LTIR Opening Up Trades For Maple Leafs, Golden Knights & Hurricanes? | February 6, 2023

I know that some in our audience know the finer points of hockey. The Chris Johnston Show. We are your friends. The biggest stories. Bringing you inside the game. What did you hear? The Chris Johnston Show. Powered by sports interaction. What a bet. What is going on? Here's Chris with your host, Julian Mackenzie. Part of the game. Big Money Siege has traded in the sunglasses from Florida for earbuds. It looks like you're ready to go on a run. It looks like as soon as this is done, you are about to go on a run somewhere. It's actually true. That is what's happening. Because I didn't get up early on. Do it before the pod today. So I got to do it after. OK, but to be clear, you're going outside to do this. You're not going on a treadmill. As some of the overdrive boys, we're making fun of you for, right? Yeah, this will be an outdoor run. I will say this. Obviously, we've talked a number of times with the run street. Usually, people find out about it. They say, oh, wow, I can't believe you did that. I've never had pushback. But I did it hit on Friday night with overdrive. And they were giving me pushback. They were trying to say because some of the runs over 1,000 plus days have been done on a treadmill. It shouldn't count. The way they'd like you to actually do it, they said, it'd be like if you went to a golf simulator, you don't say to your buddies, hey, I went golfing today, which I think is a flawed argument. It is. Because it's not, you know, you still trust me. I still sweat like crazy on a treadmill. I mean, I acknowledge it is easier to run on a treadmill indoors when it's minus 30 in Canada. So like, there are days I've run the treadmill when it's easier than what it would be to go outside. And sometimes too, when you're in another city, you don't really know where you're going. You have a small window of time. It's just easier to go to the hotel gym to do the run. So instead of figuring out a route and maybe getting lost. So like, I'd say 94% of the runs during my street could be outdoors, but there are some that have been done in the treadmill. Yeah. So look, I'm not someone who runs regularly. You are not going to get any judgment from me on how you go about your run streak. So the fact that you're still able to do this and we are past 1,000 days is beyond impressive. I know we got to get to hockey stuff, but we got to mention that. I just love that I'm getting chirped by the overdrive guys. Like, you just go on that show knowing something's coming. Like, it's always on a left field. Like, I'm telling you, that's the last thing I thought they would be, you know, going in on before, which it was a funny conversation. I'd say the fact that the overdrive for context, for those who are not in Canada, the overdrive show on TSN 1050 with Jeff O'Neill, Jamie McLennan, and Brian Hayes. Obviously, nationally, based out of that radio station, but you can watch on TSN as well. I believe nationally, one of the best Canadian sports shows that we have. So the fact that CJ gets that placement on that show, I mean, that is no small feat by front. Right. But when you go there, they might even take what you, you know, one of your accomplishments and turn it on its head against you. You never know. Yeah, just ridiculous. Anyway, good on that. But good on the run when you get a chance. But I want to talk about Florida and the All-Star weekend that you are at. We're going to get to talk about the playoff format. We'll get to sports interaction. We're going to look at some teams that have done some things with their cap space. And of course, it's Monday, so we'll get to ask CJ. But I want to ask you about your impressions of the All-Star weekend in Florida. You were in the building. You saw the events. You saw the players take me through it. What were your impressions, man? How was it? Well, let it be said, I came away able to make a statement that not to make people associated with the event could make. I did not visit the elbow room once. Well, down there. And everyone from media members to players in the game to agents. I'm sure fans that were down for the event can not make that statement because from what I heard, it was pretty wild. I won't name names, but there was a lot of fun to be had in there. So I did avoid that. I'll tell you, I actually love the weekend, honestly. And I think if you just consume it on the context of watching the skills competition, went on a little too long, I would say that's definitely the pacing wasn't great for that. And then if you watch it through on three tournaments, like, if that's all you see, I understand the hate. I do there's an understanding at the high levels of the NHL that they have to keep working to try to find ways to breathe some life into it, to shake it up. Now, I know we've chopped that around a bunch in the past, but like the actual weekend itself is awesome. Like the players are so relaxed. I don't know. Everyone just has a good time. Like, I think you do need a break in your season. And I don't have the answer, honestly, and what has to happen. This is what it comes down to for me. The performers have to want to perform. And right now, I don't think they do. Like it's hard to just get the players carrying or putting out a little extra effort when you're talking about whether it's the skills or the game. If there's a way to do that, I'm all for it. I would highly suggest to you that when we get to Toronto next year for the All-Star Weekend, it's going to look quite a bit different. I think that they're going to go back to the drawing board, watch what happened here, brainstorm ideas, and at least give it another shot somewhere else. But even if the game kind of stinks and it drags on to Log on Friday, I still think it's worth doing. There's a ton of league partners down at this event. As I mentioned, it's a big business weekend. NHL owners were in the building. You've got families of the players. It's kind of like I've said about the draft, it's hockey's version of a conference, industry sort of conference. Those two events are the times probably where the most number of people from all aspects around the league or league adjacent get together. And so it was cool. And I think it'll be neat in Toronto. I mean, part of obviously what we all liked in Florida, we literally had a media day availability Julian beside the ocean outdoors. It was so unique. It was cool. We're in Toronto in February 2024. We're going to be somewhere where there's heating. So we won't be there. We won't be outside on the top of the CN tower, I don't think. But I think still being such a hockey city, it works in different venues. And so I still think the weekends we're doing, let's reboot it a little bit, but I'm not going to kick it around too much either because I had a lot of fun. I think there's a lot of value seeing players, seeing people again. And I come away going like, yeah, that was a fun few days. Okay, let's put the Toronto portion of this on the side for a second. You did mention Toronto because it was announced that next year's all-star game will be in Toronto. I got to say something about the weekend. The games itself, okay, pretty much like what we've seen in the past with the three on three, the jerseys are incredible. I ordered the Eastern Conference one, the one with the Black Top and then the White Bottom. I love that jersey, it's coming in a few days. The skills competition. Did you get a name on it? I didn't get a name on it. I'm not going to put a name on it. It's probably fair. I just keep like, I need to say something about that Friday because as someone who watched it, off their iPad, actually from the comfort of their own home, I'm like, what the hell is going on? Can you think of any other year where they've had skills where they start an event? And then they stop and they go to another one and they go to another one and they don't finish them. It's one thing about we can get to the level of effort and how much the players want to get into it, which I think in the break-away competition you saw that more than anything else. But I hated the idea of them starting an event and then not finishing it and then they can go, okay, we'll just get back to it later in the night. That's not how you do it. Just go to the event, go through it, finish it all the way through and do that. That's a big thing. Also in terms of players caring. That's a TV thing though. That wasn't the NHL. My understanding that's what ESPN wanted to do. It is a new league partner. It's a new, I don't think that I'm pretty confident that that won't happen again. I think in some of the conversations I had on the ground, again, with people that can affect this, they recognize in real time that that didn't work. They haven't even had a chance to really decompress from it. I think that was a TV decision. It didn't work. Just have five or six or however your competitors go fastest around the rink and tell me who's the fastest. I actually think those events work. Sometimes the more gimmicky ones, you're like, what is the rules here? What is it? It's pretty clear when you watch someone skate around that you're just trying to see who's fastest or even the hardest shot. Pretty obvious what you're measuring. I think that those have historically been some cool events. When you see Zidayo Chara, I think it's slaps on the hardest shot. You want to see what the number is. It's cool. Absolutely. I think the simpler, the better for these events. Also in terms of players caring, it's kind of funny. I got the sense maybe Conor McDavid cared. At least in the conversation you had with Kevin DeAksa before it started, you were saying, you know what, let some of the other younger guys do some of the events like Fastest Skater and he does the accuracy competition and that works out well. It would have been cool if Conor was in the breakaway competition. Maybe he doesn't do all the fancy costume stuff, but he goes in on a loan and makes this sick move. That's what that particular competition should be. That should be the NHL's equivalent. I'm not saying it's anywhere close. It should be the equivalent of the slam dunk competition in the NBA where everyone comes away from that, where people or the players are doing something really cool that we should be talking about for a long time. But just for whatever reason this year, they kind of mangled it in how they showed each player after every few minutes and they focused more on the costumes minus Sydney and Ovechkin and Sergey Ovechkin, which was cute, mind you. But they focus on that more than actually trying to do something cool in terms of an actual cool goal. But how was Trevor Ziger's not here again? Did you see the tweet he put up? Yeah, I mean, that's fine. But he literally scored like that breakaway scored in last year's All-Star Game was crazy with the blindfold and everything. He should have won. That was our thing. He didn't win last year somehow, which is its own. I guess maybe that's why they don't have a back, but it's like he flew in just to do that one move and it worked. To me, you've got to bring him back and see what else he can do. Clearly, he's got to bag a trick that very few players have in terms of just like some of those crazy individual moves. Seriously, it doesn't make sense to me. For context, for those who didn't see, as the event was going on, Trevor Ziger just pulled up a yawning emoji, a sleeping emoji. It was like, that just tells you all you need to know about how that went. The highlight of that, honestly, was Sarah Nurse's Foresburg rule. She deserves a lot of praise for that. That was an amazing moment. Awesome. This is what I mean. There's something in there. I'm not in that everything needs to be scrapped and let's just forget it. I got that morning Julian of the game. The leak puts out a daily media email and then it said the 67th ever ulcer game. That kind of hit me because I wouldn't have known that number. It's been done for a long, long time. I know it's been done in all million different formats. There's no real historical precedent. But I think the fact you have an event that's been held 67 times in a leak's history, I think you do continue on with it. You just got to try to really accentuate the good and weed out the bad. I don't know. The thing is players want to go now. The story, I remember early in my career, always the story you get there is all these stars who don't want to be there. That was not the case. Obviously a few players had to pull out, but it's all legitimate injuries in those cases. When Ross was Dali, his teammate, Tae Thompson gets injured the night before and then he flies on a moment's notice to go, I think the players want to be there. We just have to give them some carrot to really make it cool, but work in progress. Last thing before we bring on David Bastol, Toronto, next year, 2024, you mentioned the fact that maybe they do need to go back to the drawing board for some things. Is there any added pressure for the league for them to have a great weekend considering the location of the all-star game? Does that matter in all of this? I haven't thought about it, but I think it's fair to say that. One thing that's interesting about Toronto is they have huge fan-based interests. They have a massive season ticket list. I'm sure whatever the cost is, it's going to be high. I think that there's pressure to put on a good show. The one thing I'll say too, being in the arena, especially for the skills, when they had all those taped events, I actually found the golf thing pretty funny when the players were out golfing with their gloves on and all that. Of course, they had the dunk tag and some other events. When you're in the rink, you're just watching it on TV. I feel like for some of the people that were in the building and might not have been the best experience that way, you're just sitting there watching the scoreboard. I don't know. I think there's some pressure there. The other thing too, it depends on the market. There wasn't a lot of juice in the building. It didn't feel, but we'll see what the crowd is like in Toronto. Maybe there'll be a little bit more energy atmosphere which might spur on the performers. I don't know. There's definitely some pressure there. The only reason it's going to Toronto or the main reason is this was supposed to be when a World Cup was held, a window in February 2024. If you remember, it was only late 2022. They had to abandon plans to go there. We're talking three months ago or two and a half months ago. Typically, these events take years of planning out. I've been told they actually have the cities identified for 2025 and 2026. They haven't signed all the agreements. I haven't made any announcements. But the NHL knows where it's going already for the next two way beyond 2024, but they needed a place on a moment to notice that has the hotel space that can be grabbed, convention centre space for events they have there and where they're confident. I think that it will work, but there'll be fans and all that without a lot of advanced marketing. Toronto actually entered the equation quite late. It was only November. They're like, oh crap. We're not having a World Cup in 2024. Now we've got an all-star game that hasn't been on the horizon. This one's being, again, it doesn't seem like it's short notice because it's still a year and a little bit of time from when they started doing it. I think that there is some pressure to get it right given the market. There'll be more media attention in Canada anyway, because most of us won't have to fly anywhere. I'm going to sleep in my own bed those nights, which will be a little different. I wasn't around as a working member of the media yet in 2000 when the game was last and wrong. I was six years old. I was in high school. Oh boy. But the time, if you could tell us in 2000, what we'd be doing in 2023, I'm not sure we'd be able to tell you what a podcast was. No, but I still, I was hell-bent on being a hockey writer by then. I think I knew by then by six that I wanted to do something with sports writing. Yeah, we were both well on our way. We're both well on our way in the year of our Lord 2000. Anyway, let's get on DB. And we will talk about a very big talking point that emerged from this weekend's NHL All-Star Weekend. You can bet that with David Bastel. Brought to you by Sports Interaction. Get in the action and make a play. 19 plus. Please play responsibly. Welcome to Sports Interactions. You can bet that with Sports Interactions. Very, David Bastel. Hope you had a good weekend, bud. Pretty good, guys. How are things over there? Things are good. This is another one of those episodes where CJ and I are in different cities than where we normally reside. So that's what you can tell the backgrounds are a little bit different. But remember to hit up Sportsinteraction.com slash SDPN for all of your gaming needs. As of right now, we're recording this on Monday morning for February 6th. The Toronto Maple Leafs are in a playoff position as we speak. But they want to pay jets. You're going to pay jets, David Bastel. We're going to play off position as we speak. And Edmonton holds down a wild card spot and Calgary is tied with Colorado on points for the second wild card spot. So it's a four team. The torque Canadian teams are in a playoff position right now. Sports Interaction is asking the question, how many Canadian teams make the playoffs over three and a half is at 1.77 under three and a half, 1.93, David. How do you see it? You know what? Right? We're looking at four teams. Unfortunately, I don't think we're going to take any flyers on Ottawa, Montreal or the Vancouver Canucks. It hasn't been, you know, point productive seasons, let's just say. So I don't know about you, CJ, but I'd love to see both Alberta teams in this postseason and see what happens. I know by most people's standards Calgary probably hasn't performed like a lot of people thought they would. I think they would probably be in a conversation of should have been head of Seattle, but no disrespect to the crack and they've had a very good season and sitting nicely in the Pacific. But I think we're going to see four teams somehow in this postseason. But you know what? That's why we debate about it, right? We have three, possibly four and I don't know. How are you looking at it right now yourself? It's a nail butter. I mean, I'm stunned with this deep in and both Calgary and Edmonton really haven't secured their spot. I know Edmonton had a really strong run into their all-star break. So they put a little distance in between themselves and that. But I think it'll go right down to the wire and I'm with you. It's nice to see four Canadian teams in there. I love seeing Edmonton and Calgary play each other last year in the playoffs. I probably leaned towards four, quite honestly. I wonder if LA can hang on with the goaltending they have. I just think it's going to be a close race and I don't see either team selling parts or anything like that. They're all into this is this season, both have to get in. So I think they're going to find a way. Should mention Calgary again, as we're recording this six points out of top spot in the Pacific, which as you mentioned, LA Seattle and LA tied at 63 points. Vegas only a point behind. It is very tight in the Pacific Division, gentlemen. So I mean, we could easily see those four teams make it considering what it begs in a good spot. The Toronto Maple is obviously in a good spot. But yeah, the Oilers in the flames look like the two Canadian teams that will be fighting like hell to make the playoffs. I would be surprised if we start seeing them jump over each other for the next 30 odd games or so DB. Thank you so much for joining us. As always, don't forget to check out Sports Interaction dot com slash SDPN for all the best odds before game in game and the best props sports interaction dot com slash SDPN. See you Thursday. Thanks, fellas. Our next partner is athletic greens. I take a G one by athletic greens literally every day. I gave a G one a try because I want a better health sustained energy immune system to be better support as well. For that, it I just can't stand taking all these different pills and vitamins all the time. And I want something to actually taste pretty good. And a G one has all of that. The morning I could take it before I, I, I breakfast. Some people have to take it before they work out, making coffee. You literally could just start your day off with a G one and it can help you feel unstoppable, ready to take on your day, ready to go out, ready just to do something good for your body because you can't just keep putting crap in it all the time. It's not good. It needs vitamins and nutrients to survive. Seriously, seriously. And thanks to a G one, they're able to provide a whole bunch of different high quality ingredients. In fact, 75 of them actually that give you a long term gut health support, a whole bunch of different nutrients that can help you get to that point. If a comprehensive solution is what you need from your supplement routine, athletic greens is giving you a free one year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. Go to athletic greens.com slash Johnston athletic greens.com slash Johnston to get yourself a free one year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. Check it out. I should mention siege before we get to all the fun hockey stuff. We have the fourth and final $100 gift card from beer town to give away. The question we asked was which fast food restaurant did CJ work at once upon time and siege last episode you said it was going to be a bit difficult for plenty of people to get the answer. I don't think the answer was as difficult as you thought it would be. Do you know what is so weird or so? It's just not weird. It's like one of the most surreal moments of the entire weekend is if you remember I mentioned when I was at the board of governors meeting that a minority owner of one of the teams came up and said he likes the pod. I happened to run into the same individual again at the arena before the three on three tournament on Saturday and it comes up to me. The answer is Wendy's right? No way. Yeah. There's someone who has an ownership stake in an NHL team that not only listens to our show but is engaged and remember enough about the contest and do the answer somehow. Again, I'm not going to dox the person but if you're listening I'm blown away. That sort of stuff makes my day. He also mentioned I could say too because crazy week, Brad Marchin and Steve Dangle going out of the middle. Oh my god. You know, sometimes you feel like you're operating in our own little vacuum or you know obviously I know we have our SDPN community. Lots of people that are super engaged, super involved, you know, submit questions, you know, come out to the live events, all that stuff. But like you just don't expect someone to who has amassed more wealth than we can ever imagine and owns part of a sports team and all that is involved in our world too. It's pretty cool. Yeah, I'm not going to mention that name either but when I was told of their qualifications my mind was completely blown. Unfortunately to that person they did not tweet at my Twitter handle or Chris's Twitter handle or the SDPN sports Twitter handle that answer. So they are not eligible for this contest. But Aaron Manton did and he wrote CJ worked at and was named and he of the bug fat Wendy's and he is the winner of our fourth and final $100 gift card from beer town. We're going to try to make sure that we get gift cards out to all of our winners. Thank you to everyone who participated in the giveaway in the contest. Thank you for everyone who tweeted at us and tried their hand at winning one of the bad boys. So we really appreciate it. This was really great to do. Yeah, remember white red green, Julian mayonnaise ketchup pickles, tomato lettuce and then you finish with the mustard and I didn't put this in last week because it would have ruined the answer. But you do a mustard W on the burger or on the cheese patty if it's on the cheese if it's on the burger. If you do that you can make sandwiches there. Do they do the four corner press when you do the grill because you know Wendy's doesn't cut corners. They got the four corner press. No sir. I'm telling you I could still go back if I had to like if you could I guarantee you you could throw me on a shift right now and I could hold my own without any training. The problem is they're probably some new burgers and they don't know exactly how to make. Wow, that is amazing. Chris Johnston the fry cook. I love this and also love everyone. I was pretty. Did I ever tell you the drive through story? No, tell me the drive through story. So a lot of my shifts were a period of time. I worked there for years so I did everything over my time there but I was I was doing a lot of drive through at one period and when you do the drive through there you have to do the dishes at the same time. And there's more dishes than you think so you got to stay on top of the dishes on the drive through. But anyway they installed a clock they installed a clock at one point at for the drive through and basically the minute someone's car you know pulls up to the the order part and then when they leave it was it would time you know how long took people to go through. And so you know I was a we were to get generate high school students and we had like you know like a dolly like a metal dolly to like lift anything. We discovered that if you if you walk the metal dolly through the drive through it actually registered like the car went through. And so late at night because they were you know there's a lot of pressure on whatever the number I don't remember what a good time was but but there was like time threshold that they're measuring us on. And so then we realized that you could just run through the drive through with the dolly and like bring down the average because all of a sudden you'd have like you know there'd be a few 12 second trips instead of a minute and a half. And we started doing that enough that at one point in time our Wendy's had the best drive through times in all of Canada. And the problem with that was I think they were like oh wow what is this one. What are you doing? And like one of the managers like look through the log or whatever found out that we were just greasing it at the end of the night just all these 10 second trips. Oh my god. It was good for a time because we were bringing our average down and everyone was happy and then we got too good and we got busted. So that's a real story. I don't think I was the ringleader behind it but I was definitely I was definitely involved. Dog. Sorry. Sorry. That was. Y'all dumb ass kids. We were so dumb. Oh dumb. Oh. The thing was we actually were trying to show off. Our motivation was not to get in trouble right. Our motivation was just trying to bring the average down so that they weren't like why is this drive through so crappy. You know we got too good and we got on the radar for the wrong reasons. How was it letting them know that like oh yeah we like ran through this metal thing and that's what brought the average down. Well that's what I told you earlier like I got written up once reading a candy cane well at work. So like my point is like that in the context of the moment that was all normal stuff like getting trouble for like and like they were half babysitting us half employing us right. Essentially I mean it was mostly because I work nights because I was going to school during the days. There's a there's more adults that work there but like at night it was basically all those high school students you know doing all that crap anyway. I feel like I feel like you would do something bad and then like your boss would just kind of look around and just be like oh crazy CJ. But again it wasn't just me that there was that was a systemic thing that that rooted up in the Cobour Gwenys back in like 1999 or whatever year that was still anyway. Thank you for that story that was really great. It's time to talk about the NHL playoff format. I don't know I just remembered it right now just like crossed my mind. Yeah right we have to talk about that stuff. Okay the biggest headline from that during the during the many immediate availabilities during the All-Star weekend. Sydney Crosby was asked about the current playoff format in place and he let us know they don't like it. It feels that going to a one through eight playoff format would reward teams better. Mikey Stevens was the one who kind of tweeted that out first. I'm sure it was a scrum but Mikey Stevens got that out so I will give him the stick tack for that. And of course naturally discussion ensues after Sydney Crosby one of the faces of our game one of the best players of our generation says something like that's one of those things you should take notice of Gordon Miller went on Twitter and he mentioned that the one to eight format works with how the current scheduling is done and which teams play to other teams for the other conference at least twice teams in their own conference three or four times teams in their own division three times. But if we get to a point where we might have to change that format or or at least if there's a proposal in place to change the the number of games adding two more and maybe changing the schedule how does that work with the playoff format. There's a lot to get to with this but where do you stand? Yeah but let's cut through it. There's a lot but it's simple the players don't like it. The guys that are playing the game are actually speaking out about it. It wasn't just Sydney Crosby Nathan McKinnon without being asked specifically about the Atlantic Division said the Toronto Tampa thing is silly. Wow. That like and he wasn't asked like hey do you think this how does this affect the Leafs Nathan like he was like it doesn't make sense you could be the second best team your conference and play the third best team in your conference in round one. He actually referenced St. Louis in Minnesota from last year as well that there was one of those type of discrepancies there and a number of other players that don't have the name or star power of Crosby and McKinnon also said that they'd like to see one to eight again and they don't like the divisional format. I think you know it's funny it's one of these things where the league doesn't see an issue. I think a lot of people watching the league see an issue obviously the players that are playing the game see an issue. I actually think that this could be the start of where a change happens honestly. You know I ask Gary Bettman and Bill Daly about it when they were available on Saturday and you know one of the things Bill Daly said like this isn't a burning issue. He said when we pulled general managers two years ago two thirds of them said they liked the divisional format but it becomes a burning issue when someone like Sidney Crosby you know and he didn't take a hard stand he just said I don't think it's the most fair way to do it. You know it's all tied together though and that's sort of I think Gordon Miller's broader point I read through is like 28 page Twitter's screen there but like essentially if you're changing the playoff format you have to be mindful of what you know that you have some sort of fair and balanced schedule that makes sense. You want to make sure you are measuring the right things when you do that and that each team is somewhat fair but it just it doesn't feel right how often every single year in round one or round two you have like two of the absolute best teams in the league play. Like it's I guess it's exciting because those individual series tend to be pretty good but you know why have teams play 82 games like there's a certain amount of inertia in the system now right. Like you know you look at the Atlantic as the current best example of it but it's just it's hard to imagine any scenario where it's not either Boston Toronto Tampa or Boston Tampa Toronto in terms of the one two three in that division and what that means for the playoff matchup of course Boston's going to play wild card team likely as the division champion but the two three is already locked in. I just don't think it's that interesting I mean that again the series Toronto Tampa might play a great series but that's that's not really what's at issue I think it's whether it's fair there's there's less reason for those teams to put the pedal down either like they're just kind of stuck with each other the only thing they're wrestling for is which team plays game one at home and a potential game seven at home that's that's about the only thing at at issue right now. So you know I don't know where it goes next I think obviously the general managers meeting will be in March that's that's the place where rule changes happen you know Gary Batman mentioned the competition committee will discuss this too so maybe we just start to see if the public comments change if some of the sentiment behind the scenes changes but you know I can't imagine the league wants players especially players like Sidney Crosby or Nathan McKinnon openly questioning the play off format I mean maybe they'll stick to their guns I don't know it seems to me like this is this this is the start does change doesn't necessarily happen overnight but this might be we might look back at this is like okay enough is enough we've got a shift this. Yeah that's how I see it's one thing if a lesser known player says something but when you have Sidney Crosby and Nathan McKinnon two of the best players in the national oculus saying something about this like if the HL sticks to its guns then like wow the players really don't have a voice or a say and how things are run that would be really disappointing. Well and Gary Batman said he values their opinion like but let's see right I mean as I say I don't what is interesting too I don't know if you saw this too in the athletic your colleagues there you can kind of an unofficial bowl of players and very few were but very few players were in favor of a play in because we have talked about that as a potential change to the playoff format so you know if that's the case because you know I've thought the play in made sense if only because it's something exciting to sell it's dramatic it's a new TV property so to speak built into the county like I'm looking at it from that way but so maybe the solution is just going back to what we had you know not so long ago ten years ago one to eight was how it was done in each conference I mean maybe that's what happens but I do think this could be a turning point early turning point kind of moment like I appreciate what Bill daily saying this isn't a burning issue meaning I think at the league level they're not discussing this every day they're not debating this but maybe they're going to be forced into that discussion or debate you know by the players putting their voice to this opinion yeah let's wait and see about how that will go I want to get to another story that broke out yesterday and we wanted to originally do a trading power segment but we realized there's some teams that are trying to do with some things with their cap space whether it's signing players or putting players on LTIR and maybe maybe less so in the case of the Islanders but if you look at what the Carolina hurricanes are looking like in the Vegas Golden Knights maybe that puts them in a position where they can get some players within our trading piles we're going to kind of condense the the trading pile and the segment that I wanted to do called cap space and kind of do some kind of weird weird mashup of the two but let's start off with the New York Islanders first because Bo Horvat gets traded plays for the Pacific Division while wearing the Islanders patches and still gets to do his moment with Elias Patterson but he signs an eight year deal with eight and a half million dollars over the weekend what are your impressions of the deal Bo Horvat and his weekend so the hockey world stopped and nothing else happened except the Bo Horvat's life got turned upside down right I mean did anyone have a more surreal week than him is on vacation with his family at Disney World or in Florida gets traded you know Monday from Vancouver to the Islanders goes to the All-Star game pulls on an islander sweater with a new number number 14 for the first time in participation skills competition has his goodbye moment so to speak with Elias Patterson as his longtime teammate with the Canucks and then signs a massive extension before ever making his NHL debut with the Islanders that happens Monday night in Philadelphia so what a strange week I think it's a great week for Bo Horvat at the end of the day his contract is a screaming home run for him personally and his family I believe I mean eight and a half million times eight and Cooper wasn't willing to go anywhere near those kind of numbers when they talked last summer and again in December about what a new deal might look like you know obviously Bo Horvat is sacrificing the the opportunity and ability to go to free agency on July 1st but you have to remember if he went to July 1st he could only sign a seven year deal and to get 68 million dollars at a seven year deal you got to get pretty close to 10 million a year slightly under right nine points something something I don't think that would have been out there for him even as great as the season he's having and so he has maximized as earning power with this he bet on himself too right I mean it was not an easy year for him to not extend with the Canucks last summer he sees his teammate at the time JT Miller extended just prior to training camp he's subject to all these trade rumors and everything going on but he bet on himself he's having a massive season with 31 goals already heading into the sort of unofficial second half year out of the all-star break and and now he's got security so you know he really had down there's I think he had a lot of leverage in this negotiation because Lula Luell and Rello makes that trade he gives up a first round pick and a decent prospect and not to Ratu plus a player and Anthony Belville but he says to Bo Horvat when that trade happens like this is not a rental in my mind well I mean Lue hands over some leverage when he sends that to him too right I mean I think it's me you know it's it's a good spot to be in but it that way if you're Horvat because you know that they really want to sign you and that they gave up they feel like they gave up a lot especially if you're only rental and so he gets a good contract to animate no signing bonuses but 68 million bucks man that's uh that's a nice way to cap a crazy week it's too long and it's too much money that easily that sentence could be something I might say if you had an opinion on the contract you might say that if we were to listen to the Steve Dangle podcast maybe one of those three guys on that show would say that line it's too long and it's too much money is a quote that can be attributed to Lula Luell and Rello himself hours after finishing negotiations with Pat Morris right I mean what well it's honest and he's probably right and I don't say that as a slight on Bo Horvat right you're only worked with the market says you're worth right and you know Bo Horvat was in a really great spot I mean first of all he's having a career season he gets traded and so the Islanders have given up you know a fair amount in their in their view like they feel like they need to maximize their window with him and if you're Horvat you don't you don't have to do anything right he didn't even have to negotiate he could say yeah I'll come to Long Island oh I'll play it this season but then we'll see where we're at and so there is a lot of pressure on the Islanders and I think anytime you're signing an eight-year deal with a player that's 27 that is it is too long there's there's that doesn't mean Horvat can't perform up to the level of this contract like it is possible but eight years in pro sports when you're already multiple years into a career is is a lifetime right I mean injuries and all kinds of things can happen you know Bo Horvat has been a 60-point player give or take throughout his career I mean this year he's popping big he's already had 54 points so he's gonna be probably 70 plus point player this season you know and that's that might be modest maybe it ends up even higher than that but the point is is that they're making a fairly big bet on someone who's having the best season of his life by production anyway and yeah I think that there's there's a lot of there's there's every opportunity three years down the road we're looking back from this going like oh wow you know that that's that's a tough deal but you know the flip side of that of course is it if the cap rises a lot and you know eight and a half million might not look like so much so that there's that's the gamble both sides take you can understand as a player why you want that security because that's that's a pretty nice guarantee for you more or less obviously there can be buyouts and things like that but but for the most part this is great deal for the player and the team didn't feel great about it but they did what they felt they had to do right I mean that's that's all it is yeah I can't imagine how Lou Lamarell is gonna feel on this Monday where there's nothing to talk about in New York sports media and everyone's gonna talk about that deal there's nothing that happened immediately after that trade that would take attention away from Bohor Vat Simon there's absolutely nothing well it's not like minutes after the that deal with that minutes after legit minutes after Kyrie or get straight into Dallas right yeah I mean I'll tell you this much I would love to one time be in a situation where the person that signs me to a deal says it's too long and it's too much money I would love to be on the the other side of that negotiation like like he's because I was anticipating you might ask me that like how's Bohor Vat gonna feel about hearing that it's like well that you feel great you feel like your agent did his job you feel like you've maximized your earning window and what you could do I mean I'd love someone to say that we've signed CJ for too long and too much money well it's probably gonna be out of mild at this point and you'll be worth every penny for what it's worth so I'd love that I'd love that of course um speaking of money uh the trading pile slash teams possibly working in LTI are let's do with one that absolutely is in the Carolina hurricanes uh in the fact that the the half max Pritretti on LTIR I checked on cap friendly last night and it looks like for the deadline they have a stupid amount of cap space over 10 million uh I know I think once we talked about the Keynes I kind of did the little like coughing and said Timo Meyer but is there another player you might envision seeing uh on that team I mean uh other Meyer or somebody else well I almost wish we had like a ditty like a little intro would be like cap space because I feel like because I feel like cap space is like a central character in this trade deadline right because there's so many of the teams that have ambition that want to be aggressive don't really have much cap space and so it gets repetitive because we focus on that well now we get to focus on a couple teams that that have some significant cap space and and you know Carolina was already in a good spot these of you the cap um you know they weren't completely at the ceiling this season but you know with with max Pritretti you know being done for the year after having a second Achilles surgery they can kind of do anything you know within reason um they can they can fit in anyone so yeah Timo Meyer they definitely like I'm not sure though that they're not that sort of team like I don't see them giving up the assets it takes if he's not signing some kind of extension like I I don't see them going all in there you know they're they're in a good spot first of all they're a smart team a smart front office um I think they'll be they'll be cagey about it but both them and now Vegas let's lump them together yeah because it does you know there's no timetable provided by the Golden Knights on Mark Stone following you know back surgery um which was announced overall star weekend but I think it's reasonable to think that that his regular season at minimum is done you know all of a sudden that's how the team it has done and and and and and and and and caps base base and you know where maybe we draw a line between the Golden Knights and the hurricanes the Golden Knights they love hitting the home runs right like they they they like you know the 12th like the bold headline moves whether it's the biggest free agent some of the biggest trades they were in on Carlson they didn't get them they traded for Mark Stone you know the patch ready move the patranjalo signing as a free agent like they go for the big one so you know are they gonna try to talk about Patrick Kane or you know I don't know where they they specifically go but certainly I would expect that they're gonna add a forward I would have said that even with a healthy Mark Stone that would that would have been part of their ambition you know same with Carolina frankly I think that that it's pretty clear that they can use help with a score you know a player that can help them put the puck in the net and so now all of a sudden we have two teams that have that I would put in the buyer's pile that actually have the thing that a lot of the other contenders don't don't have too much of I mean there's some exceptions you know there are you know Winnipeg for examples it's seen that's really well positioned for the cap the Jets could get aggressive that's not really been in their nature but they have the ability to you know because there's like all this talk about Boston these days Julian yeah Boston just doesn't have the moves like we know Don Sweeney every year is making big moves himself we can see that they're on this historic run like I can understand why you know people want to connect them like I think they were into some degree on Borjor Horvad they're certainly interested in him but I just don't know how the math could have ever really worked on that deal in an easy manner ultimately of course he ends up on Long Island but you know we have what a few marquee forwards you know got Timu Meyer, Rhino Riley, Patrick Kane, Vladimir Terasenko, maybe Jonathan Taves you know who's going to step up and really make a play for these guys I mean that that will be interesting to me because there's a drop off after that right I mean the other players that are on the market you know at that we'll just stick the forward for this the purpose of this because Carolina and Vegas are two of those teams you know it starts to fall off right I mean with respect the other names it's like Sam Lafferty you know at this point Sean Monahan but he hasn't played a game in two months and we don't really know what's going on there with his injury you know guys like Max Domi I guess maybe now you know yes he fully are you know James Van Riemstike you know with it with a big cap hit and but maybe towards the end of his career where it's tougher for him to perform to that cat like it's a lot of things Van Riemstike but there's definitely a pair but there's definitely a drop off right I mean there's a few players that you could see like Terasenko has just done nothing but score his whole career and he's a big man you know can play in the playoffs you know can help your power play like teams looking for goals have to look at him he's got to know trade clause too so he's got control there I actually spoke with him a little bit asked him a few questions during the All-Star media day and he kind of acknowledged like he feels like his time he's you know 700 games in with the blue 700 plus games and he feels like it's sort of potentially winding down here he said there's a lot going on like you know there's there's a few impact difference type makers and and you know only so many places where they can go so you know it's those are two big developments I think I mean patch ready we obviously knew from unfortunately pretty much from the day it happened that his season was done the fact he's formerly been placed in LTI opens up that room in Carolina and now this Mark Stone development the last few days puts Vegas in a different degree of trade conversations than they could have been if he was healthy absolutely James Van Reebstek I want to focus on because I noticed his name kick around a lot in the last few days I'm a bit I'm interested in treating by his name particularly because of the fact that he's been linked to the market I am currently based in in Calgary and I wasn't sure if he would be a player that the flames would be interested in but he is also a player who is able to get in front of the net which they need he's arguably been one of the best net front tippers pretty much over the last like 10 15 years but you know he has that massive cap in and I mean he there's a notable former teammate of his who plays on the Calgary flames as well as when cadre what do you what do you feel about that dossier? I just don't know if he's going to be traded I think he's at the stage of his career he'd like to be trained you know it's we know Philadelphia's not going anywhere he's he's into his 30s he only gets so many chances to win to lift the mug so I think that this this is a move he'd like to see happen I think Philadelphia would retain some cap space in a deal what's interesting is his actual money owing on his contract this is actually quite low it was a front loaded contract the structure so it's not a case of dollar like you know actual dollars it's just the cap room is is a challenge it's a seven million dollar cap hit so I'm not going to say it's not going to happen but I I have it at say like 60 40 likelihood he's moved maybe a little higher 70 30 I mean Jason Rijne likes an absolute pro looks after himself you know some of if he's look at John Torrell his comments this year he's talked extensively about the mentorship role that that Ben Rijne likes filled with his younger teammates like you know I don't think you'll find anyone saying a bad word about him and he's actually been reasonably productive he missed time in December with hand injury but he's returned and on a flyer steam that isn't that great it's putting up fair numbers so I think he can help someone and I do think let's fast forward to July 1st absolutely he's going to have interest July 1st when he's signing for a more bargain type of deal because I think he's a veteran I can help a team it just just just mentioned to see how everything shakes out here at the deadline I like to fit with Calgary I mean look they're looking for as you know someone to help out their four group definitely someone who can help contribute to power play just sick hands around the net but you know I guess we'll have to see how that plays out because maybe more teams end up with the da da da da da da da da da then he moves right but if not there's other options that are that are cheaper or just like easier to fit in in certain situations so let's let's watch how that will develop I I'll tell you this it's not a hundred percent of my mind he's dealt just because of the stupid hard cap for eager times like they're just in another world of course he's dealt but it's just you know if you're getting him there's opportunity cost means you can't get somebody else I love the fact that da da da da da da da da da da da da da cap space is a thing now I don't mean you gotta keep it interesting then well of course uh speaking you're keeping you know we didn't talk about what we what did we not talk about uh good stuff night quest and yeah what's interesting about him is he suffered a shoulder injury uh Columbus Blue Jackets player expiring contract you know he's been on CJ's trade deadline big board and he gets suffered through his shoulder injury doesn't need surgery but he suffered injury 11 weeks from the end of the regular season I think he's been given sort of a 10 to 12 week window and you say oh that's that's that's terrible I mean he's not maybe not gonna be able to play the rest of regular season they're not gonna be able to trade him but ironically I think it makes him more tradable because of all the teams that don't have enough to then and and and and and uh uh a number of them are in LTI already there's an opportunity potentially to trade four night quests put them on LTI and stash them there to the playoffs and not negatively impact your cap position and there's a whole bunch of teams that are that are good that that could at least look at doing that teams like Toronto and Colorado and Boston um I think Washington anyway there's a there's a few teams where this this could make sense and so as we get closer to March 3rd and I think there's a clear timeline on night quest um that's something to keep an eye out for because you know a team like the least as an example could trade for night quest as an example yes I'm not saying they're going to but as an example they could trade for night quest put awesome Matthews on LTI because Austin's out with right now it's in the spring and when and then you know stash night quests on use the space to put night quests on LTI there with him when Austin's healthy to return because he's not done for the regular season you you you activate them and the Leafs are in no worse or no different of a cap position they would have been anyway and so obviously there's an potential acquisition cost there there's some risk because you're you're acquiring a player who's you can't activate until the start of the playoffs meaning he doesn't get the play with your team at all who knows how that's going to fit but it's at least something to consider and to look out for this is I wouldn't call it a loophole but it's just kind of something interesting that's that's come up it actually happened a couple years ago with Riley Nash uh ironically from Columbus was traded Toronto he didn't end up playing a lot in that playoffs you know I can't say it worked out but it's something that that has been done in the past and you know I do know for sure and I quest really wants to be traded to a contender like again he's in a summer spot to James Van Rims like he just wants a chance to win a cup plan a good team be part of a playoff run he wants to get healthy like it's not like he's doing he's he's working to get back because he thinks he's going to play another game or more at the season and so you know maybe we see him traded somewhere and put on LTI and activated for the start of playoffs pretty pretty interesting kind of scenario very interesting scenario and uh yeah should have added Gustav Nyquist to my rundown but I'm actually glad we got to them all these different scenarios in that what if you like Adam and you stashed him and it brings up the the LTI our number and couldn't have been theory if you were t that were able to afford getting him in the first place and you put him on LTI put you in a position to get somebody else maybe or am I thinking yes yeah that's exactly it so like again I'll use the least situation they could acquire him put him on LTI and still make another move and I might and I should be clear I don't have any firm knowledge that the beliefs of doing are going to do this it's just it's it's easy to use that hypothetical scenario that that's all of a sudden emerged and if so in a world where Nyquist was just healthy and didn't suffer the shoulder injury I I would say he's a tougher he's sort of in the van rienze I can't be makes five and a half million you know a team mayor may not trade for that you know like I think there's a lot to like in the player but you know there's other cheaper players out there you know there's Max Domi for example potentially being moved by Chicago at half the price so and he's younger like you know like a team that's acquiring someone might look differently at it but I think now that he's injured and and may not be back until you know really when the playoffs are starting that could actually work in his favor in terms of landing on a contender okay think you know what way it's going to go make your bet at sports interaction whether it's hockey basketball or one of the biggest days in sports Super Bowl 57 get the action at sports interaction that pre-game live in play or on one of our many prop bets sports interaction makes it easy to deposit play and cash out join now and see all sports betting has to offer want to bet head to sports interaction dot com slash SDPN or in Ontario download the app using the QR code on your screen 19 and over please play responsibly let's get to ask cj we got a couple questions here for you as we wrap up the Monday edition of the cj show uh let's start from one from a deal pick on discord for cj and jm regarding the trade deadline do you fall on the side of get the trade done early to get out of the market or wait as long as possible to get a read on the market and get caught up in the pressure of a deadline so earlier late it depends which side of the bet you're on I think if you're a buyer and you're not a buyer you know the islanders were desperate right the islanders haven't scored in like a month they've lost a ton of games heading into the the that the break like I can see why they and the other thing is that the Canucks really wanted to move more about like I think they understood that this was the time and so I can see why they just stepped up and did it because you know for them they need they need to win games literally starting Monday as we had it here out of the all-star break they need to to try to climb back into the playoff position but I think if you're a buyer and you're comfortably in it if you're a boss in or you know any teams at the top of league that know they're going to make the playoffs I think it generally helps to to wait it out and let some teams overpay for the first items off the shelf and so I would say generally speaking and sometimes the conditions are different if I'm selling I'd like to get out ahead of the market because I think there's there's real risk of selling that you get to the last day or even last afternoon the last couple hours before the deadline passes and there's you just don't have many buyers left and you've only got you know poor offers on the table I think I think it's way better to set your price and just go get it maybe even can see it a little bit to get it done I think if you're buying generally speaking it makes sense to wait until close to the end because often the prices come down you know you see Ben Choraco for first and then a lot of defense in the maybe aren't all that different than him go for a second or third or fourth because those deals are made after your words and there's just not them any first round picks on the table so anyway it's negotiations there's an art to it too and like obviously there's discussions already happening now but I think a lot of it's like oh you want this fourth ladder on my team well you have to pay this this and this and this and this and this but then the truth is we all know as March 3rd comes you know you probably just want to move your fourth liner if you're if your team can go nowhere so I think it's hard to get two teams that are really serious in the same moment this far out to make a deal but it's happened once we saw another trade with Jacob Meghna on Sunday night you know that's a depth defense man though being traded to Seattle for a fourth so maybe we're starting to see something Shake was I feel like I'm on the opposite side only because if I'm especially now with how cap space is being used if I'm in a position where I could max out as much cap space as possible and put myself in a position where I can get a player who could fit there I want to consider that and it's like again especially in the context of now where a lot of teams are hamstrung by that problem yes there are teams that might want to go into early but you know if that means I have to kind of get thrown in with everybody else and I know I have the space and I and I definitely know if I'm a team that has that space I feel confident enough regardless that I'm able to handle whatever price I can I can do if that's how I feel about that um rolling through these a bit quickly here from insider jay money hello my noble heroes of the hockey twitter world thank you for the compliment for our cj this week my question is with pwhp players being involved with the all-star game this weekend where do you think that you two as writers and insiders can help in increasing the visibility of the women's game I guess by writing and talking about it yeah like that and I'm not being sarcastic I think the best way you know to me what's kind of cool is you see the evolution back to San Jose all-star when of course you have kennel coins go field you know rip around and have that lap and it gets so much attention rightfully so don't get me wrong you know but it was sort of a novelty that the female players were involved well well now it wasn't a novelty right like no one didn't seem weird didn't seem like a side show you see the comfort level even with the players interacting with with the five women that were part of the skills competition like I think continued inclusion obviously maybe we need to carve out more of a space on our pod to talk about the comings and goings of the women's game I think that's that's the way it happens but I do think it's heading in a pretty good direction you know I think that I think it's funny like I had some talks with people like offline at the all-star weekend like there is more money out there now for the players and I just think I do think the visibility will come honestly I think that I think that we're on our way but I mean if specifically us let's talk about a little bit more Julie maybe we have to be more cognizant of some of the storylines and be going on on you know the women's side of the game too absolutely I am all for that especially considering that the game is at points where they're trying to bump up salaries and that's being more and more public like I think those are really intriguing storylines or if any partnerships go on or if there's any discussions about any more of those dream gap tours or or or league changes or or notable players going from one league to another I think if we're able to hop on those types of stories that would be really great and I think it'd be really relevant to what we talk about as a as a hockey podcast and I think a lot of people who listen to the show would appreciate it and maybe it invites more fans as well that's an idea absolutely last one for you real quick here Hi CJ and JM this is from Dr. Sun on discord last week the SDP went over the bachelor buy-outs what would your bios and fun facts be if you were contestants on the bachelor rat and most importantly which meant from which member of the SDP would you think would get the best rating I don't know anything about the bachelor you have you never watched it do you understand the premise yeah I understand the I know like a bunch of people go live in a house and like yeah but I don't know I've never really watched it so I don't know like is it is it just normal bios or is it just like CJ likes long walks on the beach and yeah something something like a mash of normal slash CJ likes a romantic coffee in the morning followed by a run followed by a long walk on the beach I don't know what my bio would be I think it might be that I don't know about the second part of the question I honestly didn't get to that episode the SDP sorry but like yeah I'm I'm sure the bios I mean for me like I mean I like a nice chamomile or chai tea in the morning that's pretty nice that's pretty romantic for me we're both workaholics clearly yes this doesn't work this doesn't work that's true um yeah I don't know man just both uh oh you're short king yeah so are you I'm barely barely that I saw producer Nick in the press box at ballstar too I can't believe we got this from the episode I didn't like it the time when that part of all star weekend like being physically in the same space as producer Nick seriously I would love to he actually was creeping out behind me taking pictures of me because I didn't notice him at first sent him to the group chat like the back of my head I don't know the same thing too um think of uh I don't know uh hey people who find us attractive were two handsome relatively speaking young men who have great voices how about that I'm good with that I don't know that someone else should write my stuff what kind of stuff I so here's the thing because I'm so old essentially I actually like I missed the whole kinder slash dating app things like I'm not so I'm not being funny about this like I don't know what you put on those bios I'm not sure are you supposed to be like CJ loves to travel because I love to travel I guess maybe that's the kind of stuff you put on there I don't I don't know yeah I I'm not writing it anything from though no this is not the show for that no I just I just assume being just your generation you're a little more familiar with how that all goes down on so oh absolutely but uh this is not the show for that absolutely not we not do it that let's not do it no I Julian you can say something here but expose either of ourselves in our current situations absolutely not no we not do it we can't we can't go that far we can't go that right I don't want this to be the CJ show slash bachelor pod I don't want that absolutely not all right I need more love than you obviously CJ loves long long runs on the beach and uh and travel and hockey and good taste and wine yeah uh good food good sports good jokes good times and uh she love shoes good play player good person now that's a great general center in personation good job okay uh we got a role let's wrap this let's do this before because we're dangerous and close to say it's something we don't want to say absolutely dot uh Thursday we'll be back with stick taps uh subscribe to the podcast how we listen to the podcast I'm going back very soon for CJ have Julian so long and peace the Chris Johnson show powered by sports interaction one of that inside the game twice a week follow Chris and Twitter at reporter Chris and follow Julian McKenzie at jk McKenzie the Chris Johnson show