The Steve Dangle Podcast - Tricycle | October 24, 2017

Episode Date: October 24, 2017

On this episode, a recap of Steve Dangle Podcast Night at the Toronto Marlies game (00:00), the L.A. Kings versus the Toronto Maple Leafs (26:00), the role of the 4th line in hockey & Matt Martin is.... decent?... maybe (36:00), why was Jonathan Quick was taken out of the game? (56:00), why was Mitch Marner's goal called back for goalie interference? (1:06:00), Why did the Toronto Maple Leafs sign Roman Polak? (1:20:30), the Montreal Canadiens are going to get John Tavares (1:25:00), Sean Avery briefly (1:44:00), and the press conference! (1:48:00). Originally aired: October 24, 2017 Follow us on Twitter: @Steve_Dangle, @AdamWylde, & @JesseBlake Follow us on Instagram: @SteveDangle, @AdamWylde, & @Jesse.Blake Subscribe to us on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/steve-dangle-podcast/id669828195?mt=2 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Panago Pizza presents S.D.P. The Steve Dangle Podcast with your hosts, Steve Dangle and Adam Wilde. So, I didn't know that participating in a tricycle race could do that much to your legs. My legs are sore. Mine too are sore, and I do regular leg days, but being on a tricycle changes your experience. I thought I was in trouble big time because I hate leg day and you're all leg day. It's my favorite. That shelf booty.

I thought I was in trouble. But as a lot of people who saw the video of us participating in the tricycle race at the Steve Dangle podcast tonight at the Toronto Marlies, as a lot of people noted, your handlebars are way bent. Well, weren't yours too? See mine were too But as I watched the video replay My handlebars were bent They were bent into the turn That I had to make

Yours were bent away They bent in my favor And it was a pretty close race And you were sick I'm just saying there should be a re-race Just to make it fair At the end of the race Steve looks at me And he's like did you let me win

And I was like no man you beat me fair and square And he's like yeah I just like winning things because it's so rare Well, of course, I mean, and a tricycle race at that. I mean, that's great. You know what? I thought it was stupid, and then the second I sat down on that bike, I was like, I want to win this thing.

Of course, of course. That could have been the Marley's Night. By the way, we'll get to all the NHL news, but we have to tell you some stories from Marley's Night first. Of course. That might have been the most fun I've ever had at a hockey game. Oh, it was so fun, even though they lost. It was ridiculous fun.

So the tricycle race happened because I was buying my first Toronto Marley's jersey. I own like five Leafs jerseys now, but Toronto Marley's jerseys are, you know, I didn't have one. Oh, they're gorgeous too. So I walk up to the vendor, and the vendor says, sorry, we're out of the blue, so you have to get the white kind. And I was like, damn, I have never owned a white Maple Leafs or a white Marley's jersey. It's a cool purchase until you have to wear it out for the first time, and you're like, I'm never wearing this outside of the house ever again. You have to, like, I ate pizza with that thing on and somehow scraped by. But it's terrifying.

You know, because they were out of blue, we were at that kiosk longer than we probably should have been. And a gentleman comes up to us and asks us if we'd like to participate in a promotion. No, he goes, you guys look like big Marley's fans. And we're like, yeah. Yeah. We thought he was kidding. Yeah, because it was actually on the board as Steve Dangle podcast night at the Marley. So we're like, oh, you know.

Don't you know who we are? We did think Are you here to see me? Yeah Game ops guy You should have been Are you here to see me night That's the line

Damn Damn Thank you Jesse You're better at being Steve Dangle than I am Next episode You should just come in With like a polo

And be like Hey guys I think I'm gonna be Sexy Steve Dangle For Halloween Oh We found it You need to

Steve's having a Halloween party On Friday night Isn't it so Please show up To my own house As me I did that to Justin Fisher once

That would be amazing I showed up to his house as him. Did you just burn everybody all night? I just took all his clothes, like all his tight-fitting emo clothes, and gelled my hair funny. And I was just like, oh, Justin. Did Justin ever have the blonde streak in his hair? Oh, I think so.

No, he went full bleach blonde. His entire head. Yeah, he definitely. While he jammed out to My Chemical Romance. Oh, yeah. Justin played. Brand new. And Coheed and Cambria.

Love Coheed and Cambria. Love Coheed and Cambria. Me too, except I heard it like it was just beaten to death. Justin Bieber is a top 40 radio station Justin Fisher is a top 40 radio station Just be playing NHL 06 Minding my own business Okay for the thousandth time

Anyway Anyway so we get to this We're buying this Marley's jersey Or I'm buying this Marley's jersey Guy comes up He says you guys look like big Marley's fans Like total game ops guy He's like super pumped

And he's like perfect for the position Yeah just Where do you get all this energy Wow On a Sunday I'm so excited For a Sunday afternoon And then we're like, yeah.

And he's like, do you guys want to be in a tricycle race? Steve and I were like, yeah, of course. And then I think he didn't even look at you and go, hey, you look familiar. No, he had no idea who we are. He didn't know. He just got his job at the Marley's. He just moved here from Saskatchewan. And he had no idea who we are.

That's great. He had no idea. And all the Marley's people who helped us arrange this wonderful night were like, yeah, we didn't arrange that. We didn't mean for you guys to be in the race. The two Marley's in-game hosts knew us. And I could sort of tell that they thought that we had set this up. And I was like, you know, we didn't really set this up, right? And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, sure.

No, we really didn't. It was dumb luck. It was funny seeing Mike Valente in there because I forgot he was one of the in-arena hosts. We went to school together for like at least three years. Really? I think he was one year younger, yeah. Everyone listening knows who that is, by the way. He's the Marley's in-arena host.

I thought that was obvious information, Jesse. It wasn't. You should have said in-arena host Mike Valente. There you go. You just said Mike. He was just a guy. Okay. you know everybody went to school with a mic yeah that mic um but there was some there's some

great moments besides that which you can see on my instagram and it's all over video and and jesse actually was smart enough to put it up on our youtube page you can check that out the other thing good producer and stuff there was some other stuff that happened i think the the first thing that really made me laugh was um you know jesse when jesse wants to he can screech yes like he's got a voice that carries right so when you call someone out it's Like, some guys are like, hey, you suck. And then it would be like, Jesse would be like, hey, you suck. And you can hear it, like, across the arena.

I don't know where this is going. Jesse is huge. Like, but he acts very, like, small. He's just, he's quiet. He's often quiet. Do I keep it quiet? He's just quiet. No, but it's always lit.

But you keep it quiet. Am I going to get it? With Jordan's. Sorry, we were. Don't even explain it Just keep going Anyway so Jesse No but every now and then

He just We forget that he's a 6'5 Adult man Who screams Now we decided That Jake Chelios Was the guy Well Steve sort of decided

That Jake Chelios Of the Charlotte Checkers Was the guy that we were Going to make fun of all night I just felt like it And so Steve would start Calling him out And then you'd hear

This screech guy Because I sat in the middle Of these two guys And you'd hear this screech From Jesse He goes, Chelios! Ski! Chelios!

And I'm like, he actually can hear this. Like, for sure he can hear this. The whole arena can hear this. And it was Chris, by the way. Oh, it was Chris, not Jake. Oh, that's right. He's 64 years old. No, when the Checkers scored their empty netter to cement it,

and this was right after I was really laying into Chelios, he looked over to our side of the ice. Oh, really? Yeah, and I'm not sure if that was directed at me. Also, if you've never watched a hockey game with Steve, he likes to call out 10 seconds left in the penalty

and he'll be like 10 seconds left 10 as though they will hear you no Steve helps I helped they almost scored because of me

dick yeah it was my doing also at a certain point you know the arena starts you know dancing

and they show the crowd or whatever and the camera goes over to our session and Steve oh yeah Steve dumps an entire

thing it wasn't the whole entire bucket of popcorn on my head I told you it was coming I go if the camera comes over to us I'm dumping the popcorn

on your head and like Adam goes the camera's on us I go is it he goes yeah look and I looked and like I wasn't

wearing my glasses so I just went oh look it is he participated in his own demise I don't feel bad and also I want to shout out

Jessica Steve at one point in the evening decided that he was going to get a poutine yes and what kind of poutine was it

it was a sausage sausage poutine delicious from Spokes and And Jesse, I think, how did you end up with his change? So Steve is a very important person. Of course.

And doesn't have the time to get his own food. Oh, you got it for him. So Steve was talking to some fans. He offered. And I said, I'll go get your food for you, Mr. Steve, because you are very busy and don't have the time for that. So I went all the way to the other side of the arena. I put down my scepter, got it into my pocket, and gave him some money.

I stood in line for 40 minutes, and I told them, this is for Steve Dangle. You better make it good. And they said, yes, yes, I know him. I sure hope these are cheese curds. So I brought back his sausage poutine, and I gave it to him. The best part, though, was that Steve gave Jesse cash for this, and Jesse did the driest thing I think I've ever seen anyone do.

This is the move moves. It was very dry. So I think it was like $9 and change. So in Canadian dollars, that's one $5 bill and four loonies. And a couple quarters. And a couple quarters. Because it came up to $9.25 or something. That's a stupid number, yeah.

So Jesse's got all this change, and he's like, Steve, I got your change. And Steve's like, great. And Jesse drops all the change and the bill in the poutine. Shoves all the change into the poutine. You didn't have any hands, and I didn't know where to put it. So the first few bites of my poutine tasted like metal. And also the hands of thousands of Canadians. And it could have been that many

It was a 2012 coin It didn't exist for that long It's only five years of Canadians Just rubbing their boogery hands all over their money And then I enjoy it I get to the bottom and there's still a quarter In the bottom of the routine And Steve is so rich

He took out the money And threw it on the ground I took the bill He left all of the other money It was too cheesy for him to pick up I left a dollar for the person in front of me who got at least half of the popcorn that I dumped

on Adam stuck in his hood. Did you know that he is from Edmonton and came all the way here from Edmonton? To spend time with you? Yeah. He works up in Fort Mac and while he used to work in Fort Mac, now works in Edmonton, is a Leaf fan in Connor McDavid country, came all the way to hang out with you at a Marley's game and you dumped

popcorn on his head. I'm just gonna... When do I just give up on Western Canada? When do I just go they're never gonna like me? He's an Easterner out west. Oh, okay. He's from here. I don't know. I think Berkshire secretly hates me.

Even though he's a Habs fan, he's from out west. Oh, yeah. Makes sense. I think if you're from west of maybe even London, Ontario, you have to dislike me. I don't know. I don't know if that's totally the case. That might be a bit of an embellishment. If you're from west of London, I'm like, it's quiet.

You can't get it out there, homeboy. There'd be like one place in the entire country that you could get it, in fact. I forgot about that bit. It's all I can think about since that night. What? Yeah. And funny because literally everybody there, and by the way, if you came, thank you so much.

Oh my God. There was way more people. Yeah. Yeah. So if you tried to use the promo code PASS like the end of last week, it wouldn't work because it sold out. Oh, I didn't even know that. Yeah.

That's crazy. Our boy was telling us. Harrison. Harrison with MLSC. I didn't. Our boy. H-Dog. H-Dizzy.

HK. I actually call him Isson. Isson? Yeah. Okay. but everybody there was making everybody there was making the Bella Hadid jokes which I was like that's amazing um the other thing I wanted to throw out there is when we did get out on the ice and skate afterwards which is what we do and by the way two hours if you're wondering and you

didn't get a chance to make it this time we actually have a really special thing happening in December which we can't tell you about yet but it's going to be with the Marlies and it's going to be really really cool and we will do another one of these skates towards the end of the year closer to the playoffs. Because they're making it. I could not believe the amount of people that were on the ice. I don't think that the picture that we took of all of us together doesn't even do it justice.

I don't think that was everybody. If you've ever gone to a public skate and the arena and the rink is full, imagine a professional sized ice rink full. It was like Nathan Phillips Square. It was awesome. It was very good, very active. A lot of very good skaters.

I felt very insecure. Adam was one of them. oh I know Mr. I'm very very good at skating I'm not I'm not actually Elvis Stoico

Stoico Stoico Stoico whatever Elvis Adam Elvis Adam Elvis Adam

Adam's a very good skater well that's and honestly I'm really not and I'm not even half of what I used to be but anybody who's like stopped playing hockey

will tell you that you lose a little bit of your you lose a little bit of your edge you think I'm good now you should have seen me before my

my championship winning house league days Do you still have your Letterman jacket from high school? I never had a Letterman jacket. Man, back at my varsity days. What are you chirping? I don't know. I don't know.

I'm just, basically, I'm saying Adam is like a stereotypical high school jock. I'm like the antithesis. I was in drama club, man. But like a bad guy from a 90s television show. Hey, nerd. Stand dark. Stand dark. Yes, that's you.

Okay. And now, he's about to find out. But, you know, that was extremely fun. They gave us two hours on the ice when they, I think, only promised us one. They promised us one hour. And then when the two expired, they gave us another 30. Really? Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah. But you had to go. I stayed out the entire time. It was like me and five other people. Wow. And then we got off the ice together. I was so sick. I couldn't stay any longer.

Yeah, and you got everyone sick. Did I? I don't know. I assume. I hope not. People tweet us. Let us know if Adam got you sick. One thing, though, of note in terms of hockey is that Freddy Gauthier was playing.

And was good. And was good. And the thing with Freddy Gauthier, if you get a chance, read Justin Bourne's article, about a month old now, about Freddy Gauthier and about where he stands in the Leafs organization. But Freddy Gauthier not only played, but played well. And he wasn't even supposed to hit the ice until at least, I think, mid-November. That's what I heard. Well, I was shocked to see him. Yeah, me too.

I had no idea. And he's really hard to miss. he's a big boy he's well he's so friendly and like he doesn't play really big or mean but someone from the checkers really got in his face and then when freddie decided to be mean back to him there was nothing the other guy could do he's just a six five two thirty two forty pound monster yeah he just crushes people i know case very cabinets had a slow start with the marlies and last year i I mean, in the AHL, he kind of just made the AHL look like this league is below me. Well, he had a hell of a goal with a hell of a shot,

but it got called back because of goalie interference. But he did get a couple other points, and I think he had a great game. The Marlies did not have a great game. The Marlies' defense kind of looked like the Leafs' defense. At least talk about the refs. There were some pretty bad-blown calls. Listen, we're talking about AHL hockey, which you probably missed. I kept yelling referee CHL.

And by the way If you go to an AHL game The slashing rule Not in effect They still don't call Slashing in the AHL Oh my god It doesn't happen

There's so many injuries Where like you just Gotta Like If you tweet about it Like hey How did so and so Get hurt

Hopefully someone Responds who was Actually at that game And you just gotta Kinda take their word for it I remember I feel like Reimer

Got like a Head or a neck injury In the AHL And I feel like there was No footage of it or there was very little footage of it because, again, this was a few years ago

and even though it was the Marlies in Toronto, it's still the AHL and they're just a few years behind. And I had to be like, was it a dirty play? Was it bad? Was it... See, along those lines,

they were calling face-offs, by the way. That was interesting. But along those lines, I thought on the fan side of things, Jeff Veyette was there and he's doing his own thing with the face-off circle on his website and he was telling me about

how hard it can be to watch Marley's games. Unless you have Leafs Nation Network, which I do as a part of my cable package, but it's tough to get them. If you're watching an away game, too, there's a chance that you may not get it.

They have their own version of Game Center. It's a complete rip-off. It is so expensive. I think it's more than Game Center. Whatever Game Center costs, it's about what Game Center costs. So anywhere in the States, anywhere in Canada. Can you look it up?

It's about what Game Center costs, but what blows me away is you only get your team. So if you're a Marlies fan, you get to watch Marlies games and Marlies games only. You don't get to watch whatever game you want. Game Center, you watch whatever you want. Yes, unless there's like a local blackout. Otherwise, no, yeah, there's like hundreds and hundreds of games you can watch. I'm going to sign up for AHL Live Let's see how much it charges me

I'm excited to see this Season package Do you guys want to take a guess? I think it's $180 Is this American or Canadian? Canadian dollars All access, regular season With this package you can watch every game from every team

Throughout the regular season Including archives But it's only regular season So first off, that's a problem for me Do you want to start Do you want to start At the lower packages And then work our way up

No no let's start Let's start at the top And then work our way down I want That I want full access What's game center Full access

Give me game center Every team Every game How much do you think it costs $100 I say $180 $349 Plus tax

No $349 plus tax No AHL No I'm going to select it Dude Marley season seats Are like $600

Yeah man What Yeah Are you kidding me? You could go to a Marley's game for like 10, 12 bucks and it would, you could go to like 25 games and not eclipse that. You go to like 25 Marley's games and not beat that. Like you go to them, physically be there.

Oh my holy Lord. They do have lesser packages. Who's buying that? Other than like a broadcaster who has to cover it. Other than somebody's parent who plays, who's like a parent of a kid on Marley's, you know? Or, or yeah, if you're a broadcaster, you're, you're a family member. That's it. Right.

Jeff might buy that. Well, yeah. That's a write off. That's part of it. Exactly. So you can buy a package that's just road games. So for $124.99, you can get every Marley's road game. And that's it.

You wouldn't get their home games. You'd just get the road games. Five game pass package. So what is that? I guess it's just five games? Any five games live. It's $35. $35.

See, and we're blessed here in Toronto. We actually have a network that professionally does Marley's games. Most other places, they don't. Well, and their YouTube channel is very good. I don't know how other teams... The AHL YouTube channel? Yeah. I don't know how other teams stack up.

Oh, jeez. Like, if I had a kid on the Marlies, I'm subscribing to the YouTube channel. Sorry. I'm not watching you live. Do they run the games? Do they stream them? Do they stream them live? On the YouTube channel?

Yeah. I don't think so. Well, that'd be cool. Maybe. CWHL, I know, streams their games and they have commentary and everything. Well, because CWHL knows that they have to grow. Yeah. The AHL also would want to look at growth, I would think.

Who on earth is buying that? I don't know, man. Wow. And hey, we're not trying to diss the AHL. We want the league to grow, but that's insane. I think that's crazy, yeah. I think we're giving them good advice. Cut that.

Make that like a quarter of the price and sell it. I think that's worth $80. That's worth $80 to me. So to watch every game Is that playoffs included? To watch every game from the NFL Oh Every single game

On Dazen Which I have Which is the number one league in the world $150 Every single game Every single game for the entire season And with Dazen it's super cool Less than half

You can watch Bundesliga You can watch KHL You can watch It's all in real time So I can watch any KHL games And it gives you notifications when they're on So like KHL games are sometimes run at 2 o'clock in the afternoon here or wherever

Or 2 o'clock in the morning I don't have a dozen, did they fix all their shenanigans? So they didn't really fix it So Rogers has actually gotten back The rights for an NFL Sunday ticket Does a dozen in Canada no longer have it? It's not exclusive, so you can still buy it through A dozen, it's $150, but you can also buy it through Rogers now

So shout out Rogers That's a little bit easier Shout out Rogers, Rogers branding all around us That's what I'll do Because at least it's reliable But yeah, that's yeah imagine having the balls

to charge more than the NFL okay how do you Johnson what are we gonna charge for this we're gonna we're gonna sorry here don't look at me

don't look at me don't look Johnson no no don't look 300 no I'm gonna get through

I'm gonna get through like seriously how do you actually get through that business meeting I don't know man I can't imagine that the cost

associated with it either justify that like how many how much does it really cost just because literally the stream they're they're the streams are being created anyway unless you are physically putting camera people in each arena that are being paid union dues in which case it's a different business proposition but seriously how much does it take to have one camera go how many players in ahl history have ever played 350 AHL games. A dollar a game.

TJ Brennan. Maybe, maybe not. I don't know. Wow, that's insane. Anyway, yeah, it was a lovely experience and support the American Hockey League. Well, listen, we do. We do. Absolutely. But it's just, that's ridiculous and I would say that to anybody who works for them. That's a ridiculous price.

That's crazy. You know what the Marlies wish we would say right now? You might as well just go to the game. Which is what I did say. You're good. and you know what it was a lot Leo Komarov scored 18 so be listening

because we will be doing another Marley's big Marley's giveaway we're really excited about this one in December it's our little

Christmas present to you Steve Dangle Podcast Christmas present and again towards like late winter early spring we're going to do

another skate another game so it'll be fun speaking of giveaway I want to clarify something what's up a lot of people

were hating on me because they just said oh more free stuff for Steve because when I notably beat you in the tricycle race I got an autograph

Marley's stick. You did. I did not keep the Marley stick. I gave it to a little girl who was sitting next to me. And I was gonna give my- I got a runner-up prize, and I forgot to give it away, so Steve actually has that. I have it. Yeah, so I gave away my prize, and it still has something. He is my free stuff. What was your free stuff? I think it was a puck and a shirt. A puck, a towel, and a shirt. Oh, that's cool. Yeah, it's awesome. Definitely should've gave that to a kid. Definitely. You asshole. I know. You jerk. Fun fact, the little girl who I gave the stick to, her dad-

Oh, this is the best. He leans over to us. He just goes, hey, I appreciate the shout out on the podcast. And we're like, what? He goes, I worked on those Dempsters commercials. Sidney Crosby was in. The world. Canada's the tiniest place ever.

That was. It's smaller than the Vatican. And it's so funny talking to him about it because you know that he's a little bit like, this is sort of ridiculous. This is sort of ridiculous. Bread. And well, and I was like, I kept calling him Dempsters. I forgot his real name.

He's like, you can call me French Fries now, because I guess he's working on some kind of French Fries campaign. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. And he was a dad who brought his daughter to the game and let her hang out with us hooligans. And before they came to the game, he prepared her a delicious sandwich on Dempster's bread.

On Sidney Crosby bread. So one day, she'll, I mean, you thought Sidney Crosby was something. Wait till you see her. Oh. she'll be more like Marie-Philippe Palin who has a better resume

than Sidney Crosby shout out to Esky Stewart she always says that oh she's very passionate about it saw her yell about it at Puck Talks one time screams about it a lot

I've never heard her go off on that rant oh dude we should call her on the phone right now no we should well I don't know how to work the phones

in the new studio right now actually how about you guys talk about it on your own podcast that's right well people have been so I just want to throw this out there

again we will get to the Leafs and Kings and the Rangers and the Canadians and a few other things. Go ahead, you traitorous bastard. It's so funny because as soon as that was announced, people were like, why isn't Steve involved?

Do you hate Steve? Are you leaving the show? No, none of that's happening. It's not a coincidence that Merrick is a free agent right now. What we're doing and what we always do is multiple things, and this show is kind of the center of everything that I do. Yeah, are you guys new here? Adam has like six jobs Yeah, but I also like radio

Is the center of what I do on that side of things And so you have Alternate things, and also I feel like I want to work a little bit more in sports Where possible, the only way to do that is to Increase my resume, the only way to increase my resume Is to work more in sports So this is an opportunity to do that

So best friend, that's my best friend I want you to improve And the show is different, much different from this It's for the Leafs It's more of like a storytelling element So, like, last week we had Kevin Shea on, who's the head of the MLSC Historical Society. So he, like, wrote the Centennial book. The big, yeah, I got that book.

He was actually there for all 100 years of the Centennial. Yes, he was. Yep. New Conn Smythe, directly. He's a shape-shifting demon. No. I just thought I'd throw that out there. He's just a really nice dude.

Hey, so let's talk about the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Los Angeles Kings. This was a big game last night. I don't think people, it's funny, because on Monday night, everybody's a little tired. Can they stop with the Monday games? You know what I like it Because it means I can look forward to Monday night games But it looks like there's a lot of Monday night games I hate them because it means I either have to do the LFR

Monday night or Tuesday morning And then drag my ass in here So I'm either really late or really tired Do we have a lot of Monday games? I think we do This is like the third Monday game of the season Something like that I'm dying But this is one of the NHL's top teams

Against the NHL's top team As the standings say As the standings say You know what, boy, no, the Kings look really good That Kempe guy, I didn't know was as good Wow, his fourth goal of the year last night For a D-man And he is very fast

And they were without Jeff Carter Kopitar looks very good Well, it's funny with Kopitar He had one bad year And it was a bad year On a team that had a bad year But it's so funny that people sort of forgot that

Anze Kopitar was Anze Kopitar for a reason. It's not as though his skill dropped off. It's very clear that they needed a new head coach and look

at what John Stevens has gone in and done. If you look at the way that their offense runs now versus what it would have done

last year. Last year it felt like you were just getting into a brick wall and that's how the Kings won their two Stanley Cups and I get it was boring

and it sucked. Agony. But you look at them now and there's a lot of talent, actual skill on that team. Dustin Brown, for some reason now, is

starting to look like dustin brown did five years ago he's got five goals he's no that is that is exactly what the kings need by the way because in the offseason we were talking about what do they do with dustin brown what do they do what do they do they may make them useful yes the best answer is make them useful it's not get rid of them it's it's not try to figure out some compromise of a trade it's you know maximize that asset which which they did they're they're getting more out of Dustin Brown being a decent hockey player

then they would have been a trade or burying him or buying him out or any of that fun fact there are 23

Mondays until the end of the season the Leafs play on 11 of those Mondays wow man

when you said 23 I almost passed out I'll take 11 Leafs play all of them every Monday whatever that's

fine that's a lot of Monday games it's a little bit of Monday games that's okay It's probably a lot of Monday, Wednesday, Saturday because the Leafs are, you know,

especially in Canada, they schedule them specifically where possible on Wednesdays and Saturdays because those are the big national nights. And a couple of years ago when the Leafs were predicted to be very, very bad, and they were, there were like four or five Saturdays where they weren't even playing. Right. So now they're like they need to be. It's prime time. I was talking to someone from BC the other day, and he's sick of all the Leafs coverage,

but he's like, I get it. someone told me the numbers and I was like oh that's exactly what I would do too. It's again it's like New York and baseball it's the same thing that's all it is. A Leaf game versus anybody triples like

like a Calgary or Edmonton or Vancouver versus anybody and that's just sheer size it's not passion of it's not rating passion of fans it's not it's yeah like we're not challenging your devotion to your team the numbers are the numbers right the numbers

Population and also I mean this Franchise has been around 100 years So you're talking about people like our great grandfathers Were fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs Hockey is like a staple of Canadian culture Like I'm sure there's a bunch of Leafs fans in like BC just simply

For the fact that the Canucks weren't a team Until like 1970 And also people migrate Like if you look at the Steelers are Strangely one of the National Football League's national teams Like they got a few teams like the Patriots, the Steelers green bay packers cowboys absolutely the cowboys um and the reason that they they they think that

they don't know this for sure but the reason they think that pittsburgh has such a um has such a devoted fan base outside of pittsburgh is because in the late 70s when they were really really good the city was basically falling apart it was an industrial hub for you know 60 70 years before that all that died so all those people left but they were still steelers fans and they raised they're kids Steelers fans so they had to go find jobs elsewhere but in the meantime the Steelers are still your team right if you left Toronto Toronto still your team um and so you you have the opportunity to kind of spread your brand out a little bit and that's sort of what happened so I thought that was interesting and in Toronto makes sense I mean we were talking about actually

on the blue line podcast I said what was it that was the the official real start of Leafs Nation What was it that really cemented the Leafs with Toronto? Because I don't know if you know this or not. I certainly didn't. When the St. Pats were the St. Pats, they almost moved to Philadelphia. And it was a guy named J.P. Bickle, who this guy Kevin Shea, who's the historian, has written a book about, who came in and saved the Leafs. He got his rich friends, him and his rich friends, basically, helped Conn Smythe finance the buying of the Toronto Maple Leafs. I think this hockey thing is going to be big.

Yeah. right i think it's gonna stick around and you gotta remember like the leafs built their arena in 1931 in the grips of the depression yep so that's that tells you like just you know so so anyway we're talking about that and it was it was radio broadcasts that actually cemented the toronto maple leaf so for a long time in english canada the only team to cheer for was the toronto maple leafs so that's why it's so big and that makes sense right you know you're talking about foster hewitt broadcasting to 20 million english-speaking canadians and then the you know French Canadian was

Montreal Canadiens that makes perfect sense that's that's how it happened anyway that's it's weird how those things spread but anyway someone should

really do a podcast on that that's weird right historian who knows all anyway that I would listen to that something I learned anyway fans right now are

like I swear you were talking about also the Leafs only miss four Saturday nights throughout the whole year so there's only gonna be four Saturday nights actually

more than I would have even thought one of them is because they play the next day on New Year's Eve. So they're really only missing three.

Ah, the Leafs Vegas. Yes. Sorry. So before the game we find out Eric Ferg is put on waivers, which I

believe he is now cleared. And Roman Polak got signed. We haven't even got to that. Right, so in the middle of the hockey

game, I'm walking up to, like the middle of the Marlies game, I walk up to the seat and Steve goes, hey Adam! Go ahead.

Hey Adam! What? Leafs signed Polak! Stop! no and someone walked up the stairs

and they told me that the Leafs had signed Polak and I like I looked him in the eyes I go I don't believe you like I thought

he was pranking me and I checked my phone I go you son of a gun you son of a gun I hey whatever undefeated winning percentage

of a thousand point per game player before we get to Roman Polak Steve let's talk about Eric Fair who has just apparently cleared waivers

yes Eric Fair was surprisingly in the running for that fourth line center role and mike babcock yeah mike babcock split the games between him and dominic moore to start and it seems as though dominic moore has won and dominic moore who looked a little shaky in the preseason starting to look like wow great pickup well he's got he had two goals in his first two games he had like a crazy spinorama move last night he was great he got trucked and almost killed that's a great fourth line what what how many teams have a fourth line with a 67 point score well yeah and dominic moore

can move and he can tip in some pucks he can pass the puck shoot the puck skate and uh then there's matt martin who has not looked bad every time he's on the ice i'm like all right when's it gonna be bad but back to eric fair yes sorry does that mean that eric fair he goes down to the marlies and if they ever need him they call him up but yes um i feel a little bad for him i think it's a financial decision uh purely i can't remember who it was i want to say chris johnson made the point of it's some kind of captioning against um where eric having eric fair's contract on the roster uh his higher cap hit brings the leafs closer to the cap which actually gives them more relief in LTIR for some reason

I don't remember exactly how it works but now with him being buried and with Polak being signed the cap hit I think is virtually the same because you're able to bury

I think $975,000 worth of his $2 million cap hit plus it's prorated and all that then Polak comes in 1.1 million which is pro-rated

990 it's almost I think within I think it's the cap hit right now with Polak on the team

instead of Fair I think is within like $50,000 of what it would have been so it's virtually identical negligible

at that point yeah and again yeah if a center gets hurt you probably move more up and bring Fair in

and you look around the league that's not the worst situation in the world No, it's not. And if you don't want to bring Farah, you can bring up Miro Alton, who looked great at the Marlies and looked great in training camp and probably will be the guy going forward.

He looked pretty good, too. It's just, God, the Marlies look so much like the Leafs at times, and I don't mean it in a good way. What were they losing the game? 2-0, 3-0. Yeah, and then they came back at the lead. Yeah. And I think within 10 seconds, they coughed the lead up.

It's crazy. Lost the game by two goals. The defense loves to give the puck away. There was some bad reffing, too, but we'll move beyond that. So the game last night, you were talking a little bit about, it was Dominic Moore, Matt Martin, and Mitch Marner. Those three together look pretty good. And actually, you know what's funny?

It's almost like the skill guys are rubbing off on Matt Martin because I saw him at one point hook around the net with the puck and then turn around and skate backwards with it and then, like, look up. And nobody's taking that. This is Matt Martin. This is, like, he's got Stonehenge hands. I also saw him at one point put his hand on the glass when he was trying to get the puck in the corner.

Oh, yeah. Did he do that with his hands? What do you mean? It's almost like those older guys that put their hand on the wall when they're peeing in a urinal. You know what I mean? It's like, I've experienced. I know where this is headed.

Boys, I've got to dig in. We're looking forward to a good old pee. You're going to be here for a while. Got to get some leverage on this pee. wow what an analogy I've always wondered about that

and I apologize for anybody that might be offended by this but really it's just peeing everybody does it I don't think

there are guys that there are different stances at a urinal and it says a lot about you it does

it's like a jersey tuck there are there are those who have hand on pants hand on area there are those who are

confident enough to have hand on pants because you don't want your pants to fall off and not everybody you know sometimes you undo the top button why no you sometimes you get well because you don't want listen if you have your hand on your

pant that means you don't pee on yourself right you want to because sometimes a pant can oh i see what you're saying yeah you always have them in there you kind of have something in like a belt or whatever okay and then you and then you get your hand up on the wall because just standing up straight's too much for you you need to lean on something i don't know i still don't understand why people do there is a guy someone tries to i don't know shove you out of the urinal i don't know right i always think it's weird and then there's there's a guy and i won't even i won't say the name because i get in huge trouble but there's a there's a person here who we work with no nick kipri no it's not no no no it's not anybody that anybody would know i'll put it

that way but he stands at the urinal with both hands on his hips and if that is not the most confident stance peeing I've ever seen in my life. It's crazy. I know. He just stands there. He Nick Youngs his pee? He doesn't hold it up.

He doesn't hold his pants up. He just stands there. Alright. It's crazy. It's the craziest thing I've ever seen. In case he's got to cook or juggle or something while he's... Alright.

Alright, well now that we Now that everyone knows how that works So that's how Matt Martin got the puck out of the corner Oh, that's where we were But that line, it seemed as though When Connor Brown started there It was like, everything I can do to get Connor Brown off that line And obviously like, you know, Babcock said

I don't think Brownie thinks he's going to stay there And he hasn't But I almost feel like, keep them together Why not? They look great Or they looked great, if they continue to look like that That's a very effective fourth line that can actually score The Leafs won the game They are 7-2

How many points Does Mitch Marner have So far this season I think he's got 6 I think he's at 6-2 No goals though No one goal And I think 5 assists

He should have 2 And he had 2 Yeah we'll get to that 6 last night No No no we'll get to that Yeah we'll get to that So yeah

It's cool to see I mean Two of the Major weaknesses With the Toronto Maple Leafs Last year Which were surprising Because we thought

The whole team Was going to be pretty weak Jesse was absolutely right One goal 5 of 6 6 points In nine games. Steve was absolutely correct.

Oh, was I? I said that, but yeah. I said no goals. Oh, Jesse said that? Leo Komarov had 18. Anyway. Every time I screw up, I'm just going to be like, did you know? Last year, two of the major weaknesses for the Toronto Maple Leafs were the fourth line

and the third pair defense. Those were the two ones that you were like, man, I really wouldn't. And you know what? That was best case scenario. That was great. That's the only problem we have? Fantastic. You mean we have a goaltender that's good?

You mean we have a top line that can score? and two other lines that can do that too? Our standards were lower. Much lower. So now we're getting to the almost obsessing stage over those same two things. It would seem to me like the fourth line, if it continues to play like it is,

that's a line that you can play a little bit more than the average team's fourth line. Absolutely. Well, and it's also like whose team can, whose fourth line stacks up to that? If they're just relatively responsible defensively, like I think it's an excuse for Mitch Marder to tighten up even more because his off his offensive opportunities are going to be fewer

although he is still quarterbacking the power play so he's going to have those opportunities exactly yeah so he's always going to get his his uh man advantage opportunities his five on five offensive opportunities are going to be fewer so if he gets burned and the other team scores while the fourth line is on the ice and it's mitch marner like that's unacceptable so it's almost like he's got well it's not almost like it is exactly like he's got a tighter leash so excel at this level excel with this assignment you've been given and maybe you get moved up um when when the Leafs need offense we saw Babcock uh I want to say in the Sens game switch to putting Marner with Kadri and Marleau and Komarov went down to the fourth line um but in general I

I mean, this team has enough offense as it is. And I think we need to stop ourselves, and it's understandable why we do this, but we need to stop looking at the fourth line like it's a bad place to be. On this team, it's just not. It's not. It's not.

And I get it in regular circumstances, why we all feel that way. Sure. Because that's not the line that scores, but I feel like in this particular instance, there's an opportunity here to reinvent or to at least change a little bit our perceptions of what a fourth line should be,

And maybe we've just never had an effective fourth line before. We don't know what it looks like. Well, the identity of a fourth line has changed over the years. The ideal fourth line in the NHL a few years ago, if you ask a lot of people, was Casey Zizekas centering Matt Martin and Cal Clutterbuck. And they can bang and crash and bang and crash, bang and crash. And they can shut you down and shoot them up and do all kinds of bang and crash. Remember when the Leafs were your top six are your scoring,

your bottom six are your grinders. That was three years ago, four years ago. It was Jay McClement, some nights centering... Colton Orr. Colton Orr and Fraser McLaren. Who couldn't play. It wasn't even a shutdown line. Who could not even play.

Yeah, it wasn't even a shutdown line. It was just... You gooned up the Habs. You literally punched them in the face when the game was already 5-1. And I don't think hockey works like that anymore. No. I think everyone's going towards speed. Same thing we were talking about last episode, how on the power play, you have four forwards now.

Yep. That's how hockey's working now. You want your scorers out there. It's amazing that in an 82-game season, for years, coaches basically cut their offense by 25%. By basically being like, we're going to burden the top three lines by not even using the fourth. You know, you made a good point a couple years ago. When Vancouver and Boston played in the finals in 2011. Yes.

vancouver suffered i think what the leaf suffered a couple years later when they lost to boston which is instead of being what the vancouver canucks were they tried to become what the boston bruins were right the leafs did the same thing i mean the david clarkson deal is a direct reaction to them losing game seven now i don't think that and dave bullen and dave bullen for sure absolutely now when you when you look at it now it seems very silly but if you look at this 1970s for instance. Okay. Who's the toughest team in the league in the 1970s? Philadelphia Flyers. Philadelphia Flyers.

Who were literally allowed to get away with felonies every shift. Right. Right. And I almost wonder if the entire enforcer concept, which I don't think fully existed before the 1970s.

You know, I think they had people who fought, but I think it was anybody who fought. Yeah, I think everybody had to fight. Gordie Howe fought in an All-Star game. Right? So funny. It's ridiculous. So funny.

I think in the 70s, it became a role. And that pushed it into the 80s. And I think it was a reaction to how tough the Philadelphia Flyers were. Yeah, you literally needed murderers to compete against their murderers. And then in the 80s, you have Dave Semenko and the Oilers, right? The Sheriff. The Sheriff, Semenko. And you've got Glenn Anderson, who could score and could fight, and a few other people.

But what was interesting about the Oilers Is their top end talent in the 80s Was so good That you only needed your top three lines But other teams built their teams The way the Oilers did But not every team has Wayne Gretzky Do you know what I mean?

He was also a little guy Like in a league that was constantly getting bigger Gretzky was a little guy And he tried to fight once and it was hilarious I think it was against Will Paymont Or maybe he had two fights then I want to say Neil Broughton It's really funny

because he drops his gloves, and Broughton looks at him like, really? Okay. And it's like two punches, and Gretzky's like, I made a mistake. See, that's the thing, though, is that when the Oilers built their teams that way, first off, they had Messier on the second line, which is scary, but they built a team that could make up for the fact that they didn't need four scoring lines

because they had Wayne Gretzky scoring 215 points a year. You know what I mean? I just remembered something. I wrote an article on Gordie Howe shortly after he passed, and maybe we're on to something with the enforcers kind of coming with the birth of the Broad Street Bullies, but also Gretzky being a really little guy. The season, I want to say it was the first season Gordie Howe won the Hart Trophy.

It was like in 1952, something like that. There were 10 players in the entire NHL who I want to say were six feet tall. Or taller. Wow. He must have seemed like a giant. Now wait for it, though. Ten players, six feet or taller. Four of them are in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Being big mattered. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, Gordie Howe, Jean Beliveau, and I don't remember the other two. I don't remember the other two. So maybe that's what it was in response to. I don't know. I don't know.

That's nuts. But it's gone now. And I don't know. Does it feel like the game needs it? No. I don't feel like I'm missing anything. And even the fight, like the first fight, I think Matt Martin had two fights last night. Well, and someone, a bunch of people in the comments were, they were mutual roughing minors.

And I'm like, okay, whatever. I mean, the first Matt Martin fight was like, okay, so you're fighting the guy because he hit your player cleanly? Yeah. Yeah, but that's what his role is. I know, I know. Like, why? Why? The second fight, I sort of get.

He went after, somebody goes after Marner. Nobody puts Baby in a corner, right? Exactly. Well, anyway, and that wasn't even that stiff of a fight. But you know what? He threw some, man. You know what? I've been sold what Matt Martin is, right?

So Babcock has justified Matt Martin's role by being like, oh, he keeps the flies off. When Dominic Moore got hit by Dowd, that's a big fly. Get him off. Got him off. All right. Mitch Marner gets hit when he has no stick. Get that fly off. It's not a big fly on Austin Matthews.

It's a big fly on Dominic Moore. So what? Keeps the flies off. Keep that fly off! I've been told what his role is by the coach of the team, and he better do that role. That's all I'm saying. If that is...

If that's his role, he should do it. It's a tough lineup to crack, up front, especially on the wings. Yeah. Martin's up front and on the wing. He better do his role. Zach Hyman is in the position he's in because he plays the shit out of his role. Babcock said that's Martin's role. So if someone gets decked on that line, you better do it.

What gets me, though, is I don't know if you saw the gif floating around on Twitter last night of Dustin Brown sticking his stick into Austin Matthews' helmet, like underneath. No, I miss it. There were a bunch of weirdly dangerous plays in that game. Yeah, especially at the end when Dustin Brown hit Jay Gardner. He should have had a slashing call right before that. And that's when the Kings were already shorthanded. Doubt he was going to skate in the face.

Yeah, oh my gosh. And that was by accident. I don't think that... No, of course. And listen, there are going to be slashing calls that go uncalled, right? Like there are things that are happening. And Dustin Brown is a guy that plays on the edge and likes to get under your skin. And he is, he's the West's Brad Marchand from 2011.

Or he should be. A little bit, a little bit. Okay, I see. I think him playing at his best, that's what he plays. But it's funny that, you know, that can happen. And he's not after Dustin Brown. But Dominic Moore gets leveled and... He was there.

He was there. He was on the ice. But this is, this is the interesting thing. I think, what's the closest equivalent of Matt Martin that the Kings have? Andy Andrioff. And they pair it up. So that's one of those weird situations

again because of the code. If Martin is put on the ice to go after Brown and then he goes after Brown, now Andrioff's got to do something. And then we get the Canucks game again from last year. Oh. But that was fun. That was fun, but it also

just led to it also just led to a full month of pants shitting like online just a full month of diaper filling to the

brim on Twitter just from both sides awful terrible it was like when the rematch came I'm like

can you just fight and then Martin fights good Branson I'm like good we're done remember in game 81 last year

or there was a game where the Leafs could have clinched a playoff spot earlier and they would have played

the Sens and Game 82 They had a 2-0 lead on Columbus So game 82, it was game 82 And I remember watching Twitter and going When they ended up losing the game How negative it turned between

Ottawa and Toronto fans on Twitter So quickly, I was like, thank God That didn't happen, that would have Spoiled the experience for both sides It was a really good transition Play the caps Two fanbases who There's no animosity

Nope. Nope. It was fun. Even the Kadri Ovechkin thing. Like, oh my God. Can you imagine Kadri Lowbridge's, I don't know, Mike Hoffman instead of Ovechkin. Mark Stone. Mark Stone.

Eric Carlson. It is, you got to call the National Guard. And just put them on Twitter. Ottawa and Toronto secede from Canada. It's just a bunch of guys with rifles on Twitter going, all right, everyone, out of each other's mentions. Be off of Twitter by 7 p.m. Easter. There's a strict, what do they call that, curfew.

Yeah, Twitter curfew. Which there should be, by the way. A torfew. What on earth were we talking about? Yeah, Matt Martin's been good. Yeah, so it's changing a little bit, I think, a Leafs fan perspective of what a fourth line can look like. And I like that.

And I like what Mike Babcock's willing to do. Now, he has the depth to do it. But I like what he's willing to do to kind of just change those things and go, well, just because that was the way it was doesn't mean it has to be the way it is. I.E., and we've talked about this before, players taking a face-off on their strong side. And the best example, I think, is Matthews and Nylander,

who are both well over 55% in their face-off wins, which is pretty amazing. And that's the thing is people don't see Nylander as a face-off guy, yet he's taking a ton of face-offs every game. What is Kadriat in the face-off circle? I think he's in the pluses too. I think he is as well. The Leafs are, I think, among, if they're not the top,

they're top three face-off team in the league, I'm pretty sure. They're good. They're supposed to be, though. I think we talked about it in the summer. Matthews was a little weak in the face-off circle, and one thing I said about Kadri was whether or not they use him on the penalty kill, I don't know, but he's not good on draws, and he historically hasn't been. They just need to get better in that department.

Kadri is sitting at 53.5%. That's really good. Pretty good. Really, really good. Last season, he was 48.1. What was with Matthews? Matthews was about 47, 48 last year, too, I think. And I noticed Kadri was out there with about two minutes to go,

something like that, or three minutes to go. That's great. Taking key draws. And I don't think they would have given them that chance. And that's the thing about that. It would have been Ben Smith. It's a learned skill. That's a learned skill.

You can learn that. Through reps. You can't, yes. You can't learn what Austin Matthews does, I don't think, when you're 20. But, you know. Yeah. You learn that when you're four. Yeah, you've got to grow up a monster.

But that sort of face-off win, you can learn. You can learn that. You can get better at that. Matthew is sitting at 52.2%. That's great. So I was wrong about 55%. 46.9% last year. Yeah, that's bad.

And especially if you're going to give him those kinds of minutes. Yeah, no, that's very good. And any time you can move a guy six percentage points on a face-off dot, and that's because he's taken a strong side face-off. What's Nylander? Can you look that up? And that might level off a bit. But no, I mean, it could.

But it's also a strategy that seems to be working right now, and I think it's really, really cool. Now, again, small sample size as well. Nylander is 53.6, and last year he was 40.2. There you go. And he rarely took a face-off. Yeah, he didn't take that many last year. We also kind of forget, you know,

you were praising Babcock for the fourth line. We also kind of forget, like, because of how good this team is, how young they are. And, like, he's sheltering them in a way. How many other, like, top centers in the league get this treatment of, we don't want you taking face-offs on your weak side. We're gonna But maybe that's a team strategy going forward

Cause I'm pretty sure It is a copycat league Everyone pulls their goalie with like 9 minutes To go now Might as well get it over with We'll all get rid of our enforcers And watch some big thing is gonna happen This year

And there's gonna be some Cold Nora comes out of retirement Some Cam Jansen decking Cabriolet scenario where Darcy Tucker Or no what was it Darcy Tucker has to come out of the change room to yell at everybody and Wade Bielak wasn't dressed

for that game there's going to be some kind of scenario like that, they call him up and now they got their enforcer it's always an arms race but right now the arms race is skill so let's go through the actual game

because we haven't gone through it yet the game starts with quite literally if you were to bet on who scores the first goal, this is not it. It's Polak shoots with a pass from Marner and somehow Matt Martin gets a tip in. For all the reviews

in that game, I'm surprised that one wasn't one. Yeah, true. Good point. We've talked enough about that line and then later on, Bozak scores sorry, this is in the second period now scores like a bang around in the power play. Could have been

JVR, could have been, I think, Connor Brown was in there. And then Adrian Kempe scores 17 seconds later. This is the second game in a row where a team has scored within 20 seconds of the Leafs scoring. This has got to be something that they go, okay, now pattern's starting to develop

here. Focus. Yeah, I think it'll correct itself. Because the first one was Zaitsev with just a complete bonehead giveaway. And this was Freddie Anderson probably allowing his worst goal of the season. So, I think, Believe me, I want to go

C pattern, but it'll correct itself. It'll correct itself I think. It better correct itself I tell you or I'll skate you into the ground So, end of the second period, there's about a minute and a half left Zach Hyman and I forget the Kings defenseman's name. Derek Forbore

They are fighting in front of Jonathan Quick Now If you look at the replay from the top you get a different view than what you would get from the side But it looks like from the side that Zach Hyman punches accidentally Jonathan Quick in the face When you look at it from the top view, it's actually the Kings defenseman that hits him in the face I thought he punched him in the face

Yeah, but he's trying to move Zach Hyman, but he hits Jonathan Quick in the side of the head Now, Jonathan Quick lies down, grabs his head, and the concussion protocol guys pull him out of the game Ah, I see you have notes, I'm going to bring up something I have John Shannon Ah, that's what I was looking for John Shannon from Sportsnet Now, at this point, this is what we think should happen. He should be pulled off the ice, and he has a 15-minute concussion protocol meeting.

Yes. Doctor looks at him, makes sure he's good, and then he goes back on. Yes. Right? Now, this is great, because it's only a minute and a half left in the period. Yeah, something like that, two minutes. So why can't Darcy Kemper just jump in there for a minute and a half? What's the big deal?

And do his job. Do your protocol, and then you're back for the start of the third period. It's 15 actual minutes, not 15 playable minutes. I think this was in the first period, wasn't it? Second period. Oh, okay. Then in the second. So this is the explanation of the concussion protocol last night with Jonathan Quick.

Because Jonathan Quick, by the way, sat out for 37 seconds. That's it. Wow. So here's the rule. Original views on video showed clutching of the head in combination with shoulder-to-head contact, which requires mandatory removal for full evaluation. That makes sense. That's what we thought.

Yep. Subsequent and new video angles showed that no shoulder-to-head contact, only stick-to-head contact, combined with clutching of the head, which does not require mandatory removal. Rather, discretionary removal. I would like to see that replay another time. So, hold on here. Stick? I don't think so.

Because we know that concussions are as much, well, not as much, but they are a huge part of, your shoulders and neck are a huge part of concussions as well. Mm-hmm. So you're telling me that was what held Sidney Crosby out for so long is there was a neck injury that went with his concussion that he didn't know about for a long time. Right. So you're telling me that if my neck and shoulders aren't involved, I can't still get a concussion. This is where it doesn't make sense. If I get a stick directly to the head, I can still have a concussion.

No. So spotters are instructed to update the calls as they become aware of new video and new facts. They did that here once discretionary, which it was because it's not shoulders and head. It's just head, which, by the way, is the most important part. The head is the important part. Once discretionary, L.A. medical staff, a.k.a. a.k.a. The trainer without a medical degree, a.k.a.

Dr. Nick Riviera. If that movie is flammable, what a country. Hey, Jonathan, how's your head? It looks OK. L.A. medical staff were simply under obligation to satisfy themselves that the player was, quote, good to go. The player, no requirement for a quiet room evaluation. L.A. medical staff determined Quick was, quote, good to go. Now, we understand how players are, right?

We understand that they play through concussions. They're lunatics. Because that's just how they're built. We understand that. However, what we have seen now, 30, 40 years of concussions, bad ones, is that that is something that we need to maybe change our views on, as in you have to pull a player against their better judgment because they're not going to be the ones that pull themselves, which is why you have a concussion spot. I think that's what they were going to do, and then they watched it again and saw the stick and decided it wasn't necessary. I don't know. I mean, I guess a stick hitting you wouldn't be the same impact as a shoulder or a fist.

but there were it's two parts it's either they didn't take the concussion protocol as seriously as they should as the spotters or they made a mistake and could have potentially cost the Kings a goal by throwing in a cold Darcy Kemper and taking out a goalie who didn't need to be taken out like they admitted oh well we watched another angle we made a mistake right so the Leafs got a shot on Darcy Kemper. He made a save. What happens if the Leafs score on Darcy Kemper? Now the Kings have a legitimate beef with what you told us to get the goalie out for

no good reason. You know? And we tried to put him back in and you wouldn't let us because the rules said you couldn't. So, and I understand that. But at a certain point, he did get a nice hit to the head. And there was a lot of speculation that he might have been embellishing for a call. Jeff O'Neill said, I heard Nick Kiprio say on the car ride here. He for sure was.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Maybe. And you know what? Well, I don't blame him because why not get the call? Well, it's either concussions are dangerous or he was for sure faking it. You know what I mean? Like, we got to pick one.

Which one was it? And it just seemed like they went down the middle with it. Yeah, in a very NHL way. I asked in my video yesterday, I go, well, actually, this pertained more to the goaltender interference discussion, which I don't know. We'll get to. We will get to that. Maybe this will lead into it.

But it was basically, okay, how many of you watching this right now or listening, whatever, have become regular watchers of hockey, become hockey fans in the last 365 days? How many of you are completely confused every time you watch this freaking story? I've been watching hockey for 20 years and I don't know what's going on. In order to be a hockey fan, especially a new hockey fan, it's a decision that you make. it's not something it's not like a song that you hear and you just go I love this song you gotta actively

try to be a hockey fan you gotta love it for all it's flaws because it's really stupid sometimes the NHL I gotta ask the question and if it were Freddie Anderson I would ask the same question at what point

are they gonna take this seriously and I don't mean to get too serious but like, let's be honest if you have a lawsuit against the NHL you're a lawyer, you have a lawsuit against the NHL and your argument is that the NHL does not take concussion seriously

do you not rip that video off and show it in front of a courtroom and go here's how they're not taking the protocol seriously that's what Scott Wheeler said it's right there, his head is clocked to the side it also seems like the players the people in charge of enforcing these rules

are pretty confused too Well it doesn't seem like Like err on the side of caution Take him out And it's a minute 30 to go Exactly Exactly John Stevens I thought was very funny on it too

This is from LA Kings Insider On the late first period situation in which Jonathan Quick Came out of the game Sorry it was first period my bad I thought it was second Oh whatever We were notified through the headset from the league spotter That he had to come out

Apparently the league office had looked at the play When he got bumped into And deemed it worthy of what's the term there a mandatory evaluation so as we were getting Darcy ready to go into the net they said they've reviewed it a second time and he doesn't have to come out so when we tried to put him back in net the referees came over and said if there's an injury on the ice he has to come out for one play and I said well he's not injured we were doing what we were told from the league and then they came over after that and said you know what that's never happened before

that's fair so that was the read on it which is respectful i mean they were doing what they thought was right we just didn't like a guy going in with a minute left in the period so everybody was just doing what they were told and in the end we wanted to put johnny back in because we were told he could but then they deemed at that point that he was an injured player but had to come out for one play a reporter says but he had been playing for about three minutes after that and steven says i don't know you'd have to ask the league that question quite honestly we want to ask the league uh that question because it was a little bit disruptive for everybody i think nobody to blame really i disagree john uh i just want a little bit more

clarification so now it seems like the mistake is on the referee's fault uh part because he was pulled out of the game because the concussion spotter was like that's a concussion then the concussion concussion a potential concussion then the the spotter calls down and says never mind there's no injury on the play referee says you can't come back into the game you're an injured player but the person who originally called him injured the kings didn't pull him out as an injured no they didn't want to told him someone made a mistake i'm sorry yeah and i i feel bad for the referee is it a reasonable mistake yeah they're just they're just doing what they're told and they're like okay this is what we know happens with injured players and he's injured so they did

what they were told and then the league made a decision they're like okay we made a mistake let's fix it i think everybody was just trying to do what was right and then it just got kind of kerfuffled so this isn't a video game it's real life margin of error is this reasonable margin of error. Yeah, it sounds like everyone was just kind of confused, and they made a couple human mistakes. It's the, as John Steven said, it's the first time. Yeah. After yelling and screaming about this on the video, and

for five minutes previous to this, I'm I kind of think it's reasonable margin of error. Yeah. Sure. I still think err on the side of caution. Take him out. Two minutes left. I have to pee. So the third period.

The third period we see Mitch Marner score a goal and then it is called back now during the play there is incidental contact between the la kings defenseman and matt martin matt martin goes sliding into jonathan quick takes out his legs now if mitch marner had shot at that point i'd be like yeah goaltender interference for sure for sure my question on this play and i want you to really go back and watch it because the highlight packs don't really show the full story yeah what happens is matt martin slides jonathan quick is taken out however the puck's nowhere near the net and mitch marner's not ready

to shoot it yet Jonathan Quick then gets up then goes back to his crease then pushes his pushes himself out of the crease towards Mitch Marner who avoids him and shoots and scores two movements he gets crashed into the left post shoots himself to the right post and then he goes forward so it's two movements since the incidental contact yeah this is the stupid thing about the play uh Mitch Marner literally and he said this after the game actually he had a wide open net and he didn't shoot it because he wanted to give quick time to recover which is hilarious and then he does give him time to recover uh he goes from like one half mark to the other movement yeah and then bails on the play watch the replay and how he just completely quits on the play then marner shoots and scores

and they wave it off my question is how long should marner have waited well for the gold account i was gonna ask the same thing doesn't isn't it incumbent upon the ref to blow it dead at that point? This is sort of what Justin Fisher was saying on Twitter. It would have made much more sense to blow the play dead or call a penalty or something right when the contact

happened. Because it's almost like... How much time do you have to wait for that goaltender to recover? What constitutes a recovery? Those seconds where Marner had the puck don't count. They almost should have gone back on the clock.

Yeah. So in the end they made the right call That's my thing about it Because it should have been dead when he got run over And then we still had possession of the puck And everything's unfair at that point But because they didn't make a call Then they didn't make the right call

But in retrospect they did make the right call No I still don't think they did The right call in the moment would have been playing Do we all agree that the right call in the moment Would have been to call the play dead No because the goalie's back in it But that's the right call and they didn't make that Do you agree that that's the right call

Right, but they didn't make that call. But they did in retrospect. But you can't do it once the goalie's back in position. That's the thing. Jonathan Quick got back into position and started playing again. That's where my issue comes from. If they'd made the right call, they'd have blown it dead. They didn't make that call, and the play continues,

which to me is a signal from the referees that, hey, yeah, you're cool, keep playing, everything counts. But that was wrong to do that, to make that signal. Right, so they got it wrong. So they got it wrong. They got it wrong in the moment, and then they said, okay, let's just call it goalie inference. Let's go back in time and just call it.

But they didn't go back in time. They didn't put the time back on the clock. It's four seconds. It doesn't matter. You got to do, if that's the way you want to play it, if that's the semantics you want to play, first off, you should have blown it dead. Second, you should have put the time back on the clock.

That's how it should be. But they got it right because that was the correct call. I see what you're saying. It's right in the sense that the Kings shouldn't have been scored on. It's wrong in the sense that it was technically, the play was active. It was valid. Right? So, in that sense, the Leafs have a legit argument.

Well, the play wasn't blown dead. What are we supposed to do? It should have been, but was not. So, in a way, okay. I see what Jesse is saying. Justice was served. Sure. And that the Kings shouldn't have been scored on.

Yeah, that's my old boy. But, then blow the play dead. Yeah. And then my question is, okay, if you don't think blowing the play dead was the right decision, because I saw a few people give a couple reasons for why the play shouldn't have been dead, then what is adequate time? Yeah, that's my question, is if, to me, the second that Jonathan Quick is able to jump back in and position himself, he made two moves and positioned himself to angle off Mitch Marner.

At that point, he's back in. The move to the one post The move outward And then he stops moving He quicks He quits on the play I don't know Just like you quit on that pun

Sad All I can say is thank god Patrick Marleau scored Because Can you imagine the whole show would have been the play I'm sure that Just like what happened at the beginning of the first period I'm sure that's probably one of the first times that's actually

happened, right? Most of the time when you get a goaltender interference, it's like, you know, it's Matt Martin's butt in Jonathan Quick's face and then he like knocks a blocker out of the way and then somebody scores and it shouldn't count. That to me is the first time where it's like, it's been you know, the Leafs had possession for

a really long time. At least three Mississippi. Yeah. So at what point, and that's what the NHL now needs to look at that play and decide at what point is Jonathan Quick considered back in the play and not interfered with it's it's a lot of discretion and i think uh two goals happened very quickly there that were 100 the ref's discretion uh the goalie interference and the call on the ice was no goal

it wasn't a conclusive enough play one way or the other to reverse that call so it was no goal the patrick marlo high stick that looked pretty close to a high stick i don't think it was conclusive enough to to reverse the play to reverse the call on the ice which was goal so the king's got one the leaves got one call it even it's a crazy sport i don't know is it just happening more are we making this up in our head like is is this a harder game to follow maybe i don't know well i gotta tell you the the the time it takes to figure you know i feel like maybe two they have made a lot of rule changes in the last two years a lot of like they've gotten really specific about certain things i wonder if just like slashing just like clutching and grabbing

at the you know the beginning or the end of the last lockout i wonder if this doesn't figure itself out over the course of time and they speed it up and it's easier to understand to it or we get used to it i don't know it's like standing in a hot shower and then you're fine well i jesse i want to i want to clarify because i think i think you're Right, but would you not agree that if Jonathan Quick's legs are taken out, they should have blown it dead? Yeah, that was my point. So why continue with the play?

That's what I don't understand. That's what the NHL needs to do. He made a mistake, the referee. Well, fuck that, and fuck him for his mistake. He should have blown the— Caught me excited and off my couch for no reason. Now, what if Zach Hyman slashes somebody, and the puck comes loose, and he gets the puck?

and he starts charging up the ice, and he's got a breakaway. And this is at his own blue line, and he's charging up the ice, and he makes it to the other team's blue line, and he just crosses that threshold, and then the ref goes, Whee! Whistle! No, slashing penalty. That would have been the correct call, right? Well, no, because— Five seconds ago!

Yeah, you either call it in the moment or you don't. That's Steve's point, I think, right? Because if Zach Hyman has possession of the puck They'd have to blow it dead right away if it's a slashing penalty If you get the call right Leaf fans have a legitimate beef Why didn't you call it right away If you get the call wrong

Kings fans have a legitimate beef Why the hell didn't you call the slash Either way you goofed But the thing is they got it right in the end In the end you get it right Did they? I don't think so I think it's half

No but in the moment when it happened What should have happened A slash should have been called So in the end it should have been a slashing So I'm always Both sides are going to be wrong So you should pick the one Where if in the moment you would have got it right

Does that make sense? I understand what you're saying I get it Either side you pick is going to be Somebody's going to be upset and it's going to be wrong Because you already made a mistake So why not pick the side where originally If you had done it correctly

You would have been right Because you can only pick one of those two things No, let's go a step further At every intermission The refs get to review everything And they get to Call all the penalties That they missed

And every Each team starts two on two Oh, the Leafs have a three on two power play Or something like that I think that's fair, because then you would have got everything right Well, no, you're not allowed to have Two players, so it's three So, like, what if teams, like, what if you missed, like, three calls

and then you get into, like, penalty debt? Okay. Yeah, so it's, like, prolonged. Yeah, but did we get everything right? They did. Then it's fair. Guess what? Penalty debt and glowing pucks and Blurn Ball.

It's goofy friggin' league. Yeah, yeah. No, I see what you're saying. That makes sense. Because what's the length of time a ref is afforded to get the call right is the question we're asking. By the way, the answer is split second. That's why you're a ref.

That's why you get paid over $100,000 a year. Yeah, but that wasn't the... It wasn't a split second. It was many split seconds. But that's the point. That's to me where he got it wrong. And I see what you're saying, Jess, when you talk about the fact that...

I totally see what you're saying. I just, I think... Because replay afforded him the opportunity to correct himself. Yeah. And he took advantage of it. Wouldn't you correct yourself if, okay, now I made a mistake. Now we got to replay it.

I'm going to get the call correct. But as Steve says, with how many calls can you do that and for how long? And that's something they're going to have to figure out. The Leafs, looking at it from the Leafs' perspective, the Leafs are just trying to play within the rules. And the rule is the play was still active. And the goalie had time to get back in his net.

What should the Leafs have done? Cleared the zone? Marner just goes into the neutral zone. hung around that's what I mean how many more one Mississippi two Mississippi

three Mississippi or clear the zone and come back like is it an offside like how do you do it thank god it didn't affect the outcome of the game

no kidding boy would this be a miserable conversation okay so let's we're going to move on a little bit quicker here Patrick Marlowe

makes it 3-1 Trevor Lewis adds one unassisted shorthanded which another beautiful it was a good goal oh actually

on that note I saved something From Justin Bourne And I did not realize it was this bad So the Leafs gave up a 3-on-5 goal That was terrible They gave up another shorty in this one Things could be worse, everybody

Justin Bourne says Goodness Through 9 games The Sabres on 5-on-4 power play Or the Sabres 5-on-4 power play Is minus 3 3 goals for 6 against

How does that happen Oh I don't know How does that happen Who's in charge of the power play Buddy you're going to get kicked in the ass Jonathan Quick's penalty Towards the end of the game Hilarious

Now you can say that Leo Komarov Embellished that I actually don't know that he did Because he was mid air when Quick stuck out his arm So it's kind of hard to I mean he probably fell with a little more style Now I've said it a thousand times You can get away with a lot of things

But if it affects possession I think it was Alec Martinez had the puck Komarov is in a clear path To at least get to him, get a stick in there Maybe even check him off the puck Because Quick knocked him down, it affected possession Someone take a seat Johnny made a mistake

There was people joking about this, and it's sort of a dark joke But it's like, well, maybe he did have a concussion Who does that? Why would you do that? Why? Because, okay, this whole thing about Drew Doughty not getting a Norris until later in his career-ish because of Eastern bias.

He's still only 27, by the way. I know. And OEL never getting considered for the Norris because of Eastern bias. We, oh, and the other funny thing was the adoration of Shane Doan as a good guy. And Oilers fans are like, Flames fans have been like, we've thought he's a scumbag for over a dozen years. Yeah, because that's how he played.

Yeah, that's what they thought. Quick is a lunatic He's crazy I look at his resume Every time I watch him play And I go, I don't understand Like that guy is Fish out of water

So many of his saves look incredible Because he's wildly out of position Incredibly athletic Incredibly flexible, incredibly entertaining Goalie, but he's nuts And before he Knocked Komarov down, do you see what he did? He takes his stick in both hands

And he does like a fake I'm going to slash you in the face thing He's a nut job He's a nut job But he's entertaining and a two-time Stanley Cup champion As well as a consmith winner If there was ever a team you could make a comeback against In the last two minutes, it's the Toronto Maple Leafs this year

That picture? Yeah, Jesse's showing me the picture He's coming out of his crease To, I don't know, do whatever With Leo Komarov It is a definite two-handed looking thing He looks ominous. It's scary looking.

Yeah, that's the point. Big Bear. So why do that? I still don't understand. I would argue, again, as I said, if there's a team to come back against, it's the Toronto Maple Leafs. Right. Oh, yes. You cost your team that chance.

I'm not saying he cost them the game, but he cost them that chance. Absolutely. You get in there, forecheck on the Leafs, put them under a bunch of pressure. Maybe it's your power play. Instead, there's two minutes and five seconds left If you take a two minute penalty It's dumb It's dumb

Hey, interfere with the guy a little bit Get into his face a little bit But shove him hard enough that he falls down And at some point Like, I know it's Again, it's a very split second decision Hockey's a quick sport But you gotta be like

He's in the air Ah, knocks him down Eh, whatever I don't care, Leaf fan Polak and Borgman Together Big, scary Borgman looked good

He did And Polak didn't look bad. He looked all right. They looked kind of good together. It was a weird game. Matt Martin, I think Myrtle tweeted that Matt Martin was like an 80% possession player in this game. You know what's interesting with signing Roman Polak is one of the main reasons they did it is to take the pressure off Nikita Zaitsev. Oh, and Ron Hainsey.

Both those guys are going to explode. Someone's taking a picture of us right now. So there's a window. This is a very new experience for me. Oh my god, you guys deal with this every day? You could have just let that go. No, I couldn't. You could have just kept talking.

I'm a rook. I'm a rook. I can't do it. What was I talking about? Someone wants to look at me. Oh my god, someone must acknowledge the person looking at me. Hey there, adoring fan. So, on the penalty kill so far this season, heading into last game,

Hainsey had played something like 45 minutes. Zaitsev had played something like 45 minutes. And then the next guy was Riley at like 15. And then Gardner played like a few minutes Borgman played a few minutes You mean penalty kill, right? Penalty kill? Yes Carrick didn't play very much

And Callie Rosen played one second Wow On the penalty kill That's an oops, I was called and I'm not going on Yeah, basically Basically, Zaitsev and Hainsey would have exploded by Christmas Is Babcock necessarily right to only trust two and a half defensemen to play on the penalty kill?

I don't know. But he trusts Polak on the penalty kill. Polak was available. Looked like he was healthy. Give the coaches toy, I guess. I mean, here's the thing, and I've been going to bat for Connor Carrick for a long time,

and I called him the hill I'll die on. And, I mean, he's still young in his career, but has he been so incredibly good outside of, like, the first game of the season that it justifies taking away Babcock's favorite toy. I don't think so. I don't think so either. And if Polak's injury re-aggravates or something like that,

or he shows that he's clearly taken a step back, you always have Carrick. Put him right back in. Give depth. Yeah, if you really don't trust Carrick, call up Rosen. If you don't trust either, well, I don't know, call up Marincin. You have options. And if you're not satisfied with your options, make a move, I guess.

Vegas has 19 guys. Interestingly And this is from James Myrtle You know the teams We've talked about the team defense And how tough it's been Tough to watch That is

But the top four haven't been all that bad Gardner and Zaitsev have kind of Performed to what we thought Yeah Gardner's had a couple gaffs Zaitsev The gaff against Stone Was like his first really big mistake of the season. I think he's been solid.

This is interesting. The team is 7th in possession on defense and 2nd in scoring chance share at even strength with their top four. Wowzers. Riley Hainsey, for one, are at 56.1% possession

and 58.8% of their scoring chances. They're good. That Hainsey-Riley pair, I think, is going to stick together for a long time. Good pick. Good pickup. So anyway, I thought that was interesting. And, you know, as long as Gardner and Zaitsev continue to be what they were last year,

and Hainsey is letting Riley be Riley. Morgan Riley's looked more like Morgan Riley in the last seven games than he did all last season. And he got fed a bad pass that led to the Trevor Lewis goal. I felt bad for him. Oh, yeah. Because he fought all of last year to be on the power play, and then he gives that one up less than 10 games in. And also Anderson's best start of the year, I'd say.

Except for one shot. Yeah, except for one shot. But he made some big saves, too. He did. it was either that or the Jets game yeah the Jets game is true

he did keep him in it now the record for least amount of goals allowed is still two by the way what do you mean

for the Leafs for the Leafs they've never allowed less than two they've never or no did someone get a shutout

this season no I don't think we got a shutout someone got a shutout who needs defense but you can score yeah

yeah didn't McElhinney hey you're spending a lot Well, you make a lot, so that's okay. Yeah, exactly. As long as you're making a lot, it's not a problem. Now, the Montreal Canadiens, and I feel like we're going back in time talking about this, are now officially 1-6-1.

This is historic. Now, hang on to what you're about to say, Steve, because I want to tell you something. Oh, what I was about to say was whoo. They started 1-5-2 in 2011, which I believe was P.K. Subban's, the year they got him. Wasn't it? Or was it Gauch? No, that's the Gauch here. Pretty sure

No, yes Yeah, 2011-12 Yeah, 2012 Yeah, Gaucho was drafted in 2012 This is only the fifth time in history they've started this poorly The other three times were late 1930s and a couple times in the 1940s during World War II Holy smokes Marc Bergevin, yesterday, as we all know, refused to speak to the media

Good choice or bad choice? Um Good good because a lot of people your boy Eric Engels our boy Eric Engels included

he was upset said that made it worse I disagree why I disagree there's someone in the sports world who did some talking yesterday

and got themselves in trouble who's that buddy Eric Bledsoe oh I didn't even yeah I forgot about that one so there's two people I was at a salon

with my girlfriend yeah and I wrote I don't want to be here And then they sent me home. Those jerk Phoenix Suns. Anyway, sorry. No, I was talking about a buddy from The Athletic,

one of the co-founders there. Oh, they had a bad morning. Oh, they had a, yeah. Yeah. So what could Bergevin possibly say to make the Habs having one win in their first, what is it, eight or nine games? Eight.

Eight. What's he going to say? What's he going to say? He'll answer questions. What's he going to do other than get grilled and give inadequate answers for why does the defense look so bad? Why is Carey Price struggling?

Why is this team that everyone said was going to struggle to score goals struggling to score goals? When are you trading Galchenyuk? Their goal differential, by the way, is up to 20. Minus 20. Wow. Now, 13 goals for, 33 against.

Their possession is fairly good. That doesn't mean much, and I'm sure score effects has a big hand in there. Are you saying that you don't believe in Corsi? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Oh my god, some people on Twitter are bringing that back. It's not 2013, shut up!

By the way, Corsi matters, we know. Did you see Riley's quote on Corsi? Oh, he didn't. He's like, I don't like it. Jesse, can you please bring that up? That was because it made me laugh. It made me laugh really hard. That was the first thing I read this morning. I read it in bed. I was thinking about you, Jesse.

Also, if Montreal wants to improve, who can they trade because they don't have anybody. Yeah, exactly. Galv-chop. So think of, okay, let's think of all the questions

we would ask Mark Bergevin. What are you going to do to get this team out of this? What's up with Galchenyuk? How is the team going to score more goals? Are you going to trade Pacioretty? I'm sure someone in the media would ask. Can you ask Steve the questions that are important to the Canadians and have him answer them?

All right, all right. Because if we want him to talk, he's got to say something, right? And there's nothing he could say. Mark, how do you account for the start, the historically bad start the Montreal Canadiens have had this year? I mean, we had a private investigator go to P.K. Subban's apartment and he has a voodoo doll. With very nice glasses, I'm sure. Very nice glasses. I don't know why

I'm doing that I don't even know if he has but yeah no it's thank you for your question

it's Subban's fault next next question what do you have to say about the usage of Alex Galchenyuk he's sitting on

the fourth line right now this is a team that scored 13 goals it's a league low how is he not better

used in a different position I think Shea Weber is one of the best defenders in the league too the question is It's not is Victor Mete good

It's how good is he going to become Next At this point You're going to have to play At a pace of over 105 points for the year Just to hit about 95 points How do you

Think the Montreal Canadians in their current form can do that And do you think it's possible at all I mean, we could spend all day talking about all the Veznas that Carey Price has, but why do that when we can talk about the Hardy one? I mean, that's how we're going to get there. I mean, step one, Carey Price. Step two, question mark, step three, profit.

It's worked so far, and it's going to work again. Next. Mr. Bertram, Jesse Blake, Sportsnet 590, the fan, Toronto. Oh, sex. Typical Toronto scum. No, that's perfect. Anyway. So you think the point is, what's he going to say?

Yeah, what is he going to say? The silence is deafening, but it's very rare in this league you talk your way out of trouble. What's he going to say? Everybody leaves the press conference like, oh, well, I feel much better. Does that add three wins? Yeah. Exactly. This isn't a job interview.

You're not going to convince them, you know what, I'm the right guy for this job. You know what, you can talk. You can talk and you can be appealing and charismatic, but it doesn't add things to your resume. I know every time there's a press conference, it turns around the season. Exactly. Sure works for the Leafs. What was the last press conference ever credited once with turning anything around? The last thing I can think of was Wayne Gretzky made a big speech at the Salt Lake Olympics in 2002.

And people credit that as, that was a turning point for Team Canada. And they came back and they won gold. Sure. It had nothing to do with Tommy Sallow forgetting how to play goalie and miraculously letting Belarus beat Sweden. So Canada could smoke them in the semis. And then Jerome McGinley and Joe Sack had dominated the States in the gold. Don't you only have press conferences when there's something bad? Yeah.

It's a bad thing. Like, I want to see... Well, the Montreal Canadiens are great. That's why they didn't need one. I want to see the Lou Lamorello press conference. It's like, so we're seven and two. It says here to hold for applause. None of you did.

Okay, that's fine. How did we do it? Step one, all the moves I made. I made. Step two. I'm smart. It's related to one, but, you know, we had to come up with a list. Yeah, we had to extrapolate.

Three, Austin Matthews is a Toronto Maple Leaf. Four, we were bad on purpose in order to get him. That was also me. We're at four, and they're all me. So, number five, thank you very much. And that's the end of the – like, what, should good teams hold press conferences? And then somebody goes, Mr. Lou, can I ask a question? Who's the GM who did such a great job assembling this team?

Should George McPhee hold a press conference because Vegas breaks a record every time they win a game? Yes. I think so. That's actually true. I understand being accountable, but that's a smart move by Mark Bergevin. I wish more GMs and owners in all fields would do that.

I think the best you could hope for is, well, at least he called out his players and said they needed to be better. But how many times can Marc Bergevin do that? He knows he's next He is He's next So next question then

What At what point do the Habs get desperate enough That they do something stupid And move something crazy for something crazy Oh like very soon Very soon Because they have to be desperate They're trying to get John Tavares

They are? I think so They were supposedly in Long Island That doesn't necessarily I mean That changes the whole thing The Islanders also have a surplus of defenders. There's no scenario I could see the Habs getting Tavares without giving up Druin.

Can you imagine that? And he did just donate money to the Montreal Canadiens. He's gone now. Can you imagine? Okay, if it's February and they're in last place, do you trade Carey Price? Oh, who's going to take them? That was what we talked about, like morons in the summer, was you could get the biggest haul for anyone ever at the trade deadline

in exchange for carry price. No, they're not trading carry price. Why not? To who? Well, I mean, listen, who isn't he an improvement over for NET? Nobody right now. The thing that would be onerous is the $10 million he's owed for the next forever, next year.

Yeah, like, if you're a cup contender, you're ripping out hearts. You know who wouldn't have to move that much to get a $10 million player under their cap is Montreal. Montreal. That's true. I never thought we'd see a team mismanage their cap so badly that they'd have too much cap room. Yeah, that's a good point. Now, if Bergevin, now you've got to think he's just holding on for dear life. Because if he can just hold on Throughout this year

And the Habs sort of Oh my god There's no way he holds on Just get it back on track A little bit And become a middle of the pack team They don't even necessarily Have to make the playoffs

But if he can just get this truck Back on the road He can sign a bunch of players This summer If he wants Yeah And try to sign his way Back into a

Some of that money Is going to Carey Price About what is it Carey Price makes 6 million now 4 million Yeah So 6 more six million of the nine million that he currently

has. There are three and a half, yeah. But then who else is coming off the books? Who knows? There's a lot of fat to trade. Anyway, Jonathan Drouin, too. They're now saying in Montreal, and I thought you'd find this interesting. Sargachev will be ready to make the jump, I'm sure. Oh, no. Something they're saying in Montreal

now is that when Jonathan Drouin plays on the wing, he looks better. And we said this. Oh, no, who said that? It was on Sportsnet this morning. Oh, I don't, well, I haven't watch enough of them. At the end of the season, you're losing $6 million

in mediocre Thomas Palkanek. Oh, that's huge. That's a big job. That's huge. But there's your carry prize money. You're also losing a center and you don't have very many. That's true. Oh my goodness. Like, yeah, no, they gotta sign their way out of trouble. That's why

the move to make this summer, if you're Montreal, is just fire a Brinks truck at John Tavares. if you're the Islanders, you've got to be sweating because it's very obvious that it's like when the Miami Heat were just dumping all the money in the world

so that they could sign three of the best players in the world. We haven't really seen that in hockey. Like, we see tanking and all that, but the Habs' only move right now is that, isn't it? Mm-hmm. They don't have assets to acquire more. So they've got to sign their way out of this issue. Financially, for the Islanders, it's also a good move

because they're sort of middle of the pack. Financially, it's a good move, and I'll tell you why. They still have that deal with the Brooklyn arena that they're in where they get paid this much money. I think it's $50-something million. No matter what. No matter what. No matter how many tickets they sell.

So why not be bad? Imagine if... Why not be bad? God, imagine if Bergevin gets this thing back on the road, survives this season, signs Tavares, wins draft lottery, gets Rasmus Dahl.

Oh, man. You got your center. You got your D-man. Pacioretty's on the wing. Shea Weber's still put together. You've got Price and Nett. Duran's on the way. Duran, let's go!

And all of a sudden, you're right back into contending. Montreal could be good next year. They could be. There's a lot of stuff that has to happen First I don't think a lot of things have to happen Two relatively possible things

They just gotta not fuck this up So basically What Mark Bergevin needs to take Into every meeting with Jeff Molson from now on Is a recording of what you just said This is the But Jeff, hold on We are two moves

Two minor moves away We're gonna fix the Habs right now We're going to, okay, Thomas McCann is their highest paid forward, by the way. Yeah, wow. Yeah, $6 million off the books. Torrey Mitchell, 1.2. Alish Hemsky, oh, well, there's a million bucks. Get rid of that.

Who are their RFAs? Philip Deneau, they'll have to re-sign. Michael McCarron, they'll have to re-sign. Jacob Delarose, they may re-sign. None of them will be expensive. On the back end, Brandon Davidson, that's not going to be expensive. Joe Morrow, whatever, whatever. Al Montoya is still signed.

That's a very good contract for a very good backup goalie, IMO, IMHO. Yeah, man, I think they're going to do it. I think they're going to do it. They're going to try and go out and get John Tavares. Where's the cap hit? Let me see, let me see, let me see. Yeah, they're going to have a – okay, right now, heading into next season, they could have as much as $14 million in cap space.

They're gonna They're gonna offer John Tavares At least 10 million dollars 11 They're gonna get a top 4 pick If they

Continue to stink If they continue to stink It's just It's so funny It's so funny The way this works Because Like

You look at Craig McTavish Craig McTavish was the Oilers GM When they won the draft lottery For Connor McDavid And then And then And then they kicked him out And then they kicked him out

the exact same thing could happen to Bergevin oh no it's so mean you know what's going to be so funny I feel bad for Craig McTavish

because like they've like relegated him just as the as the Oilers turned the corner I know well and supposedly

I think he's still with the organization but what's what's going to be so hilarious is next season when the Habs are good and whoever the

new GM is is given credit for the two moves that happened one of which wasn't even he won the lottery and the only reason

they're in this position is because they screwed up and have too much capro. It's hilarious. They didn't plan for this. It's hilarious. Oh, Bergevin is going to be Dale Tallon.

A little bit. Peter Horchak. You know who really built this? Was Dale Tallon. Brian Murray in Anaheim. Now, I want to talk about the Rangers, because they are also as bad. Oh.

I have a cool stat here. I know. I know what time it is. I know. Okay. Adam Herman, who is a Rangers reporter who works for Blue Shirt Banner, said that the Rangers need to play at a 102.5 point pace

for the rest of the season just to hit 96 points. It really is amazing how quickly you can take yourself out of it, eh? Yeah. You can't get a playoff spot in October, but boy, you can play yourself right out of one. Can you break up the Rangers? I'm not saying that's not possible, because Henrik Lundqvist is their goalie,

and they were a good team last year. But it sure makes it tough, doesn't it? A little bit. A little bit. Well, and they had, like, a surprising amount of turnover this offseason because they did that big Derek Stepon trade. Ranta was involved in there. Wowzers do they have a lot of free agents that I did not realize.

Rick Nash, that's a – I mean, if you're the Rangers, you could get a decent haul for him at the deadline, although 7.8 you're going to have to retain. Well, it doesn't matter, though. How many – he's done after this year, right? His contract's done. Right. No, no, no.

I'm just saying. Yeah, but retain as much as you can. Even to fit 7.8, JT Miller's an RFA, Kevin Hayes RFA, Grabner's UFA, DeJarne's UFA, Holden's UFA. You know what, though? I think the biggest mistake the Rangers made was they got rid of Dan Girardi. That was the biggest mistake. People have talked about that, and I'm like, oh, my God.

And they're like, well, he's playing top-pairing minutes in Tampa. I'm looking at their roster and trying to figure out why they're that bad. so what i was what i was looking at or what i've heard is that it's henrik lundqvist just hasn't been as sharp as henrik lundqvist normally has seen the one game where they allowed it well no so it goes back to what how he plays he plays a little deeper in the crease because it gives him that extra split second to figure out where the puck's going but he's 35 and his and maybe his reflexes aren't the same because you need quick reflexes to do that right my goodness almost a year ago to the day we were having this exact

conversation. And then Auntie Ranta and him brought it back together. Before we get to the press conference, which we quickly need to do, Zach Parise looks like he's going to be out 8-10 weeks with back surgery, which sucks. And also, who was it? There was someone else who was

out 4-6. Oh, Troy Stetcher in Vancouver. Right. So this is the crazy thing about the Leafs. Again, JVR looks like he frigs up his knee. Josh Levo can finally... Most Canadian thing you've ever said. Frigs up his knee back. knee. Oh, he just yard sales his knee. And

Josh Levo gets ready to blow the dust off all his equipment, and JVR stays in there. All these teams are starting to lose players. The Leafs still know. Bring up Florida on your cap, Friendly. I want to mention Florida just a second from now, but Leon Dreisaitl looks to be back for the Oilers, which is a huge, huge gain for

them because, you know, they've had a bit of a rough start too. Florida Panthers claimed anti-Niemi off waivers, which means that, I think, it's Roberto Luongo that's injured, right? Yes. Yeah, Reimer's been doing good. I want to throw this out there. I'm looking at goals against.

Do you know the team in the Eastern Conference with the top goals against, as in they've had the most goals scored against them? I assume the Leafs. The Pittsburgh Penguins. Oh, well, they got filled in twice. Yeah. Yeah, they lost 10-1 to Chicago and 7-1 to someone. I think that evens out.

39 goals against. Holy moly! Now, two 10-goal games will do that. But I'm just saying, that's kind of crazy considering that they're fifth in the conference. We're still at that part of the season. You know what? For preseason scoring, the Habs were probably pretty middle of the pack because they had that one nine-goal game.

I also want to throw something else out here. And this just broke, so I looked on Twitter and I found it. And I want to thank... How much longer do we have in the show? Just let me do this. Dude, I'm not going to make it. I've got a piece of it. Okay.

You're going to want this. You're going to want this, all right? Yes, let's do it. Tyler Deller tweeted this out. There is a Finnish physiotherapist, he used to live in LA, who strangled Sean Avery in the LA Kings locker room. Oh, good. Do you know this story? It's from Sean Avery's new book, I believe.

Is it from Avery's new book or for the physiotherapist's new book? I think this one's from the physiotherapist. There's a bunch of Avery stories that have been coming out recently because of his book, but I don't think he told this story. So apparently this guy had a taekwondo background, and Avery started to poke at him. And he said, come on, like, don't. And Avery said, oh, try and stop me. Try and stop me. And the guy's like, please don't touch me.

And Avery's like, what are you going to do? What are you going to do? And he said, basically, when Avery tried to attack him, he started strangling Avery. He kept doing it until Avery just about lost consciousness. Then he let him go. He resuscitated enough and crawled out of the room. The practice room started to celebrate like it was an OT goal. Bully had finally been beaten.

every person in the dressing room came up and high-fived him because nobody liked Avery. The next day, Avery arrived to practice and said, you fucking ninja, and then walked away and never teased me again. You know what? I want to read his book.

Sean Avery's book? Yes. I've only heard good things. I would like to know about Sean Avery's opinion about Sean Avery. He apologized to FNAF in it. And Miss Cuthbert. Does he? because weren't we talking about the picture that he included in there? No, he apologizes, which was fair.

Interesting, okay. Well, I mean, he should. It was all his fault. Yeah, good on him for owning the thing that was his fault, I guess. I mean, that's what apologizing is for. No, I will take it with a grain of salt because, yeah, it's like the World War I stuff. It's Winston Churchill's opinion of all the right things Winston Churchill did.

So I will take it with a grain of salt, but it seems like it's full of entertaining stories. Yeah. I think it'll be an interesting one. Just compare Sean Avery to Winston Churchill. I'm sure Sean would say, yeah, legitimate comparison. Yeah, pretty close. Pretty close. I mean, I would shoot higher, but...

So we'll skip the press conference today. I know Steve's got to pee, and then we got to go, but... Skip it because I have to. One question. All right. Hold on, Steve. Steve, please do the press conference thing that you don't have to do. Because there's not a noise.

I never know if I put it in before or after you do that. Whatever makes him look worse However awkward it seems Put it over what I'm saying right now Put it over what I'm saying Alright, this is where it's played KingLocker16 wants to know Why there isn't any criticism

Towards Leo Komarov He hasn't done anything offensively this season But he scored 18 goals a couple years ago And was an all-star And also he scored 18 goals a couple years ago Because is goal scoring the problem? That's not what he does And that's not

If Leo Komarov Which he was a couple years ago Is scoring a lot of goals for you You've got a problem And the Leafs had a problem A couple years ago Which is they had no talent Working hard

Being an agitator He's a great penalty killer He kind of shut the game down For the Leafs last night In that he pissed off quick enough That he made them do something crazy And he took a penalty Maybe the reason you're asking that question

Is you're looking for a way To get Mitch Marner higher in the lineup Right now I just don't think It's what the team needs They're 7-2. They're scoring plenty of goals. Marner had a two-assist game. The Leafs won the damn thing.

Hooray. It's all great. If Leo Komarov gets zero points in a season, as long as the metrics show that he is, you know, as long as the team penalty kill when he's on the ice is great, and the five-on-five shows that he's still one of the best defensive players

in the National Hockey League, he's worth every penny. You don't need Leo Komarov to score points, although he will. You need Leo Komarov for defensive purposes. That's what he does. He's the one Leaf on a cold streak. yeah exactly

hey he doesn't have an obnoxious amount of points but the rest of the team does like when you said that I was like oh yeah

now that you mention it yeah I guess he hasn't really scored much but like on this team who cares he's fine has Leo Komarov

hit a wall if Leo Komarov has hit a wall named Jonathan and the wall got two minutes for being crazy yeah

like here's how spoiled we are as Leaf fans last night I like actually said to myself I'm like Matthews didn't score

like And it was weird Yeah Right Yeah I expect He scores in like Half of the games he plays

It's Yeah I mean the offense Is not the problem here guys Alright well with that We're gonna let it go Thursday we'll be back And still in our brand new

Sportsnet 590 studios I hope you at least Check us out If you've never checked us out On YouTube Just check it out now Because boy This is the nicest

Brightest looking studio We've ever been in We finally bought our own Lighting rig Which we're excited about I know it sounds really stupid But I'm very excited About lighting rigs

Oh, that's great. And we've got actual sports fans on the wall. Yeah, what else do we have, Adam, before my freaking kidneys fail? That's it. Okay, cool. See you Thursday. Yep, okay, bye. 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 and stuff your face with deliciousness.