Dan Boyle Answers Your Questions! | EP 105 Sharks’ Opening Night Roster, Dellandrea 3C Reaction

Dan Boyle takes your questions!

In a special mailbag, the San Jose Sharks legend takes a question from the equally-legendary Randy Hahn, tells us why the President’s Trophy-winning 2008-09 Sharks got swept in the first round, how an NHL locker room would react to an openly-gay player, why he joined the San Jose Hockey Now Podcast, and shares a hilarious locker room prank story.

Insider Sheng Peng and prospects guru Keegan McNally also share their thoughts about the San Jose Sharks’ opening night roster and Tuesday’s lines, including Ty Dellandrea taking the third-line center job, at least for now, from Michael Misa and Philipp Kurashev.

Dan Boyle answered his many questions first!

Sponsored by Bring Hockey Back. Custom jerseys, hockey gear & tees for every fan. Use promo code: SANJOSEHOCKEYNOW for 15% off.

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Timestamps

00:00:00 Introductions, sponsor Bring Hockey Back & setup for the Dan Boyle Mailbag
00:04:04 Randy Hahn asks: Did Dan Boyle ever beat him in golf?
00:05:12 Corey Perry stories – Was he really that bad? Ryan Getzlaf’s reaction
00:07:45 Patrick: Could Luca Cagnoni switch to forward? Boyle’s take on playing out of position
00:09:56 Kevin: Lane Hutson’s Calder points – do secondary assists really count?
00:10:54 Fallooooooon: The Joe Thornton & Patrick Marleau “it” debate
00:13:26 EH: Can Will Smith’s shot be fixed or is it fine as is?
00:15:18 Pucktastic: When partners step up – chemistry between D-men
00:17:34 Stephanie K: The biggest jerks in hockey — would Boyle name names?
00:20:18 RPhillips: Watching hockey as a fan vs. as a player – how NHLers actually watch games
00:23:11 Pescadito: CTE, mental health & how an NHL locker room would react to a gay player
00:28:45 Fin Coe: Playing on your off-hand – is it overblown?
00:30:36 Dylan Smallwood: Boyle reacts to “Blood Sucking Freaks” and cult movies
00:33:19 Brad Fitzpatrick: The mental side of his 2010 playoff own goal & redemption
00:36:55 Chris Robinson: Hilarious NHL prank stories – teammates beware
00:40:02 Rothgar: Why Dan Boyle joined the SJHN Podcast
00:42:51 Joe E: How much credit does John Tortorella deserve for Tampa’s turnaround?
00:45:26 Boomer: Boyle’s defensive preference – playing against dump-and-chase vs. speed entries?
00:48:55 GH: Being a roadie for Faith No More – and thoughts on Mr. Bungle
00:52:44 SJShorky: NHL officiating – hits in the numbers & evolving standards
00:57:03 Eric: The role of veteran mentorship on rebuilding teams
01:00:35 James R: How captains and alternates are really chosen inside an NHL room
01:04:12 Dylan C: Could Dan Boyle win the Masters starting from the green?
01:06:03 Falco5: 6 Boyles vs 6 Vlasic – who wins?
01:10:42 Mike I: Thoughts on the San Jose Sharks’ defense this season
01:13:09 Craig VanDierendonck: Miami University days & any Wally Szczerbiak stories
01:18:22 Gary To: Which playoff loss hurt more — 2011 vs Vancouver or 2014 vs LA?
01:22:08 Erik Drobey: What Boyle looks for in the first 10 games to judge Sharks’ trajectory
01:24:51 Yuri Baranovsky: What went wrong with the 2009 President’s Trophy Sharks?
01:28:30 Boyle’s closing thoughts – team culture, mindset & learning from failure

01:31:13 Sheng & Keegan Segment – Behind bringing Dan Boyle to SJHN
01:37:34 Kevin: How to improve your hockey IQ as a fan
01:41:48 RPhillips: What Will Smith must do to start driving play
01:45:20 Chris Robinson: Could SJHN add a systems breakdown segment?
01:48:56 Ted Pederson: Should Sharks move vets to make room for youth?
01:53:04 Falco5: How coaches actually decide rosters – games vs. scrimmages vs. practice
01:57:40 Gary To: Favorite Tarantino film (and heated movie talk)
02:04:15 Sheng & Keegan’s thoughts on San Jose Sharks’ opening night roster
02:17:31 Curious lines at practice – Ty Dellandrea at 3C, Misa & Dickinson status
02:28:10 Who should start in net opening night?
02:34:25 Final roster and leadership reflections – Boyle’s mentorship legacy
02:38:40 Closing: Team culture, locker room dynamics & fan shout-outs
02:46:15 Wrap-up – subscribe, follow @sanjosehockeynow & support Bring Hockey Back

Welcome to the San Jose Hockey Now podcast. Today we have a special special podcast. We have a mailbag which we like to do before every season, but this season it is special. Not just because of Michael Misa or Sam Dickinson or Ty Deandre as your third line center. It’s because we have Dan Bole on. And so Dan Bo is going to answer a lot of your questions. We feel very very hurt. Actually, most of your questions were directed to Dan. I wonder why. It could be the 18 years in the NHL or what? I don’t know. But anyway, so most of your questions are for Dan. So we’re going to jump right to it. Also though, Keegan and I we are going to discuss hopefully Zubar is not here right now. Hopefully he jumps on later. He’s in a work meeting, but uh we will also talk about the opening night roster. Ty Deandre at Third Line Center, Michael Misa, Sam Dickinson, other kind of roster questions and decisions and whatnot. So let’s get to that in just a second. [Music] But before we do that though, a word from our sponsor, bring hockey back. Bring hockeyback.net. So, I am actually not wearing a bring hockey back uh shirt today. I just wanted to show Dan Bole that I am cool. I have band t-shirts that are cool, not just Chicago or Peter Satara, so I prove myself. I didn’t just buy this last week, Dan. I bought this two months ago. You made a run at Walmart today. I saw you. Yeah. Thrift store. Thrift store. But anyway, they’ll bring hockey back. So, they do have the coolest hockey t-shirts, Sharks ones that I’ve worn many, many times. Also, too, if you need a custom hockey jersey made for your beer league, for any kind of corporate event or whatever, right, go to bring hockey back, bring hockeyback.net, coupon code San Jose hockey now for 15% off. So, you get better at this. Better at this every every time. Excellent. We’re we’re we’re we’re doing a temple run here because Dan Dan’s got to get out of here pretty soon. So, we’ll see if we can actually break speed records on this podcast and do a mailbag that is less than like three hours. Yeah, people listen to us on Fast Forward anyways. They do. They do. They do. They do. You know what I mean? And and they actually do do listen shockingly, Dan. So, I know you keep asking, you can’t believe that anyone listens for more than 20 minutes, but we did a 4hour mailbag, which is still consistently like our top viewed episode. A 4hour mailbag, which Dan, we we did a fourhour mailbag while having Return of the King extended edition playing at the same time and we were commenting on what was going on in Return of the King as questions were going to that is up there. It’s not maybe I don’t know if it’s the most listened to, but it it’s high up there. It’s not like our lowest though. I think people just need [ __ ] to listen to in the car, you know? I think they just need like long drives or whatever. Exactly. At the end at the end of the year, Shang, I want you to have a party and I want you to invite all of these people that are listening to this 4-hour podcast. I want to see these people in person in in person at your house at the end of the show. Can we have it at your house? No. At the at the mansion? No. No, you cannot. Absolutely not. Okay. So before we get started with questions to Dan, just a couple of quick things. Okay, so first um one question I I didn’t get to or um I couldn’t find your subscriber email. So that’s Julian your question. So if you are indeed a subscriber, actually your question we’re going to answer anyway, but anyway, you can email me at [email protected] or at San Josegmail.com if you want to send me your subscriber info. Second thing, uh we are going to have a cap drawing. Uh Zubar and I we we did this at the end of the last show. I’m just going to show one of them really quickly. Very cool cap. We’re giving away five caps from Mitchell and Ness and we’ll do that at the end of the show. Okay. And it is actually we’ll be for just people who ask questions and so for everybody who asked questions, this is kind of a I didn’t announce it. Um but you are all in uh will be in a drawing for for for a shark’s cap from Mitchell and Nest. Very cool stuff. So, okay, hold on. I had to scroll down there. Okay, so let’s get started. Excuse me. I love this question. And I actually verified the identity of this person who doesn’t subscribe actually, but I they will understand once I ask. So, Randy Han asked, and I texted Randy and I asked him, “Did you ever beat Randy Han in golf? Because I heard he’s really good.” Huh? Did I ever beat Randy Han in golf? Okay. Randy Han’s golf game is like watching um like a 95year-old man driving in the left lane when you’re trying to get somewhere. It’s a [ __ ] nightmare and a disaster and it’s really tough to watch. So, I love Randy. Uh but the golf game is uh is very very very very bad. So your answer is yes. Beat him many times. So my answer is yes. Okay. Let’s let’s move forward here then. Sorry Randy. Um Cella Beauty asks Cella Beauty. So in 2013 you fought Corey Perry and this fan loved that and I think you probably played with Cory in the Olympics, right? So anyway, this this this fan asked, “Is Cory Perry as big a prick as he seems on TV?” Uh yeah, I mean kicked his ass. I I I I got to play with the Olympics, which is very quick. So you don’t get to bond with those guys and um but to play I don’t know him as a teammate. I’m sure I would have loved to have him as a teammate. Okay. Obviously, he’s uh he’s won cups. He’s he’s he’s, you know, he’s successful, but to play against him, yeah, he’s a [ __ ] nightmare. But that’s his job. He does it very very well and he knows what he’s doing. But yeah, he was probably over the course of my career one of the top pests even though he’s, you know, pretty big guy. As far as you know, I guess a little followup here. Do you know if Ryan gets or other teammates actually like Cory or were they forced to stand up for him reluctantly? Uh, I have no comment on that. I don’t know. Okay. You just don’t know. You shouldn’t say no comment because no comment sounds like your comment. You should say you don’t. I don’t know. I don’t know. Okay. Okay. Fair enough. So, in the Olympics, nothing happened though. You seem you seem pretty chill in the Olympics. So, fair enough. No, we were all focused on the same goal, but Okay. Yeah. All right. All right. This next question from Patrick. Yeah. Patrick asks after he listened to our Luca Canyone episode, is there ever a discussion with these smaller defenseman like Luca transitioning from like defenseman to wing or you being used primarily on the power play and as a winger instead of a defender. And Dan, you played forward for a while too, right? So, yeah. Yeah, I did. I did. Like I said, in Florida, they put me up front. Um, and I was actually pretty good. I’m not gonna lie. But um you know I think I think if if there’s no room on the back end, you really like someone and you don’t want to send them anywhere sometimes there might be that situation where you throw a defenseman up front. We did it with you know Brett Burns years ago and he ended up being for different reasons. Not a small defenseman obviously but um and he had pretty successful I think at least one or two seasons. Obviously playing with Jumbo is going to help, but uh you know sometimes I think there’s room for that. I don’t think we’re there yet with him, but if you like a player and sometimes he just doesn’t fit in the one spot, you know, why not keep them and try him somewhere else? Okay. Yeah. Just is would a DNA ever be like offended by that kind of thing, do you think? Well, I mean, at the end of the day, you want to play minutes. I mean, um, you know, ideally if he wants to be a defenseman and he’s not going to get in the lineup, but they’re going to play him on the third line and power play and he’ll be in the lineup every night at some point. I think as a player, you’re just like, well, that’s not what I had in my bingo card today, but uh, [ __ ] yeah, let’s go. You know, so that’s what I think. Okay. Uh, this one is from Kevin and he says that Lane Hudson, I don’t know how much you watched Lane last year, Dan, but obviously had a great year, wanted to call the trophy, but Kevin points out that half of Lane’s points were secondary assists. So, kind of going micro here, but is it wrong to question just how great a season Lane had because of the secondary apples? Just how do you see it as a player? Uh well I don’t I don’t I talked about I’m going to talk about this probably every podcast. I’m not so stuck on points although as media we are um no one’s going to win any award without getting you know the right statistics. So um I don’t put too much weight in that. If anything for me it’s just the test of the eye. A guy can dominate a game and not have any points. And I’ve said this before. He does it over and over again. To me, that’s that’s the measurement. And um the added thing which was cool in Tampa, we had it in Tampa where they would watch every game and they would give us a point for uh a a great a scoring chance. So, um you can come out of there plus four or plus five even though on a on a score sheet you were minus three. Um, and I think that was way more accurate where you would get rewarded for like you could be setting up guys all night, working your ass off, getting shots, getting rebounds, being a completely dominant player. Um, but if you come out of that night with zero points minus three, it’s going to look poorly. But I believe that the system they had in Tampa would show accurately. And on the other end, you could have three points that have been horseshit. The Tampa sheet would show that you were minus seven because you were terrible in your own end. you weren’t producing. Um, so I’m not so worried about points. Uh, it’s the test of the eye and from the games that I’ve seen, he was, uh, he was pretty dominant and helpful. Okay. Okay. So, it sort of sounds like you got to look a little harder than just looking at the I Yeah, I don’t I don’t secondary, primary, doesn’t Yeah. Yeah. That’s not something I look at. Okay. Sounds like a dom kind of thing there, but Okay. Um so um a question from Foon and this was actually a very rudely worded question that I cannot ask in its original form. I love those. I don’t want to be it’s it’s it would be dropping your teammates under the bus which I don’t think you want to do. So I won’t do that but I’m listen I’m willing to listen to the question. Okay. Okay then then the question was not Yeah. Okay. I can ask as it is then. So, what was your personal moment when you realized that Joe Thornton and Patrick Marlo didn’t have it? Oh, god. Yeah. No, I mean, uh, yeah, that’s not I mean, I’m You’re right. I’m not going to throw uh Well, can I ask the question in a different way that you can answer? Let me rephrase it. Subscribers out. Yeah. What do you think when the critics and fans like this one here like Flo says uh when critics and fans say that that Jumbo and Patty didn’t have it that winning it I guess? Well, I think neither of them won the cup. I think uh sometimes that could be misleading. Um, I think personalitywise sometimes too, um, especially Patty, uh, is not a fiery. I don’t know if fiery is the right word, but, um, you know, sometimes it could be perceived incorrectly because they’re not as loud or vocal. Um, but not winning is certainly when you’re a really good dominant player and you don’t win, unfortunately, you’re going to have that label of probably a player and on good teams, uh, you’re going to have that label attached to you. U, unfortunately. So, that’s probably as much as I need to say. It’s unfortunate. They’re both obviously Hall of Famers and, uh, but they just never got to win. And had they won, I don’t know if the question still would still be asked. Right. Right. Right. And it’s obviously they wanted Olympics, right? It’s a team sport. All that kind of stuff, right? It is a team. Yeah, it’s absolutely a team sport. But the uh the comment thread for that question was just like everybody trashing the question. Bunch of down votes. Most of the fans did not like that. But I think the way I phrased it is a fair question. So that you know you can answer. So yeah. Yeah. That that’s that’s my answer. They’re both Hall of Famers. They’re both tremendous players. They just never won. And unfortunately with that comes uh you know poor labeling or maybe inaccurate labeling. Sure. So this question is from eh and they had noticed um I guess when they were watching Will Smith that um his shot on breakaways occasionally it seems like his shots lack lift and tend to go low on the opposing goalie. Is a shot something that can be corrected or does it need correcting? I don’t know. I I haven’t really noticed all that much but this isn’t my question. It’s for you Dan. So, uh, well, you like to think NHLers shots should be above average, uh, to get to that point. That being said, some are better than others. It’s something you can work on. Um, by the time you get to the NHL, he’s still young, getting stronger. Uh, that that could just be wrist strength, uh, or or or grip strength. Um, you’re going to experience what like technology and using different sticks. he’s going to have more options as a professional player than he did, you know, back in college or or as a junior player. You don’t have as many options. So, you find the right stick, you get a little stronger, you work on it. You can definitely something you can improve. Um, but as far as like him shooting low and not high enough, I I don’t know. That could just literally be just a choice he makes. Um, I haven’t seen I don’t I I can’t answer that question specifically because I haven’t seen enough video to to determine is it just something that he needs to improve on or is that just a bad, you know, poor choices on his part. Okay. Uh, Pucktastic asked about how defenseman compliment each other and he’s he was asking about Dickinson and Day, but specifically for you, Dan, though, he’s asking, “Have you seen guys step up when they’ve been your your partner and play at a different level or I guess any just in general just like just it’s just that one partner that unlocks something out of uh a defenseman?” Abs. Absolutely. Uh, I’ve had great partners and they they were part of me being better. Um, you know, a few come to mind. Obviously, Douggee Murray and I had tremendous on ice chemistry. Uh, you know, in Tampa, I had a guy named Brad Lucich. Him and I had great great chemistry. The guy that comes to mind right now is a guy that Matt Irwin. Matt Irwin and I were were partners. I don’t know for how long, but um he was very good for me and I’d like to think I was very good for him and uh he was probably not a defenseman that was expected to make the team that year that he he did, but uh we found some chemistry and um I think uh both obviously are going to help each other and and and then you become a tandem and a duo and uh but rarely are you going to have the same type of defenseman, right? So, like me and Keith Yandel, not that Keith will listen, but if he does, shout out to Keith. Um, love Keith. He was a very good defenseman, but we played together at times in New York, and we were like, I love you, but we [ __ ] don’t belong on the ice at the same time, right? It was a terri, it was a terrible combination because we both wanted to jump up, we both wanted the puck. Um, so you have to have the right combination. Okay. Okay. Okay. Um, I love this question from Stephanie K. Is there anyone in hockey that is a big enough jerk for you to openly [ __ ] talk on a podcast? And no, no reporters here. So, let’s talk players. There’s anybody who’s like, “Hey, [ __ ] this guy.” Not a person. Any reporters or any players? Players. Players. Oh, no. I won’t talk I won’t talk [ __ ] I won’t talk [ __ ] about players. Okay. Unless you said Unless you talk you asked me to talk What was the question? Would I talk [ __ ] about a player or anyone in hockey? But but Oh, well, I mean, yeah. No, I won’t I won’t [ __ ] talk about players. I I played 18 years. You know, like I said, I mentioned maybe 10%. Uh which was just a round number I gave uh guys that I didn’t necessarily love, but you know, that’s that’s life. You’re not going to get along with everybody. I I for the most part, most players, I don’t have a lot of bad things to say about them. Did I love everything that they did and the ways that they play? Probably not. But still good people, hardworking people for the most part. um with the media. I mean, there’s no secret, obviously, me and Larry Brooks, right? Uh probably the most views I ever got was was not as a player, but as my my my outro uh my exit meeting in New York. So, obviously, you know, I’ve been verbal about him and you know, I understand the media has a uh has a job to do and they’re going to be critical and I’m completely fine with that. I played 18 years, no one ever really bothered me. Um, but I believe it’s not even me. It’s it’s just it’s just when everyone that’s been there in the past, guys had reached out to me after that came out saying thank you. Uh, current players, past players, um, he seems to do that to a lot of people. And I just don’t think that’s right. I think when you’re looking for that that story instead of covering the team uh, the way they should be covered was wrong. And I kept silent for two years because it was my job to stay silent. But on my way out, uh, I wasn’t going to stay quiet anymore. So, I don’t know him as a man. I don’t know him as a brother, as a father. He might be a great friend. But, um, as someone who covers or covered the Rangers, I thought he did an absolutely terrible, uh, selfish job of putting his storylines and creating drama instead of covering the team the way they’re supposed to be covered. And, and a lot of the [ __ ] that he wrote down was incorrect, too, which was which was wrong. Uh, when you’re shit-talking guys and trashing guys, when they’re not on the ice, they’re not responsible for a goal. I think it becomes personal at some point. When the team’s seven and0 and you release a full page article that says boiled over, meaning like I’m done after a sevename winning streak, that seems like pretty [ __ ] up to me. So, I would say Larry Brooks, as everyone knows, yes, we are not f we are not very big fans of each other. Is there I don’t know him as a I don’t know I don’t know him as a person. Yeah. Is Is there anybody else and you don’t have to tell us today that we can save it for another podcast but anybody else in hockey? No I I No, I I’ve I’ve literally I think I’ve had I’ve had two runins in 18 years. The other was Mark Perty. We talked about Okay. Uh you know after he came in, you know, the LA series where he asked me if we were just taking our time trying to close out the series and uh I just thought that was an absolutely stupid question. So, uh, but again, I I I don’t have the a problem with the media. You guys have a job to do. I mean, Shankpang, not a huge fan, but, um, you know, in I thought I was going to hear something a compliment for once. Enough to come on the podcast. She tolerates me. That’s what I’m saying. No, no, no, no. You’re right. No, but yeah, you guys have a job to do as long as and no one’s going to be perfect. Uh, I loved loved Randy and Drew and uh the guys that had covered me in Tampa and no issues. No issues. Just just just had an issue uh with somebody in New York there. And with Randy Han’s golf game. So yeah, you know what? Randy is the best, but his golf game still sucks. But he’s got a hole in one. He’s got a hole in one. Whoa. Oh, he does. Not a lot of people have that. Now that’s a story we need to have. But I don’t. Oh, he has video. Make sure he Yeah, make sure he bring you guys shows you or gives you guys the video. It’s It’s he’ll reply YouTube comments with the video. Very cool. All right. This one’s more light-hearted because that was a little serious there. This one’s from R. Phillips, which is, “When you watch a game, do you enjoy it like a fan would or are you watching it like a player would watch film of themselves, like looking at matchups, spacing, power plays, those kind of thing?” I I would say it’s a combination of both. Um, if I know certain players and like I said, as I’m getting older, there’s less and less guys, uh, I will watch it, you know, watching my buddy, making sure how he’s doing well. Or if I’m watching Elaine Hudson or somebody that I want to watch, uh, it’ll it’ll be, um, it could be a little more technical. Uh, I remember a couple years ago, uh, Nolan Pratt in Colorado, him and I had talked, uh, I’m going to blank on his name, smaller defenseman, um, for Colorado. Still there, number six. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sammy Gerard. He had asked me to like, uh, watch him for a few games and give advice and I did uh, I think it was wellreceived obviously. Um, I hope it was. At least I was told it was. So, I don’t mind doing that, but that was a specific one where I was watching. And then you just have your watching a game and just enjoying the game as it is. Usually in playoffs, it’s more just watching the intensity and watching it as it is. Or I’ll watch Colorado and watch Kale Mar and just be like that’s [ __ ] awesome and you know it’s pretty uh pretty amazing to watch. It’s good to also notice we got we got hockey tonight, boys. Like we have actual NHL tonight. That’s right. So excited. I I want to ask you, Dan, I guess a little followup to that is are there any like who like current players that like you’re closest with that you kind of cheer the most for? Right? Like it might have been like I know you’re close with you mentioned Logan, right? But he obviously stepped away. But anybody that’s still playing that you’re like, “Yeah, man. I want that guy something.” Yeah. Every year there’s less and less, you know, obviously Burns. Bernie is still playing Bernzie. Okay. Yeah. There’s a couple guys, you know, uh Cam Talbot was one of my goalies in New York. I love, you know, Cam. Um, you know, Chris Krider. There’s a few young guys. JT Miller, who was very young when, uh, I was in New York, Kevin Hayes. Um, so yeah, there’s there’s fewer and fewer every year. Um, but, um, yeah, I think, uh, still enjoy watching, you know, buddies, I guess. Cool. Uh this one’s from Pescado and this is uh not light. Um there’s two questions though. These are such good questions that that that I wanted to ask both of them. The first one uh Dan is do you think the NHL should further or better acknowledge the devastating effects of CTE? What’s that? What’ you ask? No, I’m kidding. That was a bad joke. That was a bad bad joke. I It was bad. I have I have a weird I have weird I have very very dark humor. I have very dark humor. What was your question again? No. Okay. Um, uh, should the NHL, I mean, just in general, I think, uh, yeah, every sport that has concussions, uh, on a regular basis should probably do their part in looking into it. Obviously with the NFL, you have these guys wearing these goofy looking helmets. And sure, maybe it’s goofy, but that comes from studies and it comes from um you know, professionals trying to figure out ways of lessening those. They’re never going to go away completely, but designing new helmets. Um any way that we can bring those down is is something that obviously we should all support. So, are they doing enough? I can’t answer that. But, uh, they should certainly be doing some for sure. Okay. And a kind of a separate question, but also a very good question. Without outing anybody, were there any openly gay hockey players when you played or that everyone kind of knew about or you knew about? And how do you think in general any room would react to a player coming out? I don’t mind the question, but like, yeah. No, in 18 years, I actually don’t know if has there ever been a gay hockey player come out? Not in the NHL. Not I mean I think at the NHL level of course I mean yeah u yeah no so so no I mean uh yeah it’s not something that has ever come up in the 18 not just in it’s never come up in the NHL as a as a whole now if you use statistics in life right you would think you would think that’s not possible right um but and then how would we you know I think I think the the tr the the the the truth is can I sit here and say there wouldn’t be jokes and jabs. No, a locker room is a tough place to be. No matter if you’re gay, straight, your dick’s eyes, your color of your you know what I mean? Like it’s Yeah. Yeah. But it’s but it’s but it’s but it’s it’s fair game for everybody. But it’s it’s it’s it’s one of those tough just it’s locker room love I call it. Like you just right everybody kind of makes fun of each other but at the end of the day you’re all brothers. So, um, so there would, I’m sure, be some jokes, but that being said, would I care if there was a gay player on my team or not? I don’t give a [ __ ] As long as he helps me win hockey games, I I couldn’t care less. And it’s there’s nothing wrong with that. So, it’s not even That’s Yeah, it’s uh I didn’t expect to have that. I didn’t have this on my bingo card either, but uh we got some kind of where I’m at. I don’t I don’t I don’t think it would be a problem because It’s it’s it’s it’s who we are as as a as a human race. We we that’s who we are. Well, let me go deeper though because I do have a followup. Do you think though that you would have teammates that might have an issue with it? Like you don’t and probably most of your teammates wouldn’t, but you might. Well, again, if based based on statistics in the world, then yeah, then there would be some guys that would have issues with it. That’s normal, right? That makes sense. Um, there’s racism, there’s sexism, there’s homophobia. You Yeah, you would think you would think that somebody would have a problem with it. Sure. Sure. Not me. Okay. Um, unless unless unless he didn’t work hard and didn’t [ __ ] make us win games, then I’m coming. No, that’s it. No, I’m kidding. The joke. It’s a joke. Uh, okay. Beno asks your thoughts on playing your your off hand because that’s always a big discussion with defenseman playing your your off side. Yeah. Is that is that of huge consideration or is that maybe a little overblown in in your opinion as a as a defenseman? Uh no, there’s there’s it’s it’s it’s weird. Not weird, it’s different. Um it has probably a few advantages sometimes. There are a few advantages. If you’re on the wrong side in the offensive zone, you’re loading up for one-times all the time. So, there are advantages, but um there’s obviously disadvantages picking up a puck off the wall on your backhand or your forehand. Um you know, the for me coming down as a defenseman or skating back, a guy coming to my right towards the boards was what I was used to. So, if I had to flip, it’s not that I can’t do it. It’s just when you do something 95 times in a row one way and then you got to do it five times the other way for 18 years, it’s going to be awkward. So again, I think ideally you want guys on their own sides, but again based on who you want to keep on the team, you may have to make a sacrifice which is, hey, I’d rather have this guy on his off side than send him to the miners or sure back to college or whatever it may be. I I I’d rather have player A be on the opposite side. And so those are choices you make as a team. All right. I don’t know this band. Um but Dylan Smallwood, I’m imagining this is a band, not just a thing. It might be a movie, but go ahead. Might be a movie. Might be a movie. As have you ever seen Blood Sucking Freaks? If not, why? If so, thoughts. Don’t know if it’s a band or a movie. Okay, so the answer is no. I haven’t seen him cuz I don’t know if it’s a banner movie. By I’ve never heard of him. By I’ve never heard of him. I got to look this up then. Yeah. C I don’t know. What is What is C? What is the third question or is there no third question? I think this is a movie. That’s the first thing that comes up. It’s a it’s a horror comedy. Uh the the Okay. So, so right. So, right there. Horror comedies are not my thing. horror comedies or uh um I’m actually gonna bring up the movie I saw the other night with my kids which was really nice on HBO Max. Um I’m going to plug it right now. Um uh bring her back. Bring her back on HBO Max. Okay. Uh cultibalism. Super good. Get the kids. Get the Get Get everyone around. What are you talking about? Uh, get the misses. But it’s Yeah, it’s it’s on uh HBO Max right now and it’s pretty awesome. And uh it’s not a comedy. It’s horror horror comedy. Yeah, but but comedy the comedy horrors not those are not my uh forte. So that’s probably why I didn’t see it, assuming that’s what it is. Okay. So, you like kind of I like I like I like dark. I like I like dark like let’s get weird horror, not let’s make fun, let’s laugh. Well, this one is like according to this uh I don’t know how much comedy it is. It’s just what it’s categorized, but um it might be it could be up your alley. It’s it’s a exploitation splatter film from 1976. And a one-s sentence plot is a sadist kidnaps young women and tortures and kills them on stage, but his audiences think it is fake. So anyway, what’s the name? That’s the movie we just talked about. Yeah, that’s the movie. It’s called Blood Sucking Freaks. Okay. cuz three words. The description the description sounds like another movie I watched where it’s like a night uh like a David Letterman or like a Jay Leno type of show and then weird [ __ ] starts to happen and the audience thinks it’s not true but it’s actually true but different movie. Sure. Okay. All right. Well, Dylan Smallwood seems to like it. So, give it a give it a shot. Yes. Exactly. So, want to recommend it to you then. It might be it might be something that that is that you might find entertaining, but don’t feelings when they watch the kids though. All right. Uh my my kids will watch it. Yeah, they’ll watch it. Okay. All right. That Brad Fitzpatrick asks uh just for you to talk candidly about just the mental side of 2010 playoffs when you scored your the own goal and just you know just how how you felt after you scored the own goal and just obviously when you scored the next game too. Yeah. Um, yeah, I’ve been asked that question a lot. Uh, I will I will preface it yet again to those that don’t know. It did go off of O’Reilly’s shin pad, so it was not straight in. Um, yeah, I remember Cranky gave me the pass and yeah, the he was coming at me and I knew he was going to try to take the wall away. So, that’s the safe play even though I I think he would have probably taken it away from me. So, I try to go inside. Uh again, and I’ve said this before, I can stay there on Nabi for probably a week straight and try a thousand backhands and never score a goal from there. So, it was a freak situation. That being said, we still lose the game. I have to go back in the locker room. It’s a playoff game. I feel like [ __ ] I feel terrible. Uh it was uh it was tough. And I remember I think it was Scott Emmer said, “Hey, media wants to talk to you, but you know, just go shower. We’ll, you know, you can avoid him.” And I said, “No.” I remember saying no because I knew that that would just be hiding. And that was never who I was. Uh so I said, “Bring him in.” And I don’t remember the questions. I I blacked out at this point, but I remember facing the media headon and like, “Yeah, this is a terrible feeling.” And I remember want I remember wanting or saying something like, I wish it was a double header. Like I wish it was like baseball where I could go out and play right away. The worst part was going to have to be to wait 48 hours. So like many games in my life, I was the type of player where I would go home and I remember having this conversation with Larry Robinson. It’d be like a movie in your head that you can’t turn off. So it would just replay over and over and over again in the middle of the day while you’re walking somewhere. It was just replaying and I you can’t shut it off and it’s a terrible terrible feeling. Um and I had that I called the movies. I couldn’t shut them off. And so that was the worst part. It was 48 hours of just [ __ ] playing it over and over my head. I couldn’t do anything about it. Um but the best part of the whole story is the next game. Uh, I’m very happy or very proud of how I played. Our team won the game. Uh, we won the series. Uh, it just ends up being a a shitty part turned into a pretty uh pretty awesome story about overcoming what what what was a very pretty low moment. Sure. Sure. Chris Robinson asked and let’s not it’s asks for good prank stories from various teams that you’ve been on. Let’s not go with the scare tactics one because we talked at length about that a couple episodes ago. So, any uh scare tactics runnerup prank stories you can share. Yeah, I I have a good one. Uh okay, sorry. Uh I have a really good one. Um I don’t know if it’ll be 100% accurate, but it’ll be at least it’ll be at least 85 to 90% accurate. It’s good enough. I was I was I was in Florida. Okay. uh uh with the Panthers and we were on a long road trip like let’s call it 12 days almost two weeks and on day two uh I don’t know if you guys remember Mike Cllinger. Oh sure. Yeah. Okay. Mike Cinger who’s been who’s played who’s played on like 15 teams in the league, right? So Mike Cylinger had a denture like he had fake uppers and lowers. He had a full-blown denture. Uh, and on the road, Ray Whitney, uh, the wizard Ray Whitney, uh, stole his teeth. Oh god. And put him in an envelope and sent him back to Florida. And so for like the next for the next like I would say 10 or 11 days, Mike Celinger. And so for pregame he couldn’t have steak, he couldn’t have chicken. He was having soup and [ __ ] smoothies. He couldn’t [ __ ] eat, which is probably not funny to him, but like and for like 10 days and then he got home and I don’t know if his wife was like, “Your teeth are here, Mike.” or whatever. And I thought it was hilarious. And then the return wasn’t as funny, but uh Mike Cylinger put I guess cops have like a blue dye of some kind where it’s like some sort of evidence dye and he put a bunch of uh it’s powder so you can’t tell. So Ray Whitney put on his gloves uh practiced and then after after the game he had like smurf hands just totally blue. Uh but all right. So, I mean, it was in a good attempt at trying to get back, but uh to see Mike Cylinger for 10 days, not have any teeth on the road, was pretty [ __ ] funny. Very funny. Worth it. This is Ray Whitney, who I believe currently works for the NHL. So, Oh, yeah. He interviewed for the Sharks uh GM, didn’t he? Did he interview for the Sharks GM? My dream. He did. He did. He did. He did. Yeah. That’s why he didn’t get the job. No. Uh yeah, that was that that’s a pretty What a recommendation. And I was like, “No, that’s a pretty funny one.” Then the other one I could think of, not quite as funny, but in the morning you come in and there’s always like a table with a bunch of things to sign. There’s sticks and helmets and whatever. And then uh Mark Bersan, who was a with me in Tampa, uh put Stan Nescatch’s actual gloves on there. So, we’re all we all came in, we all signed like cuz you don’t look, you just sign sign. And then and then Stan didn’t really have backup gloves, so he ended up playing with those gloves for at least a few games until he broke in a new pair. Yeah. Where it was just signatures everywhere. So, that was also also pretty funny. Yeah. I got to see if there’s any pictures on Getty Images of uh Yeah. So, Stan Muscatch. Yeah, that was a good one. That is a good one. All right. Rothgar asks, and this I’m probably not the one to be asking this because I don’t know the story entirely. Um, what was the inside story of how you became friends with uh Shang and Zubar and joined the podcast? And what was the hook to get you on this podcast with us? Oh, probably not. Yeah, I think I I I I could be I could I could be wrong. Uh, Shang promised me uh $500,000. Yep. That’s Yes. 500,000 pesos. Shang Shang reached out and said, “Would you be interested?” And I I don’t recall if I was warm on it or hot or cold. I might have been somewhere in between. Uh and then he said, “Well, let’s let’s go out. Let’s meet out for a drink.” And uh you and then we ended up meeting Zubar, who we I him and I hit it off. We had a great fun night. Um we I don’t think talked about hockey very much. No, we talked about movies and and music and uh that’s a Tom Cruz night and human and Yeah. Yeah. And and I, you know, I think that’s probably at the end of the day why I’m here today because I thought we hit it off on things that I thought only me and very few people knew about. Um, I was very surprised to hear that these two knew all the weird [ __ ] I listened to or watched, uh, and even knew more than I did on some parts. And so, I think that drew me in. And then, uh, I think that’s it. I mean, I’ve been enjoying it so far. I didn’t know how long I was going to do it, but uh I like having some I I’m not a big drinker per se, but uh you know to have a couple drinks in the afternoon with some buddies uh once a week is has been a nice little added bonus. Well, we love you too, Dan. Though you are a sick individual, but I’m not judgmental, though. So, and we have hockey suit. Oh my god, it’s going to be the best. Actual games. Pontain yourself. Keep keep it in your pants. Keegan, I can’t. I can’t. I’m so excited. You have no idea. It’s like a kid on Christmas. All right. Joe Joe E. He asked basically he’s trying to see if there’s any parallels between Warsoski and Totoella. Not not in style, but just in the sense that when when when Tortoella took over Tampa that the there was a lot of negative defensive stats, right? All that sort of thing. Right. the next year, the first full year, I didn’t double check this, but I guess the first full year with Totoella, you guys jumped to 93 points. And anyway, can you speak to what was the key change to for you guys to improve that much defensively? How much do you think the coach and staff were responsible for it is the question? So, I’m a bad person to answer that question because I wasn’t on the team previously before Tors got there. Uh, I got traded at the halfway point. Um, and so I think he took over at the end of the year though. That’s why I got to double check. I’m pretty sure he did. But let me let me double check. When I got to Tampa, he was already there. So, um, I never got I never got to play for another coach and see the difference. So, I see what you’re saying. Right. Right. Right. Right. But I guess the next year though, you guys did improve to 93 points. So, how much do you think that improve without the point of comparison, but how much you think you got John and the coaches? I I yeah I mean I didn’t think coaches were that important until like I said until I retired. I think I looked back at the way I was coached early and late and compared that to the middle part and how valuable a coach can be and how they motivate how they teach. Uh and I thought um you know he was no nowhere near perfect but he’s a very good motivator and I think his biggest asset was knowing who to play, knowing how much to play them. He wasn’t, “Oh, I’m going to arrest this guy tonight or I’m gonna” He No, he was like, “No, he was just like, you get back out there. You get back out there. You’re the ones that are going to make me win the games.” And so, I think as players, we have to take, you know, they just put a good team together, you know. I think uh obviously they they brought in Marty and and you bring in like Randy or Randy Dave and uh Andy is who I want to say. uh tales and so I think they just put together a good team over the course of a year and a half. Uh so I think players have to take some of that uh the point the point increase I think belongs partially to the players but you know I’m sure to Torch played his part in it as well. I just wasn’t there before he got there so I I can’t compare. Okay. Uh this is from uh Boomer and this is maybe it’s an obvious answer but it’s also more nuance hockey question too. As a defenseman, did you prefer playing teams that enter the zone with a lot of speed and it’s, you know, dump pucks in a lot and force you to turn your back like have a guy like Scott Nickel, you know, coming down on you or did you prefer teams that try to attack you more headon? Um, so you know, try to carry the puck in and so you can keep, you know, you can keep them in front of you, I guess, but I guess those teams would probably be faster though. So that would be kind of the issue there. Yeah, that’s a tough question. That’s a tough question to answer. I mean, I I my my instinct is to say I’d rather teams carry the puck in. Um, because any team that any team that plays a dump and chase usually means they’re making you go back and they’re making you get hit up against the glass or the board. So, um, so at the end of the day, not at the end of the day, but, uh, yeah, I I I would say a dump and chase team would probably be less of a fun night for me. Uh, but that’s why you have good partners that go in the corners and get the puck for you. But, you know, there there’s the other thing, too. There’s there’s there’s the Fords got to help out. you know, if the Fords were giving me time to go back there and grab the puck, it didn’t matter if it was a dump and chase team or not, as long as I had time to go back and get the puck. Uh, you know, back in pre204, you can do a lot more, um, you know, picking. Um, so you didn’t have to, uh, get run over every time. Right. Right. Would you prefer playing the say the 2012 Kings or Conor McDavid in 2015? You know what I mean? That’s a good question. Pro I I I I like I my game was I liked speed. I like, you know, so I was a good I was a good skater. So I I would probably prefer playing that style of game. Uh and just this is not a question, but I have been asked before the red line or pre- redline or post red line. I would I would if it was me, I would put the red line back in. meaning I don’t like those long passes where players just tip their blades and it goes in the other end. I I I don’t think that’s a skill play as defenseman. I’d rather see somebody have to try to make a skill play than throw these long bombs to these players that are flipping their blades. So, that I didn’t like. It was more of like the I just I just thought it was bad bad and shitty hockey. Okay. But nobody wants to see Conor McDavid come on them 100 miles an hour. So nobody likes that. Yeah, there’s a balance. No matter No matter how good of a skater I was, no matter how good a skater scenario. Yeah. Um you want is a team that’s uh entering the zone, but they do it really poorly the entire night. That’s what you want, basically. Yeah, that’s a player that can’t handle. Give me that. Give me that. Yep. 100%. All right. GH asks, uh, how great was it to be a roadie for Faith No More? was wondering what your experience was with Mike Patton and the rest of the band. And there’s a second question on this, too. Not the music one, so we know you like music. Yeah. For those of you that don’t know, Faith No More was my favorite band growing up. Um, and years later, and I apologize to those that have heard this story a hundred times, but uh they reunited after 10 years. They had been done. They reunited to play four games at the Warfield. Uh, I had now assistant GM Tom Holley. I said, “Just get me in there. I don’t care where, how. And so he not only got me in, I was just hoping to get nose, excuse me, nosebleleed tickets, but he got me in touch with her manager. Next thing you know, I’m walking underneath and I’m in their uh their um dressing room. You know, Puffy’s there and then Mike comes in and I I’ve met a lot of people. I have not been starruck at all, but I was pretty starruck that day. Uh, and then years later we just uh they went out on tour and so uh I was in New York uh at the time and I went on a little four um venue mini trip if you will over the course of six nights I think Philly, Boston uh I can’t think of Baltimore maybe and then New York. Um, and uh, yeah. No, I mean the first by the first the first show I wasn’t doing a whole lot. By the last show I was on stage setting up drum kits, bringing out bases and guitars. I was doing tickets. Uh, I was doing stuff like uh, green room like set up. I was doing a bunch of [ __ ] They had me doing a bunch of [ __ ] U, and I I liked it. They didn’t uh they didn’t pay me. It was just it was like I don’t know. It became like holy [ __ ] this is pretty awesome. And you know, it was only for a week, so it wasn’t like I was my job and doing it for for a lifetime because that would probably be different. But uh you know, and Mike Mike was great. They all uh they were all very receptive. I think uh they all seem to we all seem to get along. Mike has a very sick twisted movie. Um we him and I be like, “Have you seen this?” And he’d be like, “Yeah.” Be like, “No one has seen that.” But Mike has some really [ __ ] up taste in movies, too. And so uh we definitely clicked. uh on on that and uh yeah, my favorite moment was just the rehearsals, just me and it was like a private concert of my favorite band. Um you know, some of the best moments or memories I’ll have when my light flashes before my eyes. That’ll probably be one of them. Awesome. Love it. GH also asks, uh was wondering, and this is also something I don’t know, but was wondering what you feel about Mr. Bungle’s last album. I feel like they lost their eclectic originality and become a bit redundant with Phantom’s heavier thrash metal sound. I got to finish all that. I don’t know what the words are. So, so, so, so who who is who is this person? His name is GH or his or her GH. So, so yeah, GH should know that the last album was uh their very first album when they were in high school that they redid. So, the Mr. Mr. Bungle that I grew up on and loved is not the original Mr. Bungle that they ended up redoing this album about. So the album she’s referring to is thrash metal like death slayer type like Slayer on crack like not the Mr. Bongle I grew up with. Not to mention, they have new band uh uh players on the new album that they didn’t have in the original. Uh it was like a demo tape back when they they were literally in high school when they released um this album. And so they they the one they redid is is not the Mr. Bungle that this person probably knew and that’s why they probably thought it was like different. The reason is because it was not new material. It was a completely old album they just re-recorded. And then uh Scott from Anthrax was part of the band as well. So it was a completely new band as well. But go listen to Mr. Bung. Go listen Mr. Bungle like California and uh the one before. I don’t even know. I think it was just called Mr. Bungle. Uh [ __ ] incredible music. Trying to get Mr. Give them some peace of mind that it’s you know things are things are still like uh the original Mr. jungle and then and then Phantomos. Phantomos is probably one of the weirdest bands I’ve ever listened to. So, okay, that’s go enjoy go enjoy Phantomos cuz even I love Mike. I love he’s probably been in like 15 bands and I probably love 13 of them. Uh Phantomos is is is a is a difficult one to uh to get through. Okay. You may want to you may want to stick some scissors in your eyeballs while you’re listening to it. Sure. So, it’s weird. All right. SJ Shy, he asked in his opinion, it seems to him that today’s NHL has decided that it’s fine to hit guys in the numbers as long as they’re up against the boards. Uh, this used to get drawing uh this used to draw boarding calls in your era, Dan. and so seems to to to Shy that careers are going to be shortened with the repeated trauma to the spine. And so anyway, thoughts. So, uh I don’t know if I’m going to uh describe it properly, but there’s something that I think the NHL should have allowed years ago, and I hope that they will by the time I croak. Um, as forwards go towards uh the boards with a defenseman or anyone really, I think they should allow like some sort of a bear hug type where you’re going in with the player and you’re both absorbing the boards together. Um, so in football, you know, with a lineman, you get to like grab and like, you know, obviously if he’s trying to pass you, then you got to let go, right? But I think it’s sort of in that world world where you should be able to as the puck is going back, you’re going in with a Dman, you grab him, go in with him, and both absorb the hit. I think that is way safer than than the defenseman going first and then there’s contact. Yeah. regard we’re b um numbers or not if you go this way versus coming into the boards together and absorbing it together um call it bear hugging call it whatever you want that should be allowed um and I think that’s a way that that will make a huge different injury-wise um so that’s that’s something that I would push for uh the NHL guys probably know exactly what I’m talking about players know exactly what I’m talking about Um, obviously you can’t do it 10 ft from the boards where you’re just not allowing someone to go. Mhm. But it’s just 3 4 feet from the boards where you’re both going in at the same time. Just grab him, allow to be grabbed and just both go into the boards together. And he did his job and he protected me as a defenseman going on the board. So I would take that all day. Would would something like that though just I’m just imagining it. Would it be uh to the advantage of whoever’s def, you know, whoever does not have the puck, whoever’s defending kind of it would be it would it would it would be advantage to the player that doesn’t have the puck because if you’re with somebody that’s shifty, um it it’ll eliminate that. You don’t have to like now all of a sudden react when you’re two feet away and he can go left or right and beat you. Um, so if you’re going in with uh whoever Kale Mar or whoever, he won’t shimmy shake you. He’s But it has to be there has to be like it’s got to be three or four within three or four feet. Right. Right. Right. It’s it’s like a lineman in in in football, right? Like they can call holding on any any given point, but like a lineman can grab you. It’s like a selective holding that you can do. It’s a selective working with you. But yeah, just that I just thinking about it. Yeah. Yeah. And obviously you learn to call it as as as guys learn it. You learn to call when hey like you did this when you were seven feet away from the boards and you were just grabbing on not letting him go. Then then that’s [ __ ] Right. Right. It be like it’ be like holding a football. You just you just have to figure it becomes a judgment call. Yeah. It’s a judgment call. When does it stop too? Like when do you then say you’ve held on too much, you know? Well, that’s the thing. There’s there’s a time limit and there’s a there’s a there’s a a depth limit. I don’t want I don’t want to see that in the middle of the ice. Yeah. I want to see that call it three feet around the whole around the whole rink. Okay. Uh doesn’t mean you eliminate the hits, right? If if if if I’m going in and somebody’s 10 feet away and they’re coming to get me, they have every right to finish me. But when two players are going back dump and chase and two guys are going back. Um Maxim Lierre like one of my concussions, right? Had he just gone in with me and like we both would have absorbed the hit, right? But he came in late, hit me from behind and all of a sudden there’s a concussion um that could have been avoided with that. He would have taken me out, done his job as a forward, and I would have not had a concussion. Okay. Um, SJ Shy also recommended some music to you. So, okay. I’m I’m always open to Yeah. to hear new stuff. And hopefully I’m saying the band names right, but uh uh Tesseract the War of Being album, Sky Harbor, Disperse, Periphery, no Aviations. I think these are all band names. Preston Mechco and Contortionist. Yeah, they are all bands. And I guess if you haven’t heard any of them, I’ve given free uh free pubs to all these bands. So So yeah, the list, Dan, if you want send me the list. Send me the list. I always love checking them out. Hopefully they’re uh I’m I’m assuming these bands are all similar and I’m assuming these bands are from someone that knows the bands that I like because if they sound Yeah. Like I think I I got early part of the question, you might have mentioned Faith No More. I I think so. I got So, so he’s if they’re bands that sound like Seems like they’re all doing or they’re current bands because they’re all putting out music now. So, but with like that kind of influence though you I love listening to new bands for sure. Okay. Um, so this one as you mentioned before that you didn’t play on a lot of losing teams. So, but still curious about your perspective though. This is from Eric and he asks, “Through difficult seasons for teams, there’s always the debate as to whether the young kids in a locker room like they need old veterans who maybe aren’t playing as much or playing as well as they used to.” And so, do you have any specific examples of kind of young players what they need to learn to be effective for pro hockey players from the old guys? you know, what does mentorship mentorship look like for a losing locker room? And basically, this fan, it wants to make sure that the Sharks aren’t anything like the Buffalo Sabres. So, well, uh, you got to bring in the right people. You can bring veterans in, but if the veterans aren’t good uh either players or they don’t have good and I don’t, you know, there’s not a ton of those players out there, but if they don’t have the right if they’re not cut from the right cloth, then, you know, I I I think there’s definitely always something to learn from a veteran. Um whether that’s something on the ice, but sometimes it’s something off the ice, right? Mh. Uh, it could be I can’t think of who it was, but like this is going to sound the opposite of what a veteran should say, but I remember like I’d stay on the ice. I get on the ice early. I get on the ice after, which is looked upon as like, oh, this guy’s working hard or working. I remember I remember a vet saying like one time he’s like, “Dude, like take a [ __ ] break.” You know, like I I don’t remember who it was. Mhm. But it was Tampa. I it was in Florida. I just remember him saying like it was it you know what I it was just him saying like relax. Yeah. It was him saying it was his way of saying like relax. You’re you’re you’re obviously you work hard. You’re trying to like play more trying to you know but like you know you play 82 games a year. I wasn’t but the team plays 82 games a year and uh you got to you got to let loose uh sometimes and and breathe. Um, so, um, yeah, I think there’s something to be learned, um, as a young guy from from veterans that have played many, many games, many situations, um, specific on ice stuff, but, there’s also some off ice stuff as well that, you know, you would never think of because you don’t know. I don’t know how much you stay in like NHL gossip circles, but like do you have any perspective of of why it’s taken so long in Buffalo just from talking to friends? Any any anything like that? No. I mean, no. I mean, the Bills are really good. So, you can get people to Buffalo. You can Exactly. You don’t need palm trees, but not having them watch not having watched them closely um maybe they just haven’t had the right players. I I don’t know. Um but Kevin Adams, who’s a my my college teammate from Miami, Ohio, um is the GM there. I know he’s been there for a few years now, so the the clock is ticking, right? Um but yeah, I mean when when when when a team is not winning and making the playoffs for decade at a time and the Sharks are coming up on what, six years now? Y um seven there’s a seven. Uh there’s a lot of fac there’s a lot of factors there. um you know and it’s not you’re normally not going to have the same coach. You’re not going to have the same GM that go through the because you’re you’re going to move those people. Um so yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know. I think uh I like what’s going on here in San Jose. I I I don’t know exactly what’s going on in Buffalo. Um but I think the players have to take some responsibility obviously, you know, like a large responsibility. maybe just don’t have the right guys. Yeah, they brought in Josh Norris this year. So, I don’t know. I think I think it’s this year’s the year. I’m going to say they make this year’s the year for Buffalo. This is the year. I’m saying they bold prediction time. Okay. Bold prediction. Like they they got a good team. They really We talked when we talked we talked we talked about or I talked about scouting how that’s a very underappreciated, you know, they’re they have probably had some bust. They’ve always drafted very high. Uh, I can’t think of the one guy I you guys will, but they draft he was there was first or second overall. I might be going back 10 years, but he never panned out. Um, well, he said his name, but yeah. No, no, it wasn’t. It wasn’t Eel. I can’t I want to say it might have been a Russian name. Uh, he was a very high draft pick that just And that was a first over or very high pick. Uh, anyways, somebody can Oh, that might be the Oilers, actually. Anyway, no, it was Buffalo. It was Buffalo. It was Buffalo. Okay. I’m trying to think of who? Well, you know what? There there is one guy in Edmonton that didn’t work out too. What was his name? Yakapov. Yakopov. Yakapov. Yeah, Yakapov is one of them. That’s Edmonton. But I feel like there was one in Buffalo. But okay. Um anyway, so so scouts have a responsibility there as well to maybe draft correctly and I don’t know I don’t know Buffalo they have. I just I don’t know if they have. That might be part of the reason they haven’t made the playoffs as well. Um, James R says, “With all the captain talk recently, I’d love to hear about how an NHL team usually selects its captain and their alternate captains, do the players get a vote? Is it a coach thing, a GB thing? Do all teams do it the same way?” Uh, I I think I’ve only been through one team, which was San Jose, where a captaincy was on uh up for grabs. Mhm. Uh Florida was Scott Melb, Tampa was Dave Anderchuk, New York was um Mcdana. So, um I’m not 100% entirely sure, but I do remember they wanted some feedback one year. I can’t remember. Obviously, I went through Jumbo, Patty, and Blakey, so I went through three uh captains. I believe at some point there was some sort of like, hey, after practice, you know, come in or some not some sort of unofficial vote. Um, but I think I think it’s a I think it’s a combination of the GM, the coaches, and the players uh having a say. But, um, yeah, that was my experience. Some other teams, it might just be just the coach or just the GM and this is the guy. I think in Tampa you transitioned from Andrew Chuck to to Tim Taylor. I don’t know what that Yeah, you you Yeah, that’s right. And I for and I forgot about that. Yeah. Yeah. Speak. Uh I don’t think it’s a CTE issue. I just I just um I I I I don’t remember having a say in that cuz I don’t even remember him being a captain, right? Um I know Tim and Andy were were very tight. They were the two old guys on the team, right? um with the most games. So, it might have just been like, let’s just pass the the C on to the the next, you know, the kind of, you know, 1B, if you will. Uh but yeah, I don’t even remember the captain, I guess. There was a lockout year in between it, too. So, it could have been some kind of like So, we had a lockout year. Yeah, we had a lock Yeah, we had a lockout year in ’05. Um and then in ‘ 06 was I think the year that I slit my wrist. Yeah. So which is another podcast. I didn’t actually slice my wrist people a skate slit my wrist. Yeah. Um so you know what I was I was away from the team and that might have been the year that he was the captain because I I don’t remember it. And then it’s very possible. your sharks example. Did you talk with with Doug with Doug and Todd or just Doug or just um I don’t want to give false information. I don’t recall. Okay. Uh my guess would be that I I spoke to Todd. Mhm. But it’s a educated guess. It’s not something that I I remember clearly. Okay. All right. Um Dylan C has a golf question. Oh, and hopefully I’m explaining this all correctly. Uh, could you win the masters starting on the green, assuming you start on the putting surface? Okay. So, now I get that add of of the of the first hole or every hole. I I guess at the end I don’t know. Or every hole you get to start on the green, I guess. Then yeah, then yeah, I’m winning 100%. I’m winning the Masters. Okay. As far away from the pin as possible. Every other player starts on a T box like normal. What do you think you would shoot? Well, normal is normal putting is a two putt is a good putt. So, you’re talking 36. Now, at the Masters, even if you three putt every hole, right, you’re going to have 54. You’re going 54. Yeah. And then you probably at the Masters, because they’re so fast, you’ll probably have a couple four putts. So, I would probably shoot 60 at the Masters or less. Okay. Well, that’s the course I think if I was just putting. So, uh, very weird question. Had to think about it, but yes. Put me on the putting green at the Masters and I will win the Masters. Okay. Love it. All right. This is actually my favorite question from Falcon 5 from all this. I I wonder how Yeah. like how you would answer this. Who would win? Uh, roster of I’m going to say five makes more sense. And let’s say a roster of five Dan Boils versus a roster of five Mark Edward Felix and let’s say the goalending is is the is equal. You know what I mean? So let’s the goalending isn’t the difference. So five gets in your prime. Well, you guys know what you guys know what I’m going to say. Obviously I’m going to say me. Obviously I’m going to say me. I mean that’s not to take away what Pickles has done. obviously played a thousand a billion games, was very strong defensively. Uh, but your rationale for it though? Well, my rational is I want the puck and I I I choose myself. Um, I choose myself. Um, what if every Dan Bole is choosing himself though? That’s four clones of Dan Bo. It could be a selfish puck hawking team. No, no, no, no, no. Because I was not a I was not a selfish hockey player. I was not a selfish hockey player. So every if every Dan Bo picks himself as as the question to answer the question, we would go out there, we would try to do anything it takes to win. So it wouldn’t matter which Dan Bole I was which Dan Bo I was passing it to. Um but I just uh you know it’s it’s really Yeah. Here here come here comes the old boil thinks you know pickles sucks. That’s not what it is. It’s just I I choose myself. I choose myself. Oh, you know, and actually I understand his question better. At first, I thought that this question meant like Dan versus Pickles headto head, but actually I think he’s talking about roster construction, he or she about like if you’re to build ideal defense, would you want six Dan Boils or six more Edward Blastics? Okay. So, that is actually the more again I I again I I I picked 6DM Boils because um I think I was more of a two-way defenseman than Pickles was. Meaning Pickles was great defensively, but his offense was limited. Whereas I don’t I don’t look at myself as a purely only offensive defenseman. Um, I mean, there were years with Pickles where I was part of a shutdown pair. So, um, I guess the question could be, do you pick five offensive defenseman versus five defensive defenseman? I mean, it’s what Dwight Dwight Falco is trying to ask. That’s an impos it’s an impossible question to answer because it’s it’s uh as a it’s I I’m an offensive defenseman, so I’m going with the offensive defenseman. You’re gonna win you’re gonna you’re gonna win game seven. But yeah, you’re not you know I don’t I don’t Yeah, I don’t I I don’t know if I love the question, but I answered it. Cheers to me. Well, I was going to ask if you feel confident with six defenseman under six feet to to win. But you you feel good about it, it seems like. But actually, what I asked about Pickles though, I’m just curious about this very quickly, is was he underrated offensively a little bit though? like because he put up some decent points. He was on the second power play unit at times, right? He wasn’t you or Brent Burns, but like was he underrated? Uh I I guess I mean um you can say no. It’s okay. No. Well, I just I just I I would never if if you talk to me about Mark Edward Blic I’m It’s going to be You’re going to talk about his defensive game and if you talk about Dan Bole, you’re going to talk about his offensive game. Uh I think I was underrated defensively and Yeah, sure. He was probably underrated offensively. How about that? Okay. Okay. All right. All all love. All love in the sounds. We love you. Come on the podcast. All right. All right. Um, actually kind of ties in to uh this question, which is what are your thoughts on the Sharks defense this year? Um, do you think how much of an improvement is it over last year’s pairings? And we can get you the pairings if you want to know what Shang has posted today about the possible season opening. Give me Give me the Give me the pairings right now as they are. They’re going to they’re going to change. Letty Clingberg, you want to go ahead? Okay, go ahead. Letty Clingberg, Ferraro, Lil Jagarin, Borlo, Mugabulan, Dehar, and Dickinson. Those are the four. Okay. But you don’t have the actual pairings. Who’s playing with who? Cuz you named the three and three. Okay. Say it by two. By two. Okay. Why don’t we switch off then? You go first, Keegan. Letty and Clingberg is the first one. Okay. Okay. Well, okay. You want me to go ahead or? No. No. Okay. Yeah. Or Mukumadullan. Okay. And then Ferraro Lil. Okay. And finally, Dear Dickinson. Okay. Yeah. Uh well, as I’ve said before, putting two offensive defenseman on the same pairing, unless you’re behind a goal late in a game is a terrible idea. So, um from what I hear, three of those have that uh combination. The first one’s a little more balanced with veteran guys. Uh Letty and Lety and Clinberg being a little older, although Clingberg, you know, uh was pretty offensive at one point. Um I mean, I like it. I I don’t again I the locker room is is huge. Uh you know there there’s the on ice product but I think there’s something to be said about what those guys bring in the locker room, how they are with younger guys. Uh what is their effort level? Um there’s a lot of things I want to see. Um so com in comparison to I I already know what last year’s defensive core did and what the year before at the end of the day they didn’t make the playoffs. So can we blame them? Not entirely. but they were part of it. So, sure, the idea here is that we have a better decor. Um, and until the season is done, I won’t be able to answer that uh fully and completely, but I’m excited to uh to see what, you know, uh obviously we’re all excited to see what Dickinson’s going to do. Um yeah, I think uh there’s a lot of there’s a lot of new faces. Yeah, fans might have been a little upset of uh Dickson being unslated on that fourth pairing to start the year, I think. Is that Well, I know you guys are going to talk about this after I leave, but people don’t don’t panic. It’s just the first game. Um, ideally, you know, we all want to see Misa Dickinson, and you want to see the new faces because you’ve been waiting for so long, and it sounds like you may not get to have what you want. I don’t know. There’s still time. Um but um uh yeah, I don’t know. I mean, they they have their ideas and their plans on how they want to bring those guys in. And sometimes it I don’t I personally wouldn’t want to do that. I would want to put, you know, those guys out and see how they do, but sometimes it’s there’s so much energy and on opening night that sometimes you might want to hold a guy back for whatever reason. There must be a psychology to it. I don’t know. Mhm. Yeah. I mean, it makes sense. So, it’s also pretty heavy team against Vegas, right? Is a against who you’re playing. Yeah. I remember I Here’s another not funny story, but I got called up. I was in Kentucky. I got sent to the miners. I got sent to Kentucky, which is not even Florida’s farm team. Uh, played 40 games. I don’t say dominate because I made made fun of saying that word before, but I had a very good first half. I was in the All-Star game. I was leading scorer I think in for defenseman in like the AHL or at least top three and I get called up. I’m thinking holy [ __ ] I’m getting called the NHL. I’m like my mind is blown and I call my parents and uh we’re playing the flyers and uh call my parents. Everyone goes to the bar. There’s 20 25 people. They’re all at the bar. They put the game on. It was at Don Cherries. Shout out to Don Cherries back in the day in Ottawa. Uh, and I was scratched. Uh, why? Because the Flyers back then were a big team. They were a big team, heavy team. And, uh, Lind Ross andlair I I probably and for whatever reason. So, I here I am get all pumped up that I got called up got everyone and I got uh, I was probably I got, you know, in the afternoon I was told I wasn’t playing. So, and then I played the next game which in St. Louis which was I guess at the time I don’t remember them being any smaller but for whatever reason they have to call that game though for whatever reason the coaches thought that I shouldn’t play against I remember um the GM saying we’re we’re not going to play you against Philadelphia because they’re a big team. I remember him specifically saying that to me. Interesting. So maybe there’s a reason those guys may not play in the first game. Although personally, yeah, I wouldn’t put it up there. Let’s see. I want to see it. All right. Uh, this is a fun question from, uh, actually there’s two very hard names to say here. Uh, from Craig Vaniranddon. Okay, that’s not that hard. Craig Van Diran asks, “Did you hang out with Wall-E Serbia when at Miami?” And Wally Serbiaak is a NBA player, Timberwolves. Uh I did not uh uh two reasons. Basketball team, hockey team almost I don’t remember any of my friends being friends with those guys. Why? Uh they were [ __ ] No, I don’t I think No, I I think I think I I I think I don’t I don’t I don’t know why. I don’t know why. B, he had a girlfriend all four years and I did not. So, okay. We wouldn’t have we wouldn’t have been seen in the seen in the same circles. Okay. But I remember being friends with like a few football players. Uh the main the main sport I will I will throw it out to you guys. Um little poll if you will. Which No, no. Men, men, men, cuz women, you know, that’s that’s which sports team do you think I had the we not me even as a hockey team, we had the most uh friendship with like the best relationship with that’s that’s my question to you guys. Does golf count or I mean abs Yeah, absolutely. Golf or baseball? Maybe. Let me let me let me throw in one guess just for the heck of it. How about and I’ll even give you a one and a two cuz there was there there was a there was a clearcut number one and then a maybe grayish number two. Did you did you have like a you didn’t have like a rugby team or anything like lacrosse rugby? I don’t I don’t think we had either. So those are I just I gave away my answer. Okay. No. So the answer was number two reverse order was the wrestling team which is weird. Okay. uh they were just psychopaths. And uh number one to this day, I still have four guys that I still talk to to this day, like 29 years later. Uh the tennis team, the tennis team, of Ohio tennis team. Uh just salt of the earth. Good [ __ ] dudes, man. Yeah. And uh we had our uh at my Ohio where the athletes stayed. Uh our dorm was their where they played their matches was right outside of our dorm and they would play in the off season when we weren’t on. So we would Oh, okay. That kind of makes sense, too. Yeah. And yeah, we would just we would it was the best. It was watching the I mean, we were Yeah. Not that we were drinking, but yeah, me and me. Not legal, but the the tennis team and uh the hockey team were I would not have brought tennis. We’re brothers. Yeah, that’s a weird combination. But so back to the Wally Zerak thing. Yeah. Didn’t know any basketball players. Uh I know he was there at the same time I was, but uh zero friendship between the hockey players and the basketball players. Okay, that’s interesting. But anyway, okay. So we damn we actually great timing. We have just two more questions for you. So I think we’re going to get get this in here. So that’s great. Uh Gary 2 wanted to ask you about this is depressing. Ask you about two disappointing playoff losses. Great. The 2011 game five OT to the Canucks the conference finals or the 2014 reverse sweep in game seven. And the question is which of these two losses stung the most for yourself and in the locker room in general? Well, the easy question would be in general would be the the the Los Angeles reverse sweep. Obviously, statistically, it’s almost unheard of, right? For me personally, uh it’s the Vancouver one. Um the LA one, the reason is that was the year I got concussed. That was my last year as a Shark. Uh as shitty as I was statistically, I I gave the team everything I had um that year and I just wasn’t myself. even in the playoffs. I was a shadow of myself because I just Yeah. And I and I take responsibility as, you know, for that loss. I was a big player and I just I couldn’t I just couldn’t, you know, but I I don’t want to say an excuse, but I I had a reason. So, the Vancouver one for me, an opportunity to go to the to the uh Stanley Cup finals is not something that um you know, and I thought we had a very good team that year. I thought we were out playing them in the series personally and uh obviously the the the BX of goal that no one saw go in was a tough way to go out. So, that one that one stung only because I was at my best at that point and off the stage. Make that one. Uh yeah, that’s that was a that was a that’s a that’s a tough one because we were a very good team. I think we were a very good team. We were a better team that year than we were the year uh that we lost to LA. I also think that year we we got swept by Chicago. Um I thought we outplayed them. And I know that’s in a sweep. How can you say you thought you outplayed a team that beat you 4 nothing? M um but I I truly believe that if you watch that series without the volume on and erased every goal that they scored, which I know is ridiculous. Um but if you watch 90% of the games, we were do we were the dominant team. Possession like you know, right? Offense, right? Yeah, I got you. Shots on goal, possession, uh gradea chances. We were way way ahead of Chicago. They just I think it might have been Nemo. Uh their goalie was so hot. He was I believe it was Anti and then they had like Bufflin and they had these timely goals. Um but overall those games it was just like we got swept like what the I don’t but you have a good goalie, timely goalending and or uh timely scoring and uh that’s a good recipe for moving forward. I guess a quick followup to that is what do you think the series should have been? Should it have been 3-1 you guys? 22. Uh I mean I don’t know that I don’t know. I mean we were swept. So right how can I sit here and say it should have been four nothing like Right. So I I don’t know. I mean I remember out playing them every night. Uh uh and maybe I’ll give you one of those games, but uh I I don’t I don’t that series pissed me off because uh I thought we were the better team. Uh but great a chances don’t mean [ __ ] All right, this is our last question. Unless if you’re done, Chang, that’s good. Uh I think so. There’s one that I thought I saw, but you go ahead first. I’ll see if I can find it. If not, then we can always ask another time, too. But I like this, by the way. This is fun. Yeah. Yeah. I don’t know if you guys are enjoying it, if the people will enjoy it, but if they’re like, I can’t wait. I can’t wait for them to stop talking now. Yeah. No, this this is this has been enjoyable. And just to be clear, I didn’t hear any of these questions before. So, I have not no prepared I have not prepared the same way that I’m going to treat this podcast before and moving forward. I will never prepare for this podcast. You have my word. Well, I think the only preparation is that uh you watch hockey, which I think you can you can do. I do. I can do that. I can do that. He’s watch a lot of hockey. This is what uh Eric Droby has to to ask you about actually is um wins aside when you’re going to be looking at the first 10 games of the season from the Sharks. What’s going to signal to you uh where they could land in the standings by the end of the season? Like are you looking at breakouts special teams just their resilience or their compete? Or is it really just wins and losses you think? All right. So if we eliminate well I mean it is about wins and losses but um I want to see are we winning by or sorry are we losing the it’s it’s an eye test. You can’t really you know like I said I I was going to say what are we losing by but then I would defeat what I’ve been talking about where you can lose the game four to one and completely outplay the other team. So uh that would be me being uh contradictory to what I’m saying. So it’s a night test for me. Um, if we’re not talking about wins, I want to see how well the team is playing. Um, puck control, uh, how’s the power play doing? How’s the penalty kill doing? How are the young guys, uh, growing and getting better, right? You want these young guys that are going to be taking over this team to be improving on a nightly basis. Uh, and I want to see effort. I want to see effort. So, if I don’t see effort, I don’t give a [ __ ] who it is. Uh, you could be, you know, record aside. Uh, the the work ethic for me has to be there. I’ll say it every freaking podcast. Work ethic. Work ethic. Take a shot every one. Yeah. If you can control that every night, you can control that every night. So ideally I want to if they are going to lose I would wish they were tighter games but um there are going to be nights where you are the better team and you are going to lose five to two just because yeah can’t get worse than it was a few years ago. I did find Dan I have one more I found lot that’s it. You have time for one more. That’s fine. Let’s do it. I got it. Okay. The question where’ I put the qu Oh, here it is. Okay. So again a downer though. What happened in 2009 playoffs? And I guess the bigger question for Yuri Baronowski is why do you think some teams just can’t get over the hump in the playoffs? But specifically 2009, what happened? Okay, but what what which you’re going to have you’re I apologize. What happened? The trophy, the sweep. So Oh, that that that was against Anaheim. Yeah, the first year. Okay. Yeah, the first year. I thought I thought that was 2008. So it might have been 0809. Yeah. 0809. 08 the playoffs. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, I mean, I made reference to being having a hot goalie. I don’t know if it was Jiger, I believe. I think it was Hiller, I think. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it was. It was. And it was Hiller. Yeah. And he a few things. A, I think their goalie was rock solid. Um, that might have been the best team I’ve ever been on. I’ve mentioned that before. I’ve won a COP. I’ve won multiple President’s Trophy, but I think that might have been the best team. So, a combination of I think their goalie being great and I think he stole the series. Um, we had guys underachieve for sure. Um, I think that guys grew. I saw a lot more effort in the next five years as a shark than I did that first year. So to me, there were still a few people that didn’t I just feel like it the next level hadn’t been taken. And so um again, I don’t remember this clear as day, right? This is freaking forever ago. But I remember the goal is still in the series and I remember the intensity of our locker room I didn’t think was enough. Um but I don’t specifically remember was our power play off that year. I remember every year there would have been something. Goalending might have been a little off that year. Power play might have been a little off that year. Top guys weren’t playing well one year. Um penalty kill was bad one year. I I remember there’s always going to be a reason. There’s always going to be an over, you know, an underlying reason or a dominant reason. Um but I can’t remember anything specific other than Hillier or the goalie playing really well. And I remember uh their top guys were better than our top guys. And uh that’s what I remember cuz I that was a very good hockey team and uh might have been the best team I’ve ever been on and you know it was just and Anaheim won the cup that year I believe right? No no no they won that was uh 2006 07 they won a couple years before that. Yeah, still a good team cuz I know we lost, you know, LA we lost we lost a cup winners a few years. Chicago, LA. Um, right. So, uh, I Okay. Well, whatever. I remember I remember their goalie Detroit. Yeah. But I remember their goalie their goalie Detroit stealing this. But we got again we got we got swept, right? Right. Right. We got swept, right? Yeah. Yeah. It’s hard to say in a sweep, but yeah. Yeah. Got to ask you though, just to close off here, did you see the the Sharks mess up the president’s trophy banner? I sent you that tweet. I don’t know if you looked at it, but I saw the tweet. What did they do? I I didn’t I don’t think I understood the tweet they remove or did they put them Did they put them all on one? So, they Okay, so it used to be separate division banners, right? Division title banners. So, they put all the division titles on one banner, which is the correct thing to do in my opinion. Um, and then they had a banner for the president’s trophy, but they got the wrong year though. They put 201516 instead of 2018. Okay. So, they got Okay. So, I didn’t I remember you sending it to me, but I didn’t understand. So, they just got the Did they Did they bring it Did they bring it down? Did they fix it? Yeah, they brought it down. They fixed it for the next game, but just that they even made that mistake for the first preseason game is crazy that they’re like, “All right, [ __ ] what’s his name?” Bob. Uh, Beckererman. We’ll bring Becker. No, not Becker. Becker. Becker. Jonathan Becker. Yeah, Beckerman is a TMZ guy. Be a TMZ guy. Uh, [ __ ] Jonathan Becker. I blame him. He also listens. He’s listening to this, right? Does he listen? He does. Yeah. He’s been on the podcast before. Yeah. Oh, really? He does. I actually like that guy. We’re going to get your $65 back, Dan. Yeah. Try to get it done. Yeah. We got How did that Did that Did that story trend at all? Cuz that’s freaking funny. Yeah, we got a short kick out the clip. Yeah, we’re going to put that out. Yeah, but it is I love that one. I I I told them we got to take that one out. So, did you guys super Did you guys superimpose my the shirt that I sent you guys a picture? Oh, yeah. No, I And then I had I had I had I had the little video of me doing it. Yep. You’ll see on the white shirt. Well, we we’ll add your shirt on to it, too. Yeah. $65 Sharks territory shirt. Here, Mr. Boille. Would you like a shirt? Sure. is gonna send you a 100 t-shirts now. You know that, right? I’m like, here’s my MX. Except. All right, guys. All right. We’ll we’ll see you guys next week. Thanks again, Dan. No problem. See you next week. And leave. Happy hockey. All right. Cool. Awesome. Uh, so we have a few questions left. Like I said, we were very very unpopular on this podcast uh for this mailbag. Dan got I think I didn’t count but like 25 so questions. So we have a handful here. We have one for Zubar that we’ll just save for for for a rainy day. Yes, that sounds but it’s it’s Zubar’s question. But and some of these are actually repeats of or um some of you guys are going to get additional question for you guys getting in two questions for the mailbag. But because Dan Boy was very efficient, he answered questions like he played very efficiently unlike us that we are clocking in at just an hour and a half. So we may as well just just get through get through these questions really uh really quickly here. So the very first question, let me let me look it up is uh Stephan Schwarz actually is related to Dan Bole so I can tell a little more about this and Stefan asked the story and process of us three bringing Dan Bole into the into the show and so that’s more a question for me and for myself I was thinking uh six months ago and I was talking to an investor and I was just thought that hey you know take the next step to for this podcast and what might that include and I thought that that would include potentially having a player. But one thing that people forget in these kind of process is that you don’t want just any player. You want a player that has a lot of personality. And so, and I could say this, I don’t think it’s it’s any it’s any I’ve told Dan this and I asked two players uh that I thought would be kind of the right fit because you ask again, most players again, that’s why people don’t really watch hockey interviews. Players are cliche machines. You know, if you if if you get the players on like five beers, then okay, then then then then they’ll be entertaining, but you’re not going to get a player to drink a six-pack before every episode of the podcast. So, I only asked two players if they would be interested. I asked Dan and I asked Jason Deares. Obviously, I don’t need to explain why I thought Jason Deares would be kickass on this show. We’ve had Jason on this podcast. You see Jason everywhere. And that’s part of why I think Jason didn’t have he just didn’t have time for it because Jason’s on Angel Network. Jason’s doing a lot of stuff, right? Um I don’t even think he’s on the Sharks or he might do some games this year, but he’s not on the broadcast as much this year. I think a lot of it is because he’s really busy. So anyway, so so Dan was interested and I’ve interviewed Dan before the first iteration of the podcast with Nick, Nick Floor. Shout out to Nick. And so I knew Dan a little bit and I think Dan knows that I when I I if I’m asking him to do this that it’s a serious thing. Mhm. And I think I can say this like it’s not any secret. Like Dan’s getting paid a little bit but he’s not getting paid like I can’t afford a ridiculous amount. No one can, you know. So we were joking about the $500,000. He’s not making $500,000. I’m not making $500,000. So, so it’s it’s a nominal amount really, but it’s it’s enough to for Dan to know that obviously that we’re serious about this, but also too that um that it’s he’s not doing it for the money, obviously. Um so, I think it just he I think he I can speak for Dan here. I think that he just is interested in doing something like this. And he I think we did vibe, you know, that time that that Zubar and myself and him, we all got together. I think we got along well. I think that also, if I can speak for myself, I think Dan recognizes how seriously that I take this. And so, it’s not, again, he’s not doing this for the money, right? He’s not doing this just to be on some podcast. And so, yeah, I think it’s a combination of all those factors. I know I’m speaking a little bit for for Dan here, but anyway, so just reached out to him and it was it was I would say one thing I’ll say about this is, and you guys heard this on a podcast, I teased this for a very very long time. Yeah. I didn’t even tell Keegan for a while because I wanted to make sure that it was very concrete before I really told too many people. And so that’s Yeah. So, so it probably was a process that I pursued very seriously for six, what is it? We’re in October. Yeah. So, like like I think the first time I asked Dan, hey, would you be interested in kind of just shooting a trial kind of thing was all the way back in March. And that just was to kind of just see if he had any interest in it and just, you know, just see how he and I would would kind of vibe. And then eventually as just it shaped out that it it made it made more sense to to do a fourman booth because then then we started introducing Zub Bar onto the podcast more. And so yeah, so that’s so that that that’s kind of a a different story of how that all developed. But basically, um, yeah, I just had the idea of taking the podcast to the next level and wanting a player, but wanting the right player because there’s I mean, you guys, you fans would know that there’s probably very few players that are consistently interesting for an hour at a time and Dan Bo happens to be one of them and we’re lucky enough to to have him on and so yeah, so it was it was kind of a long courtship and so um to make sure that it would work because it obviously can’t be something where he’s not into it, he doesn’t like us or he’s not having fun at at it too. And so, so we had to make sure that that would all kind of click. And so far, hopefully, I know we’ve had a lot of audio issues, which I I apologize for. Ultimately, I need to be better about that, but I think ultimately the shows are good and they’ve been fun and they’ve been interesting. So, yeah, it’s been a different vibe of the shows for sure like five, six episodes now. But I think that’s kind of the benefit is we’re getting a little bit more content and a little bit different content. Still stuff that we do together. Um, but it was Yeah, Dan’s been awesome. And also, even when we go into the season, it’s just going to be great to talk hockey with him and, you know, look at different games and his reaction to stuff. So, I think, like you said, he wants to have some people to talk hockey with and drink a few beers with, then he could do that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, definitely do that. So, I’m excited that uh that he’s gonna he seems to want to do it every week. So, we’re going to have him as long as we can probably. Yeah. And I I’ll tell you something that I was going to talk with him in the in the future. I will talk with him. We will talk with him in the future about, but it’s the kind of thing that would have been great to ask him about last year. Specifically, one thing that that jumped out to me was when Vrono hurt Mukuman. And there’s been different things like even Mike Greer sort of put it on Mukuman. Yeah. you know, if you’ve listened to interviews, right? And so that’s the kind of thing where a nuance from a player on, you know, like if he had seen that as a player, how would he react and all that sort of thing, right? Or is it is it on the player to some degree to brace yourself and that sort of thing, right? That’s a kind of invaluable knowledge that none of you know, Zubar, my you and and me, we have no idea about. or like the um Stenland Celibbrini thing like nobody reacting to that kind of thing like these things happen throughout the year. We’ve got you know we’ve got a guy that can at least speak to his experience. So Right. Right. So anyway, um Kevin asks, and this is something I think we both can can answer. Yeah. What are some of the best ways for us as fans to improve our understanding of the game? So I have kind of a a big picture thought, but you can go first if you have ideas, Duke. Um, I guess it boils down to two things. If it’s like a fundamental like I don’t understand the game in terms of like the rules or like all those things, you you will get it just with watching um the the way that announcers put on games nowadays. Like they’re pretty good at explaining like even the subtle nuances. So just keep watching if it’s that kind of level. But if it’s I think if you’re already subscribed to San Jose hockey now and listening to this podcast, you’re probably beyond that level of I don’t understand hockey, you’re more into like how do I understand hockey like to a different degree. And it’s the same thing. It’s it’s watching, but it’s more focusing on specific actions by players rather than results. Don’t focus on points. Don’t focus on like this guy had, you know, two assists tonight, so he must have done well. focus on specific plays and what led to those points. Um patterns like try and recognize what a player does uh repeatedly that either um even if the announcers are noticing it or like you notice like hey he’s turning the puck over a lot here in this specific spot. Um just focus on pick a player. Pick one guy that you’re interested in. It could be Misa said it could be an older player. What do they do well or what you think they do well? And then try and find a comparison. So try and find other scouting reports. If you think that Misa is a good skater and you think that this is something that you can put like your hang hang your hat on, go look at other scouting reports and see why and then try and find out why a different scout says that they are a good skater. So do your own like viewing first. Um, but then try and counter check yourself and say, “Oh, well, I said that he kind of is always in the wrong position defensively and that this guy, this scout that I know and I trust and we can we put out some names.” Um, is saying that he’s great defensively, so I think I might be missing something. Throw rewatch again. It’s just like if that’s the level you’re looking at, that’s a uh that’s more of a scouting exercise rather than a um understanding of the game itself. There’s also Jack Khan which you might mention too for like right tactics and stuff like that. So that’s my quick quick uh answer for that. Yeah, I I think that’s a really great question you have, Kevin. There’s definitely a lot of different ways to answer it or different ways to go, but I would say that for myself, I thought about this as I looked at this question and I would say the overarching thing that I think informs how I look at the game is actually relates to a lot of what we’re going to talk about in a little bit. But like the coaches who who wants to win a game more than you as a fan and it’s the players and the coaches, right? because they’re at their living is is predicated on wins and losses and the coaches more than maybe anybody, right? And so when a coach makes a what looks like on the surface to be a strange decision like starting Tai to Landrea as your third line center, we’re going to talk about it. We are going to talk about it. What I want to say is I’m not defending or I I I I have an actually a nuanced thought about it’s not just like you know leave Ryan Borski alone, leave Tyandre alone kind of no I I that’s not my thought but I would say that you know when I got into writing or hockey writing one of the things that frustrated me as a fan and I wanted to counteract is things like one cliche is like oh my god like Michael Haley must have pictures of Peter Dbor in a compromising position and that’s why he’s playing or Tai Dandrew must have comprom pictures of Ryan Wars in compromising position and you see this all along you know whoever is not getting played you know there’s some animus against this player or who is getting played there’s some deep favoritism right and of course those things do exist I’m not saying those things don’t exist coaches like players they dislike players right but the one thing I’m sure of though is that in almost any situation I can think of that the coach is doing what he thinks will best win an NHL hockey game. Now, we may not understand it, but that is what Ryan Warski thinks or Peter Dbor or anyone Bob Bner, David Quinn, anybody you can think of, right? The best coach, uh, John Tordella, John Cooper, the worst coach, Wayne Gretzky, they’re doing what they think will win a NHL hockey game. And so for me, what I like to do is not just like def like I said, not just defend, but try to understand why why this decision was made. And that’s really the the best way I can explain like how to improve the understanding of the game is to not assume that your coach is uh he may be a total dunce in life, but assume that he understands hockey even if the record isn’t good. Because even with the records not good, like David Quinn, David Quinn was a brilliant coach for a long time before he hit the NHL, right? And David Quinn probably didn’t get worse as a coach really. It just his teams didn’t work out. And maybe there are some things he could have been better as an angel coach. I acknowledge that. I’m not saying that a David Quinn is is is is faultless, but David Quinn understands more about hockey than probably than honestly you have forgotten that I have. He’s forgotten more. That’s the phrase. He’s forgotten more than I h I know that you know the worst NHL coach with experience, you know, not like a a a a nepotism hire that has no career in hockey, but a guy who’s who’s paid his dues, right? Like I’m I’m just using Quinn as example, but like Warsovski, uh all the Bob Buggner, right? Like so not to say that every decision is is perfect from these guys, but there’s reasons for it. And so that’s I think I think you can tell that that’s what informs a lot of like what I write and what I think about. I try to understand what these reasons are. I try to ask the coaches what that’s that’s my job to try to ask them what the reasons are. I don’t think it’s my job to like shout at a coach for hey why are you playing this guy that has a 45% cory instead of this guy that has a 60% cory. I I know that some I think I I’ve seen other journalists do it and I and I think some fans may want me to do that, but I don’t see that as a job that interests me. Instead, I want to know why, you know, I want the best I can to explain to the coaches why or to explain to you guys why the coaches are doing certain things and why I think that this even goes back to our our least favorite argument or our favorite one, Barkley is captain. So a lot of it is informed by why would if they did do such a thing then why would they do such a thing and so anyway so to answer your question Kevin I would just say that like just think of that spirit of thinking that like not thinking of the coach as a total [ __ ] and that you’d be better coach of the hockey team than the coach but actually giving the coach credit that okay this guy’s a hockey expert I totally disagree with him so I don’t have to agree with him at the end but understand Why Tai Dandra over Michael Misa? Like there is a why that is nothing to do with anything you can think of except that Ryan Morski thinks that for game one that Ty Deandro might give him a better chance probably will give him it’s not like even a 100% thing but will probably give him a better chance to win the game than Michael Misa 18-year-old playing his first Angel game against the big bad Vegas Golden Knights. So anyway, yeah. So, I guess it kind of is a three-prong question in terms of or three answers to that question. In terms of what you’re looking for of understanding the game, if you’re looking for like scouting, if you’re looking for just how how do you read a game or if is it more of like understanding a coach’s decision that’s a little bit different. And um yeah, also I think the one thing that I also dislike, even though I we disagree on many fourth liners and stuff like that, is that like people always complain that the fourth liner is the reason that the the like the Sharks for example lose a hockey game. And like 99% of the the time the fourth liner, the seventh D, the backup goalie, those are just like they’re not the reason why we’re losing games. It’s not the reason. there’s they don’t play enough minutes to impact the ice unless they are truly, you know, like every night turn making turning the puck over or a goalender is on like a horrible stretch where he’s letting in every goal. So like they’re not the reason why. So don’t uh don’t overexaggerate their their things. Even like when Gadro or Dandria or whatever play bad, most of the time that’s not why we lose games. We lose games because our entirety of our team is not deep enough or competitive enough yet. So, so it’s not just because of Gro or Tandria. And we we harp on guys because they are easy to to single out because they play uh limited minutes and they play they don’t they don’t do they’re not as effective on the ice as guys like they don’t do cool [ __ ] They don’t do cool [ __ ] Um but they’re often not the reason why turns the puck puck a lot too, you know. So yeah, just I will say though there are like you know there are favorites in the locker room. So PE coaches have their favorite players. There are there are and that’s how it happens. Like they’re guys that that listen to them that play the structure they want and that they do the things and they have effort every night. Those are the guys that continually get in the lineup. So, but you you you you do hit the the nail on the head though that there are reasons why they’re favorites. They’re not just favorites because they have pictures of them. Yeah. Yeah. There are reasons for actually hockey winning reasons or sometimes there’s internal locker room stuff that we don’t understand too. like there are there’s stuff that like you know I maybe years from now I can say but yeah like players last year with the Sharks you can guess uh one or two of them but that maybe they just weren’t great room guys and that’s part of it too right so and that’s not out in public not all that’s out in public but that’s a factor too you know and so that but you don’t know that and so you just assume that oh this guy is more talented or this guy can skate faster than another guy and he must be a a better player. But again, it’s not as simple as just that eye test, too. So, but um R Phillips, he asked uh he is not happy watching Will Smith skate. What’s he got to do to start driving play more? Basically, is what R. Phillips asked. And I’ll take this one first. Actually, I think this is a little un unfair to Will because I think like like I mean I think I think Will has Will Smith has benefited from Meline starting the same year with him and he’s also has unfair comparisons because of that. And so the good thing for Will Smith is that he has less of a spotlight. And so if Will Smith was the primo rookie on the Sharks last year, then we would have been asking a lot more questions of him and and not of Mlin, right? And last year, Mlin got more attention and Mlin was better last year, too. On the other hand, though, the negative part is that Will Smith is a totally different player than a Mlin Celebrini. And so, how often do you see a 18 or 19 year old drive play the way you’re talking about here? Very, very, very, very unusual. This is not like this is not a normal thing to be asking of an 18 19 now 20-year-old player to to be kind of to be kind of dragging the team along as you’re expecting Will Smith to do. So, um, for me at least, I think this is this is this is unfair because I I watch Will and sure he can be quicker. he still needs to get stronger. But I also see, you know, a near offensive genius at times who can execute some really incredible plays that actually plays that I even Mlin I don’t think can make. Um, and so he’s just he’s got to get better in other areas, but he is also just I think he just turned 20, but just turned 20. And he his rookie season he had 45 points. Good rookie season just on the counting stats. clearly got better from day one to the end of the season. No question about that, too. And showed high-end flashes of talent. Is he Will Smith, consistent Will Smith that is going to lead the Sharks to the playoffs this coming season? No, probably not. But you just he needs to get better. And that’s that’s what we’re looking for. We’re not asking him to like start driving play, you know, and maybe that’s not even his game, too, right? He may be more of a in the weeds that that crazy pass. Um, so that can also be sometimes you need to just pair the guy with the right kind of player too. And that again is not on Will Smith. Like he’s good at certain things. You have to identify what he’s good at. You have to accentuate those things and not expect him to drive play like not just like Mlin, but any other phenom Matt Vekov or any any other kind of like phenomenal young offensive player. Just different style game too. I don’t think I also don’t know if like I wouldn’t say that he’s been pulling a sled out there every shift, which was part of R. Phillips’s statements. I don’t think he’s been talking specifically talking specifically on speed. I don’t think he’s been slower or anything than he was last year. I think I think he’s faster. I think he’s faster. Yeah, I was going to say I don’t think it’s like particularly a change in speed. Preseason’s preseason. So, he had uh one really good pass in the power play that I remember. So, I don’t know. I think um Will Smith is what he is. Like you said, he’s he’s offensive mind, vision, gonna do great on the power play. It’s going to need to take a few years to really get effective on five on five versus bigger, stronger kind of competition, but he’s still going to, you know, be very productive on the power play. So, give him time. It’s a great combo there. And also, he’s technically playing a not new position, but kind of a new position. He’s playing. Yeah. Sure. Yep. Um, so we’ll need some adjustment time. He played a lot last year, but there’s still he’s not playing center, so it’s a different place. And also like Will may top out as a just okay defensive player and a great offensive player, and you’re more than happy with that. You can win with that, right? So, yeah. So, he he may not he may never be a two-way maestro, but that’s that’s okay. Yeah. And it’s uh we’re going to have some rough times coming this year, but it’ll be better than last year. That’s all I keep telling myself. Yeah. Hopefully I think we’re predicting like not predicted but most of the betting markets predictions all those things have us like 10 15 points better. So like that’s true that staff fleets we did that last week of projections they had a trucks at 71 points second second to loss in NHL but 14 more than the blockhawks who they really don’t like for some reason. So yeah and also um like what 19 points better than last year. That’s crazy. Yeah. Yeah. That is crazy. So I don’t know that is that is true. I mean, I know I predicted that in the show I did with Alan Hosida, but honestly, that was like that was a a boiler gun to the head question, so I panicked. Well, I still have to somehow I’m not sure if I believe it. The sharks still have to be like 500 by Christmas. That was my prediction last year. So, I think it was like that they would be 500. We’ll see how that works. Um, so Chris Robinson, this is a question for us that we can’t really answer, but I did do want to mention mention it though that Chris asked, “Can you do a segment on the show to talk about hockey systems, um, educational for the listeners?” I think though, I’ll be honest, Chris, that this is not something that’s great on a podcast where podcast is entertainment a part of it. But but though I do always try to do articles every year. Sometimes I last year I missed out but typically if you look at articles from the past or the history of San Jose hockey now that I try to do systems articles with a Jack Khan with somebody about like the I did a story years ago about the change from Bob Bookner to David Quinn. I’ve done system stories about power plays that sort of thing right. And like I mentioned last week that I don’t know if you heard this geek that I’m bringing on Jack Han as a consultant. Yeah. So for San Jose Hockey Now. So so there’s going to be more of it this year. Um and so yeah, so that’s going to be there. I don’t know if I quite see it perfect for uh for for podcast unless Dan Boy has something to add to it or something. But anyway, so we’ll have some we’ll have more stuff on the website for this year. Love it. Yeah, he’s he’s got excellent excellent detail on on tactics and systems and you just learn a lot of uh from Osmosis from listening to him. So, um All right. Do you want me to get this one? Let me do this one. It’s a very long one. So, let’s see if I can It’s from Ted Peterson and basically Okay. So, he’s just talking about Cardwell and Kagyoni. maybe they’re ready, but they’re not going to get a shot because it’s a more veteran kind of kind of group, which is what what happened. But the the basic question though is is there is there a year that you see for the Sharks coming that they have a training camp with more spots up for grabs? I think that’s the the gist of the of the question here. And for younger players, I know for a lot of fans it was frustrating to see Cardwell do what he did at the end there and then even Kang Yuni come on and end there and get get lose or not not not not start the season with the Sharks. So, um so Keegan, I don’t know if you have any thoughts on on this. Um, I think I think we wanted to come into this season more competitive and I think it obviously trade deadline there probably will be some guys leaving but this is also the time to see if guys like Kirav Wenberg um even guys like Delandria or you know or love all these guys are going to be a part of the future of the team or or is this kind of a rental situation? So, um I I I think it’s kind of I don’t know. I still don’t think it’s entirely said it’s done that Cardwell and Kaggs are ready yet. Um there are still Yeah. things that they can learn. So whereas sometimes you you argue that a guy is overcooked and like you have to see what you have to see. Like I think Gen last year is is the example where I think he wasn’t overcooked in the AHL, but like he was like he had done what I think he needed to do to prove it. And Kaggs has done a lot, but he needs another year of strengthening and he’s out of the year of just reps of defensive work. And then Cardwell, I think he’s going to get a shot. It’s just a matter of time. He’s got the plug-andplay model of a of a bottom six forward. So I think um thing with Cardwell too is that we really like his intensity sometimes but also there are games where he does disappear. So you can’t have that kind of inconsistency to be in a lineup um consistently to say that to say the least. So I I think there was reasons for it. I’m not I was more mad last year than I am this year and probably the year before that. I don’t think it’s going to hand the team over to the youth. I really don’t. I think that Greer is going to keep adding pieces. So, I don’t think you’re going to be like, “Oh, we’re gonna move aside everybody so that Kenyon finally has a slot.” I think he’s going to keep adding until Kenyon proves that he’s in the NHL. Cardwell proves it. Musty proves it. Shernes proves it. I don’t think he’s going to just wipe it all clean and go, “Yep, we’re going to put him in.” I don’t that’s how it’s going to happen. I think he wants to improve the team every year rather than just like tear it again, you know? Yeah. I I I I b I basically agree with what what you’re saying there that I think you’re saying and this is what I think too that as the team gets better they’re going to there’s actually going to be even less jobs and the Sharks are actually going to lose young players that actually become something elsewhere. It hasn’t happened yet really because the Sharks prospects ultimately have not been that great when they hit 2122 and that’s going to change now because they are picking higher arguably picking better right it appears maybe we don’t know yet but it looks like they’re picking better so anyway as that happens there’s going to be even less spots for Cardwell and a canyone and I think that the bar should be that Cardwell needs to absolutely take a job and Cardwell had a couple good games there but I don’t feel like Hardwell took a job necessarily. Kang Yuni same kind of thing and so I am not uh who took a job. Actually, this is this is actually great for a roster discussion, but Colin Graph Colin Graph, right? Colin Graph, like look at this Colin Graph. Exactly. Look at this. Right. And Colin Graph did it not just with a couple of nice preseason games, right? Mhm. Be he did it with a whole half season last year where he was playing good hockey. Maybe not scoring as many points as you want, but he was being trusted by the coaching staff. Again, you look at the reasons why is call. So instead of bitching about Goodro or Ryan Ree being here, what did Colin Grath do to impress the coaching staff and how can a Cardwell Kangi replicate that? And two things that stand out that Colin did over a course of a Barracuda season where he first showed it was consistency and reliability being somebody that they could trust like in a defensive situation like if they are not put in the al optimal offensive situation that they respond in a positive or neutral way more times than not obviously you’re always going to make mistakes and so these are the kind of things that like I would I guess I I would suggest that that that is focused on more like what did a column graph do to stay here as opposed to why isn’t Ethan Cardwell here? So, and because if you look really hard at those two players, just for example, I’m not trying to pick on on on Ethan here because he had a he had a very good camp, but like there are clear differences between what Graph has the the body of work in the NHL that Graph has put together. And Cardwell got an NHL shot last year just like Graph and Cardwell Ethan wasn’t as consistent. I I would imagine if you asked him, he’d be pretty honest about it, too, that his impact was not as consistent and reliable as Graphs was. And that’s why graph is here. So anyway, so yeah, so but the big picture question Ted that you’re asking is that there’s going to be even less jobs in the future. And so and that’s what you want. You want like veterans so good that like oh man like we have this guy like let’s say let’s use uh in the future uh actually well let’s use this perfect example man. We have this as Ascarov uh kid like he is everything that we dreamt he is. He is Eigor Shistokin. uh you know like he’s the he’s the new he’s the new Igor Shurkin or whoever you you name right we have this excellent prospecting Ravensburg but we just don’t have space that’s a good problem to have and so then you trade Ravensburg and white probably I mean yes you can trade a car off white way too but it’s a good problem to have and you make your team better that way if you make the right trade at least you make your team better and so that’s the same thing you you actually want I know everyone falls in love with the young prospects but you want somebody blocking their way that is so good And I understand right now the Sharks don’t have that. So that’s why it’s frustrating that they might lose a kind of a uh you know two to two players that aren’t as clearly better like a Deandre or Gdro etc etc than uh Ethan Cardwell. So, I understand why that’s frustrating, but like the ideal picture for a good team though is that you have veterans so good that either the the young player is even better and so you can replace replace the veteran with a cost-effective somehow better younger player or you you use that young prospect as a trade asset. And that’s so basically again Ted the big picture is you’re going to have less jobs. That’s ideally what the sharks want. So you don’t want to hand jobs to people. So anyway, yeah, I mean I would say that they do or they don’t. Like guys like Misa, Dickson, Smith, Celibbrini, they have believe in the talent so much that they are being handed is not the right word, but they’re being because of situations put in areas where like they have to play there. Misa has to play in the NHL pretty much. Like he could play in the OHL, but it seems wrong, right? Um so like that’s what I mean. It’s like Kenyon Kenyon and Carwell a they’re waver exempt and b they could still learn things I think in the AHL Cardwell still needs to be more consistent in his effort. I mean like when we when you see the effort from Cardwell everybody notices it, right? You’re like this guy’s he’s on it but it’s not like that’s not every game. The next game from Cardwell I watched him wasn’t wasn’t that impactful at all. And and like that’s the problem is it’s got to be consistent and you have to like really force it. Like I the to be honest I don’t think the Sharks won a Gucci on the roster last year. I don’t think they penciled him in but he put up the most preseason points in the NHL. He put up too many Yeah. I think he put too they were like [ __ ] it. I guess we have to like So that’s the thing is they didn’t have to with Cardwell this year. They they he had a great game. Um and he’s had a good camp but and he’ll get his chance. like he he really does have a great shot later on in the season to to make it once, you know, guys get injured and there isn’t we’ve already sent out Grundstrom now, you know, Good Row, um Deandria Reeves, these all these guys could sit at different points in the year um for play or for age or injury, whatever. So Cardwell is one of the first callups, I think, if he if he keeps the momentum up. So, and look at this Colin Graph. He’s the example of of making a team. So there is a spot if if you take it and you’re not and you yeah you make a great point about sort of the the pedigree fair or not the pedigree of Misa Dickinson Smith. Well, Celebrini just knocks it off because he’s like matter good no matter what. But but but nonetheless so yeah the pedigree does does matter. the situation right where like Cardwell and Kagoni are still no one would argue that that they are still being served well developing with the Barracuda right whereas yeah the argument for Dickinson Misa are they I don’t know maybe maybe they can still develop in the OHL but there’s an argument at least that there’s no point you know that’s that’s what some some people say so yeah okay um I like this this question from from Falco but this one’s hard to answer but uh but uh Falcon five. How many how much do games This actually I wasn’t sure if this was for Dan. This probably is something to actually ask a coach actually, but how much do games uh determine roster lineup decisions, preseason games? How much of of it is scrimmages? How much of it is practice? And Falco 5 mentions that as a fan, I can only watch games. So, I’m curious how important th those are. And I’ll answer it first that I I I always watch games and scrimmages the most. I think practices are actually very important, but I haven’t determined yet how to watch that in a way. It’s hard for me to kind of measure like the the one-on-one, the physical, like how hard are they going, that sort of thing in practice and where it’s sort of a, how do you say, it’s a very um uh a very deliberate situation are put in in practice, like these little drills, these little corner battles. I I haven’t figured out how to watch practice really well yet. I actually probably I’ve been meaning to like ask a scout or something. Just sit down with somebody and really watch it one day and learn. So, so for me, I watch more games and scrimmages because I have a good sense in a game situation what I’m looking for. And so, but I think practices are very, very important. And so, and we’re going to talk about Tai Dandra in a little bit, but that’s one thing that Ryan Morski mentioned that practices, the games, especially after that Anaheim game that I really liked him right in Anaheim. um and scrimmages too. That that whole that whole package is why Tai Deandre has earned his spot and so and I believe that I believe that is everything. Yeah. But I just can’t answer right now how well I watch it. But yeah, I think it’s it’s everything. Yeah. And I’ll be the first to admit that I thought that Dandria’s beginning of the camp was worse than the end of the camp in terms of the effort and like seeing the games where he turned it on. It’s like it it seemed like he fit in the lineup. Not to get into the discussion just yet, but that’s the thing is carries over. So from scrimmages to the games and I remember watching I don’t remember who streamed it. It might have been you or Curtis or somebody last year was streaming like a scrimmage from early in camp and you could even tell then that Musty was like lagging even on those like early early scrimmages. Um and that’s when you kind of knew like the the the intensity level and the difficulty level of training camp just gets like ramped up every week, right? Every and it’s just when eventually you hit a point where you could you you can’t compete anymore. So that’s what it kind of feels like happens every year. Um yeah. So I um I I mean I imagine that like if a guy is super cold in games that they’re going to be a little bit unless there’s like a clear reason why they’re on the roster like you know to fully put up a point in preseason no one gives a [ __ ] So nobody cares. He’s going to be on the team. But or even like guy like Ascarov who did not statistically and you know in most games did not have a great preseason, right? He’s still going to be getting a lot of starts this year. So, um that’s just the plan and the way that they have to run the season based on what they’ve what they’ve done so far. So, can’t can’t be all good or all bad based on just performances in preseason. So the last question we have is from Gary again showing how deeply unpopular we we are now because you and I used to fill 50 questions from but now we get six because of [ __ ] Dan Boil. So I think the the viewers probably were like oh I have to get a question for Boiler and not not Keegan and Shank. They’re here all the time. We can ask them whatever you know. Exactly. Yeah. But Gary asked and actually this one was actually for the group which includes Zubar and well just you and I then we will just answer it though because we we like Quentino too. We we we like movies too guys. All right. We do. Yeah. I just What is your favorite movie? Yeah, exactly. Not just not Human Centipede. So um I mean I’m it’s just fiction. That’s like I guess maybe that’s why that’s why it’s more spirited. Yeah, I I pul picture. We agree too much actually. Yeah. So people make too much of our disagreement. Excellent movie. Glorious Bastards is is an awesome movie too. Um Kill Bill like the like Gary mentioned is a great franchise, but um I could rewatch Pul Fiction on a Saturday and be happy, you know? Like it’s such a good movie no matter what. Like I have to be in the mood to watch Kill Bill or Igor’s Bastards or whatever. Jango Unchained is good, but that’s I really like Hateful Eight though. That one that one kind of dragged it and didn’t really come together for me, but that’s that’s that’s the one from his from his filmography that I am the least interested in. So I remember seeing commercials for it, but I don’t think I ever saw it. Yeah, I didn’t see this. Okay. Okay. All right. So we are done with the mailback portion which is actually I think a record for us. Two hours 10 minute about two hours. Yeah. So I think uh it is it is good. Maybe we we give too much lead time for questions in the past in terms of uh asking questions. You know putting giving giving everybody three days to get questions into Dan probably was is a good thing because if we give it like a week then yeah maybe we get double the questions. Uh but let’s close off though. Well, we’re going to talk uh just about some of the news uh some of the there’s there there is really big news with the Sharks obviously. So, uh first the first big piece of news is obviously the Sharks opening night roster has been has been revealed and I’ll just quickly run over it very quickly and we’re also going to talk about the lines today that I saw at at practice. So, the first 23man roster practice that the Sharks have had 23 man yeah roster practice the Sharks have had before their game. Today is Tuesday, so their game is Thursday against the Golden Knights. But anyway, um, so the roster very quickly, just to rattle it off, is sorry, I’m going to pull that pull that off of my website really fast. So, okay, uh, 13 forwards, Celabbrini, Dandria, Ekkan, Godet, Gdro, Graph, Kurishva, Misa, Reeves, Skinner, Smith, Tofolei, and Wenberg. The defenseman are Dehar, Dickinson, Ferraro, Clingberg, Lety, Logrin, Milk, Madulan, and Oralof. And goalenders, Escarov, and Adelovic. And uh injured on starting the season on IR, Fenisef, Carlson, and Jack Thompson. So that’s the opening night roster. So do you have any initial impressions of of that? Um, we I mean we were kind of right like it was all pretty much exactly what we were. We were right. I mean we thought that he Thompson would get waved but he’s just on IR. So I mean same yeah but he’s not on a team and you know what I I have checked around like yeah people scouts have not liked his preseason to be honest his his games. So I don’t think he he wasn’t making this team even he was healthy. I I can say that with with almost 100% confidence that if the people I talked to if they if their views of the player are accurate that he wasn’t Ken Yoni I think was closer to making the team than Thompson to be honest. So yeah. So it’s not because IR a fantasy has a different case. A fantasy had a better camp. So he was closer I think. But anyway. Yeah. And I wonder if this Thompson thing when he does get healthy and then he does if they decide to wave him. They might wave somebody else. I don’t know. Or or put somebody else on IR. Who knows? But uh if it’s something like where Tampa would be like, “Oh, maybe we’ll pick him up.” You never know. like with Damon Hunt because Damon Hunt got sent to Columbus and then got waved and Minnesota picked him back up. Yeah. Yeah. After he got in the Eurate trade. So maybe if a if a team like Tampa is like, “Oh, we actually kind of liked that guy.” Um he might get a shot there or two. But um or if it’s uh because they have to wave him later in the season, guys have gotten some looks in the NHL and some coaches and GMs are like, “This guy is not hacking it.” Maybe they wanted to give it a shot to to Thompson. Who knows? Yeah. And I’m still with what we you and I agreed on that. I thought it was 3070 that they put him through. Like I I asked before we started finding out that oh Thompson is on IR. I asked a few scouts who is the most claimable of Gruntstrom of Afanise of Thompson of Regenda. And no one said Reenda because again Reenda where was Reenda last year and again I really like Pablo’s game. I like what he did for the the Barracuda, but if we look at an honest perspective, that matters, you know, like having a couple good games or a couple or a good camp at I think he’s 25, that doesn’t win you an angel job necessarily. So, it didn’t for him a few years ago, right? But it didn’t this it won him that job a few years ago with Anaheim. Um Oh, I’m not really sure his history. Did it? Am I I’m not actually aware. It started off like a like a was it’s kind of a joke at this point. not joke, but like a meme of like a early Calder favorite cuz he started off super hot one season with Anaheim and then eventually got sent down. Um Okay. Because the same thing happened. He played like bat out of hell in preseason, earned a job, and then so it’s tough. It’s it’s that consistency element. There’s nothing that like Pablo Reaganda does super super well um to be like we had to put him in the lineup every night. So I don’t know. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. No, I agree. I mean, like a fourth line, he’s useful, but a lot of times though, and this is what I I I wrote in my story about Jack Thompson, that is he going to take your your guy’s job at number seven, number six defenseman, unless your guy is hurt? Maybe not. Probably not, actually. And so, so then are you going to spend a waiver claim on him? I mean, if you’re banged up, you might, but you’re not necessarily going to do it just because of the player. It’s not like if you put like I’m this is a stupid example, but you put like William Mlin on waiverss, he’s going to get picked up like that. Min subies are so good, right? It’s so obvious you must have this guy. You’re stupid if if you don’t pick him up. So Thompson is not in any kind of sense of that. He’s not a that right now at least. He’s not a bottom pairing defenseman on a bad team on a playoff team or any of that. So he is a deaf guy. He’s a good deaf guy. I don’t want to take that away from him, but he needs to take that next step, which I don’t think he did during during camp. So yeah. So So this whole roster doesn’t really surprise me. Um, so any well I was saying though I asked the scouts who they thought was the most claimable. Thompson fa there were may you know even Grundstrom got a vote because Grundstrom even though Grundstrom hasn’t done much with the Sharks he does have a track record of all these guys Carl Grundstrom has actually the most track record of of playoff caliber hockey with actual playoff team even if it’s on a fourthline role. So So and he’s just 27 too. He’s not old by any stretch. So, so yeah, but none of them had like really strong cases, right? And so anyway, you and I predicted that Brunstrom would be on waiverss. He was traded, but he actually was put on waivers right after the trade by the Flyers. So, yep. So, yeah. So, I I think I think we did we did see it right and you know, we had Graph both both on the team. So, it’s not like we just went with the easiest guys, too. So, yeah, I I would say uh pat on the back for both of us. Yeah. Yeah. We I think this was one of the few where you could kind of not see it coming a mile away, but it seemed like this was the the case. I think the the most interesting things were like Dandria versus um Grunstrom. Um I think Kenyon had a chance, but it was just with Dickinson being there unlikely. Right. Right. And him being waver exempt. Yeah. And then Cardwell obviously coming on late and putting up some. And Brigenda too in that game just just looking great. And yes, Brienda had five points in four games in the 2023 preseason which caused him to be in the uh um into the NHL and then played 14 games with the Ducks before being sent down. I don’t know. And yeah, I’m not I don’t want to take that away like like what what Pavo did and he could prove us wrong. That happens too, right? But again, when he’s put on waiverss, the league tells us. And so, if the scouts who watch the preseason games, they were like, “Oh my god, you got to pick this guy up.” Like, I don’t know what happened over the summer, but he’s a totally different player than he was the past few years. You got to pick this guy up. Someone would have picked him up. The Sharks calculate that it wasn’t going to happen, and that’s why that’s one reasons why they they did put him through waiverss instead of putting him on the team. And it what happened was was predictable. So yes and um so should we talk about lines? Yes, let’s talk about lines. So today at let’s do at practice it was interesting because there are two sets of lines that that went. So I’m going to read you all the lines and I’m going to tell you sort of my my thoughts of what the most likely lines are. Uh but none of them include Michael Misa as a as a primary center though. So I’ll warn warn you guys. But okay. So the first the first lines that went were Ekkan, Celbrini, Smith as your first line, Defoley, Wenberg, and Skinner as your second line, Kurishv, Dandra as your center, Graph on the third line, and Gdrodette and Reeves. I’m going to go with the forwards because the fence were actually very consistent. So um um I actually will read off all the defense, but they stay the same. So through the both both uh kind of uh forward kind of um sort of drafts attempts at lines. So the defense were Lety and Clingberg, Ferraro and Loigrin, Orlof and Madulan and Day Har and Dickinson. Okay. So the second group of forwards I saw were Kurishv Celbrini and Smith Ecklan Wenberg and Tofoley Skinner Dandria and Graph and Gdro Goddet and Reeves. So before we get to the Dandria part, I think the the lines that I actually believe are the most accurate were were actually the second group. And the reason why I think this is because when I the actually the most surprising thing besides seeing Dandre as your clear 3C was seeing Tofo and Skinner on the same line because I don’t think that I don’t that didn’t make quite a lot of sense in terms of just different styles. I feel like they’re very similar. I could be wrong. So they might they might try that. But to me the most sensible line in terms of balancing the lines out were Kurishv with Cbrian and Smith and not super loading with Ekkan Cbrian and Smith. Ekkan oneberg into Foley. So you’re not you’re not um you’re not heavy loading with with the shot first for wingers into Foley and Skinner and Skinner with Deandria and Graph to give a little offensive punch to to the third line. So that’s that’s that’s that’s my one one note I have. Second important note I would say is that I look what you look for in these things is repetition repetition obviously right so celebrating and Smith are playing together start season almost certainly Warsuke has already confirmed it but you can guess by the fact that in both of these iterations they’re together so you can guess that Gdrod and Reeves are together because of course Ryas praised them to the moon after the last game but also too that they have also stayed together the entire camp so that’s a likelihood you hear Another clear consistency is let’s get to Tai Dandre that he looks like he’s going to start the season at 3C. And I’ve been talking for a while. So before I get to sort of my thought about it, what do you think of Tai Dandre at 3C? Start hot there or just any of these these lines that you that you’ve looked at? Well, first of all, um Gdro Goodat Reeves has looked good. I will say that. Um, I think Godet is a really good addition to the fourth line there where even guys like Sturm like he doesn’t push offensively enough. Godette has some like at least a little bit more offensive chops and I I really like 19 goals last year. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So, I really like his addition to that lineup of good row. I don’t know if Reeves is going to be an every night player or just like a heavy night player. That’s a good way to put it. Um, but he come he comes out with what he’s supposed to. Physicality, fighting, he’s going to do that. So, I like that line. I think for a noted Goodro um basher, I I like it. I think it’s going to work out well hopefully for a while. Um, I think that part of the reason why Goodro didn’t succeed last year is because he ended up playing up like he’s playing second third line minutes. He’s playing way too high in the lineup for a guy like that. So maybe this is the solution is get a solid fourth line, stick with it because it looks like a good line. So we’ll see how they they fare. That’s my first thought. Um second is um there’s a lot of I I do wonder what I think they’re giving Dandria like the um how do you say like the audition, right? like it’s we are we are looking for a 3C um or we have options for 3C like Misa um or push one bird down 2 curvini like we it got dead even so we have options so we’re giving you the audition here with some good players Skinner and graph are good NHL players well graph is a rookie but you know not a rookie but a younger guy so no I know yeah I know where you’re coming from yeah yeah so I think it’s an interesting thing I don’t know if it’s like a longterm thing I It’s nothing to freak out about. That’s also what Bole was saying too. It’s game one. They want to see what this guy can do at this level at this level in the lineup because from last year he wasn’t 3C worthy. Um I’d say that I think he’s he was more of a fourthline 13th forward guy. So yeah, I um we’ll see. I think it’s it doesn’t mean that it’s the end of the world. Misa is never getting in this lineup. Oh my god. It’s just they want to see what he can do here after a good after clearly a kick in the pants, right? Like somebody told him you need to play better and then he did. So give him a shot. He’s only got him on this year as a contract. I mean again it’s not likely to work out. There’s no like told you so. I mean Dandre is 25. He hasn’t quite clicked as a third line or up forward yet. It usually doesn’t happen after a few years in the league even though Tai was a first round pick a long time ago. just but just normally it doesn’t happen, right? But though I think it it shows a couple things at first, the Sharks do have a something of I guess a a third line center problem in in so far as they don’t know how to fill it. Uh they do like Audetta for I think they really would like to keep him there because he becomes like a luxury there. He’s like almost he’s too good for it in a way. can move up to 3C, but but then then he may not maybe he then he’s just like a average or below average 3C maybe. And but at 4C he might be I mean he’s the I’m not I don’t know. I got to look at all the fourth line centers in the league, but I’m sure there’s not very many fourth line centers that scored 15 goals last year and like averaging 10 minutes a night. So, you know, account for shooting percentage or whatever, but like that’s that’s something for that’s a good thing for for for C. So then you have clearly celebr now. Who is your 3C, right? And so Michael Misa did not necessarily get like a lot like sort of his gameplay. He I’m sure he got better in subtle areas, but in terms of like gametoame impact, he didn’t get better. As the competition got harder, he didn’t necessarily get better. I’m not saying that, oh that means, well, again, anything bad, that’s normal. He’s 18, right? But what I’m trying to say is that he did not grab that three seed job. It was there for him to take. He did not he did not uh I that’s not if if you see it that way, that’s fine, but I don’t think the coaching staff thought that or he would have the three seat job. So, let’s put it that way. And I actually asked Wars, I phrased it and it’s a leading question, but I asked Warski like do you think that Dandria like took the job? He grabbed it. I mean, I didn’t say Michael Misa or I didn’t I didn’t say over Misa. I just said did he did Dandra take the job in your eyes? And Warsi said that yeah, he did. And this is the the quote from I have a story coming out about it later, but basically Warsoski said early in the camp, we didn’t know who could jump in that spot. Yeah. But Deli through the games he played through practice practice part has been on a mission. So he’s earned it. And specifically that game at Anaheim at Waroski raved said that Dandre was the best player on the ice for the Sharks. And even since then, you know, the the Vegas game that they won, Delandre was centering the second line, even though they didn’t score any points, but still part of he was this Delro was the second most used forward, I think, in in in that game in the Vegas uh the Vegas win. I think it was the 3-1 4-1 win, right? So anyway, so I think that they’re giving Delandre this shot because he was the best of of of the groups of the of the I guess the guys who were closest to the job, which are Kurishv and and and Misa. Maybe the question of of Kurishv and Dandre is also what they’re looking for for a 3C, right? Kerse is more offense, finesse, that kind of thing, right? And so maybe they like that more on the wing. So that could be a part of it too, right? But what I would say is that without Michael Misa grabbing that job that that left that open and that if I were to say not accounting for ages or anything, who had a better camp just as play as hockey players, Tai Dandra or Michael Misa, it was Tyandra. I mean, yeah, I I don’t really know how that’s debatable. And if you’re not debating that, you’re saying, “Oh, we should just give it to to the guy because, oh, Will Smith got it last year. Was a different year this year, right?” And also too, because I’ve seen the argument, oh, Will Smith was played last year, even though Will Smith was not as was not so ready either. Yeah, that’s that’s true, but it was a different team last year, right? And a second part of it is, and you mentioned it, Michael Mis is going to play games. They have they have nine games to to work with him here and see if he can take that job from a Tai Deandria and or not and it’s not a condemnation on his career either way whatever happens in in this stretch and it’s it’s fine like it’s not it was it’s a it was a surprising move I would say for sure but I can see that part of it that that Misa did not seize that Yeah. Um, and Misa is a year younger than Smith was last year, too. So, that’s Oh, yep. That’s that’s that’s a fair consideration, too. Yep. Like, they’re different players and different situations. Smith could go to the NCAA, whereas, you know, music couldn’t for he could have, but didn’t. Um, but like uh so it’s different and I you don’t want to Oh, the leverage the NCAA leverage thing though is is probably a part of it too. Yeah. So yeah. So I don’t know. I don’t um if we lose against Vegas, it’s not from probably not from Title Enter playing 3C. I will say that I’m again, you know, it’s we’re going to lose some games this year. This is a a better team, I think, but it’s not still not the team that that’s gonna win us a ton of hockey games. Misa is gonna get a shot and and I don’t think that uh Reeves is an every night player. I think he’s a player that’s going to play more than he did last year for Toronto, but still at his age and the way that he plays the game, he’s comfortable with sitting, I’m sure. So, yeah, I I think Mis is going to get shots there. He’s going to get shots when guys just aren’t having good good. Maybe Delra will slide down there and Misa moves up. Certainly. Yeah. So, that’s possible. Maybe he moves up or they put Del. So, there’s options. Don’t worry about it. Um I would I’m just a little bummed more than anything, but I’m not worried. I I did think there was a lot of good things from Misa, but like you said, it wasn’t like it was like he dominated or like took over or it was like very clear like Celebrini coming in at his 18year-old where he’s ready. Um yeah, wasn’t like that at all. He had subtle things that like, yeah, this guy I think he could stick around in the NHL if you gave him good minutes and you gave him good linemates. I think he could do it. So, they’re just trying to figure out how to make that happen, I think, for him. um and then see what the season comes comes for him. But I I still think so. But I I asked I asked a scout uh a couple couple days ago about Misa versus Dickinson. He actually said he thought that Misa is not ready as from what he’s seen and Dickinson is. So that’s kind of a different opinion than than I’ve had because I I’ve always been a little higher on on Misa just in terms of his intelligence. So, I’m still going to stick even though a scout tells me differently that I think I think will be fine, but Oh, go ahead. Mhm. I think it’s also like I’m just saying. Yeah. Go ahead. Like we said before, it’s it’s more um it’s harder to shelter a defenseman than it is to shelter a Misa. So, right. Yes. I think Dickinson um looked a little bit probably better, more ready in certain in certain times. Sometimes he didn’t, but it’s harder to shelter a defenseman because like again that sometimes it’s on them when you get scored on and it’s less more it’s less likely to be the reason why you’re getting scored on. Yeah, I think it’s uh I don’t know there’s been ups and downs for both of them. But I was more surprised that Dickson didn’t get in the lineup than Misa. So I guess I agree with that statement because I really thought that Dickson would get into the lineup there. But it’s also hard to be like you’re gonna scratch above. So, Right. Right. Right. I mean, in terms of sort of like if you want to give the veterans like, hey, they they’ve done it before. They’ve done it for years. Let’s give them like the first crack. Like Letty, Clingberg, um Orlof, even Ferraro are like very like long established, especially the three Lety Clingberg, Orof, very decorated defenseman, right? Um, yeah, like who I’m not sure yeah who you would scratch. I guess you can say Dickinson for Loigrin, but that’s not that clearcut. Like I I’m not going to say that that Dickinson was better in camp than Logrin. I thought Logan was actually decent, you know. Uh, and Logrin is obviously just more experienced and and stronger um and and and and all all all that business just being a guy that’s eight years older than than than Dickinson. So, um, so yeah, I guess I guess I’m I I don’t think of it of like you. I don’t think of this as being like a a big big deal. Like I get why Dandre is there. No, I don’t think it’ll last because just track record. It’s not that hard to figure out that Tai Deandre is 25 and it hasn’t quite happened in a higher role for him yet. So, is it going to happen this time at center? Probably not if you’re just being a betting person. But if he has had the better camp, let him try and let’s see see what happens, right? And so yeah, as as for the Dickinson question, yeah, I mean, this one is is is is interesting because there there just feels like there’s there’s not as much space. you know, the forward there forward lines, there was a clear spot at 3C. And on defense though, it’s not quite clear like yeah, if you like you mentioned, if you take somebody out, like who where he put Dickinson in? He’s not on the power play because Clingberg is here for PP1 and Orlof has PP2 right now until they show that they can’t handle it anymore. So yeah. So it would be one of like Leti Little Shagrin or Muka Madulan. And I think what’ll end up happening is um like maybe Elijah will sit some games. Muka Madulan when he’s not like because he’s not going to be as consistent every night. Maybe they’ll sit him some games. And then Lety with his age um and and everything. Maybe they also sit him some games. So I I think that’s it’s just going to be a rotating of those three guys kind of sitting for Dickson and then Dehar for like Oh yeah. Yeah. Right. Sorry. I Yeah. Yeah. I got the hand in his Dickson’s hand. I I I I I I had a tight pull there. I put Dickson on the right side, but he’s on the left side, but um yeah, but it is tough cuz like Loa Grin is one of the few righties. Um you got Darn Clingberg, Gloin, and then everybody else is lefties. So is lefty. Yeah. Yeah. It’s it’s a good problem to have. Um but you do want to see Dickson get games because more than anything that’s why he’s not in the OHL is because you think he needs the NHL experience. Um, right. And but I think the secret benefit is that you get to slow play their nine games, too, which I I’ve said before, I think that that’s the most sensible plan anyway to kind of slow play those nine games and send them to the AHL for conditioning and get them to to to roll juniors and then decide if you really want to keep them or not for the season. Yeah, they might do that for both of them, right? Like I think so. It seems like it. Yeah, it’s an interesting uh interesting play and sure team Canada would be happy because Team Canada’s got like a bunch of dudes that just made the NHL roster. Schaefer is not going. When people thought he might be going to World Juniors, he’s not. So the defense for world for team Canada is looking real rough. Um that coming up. So we’ll see. Um I don’t know. Or just grabs a job because there was times when you’re like right that’s the reason why we want you in the NHL. Yeah, he did have moments for sure. Like I think Misa I actually did a story I put out today earlier today about Michael Misa and talking with him and Ryan Rosski wants him to he said to think less that he’s thinking too much about making mistakes and that that is what I thought about Misa in the sense of like he wasn’t as dynamic but I felt like he was trying to fit in. He and he was positionally sound like Warsoski said, but he didn’t have those moments that like kind of get you out of your seat a little bit that Dickinson had to to some degree. And it’s a delicate balance. You can’t have you can’t have too many of those kind of those kind of like dangerous kind of plays because you hurt your team too much. But you got to do it a couple times though, I guess, to really like Okay. Yeah. Good question. Did the um Orloff Muka Madulan pairing was that the hand or the side? Did they put Orlof back at left and Mukabulan back at right? Yeah, they they switched that left left to right. Uh Mukuman Yeah, Mukin played well uh there last year and then Morlock’s dealing with some upper body issue. He didn’t specify what. So that could be a part of it too. Or maybe they just saw in camp that that because Zoro didn’t have that great game against um it was that the home game against Yeah. So maybe they saw, hey, that that that that that’s going to work to have like the younger legs and and and the longer reach of Mukumadulan on the right side. So, and we’ve seen him do well on the right side. So, like in the past. So, I think that’s a that’s a really cool pairing if they keep it like that. Or can play right side, too. But, um I like that pairing. Hopefully, they um I really wonder what the the time on ice is going to be like. Like obviously Clingberg and Orlov are going to get skewed because of um power play and everything, but I do wonder what the even strength uh balance is going to be like. Yeah, I mean there’s an argument that maybe they’ll be pretty balanced because Orloff isn’t 2018 Orof. Neither is Nick Ley. 2018 Nick Lety. So like, but they’re still competent and so you know, FAR is younger, but Far Fro isn’t a number one number two defenseman necessarily, but maybe. So maybe it’ll be pretty close. All these three pairings. I would It kind of feels like we have three. This is This is going to sound harsh, but three line 2.5s like three like line between two and three in terms of quality. That’s what it seems like. Oh, you mean the pairings or the pairings or the lines? Yeah. Yeah. Like it seems like Yeah. like the pairings. I mean, um, it seems like we have three line 2.5s. Yeah. Yeah. I think I think that’s that that’s like a pessimistic way to look at I think there’s a chance that Orlock, Muk, Madulan, they could be your sort of two. Yeah. I mean, because I mean, Orof did play that even if he didn’t have the best season. He played that last year for Carolina and made it to the he did in the playoffs for them, too. And from what I understand, he was much better in the playoffs than he was in the regular season. So yeah, and Mukum Doulan we know has a lot of talent. So I I would guess that’s the one that they’re hoping emerges as sort of as sort of the top pairing because that would also mean that Mukuman is is a player that you know a good player which you hope he is. He’s young and Orlof who you’ve invested more in is also still a good player. So, so I would guess that’s what they’re hoping that that those guys can do that and then just see what you get out of Lety Clingberg and Ferrar Liginrren and obviously, you know, mix in Dehar and Dickinson, too. Yeah. What did you think of Luka Badulan during um training camp? I thought he I thought he played well in certain aspects. I thought he got better. Uh I I I also thought he was a little slow to start. I’m not sure if it’s the hand in his thing or just in terms of maybe tentative at times, right? And uh that that’s what I saw early on. But I thought he got better and I think though by the end he was starting to show the kind of game that he showed last year with the at the end of the season where he was one of the Sharks best defenseman. I don’t know if it’s still a very very good defenseman yet though that’s you know if you compare it to the rest of the the league but definitely definitely came on though by the end of camp for me. Yeah it seemed like he he has a play killing ability that I think is super underrated. He he smothers people when they enter the zone really really well. And yeah, which is awesome. And then he can move the puck. Um when he has confidence, like when he’s confident, he he really can, you know, take it himself or got good vision, too. There’s just a lot there with Moo. You really hope that this is the year I want him to be a top four Sharks defenseman coming, you know, like for the future because I’m hopeful. And Orof seems like a good partner. Hopefully they figure it out. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, it seems it seems like this this could work out. I would say um here uh let’s I don’t know if you have any any any anything more uh past this, but if we might close with this then uh let’s say they keep these pairings or close to who do you think emerges as a top pairing? Uh Orlock Mukadillan Farloin or Lety Clingberg? Eventually I think Orlock Mukadillan. Yeah. Okay. I think needs to be sheltered and Lety um I don’t know yet about Lety. I mean, the experience is there and like Dan said, you never know what vets do in preseason if it if it matters or not. But, um I think or love Mugan has the best chance to be the top pairing. Just that they have two-way game. They’ve got um they’ve got some speed. They’ve got offensive ability. Neither of them seem like too too weak defensively. So, I’m not Yeah, I like it. Um, and then Ferraro Ligin, if we like Ferraro, we keep if we keep the lineup in the right spots, he’s still a good player. It’s just the right spots for Ferraro, you know, he can’t be eaten 23 minutes a night. You just can’t do it. Yeah. But, you know, going going back to it, I’ve said this a lot about these defenseman, but if we go back to 2021 or 2017 and you got Orlof and Young defenseman as your top pairing, Letty Clingberg as your middle pairing and you can bury, you can not bury, you can push down Ferrar to your bottom pairing, that’s actually a good defense. So I think it’s a let’s put it this way that uh at least for me to close off that I do think Olaf Mukum Mukumadulan will emerge as a top pairing but I also think that the if you’re able to to keep Ferraro Green as your bottom pairing that’s a good thing. It’s not a negative on their abilities. I think that that’s where they can really shine and that means that your entire team is stronger because people are slotted closer even if they’re kind of 2.53 defenseman um or two two point 2.5 pairing or third pairing defenseman that for Loigrin ideally is probably on the bottom end of that spectrum but that’s where they can like say they can thrive there they can yeah they can be really good there. Yeah, like I think Lil Shrin is like the epitome of the number six defenseman. Like he’s just he’s fine. Like he’s he’s okay. And I think if he’s it at your number six spot, you know, you you’re not going to lose or win all the time with him there. So it’s I think he’s just fine. It’s just the problem is when you play them higher and higher and higher. That’s the issue. So Right. Right. Right. We’ll see. It’s a It’s interesting. Uh, I think before we went to the offseason, I said that I wanted to get some defensive revamp and um, he did. Ferraro is like the only guy on this team that was on the beginning of the opening night roster last year, right? So, it’s a revamp. Um, right. And an interesting way to do it. So, yeah. and also the only guy that I think you would characterize as defense defense first. Maybe let kind of become more of that over the years. But like yeah and then dear obviously too but um but yeah so there’s there is a lot of puck moving a lot more than before. So at least yeah I see Darn and Reeves is kind of the the fill in guys like Reeves is going to play a lot in the beginning of the year I think. Um, and then we’ll see. But I think both of them are kind of your your slot in replacement guys. Like you like the some of the physical aspects that Dehorn gives you. There’s not a lot else that he’s going to give you on most nights other than physical defensive play. So you slot him in when you need him. But yeah, I think it’s I think it’s a good lineup. I’m I’m cautiously optimistic rather than I think last year I wasn’t even close to optimistic. I was like this is going to go terribly. What do we get a do we get any sense of a starting goalie for for the first day yet? No. Uh Warski is really keeping that close to the vest. I think this year he might do some of the things that coaches have been doing around the league. I think like uh Torier and Utah said that he’s not going to answer the question in the morning. So So I I wonder unfortunately I wonder if we’re going toward that. So hopefully he’ll at least announce in the morning at least. It’s going to hurt a bunch of fantasy rosters. I can tell you that. Yeah. Yeah. I think I think I think I think he is um I mean and it’s also another one I guess we can end on that that’s actually a good good question or debate or whatever that who should get opening night and that’s one of those things where I think either way I and I wrote about this I’m not concerned either way about opening night I’m more concerned about how Ascar finishes the season if he’s taking a job by the end of the season because that’s why I want to see that that growth obviously in camp Nelkovich has been better u but I’m also careful about don’t judge uh somebody just based on one good or bad game. That’s Yuruslav Ascarov who was not very good in the last game in Utah. That’s obviously Barkley Gdro, Ryan Reeves, good or bad, etc., etc. Pavo Regenda, right? And so I’m also okay if they just give him the job for opening night and even though Nick Nulkovich was better and just and see if he can run with it too. So, I’m fine with that, but I just want to see at the end of the season that he has defined himself as a Sharks number one goalie. Yep, that’s the hope. Um, yeah, there’s a lot writing on that, too. Not a lot lot, but it’s definitely the gamble that has played here for the goalending future for the Sharks. So, Shangers. Uh, well, guys, I think that’s it for today’s episode. Shang has uh disappeared off of the podcast, but um we will be back next week with a update on the San Jose Sharks 2025 2026 season which starts and probably a captain update as well. Um I was going to say that the Sharks are officially losing the Tankathon standings as the Blackhawks have lost to the Panthers two to three for the first uh opening night game of the regular season. So we’re already behind the eightball on the Gavin McKenna sweep stakes. I’m gonna riot. But I uh hope you guys have a good week. I don’t know if Shang is rejoining me. Let’s see. Perfect. All right. See you guys next week. Bye. [Music]