Jeff and Elliotte discuss the Tyler Toffoli trade to Calgary, Sidney Crosby's pursuit of 500 goals, the Oilers under Jay Woodcroft, the return of Jack Eichel this week, and Rosie DiManno’s opinion piece in the Toronto Star.
The news never stops! Jeff and Elliotte kick off the podcast discussing the Tyler Toffoli trade to Calgary (1:00), the pursuit of 500 goals for Sidney Crosby (5:30), the Oilers under Jay Woodcroft (17:50), the return of Jack Eichel this Wednesday (21:15), what Colorado might have up their sleeve (26:00), Tomas Hertl and the San Jose Sharks (28:00), and the Jets play as of late (34:40).
They also touch on Rosie DiManno’s opinion piece in the Toronto Star on “Why women’s hockey doesn’t belong in the Olympics” (37:00) and they take your questions to wrap things up (47:40).
Full transcript for the episode can be found here by Medha Monjaury
Marty Zylstra - Rattle The Glass
Listen to more music by Marty Zylstra on Spotify
This podcast is produced and mixed by Amil Delic, and hosted by Jeff Marek and Elliotte Friedman. Production support by Griffin Porter.
Audio Credits: Bally Sports San Diego, Edmonton Oilers,Sportsnet 960 and Sportsnet
The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are those of the hosts and guests and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rogers Sports & Media or any affiliates.
OPEN //// Caller [00:00:01] [Hey guys, Leo from Boston here. Just wanted to weigh in on last week's discussion, and I got to say, Jeff, you're 100% right. None of the blame should go on you for mistaking the score for the Buffalo Sabres game. Elliotte I respect the effort in trying to argue your way out of it, but you are 100% wrong. Thanks, guys. Keep up the good work!].
Jeff Marek [00:00:23] Leo kicks off the podcast, I like that! Welcome 32 Thoughts the Podcast presented by the all new GMC AT4 Lineup. Leo makes a lot of sense. He does applaud you for trying to spread out the blame, but really, it really all really rests with you Elliotte. Sorry.
Elliotte Friedman [00:00:38] You know what this proves to me that Leo is some guy who's locked in your house somewhere. You only let him out to agree with you.
Jeff Marek [00:00:44] That was actually a hostage audio. Say this, and we'll let you see your family again Leo.
Elliotte Friedman [00:00:50] Oh, and by the way, hold up a newspaper to prove that's today's date.
Jeff Marek [00:00:54] Yeah. Leo in Boston. Okay, you're free, you can see your family again, thanks for the audio. Okay so Elliotte, Monday was a big day for trade news around the NHL, the Calgary Flames and the Montreal Canadiens, Tyler Toffoli. You've hinted about Tyler Toffoli to the Flames before and Monday it became official going the other way. Emil Heineman, a first round draft pick, a fifth round draught pick and Tyler Pitlick. Your initial thoughts on this one.
Elliotte Friedman [00:01:19] One of the things I kind of wonder about Jeff is, was Ben Chiarot at this deal at any particular point in time? I heard they were really getting into it on Sunday. The conversations really deepened, and we mentioned the Kings were possibly around Toffoli too, I think the Flames really liked him, and we were talking a lot about cards here, but it's a lot like poker philosophy, right? If you think you've got a good hand, do you try to milk the other people or do you just knock them out, bet so much and knock them out that they can't get the card they need to maybe beat you? And the Flames went with B here, they said, look, we like the player, we really want him, and we're gonna take him off the market. And that's what I would do. You know, why let someone else enter the race? You know, I do think they were talking about the possibility of making it a Chiarot trade too that, that didn't happen, and we'll see where all that goes. But I think at the end of the day, Calgary just decided this is the guy we want, our coach knows him and we're going out and getting him. And this is exactly what they need, a scorer, and he's gonna be one of the best scores available.
Jeff Marek [00:02:21] You know, I'm trying to be, you know, look at this and say, well here's the floor in Calgary's plan here, here's where they gave up too much. I can't see anything wrong with this trade like this to me looks like a slam dunk for the Calgary Flames. They didn't touch their lineup.
Elliotte Friedman [00:02:33] Yup.
Jeff Marek [00:02:34] They didn't give up one of, you know, Jacob Pelletier or Connor Zary or--
Elliotte Friedman [00:02:39] Or Dustin Wolf.
Jeff Marek [00:02:39] Or Dustin Wolf or Juuso Valimaki like, they didn't touch any of those young players and they got someone who's under contract at a very good number for two more seasons as well as you might want to look down the road and say, we might need some winger insurance here like. To me, this one looks like a home run for Brad Treliving. Am I missing anything here?
Elliotte Friedman [00:02:59] No, I don't think you're missing anything like I see two teams that did what they want to do. You mentioned all of the reasons that Calgary wanted to make this deal, and what you didn't mention was Montreal's side. They get a first rounder, now they're getting it this year. It's gonna take an absolute monster collapse, like a Mount Vesuvius-like implosion for Calgary to have that be a top 10 pick this year. And so they're getting it this year. You know, Heineman's an interesting prospect, he's already been traded twice, first, the Bennett deal and now this one. But like I said, like this is what Montreal is is going to be doing. Flames are the better team, they're trying to win, they got the best player in the deal, they got what they needed, you do it. You do it 100% of the time, especially with the term on the deal.
Jeff Marek [00:03:48] You know what I wondered about Elliotte? I wondered about what you talked about on Saturday and we discussed afterwards as well, and that is the chill. Like Ben Chiarot going down on Saturday, did that chill the Montreal Canadiens into thinking, if we're gonna make moves, let's make them sooner than later? Hockey is a tough game, hockey is a violent game, hockey is a game where injuries are baked into the pie. If we have something, we should do it. Do you think that factored in too? I mean, certainly it'll factor into Ben Chiarot. Did it factor into the Toffoli decision?
Elliotte Friedman [00:04:22] I only think it factored in because they got a price they thought that was fair, right?
Jeff Marek [00:04:26] Mhm.
Elliotte Friedman [00:04:27] You probably worry about that a little less with forwards than you do with defencemen? Both the injury kind of thing. I mean I, just because defencemen have so many more things where they put themselves kind of are in the way or, or there's contact with them. Usually forwards are initiating the contact while defencemen are kind of taking it, in most cases. What is obvious to me is that the Canadiens in the in the Flames have been wrestling over this a little bit, and they really got down to it yesterday and Calgary just said, look, we're we're ending this conversation. That's the sense I really got. The Flames said, we're ending this debate. We're taking him, we're getting it done, and that's that.
Jeff Marek [00:05:05] You know what else got better through this situation Elliotte?
Elliotte Friedman [00:05:08] What's that?
Jeff Marek [00:05:09] The Pacific division, who is adding not just Tyler Toffoli, but Jack Eichel as well. All of a sudden, there are two new players in this division. The Calgary Flames are better, Vegas Golden Knights or better as well, we'll see who else ends up in the Pacific next. You know, this may be my favourite opening to any podcast we've ever done, where Elliotte Friedman essentially begs and grovels and pleads. Elliotte, please address Sidney Crosby.
Elliotte Friedman [00:05:35] So my schedule this week for TV is two Toronto regionals: Toronto at Seattle on Monday night, and then on Thursday we've got Pittsburgh at Toronto, which may, I think the Ontario teams are hoping that they'll get 50% capacity a few days early, and we all know Sidney Crosby's at 499.
Jeff Marek [00:05:52] 499 goals.
Elliotte Friedman [00:05:56] 499 goals, thank you Jeff. And I don't think it's at all selfish of me in any way, shape or form to wish for Crosby to hold off until Thursday to do it. I would like to see this in person and, you know, I feel it's not Christmas yet or anything, but I think I've been a good boy this year, and if it did happen at Christmas, Santa would say yes, Elliotte. Even though you don't really celebrate Christmas, you do deserve to see it.
Jeff Marek [00:06:18] I was gonna say!
Elliotte Friedman [00:06:19] So I just would like to start off the podcast by saying, Sid, can you wait till Thursday? Now here's the problem with this.
Jeff Marek [00:06:25] Yeah, I see this one.
Elliotte Friedman [00:06:27] They got a game on Tuesday. And the game on Tuesday is against Philadelphia. And...
Jeff Marek [00:06:33] Much heat there at all?
Elliotte Friedman [00:06:35] He hates the Flyers, and someone once said to me, that, you know, first of all, when you play for the Penguins, you hate the Flyers to begin with. They're your fierce rival and everybody gets that. But that whole year of the Laviolette-Giroux playoff series where, you know, they had that fierce battle and and Laviolette called Giroux the best player in the world or whatever he called him at the time?
Jeff Marek [00:06:59] Oh yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:07:00] It still burns him. Like it burned him for years. And it probably still burns him to this day because the most competitive are like that. So I have to say, I don't like my chances. I do not like my chances. I think he scores 500 against Philadelphia on Tuesday night. But if he would like to wait to do it Thursday in Toronto, I would be extremely appreciative.
Jeff Marek [00:07:24] So let's all watch the Philly game, Pittsburgh and Philadelphia Flyers. And if slash when and Crosby scores goal number 500, I want you all to think about and more importantly, tweet Elliotte. Like when the, when the, when the video shows up online, you know, usually we put the historical ones up or the exceptional ones up at our Sportsnet Twitter feed. Send it to Elliotte right away. Flood his timeline with Sidney Crosby goal number 500 against the Philadelphia Flyers. And if he doesn't, then we'll all watch him face off against the Maple Leafs. 500 goals has always been an interesting one for me. I'm not sure how you feel about this but, I've always looked at, you know, various barriers to entry to the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Elliotte Friedman [00:08:03] Yup.
Jeff Marek [00:08:03] 500 to me has always been... some might say 400 or 450, but I've always felt that the number 500 should buy you into the Hockey Hall of Fame--
Elliotte Friedman [00:08:14] Regardless?
Jeff Marek [00:08:15] Or at least include you in the conversation. Crosby can never score another goal and he's going into the Hall of Fame, it's a tap-in.
Elliotte Friedman [00:08:22] Oh yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:08:23] Considering what he's done like his Hall of Fame resume is done, it's over, the only question is, you know who is he above on the Mount Rushmore of hockey? That's the only question I have of Sidney Crosby in his history at this point. But when you look at some of the more notable players, like I'm going to read you a list here Elliotte, of players who have hit 500 goals and are not in the Hall of Fame.
Elliotte Friedman [00:08:46] Okay.
Jeff Marek [00:08:47] Okay? Peter Bondra has 503 goals. Jeremy Roenick has 513. Pierre Turgeon has 515. Pat Verbeek has 522. Keith Tkachuk has 538. And then, I'll throw him in there as well, Patrick Marleau at 566. Do you consider 500 to be a barrier to entry or some type of cut line for, okay, you got 500 goals, then at least we can entertain the conversation about you being in the Hockey Hall of Fame?
Elliotte Friedman [00:09:27] Now, the one guy you don't mention because he's still playing is Jagr right? I think sometimes people forget that he's still actually.
Jeff Marek [00:09:33] By the way.
Elliotte Friedman [00:09:34] His birthday yeah, he's 50 on Tuesday.
JeFf Marek [00:09:36] He's 50 on Tuesday and unfortunately for Jaromir Jagr, I'm gonna turn into hot take guy. He's never gonna get in the Hall of Fame.
Elliotte Friedman [00:09:43] Cause he's gonna keep playing forever?
Jeff Marek [00:09:45] Because he's never gonna stop playing yeah like, when is Jagr gonna--like seriously, when is Jaromir Jagr gonna retire? [unclear] And he'll never go in because Jagr will never retire.
Elliotte Friedman [00:09:55] I'm beginning to think that Jagr's one of those guys who should go in right away.
Jeff Marek [00:09:59] Before the career is done?
Elliotte Friedman [00:10:00] Yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:10:01] I'm fine with that, I think we're all fine with it.
Elliotte Friedman [00:10:03] I'm fine with that. I mean, you wanna talk about dedication to hockey. Still playing. I mean, he's the guy, but I think I've told the story before. My father's a chartered accountant, a very good one, because of him I hate numbers.
Jeff Marek [00:10:17] What? Well you know what though hang on. My dad was was an engineer with CN for decades, so I know what you mean.
Elliotte Friedman [00:10:23] So you hate CN or you hate engineers. Which one do you...?
Jeff Marek [00:10:26] Anything involving numbers, anything involving math, because that's what he always pushed on me and so of course I went and did a liberal arts degree at University of Guelph.
Elliotte Friedman [00:10:34] You know, we all reject our parents, right? Absolutely. Well, because the thing is, I've never liked the idea of thinking that, oh, you get 500 goals, you should be in the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Jeff Marek [00:10:43] No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Elliotte Friedman [00:10:44] No, no, no, no. I know, I know you're not saying that. I know that you're not saying that. But I think that people use that as an argument. Well, you know what? You get 500, you should be in the Hockey Hall of Fame. I don't like that. Like, I don't think it should be amount of goals you score. I think it should be impact that you have when you played, right?
Jeff Marek [00:11:08] Yes.
Elliotte Friedman [00:11:09] Some of those players you mentioned, I think they're great players, but I don't know if I see them as Hall of Famers. Of the group of them, I think the one, if I had to vote for one guy first, it would probably be Roenick. And Verbeek might be close, and Tkachuk around there, but it wouldn't be all of them. I don't think I would vote for all of them. Like to me, if you're in the Hall of Fame, I have a very high definition of a Hall of Famer. I think that, you know, for example, let's just say for argument's sake, Sidney Crosby retired after Pittsburgh won their third Stanley Cup in 2017. I think he should have been in the Hall of Fame. No matter what his numbers were. To me, a Hall of Fame is about impact. What impact did you have as a player or an executive or a coach or whatever it is? That's what a Hall of Fame is, did you have a significant impact on the game? And so even Sidney Crosby never scores another goal? To me in the Hall of Fame.
Jeff Marek [00:12:06] You know who feels the exact same way and he told us in Chicago? Nathan MacKinnon.
Recording [00:12:12] [Nathan MacKinnon: Yeah, I think, honestly that's why the MJ stuff, it's just like, I find that so embarrassing, you know, seeing me compared to someone like that like you said like, I mean, I've had, I've been up for a couple of Harts but like, it doesn't really matter I don't think, you know, I just wanna, you know, have my name on the Cup one day and I think that's what I'm really looking to do. And I think it'll be a big disappointment if we never get that done in Denver.].
Elliotte Friedman [00:12:38] I love that about MacKinnon, we talked about that, I love that about him.
Jeff Marek [00:12:41] The only, the only point that I'm making about the 500 goal club is, once you're in it, then you become part of another conversation that's like, okay now that you're in, now we can have the Hall of Fame conversation about you. Not necessarily that it's a slam dunk, oh, you know, Tkachuk's got 538, he's gotta go into the Hall of Fame or Bondra's got 503, he's gotta go into the Hall of Fame. But at least you can have the conversation around them. That's my only point about 500 goals.
Elliotte Friedman [00:13:06] I don't see it that way. I see it as, what's your impact? Like Sandy Koufax, if you want to answer, you know, who's the youngest player to get to the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame? It's Sandy Koufax, because he retired faster than everybody else. He doesn't have the counting numbers like 300 wins and all that, but he's in because of the impact. That's the way I like to see it and talk about it.
Jeff Marek [00:13:31] I always, look and this is what I always come back to with Eric Lindros. Like there was that two, maybe three years where there was no one even close.
Elliotte Friedman [00:13:39] Yes. Hall of Fame.
Jeff Marek [00:13:40] To the player that he was. Like as far as being a peak performer, there was no one, and you could even make the argument Elliotte that when you look at the skillset that Lindros had, if he would have had a career like he had in those two to three years, that narrow window, we talk about him as one of the greatest hockey players ever. But of course, longevity was certainly a thing for Lindros. But those three years, there was no one even close. I know you can make the argument, you just mentioned Jagr, and he was in the conversation around Lindros, certainly. But those two or three years, man, because I'm with you, like the impact that he had in his game, we'd seen big guys that can move their feet before. And, you know, a lot of old timers listening to this might be screaming Jean Beliveau at me right away and you're right, but no one like Lindros. Nobody and no one had that kind of impact, and no one was that big and can move their feet like that. Now we see it all the time, but Lindros was a freak.
Elliotte Friedman [00:14:37] Like, who's that guy now that we're talking about? Okay, so I'll give you a perfect example. You know who's a guy who's never been really anywhere near the Hart trophy? Like never even anywhere close to the Hart trophy? Who to me is a slam dunk Hall of Famer? Such an easy slam dunk that I wouldn't miss it. Patrice Bergeron. His numbers are not even gonna be close to the greatest players in the world, and to me, Patrice Bergeron should be going to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility.
Jeff Marek [00:15:15] I'll see your Patrice Bergeron and raise you a Henrik Zetterberg.
Elliotte Friedman [00:15:19] I think that's a good one too.
Jeff Marek [00:15:21] Those two players or more, are more similar than they are different in that, it's a real luxury as a head coach to find that your best offensive player is also your best defensive player. Now your best offensive player in this case isn't gonna score 130 points a year but. It's gonna be impossible for you as a coach to lose a line matchup. That's the impact. When you're on the ice, you cannot lose a matchup.
Elliotte Friedman [00:15:45] See, as we tape this podcast, Patrice Bergeron has 387 career goals. I would probably take him over all of the guys you mentioned who had 500 goals.
Jeff Marek [00:15:57] Yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:15:57] That's not to slight any of them as players because they're all great players. But that's an example to me of a person, like when I think of impact, I think of Bergeron. Like, Bergeron, to me, is a slam dunk Hall of Famer, and he won't have the counting stats of many of his peers.
Jeff Marek [00:16:16] And there's one question that he can answer with a resounding yes, which is, can your coach put you on the ice in every single situation? That to me has always been the mark of greatness of a hockey player, of forwards, obviously. Can your coach put you on in any single situation? Can your coach always call your number no matter what the situation is, no matter what time of the game is, the nature of special teams, the 5-on-5, close game, blow all of it. Can the coach call your number at any time with confidence? And with Bergeron, tap-in. Zetterberg, tap-in. Datsyuk, tap-in.
Elliotte Friedman [00:16:55] Tap-in. He's a Hall of Famer.
Jeff Marek [00:16:56] Easy. Future Hall of Famer Connor McDavid. Are we ready to say that already about Connor McDavid's career Elliotte?
Elliotte Friedman [00:17:03] He's going well, I think I think it's a safe bet.
Jeff Marek [00:17:05] On his way. With that, the Hall of Fame conversation. Somehow we opened up post-Super Bowl podcast with a Hall of Fame conversation and--
Elliotte Friedman [00:17:14] Thank you Bengals. Thank you. Thank you very much. Much appreciated.
Jeff Marek [00:17:17] Did your accountant like how you gambled this evening Elliotte? Was your accountant very happy?
Elliotte Friedman [00:17:21] Bengals vs. the spread in the under, very happy.
Jeff Marek [00:17:23] We're talking Connor McDavid and the Oilers when we return. Welcome to 32 Thoughts the Podcast.
Jeff Marek [00:18:36] Elliotte, they may never lose another game again. The Edmonton Oilers under Jay Woodcroft by the way, Mike Smith was excellent in that game against the Islanders.
Elliotte Friedman [00:18:46] Yes he was.
Jeff Marek [00:18:47] We talked about the back-to-back and he went back in there against the Islanders on Friday night and he looked excellent. Your thoughts on the new bench bosses and what they're doing to the Oilers?
Elliotte Friedman [00:18:58] Well first of all, Jay Woodcraft should retire undefeated. They have a game on Monday night. I don't think he should go. I think he should just say my winning percentage is a thousand and I quit. Just give up and quit.
Jeff Marek [00:19:11] Dexys Midnight Runners, one hit single and I'm out of here.
Elliotte Friedman [00:19:14] They did look a little bit different. I'm not really sure how much they could have done so, the coaching change was on Thursday morning. They didn't have practise that day, he came in, his first day with the team really was on Friday, which was the game day, and the one thing you really did notice differently was they stood up a lot more at the blue line and the players did talk about it postgame but to me it was noticeable, and it clearly is something they have identified. And, you know, we'll see how they do when they play their next games because they're playing Monday and Tuesday night. But, to me, that was the biggest difference game one. I don't know what you, if you saw anything different Jeff.
Jeff Marek [00:19:51] No defensively, they're a lot tighter. Again, I just keep going back to Mike Smith, and amazing things happen when your goaltender's giving your saves.
Elliotte Friedman [00:19:57] Yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:19:57] I know that's always the hospital bracelet issue, and I know the concern there but, I thought it looked like a team that, I don't know, whenever there's a coaching change, I mean, everybody sort of wants to audition for the new coach and there's an element of that too. But they just looked a lot more... comfortable, let's just say. Listen and they're playing against an Islanders team that hasn't, you know, you look at the last couple of games the Islanders have played like, this isn't the best that we've seen out of this team but nonetheless, you play the opponent that's placed in front of you. I thought they just looked better all around. I think that everybody like to a person looked a lot more comfortable. You know that there has been a change, some new optimism, I think Woodcroft, you know, knows a lot of these players from his time in Bakersfield, even knows a lot of the guys from his time with the Oilers like, McDavid knows this guy like this is someone who's, you know was in the NHL for what was it thousand games or something like that Elliotte? So I don't know they look, again, it's one game, I don't want to read too much into it.
Elliotte Friedman [00:20:53] Yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:20:53] But they did look better. We all still know what the problems are and they still exist but for... just for the first nights, all of those looked a lot better. Listen this is the post-Super Bowl edition of 32 Thoughts the Podcast.
Elliotte Friedman [00:21:06] Yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:21:07] I don't wanna talk about the Rams specifically, but congratulations. Do you want to talk about Stan Kroenke's hockey team, not his football team?
Elliotte Friedman [00:21:14] No no no no no. Let's talk about Eichel first, because that's the big news right now, Kelly McCrimmon going full Vince McMahon showman if the WWE was in charge of the National Hockey League, Jack Eichel was playing on Wednesday night against the Colorado Avalanche, and that is indeed happening.
Jeff Marek [00:21:30] Yes.
Elliotte Friedman [00:21:31] Kelly McCrimmon announcing on Monday that Eichel's gonna play and that Mark Stone is going on long term injury for as long as it takes. It will take how long it takes, we just don't know. So it's gonna be, I can already hear it, the LTIR complaints, and I am the wrong person to complain to. Number one, every pool I've been in, there are Friedman rules to stop loopholes I try to exploit. I'm big into trying to exploit loopholes and also to this, horse is out of the barn. Chicago 2015, Tampa last year, and I know there's some teams that really hate it. I know there's some people who're gonna really hate it. The way I look at it though is, we're in the entertainment business and this allows people to be entertained. I know not everybody agrees with me, but the fact is, Jack Eichel getting in there and playing and it's been established it can happen with LTIR, you can't stop it now.
Jeff Marek [00:22:31] Mark Don't-Call-Me-Kucherov Stone goes to long term injury and that's how it gets done. But this also frees up space not just for Eichel but Alec Martinez as well, we'll get there in a second. So Jack Eichel is in and playing on a line with Max Pacioretty and Evgenii Dadonov. This is a great day for hockey because Elliotte in a lot of ways, I think we've forgotten how great a hockey player Jack Eichel is. What are your expectations for Eichel come Colorado game?
Elliotte Friedman [00:22:56] Well number one, first of all, he's gonna take a hit at some point, and I just hope it all turns out okay. This has been a long road and we all know what the story has been, and Eichel is confident, they tell me he looks great. Pietrangelo says he looks great. You know the Sabres' battles with him about this, you know I got a call from somebody who defended the Sabres doctors to me just about a week or two ago, he said that their fear was, if they had a problem, is that they were extra careful. As you know, we, we spoke a lot about Eichel on this, we interviewed Eichel doctor, we had an interview with Eichel after he was traded. And someone said to me, I just think it's fair that you know that the Sabres issue the doctors was that they were just overly careful. So number one is, I hope this all works. Number two, I hope it's great, I hope he has a great performance, I hope it's fun to watch, I hope the game on Wednesday night is a fantastic game to watch, and it's great for the NHL that Jack Eichel is back. And the one thing I do think, Jeff, I think the NHL will be on the Golden Knights just to make sure, okay, you know, Stone, it's a back injury, it's legit, in no way am I questioning that it's legit because it is legit. But they'll be on him to make sure that he is... he can't come back. Because that's the one thing they do do now. They've had Weber come in and get looked at a couple of times and they'll do the same thing with Stone.
Jeff Marek [00:24:25] Do we get our Mark Stone LTIR shirts?
Elliotte Friedman [00:24:29] 18 million over the cap, like with Kucherov.
Jeff Marek [00:24:31] Oh please, she's in the playoffs, please. I just better see some Mark Stone LTIR shirts.
Elliotte Friedman [00:24:37] Before we talked about Stan Kroenke's hockey team. We should mention that Daniel Briere of the Flyers was in Colorado last week watching both their team and the Eagles. Geez I wonder what that could have been all about.
Jeff Marek [00:24:52] Is there anyone out of Philadelphia that's been tied to the Colorado Avalanche at all Elliotte?
Elliotte Friedman [00:24:58] I think Colorado's gonna a really, really interesting team. I also want to mention, I think Chicago has got maybe one more interview coming. Somebody told me that Chicago, I don't even know if this is true, but you know what the heck? That maybe Chicago's initial plan was to interview about 20 people, and now I don't think that's gonna happen. But they announced, I think what, five? And I think they've got, there's some rumour about one this week, maybe two. But I think they've got at least one more.
Jeff Marek [00:25:34] Is it a traditional hockey name? Like do you know?
Elliotte Friedman [00:25:37] I don't know yet. I'm working on that one. I had one name, I was told, and someone said to me, don't go with that, so I'm still working it as we're talking on Sunday night.
Jeff Marek [00:25:47] Mike Forde is involved in this process. You can't just limit this to hockey people.
Elliotte Friedman [00:25:52] Well, I think Jaime Faulkner is like that too. I think she's also prepared to go outside of the traditional.
Jeff Marek [00:26:00] Okay, Colorado Avalanche. Here's where we are. Boy this team is good. They just took care of the Dallas Stars 4-nothing, Darcy Kuemper with the shutout, Gabriel Landeskog with two goals, Nathan MacKinnon returns, and now Nazem Kadri has 20 goals, 62 points in 43 games. You mentioned a couple of weeks ago on Hockey Night he's now with Darren Ferris at Quartexx. He's going to be a free agent next summer, and there's gonna be a lot of teams that will be interested and the price will be high. Do you have a thought on Kroenke's hockey team here now that his football team has won the Superbowl?
Elliotte Friedman [00:26:36] Well they might get a double this year.
Jeff Marek [00:26:38] Yup.
Elliotte Friedman [00:26:38] I mean obviously I think they're really good. You know, Kuemper's been hot. I'm not convinced that they wanna go make a goalie move if they don't have to. I think they'd rather do another player. To me the thing is, MacKinnon, he's just having such a cursed year: COVID, the injuries, you know, everything around that. I just want to see MacKinnon get his game going and get back where he, we know he can be. And then I think they're gonna be just perfectly fine. You know I'm hoping that maybe all of the time off MacKinnon's had, it's gonna help him somewhere down the road because I really wanna see that guy have a great run. I love watching MacKinnon play and I, I wanna see him do well.
Jeff Marek [00:27:21] Put a horn on the helmet, the guy's a rhino. Like seriously there is no one in the game that plays like Nathan MacKinnon, and I know I've made the point before that you know, what Landeskog does on that line allows MacKinnon to freestyle and do his Nathan MacKinnon thing, but there's nobody that plays like that. There's no one that can impose their will physically with that type of skillset on the game like Nathan MacKinnon. And the interesting thing about him too is like, whenever he comes back, whether it's from COVID, whether it's from injury, he comes back and he hits the ground running. Like it's not as if he'll have like, you know, it'll take him like four or five games to get back? Like he just comes back and he's Nathan MacKinnon like today against Dallas, he just comes back and he's Nathan MacKinnon, it's like he hasn't missed any time at all he's one of the most remarkable players in the in the game today. Tomas Hertl and the San Jose Sharks. Staying in San Jose or decision at deadline?
Elliotte Friedman [00:28:16] It was interesting like Joe Will, the acting general manager, was painting a picture of real optimism. And I'm always careful about this because, you know, this is where I radio myself. I don't want to say that Tomas Hertl poured cold water on it, but what I did get a sense was Hertl was saying, wait a second, like wait a second here. From what I can tell, I don't think there's been and neither the agent who's Craig Auster nor Joe Will was gonna talk about this. But from what I can tell, I don't believe there's been a formal offer presented yet. And the way Will talked like, just in my history and my experience, I think that means that it's coming like this week or next. And sometimes teams tell me that, and even agents tell me, with some situations, you might not get your best offer until 48 hours before the trade line deadline. So we'll see what San Jose's approach is here. But the way Hertl talked about it the other day, it made me think that this is a player who at least has it in his mind, and then when you look at the way everything played out last year in the summer with things that were reported and said, this is a player who at least has thought about the possibility that I might have to leave.
Jeff Marek [00:29:37] Mhm.
Elliotte Friedman [00:29:37] Put yourself in this player's shoes, like imagine you're in a job and your contract is up or you know you're going to get another offer somewhere else and, you know, depends on how you feel about your job. Some people are like, I'm taking the best offer, I don't care which one it is, I'm not married I'm, I'm going purely for the money. Some people are like, no, I like it here and I want to stay and other people are like, you know what I'd really like to stay, but I know I may have to leave. And to me, Hertl is in that third camp. I think, yes, he'd like to stay, but I think it's already been in his head that, you know, maybe it won't be in San Jose for him. So I think on some level, he strikes me as a guy who's prepared for the possibility of that eventuality. With Landeskog last year, I really believe, like you heard the way Makar and MacKinnon talked to us right?
Jeff Marek [00:30:29] Oh yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:30:29] Like they all believed at the end of the day that it was gonna work out. And Landeskog got frustrated for a bit and things got emotional but at the end of the day they all believed it was gonna work out and the Avalanche believed it was gonna work out too. I think that Hertl and the Sharks both have to realise here that this is a player who's thought about the possibility of going elsewhere, so you have to be careful with that. That means you can't fool around as much, you have to be serious and you can't put that player in a position where he's like, forget this, I'm done. So I think the next weeks are gonna be huge. I don't think the Sharks can necessarily wait till 48 hours before the deadline to say, all right we're coming in finally their best offer. I think they've gotta come in hot and have something in the ballpark pretty quickly because Hertl basically said, I don't wanna hear anything unless my agent tells me there's something worth hearing. Like, Auster is a tough negotiator. He really fights for his clients. He's a bit of a bulldog. He's not going to Hertl with anything unless San Jose's serious. So I don't know if San Jose can fool around too much in this one.
Jeff Marek [00:31:38] You see I kind of look at this deal and say, there's two things here. One, there's the actual deal itself. And then for Hertl who, you know, let's just be honest about it, he's 28 years old, and there's been a lot of frustrating seasons in San Jose. Doesn't part of the pitch have to be, here's what our plan is for the next 3-4 years for Hertl?
Elliotte Friedman [00:32:00] I think you can see that. Like San Jose this year, they're not gonna make the playoffs, but I think they've been better than a lot of us expected. Like, didn't you think there was a chance they could be one of the worst teams in the league this year?
Jeff Marek [00:32:13] Yeah, with a handful of guys that are on monster contracts too, which makes it that much worse.
Elliotte Friedman [00:32:17] Look like the Kane thing wasn't working out there and like, whatever the truth is, I just think everyone's better off, including him, that he's not there anymore. Like Ferraro is a player, you know, the kid they drafted last year. Eklund, I think that kid's a player.
Jeff Marek [00:32:34] They like him a lot.
Elliotte Friedman [00:32:35] They're better than I thought they were gonna. Look, Burns has been really good, Couture's been really good, Hertl's been really good. You know, they need more players, but they're better than I thought they were gonna be. And this is the other question they've got is, Vlasic's starting to get really sheltered now, and they've got a lot of long term deals there, and they're gonna say, look, we've done a lot of long term deals, we don't wanna do another one, well it's not gonna work in this case. You're gonna have to do it. It's the same thing that Nashville is going through right now a bit with Forsberg. They've done a long term, a lot of long term deals.
Jeff Marek [00:33:10] Yeahhh.
Elliotte Friedman [00:33:10] Some have worked, some haven't, they're a little nervous about it. Well, it's not gonna work if you're not going to do it. Like basically Hertl threw the gauntlet. He said, this is our choice, this is what I want, and they're gonna have to come at him with that.
Jeff Marek [00:33:23] You know, one of the other interesting ones too you just mentioned his name and we had him on the podcast two years ago, and that's Mario Ferraro, who's playing 23 minutes a night. The San Jose Sharks on the top pairing with Brent Burns, he's a albeit restricted, he's a free agent at season's end. And to my knowledge they haven't opened up negotiations. He's 23 years old. You know you mentioned you know, Vlasic getting a little more sheltered here I mean, he's not due up until 2026. Here's Mario Ferraro, who's playing 24 minutes a night on the top pair. What does that next deal look like? If you're Ferraro's camp, you're probably saying, okay you know what? We won't look for the max because we think we have one more shot at big money, so maybe you get a break there Elliotte? But that's another interesting one to keep our eyes on here for San Jose. What's Mario Ferraro worth?
Elliotte Friedman [00:34:22] You know what I say when you have a good young player who's part of the core of your team?
Jeff Marek [00:34:25] Wrap him up!
Elliotte Friedman [00:34:26] You sign him as long as you can, because the price never goes down.
Jeff Marek [00:34:30] I hear you on that one. A couple of things quickly here. Winnipeg Jets fighting for their playoff lives, down 2 against Nashville on Saturday, what a comeback, Blake Wheeler.
Elliotte Friedman [00:34:38] That was a hell of a comeback.
Jeff Marek [00:34:39] Like five points for Blake Wheeler! And listen man, this one had like a playoff intensity as well. Is every game gonna be like this down the stretch for the Winnipeg Jets, where it feels like it's not three periods, but it's a, it feels like an entire season?
Elliotte Friedman [00:34:53] I think that. Because you know the problem the Jets have, and I feel like I've said this a lot is that, if you are right now outside of the playoffs looking in? It's a lot easier to be in that situation in the Pacific than in the Central. Like if you look at Winnipeg in points percentage, they're sixth in the Central right? And they're, barring major collapses, major collapses, they're not catching those top four teams. They're not catching Colorado, they're not catching Minnesota, they're not catching St. Louis, and they're not catching Nashville. So their way to the playoffs is the wildcard. And that means Dallas, that means Winnipeg, that means L.A., That means Edmonton, that means Anaheim, and even San Jose is just behind them. I really think, you know, teams can have bad nights, but they can't have any. They're not really allowed to have a bad night from here to the rest of the season. They played really, like I thought that win on Saturday night, that was a hell of a win. They played Dallas the night before, that was a really tough game, they at least got a point out of it, and then they go to Nashville and they're down 2-nothing. They will score five in a row to win that game. And you know, the other guy who I think deserves a lot of credit, you mentioned Wheeler. Connor Hellebuyck this year on back-to-back nights? His numbers are unbelievable. He's 3-and-0. And I think he's allowed six goals in three games. And we're talking, you know, well over 100 shots.
Jeff Marek [00:36:31] Okay Elliotte, let's reset quickly, come back and talk about, I want to get your thoughts, we didn't do this last week, we were packed, I wanna get your thoughts on Rosie Dimanno's piece that really raised some eyebrows and ruffled some feathers, we'll talk about women's hockey here in a couple of moments and get to some of your phone calls and emails as well. More 32 Thoughts in a moment.
Jeff Marek [00:36:59] Elliotte it's a conversation that rears its head every four years, and that is, does women's hockey belong in the Olympics? The argument goes, well there's really only two teams, Canada and the United States that compete for gold. Why should this thing be considered an Olympic event? And Rosie Dimanno, week and a half ago in the Toronto Star, weighed in, maintaining that it doesn't belong in the Olympics. That surprised some, that angered many. What are your thoughts on it?
Elliotte Friedman [00:37:29] Well first of all, whenever this argument comes up, I kind of roll my eyes at it because, it's not like women's hockey at the Olympics is going anywhere.
Jeff Marek [00:37:37] No.
Elliotte Friedman [00:37:38] No matter what anybody says, the IIHF and the IOC have made their vote, and that is that women's hockey is staying. I remember when I was going into media, I went to Western in 1989 and not long after I was, I can't remember what year it was, but the Ryerson Review of Journalism did an article about her career. And, you know, Rosie went through a lot of crap to get where she is, especially as a female reporter who covered a lot of sports. I have a lot of time for her, and you know, for one thing, I've seen her in very tough situations, just refuse to back down. I have a lot of admiration for that. I don't agree with the column. I don't agree with that point of view at all. Just to me, I roll my eyes at this argument because it's come up before, and it literally has no impact on the future of the sport at the Olympics. Like, I remember being at the 2006 Olympics in Italy, and in that tournament Canada won its round robin games by a combined score of 36 to 1. Those games were ridiculous. At that point in time, they said, look, it's not going anywhere. And actually that year, the U.S. got upset in the semis by Sweden, and Canada won the gold medal 4-1 and I remember asking Cassie Campbell-Pascall, once Canada got the lead, they basically played keepaway because they didn't want to run up the score because of all the controversy.
Jeff Marek [00:39:02] Yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:39:02] I remember in 2014 Jeff, people asked at the IIHF press conference, again as it was Canada-USA in the gold, and that was an incredible gold medal final. Still not competitive, you know, you have to take it out. And René Fasel was like, I don't know why this always comes up, we're not taking it out. So to me, whoever wants to make this argument from a media point of view, it's completely immaterial. The only thing you ever have to worry about is if somebody from like the IIHF or the IOC says it, and I just don't see that happening. But the one thing I do think about Jeff is, you know, what's the next step? You know, what can we do? And you know, one of the things I was thinking about was, I was not a huge F1 person. I like it because I like to drive fast, but I wasn't big into the sport, and then you watch that Drive to Survive, and it was so big and so good. And you see now that the tennis tours are gonna do it, the golf tour's gonna do it. And you know, the NHL's got Amazon and there's gonna be more teams that do that and, you know, football has their, the HBO show the Hard Knocks. More and more of this stuff is happening. And I really think that whether it's the Premier Hockey Federation or whether it's the PWHPA, I think what they should be aiming to do next year is this. I think they should be saying, we're gonna sell an entire Drive to Survive year. We would have a year where you're gonna say to every player, you're mic'd up the whole year. Everything you do, you're doing a year of reality TV. You know, the practises, mic'd. The games, mic'd. The meetings, mic'd. The travel, mic'd. You know I mean obviously there's gonna be some things you don't get mic'd for and the cameras aren't gonna be following you around, but that's what I think next year should be. If I was an executive, and I'm not, but if I was a sports executive, that's what I think they should consider trying is, basically it's every week there's another show like this is what happened in our league this week, and you just put the best stuff out there. And you know what part of the package is, you have to have a game of the week I think that's really important. And what I might also consider is centralising all the teams somewhere. I would hope you could find a way to pay the players or at least their living expenses to make it a lot easier on them, but pay them.
Jeff Marek [00:41:33] Mhm.
Elliotte Friedman [00:41:33] And I think you have to make sure you bring in players from other parts of the world. We all know that a lot of the players in the leagues are American and Canadian. You've gotta find a way to bring over some Swedes, some Finns, some Russians, some players from other countries. If a lot of them don't speak a ton of English, you can make that part of the show. Or maybe you find some who have decent English. I don't know the answer. But you know, that's what I'm wondering if the next step is maybe a year of Drive to Survive a women's league that is out in the open because I really think people would watch that and I think you could make stars. Tell me if you think I'm nuts.
Jeff Marek [00:42:11] No, I think you're right for a couple of reasons here. One, there is precedent for it in a lot of other sports and hearing you talk about this and we sort of talked about this I think in the first season of the podcast with the idea of doing like an HBO 24/7, but around Canada versus USA at either the World Championships or the Olympics, probably the the World Championships would make more sense. But, you know, the one thing that I'm hearing you with here, whether it's F1, which was a spectacular success. You know what this concept completely saved? And it was a gamble. And this sport was, it feels weird to say it now, but this sport was almost taking its last breath here: UFC. And you know what saved the UFC Elliotte?
Elliotte Friedman [00:43:00] What's that?
Jeff Marek [00:43:00] The Ultimate Fighter. And it all culminated in one big show. There was like a light heavyweight bracket and there was a middleweight bracket, and Forrest Griffin and Stefan Bonnar put on a fight for the ages. Like one of those fights where, you know, Twitter's going crazy and everyone's like, you gotta tune in, you gotta tune in, you gotta tune in. And between the reality show and that event delivering, the sport popped again, right? And we've talked about how, you know, big names, great fights can help pop that sport. But that reality show saved UFC. You talk to any of the fighters, they'll tell you, catch Dana White, he'll tell you how much the Ultimate Fighter season one meant for the UFC. And I'm with you 100%. And here's a, here's where this idea I think, is different than the way women's hockey has traditionally been presented. It feels as if the way it's presented is, these are two teams that respect each other and the premium is on respect. You know what we don't get a sense of at all, and I think your reality show idea would give us one?
Elliotte Friedman [00:44:06] How much they really don't like each other?
Jeff Marek [00:44:08] It's how much they can't stand each other?
Elliotte Friedman [00:44:10] Yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:44:10] Like you don't really, unless you talk to the athletes, you know, and I've had, you know, the conversations about like, who do you wish you didn't have to speak nicely about in front of a camera? And the answers like, and why, will drop your jaw. Like I remember and Cassie, we mentioned Cassie Campbell-Pascall a second ago. I remember Cassie telling me this story. I don't think this out of scope because we've talked about it on the air before. Cassie [was] telling me a story when she was playing, was one of the World Championships and the United States, had beaten Canada and in the handshake line, one player of the United States in a handshake alley, as she was shaking Cassie's hand, said something so offensive that I don't want to repeat it here Elliotte, how about that? And Cassie wrote it down and carried it with her. You know, put it in whatever rink she was in, she hung it on the wall. She kept it with her as a reminder of what this one player said to her and it burned in Cassie and that led into Salt Lake City. And then they met each other again in handshake, I remember asking her, did you say it back to her? And Cassie said, I really wanted to, but I didn't. Good on you, Cass. But Like yeah, like if you get that side of it because no one's seen that but Elliotte, everybody can relate to it, and everybody understands it, and it makes them, like in any sport, male or female, it attaches you more to the athletes when you see that side of them. I think it's a home run. This idea, what it did for F1, what it did for UFC, I think it can do for women's hockey as well. I'm with you about a million percent on this one.
Elliotte Friedman [00:45:48] Now I should say this myself that this is gonna be a chapter in my book. And I just want to say to all publishers that when I do write a book about my career, the advance is going to be worth it. So I'm not going to get into all of it right now. But we had a big meeting once at one of the places I worked at, and it was a really intense meeting, and there were a lot of really raw, honest things said. And after the meeting was over, one of the executives said, why didn't you film that meeting? We could have shown it. And, I lost my head, like I said, that is everything that is wrong right now that we had the meeting of this subject matter, and the only question was, why wasn't it filmed? So I freely admit that I am not always comfortable with the camera being everywhere in my life. But I also understand that this was several years ago. That horse is out of the barn. And you know what, I think eventually the NHL is gonna have to do more of this too. I just think that we all have to come to a point where we're understanding that those of us who are not comfortable with our lives being more and more public as opposed to private, if we're trying to sell ourselves to an audience, we have to come to grips with, that's what the audience is now starting to expect or demand.
Jeff Marek [00:47:20] I think younger athletes are more comfortable with that than older athletes.
Elliotte Friedman [00:47:24] Or older broadcasters.
Jeff Marek [00:47:25] Or older broadcasters in our case.
Jeff Marek [00:47:37] Okay, to some emails and phone calls as well, let's get to a couple of these Elliotte. Once again the, the email: 32thoughts@sportsnet.ca, the phone line, 1-866-311-3232, that is the thought line. Pruitt from California. "I was listening to another podcast.".
Elliotte Friedman [00:47:54] What!
Jeff Marek [00:47:55] Hang on, hang on.
Elliotte Friedman [00:47:58] That email's disqualified.
Jeff Marek [00:47:59] He writes--
Elliotte Friedman [00:47:59] There are no other podcasts.
Jeff Marek [00:48:02] Pruitt writes, "Sorry, I'm not exclusive to you two, and they were talking--" it's okay, we have we have an open relationship with our listeners. It's okay, you can can dance around, that's okay no problem, we're cool with it. "They were talking about how Montreal should try to find a way to move Carey Price if they can, and it made me think. What happens if a player gets treated with a retained salary and then gets bought out? Do all teams involved get cap relief or own the team who had his contract most recently?" Elliotte, bestow some wisdom upon me.
Elliotte Friedman [00:48:36] So Jeff, I do have an answer on this one. So let's basically say that, Jeff, you've been traded from team A to team B, and team A has kept 25% of your salary. If you get bought out by team B, the retention is now replaced by 25% of the buyout.
Jeff Marek [00:48:54] Okay that makes sense.
Elliotte Friedman [00:48:55] Yes. I believe that happened with Dion Phaneuf when he went from Ottawa to L.A.
Jeff Marek [00:49:01] To L.A.? Yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:49:02] Yes. And L.A. bought him out, so his cap hit changed for the Senators on the buyout.
Jeff Marek [00:49:08] Pruitt from California thanks so much for that email. Corey from Grand Rapids. "After seeing Matthew Tkachuk's between the legs goal to put the Flames up 5-nothing in the third against Vegas.".
Jeff Marek [00:49:28] He's done that to a bunch of teams, by the way.
Elliotte Friedman [00:49:30] It's happening more and more now.
Jeff Marek [00:49:32] Nashville--
Elliotte Friedman [00:49:32] I really give credit to the skill of the players, I really do.
Jeff Marek [00:49:36] He's done that against the Preds, he's done it against the Sharks, he's done it against the Rangers like, Tkachuk's adding up here.
Elliotte Friedman [00:49:44] By the way I wanted to mention to you that Max was skating, he has skating on Sundays.
Jeff Marek [00:49:49] Oh yeah?
Elliotte Friedman [00:49:49] And some other--like there's a bunch of kids on the on the ice, it's basically a complete free for all. And there were some kids practising the uh--
Jeff Marek [00:49:57] Oh yeah, the Michigan.
Elliotte Friedman [00:49:58] No no no, not the Michigan. They were doing that too, but they were also doing the Zegras to Milano over the net play, you know, from the game that Buffalo won.
Jeff Marek [00:50:06] As we all know, the Buffalo Sabres won that game and we didn't have to apologise for it and great job with the violin kickoff last podcast.
Elliotte Friedman [00:50:13] Yes that was good Amil.
Jeff Marek [00:50:13] Amil that was outstanding. Well listen, my youngest son, Brody in his game in Kingston on Sunday, one of the players on his team was behind the net and defenceman on either side, and much like Trevor Zegras, tried to lift it over the net to get a pass out in front. Like kids are watching.
Elliotte Friedman [00:50:32] Yeah.
Jeff Marek [00:50:33] Shoutout Cam DeCosta for trying that move. Okay! "I wondered about unwritten rules in hockey. How do players look at goals like that? Elliotte has covered baseball, major league teams don't steal bases or swing at three and no pitches, Fernando Tatis notwithstanding I suppose.".
Jeff Marek [00:51:12] "Outside of fighting, are there any unwritten rules in the NHL?" Oh boy, are there. The one obvious one to me is when you're blowing a team out, you don't put on your first unit powerplay.
Elliotte Friedman [00:51:24] Yeah. That's probably the biggest one that I can think of is do you put your powerplay out there when you're winning big? You know, for example, that happened in Montreal-Minnesota, this year. Minnesota had their powerplay out late against Montreal, and the Canadians were mad.
Jeff Marek [00:51:40] Yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:51:40] And that was the game where Pezzetta ran Dumba with 10 seconds left.
Jeff Marek [00:51:44] Usually when one team, like when there's an issue between teams, sometimes that's the not-so-subtle screw you from one team to another. We're blowing you out and we're putting our first unit powerplay out there. Not touching the goalies' water bottle would be another one. Not shooting the puck in the other team's net during warmup or after warmup, and you referenced the Flyers-Montreal Canadiens a couple of podcasts ago.
Elliotte Friedman [00:52:09] Boxcar Hospodar.
Jeff Marek [00:52:10] Eddie Hospodar in there. No high shots during warm up. Goalies don't like that one at all.
Elliotte Friedman [00:52:16] No, definitely not. Even in practise they don't like that.
Jeff Marek [00:52:18] How about not mentioning shutouts?
Elliotte Friedman [00:52:19] I think that's stupid but, it is kind of an unwritten rule in broadcasting.
Jeff Marek [00:52:25] No stepping on logos.
Elliotte Friedman [00:52:26] Yes, that's definitely, it's not an unwritten rule, that's pretty much a rule. So put them on the ceiling.
Jeff Marek [00:52:32] What's Arizona gonna do then? Is it going to be a Sun Devil logo in the dressing room or is it, don't step on the logo? Oh it's not our logo, go ahead!
Elliotte Friedman [00:52:40] You are more concerned about the Arizona logo than the people who work at the university.
Jeff Marek [00:52:48] I know one unwritten rule! And this is a media one. We've talked about this plenty of times. If you rip someone, you have to show up to practise the next day.
Elliotte Friedman [00:52:56] And by the way I know that there were a lot of people who were wondering about that whole thing with Connor McDavid saying, you know, "Spec can I talk to you" the other day?
Jeff Marek [00:53:05] Yeah.
Elliotte Friedman [00:53:09] I will say this, as a media member, I will take that a thousand times out of a thousand. If you're really pissed off at something I say, and you wanna talk to me about it, by all means say, I wanna talk to you, and it's happened to me before. I have all the time in the world for that. I will never, ever have a problem with that. Never. I did talk to Mark about it. I think that's up to Mark to decide what he wants to say. But if it was my shoes and that was me, I got all the time in the world for you calling me up like that. No problem at all.
Jeff Marek [00:53:42] Let's get a couple of voicemails in here. The thought line, Janet, oh man Janet Crosscheck is a regular, she's awesome, let's hear from Janet Crosscheck.
Caller [00:53:51] [Jeff, Elliotte, Janet Crosscheck on the Twitters and the Gram. Forgive me if I missed it, however, stuck in the states, what can you do? What is the origin story of Elliotte's nickname Friedge? Because you know what, is fits him, but I don't have any, I've never heard of that, I have no idea, and I'm really--inquiring minds wanna know. Thanks!]
Elliotte Friedman [00:54:13] Hey, Janet, well, the person who deserves credit for naming me Friedge is a broadcaster and former boxer by the name Spider Jones. And so, when I first started out, one of my first big breaks, actually my first real big break was volunteering at the fan radio station, and Spider was an really entertaining broadcaster who really had an ability to connect with people, but he was terrible at pronouncing names. He just wasn't very good at it. Some people have these things. That's why, you know, people used to call Bieksa Bieska because you just can't do it. And so Spider, as great as a guy is he is, just a great teammate he is, he was terrible at pronouncing names. And there was, you know, one night where he would say the sports update and I was volunteering, doing late night sports updates on the show. And he would say, coming up next with the update is Elliotte Friedge. And once he called me Eric Friedge.
Jeff Marek [00:55:09] That's awesome.
Elliotte Friedman [00:55:10] And this is 1994 I think.
Jeff Marek [00:55:13] Yeah!
Elliotte Friedman [00:55:13] And it stuck. Everybody just started calling me Friedge. Gord Stellick still calls me Friedge, he was at the FAN back then. Brian Speer, who's the producer of the studio show for Hockey Night in Canada, he still calls me Friedge. He was a producer at the Fan back then. So it's pretty funny how that all started and it stuck.
Jeff Marek [00:55:32] I don't know, I didn't know it was Spider that did. Spider was huge for me. He put me on the air on his show, and I had no business being on like I was a overnight call screener for his show. Stroumboulopoulos was the overnight board op and I don't know if he was bored or weren't getting calls, he'd just throw me on and we--I had no business being on the air. I remember once, oh he told me the funniest stories, cause I always, because I'm a big boxing guy, and I used to always ask him about his boxing career because he was a, Spider Chuck Jones like a really good boxer. And like Spider. I never saw you fight, what kind of boxer were you? And he told me, he goes, oh man I was dirty, I was dirty. So give me an example of something you did that was dirty. Like what made you a dirty boxer? And he's like, you know what I used to do? Before a fight I would put pepper in my afro, and then I'd get in real tight on a guy and rub it in his eyes. And then we'd have a referee call for a break and his eyes would be watering, and it was easy for me at that point. Spider, I have all the time in the world for--that guy gave me so many breaks when I deserved exactly none of them. I got nothing but great things to say about Spider Jones, the great Spider Jones.
Elliotte Friedman [00:56:42] I gotta tell you that was actually more devious than I expected. I didn't know what I was expecting, but that was pretty devious.
Jeff Marek [00:56:48] Pepper! He's like man I would fill my afro full of pepper man, I'm telling you, just pepper pepper. Anyway. Let's finish up with an email from Paige Dean, who is a diehard Flames fan living in Edmonds. Okay! "Regarding the conversation on a recent pod about brothers fighting in NHL history, of course the Sutters are in the conversation. Now with the next generation of Sutters in the league and a recent incident, I wonder about family communication or confrontation. Juuso Valimaki was injured by Brett Sutter, son of Darryl. Then in his return, scraps with Brett leading to an altercation with the official that ultimately led to his suspension. Is there a phone call between Darryl and Brett to leave my prospect alone?" I have a hard time thinking that Darryl would call Brett on that one but, you have a thought on that one Friedge?
Elliotte Friedman [00:57:41] I doubt that Darryl would call Brett on that. I will say this that, when Darryl was fired as general manager of the Calgary Flames, Brent was the head coach. And they had a feud over it. As a matter of fact, I can't remember, I know I wrote it in one of my old blogs, but one of them was actually trying to fire the other one and got fired.
Jeff Marek [00:58:09] Oh geez.
Elliotte Friedman [00:58:10] So like, I think if I remember correctly, I think Darryl was trying to fire Brent, and he got fired. I remember I wanted to interview them about that, and, like Darryl, in no uncertain terms told me what was gonna be happening about the possibility of that interview, which was a pretty funny conversation actually. I do think they have battles from time to time, but I can't imagine that Darryl would call Brett about that one.
Jeff Marek [00:58:40] No, that incident, and I'll link to the incident on Twitter in that scenario were Valimaki gets the suspension for getting rough with the referee. So in that video, you see Cameron Gaunce, who's a defenceman for the Ontario Reign, talking to Valimaki and then mocking him by like running his fingers over his helmet, mocking that he's running his fingers through his hair. So when I got this email, I said, okay I gotta find out more about this incident after watching the video, so I called Cameron Gaunce, and here's the story behind that entire sequence. So, yeah, Sutter and Valimaki had something going our game and in that game as well, Martin Frk caught Valimaki with a thunderous hit like really caught him and all the guys, like it was one of those hits Elliotte apparently where everybody is concerned on the ice right away, like, ooh, that looks like a bad one. Everybody's, you know, concerned about Valimaki but he waved everybody off and, you know, sat up and I don't know if he took his helmet off or his helmet was off and Valimaki's got the long feathers and he started running his fingers through his hair, sort of indicating that, yeah, I'm fine, no problem. And then this incident started, and Cam said, you know, he went over to Valimaki and said, what are you doing like you've got a head injury and you're trying to start fights and Valimaki said, I don't have a head injury I'm fine. And that's why Cam kind of said, like, well, then what are you doing like with the whole act with like running your fingers through your, your hair, like running your fingers through your feathers? And that's why Gaunce at that time started mocking him by, in true hockey fashion, strutting past him, pretending to run his fingers through his hair. Cam, by the way, did want me to mention if I'm telling the story that one of the reasons why he did it is he's envious that Valimaki has the long hair because there's no way that Cam Gaunce could even come close to growing it. So that's the the backstory on the Valimaki, Sutter, and Cameron Gaunce story with the with the Ontario Reign and the Stockton Heat. We'll end the podcast with an AHL story, thanks to everybody who emailed in and used the thought line as well. Okay Elliotte, just mentioning Martin Frk there a second ago, this year at the NHL skills competition there was an invitation to Zdeno Chara of the Islanders to come back, participate in the hardest shot, he politely declined. They would all would have loved to have seen Chara do it one more time, but it's not to be. How about next year at the, the All-Star Game in Florida? Bring in another specialist. How about bringing in Martin Frk to crank it up because you know that guy's got a hammer of a shot. So bring in one American Hockey League ringer just to give the AHL a little bit of love.
Elliotte Friedman [01:01:28] I don't have a problem with that. I like to be inclusive, and if you want to bring in a great player to challenge people, I'm really good with that. I will say this. I know it's come up before and I've heard that the reaction is, the NHL All-Star Game should be for NHL players. I don't think it was just one person who thought that, I think that was kind of an overwhelming feeling. So until that changes, I don't see it happening.
Jeff Marek [01:01:55] I just want to see Frk shoot the puck again, god that guy can hammer it.
Elliotte Friedman [01:01:58] Yes, he can.
Jeff Marek [01:02:00] Taking us out, a musician from Vancouver. Marty Zylstra has dropped a pair of records that come with their own unique sound. The first single from Zylstra's his latest album pens a love letter to the sounds of the late 60s and early 70s. From Boom Chicka here's Marty Zylstra with Rattle the Glass on 32 Thoughts the Podcast. Enjoy.