SSD.

The Steve Dangle podcast with your host.

Steve Dangle, Adam Wilde, and Jesse Blake. Let's go.

Well, if you've ever experienced bad repping in your life, you know that it can be painful. I do want to do a quick shout out to Team Canada, who lost yesterday against Argentina. Devon Horeau, who works with CBC and is a former Olympic athlete and also is just a great guy. He wrote this tweet and I thought it was perfect fouls in this game. Canada 13, Argentina, four.

Oh, come on. Oh, no, Adam, they won fair and square. More like unfair and circular.

He said. This is bullshit. Exactly the case in the match between Canada and Venezuela the other evening. Blatantly biased and very true. Copa does not. Copa doesn't do north american teams too well. But for Canada to get into the top four and be playing for third place is pretty spectacular. And to only lose 20 zero to the literally the best team in the world right now. Yeah, euro or not.

And one of the goals shouldn't have even counted. So, you know.

You know, why don't you think? Why don't you?

Well, they were all over it on the broadcast, Jesse. It's almost like you didn't watch. There should have been a foul called on Argentina just before the goal.

Yeah, but then I.

But then they didn't.

Yeah, no, I saw that. I just. I didn't know what reason you were referring to. Yeah, like, I thought you could have been talking about the second goal, the offside. Oh, he's offside. Oh, no, he was onside here.

I'm not gonna claim to know the finer points of.

You don't need to. You're allowed to talk about sports and not know the finer points. No, no, it's okay.

There was.

You'll be fine.

So it's funny, I had just texted my brother in law, so I've told the story before. My brother in law played, like, semi pro in Scotland for a while, and I was like, you know, I know how hockey guys view soccer. Oh, my God, the elbows.

Oh, no, it's a rough sport.

They beat the crap out of each other. And just when I was starting to get an appreciation for how gritty of a sport it can be, ol buddy, two names on. What's his name? DePaul on Argentina with the hair, dives on the tackle, and then he gets kicked in the lower back with a soccer ball. I can only imagine how devastating it must be for a soccer player to be hit by a soccer ball in the back. And he rolls around like, don't you have, like, family who's watching? You're not ashamed?

Yep. But that's how. Here's the thing. So Copa is like a. They, what do they always compare Copa to? Like, an. Just a bare knuckle brawl. Whereas if you watch the euros, the euros are a dance. And I have been watching the euros, and it's an awkward day for me because my family's English, Natalie's family's Dutch, and they're playing each other this afternoon.

Which means you're cheering for the Dutch.

She'S trying to get me to. And I have to say, the thing about it was, it was a bare knuckle brawl until that guy. And it was bizarre. And I'm like, why? That guy's built like a truck. Like, he's huge. He's very broad, very in shape. I'm like, you're not hurt. I know you're not hurt.

The reason is it's allowed. Yeah. Is it's allowed. Like, I've.

But it's not allowed in the other rounds, which as leaf fans, we can relate.

No, I've talked about this in the NHL. Like, the. The fines for diving are not enough. Like, it's cheating.

No, the fines for diving is never get a penalty called ever again. That's fine in the NHL.

So they punched their ticket to the final. I don't think it's unreasonable to say he shouldn't play the final. Ah, that's ridiculous. No, it's ridiculous.

Well, what are you going to do.

Around, like, a fish on a dock? You suck.

It'd be nice. I agree with Steve that it'd be nice if they tried at least to try and fix it.

Well, I think it's interesting. It seems like they did try to fix it, but in a different way. Jesse, Canada is the reason Chile didn't get out of the group stage. And every ref last night was chilean.

Oh, were they?

I just think, like, from a rules perspective, because soccer has gone so far into technology, and I think it's really cool. You see how quick var is. You see any goal review. Like, everything's done with technology and it's awesome. Why not just use that for guys who are flopping? Why not just say, hey, we can review. If this was actually a penalty, in this instance, instantaneously. And if you flop, then it's like a free kick the other way. Or you can get a yellow card. Yeah, get two, then it's a red or something like that.

You know, you can watch it in slow motion. You can watch the whole sequence in slow motion in 10 seconds.

And we know that if when DePaul got hit with a soccer ball in the middle of his back, he didn't get shot with a bazooka. Like, we know he didn't die in that moment and that he's rolling around on the ground because he's being a baby. And you can look at that instantly and just make a call. Give him a yellow.

More like, DePaul bearers are going to have to come out onto the field and bury this dead guy, because he's dead.

Now, I like this conversation because it supports my very correct argument that linesmen in the NHL are superfluous at this point with technology.

Gonna make this about you being right about. I am right about it.

Look at the VAR on the second goal where they. They were like, oh, no, that's fine. It's not offset.

It was great. I was like, every sport should have this all the time.

We could. What if we simply ignore it, though?

Nipsey in the bud, right? That was offset. Immediately they go, no, it's not.

Your argument's over. It's perfect.

Yep.

Thank you. I have a perfect argument.

I. Jesse, no, that's no more linesman conversation. I don't know how that affects the NHL. Linesman.

Well, it. You know what? It's a stretch, but I'm going for it. Summer content, my friend.

Now, sportsmanship be damned. Bad luck in the final. Argentina.

Big news for.

The winner of Columbia.

Uruguay.

That one.

So Uruguay was really good in the group stage. I watched them this weekend, too. I watched, like, four soccer games this weekend because I miss hockey so much. And they were all really good. Except for the Panama game.

They still have the guy who bites people.

I don't know.

I forgot.

I don't know. But anyway, that should be a good game. Either way, Uruguay or Columbia is not going to be a matchup for Canada. But if they ever get. If Canada ever gets a striker who can actually put one in. Watch out, the head.

Jesse Marsh, the coach? Yeah, he went to the Sheldon Keef school of yelling at refs.

Oh, he sure did.

Holy shit.

Early and often. Oh, yeah.

You know the thing with, to me, he's the standout of the tournament of the entire team. Like, it's not Alfonso Davies. It's not anybody else. It's Jesse Marsh. And he took the job, what, six weeks ago. And USA Soccer passed him up to retain the guy who's been doing a bad job for them. And it's funny because Jesse Marsh used to be on television and at one point, you can look this up. He said, well, I don't understand why he's making these. These picks or whatever for the starting lineup. And the USA coach, like, responded to him in the media, and Jesse just lost out on that. And I think. I think TM USA is kind of feeling a little bit silly.

Disaster there soccer program right now.

One team went a little further.

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Okay, so let's. Let's talk about the. Let's shift to the NHL here. Some news, some actual news. Mid July news. How about that with the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Toronto Maple Leafs have lost free agent Wes Clark. No longer a leaf. Wes Clark, if you don't know, and I don't expect you to, if you're not from Toronto. And in fact, if you are from Toronto, I still don't expect you to. Wes Clark was the head of the scouting staff. He's notable for draft picks. I think people were attributing draft picks to him that were not fair. Like, jersey was not under his staff. He wasn't the head scout until 2021. Um, so we're talking about, uh, a guy. The guy he really seems to have hit on, although this player has never played in the NHL, is Easton count. Right. And so because of Easton Cowan, that pick last year, Lee fans have been really high on this guy, and they should be. This is a really. This was a guy that, strangely enough, former Sue Greyhound. You're not worked on dubious staff with the sue hit Greyhound.

You're not going to believe it.

And he posted this really weird tweet. Now, I can't play it because it's another podcast, but it was from the Lex Friedman podcast. And lex Friedman, if you don't know, is one of the biggest podcasters in the world, but he's kind of the Horatio Cain of podcasting.

I don't know who either of those people are.

Okay, so, you know, did you guys ever watch CSI Miami?

Yes.

You know the blonde guy with the sunglasses?

He's like, the meme.

Yeah, the meme.

The meme.

He's the meme. Lex Friedman is that guy. So, like.

So one of them is real, though. Lex Friedman is real.

Lex Friedman. Real Horatio Cain, fictional character.

Why is he that guy?

Because. So here's what the. The interview clip says. It says, don't eat with people you wouldn't starve with, which is just another way. Another way of saying, hang out with people you like.

Okay.

It's such a stupid. It's one of those sort of alpha male adjacent type shows that's like. It's like in every man, there's a rabbit or there's a bunny and there's a wolf. And I just gotta ask you something. Are you hungry?

It's a term I learned from the Joe Rogan podcast. And it's very ironic because Joe is now the number one perpetrator of this shit. Is woo pedaling.

Woo peddling.

Woo pedaling.

What is that?

You're just peddling stuff that makes you go woo. And that's all. That's exclusively what he does. He's the biggest hypocrite in podcast.

There was a tweet about Joe Rogan. I think it was about the UFO's thing, like years ago, where he had some UFO files guy and somebody's like, somebody tweeted like, there's a person standing outside of planet fitness right now smoking a jay going, that's crazy, bro. And you know what?

He should invite on a Sandy hook tonight.

Lex is very, very successful. But it's such a bizarre thing to go with when you're Wes Clark, because Wes Clark's tweeted like ten times in the past four years. And again, like I said, don't eat with people you wouldn't starve with again. You know, just. It's cool, man. That's great. But it was interesting to me because most of the time you get a hey, thank you to my former team. I'm now leaving. Appreciate the fact that you gave me my shot in the NHL, which the Leafs organization did. Wes came in and I think 17 or 18 joined the staff, was not the head of it until 2021.

The checks that Wes cash did not say Kyle Dubas on them.

They said maple Leafs on.

Right.

And so I just thought it was very, very interesting that there was no thank you to leafs for giving my first shot at the NHL level. I'm sure his resignation said that. Um, but I think I'm not gonna.

Trash the guy, but I think it's a bit weird.

I'm allowed to say that it's obnoxious.

It's obnoxious. No, because it. I think what he meant was for it to be.

He loves Kyle.

Yes.

And that's great.

I meant, yeah, of course. Why wouldn't you? But it comes across as I'm blowing this popsicle stand and it's like, okay, cool. Thanks, bro. Sure have a lot of confidence in the integrity of all the picks you just made.

Right? It does. It does feel like that. But what I will say is. And people were like, oh, this is a huge loss. There's an entire staff of scouts, player development, people that work under Wes West. Wes didn't go to every ohl game. This will shock you. He was not at every OhL game. West didn't go to every Chl game, every NCAA game. He didn't watch it. There's an entire staff of people that have built a good culture and they come to a consensus pick based on what the team needs are as directed by the general manager. And when Wes leaves, it's just like when the last guy left, I think his name was Dave Morrison.

When they've had so much trouble, they.

Will have somebody else who gets in and gets to be the next Wes Clark. There's no reason to freak out about that.

Yeah, I'm not going to walk back. All the praise that we had for Wes Clark, like, throughout the.

Certainly not. I just thought it was a weird way to leave and everything.

It was definitely a weird way to leave. But, like, as, as much as I like how he did, I thought he did a good job with not very much, you know what I mean?

Yes, he did.

And that's. He had all the resources in the world at his fingertips. I'm not saying that. I'm saying he was like the head of scouting and had no picks. Right. So he did a pretty good job with those picks, we think. Right. Early returns on those picks have been good. Easton Cowan and Fraser Minton and Matthew Nyesen.

Oh, the Matthew. Nice pick was a really good one.

Nikita Grabenkin is hopefully pretty good.

Who's the goalie?

Artemash Artur Akimov.

But I don't think that was. You're saying 2021 onward. Yeah, I don't think that was him.

He would have been on the staff, but he didn't pick that. Exactly.

Yeah. We're just going to gloss over the 2020 draft, which was not great. He did a good job with not very much, but like you said, all the infrastructure and the framework and the staff still there.

Sure.

So, you know, is this a loss for the Leafs? Yeah. And he'll be replaced with someone who either learned from him or someone who is going to have the same staff as him.

And he got a promotion, by the way. He's vp.

Well, that's the only way he can leave.

Yeah, the only way you can leave with jobs in the NHL is if they're going up, you know, move laterally, they can't get you out of your contract. But like you say, it's a loss, but just based. It's strictly based on the tweet and nothing else. It sounds like it's nothing. Cause you don't want people within your organization who don't want to be there. And it sounds like you'd rather go work for Kyle than be with the leaf. So I'm like, it's not a loss. We can all move on from this gentleman.

I don't wanna. I don't wanna put words in his mouth.

Yeah, that's why I had to put it.

He put that out there, Steve.

That's. I have a feeling it didn't come out the way he meant it, but the way it came out was insulting.

Yeah, that's why I had to buy.

Are you a pizza or are you a mouth?

Whoa.

That's like, just.

Fuck.

I think it's important. I think it's important to preface, like, everything with it's simply one tweet. And you can't, like, take everything from that and extrapolate from the single tweet of a podcast clip. But it's strange you don't think the organization on the way out. It's strange that your. Your final move as Leafs in the player development staff is to talk about how happy you are to leave and if anybody is leaving a company that I'm at and like, oh, that you're. You're just happy to leave. I'm like, okay, so then you shouldn't have been here. And then I'm happy. Then I'm happy that we can bring in someone now who's a part of our team and wants to be on our team. So I assume they'll upgrade in some way.

It's. You contrast Wes Clark's departure or social media departure with Sheldon Keef, who literally looked like he was facetiming us from the afterlife.

Yeah, he ran down. The day he gets let go, he runs down to Etobicoke, goes to Lakeshore and films his little video. Like, that's one way. That's one hell of a way to go out.

Hello, Leafs nation. I am at peace now, no longer having to deal with the trials and tribulations of the Toronto media.

Only dead know the end of war.

And I just wanted to say thank you and farewell. And he flies with an angel.

You guys are so right on that. And so, listen, I think Jesse makes a great point. You don't want people here that don't want to be here. I think that. That, you know, I think you got your conspiracy theory hats on if you think that Wes is like, you know what, guys? I know I'm leaving in ten days. I'm just gonna. I'm just gonna tank all the leaks. You're not gonna do that because part. Part of it is professionalism, but the other part of it is there's like a. Isn't there like 1015 people on that staff who would be like, what are we doing?

No, I know.

Yeah, there's balances here.

I did say something along those lines and like, I don't think he would do that. But if someone leaves on what you think are tumultuous terms, there's going to be at least a little party that goes, ooh, were you giving it your all? I hope you were.

I think he was, yes. And even if he wasn't, his staff was. And I. And that's what matters. And I think we got to look at this in a bigger context of, you know, whenever you see a department head who are the ones obviously on these teams that get the most play, and the fact that it's a very Toronto thing for your head scout to be on multiple interviews at the draft and to.

We shouldn't know who this person.

Right.

It's weird for us to be starting a podcast about this gentleman. Like, it's so. It's the fake NHL is where we're living.

Yeah, tell your dad.

Yeah, yeah.

Pause the show and tell your dad.

They don't care.

They don't get, by the way, we're.

Talking about a tweet of a staff member who's leaving.

I like it. I like it. I like being this in depth. I like caring this much.

Definitely more fun.

It's way more fun. And I look at this and I think, okay, what a great opportunity for somebody else. And I think that. That in Pittsburgh, he's got a lot of work to do. You know, that's one of the worst ranked systems for development in the entire NHL because, you know, they've tried to continue to be successful. And Hextall and Burke were a disaster for the Pixhood Pittsburgh penguins.

He has to do in Pittsburgh what he had to do with the Leafs. All right, Wes, you're in charge of making all our picks. Okay. How many picks do we have? Ah, well, you've discovered the problem, right. So you're gonna have to do a good job with. Not very much.

It's odd. It's just an odd way to go. And, uh, it was notable and I thought we should bring it up. I think.

Good for him.

I think, um.

Yeah, also, congrats. You got that hired at a better job.

Yeah.

Like, you gotta upgrade.

You gotta promote that's great.

Awesome.

Hopefully you don't starve.

What does that mean?

Yeah. Well.

Well, the eating.

The eating thing. Don't eat with people you wouldn't starve with. Would you guys starve with me?

No. Because you're a good hunter gatherer.

Oh.

Ah.

Thank you.

Right. It would be impossible to starve with you, right?

It's true. Jesse, do you feel the same?

I would hope that you would be smart enough to get food for us.

Okay.

It's a difficult question for me to answer, Adam, is you can tell I haven't done a whole lot of starving.

I don't think Wes and Kyle have either, to be honest.

More starving.

Doesn't Kyle make like $7 million a year? Like, I don't think he's going to be starving in.

Kyle Dubas going to hire a gm?

No.

Or is he just going to be like, oh, no, I got to do.

Well because here's the, you know, he's.

Got a lot on his plate, right?

So I have to tell you, it. It's weird that. It's weird that there seems to be a bit of a. And this is floating around, that there's a little bit of. They like to have that group, that person, that management likes to have people that agree that is floating around, that's out there more than one person.

Okay?

And I don't blame them for that. I will tell you that the tension, sometimes the tension of two people who disagree with each other is so much that they can't work together. So you don't want that, but tension in. Hey, have you considered something else outside of your square box, which is part of the problem the Leafs have, because they never do. And Kyle built a lot of that. I think that is, whether they like it or not, whether it's fair or not, that's out there.

I think you're right. I think that sentiment is right for the wrong reasons, that it, to me is also dubious. Biggest crime, like, to me as a leaf fan, because sometimes it's easy to look back at Dubases. He arrived in 2018 when he became the general manager. That's not true. He arrived to the Leafs in 2014 as the assistant Gmdeh ran a draft. Well. And stuff immediately started getting attributed to him right away. Like, I want to say the day he became AGM or the day after, like, Jake Gardner got extended and it was a decent extension. We were all like, whoa, Dubas. And he's gonna be so smart and he's gonna do this and he's gonna do that and he's gonna do that. And, oh, he hired all his friends, like every other hockey guy ever. Like, you look at Brad.

Sure.

Living. I mean, he's hired all his friends, like, he's hired people that he's Chris tan of. Yeah. Oh, like even some of the players. Some of the players, yeah. Guys he knows from Calgary, guys he knows from Arizona. Those are the players. And then there's Shane Doane, and there was someone else. I can't remember the name and which.

Is, by the way, fair if they can do a good job, right.

But to me, we've done that. Dubious. Biggest crime to me is he was touted as such an outside the box thinker, and after a while, it just became more and more obvious. Oh, no, he's just some other hockey guy. He just dresses a little better and knows how to read. Like, it's. He's just another hockey guy.

And that's okay.

Thinks he's really right. Hires all his buds. We'll just like, he's just another hockey.

We'll see how it all plays out in Pittsburgh. Because, you know, when you look back at it, well, it's not going great.

How's it going and how's it look like it's gonna go?

The. The Leafs handed, you know, Kyle Dubas was a part of it, but when he became general manager, they handed him the keys to a Ferrari that was already warming. Right. You had three great young players. Then he goes out and he nails the Tavares signing. Right? He absolutely nailed that. He did. That was a great signing.

$11 million when he was getting offered 13.

I mean, it comes in, scores, 47 goals in his first year.

It, like, people are not understanding, like, how many teams are guaranteed a playoff spot every year for basically the duration of a contract. Like, the moment he signed that deal, it's like, oh, we don't got to worry about making it anymore, being a contender. Sure, you got to worry about that. But, like, you have a one two of Matthews, Tavares, you're not missing the playoffs.

Yeah, how.

How are you going to pull that off? You're not going to be able to do it. Right? But no one's going to look at it like that right now, so we.

Just need to look at it. I'm. I'm. I'm. I'm waiting for a plan in Pittsburgh, and maybe this is the start of it, but I'm waiting for a plan.

You know, like, if west does a good job, you'll start to see the fruits of his labor in like three years.

Yeah.

You know what I mean? Like, this is, this is not a quick fix.

No, this is a long term thing. Ag one. Tell me how it's a part of your day.

Well, first you take it out of the fridge, and then you take the scoop, and I like to put a little water in the cup first, then put the scoop of ag one in, then fill it with more water, shake it up real good, and then put it in my face.

Do you not put ice in there, too, Jesse?

What do you. How do you. What are you talking about, Adam?

No, you don't. You just agitate the stuff.

If you wanted to get nuts, you could. You absolutely.

Then you can't drink it.

Well, a little bit ice. A little bit ice. Break it up.

Anybody who's, like, a big time water drinker like myself, knows that if you. You don't drink cold water.

Why not?

You want to drink room temperature water so you can drink it. Because you can't, like, drink cold water. It's too cold.

No, no, this is. This isn't in the script.

I used water.

This isn't in the script. Ag one sicle.

There you go. Your treat this summer.

Too cold. You need to just drink your ag one. It's 8oz of water.

Could you do an ag one cycle drink? Sure.

Could we have science?

But that's ridiculous. You want to drink the whole powder that you put in there, Jesse.

I'll tell you what's ridiculous. Folate, magnesium, vitamin C, zinc. It supports your immune system. It supports your gut and usually feel better, too, which I think you both do.

Right? Right. I'm hung up on this. Ice water.

If you want to take ownership. I was just thinking more of like an agitator. Right? Breaks the power.

I think you're agitating.

You need that if you want.

It comes with a bottle. You put it in there and you shake it.

If you want to take ownership of your health, try ag one. Ice or no ice, it's up to you. Free one year supply of vitamin D, three k, two and five. Free ag one travel packs with your first purchase. Go to drinkag one.com sdp. That's drinkag one.com sdp.

I was caught up in the popsicle idea.

Check it out. As of today, Stan Bowman, Joel Quinville, and Al MacIsaac of the Blackhawks, formerly the Blackhawks, can officially be hired in the NHL. It's the NHL said this, while it is clear that at the time, their individual responses were unacceptable, each of these individuals has acknowledged that they use the time away from the game to engage in activities which not only demonstrates sincere remorse for what happened, but also evidence greater awareness of the responsibilities that all NHL personnel have, particularly personnel who are in positions of leadership. Moreover, each has made significant strides in personal improvement by participating in a myriad of programs, many of which focus on the imperative, responding in effective and meaningful ways to address alleged acts of abuse. The league expects that they will continue this commitment in any future capacity with the NHL and or one of its clubs. Now, for a lot of people, that isn't enough.

It's too vague for me to have an opinion on it.

Yeah.

Yeah. So naturally, I think that leaves. I think. Right, because of what you guys just said there. I think that makes people uncomfortable.

Well, like there. It is possible that you could have put something in that release that would make me go, damn. All right. Good job. Yeah, welcome back. I guess, you know, I don't know if I necessarily want them to work for my team, but. All right, fair enough. That's just. Ah, yeah, they did a good job.

Yeah. Something about the people that were affected by this, the victims in the situation would have been very helpful. Kyle Beach, I think. I feel like it's very apparent that that's missing from their statement and it should be in there.

Yeah.

Kyle beach, black ace one and John Doe two.

Yep. And I look at. I look at this and I think about it's. It's how the NHL runs things. As much as you guys are correct, the NHL doesn't want to be held to anything because if they did put something specific in there, they don't want anybody going, well, that's not enough. They'd rather have everybody saying that's not enough. And which is how they left it.

Oh, they don't give a shit what we think.

No, no.

They don't care what fans think.

Care about anything.

No. So just thought that that was noticeable. Notable. Now onto better things.

Do you expect those guys to get jobs?

Yeah. Bowman's. Bowman, I think is going to Edmonton.

That was rumored. And then there's kind of no follow up.

Well, I don't think Jeff Jackson like, unlike Kyle Dubas with the GM search, which was hilarious, lasted three minutes last year. I don't think Jeff Jackson wants to be the general manager. I think he wants to be the guy because the general manager. It's a tough job. AGM, GM, tough job. You gotta make a lot of phone calls. You're on meetings a lot. You know, wouldn't it be so much better to be like Brennan Shanahan, where the GM brings you. Here's a potential trade kit. Are you yay or nay?

And that's the archetype of NHL organizations nowadays. It used to be the GM was, hey, I do everything, and that's my job. But now the president is just. He's so involved in the hockey operations. It's the same formula they have in Vancouver. Jim Rutherford, like, he's running the show. Patrick Alvin's the Gm. He kind of brings him. He does all the day to day work, and you do the hard stuff. Gets to sit back and be like, you know what? Go, go. Move.

BROCK MESSER, the number one meme in Oilers Twitter has been that, like, jeff Jackson has just had the best offseason of any Oilers GM in, like, two decades, from his living room doing a job he doesn't want to do.

And I don't think they're entirely wrong.

I don't either. But part of me wonders, like, there's lots of people in the Oilers organization. Part of me wonders if they're like, you know, you're actually quite good at this, Jeff, and we would like you to just continue doing it.

I think he would. He would push back and say, I get an underling to bring me things.

Yeah. You're essentially the executive assistant to the president now.

Yeah. Is what a GM is.

It's interesting.

And that's why, like, you remember Berkey's book, right? He was saying, if I was hired as a GM somewhere, I had to make sure I had carte blanche, otherwise I wouldn't take the job.

And that's how it used to be, where the GM actually ran show, and then now that's. We've moved way far from that.

It's interesting to me that, like, two agents have become GM's in recent memory. Alan Walsh or no, three, I guess. Cause, yeah. Alan Wallace. No. Kent Hughes in Montreal. And this actually reinforces my point. Kent Hughes in Montreal. Bill Zito in Florida.

Although he started, wasn't Alvina an agent? And Emily Castingay was.

I think you're casting a bow cast.

Um, and, uh. And, uh, now Jeff Jackson. So it's these three former agents, and I I listened to Alan talk about, you know, well, being an executive might be difficult because I wouldn't want to trade players. And these two are some of the fidgetiest GM's in the league. Kent Hughes loves a move. Bill Zito loves a move, and Jeff Jackson, uh, has not been afraid to pick up the phone.

Great tinkerer.

And you're great tinker. Oh, good. I do you know why? Good word. Because that's their, that's where they come from. They were made in moves.

Phone calls.

Phone calls and, and being creative. And how do we do this? And how. And the GM calls you and goes, okay, fine, you want to, you want to find a trade? Go call a bunch of NHL general managers and do my work for me. Like, that's what they, that's literally, it's so weird. But that's how it works a lot of the time.

Listen, like, whether Alan acknowledges it or nothing, a lot of agents are made for this job. Speaker two.

Oh, no. Allen acknowledges that. I think he just doesn't want to be on the other side. He's pro player and pro labor.

Right, right.

I think he, he, he's never won. He's been offered for sure.

Well, I mean, you know, let's, is the Ryan McLeod trade, for example, that's going to end up being good for his career?

Sure.

He's going to go to Buffalo. He's going to get a bigger opportunity. He's going to score more points. He's going to make more money. That's going to be great for his career instead of playing behind the best two players in the world forever. You know what I mean? And in return, they get a top ten prospect from two years ago. It's, to me, that was a master stroke, but at the same time, he didn't treat a player on his way out poorly. You know what I mean? Dump. It was, no, I'm going to find you a good opportunity. You're going to land on your feet. And also, yeah, I'm going to help out my boys.

My original question was, did you know, do you guys see any of the three gentlemen who've been reinstated getting hired?

Yes.

Sorry. Sorry.

I don't want to agents and gyms, but, well, it was just like, I.

Don'T think Jeff Jackson needs a GM, let alone that one.

Right?

I mean, yeah, I do see them getting reinstated.

This is, they're all going to work, guys. They're all going to be back to work, especially Quinnville Bowman in the next six months.

Well, this is not.

If you're on the hot seat right now. You're on the hot seat. And I'm sorry to interrupt you. No, no, Quinnville will be hired probably October, November. If he's not hired by, you know, like, somebody's going to get out to a shit start like the Oilers did last year, and they're gonna have to make a coaching change.

This is not an apples to apples comparison. But, like, someone was like, I don't know, let's give Babcock a try.

Yeah.

And they did. And I mean, the big difference is players just hate the guy. Whereas Quinnville doesn't exactly have that reputation with guys who have played with them. Until this story came out, his reputation was pretty good. Um, and I think the difference is, like, there's. There's a potential piece of hockey history here. Like, I still think that that, um, email was way too vague. That release was way too vague. But, like, this is probably the second best coach of all time. Who's better? Bowman. Original Scotty.

Yeah.

Older Bowman.

Yeah, that's it. That's it. Right? Like, and one day his name's gonna be put before the Hockey hall of Fame committee and they're like, and he'll beat McGillny in. Yeah. What's match fixing between friends? And, you know, they already. Yeah, we got. We got colon in, Joel.

And I don't know if the NHL realizes how awkward this is for everybody else in this situation, because, like. Like, if Joel Quinville gets a gig and everything, like, first day, first question from the reporters should be about this.

There's another story that I'm aware of. It's. It's not similar to this one, but it's. I don't know. Unfortunately, I have to be vague about it, but it has given me new insight into how absolutely terrified hockey players are of rock in the boat. I don't think anyone's gonna say shit.

The media will, though.

No, I'm talking about the media.

Oh, media. I think the problem, like, okay, here's the problem I'm having today is how am I supposed to have an opinion when you gave me nothing?

Yeah, that's what I'm trying to point out here. That's just. It's so. Okay, they're back. And then what happened in between? They just.

Well, that's the point.

That at home with. At vacation for a little bit.

That's the point, though. They don't want you to have an opinion.

What hurts? What I would like.

Why do you think it's July 9?

Awkward.

July 9. July 10, they're releasing this info. What do you think?

Well, because who's going to give a shit?

Because the news.

Everybody. All the media is on vacation.

They're on.

LeBrun's already done his cottage tweet.

I would like the media to like. If you pay a little bit of attention, a lot of the story falls apart. Like. And I'm talking a minimal amount of attention. Quenville remorse, remorse, remorse, remorse. Family members on Twitter. He didn't do anything wrong. Okay. So which is it? Well, I don't think I need to know.

I don't. I don't.

I don't know. I don't think that that's, I don't think it's. And I'm not trying to take away from your point here, but I don't know if that's relevant here because of course family members are going to do that.

His remorse is 1000% relevant.

Okay. But the reality is, Steve, you're not going to get that. You're not going to get that. He did speak to a bunch of GM's and coaches, I think at the, in September last year about how. How to deal with a situation like this and what he learned and what he did wrong and all those things.

So before even being.

Yeah, yeah.

I thought was interesting and significant was.

Like a full year ago too. Right. So, so listen, this was always going to happen. The NHL is going to be like this about it.

I'm not sure it never. When he spoke a year ago and still wasn't reinstated, I don't think it was guaranteed.

I thought there was a chance it would never happen.

Yeah.

I didn't think it was always gonna happen. I thought there, this might have been done and because I thought there would been something clear that demonstrated why he's back and we never got to that situation. So I never knew if he was gonna come back. And so it took me by surprise.

The speaking to the other coaches I thought was, okay, here we go, here's his path back. And then he wasn't reinstated for another year more than. Yes, I think, okay, maybe he won't be back.

And if you remember at the time we talked to people and we, and we did talk to people, just so you know, a lot of people said, yeah, not sure he ever gets back even though he did this talk. People told us that. So I think, I think it's like, you know, I. People are going to ride for their family members. Like, I think that's a side issue of people riding for their family members and of course, and hurting their public perception. I don't know if that's. I don't know if that's surprising, though. And I don't think that that has any to do with the NHL part of it. Steve, I don't think it has anything to do with the NHL, though.

That's fair.

Right. And that's what we're talking about here. So I think the point of and I think the. The goal of this was to keep it so that you don't have an opinion on it. It's to put it at a time you didn't want to do it July 1 because all the media were working and they would go into hyperdrive. You didn't want to do it at a time when the games were being played because there's going to be shows that night and podcasts and stuff. You want to do it when pretty much the SDP and a few other shows are barely like, shows are barely working right now.

Who gives a fuck about us besides you?

Exactly. So let's move on to. And I want to move on to this because I think it's a good one. The NHL did do a good thing. There's a lot of concern about. And this is a completely separate issue, by the way, a lot of concern about what the jersey is going to look like now that fanatics has taken over. I know that they're working it out of Quebec. I know it's the same staff. I don't really care about that. To me, it matters. What kind of material are they going to use? That's what matters to me. But new era.

Oh, this is the story.

You're the cap maker.

Okay.

The baseball hat maker has signed a multi year agreement with the NHL to start producing caps and apparel and apparel for 32 NHL teams.

Interesting. Interesting.

So I wondered, and I don't know how this all works. Maybe ice Lex does, but I. But the curious part for me is I thought fanatics, when they buy that license, they're the only ones who can make apparel.

I was confused by this also. Yeah, I didn't get that.

So I guess we're gonna get t shirts and hats and that sort of thing that are new era and not being a big hat wearer because my head's gigantic. A lot of people seem to be very excited about it.

You can sell to more than one, I think. Now that I think of it, there were Mitchell and Ness hats.

Yep.

There were. I don't know.

Well, I think Mitchell and Ness was bought by fanatics, if I'm not mistaken. Oh, well, yeah.

This is the other difficult thing about keeping up with all this is like it's. The world is just owned by six corporations in a trench.

Yes.

So I have no idea. But I don't know. Hopefully the product's good. What I thought you were gonna go with is the video of. There was a video going around of all these fans trying on the new fanatics jerseys and talking about like, oh, oh, this is pretty good. Oh. And they sounded surprised, and I was like, oh, my God, it's the Domino's commercial.

Oh. Like, oh, this pizza is actually good. There was a, by the way, I freaking love Domino's.

I've always liked some of you might.

Be too young to remember this commercial, but there was a time where Domino's pizza was considered bad.

Yeah, it was garbage pizza.

It was garbage. And then someone new took over marketing or the company or whatever, and they released a commercial campaign where they had people try Domino's, and they were like, this pizza sucks. And they talked in the commercial, the Domino's pizza commercial, about how Domino's sucked. And then they changed their pizza, and everyone's like, let's try their pizza. And was it the best? I don't know. Was it better? Yes. And people started to buy Domino's pizza.

Yeah.

It was a really successful campaign.

And now Domino's has become top three. Right? Like baseline pizza chain in terms of deliciousness, I'd say.

Oh, I love Domino's.

Oh, top three.

Yeah.

I haven't had Domino's in a while.

Really? I know I have Domino's, dude, once every couple months.

Domino's, to me is the. It's like the ultimate, like when you, you know, when you see, like, the teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles eat a pizza and, oh, God, I want pizza. That's what Domino's looks and tastes like to me. That's what it's just.

Oh, I always say that.

I always thought pizza should have five times the amount of cheese that it did because of the Ninja Turtles. Because they would always take a bite and then go like that.

Yeah.

And the strings.

Oh, that's like Detroit. Detroit style pizza, which is not Chicago style pizza. It's the bits, which is pizza casserole. Yeah. It's lasagna. It's without the layers, literal pizza pie. So anyway, people seem to be excited about the NHL thing. Something else that I think is interesting, and we didn't get to this last episode.

Just to clarify to your new era thing. Oh, yes. Fanatics's deal with the NHL is they're the on ice, uniform, authentic jersey supplier.

Okay.

They have the exclusive right to produce on ice jerseys and anything that's, I guess, technically off ice jerseys as well. But. So the NHL has the right to sell other merchandise to other organizations.

I love that because the, the. Some of the fanatics, some of the fanatics, like, where's the. It's the fanatic sucks Twitter account, like, from other sports. I'm like, oh, my God. Some of the prints, they get wrong, or just prints.

To me, the most glaring one was like, how do the baseball players have see through pants? How did that get past? Here's the prototype.

That's, uh. They still do, by the way. You can still see them tucked in.

Why can I see their undies now?

But that's apparently Nike's fault, so. Yeah, I don't care. Yeah. Anyway, the Dallas Stars have announced they're. They've entered into a seven year agreement. This is a couple, a couple days ago, but we had CJ on. There were other important things. A seven year agreement with a parent media company, APCM. APMC. Excuse me. To stream regional Dallas Stars games free of charge. Beginning this coming season, the games will be broadcast on a newly formed direct to consumer streaming service called Victory plus. And it was created for fans by the APMC with the Dallas Stars. So I think this is really interesting because essentially what the stars are doing are they're going, instead of you paying a subscription fee and also watching commercials, we will partner. We'll take a revenue piece of, I'm assuming a revenue piece of this, of whatever victory plus makes, right? And fans can watch it for free. And when you are able to watch something for free, people are thrilled not to pirate it.

Yeah.

Dude, it's crazy.

They are reinventing television so fast. Wait, no. Okay, so, like, you can watch it, right, in real time and it's, like, free. Right? You don't gotta pay for it. It's just like, in your house and you put it on this big screen that everyone can watch. Yeah, just tv guys. Like, I. Oh, my God. For years and years and years, everyone was just screwing with the Internet, trying to make it this completely ass backwards thing. And no, everyone's going to watch on our native players. Sportsnet, ca fucking stop. And then they eventually did. Now they're.

Well, and so doing this interestingly, too. And we didn't have this for a while. I remember TSN didn't have, like, an Amazon app for the longest time because they just didn't feel like they needed it, which is up and coming company.

Right?

So annoying. But Victory plus will be available for download on smart tvs, tablets, and smartphones September 2024, ensuring fans within the regional territory of the Dallas Stars. This is a huge territory, by the.

Way, about to say.

Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas. Those are like, three of those are, like, the three biggest states. They're huge. Their regional area is enormous.

Texas alone is preposterous.

Wow. Yeah. You can enjoy whether you are. You can enjoy content, whatever your preferred device, which I love. And there it will be. Free ad supported streaming service, making it accessible without barriers and enhancing the fan experience with low latency feed and high ad fill rate for superior viewing experience. Meaning when. So here's the problem in Canada is when you buy instead of you, instead of buying cable, if you buy one of the app subscription services, you're getting it in like a 720p feed. Whereas if you have cable, as Jesse pointed out, you get it in 4k or you get it in at least 1080.

Oh, yeah.

And so they're actually going to be like, hey, we're going to give you good streams and they won't freeze that much. We don't think.

So.

It's right.

High quality, live free. There's going to be commercials, so you don't got to pay for it. It's tv. They reinvented tv.

They did.

It took until 2024, but they made tv.

We figured it out.

Good for you.

Yeah.

Now, wait till you hear about my idea for this building where you can get free books. I'm finally here.

It's funny.

I'm finally shocked that they went all the way with it. Like, they made it exactly what you would imagine in your mind. Tv, it's not even like, hey, I, we're going to send you the over the air thing in your mail and then you can do that because I know some teams have tried that before. It's like, hey, you got to pay for it. No, it's literally an app like Netflix that's going to be just for the Stars games. I'm shocked that it's this perfect. There's no notes.

No, no, it's great. It's great. And you know what's interesting about it is obviously versus something like football. I know Dallas Stars fans, when I say this, I don't want to be insulting. Dallas Stars fans are. There are many. They are passionate. That's been a great fan base basically from day one. Um, never been any issues about the stars leaving or not getting. Not selling and not getting gate, even when they were kind of bad. The stars, throughout their history are one of the more successful teams, winning percentage wise. They're an incredibly well run franchise and have been for a long time.

They haven't really been bad for like a sustained period of time.

But versus the Cowboys and things like that, you can still say all the NHL is a bit of a growth market. And what I found interesting is they took what we love so much last summer about what the Phoenix Suns were doing Matt Ishbia, sending antennas to people's houses going, here, you can get it for free.

He should have just made an app.

He should have just made an app, Jesse. Yeah, he should have just made an app. And I wonder if this group, this victory group are using Dallas as an opportunity to go to other markets in other sports to go, hey, we'll, we'll just do it for free. It'll be ad support. It's gonna be super cheap to run. It's. And you need to, to make. In Canada, that doesn't make sense because people will pay a subscription to watch the hockey game. Maybe in certain parts they just won't or certain amount will, but it's gonna be hard to reach new audiences because it isn't free.

The, the NHL, like one of these years when all the tv contracts are expiring, the CBA can be negotiated or will whatever nonsense needs to be done. They just need the f one app equivalent of NHL games. Like the f one app. Right now, if you're a Formula one fan, is the most perfect way to watch Formula one, that you get everything on this friggin app that's in your phone and it's very cheap and you get to watch every race and there's a bunch of alternate views as well, of every. There's alternate commentary of every race and you get all of this extra content as well. I don't know why a league like the NHL can't have an equivalent, just existential, have it cost a shit ton of money. Because it should. And if you're getting every game for free and all these alternate content, like, it should cost a lot, but just make it available for people to buy.

Jesse, why are we getting this, the victory plus thing? Why are we.

Because Bally Sports went bankrupt.

Exactly. And look how fast we got it.

Hold on. Bali, though, still exists and will continue exist. Amazon now owns it.

Right?

Yeah, but his question was, why did we get this? We got this because that Valley sports had 70 of the 82 games in the first round rights to Dallas and they went bankrupt. So Dallas got their rights back and they made. Built this up.

The technology has existed for a long time. It's just these giant friggin monoliths had to crumble and die. And then all of a sudden, man, innovation happens quickly when there's a need. Here's an app.

All the free.

It's just tv.

Jesse name. Can you go back through what you just suggested for a sec?

What was the NHL has a what the f one does with their app.

Right. Do you know that the NHL. Did they. Right up until 2013? They had it.

And they had it.

Yeah. You could watch every game all the time.

Yeah.

You just had to pay like, $250.

I remember they had the. I had the app on PlayStation three or whatever. Yeah, I could watch it on game plus or something. Whatever. Whatever. Yeah, whatever it was called. But it was. It was. They had it.

No, they had it.

They had it.

At one point, they were just like, no, no, let's. Let's not.

What if we did, what if we just griffed so hard?

You know? It's crazy, though, is if you did have that, being able to access a local victory plus stream would be worth it to me. If I wanted to watch a Dallas Stars game regionally. Why can't I watch it if it's going to be free anyway? Why can't. What's the. Who's. Who's the national carrier of the regional Dallas Stars game?

If it's regional, you just.

You just blow your mind.

Yeah, you just.

Why can't I just watch it?

I. Right there it is.

If it's. If it's a national game, fine. But if it's regional, why is it only restricted to the region? And that's what the NHL app used to do. Used to be able to watch the regional feed of regional game, and it would ask you, which team are you watching for? Are you watching for Nashville, watching for Dallas? And then you would get that team's feed and it's like, it's a regional game, it's not a national game, doesn't affect TNT, doesn't affect ESPN. They're not running it. Why can't I just simply do that now? I think with ESPN plus, that was supposed to be the point, but I don't believe that's how it went.

Well, we also know the technology for, like, dynamically inserted ads is improving. Like, so if I'm watching a game in Florida and I live in Seattle.

Yeah, all right, you're a big pants fan.

Yeah. But they don't want me watching the game for free because they're gonna show ads local to Florida and. Well, what do I get out of that as the broadcaster, if you're in Seattle and I'm showing you ads in Florida, like, my client gets nothing out of that, but just show me a Seattle based commercial. Yes, we have the technology now. Just.

We called programmatic ads.

Yeah, we could do this internationally today. And it's just. It's just not set up that way. That is how it will eventually be. Clip this for 2045 when it friggin happens.

But like, but what if we simply didn't?

I know. No, like, I remember drunkenly ranting in my friend's basement in like 2008 with basically this victory. Like, dude, we have the technology. It's all just going to be on one device. We don't need all this different bullshit. And then sure enough, it only took what, 16 years for them to reinvent television.

Adam, I'm glad you brought up NHL center or NHL game center because game center, NHL game Center Live was like what I just said about the f one. It did exist.

It completely did exist and had its own content too.

Still does in some international markets. So NHL game Center Live was launched in 2008. Like, that's.

It was ahead of its time.

I think it was PS three when I added, yeah, it was there. And then in 2016 they rebranded it to NHL TV. And up until a few years ago in the middle of the Rogers deal where they shut down NHL tv in Canada and now everything's on SN now where you can buy the NHL package through Sportsnet and get all the games, all that stuff. It still exists in the states and you can get it. But then when ESPN came back to the NHL, they shut that down and now you gotta buy ESPN plus to do all the NHL games. But in some international countries, they still have their NHL tv where you can just get all the games.

See, I completely understand why a company like Rogers is like, yeah, that's got to go through us if you're going to spend that much money. Or ESPN. I completely understand that. Just make sure it works. Like game center used to work so well. It was clean and easy and respectfully, there is always to go with the sports net app.

And why are you saying it respectfully?

Well, I think it should be respectfully.

Because you pay for the product and it doesn't work.

It doesn't work as well as I'd like it to. And so all that said, I just. Yeah, anyway, I want to move on. Before we get to the press conference, just one quick note.

Sure.

I'm going to bring up the name Alex Murillo.

Why?

Sahara Bets, the Murillo sportsbook, according to Leah Merrill, who is the host of Phoenix hockey, is officially discontinuing. They had a sports book.

Oh, is this guy in, like, trouble?

I don't know if he's in trouble. I just think it's a business venture that didn't work. But I just thought you'd be interested to know 30 days Sahara Bet sportsbook. Your wagering account will be accessible for the next 30 days to allow time for your outstanding bets to settle and to withdraw your account balance. Withdrawals will be processed one to two business days, blah, blah, blah, blah. But yeah, I think that the reason that Sahara bets is shutting down and this is just completely my guess. Guess on this is the idea was sports team. So NHL sports team, AHL sports team betting, some sort of, you know, use those teams to promote your betting app. Right. In arena, on tv, whatever it is.

We talked about that, like, when he was rumored to be buying the team.

And create a whole environment that's a wholesome business that way. And then hopefully, I would imagine if I were him, I would want to buy other sports teams in the area. Like when he bought the coyotes. You know, had he had the capital, he probably could have bought the Suns, too, because that. That owner was forced out like a year later.

Right.

And so I wonder if. I wonder if that. If the Sahara bets thing is just because, hey, we handed back the NHL license. Yeah, we own the Roadrunners. We're moving them to Nevada. We think in a few years there's really no point to hold this betting license anymore, which are very expensive to hold. Right. Because he was going to do a casino as a part of that. That fan district. It was. It was hotels, casinos, condos, houses and sports arena. The whole thing.

I think we're. The more things that come out about Morella, I think just he doesn't have the money to do these things or the influence to do these things or the trust of the people to do these things. And it's better he just goes and does other things.

Yeah. You made your money.

Yeah, yeah.

Just go be rich.

Go do something else rich. You know, maybe go back to Nevada and build things there.

You ever heard of a boat there, Alex?

It sounds like the Arizona area I'm speaking about specifically. He just needs to get out of that business.

This whole Arizona debacle could have been solved if like ten years ago someone got him a fishing rod for Christmas.

They already would be back. Had they. Had. Had Gary not sold to them.

Yes.

Yeah. Somebody competent.

Yeah.

Owned the team. Yeah.

And as soon as a billionaire, and there are a few in Arizona, emerges and goes, I want a team there. The NHL is going to do it, so. And by the way, they're going to do it the same way that Muriello tried to. There will probably be a sports book, there will be a center for bars and restaurants and entertainment and, you know, all that's all that's going to happen. It's just with a different dude. And I think, Jesse, the key part of what you said is a money b trust.

Yeah.

There wasn't the public trust. There wasn't the financial business trust. You know, when you're, when you're not paying your taxes, governments don't like that. And, and even if that happened a couple years ago, if I'm going into business with a guy who the other jurisdiction right next door said, yeah, he didn't pay his taxes, that is going to raise alarm bells for me.

Yeah.

So whether or not that's fair, not my business. But I just thought you guys find that interesting. Let's do the press conference.

The presser SDP, the Steve dangle press conference.

That should only keep thing was funny, man.

Thank you. Rick Westad had an article today. I'll read the first couple paragraphs. Former National Hockey League player Greg Johnson, who played 14 seasons in the league, has been posthumously diagnosed with CTE, the brain withering disease linked to repetitive brain trauma. In contact sports. Johnson's family and the Concussion Legacy foundation disclosed news the news Wednesday. In a joint statement, five years after his death by suicide, Johnson's daughter Carson used the moment to confront the NHL about its views on CTE. To date, the league has refused to acknowledge a link between repeated brain trauma and the disease. So tomorrow, Adam. No. Yeah. Tomorrow we'll be speaking with Alan Walsh, who's been doing a lot of work with the Concussion Legacy foundation. Have more to talk about that. And that'll be released, I think Friday we'll drop that episode. So we'll have a lot more on this there. But thoughts, guys?

It's not surprising. And the only way to diagnose CTE is posthumously. You can't do it during, during life. And, you know, Alan will obviously have more to say because he is very passionate about this issue.

But, and he works with the foundation.

There are. Yes, there are situations that the NHL puts itself into and we decide, we discussed this when we talked about Bowman, Macisa, Ken Quinnville, where once this group is done and they're close, right. Like, as much as, you know, Gary's going to be what, mid seventies? By the time this contract's up, I'll believe it. Well, I mean, Lou, Lou's in his eighties and he's still working, right? Lou's not part of the NHL brain.

Is 72 right now.

72 right now. There's going to be a time where in our lifetime, hopefully Gary's not running it and you know, you say that. What is, what is going to be very, very interesting, at least for me, is when my kid say, my daughter's 20 and she's in the NH into the NHL. She's talking about whatever hockey. How will 15 years post Gary Bettman look back on several of these issues? Now there is a business case in the NHL's part to ignore the CTE thing, but it's become so ridiculous, so cartoonish at this point that you go like, they're really only doing it to high five each other.

What do you mean there's no link? What are you, an asshole? What do you mean there's no link?

Yeah, well, yes, interesting.

Like, this is why, like, I just can't respect this person.

I think that's a fair point.

Like, I know, I know he's a lawyer. I know he's doing his job. Your job fucking sucks. And you've chosen to do it since 1993 and you're still doing it. And you're a liardeh. You're a liar. Oh, yeah, there's no connection. Fuck.

You can't stand him, but he's paid to lie. And if they acknowledge that, what they believe is they open themselves up to a ton of lawsuits. And it's interesting because I believe the NFL has the NH. The NFL, which is the center of it all when it comes to CTE.

Yes.

There've been 200 plus athletes that have been tested posthumously. Oh, most of them have CTE.

The documentaries on the NFL is insane.

But let me say this. There's not some flood of legal work that has followed them. Like, they get sued. But it's not like you hear a bunch of concussion lawsuits being filed against the NFL. I don't know why, but that's the only reason at this point that I can think that the NHL is being so pompous. Pompous isn't the right word.

Yes, it is.

Is it?

Pompous is everything Gary Bettman does is done with the I'm better than you stink. He's an asshole. He's a disingenuous asshole. Let's call him what it is, okay? He's a disingenuous asshole. Gary, there's no connection. So I tell you what. You go to the office slot, you go to a lot of meetings, you go to a lot of games. There's no connection. Open every door with your head. Everywhere you go, for the rest of your life, open every door with your head. There's no connection. It's the hardest thing in your body there. Gar. Open everything with your head. Everything's fine. Don't worry about it.

Jesse, that's very funny.

Open every door with your head.

The thing you said that I think really hit home is about respecting Gary Batman, because the way he acts.

Respect him.

Yeah, I think that's a very good point, because I never really thought about it that way. Just the way he acts publicly with, with every issue that's semi controversial or anything that requires, like, cojones to stand on. I just. I have no respect for him with the way he acts publicly. I don't know. I've never met Gary Ben. I don't know him as a person, so I can't respect him from that point. But it's strictly his job, which is a public one. Like, the way he acts, there's hard to respect him as a person.

It was interesting reading Brian Burke's book, talking about Gary Bettman. There's a whole chapter called, I think it's called Gary's league. And he talks about Bettman being the smartest man in the room. And Berkey would often have to be like, gary, you got to slow down. No one here is getting this. Like, he's just miles ahead of everybody. And that makes me respect him less. He's smart enough to know he's wrong here. He's smart enough to know he's just touting bullshit.

Like, he knows he's blatantly lying.

Yes. And he's doing it anyway. So fuck him. Fuck you. I know guys in head office. Watch. Fuck you. Speaker one, what else should I.

Speaker two, at this point, to me, I look at, it's a formality. It's a. They know, everybody knows. Nobody's surprised.

Speaker one, would you shake his hand if you met him?

I'd shake pretty much anyone's hand. I'm pretty. I don't think that listed people in.

History who Adam would shake their head.

Not like everybody, but like, I don't think that someone else's behavior should dictate how you behave. You know what I'm saying? At least how you introduce yourself. And I have vehement disagreements with Gary Bettmande. Does that mean that I'd go in and look at him and give him the finger? No. Yeah. I would be like, gary, I think you're wrong here, and I think you know that you're wrong. And I think you're doing this because you have, there's a. You're worried about being sued. Like, let's just. That's what I would say.

This question is from Emily what is one thing the league needs to be leaning into more?

Firing the commissioner.

Something they already do do well. Okay. But should be exploiting more.

I thought it was interesting marketing their players.

They're getting their starter at it. They're starting to know they're definitely getting do more at it.

Yeah, that was the question with all.

The Amazon stuff, like, they're heading in the right direction.

Yeah.

So, yeah, that's my answer. I would say marketing their stars. Look how well, like, okay, on paper, a Stanley cup final, that is Edmonton versus Florida.

Mm hmm.

That should be an unmitigated disaster, ratings wise. No offense. It should be.

It should be because you got one canadian team and a, like, I know Miami is a part of the Sunrise, quote unquote market, but sunrise is its own city.

You got a small canadian team and a Sunbelt team like this would go. Look at how people talked about the 2006 stand in the cup final. No one was stoked to see that happen except for Oilers fans and Hurricanes fans. Right. But Connor McDavid and us and kind of underrated. Lee, like, people don't talk enough about how big this player's profile is. Nothing good, Chuck.

Oh, yeah. Guy was in freaking People magazine.

Yeah. Last year.

Yeah.

Right. He's got a huge profile. So stars matter.

Like, the.

The numbers did well, despite the size of the markets involved. Stars matter.

Yep. Absolutely. So that's what I would say.

A merit bank where the Florida Panthers play is also, like an hour away from Miami. So, like, I don't even count. It's a small market team. Right.

It's Sunrise Florida.

Yeah.

It wasn't even until recent years people started, like, saying sunrise all the time. It's not just Florida. It's just Florida and you. Florida.

Big place.

That's a lot.

Well, it's like. It's like saying the Ontario Leafs and they play in Campbellford.

Right.

Like, it's. It's not. Ontario's a big place.

Yeah. It's not the same playing Sault Ste. Marie. Yeah. One thing I would hope the NHL leans into more is NHL edge. Like, it's a great start.

Yeah.

I'm so happy you're tracking all this data. I'm so happy it's publicly available. It's just the way you are disseminating it to the people is stupid and you need to fix it, because any way you're trying to sort and use this information, it's unusable. So there's no point to the data. But if you fix that and just make us, allow us to sort it by player. I'd love it. Fix that.

Let me know who the slowest player is. So I cannot care about it or the fastest.

I can't even know that.

What if we find out something impressive?

Right?

Like, so silly.

That'd be crazy. All right, next question comes from Tim. The ties into the conversation we just had. When should Batman retire today? Who should replace him? And what will it take to change overall culture of NHL, regards to how it handles controversy, accountability and for actions? So I think we kind of touched.

On, yeah, NHL is going to do what makes sense business wise, and you're never going to like that.

Do you see Gary retiring? I think that's.

I. You know what?

I may be at the end of his current deal.

I. I don't think so. I. I see. He seems like one of those guys that's going to hang on with his nails, right? Like, he. I think that it would. I thought. But there was a time that I thought, okay, this. This Chicago Blackhawks thing could spiral out of control for them.

No, you got a five year extension out of it.

Yeah. So I think. I think what would it take for that to change, man? Like, different set of owners.

Yeah.

They're the ones that hired him. Like, I don't know, they pay them.

So your question, like, should he retire or when should he retire? That's an interesting question. That's a little easier to answer. I mean, he's 72. His deal expires. I think when he's 75, I want.

To say more years.

That's a reasonable time to expect someone to retire who should replace him. That's a really good question. Yeah, I think there's.

I have heard it's not going to be Bill Daley.

Yeah, I have also heard that.

Yeah, I have heard it's not going to be bill.

Well, it's just like Gary Bettman's. You know, it's like Robin takes over the back.

Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of.

Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen.

Okay, good.

No. Robin takes over the Batcave. If Batman was just responsible for evil, if Batman was the joker, there are plenty of hockey people who are forward thinking and interesting and would have good ideas. But then what was the third part of that?

Accountability and change? When were we going to see that? Oof.

You sunk my battleship. You need 32 ownership groups who have for years thought Gary Bettman was doing a good job to hire someone not like him. And I think we might be screwed.

This is from Tom. How many goals and assists. Does McDavid put up in 82 games with a wood stick?

Good question.

Wow.

Very interesting thought. Exercise.

I mean, guys in the Gretzky did 92 with a wooden stick. Brett did 76, Solani did 70 something, 73 with wooden sticks. Like, I don't think that NHL players are finicky about their equipment, but I don't think it would make McDavid worse. What it's all about, really, is your ability to handle a puck and your ability to release. And I think he'll be. He grew up playing with wooden sticks. Like, it's not crazy.

It might be harder. No, he take the puck off?

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, yeah. Carbon fiber sticks didn't really come in until the mid to late two thousands, where they became everything. Only people use those. When I was in high school, having a carbon fiber stick meant you spent $300. That's what they came in.

You were born in 88. He was born in 97.

Right.

Still, he wasn't playing hockey when I was playing. Yeah, he wouldn't have been.

So you think, like 2005, he really knows what hockey is.

Okay.

You know, he's. He's seven.

There is a way to solve this.

Ask him.

We know someone who has a photo of seven year old Connor McDavid playing against seven year old Mitch Marner.

Oh.

And we simply look at the sticks they're using.

Okay. There's a good idea. I think there's video footage of it out there too.

But, like, I think when Connor McDavid is in his teens, like 13 and up, I don't think he's ever used a wooden stick to play. I think those are the formative years that matter.

So it's interesting. He wouldn't be able to stick handle as quickly. No, but it might make it harder to take the puck off him, like with a stick lift or a slash or stuff like that. But remember when Leon Drysidel couldn't skate and led the playoffs in scoring anyway?

That's how good these guys are.

Yeah, you just.

They find ways.

How would McDavid's game adapt to, oh, my stick isn't light as a feather anymore.

How many points did McDavid have in his down year last year? Year.

He had a down year last year. No, last year. The year he scored 60 goals.

No, like this past season where it wasn't like David didn't go crazy. He had 132 points. That's his down year because the year before was 64 goals. 153. Year before that, 123 points. That's actually the second highest total of his career. But he put up 32 goals, which is amongst the lowest of his career. So it's kind of. Of a downy. That's like, he brought 100 assists. Like, third guy ever.

I think he's still going to do that. Like, I think he's like, McDavid is going to take all training camp to adjust if he's doing it.

Yeah.

And then. And then maybe, you know, because the games are. Are better in the regular season, the preseason. What a surprise. Maybe it takes him ten games to figure it out, and then he's Conor McDonald.

I think Conor McDavid puts up more points than he did last year with a wooden stick. That he does this year because he started off slow. He missed a couple of games.

That's right.

Forget the. The wooden and stick. McDavid surgically repaired his knee without the surgically part.

Yeah, he rehabbed it.

He just fixed it. I think he still cracks 100.

I'd say 100, 4140.

You think he's better?

Yeah, he's only getting better. I think he's.

I agree with you.

His trajectory going up 140 points, also the goals thing.

Gretzky, the year he scored 92 was not the same year he set the points record for 215. I believe he only had 52 goals that year and just put up like 160 assists. Something stupid like that. So McDavid kind of had a year like that.

Yeah.

Or except less mutant.

He gets in that assist record territory where.

Yep.

Third guy ever put up 100 assists and. Yeah. Not even his highest point total. Not very low goal total. He's. He's a mutant. Like, there's no doubt in my mind. He has a million Jabil jillion points in leads, leak in scoring with nobody's close.

I hope. I hope with the final few years of Crosby's career, a, we're able to appreciate, like, what an all time great Cindy Crosby is. But then when we go through his accolades, we start side eyeing McDavid's and go, holy shit, he's catching up quick.

Yep.

He's. He's. He. Like, these two mount Rushmore guys might be playing at the same time. We don't know.

Different conversation. But if you silo off Austin Matthews and just a greatest goal scorers conversation, he's ahead of Ovechkin. Like, start the conversation. Like, how long does Matthews keep it up to where we're like, oh, he's one of the best all time. He's ahead of the current soon to be all time goal scoring.

Yeah, I know.

That's. That. I think that's going to be a fascinating one from this generation, too.

It's worth mentioning a few times a season if he's hot and then I think you evaluate it when he's 30 and you go, he might do it, you know, or we laugh about. No, Ovi's just that cracked. Like, but ridiculous.

Even if Matthews doesn't have the longevity that OV has at his peak, he was better.

It's an interesting, I wonder how the era adjusted stats are going to look at that. Ov still probably breaks that record because it's been harder to score for the majority because Matthews was scoring 40 plus in shortened seasons where goal scoring still was not up.

Yeah. The amount of games Matthews has missed because of like pandemic.

Oh, that too. Like you look at the Ov missed all those games as well.

Yeah, no, Ovi has that exact same thing.

And the lockup. Two of them. Yeah, he missed. He missed the first full season of his career.

Yeah. No, that argument doesn't work for Matthews because Ovi's missed so much more of it.

Ovi's missed like 150 healthy games. It's crazy.

His first full season.

He should be. The record should be in his rearview mirror already. It's nuts. Nuts. We could make the show 2 hours.

One more as questions from jaws jaw underscore sxdehdeme will the Devils win the metro?

And then he says, yes.

What are your thoughts?

I'm more interested in Jesse's thoughts because Rangers are in there.

Yeah, I'd say it's Rangers, Devils, Kane's, I guess top three. That's what I'm going with right now.

They're going to be really good. I think they're going to make the playoffs. But, but you're asking, this isn't a conversation of who's better, like who's going to win a series. You're, you're asking if a team who didn't make the playoffs last year is going to pass the reigning president's trophy winners. And that's just not something I can reconcile. So, like, I think the Devils are going to be extremely good. Win the metro. No.

Interesting. I think, I certainly think it's possible. And the reason I say it's possible the devil, Columbus might win the cup. Speaker two. You're asking for a 40 point swing from the Devils, right? They finished with 81 points. They were second last in the division last year. But we were, we got to remember how great this team was just the year before. And we know injuries and bad goaltending can, can sink you and it did I look at the Devils and I go, I actually think this is a team that can. Because you're going to get points back from a couple of, of teams here. The. I don't think the Flyers are going to be as good as they were. I think the Flyers skated on a bad, on a bad division and we're in the playoffs because it was a bad division. I don't think anybody's going to dispute that.

There may be biggest goaltending wild card in the league.

I think the, I think the Hurricanes have a few points to give. They finished just three points behind the, the Rangers and I think that. But those point I. There are people who are, who are Carolina fans and I appreciate you, uh, but I'm going to say something you're not going to like. They're like, oh, man, we got Sean Walker and this and that for tight, tidy business like Carolina took a definitive step back. Doesn't mean that they're not going to make the playoffs, but they are not, to me, a contender for the winner of that division. If Carolina cracks 100 this year, that'll be a great season for them. And that's eleven points less. That's eleven points less. That's the difference of three, four wins, five wins.

That's, that's not crazy, unreasonable drop. I put their number at 103.

And if the Devils are more competitive against the Rangers, the Rangers will have points to give. So I think it's entirely possible. But I'm not going to be like, yes, it's definitely happening because Rangers are great.

So you're doing the. Oh, they get a few points from this team and this team. And that's how I used to do it. And now I just kind of go, uh, fuck it. Fourth. Doesn't matter. Fourth.

Anyway, so we got to record our vip next year, guys. So we're gonna wrap the show. We do, but we are gonna be back, obviously. We get the vip coming out at midnight on Thursday and then next week, Monday and Wednesday again. Yeah.

The summer schedule is underway.

Yeah. How do we know? Are we feeling good about it?

No.

You gonna fire that extra or.

I want a podcast on Friday. Let's. Let's do get one.

You get via a on Friday. Ah, you see.

Damn.

Actually, I got some good stuff cooking for vip. I wanna, you know, you know what does really well on our vip? Movie opinions. And I have. I have one for you. I wanted a new trailer came out yesterday. I want you to check out.

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