[MUSIC] >> 40 seconds on a chance there. [MUSIC] >> I mean really, the Leafs got taken down by Marcin who ends up scoring into the empty net. >> Yeah, I mean, he's obviously, once again, they're skinning and you know, and influenced the refs, so I think we just got to be. >> You know, composed and, you know, not kind of getting that, you know, bull [bleep] and just play hard and, you know, make them, you know, be effected. >> It's a world-class player, both at the ability and how he plays in the gamesmanship. And everything, it's world-class and been the league long enough as you can see. It gets calls, it's unbelievable, actually, how it goes, you know. >> We got to play through that stuff, I don't think there's another player in this series that gets away with the taken up to his legs the way that he does. If not one of the players in the series that gets away with that, but he does, it's an art and easily eat at it. [MUSIC] >> Fan, morning shows, 4.7.5. Night in the fan, Ben, and it's Brent Gunning. Good morning to you. >> Yeah, right, Trent, follow me. >> Yeah, yeah, yeah, bar, follow me. >> Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, sure, son, I was gonna say son's risen. I don't know about that, I can't see it from the angle I'm sitting at and who cares if it does? God, good morning, how are we all doing today? >> I'm fine. >> Yeah, I know, you didn't like that, I know you want me to be like, it's okay. >> No, no. >> I know, you don't need that, I need that. >> Why do you always have to like, you like, to pre-decide how you've reacted? >> Yeah, I told you, I am the, when someone tells me something, they need my opinion on it. And when I say something, they need my reaction to it. >> No, I'll tell you when you can give your opinion, starting now. Okay, so Leafs, game three, four to two, here's the reason why they lost game three, four to two. Well, I mean, primarily because now, okay, we're past the like two goals are fewer in a playoff game. We're now, three goals are fewer, ten consecutive playoff games, which is apparently an NHL record. I was not, I was not on alert for this, but now, but now it is, that's a record. They scored three goals once over that span. >> How many times would you be willing to be shut out in a regular season game? We're very proud of that record of like, oh, never shut out. It's like, I don't know, I'd take ten of them this year if you could just get five in a playoff game. >> No, no, no, that's, that's the new Raptors, at least one three-pointer aid and a NBA record consecutive games, which was a record they held for a while before they won anything. But now they won a championship, so that's behind us. All right, Leafs lose because of two things. Because they didn't get the superior goal-attending performance. >> Yep. >> And we can talk about Ilya Samsonov's performance because it was a wild game from him. >> Yep. >> And they lost definitively the special team's battle. If I told you going into the series that that was going to happen, you'd say, yeah, that sounds about right, no? >> Yeah, I was going to add one more thing in there. And it's not, no, it's actually not the thing you thought I was going to mention, because I think it's super tied to the second thing. It's a lack of dominant performance from star players. That was not as much on the menu. That was just as much a part of last night. But boy, is that tied part and parcel to the special teams. >> That's the power play, yeah. >> That's it, right? Because if those guys have a moment on the power play, it doesn't, well, I mean, it does matter what they do for the other 56 minutes of the game. But we'd certainly talk about it a lot less. Yeah, I mean, again, there's a million things I know you all know who I am. And you all know what I'm thinking about from last night's game. But in terms of what happened involved in the players in uniform, yeah, the goalie was great. And both of them were. >> Yeah. >> That was great last thing. >> Same for one. >> Yeah, but I think that he has given this team every bit good enough goal tending to win in this series if they have just a modicum of offensive success. >> He's playing well enough. >> He's playing well enough. >> As much as there was a question going into game two as to whether he would start game two, like those have been erased. Like that's, he now has all the leash of the entire series unless he entirely implodes. It's Ilya Sampson. >> And I don't even, well, I mean, not to derail the conversation, but like, let's say Saturday night, two bad ones going early and Joe Wall comes in and is fine. I don't know that that means you're definitively not going back to Sampson. I'm again, like you have to see how it plays out and Joe Wall and team response yada yada. But yeah, I think Sampson always earned himself a lot of leash. And just forget about that happening on a playoff series. Go back to December and tell yourself that that was going to be happening. It's like, right, leash because they're, he can run away and they don't care if he has as much leash as he wants because they're never going to pick it up. No, he has a lot of leash now because of the performance he's given him. But having said all that, and this, we haven't had the Freddy Anderson moment from Ilya Sampson obvious. So I'm not going to put them, put this on him. But much like Freddy Anderson, there were a lot of playoff series where you talked about how good Freddy was for the bulk of the series, but the other guy was better, always a better goalie on the other side of it. And I don't think you can hold the Ilya Sampson off accountable for that. But you can't look at anything other than swam and being forget the best goalie in the series. Obviously he's been the best player in this series far and away. Yeah, there's no question. We've done this before though, right? Like here's the thing. You run into good goalies. You don't get to the playoffs. You don't end up with home ice advantage, which is generally the case when Maple Leafs entered the playoffs save for last season in the series. They did eventually win against the Tampa Bay Lightning. You don't get here unless you got good goal attending. Yeah, they've faced a lot of Vesna winners. The guy that's backing up the guy that, my God, has to start on Saturday. It's hilarious that there's even a discussion that germs. You know what? I would just like to be on record. Jim Montgomery, if you're listening, I don't think you're man enough. Everyone, you have your plan. You're a Jack Adams winner. It's you're the defending coach of the year. And you have your plan to run all mark out there. And you're going to let people talk you. So I'd just like to go on record that I don't think Jim Montgomery's man enough to play all mark in game four. Yeah. I think he's plenty man enough, but that's about the only road I can see is like challenge, like direct challenge to him or like bet you won't. Otherwise, how can you go away from Swain? Honestly, if Jim Montgomery is threatening to start Lena Salmark in game four on Saturday. It's a fireball offense. How do you not? Like, you've got to throw your body in front of that. Like if you're Brad Marchand, you're like, what are you? What are you doing? Yeah, I only have so many kicks of the can at this thing. And he was great yesterday. And we can talk about the officiating. I'm going to take a couple of these kicks that Tyler Burtuzzi and no one's allowed to say anything about it. Yes. Am I shocked that you said the other thing that wasn't mentioned was the officiating? I am. Yeah, I know. I mean, what does it matter? What does it matter if you're missing a few extra power play opportunities? If you're going to look like the majority of the power play opportunities look like? I mean, that's yeah, they're, I don't want to do this now. Do we not? Yeah, the special teams, I think it's two things. So, okay, we did the Samson off thing. We'll come back around to it. Honestly, one of my early notes was, yeah, when the Leafs are leading one, nothing. And Samson was making the saves he was making right out of the gates. The Simone Benoit Holy cow, do you look like you're in over your head in the first couple of seconds of that game? Everybody did. Yeah, like just a scramble drill. Like no one had ever played hockey before in the first 30 seconds of the hockey game. And then Simone Benoit was like, you think you don't know how to play hockey. Check this out. This is the road to 10.9. This is the road. I'm going to glass right in the playoffs. Like just nobody within 20 feet of him. It's like these guys can't turn me into the next Larry Murphy. If I'm handing out souvenirs, here you go. Shashimi eaters. Into the into the crowd. And then two minute panel day and you're like, Oh, well, this is this is going to be a devastating blow to this team who's riding a four consecutive home playoff loss streak. But not only do they kill it off, Ilya Samsonov with one 10 Beller, a couple of great saves. But the one where at the time you're like, Oh, did he make the save? Did that was that? How good a save was that he actually adjusts to the tip as it's coming in on his pad. Unbelievable. And you're like, that's a momentum swing. Let's take the one nothing lead. He's he's stopping short handed breakaways. And at that moment, I'm telling you, I wrote it down. And maybe it's the reason why it didn't come to fruition. Obviously don't assume a good thing will happen. That kind of performance that you were getting from Ilya Samsonov before the Trent Frederick goal was the reason to believe anything's possible with this leaves team. Yeah, Samsonov is going to until there is an event, and I'm not saying that it can't happen, but until there is an event that knocks him out of this. This is the level of goaltending you're going to get familiar Samsonov. We know what it looks like when it's really bad. And again, I'm not saying you're never going to see that again in these playoffs, maybe not in his career. Almost certainly you will see it again. But we also know what it looks like when this guy's going well. And this isn't something that the least found at the tail end of the regular seat. This is the guy they saw for long chunks of last season. This is the guy that was good enough throughout long chunks of that first round series against Tampa Bay and was good enough against Florida. Well, I mean, the team in front of them wasn't, but he was good enough against Florida until he got injured there. So I think that, yeah, the Samsonov part of it, you mentioned the the breakaway save on the shorthand error. I mean, burns are shorthand at least on the power play. Those are the little checkpoint moments that that would have been a backbreaker to give up that goal there. And could you kill them for it? No, but you need to make that save. You needed to come up with a stop in that moment he was able to. Yeah, he was. And he wasn't able to stop the trend for Edward Shaw, which is a bad goal. It's a bad goal. There's just there's no debate about it. Now is it? We'll talk to Devin Dubna later on. I want to get his opinion on this. Like how distracting it might be to have what was happening at Santa Rice between Tyler Bertuzzi and Brad Marsh and, and honestly, if we're going to break down the officiating, which we are, and I later, and I know I'm kind of going all over the place, but we're still kind of focusing on the goal tending here. But if you're going to quibble about something about that play, it's like the thing 10 seconds earlier where Charlie McAvoy just like absolutely suplexes Austin Matthews behind the net. No, it's actually, believe it or not, it's actually all three. Like, I'm sorry. No, like, okay, we're doing it here. I didn't want to lead with this. We're here. The idea that the Leafs getting a makeup call after that happened is like giving a one, a no armed man a spoon to eat his soup with. It's like, all right, Leafs, here's your makeup call. You're going on the power play. We all know how well that's going to work out for you that the Leafs were not undone in that game because they didn't get enough calls from the officials. I actually thought they got a pretty good whistle earlier. The cross checking penalty early on in that game, soft, soft, soft, soft, should not be called. So I can't sit here and say that it was they were out for the, but to miss a call so egregiously in that spot when it's, and this is the part that drives me the most nuts about it, is that all we ever hear is, hey, don't make these officials look bad, man. Don't make them look bad. Brad Marshaan starts every day saying I'm going to make you look bad. And then for some reason, the whole league has to line up to shake my hand at how good I am, tell me how good I am about it. Brad Marshaan highlights there looking at the refs. Go ahead. My guy's going in on a mini breakaway here. I dare you to call it. You're not going to. You're not going to. And it's that guy that's allowed to be on the other side of it when he was caught diving in the last game. Like we can all say it should have been a slashing penalty on Tyler Burtuzzi and it should have. But he was also like, just go look at the video. He literally grabs the wrong leg when he tries to sell the call. Why are the refs not bothered by that? Why are they? Did they not take more offense to him making them look bad? Quite frankly, all the time. So it's all egregious. And that's the reason why it kills you is not that the Leafs didn't get their makeup call. They got it immediately, which tells you how egregious it was. But for a team that struggles to score on the power play, and I'm not saying the Leafs should be officiated differently because they struggle to score on the power play. But to give the team another goal or not negate one, and again, it's all tied together and this shouldn't be. But the idea that the Justin Hall pick penalty just had to be called because you can't let a goal be called in that instance when you open it up. But I can watch Bradmarshan trip a guy right in front of the refs twice as a player walks in. It's infuriating. It's not the reason they lost. But I also have such little time. And maybe we'll do later today the idea of what's fair to expect from the crowd in these games. I hate people getting on the fans for being upset about the officiating in that moment. It didn't cost them the game, but it a thousand percent cost them that goal. If they just call and call it on Burt too, make it an even up. But to not call it in that moment and it literally leads directly to a Boston goal because it's not blowing dead. And then following it up with an immediate makeup call because you know how egregious that was, you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube. You can't take that goal off the board unless Chantavara scores it in Justin Hall with the one committing the penalty. Then you have to take it off the board. Infuriating not the reason they lost could pick in a million other faults of this team. But I loathe the idea that people in this market are crying about the refs all the time. That's a massive swing point in the game. And again, I do think it's all kind of tied part and parcel with the fans and the nervous energy. When things just always go wrong, you expect them to. And maybe I shouldn't draw a through line to the Justin Hall pick penalty three years ago. But you know what else? There's people in that building watching that game when they see the refs screw up in that moment and they're drawing a through line to Gary Frazier and Doug Gilmore in 92. It is just it's not the only thing. But heartbreak and pain and misery is what ties this fan base together. It is the core tenant of it. Unfortunately. And to have that happen in that moment infuriating and to have them make it up immediately so they to to almost admit to everyone they know who how bad that was in fury almost worse. officiating was bad yesterday in the hockey game. The officiating is almost always bad in just about every postseason game you're going to get like the NHL officials not good. Sorry NHL officials. You know what officials in all sports and part of it is that we we all know too much and we all are able to break down the plays in replay and then cultivate our own replays and look that replays about the replays and like different. We have access to all of it. So in a way it's not fair. It's not the same scrutiny that an official would get even 10 years ago, right? But it's bad that that was bad in the grand scheme of things though. Yeah. Okay. That's a goal that can't go in. Trent Frederick goal is a bad goal. Yep. On Elias Sam Johnson. He's a little distracted. Yeah. Like do you not? I mean I in the moment when it's happening and you hear it being described by Chris Cuthbert you're like what is happening as the play is going down the ice and then it's only upon replay do we see that it's you know it's just an absolute melee at center ice between those two again following what I think is a more clear egregious penalty by Charlie McAvoy taking down the best player in the series. You're mad to call that too. Behind the net but here's the scenario Brent. Lease had gotten the majority of the power plays to that point. I believe it was 3-1 power play opportunities in favor of them. They were leading the hockey game one nothing. Yeah. So you can't possibly you can't possibly put them on the power play again. Yeah. NHL officiating is all bad. Yeah. Maybe so the Blue Jays though right now where the margins are so thin because they can't score because this team that is the second highest scoring team in the National Hockey League during the regular season that had a power play that once upon a time was the second best and the NHL faltered all the way down to seventh overall in the regular season. Now all of a sudden is clicking it less than 10% in the postseason. You got to score on one of those five power play opportunities. To me they're just two different conversations like I agree if we're going to do the Blue Jays analogy though that Marchan Bertuzzi is not getting squeezed on the edges in a 1-1 count. That's like calling strike three at a ball at his head like it is that is so egregious and it had such a swingpoint moment in the game. And again if we want to have a conversation and we will we'll talk about all the elements of this. The Lease power play is the chief reason they lost that game and its complete ability to do anything. It's not the draft. Jeremy Swamin. They didn't. Sure. And maybe they're related. I think they're completely related. Well let me speak in one more quick one. Sure. Well we're doing this. It's like also definitive or not. It's like the guy might have put his hand on the puck in the crease during a penalty and it's like oh gee maybe that would have helped you know like foster things along a little more. But to your point like the Leafs they have more power plays in Boston so you couldn't possibly assume they did anything wrong in that spot. Yeah. I just I don't know so it's it's true. Maple Leafs there were some calls that didn't go in their favor. I think that they got the the majority of the calls. I think the more egregious one is the one where this team who has been had some pretty spectacular six on five moments during the regular season. Had some pretty spectacular six on five moments in the postseason last year. To me all of it. That's the one that's the most egregious. The the John Tavares having his sticks stuck between a Bruins players leg and who's actively squeezing his legs together to hold the stick there called for holding which effectively ends the hockey game. Yep. And he was holding them. That's fine. Yeah to me that's that has a more direct impact. I understand yeah the goal goes in. That's the thing. It's if that let I and maybe this goes to the like I won't I won't say hobby horse but it's like I think we all try to have like it's funny to put it this way. But it's like we all try to have like a take about the game. That's not just like a big picture thought. We try to look at him and the thing I've been hammering home and I will continue to in these playoffs is Flashpoint moments Flashpoint moments and the least didn't lose that game because of the refs. But if that Trent Frederical just if the whistle blows forget Samson Samsonov doesn't make the save but the whistle blows. Is that not a completely different hockey game and they don't give up that goal there and they go into the second period and it's not one one but it's one nothing and it's entirely possible the rest of the game plays out in a somewhat similar manner. But you can't tell me that giving up that weird quite frankly yes bad goal at that moment didn't suck some of the wins out of their sales or affect the game one way or another. Of course it did. So yes the power play yes but it's that one Flashpoint moment. How different does the game play out and we could do this with a million things. How different does the game play out if Helia Samsonov doesn't make that save on the shorthand a breakaway for Boston much differently but he did. I just don't know what to do with the officiating thing it's like yeah well okay the officiating was bad it's generally bad you can't count on it not being bad it's likely to be bad I mean maybe you I guess what you're hoping for is that it's bad in a more least positive direction. No let me put that that Brad Marchon now through three games has not taken a single penalty or has not received a single penalty minute in these three games that maybe that's you know maybe and Sheldon Keith did mention Brad Marchon's ability to toe the line and evade the officials. Okay I want to talk about that like does he does he have some special ability to toe the line or is it a thing where he gets the benefit of the doubt and then we talk about that special ability that he possesses and I'm not blind to the reality that guy comes in he's a young Bruin on the 2011 team he's in the playoffs all the time he's looked at as a winner guy we look at him differently I'm not blind to that reality I would just like someone to bluntly state it we talk about this ban he's got he's got such an ability to walk the line yeah he plays the game to a different standard he's officiated in a different way you know it'd be pretty good at walking the line in that regard Michael Bunting would have been pretty good at walking the line in that regard if you just never called it for him but it was actually the opposite where he was seen to be making the rest look bad and you're hurting the refs image well then we saw what happened the other way why does it never ever go the other way I understand that Sheldon Keith I don't want him whining and crying I think that's the right tack to take you take that tack publicly and then tell you go tell to a living or whoever to argue with the series of fish yeah I mean you have to make it you have to make it known that you your displays which he did I think in the comments that we played off the top of the show like we all understand what he's saying that it's like hey way to go brad marsh and you're fooling the officials officials you hearing this like he's fooling you and you hope that it things turn out a little bit differently on saturday do i know what i think is going to happen i think they're going to ding him for one inconsequential penalty early on in that game four on saturday and then that'll be the last penalty we see called on him the rest of the series like you know that's how it's going to go i'm just saying the rest of the series would be quite a thing why why he's gone three games he's he's he has committed infractions in every single game and he's made it nearly half the series so why would it be so strange to think he could do the exact same thing again uh okay so that's certainly a part of it the officiating again i don't know what to do with that i would just like it on record that when i was putting together my order of topics i literally did everything and then said okay officiating is what i wrote down in my notes i wanted to just like i wanted on record that i did not think that that was the most pertinent thing to start with but it does have a it it dips its toe into every other discussion so it's hard to avoid it okay so leaves had just factually the majority of the power play opportunities they they had uh not quite ten minutes because one of those power plays was interrupted and yeah the Bruins scored one of their two power play goals the second one doesn't count because it's into an empty net they had one power play goal they gave they were one for two on the power play they weren't two for three okay there were one for two yep on the power play in an abbreviated power play just didn't even need the full two minutes imagine that in in the second period after a four on four reliefs like felt like they were already killing the penalty idea i wanted nothing to do with that four on four to start the the third period anyways leaves go all for five on the power play yep the first power play opportunity in the first like 30 seconds it was revelatory and of course they give up short ahead of breakaway yeah but it was like oh my god there it is yep and there were like few and far between moments Jeremy Swamin had an incredible sequence later on in the hockey game on the power play but this this is the same old saw for this this team we've we've done this time and time again the power play clicking at under 10 percent the one time they've gotten something close to their regular season level of power play production last postseason where they want a freaking round like it's it's hard to look at anything else other than the team that is supposed to score the goals and before they started adding physically tough players right their toughness was the five on four man you you're soft you're soft in that area because it's not just it appears in the postseason it trends in that direction every regular season and it is okay sometimes you run into a hot goalie again that's where they live is in the postseason it doesn't matter when you have the game breaking talent that you have you have to score on the power play this team's just incapable of doing it in the postseason yeah it's it has been the Sahara when you've looked for them to like it has just been drought city when you've looked for them to have the big kind of impact momentum swinging goal the worst part of this is we all saw the writing on the wall heading into the series there's not a person that cared about thought about you know analyze this team that didn't see this being among the one or two reasons they were going to lose the series yeah i think the other thing that is frustrating regarding it is i mean we had the math use game in game two he's allowed to have back-to-back games by the way he could have it could have popped a little more flat last night certainly but yeah it wasn't actively good yesterday but barely under the weather as well so this is what i i don't mean this with him if you're playing you're you're good to go and i mean this from rnner as well but how much game breaking talent do they have right now well even the vendor's not there this is a guy again like 10th 10th in the nhl and scoring this year was second on the team and power play points austin bathy's i'm like he's playing i'm not going to sit here and give him like oh he's sick but he's clearly a slightly diminished version himself but he's also never been a power play merchant he scores a lot there because he scores a lot everywhere but it's never been that's been where he's so dominant and then marner i mean we had all the conversation yesterday he had the moment setting up the ny's goal but you haven't really seen it popping from him in this exact moment how much elite talent do they have right now uh this isn't me making excuses for him i'm like it's like you're on a whole john Tavares feet to the fire go for it mitch marner and i'm goal listening yesterday's show but are we when we think of the high powered high flying Leafs it's like i think we all have to recover what john Tavares is 65 point jt like i'm so you're it's coming down to one player because this is like i said this is the second high scoring team during the regular season they're missing William kneelander and that sucks like that's that's a huge huge loss and i don't this isn't me going toronto sun this is me just having the conversation are they they're not missing mitch marner he's playing he set up the goal uh but this is not 10 point nine million dollar mitch marner uh huh i like whether he's dealing with something with the high ankle sprain never really healed up whatever it's clearly not that player you just see the lack of of jump the ability to i mean he always seem to find two or three moments to just kind of shake loose and have all this time in space when he's at his best when was the last time you saw that for him okay if this isn't enough and like you said if you're on the ice if you're playing you're good enough yep right we can evaluate you yeah you maybe at the end of the post season we can say well do you all right maybe you weren't at 100 but who's at a hundred percent this point the in the post season yep and certainly by the end of the post season you'd be even more banged up if you were lucky enough to get that far if this isn't enough if the toronto maple is do not have enough then at the salary cap limit after the acquisitions last off season and bradcher living having to catch up to speed like very quickly but all the additions made with the express purpose of increasing the scoring potential on this hockey team if this isn't enough oh you you gotta you gotta have major questions and major conversations about the entire makeup of this hockey team and you guys like almost start from scratch you can't because you have guys under contract and some people who are running out of their contract but i have full no move clauses if this isn't enough i i don't know what to tell you well i was just thinking about it because the idea heading into this series and this was more when we thought they were playing florida than boston but the idea should still hold was that it didn't need to all be on your 10 million plus dollar forwards you should put a lot on them and you should ask a lot on them but the idea was that there was going to be more secondary scoring now the least i'm losing the series because bobby mcman hasn't played a game in it yet but that's a that's a piece like part of the reason we had the confidence in that was bobby mcbann brituzzi and told me they've both had their moments in the series brituzzi scores last time they both scored but they they largely go how austin mattheus goes right like i think it's pretty safe to say and then you look at the you look at the new lander marner i mean new lander hasn't played at all marner clearly not the best version of himself and again i'm not saying that to be an excuse it's just all of the things that you thought in terms of offense from this team all the reasons why you had yourself feeling good and flying high they've kind of dropped by the wayside even you know your yarn crock homburg people and you know include myself saying hey that's a third line yeah but you feel differently when kneel enders on the right side of that line drive in the bus and creating things then when it's nick robertson and even nick robertson he's a guy you think can come in off the bench or sorry out of the press box and score a big goal for you but not if he's asked to drive the line generally speaking he's kind of thrived when there's been another skilish player around him sorry homburg and yarn crock that's not exactly you so it is amazing what a house of cards this leash kind of forward depth seems to be you take one i got the way i look at it is like you take one and a half pieces out it's like kneel enders not there and i guess two two full pieces it's like mcman's a half piece marner is playing but he's not driving it the way you need him to you're kind of missing a half piece there and then you're missing kneelander it is amazing what a what a house of cards it does kind of look like i mean okay could it be better at five on five sure sure it could be better i think it's okay at five on five it's hard for me not to look at the reason the maple leafs are down to one in the series is one because penalty kill is no good which i mean that has nothing to do with what we're talking about here zero but the power play specifically hasn't been good enough you get five power play opportunities you got to score at least once yeah if not twice and that's a different i mean it's a different conversation we're having about the hockey game i mean then you're you're scoring four goals minimum three right and i guess the record the NHL record is ten games with three or fewer couple of times finally you break free of that that old saw again go back to the first round series against the Tampa Bay Lightning finally look like they're capable cells at the five on four it's the first series they win in almost 20 years that's i mean and okay i can hear you on kneelander helps it but this is no no no i i think the kneelander helps it sure no i don't want to make this about one guy but it's like who's supposed to be the engine of the power play awesome after you supposed to rip it home sure but like the least power play has never hummed along all we all we ever try to do is kick Morgan Riley off of it okay like even when he's there unless it's playoff mo all we're trying to do is eh can we get a little grin in there so it's he's not supposed to be the straw that stirs the drink there we know what john Tavares is he's supposed to win his draws be in front win puck battles and yeah you can hold him accountable as well but john Tavares is not supposed to be the driver so it's supposed to be the engine of the least power play it's two guys math he's supposed to rip at home marner's supposed to be magic on the half wall and neither of those things is happening in the in the on the power play in this series i think math use gets like a stay of execution for lack of a better term because of the full body of work and we're literally a game removed from him putting the team on his back but we're talking about the power play it's those two guys man it is oh there's just no question yeah i know i i wasn't saying that like you're gonna be like no it's peruses fault no okay but so so then i mean that's what they played and especially when you get a delay like they had on the one power play where they they're out there for the whole two minutes it's it that's what we're talking about yeah yeah you're right like substitute power play for star players yeah it's the same conversation it's the that's the thing and it's like you can talk about it being hard to score in the post-season especially five on five because holy cow and like the hits the NHL record like most hits through 40 minutes in a post-season game and what like eight years and everybody on the ice having at least one hit the last guy the first period for a scoreless hockey game was electric what an electric electric hockey game but yeah i know it's very difficult to score five on five in the post-season because there's just not a lot of room out there you know there's a lot of room when you remove one player from the ice right like when the opposition has factually one fewer player mm-hmm one less player than you you can move it around you can do your skilly dipsy doodle whoopty doos right you can do that that's like that's your time do your thing and then have the puck end up in the back of the net haven't been able to do it that's that's you're supposed to be your biggest weapon it's supposed to negate everything you haven't been able to do it it's the number one failing over the the last decade of of Leafs teams in the post-season looking at the power play time on ice last night i do wonder then like do you need to find more time for max domi i don't know that he needs to come necessarily at the expense of Mitch marner but domi is a guy who has shown some ability to create he i mean he hasn't done on the power play because he got no time there but i mean we've all heard the stat banded over what is it's like only Conor McDavid had more five on five assists than max domi this year whatever the number was domi shown an ability to create the only forwards that actually played on the power play last night that had less time than him or David camp for 28 seconds and then i don't know i don't know how he did it i hope no one tells keef that this happened but punches Holmberg snuck out there for five seconds of a power play as well but i do go there of again not to absolve Mitch marner and austin matthews of the pressure that they kind of rightfully should have to produce at that spot but domi's been a guy who has shown chemistry but the guy who's most likely to score he did it's not that he didn't play he got over two minutes power play time last night so it's not say they're not using him in that regard but that's he it's not an easy fix because i don't i think the easy fix is like going like you know like jeremy swam and falling in a in a pit somewhere or something that's the easy fix but i would like to see domi get more kind of run out there something like you got to do something it's just hard for me to imagine so what like you sub out burtusi for domi i mean this is all going to change we assume on saturday now my my take of willy kneel ended not playing in the rest of the post season it seems like less and less likely because everybody seems of the opinion now with the extra day off and sorry to jim Montgomery it happens in the beautiful city of toronto you have to stay at the ritz colton for an extra day poor how how devastating that is love his family um that's uh will you kneel that'll allow willy kneelander to reenter the fray and out goes tylor burtusi i mean the the thing is that loaded up forward power play has largely until mitch marner got hurt down the stretch of the high ankle spry but we got a large sample of that it's still no good it's not good enough and do you if you're Sheldon kief say i don't care if like yeah obviously this team is going to be evaluated on the the performance of the star players and it it makes like i can't run a number one power play unit without the 40 million dollars worth the forward but it hasn't worked like how much of a sample do we need that it has not been effective and you just say what the hell i like i don't care like austin mattes you got to stand the number one power play unit because you've scored 70 goals over the the regular season the post season but somebody else like just and maybe split it up maybe that's how you solve it is that you just you you separate the forwards in the two units and you run more of a 60 minute or 60 second 60 second power play unit the the fact that we've got perilously little personnel change on the five on four this season it being as ineffective as it has has i mean it's been a little bit mind boggling not it's not mind boggling because those guys are getting paid the money they're getting paid to score the power play and we've seen it at times be super effective but it's now like what three months since it's been really good what's mind boggling to me is that we can be correct to talk about the seventh best power play in the NHL this way yeah seventh best no but they've been one of the worst for like the last month and a half right and then they also had the month of february where they were 50% and nobody could keep them at that is i only say that to say that this is not a personnel issue this is a things get gummed up things get static they have the there's no world where it's an issue of not having the right lever to pull and again this is like the conversations we have all the time about the lines it's so bogged down to like this is the this is the number one line of the toronto mate beliefs etch it into stone no it's this is the number one line of the toronto mate beliefs right now and in a week maybe it's the same in a week maybe it's different that's the exact same way the power play should operate the other part of this as well and you know like i don't want to make this all about one guy but if we're talking about moving people around he's a big part of it is that i think they're so hesitant to let's say it is a splitting up of the units and you're you know you're splitting matthews and marner that's as easy to say okay one gets one one gets the other do you the power play in theory is supposed to be where marner's able to drive this confidence from this is clearly a player who is i'm not saying it's like confidence is shaken but you know we saw the cover of the paper we've seen how he's played through the first three games of this it'd be hard to say it'd be at an all-time high right now i think there is such an element of not wanting and it's you have to coach different players in different ways i think if this was william kneelander going through this exact same thing shelving key for just put him where he feels he needs to put him because kneelander's been adamant about hey do that with me it doesn't affect me or i actually kind of need it sometimes i don't think that's the case with this player i was a very disappointing loss with toronto mate beliefs agreed that was a lot of talking to say that uh yeah i mean series isn't over by any stretch of the imagination um but yeah to to to go down two games to one a very winnable hockey game when you take the lead when you do all the right things early in the game to get the crowd on your side and then for it to disappear and we'll have that conversation later on as well i mean just like the referee is like i don't know what you're supposed to do about it like it's just you can talk about it and if being an impact maybe maybe not on the product on the ice but it's like okay that's an observation i suppose but it's not it's not something that there's like a cure all for or even a resolution for could go full balmer he just like you better earn these seats on the wall okay i mean we'll have that conversation later on uh we'll talk a little blue jays though next as uh addison barger makes his debut i was in a vedful one it's like an error in left field seems so quaint after everything we've talked about here all right no do they score it as an error who knows uh latin more next as the fan morning show continues ben and sprent gunning sportsnet five ninety the fan hey it's aelish for a fire and i'm just in cuddford 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 pre-game six p.m. weekdays on sportsnet sportsnet five ninety the fan and wherever you get your podcasts fan morning show sportsnet five ninety the fan man and sprent gunning blue jays lose in kansas city three to two yesterday looking for the series split this afternoon against the royals they didn't play perfectly shame on them shame for shame they have to play absolutely perfectly defensively to win baseball games because now 16 games in a row without more than five runs that's a lot it's also the six fewest runs in franchise history that they've scored in over the course of the first 25 games of a season it's not ideal okay it's not what you want i will say at a certain point the the top three dudes in the order and maybe starting to happen with george springer his home run yesterday to straightaway centerfield which i didn't realize was possible in that ball park because there are a couple of balls hit really really hard one off the bat of daniel vogelbach another off the bat of adison bargeard which was almost 400 feet to straightaway's centerfield that is a difficult ball park to hit a home run in i didn't know where you're back the polo grounds uh george springer capable of doing it though but uh not quite enough in a one-run loss barge or those that the lead item because he makes his major league debut after kevin kiermeyer hits the i l seem like the clear and obvious choice uh because he's a left-handed hitter because he's an out fielder um it would have been a relevance martinez i suppose if there was a need on the infield there isn't an adison bargeard can play third base as well it is hilarious and he's played the outfield like i said it is hilarious that this guy who's played five times in right field this season literally enters the major leagues of baseball and upon having a conversation with the media for the first time is like uh oh left field yeah no i never played that in any level of baseball now left field right field you would generally think day what's the difference there is i like a sizable difference and i think i'm a one ball that he missed which was not an error the error was trying to collect the ball on the warning track does not end up in an uh unearned run but that's a pretty crucial like dalton varsha playing left field blue jays might win that game uh scoring just two runs but yeah it's hilarious that you're asking this guy on according to him 20 minutes sleep amazing to play a position he's never played at any level of baseball and misplay is a ball it's just a difficult chance and it's left field and again i keep saying like adam lens played out there edwin and karnass you know when he's played left field there've been some statues out there yeah yeah and he makes a great play later on in the ball game like he's capable he's a good athletic kid but it's hilarious yeah uh hey here be the power source for a team that has no power also go out there kid and play a position you've never played in your life yeah uh it's fun stuff yeah and you know it's just like the way the ball spins on you left handed hit or right handed hitter so you're just kind of backwards right is the way you're doing it uh just copy paste all conversations we've had about tj brodie playing the right side to right and left field there it's like yeah it's not impossible it's just backwards and harder yeah and yeah the other funny thing about it is how you know not everybody has as eventful uh first game is him where he like everything he hits is at least like 90 miles an hour off the barrel he smokes the pitcher yeah but that thing does happen so often in baseball where the ball just finds you it happened last year with matt chamen where the ball found him in that he was up at the plate every time there was a runner on base he's like hi i don't want to be here can we just skip my turn please but somehow found a way for bargeard to be in that spot and that again that's a tough play like you're to your point he rightfully so gets charged with the air not on not making the catch but bumbling the ball with the track that is a tough play but it's just this is the it's just a tale as old as time you put a guy in his body's not supposed to be in or you put a rookie in a in a game hoping okay we can ease him in here it always finds a way i'm curious to see how he looks though because this guy you mentioned at the exit velocity on yeah some of those at bats i mean getting the two strikes and still getting a piece of the ball and he looks very hitarish to me uh a guy that's i a guy that's taken his fair share of walks uh with the bisons this season it's from the correct side of the plate for this team and the the left side not the right side he correct the correct side of the plate good good job um he's got the power potential which we almost saw again boy and this blue j's team has seen like over the last 10 15 years some incredible debuts couple of guys come to mind obviously from last season davis shiniter at fenway park but like yeah go back to jp errant cebia allak manoa also his debut at yankie stadium if we're going to go pitching side of things kind of had a feeling that like yesterday might have been another one of those with uh with adison bargeard no i i'm i'm intrigued to see what he provides considering what he's done every healthy season he's had in professional baseball last year he wasn't fully healthy yeah and it's a he's in a he's actually in a perfect spot where that if he performs there's a role for him there's a job ish to be one but because of how he's come up like this isn't even a Ralphus martina is coming up where you're going all right bombs let's go i've seen it i've seen the clips bargeard feels like he's in a sweet spot is a rookie where it's not that you expect nothing from him but he can just kind of go be one of these faceless men in the bottom third of the order and it's hard i mean you do anything you look like you're really succeeding the way the bottom third of this order has has hit for this team this year so i think that also we talk a lot about expectations and what guys come up with he seems like he's in the sweet spot to be able to thrive with there are people intrigued by him but i think it's that it's a there's trepidation to be anything more than that because because of what he is is a prospect uh so budgie is one game over 500 still mmm this is not going to be a good offensive team it's going to be better than this i would think i mean maybe not maybe they are a bottom five offense in all of major league baseball maybe boba shet's going to have the worst offensive year of his entire career i'm done thinking like i'm done doubting this guy so i i don't think that's going to happen maybe Vladimir Guerrero junior but like last year wasn't the low point of his career i tend to think it is closer to the low point and then he's going to be better i mean i i think john should i just kind of write when he says yeah it's you know we're not hitting yet we're still like kind of hanging in there record wise like if this is if this is the low point of the offense we're like everybody outside of dalton varsha who was on base again three times yesterday and like i said i don't know why you'd pitch to the guy he takes two walks yesterday like why would you ever pitch to dalton varsha right now the way the rest of this blue j's lineup is is constructed it's dalton varsha it's just in turn or that it's who else like maybe maybe now george springer's hot after a couple of hits uh including a home run but those are the two guys that's it there's there's nobody else on this team that's hitting and still they find themselves the game over 500 thanks to the incredible starting uh pitching that they've gotten included in that was yareo rodriguez is i think like pretty respectable forendings of work yeah i i don't think this is going to be a bottom five offense in baseball but i have zero problem seeing it being a bottom 10 one uh throughout the season you're right with bachette like i expect him to turn it around i think Vladi Vladi's gonna be a streaky player i think we're gonna see times where we have the conversation of oh do we need to reset expectations or what's fair of Vlad and the new kind of come crashing back down to earth i expect there to be two or three kind of peaks and valleys with him this year in that regard and then i think springer and turner you know turner a little more consistent springer can kind of go back in the time machine and find it i do think they're really gonna struggle this year not quite to this extent else i don't think this is i'm not saying he's gonna revert back to what he was last year but it's like this is the peak of dalton varsho which you're seeing from him right now like there's gonna be i think yeah some regression to the mean or again if he's this he's just an mvp candidate and then good job you've traded marino for an mvp candidate we've got to give you nothing but plot it's there i don't think they did that i could be wrong i don't think they did that no i think it's possible the dalton varsho is this as an ops over 800 on the strength of a bunch of home runs um he's taken a few more walks recently i think that's more as a result of the rest of this lineup being as inept as it looks and the opposing game plan being like don't give him anything to hit because he's like the only guy that can hurt you but yeah he's a it's if he's got an ops over 800 and playing the defense that he's capable of playing and especially now that he's the center fielder every single day pencil is named into the lineup until kevin kiermeyer returns and even when kevin kiermeyer returns if adison barger's hitting like maybe kevin kiermeyer's the fourth outfielder on this team like maybe we're not seeing him nearly every day which kind of i thought was the ideal scenario for him when he was signed last season and he his offense just required him to be playing every single day uh anyways uh before taking a break also uh allak minoa we were doing this like start by start in the minor leagues for him but after a very good start and another very bad one three inning six or and run seven hits four walks five strikeouts but a couple of home runs uh and it's noted that that happens on the same day that yari el Rodriguez has like another very again respectable start this guy's not stretched out he's not gonna give you a hundred pitches he's not gonna go deep into ball games but yeah him and bowden frances as like a combined fifth starter on this team it's been more than effective and it's changed the outlook for allak minoa and from the comments that he's given us i would think his mentality is like i just have to be healthy and and prove that i can throw a hundred pitches and i'm back in the major leagues i i don't think that's the case man if this continues at this rate 30 days we're gonna lapse on this rehab assignment yeah and you're gonna be optioned back down to triple a that's what performance should indicate i just have been reading the tea leaves of how much a part of the team he feels like and maybe i'm maybe i'm wrong to do that but it just it seems like it's going to be a pretty big kick in the shins for you know let's be honest he'll feel it somewhere else but i'll say shins because it's it's not yet seven in the morning that when if he is optioned and he's no longer on this team he certainly feels like a part of this team a part of the furniture when you see him and and obviously wasn't there yesterday was performing but he has been with the team so yeah i think that's the way it's trending i think that's the way you should do it i also think it's far from a certainty that that's the way it plays out also uh the finale of this four game series of this afternoon two ten first pitch on sports net sports net five ninety the fan hose burrios trying to run his record to five and i'll keep that under uh ira under one against kohl ragan's going for the kansas city royals all right sounds like a ballplayer got to say kohl ragan's sounds like a ballplayer it's good ballplayer name all right good hockey name next justin born of real kipper and born as the fan morning show continues ben and s friend counting sports net five ninety the fan
