"My dad works in B2B marketing. He came by my school for career day and said he was a big row as man, then he told everyone how much he loved calculating his return on ad spend. My friends still laughing at me to this day." Not everyone gets B2B, but with LinkedIn, you'll be able to reach people who do. Get a $100 credit on your next ad campaign, go to linkedin.com/results to claim your credit. That's linkedin.com/results. Terms and conditions apply. Linked in, the place to be, to be. This episode is brought to you by Honda. When you test drive the all new Pro Log EV, there's a lot that can impress you about it. There's the class leading passenger space, the clean, thoughtful design, and the intuitive technology. But out of everything, what you'll really love most is that it's a Honda. Visit Honda.com/ev to see offers. Don't want to get into the weeds with what his ask is. But I know I have 64 million reasons why I'd be playing right now. Those are the words from Boston Bruins President Cam Neely after he was asked exactly what Jeremy Swamin of their RFA goaltender could be asking for still unsigned at this point. CJ, if you're Jeremy Swamin, what is going through your mind right now? Well, you probably don't like this business spilling out into the public the way that it gets done here. I mean, look, it's hard not to interpret that. That answer is though Boston's latest offer is 8 million times eight. As I said previously, I believe that Swamin wants nine and a half million, which would match Charlie McAvoy on the Bruins as being the highest paid player. And so doing some quick math, there's a fair bit of a ground between 64 million reasons to play and 76 million reasons to play. So it does give us a good idea of where conversations have been. And yeah, I mean, I think the easy answer to your question, you're probably not feeling awesome about that getting out the public, because obviously, you know, I don't even know how calculated that was. I mean, quite honestly, I heard the exchange was Kevin Paul DuPont, longtime Elmer Ferguson hockey hall fame writer out of Boston. And I feel like that was said spur of the moment as opposed to something that Cam Neely went in there trying to say, but still, you know, there's a PR aspect to saying that sort of thing publicly. And you know, this is probably dividing Bruins fans to some degree about how they feel but the situation, because some of them probably think eight times eight million is a fair contract for swimming. Can you go into that PR aspect of why the Bruins would say this? I mean, for our purposes of entertainment, we love this. There's a reason why we're leading with that quote. But if I'm a Bruins fan, I'm looking at Cam Neely and I'm thinking, well, why would you say that? Well, I think it's emotion, right? I mean, that's, it's what I saw from Don Sweeney on the opening day camp. When he got into the whole spit and chicklets thing, you know, and what you're seeing here, I think that there's a lot of emotion built up in this negotiation and hasn't gone well. The sides have had a pretty big gap between where they've been and, you know, we've sort of hammered this point home, but swam is obviously an important part of the team. And here we are, the calendar is about to flip over to October and he's still not signed. And so, you know, I think that it's, I think it is a reflection of some of the stress around the talks and where they stand. You know, Cam Neely did also mention that he's heard from Jeremy Swim and he wants to be a Bruins. I still believe ultimately that it's going to wind up this situation with him signing in Boston. I don't think that this is, we're going to be talking about a trade situation or anything like that. But, you know, right now that you've got two sides that are dealing with some frustration with each other because they haven't been able to get close to getting a deal done. And there's, there's certainly implications and, you know, things on both ends that it's not good for either of them. And so I think honestly, just the way Cam Neely said it, I don't think he went in there trying to send a message. I think he got asked a direct question and probably wishes he could take that one back, quite honestly, as soon as that press conference wrapped up. No take-backsies in the world of quotes, Cam Neely. We've mentioned the worry meter or the concerned meter. We would decide on concerned meter last time we did, we did an episode and our good friend Mark Antoine Gaudet has said, maybe we should just stick to worry meter just in the case of figuring out what's the difference between a concern and a worry. Worry is what we're going to use. I would think that after this, it might have blown up after Cam Neely said those words. But with the way that you're saying it, maybe we should push back a little bit because right, there could still be an opportunity for a deal to get done between both sides. Yeah. But it's moved up. I mean, if I had it at 3.5 out of 5 previously, it's in the 4s now. Oh, yeah. I mean, it certainly definitely moves in the other direction because I do know that the sides have been having some ongoing dialogue, they've been grinding away at it. But what I don't know is what will come of this press conference. I mean, we're recording this episode literally within minutes of that press conference being held in Boston. And so it's hard to know, does this set things back a little bit, you know, is if you're on Swamans end of this negotiation, are you just like, well, forget this. I'm not, I'm not capitulating you guys just because you're trying to put this public pressure on me. I mean, that, that all remains a big unknown in the immediate aftermath of this. And it could be the kind of thing that sets back a negotiation. I remember, you know, referenced the William Nylander situation that that play out in Toronto years ago, you know, there was a press conference at Brendan Shanahan gave that day that also the president of the team, ironically, and a former NHL star like Cam Neely is. And he, you know, he sort of mused during that press conference that when you're a player, when you look back, it doesn't matter whether you have, I think it's, but was it whether you have 50 or 60 million in the bank, it's, you know, the success you had to your teammates. And that definitely set back those negotiations at that time. It was seen as though, you know, he was trying to meddle in the negotiations. So I actually, I was actually part of that scrum and I, it's the same way I feel about Neely. I don't think Shanahan went there with the, you know, desire to try to, to, to put any pressure necessarily on Nylander, but that's, that's what flowed out of that. And I, I could see something similar happening here. I mean, I've had no reason at any point to believe that Swaiman is going to, to simply buckle under the pressure. There's probably a little bit more public pressure on him now. And as I said, I haven't had a chance to scan social media, but I'm sure there's some Bruins fans out there that hear this and say, well, 64 million, just sign the contract, bud, get into training camp here. Maybe get a preseason game in and be ready for the year, but, you know, this, this could be a moment that sets things back a little bit longer and, you know, the Bruins are staying relevant. I'll say that they're in a busy sports market. You've got the, the Red Sox end of season press conference going Monday. Obviously, the Patriots seasons underway. The Celtics are getting up and running soon trying to defend their title, but the, the Bruins are making sure that they're still in the sporting news in Boston, which is not easy to do in October. If Jeremy Swaiman doesn't start the season, do you think the Bruins could survive with Uniscorpisalo and that he's looked decent or pretty good in pre, in pre season so far? But for the regular season, how do you think that could go? I do think they could survive for certainly for a period of time. I mean, the one thing I'll, I'll point out about Boston goalies is a lot of goalies tend to have great years when they play for the Bruins. And, you know, I think that that they're clearly benefit from some of the, the systems play, the defensive play in front of them, not taking away from the abilities of these cold tenders. But you know, I do think that they're, they're not a team that gives up. They don't tend to give up a whole lot. And so, you know, in that, that world, it was probably going to go a little better for Uniscorpisalo this season, no matter how many games he plays, whether it's opening night and right through if Swamin isn't there or even as the number two man behind Jeremy Swamin at some point, I think his numbers are going to look a lot better in Boston than they did last year in Ottawa and in a huge part to do with the fact that senators are particularly Leakey team or they have been so and they certainly were last season. So, you know, I think sometimes it can be hard for us to measure the exact impact of a team. But I just look over a long period of time and Bruins goalies have always had pretty strong save percentages, I think that they've benefited from the guys in front of them as well as had their own abilities. So, you know, to me, Boston's still going to be a good team, but, but they're not at full strength. And, you know, another point here is just like they don't expect even if he signed tomorrow that he can necessarily play preseason games by the time he gets in the camp and does what he has to do. I mean, it's just hard to predict what you're going to get from Swamin in the short term after missing this, this time. I mean, I can't think of the last goaltender to miss not due to injury or something like that, you know, this much time. I mean, obviously Vasilevsky last year in Tampa wasn't able to play until towards the end of November and he had, you know, his most difficult season. So, this is valuable time to get up and running. And so, there's a couple aspects to this layoff that's, you know, now into week two, almost into week three and getting awfully close to that season opener against Florida that Boston has on the calendar coming up. And not to project too far in the future if you're a Bruins fan, but are you, does this situation stretch into December to that absolute deadline, December 1st, I believe? It's feels so far off right now. Yeah. But you can't, but you can't say, no, I mean, that's, that's the real deadline as much as, you know, all these negotiations have sort of artificial deadlines or periods like the start of camp or the start of the regular season, which I think tend to bring sides that don't see the world the same way together, you know, maybe encourage some compromise at the bargaining table. The real deadline is five o'clock Eastern time on December 1st. That's when Jeremy Swamin has to be signed in order to be eligible to play games at all this season. And, you know, it's just, it's so hard to predict if these nearly comments, I mean, they're obviously getting huge traction on social media. My phone's blown up over here to my right. So I'm sure probably people reacting to that. But you know, I don't know if it's going to set things back or not, but that that's what could happen. I mean, you get into the season kind of what's done is done and what forces you back together unless one side or the other has a change of heart. And usually the longer negotiation goes on, it's between two parties that are stubborn and in their belief. And by stubborn, I'm not picking one or the other, but I'm just saying that they're entrenched in their belief. And so it's harder and harder to get to the point where you're like, "Okay, well, you know, why would you miss two weeks of regular season if you're Jeremy Swamin and then just take $64 million contract?" I mean, that's probably not the way it's going to go, right? There's going to have to be movement in the talks. And so I don't know what it's going to move it, but I would be worried in the immediate aftermath of that press conference in Boston that this could be something that, you know, maybe ISIS things for a little while, you know, has, if they're grinding away towards the solution, it might stop the grind for a bit here and, you know, both sides will just look at each other and see if who wants to blink. I did not have on my bingo card, Jeremy Swamin, Boston Bruins contract dispute, CJ. I have to admit, I did not have that on my bingo card. I can't believe we're here. Yeah. I mean, it doesn't surprise me just because, you know, the whole arbitration thing last summer. The other part of this we haven't gotten into either. If you look at the Bruins, I mean, every team has to be cap compliant by next Tuesday. And the Bruins only have about 7.5 to 8 million, depending on sort of the last cuts of their camp in actual space right now. So even if they felt like $9.5 million contract was one that they could give to Swamin, there would be a trickle down effect on the roster. And so some of it does get down to just a practical matter of how you navigate the caps situation too. It's not always just the principle of trying to argue for a certain amount of dollars. And so I didn't necessarily have it on my bingo card. You know, it was clear that this was not going to be an easy contract. And this sometimes is the danger. I will say if you don't, if you don't find a way to, you know, we saw so many other RFA situations. In fact, the last one just got signed in St. Louis. So this is actually the last unsigned RFA around the league. And sometimes the longer it goes, it's harder and harder to find a solution that either the side can work with. Yeah. All right. We'll obviously continue to monitor that story as it develops. Okay, Sage, let's go to Montreal. Patrick Leine was at Canadian's practice today, still injured, obviously after what happened to him on Saturday, a knee on knee hit kind of cutting out crunch between two Maple Leafs players. What did you think of the injury, obviously a freak accident, but really tough to watch for the Montreal Canadiens, especially. We're hoping to have Patrick Leine as a big-time player in their lineup. Yeah. And that's not going to be able to happen for any time soon. I mean, this is a significant injury that Leine has suffered here. And it's what a, I mean, just awful play. I mean, it happens in a game that no one else will remember for basically any other reason, preseason game. It's a, it's an AHL player in Cedric Parre, who, you know, in my view, the way I view that play unfold just isn't up to the standard of an NHL player. So you have an NHL player trying to defend an NHL player and it has terrible consequences. I have trouble viewing that as anything other than an accident, but, you know, it has pretty significant consequences. And in this case, Leine's worked so hard after finishing last season in the player assistance program, you know, physically, mentally, to get ready for this new challenge in Montreal, fresh opportunity for him. And, you know, it's, he's going to be sidelined before he ever gets to play his first official game in the regular season as a Canadian. So, you know, we'll wait for the official timeline here, but I certainly don't expect to see Leine, Leine on the ice anytime soon. And, you know, just tough to see him rolling around. Again, why do we have so many preseason games? I mean, it's not, not that we can blame it on him. He's far from the only player. I mean, Drew Dowdy's got a significant injury too. There's, there's others around the league that, that, you know, suffer injuries obviously during this warm up period for the season, but just feels, feels needless when you see someone like that and on a personal level, knowing, you know, how much Leine has been through, you know, it's, it's another big setback and a career that's unfortunately had too many of those in the last couple seasons. There's, there's a discussion to be had about too many preseason games that I might want to ask you about, but before I do that, I'd like to ask you about the aftermath of that hit where, where our project guy basically mauled Cedric Parre to the ice and I know some people have wondered, hey, is that suspension worthy? I thought the fine was, was just fine. I, I, I get, you can't really do maybe what our project I did, but I think maybe a suspension would have been a bit excessive. I'd like to know your opinion on it. Yeah. I, I don't mind the no expansion there. I mean, I see some people drawing parallels to like the, the play with Morgan Riley last year in Ottawa. You know, the big difference there is Riley's approaching someone who doesn't expect it after play has stopped because, because the player in that case had scored a goal. And, you know, it doesn't maybe sound like a big delineation, but when, when things happen in the game while the game is on versus when it's supposed to be off, when, when it's the play is dead. I mean, that, that's a different thing. And obviously, you know, the outcome wasn't nearly as serious here and, you know, Parre comes through it. Okay. So I'm with you. I think you have to send some message and, and well, you might look at that exact fine amount 3000 and whatever and change is not much. It does now establish that Arbor Jack. I will be a repeat offender if he does cross the line at any point in the next 18 months, which comes with more significant fines or, or, you know, salary loss. If he gets suspended in that window, put some kind of on the radar of player safety, it sends a message, look, man, you can't just be doing that. But, you know, I, I have trouble, I guess people like to get worked up. I just have trouble believing that that has to be a suspension. It's weird because you get in this as like, you're, you're almost forced to, to defend something you don't want to defend, but put it this way. I think it could have been worse if you wanted it to be worse. I felt that he crossed the line, but it could have been much, much worse if he, if that was his intention. I mean, he was sending a message, but you know, he wasn't, we've seen much worse things happen in the past when, when it's risen to the level of a suspension and, and obviously it didn't quite meet that standard to hear this time. I've seen much worse things that have not been suspended, to be quite honest with you. So, right. Yeah. That's kind of like, that's where I fall. And I think in this case, you can understand the frustration. Um, again, it's our sport can be barbaric. That's a thing. It's like, it can be right, but it's like, you get in a weird spot here, like I'm not, I don't want to be like, well, it wasn't that bad, but kind of, like kind of, well, it wasn't that bad. Like it's, it's what happens. And so yeah, that, that one, that, that one didn't get my dander up. And if it went unpunished in terms of supplemental dish plan, I think I would be raising more issue here because you wonder what message that sends, um, you know, having the fine doesn't sound like a lot. But if Jack, I does something now in November, it's going to seem like a lot when he's, you know, when he's paying 182 of one 82nd of his salary instead of much less than that, if he should get suspended at some point in the next 18 months. This episode is brought to you by Microsoft Azure. Turn your ideas into reality with an Azure free account. Get everything you need to develop apps across cloud and hybrid environments, scale workloads, create cloud connected mobile experiences, and so much more. Discover what you can create with popular services free for 12 months. Learn more at azure.com, that's A-Z-U-R-E.com, and sign up for a free account to start building in the cloud today. For sure. Now let's unpack your previous comment about too many preseason games. You're right. There have been some, some strings of injuries, obviously with Lina, you mentioned Drew Dowdy out in Los Angeles, uh, there, it's, it's unfortunate, but at the end of the day, right? We still have to have these preseason games to give these players some kind of runway to get themselves going before the regular season. That's how I view preseason. I, I don't like the fact that it's as long as it is, but I also understand that if guys don't have that time, then maybe it could result in a worse product on the ice or any other sport for that matter. That's at least my opinion on it. Well, I'll tell you this, I will personally guarantee we're going to see a reduction in the number of preseason games in the near future. I think the conversation is already pretty advanced that at various levels of the league that that needs to happen. I mean, right now every team has to play between six and eight preseason games. I think it's what, while your point is made, of course, you know, you need some period of, um, where, where the athletes get a chance to get back up to speed. I think there's a growing feeling it doesn't need to be that many, but part of this is just about money. A 10 of the day. I mean, I know that, that, that these games don't sell out in every market, but, but, you know, fans pay actual money for tickets in a lot of markets, it's, it's a required buy as part of getting your season ticket package for the season. And I kind of felt like the NHL showed its hand a little bit when we got in the pandemic situation and they restarted that 2020 season. And of course, in this, in that world, there was no fans, there was going to be no fans for a long time. And they played one preseason game per team right before jumping into the playoffs. And some of that might have been scheduling, but I think some of that was also saying the top level players in league don't need much more than maybe one or two games, but, you know, in a world where we're charging for tickets and it's still a gate-driven league, you know, you end up getting as many as we have now. So I, I just wondered if, if the solution here is going to maybe an 84 game regular season or something like that, adding a couple more games in the regular season, which actually, if you look at the round numbers in a 32 team league, you might get to where you have a more equal distribution of games with, you know, when you play the other conference or, you know, all those types of things. And also it does account for some of the lost revenue by chopping down the preseason. But, you know, I don't, I don't know anyone out there that feels like they need six to eight preseason games. I mean, it just, it feels excessive. I don't want to just use this line of injury is like a, I would have said this last week before that, that hit happened. I just don't think the games teach you all that much. I mean, we are getting into this week now. I mean, the, the final one or two that the most teams have left, I mean, you're going to see more NHL like lineups, you're going to see probably a little different standard of play because we are getting very close to the real thing here. Hard to believe. But on Friday and Prague, the actual regular season puck drops and, you know, next Wednesday back here in North America, same thing, but we're, you know, it's getting close enough that the preseason games play this week will be of more consequence, but the day is coming. I am sure when it, when I think four will be probably the number and honestly, I wouldn't mind if they shaved a back more than that, but you know, there's clearly a financial cost to doing so. And in the league where the owners and the players split revenues, neither side probably wants to see the bottom line reduced that, but also this is obviously on a much lower level of, of things to think about for why maybe you should keep the number of preseason games where it is. But if you're a coach and you're trying to determine your lineup and there's also obviously roster battles, you have to think over young players trying to get into the lineup and trying to figure out what it could look like, shouldn't you want as much time as possible to determine that? Like, I, I can't tell but think that like maybe some coaches might maybe have some kind of a stink with it. Maybe you don't want it all the way to two or three. You want it at like four to six. That's, that's, I'm just trying to think of it from their vantage point. Maybe a little bit, but I just feels like in a cap world, so many of the final decisions are driven like feels like most of the teams are kind of set absent one or two decisions entering camp. Like, um, I mean, I guess in, in some places it's different, but so many of the top teams in the league are basically at the cap ceiling that even if like three players that are not on the radar have amazing camps, I just think most of them are already earmarked to be sent down to the HL, maybe with an idea, oh, hey, you had a good camp. We'll bring them back up when we get an injury, but I feel like a lot of the roster battles are more or less played out in the, the boardroom in today's day and age. Yeah, that's not to say there aren't coaches out there that might bristle at this. There's, I'm sure, you know, some of the older school types probably like having this three week camp, essentially is what we get for the conditioning aspect. But I just feel like no one comes to training camp to get in shape anymore the way they did 40 or 50 years ago. I mean, the, the leagues changed in a lot of ways. And even just having the salary cap, I think most teams, you know, the only X factor is if now if you have a big injury in camp, like Montreal just did, that might change what they can do. they're implications when you lose a player like Line A, who makes 8.7 million on the cap for a long period of time. But for the most part, I think most teams know who's on their opening night roster when they gather on September 17th. That's very fair. I like this little back and forth on pre-season games. It was a very interesting discussion. I don't know if I disagree. I'm willing to hear both sides on this debate, because I think it is a fascinating debate that can be applied to so many different sports, not just the NHL. We hear people talk about how the NFL product right now looks a little shaky because maybe the cutting number of pre-season games plays a role into that. I think it's a really fascinating debate to have. The NFL, the starters barely even play in the preseason. They'll play one set of downs and then they're out for the game. I mean, because you wouldn't want to lose the equivalent of Patrick Line A on your team for a game that means nothing. This is how much pre-season matters. The year that Detroit Lions went 0-16 in the regular season, they were 4-0 in pre-season. I remember that statistic, Ryan. That's why you can't put too much stock in pre-season. The great David Alter reminded him of that recently. I have to give him props where they do. It was not my stat that was on the tip of my head, but it does underline how ridiculous this is. I don't know if you saw, but there was someone to ask Craig Brubey when the Leafs lost their second pre-season game. They started the pre-season if he was ready to panic, and then that's when that discussion came up because nobody should be panicking or nobody should be celebrating no matter what their team's record is through the pre-season. Yeah, I have to admit some of that attitude. I think there was a round of time we had that episode where for the first 15 minutes we just kept saying it's pre-season. That attitude, basically, Craig Brubey and I, we get it. We're on the same fight. Anyway. He handled that question pretty well. Actually, the next day I was at practice, and when he left the Scrum, I said, "Hey, coach, are you panicking?" And we had a pretty good chuckle about that. I mean, if anything, it just became kind of like its own joke versus anything that anyone was taking seriously. Good one. Are you ready for questions? Ask CJ time. Yes, sir. Let's go. Let's do it. Thank you to everyone who sent us questions, whether through Twitter or through Discord. Producer Drew even sent in a question. I think we're legally obligated to answer questions from anyone from the SDPN who sends them in. Any big names going on waivers this week? Maybe. I appreciate it. Probably the biggest names. I just don't know. I think it's possible that you see teams. I mean, if it's going to happen, it might not be this week. It might be next week. Probably Sunday, Monday are going to be the big waiver days for the final cuts of camps and teams getting back under the cap. I mean, you're going to see some, I guess, I don't have big names. That's the hard thing. I don't see any like $7 million on waivers, but you could see players around the margins. You could see vendors, Matt Murray, players like that will probably go on on waivers as their teams cut down. But I don't have a good enough intel to give you a spicy answer there, Drew. So I'm sorry for that. That's okay. Drew needs no apologies. From Melissa Foley, do the players on the Amazon series get paid? I don't know the answer, but I don't believe so. But I don't have, I can't say with 100% certainty, but I... I wouldn't think they would, right? I don't think that would be a good... I mean, I don't know if that gets into journalism ethics, but I don't know if they would. Well, but I mean, players can get paid for outside sponsorship endeavors. The players that will play at the Four Nations tournament will be paid some kind of stipend versus those that don't. So there are instances when you're basically performing duties that are seen as outside your standard player contract where you would be paid. I just, I think this would be sort of seen as the same as the way players aren't paid if they do a sit down interview with Julia McKenzie or Chris Johnston. I think that... Exactly. That it's part of promoting the league and the sport the way they're expected to. That's part of, you know, in the actual standard player deal. Like, I know that fans, like the last thing fans want to hear is when reporters are complaining about access to a certain player or interviews. But it actually is part of, you know, the obligations that are, you know, for playing in the league. So I will follow up and ask someone who would know on that, but my instincts tell me that it's covered by what they're paid to do already. But stay tuned. Maybe I'm wrong. Okay. From James Buckle, how have you guys been feeling about the Calgary Flames so far? Well, you got to answer that first. I mean, you're actually going to the games, man. Yeah. I mean, kind of what we were talking about early with pre-season. I know they've looked good in pre-season. Their kids have looked good. Guys like Samuel Onzek have put up points. Matthew Coronado's had good games. I think if you're a Flames fan right now, that's what you want to see. You want to see your young players progress and do well in those games. Does that mean that's going to translate it to a playoff season for the Calgary Flames? Probably not. Are they bottom three bad in the Western Conference? I'm not so sure of that either. I think they're maybe a couple notches below what they've been the last two seasons, which is essentially a team just missing the playoffs. But I don't think, I hope, I hope this person, I don't, I hope any other Flames fan is taking their pre-season as an indicator that they're going to be a really good team making the playoffs. I think what you should take from it is that young players, including Samuel Onzek, who went through some injuries last year, was not at his most confident self, even at the WHL level. He's looked good this pre-season. You should be encouraged by that. He'll likely start the season in the American Hockey League, but you should be encouraged by that. I am intrigued about Jacob Peltier, though. That's a guy who I thought would be penciled in as the third line left winger, maybe a fourth line left wing spot. I don't know if he's had the absolute best camp. Does he still get a starting spot? I'm not sure. Two-way contract, too, right? Yeah, it's a very interesting situation with Peltier. And since you mentioned two-way, we should remind people now, just because you have a two-way contract, does not mean your waiver exempt. And Peltier is not waiver exempt. So if the flames were to send him down, he would have to go through waivers. I remember at the beginning of pre-season being asked if he would be a waiver candidate. I didn't think he would be. I'm still not sure if he would be now. I don't know if the flames would want to put themselves in the position where they lose yet another first round pick. For nothing. I would sooner see them try to trade him if they ever get to that point. But yeah, I'm a bit surprised that he is not on that list of players who have played really well. They're young players, I should say, through pre-season. That's why long-winded spiel about the Calgary flames. Yeah. What can I add? I think it's probably more exciting a year in some ways because you're watching some of those younger players in Calgary. It depends, I guess, on your view of these things. It's not going to be as chaotic as last year because there's not the sheer number of players that they'd frankly have to try and trade. But I still think it's another year when we get close to the deadline. We're going to be talking about veterans that they might be shedding and they're in a process. You can tell me, Julian, I don't know if they use the R word around there or not, but it looks a lot like an R word from afar. Yeah, you can use the R word when it comes to the Calgary flames. Anyway, I want to know if you're going to be able to answer this question. Tell me when the Simpsons jumped the shark. For my money, it was when Principal Skinner turned out turned out to be an imposter named Armin Tamzariit. Are you a Simpsons guy? So, yes, I was as a kid, but I have not watched the Simpsons in a long, long time. So, I don't know when it jumped the shark. I can't believe they're still making episodes. Like, they must have jumped the shark a long time ago. It's actually funny. We're talking about this because yesterday they released a new episode and dubbed it as their, quote, series finale. And they had a whole bunch of these different plotlines that as a joke, they were basing on AI. And I think Conan O'Brien was a special guest. I haven't watched the episode yet, but it's been written about on a variety of different platforms. So, it's really funny that that question was in our mailbox and the Simpsons are in the news. Did you remember who shot Mr. Burns' episodes? I remember those episodes. Yeah, that was an incredible television. That caused, like, legitimate buzz in my high school at the time. Amazing. Like, I can't say we were, like, gambling on it, but I know we were definitely, like, pools and there's debate about who did it. And, like, it was, like, definitely lunchroom talk in the cafeteria. So, like, the fact I can even relate anything to high school that's still going on now is crazy to me. So, it must have jumped a shot a long time. And I'll trust the questioner's opinion on it. Maybe when Principal Skinner got revealed as an imposter, did you say? I mean, I'm not going to go watch that. No, I mean, I understand why it's seen as the beginning of the end because it's very much this really weird plotline. It's like, when you have a character set as who they are for a long period of time and then you mess with it, how many seasons in? It's like a hard right turn out of nowhere that makes no sense. Yeah. It's one thing if you do that with a character people barely know about, but Principal Skinner is a foundational character on the Simpsons. There's no reason to do that. Anyway. Well, there's a reason. It's like we're out of ideas and we got to find, like, the reason is not a good reason, but it's like, "Oh, crap. We're in season 38 of this show," or whatever it is. Probably not 38, but I'm pretty sure it was around when I was, like, eight years old. Like, it's over 30 years old, for sure. How many seasons of the Simpsons? It's at least what? 40? It should be pushing 40, right? No. I bet like 35 at the most. Okay. Well, as of yesterday, they started their 36th season. There you go. 36. I'm old enough to remember the start of it, like, that's how crazy it is anyway. And it was massive. I mean, it was, you know, once a week, a world doesn't exist where you had to gather on your TV at a very specific time. And if you didn't do that, you would never see the episode, so. When you were betting on who shot Mr. Birds, the answer to that, which, is it really a spoiler alert at this point? No. I didn't have Maggie. Yeah, you didn't have Maggie. Did anyone have Maggie? Someone must have, but I remember being surprised in real time on that one. I feel like we lost a lot of time in the history of our podcast, not bonding over our love of the Simpsons. Anyway, we continue to go down through the list of ask CJ questions of this one from Colin Clark. Hey, guys. Love the podcast. Is there any plans for Utah to fix the obstructed seats in their rink? I can't see why anyone would want to watch a live game when you only see half the ice. Yes, there are. I believe it to two year window that they have to modernize their own facility. Obviously, there's a subsequent plan to build a new stadium entirely in Utah, you know, as part of an Olympic pit that's coming up. That's not going to happen overnight. But, you know, I think that there is a pretty good understanding here that the Delta Center has to be updated. And I think it has to happen within two seasons because there's a lot of obstructive U seats there. Not to raise the specter of this, but there was a lot of obstructive U seats when the formerly known as Phoenix Coyotes first arrived in a desert and they were playing into the sun's rink in downtown Phoenix for the same reasons. It's just, you know, a stadium configured originally for basketball isn't easily turned into a workable hockey arena. And so I think they're going to take part of the building off. I think like half of the building and then put new seats in, essentially. I mean, pardon my lack of engineering knowledge, but there's a pretty significant renovation and improvement coming there. But, you know, with the team only moving officially in April, there just wasn't time to do that work in this summertime window. How dare you not have a background in engineering? It was too busy going to hockey games to learn all that stuff. Clearly, CJ. Next one from Lacks Girl. Would you rather have Mitch Marner at an $11 million cap hit for eight years or Igor Shastirkin at an $11 million cap hit for eight years? Hmm. Really interesting hypothetical. Yeah, I don't think you can add the problem is I'm not sure if you're going to get either of them for an $11 million cap hit. But, you know, they'll probably Shastirkin, I guess. The thing is, is that that's not me hating on Marner. It's more like skater results tend to be more predictable, right? The players that get 89 80 or 90 or 100 points tend to do it year after year after year, whereas you see goal tending performances sort of rise and fall a little bit. But Shastirkin clearly is, I think, hardly a hot take to say he's among the absolute best his position. He's still young enough where I feel like if you have him for eight years, you're going to go into the playoffs at least half of those years really feeling great about your goal tending. But at the same, in the same breath, there's not a lot of teams paying a goalie that much yet. And so, man, it's a tough call. It's a really tough call. I probably go Shastirkin, but I also think Marner is going to perform really well in the next eight years and 11 million. If he would sign that, I think that contract would already be signed. We'll put it that way. But funny, we're in all these hypotheticals. That's a lot of money to tie up in your crease is all I'm going to say. It's not something a lot of teams have done with success, but I'm also not going to sit here and say you can't win with a great goal tender who's getting paid fairly. You need a great goal tender. You don't necessarily need the great goal tender, but I don't know. Mitch Marner, we've seen his record in the playoffs. Obviously, Igor Shastirkin, it being one of the best goal tenders in the world. It's such a difficult decision. And Shastirkin is something like 930 career in the playoffs, like it says percentage. He also has elevated at that time of year or performed better than everyone else. I guess it's Igor. I mean, I'm going to take Igor. Probably got to be Igor, but it's good hypothetical. Great one. I think getting hypotheticals because that's when you get radioed. It's almost like you're expressing an opinion, but it's more just like how do I work through this answer logically. Yeah, insider Chris Johnston would rather pay Igor Shastirkin than Mitch Marner. I can't wait to read that article on insert blog here. Now, if you said, would you rather pay Mitch Marner 12 and a half and pay you or 11 and a half? It's probably closer to Igor that way, but like because I think that's probably the range that each guy is going to end up looking at something like that. But definitely not. Anyway, I got one last one for you from Dallas Stars fan. What is your favorite SDPN bit? Bactions, smart insider man, Arizona walkout, 82 games that so many games, Zamboni driver. Those are some of the examples. Do you have a favorite SDPN bit? I like that they've come up with the sort of swear jar where every time they talk about the playoffs that money's got to go into it. I know that's a more recent bit. So it's maybe not historically a significant, but like the first time I saw that, I was laughing. I'm like, these guys are so clever with stuff like this. You can't go wrong though. I love the SDPN guys. I can't believe they turn out three shows a week. Sometimes two feels like a lot. Three and they're longer than us. They need bits. They need lots of bits. They do well with their bits. I love the episode where Steve bought a kayak. He bought a kayak and he barely uses it. He bought it at substore and his car did have a roof rack to put the kayak off so you just had this kayak. So he had to carry it down to the water? Why would you buy a kayak without a roof rack? Sometimes a dull thing is hard, man. Sometimes you don't think everything. I know. I know. I've made dumb decisions too, but I've never bought a kayak. This man's responsible for two children too. This man is keeping two other people alive, young people alive. Hey, he's doing well with them kids. Good on you, Steve, but man. I think Mrs. Dangle gets a major assist on that. Oh, she absolutely does. She should get all the points. Yes, for that. But Steve had to raise a kayak and I don't know how his father equipped with that. Anyway, thank you so much to everyone who said did questions for us on Ask CJ. That's going to do it for our Monday show. We're going to be back later this week with more fun stuff here on the CJ show. Subscribe to our podcast in the meantime and we'll see you all soon. The Chris Johnston Show. show. (upbeat music)
