Sept 11, 2026: Prospects open Canucks season; Cootes in the NHL?

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1:21So here's some price for Friday, September 11th, 2026, where a presentation of Bet365 at Bet365, boring games, a thing in the past. Now, there's always a reason to tune in. Even if the score isn't one of them, download the app today. Must be 19 plus, please play. Responsibly, Mancecarrice, Blake Price. Micro-attersen, hit and switch is conducting things. If you're watching on YouTube, remember hit that subscribe button. Same goes if you're listening on the audio podcast. And as always, we appreciate the likes. How are you? I'm good. I'm good. Nice to see that we're still getting a little bit of summer weather here, even if it's not hot per se, but we're still getting it out. We're not dodging rain drops just yet, which is nice.

2:25I was on the golf course yesterday, though. And I think we teed off like 230. Like 330. I was in long sleeves. I know. It was too much. I was in the shade with the wind up. It is still not. And the brightness too, right? Like it's starting to get darker early, all that little depressing on that front. We're hanging on. Enjoy the weekend. Where are you off today, MLS duty? Yes. Denver Montreal in Denver. The last place team of the CF Montreal. We're pretty good here, though, against the White Caps. They did. We can go Wednesday and we'll see the White Caps there at CF Montreal next week, Canadian Championship Series. Anyways, more on them later. Let's get to our top story brought to you by Yellow Dog Brewing. In the neighborhood brewing Yellow Dog Sparrow and Foolish Winery. Players, some of them professionals already in Kinnux sweaters team issued on the ice

3:30with Kinnux coaches presiding. That's right, everybody. Hockey season is here. Kinnux prospect. Showcase goes this weekend versus the Seattle Kraken prospects. This of course is the replacement for the young star's events that was so beloved in Pentectin for all those years. And no third overall pick Caleb Maholtra will not participate. He's at Boston University already and won't be available to the Kinnux until the terrier season is complete. But fellow first round pick Adam Novotny will be there with an outside chance to make the team and get a look. See before returning to junior and of course, so well braided in Coots, the 2025 first round pick who has the best chance of making this team amongst the forward prospects. More on him in a moment. So two will second round pick Brooks Regowski, the hulking six foot seven American center

4:34of the O H L's Aushua generals. Pick in the second round this year and 2025 second round pick gold tender Alexei Medvedev of the O H L's London Knights who struggled last weekend in Victoria in a junior hockey Dub Meets O tuna. We will not break down the line rushes today at practice, but we will point out that they did put the beef together. Regowski, Aurexan and Brimmer, the shortest of them being six foot four. That's the diminutive player on the line. Do you have the weights there as well? Because Aurexan is listed at six foot six. This is the big Swedish swinger. They took a couple of years ago, played last year for the Abbotsford Kinnux, who's got a chance just on sheer mass alone, right? Because if you can do anything with the pocket six six to forty or whatever he's tipping, you're going to get an opportunity that the smaller man doesn't need list to say.

5:37Brimmer listed six four two oh five. Okay, that's big, but that's conventional. Where's Brimmer from? Brimmer is Ontario boy. Okay, Markham. But like he's just a free agent, he's not a drafty. I think he was there last year, wasn't he? Regowski six seven two thirty. Did Kinnux drafted this guy or? No, no, I don't think so. No, I didn't think so. Regowski's what? Six seven two thirty five. I mean, that's like NCAA power forward. Yeah. Brimmer was another one of the late college guys, RIT last year. Oh, okay. He played the 13 games like Bennett Schumack. We will get to in a second. Yeah, I'll be extended. Massive humanities. Forward time Mueller and defenseman, Carill, Kudra Atsev are at the prospect showcase. Both have played NHL games.

6:39Memorial Cup champion Ben Shorot. Winger with the kitchen or rangers. Of course, lifted the trophy in Colona. Last May. He's there. We talked about him a lot last year because he has already outperformed his draft spot. Looks like he could be a very useful serviceable middle six, bottom six, Winger going forward. As his defenseman, Sawyer, Minho, let's not forget about him. Cam Loops boy, third round pick, Canadian world junior, Abbotsford, Kinnux class here. Has developed each year? Yep. Not meteoric, but developed. Right. The one guy and he's already name checked him that I know Blake wants to talk about is college free agent, Winger, Bennett, Schumack, who made quite an impression at Abbotsford last season after signing out of Arizona State. Catch the mop on. And we're not breaking down lines, but he is going to be given an opportunity this weekend to look the best, perhaps, playing alongside, breaking coots.

7:42And you know, that'll allow him to pick up where he left off last year, which is dropping in, playing the Bakers does in 13 games, as the aforementioned Austin Brummer did. But he was nearly a point per game, 11 points, five goals, six assists, well-rounded, right-shot, right-winger from Mendota Heights, Minnesota. And not promising anything, but just it was an intrigue, Bakers does in games there. And we would like to see more just during 23 this summer. Well, and Tragan also because he was better than a point per game player in his final two seasons at Arizona State, he spent his first two years at Providence College. And look, maybe it's not uncommon for freshmen or even sophomores to put up huge point totals, particularly at schools that have hockey history and are able to recruit good players. So he transferred to Arizona State, which is the Division I hockey program now. Remember Mullet, Irina.

8:43And took off 37 points in 35 games and then 43 points in 35 games the year after it looks a little bit more just flatly on paper as a playmaker than he does a finisher. He was also a USHL champion at Sue City, we should mention. So like, look, he went undrafted as college free agents are undrafted. But there's some decent pedigree here. You go back and look at his career arc. Yeah, not a lot of down years. He's made the most of his opportunities given intriguing me again, something the monitor, not likely to vie for an initial game in the first half of the season. If you look really good though, and I was for up until new years, who knows? Remember, he's older guy 23. So showing the ability to play HL hockey so easily coming out of college, it bodes well. Mike, if you can put the roster back up there for a second, I want to go down and name check a few other names here.

9:44Now Ilya Safinoff was signed going back to last year, a European Russian free agent. He's a big centerman. And look, there are a lot of guys on this list, folks. Certainly the guys who are going to be in Abbotsford. I mean, some of them are going to be dispatched to junior and so be it. But certainly the guys who are in Abbotsford who could very well play NHL games this year. And we say that because look, the connox roster is not chalk a block without standing NHL talent. We all know guys at pen, they can't be removed. Right. Right. But also, you know, injuries will be a thing. They always are. And then of course, we do suspect at some point, trades will be a thing. And NHL veterans will be shipped out creating more opportunities for the HL players. Safinoff would be one of those guys with opportunities.

10:46And he's a certified pro. He was a decent K HL player. He's 25 now this summer. So like this is a guy that he's trying to be an HLer now. Right. We mentioned Mueller. He played some NHL games last year. Right now the betting money. He's probably an HL professional. But who knows? He's got an opportunity to change that. We mentioned all Rickson. We mentioned Schimmick. Sherat as well. Riley Patterson and Riley Patterson has done some very good work in junior intrigued by him at the Ontario hockey league level. Then on defense, I think we're just looking at minio and kudra ads. I mean, maybe one of those other names surprises us, but nobody on the cusp. And then the goal tenders, okay, Medvedev will go back to play junior and really needs a good year because I'm not sure his draft plus one season was ideal, but they stretch.

11:48One point started seeding starts in that London night's crease. But the other two goal tenders, Ty Young and I and Akku Kaskinvo, can I extract picks? With of course input from director of goal tending in Clark or former director of goal tending in Clark now a scout, but one of the best goal tending minds eyes in the world in Clark. So they've both been blessed by him. They're going to get more chances to play American hockey league games this season. And look, I can't expect there will be a ton of opportunity in the NHL crease. Like even if that should have co misses a ton of time and he's not ready yet. I look like an antelopeia, we're going to get a lot of run there. I think it would take something pretty severe if one of them seed starts out of performance

12:54to one of these young goal tenders. And then of course, if Demko comes back at some point, then it may even be tough for tole a pillow to get in a NHL crease time. But a couple of injuries and all of a sudden one of these guys could very well be the backup if they don't sign the PTO, Chris Dreecher to a contract. Yeah, and I understand bring injury, Dreecher in. It behooves them to do so and have that in their back pocket. But I don't think you twist in the win too much like in previous years when you're trying to be a playoff team and you've got this sort of setup for goal tending, you might be a little bit queasy about the prospect of throwing in Cascinville or young in for a start or two. I don't think you're that queasy about it this year. If they needed literally a one or two game stopgap, I think you're fine. I think you don't want them to be the number ones at any point. But if they're just backing up and giving one of the other two guys a rest, I'm okay.

13:55I do want to underline Patterson one more time though for this reason. He played all of last year as a 19 year, like finished the year, birthday is in late March. So he's going to play most of this year as a 20 year old, like 90% of this year will be played as a 20 year old player at the HL level. Matt. Right shot center. Again, intrigued. Won't play an NHL game this year. But large sums of money on it. But in terms of how he know this is a well above a point per game player in the HL last year. So how he develops this year, I'm going to be very intrigued. Well, the thing that struck me and he played for a HL games last year and he did manage a couple of points in those games. The thing that struck me about Patterson when you just look at his hockey card, a lot of first year, O H L players do not put up a lot of points. And they don't put up a lot of points because they tend to not have forward rolls on the team. Some of those O H L rosters can be quite good.

14:55I mean, look at kitchen or winning last year. London has historically been chalk a block with great prospects. And that was his first year and his draft year. So yeah, that added pressure. But the kid played junior A and then he stepped into a Barry Colts team and put up 62 and 68. Yeah, like as an O H L rookie. 29 goals. It's pretty good. And that was 59 and 64 the next year, Barry. So maybe stagnated a little bit didn't improve all that much at least in point totals. Although they went to the playoffs, had a pretty good run and he played okay there too. Yeah, 12 and 60. And then as he mentioned, explodes last year. I mean, 40 goals and 60 games for Niagara. And not as it's 20 year old. Yeah, over age. That's right. So yeah, something to watch. Yeah, I mean, and they're all lottery tickets. But as we have long set on this program, it's been more than a day. It's been 12 years, 13 years. Just collect lottery tickets.

15:56And the connoisseur maybe do for a surprise offensive prospect. Like it's been, they've had surprise defensive prospects. Elias Patterson most notably, perhaps. Kudraettes have. I think as well. Yeah, even Minio is tracking in the right direction. But when's the last time I like an offensive player surprise? Well, are we okay, draft pick different, but are we putting Lena's Carlson in that category? After 15 goals last year? Yeah, no, I'm not going to put him in the category. He was in five. He was in five on a trade from San Jose, of course. No, it's duly noted. Talking about a guy that you scouted, you picked all that sort of stuff offensively. Yeah, like I wouldn't put a Dakota, Josh White, no prospect bucket, right? He was more just a late brewing pro. Yeah, I'm going to put Carlson closer to that than I am. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. So, you know, when's the last time I was forward surprised? I don't know. I mean, Sasson's been a nice college free agent. But surprise. And hadn't scored some goals last year.

16:58Yeah, like other teams get like stars out of the fourth and fifth round. And the connects aren't exactly doing that. Niels Holglander, look like he might be that. Yeah. But then ultimately, no. I'm, I'm, I'm, I know, I know what you're talking about. You're, you're like, you know, show me a Jesper brat, a sixth round pick that turns into a frontline NHL score. Yeah, something like that. And you can say, all those don't come around very often. No, that's true. That's true. But the connection do for that. Like, like, like, I'm scrolling through their draft picks, folks, and I don't see any of them. I mean, Desalto's burrows count undrafted. He sort of counts, I guess, but you'd like somebody that you actually did homework on, decided he was worthwhile and actually band out. Right. And I don't see one. Right. Like, we hope it would be Adam Goddatt, a hobby baker winner, right? So really, the, the last regular pseudo star, and this is even pushing the boundary of

17:59the word star, but notable player Mason Raymond, 51st overall in 2005. And again, that's a lower case S star. Yannick Hansen is the best example, maybe, although they have similar stats. And he, of course, was a ninth round pick. So they did it back to back years and old 4 and old 5. No, they're, they're due. Yeah, they're due. In fact, if you want to say like, just beyond the first round, and that's a pretty low bar, but yeah, sure. Yeah, let's go even that. If you want to say beyond the first round, just beyond the first round, of course, at one point, we were hoping, maybe it's didn't look like a moment. Yes. Some of you older heads may remember, we got a little bit excited there about Ty Madden, Jonah Gadgevic, Cole Lind. There was a blip there on William Lockwood.

19:03Cole Castles, remember the McDavid Stopper? Yeah, yeah. Really? Yeah. Oh, my goodness. Anton Rodin. But if you're just going to tell me beyond the first round, and he's not here at the prospects camp, how about Nicholas Aaron Moulson, the Norwegian kid they took in the second round? Yeah, so 41 years old, sorry, 41st overall, and there were a lot of people who thought he was closer to being in mid 20s, late round pick, and he was at for the value was tremendous. And look, he's playing in the Swedish top division, or at least he finished last season in the Swedish top division, and did not put up a single point in 16 games. He was awfully young. He only turned 18 in April. He's a shooter. He's a score. He was twice a 20 goal score, and in 42 and 29 games in the Swedish junior ranks being, well, far better than a point per game player, nearly a point and a half game player.

20:07Actually, yeah, point and a half game player in the second year in the Swedish junior ranks. And he's a pretty well put together kid too. And of course, he gets all that opportunity on any Norwegian national team because they just don't have the depth that he plays in a front line scoring role and has to be the man. And I think you can say something for that that, you know, sometimes being put in that spot, being relied on to be a scorer on any team, even a rep team, means you just move more comfortably into that role. So give me Aaron Wilson as the kid is going to surprise as a... Offensive, an offensive surprise from a Kinnux draft. Maybe it's Shorot going forward. Who knows the way he played last year in junior and I suspect Gabe Shorot will be a Abbots for Kinnux.

21:07In short order, he has played three full seasons in the American hockey. Although, yeah, he'll be 20 later this month. Shorot. All right. So looking forward to Kinnux on ice in sweaters under the guise of Kinnux coaches, with the guidance, with neutral officials, paid officials, refereed, like real hockey games, not scrimmages, not captains, skates. Yeah. One times. Minus the captain. And then training camp is next up in Panticton, of course, where people will be able to pay a visit to Yellow Dog and neighborhood brewing in person, of course. They can probably get this next beer on tap up there. It's the big dog's big dog. The played deadter IPA. It's a double west coast IPA. It hits with a wave of tropical fruit citrus and a hint of pine balanced by the smooth

22:10bitterness and clean, dry, finished, dangerously drinkable still with its heftiness. Play deadter doesn't just play it dominates. Check it out. Next time you're drinking Yellow Dog. Let's get to our poll question. We're asking you, Braden Coots plays 42 NHL games this season. You going over, you going under vote at the S&P XN YouTube channels. Of course, Coots is going to be a part of the prospect showcase. Let's face it with no Caleb Melholtrich here. He is the apple in this showcases eye. He is the player who the conucks have the highest hopes for. And this is a player whom we've discussed over the course of the summer. In fact, we discussed over the course of last summer too, because he not only showed up to training camp as a first round pick out of the Western league, but he looked awesome in training camp. And then he looked awesome in preseason games.

23:14And he forced the Vancouver conucks hand to keep him past the roster deadline and into the NHL regular season. Now he got into three games and was overmatched. And that's not surprising because the difference in intensity and aptitude goes up several times over moving from preseason to regular season games. So he was dispatched back to junior and played on the Canadian World Junior team before going on a run, getting traded, going on a run with Prince Albert in the Western hockey league playoffs. Now, interesting wrinkle for Coots this year with a new NHL rule. And that allows you to place one 19 year old player in the American hockey league. So last year it was either junior or NHL for Coots. That was the decision that Adam Foot and his staff had to make, I suppose with management's input as well. Pretty customary decision. Yeah, this year it's a three pronged decision.

24:16And many believe because of this new rule that that is where Braden Coots will start the season. And further that many others believe that Braden Coots will be dispatched in early December to the Canadian World Junior outfit again, whereby he would stand to play an even bigger role than what he played last season. So as we sit here and break down the poll question and why 42 you may ask, well, that's the exact midpoint of a now 84 game NHL regular season. We're adding two games for maybe two to 84. So basically we're asking does he play more half the year in the national hockey league? I look, I think it's a big ask because if he does start now, it's firt and he is dispatched to the world juniors, then he only comes back what, for a second week of January from hockey Canada. And then pretty much has to be a regular from that point forward if he's going to get to

25:2042 games. That's true. He's behind the April to do that because the juniors. So he almost has to force his way into the NHL lineup within the first two months before we start sending player talk he Canada for a world junior camp. And if he does that or if he even plays enough games in these first couple of months, goes to the world juniors and then comes back and becomes regular, those are the routes to which he gets a half season of NHL duty in. I like there's no chance he becomes one of those young kids that just the NHL team doesn't like go to the world juniors. Did he play so well at the NHL level? No, no, totally disagree. Yeah. Yeah. Well, like look who they're playing down the middle. You can't until proven otherwise sadly, you can't count on Filipino. One hit away.

26:22That's who Ratu was awful last year. I mean, it was a really big step backwards. Yeah, let's take a look at this. Good timing here. David Quadrilla just sketched this out in his piece today. So no sign of Coots here in his, and it doesn't mean the Coots isn't the 13th guy in Quads' mind, but probably won't be the 13th guy because you want him playing. Yeah. Watching too. I mean, watching opening night, I could see a coach taking about saying it doesn't want the pressure and hype of opening night to affect them. This assumes that he does ready to go and he does is pronounce 100% healthy. That's for sure. But whether or not the connex organization after all that he has gone through just says, yeah, come on in. Everything's normal. I don't know. Maybe they're going to slow play Filipino a little bit and say we're going to make one trillion percent sure that you are ready to go. I mean, I don't know. Anyway, slice of Blake. I mean, for me, Coots is the fifth center organizational center.

27:23So if you got one entry at center, he might be the fourth. Well, that's it. Like he's no worse than the fifth NHL center. Yeah. I mean, it's barring Saf and off, making a big impression as Blake mentions, the 25-year-old season pro, right? Yeah, like so. You got like six seasons in the game, you know, he's been playing pro hockey a long time. Yeah. I killed Thomas came over from the LA Kings organization. So one time second round pick of the Kings, who of course is known by the new AGM and GM of Abbots for Celi. But he has been a not even a very fruitful A gel player. So I'm not a new. Time Mueller, as we talked about, got into NHL games last year, but there is a question about whether Mueller projects us at NHL center or if he's going to have to move to the fourth. Flying center, that's possible for time Mueller. Yeah. Again, possible. There are some other, I mean, Chase Wilder's Matt Steinberg. There's some other sort of career minor pros who might enter the chat here for one reason

28:28of the other. Of course, new coaching staff. New coaching staff, there would no waters well, right? Because Manny and his lead assistant have coached him for some time. New management. Maybe Ron Johnson has always felt one of these guys to reserve more of an opera. Forginger Dean, the Natum Futter, Rick Talkett was willing to give them. But yeah, like, just bring it up again, Mike. Here's the other thing. And this is something that we've talked about in the past with the connox. But more vis-a-vis looking at the connox roster and comparing contrasting with other NHL rosters. Can you remember, St. Louis was big on this back in the day. There's not even a hybrid there, right? No. Like, there's a lot of NHL teams who have their four centers. But when they get an injury down the middle, they have a winger who has played a lot of center ice in his career. In a lot of cases, NHL center ice says, well, right?

29:30They're just so deep at center ice position. They flip one of them over to the wing. You know, as Blake always says, it's pretty easy to play the wing if you've already played center. You're going up and down. It's a simpler, more straight line game. It's very much more difficult for a winger to go on over and play the center ice position. But like you look at these connox wingers, Debrusk, Baster, Ogrin, Linus Carlson. You go back long enough Carlson was a second. If you go deep enough in, yeah. But Lackramacky, poor Drew O'Connor had to masquerade as the center last year after they had the injuries early on to Teddy Bluger and Philip Heidel. Maybe Paul, maybe Paul Conner, but like you don't even really have hybrids here. And in fact, you know, there's some believe that he'll, the he'll might be a little better surf playing the wing given his concussion history than being in the middle of the ice more often and taking those, those unsuspecting heavy hits at speed.

30:36Okay, before we move on, keep it up here, Mike. And for those of you on podcast, first line, Patterson, Debrusk on his left, Linus Carlson on his right. Second line, Rossi with Liam O'Grant on his left, Brock Besser on his right. Matt, I know there's some hope bets a little bit with Linus Carlson and Liam O'Grant respectively. But the other four are certified in a shell top six players. Like, I don't mind that top six for the connox. Again, not for the Stanley Cup contention here, but just in terms of viability of scoring a few goals and entertaining people at Roger Zarina, like the top six is not horrific. It's not assuming everybody plays as they normally do. And in the least, Patterson's case, I don't know what that means. But you know what I'm saying. So I would agree the top four is not horrific. I'm not sure I'd say horrific, but top six is certainly lacking until proven otherwise.

31:39This question marks on each of the lines, and O'Grant and Carlson. But I really liked how the bro line looked last year with Rossi centering O'Grant and Besser down the stretch. Brock played some pretty good hockey down the stretch. Let's remember because he had not played good hockey previous to that. And we think O'Grant's coming. Tools are definitely there. He already had a big summer, Cameron Robinson reporting. And I'll say this about Besser and to a lesser degree about Patterson because the character. Besser in particular, I think a lot of the veterans last year, remember, they started last year as our predictions that we showed you yesterday and the day before proved there was expectation of playoffs, nay contention last year. And so I'm not saying that guys took to the ice with the expectation, like just expecting it to be easy. But deep in the recesses of the brain, missing the playoffs was not a huge fear of theirs. I don't think when they got on the ice. Now when it's not a huge expectation of theirs, I wonder if there's a more giddy up in

32:46Besser and maybe Debruski's wall to start the season. God, God, I would hope so. Before the depression hits and the depression will eventually hit them. Mike put it back up for a second. Honestly, Mike just leave it until we try to do this. So this question marks Carlson and Overn. Yeah. Here's what I will say. If one of them flunks out, maybe Lecromacky with the first round pedigay and the big shot, you don't want them playing with skill, Lecromacky and creative players because I'm not sure he flourishes without. We saw some really good moments from Drew O'Connor. Okay, maybe not a quintessential top six. I think we can all say that. So maybe a couple of patches in the dam. If it falls apart or if you get an entry there, maybe even caught her with the way he transports the puck. His friend Karato was telling us earlier in the week that he does a really great job of getting the puck in his own zone and skating it through centerized neutral zone into the

33:46offensive zone, which you don't really see a lot of from bottom six wingers, right? They tend not to want to handle the puck for that length of time. The other thing we should add going back to the discussion about the hybrids and who's your fifth organizational center. Max Sassen has played who is not in this starting 12 by quadrally. Max Sassen has of course played NHL center for the Vancouver Conucks. We do think in the last coach, in fact, I think the last two coaches believe this, that Max Sassen is better equipped to be a winger in the national. I saw a young player last time. That transition is something that has already been underway and is the hope for the organization. But I suppose there is a world where if you lose the center isemen and you're asking yourself okay, who's next man up, that it is Max Sassen overbred. He was a greater than two to one ratio of goals to assist last year.

34:48If you're going to be that as a center in the NHL, it better be 50 goals, 25 assists. It's not for Max Sassen. At 13 goals, six assists, I don't think that's the makeup of an NHL center for me. He was the third highest goals per game on the team last year. Yeah. Yeah, very side-youngish for sure. Well, the other thing is he lost 58% of his face-offs. He won just 42% of his face-offs. So he wasn't holding his own in the face-off circle either for those of you who... He can show flashes of great skill, but I'd rather see that down the wing with a simpler job assignment for sure. Yeah. But again, if he'll went down in the opener, who would be the fourth, who would be one on the four center in game two, it could very well be Sassen overcoots. We should note that before we leave the discussion. Okay. Oh, yes, coots. Does he play 42 NHL games? So look, mentioned it's a big ask, but the routes are make the team out of camp.

35:57Force your way into the lineup in the first couple of months of the season. Become a full-time NHLer in the second half of the season and just by the hair on your chin, each inch in, get to 42 NHL games. Injury forces you into the lineup. He'll get moved to wing for his own safety and security. Or there's a... Ratu fails out because you have to think the least is shorter this year after what you saw last year. We left Ratu out of the conversation here on this as well to some degree, but who could elevate and be a solution? Maybe he's a better winger as well, right? So there's some people who do think he's a barely. You like that Ratu in the dot and you also... I think you also like Ratu as a defensive presence as the centerman, particularly if you're going to play a little bit more of that older school. The centerman is high as opposed to just rotating group of forwards.

37:02Or there's a trade, right? Which is also possible. So I put it all together, you know what? I'm going to go on the thinner limb here and vote over. Okay, we'll be far more... Far less adventurous and... Take the under for sure. Mike break the tie. You're a connox fan where you're going. I want it. I want to see more. I want to see him play. I don't see the point. Like I think he's frail. You know, you don't need to shelter him. I want to see him play more. Okay. You can vote at the S&P X and YouTube channels. Boy, I sure hope we get an official announcement at some point soon out of Connox Sports Entertainment and Rogers Communications Inc. We mentioned this yesterday. Donnie and Dolly reported there would not be pre or post game shows on KISS FM, which

38:08Brendan Bachelor and Rand Deep, Jenda, the broadcast team have confirmed, is the new home of the Connox Radio broadcasts, a Rogers owned FM station. And there's also FM's in the Valley that will distribute the games. And of course, you know, much as I like batch and Rand Deep, they're not the official word here. That comes from their employer, Rogers or Connox Sports Entertainment or joint announcement. What I can tell you with absolute certainty is that a pre and post game show with studio intermissions was being planned. It was absolutely being planned to accompany this broadcast. In fact, I heard they were very close on hiring both of the studio roles, both the host, which of course, this guy performed those duties capable play for a long, long time.

39:14And the in studio analyst for your intermissions for your pre and post, they were very, very close on both of those roles. And I'm told both of them now have fallen apart. And that was either the person me, by the way. And the host they were looking at hiring and the analysts they were looking at hiring are going to be a part of it anymore. Now as you pointed out yesterday, is that Roger saying we don't want to pay for pre post, or we don't have room for it on our dial. We must have the music return on Kiss Throwbacks or the music leading right up to, you know, that's where saying hello and the puck's going to drop here in a few minutes. Yeah. And keep in mind, the Mr. Mr is not going to be heard for the afternoon drive show when

40:17they're out of the Pacific time zone. And that could be it, right? Like that some of these games do begin at 4 p.m. when they're on the East Coast. Or is that Rogers taking the pre and post in house? For many years now, we have heard that the conucks had designs on creating their own media network. They started a number of years ago when they hired Chris Faber. Of course, Chris was a, what was the next step after that? Well, that is. Yeah. There's some believe that they finance podcasts that are out there, conucks themes, themed podcasts that are out there so that they're not exactly attached to it, but it's going to be, you know, Rosie, Cherry, Vancouver, conucks coverage. So maybe that game is pushing forward more fulsomely.

41:20And in a full rebuild year, you know, the need for true criticism after a four to loss on home ice, little less so. But when that, you know, that's a, that's a very short term. But again, like, like get on a jail free card in a few years time when the expectation is building, you cannot have an in house conucks.com post game show that has any sort of merit to it. Like you can't because we know how they will oversee that. But there's a segment of the, oh yeah, there's a segment of the audience that is here no evil, see no evil, they go to joy, they go to sports for joy and nothing but joy. They're not interested in the full conversation. And they might be happy with that. There's obviously a more discerning sophisticated and I would agree. I would, are you larger portion of the fan base that is interested in the holistic discussion around the team?

42:21So also had a tough night three giveaways right in the slot. Well, but, but, but here's the thing. It's a puzzle. And you know this better than most. And of course, we would know this by virtue of Rank Wide Vancouver and looking at the numbers there and what Jeff Patterson has done with that property. There will be nights over the 84 games where that post game show is destination media. I'm thinking of. William Ogren goes out as a monster game scores a hat trick. People are going to want to get to that post game show. Good. He's blossoming. Exactly. Yeah. Like a macchi. Like a macchi. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Pick a young pick a young player who has a monster game. See, Zee Bliem, wow, like get me to the post game show. You want to, you want to hear you want to get into fantasy? A Leeus Patterson has a has a five point night. He's back, baby. You know, so all those good news stories. Yeah.

43:23The nights where they lose seven, nothing eight one and there could be a few of those this year where everything goes to pot and you've got that what are they doing here, segment of the audience that wants to go and hear the dissection of how it got so embarrassing, so humiliating. So lopsided. We haven't talked about this as much lately. But in part because they didn't bring back Curtis Douglas, but the night where it goes off and you got the line brawl and the fist of cuffs and the violent stuff and the retribution stuff and oh, they didn't respond enough. So and so got hit and we know those are big post game nights, right? Yeah. This guy's phone board. You sell it up like a Christmas tree code violations, if you will. Yeah. You can Keith hit Daniel Sedine with the rogue elbow. This guy could have stayed on the air to like four or five in the morning taking your calls. It's been several nights like that.

44:24Yeah. So, you know, pre games, the different animal. Really outside of playoffs, maybe opening night, you know, maybe in advance of a big game, a retrobusion revenge game, pre game is meaningful. But boy, post game for me is indispensable. Yeah. There's a lot of nights that it's a benign game with not a ton of talking points, low events, hockey, fair enough. But you got to do those that have the consistency of being their night after night, after night, breaking it all down again. We're going to do those. Yeah. Right. Vancouver is here for you. That is all set for another year. We're turning for the preseason, no less. Yeah. The criticism, I think what we're both coming from is this is the NHL. We're doing it for you because we know that you want it. The fact that they don't even seem to be doing it really calls into question their organization and. Well, I mean, we don't know again.

45:25Again, it sounds like it sounds like it may be on the conucks, like website. Yeah. And, but again, they still have an announcement. It's September 11th as we've chronicled. I am mildly surprised. mildly surprised. And if there is no post game, boy, big week for team art on this program. Well, you can't remember the last time we read one team art tweet on the show, let him alone two team art tweets. But Trevor Martins is have a bang, a banger of a week on Twitter, Trap. In the span of 10 years, Vancouver's hockey fan went from two sports stations doing two hour pre and post shows for each game with instant analysis and live interviews with the players coaches to that's the final buzzer. Coming up next, Destiny's child with bills, bills, bills, the kids throwbacks.

46:28It's well done. Team art does know his, Outspulp culture. Yeah. And the transitions will be hard if that's the case, right? It's going to be very, very abrupt. Like radio people would know this. I'm not sure if hockey people would know this as readily. Yeah. Steely Dan into opening puck drop. You know, you'll have eight minutes to go over the lines before the puck's dropped. That's tough. Well, again, the pre game part, I think you can just get to more obvious than the post. It's way more obvious than the post. But you say that, but the pre game, I can't, the 430 puck drops, even the 5 o'clock puck drops, like, and people are just in their car listening to the music, bopping around and all of a sudden, what? So that immediate visceral reaction from the fan base is what she captured in post game.

47:29It's one of the reasons why we took Rincquide and changed it from a package podcast that came out sometime after the game, too. No, we're going live in the middle after the game because those are sort of the moments of fandom where it's coursing through you. And we don't want you to the bed. We want you to talk right away. We're in fan thread away. So it is front of mind where you are alert to the proceedings that you've just digested and you're looking for a community to discuss that with. Even if you're simply a listener or a viewer, and it's a one way relationship, but of course, in today's social media world, we're also feedbacking as well. So yeah, as a radio person, somebody who just loved the medium from the young age and was lucky enough to work on it, working it. To have the hockey games on the FM dial is one thing.

48:32I'm not as offended by that as maybe some purists, part because it should be a better signal, clear audio, better listen, but to not have pre and post for a big four franchise in arguably the second biggest hockey market in the world, Vancouver and British Columbia, that is troubling. Like that's an indictment on the company that owns the rights. The hockey club that would allow such a thing. Like if I'm Michael Doyle, I'm putting my foot down with Roger Sunsay. It's bad enough you shut down your sports talk, which was daily promotion of our team, our brand, our players. But now you tell me you're not going to do pre and post around our games. Like if that's the decision that if this was Rogers initiated, I'd be furious if I was

49:37at Doyle's chair or on the business side of the Vancouver canucks. Knowing, you know, I mean that, you've got to have serious people. And if that isn't serious. And if that isn't the case, Matt, and even if it's brought in house, we are 11 days away. When are you going to alert people on a major shift in their behavior? Yeah. Anyways, it's not leadership. From sad news today from the Vancouver canucks family with the passing of former player Brent Peterson. And the canucks have put out a post here. Brent was a special person who meant so much to so many his kindness character and genuine carry showed for others left the lasting impact on everyone. Fortunately enough to know him, he will be deeply missed. And our hearts are with his family friends and all the lives that he touched. He was maybe better known as a coach, certainly recently with the Nashville predators, what

50:46he played two seasons with the Vancouver canucks. Two seasons, but he also stuck around these parts. He was a part of a juggernaut Portland Winterhawks program as well where he coached them to third round, second round, and ultimately won them the WHO in his last year, which vaulted him into the NHL ranks with the Nashville predators. But six, seven years with PDX and then moved on to Nashville for a decade or so. So he had a fine career after his playing days were done. 600 in some minute till games. He was diagnosed with Parkinson's in 2002 and in 2009 started the Peterson Foundation for Parkinson's while with the Nashville predators. So he lived with the disease for 23 years and battled it day to day. He leaves behind a family and the Nashville predators were extremely classy and tributing.

51:48Back to back days. Well, Barry Melrose. Well, that's back to back days of former NHL player. But those Parkinson's as well, right? LA King's Tampa Bay Lightning coach, Barry Melrose, but he has truly been the tributes have poured in far and wide with great sadness and tears from American hockey fans because of course, Barry Melrose after his playing in coaching days turned himself into an indispensable piece of American hockey media where he was the lead studio analyst for ESPN's coverage in their previous incarnation of covering. He was Canadian, but he was there, don't you? He really was. Like with the garish suits and the mullet and I mean the hair and he smoked the big stogie. I mean, he had a lot of charisma, a lot of swag. And I think I saw Sarah Velley tweet something like, you know, it is impossible to measure the impact that Melrose had on American hockey fans and bringing people to the game.

52:53It wasn't a lot of hockey on television. ESPN did the, it's a little bit and it was, and it was him. Like he was it. And I don't want to undercut Brent Peterson. Yeah, actually, he won the W's, nobody else won the Mem Cup that year as well in 1998. So rest easy. Yeah, to both the Pearson and Melrose friends and families condolences. Okay, our menu today, we're going to speak to Jeff Merrick. Jeff's been awesome on the topic of Canadian hockey fans. Whether we're maxed out here, are there still audiences to gain in Canada when it comes to hockey? Do we gravitate to hockey at a sense of duty, loyalty, patriotism or passion?

53:53And what does it all mean with these Monday night national games now going behind a paywall with Rogers and sports net? So we're going to talk to him about that. We're going to talk to him about Queen Hughes's comments in Minnesota about resigning. We're going to talk to him about the ZB William extension, our first opportunity to talk to him on that topic. And then our, our friend our, our child, Elijah Ford started. It has an intern with us and has just to the moot rocket ship. He's writing for DFO Vancouver. He has penned another, well, another, a number of provocative pieces. I mean, I love the topics he takes on and the way he explains them. He's a little shy in camera. Not so much. He's got Linus Carlson scoring 30 goals this year.

54:55He thinks make your break on lechromacky break. He's dug deep into first time NHL coaches and what that means for the, when they're promoted up from the HL team and what that means for the HL players that they had in their charge. And he's also written on the three year Queen Hughes appeasement cycle of the Vancouver conucks and what that rod. So Elijah is going to join us to talk about his stories on DFO Vancouver. If you're new, that is the new name for a conucks army. That brand was changed over the course of the summer. DFO Vancouver is now where you want to go to read David quadrallion, his great team of writers. So that's all coming up on the show. We'll talk about the NFL game in Australia last night. Look forward to the lions and allowets tomorrow from BC place. Of course, Whitecaps are here this weekend as well.

55:55That's a Sunday game very beatable Austin team on Sunday. And Vancouver Canadians can lift the trophy tonight in Eugene, Oregon holding a two-nil lead in the best of five Northwest league championship series final. Look, season's underway, but we know some of you wait until the second week to conduct your fantasy football dress. And if that's the case, skip the basement, skip the cleanup, bring your league to Greta YVR for an unforgettable fantasy football draft party with reserve draft space, high-speed Wi-Fi, great food, cool beer, arcade gaming and plenty of screens. You got everything you need to kick off the season in style. Three different packages are available there at Greta, depending on how much food and bev and arcade time your league wants. Those of you who picked the Hall of Fame package are going to get fantastic perks every Thursday, every Sunday evening as the season goes along with those, of course, very highly

57:00rated standalone games on those nights for more information. email k.com at Greta bar dot com at Greta bar dot com. Time now for our bet three six five bets to the day. Boy, I'm old for two on the NFL already. I had the Seahawks covering. And in fact, covering a bigger number. Yeah, no, I know. And I had the Rams last night and Mayor of Wrongville wrong. They were awful San Francisco. Tip cap. I got the money right to the money line. What plus what? Well, the plus one seven or something. Yeah, something bigger like that. Yeah, for sure. I'm looking at home dogs here opening couple of weeks. Love the home dogs. Now you have to be reasonable. I'm not going to bet on the New York Giants. Now don't laugh. I might bet on the Indianapolis courts plus one fifty at home to the Baltimore Ravens.

58:01I said don't laugh. It's early. Nobody knows what to make of anybody. And that includes the coordinators. Surprise has happened in week one and week two. Am I saying the Ravens will finish below the Colts in the days? I am not. But this week, this week only take the Colts on the money line plus one fifty. So we're prepping this segment. And I say to him, I really like that Tampa Bay plus three and a half at Cincinnati. Oh, shoot. Did you say this? But you picked it yesterday. So I'm going to go away and take another underdog because I really like underdogs in the first week of the season. I'm sorry. And so I'm going to take Indianapolis, West three and a half at home against Baltimore. Okay, you check his brand. I'm going money line. It's different. I'm just glad we're able to provide great variety of selection here on bet three, six, five. The whole NFL card was available to us when we find the nuggets, we find the nuggets together.

59:04And now I feel even worse about it because you picked them, although you are to know, I have to give you that. People need to realize this is a longstanding thing for the two of us. In our prep, both of us have a tendency to get so dialed into whatever we're reading or listening to or that we can tune out what the other person is saying. It's like a marriage. It can it be a lack of respect? Yeah, potentially. But it's mostly just focused. I apologize. That's okay. Hey, Grinards out. Give me the Packers plus one and a half of Minnesota. No, no, you're right. And I'll find half with Cleveland in Jacksonville. Hockey season worst thing about it. It ends every year and then he got months until the next puck drop. Well, we're getting closer and of course, until then the good news bet three, six, five. So let's play a game. It's just none that require lacing up skates at bet three, six, five casino. You can choose between hundreds of slots, live tables and your favorite games are at least your second favorite games.

1:00:07Must be 19 or older. Please play responsibly. Jeff Merrick is next. This is the story of the one as a shipping manager. He's running the dock, stocking supplies and making sure every order goes out on time. And Granger helps him stay prepared from shipping supplies to PPE to hand tools. He counts on Granger to keep products moving and trucks rolling. So his operation runs smoothly, no matter the shift. Call 1-800-GRAENGER. Click ranger.com or just out by Granger for the ones who get it done. Hi, Podvans. Max Russian here from the chart topping Guardian for the weekly podcast. Don't want to cry. If you enjoy the World Cup with us, you'll be glad to know we're back for the new Premier League season. Expect three episodes of week questionable predictions and the biggest stories in soccer from the Premier League to the Champions League and beyond. Watch now on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts. Losing weight can feel like a roller coaster, full of ups, downs and being thrown for loops,

1:01:12like when someone brings donuts into the office or your kids' dino nuggets start giving you that look again. That's why there's noom. They combine GLP ones to quiet the food noise with healthy habits that help you keep it quiet, even if you get off the meds. Your program is designed to make weight loss a smooth ride, helping you understand what drives you. So you can build better habits to not just lose weight but keep it off. Noom. Lose for keeps. Get started at noom.com. Not all customers will clinically qualify for medications. Individual results may vary. Secure some price from the Historic Wall Center. We welcome in the host of the sheet here on the nation network daily with Jeff Merrick who. Hey, hey, what's going on? Awkward. Well, I was just going to say we're delighted to have back again this year. He's a fantastic teammate. The best of teammates. There is no teammate better than Jeff Merrick. I'm so tired of the morning, but I see Jeff Merrick's face and I get energy.

1:02:16You know what's impressive? Maddie read that just like I wrote it. That was amazing. Yes. That was fun. Word for word for the intro. That was amazing, man. He gets you maven pause to allow you to jump in because I'm a custom team jumping in with the story. It's so bad. We were talking about something completely unrelated to hockey and sports. Or whatever. And he said, I got a story about him. Oh, you really? I don't doubt it. But that's a real story about everybody. So the so to pull the curtain behind and there's a reason for this and I just experienced this again. I always experienced this when I go through airports. A million years ago when I was doing open line radio and Toronto on AM640, I had Rick on for an hour and it was incredible. He's an incredible human being. And I remember saying to him, you're always such a positive person, really inspirational, the like to talk to like you feel better about yourself and about life after you talk to Rick Hansen. And so is there anything that upsets you?

1:03:18The look around and kind of gives you like a, because you seem like such a positive person. And he said something on the lines and I'm paraphrasing here, but you're going to get the spirit of it. He said something along the lines of, you know, when I see people like you taking the escalator, I get a little upset because I'd give anything to walk up those stairs right now. And ever since he said that, ever since he said that, you will notice I do not take escalators. Oh, really? Just from that one, yeah, I do not. Just based on what Rick Hansen said, like I'd give anything to get out of this chair right now and walk up those stairs. It's one of the most profound things anyone has said to me to my face in my life. And that's the reason to this day, you will not, I mean, unless it's the only option, you will not catch me on a escalator. I will not. I will not do it because of Rick Hansen. Some would call him Canada's greatest athlete when you think of the man in motion tour. And of course, he did at the Paralympics.

1:04:19In fact, so often we have asked poll questions over the years. Canada's greatest athlete. And British Columbia comes hard with Rick Hansen and Terry Fox. And we still always say, okay, like are we talking about in the arena competitive athlete or are we just talking athleticism because if we're just talking athleticism, it doesn't get any better than Terry Fox and Rick Hansen. This is athleticism, but life too, like touching everybody's lives profoundly. I can still remember, as a kid watching the marathon of hope, telephon and the numbers go and following Terry's journey, day by day, update by episode. And still to this day, it's one of, if not maybe, the most inspirational Canadian story ever. So few things that bond us together from coast to coast to coast, but Terry was it, right? Terry was a guy for everybody.

1:05:19And to this day, like I love the fact that at my kids' schools, they pause and they do a Terry Fox run once a year. And that that and the memory of Terry Fox is still profound for everybody. So yeah, listen, you're just going to be tough when you're competing. If the competition is like, okay, it's Terry Fox and Rick Hansen versus the bunch, as far as athletic inspiration, just understand you're competing for second place. Yeah, absolutely. Because first place has already been wrapped up. You're competing for silver when you've been going through. And honestly, if we're talking about things that should unite Canadians from coast to coast to coast and hopefully with our neighbors to the southeast days, then on the 25th anniversary of 9-11, I would show out the good people of Gander, Newfoundland. And if you're not familiar with the story of Gander on September 11th and really September 11th through, I guess, September 17th, 18th, when the planes were finally allowed to take

1:06:21back off. They come from away. Documentary is extraordinary. The music has a lot of fun, but the documentary is, I stop and watch it every single time. I see it on television and it always moves me emotionally. So, okay, good start. Okay. Yes. Well, I was just going to say, like, because we had big designs on starting with the topic that's near and dear, not that these topics aren't. Near and dear to you, Mr. Merrick, clearly they are. But incidentally, I don't take escalators either, but it's more because of Jason Lee, Saliliquian, Mollrats. We have two escalators here in front of our studio at the lower lobby level of the wall center, snorkeht tower. And I occasionally see youths frallicking on it. And I am reminded of Jason Lee's Saliliquian about respecting the escalator. We were all surprised when we heard that Rogers is taking Monday night hockey behind a paywall.

1:07:22I mean, we sat there yesterday and spent some time on, is it a CRTC violation or is it a competition bureau matter? Does it violate that act? But you have had massive thoughts in the past, Jeff, and the summer we were talking about this, about growing the game and does the National Hockey League and its broadcast partners take Canadians for granted. See, that's what I think all of this week's at. However, Rogers wants to conduct business, how they handle the rights and how I know a lot of hockey fans feel like they're asked to pay on every single rung of the ladder. Like you cannot take another step up without having to get into your pockets. If that's how they want to conduct their business, they have responsibility to their shareholders and their stock price, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

1:08:22But to me, the conversation winks at an even bigger question. And that is, do we feel an audience as Canadian hockey fans that we are being taken for granted? There's always been the assumption that hockey's fine in Canada. Ultimately, it has its problems, but Canadians will always come back. There was a sensitivity around 2004, 2005 in the lockout where we all wondered where hockey fans in Canada come back to the game. We knew it was going to be tough to get Americans back out of the game was dark for a year, but what would happen with Canadians? And Ken Dryden talked about, is it a passion? Is hockey a passion for Canadians or is it a habit? Are they just used to it? And they're on the trolley tracks, and this is what they do. And this is what they spend on, and this is what they consume, what happens when they have a year away from it. Do they find other things to do? Now Canadians came back. But I really do wonder, because everybody has a line. At what point do Canadians say, I can't keep doing this?

1:09:27I can't. Because it's getting more and more expensive to enjoy this sport that I love. And too, at the NHL level, where's the payoff? Like I think it's a real issue that there hasn't been a Stanley Cup champion in Canada since 1993. I know it's the butt of a lot of jokes, certainly stateside. And I understand it. Like go for it. That's fine. But I do think for the health of the game, I do think that it's it, and at what point, because no one, no one, you can do a lot of things to fans. You can do a lot of things to hockey fans. But at a certain point, at what point to fans start to say, I feel like I'm really being taken advantage of. Borderline, my passion and love for this sport is being abused. This is intertwined with the expansion talk of this week as well. Because the TV deals, both North and South of the border, get bigger theoretically with

1:10:29expansion. The taking advantage of taking for granted part also goes there because when you get to it, and I saw some people talking about this, a one in 36 chance. They're now talking about four teams being added to 36, not necessarily in three years time. But in the medium term, getting to 36 teams. Jeff, you can have a very, very good team. But if you're one of 20, very good teams, your chances of winning Stanley Cup are reduced mightily. Like a one in 36 chance. It's not a very good chance of winning the Stanley Cup at any point. And the drought is already what it is in Canada. All true points. And I can't say, like there are not every owner wants expansion. I can tell you that. This isn't like every owner is like thrilled. Hey, let's get more under the tent here. I think short term, it's a cash infusion. Understand it. Everybody shares a piece of the, what's it going to be? 2B, 2.5B, and get it.

1:11:29But there are some owners that are taking more of a long view and wondering about quality of product. Is this right to expand? Should we expand while we still have a lot of other teams that need a lot of assistance from some of the richer teams in the league? So it's not unanimous. The expansion is a good thing. But I do think that there are enough owners and certainly the commissioner in the commissioner's office feels as if this is the right time to at least start to have the conversation about it. Here's where they both tie in for me, Jeff, and amazing that you say that because you're right. So expansion is quick money in the owner's pockets. But when you're splitting up television and other revenues, 36 ways, as opposed to 30 ways or 32 ways, over the long haul, it actually costs you money. Now it might be a long, long, long haul. But it's, you know, because it's a one-shot payment with the expansion fee, right?

1:12:33Over the long, long term, you're actually going to lose money on it. It may take a while. So it's the quick buck today, which is kind of like what Rochester's doing, too, with the paywall, right? It's the quick buck today. Gary, his board and now his broadcast partners have all shown themselves they will chase today's dollar over trying to quote unquote, grow the game. And I think that's what is disappointing that we have caretakers of the sport that we love, who, A, don't listen to us. But B, have revealed themselves as people who are chasing personal riches today, as opposed to benefits for all long-term. Again, that comes back to my point. Like at what point do fans feel profoundly taken advantage of? And it's one thing, because right away, the hue and cry, whenever you raise a price on something or introduce a new monetization fund here for Rodgers, for example, fans

1:13:34are going to push back. I'm not going to watch this. I'm not going to pay this. Let's see what happens, right? Now that has been put out to the marketplace, let's see how Canadians react to, you know, the subscription base for Monday night hockey now. I'll tell you, this has been a really interesting summer, I think, where we can see the sport very much in transit. This is like a hinge moment for hockey at the NHL level, both financially with players making amounts of money that we haven't seen before, with new players coming into the game that are making a lot of money right away with the possibility of adding new teams. Let's throw another log, Matty and Blake, on the fire here. And that is, you know, Bill Daly, talking this summer about saying, you know, the European expansion is inevitable too. And growing the game that way. But I keep coming back to this idea of what does this mean for Canada?

1:14:41What does all of this mean for Canada and Canadian hockey fans? And there's another thing that I think is already out of the equation, but I think is massive. And it's something that helped all of us become hockey fans. The three of us on this show right now, Mike, you know, playing the keyboards behind us as well, conducting things. And everybody watching and listening right now. And that is, there's not going to be a Huck and a Canada on CBC anymore. That's not going to be, that's not hockey is not going into everybody's house in this country anymore. So it's funny you mentioned that because I have massive. I, is it? Okay. So I do think, I do think it is because at this point with this sport, it's not just about sports, but it's about culture and right now Canadians more so than people already don't feel connected to the case. Bingo. Bingo. Right. So here's the thing.

1:15:44One of the thing I'm taking them behind the curtain here, but one of the things that I have tried to do on this program over 15 years is to guard against my own biases. I am, I'm a big lover of history. I'm an astalgist when the hockey night in Canada, the old theme song plays. That stirs something in me. One of the things I've had to remind myself in hosting and, you know, setting the agenda for this show is that not everybody has those tastes and to be cognizant of not falling in love with your own model, so to speak, or falling in love with your own opinions preferences. I had a moment of reflection this week when I felt like we were a little bit dismissive of the fact that it's not hockey night in Canada on CBC because, hey, like who just has over the air television.

1:16:44But I was reminded, I think it was a couple of years ago, Blake, we did an item where somebody brought to our attention that a lot of these court cutters actually go out now and get digital rabbit ears that work way better than our old school rabbit ears. Remember Jeff, you'd have to position them and maybe duck take them in place. And do actually watch CBC, CCTV and they quote unquote over the air television station in a digital world as a compensation for not having on those things now is way better than anything you can put over through. So maybe I was a little too dismissive of the court cutter who has the digital rabbit ears. I don't want to be dismissive of hockey night in Canada and its legacy and all of that. But one of the things I've learned is we've moved here into the digital space and streaming

1:17:45with young people is they don't really care about history. They don't really care about why your, their older brothers and their uncles and their elder here and dear, a lot of them believe history, you know, began when they arrived on the spot, right? Like they're more interested in the forward looking than any sort of backwards looking. He, here my, my, my issue with and I agree with it's still hockey on Saturday. No, it's Jeff. It's just a different title. It's still hockey on Saturday night. But what I'm saying is the penetration that CBC had allowed people to sample the sport, allowed a, an entire country to sample the sport, right? Again, I understand it is a completely different universe now. But is hockey at a place where it's maxed out? Right? Like is, is hockey is, is hockey in a place right now where like you look at the NFL and

1:18:48you can understand why they monetize every single rung of the ladder and you understand why like that sport has hit its stride and continues. Okay, it's time to go to the pay window here and here and here and here and here. I don't know that hockey's there, even in Canada. And I'm always wondering about like who's doing the anthropology going out and finding the info and bringing it back to the village. Like how, what, like what are your entry points to find hockey? Like hockey is still a sport where you have to make it easy for people to find and to understand and to consume. It's not a sport like you look at everything like you go back to like, geez, I can't believe we're going to use this example Aristotle Aristotle always say things exist in two states actuality and potentiality, right? Is hockey in a state of actuality? You can say it's closer to actuality in Canada than it is in the States, but I would still argue it's still in a state of potentiality, certainly as it is now. So what's the vehicle?

1:19:48The free vehicle that allows people to get a taste of that. But also, it's all about it. And it's tough to do, one quick thing, it's tough to do to Maddie's point when your economic is just quarter to quarter to quarter. The kids back in our day play hockey. Like there was not a lot of high and soccer being played. There wasn't a lot of high and basketball being played. Now there's academies for all those sports. So I think hockey does still have the battle for attention. And of course, being on the CBC is also a statement of this is important to our culture. Yeah. I think by nature of what the CBC is, it's a statement of, hey, watch a little bit of this. I'm glad you brought up that point in form and light and entertains, right? Two of those things are not simply Pablo, you know, distraction, inform and

1:20:49then. Yeah. So I'm glad, Blake, I'm glad you brought up that example specifically of playing hockey because one of the things that we've seen now is once upon a time in the United States, hockey players were probably, you know, not the elite athletes. Elite athletes didn't play hockey. They played baseball or football or basketball or track and field or whatever. It took a long time to get to hockey. The elite athletes were not choosing hockey first. In Canada, the elite athletes chose hockey first. The blades played hockey. I mean, wide brush I'm painting with here, but I think you know what I'm getting at. The elite athletes chose hockey. Now in Canada, can we say the same thing? And in the States, can we see the same thing? The idea that the scary thing for Canadian hockey fans and this rivalry with the United

1:21:49States is now what you're seeing is the elite athletes are choosing hockey first, more of them than ever before. And in Canada, the opposite. Now because you have more opportunity to your point about the different academy models for various sports, now hockey does have to compete for the elite athletes. It's going in a different direction, guys. We can see it, we can feel it. And now, what's this country going to do about it? It's a very good question. Three years ago, we moved to a more residential family neighborhood here in Vancouver. Because I had spent the previous 20 years living in a more sort of urban neighborhood central in the city. I'm stunned at how little road hockey I see. My neighborhood is a wash in kids. My neighbor has a basketball who behind the house that him and his friends, they're 10 and 11 play at.

1:22:50Especially in the alley split because Vancouver has these great alleys, Jeff, like every neighborhood has these big, long alleys that are perfect for street hockey, right? Like there are fewer cars coming down there and when they are coming down, they're really, really slow. And you just pull the net out of the storage or the garage or the basement. If we had those alleys as a kid, we would be playing. We had to go find quiet areas on streets to be able to play. My family is the only family I've lived on two streets in Vancouver. In Vancouver, my family is the only family that I've ever witnessed playing street hockey. And it was only within our family. There's not enough kids in our neighborhoods that play hockey, Jeff, that I can ever duplicate what I had in my youth in Winnipeg and in Toronto of the neighborhood kids playing a game of street hockey, never seen it in Vancouver. And I'm not saying it doesn't exist. I'm sure it does somewhere, but it doesn't exist rival it. I've lived in a few places. My neighborhoods, can I add Ontario, Northwest Calgary, Beacon Field, Quebec, the whole

1:23:55neighborhood, like the 16 year old down to the 16 year old, we're at the six year old, we're all playing in the same. We comfortably get 12 people to play in. 12 people to play in. Right? And the older kids, you know, maybe played, you know, two 16 year olds versus the rest of the kids on the street sort of things. With no going. And that's what honestly you make up the games. And guys to try and act without smartphones to arrange it. We had to call on landlides. You knew the where the game was. There was an assigned area of the street or of the school yard where the game was. And you just found doors there after. Knocked on doors. School with your stick. I really can't one point out. I wonder if that is because sports in general has become hockey, hockey specifically has become so structured. Yeah, programmed. Yeah, for sure. And complete the idea of just play free time. No, no, no, absolutely not. Yeah, got. Okay, let's move on. We talked to Queen Hughes last time we had you on and you have to say he had a lot to

1:24:57say. And I know some of it was jarring for hockey fans though, look, it's my life and I'll make my decisions and I, you know, I'm going to pursue what makes me happy and not do it for anybody else. Yeah. It's jarring. It's the hockey players going down the basketball road that of course hockey fans have forever hated. It's the self involvement that Quinn and the Hughes family has put on full display, especially since the Olympics. And yet he's not wrong and get used to it, right? How did you interpret what the ex-Canucks captain had to say at the media tour this week and the, how this plays out, be it in Minnesota or New Jersey? So it, first of all, it's great. It's great talk radio topic, right? Because it hits on so many different levels for a lot of people. Here's where I'm at on it. What's the saying about Vegas? What happens in Vegas? It stays there. Finish it. It stays in Vegas. All right. I got a new one for you for Quinn Hughes.

1:26:00What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. And that's how I feel when I hear either Quinn Hughes or Jack Hughes talking, I feel like I need a Hughes family decoder ring. Part of me when I hear Quinn speaking, I think of Vancouver Canucks fans who are like, okay, we've seen this before. We've heard and we've heard this before. I love this. This is great. It makes all this and then what happened. The thing that I about with Quinn Hughes right now is there was one thing that he said of the players tour, which really stuck with me. And that is when the time is right. We'll get there when the time is right. And to me, if I put on my Quinn Hughes decoder ring, let me know if you guys agree with me on this one. It's he saying if I feel this team is good enough, I'll sign.

1:27:01But I want to see. But I want to see. Is that what Quinn Hughes? Because there's no way he's going to come right out and say that. I'm concerned about our middle. Sure, we love Joel Erickson. I quite a much sure as a long term one see whether he's going to be like, he's not going to come up and say that. But he might say vague things like when I feel the time is right. That's how I see all of this. That this is almost this is Quinn Hughes saying, I've been there since the trade obviously gone for the regular season and the playoffs went around. But I want to see what legs this thing has before I make a commitment. Okay, so on that note then, he's doing a three month, a pre-Christmas comparison of the direction of the New Jersey Devils and the direction of the Minnesota Wild under new tutelage in the Devils. The Devils have banged their head against the wall for a long time. Is he going to monitor the first three months of the Devils? See what they're doing on the ice, see what they're doing off the ice and compare and contrast

1:28:02with the wild before he makes his decision? I'm not sure the Devils matter. I think the Minnesota Wild matter way more because the presence of his two brothers in New Jersey. I think that's a next year and go forward. Obviously the brothers are a safety net for sure. But I think if the if the brothers are playing for a tire fire, I don't think he runs as quickly as it was brothers. So I think he does want to see what the new the new Devils look like. Really? I mean, I think blood is thicker than water here. Like I don't win. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, totally discrete. I think the Devils have another tire fire. Quinn looks at it and he goes, we'll be the case when I'm there. We'll be a lot of better when I'm there. The only part of that too is like if you're going as brothers, you know, understand the Quinn's coming in to take Luke's power play time. And how much how much does that how much is that factor in? Luke, Luke hasn't earned the power play time. Like, I'm sorry. I know. I know. But you know, I drink in the Luke Hughes cool aid just.

1:29:02Yeah. Hold on. No, but but but yourself in Quinn's head and we're talking in the in the in the family's head. He's like, if they would have moved Luke Hughes to Calgary and kept Seymour Nehmich, Quinn would walk in and say, I'm punting this guy off the power play. You know, I really don't care. Yeah. It's different when it's your brother. You know, I've joked, you know, maybe I'm maybe on here. I did like if you really want to like the case, you really want the chaos factor to go to 12 on this thing, hate a trait red wings, make Jim Hughes your general manager. Like if you really want to take this to the next drama level, higher Jim Hughes to run the Detroit right. That would be delicious. This would be the summer for something ridiculous like that to happen, but none the less. I really do. It really feels to me guys. And again, this is all just this is just feeling. It feels like he wants to know if he's going to be signed there for any term, he wants to know that they have the team. He wants to know this because let's not forget every year, there's at least one 100 point team, sometimes two, sometimes three that fall off the face of the earth the following

1:30:07season and and don't make the playoffs. It happens every year, could Minnesota be that team? Could Dallas be that team? Like it happens every year guys. I think that I kind of understand where can Hughes wants to see what staying power this team has right now before he ultimately makes any type of decision on staying there or not. Which if you're Bill Garen. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. All right. Bill topic today. Yep. Zeeb William in his extension. It's our first opportunity to talk to you about all of this. It went down last Friday, eight years, 9.38 million per season, 75 million total value. And while I think this is celebrated in Vancouver because everybody loves William, the kids attitude and communication skills are truly quite special, particularly given how difficult

1:31:07last year was and down the stretch, she became a statesman for this team. And of course, everybody loves the potential there. It looks like that's a very good offensive power play quarterback in the making around the league. It seemed like it was, it was received as more watershed like Holy cow, 26 point defense been getting 9 plus million dollars per year. Talk to me. 76 76 games. Yeah. Well, so you know, talk to me about the dichotomy, the juxtaposition here between the Zeeb William contract in market and around the league and what you make of it all. It is very much following the philosophy of choose your core and bet on them long term. I understand it that way. First of all, just as an aside, Kurt Overtar's having an incredible summer. They've got to get Shane right out of Seattle, but other, yeah, you know what?

1:32:09And I thought I'm relieved because I've been worried about him because I know the commissions over the years have not been enough. There's a couple of different types of games that happen within, within hockey and the agent games, over hearts having an incredible, so boy, him, Truba and we'll see what Carter Gochay gets. That's a, that's a nice little bit of business. That's a nice bit of business for Kurt Overtar. I know. We're worried about how Kurt Overtar's doing and everybody over there at the team, but still. Well, Overtar is one of my favorite agents and he's one of my favorite agents because, and I do think Jerry McGuire changed everybody's perception of agents. Like, if you were in the business before Jerry McGuire, you probably had a much different conception of what a sports agent looks like, sounds like talks like, then post the movie, right?

1:33:10But what I love about Overtar is that he is just so unapologetically slick, right? Like immaculately dressed the hair, the way he speaks, like he could run for governor in Colorado. I remember we were having, I want to, I think it was Castler, but it might have been another client of his one summer. We see him at the draft. It's like stinking hot in Chicago, we're buffalo or we wherever we are. Yeah. We're like, Kurt, you got to come over, sit down and do the interviews. Okay, I'll come over. He is in like a, you know, $2,000, $3 piece suit, Blake and I are in like cargo shorts, flip flops and tank tops. And he sits down between us and our producer takes a photo of this. And I thought to myself, you know, we really started, ought to start. Like I know it's radio, but we really ought to start dressing a little better if we're going to have these sorts of guests sit down with that in mind. I landed Denver at 730 tonight, Kurt.

1:34:11So if you're listening, yeah, exactly. I have the mode. He needs you to take them out to Denver's best steakhouse. Yes, please. And nightclub for anything on KO. God knows we floated your clients enough over the years here. I try to get changed right now. Yeah, I'll hear on the program now. I just really click on Zeeb Boyam. The cascade is going to be massive. Like a couple of defensemen got numbers that none of us expected. Paven Minchikoff is one and that was a reflection of the Danny Brear offer she with Leo Carlson. So there's that cascade. This cascade is going to be fascinating because what does this mean for Simon Edvinson? Right? And that's like, and the clock is ticking here on the eight year and we all know is like, what is this going to mean for an occasion in Carolina? Like this is now all the like the minute that that deal got signed, both those players specifically went well. If Zeeb Boyam is worth that, what am I worth? If the eight out of 10 prospect is worth that, what am I worth? A lot of kids show hockey after seeing that.

1:35:13A lot of those great athletes were talking about. I was in hockey after seeing the boy in contract. Fair, fair. Okay, we'll bring it back to Easter egg. We dispense with the Easter egg. It's quick one today. It's off the news. Dylan Larkin is handed back the captaincy in Detroit this morning, put out a statement. He is going to report to camp. They are going to deal with his trade request privately. Both sides say we're going to say no more. And we're going to wait and see who Detroit hires as a GM before the next steps there. Steve Igeman retired 20 plus years ago, 2006. How many captains have the Detroit Red Wings had since Iserman and who are they? Nick Lidstrom is the obvious one. I'm going to say that there has been Lidstrom is correct.

1:36:18You hazard a guest here, Mr. Price, so you're going to agree with him. Yeah, Larkin. It's not it's we know there's two. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Did Holmes from have a brief spelt the after Lidstrom left? No. There's got to be some free is correct. So who's the sandwich one? Who's the one who's the one who's the third? Yeah, I'm surprised you're struggling with this as much. I would have thought. Ron vol. I would have thought you would have this one. We're going over. And Rick's at a very good. We over thought it. We over thought it. Yeah, well, I was wondering. I thought one of you might go down that's who. But yeah, I would have thought that that's who can and and Lidstrom had parallel exactly

1:37:18parallel careers. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Did they retire? Did they retire that's a number? Should they retire? I don't think they have. They should, but but we're like listen, they did Fedoroff. We know what the acrimony I know it was exactly. Lovely the way that everything and did with with that secure, but yeah, that's a number right? Yeah, I mean, he's old friends. The real the real the real retirement number story in Detroit is with Larry Orey. And I know we don't have a lot of time to do it. No, we don't. But he wore he wore number six. The number was retired by the Norris family. The Ella family bought the Detroit Redbings unretired at bots. Nobody's wanted to. Yeah, I just remember, you know, years ago talking to Kendra. I didn't and I was like, you know, how many years did you play eight? How many cups did you win? Six. You know, you know, you know, you know, you might, you know, you know, you call her all

1:38:18that. And he argued with me that he had not reached the standard for a retired number with the Montreal. Come on, yes. Come on. Well, I think a lot some of it was monsting, but no, some of it was like, Ken dried in the intellectual, constructing the argument going, no, guys, look at who's up there. I don't meet the standard. Like, there's a lot of my teammates that I love and who in any other franchise would be retired. And then several years later, that sense, there was two seasons, there was two seasons. The cup. It was not perfect. It was not perfect. Thank you, Jeff Merrick. That's a great. I'm happy. That's a great life. His champion show percentage was near 80 some percent. Poor fella. Yeah. Yeah. Very average, Ken Dryden. Ken, are some price from the historic wall center? Many people have been wondering, and the segment, a presentation of BC liquor featuring fabulous September sale products and people have been wondering, hey, the team going to make any

1:39:21deals before the season begins. You want deals? Oh, here's a big one. Breaking news all caps. $10 off the Ed Edmundo mile back. They're giving it away. Down to 1299 right now at your BC liquor stores, medium body wine, pleases everybody. Round tannins, light, fruity finish. Good persistence with this wine. Stays with you. Good hangs around. Good mouth feel. That's what you want. Mm-hmm. That's what you need. Go check it out right now. Seven bucks off. Is it near a BC liquor product varies by store? Well, quantities last, please enjoy responsibly. Elijah Ford is a writer with DFO Vancouver. If you're not familiar, that is the new name for what you previously knew as Kenax Army. He has been most prolific of late. And yesterday we were talking about, we identified 16 Vancouver Kenax, neatly eight veterans,

1:40:27eight younger players who have room for improvements. And could be reasonably expected to make such improvement. And Elijah has identified two of them, one that he thinks will make improvement, one that he thinks won't and he joins us now from his home in Langley. How are you? Just phenomenal. I mean, first of all, I got to say, I've been made fun of on many online platforms for not looking like I'm of drinking age. But if I was, I would be going to the latest liquor store to buy that wine. No one quite does adries like my friend Blake Price does. Good and scratchy. That was impressive. He is of drinking age folks. We can vouch for that. It is. It is. Has he reached his ad at Mundo Malbec years though? Is the question. Is he refined essay palette? Kid like this probably puts it on ice, would be my guess. He turns it into sangria. I like a sangria for sure. Yeah, who doesn't?

1:41:29Let's start with Lena's Carlson because it was a very nice season for Lena's Carlson last year. He got the contract extension. We've loved watching his progress. A late bloomer who came up and of course, starred for Coach Mani at the HL level and that called her cup run. And then last year he breaks through. He becomes it every day regular 79 games, 15 goals, 35 points. And now you want to double that goal total, Alayshah. You're saying 30 goals for Lena's. That's just not room for improvement. I mean, that's transformative. That's bad math. Talk to me. How do you get to 30 goals for Lena's Carlson? Well, the way you do it is being the best five on five score on the conucks last year to start off with is just a base point. I mean, he did not get power play time on the first line really at all last season. So with his new head coach, Mani, my whole trip coming in, I would expect some added opportunity for the power play to in general, which gets into Jonathan Lecker, Mackie

1:42:33later. Perhaps he can get some time on that unit as well. But just in general, his scoring has developed every single season of his pro career. And he had 13, five on five goals last year, like I said, most on the team. And the beauty of Carlson is that he'll never be a particularly flashy player. But particularly flashy score, but he's just really, really smart at getting into areas where the most goals are scored soft spots around the net, banging home rebounds, tipping and pox, which he's really, really good at. And he was in the 86% tile of high danger shots on goal last year with the limited ice time that he had. It's just a really, really impressive season for the guy. And speaking of the added opportunity that I think he's going to have, I would imagine and we kind of talked about this last hit. I was here. I think he's going to get some time on PD's wing on the first line with Jake DeBrusque on the left. And what is something that PD still does really well, even in the last two seasons where

1:43:33he's played his worst talk of his career, he still generates rebounds at a very, very high rate. And he had passed us to the slot more than any conuck on the team by a pretty decent margin. There is no one better in Abbott's firt under manny than Carlson at banging home those kind of opportunities. Obviously, I understand a lot of it next year. He'll have to do with set opportunity if he's in the bottom six with a max ass in or a Filipino getting to 30 and doubling his goal total will definitely seem like a bit of a reach. But with manny having the proper line mates in mind, like I think he does with the confidence that I think Carlson will play with this year, like he played a very simple brand of hockey when I went back and watched his tape for this project. He wasn't really doing anything extra with the puck. There was no extra move, no deakes in the middle, really. It was just very simple, pucks and corners, pucks to the point, get in front, bang home. I think if he takes an extra second, reads the ice with added confidence, I really do think not the sky is the limit for this guy, but I think 30 goals is the limit for this

1:44:36guy this year. And if he does it, man, what a win that is for just the entire conucks organization. Cause like you were saying to set this up last season, it was a genuine question mark whether he would be on the team full time. Now he has the chance in my opinion to have a real breakout. It's been a really, really cool story to watch. I think it's eight or nine, depending on how you want to count it, straight seasons were the goal total per game's played improves. Like that is pretty astonishing, right? Like to improve your goal scoring in eight to nine consecutive years, going back to his first toe dip in the Swedish top division. And you know, the fact that he's got 23 and 32 under manny in 2024, 2025. And then added 14 more in 24 playoff games, you know, engulfers that holy, always just play well on that par five that you just, you can shape the team for Matt. It's the par three with no bunkers. Just you could nothing is just. Yeah, I mean, I tear up that Queen A pitch and putt.

1:45:39Yeah, let me tell you that 74 yarder with no bunkers around the green Matt, that Matt steps up there. He knows he's going to play well. But the mindset for lean is Carlson might be a little bit of him being in his comfort zone, but the guy that he knows he excelled under, I don't think that can be at least to start to you. Like that can be just a really good launching point for Carlson to have a good start. Yeah, 100% and also add on to the fact that it looks like Max Sassen is going to be moving to the wing. If you put a guy like Filipino with an extra layer of speed or even like an hot two It doesn't matter. Those two have already chemistry built in that called their cup run in my opinion was mostly defined by Sassen Carlson and R.C.D. Baines just ripping through on the four check on that first line, relentless pressure all the time. Talk about familiarity and just having that golf hole that you just always find a way to hit the fairway on. Max Sassen is that Callaway ball that always just seems to find the short grass.

1:46:40Yeah, like Elijah at number 12 on Belmont. Okay, so it's a name brand drop. Yeah, do I know it? And again, the news recently and not necessarily for great things. Oh, good point. Yeah, no exactly. Mind your references, young man. So I'm thinking of the audience and they're love and they're like, I love this kid. Phenomenal, enthusiasm, if I can borrow a phrase. I love the take on Linus Carlson for 30 goals. And now you're going to cut their legs out for under them and talk to me about Jonathan Lecromackie because you're not as bullish on him. Why not? I mean, it's hard to say that a player is going to break instead of make, but the realistic element of it is when there's players who rise, there are naturally players who stagnate and don't. And if I were a betting man and I just don't quite see the development for Lecromackie

1:47:43coming this year for me, like I understand that his shot is elite. Flatly, it's awesome. And chicks dig the long ball and fans dig snipers. I understand why he's a fan favorite. He can score from anywhere. He has really good hands and tight. He can get a shot through defenders and sticks that most people wouldn't be able to. The issue for Lecromackie is that scoring is inherently streaky. And the fact that scoring in the NHL has a whole lot less to do with your shot and more getting to areas, as we talked about with Leonis Carlson, where the goals are scored. When he's not tucking the puck home, he just doesn't bring a whole lot else to the roster at this point in time. He struggles to hold on to possession in the corners against NHL defenders. His defensive game remains a work in progress. And this is the really concerning part for me. Last year, he was the single slowest canucks forward in terms of max skating speed according

1:48:44to NHL Edge, which is typically the trait that the best scores use to create space to use that shot. That's just, it's concerning to me. And again, the thing with Manny coming in should give him a boost in terms of his spot in the lineup. I anticipate him getting chances early. His lack of a change up pitch puts him in this awkward middle ground where when he's in the top six where his skill set points to him being, he really struggles to hold up in those minutes. He was the worst canucks forward in terms of course, he 4% is last year of anyone who played at least 10 games. But in the bottom six, you kind of want checkers and penalty killers and defensive specialists. And all the guys who do the little nuance things that make a team successful, like or Machu just doesn't have that pitch in his arsenal right now. So I could see later in the season with guys like Max Sassin, Ilya Sampanov, Arstit Bain,

1:49:45who we talked about, Matthew Steinberg, they're not currently in daily face offs projected roster for the canucks to start the season. If Lecker Machu isn't making his presence felt night to night on the margins of the game when his shot isn't going in, they might decide that his NHL minutes are better used to evaluate another developing player. Now obviously if he scores 20 plus goals, keep them in the lineup awesome, but I just don't see the rest of his game filling out the way I would hope it would have considering where he is in his development. Yeah, and the other issue they have is if he's going to play in the bottom six, he'd prefer to have a creative playmaker getting him the puck to unleash that shot and they don't have a lot of creative playmaker. But they do have to give him that. That is quite bold because you would think after the trade deadline, there will be opportunity for young players and Elijah is just out here, name checking guys who might actually be able to steal some minutes and get their NHL e-vow. It will be really start for Lecker Machu at the start, but especially coming off the surgery.

1:50:46The good news is regarding his skating, you know, he was an upper body injury. I would hope that he was still able to work on his skating, whether that's on a mill or actually on the ice while he was recovering from the shoulder injury, but I mean, it's not a bulletin to anybody that his skating was not great. I would hope to get better. I would think the skating, like, but these kids don't have their head in the sand. Like, I hope that the people around Jonathan Lecker Machu, and I'm not picking on him, but people like Jonathan Lecker Machu as well. There's more than just him who say, I really need to work on this. I'm only 21, 22. I'm not a finished product. I'm going to get on my horse and try to be that guy, that old dog learning new tricks. I hope he did. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. As Elijah points out, you can't survive in the NHL on just a shot alone, and the skating has to get better and the strength has to get better. Then maybe you start playing the... I hope rock bests are thinking that this offseason. My skating needs to get better. And then... Let me just drop this on you since we're talking prospects before we move on to Manny and

1:51:51the other story you penned. Hidden Coots, if I told you over under 42 NHL games, exactly half the schedule. Where are you going on that? I think I've taken the over. The fact that he made the team straight out of camp last year is just a signal of how NHL ready the conucks truly think that he is. And now you have a whole lot less concern with using up a year of his ELC. Like you just said, Matt, after the trade deadline, I fully anticipate that he's going to anticipate this roster having some more open spots. Why not throw the kid into the fire? See if he can carve out a niche for himself on the third second line. Like you have nothing to lose this season. If you win a couple of games, awesome. Hopefully the prospects are developing the way you want them to. If you lose a couple of games and suck, great. You have a better chance at getting one of these studs that is coming up in next year's draft class, which I'm told is one of the best in recent memories. So yeah, absolutely.

1:52:51I would probably take the over on 42 games. Many Melhotra, the new head coach, familiarity. You've touched on this already with some of the guys who of course he coached to an NHL championship a couple of seasons back. But you write that the familiarity will matter to this new head coach in the players' explain. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it kind of became like a generality over at DFO Vancouver when we were writing goals and expectations for certain players. Like you said, the sassons, the Carlson's, oh, having their former head coach will be good for them. But I always pause at those accepted notions and wonder why exactly that would be the case and does history point to be true. And I look back at a bunch of other examples. And the best one was Sheldon Keith because Mani was an assistant coach under Keith for a couple of years in Toronto. Keith was the head coach of a Canadian organizations, AHL team for multiple years before being promoted

1:53:51to the NHL. Mani has talked about how much Keith has influenced him. So I thought that was a good place to start. And he came in to the Leafs job and immediately William Neilander who he coached in with the Marley's, I guess, in Toronto, the both in Toronto. It doesn't matter. His points for game did increase to 0.93 under Keith from 0.74 under Babcock. But Neilander was already a pretty premier prospect entering his early prime. So it's tough to kind of determine how much coaching had to do with that and how much just this awesome prospect got better at hockey. So I looked at some other forwards who were kind of more on the margins, more akin to a Mac Sasson or a Jonathan Lecker Macier, some of these guys. And the most prominent name in that group was by far Zach Hyman. People forget Zach Hyman was a fifth round pick in the 2010 draft coming out of a tier two Ontario junior hockey league four years of college hockey. Like not a lot about this guy said that he was going to be one of the better goal scores in the NHL on the fringe of making team Canada's Olympic roster.

1:54:53But Keith really, really quickly recognized a niche that Hyman could carve out for himself in the professional game because of his experience with him with the Marley's. He said they started calling him Shaq Hyman. He got to the paint better than anybody did. So they played Hyman net front on the power play, put him on a line with guys like Neilander who get the puck to the middle of the ice and Zach Hyman turned into Zach Hyman. And then we saw that as well with Pierre Ingvall when he was on the Leafs where Ingvall was a seventh round pick. He spent a couple of years with Keith down with the Marley's and he saw immediately that Ingvall was a penalty killing specialist. And even though this is a funny story that came up in my research, Ingvall actually made his NHL debut Mike Babcock's final game behind the Leafs bench. But the next game, Keith came in his first game under him. Ingvall scored his first NHL goal shorthand and eventually made his way up the line up scored six goals in his first 21 NHL games.

1:55:54So I'll add on top of that. Jay Woodcroft with a guy like Evan Bouchard. And you can see that familiarity, especially early on in their 10 years as coaches matters a lot because training camp as a fresh coach has less to do with actually training these players and getting them in shape. They're all kind of expected to do that themselves. It has to do with understanding like we've said in the set so a bit, the nuances of their game, what they're good at from shift to shift, where they're most comfortable on the ice, where they want to shoot from all of that little stuff that adds up to big stuff. And the familiarity allows those coaches to have a huge head start on that. So I anticipate guys like Carlson and Sassin, if they get into the lineup early, having great starts because their coach already knows what they're good at. The golf analogies continue. A Mulligan for Quinn Hughes, explain this piece if people missed it from a few days back. I love his turn of phrase here, the Quinn Hughes appeasement cycle.

1:56:59Yeah. So I went back and the original premise was a five year Mulligan for the connox, but I thought three years was more interesting considering that's the time frame. They went from one game from the Western conference finals to dead last by a considerable margin in this league. So what went wrong was my question that this led me to. And when I looked back at all of the moves that brought the connox to the spot where they were behind the eight ball at the start of the rebuild, it all came back to what I and we at DFO Vancouver have now dubbed the Quinn Hughes appeasement cycle. Like to go back a little bit during the 2023, 24 season, connox went all in, traded for a lend home, traded for Zodorov, even though they were on expiring contracts. But that made sense. They looked like legitimate Stanley Cup contenders. They were top of their division. You got to go for it and take big swings as we've seen with teams like the Panthers nights. You got to go.

1:57:59So understood what came next was a lot harder, a lot harder to justify. Both of those guys left to some feared they might and the connox right out of the gates as you guys can remember, just were not the same team as the year before. They hovered around 500 for most of the year while the alias Pederson, J.T. Miller dynamic became frostier than the outside of a slurpee cup and that eventually boiled over into the rest of the locker room where it seemed like nobody really wanted to go to dinner. Everything was starting to deteriorate very, very quickly. Miller took his leave of absence and then was eventually traded in January, which brought them to a very interesting crossroads. In that trade, they received a center replacement in Filipino, a prospect in Victor Mancini, who I'm very high on, we've already talked about that. And a first round pick in that deal. So with Miller gone and they were already outside of the playoff picture, conventional wisdom would probably say either stay put, run the course, take the first round pick and

1:59:05blow up the team. That would take a whole lot more goonies, but those would probably be the two ways of going. But with Hughes still on the roster, being maybe the best defenseman in the entire world, a full on rebuild was really tough to envision and almost sacrilegious for some connox fans. So how long did the connox take to evaluate their options on this dynamic crossroads? A total of 24 hours when they flipped that first round pick and other assets for Marcus Pederson and Drew Conner. And just hours after that, they gave Marcus Pederson a six year extension, followed a couple weeks later by a five year extension for veteran gold tender Kevin Lincoln. And that was the start of it. That was the start of the Quinn Hughes appeasement cycle. The connox were nowhere near good enough to contend, but they were unwilling to fully commit to a rebuild because they still had Hughes on that roster. And instead of accepting the reality that their team simply wasn't good enough to win

2:00:06the cup anymore, they continued to just dig a hole. And the next offseason really felt like it was the offseason of Hughes. They hired Adam foot because he was friends with Quinn Hughes. They extended Brock Bessert, that's your demko Conner Garland all because they were friends with Hughes. Like by the way, that's not what's even that. No, I know, sorry, real quick. Jim Rutherford said this and I quote, it's one of the reasons we signed the guys, the Garland's the Besserts, the demko's that had that relationship with Hughes hoping for a little bit of a chance right down to the end that he would stay. It just doesn't, they signed $112 million worth of actual Canadian money in contracts. And it was a latched ditch effort to keep this guy in Vancouver. And in the same press conference, he went on to say we knew that he was leaving before the season started. So which one was it? None of it makes any sense. It put them behind the eight ball in terms of the fact they had to trade Hughes when he had less years left on his deal.

2:01:06They could have avoided a van der Kaine and Adam foot's 10 years entirely. Probably could have traded their veterans when their deals were more digestible. Just the whole thing was a joke of a process and terrible foresight and just everything in the last three years that put the canucks behind the eight ball, the new regime. All of it has to do in my opinion with the Quinn Hughes appeasement cycle. And imagine if they had just called a spade a spade at the end of that attempted playoff run with Lynn to them, et cetera. And just said, okay, but now we're in a bit of a pickle here. Let's rebuild now. And in three years time, we'll show Quinn Hughes that we're ready to win a Stanley Cup. Of course, he's just said that you need ownership's approval, right? If you're going to tear it down. First of all, his show, his show, his show. Yeah. And secondly, Eason knows they didn't marinate for 24 hours. My dude, they marinated for like 90 minutes before making the Marcus better center. It was later that freaking night that the Marcus betterson trade was announced.

2:02:08But you're right. And then he's like showed up to Vancouver like he had barely even, you know, received his key card at the hotel and was signing a long term extension. It was just now be beef. I make it all make sense. Before we let him go, let him come go. The chicks dig the Longbowl Nike ad was from 1999. What year were you born? 2005. Six years prior. Well, between Callaway and chicks dig the Longbowl, like he's not the most politically correct young man now, is he? That's true. But he can be a part of the clinic. Nike and Callaway, both just in his back pocket. Yep. Interesting. It's just comes out. Phenomenal. Thank you for the time. I anticipate that you'll be busy on DFO. You've got anything in the hopper you want to preview right now or the big reveal next time we have you back on. Oh, all I'll say is I think drill Connor is going to have a pretty big spot on the

2:03:11connox this. Oh, okay. Good. I got time to talk to you. I got time to talk to you. I see. And we got time to talk to Elijah for the DFO Vancouver. Thank you for this. We'll see you soon in with Jeff on a ringquad coming up. Yeah, so look him for it to that as well. Thanks, buddy. He hasn't passed. Thank you very much. Hi, my band Max here. Barry's here too. Hello. And now the Premier League is back. Barry, meaning we'll be providing incredibly astute analysis three times a week wherever you get your podcasts. Barry, with the remaining 10 seconds of this ad, can you provide some astute analysis? I think our solar going to win the Premier League. And there you are for more hot tanks like that. Watch your listen to football weekly wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Nick co-host of the best one yet. You optimize your workouts, your portfolios and that rando startup idea that hit in the middle of the shower. But if you're not hydrated, you're already playing catch up. So we keep a stash of liquid IV in our studio. One stick mixed into 16 ounces of water is clinically demonstrated to hydrate faster than

2:04:14water alone with three times the electrolytes of the leading sport strength plus eight vitamins and nutrients. So that way exercising or podcasting the best business news ever, liquid IV makes it easy to stay hydrated wherever life takes you. So shop now at liquidIV.com, liquid IV hydration that goes wherever life takes you. Guessing is for game shows, not your business. Workday is the enterprise AI platform for HR, finance and IT, with AI grounded in your context to get work done and done right. It's a new work day. Take care of some price from the historic wall center of the nation network studio built by Arbor Lee. The real win happens after the final buzzers. Stay downtown, stay comfortable. Stay close to everything here at Sheraton Vancouver wall center, your game day home base starts at wallcenter.com. Shout out to longtime audience member Brittany, who was kind enough to text us at 777-840-29680

2:05:14for some very nice words. Thank you, Brittany. And congratulations to her and her partner on their nuptials. So they send us pictures of the cake. Very beautiful cakes. Hockey themed cakes. Right. And she claims we introduced her to Grace too by the tragically hip, which really Brittany, I have no recollection of. No, she's been at her events. No, she's not. Should we have been the ones to introduce it to you? No, it was one of the biggest hits. Yeah. I mean, we know Brittany's been on her feedback channels going way back to our radio days, but I don't remember the Grace too part. All I can say is to Brittany and her partner, I sure hope, you're fabulously rich. Yeah, it's good. Our friend at the matinee, they do a fabulous cover of Grace too, by the way. You know the story there of the song, Grace too. And they changed lyric. No, oh, yeah.

2:06:15Dan Acroid insists to learn Michael's fellow Canadian that if he's going to host Saturday Night Live, the musical guest has to be his fellow Kingston, Kingstonians, the tragically hip. Michael's agrees, needless to say, the hip or not quite at the level of popularity in American music that most musical acts on SNL were, but sure enough, he green lights it. Gordon gets out there, well, bit nervous. And instead of saying, fabulously rich, he said, I'm tragically hip. And every hip show there after at least the ones I went to began with Grace too. I don't think it was an accident. I don't think he said that. It was an accident. Apparently it was an accident. The documentary says it was an accident. And you know the crowd. They were at a Stax Canadian crowd that night at S&L. One hundred thousand twenty one fans attend at the iconic Melbourne Cricket Ground, the

2:07:21seventh largest crowd in NFL history. And it looked exactly like we thought it would one with the posted stamp of a NFL field on top of that massive field. If you were in the lower rows, you didn't even see the game. You just saw the personnel in front of the field to watch the San Francisco 49ers would shed the LA Rams 27 seven in the Thursday night opener in NFL week one. So it turns out the 49ers travel plans of getting to Oz early and adjusting was the better route. Of course part of the Ram strategy was to stay on Pacific time for the go forward benefit from here. So story not over. We'll see how they do in week two. Oh, sure. Ram since 15 staffers to Melbourne over a two year period to measure body rhythms come up with their travel plan. Their travel day. Sorry, their game day down under Blake began at two in the morning like eight hours before

2:08:22kick off as they what is though it was a same old same afternoon start in Los Angeles. And NBA player Frank Kaminsky with a amusing tweet as I go to bed tonight, I'm thinking of those 15 Ram staffers who conducted a two year experiment trying to prove that the optimal way to prepare for an NFL game in Australia is to simply refuse to acknowledge that you're in Australia. And it's really easy to say that, you know, if you're an Eastern, if you're a New York team playing in LA, you know, and I do this all the time when I go out east, I just stamp a specific time, I stamped until 2 a.m. You all that's, you know, 11 p.m. Here. But this is like profound difference like going to Australia is turning your world. Yeah, international date line. It's a 17 hour flight. And again, the 15 staffers, that's all well and good. They didn't have to play a 60 minute NFL football game. And I think after the game, they're going to they're going to be too disappointed in the

2:09:24result to really have a clear view of what went on and how they felt in their bodies. But like a week from now, talking to the Rams will be very interesting about this experience. And ultimately, if and they're not going to want to use it as an excuse, but I would love an honest answer on how, how do you, did you feel, did you feel different than you normally do? And I think the answer has to be yes. Miles Garrett, very quiet in his Rams debut, did not get in the backfield, did not sack the quarterback, a whole lot of nothing actually from the reigning defensive player of the years at the sacks. No, Aaron Donald obviously for the Rams, but still, yeah, BC lines home to more versus Montreal. Remember the pregame tailgate at the plaza of nations. This is real tailgating, y'all. $45 to park your ride, bring your own food and bath, cook in your own grill, play your own music, parking lot games. Do not jump onto flaming tables. Do not jump through tables.

2:10:25Yes. It's the only rule. Well, there's a few other rules, but that's the big one. Do not emulate Buffalo in any way, shape or form. Never a good idea. Mike keeps telling me we have to do this item. The bills are doing the Canadian anthem before their home game at the new high mark stadium, Barney Kid Ladies to perform and Blake. Here's why. So this is a sparkling new stadium built at quite a cost to the Pagula family. And of course, Western New York is not exactly economic boond times right now. In fact, it's been decades since it has been there. Right. They're kind of pricing the good people of Buffalo and go for the Reese Rochester Syracuse of this new stadium. Like bills mafia at the old place, which went by many names, but rich stadium back in

2:11:31the day was always a pretty affordable ticket, especially in comparison to some of the other NFL tickets. So the Buffalo bills are once again getting reliant on all the money in Toronto and the Golden Horseshoe to help fill that stadium and especially the expensive seats. Like 20% of the season ticket money is now coming from Canada. Yeah. And this is where the good bills team, right? Like for those that have been in Toronto, the bills dominate the Toronto market more than the C-Hawks dominate this. Oh, I don't know about that. I think it's pretty. Well, I mean, the bills have played regular season games in Toronto. Right. So I see far more bills paraphernalia than I do C-Hawks paraphernalia here, like just in the day to day. I hear people talking bills more there than I do C-Hawks here. And that's from a C-Hawks fan. I'm going to be biased the other way if anything. Aloettes, 10 and 2.

2:12:31I've already wrapped up the East. And they of course won the first half of this home and home with the Leo's Alliance quarterback Nathan Rourke trying to avoid those interceptions that prove costly. Xander Hortwell and third down third and short. Xander Horvath trying to get back to his dominating ways that BC defense has to keep up its high level. Travis Luley Ryan Phillips who he had on the show yesterday headed into the Lions wall of fame with a halftime ceremony. As for the depth chart, here we go. Stanley Thomas Oliver who was playing so well in the defensive backfield is back at corner, but the veteran Gary Peters can't go there. And as we predicted earlier in the week, the Canadian defenders Ben Latic of Vernon, Christoph Bolier are back on the roster. They'll back up at linebacker and in the secondary play special teams and news off the field from BC. They have extended defensive end power excellence, Meshii Betts.

2:13:32His contract was set to expire at the end of this season. It's just a one year extension. So he'll be in the Lions Dan through 2027. He is the only Canadian player ever to twice win the CFL's most outstanding defensive player. Congratulations. He'll be a wall of fame or one day too. I suspect after his magnificent career. Vancouver Canadians can win the Northwest league title with a victory tonight in Eugene. This game three of the best of five championship series. The C's lead at two nil after two thrilling victories at the net this week. Landon Maraudis who has been with the C's from the jump back in April starts for Vancouver. First pitches 635 PM from Oregon. They are also quite lucky that the University of Oregon ducks are on the road this week. Like otherwise that Saturday game for if necessary.

2:14:33I think would have been sparsely a little overshadowed. Given how Eugene feels about their ducks. You can watch or listen to the game by heading to the Vancouver Canadians website, Vancouver Canadians dot com. Go to the headphone icon at the top of the right corner for the mm I LB app. You can also find it on sportsnet.ca and you get the game if you have the major league baseball package. J's begin a critical three game home stand versus Baltimore tonight. One game back of Cleveland in the wild card race. Orioles are three back. And how about this for a pitching match up? Love it. The former J Chris Bassett opposes Max Scherzer in a battle of Uber veterans here tonight. There's a lot of innings, a lot of pitches, a lot of wins, a lot of strangely Max has been his best of late. You know at the end of a season this old guy's he's risen to the occasional they need one more good one out of Scherzer here today. Spencer Eric Getty versus Kyle Brattish in game two tomorrow and then Dylan Seas versus

2:15:37Taylor Rogers. Brother of J's reliever Tyler Rogers Taylor and Tyler in game three. That's right. They could be dub players. These two will play another three game set. This one in Baltimore a week from Monday. But as we discussed earlier in the week, J's get two of three or sweep here and that puts the Orioles in a very, very difficult position. So we'll see how much that one means. I remember Seas on Sunday coming off as first really ordinary start of the season. Nay bad start of the season. Some bad defense involved too, but yes. They need bounce back. Mariners are in Sacramento to face the athletics still need a miracle called Mike and his mechanics. Second straight day with the Mike and the mechanics reference. What have we become? Well, you're the one who brought it up.

2:16:38Vancouver White caps that say home Sunday to Austin 330 BC place looking to build off that demolition of the galaxy on Wednesday retain first place in MLS West. They'll retain regardless, but they can be tied on points. That's with that's my Houston. The second place shooter right now in MLS West. They're in San Jose Saturday. So the caps will know where they're closest rival stands when they kick it off Sunday. Third place L.A.F.C. is that last place sporting KC. So I suspect L.A.F.C. will win that one. Here's the problem for them. They're down to eight MLS games left after this one. Houston will be down to nine. The caps will still have 10. So games in hand on both closest pursuers. And of course the caps have 10 because of that smoke postponed game in Chicago this summer. You remember that was supposed to be Thomas Mueller versus his old mate, Mr. Levin Doftsky

2:17:39of Byron Munich. Which would have been questionable as to whether I Levin Doftsky would have played because he was so new to the fire at that point. So presuming full health. Now it's almost a guarantee that they face each other. Although if the white caps are home and cooled in first, maybe they're resting players, this weekend is going to be very interesting because as we've talked. And I guess that game will be made up in October and yes, smoke postponed the game for a team name fire. Yeah. Sure. I mean the irony. The two on the nose as Blake would say this weekend is going to be very interesting for yes, person because as we've said, when he's had enough of the losing, he dresses the a team and gets the three points as we saw versus the galaxy. So they've won three or four in the end. But does he really want to allow this team to slip back and just drop the next one? Or do you do you have to stop a team at the bottom of the standings and just ensure that you get the three points? I'm I'm of two minds here. So I so Blake here's here's what I would say.

2:18:44The whole Darby now for me is win MLS Cup. And in fact, Axel Schusser said that to us at one point last year. They have won four straight Canadian championships and nobody wants to dismiss the trophy. But if you're left a little weekend for that Wednesday game in Montreal, the second leg of the Canadian championship series and you happen to bow out in the semi finals against another MLS team, so be it. For me, I'm playing the long game. I'm trying to win the league trophy that you got so close to last year in Florida. And I want to be at my best for next Saturday against Salt Lake City, in Salt Lake City at the altitude rather than on Wednesday in Montreal. The bonus if you will is I don't think Thomas will is going to play a minute this weekend because of that. Charlie. Of course. So that's a forced benching. So then you go all back into his spot is the 810 and then you know, Kaisato and Sabi

2:19:45back to being wingers. So that's not a huge degradation of the 11. The other thing we should point out here. And of course, it's been a very odd schedule for the White Caps of all of MLS shut down for the world cup. But of course, their stadium was required on the front end and on the back end because it was a venue. So you had that cluster of home games early. Then they went on the road for months. Blake they have five consecutive road games in the month of October because of the makeup game and she begins with that makeup game in Chicago LA, St. Louis, Austin, Colorado, all between October 6th and October 24th. So what's that? Five games in 18 days, all of them on the road. Yeah. So you have to mitigate and you have to make sure that you've got as good a health as you can muster and the freshness, all the freshness you can muster to get through that

2:20:47span because for me that span is going to determine where they wind up. And as we discussed earlier in the week, you know, if you were a few points better last year and you got Lee and L messy and Miami having to come to BC place as opposed to having to go down there to Florida, Lottardale and play in the in the heat of cell Florida. I think I think there's a banner at BC place. I think they're racing a cup. Well, and the the Montreal game this week, it comes at a perfect time. Every new guy should be starting. That COVID starting. We saw some as severe, severe, a little bit on the weekend. So that could be starting, jabi starting, moudesta starting, all of them starting to get their fitness up their game speed up. They should be playing versus much real. Ryan Gold and Yohei Tako come make the team of the match day for MLS. Is gold, I mean, it was magnificent on the weekend is gold all the way back. Yeah. Do you think he looks as good as he did at the height of his powers when he was a league

2:21:49MVP candidate? Yeah. It took a few weeks to get there. He has been in his motor moving again. Like I mean, the ground that he covers, the intensity that he tackles him and Kubas have the highest motors in the league. Honestly, they just never stopped going. Gold to me is all the way back. Incredible. The Wii Scotsman and do we take Tako, Kuffer granted? No. No. Because look, a couple of years ago, there was an undercurrent in the caps. I'm not sure this is our guy. We may have to make a move at keeper going for you, but drive Vanny nuts from time to time, right? He still does for me. And yet now all he does is stack clean sheets for the most great distributor of the ball. Paul Dolan has taught me that he's top of the game. Maybe he's probably the best in MLS and being a distributor of the ball. And for a team that doesn't surrender chances, he is the perfect keeper for this team. However, when you need the big stop, I do not have confidence he will make it.

2:22:55So it is incumbent upon the caps to play the kind of defense that they have played. As I said, he does work here because they don't surrender of any shots and chances. But if they do, you cross your fingers because I don't think he's a shot stopper at all, he's magnificent with the ball on his feet. What does Dolly think? He's not quite all the way to me, but he's in the same direction as me. New Kinnock Paul Carter says the team can surprise people. Do you agree, yes or no? What did the people vote on yesterday's poll? Ultimately, I think they probably said no. The optimism reigned really. Barely. 53%. Yes. It was 50 from the jump. It was 50, 50 from the jump. I don't think it fluctuated more than three or four percent over 50, 50. Is that surprising with a declared rebuild? No, no, because it's the perfect time of year to be optimist.

2:23:56Generally, I would say I agree. I've seen this year after a year now for, well, 15 years of doing this show, 20 years of covering this. This is the epicenter of when optimism reigns. I hear you. I just thought of all years where people might just be like, no, no, this is going to be a losing team for sure. I thought it might be this year, but I think you were away, but I told the story. I got stopped by a good friend of ours at the wall center up here in the cafe like a month ago. Really smart guy. He pulls me and I was like, you know, Maddie, I were young, were hungry. People are going to take us for granted. At some point we're getting demco back and we know what he can be and the difference he can make. He's like, do you think I'm crazy, but I got a feeling that we're going to make a run for the playoffs and be right in the thick of it, Napoli. He was sincerely, like at first I thought he was putting me on because we know I'm pretty

2:25:00well. Well, shout out Sean. We talked about the who needs to rise to the occasion of six team players that could envision, but they would need to go for improvement. Yeah, they're 16 guys that we've identified have room for. They would need to go up 16 for 16. I think for that. Here's what they said, salt and paprika. Yes, but I don't want them to even a somewhat competitive team would be triggering Blair. A reminder, surprise is undefined in this pool. The conucks could be surprisingly good, surprisingly bad or surprisingly bad managed. The last two have up until recently been good bats. I said, does 28th count as a surprise? Good question, Troy. For me, it would because honestly, I think 32nd or 31st. Now, 28th might be a little too mushy middle for many, but I think they would do quite well to get to 28th in the league. Because like 28th in the league, that's probably in the 80s, right?

2:26:03Points wise. Oh, I don't know about that. I wasn't the last. Hi, 70s. Yeah, it's probably something like that. OK. And lastly, mostly Awake says, surprise me by winning the draft lottery instead of picking third. I hear you. I think I saw somebody in the media or adjacent media tweet something to the effect of, I think I might be more mad if the conucks do play well this year. Like, that might be more of a betrayal in a rebuild year. That might be more of a betrayal than they say when you think they'll say, yeah, no ease and os today. No ease and os. Thanks for joining us. Everybody, appreciate you spending some time connecting with the program. Please do subscribe to all our sorts of channels, YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts, follow on social, accents of Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, Blue Sky, live on many of those platforms, noon, Pacific time weekdays. And of course, please support the community sponsors you hear us telling you about and

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