All right, bang, bang, what's up, everybody, it's Eddie, we got to let the people know that St. Patrick's Day is now available in the barstool store, all you got to do is go to store, barstool, sports, dotcom, go get your green, get ready for St. Patrick's Day and yeah, go do it and enjoy your podcast, whatever you listen to. Sure. It's a great show.

Hop into it now. On the road again. Just can't wait to get on the road again. What I love is making music with my friend. I can't wait to get on the road again. Seeing things that I may never see again, I can't wait to get on the road. Hello, everybody, welcome to Episode three hundred and twenty two of check that's presented by Pink Whitney from our friends at New Amsterdam Vodka here in the barstools blood podcast family Paul Business-to-business.

And we're going to go to you first. Staring at me right now. Forkan Aaargh! Is High-stepping just like on the other live stream last night, which we should probably get right into wit shaking his head right now, the towage. Where's the told you? I'm sure it is it already on your eBay account with the signature on it.

It's a pile of ashes at the bottom of the the rented house is a fireplace. And I swear to God I haven't been more disgusted ever watching a video in my life. You talk about two guys, girls, one cop. You talk about the dirtiest, most disgusting stuff in the in the history of the Internet.

And as I'm eating dinner, I see a video of a pick, his total cheese from his big toe as in cut the thing in three months and he rubs it on my shirt.

Now, Ari, I walked in the room. I said, Are you fucking kidding me with that last night because I didn't see you in. The video was broke. And I said, and you're like, well, we got to get into this in the show. It's got me. I got a I got I got plenty of things I got to say. There's a blatant video of you rubbing your toes, whether it was dead skin, cheese or all acid that you left under your toenail from some monster trip you had.

You didn't rub it all over me. Well, I. In the middle of a discussion. So what do you have to say?

I wait for this. I think we can all agree. I was pretty fidgety yesterday for no reason at all. Sometimes not no reason. I think you're fidgety guy. Yes. You're you're you're you're you're fidgety. I'm a shitty fuck sometimes time. Definitely yesterday. Also, if you watch the video, I scratched myself a thousand times. I am actually, Larry, my skin is super dry. I was scratching all day. I just scratched it.

I don't even remember doing it. It was like subconscious. Like I was like, oh, I'm going to touch my foot, rub it on wet. And I watched the video and that's exactly what I fucking did. But it was just a scratch was no toe cheese. I just I can't even say I did it.

OK, I know this is thinking like way outside the box. If I'm like itchy every day and ashy, Larry, as you call yourself, what about, like throwing some lotion on your legs shower. I'll start rubbing. Aaargh! With I'll be a team player. You rubbed your mother in law's feet with CBD cream, and now it's like just it takes three seconds to just open up your legs, maybe because posher was a little bit delayed in rolling out the sandbagger, which will get to as punishment.

He needs to be Aura's lotion, guys now all posher.

You won that bet yesterday, but you just lost that big one. Suck on that. Those Cavs are ready to get rough. Yeah.

Where do you get the gist? All right. Where do you write? In the sack area so Poshard can get his pocket sensitive hands ready. My wife saw me all the time, says I should use lotion. I'm just the guy I've never used moisturizer, lotion. I just never have. But I'm going to stop. It's like it's like, man, I keep walking out of the house and I'm tripping over my shoelaces. It's like, tie your shoes.

Like, it's just so easily fixable for a few scratches and then putting it on me.

But I'll tell you what, though, toe jam aside, it's great to see you guys live in the flesh. We are down and we're going to be great. It's great. It really is. That that's not going to overshadow we're finally all together because I already didn't make Scotsdale right. So the last time all of us were together was past Boston Sandbagger City. Fuck, we're down here doing one of those. We can chat about the success of us going to five and one in our careers as partners.

Four in a row. I was a little embarrassed because I didn't bring my A game with you. That was that was the most complete game you've ever brought to the sandbagger. And we needed it. And we're at a four game winning streak. We are in a four game winning streak. And you were taking heat, which was well deserved, ground ball after ground ball off the ground, both the driver. So I think we're going to be able to get some things figured out in your game.

You got new TaylorMade club. Thank you so much. What are they, the 1970s or seven? Yeah, we'll figure it out. We'll get it. We'll let you know. Either way, they're pure.

And listen, because I am like reading this chat, it's hard to read because when we do the premiere, I go on and I'm like, are you to China? Like, basically, like give my input to different things that are happening because we've watched it prior to being released and people are just still all over my partying.

All over the party. Yeah, partying is not my strength. I'm three under bogey free and I see some people chirp and me through seventeen. Eighteen got the easiest par five in the world. We just drove in. We were feeling pretty good. This you said to me on the sixteenth hole. I totally forgot. You said, are you hitting it good today. I don't have a bogey. Oh is that good. But that just shows that you are in your own world which I've learned to kind of accept as his partner.

But I think we are willing to grow and move forward. And sandbagger Schoettle Pasha. Who took a lot of heat, right? Well, it turned out great chaser as well. Yes. Chase, Chase, Chase helps out with the graphics. He helps out with shooting it, of course. And, you know, these things aren't easy. So we're trying to figure out the production and continue to make them better and better. We obviously had a drone shots Shirota to golf club.

Great track. What did you what's the word that I'm looking for when the fairways are green and the dormant grass serendipity. That was that was a good discussion about that movie when we did remember that word finally there, the dormant grass, if you haven't seen it, you know, they keep the fairways and the greens, the color green. But in the winter when this grass dies, they just let it go. And it's actually a pretty cool look.

It's also nice to play on those courses because granted, you have desert, you could hit into trouble. We saw business to do that, but there's no rough. So if you missed the fairway a little bit, that thing's running and rolling around vast golf. So we're releasing another one. We did one more in Scottsdale. I don't think we're going to release the names we can release.

OK, so we're going to release the names we got re the wizard Whitney, the good Whitney hockey player, the man who probably gets asked as often now more than anything in his life. Are you the pink Whitney guy? Because he's a hockey player. He really is like like I'm like probably admitting and knowing that he is way above me in the Whitney game. Right. He's he's he's over a thousand games.

Over a thousand points. Yeah. I could explain it. Well, he's also I've talked for years about how good of a player he is joined by the one and only Mike Babcock.

Stan Mike Commodore, I know right now you've sandbaggers you you fans of the sandbagger thinking, what a combo.

And I know that we have many things that are going to be dropped within this video because the day the day is is is in my mind, like I see it so clearly still that I think it's going to be one of our best, if not the best. I'm excited for it to. Yeah, I'm looking forward to it. All right. You're coming to the next one. You got to come and do some announcing from the car. Get banged up.

Yeah. Rub you rub your fingers on my myself, myself and Taishan. We're having a great time. He was an absolute comedy show. He's I've had the pleasure of working with this guy since I started in my media career with the car. These guys he has he has really like made me feel comfortable and get better in that role. He does the color on the television side of things for the coyote. So to Tyson Nash, who I didn't get a chance to play with in Arizona, but he was doing the media gig.

And of course, Shane Doan, thank you to both. I think that was probably probably the most successful one as far as numbers early on, it was trying to get one point. And once again, to all you Checketts fans who showed up for the live stream you guys are or the live viewing. Excuse me, you guys have you guys are you loyal? You know, the kids say you're loyal.

Oh, no, that was Jay College. Kelly, how did you get all the way that the kids say, I'm not the one. How did you gain all the weight? Was that Larry King?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So how'd you get so fat?

Should we what was the one thing we just discussed about. Oh, never mind. Keep going, sir. All right.

Well, first, we do want to mention now that hockey is back, you're going to have to find your shot. And what better way to do that than with Hank Whitney from January 1st to March? Twenty sixth, we had given Checkbook's fans a chance to win a custom pink Whitney shot machine.

All you have to do is post a picture of you and your pink Whitney and use the hashtags hashtag pink Whitney hashtag take your shot. Hashtag sweepstakes will be picking winners from the U.S. and Canada every other week. So make sure to get creative with your submissions given those bad boys away soon.

Now we're going to shift over to the old North Division, the Canadian division. That's where the big news was last year. The Canadians fired coach Claude Julien was his fifth season there.

They lost that shootout to the sense and it was kind of weird to like the base of the cage won that game. They over they overruled that. We got to get we got to get into that Horwitz talk. I think, listen, that was a fucking horrible call for a few reasons. One, he was battling for positioning and he got hit in by the Ottawa Defender. OK, let's say that you're like, no, no, no, no, he's got to go the long road because that's just as much the defenders.

OK, fine. I'll meet you there. So then he makes contact with Murray. OK, so he hits his right leg. Now, most you'd say, well, he spun them around. Well, technically he didn't. He hit him. And then you could see Murray. I believe he ends up using his right leg again, the one that got hit to make what they do in pregame skate when they're warming up. Yeah. So he ends up making the full turn because you might have thought I just easier to go with the flow and the plays going out towards the blue line.

So we'll have time to get set. So by the time he ends up standing up, what was odd to me was he doesn't position his stick to where his five Holness, which was normally as a goal. You would do you would get set right to me, it felt like he was being lackadaisical with it. Some people say, well, it might have taken a. Time to track where the puck was because he did the 360, well, may I remind you, he's the one who went 360 so he doesn't right away put the stick to his five hole.

Well, as he tracks the puck, the the shot starts coming. He tries to go five hole to get set. It gets it gets tangled up with Gallagher's skate, which is in this creased, mind you, after Gallagher had originally got hit and he was down, he got back up, but he got piled on to buy another Ottawa senators trying to get out. He was trying to get out. So not only that, not only the amount of time that Murray would have had to get reset, but also, in my opinion, he was colliding with Murray because he was essentially pushed in by the Ottawa Defender bullshit goal, which is crazy, because then they end up losing that game.

And if they don't, well, maybe Julian doesn't get fired.

Well, well, OK. All right. Well, so I think that that's a valid argument. And what else is the GM going to say? But they said the decision had been made. They said the decision had been made prior, that they were going to fire him after that game. Now, I think this is a good time to bring in and shoot this over to Eric. And yeah. So All Angles is a guy I met when I was working the trade deadline show one year for SportsNet.

He covers Montreal for SportsNet and he's dialed in. So we figured we'd have him on for the first time and chat. What's been going on there? What's the issue with the team and how is everyone reacting to the big news? We're going to shoot over to him now.

Before we do that, don't we just want to mention most guys have tried lasting longer, embed different ways. Thinking about baseball doesn't always work. Baseball season, train in spring training, start it up.

But the folks up busies Aphro Fleche six nine. I love it.

Actually, the folks at Román and online mental health company are changing the game with Roman swipes. The secret to longer lasting sex, Roman swipes, very clinically proven. Way to last longer. But they're effective, easy to use and fast acting.

And the best part, they don't require a prescription Roman can ship swipes to in discreet, unmarked packages in each swipe back at a small enough to hide in your wallet for whenever you need it the super easy to use.

You just take the swipes out of the packet, swipe it on and you let it dry.

And what up as you're good to. Good to. Good to go. That's it baby.

So go to get Roman dotcom slash chocolates and you get your first month of swipes, which is five dollars. When you choose a monthly plan that's get Roman dotcom chocolates. And now we're going to send it over to Eric Engle's.

Quickly, though, because when we were four up through nine and you said this match is going to need a Roman stripe, it was one of the funniest things you ever got. And then I tried to do an ad read after the five minutes ago. I couldn't even talk. So thank you to Roman for sponsoring the sandbagger. That was one of the reasons why you guys got to see it and enjoy Erik Engle's. Well, the big news of last week was Montrail firing coach Claude Julien.

So we're going to bring on Eric Engle's. He's the Canadians beat reporter for Rogers SportsNet to discuss it. Tremendous reporter Eric Article is fantastic about Shea Weber.

Thanks for joining us, pal. It's a pleasure to be with you guys.

Was this just a classic case of a of a team tuning out a guy after five seasons like we see all the time in the NHL? Yeah, well, that's that's what it is in simple terms, I think, you know, there was a lot of pressure on the Canadians before they came into this season, right. They they made some great additions in the off season. And you see the way those have worked out so far. Jake Allans, towards the top of the standings of any goaltender that's played at least five games.

Josh Anderson has nine goals and is playing like a freight train. Tyler to Folies Fourth in NHL scoring with 12 goals. You look at Joel Edmondson, he's leading the league at plus 18. You know, there was a lot of things that improved about this group and they built on what they had shown in the bubble in terms of their cohesion. And Nick Suzuki and Barry Cockamamy taking steps forward. So the pressure was on. And when you start going into a losing streak and the trends continue to be negative and the power play in the penalty killer problem in the face offs are an issue.

But but more than anything, when you hear someone like Shane Weber start to say that a heaviness has overtaken the room and you hear Nick Suzuki saying we're too much in our own heads, it becomes clear that you need a new voice. And that was what Mark made focused on when he said he hired Dominic Ducharme. He said we needed a new voice. Yes, he's been on the bench for the last couple of years, but he hasn't had the ability to assert himself in the way that he will now.

And we're already seeing some positive changes take shape.

Yeah, I mean, they they probably could have won that game against the first game. It was it against Winnipeg. But the goaltending, you talk about Jakon, but Gary Price is the story.

And with with one of the biggest carpets in the league for gold and what's going on there and almost in a sense, a couple of years where it's a trend of him not playing like he used to, is there like panic there where we have to continue to start price?

So we're just riding Jake out because he's the guy that's getting us wins.

You know, one of the first big decisions that he had to make, Ducharme, was whether he was going to go to price after struggling at a loss to Ottawa in season long struggles. That kind of led him to that point. And he did. You know, the fact that he gave him that kind of confidence boost, that artificial confidence boost, because you can only gain confidence from within. And you guys know that as guys who have played before.

But for your coach to say, you know what, I know you've been struggling, but I'm going to give you a chance to redeem yourself. Every player wants that. The first chance that he had was the first game against Winnipeg on Thursday. Sorry, it's hard to remember everything that happened last week.

But, you know, price was OK for the first half and then those same struggles were there where he's making great saves and then he lets in some bad goals. And a goal that he led in to Nate Thompson was was a goal that was symptomatic of what's wrong with carry price when he doesn't play well. And I've talked to Price. I've known price for 14 years. I've covered him his entire career. One of the things that he likes to say is that you can't be guessing out there that every fourth miner in the NHL now shoots the way a first line or does.

And it was one of this came up because I once asked him, like you and Dominic would never be compared to each other in terms of the style you guys have. But are you able to play the way he did and in the sense that he could show you Blocker and take it away or he could show you five holes and take it away? And he said you just you can't do that anymore the way the game played. And if you watch the goal that Nate Thompson scored on him to put the Jets up for three in Thursday's game, the puck goes behind the net.

He drops to his knees right away. Thompson gets a pass just outside the slot on the side, and he's got the bottom of the net covered. And yet he lifts up his stick, comes off the ice. There's a hole in between. He's guessing and that is not carry price when he's at his best, when he's confident and what he's doing, he knows exactly where the puck is going because he's so positionally sound and so well structured in terms of the way he plays position that nothing requires a guest.

So now that he had that first stumble, they turn to Jake Allen. He plays very well in a two one loss to Winnipeg, where they played a much better game. I don't know. Dominic Duchamp's speaking as we're taping this right now. I don't know if he's going to reveal his plan for Tuesday's game. Wouldn't surprise me if Jake Allen is in for that one.

And probably the next time we see Gary Price will be Thursday when they play the Jets again, going back to last year because of the the shutdown and everything that happened were there were some rumors that they were potentially going to do this at the off season. Now, they weren't planning on heading to playoffs and of course, they ended up getting in and then beat in Pittsburgh. Do you think that that helped Julian essentially keep the job to start this season?

It had to.

You know, I think if the season had just ended with them in twenty fourth place and they didn't get that chance from the NHL and the Players Association to play in the postseason, then they would have seriously had to contemplate making a coaching change right then because they had two eight game losing streak and another five games where the trends just continue to go negative and then didn't reverse the other way. So the reason why Julian was kept in place, and I think rightly so, people forget because they saw what Kurt Mueller did against Philadelphia.

It was Giuliani who got them past Pittsburgh. It was Giuliani who elevated Nick Suzuki to the first line. It was Julia who gave yes, Barry cocky Miami Max dunamis roll. Essentially, it was Julia who. Jumbled all these cars relied on the youth. He did a lot of things that most people would have looked at and been like, this isn't really close. And Landis isn't his. He was bold. He made some bold decisions and he deserved the opportunity to continue forward.

And he's a Stanley Cup winning coach. He's an excellent coach. But all coaches have blind spots and they have issues. And his just came to roost when when the time came that he lost his job.

I was just going to follow it up by saying, do do you think it hurts the organization at the fact that it basically is I was pressured into hiring French coaches were it eliminates a lot of good candidates. But do you feel that that is the case and it does hurt them in the long run? Because Kurt Mueller was one name that came up. But once again, the power play was struggling and he kind of had the reins on that. So what's your kind of your feeling on that whole thing?

My feeling is it's an exceptionally complicated issue that's very difficult for people to understand that don't live in Quebec. And Montreal is a 50 50 city in terms of French and English, but every other region in Quebec is 80 percent French versus English. Now, I'm not justifying these decisions. There is a I think the Canadians are in a place where their owner is French and English. Their general manager is French Canadian. They're they've got assistant general manager Marty Lapoint is French Canadian.

They've got French Canadian players. You know, I think there is a pressure on them to have a coach that speaks at least in the same language as the people that they can understand what he's saying when he speaks. But I think we're also in twenty, twenty one where you're in a place where, you know what? If it's that big of an issue, you have an interpreter right up there next to him. It's not like everyone in the media speaks French and English.

So we can we can decipher it and translate it. But I just think there is this. If it's the right coach, you know, it can't just be anyone. When when they when they fired the jock Martey and Randy Cunneyworth took over, it became an issue. It became this political issue that kind of persisted.

The other side of it is that, like, if it was if it was Mike Babcock or Gerard Golon, for example, maybe they'd be able to come out and say, hey, we've got one of the best coaches in hockey. He was available to us. We hired him. And they may have even been willing to go that route when they fired Michelle Tarion. But Clotheslined was available as of a week before. And he is he was one of the best coaches in hockey.

Quebec also has a ton of great coaches within this system.

And if the Canadians organization, whether it's on their own bench or lower down now that they have an equal franchise and also an NHL franchise, if they're not using those those areas to develop French speaking coaches, if this is an important thing for their organization, then then they might as well get away from this to begin with. So, yeah, you know, anyone who saying that it's a handicap for them, it's it's impossible to argue against. You want to hire the best coach available, but they have found some people that are great coaches.

And I think you guys know a lot about the guys that have been behind the bench. And I say this about Dominic Ducharme. It's a short sample and there's very limited information that we have on how he'll be as an NHL coach. But my insight is telling me that he's going to be a really good one, whether it's with this team right now or moving forward.

And you talk about the special teams and along with the goaltending be an issue because five on five, they're are good. They're a good club. I mean, Edmonson couldn't be plus eighteen if they weren't, you know, pushing the pace and controlling the puck. Five on five. Have you seen any changes immediately to how the power play may be different or the PK? It's like they had the guys where it's like Gallagher in front, Petrie and Weber shot.

It's like their power play should be so much better.

You know, you talk about their power play and we can get into that. For me, the biggest one is the penalty, how this team is twenty second on the penalty kill with Carey Price and Jake Allen, and that's with Shea Weber benched Joel Edmondson and Jeff Petrie and Alex Romanoff on defense with a forward group that includes Josh Anderson and Tyler to Foley and Nick Suzuki and Phillip the No and Paul Byron artery like that. To me, they should be top five, should be their bread and butter in the NHL.

But on the powerplay, they definitely shouldn't be twenty. They shouldn't be top five. They don't have Connor McDavid, they don't have Leon Driesell. They don't have Alkalis Patterson or Austin Matthews or Mitch Marter, but they can be better than twenty eight. And one of the things Ducharme talked about was mentality. Get the puck back, be intense, treat it like a situation where you are five on five and be have show that desperation. Composure is another big one.

I think when power plays are operational and you can definitely speak to this, there is a mentality where it's like we're not getting off the ice. We're the guys who are going to score this goal like there's no work. We're like it's a competitive thing between both units. And there's a feeling like, I want the pocket, I'm going to make the difference. And that mentality needs to take shape. Alex Burrows is going to be in charge of that right now, and he's got the experience to help in those regards.

Let's see what he brings to it. I saw some improvements on Saturday, but one thing that I saw that I really didn't like. If they're going to use your army on the powerplay and you get to looks from Foley and Suzuki on a on a wing play where they got a clean shot, or you get a one timer for Webber, which is rarely available, and he blasted on that, you need to be in front of the net. And Corey Perry was there for one chance on Saturday, is very Cockerham took a shot and it just happened to hit halibuts glove.

But it was a perfect screen and probably a goal or a rebound opportunity that needs to change.

Daniel was one of the names you mentioned. We talked to McKinnon before the season started and he said he's one of the best setters he played against in the league. He's unbelievable. Shut down guy. He seems to have been struggling so far this year. What's going on with his game and why? Why the struggles?

So there's a lot of layers to it. You know, he started off the year where he said, I'm not ready to just accept a different role. And you think about what he did for the last two years for a Canadian team that wasn't very good and honing his reputation as a guy that can and would say that to you guys about on your podcast. Like this is a guy that is very good at two ends of the ice. And, you know, people are focused on the zero goals so far.

I personally don't really give a shit about the zero goals. Yes. Obviously, you'd like for him to have one or two. I think his max is thirteen. This is a guy that can distribute the puck. Well, but what the thing I do care about is the face offs. And this is a key face off player and he cannot be set out for the off the defensive zone face offs and losing them clean. It's you're going to get beat by some guys, but you can't afford to lose them clean and the defensive zone.

That's one aspect for Philip to know that he needs to focus on. But in terms of why it's kind of gone a little downhill, there was the pressure of his role being being reduced a little bit and the importance of Suzuki and Cockamamy. But there was also he's in a contract year. It got leaked out during that Pierluigi Du Bois trade scenario possibilities with Montreal that they know had turned down a six year deal worth five million dollars a year. There's something that that kind of stinks about that whole situation for me.

I don't like the fact that it leaked out to somebody. If I'm if I'm Filipino at that specific time while he's trying to find his game, that's tough. What's not helpful for them? And the other thing about it is like and I'll I'll look into it. But he's represented by Newport and Don Meehan. And I know Damian well enough not he's not my best friend, but I know that if a five year or a six year deal worth five million dollars comes across the table, I'm pretty sure his next move is not hanging up the phone and saying no deal.

It's normally you'd have a deal done within about six minutes. But I don't know if it was a make or like take it or leave it offer without trade protection and all the different elements that come in. One thing I do know is that Phil Denault had built himself that profile and we're talking about John Gabrial HIJOS deal right now. I could see essentially the same deal that it's rumored that he's turned down. He is actually coming into the season, built that case to have a contract that was better than that pandemic adjusted.

We talk about something different. But I'm just saying, like there's something more to that that needs to be fleshed out and I'll do my best to do that. But at the same time, like, that's a tough situation for any player. But right now, he needs to put that all aside. He's being given a chance to play with Gallagher and to who had great success with and he needs to rise to the occasion and play better because he's an important player for this team.

I look at the young talent well, I look at Montreal and I think they made the the calculated move to they don't have like a true goal scoring stud, but they have depth where all their lines can can score.

But you look back to the draft and you look younger players and Courtney and me, I mean third overall.

Twenty, eighteen. And after him it's like Brady Catcher Quinn Hughes. I mean, even Ferebee in Philly was available. And you haven't necessarily seen what I think any Canadian fans hope when when they have a top three selection. Is that still there? Is that a possibility where you're looking at a point per game player or is it even too early for you to even kind of judge where the rest of his career may go?

It's a great question and a relevant question because obviously you need that pick to hit. Yeah, quick. The thing about this very cockerham is a couple of things here first. He started off his career as the youngest player in the NHL at 18 years old. And the Canadians just didn't have anyone at center and desperately needed him there. And he didn't just earn a buy here like he he earned his way onto the team. He he really played great in that training camp and found his way at thirty four points as the youngest player in the NHL in a sheltered role, playing only a 13 and a half minutes a game.

It tells you the potential's there. Last year went through some classic struggles for a player who was elevated pretty quickly into the NHL. And as of right now, at 20 years old, there's maybe 10 players in the NHL that are older, that are younger than him. So that's one factor. The other factor is you can look back in hindsight and look at that draft and say, what are they doing picking Cochimi third overall, when he was probably going to go sixth or seventh or maybe even as far as tenth, like the Canadians had two and a half decades worth of just a barren ice position.

If they don't get the best center ice men available in the draft.

That's what we're talking about today, because Mark Berman has spent eight years or nine now talking about the fact that you can't trade for them. They never become available. You can't sign them in free agency because they never teams never let them go. Deborah, I understand he became available, but that was a really unique circumstance. Who knows where it goes with Jack ickle in Buffalo? We'll see. But now all of a sudden, they've got Suzuki. And I mean, I love Brady Kucuk and everyone knew who's was going to be a good player.

But I'll tell you, going back to that draft, the Canadians had Arizona behind them at five. They knew that Arizona wanted to center. They ended up taking eight. I think they would have taken this very cockamamy if he was available at five. They couldn't really trade down out of the position and they made the choice. We're going to get a sentiment with the third overall pick because we need one.

And you bring up seven and it's eight years. And I mean, I don't know if it's necessarily fair to ask you or you want to say, but I'd have to think personally if they don't get in the playoffs this year, he's probably gone.

And I would have to agree. And I think if you look at the moves that have been made here and it's clear that that's on his mind, it might not even be that they'd be looking to fire him. It might be that he might say, you know what, I'm going to step aside. I know that he loves the job and doesn't want to do that. But I also know that the pressure is on for them to perform right now.

And I'll say this, we all had I'm sure you three had the same opinion that I do before the season happened, was that he had he knocked it out of the park. He did a good job in free agency brought in. We all know that. And I mentioned it off the top here, what those guys have done so far. But it's a team. You got to bring everything together. You have to make decisions at the right time.

And if it doesn't work out, if the Canadians missed the playoffs this year, it's it's probably time for a new direction. And I would think that's a big part of the reason why. Dominant Ducharme as an interim tag as head coach, you know, if potentially you could have a new GM because it didn't work and you couldn't turn it around, you'd want that guy to sign his own coach or decide on his own if you want to extend.

Ducharme So there's a lot going on here, but I don't think Bourgeoning is under any illusions about what's at stake.

A season, do you think it was it was it probably going to be him who would have gotten the job if it if it had happened after the regular season last year?

Because it seemed like Bertrand's very confident in this guy. And it seems that seems to be if he was going to be the guy.

That's a really hard question to answer, but I'll say this, Brugmann could say quarantine or not, Ducharme is my guy and he should say that because he's made him the coach, his future is directly tied to this coach. He believes in the coach. And I think he's absolutely genuine when he says he's 100 percent my guy and I believe in him. But we also know there was major constraints in being able to bring in a coach from outside if you bring them in two weeks before you fire Julian.

Good luck keeping that under wraps. That's going to get out somewhere, whether internally or externally, if you bring them in in an urgent situation where you've lost a number of games in a row and you need to turn the tide and bring a coach. And he's got a quarantine for two weeks, having an exhaustive search outside of the organization in the middle of what's going on in the season is virtually impossible. But I do believe that Mark Burcham believes that Dominic Ducharme is a good coach.

And I would say this in the very short time that Ducharme has been here in position, I think Brochmann is going to be really reassured about a number of elements from what he's trying to tweak in terms of the strategy, but also in terms of how calm and collected he is with a media that is not a vicious media or anything like that. But we're well in tune with what's going on and we're asking hard questions and questions that are not easy to just navigate.

In your first time in that position and the pressure of Montreal, there's a tornado of pressure going on around him and he is handling it extremely well. And if I was my first mate, I would be really reassured by that.

While we're super excited to see how this plays out and I think it's a long time coming, you join in the pod. Great job on the Weber article, as we mentioned in all your coverage of the Canadian. So I right away backtracked from me saying they weren't going to make the playoffs. Now I'm like, wait a minute, I don't know what's going on, but it's going to be a fun story to watch over the next few months. So thanks for joining us.

At the risk of putting myself on the line here, I'm confident that they will I will turn this around. And then if they don't, we can we can make fun of me for for however long you guys want.

If they don't, that's a pastime of ours, is making fun of anyone that comes on the show. So we have a good time and we appreciate it.

Thanks, guys. It's it. Thanks, Eric.

Thank you very much, Eric, NGOs will be chatting with him again in the future, no doubt. I mean, personally, it was like it was a little surprising and I think mainly because you saw the start that they had and I didn't quite realize how bad it had gotten for a little while. They're trying to follow the whole league. So still, you see him fired and you're like a little surprised. But then then you hear Engle's explain it.

And you really do hear him say that Bergmann's pretty much relying on this year and then that could be it. So if he's not in the playoffs, he's he's kind of ditching and he knows it's his last effort. He's going to find a coach who he thinks can get this thing switched around because like Engle's also mentioned, Shea Weber saying, like, it's just so negative around here that that's kind of shocking to see. That's when you probably know the right time to make a change.

But shout out to Jeff Petrie. We didn't even bring him up. I think he's fourth in the league discoursing. And I brought his name up button on this, but he's he's had a great season for them. So the guy who covers most thinks they can turn around and be in the playoffs. What do you guppies?

I just I get like I mean, hearing that, of course, takes me off the fact that, like, if they win that game, maybe he sticks around. Then you said that, you know, they'd already had the decision made. But, you know, it's obvious that there's there's just a few things that need to be turned on. I mean, we can, I believe, carry price can turn that switch on. I think that ultimately it's you know, special teams will figure themselves out.

You mentioned the five on five numbers like there there's they got a solid team. And if they just turn a few of those nozzles, they're going to be OK. We're going back to the Gallagher thing. I thought one of the interesting comments after the game was he thinks that most of video review has basically ruined the game and it slowed it down. And in situations like that, maybe I agree completely. There's too much overthinking going on in a sense.

Well, that's that's a little hypocritical for me to say, Mr. Fucking. You're not even known of starting at half the time. But as far as the firing, what do you guys think? I mean, do you think well deserved.

I mean, we were shocked, I think, when we had the text read the next day, just because it seemed to come out of nowhere in a game that basically the Canadians won. I got screwed on that call. I'm curious what's going to be next for Clode? I mean, he's going to be sixty one. He kind of is a defensive style where the league is kind of going a little bit more up tempo. I'm sure he'll have a job if he wants one.

But I'm curious to see, you know, if a team is going to bring him in, if, if they're going to want a guy with like a defensive approach, if that's going to work. Because when he got hired, we wish we had started the show. And, you know, we would question if he was the right guy for the job and not that he was a failure by any means.

I mean, you know, it's like sixty years old plays that style. It just didn't mesh well for whatever reason. So I'm curious to see what doesn't. We're going to get Dale saw because he was fired off on Twitter. He was saying, well, I bet that they get a lot less too many men penalties. So apparently he he forgets to call the lines. Oh, I played with coaches for coaches like that before to where it was up.

I think Barry Trotz is like that to where they get so focused on watching the play and how the how the game you know, how it's all transpiring to where, you know, part of it is trying to remember who to match up and call line. So that's one of the things that I was reading on on Twitter the last couple of days.

Yeah, I was interested in a little thing he put out. He's pretty funny on Twitter, so I can't wait to get him on the show. But I thought it was my expected with tweeted out, like, what other job out there with his blog post odds on who's going to get fired next.

And they had a list of names, I mean, which is report Potok put out there, Travis Green, three to one next to get fired.

Hines four to one, Quinn six to one. I mean, it's not getting fired. I don't know why he's on there at seven one, but they didn't have Jeff Ward listed because I sent out a tweet the other night, who's going to be the next coach to get shit canned? And I think it was overwhelming. A lot of flames.

Fans would have been thrilled. Would it be rude for us to like throwing our picks? You know, I mean, you know, it sucks to get fired, but I think people need to remember these guys. They'll get paid when they get fired. So while it sucks to lose your job and work, is this who do you think's get the next paid vacation? I would I would guess Hines that would be my pick also have been a little bit better over the last couple of games.

Yeah, National stepped it up a little, but I guess if you are the owner of Nashville, OK, now if Poile brought in Tienes and it's not working out there, you're going to take a look at Poile. I know he's a oh, one more.

Are you going to do a parlay? How are you going? Is this a bar stool book team coach, barstool sports sportsbook? No, I mean, I'm not talking about the combo would have six odds. Well, I think if you're the owner and you're looking at his last hire, it's like, OK, if Hines isn't working out, I mean, they might turn around. Yeah, but if they don't, you know, as an owner, are you going to look at his previous hire and say this isn't working out?

And I mean, again, Pyles record is what it is. But I don't know.

I think it's something to maybe think of if you got it.

I don't know man. That's so hard. I don't read him again. Travis Green.

No, I don't think Hines got David David Quin Jr. Smith. He's not going to Blaze Blaze all bug no Tocchet bonus. Eakins Kruger. Like I said, they didn't have Jeff Ward listed there. So yeah, I would actually take that. Not one more coach gets fired during the season this year. I'll take one action. No way. I think I think John Hines gets fired. And one other aspect to Ingles brought up. The fact that there might be a quarantine process that has to happen, right, so they may be factoring that in, saying it's a shortened season, let's just fucking let's just get out alive.

Yeah, I didn't pick anyone.

I know John Hines well. I mean, I guess it looks like he would probably be the next one I really hope doesn't happen to him, though. I've known him since I was like 14 years old. So he's a great guy. He does. I mean, I know you mentioned they get paid, but you're still wondering, I am I going to get a chance again? Right. So there's there's some there's some probably panic for those guys.

All right. Yeah. I'm not rooting for anybody to lose their job here.

But, you know, it is something. It's Bodrog. Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. But take a look at the rest of the division men. Winnipeggers, like, quietly feel like people aren't really talking about them kind of halibuts, but playing out of his mind. Take a look at where are they throwing the division? Twenty seven points. I don't got to give a little love to the Jets, I think, especially like I said, Hollerbach.

Yeah. I mean, everybody was criticizing their back and going in it. But, you know, I think they've I mean, Hellebore might be cleaning up a lot of that mess, but ultimately, yeah, they've looked really good.

They've kind of tried to I mean, I think everyone's after Edmondson's run here and I think it was at one point eleven and two in their last thirteen. I know exactly. But they obviously have picked it up and it's like them in Toronto have started making the steps to kind of pull away. Well, Winnipeg's right there. And everyone else, if you look, they got to chase them down now. And I know I Marcelo's only played twenty games and Winnipeg still has a chance to make up ground, but Hellebore creates like a team where.

All right. They know they're going to score. They have enough talent up front like yours. Looks awesome. I've always actually loved watching him play his style plays like he's he's going so fast and every shift it seems like he's giving it like there's not really much laid back. Like he's almost the opposite of line anywhere. You just like some nights there's nothing there. Isla's is just every night. I think fans love that guy and then like the talent of Chifley and all that.

But when you have a goalie who's playing, there's so much mental there's so many different parts of the game mentally as a defenseman, where if you know that there's probably going to be a big save made, it just loosens you up. It like makes you feel at ease when you're on the ice where you can throw a couple of. Yeah, like, listen, I don't want to throw a pizza, but if I do, I could get bailed out here.

So, I mean, I think that they're going to be there all year. I think they're going to be competing. And that's a place that I mean, I know fans is like so far from now, I think. But Winnipeg, with their barn going, it's like I wish that was the case because I love I love their whole fan base and I really hope they do do well this year. They're fun team to watch.

I think maybe the funniest highlight from that division all week was Calgary goalie David Reddick. Headbutt in the wall. Remember Gus Farat, the Redskins quarterback didn't break his neck. Yeah, he had bought a googol after a touchdown. He like, yeah, dislocated something. Isn't that Kattegat in the Angelus Fortunati? That didn't happen to Reddick. But nonetheless, I'm seeing a goalie had but a wallet.

That is I mean I mean, I'm sure it happens every week in the KHL. Binnington almost had but mean if I had to guess it just happened so much. They don't even bother releasing the footage. But I tell you, man, there's there's been a few times in my career where the wires have crossed. I'm pretty sure I've had buttered shit up. Pretty sure I've punched a few walls and fuck, man, that that's that's especially playing in the Canadian market.

That's the type of of of a built up shit that you deal with. I mean, you're constantly in the media. The team hasn't necessarily been playing that great, although I don't think goaltending is necessarily been the issue. Yeah, the fucking wires cross. What are you what are you going to say?

I mean, that team right now, like they got blown up by Edmonton seven one, whatever, four or five games ago, then they beat Toronto and then they lost in overtime. It's like, all right, that's a pretty big step back after that embarrassing display. And then they get blown out again, six one. It's like, oh, my God.

So, yeah, I guess we're in Calgary. Put his name up there because I don't understand it. I mean, they they made changes this summer. Like Guidroz look good. It's just so hard. Mark Mushroomhead Times you look so at the beginning. I mean like Markram in the way that team was playing it look like, all right, this team has figured it out. And then like the past failures in the playoffs and everything, I think this is the year they could take a step forward.

And now it's the same thing where you're like, I don't even know if they're going to get in the playoffs. So as a as a flames fan, you've got to be seriously questioning, like the whole core of the team. I would think. I mean, it's at some point we've talked about this before. This team isn't able to take that next step. So, I mean, there's yeah, there's probably two teams that stand out the most right now to where like, OK, if you if you can't get out of the first round with that core group because there are some guys and like, you know, we hate being critical.

It's them in Buffalo right now. It's just like at one point when do you just you got to change a few major pieces.

Yeah. Comparing them to Buffalo is a low I big time. But would you not would you not agree if they don't make let's say they don't make fucking playoffs with this Calgary Flames lineup. Yeah. There's something that I could see.

I could see it being like a shortened season. No training camp, OK? Let's reset the deck here, but it's going to be a short week next season. We also want to give a shout out to Mike Smith. I mean, he's down the clock, back with the second goal, age 38, old at the start of season six. And he's got a tool for goals against nine three four save percentage already got two shutouts. Edmonton, I mean, they were struggling.

That was an issue, I think, with goaltending. And he solidified, at least for now. We'll keep an eye on it going forward.

This is when when Tippit went out and got them. This is exactly what happened in fucking Phenix, dude. And it was crazy to run, right? I never I'll never forget. I think we were like seven or no. And then Tip was a little weary of us having a rookie party in L.A.. If you thought I wasn't going to. I was begging Shane, though. I'm like you. We need this. Let me set this up to go to a club.

It's not going to be in Nashville. It's a fucking bar where there's nothing to stare at anyway. We we have rookie party. It was a blast. We were brutal against L.A. I think they had fifty shots on that. Smitty fucking stood on this. Had we won the game with no way in hell this guy showing up for that. And then we played Chicago, stood on his head, then we played fucking do it. It was the craziest run I've ever been a part of watching a goaltender just be completely in the zone.

It was like every night it was like you said, you could throw six pizzas. You're like, all right, somebody got it.

Is that when he signed that big ticket in Tampa or, you know, he saw so he came over from, I don't know any more from Tampa or Dallas, but but he'd obviously had some connection with tip or tip was like, hey, this guy is severely undervalued. And he came in and that's when he we are having the lockout year where it was a shortened season. Forty eight games after that year, he had that crazy run. But it was the next summer when he signed his deal.

I think he got six times six in Phenix. But guys is with Arizona, that deal. He was with Arizona when he got his big deal. So, guys, this is one guy I've witnessed do it. And it's not shocking because I think Tip, it is instilled that confidence that he got back in Arizona. And I'm really happy for not only him, but Edmonton, because they they've deserved this for a long time. Keep going.

He's also he's got to be near forty. Right. He's he's even up there, but he's he was jacked like he's in pretty good shape. And that's the thing that's frustrating too, is like he he he cares and he takes care of his body. He's training hard in the off season. So it was hard to see where he kind of lost his confidence there for quite a few years.

So I had it backwards. He was in Tampa before Phenix and I totally like. Yeah, yeah. So then he that's when he found it. He was with him in Dallas originally where he he'd seen him play. He's thirty eight to thirty eight. He's getting up there. So it's nice to see these guys get one last. That's what Edmonton needs though. You'd said that for a long time. All right. Yeah.

Thirty nine actually this month. So nice to see him having some success. A tough week for the old Kanaks oh two and one this week. But the team was going to give away some of those reverse retro jerseys. I'm not a big fan of the Canucks ones anyways, but they didn't score any goals that night. They were going to going to give three of them away. They didn't score anything, but they got shut out. But they still and that's karma for Chirping Forbert and Instagram DM's, you clowns, some of you, some of the Canucks fans.

Shit. And before we get to the East Division, I know it's got to wear off my them a lot, but also Shuto to Brady Kucuk. He became the youngest senator ever to reach fifty goals, so kudos to him getting it done. I'll do.

I'd be remiss. I my buddy Tyson Berry, another guy who's been finding some success there, he's been snooping around. I think he's probably one of the league leaders as far as demerit points. Just we talked about him having a very similar role on a team that had a couple of superstars in Rantanen and McKinnon. So now he kind of goes over that similar situation and he's thriving right now. So another reason for their success can run a power play.

And I do want to talk about Peter Malachi's. I think that it's the slickest, nicest looking golf gear you can have. It fits perfectly.

And the new Crown Sport outerwear, Hyppolite Shield is what we're going to talk about. It's a half zip, right? And it's engineered from a highly technical two and a half layer performance fabric. The Hyppolite Shield half zip is a go to peace offering, fully waterproof, seem sealed protection and optimal coverage in inclement weather. Golf's played in all weather men. Wind, rain doesn't matter. They don't always blow. The Horn of Lightning is not nearby. You play playing, especially in Europe, especially manured.

So the tortoise tested fabric is supremely soft and comfortable with two way stretch and easy care benefits. A separate pouch allows it to be packed down tight and easily stashed in the golf bag or carry on. If it ends up being nice out, you chuck it in the bag barely weighs anything. It comes in both long sleeve and short sleeve version, so you can't complain that their gear is getting in the way or leading to them losing more money on the course.

I don't know what that just said. That's gambling. Fair enough. That's a fun part of golf. For more, go to WW Dot. Peter Miller, dotcom slash check. Let's check it out now.

We look pretty good in the sand. Yes. White on white where I was one on one. You had great gray pants. Fucking spandex you wear and when you go off, you can see it was Zula going back to junior arenacross like a truck driver. Quantic wa wa wa wa wa wa.

Nervously I got a girl named Cisco. Yeah, you sound like Cisco. Actually, that was I used to sing that in the locker room. So you can ask Tailor Pilot's brother Tommy Pietje. You a big tongson guy? I would imagine he was weird.

I was wearing I used to wear Speedos to the beach like it was nothing. I got a small small horn when it Sotho, so I would have to like, get the fucking blood flow going before I'd get there, just to make sure I could maintain it. Because you could actually be so small that you can anything like a light switch to the into this thong on that side hung like a field.

Most grower, not a show of it's not a fur coat. We didn't even mention our other guest this week.

We're going to bring along a little bit, Jody Shelley. We just had him on recently to talk about the Columbus trade. While he's such an awesome guy, we want to bring him right back. And we did. So we talked about his career and we're going to bring him on a little bit. Just want to mention that we're going to move over to the east. And this isn't fun. Talk the Buffalo Sabers, man. It's been even worse than we thought.

They've lost three straight oh two and one this week. They were shut out in consecutive games. Only the ducks have fewer goals. Jack, I missed a couple games with a lower body injury. He did play Sunday, but Jeff Schiano scratched in three straight. He did play Sunday. Twelve minutes. Thirty five seconds. One shot, minus one. Ralph Krueger, the coach, said, I don't have a doghouse in relation to Skinner. I don't know what he caused when he scratches a guy three times in a row.

But Rasmus Dalene had some harsh words after Sunday's loss. Very embarrassed. This is not acceptable. It sucks. It's the worst. It all comes down to competing work for each other. Be a good teammate. Right now we have nothing to lose. Someone has to step up, make a hit, make a play. I don't know. We have to find something. But it all comes down to work for each other and we just have to stop competing.

What's the issue with this team? Like I said earlier, it's almost like they have an undiagnosed disease in that franchise.

They just can't figure it the hell out. It's like a gigantic black cloud that's just hovering. And there's teams in all professional leagues. That's just it's like the Cleveland Browns. I mean, they've finally started switching it around a little bit. But the Buffalo Sabers, man, it is such a dark period to be a fan of them. And they're keeps coming with each new season, new optimism. And like they had Halsy come there this year and they have Eichel, this guy is like his skill level.

And what he can do when he's playing is is just it's almost unrivaled. There's very few people in the league that can do what he's done or is able to. And so I think for him, it's got to be like, I know. I mean, I don't want to speak for him. I haven't talked to him, but I can't I can't keep playing here. There's there's almost right now, it seems like zero chance that they're going to be good anytime soon.

Like there's pieces there. And Darlene has those quotes. And like, I know people are disappointed in his play at time. I mean, that's a young demon with so much skill. That's a guy you're not getting rid of. OK, he's he's he needs to be like the guy that that stays, but. What are you what are you against seeing Buffalo just like move a lot of different people to blow it up? Man horses, he's on a one year deal so you can be able to move him somewhere equal.

I think his no move cause moves in next year. I think 2020 to where then he's deciding he if that's a major come onto you if you want. I mean, if you want to like at least some sort of control over the situation, you're looking at that. And then the Skinner thing is nuts. And Jeff Skinner, two years ago, I think he had 14 even string goals. It was it was more than like Chifley, Mark St.

Barkov Tavares Burger on or off to a really hot stright.

And now, I mean, he can't even score five on five scoring. He can't score at all. He's done playing. So I think that, like, if a guy's making nine million dollars or whatever the hell he's making and you sit him, it's like, all right. Yeah, this kid, he needs to wake up. He's not playing well. But I feel like those are the players you set for one game and they're back and he sit in three straight games.

It's so obviously the coach, the coach can't stand them all. Really. You think you don't think he's being honest with the media because he says, I don't have a dog house. I don't think like lying. I think. But he might he might be in a situation where he thinks he's protecting him, where he's like this guy has been stripped of all of his confidence. He knows he's probably feeling the weight of the world on his shoulders.

He's making nine million. I don't I don't know him enough. Right. Maybe he's just one of those guys on, but it's not a bad call where he I mean, in the end, though. You take a step back as the player, and even if he's telling you, listen, you just need a break in your mind, the team needs to win and this guy is choosing to not have me be a part of the club to go try to get a win.

So it's like no matter what you can say that Ralph, who we can say he doesn't have a doghouse, which I'm not saying that's not true, where like he's probably definitely willing to give him a chance again. But Ralph Krueger also looks at his entire team as any coach. Yeah. In any case, it says and says, like, I don't love his game. Like he's not necessarily in my doghouse. I just don't think he's that good.

And I think that Skinner right now is I mean, he's skating was always different, right? He was able to move, but it was the opening up of the hips. And there was many different ways that he was able to create space for himself and skating to the neutral zone. He'd be like opening up. It wasn't always in a straight line. Maybe like, you know, he's had injuries in the past. Maybe he isn't the same player anymore.

But to have that much more time at nine million, they can't trade him.

Their only hope is that the cracking would take them. And Ron Francis was in Carolina when they drafted him. And Jason, the assistant GM, gave him the contract in Buffalo. Right. So maybe there have it's an inside job. Well, I don't know. You hold out the door and we'll take them. We're not paying them. Not what you want or else who gave them. That's what you're insinuating. It's an inside job, isn't there?

It would be a hell of a conspiracy. And you love conspiracies is going to spend the next two weeks on the computer investigating it. I was like already I was on YouTube till 4:00 this morning.

So to get serious about it, I don't know what tough times you got to imagine Michael is not going to stand much longer for this. You said Hawley's and a one year deal. I don't know if he's regretting the decision. I don't know how how what's going on inside the locker room. But you can gain some pretty good assets as far as drafting capability and maybe get some young prospects. I just think it's like it's got to get worse before it gets better.

And and you have pieces that you can move now. And you mentioned one of which you're in control of with the the no trade or no move close kicking in next right here.

I think I'd have to agree to it or pick it. Yeah. All of a sudden you're getting the list to the teams that would take in. And it's a tough situation for the organization. Ultimately, though, I say blow it the fuck up right now and it's going to get bad for two, two years. But at least at that point, it's going to really turn around to where you don't want to be in the same position three fucking years from now.

I know. The problem is, is it was this bad seven years ago and then they got ickle and it was thank God we did it. We went through that time. We're going to we're going to go. And now it's like, oh, my God, wait, we're doing that again. It didn't work. He's this good and he's he's gone we to find somebody else.

One other thing, Sam Reinhart's been good this year. I mean, that's been a positive note. He's he's I think second and team scoring right now behind Olafsson, who is another good young stud. So they got some pieces like we know today's NHL with with everything going on, you can turn around quickly. But holy fuck, man, this is like one organization I was pulling for. I think I might have had the making playoffs this year. Yeah, they might be getting first.

Overall pick all of sudden has been one of the few bright spots. Second in the league, a power play goals with six. But honestly, I don't think it was a bad play by Halsy because he probably figured, well, even if they suck this year, I'll get traded at the deadline. He could very well end up on a contender.

He probably will. So, I mean, I'm not how you want to play in a season, but it gives him a little bit more control in that sense. And he was able to potentially fetch his numbers. So, I mean, hey, he's a he's our buddy. And I hope that he's able to get moved and go to, in a way, better situation and he's able to get paid accordingly. But I can't imagine that he expected it to go this bad.

Yeah. I mean, he might have his cake and eat it, too, if he ends up with a good squad. Also, a more tough news for Buffalo, Gogola, Lyness, Almac, another one of the few bright spots he's going to be able at least a month with a lower body injury. So it's like the more what's it, the more more it rains, it pours. What's that phrase? It's easy.

When it rains, it pours out. I get busy, help me out there. But so either way, man, yeah. We don't like to pick on Buffalo. We know they're great fans. But it's a situation that, you know, we got to talk about or the more things change, the more they remain the same.

Yeah, that's that's another one that. Thank you. But let's move over to the Capitals.

They had a great week, three oh and one week, seven point jump they got in the first place. Hank Lundquist did skate the other day, which is great to see, but he still months away from playing. They're not even put any sort of timetable on it. But for caps, man, I mean, they had a couple little bumps in the road, but they're looking pretty sharp lately because I haven't been watching that much.

So I might even open my mouth about the caps wagging, I think going to make miss playoffs this year. So that's that tells you the extent of my hockey knowledge.

That division, when we when we watch and like, you know, we got the Islanders Penguins stream on Sunday. Thanks, Bob. Blue light.

You just see, like the Pittsburgh's had success against the islanders, all of a sudden the islanders take it to him. They win a two nothing game. Boring as hell. Thanks, Islanders. And then you just look. Like, Pittsburgh's not even in the playoffs right now, and so that that division is so strong where the Rangers fans had way higher expectations and what's going on there now, granted, like they're falling away quickly with Buffalo and the Devils in terms of like this is a five horse race.

Washington's I don't want to say the entire time, but heads and shoulders above the rest of the division, because I think Boston's look so good through certain stretches, they had a tough go. Rangers and islanders pounded them. I'm kind of just jumping all over the division, more so because I bring up like Washington's good. But that that is such a dogfight the rest of the way. There's so many games and so few days that you can at all make the decision that they're going to end up finishing first.

If Washington finished fourth, I wouldn't be surprised. It sounds crazy now, but the beatings that these teams put on each other are going to continue to get worse and worse. This division's the deepest. And I think if you don't take advantage of, like, pounding Buffalo and the Devils, sorry, Pasha, you're going to lose ground.

Paul said, stick taps for that's just an absolute. That was a roundup of the MassMutual esthetician in the NHL. It's called the MassMutual and all I think is, is there a man I don't know. But if it is, that's a cherry on top. And you just got the actual MassMutual thing, where to go.

What a play by you.

You mentioned the devil mentioned Pasha's team, the Devils. It was nice that they got to Onas Jack at home. Travis AIJAC, the whole team called the jerseys. You know, he was on the road when he did. It's always nice to see acknowledge his career accomplishment. They're sneaky, sneaky thousand games. Yeah. Yeah. Sneaky best center paresis ever had. I said last week it's you don't hear about certain guys and then you look and you're like whoa, that's, that's a career that any person in the world would be proud to be able to say was theirs.

I know you just dumped on the Isles. What, because that's what you do. But they also had a good week there, right in the thick of it to table Boston, second place in the division stroke and two straight shutouts. Valot Varlamov, he's been outstanding all year. This is a team. They just get it done by committee. Man, there's not one obviously by Zaza stop. But you know, this team just fucking someone steps up every night and they just they're all bought in.

And I'll tell you what, the amount of they limit the the high end scoring chances. And I'm not taking anything away from the goaltending either because they have competent guys in that. And we talked about their Schostak and had a first rookie go over to back to back shutouts for the islanders. Is that the first time it had happened for a rookie goaltender since seventy five and I don't remember who she goresh it was. There you go. You're buzzing today feeling it, but they just like I said, they limit other teams high and scoring chances.

We watch the livestream against Pittsburgh and like fucking I mean that's that's me drinking more of druggers Kool-Aid. Like I just this the penguins couldn't muster anything up. And I'm not saying that that island is reinventing the wheel, but they just had nothing. So islanders are completely dialed in right now. Crosby was two and he was fuming. I think he went after Bolivia heavily. Excuse me. And you just saw at the end of the game, like when he's pissed off and frustrated and getting in, like crosschecking matches or even fights in his career with guys you could tell in the locker room out there, it's probably definitely tense.

Also, Philadelphia, they had a nice week, three and oh seven hundred one for Elaine Vinicio, who keeps climbing up that list. A couple of notes at Pittsburgh's Jason Asaka. Has we found that wasn't playing Sunday because he's going to be a longer term as the same with a lower body injury? That's been Jeremy Lasan. He had surgery on his left hand. He's going to be reevaluated in about four weeks.

And the other notes from the E coil, what a goal he scored. Just shout out. I'm a big Charlie Coyle fan under the triangle snipe top right to get the Bruins out to the lead. That game annoyed the absolute shit out of me because I saw the Bruins got pounded by the iron ore. So I hammered him against the Rangers every which way to Sunday. The Rangers drummed them great fight at the end of that game with Trent Frederich and Brendan Lemieux, who had fought earlier in the season, and Frederich told them, we're going again.

What was it?

It wasn't Richie who fought him at the end of the game. It was Richie who, Fredricka and I don't think Frederick fought, but he did score again.

I'm sorry. I got I got ahead of myself saying I was feeling it. I just butchered the entire well, I didn't Bruins one that I didn't do. OK, either way, fuck it. Forget it. Forget get back to my story. So I pounded them against the Rangers. They got worked. So then I said, Walt, they got him again Sunday. That is Max Bettelheim, MONEYLINE Popline everything. And I thought the is at three o'clock.

And I know for gamblers out there, it's like I looked at randomly my phone. Twelve 15 it was Bruins are up one nothing and I was sick to my stomach. It's almost worse than a loss. I said to all right. So yeah, play the violin for me, have some chips.

You play one if you like old school hockey. I would probably tune into every other Rangers Bruins game to finish the season because they there's some legitimate hate there. We you know, we've had Brendan Lemieux on. He just he'll drag his team into it. He'll drag him into the fight. And I would say there's some prospects for you, Lemieux, get in a scrap next game against the Bruins bookit.

I like that. Yeah, at least it all. It's nice to see a little original six hatred because for two original six teams is not a huge rivalry there. I know they played in the playoffs earlier in the decade, but it's not as if it didn't.

They beat him in the cup final. Who the Bruins beaten. Seventy two. Yeah, that was the ranges in 72. Yeah, but I don't know, there is no rivalry. I know, but it is true. It's kind of odd. I guess the Canadians have that baby, Derek Sanderson, would have something different to say about it. Well, he got some at bats. He got a few at bats in those series. But I would have in those cities Rangers, Rangers, Bruins I would have never paid attention to until this year.

All right, gang.

Well, at Labatt, they don't care if you're good or bad. At most things in life. They only care if you're good at being great at being yourself and not pretending to be someone you're not. And if you are, they're good with you. After all, if you choose Labatt Blue Light, you're good at the most important thing there is beer.

We already know you're good at watching hockey. Now, be good at beer, too.

With a pristine Canadian pilsner Labatt Blue light, we're going to be working with Libet Labatt Blue all. Yeah, we have some exciting content coming up. So grab a pack and enjoy. We've been enjoying them all weekend. We're going to continue to enjoy some nice celebratory tasty.

Had about ten during the live stream. Another live stream coming to you on Wednesday. Euler's versus Mapley. Very excited for this one. Oilers were shit. Was it Sunday they played or was it Saturday? I think Saturday. Saturday. And I think it should. Yeah, they stunk that night. But right now Matthews's is on the ice, are questionable tonight, on Monday. So hopefully he's back in the lineup and we have a great successful live stream.

And the good news is it's not the islanders plan. So we don't watch any boring hockey. So you won't have to listen to me for fucking another two hours. Yeah.

You're going to rub your ear wax on business business like this stream shit. I think we should send it over to Jody Shelley right about now.

This is a great interview. I got such a fucking great guy. He had an unreal career. So that's why we brought him back so quick. And I enjoyed Jody Shelley.

It's great to welcome this guest back, though he wasn't drafted, he played over 600 NHL games, is one of the NHL last generation of enforcers.

Most of them went to Columbus Blue Jacket uniform where he led the league in penalty minutes in 2003. He also suited up for the sharks, rangers and fliers. And you can currently catch him providing his expert color commentary for the Blue Jackets. Blue Jackets on Fox Sports, Ohio. Thanks a bunch. Coming back on Jodie Shelley, long time no see my friend.

I was awesome. All right. Thanks for having me back on that little hiccup at the end. But it was the land that last time we had you on.

It was to talk about Plup to Bob Patrick, Lanny Ross Slovik. He's been he's been a stud since he got there, huh? Ross Yeah.

That was quite a trade. And, you know, Lyonnaise a star. But Rossell Vick is a player that's got skill and he's got a lot to prove. So it's been a good fit here so far.

You know, he's a guy that grew up in Columbus, idolized Cam Atkinson. You know, Atkinson continues to idolize Marty St. Louis. And and Atkinson got to meet Marty and learn from them. A little bit of that happening in here with Rossell, Vick and Atkinson. It's nice.

So is should we have added Patrick Lyonnaise personal fighting coach to that title at the beginning here he's been chucking to knocks Cody, grab some aphoristic. Let me help you next. The next practice.

Well, no, I think terrible would have to do that. He's an assistant coach. He did take one, though, because like I do like when we fought, I think I took one from you. So, yeah, you might be my signature move there.

I think you slipped on a banana peel and I looked like I won the fight. I was shitting my pants the first time I ever fought for the Arizona Coyotes. What was this guy in San Jose? And I'll tell you what, as nice as you are off the ice, you had one of the meanest mugs on the ice. Did you practice that puck? That that's that look that you had? I did.

I was playing the role big time, buddy. What I remember about your fight, you asked you were so, like, polite. You were like the nicest guy. You're like, hey, Chelsie, you got one in Yemen. I got a guy. I got to get a fight going here. And I'm like, sure, because I knew you were coming.

All right. That's just shows, though. You respected your elders. You weren't that loud when you came into the league.

I was like, hey, can you not pump my fucking eyes shut, please? I tried to, but I didn't like the end of that fight.

So last time we didn't get to do the full Monty what you like. We usually do. So we brought you back on. Now, you were born in Manitoba, but you moved to Nova Scotia as a young kid. We I loved that trip there. Obviously, these guys have been there multiple times. It seemed like a real great place to grow up.

It is, man. It's tremendous. But I was born in Manitoba, grew up on Vancouver Island. So the the west coast of Canada. My dad was a miner. So we were out there for twelve years. And then long story short, we ended up in Newfoundland where my parents are from after we left Port Hardy, B.C. and ended up from Newfoundland in a year and then to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. Nice little lobster fishing community on the South Shore there.

Everyone knows that Halifax area, which is great, but little lobster fishing community, actually. Ryan Graves is from the same town I'm from. So I grew up there and yeah, it's a beautiful spot. You guys got to see some some some of the highlights of the province for sure with royalty in McKinnon and Crosby, of course. But it's a great spot of the world to visit.

I actually I wanted to ask you before you came into the league. Right.

And well, I don't even want to jump that far ahead, but I want to I want to know, like when you came into the league and you knew you had to play the role, was it scary at that point or were you so used to it after junior after college, all the things we'll get into like, was that something that was easy for you?

Yeah, it was easy. It was it was my only ticket. I mean, I had no other choice. So, you know, I knew I was it why I was there. I tried to fight every three games. At least if I went for games without a fight, I felt like I wasn't doing my job. So and it was easy to find fights then.

But I was I was intimidated, but I didn't care if I lost. And that was my mentality, you know what I mean? Like, I couldn't have been the champ. To me, that would have been too much pressure. I would have rather been the underdog and every fight and been like, I don't care if I lose, I'm just going to go at it. And that's that was the part that settled me down.

So not much anxiety when Bui's talks about pre game meal night before. Not not not the case for, you know, I was good.

I slept well.

I just feel weird way when I had when I was sick puppy when I retired, I realized how much it consumed me, you know, like it was on my mind all the time. Like, you know, we used to get Transaction's in the newspaper. So it was like, oh, so-and-so got called up or sent down, you know, maybe slept a little bit better if I knew a guy got sent down. But when a guy gets called up, you know, I deal with it mentally, filed away and get ready for the next day.

But I slept and it was no problem.

It's like a goalscorer going a couple of games without a point. You know, you get you start the anxiety starts to build a little bit. You don't feel like you're contributing. But it's Aaron Aaron Potts line. Correct. Right after we had you on an unbelievable article comes out of the 20th anniversary of you getting your first NHL game now. Throughout the course of the article, this does talk about, like in minor, how you ended up going from playing like Midget where Halifax ended up coming into the league as a new team, correct?

Yeah. So you how did you end up getting invited to camp? Was it just like they noticed you locally or what was the story behind that?

It's a great story. It's a great question. Yeah. Aaron Sportsline wrote that it was an unbelievable article because because he did so much work and it was it was just a nice it was awesome to read that, you know, I had all these stories in my head, but he put it all together so well. But I was in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, and I went to Hockey Night in Boston. I made this team at a Team Atlantic.

I went to Hockey Night in Boston and got on the draft list when there was like 16 rounds. So they were inviting they had 90 invites to Camp and Halifax. And there was a couple of scouts that had seen me and they said, who's just kidding? Yarmouth? It's on the draft list.

Like, we got to invite them, you know what I mean? You know, so Shane O'Brien was a local scout. He invited me. I got to go to or Shaun O'Brien excuse me. I got to go to camp and I got a tip going to camp from a guy, a local guy where I trained in Halifax, a college that if I wanted to make an impression, I should drop the gloves. And I was 17 years old, just graduated high school.

I'd never dropped the gloves in my life. Never. I don't know if you had thought before you played it played high or like on the streets or anything, but I've never been in a fight. You fought the pause like I was like so I was like, yeah, yeah. I'm not that's not something I'm going to do. So I actually started boxing and learning how to fight just in case for camp, you know what I mean? So this guy, David Haines, gave me this tip that this one guy they were toting around on the billboards and on radio shows was not that tough, not as tough as they thought.

So I ended up fighting him at camp and I was a local kid and I ran inside Lane and I ended up making that team in Halifax just from learning how to fight and camp, getting beat up my my whole training camp whole first year and then just took it from there.

Not often does a guy like that end up going on to become captain, too. And one of the most beloved Halifax Moosehead players of all time, like what a wild ride it was throughout that entire junior career.

It was amazing, man. There was it was something that, you know, an expansion team into the Quebec league. There was a lot to learn. Our first year there was 11 English players, 11 French. You know, we were pretty pretty. It was really split up into two groups. But it was fun. It was a great experience being in the Maritimes, having the Quebec guys article back and in our turf. And, you know, that kind of helped us in a big way.

It was amazing going into like towns like Valdo Circle Back and the passion in that league. And there were some tough boys like Patrick Coté and George the Rock and Peter were all these are big boys that we had to go up against every night. But, yeah, it was it was pretty spectacular when they got to be the captain. I mean, you know, I was a local guy fighting with so, you know, like.

Yeah, but the reason there was that doesn't necessarily know anything to be a leader on the team.

No, I know. I know. But it was it was I was well known. It worked out really well. But I appreciate that. You're right. I did have some leadership qualities and I'm really proud of that.

Now, the underplaying it to join you at your number, twenty five was retired. Yeah, I mean, yeah, that's right.

Seven hundred seven hundred thirty nine penalty minutes over the last two seasons. That's impressive as hell. But did the fighting come naturally to me, like once you started it, you like like kind of started salivating a little bit.

Oh yeah. I mean I knew it was my role, you know what I mean? I knew I didn't forget what got me to the dance and I'll never forget. So after my third day in training camp in Quebec would have been like fifth day, first round of cuts happen. And I remember calling my dad after the third day and I was like, dad? And I was waiting at a payphone with with a calling card. I finally get to the phone and like, Dad, I got to come home.

I can't do this, you know, like this. No one speaks English. I don't know anybody. I just want to go home. And my dad said, just don't cut yourself, you know what I mean? Just stay there. Give yourself a chance. Just don't cut yourself. So I go back, I keep going to work. And I only had that one fight in the first five days. And the assistant coach came up to me and he goes, hey, you know, we got a lot of guys that are from Quebec that are five foot nine and can play with the puck.

You know, if you want to play like your five foot nine, you might not have a chance. But if you play like you're six foot three, like you did on day one and I like the light bulb went on like, ding, OK, I know what I have to do to stay here so that I just kept I just kept fighting. It came natural after that. But I mean, you know, people ask me, how do you you know, what do I have to do to be a fighter?

How can I learn to fight? The only way to do it is to get beat up a number of times. And that's what I did my first year. And then I was just fearless. And I think that's what it was. I wanted to be there. It was my only ticket and that just let me be fearless and be able to do it.

I mean, look, I was going to say, looking at your numbers, though, were you somewhat of a decent player in minor hockey because you're putting up Kentucky your first year or was because you were creating so much space for yourself out there because all all these guys were afraid to get close to this mutant?

No, I. I was I was pretty good. I mean, I played Midget B and, you know, that was that's not a high league. But I was I was a good hockey player.

I could shoot. So to adjust from being a skilled player in a sense to going to getting limited minutes, was it hard to adjust on the hockey side of it?

Yeah, I mean, it was at first, but, you know, it just it was just part of it like, you know, the fighting was a priority. But like when I got to go on the power play, when I got to play in practice, when, you know, I just it was different in JR. You know, you didn't have to be so specific. I took care of the fighting and then it was kind of off to the side and I got to play more minutes so I could turn down fights too.

But in the NHL is very specific. So, no, I think the hockey side was just it was just it was more natural in Junior because it's free flowing and less stress and less thinking or I think the NHL is really that system. And, you know, you got to do your job and then you got to worry about guys and you make one mistake and you're on the bench.

Were those actually the guys you were running through in Junior Laroque?

Warrell like, was Big George the Champ then then even before you get to the show, you know, he's a lefty and he was big and the rinks were small and he was he would fly around and he so fast straight ahead, it's OK.

And everyone in the building is screaming, look out.

You know, he's just running over. I have Peter where I was there. I mean, we must have won at it. I don't know how many times, but yeah, there were all the big boys there, Gordie Dwyer, Patrick Khattab. And he's still I mean he's still running through the Quebec league. I think.

So your last your junior you end up tearing a ligament in your knee, correct. Yeah. And so after that you don't really know what you're going to do. You end up deciding to go to Canadian University. Yeah. What's great. Yeah. Like so, so the story goes that you get there but then you're kind of seeing all these guys you've been fighting in Junior who I don't know, you might even thought you're a better player at the time, making all this money, playing pro hockey, and then you're kind of like, I'm over this college situation.

Well, yeah. So I was I finished my major junior career, tore my ACL. And then every year you play in the Canadian call or CHL, you get a year of Canadian college paid for. So I had three years in the bank and that was a big deal. So, you know, at the end of my average year, Saint John of the Calgary Flames had some interest. But once I blew my knee out, there were like, when you're rehabbed and done, Corless and I was like, I'm fine.

I'm going to go to college. You know, this is this has been great. But as I sat there, I watch those guys that I thought exactly there were stars in the in the National Hockey League. People knew who they were. They were making an impact. So I left and I know I signed a tryout with the St. John Flames towards the end of their season. And I went there in that forfeited the Canadian scholarship. That was I meant that was gone.

But I was like, OK, so, you know, when they say, like, burn the boats, you have no other options, no other way to get off the island. The scholarship was gone the next year. I went to Camp Calgary and within days I was in John. Out of the East Coast oculi wondering, you know, what have I done, what I've been there to? I would have thought the same thing. It's a great town, but it's a long way from the NHL.

Yeah.

When you go when you finish Junior now, obviously, I don't I know there's examples of people who ended up making the NHL, but if you finished Junior and go to Canadian University, for the most part, it's like that's it. You're probably not playing at the highest level. Was that your mindset then, too?

Or were you actually like, no, I'm still going to be good? Or did it take to see those guys for you to be like, wait a minute, wait a minute, this dream isn't done yet?

Well, I'll tell you, I saw I saw those guys and I was you know, it's thinking about they all got signing bonuses and they all had a good time. And I was at Dalhousie and, you know, I was playing on the team and I wasn't really my style of hockey. I went took out a five thousand dollar credit line and used that as my signing bonus. I think I spent it in about nine days in Halifax. And then when I realized that, I was like, you know what I think?

I still think I think I still have that pearl mentality. So I think I better go take a run at this.

So that really was one of my indicators that, yeah, you're not ready for college or that style of hockey on three dollar beers, that's that's how much you drink it out in Halifax, you dog you. That's fucking hilarious. What was what was outside of that though. What was the college experience like off the ice. Where you having a good time.

Oh man. It was, it was, it was awesome. I mean, you know, when you play Major Junior because I don't know if you talk about this, but you always look at the college guys and you're just like them. It's so much easier. Like, you know, they got the campus life and they got everything there and they got the dorms living together.

No, no.

They're way funnier, you know, all the good. And, you know, we're on the bus grinding it out, go on air here and there and all through the week. So I enjoyed the college experience. I mean, the school I remember going into one class, though, it was a business class. And I went to the back of that room and I sat down and I cracked open my brand new book, you know what I mean?

It was just like you could hear the binding on it, just crack open. I was like, oh, I'm ready for this. I got my pencil out, sat there for ten minutes, looked at my buddy and I was like, let's get out of here. Oh, I was sitting next class. I enjoyed it. Like a kind of like a frat frat boy, I guess.

Is that when you went and took out the signing bonus? Yeah, right. Okay. I would have been a Wednesday night. Yeah. Unbelievable.

When you signed Akhalgori, how much did they tell you you would have to put in as far as getting to the NHL? Did that was that like a place that they had you in the future at all?

Like, oh no. Like no real conversation. It was just it was a two way contract, American Hockey League, East Coast. And I you know, when you signed that, when you don't really know anything, you think I'm hoping the East Coast Hockey League. But it was an invite to training camp, which was a big deal. But no, there was no talk of prospects. I was in the American League with John Sebastian Junger, Marty St.

Louis. You know, Chris Clark was there. There was a lot of good players that were down there that ended up having futures and other organizations. But, you know, at the time when I got to Johnstown, I was down there with a second round pick and John Trip. Derek Walser was a prospect. He was down in Johnstown, too. So no one was sitting around feeling sorry for themselves. But we all kind of felt like there's no real we didn't know where we were going.

Since you brought it up, I got to ask, what was it like playing with Martin St. Louis, the American Hockey League? I believe you guys played together in St. John, correct?

Yeah, we were in St. John. I mean, he was just it was great. I mean, he was a guy that was you know, you could tell he was going to prove something. He was a guy that was if you ever been around, Marty, he's he's a great presence. He's very demanding. He's vocal, but he's also like he's got this leadership quality. But he was hilarious because he was part of the veteran group with Chris O'Sullivan and Todd Lutsenko, who were probably two of the finest people I'd ever met in my life at that time.

And, you know, in St. John, New Brunswick, the hotel was connected to the rink by way of a mall.

So, I mean, we we just spent all of our time together laughing at that. These three guys and the mockery, they they're the fun they were having off the ice. So they were great to be around play.

But jaggery Halifax's. Well, true. He must have stole a bunch of games for back that.

He was he was he was awesome. I mean, he was a guy that I'd really the first guy had been around. That was a first round pick, you know, big bonus. Big future. So competitive. Yeah. He was a backbone of our team in Halifax. Yeah.

I got to play with him in Anaheim. He's so funny too. Oh, he's awesome. We just chirps guys. That is like funny sense of humor.

He sweats so much I never seen somebody sweat that much. It must have been the same in Junior.

Oh, Gigi. He cramped up. Yeah he's he was. He was. Make it up for Niemira. Because tomorrow would come off from playing 30 minutes, you have one bit of sweat on his chest, but listen, even when I played against the Syracuse crunch, they envy their fighters. And that was that was like your last spot before making a full impact in the NHL. Now, you ended up becoming kind of a cult hero there, much like you were in Halifax, correct?

Well, Syracuse was a good town to Busi because we had I mean, that's that's a blue collar town. And they like they like that action. And there were some big boys in that league at that time, too. So, you know, you protected the turf. And, you know, that was one step away from from the National Hockey League. Now, that was an expansion team in Syracuse. You know, they were now the BLUEJACKETS affiliate instead of the Vancouver Canucks at the time.

So, yeah, we we wanted to prove every night that we were a tough team to play against. Plus Syracuse, man, that rink is intimidating. The boards rattle the stages right at the end.

The fans are right on the memorial, the war memorial, just like myself.

I remember seeing the name. I was like, wait, it's actually called the War Memorial. This is Slapshot.

Is this a great barn? And we knew we tried to keep it intimidating and our coach loved it. Gary Agnew loved to have us out there running around, you know, trying to get in the face of everyone else.

So that's why we that's why we had such an intimidating team.

Here's where things got a little bit interesting in that article. They mentioned there was like an off fight between Christoph Oliva and Lyle over the line. And that kind of was the start of the fact that you were going to eventually end up coming up. It didn't mention why they were fighting. They're end fighting twice off the ice in the same day. What was what was the conflict between Lyle Oldroyd and Christoph Oliva?

I have no idea. You know, I don't know what happened there, but I know there was you know, it was it spilled it went from the shower out to the parking lot.

I finally did talk to Old Line about it or any of that stuff, but you never you think that stuff would come out at some point. But, you know, we'd heard rumors that it was, you know, girlfriends and stuff, but we don't know. I didn't know what happened. So I was just in Syracuse waiting to see if I was going to get the call.

When do you like not when. Like, what was the memory and what do you think back when you got the call?

I was just in Syracuse fighting everybody. And, you know, again, Kerry Agnew said to me, he goes, you know, you're going to be going up.

And I'm like, yeah, right. You know, that's not happening. And he's like, yeah, you're going up and be ready. Be ready. And so, you know, he worked with me on my skating and all that stuff. So I didn't believe it until I was actually on the plane. I just remember getting in the nationwide arena. We were playing the Pittsburgh Penguins. Merrill of me was on the bench and I was there to fight Olawale and we had nineteen thousand fans in the building.

And I remember being a warm up and just thinking I was waiting for someone to come over and tap me on the shoulder and be like, Mr. Chelly, you're in the wrong place. Get out of here. You know what I mean? Get off the ice. But no, it was just one of those moments that, you know, you felt like it wasn't supposed to happen. And the next thing I was in a fight that I mean, I could have fought anyone that night with the energy I had.

It was amazing.

Well, you end up having to fight Steve McKenna first. You thought about. Oh, yeah. You getting to scraps the first period. I don't even get a minute of ice time.

I had eight seconds of ice time to fight. Both started off the year.

We got eight seconds. So you're like, hey man, can we stayed around for a couple seconds for ourselves?

No, but I wanted to get it out of the way. So it was like dropped the puck. I don't know how you got four seconds in of ice time after the puck dropped. But anyways, McKenna grabbed me first. That wasn't on the script. I mean, I was like, whoa. And he's a big guy. So I was like, this isn't going to end well and this isn't supposed to happen. So but I survived that one.

And then when all I was out there again, Dave King put me out and I don't know how the clock ticked four seconds from I mean, the pocket, the ice or gloves hit the ice and we were dancing.

I also read in that article before the game, you're trying to get in touch with your parents who had won a free trip to Vegas and back then no cell phones or nothing. So they were completely unaware that you were even going to start in your first NHL game?

No, they were they were out of touch. They had never really left town. And here they were like two kids in Vegas. And I'm ready to make my NHL debut. And I was like, so frustrated. I'm like, how can this be happening? You know what I mean? But you're right. I mean, I there's no way to get a hold of them. You call the hotel, they're like, oh, we don't know who they are, where they are.

So my my dad's comment after I was like, damn well, you guys missed it. And he goes, yeah, we saw the highlights. I was like, well, it would have been great if you would have saw it. And he goes, well, you'll just have to play another one.

I'm like, but unfortunately it didn't. And then, you know, it's funny that I got sent down right away.

And a big part of that, too, is because, you know, they sacrificed so much for you growing up. And that was also mentioned in the article as well, just like talk about like the influence that they have. On your career, yeah, well, you know, it's nice because, you know, I mean, we all kind of everyone that that makes it to the top level.

You know, you think your parents and your family and for me, they you know, they sacrifice for themselves and for us all the time to to just try to survive. We lived all over Canada, but there was always great. So their attitude is great. The way they raised us was great and how they always gave us an opportunity, especially me, to play hockey. I mean, I just played hockey for fun. And, you know, it's so rewarding to be able to play your first game, score, your first goal, you know, meet idols or talk about teammates and be able to pick up the phone and shared with them, you know, a lot of moments, I think, in our lives.

You know, you almost think I wish my buddies and my parents could be here. And, you know, I was glad I got to play so long because I got to share some a lot of the moments with them through through just appreciating what they did for me, spending the summers with them, too.

It's like you get to tell these people's stories and it's like they're they're just NHL fans at heart. And then you're their family and best friends. It's it's such a cool thing to think about. But when you got to Columbus that year, you get called up. I mean, that's the first year the bluejackets. That's right.

When the city gets a team and there were some tough years, but at the beginning, I mean, they had a pretty loud and proud fan base right off the bat, right?

Oh, yeah, they were. So this town is a major sports town, Ohio State's one hundred and five thousand fans inside. You know, winning is everything. I mean, they lose. This town shuts down, but they understand their sport. So this is their team. So they're all in. And, you know, the fighting, the goals, the excitement of having Pittsburgh. Detroit was a big rival, of course, because Ohio State, Michigan, the energy was there.

The passion was there.

So, you know, a lot of times you see that the cheering would be off the charts and you'd be wondering what's happening. It could be just simply, you know, a guy falls down for the other team and they're just all over it. So they're a raucous crowd right away here.

Jodie, you mentioned Lyle Odlin, we had him on the show, just an unreal story, what he's gone through, what he came back from, but we've talked to other guys to just an absolute doozy.

Beauty of a teammate right there. Oh, I mean, so the old school, Montreal Canadiens to me are the I mean, they they're stories they have about after practice being together, you know, whatever whatever they did in Montreal, they did it all year.

Yeah. And they're all legends in that department. And to me, Lilo below the line, he's my first captain. I get to Columbus. He could have told me. I mean, he could have said, we're going to go do whatever. I mean, I would have been like, OK, here we go. You know, your Lillo line and let's go.

We used to go after practice and we would sit around and have bud lights and he would tell stories and we would eat chicken wings. And I would ask I would ask him a thousand questions and he would do it right until he be done in a classic. Odey Every time he's done each stand, stand up and be like, all right, I got to go home. And he would leave and he'd be the first guy at the rink the next day, showered, chewin, and he'd walk right by with a coffee like he didn't see it for a week, really, like, good morning.

And he walk right by like nothing happened.

I'm like, that is awesome. That's just old school business right there. Have fun but show up for business. And that's what I loved about a great guy team first guy and a real throwback where there's some off ice games.

You guys, we play with a pool with a darts. What was the thing you guys were doing when you're you know what we used?

We used to play Golden Tee. He used to play Golden Tee all afternoon. I mean, the hours, a golden tee. And he thought he was pretty good at it.

I was smashed me. He smashed it in that game. Yes. He's like, want to go. Can't I'd never played like OK, they're collecting my signing bonus. Yeah. There's, there goes your bonus just like Jodis. Yeah. I was quick to add I want to bring up another date January 10th.

Twenty two. You thought Bob Probert once each period that game, what was the lead up to that. What was your mindset going through the game. Take us through that adventure.

Well, that was tell you what, that was the moment where I was probably most scared of my career because Bob Probert was the guy and, you know, he was later in his career. But I got put on the ice with him. I remember the game was on in Canada, coast to coast, on tsin, on the network. And I knew the boys are going to be watching back home. And I was standing next to Bob Probert in a TV time out.

And I remember clearly thinking, wait till next shift, ask him. Right. Because you can always think, oh, I'll do it later. I'll do it later. You'll understand that. But and then so I was content with that. And then I heard myself say, do you want to go? And I was like, no, I was just saying I was struggling with it, you know what I mean? So he heard me ask him, do you want to go?

He looks at me with this. He's got these beady black eyes. God bless us, God rest his soul. I mean, he's passed along and but he looked through me and said, I don't care.

And I was like, OK, I'm done. First of all, I was hoping he was going to say, no, I'm not going to fight you, kid. But he's like, I don't care. I was like, oh, my goodness, this is really going to happen. So this is the first fight we're in Chicago. You know, not a lot of fans are at the time. And they still beat the drum, though every time he threw a punch, they'd beat the drum.

And I knew that. I was like, I just want to hear that drum too many times. And I don't want the lights to go out, you know, get chayote. So we fight. I'm over. I'm fighting scared. And any time I lost a fight or I ended up not feeling good about it on the way to the box, I said to the guy that I'd fought, I said and I said to Robert, We're going again.

We're going again. We're going again. We've got to do that again. And I said it that a fifty times. I said to him why we were in the penalty box. He didn't look at me once. But second period comes and I'm on the ice and we collide and I look and he's got his gloves off and he's ready to go. We go again. But this time I grab him really good and actually cut him. So, you know, this is the second period.

So now I fought Robert twice. I remember going back to the locker room and the two locker room attendants are still there in Chicago to this day. And every time I see them, we have a chuckle because I walked in and they were like. You just beat up Bob, Robert, and I'm like, yeah, this isn't good at this. We got to play him again, I got to play. There's still a period to go back out there.

So they're like, do you want a Gatorade, a towel? I'm like, no, I don't want anything.

I just want to sit here till the guys come in. I remember Tyler Wright and the guys are like, you just beat up.

I'm like, let's not talk about this, because I heard if he ever loses a fight or gets cut, he will get you back the next day. The next minute. The next month. It doesn't matter. He'll get you. So I got to get ready for the third period and I'm on the bench and Dave King finally throws me out and it's out there. It's it's a face off again. And I get over the boards and king or goes, get out there, Tony, but don't fight them.

And so I stop and I look back at the bench. I'm like, King, I got to fight them. He goes, well, don't take an extra two minutes. I'm like, what does that mean? OK, so I go over. Bob Probert cannot wait to get at me. His winger sees me hop on the ice. The right winger, he automatically just looks he sees me skates across. Proby comes over and then we go again.

And yeah, I survived it. I was happy about that. But the worst part of the story is we had to play him again two nights later in Columbus. So I had to fight him again in the first period of that game in Columbus. But I survived it. It was it was probably the moment without Twitter and everything else it was on and it kind of gave me a name. So I thank him for that. But it was the longest night of my life.

What an unbelievable story. That's phenomenal. Phenomenal.

Something that was it was also nobody even knows what to ask you now. I just know I'm just I was I was actually thinking he was just so feared by everyone.

It was like he had that presence and then like what he did, like hockey wise Jews and all star.

It was just like I feel like every guy's first chance to fight them is memorable.

And then you have that story and just like that on steroids.

But he didn't have to fight me to it. He could have said, yeah, you know, I don't care. I said, buzz off. And I would have said, thank you.

Thank you very much. That's a Hall of Fame reply. I don't care. Yeah. Oh, he was stoic. What?

Let's talk about Dave King a little bit. And Doug McClain as well was a he was a big fan of you. He kind of gave you that first opportunity just being involved with that organization. I know that they they stress like you going down and putting that work on working on your skating and your skills. And, you know, there was a lot of work to put in. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. Those guys, man, you know, I was lucky like those guys, they understood that I was a player that could be here at some point. They believed in me probably more than I believed in myself at times. But I think when you're in the minors, sometimes, you know, you hear people or you see people get disappointed. Oh, I was supposed to go up. You know, you see those guys are like, oh, he got the call.

My agent told me I was going. The GM said this. I never got caught up in that. And maybe they appreciate that. But were I had some good people in my corner and you had Doug McClain was definitely one of them. Care was awesome because he used to take me after practice. Picture this. I just get called up. So, you know, practices ended and the head coach now is called me over and we're doing quick feet, crossover drills and stick handling drills side to side.

And I'm looking around. I just want to fit in with the veterans. You know, I got they got Bron Tugg, not Lyle, old line, Jeff Sanders. And they're all kind of looking over like, what is this hockey school that's going on right here in front of us? And but he put in the time with me and I would have done it all night, you know what I mean? But that's the kind of people and teacher that he was for me.

I want to bring up Gerard Golon, that was his first coaching gig ever, Colombus, he was known as a player's coach and he was getting pretty good results out of the team that was there wasn't very deep then then said he got kind of canned out of nowhere and then they brought Hitchcock right home. Did they basically fire going out just to bring in Hitchcock thinking it was an upgrade?

Well, you know, there was a lot going on in the organization at that time. You know, they had some good players here that we just couldn't get going. You know, it was past the expansion time. It was around 2007. You know, you had some good leadership, some good players. You want to reward those guys. And we just couldn't get going. And if to to this day, I still say if we could have won some games with Gerard Galon, there's no nicer person, there's no better coach.

There's no guy who cares more about every single individual. And we dropped the ball there and they had to go a different route. And a different route is more of a guy like Hitchcock who's, you know, very intelligent coach, but he's very demanding. He's very on you every single shift, whereas Jarah would let you work through it, understanding it as a player.

And I think that's just what you see with organizations. You know, you get the guy with the whip and then the next thing you'll get a players coach, they call it. So that was happening in Columbus. That's why that happened. When Nash came in, I mean, it was my draft. I think he had 40, 50 points his rookie year, like it had to be a feeling of like, oh my God, now we're now we're beginning.

You know, I think Clezio was a high pick prior to that. But all right. We're going to go here. And I know the the gold. Who did they pick in 2001?

Was it LeClaire? Yes.

Yes. And he kind of never really panned out. And then it was like, I know that that that definitely hurt them trying to build this nucleus.

But Nash, what a game breaker he was right off the bat.

Yeah, he was. He was special. Big guy, great hands. You know, the star, the first pick, it kind of kicked us in to another level, a higher gear, you know what I mean? You know, remember, Minnesota and us came in at the same time and two years before that, Nashville came in. So there was a lot of players that were were passed around the league for those expansion drafts. And then, you know, Nash was that player that.

Yeah, he was a guy that, you know, the all star. He scored forty two, I think his second or third year. I mean, he was a guy that share the rocket Richard Trophy with I think it was Iginla that year. Yeah.

He helped us a little bit but it still took time. I mean this organization now finally with Tortes and with the players that they've got here, they're finally getting going. But, you know, at those times, it just couldn't piece it together. They couldn't put the pieces around Nash that would help.

The last guy I was going to ask you about before we move on to San Jose was Sergei Federoff. Oh, awesome. That's a you know, that guy comes into the room. You're like, this guy is one of the best Russians of all time. And what was he like off the ice?

He was awesome. He was he was so just in his own little world, you know, like super major superstar. I remember being in Vancouver and we were out to lunch, having lunch together. We were eating. We were out for sushi. And there was a bunch of people that were like knew who he was. But it's almost like he didn't know how famous he was. It was like he was like, why are all these people can you believe all these people are trying to get pictures of us?

And I'm like us trying to get pictures of us trying to get pictures of you. Sergei what you think so? I'm like, yes, they're trying to get pictures of you. I'll just sit here in the background. And he was like it was almost like he didn't understand that that was happening at the time. He was such a great guy, humble person, a guy that, you know, always had was fidgeting with something on the ice, like trying to improve his game.

But off the ice, he was fun, really, into different things like diet. He would criticize my diet. I'm like Sergei just eating, you know, I'm just eating chicken now that chicken is cooked. OK, teach me, man.

But he's a real great guy. Yeah, like you mentioned, you moved on to San Jose after you got traded in January of 08. Now, Joe time the guy's been around forever, but I feel like we're finding more and more stories each year.

Just how much of a character he is. You were there for three years, but what was that like? I got to tell you, man, I'm so excited for the Toronto Maple Leafs because I see the energy from the young guys and I understand it. I mean, we used to go to the rink early and we would leave late just because the energy and the this is practice practice arena because of that guy, the way he approached life, the way he approaches the game, the way he's just a kid, you know what I mean?

It's amazing. One of the greatest stories is so for me is so we're in San Jose and it's the father's trip. OK, so my dad gets the year.

Joe thought, you know, trips are great. All the dads there, it's loose. And so my dad's talking to Joe and I'm thinking, oh, what's my dad talking to Joe about? So I get over there and they're like, my dad's finished saying, now, when you guys get to Edmonton because my parents live in Edmonton. Now, when you guys come to Abbott and Joe, we're going to knock the snow off the barbecue and we'll have you out for dinner, you know, and I'm thinking and Joe's like, oh, yeah, yeah, we'll be there.

We'll be there. We'll have the whole team out.

And I'm like, oh, don't even start. Because, you know, my dad will be ready. My parents will be ready.

So about six weeks later, we're in. We're in. We're getting ready for the Edmonton trip. OK, but about a month before that, my mom starts calling. She's like now, Joe Thornton said that you guys are going to come out for dinner. I said, Mom, listen, you guys are 30 minutes from the hotel. We're not going to we're not going to probably come to dinner. I don't want you guys to get excited and plan it and then not I don't know, no one's going to come.

But, you know, just just plan on me and a couple of guys come. Just three of us will be there. So, you know, I'm not asking Joe on on the trip at all. I'm not saying, hey, we're going to my dad's we're we're going to go to my parents for dinner. You said it. You know, I'm just kind of wait and see what's happening. So even the day before, I didn't say a word my parents are wondering.

So now it's a day off and we land in Edmonton. We drive, what is it? Forty five minutes from the airport to downtown to the hotel. Just as the bus pulls in, Joe looks at me and goes, Hey, Joe, are we going to need an Doreen's for dinner? And I'm like, so I stand up. I'm like, Yeah, OK. Anybody that wants to come to my mom and dad's for dinner, we're having steak.

We're going to leave in a half hour. So I go up and get changed. I call my dad. I'm like, listen, you might want to get my brother Luke to bring his truck down because I think there might be two carloads of guys, but I don't know what's going to happen. He's like all but ready. We've got the beer in the snowbank, the barbecue knocked off and the stakes are ready. I said, OK, so I can get down in the lobby.

And there's a group of eight guys, I think seven or eight guys ready to go. So I look at the group and I and I, well, I'm the first one to walk out the door to see my dad's face. Right. But the group is. So it's Joe Thornton, Rob Blake, Jeremy Rolnik, Claude Lemieux and Ryan Clowe and Doug Murray. Who am I missing? Someone else in there. So this is the legends that are walking up.

My my dad is like, you know, it's jaws dropping. So we go out. We had dinner, they tell stories, they sit around like their buddies. You know, Joe's there in the middle of everything. We're watching hockey eating steaks. Thirty minute drive out, 30 minute back. And it was one of the greatest nights for my family to have them out there. It was awesome. But it was all Joe. I mean, he's that type of guy.

We've had a lot of stories that just that like sums it all up, though, when everyone says teammate and the person that's great.

He's a good dude. What is I'd like to take I'd like to get your point of view on what you remember about in 09. We played I was in Anaheim. We played you guys in San Jose. You guys won the Presidents Trophy that year and we beat you in the first round. Yeah. And it was a huge upset. And we had Pronger Niedermeier playing like forty minutes each.

But do you remember the game? I think it was game three where Thornton gets that went right off the opening draw. Yes. Did you know that was coming. Joe said anything.

It was that a complete OK so we knew that was coming and I think Pepe Clode Lemieux had had gotten his ear about it because I don't know if Clode had did that, done that, or someone had done that in Jersey at one point. But remember, it had come in from the China sharks. He started over in China with the sharks and ended up in the San Jose Sharks. And he brought all that experience. And I think that was one of the things was to kind of help with those situations.

But I think Joel was just trying to get going, get something. Get some momentum to start, but that was that was something that was talked about, we were ready to watch that one.

I remember I remember thinking like, oh, this is going to be all over. Like it's and ESPN won't even cover this. Two superstars going toe to toe.

Yeah, that was that was right at the opening draw. Yeah, I remember that. That was you think a lot of it didn't work. Do you think a lot of it had to do with maybe the criticism at the time because they had had these good teams for a long time and they were never even able to get out of the first round?

I think maybe it's maybe it was a good thing. Yeah, but yeah, for the longest time, I think it was the pressure we could feel.

I think, you know, something had to happen. And we were playing kind of on the outside getting dominated president's trophy winners. You know what's happening here in the first round? No question. It was something to show a little more desperation.

I think I would say probably, you know, when I was playing with the coyotes, I had no idea how loud that arena was. Probably one of the more underrated fan bases, at least during that time in the entire National Hockey League.

I think it is. And I didn't know what it was going to be like once I got there. But there's nothing like the playoff atmosphere in that building because it is a little smaller, it is a little louder, and it feels like the fans are on top of you a little bit more and their fans are passionate. You come out of that shark, that shark head, and they all got the white pompoms gone. And it's it's electric. It's you're right.

It is louder than you would think. Jodi, excuse me, then you end up with the Rangers, there was a real cup of coffee there, but definitely some characters in your time there. Obviously you played for toits Sean Avery there. Chris Drewry, what was your experience like? That must be awesome. Just to play on Broadway in New York is such a history behind it.

I was phenomenal and it was it was amazing.

And, you know, our the greatest part about New York for me was the mindset that I had because I thought my career is going to be over, you know what I mean? I got traded from San Jose. I didn't I didn't know where I was going to end up. I knew I was there on the deadline. And I just went to New York as a ranger. You know, my son was born in San Jose. There was a big move for me and my wife to move to New York.

But we said to each other, like, let's just go enjoy it. That's exactly what we did. She was pregnant at the time. My son was sleeping in the closet in a hotel. You know, the whole crib was set up in the closet. But I walked. I mean, it was the most amazing thing because, you know, Madison Square Garden down there on 34th and to get there from we were on the south of central south part of Central Park, you know, you go through all the traffic and hustle and bustle and you get to the garden and then there's a guy there with the rope, with the kind of like the velvet rope, and he recognizes you.

And he's like, Oh, Mr. Shelly, come on in. And I'm like, that is the coolest thing I've ever seen. And then you're in Madison Square Garden and you're having practice days. You're having lunch. I remember one that one day in the practice facility, Mark Messier was in the the he was in the lunchroom. You know, he share the lunchroom with the Knicks. And, you know, there was already eight guys in the lunchroom, but there was a table for four with eight guys around it and no one was sitting with MEST.

So I was like, you know, I was kind of like, screw this. I'm going to sit with Mark. This is a chance. See, you know what I mean?

So I sit down and I'm like, hey, anybody sitting here? He goes, No, sit down. I'd love for you to join me. So I'm sitting there having lunch with Mark Messier, I think. And, you know, this is this is unbelievable. So, Glenn, say there are all those people are there. You're in New York City. But I think my mindset, my attitude was the greatest thing because the Ranger Blue, Madison Square Garden, the energy there and how I always wonder what it was like after a game, you know, like everyone just kind of disappears into the night.

You don't see a teammate for, like, the whole day, the whole you know, you do whatever you want. And I thought that was a really cool part of that city, too.

That was your first experience with John Tortorella? Yeah, it was. Yeah.

I mean, I imagine a guy like you, he's going to really respect and not going to give you too much shit when you're doing what you're doing for the team.

But are your memorable battles with Gaborik and other guys?

Well, it was interesting because, you know, so late in the year and those guys that had him for so long that I didn't really get into that stuff. I kind of watched from afar. Yeah, I remember being asked to go over the boards and Gaborik sitting on the bench and I was like, oh, OK, Gaborik, this is, you know, but that's I felt bad for a second. But that's how you know, that's how towards coached and that's what that's what was happening.

So for me, you know, I was playing like fourteen minutes a night. I was getting great situations. But to see Gaborik sit there, it was kind of like, OK, this is how it works. But, you know, they already had the history there. Things like that surprised me. But, you know, Wade read the experience with Wade Read and how he was trying so hard and the fans were on top of them. The experience with that, that was my first experience with the real the original six team and the fans being that ruthless on the player.

They were upset with him. And I had a lot of long talks with readin about, you know, just what was going through and what it was like. And there was some interesting dynamics on that team for sure. Brandon Prust, Brian Boyle, some great, great people there, too. So it was it was overall good experience.

You mentioned the star factor of going out with Federov. I could imagine if you went out with Henrik Lundquist would be very similar to NYC.

Well, yeah. And there was a couple of times where we went to a couple of clubs and, you know, him and Sean Avery, they're so well known. They know the city so well that, you know, it was seamless getting into anywhere. And I always was curious what it was like. But, you know, we go to like one OK, or a place like that. And, you know, everything was set up and everything was they could feel that we were way cooler with those guys around because they were they were so well known.

And we were just we were still trying to be know.

Were you shocked at the antics that Avery brought to hockey? Had to been the first time you'd ever seen it to that extent?

Well, I'd played against them. So, you know, I wasn't I was I had heard some of the things he said. But to be on the bench with them and hear what he would say to some people, I was shocked. I mean, there was a couple of things he said where I had to move down to get a couple people away from him, just be like, oh, my goodness. I mean, he just melted guys.

It just melted them. And it was just it was ruthless, man. It was it was some of it was hard to hear. Jordy only had twenty one games with the Rangers.

But you must have done something right, because July 1st first. Free agency fliers come along, give you a deal, and I mean, that just seemed like a perfect spot for you, a tough guy. Philadelphia's history like a match made in heaven.

No, I'll tell you, IRA, I had a good showing against the fliers at the end of that season. It was that home and home sequence. And my buddy Bush was in that. And I had a couple of goals on him and we almost made the playoffs. I was twenty ten when they went all the way to the cup, you know, it was us or them came down to a shootout. That's right. Yeah. It was only open in that got stolen by Brian Bouchet on that last shot that sent us back home on the train.

The season was over and they were off to the to play end up playing Chicago in the finals there when Kane scored that goal. So, yeah, Philly was awesome. I mean, you guys know what it's like to play against the Philadelphia fliers, wit and biz. And it's not easy, man, but when you're on the inside, it's it's really passionate and fun place to be. We lived in the practice rinks over in New Jersey. Me and my family lived in New Jersey.

Some of the best times we had were away from Columbus, were in that little town of Haddonfield, New Jersey. It's it was a great setup, a lot different than I thought. But but the fans are so passionate. They care so much, they'll they'll be in your face. But you can really feel the the love they have for it. And it was a good fit for me.

Did you have a ticket punched to Dry Island while you were there? Did you have not to go?

I was on the island for about a week and nothing more. I remember my name off the board as I get this.

How bizarre was that when I heard that Carter and Richards, they hadn't even been given the heads up that this was coming coming at them?

I don't know. I didn't know the back story of it. Again, I was pretty naive with a lot of these things that were going on behind the scenes. I look back and I think, well, how was I not more aware of what was going on? But, you know, this was an established team when I got there that had just gone to the finals. So and here I come in. I'm like, oh, this that was that was a good year.

I hope we can do the same or better. So I'm just kind of like, you know, just trying to fit in and help where I can. I didn't get involved with that, didn't know that they were they weren't aware of it. But I remember when the whole thing came up and guys signed up and guys didn't. And I was like, what? What do you mean dry? I'll explain this to me.

Like, could you imagine all over the line here in Dry Island, you would have fucking walked out of the room. It might have sunk it.

Actually, I want to ask, how was your experience playing for LaViolette? Dry eye on the side. He is what you call him, a players coach, an old school coach.

He seems like sort of a blend, I would think. I don't know, old school. I think he's he's a motivator. You know, he's a he's a guy that he's a guy that he did a great job pumping us up.

He had a lot of creative things away, like Dry Island and motivational videos and just thoughts. And, you know, the the way that he would get the team fired up just before they went on the ice, he was really good at, you know, my role with him. And he just didn't I mean, that's not part of his game. So it was a struggle for me to get in the lineup on a more regular basis. But he was good to me.

He was fair to me, you know what I mean? Like, they wasn't like it was unfair. But I would call maybe maybe the mix is a good call. The players coach and a little bit of an old school, maybe a little bit there. I would agree with that.

Very aware. Your first year in the NHL, one game, your last year, one game. How did it how did it all come to an end?

You know, that's a really that's a great question, because it was so weird because I had a hip problem, OK? So I had to have hip surgery. But what I was going to be after the season. So I had played one game that season and LaViolette wanted to address me in Toronto and they had Colton there and Frazier McLaren ready for me.

I think it might even be on a Saturday night. So I hadn't played in a while, you know what I mean? I'm an old I was thirty seven years old, two kids and a wife at home. And I'm and this was when I knew I was done because pre game Skat in the morning, LaViolette comes up to me, goes, you ready to go tonight. I'm like, oh yeah. Always had that answer right. Always he goes, All right, you're in.

And I'm like at the minute he told me that I had a whole I had this empty feeling in my stomach. I went back to the hotel and I could always nap. I could always take a nap. I had no problem sleep in the afternoon. I couldn't nap. So I called the trainer, Jim McCrossin, and I explained to him, I said, you know, my hip just doesn't feel. And he's like, OK, all right, I'll tell the coach.

So I got back to he didn't call me back. I got back to the rink at five o'clock for seven o'clock game and ah, four thirty for seven o'clock game. And my name was not on the board, so I went to Jimmy. The trainer might not and he goes, No, no, we took you out. You take care of your hip. The whole thing was, you know, they knew and I had always said the.

Myself, if I didn't have the fire, I would not go out and fight, so I was proud of at the moment I was heartbroken, but when he told me I was not in the lineup, I was so relieved. I mean, I'd never it was like a thousand pound elephant right off my shoulders. And I just kind of I was like, this is it, man, this is it. And I remember Scott Hartnell came over and he talked to me and I told him I was almost in tears.

And Paul Holmgren, who's who's one of the classiest people ever to be involved with hockey, we had a nice moment where he came over and he said he looked me in the eye and he said, you did the right thing there. You did the right thing there. And I was like, man, I don't even I didn't want him to know that I knew what he was talking about. But it was just like a moment of respect that only, you know, you got to be there and you got to be in that moment and do what we do to understand what it was like.

And it was really it was a moment I was I was so thrilled that it was over. But I was it was a I was glad that I knew it from a guy, too, who played the game as hard as anyone in home.

And it was like it was such a, like, fraternity type thing, you know what I mean? He knows what you've been through. That's that's so true.

And when when the relief kicks in, you're like, oh, my God, I just I can't do it anymore. Like, that's a relief. I don't have it.

But crazy story for you to just. Figure it out that quickly, you know, it's weird, it's like you can't take a nap that day and all of a sudden that's it. Well, I think it must have been building up, you know what I mean? It must have been like the more that I was I remember being at home and I you know, I would go healthy, scratch for like 12 games in a row my last year and I would still go upstairs, my wife with two young kids.

And I would be like, well, it's time for me to go take my pregame nap knowing I wasn't playing. And she was like, OK. And then finally she's like, I'm going up. One day she's like, Really? You're going to go take a nap? And I was like, I guess not. I guess it's over. So it was kind of coming along.

You can get away with it now. Yeah. You said you said like that weight off your shoulders. How long before that turns to. Well, what am I going to do next?

Yeah, that was so I was still inside the ropes, you know, that latter part of the year knowing I was going to be done. I knew I had to have hip surgery, so I got that taken care of. I kind of knew I was done, but yeah. Then then that's when the scary feeling comes. Now what? You know, my wife's from Columbus area, so I knew I'd be back here when I got traded from the bluejackets in 08.

They very kind gesture and saying make sure when you're done with all this circle back. But, you know, you're wondering, is that still the phone call is still available and then one point fifteen guys from Columbus since then, why do they still want me to Boler?

So I'm, I'm like, you know, so I get back there and then do they really want me. So yeah, it was they offered me a radio job and I was going to actually go. Sergei Federoff, who you mentioned earlier, was the president in Moscow there for CSK or whatever, and he had an offer on the table. And I was kind of thinking about going. But, you know, and then I was thinking, what if this this media availability with the bluejackets isn't there in a year and I've gone to Russia, you know, what am I doing?

So it was right away because I was wondering what it was going to be like to answer your question, but it kind of fell into place easily. Jodi, I mean, I think you're a natural. You're one of the better commentators out there. What I wanted to ask NHL deal at NBC expires this year. The speculation they're going to have ESPN and NBC involved going forward.

Is it possible we'll see you maybe on a national platform? Are you content in Columbus? Well, you know what?

I was content earlier with just being in Columbus. But, you know, I think there's a lot of people that do both. I see Keith Jones doing both. So I'm going to try to take a run at it. I see guys like wet and busy, these guys and you guys, you guys are tearing it up. So, you know, why would you be content? I think, you know, especially with a new new horizon coming in, I don't want to give up the Blue Jackets thing.

I love this organization. I love being a part of it. But I think it's worth taking a run at.

That's a great point. Tabloidy Jodi, adapt or die, buddy.

Exactly. I mean, you guys are a great example. You're doing the pink Whitney and the media. I mean, it's like you guys are blazing the trail here, especially for hockey. Especially on the numbers, too, I'm too afraid of the networks, because every time I'm on live air, I'm like, oh no, what am I going to say to get fired here? You have that feeling in your stomach of like, oh, my.

About to drop an F bomb or say something stupid.

Yeah, I think you have to I think you have to have that. You have to be a little nervous every time you're around a mic or else.

I mean, you see what's happening to people. You got it. It's yeah. Great to be sharp Frosti.

You've got to be from like this hot mic. Used to be used to be hot Mike. You'd be the guy miked up at practice or Game Boys. I got a mic on my it caught my eye and now it's like everywhere, everything we do, we going to be a little scared.

Did you guys ever do that? HBO, did you ever have.

Oh, yeah. I remember you were on the one year, the Winter Classic lead up. I wish I had. They did a great job with that.

Oh, it's amazing the work they put in. And even funnier is you'd be in practice. You get to be a part of the background and you look over on the glass. You after having a conversation with two or three guys of practice and two or three of them with the boom mic and the cameras, they'd be laughing, you know, just die and laugh. And because and you forget they're listening to your conversation. But they were they're great.

I just got like I'd like to see some of those like like outtake tapes in the vault of the HBO 24/7, HBO after hours.

Yeah. A lot gets left on the cutting room floor. I'm sure I had one more fly, obviously, when it came about in play. There's a lot more fighting, a lot more physicality.

You know, it's obviously toned down a bit. But you think the game is at a perfect balance of, like, grit and finesse right now. If guys want to fight, they can. But the talents too good to not have it fully, fully flowered, I guess.

No, I you know, I always think there's more more room for emotion, you know what I mean? I look at the the battle of Elberta seven one and nothing going on and nothing really happening.

I just think that I just think that's still the mindset of a certain mentality of representing your town, your province, your state, whatever it is, your fan base, especially now when the fans aren't there. I know it's hard, but I love the emotional part of the game. You know, I love the fact that especially that, you know, you can settle the score. I'd like to see a little more of it. I don't mean in a bad way.

I would just like to see a little more fight from some teams, a little more in your face. But I don't know if it's a perfect balance. I think it's gone a little far one way. But in saying that, I know the optics are bad when there's always fights and big fights. But I would I would like to see just a little bit more, to tell you the truth, little more fire in this game.

Perfect. You guys, I don't even I don't even know what else to ask you, Jody. This has been fucking on. You guys are awesome. Is that is there is there one or one or maybe even a few stories that you were like, oh, man, I got to tell this one, because, you know, I'm sure you have a lot that are in the vault, but anyone you can share that we didn't bring up, I you know what, I that's always a tough question.

I ask it sometimes and I'm like, I feel like a dog.

I think it's a great it's a great question, you know. And I think getting prepared for you guys, I thought of a few things. I really wanted to tell that story of having those guys out to my house because, I mean, it was a major namedropping session there with good guys, but it was such a reward for my.

Was Chechu there or Marleau or those one of the other names for all of us. You forgot a few, but don't worry about it. Kind of like lightning in a bottle, too.

He was always that long. It was Blake, Rob Blake, Jeremy Rolnik, the Mujo Thornton. So yeah, that's what it was. And then Duggie, Murray, Brian Clone myself. That's that's the group that came these I mean, you know. Yeah. It was nice to have Jay are hanging out on the couch just telling stories. You know, there was that was a story I wanted to tell.

Are there any guys that you fought in the past you still sour about and wouldn't turn down a Doce dough today with.

No, you know, I you know, there's no real guys. I left it out there, you know what I mean? I just kind of I think we're all so relieved that when the fight was over, they were just got it done out of the way.

But no, there's no no animosity. I'm glad I got to fight because he was so polite.

You know, the way you gave you gave me my start, buddy. After that one. I got I got to hang around Arizona for a little bit, so. Jody. Yeah, but I thank you so much for for for everything for coming on. I know our fans are going to love this. And congratulations on a wonderful career. And even better or at least a comparable post career. You're buzzing right now, buddy. Well, thanks, man.

I appreciate you guys having me on. You guys are killing it. And this has been my pleasure. You guys are great.

I think more games than me and you combined this fucking guy. Great. Great job. Thanks for coming on and we appreciate it.

Have a great one, Jody. It's just a great guy, great stories. One of the probably one of the most well-liked guys in the league over the last several years, so big thanks to him for coming on once again, prober for periods and are all in so much insane story.

Man like Hubo probably I don't care like that at all times. Looking the fight shit.

While you guys have heard us talk about woop, it truly is our favorite fitness wearable. It's the fitness tracker that provides 24/7 personalized sleep training and recovery insights to help you unlock your potential each day.

It measures measures how well you slept, how recovered you are, and how much stress you put on your body from both your workouts and just going about your everyday life whoopers one by some of your favorite athletes in the NHL and on the PGA Tour.

But it's not Metford, just the professional athletes who can help anyone improve their performance by providing personalized, actionable data to help you make smart decisions, whether you're looking to sleep a little better at training for an event or just looking to build healthy habits in twenty twenty one, Hope can help you reach your goals of a healthier life.

The triplets boys have all been there for a while now and we've already turned our sleep in recovery into a competition. I'm kicking ass in the sleep pod. Once you're on Woop, you can create a team with your buddies and make sure to chip whoever's sitting around and falling behind whoopers. Help me get smarter about the way I train and has made me much more aware of my body, sleep and recovery. And right now, whoopers offering 50 percent off.

When you use the code, checklists at checkout. That's see, let's so go to Woop dotcom. That's W.H or p dot com to join.

Now, sleep better, recover faster and train smarter this year and beyond with boop.

He tracks his his feet miles when he's doing fucking circles on the live stream with his group.

Their feet. Yeah. The activeness of the feed. It's just like, they're like hey it's not supposed to be on your toe, it's your forearm or your wrist. But woop is phenomenal.

So check it out now and aaargh! We were doing we're throwing it to the Sheli interview and RJ gets a text from your it was your mom texted. Yes, yes.

About you're about the feet. Thing is, are you concerned at all about which shirt or is it just your feet? No, I don't even think it was the Funen mentioned the she said send them a new shirt.

Be a gentleman. Hi, Bryce. Are all the tweets all OK? A little over exaggerate I think. Check in with me. OK, it's like I'm like my taping now. My mom. Fine. It was a sponsored live watch for a beer company that sends us beer to watch the game. Please ignore Internet comments like she probably didn't because people are saying had coke feet last night and the coke feet was the fight against Coke.

I've never seen Coke feet and I don't usually response aromas, but can we just say how much food I ordered out? There was no there was no. Oh, is that a sign that you haven't been doing? Wolf, that's what I read on the Internet.

I think those are just completely buzzed up. But the fidgety this and the feet and then the the mom, it's. How old are you? Forty six. I wish for forty eight minutes. Oh my God. What do I really fucked up what I ordered for hours with you. Oh you want to do.

He's going to put those sandals on and he's going to dance those coke feet up a storm out at some club Vegas thanks to Vegas.

I love it for my for my fiftieth. When it happens, let's get partner to get our APJ for his fiftieth to Vegas. There's got to be some form of bet here that we can make with in order to get you that.

Yeah, I mean, we're a ways away from it right now, so I don't have to fake it. All right.

Now, let's I think I think I'll get him one. If he puts lotion on his legs every day. Until then, send me a video every day. Actually, I don't want to see that video. We'll figure something out. It puts the lotion on its feet.

But I know what that one is. Silence of the Lambs for me. Yeah, you got it. That's like the first ever one I got. Did that win best picture?

It did one of the five movies in one of three movies to sweep the five major Oscars.

And spoiler alert, if you haven't seen Silence of the Lambs at the end when it's pitch black, I've got the fucking night vision goggles on is just terrifying.

Moments of creepy.

And Anthony Hopkins, he's only in that movie for like less than twenty minutes the entire time. But he's such a presence in it. It feels like he's in the whole goddamn thing.

Now, he's he's he might be up for another Oscar this year, Anthony Hopkins, but we'll save that for another time. Let's move over to the Central Division. I'm still screwing these names up. Tampa Bay. They lost two straight games. People started wondering what's wrong. Oh, yeah, four straight wins had been gone. Do I have a trade off? Maybe you do. I have a trade for you.

Jeff Skinner ickle and who else we throw there? Halsy package deal for Kooch Wesolowski and had been straight up. Keep the change. Cap works out. Let's roll it. I'll tell you what I like guys.

It took fucking 20 something years, we're finally getting like an interstate rivalry between Florida. Yes, years. The games really haven't meant anything.

But I mean, obviously the divisions this year playing each other a bunch, but it feels like there's finally like a true rivalry developing.

I agree with you on that. And Florida has not slowed down. I think we originally said, I don't know about this. They had to delay to the season because it covid you got to talk about Draeger.

And am I saying correct, Draeger for those Draeger about Draeger, I feel bad.

It's a tough one without him.

That's in a few more wins. And give us a bigger sample size and we'll remember your last. No offense, guys, but I had an eight year old artist call me Bissonette Dee, so don't even fucking start that. He took warm ups again, but he won't be Italian idiot. Italian. Twenty first. I'm a cyclist. Twenty first strait's God forbid Tonetti. He's now flipping pizzas in the concourse G. You can get an autograph at the first intermission.

Set the record for a one way contract being healthy, strapped to the Italian. How did this guy get it one way again. Oh yeah.

Twitter Newport Sports Management shout out Marki fucking hamburger. He should have one agent of the year for five years.

Is your agent probably got you that one that one way and was like, oh, my celebrators dick off that that night I got Paul Bissonnette. They a one year deal. His wife's like, isn't it Pisin that he's like, oh shit. Oh, I'm gonna kill Patrick.

Kane scored his fourth goal, the hundredth player in history, to reach that number, the eighth active guy. Oh, man. And since he's joined the league, only Ovechkin and Stamkos have more goals than Patty Kane.

Since you see his interview after he's like, it just makes me hungry for more like he just did a fucking gold bump in the fucking back room before he came on four hundred talks and he's staring into the camera. He's he ain't going to stop playing until he becomes the best America. He is what he is. I see. Already the best American ever.

Yes, I think so. Barstool chief. I'll dress something else with him in a second. I saw him. I know it was a blog or tweet today that said Patrick Kane is the best American born long time. And I agree with it. I think he like just everything he's done, the way he's played, how long he's done it, the cups.

He has everything that you need when you're talking about like, you know, he doesn't know what a gold medal. Not saying that it's the end all be all.

But he will get to try to put who the best American born players of all time. Oh, I don't know. I was just saying one thing that he didn't have. I was like, OK, yeah. All right. Well well, you know, you stick to your country up north back to chief.

I saw he I think he threw the word buffoon after my name on red line radio with big boss Toshka guys. But Chief, that fucking clown called me a buffoon. Now, I said to the Black Hawks, have no chance of making the playoffs. I still don't think they do. Dallas has been horrific. They're going to figure it out. There's there's they've they've played more games. Chicago, I don't think getting in the playoffs, they're way better than I thought.

But Chief Chuck, an old buffoon to me, I don't know if anyone listening has ever listened to a snake draft. They probably listened to the one I did where I just dominated all four of those clowns in one hour. Sit down. Chief is the worst drafter of all time. They call him Baret Baratta. What's the cheese?

Brautigan gang. Bharata Gang. Because he makes these horrible claims. I think he I think. What do they want for. They did they did a Fourth of July barbecue and I want to say that's when he might have bought like a burrata salad, like he's just a clown. He's calling me a buffoon. He could take a hike. I do think Chicago is enjoyable to watch. They have guys and Brincat should get showered up because he was shit and he's bounced back.

He's looked awesome. But it all comes back to Cain and it all comes back to this dude that you think might slow down. Maybe this is the year. Nope. He's right there. He's top five player in the league. And I think that that the way he's doing it this year, when the expectations weren't weren't high and he's truly carrying this team with motives, makes it even that much more special fucking barrier here, Chief.

What a Muppet to Patrick Kane to five to five hundred. Yeah.

Eleven goals. Twenty three assists in twenty three games. He absolutely has that team on his back. Columbus, tough week for them. They've lost five in a row, one, five and two in the last eight. This is when job stuff comes up a coaches. But Tortorella is not worried.

He's, you know, it's going to do what it's going to do. He's in his sixth season, which is, you know, typically when wouldn't that be a fucking curveball?

Or they drop the hammer on torts. Do it. What's the GM name again? We always Bergamo line the line and. Yeah, do it. Do it for us.

Imagine the Habs want the non French Outremont with all quick Krick gas of dullards comes in first press conference with a poutine, throws it on the ground. He's like not on my watch motherfuckers.

Oh a mess today Turnitin w-w do it let's fucking go. Oh well that gets us to Binnington or is that the West does WWE. We'll get to that. He threw a curveball at us for throwing St. Louis in the West. Thanks a lot, Batman. We met Dane Lewis in Colorado. We mentioned Dallas the last the division. I know they've only played 16 games, but you've got to kind of feel bad for them, I think, because Colvert is absolutely wreaked havoc on this schedule.

You know, it's really through no fault of their own. Some guys are getting on the list. They've done nothing wrong. But what are they, six, six and four? I mean, Detroit does have one more point them, but Detroit's also played, I think, eight more games.

But is Dallas going to pull together and get lobbyism, try and get into contention here in this division or what? Yeah, I think they have an excellent team. My only issue is the fact that they're going to play this insane condensed schedule and I don't know how that's going to affect these guys aren't robots. So I saw I saw the coyotes play the avalanche, not saying that they're on par with the avalanche, but Avalanche should play three less games and they came off two losses to where it's like three less games means like one less game per week were coyotes play four games in one week.

That's fucking crazy, man. That's fucking crazy.

I know for NHL games in one week and that's going to be them for four months. For two months.

For two months. It's well now. And that brings up the point where they could have gone with the 48 game schedule and they could have been like, but what they did is with the fifty six, it does give them wiggle room because there is a legitimate chance that that teams don't all get to fifty six. I think that if that happened, the league would have to see it coming to a certain degree and they would have to figure out a way to slow it down on the back end.

Well, I think it would be ridiculous for, let's say, the North Division, what seems like the division that's going to for sure play fifty six, just given how how buttoned up Canada is as far as that. Right. That's based on fucking stats.

They shouldn't have to play fifty six games where other teams are only playing fifty six games in a condensed schedule is a major you know energy exertion factor. Yeah. Should slow it down on the back end if that is the case.

I was reading also like the possibility and it seems crazy to me but where you, you could actually pick the playoff teams based on point percentage if a team didn't, wasn't able to play as many games. Right. Like then you're looking at like Paul Wall will not like how are you going?

How are you going to say that what they've done prior means that they would have done? Well, I mean, they essentially did it last year with the fact that they let twenty four fucking teams in because they didn't want to eliminate teams that, like, there's enough schedule here where that could have made a difference. So do you have to do that again if all of a sudden that happened? So I see you get ahead of it about like three quarters of the way.

What does the US have played right now?

Sixteen games. Oh, my priorities have played at least twenty one.

And what to back up your point, about points percentage. It should be noted that the NHL dotcom has added that to the standings. If you if you looked at points them warming us up for team that is fifth and you think Batman's in the mind torpedo in his early, we don't even fucking notice it. I think that that may be the reason I'm reading that is because the league wants that out there and has certain reporters possibly reporting it. And right now, I apologize for ruining the flow I had earlier when I fucked up the Bruins fight with the Rangers.

But now I'm fucking back. You're back me just figuring out what the NHL is doing, that's big time broadcasting with a point percentage.

Yeah, break. Just put it all together right there. Thanks a lot, Bob. Blue light thanks to Pink Whitney. What a day we're having. Except for the fact I have touches on an old shirt that I had to burn.

I have a memory with a buddy of yours will remember me.

Buddhahood Bootable.

All right. Now, Sam Gonyea, who are just brought up and his first hat trick and I think it's, what, eight years?

Nine years. Nine years. That's the last year in the NHL or maybe the next year. Either way, Sam Gonyea has been such a great teammate and such a great guy that it makes a lot of sense for a team like Detroit to have him this year. And knowing Detroit knows they're not going to get in the playoffs, but they have a veteran who they can really count on teaching the younger players what it's like for good people, what it's like to be a pro.

And he still can play. And he's had times where he's in the minors. Was he over in Europe at one point? I might be completely making that one up. But either way. Gags He's a guy who when I saw you get the hat trick, I was so fired up. It reminded me of the night when he had eight friggin points.

I was going to ask you that was that I was either him or I really that was the last time he had a hat trick was the eight point game against the Blackhawks. I had one of the goals. Funny enough, people say that that shouldn't have been an assist for him. My goal, I think that was like my first goal and close to forty games I did the old monkey off the back throw. No, you did pigeon move. Yeah.

Yeah. But I knew I was like, God damn it, finally but. Gags Yeah.

He what do you got here for me. He wasn't in but that might have been the lockout. Yeah. That was the lockout.

So but he was in them. He was in the. With the Marlee's Lehigh Valley Phantoms and Bakersfield, and then he got a chance with Columbus, I think he was awesome that season on the power play at 18 goals. So I'm looking at his stats and seeing how long he's played. Eight hundred and sixty games, played 31 years while he's been in the NHL since he was 18.

So that's just a guy you have to watch. I wouldn't mind if you got to watch. I know one 40 more. Fuck, I hope he gets it. Might be come on TV, but we're going to go on Falkenstein, our boy, a couple of year extension, I think he'd say he said he'd come on whenever, but maybe we would wait a couple of years when gags is done.

And I think that he's a guy who would actually keep playing. He loves the game and maybe fucking England before we know it. I don't know about Nourhan more like I don't know why he can't live up with the Cardiff Devils.

We can go back for the ceremonial on puck drop case of Beer UK for the for the MVP, the game you get a case of beer to bring back to the no way. Yeah. And the EIA.

That's what time. It was unreal.

It was, it was part of like a beer sponsorship or was it just like hey here's here's the game, you stay out on the ice and they present it to the MVP and then you'd fucking bring the case back to the room.

And then, I mean, everybody was going off the top ropes in the show. It was just it was it was something I don't know how we got there. I was a stand for England. Thanks for putting me on the English International.

I got the fucking abbreviation. Right. Can we not just leave it at that? I don't even trust it. That's right.

Good, I'm good. Let's go to the west, the vision again, the highlights from the week was another goalie pal played ice hockey league.

Will you laugh? It's called the elite ice hockey. So far, so good. I said you lost the game there with I would have fucking led the league in scoring.

So Jordan Benenson put on an absolute snap showing the game the other night, literally trying to fight everybody on his way out went of the Dubnyk. Like why? I mean, just hilarious. I know he was probably pissed off during the game, which is a wild one, two, seven, six blows.

But any time you see a guy just like want to fight anyone, it's it's always worthy of going viral that I think our league or our league. Their league uncross your legs uncrossable it like that.

It needs more of this shit emotion. He doesn't give a fuck. We know he's a little bit tapped and to be that good at hockey and have to get that dialed in to go on the run that he did when they won the fucking cup. Yeah, yeah. He's a little fucking crazy, folks. And we saw a little bit of it there. The fake blocker to Carlson's face. Dubnyk chirped him after the game. I would like to see a goalie fight the next time they play each other.

Let's go. Let's doobies a big boy. Oh, he would come around. Bennetto would be smiling the whole time because we know he's Tap Binnington. He's tapped you. When we interviewed him, you've seen what he went through and what he really thought about himself to put it out on the line and basically say, like, I'm going to be an NHL starter. And now, by the way, he's been great. He's been good. He's been really good.

And so he has an off night and he's just pissed off. So I think that they end up winning the game. I think they after that, they looked awesome. The emotion came up.

I know nobody could stop a fucking beach ball, but those retro jerseys the sharks have, I, like I said, them in the stream. They were wearing them that night, weren't they? Whatever maybe they want. I think so, yeah, those articles are pretty sweet. Yeah, they all blend together all week. Minnesota for an all week. This team, a rookie, lead them Carol Capri's off six goals, eleven assists in 18 games, played a Minnesota man.

They look for real, this backup golliwog, not a backup. Now, Carr got going in there. This kid's a rookie. He's been playing out of his mind. Kim Talbert's basically become the backup to him.

They keep it, keep it going, get getting the playoffs and see that. Yeah, you see them. Well, Dunbar scored one point point.

Three seconds left. Yes. Oh, my goodness. As a goaltender, you don't even imagine being a coach coaching that long of a game and then you lose it with point three seconds left because of a fucking defensive breakdown.

That's that's pull your hair out. Shit. You battled all game. Yeah. For the point of the press conference. Post game for a coach, if you get the point. Yeah.

On the road like no, they weren't on the road. I think it was in Minnesota. But but at that point L.A. had been rolling. I think they won six in a row. They fucking dummy the coyotes back to back games. They got their young guys playing awesome. All their veterans. Dustin Brown's probably then oh, I want to see their best player because fucking Kopitar and Doughty's been back. Yeah, I doubt he's been fucking snap it around.

But yeah, it that's just a devastating loss for L.A.. But as far as Minnesota is concerned, man, early on you could just tell they had the mojo. I thought maybe the shutdown with the covid protocol might have slowed him down. Boom. Fornero They have Fornero right now. Right.

That was weekday. And Kappelhoff is like easy as advertised, their speed, creativity, a player that Minnesota hasn't really had in a while. And I dog I dog them and being a little bit boring at times. But when Billy Garran came in, the changes he made right off the bat, he was very open about like making cultural changes. And you kind of see like it's not shocking that this is going on. They get a game breaker in this rookie and they're getting goaltending.

And all of a sudden, I think like it's a team that probably could be around here making a real run at the playoffs. So I think it's more exciting. Those old North Star jerseys are. So say, do you not feel that when you bring in like a guy like Bill Garrard, who everybody's well aware of how much he's respected as far as a player is concerned? But you could he's making obvious changes to the culture aspect of it.

It just like it'll elevate the group because it kind of just makes everyone be like, well, I haven't fuckin achieved nearly as much as this guy. Like, I better fucking my shit up.

And and if you see people that are that are getting dealt or not, on the whole, it's like, all right, all right. I'm I'm one that's here. I'm one that he trusts. This is a guy that I want to make sure I stay on his good side for as long as possible. Yeah. And I also think that from, like talking to different people, Billikens, like, is honest and open with players, I think is as you can be.

And it's the new kind of time being a GM. He also played quite, quite recently and with the Cup in Pittsburgh. And so you look at like a guy who has the respect and also is telling each guy where they stand and you can see why there is success there. So, I mean, the goaltending is huge. It's similar to a team like Montreal. They had they had off seasons that I think you can kind of compare in that there was big changes and Jake Allen's been good.

But overall price hasn't. Minnesota's goaltending has been phenomenal in yappers.

They have won six straight. They won four straight in the last I thought it was sixty six straight. And the L.A. Kings do it. I love their retros to the night. That was some serious jersey point. I usually don't like purple and yellow, but I don't know. It works with what. The whole blending of the logos. They're the kings.

Yeah. You mentioned they won six straight points and seven of eight to jump right into the race. Twenty two points there in fifth place. We also want to give a shout out to our Arizona head athletic trainer, Dave Zirin. Olby is 2000 games.

This guy you must know I don't know him that that closely, but like he's always he's been he's been unbelievable. Keep it up with, like, the covid protocol, like he is just so well in form. He works his fucking balls off. All the guys in the locker room love him. I think he was in he was actually with the Panthers before he came over to Arizona. But fucking a great hire for the coyotes. An awesome guy said everyone has some awesome say about him.

And he was so yeah, it was the Panthers when I was there and like, you know, I had no business there. Seven, seven games. Punctuality scratches down to the minors on the table, the entire. No, no. Yeah. I mean, I would try to do my best to not take up the time from the real players, but he still has helped me with my ankles. And they were so bad then, like doing whatever he could.

So congrats, because two thousand, what a run that is. I mean, I think you look at like the thousand games played for a player. It's obviously different being a trainer, but those are late nights. We've talked about it a lot.

Marc-Andre Fleury, Third Schutter, our guy has been absolutely insane. One point five, nine goals against nine for one same percentage. It's great to see him get that swag back. But this is the good news out of out of Vegas. Well, I should say Henderson there, HL team, did you see this? They have a town crier to announce their goals, you know, like an old old England old meet mediæval.

We had one of the Pontac turn. Yeah, exactly. He was unbelievable. It was unreal. Yeah, so, I mean, I think it's great that, you know, what Vegas does, whether people like it or not, it's it's stuff that people talk about.

So they're carrying the song at the Angel team, and you can get away with crazy shit in the minor leagues. So they're probably going to come up with some wacky shit. Oh, yeah. By the way, we did drop a Vegas T-shirt last week for those fans of the team that we try to take the horse team little. What do you call it? A joust theme with the hockey stick on that. So I don't if you haven't seen it, check it out if you're looking for a different type of shirt.

So barstool sports, dotcom slash, chick lit, you can find it. There you go.

All right, boys, I think we could talk about the etc stuff, but I know Whit had another word for us.

Yeah, I want to talk about TaylorMade. We mentioned at the beginning of the show biz, got his new clubs. I mean, these irons are fresh. He's going to finally be able to hit the center of the club face. And also with TaylorMade right now, it's all about the same clubs, all these products, all their new woods. They're available for shipping and in stores now. And you've got to go in. You go into your local, you know, PGA Tour, superstore, golfers, warehouse, whatever it may be, get fitted.

You know what as to hit the same driver, the same three with the same hybrid as to hit the TaylorMade irons and really kind of figure out your game, your swing, and they'll be able to help with that. So we've talked about them a lot. They're in stores now. The drivers fairway's rescues and the three new sets of irons are all there. And what is really good about the new driver and the fairway is that the new ball's also available so you can pound the center of the face with the new ball.

It's not the exact high top price that you're thinking, but it's a high top performance type ball. It's the toy response. It's for people have always wondered what the high priced ball and what it would be like to hit one. And now and you're afraid to pull the trigger and boom, now you can get the total response, less money and also the exact same performance. So what are you waiting for? Go to the ball stool store. You can get balls with the Chiclets logo and you can also get yourself fit for the new SIM driver anywhere you want, where clubs are fit for local athletes, golfers.

So where is the fucking link here? It's basically no link, I think. Just seem to drive a Fairway Rescue Club in the islands. Check it out.

A couple things about the West. So I had written down Folino laying off the young guy in San Jose, you know, very classy move. Yes. He he bloodied him up. I don't even know the kid's name from San Jose that he dusted. But this new wave of player, like some of them, like they've never they might have been in one fight in their life. And Folino just teed off a few bombs. Off is off his face.

And do you know the kid's name? I it's a rookie.

I could pull it up, I don't know, off the top. Oh, it's all good. But I thought it was just a classy move. He talked about a post game. So stick taps there. I got to watch two games in a row on Mikis got his name.

I mean, this is the toughest name I've ever had to say. Conesa wrath, North Korea's looming kriesel, is that an orange your screen's broken or Conesa of Conesa.

All right, well there it is. Yeah, it was a nice move. I mean, like I said, why keep punching the guy? And I've had like a couple of thousand Twitter, like give you a hawkish commentary, hawkish Joseloff.

Now it's like dude just broke his face. Like, you know, we know things about head injuries. Now, the guy had, you know, he felt bad for him, but he had a little empathy for the guy who didn't want to fucking further. Yeah. I mean, if you fucking put one of his players, like, you know, into the wall or the guy's like a stretchers coming out kind of thing, OK, I get it.

Another thing, I got to watch Bo Byrum play two games in a row. I know, buddy. Game breaker. He's fucking got a chip on his shoulder, too.

I don't know. He was he was as mean out there and nasty as he is. So we got to talk to them. Khadra yesterday. But I asked them about them too. And I'm like, man, I thought this guy was kind of going to be, you know, just like a little puck moving skilled defenseman. But he's a Western League boy, like he he was fucking standing up to hit guys and lay big hits. And then, like I said, he ended up getting the dust up with Cuadrilla.

He fucking took a couple of bombs, but he got up right away. He's like, whatever I got in a battle in front of them that I fucking give it up the front. Yeah. So Colorado, you got a fucking good one. And then I don't know if you saw Mackey. I felt bad for journalism. Put Oh my God angle and his eyes on that shot. I don't know how fast you think that was going on. Snapchat and all of his glove.

And I was like, whoa, I just want it like hit the match. Like it hit the crossbar. That's how fast that came out. It might have came out faster than it went under the fucking net. So the Mack Dog. But the game before that, I mean I think Max but a little bit snake bit like a lot of posts. A lot of but Kadry man and we got to interview him. We had a goal and to assist and they got some great secondary scoring, a bit of a boys club there.

And I think there I think there are a couple of pieces away.

Crosby. Yeah. Keep making up trades.

We just talk about golf, obviously with the big news in the Gulf War this week. Tiger Woods accident.

Yeah, that was, well, crazy. I mean, I was sitting around and I think it happened at seven fifteen, like West Coast time. So ten, ten o'clock, ten o'clock, ten, fifteen we are. You didn't hear about it. Or two or three I think. And right away I just remember it. Is he alive like you saw the picture of the car.

It was like pretty horrible. I mean what's crazy is, is his tournament, the Genesis Invitational at Riviera, and he was driving and Genesis obviously. So that's I know it sounds crazy. Like almost good at for them. They saved his life, this car. And the thing is, like with the online, she reports. And that's what Twitter is like. I remember the day that Kobe passed away. It's like same thing. You're seeing all these different sports.

It's so crazy now. But once everyone kind of it was announced Tiger's injuries weren't life threatening. That's what I'm like, you know, as like a golf fan or even just like following the story. It's like, all right, there's a big relief there. He has kids, his family, like, fuck golf man. It's like when you hear that stuff, I wasn't even really thinking about golf. You know, like people are saying, like, well, could he get another major after this?

It's like, dude, you know, I think his, like, legs are all broken right now. Just hold on a second. So glad to hear he's doing well. I will say, like, if anyone could come back and play high level golf again, it could be him.

Ben Hogan got in a horrible accident.

I think he was ran over by a truck at one point and he played and won again. And but still just to hear he was alive and OK is nuts. Now, I don't know if we'll hear more about the crash or what or what happened. Like, is he looking down reading a text or is he kind of like, you know, you're speculating, but is there something going on? Because there wasn't actually there were tire. There was no he never hit the brakes.

So then you're like, oh, man, like fall asleep. You just don't know. So that's why I'm speculating is kind of brutal. But I would would hope to to find out like kind of what was going on. And I think the police right away saying that they were not even going to like blood test them. There was no reason to think it was any sort of what is the word inebriated driving or whatever. Yeah. So, I mean, that's good to hear.

But still, it's definitely scary time. Glad he's OK. Yeah, it was. It's pretty dangerous road too I guess.

And they said these vehicles have actually have a black a black box on them similar to like an airplane. So they can tell how fast the vehicle is going and all the conditions of the car when it had the. Oh really. Yeah.

So like you said though, they didn't seem like he was appeared in any way a dangerous road. We obviously wish him the best, but I thought it was pretty cool. A lot of his opponents were the sun red. Oh yeah.

It was cool. It was cool. And that's that's a that's that. I'm glad you brought that up. That's a great way to, like, honor. I mean, listen, he's alive, so it's a little you know, it's a great way to kind of show your respect to Tiger Woods. And I think it's just them showing like we understand. Yes. Right. This game to a different level and like, we're so grateful and call Makawa after he won, actually said, like, you know, we all we don't thank Tiger enough.

Thank you. So I understand. But the issue I had was it with Max Haoma, who won at Riviera.

Ironically enough, he. Eat it, OK? Now, listen, I already packed my four outfits before I got here, these guys have sponsors on all the shirts. He's like, so I won't be in red and black.

And these Gallardos are like attacking him. Like, that's disrespect is like, hold on. He's like, I can honor a guy or respect the guy any way I want. And he actually ended up tweeting it was he was going to do it. But, you know, he's tried to model his golf game after him and play the best he could. That's him. Him, you know, thinking of Tiger Woods. But they like the people who were going after the guys who didn't have the red and black on it.

Like, I can settle down and relax. Yeah, it's fucking social media.

Yeah. It's always an idiot. Yeah, they're easy to find. We already talked about Sandbagger six, right. You guys, we want to tell people subscribe to our YouTube page as well when he's been on his ass. I want to get a tremendous amount of hits just the first couple of days.

So if you haven't checked out, welcome back yet. Not only that, like, you know, I have aspirations to do other video stuff. Like we you know, we want to go check out leagues overseas and we want to give as much exposure to to hockey and all these amazing places as possible. So you guys signing up and subscribing to the YouTube channel helps grow that. That way we can get the funding in order to do so. Like, you know, we got to hire a good team, like, you know, production goes up and we want to we want to show you guys some cool things.

So if you guys could subscribe to that, it would mean a lot to us. And yeah, that's pretty much all I got to say.

One of the things I'm not sure I sent that text, you guys, about Bittoun, that new show on HBO of you know.

I know. I know. It's a book and it's a Swedish show. But I heard amazing things about the book. And now you're saying the show's a yeah.

I watched the first episode. A bunch of people hit me up on Twitter, I think. I don't know if the second episode dropped over the weekend, but yeah, it's a former NFL player who's coaching a team in his hometown in Sweden now. And some sort of controversial thing happens. Obviously, like I said, there's only been one episode, but I'm hooked, man. It's one of those shows that ropes you in. It's in Swedish with subtitles.

But a story like why more shows like this, if you haven't checked it out yet, by all means, you should.

I don't know if you guys have any final thoughts. I got one last thing here. I want to send the welcome home to U.S. Marine Staff Sergeant Zane Betcha and his fellow PVM for three, two, three. Death rattle is on the USS Nimitz. They just got back from the Middle East after an 11 month deployment is a big list. All thanks to all you guys.

Shervon, we appreciate you. Enjoy your time back on U.S. soil. Would you?

And we just drop some blankets in the barstool. Sports story of pink Whitney, blankets, fit and checklists. Blankets like a good blanket, nice fleece blankets. They're so comfortable. So go to the barstool sports store right now and buy those boom.

Absolutely. And yep. As always, thank you so much for listening in like this said. Check out the YouTube. Thank you for watching the sandbagger. We really enjoyed doing them. A lot of hard work goes into that behind the scenes, guys, and I think that the upcoming interviews were getting well, we're here along with maybe some more action on the golf course. You all you all enjoy. Hopefully, hopefully you do at least. So we appreciate it, as always.

Thanks for listening. Have a great rest of the week.

And we'll see you Wednesday for the live stream brought to you by Labatt Blue USA.

Oh, yeah.

Have a good week, everyone. As always, we like to thank our fantastic sponsors here and Spit and Checketts big thanks to our long time friends over at New Amsterdam, vibrant pink Whitney, huge thanks to our friends at Román for taking care of us fellahs. Big thanks to everybody. Happy to Molla for making us look fresh out in the course. Big thanks to our new friends at La Babloo have been enjoying these all week. Huge thanks to our friends over at Wuk for taking care of us in the fitness department and a big thanks to our friends at Tailor-Made for helping us look good.

Golfing on the course. Have a great week, everyone.