[MUSIC] >> [INAUDIBLE] >> 38 seconds in, and the Canadian strength hurts. >> Well, there's one way to get this building jacked up. >> Here's a 2-1 one, McMahon scores. >> Bobby McMahon has tied in for trouble. >> Right there, first of the way, maybe a break for Novey. >> Back, Novey did, scores, what a first from next Novey to score. Geeks is over team. >> The past year, again, in time. >> That's no doubt by Tavares. >> Trying to get the little pre-alls home with Novey. Read why he became about to get in. >> John Tavares on the doorstep. >> And the Leaks, Ricky the Leaks, are gonna break the home ice domination. >> Good, and we're here in Montreal tonight. >> Nice to make some two points on this building, special for Saturday. Saturday, play in Montreal, you know, like, it's a big deal. [MUSIC] >> Bad morning, Joe, sports at 5'9", bad at us, brand-gunning. Good Monday morning, friends, and also to you, the Toronto Maple Leafs, improved to 2-0 against the Montreal Canadiens in neither victory, all that inspiring, but so what? >> Oh, I disagree. >> No scoreboard. >> No such thing as an uninspiring win against the Montreal Canadiens. >> It'll never matter where the teams are out in their winning cycles. It's, they are Super Bowl, it's game 7 of the Stanley Cup final every time. So, I know what you're saying, but no such thing as, maybe all amended. No such thing as an unsatisfying win, cuz they don't care how much are. Satisfying, hey, listen, the first time the Maple Leafs and Montreal Canadiens met was game 1 of the regular season. That was a feast for the eyes, what was 6'5" shooter, victory for the Toronto Leafs? My goodness, we were, it felt like we were in store for one of the great entertaining seasons of all time, and since then, yeah, pretty much lived up to the billing. Although Austin Massey's fallen on hard times as a blatant boy, Brent. I know you know that I'm up to date with all my pace statistics. >> You love a number. >> I was gonna save this, but now we're here we are. You let it, you were the horse and you saw water and you're like, I gotta gallop to it. >> No longer a pace for 70 goals, 69 goals, Austin Matthews is on pace four. And his line, that's a great new look line with no Mitch Marner in there. Who's banged up a little bit with maybe a foot injury. Luckily for him and the Maple Leafs, not luckily for you because I'm sure you're gonna talk about how devastated you are the Leafs don't play again until Thursday. I had no John Tortorella when they see the Islanders on Thursday. >> Okay, no, you want to start here? You're going to get mad at it, Scarsal. >> Scarsal, no, I have a whole week to do that. >> No, no, no, it's okay. >> No, mm-mm, no, I have. >> No, no, ah! >> I won't do it. >> No, no, I won't do it. Okay, they beat Montreal Canadiens. >> Mm-hm, let's stick with happy guys. >> On Saturday and yeah, this is the team. Let's start with that. This is the team. Friday's NHL. >> You'll be our Dorian, we are a team. >> Yeah, boy. >> What do you got to say about your group? >> Well, they are here. Senators- >> Stop, stop. >> You know what, going so great, eh? >> He was right then. It's like, say something nice, you can't do it. >> I've seen the future, cannot do it. >> Could not beat the San Jose Sharks on Hugging Night in Canada, could the Ottawa Senators- >> Same way, stop. >> We're going in a bunch of different directions. >> Monday morning, holy. >> Okay, let's drill down then on this. This is the team. >> It's on our door, you got a couple of depth defense men. >> Yeah, you're George. >> You've been poking around. >> Yeah, who, I mean, broke, poor Sheldon keeps hard by keeping C-Mall Benwell out of that game in his home province. >> Did someone have a gun to his head? Last time I checked, he writes the names on the card. I don't know exactly how that works, but boy, that, I saw that quote and I didn't like it. I wouldn't have accepted it from Mike Dabcock going, "Oh boy, I have my hand forced in this situation." I didn't like it from Sheldon Keefe. Samoam Benwell has been an awesome soldier for you, and I actually, I didn't want to make too big a point of this, but now that we're here, if you were going to come out and say, "Hey, this is good a chance for Samoam Benwell to show he understands and everyone understands," you're doing whatever the team needs, and I'm going to kind of lay down the gauntlet of a guy in his hometown, and maybe he says that to the group, and publicly we get a different message. But man, that is a rough, rough, rough scratch for a guy who's been an awesome, awesome soldier for you all season long. He has, and he will be relied upon again this season, and even if he's not in the top six defensemen when the playoffs roll around for game one, you got to figure he's going to be part of the playoff plan at some point, because as everybody who wants to talk about NHL defensemen will tell you ad nauseam. You don't need six defensemen, Brett. You don't need seven defensemen. No, no, no. You don't need eight defensemen. You don't need, okay, maybe you need like, I don't know, eight or nine, eight or nine, five. Yeah. And now, although Mr. William Loggerson is departed, sorry for maths, indeed. That's okay. Yeah, he was claimed off waivers. Again, we're going far afield here. Let's just, okay, answer this question. Sure. Now that it's over, the trade deadlines in the rear view mirror, and there's no Adam Henry walking through that door there, there is no Colton Pareko walking through that door. What do you make of this Toronto Maple Leafs team? I think they got what they deserve to a certain extent. This has been a team that is showing itself to be a playoff team. They have not shown themselves to be among the best teams in the NHL this season. These are the types of ads you make to a group like that. You throw in everything that was said about a set, said about the lack of prospect capital and the lack of pick capital that was available. You can always make a deal. It's not say the Bradshaw Living couldn't have. It could have moved the first if you felt like that was necessary to make the deal that was there, but that deal wasn't there. So yeah, I think my overarching look at the deadline team now is they got exactly what they deserved based on their body work this season. That's kind of my read on it, you. This team was always only ever going to go as far as its top players took them, and they took them into the second round because as much of a part of the story and the biggest part of the story in the second round, not advancing past the Panthers as it was the top four four. It's not getting on the scoreboard at all. They were crucial in getting them over the hump in that six game series over the Tampa Bay Lightning and of course, John DeVarr is over time game winner in game six. You're also not going to judge Bradshaw Living on this deadline as much as people want to talk about, hey, if they don't get through, you're going to look back and say, why weren't you more aggressive? Look around. Okay? Like we're getting Jake Genssel. Nope. Okay. And that he didn't go to an Atlantic division team, but maybe it's the canes they have to go through to win a Stanley Cup. They weren't getting glad of your Tarasenko. He said he wanted to go to one place and secondarily I don't like this team that seems to be. No, no, he will. He just because he's going to score five goals against the Leafs in the series doesn't mean he was the guy you should have had going a couple of times in his debut. No, no, it's just it's an odd thing to say that the team that the Leafs almost certainly have to go through if they want to go anywhere that they acquire a winger, which is, hey, we talk about it. Like, you know, Leafs are not weak on the wing, but they certainly could use upgrades here and there at various spots that they acquire a guy who is going to play well for them in the playoffs almost certainly against the Leafs, but even I, the biggest Leafs like doom and gloomer, I don't want to be, I'm just a realist about these things, is going to say there wouldn't have made any sense. Even if you could have forced his hand, even if you could have, if he didn't have the ability to shepherd himself exactly where he wanted to, the last guy this team needs quite frankly. Yeah. So he goes to the Panthers and the rich get richer, I suppose, and yeah, he's going to be a perfect fit, I'm sure, and they, at the last I can add Kyle Caposo, is how. And I have to add that it, it helps that it's going to be a perfect fit there that knows it's going to ask many questions when he doesn't score a goal for a week and a half of a year. Correct, correct. And the Bruins did make an ad and the Big Reg Pat Maroon and, okay, you're not going to convince me that Adam Henryk or David Savard, who did not move, is the difference between the really believing that this team can win a Stanley Cup and saying, yeah, they could win a Stanley Cup. It just was not out there, and there is no Tomas Hurdle move for this team and we'll get into the Vegas Golden Knights. Later on in the program, it just, it didn't exist. This team and Brad for Living's season as his first in charge of creating whatever this next generation of Leafs team is, isn't it? It's going to be judged on the preseason moves and it's going to be judged feels like specifically on the performance of two guys, and that's Tyler Bertuzzi and Max Domi. Oh, in terms of reliving in the way he's feted, yes, but also no, because if Austin Matthews just has a better, let's say the Leafs, let's say the first round goes exactly the way it went last year, and it's not even a good first round for them, but because Sam Snov is great and because they get the right amount of goals at the right time, they get through. And then Austin Matthews just scores five goals in the next series and the Leafs win that series. That's what Brad for Living will be judged on, but we won't talk about that. We won't talk about that. We'll give him credit for that, but that will be the reason. And why this team is in the third round of the second, like it is all going to be because of those big guys. Now, I think the interesting thing about the lack, because I do think of all the moves that were made. The Henrik one is the only one that any reasonable person can point at and say that would have made them better. And it's just a team building philosophy thing. If you were somebody that believes you double and triple down on your strengths, then that was the move you needed to make, then that allows you to go back to what you were supposed to be, a team with a matchup nightmare on kind of every single line, one through four in terms of your center ice position. If you're somebody who believes that's the way you build teams, but what's been the Leafs on doing? It's not been the lack of their center or the thing that makes them great coming through. It's been one glaring fault that's kind of come be a goal 10 and be a defenseman. So I think they're just looking at the way, the thing you needed. If Adam Henrik, the defenseman, existed, this is a very different conversation we're having. He's saying you need to go get that guy, but there just wasn't the player there. I suppose Tana, but even I'm not that bullish on it. So I don't think anybody can, I think the people who are upset at tri-living or killing tri-living, it goes back to the Klingberg move. That's really been the biggest misstep he has made for a while. It looked like it was Domie and Bertuzzi not fitting in, they're fitting in fine right now. So I think it all kind of goes back to if you're somebody who has an issue with what claim or what tri-living has done in the time here, goes back to the first day of free agency and it's Revo and it's Klingberg. But other than that, and we can sit here and quibble about how good a move the William Kneelander was versus the one you had to make, but pretty much kind of checked all the boxes since. Yeah, and I think going forward, we should probably be of the belief and history should have told us this outside of the Tyler Tafoli move from a couple of years ago. Deadline is not necessarily where Brad for Living's going not so, right, and changing the face of your franchise. I don't think it'll be changing the face of your franchise, but I just wonder if it's different, right? Like being the GM of a team at the core of all these guys who are late 20s and all paid, you have to act more aggressively than when you're GM of a, going to keep bringing it back to baseball. The Calgary Flames are much more the Jerry DiPoto, 54%, let's build a good team, let's try to get in, let's try to give ourselves a chance. The Leafs are trying to build a great team that should be among the cup favorites every single season. And I do think you have to operate in a different manner. This isn't me criticizing the deadline he had. I have no issue with it, but I don't think we can just copy and pace what he did in Calgary to what he will do here going forward. Well, and how they perform in the postseason, well, certainly in Formable One, the pressure he feels to get it done. They bow out again in the first round, all of a sudden, yeah, Brad's were living in your two fields under the gun with the new president at the top of MOSC as well. Yeah, and if they're conference finalists, then it's a very, very different thing heading into that. And just a quick note, like, I don't, I don't feel like there's much to say about this. I didn't think it was an interesting note from the brat, the broadcast that Shanahan and Pelly were, or I believe expected to meet over that weekend in Montreal. I mean, who knows? He's Pelly's in town. Exactly. I love Keith. Well, he might be on Europe. He in time, right? Maybe up early. Yeah. I mean, I mean, I feel like a captain of industry like that. I don't feel like many of them are starting their day at nine, but they're generally speaking up grind. They have 30 minutes of sleep at night. They have that Mike Mark Wahlberg schedule golf for 12 and a half minutes, spend three hours with my family, go to church, drink a smoothie, something along those lines. Hello, Keith. Yeah. Anywho. Now that we're here and we're talking about the additions, we're talking about the things that weren't done and the things that were done and Connor Dewar plays in that game as the fourth line center and David Camp gets bumped up to the third line even and no much marner and William Neelander at top and Matthew Nye's all over the place. Tyler Batuzzi back on the top line, a horrible game from them, but I just agreed, yes. I think one of the major questions I had going into three o'clock on Friday was the chemistry with the chemistry thing and the eye test and the numbers, maybe not lining up with the way the head coach would like to deploy a second line with Max Domi as the center. They got Connor Dewar who's like, yeah, he's Connor Dewar, like he'll do her. That's right. It's a perfect name. He's just out there. He's doing stuff. Yeah, he'll kill some penalties for you. Play 11 minutes a game and like a poor man's David Camp. He'll look at a guy. He'll look at a guy. Go. Don't do that. Score maybe double-digit goals in a season, which he's done now twice. Yeah, he's not going to change your upside, but given just one extra body up the middle, they've gone away from the Max Domi at center thing and David Camp back centering that third line and John Dewar is centering the second line and it's all in flux, right? And there's still a sample to get an idea of what we're going to look at going into the game on and even in-game you're chasing the game. You want to load up an offensive line? You can do that, but it does feel like the idea that Sheldon Keith was ever even without a move and the Connor Dewar move is barely a move. Like you could always, you could have put Pontus Holmer back up the middle and your fourth line and then move David Camp. If this was always the move, the idea that, hey, well, you don't want to upset the apple card as far as the chemistry and the Max Domi up the middle thing as your second line center. It seems like that was never in the cards. You might read on it, I got to be honest. My read on that is that Nick Kiprios is both like, hmm, I feel good this morning. It's just proof of how integral Mitch Marner is to this whole thing and shocker, I know the guy who wears an A and is not quite, but almost 100 point guy is integral to this, but he is a, he's like one of the load bearing walls of the Leafs forward lines. You take him out and you have to completely rejig things. You apparently, I would have no issue with this, but they don't want to go back to the Babcock staple of Matthews with the two hardest working, but least skilled forwards they can find on the team. They don't want to do that. They want to put Matthews with skilled guys. And then once you do that, well, all of a sudden Mitch Marner is there. So it's not really a skily second line. It's a very, very different group, but I think that it just, you lose one of those elite top six guys and it completely changes the way you want to go about your lineup. I don't know that it's a, I'm not saying that Sheldon Keefe sits there going, oh, second line center max, don't me the thing I've always dreamed of. I don't think it's that. No, it probably goes into what you said, but I would imagine that Marner healthy, you go back to what we've been seeing with Stomi up the middle and Tavar is there. We'll see. And it could be Thursday and maybe, I mean, if, if you're a Leaf and your fingers are crossed Saturday, you know, Mitch Marner misses that game out of just an abundance of caution especially given the schedule coming up and that maybe he's back in the lineup on Thursday in Philadelphia against the Flyers with no John Tortorella. Yeah. But we'll see. Yeah. Okay. So your, your contention is that with Mitch Marner back in there, that you will see Max Domi back playing second line center. I think so. I, I don't think that the run of play that they have had kind of pre deadline. I know it didn't go their way with the Boston games result wise, but I think we're fairly happy to a certain extent with various things you saw in those games. So yeah, I, I do think they'll be, they'll be back to that. I also think it's the best version until, until it completely blows up in your face. It's the best version of what you've got. It's the only time we've seen any semblance of balance on this Leafs team. It's the only time there's been people who actually feel like they have a stake in the game up and down the Leafs lineup, but it's not just been the A team and the B team. So I, again, I don't think Max Domi is an ideal second line center. I think there'll be moments in the playoffs where you win and you wear it a little bit, but I don't think Timothy Ligren is a perfect great shot defense, but neither. And guess what? He was out there on Saturday. Oh, yeah. Well, we'll talk about how the blue line shakes up shakes out and how we think it will be deployed for game one. I mean, to me, the big question is whether you think you can get enough offense out of a David Campbell led third line and whether you, I know the answer to that question. I generally do too. Bobby McMan now with 10 goals this season. Back to scoring. Yeah. Yeah, you can snap it. Apparently. Bobby McManath, who's. Yeah. Matthew Nye's like, is there more there offensively? And is that enough to be able to, because I think a David Camp third line can certainly be deployed in the defensive zone and you can feel pretty good about that. The punt possibilities. Big time. With David Camp. But boy, you want to point to the reasons why again, the Leafs have failed in the postseason and it's just been like the slimmest of margins, of course, it's out of the five game series last year against Panthers, a lot of it has come down to, well, special teams, but also like secondary scoring, just getting like a little something, just something. And that's why I think you're going to see the centers deployed the way they have. That's the only way for this least team to do it. I know Connor Doers popped in 11 goals, but I'm not sitting here. No, no. Wishfully thinking about a third line led by him. The other thing about this and this is a summer conversation, who knows how it all depends on how the playoff run goes, what this player is. But I think Connor Doer is your David Camp replacement. We see this all the time with GMs. Brad's your living is not the guy who traded for David Camp. Brad's your living is not the guy who gave him that contract, which is not aging very, very well, by the way. So why would Brad's living not be looking for a taker for that 2.6 million bucks and saying, okay, I have my bill term replacement in Connor Doer. This allows me to go spend it on something I actually want. And I don't think that means he hates David Camp the player or anything on those lines, but just not the way he would go about allocating those resources. So I think that's the other part of it as well. And the thing about a David Camp is he's either going to be a nothing asset or teams are going to be clamoring for him because either the least you're going to bow out in the first or second round the way it went last year, or he's going to be seen as the defensive shutdown center on a team that made its way to a conference final or something like that. That's a very, very different asset than David Camp at 2.6 now. Oh, we'll be talking like Phil Donotones about David Camp. Well, I mean, I'll be talking about it the rest of you have been rolling your eyes, but maybe I will be here. All right. So the blue line mentioned it. See my Benoit, the first guy to spend some time in the press box just crushing milk up there, dunking cookies out imagine being sad, like this sucks. Yeah. Milk, man. He's been a revelation after the Anaheim ducks, despite him playing 20 minutes a game for them last season. We're like, thanks, but no, thanks. Try to are there. He's like, we can't have this. Okay. And boy, where's he Chris is getting intimidated by him in practice, we've got to get this guy out of here. And where would the Leafs be without him this season? It's frightening to think about. Anyways, he's been great and you're going to need again more than six defensemen, but they go out and get Ilya Labushkin and it feels like pretty obviously that they're going to try and do a Luc Shen replacement thing with him and Morgan Riley. Joel Edmondson wasn't acquired to not play and somebody has to be on the outside looking in. And for again, game one, it was Simone Benoit. I think the clear question is, can Timothy Lillegrine go through a post season series where he plays in every game and I don't mean getting injured? This guy's been a healthy scratch. Every single time he's gotten an opportunity in a post season for this Leafs team, that's the guy that should be looking over his shoulder and especially with the recent run of play. It has not been awe-inspiring. No, it hasn't. He takes a penalty that allows him to type the game and thankfully Tavares scores the winner later in that period, but this is a guy who is in your kind of classic state of NHL defenseman growth where, yeah, he's not a blue chip prospect, I know it's a 17th overall pick and get over that or 19th or whatever he ended up being. That's dead and gone. Now, he is a guy who's cast in the wool and I don't mean cast in the wool of what he is as a player, but we understand where he is, a intriguing but relatively speaking, middling prospect in terms of what's expected of him. I don't think anybody looks at Timothy Lillegrine and says, "He's going to develop into a top pair guy," but he's also at that stage where you can look at it and say, "I don't know. Sky could, to a certain extent, be the limit with him. This is why, I mean, at the same point, we said Sandin, a man a million times in Nick Robertson. It's just so hard to draft and develop at the exact same time and then you go out here and get all of these guys who are unspectacular, but safe and stable and how can a guy like Sheldon Keefe continue to go back to it, it really tests how much he cares about right shot, left shot. That is basically it. If Sheldon Keefe is beholden to it, then guess what? Timothy Lillegrine's going to play. Sorry. That's why it's going to work. But if he gets to a certain point where he says, "I can't do this anymore," sorry Jake McCabe. You got to play the right side or somebody like that. T.J. Brody, the other obvious option, although we've seen that. Not so great. Yeah. Or Joel Edmondson. Yep. And seems to have been on a pairing of their own. Yeah. I mean, if you're looking at things that we should be evaluating and we won't do this today, but maybe tomorrow. I mean, as we have a week of trying to make up like Leaf discussions, because they don't play for a while. Yeah. And honestly, just the need was another bye week. They've had- You've only had a hundred this year. And no offense to the Raptors. I don't think we have like an hour of Raptors discussion in us tomorrow. So would they play the defending champion Denver Nuggets tonight? Might have some stuff to say about Yo-Kit. Yo-Kit. I guess. Yeah. You could say it now. You could say it right now. You don't need to see them play the Raptors. He's very good. Yeah. Like, of all the things that I guess we'll talk about, maybe tomorrow about this Leafs team about, hey, what are we looking at going for these final regular season games as the Leafs are well cemented within the postseason and still, yeah, they want to pick up their two points. But the most important thing is, well, one, staying healthy and two, like, evaluating and getting an idea of what you have going forward to the playoffs, I think. The Timothy Lillegrine, where does he fit into this defense core going into the postseason? He's outside of the goaltending conversation, which we'll have right now. Well, like, I think it's two. Yeah, I think it's very safe to say that. It's like, there are other individual things like, we'll see what Matthews pace. And I know you've informed me already. It's below 70. It's like nine. Okay. We'll see what nice. Okay. You said it. I was thinking it. I just let that thought just go. It's one of the rare ones that occurs up here and doesn't make it through the lips to the mic. But thank you for getting that in there. That's something we'll be keeping an eye on. So it was my pleasure. Thank you. Great day for sports. When I look at it, I think those are the types of things we're going to be looking at. But it's goaltending and it's how does the D shake out? I suppose we can have some internal winger competition among like the Tavares kind of group there. Like, there's going to be Bertuzzi with Matthews. We're doing that again. Like, I don't think so. I think Sheldon Keefe said as much, you know, wanting to be part of that. No, it's the goaltending is the biggest question mark and it's less and less of one right now, but it's the thing that matters the most. But then it is going to be how does the packing order shake out on the deep pair and can Lilligan do enough to stay in because I do think Sheldon Keefe much like I think he started the goaltending situation thinking, okay, Joe Wall will be my guy. Let's see how the season pans out, but Joe Wall will be my guy. I think he looks at it now and goes, I really want you Timothy Lilligan to play good hockey so I can put you in. I would like that to happen. You're a right shot. I want this to go, but yeah, the push comes to shove. I'm happy putting in Joel Edmondson or some and some own Benoit or whatever machinations you look at that with. Yeah, Edmondson's going to play. No, no, of course. Like the guys who they traded for are going to play just me Benoit and mix as well there. All right. So the goal timing. Here are the numbers now updated for Ilya Samsonov since the demotion since you're just going to give me your percentage of what it's going to start. That'd be a very funny. That'd be a good bet. I can do that. Yeah. Oh, I know. I'm up to 60%. Yeah. He's 12 and three with a 9/11 save percentage and beyond that, man, he's made some key saves at the end of games in important, not important because there are no important regular season games for the sleeve. But in important moments in these games of relative importance, he's made some key saves to have the record of 12 and three since he's returned the same percentage not overwhelming. This is a guy with a near 9/20 save percentage last season. And yeah, you combine that with the horrible start, like the numbers are still, he's not going to be able to salvage the counting stats this season going into free agencies. And I'm not going to be able to point to even a 900 save percentage at the end of the season. But since he's come back, pretty close to the guy that we saw over the course of his first season as a member of the Toronto Maple Leafs. Now you look at the schedule and mentioned not a ton of games. This week especially. >> Desert Island of Leafs, Leafs games. >> They're in Philly Thursday, hockey night in Canada back home against the hurricanes. And then you got a back to back next week, Tuesday, Wednesday, Philly, Washington. Do you treat him as the number one guy? Are we still doing the alternating things where I guess Joe Wall gets the start on Thursday? I mean, if you just treat Joe Wall as the backup and he's only starting in the back end of back to back, it's two weeks since his last start. >> Yeah, if I'm the Leafs, how I handle this now is I go back to Samsonov Thursday and then I think you go Joe Wall Saturday. That's the way I would handle it. I don't think you want to lose him. >> God, he gets all the important, he gets the two Bruins starts, he gets the start against the hurricanes on hockey night in Canada. >> And then flip it if you want. That's fine by me. Like, I'm not particularly bothered of who gets which one of these because I don't unlike Boston, I don't like, yes, hurricanes game matters. It is one of these six or seven I had that matters the rest of the way, but you know, it's on the lower end of the matter scale. It's not quite up there like a Boston game, but the question I have about the goaltending, it's not about what Samson I was doing right now. It's just about the wishy, washy nature of NHL goaltending. Can he be this guy, and this isn't about what he'll be in the playoffs, but can he continue to be this guy for another month? Because that's roughly how much time, month and change is left in the regular season here. And he be that guy for a whole other month, given the track record, not this year that we've seen of him, but over the course of his Leafs tenure, because there always seems to be something somebody says something mean to him. He remembers there's another goalie on the team. He gets hurt. There always seems to be something that is a speed bump. And this is just the nature of being a goalie who is not Connor Hellebuk or Jake Ottinger or Sorokin or Shosturkin. One of those guys, that's the question I have for Samson between now and then is can he kind of keep this up for another month? Yeah, who knows? Yeah, save for that first part of this season before when he was demoted, he's been pretty steady as far as, you know, his first go-around as a Toronto Maple Leaf coming off, the uncertainty of not being tendered, a qualifying offer, but he lost the times last year to Mount Murray as well. Yeah, I mean, last year was weird the way it worked out, because both guys got hurt at like the time that the other guy came back and I felt like there was only one guy healthy at a time last year. It wasn't always, it wasn't always performance often it was injury, but then the like ships passing in the night of it all the one guy would be going well and then Murray would get hurt and they go, all right, we got to go to Samsonov and then he'd have a free runway and he would play great and then the opposite would happen. So I just, hey, health is a big part of this as well, right? If you can't be a guy you can bank on health wise, what are we doing as a number one goalie? So I don't have any questions about his play, it is about the consistency factor and that's what takes you from being a good goalie or on a good run to a truly great one in this league. Because guess what, if he's this guy consistently, you're laughing, you're, you sign up for it in a heartbeat and he's been this so far, it's just, I'm sitting here waiting for the other shoe to drop and maybe that's completely unfair to the guy, but that is how I'm looking at it. And one thing to allow a goal, a game that you're like, oh, was that so good? Or was that a great shot or how much credit should we give the offensive player? It's quite another to have what we saw multiple times before the demotions from, from Eli Samsonov was like, multiple goals were like, Oh, well, that's heartbreaking. That's backbreaking and that'll kill the spirit of this hockey team, which we haven't seen. No, I haven't seen any of that from him in the, I don't, I just like let me hammer home how good he has been in the battle situations in the playoff type moments. I love it. Please do it for another three months. Seems like a tough ass. That's all I'm saying. Yeah. For anybody. And the more likely scenarios that both guys are going to be called upon in the postseason, which is why you can't lose wall. And that's not to say you can't treat Samsonov like the starter, but you treat him like the starter with a backup who needs to get some work as well as kind of the way I look at that's what they say. You don't need one goal. You don't need to. You don't need 500 goalies. You need to have Glen Healy in the chamber. They might have three with Matt Murray returning. Hey, how can you kill the Vegas golden Knights when Matt Murray is going to come barging through those doors during the postseason? I honestly, strictly from a content perspective, would love nothing more than the melting down of the NHL. And I mean that at both the league offices and just at the other 31 markets in the league, with Matt Murray, him riding in on his white steed saying this one's for you, Kyle, as he as he leads the Leafs to the promised land. Oh God, what I what I'd give for that. Don't think it's going to happen. And also Martin Jones, who has better goaltending depth than the Leafs. Yeah. Shut up. Mel NASA. Nobody. Yeah. Yeah. Leafs do have four goals. All right. Will we come back? Boy, I don't know how this happened, but I'm fine with it. I've been anointed as the Joey Votto guy. He's great. I guess. Cool, man. I was feeling taxed congratulating you through me on Friday. I was like, and I said, please, I'm going to have to talk about this so much on Monday and stop. I was on the phone. I was, so I was doing the other things and I, I missed like the moment Joey Votto signed his minor league deal with the Blue Jays by about 15 minutes and I was on the phone to JD Bunkus. Of course. I was like, oh, you're Super Bowls happening. Why aren't you active on Twitter? And I was like, what? And then I had to gather my thoughts. And then I had to like take a moment to make sure that I said the right thing on Twitter because a lot of people are just like, look, it's like the Simpsons meme, right? Like I'm Bart Simpson in the classroom. Same thing. Yeah. Like we didn't know what the thing was. Yeah. Okay. So I don't know. I didn't, I didn't espouse too much on Twitter. I'll talk about a pretty significant move for the Blue Jays and a guy who's, if not the best Canadian baseball player of all time in the top three. When you said you were on the phone, I thought the, you were going to say the Blue Jays set up a call with him. They're just like, Hey, Joey, this guy, he has been going on about it. You got to, you got to say a couple of kind words for him. He's like, it's make a wish thing. And they're like, sure, sure. Yeah, we'll go with that. That's where I thought you were going with it. I, boy, could I be the guy that gets to introduce Joey Votto in Cooperstown? Also, like John Schneider, get it together, calling him a borderline Hall of Famer. Oh, man. Okay. So we, that, that's a great little preview of what's coming next here. Just glowing praise, getting angry at people who had the slightest of slights. I love this side of you. I can't wait to see it. All right. Let's go it up next. Morning show continues, Ben and his friend, Gunning, sports at 5.9 of the fan. Hey, it's Ailish for a fire. And I'm Justin Cushford. Join us as we discuss the most important sports stories of the day and tee up the biggest games of the night. It's the fan pregame, 6 p.m. weekdays on Sportsnet, Sportsnet 5.9 of the fan, and wherever you get your podcasts, I would have loved to have finished my career in one uniform, but that opportunity wasn't presented, and this is the one team that, that excited me, the idea of, of not having a major league deal, but working my way back and being able to stay at home. I live just west of the city, be able to see family, have family support me at the games. And most importantly, I was a boy, you know, at some point I'm going to post pictures of, me and Blue Jays, Ben. I was a Blue Jays fan, and I watched Carter hit the walk-off home run. I watched us win against the Braves on the road. Those were the most exciting moments of my childhood, and so the idea that I'm back with the opportunity to possibly be a part of a team down the road, I'm working toward trying to be a part of a team down the road that has championship aspirations, it's just a dream. Fan Morning Show Sportsnet 5.9 of the fan, Ben Anis, Brent Gunning, since then Joey Votto has posted on Instagram, pictures of a little Joey Votto. Yeah, doing the Tavares bit, it's a good run, I like it, I'm a fan, generally speaking. Yep, it's baby with those little Blue Jays, Ben Bonn. Only question I had is, you were just talking about a team with like Championship World Series aspirations. And is he going to another camp? That's mean, might be true, but sure, that's mean to me to start your triumphant segment with a bad champion. Wow, okay. That's fine. Whatever. Yeah, everybody makes playoffs, okay? Blue Jays being the player, they're going to win 84 games next year, and they'll get in. You just need a chip and a chair, okay? Once you get in, you can win, as the Arizona Diamondbacks almost showed last season. So okay, you're like, everyone's expecting me to go on this like, well, this is it, this is the missing piece. And finally, the returning hero, Joey Votto in his rightful spot as a member of the Toronto Blue Jays. We can talk about the Joey Votto legacy and what I think about the player as a whole. And while I disagree with John Schneider about him being a borderline Hall of Famer, I think he's a slam dunk obvious. You seem offended guaranteed Hall of Famer and go back to when the man made his debut in the Major Leagues of baseball. And I mean, it's just one statistic. But look at the number of walks he's accumulated opposed to everybody else like far and away the Major League leader since 2007, when he returned in what six top 10 MVP seasons, including the one victory and just one of the greatest first baseman of his generation. And I would probably give the nod to Larry Walker, Fergie Jenkins, it's hard to compare pitchers to position players. I'd probably put him though, as the second best Canadian position player in the history of Major League Baseball. >> That was a big maple for me, obviously. >> Big maple, the greatest fall time joking. >> Okay. But that's all well and good, and that's all true. And Joey Votto at his best, yeah, does change the outlook for this team and go back to 2015 when there were legitimate conversations and rumors that have since been substantiated that Alex Anthropos, you thought David Price was a big move. You thought Troy Tulliwitski was earth shattering. >> I did. >> There were conversations that Alex Anthropos was having with the Cincinnati Reds about acquiring Joey Votto. And that didn't come to pass. And boy, what an exciting return to relevance that was for the Toronto Blue Jays and coming within two victories of a World Series appearance, and we know how Game 6 ended with the Royal Seattle. That's different than this version of Joey Votto. Here's where I'm at with this version of Joey Votto. Is that Joey Votto might be done? Like I'm not an idiot. Like I've seen the last two seasons. I know he's 40 years old. >> But disagree on that. I'm not an idiot part, but again, continue. >> Yeah, he's 40 years old. I understand that. This is not vintage Joey Votto. >> I also do believe that, yeah, the man who said I'm the healthiest I've been in three years, I defer to that person and somebody who maybe understood that his skills were diminishing last season could have waved goodbye and played for one franchise the entirety of his career, but wanted to return to playing this season because he believed there was something else in him. And I would defer to the guy that would better know than me, although sometimes the athletes are the last to know. I understand that there's a possibility that this is going to be not a disaster because it's a minor league deal and I'm sure, and we can talk about the ways that they can massage the messaging here if it doesn't work out for Joey Votto. But we're talking about Spencer Horwitz and then Daniel Vogelbach playing a specific role. My argument from day one of this thing, and even after Daniel Vogelbach's hidden home runs the spring training games off a garret call, well, guess what, here's what I know about Daniel Vogelbach. >> Okay. >> He's Daniel Vogelbach, okay, and at his best, he will only be Daniel Vogelbach. And if you're going to have Daniel Vogelbach or Spencer Horwitz, you might as well roll the dice on a future Hall of Famer returning to some level of relevance. So this always made sense to me, the timing doesn't make sense, but then when you think about it, it makes a little more sense because, and Joey's been kind of explicit with this, is like, yeah, I thought someone would give me a guaranteed major league contract. I thought my path to being an everyday player was a little more clear. That clearly did not develop at the pace that he wanted and then reached out directly to the Blue Jays. It feels like the lines of communication were there before Joey Votto came to Ross Atkins and said, whatever you want, and I'll just try and make this team and I don't even need to start in the major league's baseball, I can need to prove myself, I need to prove myself to everybody that I can still hit, and I can do that in Buffalo. And then in April or May, you can call me up and you can see how good I am at 40 years old, that that had to develop over time. But yeah, we're in the spot that we always should have been, that made the most sense and instead of embarrassingly waving goodbye because nobody has an offer for you, even on a Major League deal, Joey Votto gets to save some face here. Yeah, he does. I mean, like you said, there's the possibility that the saving face could result in, okay, maybe I was done, like the age, he even said that explicitly, he's like, maybe I'm done, I don't think I am though. Yeah, and I think that when you are, you know, I think personality helps go into this, is that he's always been the kind of self-deprecating, dry humor, like it does help play into that, he can say it, and he's being real about it, but it's also like, ha, ha, maybe I'm done, like you're allowed to kind of, it allows you to say something like that without it being a embarrassing thing that your career could just kind of wash away. Now, the fact that it had to come here as opposed to anywhere else, I don't begrudge the J's for that. I don't begrudge him, like I think that this is the point of having, you know, his legacy will be in Cincinnati always, but it's a point of like having connections to a place. It makes all the sense in the world for the J's to give him a track. The thing I do wonder, the question I'll be having about it is, how differently would this all have played out if you would have come to grips with this a little bit sooner? Because I do think it is a coming to grips with, like we've said, it's not that the J's were never open to the idea of having him in camp as this, I imagine they were always open to him having him in camp as this. How differently do we think the spring potentially could have played out for him if he did have the actual, it's not even the extra reps because it's not a reps issue. It's reps in front of eyes. The blue J's need to see those reps. How differently would this have played out and, you know, maybe he maybe has a completely different spring even from Daniel Volkobock and it's a spring training who can read too much into this. Like how different would it be if he just would have come to grips with this a little sooner? Daniel Volkobock's not here and not just because the blue J's are on reach. If Joey Votto says at the outset of spring, and maybe I'm wrong here, maybe the blue J's do believe, and I don't think that this is an incorrect assessment. This is getting it sound offensive for me, Mr. Joey Votto. >> I do agree with it. >> I think it's like, it's not the worst take in the world if you believe Daniel Volkobock just roll the dice, Daniel Volkobock has a better than 50/50 chance of being a more productive player than Joey Votto. >> Yeah. >> Just season. >> Like that's within the realm of possibility. I get it, but I think it's pretty close to 50/50. And if Joey Votto is coming to you, hat and hand sounds like a little too much. But if he's at the outset understanding, boy, it's not just been one season. >> It's treating sad memes about being in a park. It's as close to hat and hand as we're getting. >> Yeah. If he looks at the last two years and he looks at his age and he looks at all the underlying stats and says, okay, I said I'm coming back, but it's just, I understand also the realities of the performance or lack thereof of my last two seasons. >> Yeah. >> I gotta earn my way onto this team. Bluejay said, great, you can battle with Spencer Horowitz. Like that can be the camp battle, right? As the lefty who starts occasionally at DH or first base, and I think for Votto it's more DH, or the lefty bat in a pinch hit late in a game, and we're not seeing Daniel Volkobock and him battle it out because Daniel Volkobock is signing on somewhere else. How's that guy trying to make a team? Now it does feel like reading the tea leaves here and hearing the explicit comments from Joey Votto who told, again, the Bluejay is that I get it. Like I need to prove myself, and that probably means in the minor leagues, that it does feel like Daniel Volkobock is making this team in that role, so it's season, and part of that is the performance that we've seen in spring, and that maybe that evolves over time. I also am a little curious as to what that role is exactly, but you do have a full-time DH in Justin Turner. Yeah, so this is what I wanted to ask you about is what do they need that position to be, and does that change the thinking process from anything other than who is the absolute best performer we can get in this role? Like how much does it, you know, Daniel Volkobock's not nothing in terms of his MLB career, but I don't think you can say he'd have the same impact in the clubhouse or provide any of that. Given what that role is and how minimal in theory it can be at times this year, how much does that affect the Votto's ability to kind of win that job? Yeah, it feels right now like it's very limited, because like I said, Justin Turner's the everyday DH right now. Now, could that change when Isaiah Kiner-Folefa is OPSing 550 in May? They're like, well, hey, hey, and Justin Turner, he's also a million years old, and he didn't play a ton of third base last year, but like we only got him on a one year deal. So if we run a minute of the ground into dust this year, what's the biggie? Can he play a serviceable third base without breaking all his bones and open up a DH opportunity? Okay, I could see that down the line. But yeah, as currently constructed, it's you get the occasional start a DH with like the couple of starts a month, I was going to say that that Justin Turner is not starting as your DH and late in games. If it's Isaiah Kiner-Folefa, his spot comes up in a key moment where you need to run. Can you hit one over the fence and say what you will about Joy Votto's season last year, and it wasn't a good one, but he had some bombs. Like for as poorly as he hit, the balls that he hit, a lot of them went over the fence considering the small sample. Now, that's the entirety of Daniel Vogelbach's career has been either I walk, I strike out or I hit home runs and he's hit some home runs in his day and age as well. The difference if you're just going to go buy like a deployment thing is, well, if you bring out a lefty to face Daniel Vogelbach, Daniel Vogelbach, it performs like you and I. Daniel Vogelbach cannot play baseball against left handed pitchers like it's just not happening. And Joey Votto, okay, while he's worse against, he's still like an 850 OPS career guy left handed pitching. If Joey Votto is some semblance of above average, Joey Votto, he is more match up proof. He's also as much as he's 40 years old. Yeah. I mean, it's kind of a six and one half dozen on the base paths. Yeah, I don't know where you're getting at there. I can see what's not true connecting, they're slow. You're pinch running for both guys and honestly, even at 40 years old, I feel more comfortable with Joey Votto at first base than Daniel Vogelbach, who's all his gloves have been taken away. Like all the teams the last couple of years are like, you didn't please don't. They even feel a little uncomfortable with batting clubs. They're like, all right. Don't get any ideas. The other thing about this is that just a couple more or a couple for beyond it is that if Votto, I don't know how this works. I don't know if this is like a transferable skill, but he should just be having, I don't know, Zoom meetings, one on one session, seances with Matt stairs, just trying to get a little bit of that pinch hit juju on him because that's what he was wanting for. And then the other thing with Daniel Vogelbach is we talk about him looking around at camp going, hold on a second. I thought this was my role and now you bring this guy in. This is also the only guy they could have brought in who would not be more of a, ah, the fans love this guy than Daniel Vogelbach. Like that is the teams not bring him in here for this. But if you're just looking at it from a PR perception, Daniel Vogelbach is your classic like, ah, look at this guy, I'm going to get frustrated if I'm super locked in. But when I'm not, it's like, ah, he swats bombs. He's a big fella. He came up to milkshake last year, Joey Votto is the one guy out there as Fringey DH camp invite type who immediately passes him on by fan favorite packing order, a hundred percent. So this, the, the comparison and I think it's a good one has been made to the Vlad senior signing by the Blue Jays, right? And the minor league deal. And you wonder how much of that had to do with the fact that, hey, they were working out at an international signing with his young son, who at 16 years old, didn't sign with the Toronto Blue Jays. True. And Vlad senior was coming off a year where he was, hmm, I was going to say more productive than Joey Votto last season, but he had a 733 OPS. Now he hit 290 and 145 games with the Orioles in 2011 before signing that minor league deal with the Blue Jays. But like, this guy's never took a walk and the power was, was supremely diminished at that time. And again, we're talking of a full time. Kind of exact opposite hitters. And he hit some bombs and he played well against, you know, the 19 year olds in Dunedin. But in eight games at AAA and the Pacific Coast League where like everything was a home run, he did only OPS 739. Now what can't happen and what won't happen is if Joey Votto is holding up his end of the bargain. Yeah. And he is producing the International League and also if people aren't aware of that league and how the stats have worked, although last year was a very elevated offensive environment in the international league, early parts of the season for that league, because it's outdoors and it's in Buffalo and it's April. Hard to carry. Yeah, it's hitting is tough early in the season. But if he's still producing in that environment, you cannot, you can't deny him even if Daniel Vogelbach is going ham. So that that is an interesting scenario to me. The other one, hey, I mentioned we could talk about the exit strategy here if it, because I think there had to have been a little bit of hesitancy from the Blue Jays in this respect that this is a guy who's a legend in this country already and going to go into the Hall of Fame and going to be in the conversation amongst the best Canadian baseball players of all time. Hey, do we want to bring this guy in and have to like unceremoniously wave goodbye to him? This does, I think, and part of it was the acknowledgement that we heard from Joey Votto over the weekend that he has to earn his way onto this team. If he goes to Buffalo and he stinks, he's not going to be happy about it. But I believe Joey Votto will be very accepting of, hey, man, they gave me a chance. Very few teams, if any, said they would even on a non roster camp invite minor league basis. I'm 40 years old, I still had an all time great career. And you know what? Even though I didn't get to wear a Blue Jays uniform at the major league level, it was an honor to be a part of this organization even as brief as it was and you could have his farewell press conference in Toronto. I do think there's like a graceful ending for Joey Votto if he can't hack it at 40 years old. Totally. The fact that it's a non, like it's a minor league camp invite, if they made him a part of this team, if he was one of the, it wouldn't have been the first piece of business. But if it shook him a different way, okay, then you have to go to the business of cutting him or designate him for a seminary, I don't know, you baseball nerds tell me what the right terminology is for all this stuff. But getting them out of here, they don't have to do that now. He is just, this thing will play itself out. He's going to be good enough that the team will have to call him up or he's going to be bad enough that it won't make any sense in the world. And that is unfortunately for Votto, it's like those are two totally fine paths for the Blue Jays. They would love this thing to work out swimmingly. But the fact that there's no world where, what are we going to do with them here? It does, it does kind of set it up seamlessly to work out one way or another, even if working out means he has his press conference and, you know, the mascot can be there and everything. And you can put the big picture that he posted on Twitter at him and his bib and it's all great. And what a way to go up if that's what it is. But it's entirely possible. I'm with you. I'm banking on that, not being the way it happens. I think he performs well enough at Triple A that he gets a sniff with this team and then we'll see what that means. All right, this conversation has been way too realistic before we ended. I do have to do like the, I have to tell you like the 1% quote of my brain for it. That's why I've been trying to lead you to this the whole time. I'm, I said it's realistic. Like I, I understand where Joey Votto's at. I've also watched him the last two years, right? And I understand that he took his time coming back from the shoulder surgery last year. But there's a non-zero possibility that Joey Votto can at least replicate what Brandon Belted for this team a season ago. Brandon Belted, this team's best hitter, like start to finish most consistent. And when he was out of the lineup, you're like, Oh my God, how are they going to score runs? That possibility exists. That Joey Votto is actually contributing at a high level and supplanting Justin Turner who's also at an elevated age and coming off a pretty good offensive season, but not overwhelming. And in a pretty good offensive environment, yes, I understand Joey Votto in Cincinnati. That's a band box as well. But like that, you have to be open to that possibility understanding that it's not the most likely, but it is definitely a possibility. I'm just happy for you, man. I really, it's exciting. I'm happy for you. To see at least in Buffalo, I'll be grabbing my tickets for bison's games if he plays there. I hope it goes better than the last time. If you take your kid, I hope it goes better than the last time you watch the sporting event there. Yeah, yeah. Maybe the Buffalo team could win though. That'd be cool. All right. When we come back, Gord Stellick as the fan morning show continues, Ben Annis-Frank gunning sports at 5.90 the fan.
