, yeah! Dude, game seven between the Blues and Blackhawks got Tony X into hockey.

Okay, that was fun. Come on! Tony X. Famed Twitter user, Tony X. Famed Twitter person, Tony X. Wow, this is wild. Cool, here's 100,000 followers. Hockey's crazy!

Why have people been hiding this from us all this time? That was a great tweet I give it to the Blues You do? I give it to the Blues The Wild have been so bad Now, have the Wild been bad Or have the Wild just regressed

To what they should have been? No, no, no, no So what is that? I think Dubnick Dubnick, sorry Was playing a little bit too high Like, what was he? A 940?

It was ridiculous Like, beyond Christmas So there was a bit of an evening out there But, boy, he's been bad And they haven't won anything And Bruce Boudreaux, like, I'm not sure how much I actually believe the playoff voodoo with him and how he's never won a Game 7 or whatever it is. He's like 0-8 in Game 7s.

But there's something about body language sometimes. Sometimes. This guy on the bench, if you're a player for him, How do you not just feel the poison Just radiating off his body When things are going poorly Whenever the camera's on him It's misery

It's misery from this guy And they've been so bad Hansel has not been the answer They thought he would be And the blues I think have actually Improved He's not so hot right now You'd say

Ha Oh How dare you Sorry How dare you First the blues and now how dare you Well I just don't I don't know

The reason I call it a boring series, it has nothing to do with... It's just like there's a lack of storylines. But I guess because the Wild have been cold, there's one there. Lack of storylines could be they traded Shattenkirk and still made it to the second round. That's true. Because they've been very good. They've been very good. And they fired their head coach.

Or released him. Relieved him of his duties. They fired their head coach and replaced him with their head coach. Next year. Strange coaching situation. It's been a huge strange coaching situation. So do you give the edge to the Blues in this one? I do.

I do, yeah. So, for Bruce... And Jake Allen, by the way, stopped being the worst goalie in the league. And suddenly the Blues were better. Yeah. It's almost as though Winnipeg might need to watch that. Maybe. By the way, I read a quote...

Or just Paul Murray specifically. I read a quote yesterday, and it was Greg Wyshynski, of course, that retweeted it. Oh, was it snarky? It might have been a bit snarky. Oh, Greg. I think it was Kevin Sheveldayoff was like, well, if you could general manage in reverse, everybody would have a perfect NHL team or something like that. And Greg wrote, pretty sure in six years of the Jets being a team,

goaltending has always, always been the biggest issue. And he's right. And you see it with the Blues. Jake Allen stopped. We talked about this when Kenny Chicago— That perfectly describes Kevin Sheveldayoff. So slow, he's going backwards. Yeah.

The only person I've ever known that was slower at making a decision was Mike Gillis in Vancouver Oh my goodness Well, his team was already perfect They were perfect, so why not leave them? And we still have to talk about Vancouver Because there was some interesting stuff coming out of there yesterday Flames and Ducks, I am jacked about this one That's going to be a nasty series

That's going to be Michael Furland and Matthew Kachuk in the playoffs Matthew Kachuk is quickly becoming the biggest pest in the league. Yeah. And by pest, he is somewhat, he's like Marshawn Dirty sometimes. And another guy who excels a little bit in the playoffs, he's had a rough season, but Corey Perry. Corey Perry. Guys who do nasty things and they don't quite get away with it all the time in the regular season, they start to get away with it a little bit more in the playoffs.

Corey Perry. Then you got big mean Ryan Getzlaff You got that great back end Who's been their starter The past few games Cause I've seen a bunch of playoff brackets That had the Ducks going all the way to the final And then losing

Most have them losing I've seen a few of those too Buddy if it's Jonathan Bernier And they make it to the final All they gotta do is make it to the final And he's gotta play half the games on route Leafs get a second round pick Oh no it's one or the other isn't it

Or is it half the games? No, it's both. It's got to be both. It's got to be both. That is a hell of a condition. Yeah, the condition is basically, here, take this. Yeah. Here's something that will never happen.

Yeah, and then it might. It might. It might actually. It just might. Flames and Ducks, though, in terms of how they match up, you've got a younger Flames team, a Ducks team that has been there, but has not won since Randy Carlisle was the coach in 2007. It's a while ago. A little bit.

What do you think we expect? The Flames are interesting because They have a little bit of playoff experience But it was a couple years ago And their goaltenders are also not the worst in the league And look at, they've come on Yeah, so now you've got options You've got Brian Elliott playing out of his mind

And you've got Chad Johnson Who is an upgrade on whoever the hell they had in that last year Reto Berra Maybe that was the year before Yeah, I think it was Two years ago, I think Curry Romo and Right

Hiller? Jonas Hiller. Yeah. That's a strong team. It's a very strong team. And it's not, it's young, but it doesn't have, like, the baby fat that the Leafs do. You know what I mean? Like, those guys are.

They're not cherubs. No, they're starting to, I don't even know what that is. Okay. They're not, like, freshly born kids. Oh. They are, they've matured a little. They're seven or eight. Right.

See, that shows how smart I am. I thought you were talking about a bug. No. They're like in their early, kind of mid-twenties They're young, but they're established guys Johnny Gaudreau Sean Monaghan They're young like Morgan Rielly's young

Yeah, kind of 300 game player Morgan Rielly Even Dougie Hamilton Yeah 2011 draft to Dougie Hamilton They're a good team They just, I would I would gladly say Flames and Seven

Or something like that But they got this voodoo about the Ducks, man. They got this thing about winning in Anaheim. I think that's regular season only. I think you leave that in the regular season. I remember there were many, many games where, and this is a long time ago, but when Ottawa and Toronto were really at each other's throats 10 years ago or more, and then they meet in the playoffs, Toronto could never beat Ottawa in the regular season

and always would win. One year, it was like 0-8 against the Sens. And then I think they swept them Yeah It was like ridiculous Yeah it was so silly So I feel like the Flames Will

Will Douse that one right away That will be Something that they Take care of I Goaltending's so important Yeah

It's weird though Both of these teams Have goalies who can do it But don't always So you got Elliott And uh Johnson

Against Gibson Eh And Bernier Now if Freddie Anderson Was in net for the Ducks I'd give it to the Ducks Without hesitation

But I think the Ducks Will pull this off But this is one of those ones Where I don't think It's written in stone Well I mean none of them are So you think it'll be

A long series I think Oh please For the benefit of the sport Let's have this one go seven Yeah I have this one going seven We gotta leave

The radio portion of this show Okay Didn't even get to every series. Into the online portion, we're going to talk about the Hawks and Preds. And why the Blackhawks are going to lose in the first round. Plus Black Monday. Oh, this has been the Panago Pizza Steve Dangle podcast. It's what's on the inside that counts in terms of Panago.

That's the worst reading of that line I've ever done. But it's Panago. Thank you, Panago. We love you. The video won't get it. Steve's a little antsy. It's not Steve's fault. It's mine.

Hawks and Preds. You think, Steve Dangle, that the Hawks are going to lose to the Nashville Predators. Yeah, I'm going to try to bring up this here. Maybe you talk about your thoughts on the series. I'm going to quickly bring up Tyler Della's little thread yesterday. It turned me on the whole thing. Okay, because I tend to feel the same way, but I also think I'm crazy on this one. Because PK's had a rough year, but PK hasn't been in the playoffs in two years.

And I like the way he plays in the playoffs. I also think, to me, the Predators as a team are a little more complete. This from Dello. I haven't gotten to the thread yet, but this is good. ESPN writers unanimously picked two series. So only two series out of the eight were unanimously picked by ESPN writers. I bet it's Caps and Leafs. Caps and Leafs.

Black Hawks and Nashville. And they picked Hawks over Nashville. Yes. Ooh. Unanimously. That's weird. I get the Caps and Leafs. I get that.

Can you look up what the point difference is between the Blackhawks and Predators? The problem with Tyler is he tweets so damn much. Yeah, let's not forget, this is a one versus eight matchup. It is. It is. Chicago sat at 109 points first in the Western Conference, and Nashville at the eighth seed was 94 points. So what's the gap there?

109 minus 94 9 plus 6 Is 15 points That's a big gap Pat myself on the back for that one Alright so here's the thread I hope he's right because I'm not even going to try to correct him I'm not even going to fix it

Here's the thread from Tyler Dello of The Athletic Chicago finished Could have just started with this Chicago finished 15 points ahead of Nashville Reading They had 13 overtime and shootout points So here's the interesting thing I love 3-on-3

To end Overtime I would rather have it End overtime than the shootout But If you're gonna Like let's say a team goes like 20-0

In 3-on-3 OT And they head into the playoffs You're not playing 3-on-3 in the playoffs No you're playing 5-on-5 You're playing 5-on-5 No matter what So that little advantage you have Maybe you have some crazy video game style

That allows you to go 20-0 in overtime It's negated by the playoffs. Maybe you have Donny Keith and Patrick Kane. Yeah. Well, I don't even know what their record was. Well, I guess we're about to find out. Chicago had 15 points ahead of Nashville. They had 13 overtime and shootout points.

Nashville had six. Thinking Chicago is invincible is ludicrous. Chicago is 15 goal difference better than Nashville. Ten of that is overtime in the shootout. So they were five regulation goal difference better than Nashville. That's it. Five goals. I got distracted with this.

Chicago was plus 12 with empty net goals. Nashville was minus four. Chicago was plus five in terms of extra attacker goals. Nashville was minus one. So at real hockey with goalies in, Nashville was 17 goal differential better than Chicago, which is crazy given that Chicago was a plus 31 and Nashville was a plus 16 officially. 32 goal differential swing On shootouts

3 on 3 Overtime And goals without the goal he pulled Or sorry With the goal he pulled Can't believe They're even making Chicago play this series Which

I can only assume He said sarcastically So That series Looking at the standings Is misery for Nashville And it's over in 3 Looking at what Tyler said

Well and I also look at Chicago And they have a lot of They're like the Leafs in the sense That they have a lot of rookies or younger guys in the lineup? A little bit, but they're not forced to play the prominent roles that the ones on the Leafs are. And these are guys that have been underestimated

and, oh, no, this is the year they fall off. Oh, no, this is the year they fall off. And this isn't, oh, analytics hate the Blackhawks or something. Tyler actually had a really good point a few weeks ago defending the Blackhawks, where it's basically they have their core. Yeah. And they've had their core since, like, what, 2008, 2009? and they've just recycled their depth guys constantly,

rather than paying Brandon Saad, rather than paying Andrew Shaw, rather than paying Christopher Stieg, rather than paying Dave Boland. They just constantly recycle. Brian Campbell. Why would teams pay their depth guys an insane amount of money when it's very obvious that if you just draft properly or, you know, you have good scouting, yeah, you can do it. You can have guys that will eventually

Not be depth guys Be your depth guys And then trade them For lots of stuff Yeah Seems like a pretty good system That they have figured out So Tyler's not anti-Blackhawks here

And he's not even necessarily saying Nashville's gonna win this series He's saying that Calling it a lock for the Blackhawks is crazy I think he's right I think he's right I think this one could Be one of those ones that goes 6 or 7

And I think Nashville could easily win We always get a first round upset So do you think that's the one? The last year it was Chicago. This is interesting. I don't know. I really don't know how to call this. This is one of those ones that can screw you so bad, too.

Like, let's say you pick Nashville to beat Chicago, and then Chicago wins the whole top. And they easily could. I mean, to me, you'd be... If you're betting... If you're talking about the bracket challenge... By the way, my bracket is not done. Full disclosure, my dog's been in the hospital,

so I haven't really had a chance to fill it out but she's okay right yeah well we can't really save that I'm going to do it live here on the show

with you guys I hope that's okay the website's also down so you might not be able to do it I can't do it today shoot well I said all my picks

so you can call me yeah we'll go through our picks next episode fully don't worry we have to have them locked in for tonight or tomorrow

because before 7pm yeah and by the way if you want to sign up we'll tweet out the link but I think it is

it's very very hard betting wise to go against the Hawks. It's just very hard. It is, but there's a lot of playoff experience there. Yeah. But outside of that, it's a lot of green. A lot of green.

But if you're a green guy, and you've got guys in the dressing room like Jonathan Tays, like Seabrook, like Keefe, who have been there before, and you don't have to lead, you just have to play and do your roles, and you've got one of the best coaches ever. when the Bruins won the cup in 2011 Brad Marchand was a rookie and Tyler Sagan was a rookie who

almost never played I think his first game was third round wow yeah pretty nuts uh yeah so it's it's definitely how bright the future looked then yeah I want to give it to Nashville just because I'm I don't know I want PK to make it you do you know how realistic a the thing that we joked about in the summer, a Nashville-Montreal Stanley Cup final is? There is nothing that would make me happier except for the Leafs making it. I want a Nashville-Montreal Stanley Cup finals. I'm on the record

of saying it. I want it. Here's a legitimate thing that could happen. Capitals beat the Leafs. Penguins beat the Blue Jackets. Capitals have to play the Penguins in the second round. They end up beating them because the Penguins are broken and also because the Capitals are a very good team. But the Penguins take a chunk

out of the Capitals. Montreal... Even if it's Columbus, the Columbus takes a chunk out of the Capitals. 100%. Maybe even a bigger one. Then you get Montreal. I think they beat the Rangers. I think they beat whoever comes out of Ottawa or Boston. Then it's Montreal-Washington.

Then it's the third round. There's a variety of factors at play. Let's say they beat the Caps. All of a sudden, Montreal is in the Stanley Cup final. Nashville beats the Blackhawks. And I don't know. I can't remember how the bracket breaks down for them. But if you beat the Blackhawks, you can basically beat anyone.

Adam? I'm thinking it's possible. There's another reason you should be cheering for Nashville to make the Stanley Cup Finals. Oh? Because if you do, you will get a ticket to the game. That's right, I will! What? On, what would this be?

The 8th month. August. August 10th, 2016. Kevin Harris tweeted, Adam Wilde, since you hope that PK pulls a fill and wins the cup here in Nashville, You will get the Steve Dangle treatment From this Preds fan Wow

And then he replied to himself And he said That's an invite to a finals game To be clear Wow That only has three likes Retweet that Retweet that

Yeah Time to retweet that I saved that For this day I am so glad you saved that Yeah I forgot So my bracket's gonna say Nashville

I'm gonna hope and pray it's Nashville You're gonna fly to the music city Wow I got a little bet going on With Russian Machine Never Breaks too What's the bet? If the Leafs win, which they will, well, no, here, we'll do the unlikely scenario first. If the Caps win, I will change my Twitter profile picture to the Russian Machine Never

Breaks logo with Ovechkin's big dumb face for, I don't know, we didn't determine the amount of days, I don't think. Plus there's some other stuff that we said on the podcast that I don't remember. In the unlikely event of the Leafs winning, or sorry, sorry, damn it, I think I fucked this up. No, no, no, you're doing great. If the Leafs win The Leafs win

In the likely event Of the Leafs winning There we go Russian Machine Never Breaks Has to change their Twitter picture To Austin Matthews Big face

And then I thought about Well Caps fans Will be able to look at that And go well At least it is an American So I'm gonna take that away By making them put A giant Canadian flag

Behind it Nice Austin Matthews face With a Canadian flag Big Canadian flag Just gonna offend everybody I'm taking it all away You're not allowed

To have any of it Take that! Nation's capital, take that! I like that. I like that too. I have to pee so bad. Give me a second. So, we gotta make a phone call.

Uh-oh. Yeah, Jesse just said we have a surprise. We do. So give me a second. I'm just gonna dial. Um, Kevin Harris? Did you actually have to pee, Adam? Yes.

Yeah, yeah, he legit had to pee. So Kevin Harris, after I retweeted his tweet, he tweeted something at me. Did he just go, uh-oh? I've made a terrible mistake. What did he say? He said, Jesse Blake is invited, too. Oh!

What? Looks like me and Adam are going to Nashville. Apparently, Kevin is loaded. I hope you have fun in Toronto. What's great about this is you guys are going to be spending more money than him. That is true. That is true. But you know what?

Worth it. I'd love to see a Stanley Cup Finals game. Yeah, the Pittsburgh game, even though Mike Darnay paid for it, was expensive. Totally worth it. Yeah. Totally worth it. It's unbelievable seeing a game of that high stakes. I felt like a bit of an alien

As a Leaf fan though It was great watching Mike Dernick Buy his towel Hi there Is this Mrs. Dangle? Yeah can you hear me Because I'm driving Yeah we can hear you perfectly fine

You're on the show Steve's Steve is Steve is so disappointed To be talking to you right now No What did she buy? What did you buy?

We were talking Mrs. Dangle We were talking a little bit earlier About your You tripped and fell And bought 30 Leafs Or 30 Blue Jays tickets. So, we wanted to call and check in.

Not necessarily about that, but there's something else. Yeah, so, Steven? Yeah? Okay, you can't get mad at me because I started a little savings account. And I've been saving a little bit of money. Okay. I really wanted to try and get you a playoff ticket. Okay.

So, I got you a playoff ticket. Yay! Free stuff from your wife I got it for Monday's date Hello? Honey This is the worst news ever

Oh, it's terrible You got me a Leafs playoff ticket? What? You got me a Leafs playoff ticket Yes, for Monday Oh my god I can't go yes you can

I'm working no I read that email and it said it's from 5 to 7 oh you're right oh my god I forgot yes yes oh you're right

holy shit listen okay so I got two tickets but I have to get separate i was like there's no way she's this crazy you're right sorry wait okay what did you do okay so i tried to get two together it didn't work obviously so then i got single tickets so i'm sitting like way up in the purple and you're sitting i think in the red do you take the red seat no you take the red seat no i'm sitting in like an obstructed seat

I don't care. Wait, seriously? You're sitting in Brooklyn? Yeah, I'm sitting in Brooklyn. I don't think I'll even see the ice. Oh, yes, you will. Shut up. Just find a place to stand. We'll meet up at intermissions.

Oh, how nice of you. Oh my god, my heart sunk. Because I was like, you're crazy. So Steve, do you want to make that announcement now too? Well, yeah, I gotta make that. Holy shit, my heart sunk so much. So, um, You know how there's

Crazy stuff going on In Maple Leaf Square Yeah For the Leafs Home games During the playoffs I will be hosting The tailgate

At Maple Leaf Square That is so sick Along with someone Named Emily Who I haven't met before But why am I on the floor I'm on my knees right now Only from 5 to 7

That's what she said Oh yeah I forgot Jeez My heart sunk Cause I'm like She spent What was probably a fortune

On tickets That I can't use Cause I'm working but i'm not and you're the best wife ever some of this doesn't exist to me you're gonna see a playoff game for real oh my god adam what as a as an employee of sportsnet and someone who covers hockey for sportsnet right couldn't steve just fill out a form and apply for a press pass could you not um sportsnet has told me they could get me uh press passes before playoffs i i don't think So I've been up in the gondola before.

I don't think there's enough space. Especially during the playoffs. No, they're probably all reserved already. Hey, can we just take a moment for Mrs. Dangle as the best wife ever? Oh, my God. That is so sick. Come on. I'm feeling joy because I'm going to the game, but also relief.

Yeah. My heart was racing when I was getting in it. My heart was racing when you told me you got it, and I thought I couldn't go. Oh, my God. Yeah, so I'm hosting the tailgate, and then after that, I was planning on watching the game from Real Sports, but I guess the Monday game, I'm going to be at the game. Is that game three or four? No, that's game one, home game one.

Game three. Home game one, so game three, yeah. Yeah. Oh, my God. I figured there will definitely be a game one, right? Home game one? Yeah. Oh, yeah, there definitely will be.

Oh, my heart right now. Home game one and two. This is fantastic. I can't talk to you about how much I spent, but... Yeah, you can. I'm your husband. I'm like, what is it? No, I'm not telling you. I've been saving up for this for a while now.

Well, and you know what the great part about this is, Steve? You know what? I don't need to know. The great part about this, yeah, don't look a gift horse in the mouth. But also, it means that your fund for getting a second dog is now depleted. So you should look at this as a benefit as well, right? It's expensive even to get a rescue

Bindi's fee was $450 Well then that's just the fee Then you have to raise a dog But your fee for getting the dog Which is what I told her So this is good It's not the money It's the 10 years of having a dog

And it also costs money to have a dog Anyway I know girl tricks What? This didn't decrease her chances of getting a dog This increased it. Oh, no. Listen to that.

He'll laugh. I got you playoff tickets. You can't get me the dog I want. I did get you the dog I want. His name is Iggy Dude Dangle. He lives with us. He's wonderful. Anyway, I saw...

You know what? No, I... Should I deny these tickets? No, you should not. Yeah, you're right. No, I would never. I would never. No, don't even joke about that.

Or should we upsell them and make a mortgage payment? No. I don't. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Yes, fuck that, I agree. Mrs. Dangle, you're a wonderful person, and Steve, I'm so very happy for you. And a little jealous.

I'm not going to lie, I'm a little jealous that you get to go. It hasn't sunk in yet. Well, how could it? We just found out. I didn't think until Monday. No. Yeah, I know.

She's like, are you excited for the Jays game tonight? She called me on the train on the way here, and I'm like, no, I'm doing the podcast first. I'm a one-thing-at-a-time guy. Has your wife ever asked you, so you know that event we have next weekend? What are you wearing to that? Oh, yeah.

And I'll be like, let's start with what event we're going to next weekend. What are we doing? Yeah, let's start with what that is. Because I don't know. I'm going? I didn't know that. There's a next weekend? Yeah, right.

I wasn't aware. It's very true. Mrs. Dangle, we have another thing to thank you for, but that'll be later in the show, so you'll unfortunately have to hear that in the recorded portion, okay? Yes. All right. Or should we do that now? Well, I guess.

She's on the phone. You're right. You're right. I found out something yesterday. So we were at Real Sports. interviewing Aaron Sanchez, Jesse Blake and I. Adam had to tend to his sick dog, unfortunately. And Jesse said something that I did not know, because I suck.

And I've known this a couple times, but Jesse's very mysterious. Incorrect. He's very secretive. There's just not a lot going on. We missed Jesse Blake's birthday. We did. You didn't miss it. To be fair.

I didn't tell you. Well, there's that. Jesse doesn't like celebrating his birthday. Yeah. Right? We went over this. Sure. You're not like, I need everybody to celebrate the day that I was born, right?

What's the family guy bit where she's like, me! Oh, the Julia Roberts? I'm not Julia Roberts. It's more of me! Well, Jesse, as your friend, too bad. It took so long. So because Bindi was sick, I was going to go and do this. But Mrs. Dangle actually ended up doing this.

Because if I texted Steve, he would have forgotten. I know I love my friend But that's the way it is Yes And same Vice versa Whenever I'm told that I go hey

Yeah So I said You know hey Can you guys pick up Some cupcakes And Mrs. Dangle's like Nah dog I can make some cupcakes

What Because you Because you like that cake That I brought in It was the banana cake We made banana cupcakes With chocolate By we we mean Mrs. Dangle

We I was there Giving her love and support Does that not count Can we just talk about how beautiful this icing is. The icing is beautiful and the candles that are in it,

which I don't know. None of us have a lighter. We can't light them in the studio. Also, thank you so much. Oh, yeah, also fire. It's Winnie the Pooh. So kind. Winnie the Pooh.

So Mrs. Dangle, with another round of applause for her. And happy birthday, Jesse. Jesse was just saying how hungry he is. Happy birthday. I was. We love you, Mrs. Dangle. I'm eating them right now.

I picked the biggest one. Mrs. Dangle, the best. Thank you so much. Okay, you're welcome. I love you. You hung up on her after I told her I love you. That's fair. That's fine.

I want to eat one of those, too, eventually. Me, too. Because they smell amazing. I'm going to wait. We're going to talk about Pink Slip Monday or Black Monday or whatever you want to call Monday, starting with the Los Angeles Kings, who... Did we talk about every series? Yes, we did.

Oh, wow. It always feels like there should be more. It seemed like the era was ending in Los Angeles. It seemed like it was done anyway. Unequivocally. But I would have thought, with the amount of success Dean Lombardi and Mr. Sutter had, that they would have had a shot at rebuilding this thing. Yeah. And it's AEO or AEG or something, whoever, AEG, who owns the LA Kings.

Who is it? Is it an insurance company? I don't know. And they own the Galaxy as well. Live events. Live events. There you go. They got rid of them.

And what's interesting here, I think, is who they've replaced them with. which is Luke Robitaille as a president and Rob Blake, who was the assistant general manager for, I think, four years. As the GM. As the GM. You got two former players in charge. Right.

And what happened in Colorado when that happened? Now. Well, what happened in Tampa? Exactly. Different situations. This could go one of two ways. You have arguably the worst GM in the league and you have arguably the best GM in the league.

Yeah. Both former players. Yeah. There's a lot of former players in there. It was very interesting, but Kings, I believe Since 2014 So here's how it went

Won the Stanley Cup Missed the playoffs Made the playoffs Won just one game Missed the playoffs One playoff victory in three years That's not very good, is it? Well, I might be wrong

Leafs general managers have survived more than that Yes, that is true But now the Kings are in a crazy cap I saw the Anze Kopitar contract quoted as a bad deal Is it possible that I think that Anze Kopitar just had a bad season I think the whole team had a bad season If your teammates aren't getting points, it's hard for you to put up points

It's difficult to get an unassisted goal There's a reason why they're a little bit rare Generally speaking, you get on a breakaway, it's because someone fed you Kings didn't have a whole lot of that this year that was rough well and what's he making

10.5 yeah it's a lot all number one centers like if they're on a new contract they gotta make that Anthony Kopitar is the least

of the Kings problems the Dustin Brown contract is a horror show they had the whole Mike Richards saga that was handled very poorly Slava Voinov

Slava Voinov saga that was handled very poorly Jonathan Quick's contract is rough how do you look at the Bishop trade now desperate attempt

by GM Oh, that makes sense Now the trade makes sense Because that's the only thing that makes it make sense Yeah, maybe he saw the writing on the wall and he's like I need to go get Bishop Interesting That's a great theory

Interesting that they gave him the leeway to do that But I guess if he's got the leeway already It's pretty hard to take it away from him Yeah, I mean, if you're the GM, you're the GM I still won you two cups, you jerk And it's interesting that you say you think he would get more leeway You would think that Because that's what most teams have done

But a smart ownership group Sees the writing on the wall Now I usually say I don't like when ownership gets involved Well they have to though At a certain point they have to Sometimes you do, you have to I don't like when

Ownership influences A general manager And who's playing and who's getting drafted And stuff like that I don't have a problem with ownership doing what ownership is allowed to do Which is firing a general manager You know I have a problem when ownership fires a coach.

Right. GM? Well, you're supposed to. Yeah. It's what you're supposed to do. So Kings now have a great opportunity to rebuild. And I joked about this last night

by saying, hey, Drew Doughty's coming to the Leafs. But the first thing rebuilding teams do is get rid of their best players. I think Jeff Carter is a very attractive asset there. He's locked in so long.

And so cheaply. Still scored, what is it, 25, 30 goals this year? Yeah you know what He's good value but that term It's very long It's going to be hard to move Doughty you just shouldn't move

Kopitar is now impossible to move He's still good but he's impossible to move Brown is too rich For anyone's taste I would think You can't move him Quick probably can't move The thing that they said

That got Dean Lombardi fired Was that he was too married to the guys that weren't your Jonathan Tays, Duncan Keefe. So maybe they did say... They got a little too married to the depth guys. Too much money into the depth guys. Well, dude, they signed

Kyle Clifford to five years? At 1.7 a year or something? You don't need to do that. And Dustin Brown is a depth guy. Well, and he at best, when he was playing at his best, was still a third line guy. Second, third. Yeah. The Leafs almost traded for him, by the way, the year they won the Cup. Scary.

How many Maple Leafs players scored more goals than Anze Kopitar this year? How many goals did Anze Kopitar have? I'm going to go with he didn't hit 20. So I'm going to say, okay, Matthews had 40. Kadri passed 30. Nylander passed 20. Marner had 19. Brown had 20.

JVR had 29. That's right. So what are we at, 6? Yeah, I don't know. Bozak had a bunch. I'm going to say 7. Adam? Just to be different from Steve, I'm going to say eight.

Eight players on the Leafs. Bozak. Hunze Kopitar had 12 goals this season. Ooh, how many assists? He had 40 assists. 40 assists. He's a playmaker. You know what's funny?

He's the guy I thought Austin Matthews was going to be. Defensive center, doesn't score many goals, gets a lot of assists. Wrong. I don't think anybody knew what to make of Matthews. I don't think anybody knew what he was going to be. It's so funny. there were so many prognosticators Anze Kopitar I heard

I heard Jonathan Tays I heard you know all these as long as it didn't liken him to a guy who was

really good offensively then they were cool with it but it's so funny with a guy with a shot like he has with a release like he has with puck handling skills like he has

they didn't think that he would somehow score a lot of points I don't I don't get that we're like he was known as

an incredible puck handler I fell I fell into the trap of going with Just what you're told Me too Which yeah

I didn't I also never seen him Play in Switzerland Can you bring up The Kings cap friendly I have it up There it is So like we just

We just tear into the Blue Jackets all summer long But like what What is the Kings Situation So we start at the Top with the forwards You got Kopitar

Making 10 million dollars By the way can I have a cupcake While you're ripping this Thank you They smell so good I just have to I was debating I don't trust myself

Not to talk with my mother During the show or effort. Oh my god. Okay, so while you're reading through this, I'm just not going to say anything and I'm going to eat this cupcake. So, Anzacopitar is sitting at $10 million a year until 2024. Damn.

Holy shit. Dustin Brown, 5.87 until 2022. Oh my god! What was the point of that deal? Was that one of those weird back-ended Ilya Kovalchuk deals? No, it was one of the weird front-ended I think that was signed

just before the lockout so like when they put a cap on all of it yeah shit and um he's 32 right now so

can we talk about how lucky the Blackhawks are because they have two of those goofy contracts but lucky for them those two goofy contracts those like now

illegal contracts are Duncan Keith and Marion Hossa with the Blackhawks Jeff Carter yay Dustin Brown oh

yeah Jeff Carter sitting at 5.2 till 2022 Marion Gabrick, who's 35, sitting at 4.87 until 2021. Whoa. And he's not looking like Marion Gabrick anymore. All he has to do is show up, and they still have to pay him. Tyler Toffoli expiring this year.

He's going to be an RFA. Yeah, RFA this year. Jerome Aguilera, UFA. Trevor Lewis making $2 million until 2020. Why? Why? Wait, sorry. What's he making?

Trevor Lewis, at 30 years old, is making $2 million until 2020. Now, see, I don't know a whole ton about Trevor Lewis. I know a lot of people have thought of him as a good depth player for a long time. That's a lot to be paying depth when you can't afford it, though. Or just, why the length? It's one thing— You want to play a $2 million—he's a center, right? Yeah.

Okay, you want to pay a center in this league $2 million, great. Maybe that's how they got him at $2 million. How old is he? 30. Maybe that's how they got him that low. I'm a little hypocritical because I said I would gladly take Boyle back on the lease for $2 million, something like that. But I think you pay your depth, guys, when you can afford it. The Kings can't afford it.

There's a reason the Blackhawks don't do something like that. They can't afford it. And Brian Boyle on a five-year contract is far less attractive, I have to say. Oh, absolutely. I like Brian Boyle at two years and two and a half. I don't like Brian Boyle at 2 million over 5 years 2 million a year over 5

like it's a 10 million dollar contract or something like that I just think it's just too long that's too long to commit to somebody because inevitably you're you're signing your own you're signing your own pink slip

basically you have a chance to win 2 cups in 3 years when do general managers get fired usually when the team underperforms and they're out of flexibility. Usually those two things converge. Yeah, it's when your time runs out because there's no more room to do

and your team isn't good enough. Yeah. This isn't the greatest comparison in the world, but Louis C.K. has this bit. I don't know if he ever did it on stage, but he was on some talk show once. He was talking about he brought his two daughters to like some, I don't know,

I think it was some crazy memorial in Washington and they had a spectacular day and they did all these very cool things. I think they got a tour of the White House, like a private tour of the White House. And then they had to drive back. And he's saying to his daughter, he's like, okay, you had that really cool experience.

Well, now you have to pay for it. You're paying for it now and we're driving back. Do you understand? And it was kind of a lesson for them. Like you're getting this really cool thing, but it comes at a cost. And the cost is we're going to go on like an eight-hour drive now or whatever it is.

So we're going to go out. We're going to sign all these guys to long-term deals. We're going to win a cup. Two cups. We're going to win two cups, but then we've got to pay for it on the back end when these deals come up. I think Dean Lombardi, like, if you said, hey, man, do you have any regrets? He shouldn't. And did he make mistakes?

Absolutely. Should you regret mistakes? I think Mike Richards would be a regret. Yeah, okay. But he got to see the White House. Exactly. Yes, literally got to see the White House twice. Got to go there twice.

You know, I'm not saying he handled everything perfectly And he should be praised Like for the, again Slava Voinov Slava Voinov Handling of both of those was very poor But if we're just talking dollars and cents here And purely hockey decisions

Won two cups and now he's paying for it That's the cost Any GM would gladly trade that Hey man, you get two cups But you get fired three years after Do you take it? And that GM would respond, wow, two? I'd do it for one.

I would gladly do it for one. So it's just him paying the Pied Piper, right? I sort of wonder with Sutter and him on the market, in terms of free agent coaches and general managers, if Colorado doesn't have their next brain trust. Although I don't know. You tweeted that earlier, right? Yeah.

It was a good tweet. I don't know if Sutter is the guy to coach young guys. I don't know that he isn't. Yeah, I don't think that's the best fit. I don't know if his style is even the best fit. Some people were talking about how his style is kind of passed by. They won a cup in 2014. He's not a dinosaur.

No. By any means. But Lombardi, I think, could be a really good match in Colorado. Yeah, because you bring in somebody with experience who can build something that they don't have at all in Colorado. The truth is so bad. Should we do a check-in on their plus-minus? Yeah.

Or their differential, sorry. Yeah, let's do it. The LA Kings? So I think the stat was... Oh, Colorado? Yeah. Oh, I know this. So I think the worst goal differential of any team in the cap era was negative 113.

The Colorado Avalanche... I'm trying to remember. I want to say the Sabres. Okay. Probably the McEichel Sabres. The Colorado Avalanche this year had what? 112 If the Leafs had just beat them

That one time We would be playing Ottawa And they would have broken the record At least tied it And you know Colorado did not expect to be this bad And were this bad People deserve to pay for that

In their defense They lost Verlamov at what? Christmas? You're a little better If Colorado If Colorado doesn't make wholesale changes Bednar gone, Sackett gone Are you going to be shocked? Absolutely shocked

But this is the problem That I think maybe the Leafs had a little while ago What does Colorado have to give Other than their best players? Well, they have their love, too That's all they have That's the thing Like, okay, you get a new coach

Boy band reference Just throwing that out there My love is all I have to give 98 degrees No, okay, all right, fine Yeah, it's not... Fine. Fine.

But yeah, you could do Shane. Okay, so a new coach, a better coach, assuming they're better, would be an upgrade. A new GM, that's great, but that's... Takes years. What moves do they make? Yeah, it takes years. You get rid of Dushane, are you better? No.

You get rid of Landeskog, are you better? No. You get rid of McKinnon, are you better? No. Well, you wouldn't really... I think you'd keep McKinnon. You probably... Yeah, you'd definitely keep McKinnon, but...

But what do you get for Deshane and what do you get for Landeskog? And then beyond them, what do you have to give? They've got a couple of young guys in the system that look like they could be pretty good. Rantanen, I think. Tyson Jost, I think, had a good end of the season. Tyson Berry is not going to be as bad as Tyson Berry was. No, that's probably true too. I think Eric Johnson was out for a while.

But if you're talking about just selling off guys to bring back assets, I don't know if Colorado has a lot to give. I don't. Other than Landis Cog and Duchesne, which I don't think are good decisions. So, okay, here's what you had a few years ago. You had McKinnon, not in this order, but you had McKinnon, Duchesne, Ryan O'Reilly, and Paul Stastny. And you lose Stastny to free agency. You lose Stastny to free agency, you lose O'Reilly in a trade.

So naturally what you do next is Get rid of Duchesne as well What? Yeah I know Are you nuts? And they almost did Montreal almost ended up with them You were the best team up the middle

And you pissed three of them away? That doesn't sound smart Well and then And then you've got So you've got McKinnon McKinnon who's now a center Yep And you've got Duchesne

So that's a pretty good one-two punch And Duchesne's locked up for a while It's something to build around Exactly Something to build around Centers don't grow on trees Chances are I mean they have a 20% shot

At the number one pick Chances are they get it Let's just say chances Let's say they end up with it Leafs got it They get Nolan Patrick They get Nolan Patrick Is he a center?

Yes I believe he is But I'm sure they could Start him on the wing If they wanted to play him top six No one's been talking about him No because of that knee injury That's what happens when you're out People are like

Oh man He probably won't go first overall No No But You know who only played Like 17 games in his draft year? Still went fifth overall?

Morgan Rielly Oh yeah That's right He was kind of the forgotten about one Yep When they picked him I was legitimately upset I was so mad

I was like Who the hell is this guy Oh my god He's going to be another bust Lo and behold Morgan Rielly Hello He is a center man

He is a center man Okay I'm just being true So yeah You have a guy That doesn't have to play center Because like Austin Matthews As much as

Yeah it would have been They could have started him On the wing Because Babcock Kind of talked about that We kind of needed him Like we didn't really Have a choice

I mean yeah you have Bozak And yeah you've got Kadri But you needed a third center there, and you needed a No. 1 center, and he looks like the No. 1 guy. No, he plays on the third line. Yeah, that's right, the third line. Checking line. That's sure.

Totally. Remember the top six? Remember the Carlisle-Burke era? Top six score, the bottom six. That's the grinders. Do nothing. They are Colton Orr. Punch guys in the face.

We're going to win. We're going to punch it. By punches. I do think that Austin Matthews Is a good comparable Nolan Patrick coming in They could have

Potentially a guy Who could Either play the third line Or they could have him On the wing And if you've got Lannis Gog And Duchesne

Already in there And you've got Eric Johnson And Tyson Berry Those are arguably I would say Arguably better pieces Than the Leafs had

To build around You need to be smart In free agency And usually that means Avoiding free agency And figure out goaltending. And you need to draft very well. I think their goaltending might not even be that bad.

It's just they were developing guys expected to do way too much. Spencer Martin, nice kid. He was the goalie for the Steelheads when I was there. Nice kid. Could really develop into something. But the games he played. Like, he's a religious guy. And I think he was doing the sign on the cross for more reasons than just God.

Like, just, oh my God. And, of course, it's the Avalanche, man. It's the Avalanche. Didn't have a chance. Yeah. One Willis Desjardins. Oh, yes. Willie Desjardins and his staff fired in Vancouver.

Now, I looked at this and thought— Oh, and the staff. And the staff. Oh, I didn't know that. Assistant coaches are gone, too. Oh, shoot. I wondered—I looked at this situation and thought, okay, so you have him fired. To me, he's the least of the problems.

He might be part of the problem itself But he's the least of them Everything I read out of Vancouver was actually something along those lines Part of the problem Not necessarily the problem I think the problem is Jim Benning Man, he built up all that goodwill at the trade deadline

With a couple moves that looked pretty nice And then he starts talking again When is someone going to tell him to shut up? Shut up! Well, what did he say that bugged you particularly? I can't even remember what it was, man. Dude, it all blends together. Well, here's an interesting statement that I thought was very Dave Nones-like.

It was something about a defenseman. Maybe that's what you got. Well, no, it's not. It's Trevor Linden. And it's very Dave Nones-y. And I find that very interesting. Shut up. Yeah.

Guys that shouldn't say stuff. He said, this is Trevor Linden. I am a lot more optimistic than at any time since I've been here. This is in the press conference explaining the firing of the head coach. That's the line you want to use Listen, if you work for a corporation This is exactly what they start to say When things go south

If you work for United I blame the passenger I'm Trevor Linden of United By the way, I also find it very funny Just as an aside That they've dug up history on this doctor And that somehow negates the fact that United Pulled a man off a plane

Physically But he was charged guys In 19 or 2005 With what? It was like pay for, like sex for treatment stuff. Oh, shoot. 98 counts of it. Yeah.

However, they still physically pulled a man off the plane. Yeah. It had nothing to do with, that has nothing to do with this. You have rights as a human being. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Anyway.

But United's statement on the incident was so, hey, we know everybody's going to forget about this in a week when something else on the internet happens. I've heard nothing but terrible things, but I will never fly them. Have you ever flown United? I think once. It's awful. Yeah, I've heard nothing but bad things. And the reason that people fly United is it's cheap.

It's huge and it's cheap. And they know people won't stop flying. No. So they're like, hey, yeah, we're not sorry. What are you going to do? If you want to take a connecting flight anywhere in the States, it's United. Like you don't, I laugh at people that say, oh, I'll never fly United. Okay.

I got it going somewhere. Yeah, go through O'Hare and not take United. Flying, generally speaking, is unpleasant. I got on a flight, I think it was out of London, England, one time, and just looking at the paint on the plane, I'm like, I don't want to get on this thing. And the only thing that put me at ease was the flight attendant talked like this. And I'm like, okay, so this plane has been across the ocean once. That was the only thing I was like, okay, so it's made it. It might be the last time, but it did make it.

We're going to crash! Oh! You're going to go on a flight that you paid for? Oh, that's terrible. Now, to be fair, even to United in this, it should be illegal to overbook an airplane. A hundred percent. Yeah. That's the government's fault, not United's.

Oh, okay. So I clearly don't understand how that works. I thought that was United's fault. So no, United and many passenger airlines do this. they will overbook the flight because some people sometimes don't show up. This shitty plane that I got on, I got on it because they overbooked our flight

and I'm standing in line with people and we're talking to each other and we're like are you here because it was overbooked? They overbooked like 50 people! That's not overbooking that's booking two flights! Now what the airlines will tell you is that if you get rid of that

then they will pass the charge on to consumers and make tickets higher because they still have to make their profits. So the governments are like, oh, well, we don't want to be the administration that's responsible for that, so we'll let the next guy take care of it, and we'll

let this continue to go on, and you've got groups like United who, what they need to do, if you want to do an overbooking, if you want to do, like, say, a four-passenger limit overbooking, you overbook four people, I'm okay with that. But when it gets to

10, 15, 20, it's obnoxious. There are going to be people that just don't show up for flights. Also, I don't know who everyone else on the flight was, but if you're going to kick someone off, I know you're picking people at random, but maybe don't pick the 69-year-old.

Oh, but Steve, it was at random. Like, make seniors exempt. It's a senior citizen. It was random. They picked it out of a hat. But Steve, it doesn't matter that he was a senior citizen or that he was physically assaulted. It matters that he had some charges laid against him in 2005.

You're right. Let us not forget. How did we get into this? No, I brought it up. I brought it up. I apologize for that. But it was just like, this Trevor Linden quote

is very much like the United thing. It's very corporate. Here's the Titanic sinking, but hey, things are great. Look, the band's still playing on the front deck. Well, look, we tweeted

at the McNuggets guy a couple days ago. Not even McNuggets, the Wendy's McNuggets guy. Yeah, so to me, it was a very Dave Notice in Toronto quote here. I'm a lot more optimistic than at any time since I've been here

I'm not worried about Years 5, 6, and 7 Remember that? I'm going to continue Our prospect pool is deeper and better Because you've been bad Vancouver, because you've been bad That's why your prospect pool is deeper and better

Because you've been bad And here's where it gets fun It's challenging times, no doubt No one is happy with where we're at But I am happy and encouraged in some of the improvement from guys like Bowe and Marcus.

And then he goes on to say that they've walked a fine line. What are you looking at? Mrs. Angle is here. Why? Really? Yeah.

Okay. I told her not to leave until two. Small note about Vancouver as well. They did an awesome tank job to end the year. They went one and nine

and they snuck into the second last position. So the Coyotes passed them? Yes. This guy always won four games and didn't lose eight. Can I make a bet? Vancouver's winning the draft lottery. You think so?

Yeah. I feel it. I feel it in my bones. Nolan Patrick's a Canuck? Vancouver Canuck. Here's the quote I wanted to get to. Because my notes have been deleted. Some of this is missing.

It sucks. We've walked the fine line between trying to develop players at the NHL level and winning. No, you haven't. You finished 27th last year and 28th this year. Can you repeat that? Oh, sorry, 28th and 29th. We walked the fine line between trying to develop players at the NHL level and winning. First off, you shouldn't have to develop NHL players at the NHL level.

You develop them in the A. No, no, no. Devil's advocate. That's what the Leafs did this year. Okay, fair. Zach Hyman had a year in the AHL, but they've been developing him. Connor Brown had a year in the AHL, or two, three years. I'll let them slide with that.

You know who's developed players at an NHL level and walked the fine line with winning? The Toronto Maple Leafs. Damn straight. The Vancouver Canucks, with 28th and 29th consecutive finishes, have not walked that long. The Chicago Blackhawks. Chicago Blackhawks are a perfect example of that. For what they've done with their depth guys. And they're probably trading them.

Brandon saw it. You know what I mean? NHL. I mean, sorry, NHL. Nashville. Can I give you the Probably the saddest stat In like hockey

This year Like the saddest Okay I have 10 professional goals this year Or sorry No, no I made a mistake

I have 19 professional points this year 18 of those points Are in the American Hockey League I scored those 18 points In 62 American Hockey League games Who am I? Jake Furtanen Yeah

Fourth overall pick I think He was Was he fourth? Sixth Oh sixth Two picks If I'm not mistaken Two picks before

William Nylander Oh god Three picks before Nikolai Yielers I remember One of the happiest moments Of the past few years For me

Was The moment the Canucks Picked Jake Furtanen I was at the draft In Philly Cause I I remember thinking The Leafs would get

Furtanen Cause I thought He would drop to eighth and I remember looking at his stats and going, oh, okay, that's fine, that's fine. They pick Vertanen and I go, that means the Leafs will get one of Nylander or Ehlers. Hurricanes go up and they pick Hayden Flurry.

And I'm like, holy shit, no way! Oh, fuck, don't you fucking pick Nick Ritchie. Don't you fucking pick Nylander! Holy shit! I remember that being like a huge surprise. I was very happy. I was very happy. So I think that

Vancouver does have Some good pieces I don't think they're wrong But let's not pretend That they've walked A fine line Like why are you saying Why would you say that

You're not winning It's either spin Which I mean Yeah I don't know I guess you can't blame Someone for trying to Spin You'd be better off

Being honest I think you're better off Being honest We know where you're at Making your fans think They're stupid Yeah And it makes me mad

For Vancouver fans Because I was mad As a Leaf fan When it happened I want to know what Vancouver fans believe that. I think they do. I think there are some that do.

Of course there's some. You need to only look at the Canucks Army blog. No, they hate with ownership. No, no, no. Well, not the Canucks Army blog. Oh, the comment section. The comment section. Oh, yes, absolutely.

They're like, oh, no, I believe it. See how quickly that changed? I don't think so. Jim Benning, I believe. And the Panthers. And another interesting quote from the Panthers. So the Panthers also made a shuffle. They did.

Dale Tallon has been renamed general manager of the— Now, before you get into the quote, again, this is—it's impossible to find people who— We should have called Doug Sifu, by the way. I know. It's impossible for anyone to be fair about the Panthers. So you had all the old boys club crapping on the Panthers when they got rid of Gerard Gallant and wondering what the hell Doug Sifu was thinking, meanwhile not bothering to ask Doug Sifu. Then they went on this run and you had the whole computer boys thing and all the analytics folks and a lot of the bloggers were getting on the Panthers thing.

Rah, rah, the Panthers are going to be in the first round. I even said it. I was like, oh boy, it's really going to suck when the Panthers pass the Leafs because for a while it looked that way. And then for the final stretch of the season when they were bad, they were just kind of ignored. Now Dale Tallon Is the general manager Like the old boys club

Wanted him to be The entire time And they're like Oh see it's a circus What? You got what you wanted But it is still a circus It is still a circus

And what's funny is I think they're still right To think that Like they do have a point But But they got their guy This is right back to what it was Yeah

Well and You got what you think Is the right decision It's funny when they were Talking about Can't call them stupid When you think they're doing the right thing.

I don't know. What they were talking about was there's a chance, not a great chance, but a chance that Gerard Gallant comes back. No. He was named as one of the possibilities because it's Florida, man. Would he come back? Well, I'm sure they'd have to pay him a... If you double Gerard Gallant's salary, I'm sure he would do it.

Oh, God. Hey, it comes with a free taxi. Yeah. We'll give you Uber to every game. We'll buy Uber. We will buy Uber because they have that kind of money. Didn't that happen with a prominent Toronto radio personality

They got fired There was all this uproar About them getting fired Someone asked them to come back And they said yeah sure For more money Yeah Oh a lot more

And a public apology Yeah And like in the newspaper Back when When that was like When everybody read the newspaper Yeah Right like it was a big

Yeah this was like what 20 years ago Something like that 15 15 15 yeah Yeah That'd be great

You know what That would be funny Wouldn't it be funny It would be funny They'd be Doug McLean's Favorite team again yeah because that situation

would be so toxic I don't think it would I think it's kind of like I actually here's I'm not defending what they did because I think

it was ownership for sure overreaching and I also think it was a I think it was a Tim Rowe power play Tom Rowe Tom Rowe power play

I think I think this is like Game of Thrones and I think Tom Rowe hoodwinked a few people and then I just I feel like

it looks to me how does a guy how does a guy see I think he's been hoodwinked He was Xerxes. You think he was Xerxes? Yeah, he lit the castle on fire just as a power play.

He just blew everybody up. I feel like how did he end up the GM and the coach without making some movements in the background? Wait, though. So he started the season, if I'm not mistaken, he began the season as the GM, then became GM coach, then became coach with other guys taking on the duties of the GM. Now he's not the coach Not the GM And he's special advisor

To the GM Which nobody has any idea What that That's what I mean Like I wonder After all this Did he get demoted? Oh yeah

He 100% got demoted Yeah So Maybe he did try to Hoodwink some people And it turned out poorly But it kind of just sounds Like he got shafted

I don't know To me it sounds like There's some dealing In the backgrounds there Now I'm just trying to look at it You know Here's my quote

Here's the quote And I love this I love this From Dale Tallon We're turning the page on a disappointing season. That is an understatement. Which I think is kind of the conclusion we just came to. Bury the season in the sand.

Because again, remember, Dale Tallon and Gerard Gallant, with this team, won the division. For a variety of interesting reasons. But they won the division. But they did. Yeah. Again, can't take it away from them. Tallon said, from today, we're moving forward with a singular voice under my leadership in hockey operations. we're going to have one agenda

and one agenda only and that is winning and now I thought that was interesting the one agenda thing means that there was multiple agendas means that there was wheeling and dealing in the background now I don't know what Tom Rowe's part in that would have been he's obviously still with the team

but for how long who knows and I there's something there is something political that happened back there bizarre little case yeah it's weird well and what gets lost in this is, what are the Panthers on the ice? I still think they're a good team.

I think they're a fantastic team. Reimer played well, but they were without Luongo. Barkov was out. Huberto was out for a very long time. Trochek has been a revelation. Marcheseau was a revelation. Aaron Ekblad was out for a while, multiple

times. On the ice, I think the Panthers are fine. Similar situation to Tampa, but I think Tampa's stronger. But behind the scenes It was such a distraction And you can You know what's resonated with me a little bit

Have you seen Willie Mitchell's Twitter? No Former Captain Willie Mitchell Former Florida Panthers Captain Willie Mitchell Last year He keeps tweeting carnival music Whenever a story comes Whenever something comes out about the Panthers

So he knows something Well it's It's his Even if it's not He knows something extra It's That is his opinion What about the Panthers players?

Surely they can't enjoy this No It's never good When your team Is painted In a bad Incompetent light And it has nothing

To do with you How frustrating How taxing Must that be on your mind? Pretty bad Pretty bad That would be tough And you got all your other crap to worry about.

You're trying to get better from a concussion. You're trying to get better from your leg injury. You just had a kid. You don't want to be dealing with this. You don't want to be hearing about all of this. No. So I think next season the Panthers come back as a much, much better team. Lindy Ruff out in Dallas after four seasons.

Yeah, well, I mean, Lindy Ruff had two shitty goalies with a shitty defense. What do you do? He had a rough time in Dallas. Oh! Real difficult. You're awful. You're so garbage. That comma was so bad.

Woof. Get it? Because rough. Woof. Oh. Because that's the other dog thing. Get it? No.

I would have tweeted that. Anyway. It came back. You got it. Jesse. Yes. If you look on the Steve Dangle Podcast Reddit page, I know that you already know this is there, but I'm announcing it anyway.

There is a happy birthday Jesse session. And I know Jesse hates it. However, there are 68 comments there, and I believe you should read all of them. It was very nice of you, Adam. And what was hilarious about it was I was like trying to keep this a secret. People started tweeting, Jesse, happy birthday. I'm like, no, stop doing that. I got tons of tweets that said happy birthday.

I meant just for it to be on the Reddit page, but I didn't specify that. So to be fair, it's not your fault. It's mine. Guys, Jack Eichel missed out on $2 million. So here's what happened. Jack Eichel was to get a $2 million bonus if he finished in the top 10 in the NHL. In points per game Not points

You missed too many games for that Points per game Heading in to game 82 Leon Dreisaitl Needed two points To pass Jack Eichel By 0.01 To shove him into 11th

In the last game of the season Dreisaitl gets two points Did he get a hat trick? I don't know That sucks Missed out on a two million dollar payday So the next day They go

So Mr. Eichel What did you think about the season? And he's like Fuck bullshit This whole team is bullshit Bunch of teammate bullshit Bullshit Sabres Bullshit everything bullshit

That is a lot of money That's so much money Two million dollars $2 million. You can get a home wherever you want. You can get a home in Dubai. What can you do with $2 million?

You never have to pay for food ever again for the rest of your life. No. No, seriously. What are all the things you can do with $2 million? You can buy two $1 million homes. You can buy a Bugatti. You can wake up in two Bugattis. You can wake up in two Bugattis.

No, I think it'd be the low-end model, though, because aren't Bugattis $2 million? Well, there's the Veyrons now you can probably get a used Veyron for less than a million. Nobody wants a used Veyron. Screw Bugatti's. Like, how many Mazda 3s could you get? I woke up in 70,000 Mazda 3s. Or 50,000 Mazda 3 GSs

where you have the buttons in the wheel. Think about all of the Chicken McNuggets you could buy. He could single-handedly fund that Wendy's guy. He could single-handedly fund Wendy's. He could buy a Wendy's

He could buy a couple Wendy's He could buy a Tim's He could I don't know buy a newspaper Buy several Buy a Tim Hortons for some people You know what I would do if I were him I would surround Tim Murray's house with port-a-potties

And go ha! How's that for number two Now you get to look outside at number twos all the time There you go You could do things You could do expensive mischief How much clubbing in Buffalo could get done for $2 million? Oh, so much clubbing in Buffalo. How many drinks would you have to have per dollar drink night?

You could never out-drink on a dollar drink night. You could never drink $2 million. You know how much outlet shopping you could get done at all the Buffalo outlet malls? Can't find good parking in Buffalo? Buy your own parking garage and you're fine. Do you have to find... How many LaCasse in this mall? You can buy your own mile LaCasse.

You could buy Wicca Paws. Could you buy Cheek to Wagga? You could buy Cheek to Wagga for $2 million. Cheek to Wagga for $2 million? Yeah, for $2 million. What can you do with $2 million? I'll tell you some things you can do with $2 million. You could take Ralph Wilson Stadium and call it Ralph Wilson Jack Eichelstein.

How many Salino and Barnes commercials could you fund? Oh, my goodness. How many quality items could you buy with $2 million? Sorry, American friends, you sound funny. I know we do, too. Uh... How many? Seriously, you could do...

You could buy a school! You could be a Dane Cook sketch. Two million dollars because Leon Dreisaitl, some guy on another team, Connor McDavid's teammate, had a nice last game to the season. Hey, speaking of which... Shit.

Yeah. Connor McDavid did not win the Calder. No, he didn't. I still think he deserved it. No offense to Terry Panarin, but I think in the 45 games he played last year, to me, he was the best rookie. But it's always based on who scores the most points. Now, going into March, I think we had this conversation.

I thought, Steve thought, Jesse, I wasn't sure about your thoughts. I was kind of sitting on the Matt Murray fence. I had line A. And I thought line A as well, although I thought Matt Murray definitely deserved a lot of votes. I mean, the team's doing extremely well. He still gets them. He was a top five goalie. Yeah, so now, with the last month and a half,

you know, Line A sort of fell off. Winnipeg sort of fell off. Matthews has 40 goals. The milestone really helps. It's not a debate anymore. Is it a debate anymore? No, no. He led the league in even-strength goals.

What?! He has 32 even-strength goals. Crosby has 30. And he was second in league goal scoring. He almost won the Rocket Richard Trophy. Are you serious? Yeah. I haven't really been paying attention to that stuff.

He was very high up. Well, Crosby won with 44. He finishes in a tie for second in the NHL with 40 goals. No rookie has finished higher since Timu Solani in 1992-93. Didn't Ovechkin have 50? No rookie has finished higher since Timu Solani in 1992-93. Who tweeted that? Sportsnet Stats.

I think that's wrong. did in Ovechkin's rookie season what did he finish pretty sure he had 52 goals did somebody

did two other players have more did he finish higher because I don't think sports news stats gets a lot of stuff no they don't

that's why I'm confused okay I'll look it up and also we have to shout out Nikita Kucherov who also tied with Austin Matthews 40 goals most underrated

player in the league this year Nikita Kucherov yeah oh my god gotta be he is so dangerous he's scary

gotta be He's Teresanko without any of the hype. I was just going to say Teresanko. Yes, he's Teresanko without being on the cover of a video game. Yeah, yeah. But he will be next year. Because he's not the face of the franchise like Teresanko is. It's Stamkos, but he was gone the whole time.

Yeah, imagine you have Kucherov and Stamkos on the same team. Yeah, I can imagine. That's stupid. In 2005-2006, Ovechkin's rookie year, Jonathan Chichu finished in first place with 56 goals. In second place was Yarmir Yager with 54. So Ovechkin finished in third. Oh, it's no one has finished... No one has finished that high since Tame Musolani.

I thought it was about the goal total. No. I wonder if you era adjusted, by the way, because I wonder if you era adjusted, and I'm not saying in any way that Austin Matthews was even close to Tame Musolani's thing, but I wonder what the era adjustment from the early 90s to now would be

and how many goals that would conceivably be mathematically. It wouldn't be 70-something, but it'd be higher. Do you want some more Matthews stats? Yeah. So, he's the first player to score 30-plus 5-on-5 goals since Corey Perry in 2013-2014. No way. And he finishes with 279 shots, which is 8th in the NHL. And that is the most by a rookie since Ovechkin had 425 in 2005-2006.

So, the 425 is a ridiculous number. That's stupid. Also, can I just throw out there that didn't he, wasn't he like one of the only guys to get a shot in every game this year? Yes. He was the only. Only guy. The only.

Sometime in the winter, it was just him and Ovechkin, and then Ovechkin missed. Patrick Laine, though, deserved this. Totally. 36 goals. Unreal. And had an injury. Yeah.

Yeah, missed a couple. Great season. 36 goals. How many assists, how many points? Let me find that out. I've got the, I've got, you click on that. I think it was 64. 64 points

28 assists great player I mean great player great player did he finish with higher points per game maybe

probably he played 73 games I don't know math and yeah he probably did his shooting percentage 17.6 that's pretty high

yeah that's very high now what doesn't now don't elite players shoot around that like Crosby for instance 14-15

is pretty high Crosby's shooting percentage this year is ridiculous not this year actually no Oh no sorry I'm looking at career playoffs

This year it was ridiculous 17-3 But his career average Is 14-7 It's almost 15% That's But that's Crosby Right

And that's the measure By which everybody Has to kind of put themselves Unless you're McDavid Unless you're McDavid Then you're looking down At Crosby and saying Hey what up

And if you look at Austin Matthews here I'm just going to pull that up His was About normal 14.3 About normal A little high

A little high A little high But yeah Wow God, he's so good He is good Now Is he gonna ever pass 40 goals?

Austin? Is he ever gonna outdo himself? Absolutely Because it's not that uncommon For rookies to have a Ridonculous first season And they can't match it Yeah

No, he's I think he'll for sure pass it Neil Broughton Who he passed for the American rookie goal scoring record Had 38 goals as a rookie Why are you leafing this? You're right.

Why don't you just believe that he's a very good player? Because he is. Oh, I'm not saying he's not going to get better. You can get better and still not have the same amount of goals. He'll never have 69 points again. Nice. He'll never have 49. I think he will.

I think he'll have years where he has... I think he'll be one of those guys that eventually gets 50-plus goals. Once or twice. I don't think he'll... I don't know if he'll ever lead the league the way he did in even-strength goals again. I mean, he's going to get... But I think he's going to get a lot more assists in the future, too. I don't think 29 assists is normal.

I don't know about the 50 goals thing, because I don't think many people are going to get 50 goals in the next 5, 10 years. It is. I still think he's going to do it, because he's so... His release and his shot, if anybody's going to do it, it'd be like him and Laine and... Well, Vetchkin and Stamkos, I think, are the only guys who have hit 60 goals since, like, Friends came on the air. Yeah. It's crazy. It's difficult to score that many goals.

Those guys are crazy good. I know. It's crazy. Let's do the press conference. The Presser SDP. The Steve Dangle Press Conference. Oh, fun Ovechkin stat. He's the first player in NHL history to lead his team in goals for 12 straight seasons.

Wow. Wow. Yes. Unbelievable. First ballot. Retires today, first ballot Unless you're dumb Leafs fan DVE

Wants to know What are the odds that Maple Leafs players Are allowed to grow a playoff beard And if they are What is the odds that the rookies Actually could Well that was already covered wasn't it Shanahan's quote I believe was

Oh they're absolutely allowed The question is can they Let's think of who the rookies are Can Marner Marner can't grow a beard. There's no way Marner can grow a beard. There's no way Nylander can grow a beard. Matthews could grow a really bad Sydney stache.

Yes. Yeah, he can maybe grow, like, the Sydney stache in Taves chops. Connor Brown can't grow a beard. See? And I don't know it would show up. He's got very light hair. Yeah. He might be one of those guys that if you give him enough time,

because he's got lighter hair, he'd be like, Joey Crabb grew the meanest mustache on all the Marlies, but it was blonde. Well, he's only going to have three games to grow it. You're right. Even though that's a mathematical impossibility. They're only going to have three games. It's a shame that the Caps, after all this effort, are going to get knocked out in three games.

Yeah, it really is. It's going to be a tough one. Who else? Hyman, that looks like it's going to be tragic, too. I don't think Zaitsev. Sosh. Kapanen. Sosh.

Even Nikita Zaitsev. I'm like, there's no hair there. Cather's going to have a nice one. Yeah. Kadri will have a nice one. Polak should have a nice one. Leo. Leo will be one of those

light haired but thick handlebars maybe that'd be cool there you go he would be so badass with handlebars I wish a team would do

something different other than just the playoff beard like I wish they would all do handlebars together that would be sick can you imagine an entire

team of handlebar moustaches coming at you that would be sick half of the Leafs are the generation that grew up with the bleach blonde hair in the playoffs

yeah oh that was a thing too that's right still is um Trying to think of all the players I feel like Riley There's another guy

Who Could grow like Thick but again It's too fair to see Gardner for sure not Gardner no Not a chance He's still got a baby face

Baby bottom Boyle No Boyles isn't good Could Freddie even Freddie can't Martin I don't think can We're gonna have some bad

Holy shit This whole team It'll just be like Did I miss anyone I don't think so oh my god it'll be funny we're gonna have like

three playoff beards on the whole roster GVR? no that's gonna be tragic too he's blonde no and I think he's one of those guys

who just can't grow the facial hair either dude this is only this is like a day and a half it's getting prickly it's better than it was in 2013 yeah mine is

yeah mine's I still don't know if I'm allowed to grow this I did mine I shaved my I shaved my face Saturday night and this is what it looks like

so I don't grow a very good beard are we doing playoff beards well you I can't I don't know you already got one though

yeah I don't think either of you can because you have to host the event and you probably can't and it sucks because I think I can grow one now

it used to be really tragic but now I can't you can't be on TV with a scruffy yeah yeah they would

BT would have a problem with that they like it they like it to be clean yeah once you have a beard it's good it's getting there

if I made it into a thing on breakfast television like oh yeah you know what i mean it was a bit and i maybe i would have if i if i was more confident that the leafs would beat the caps but honestly like and and if if there were any leaf players listening i and they were offended by that i'd be like guys i mean you know don't fault me for listen i'm cheering for you i want it but we have to look at the mathematical possibility of of this happening and it's okay it's not great you know what you look at how the least performed in uh

down the stretch, down that final stretch. It was pretty poor, I thought, their final five games. Even the games that weren't the second half of a back-to-back, they didn't look like themselves. Even in the Pittsburgh win, didn't look like themselves. I thought they needed to breathe. They needed to breathe, but they couldn't because they had to make the playoffs.

Now, no one's expecting them to do shit. And they got half a week off. House money, and they get a few days off finally. Bozak, I'm sure, is pretty stoked about that. Just hanging out with his kid. Yeah, wrestle with your kid. I think you'll see a better Leafs team than you've seen in the past two weeks. Do you have to take your Holt Beast figurine off your wall?

Maybe, and replace him with some kind of Leaf figurine. Why don't you have a Freddie Anderson one yet? I haven't seen one. I think you need to get one. I don't think they make those, but I'll try to find one. They don't make one? Not that I've seen. Don't you think I would know?

I was at Sports Check on Sunday And they're selling Dion Phaneuf Leaf Lego figurines For I think it was $4 That's too much Just give those away Yeah My favorite things that you see Is like at the dollar store

Where they've licensed the player But they haven't licensed the team logo So it would be like Dion Phaneuf And he'll just have like a number 3 on his jersey And a blue shirt And then Sidney Crosby 87 And it's like an 87 jersey that they photoshopped on I have an Eric Lindros figurine in an orange NHLPA jersey.

Interesting. Next question. What? This guy's a little mad at you guys for the last episode. Oh, shit. What else is new? It's in all capitals. Oh, shit.

Hey, Steven Adam. Oh, my God. Now can I ask what the most underrated storyline of the season was? Yes, you can. Oh, this was the guy who we were like, shut up. We're not done yet. It's not over. Most underrated storyline of the season.

You'd think we would have prepared for this. We didn't. We had a week. You know, okay, so I was thinking about this, and I think this was going to be my answer last show. Did we still make a big enough of a deal of how bad Colorado was? I don't know if we did, man. No, no.

They were shit, and they weren't supposed to be. I'm not saying they weren't supposed to be good, but did they hit 50 points? Leafs hit 69. The McEichel Sabres, who sold and then sold the guys they sold for, finished with 54. What did Colorado have this year? 48.

Are you fucking with me? Or were you even trying? They had nine road wins all season. That's like me playing a whole season on pro on NHL 17. Just pro, not even all-star? All-star. I'm pretty bad. I haven't played much.

I think I agree but I also think not enough was made and you're gonna laugh at this because it's not how good the Leafs

rookies were no no I think enough was made of that I think you know not enough was made of Sidney Crosby it's on that level

there's just too much about it I think that not enough was made about the two record-breaking winning streaks that we had

from Minnesota and Columbus I think you're absolutely right. Nobody would have called. You would have called maybe Minnesota as a fringe playoff team, and you would have never thought in a million years that Columbus was making it, let alone Tortorella surviving the season. Yeah, seriously.

And so to me, those two, and the fact that we had two games, was it both of them went over 15 games? Columbus was at 15, I think, and Minnesota was at 12, and they faced each other. Streak versus streak? Yeah. To me, that's the one. I think it's subjective, but I think that's the one for me. I'm going to say two rookies that were severely overlooked.

Matthew Kachuk, but he brought himself into the spotlight. But maybe the most underrated rookie of the season, Matt Murray notwithstanding, because that whole weird thing. Sebastian Ajo got nothing in Carolina. It wasn't until the very end of the season everyone's like, well, and look at his numbers, wow. come on. You had nothing.

Who had the most underrated performance of the year? It can be points, it can be play, it can be anything you want it to be. Underrated performance. Aho, for sure. Wierenski got a lot of love at the beginning of the season. Brent Burns, because he tore it up as a defenseman. And he was leading the league in points,

and then he fell off for the last probably two months of the season. And I think everybody forgot that he was on a pace to break some records. But there was a time where he was really prominent in the Norris and Hart conversation. I can't believe that he's not still prominent in the Norris conversation. Well, I'm going to say Eric Carlson because he had a similar season but didn't get any of that love. So maybe Eric Carlson, Cam Talbot in net for Edmonton. Oilers fans gave him the love. I don't really think anyone else did.

Is it fair to say Jonathan Bernier? Sure The Ducks season could have been really disastrous And he saved them Saved their bacon I'm sure there's a lot that we're missing I mean anyone on Tampa So I was going to say

Nikita Kucherov He missed 8 games Still had 40 goals and 45 assists Jesus So he had 85 points In an era where you can't do that He had one of the highest points for games in the league, I believe only behind Connor McDavid.

The year Jamie Benn won the scoring title, he had 86, I think. Or 87. So, yeah, Nikita Kucherov. And another one I want to point out is Mark Shifley. He got a lot of love at the beginning of the season, but still sort of played second fiddle to the line. Patrick Liner. He had 82 points.

Mark Shifley. He had 82? 32 goals, 50 assists. Now his shooting percentage was ultra high 20% So that will regress However it's not unfair to expect that he gets 45-50 assists When you're playing with Patrick

Yeah his shooting percentage was high But he had that many assists One of the most underrated storylines Might be Stephen Stamko signing that big deal In the offseason and then only playing 17 games What did he get in those 17 games? 9 goals and 11 assists Oh wow

Shit sakes he was so good 20 points in 17 games. What? That sucks. Somebody sent me a message when he went down and they said, you know, this is why I'm glad that we didn't sign Stamkos. I feel like all of his injuries are fluke. Like, it's not like he wouldn't have gone down game 17 had he played for the Leafs.

It was just that particular situation at that time. And if he had, if John Cooper had held him back a shift or something like that, or something, it's just one of those weird things that just happens sometimes. I saw a tweet today that was interesting. And it's true. And I agree with it So I'm not dumping on it Let me start with that

But The Leafs were historically Healthy this year And part of the reason Was their sports science team You know Probably helped them Through a lot of injuries

Bumps and bruises Also young players Just tend to bounce back A little quicker Carlson with his Carlson with his Achilles heel And Stamkos When he broke his leg

And everything like that But Like What How much science is there To cure Like A head injury

If someone were to get A really bad concussion on the Leafs, which they, for the most part, avoided. Or a bone break. They didn't even have a broken bone. The only bone that got broken on this team this season, if I'm not mistaken, was Ben Smith's finger.

And Eric Farris' finger. And Eric Farris' finger. Shit. But that's it. That's it. Like, a lot of luck goes into that. A lot of luck. Yeah, there's no sports science for Mark Mathot losing half of his pinky. You didn't get hit funny once.

You didn't catch a rut once. You didn't block a shot by accident. Like, even a teammate shot once. You didn't get slashed in the hand in a funny way. You didn't, or you did, but it didn't break. A lot of luck went into that. Which means a lot of shit luck went Stamko's way. Yeah, and Tampa.

And Tampa. Tampa's going to be scary. You said it in your video. They're going to be scary good next year. Even without, they can afford to lose Tyler Johnson now. Braden Point's that good. Is Tyler Johnson an RFA? I don't know.

If he is, they're just going to get more assets for him. I know. And Tampa continues to be amazing. Tampa almost made the playoffs with an injured, busted-up team and got picks and assets for Valtteri Filippola, Brian Boyle, and Ben Bishop and Capspace. Are you kidding me? Tyler Johnson is an RFA.

And so was Andre Palat. So who do you keep, Palat or Johnson? Two RFAs. Palat. Druin is also an RFA. You keep Druin and Palat. I don't think you have to pay Druin too, too much. Yeah, it's only his second contract.

But you look at, okay, so here's the, this is the great part about Steve Iserman. He got, last year, who did he get under contract that he wasn't supposed to? Hedman to a great deal. Kucherov is a great deal. Kucherov for the next two seasons makes $4.5 million, if I'm not mistaken. That's a $7 or $8 million player. Yep. So Hedman signs for less.

Stamko signs for less. Kucherov signs for less I bet You could get Tyler Johnson to go Listen Tyler If you can give us

A couple years Just give us a couple years Then go make Your crazy money He might be able to do it He might be able to do it And Palat Because why not

Go for it Come and win now And then make your money Yeah Because when you put You put Okay yeah You can make money now

But you put Cup on your resume You can make way more money After that Maybe draw in two Yeah we Christopher Stig you And then you're made For the rest of your career Dave Bolanew

Dave Bolanew Anything Anything the Blackhawks did Brandon Saad makes 6 million dollars Any more? No, I just want to say thank you For all the birthday messages Mrs. Dangle is waiting outside the Starbucks downstairs

At 2.06 She's like, are you done soon? I'm like, yeah, it is 2.41 By the way The next time we do a show It will be the first time In the history of this podcast That we are doing a podcast

on a Leafs playoff game day I love it are we doing the show on Thursday? yes we are doing the show on Thursday

because we were talking about possibly doing it on Friday on Good Friday so we have oh are we not all free? that's true is it not a

I'm available it's a free day we can do it any time of the day because none of us have jobs I have a dinner at night so maybe early on we can do noon we can do one

it's great that we're figuring it out stay tuned we'll see we'll figure it out Well, no, let us know your feedback, too. Like, do you want a game day show? No, we need to make that decision. I know.

But a game day show, which, keep in mind, there's a very good chance you won't hear that show before the game. Or do you want the next day where you get our full analysis of the thing? I think it makes more sense to do it Friday, guys. I think it does, too. That's why. All right, so Friday it is. Friday at 11 or noon or whatever, and then we'll put it out immediately afterwards. Jesse, it takes about 10 minutes to do.

Do not leave Steve Dangle Before putting the description And the title down Yes Alright That's usually what takes us so long To get it up Oh I'm sorry

It takes two hours to get it up No no no Don't give Steve all the blame I have to Most of the time I have to leave here And go do our other job So that's why

That thing Like today It won't be up For another couple hours That inconvenience Well we love you guys Thank you so much for listening The next time we do a podcast

It will be the first Post Leafs Game Day podcast We've ever done It'll be one nothing Leafs Is what it will be Woo follow the guys on twitter at steve underscore dangle at adam w y l d e and at jesse blake the steve dangle podcast brought to you by panago pizza order at panago.com

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