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add free episodes and much much more you get

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to support this podcast all offseason long as we

0:39

continue to talk about the New York Rangers Actually,

0:41

one of our bsbot is the one we

0:43

did last week on the urtemy Panarin

0:45

news that broke on Thursday is now free

0:47

on our patreon We covered a little

0:49

bit on this podcast. It's a very

0:51

long podcast, but we did that podcast.

0:53

I think I don't know Three

0:55

hours after the news broke, we kind of

0:57

tried to break it down as evenly as possible

1:00

as best as we can as we're not journalists

1:02

and we're just fans of the team. So

1:04

that's fun. So if you want to listen to

1:06

the 30 minute reaction and kind of break down

1:08

of that whole situation, it is on our Patreon.

1:10

It is, we switched it to the free

1:12

so you can check it out there. But

1:15

on today's episode, we have our friend Joe

1:17

Fortunato and we talk about all the quotes

1:19

from the end of the year, Sam

1:22

Rosen and boy. The season's over and

1:24

it's time to start anew, as

1:26

many would say, with an offseason

1:28

that should be full of peril. And

1:30

without further ado, here's Marc Messier. Hi

1:33

everybody, it's Mark Messier and you're listening

1:35

to Blue Shirt's Breakway, the number one

1:37

range of podcasts. Welcome

1:55

breakaway. I am your host and I'm here

1:57

with my co -host Greg Kaplan We are

1:59

doing exit interviews the season is

2:02

over Sam Rosa no

2:04

longer the announcer Gregory say

2:06

hello That's of one for straight

2:08

we swept the Cardinals do you

2:10

want to do I saw this

2:12

happening yesterday Ryan and I clocked

2:14

it what I clocked it hold

2:16

on hold on I saw a

2:18

number of met fans doing the

2:20

1994 New York Rangers shit because

2:23

This 9 -in -1 start, the Mets have

2:25

had at home, has only

2:27

happened two other times. One

2:30

was 1986 when they went 9

2:32

-in -1, the other was 2015 when

2:34

they went 10 -0 in their

2:36

first 10 home games. That was

2:38

part number one. And then

2:40

yesterday marked the first four

2:42

-game sweep in New York

2:44

Mets history over the St.

2:47

Louis Cardinals since 1986. So

2:49

a lot of people are already

2:51

making the connection, and I have to

2:53

tell you... hate it. Stop. Just

2:55

look forward. Stop looking backwards. We are

2:57

going forward. We are moving forward.

3:00

We are not doing this shit with

3:02

this, oh, but the cosmos say

3:04

that this, I think we'd never fuck

3:06

off. All right. Let's make

3:08

our own history. Let's forge

3:10

our own path. Let's start something

3:12

new. And we're going to start something new by

3:14

talking about things that have happened in the Rangers

3:16

past. That's what we're going to do. If

3:19

you're listening to this right now

3:21

on Tuesday and Nick Castellanos didn't hit

3:23

a home run yesterday, something's very

3:25

wrong. No, but here's the thing too.

3:27

I think too many people are

3:29

now in on the Castellanos joke. Yeah.

3:31

The fact that the odds have

3:33

plummeted from plus seven 50 to I

3:35

think as we are recording, this

3:37

is four 10 PM. I think there

3:39

was low as plus three 60

3:41

right now. You have to swerve. Tyler

3:43

McGill, no hitter. That's what's happening

3:45

tonight. It's so crazy.

3:47

I love the Castellanos thing. It's just

3:49

become some sort of cult sports

3:51

legend. It's one of my favorite. It's

3:53

unbelievable. But we're here to, unfortunately,

3:55

talk about the shitty New York total.

3:59

Did I tell you I had

4:01

to explain this Castellanos bullshit to

4:03

the four most senior people at

4:05

work today? No, but

4:08

please explain how that went. Beautifully.

4:11

I have no notes. I still

4:13

have my job. Everything went great. I

4:17

hope he hits the home run. I look,

4:19

I know the Mets are on fire right now,

4:21

but they'll probably still end up winning the

4:23

game because the Phillies bullpen is garbage. It's

4:25

so bad. So I think you guys will be

4:28

OK. Anywho,

4:30

the New York Rangers. you

4:32

ready to do the deep dive into? Oh,

4:35

we're so delayed. Are you ready to do

4:37

the deep dive into Sam Rosen? And

4:40

honestly, his last game

4:42

because. Man,

4:44

I have mixed feelings

4:46

on the entire situation. I'll

4:49

start here, Gregory. When the

4:51

game was finally over, I sat on

4:53

my couch and I watched the salute

4:55

to Sam segment that somehow MSG produced.

4:58

I don't know why they did this or didn't

5:00

promote it, but it was like three separate interviews,

5:02

one with JD, one with Joe

5:04

Micheletti, one with John Giannone. And

5:06

it was just Sam doing Sam things,

5:08

over talking and telling these amazing stories

5:10

for... 45 minutes so I watched the

5:12

whole thing just like in a days

5:14

that the season was over and when

5:16

it was over I turned off my

5:18

TV and I let out a deep

5:20

breath and that deep breath was very

5:22

cathartic for me because I as I

5:24

walked up the stairs to go to

5:26

bed I said it's over this fucking

5:28

season this shitty ass season everything that

5:30

happened every part of this that was

5:32

just truly awful to cover as a

5:34

fan truly awful to experience,

5:37

no comebacks outside of when they were

5:39

outside of the playoffs. Everything that we

5:41

talked about on this podcast the past

5:43

six months all came to that one

5:45

shining moment when Sam Rosen rode off

5:47

into the sunset after Joe Micheletti and

5:50

him said jokingly, well, this season wasn't

5:52

fun, but we had fun in the

5:54

booth. I let out just this huge

5:56

sigh of relief that it was over

5:58

and we can move on to the

6:00

next part of our lives, which is

6:02

this. I guess tumultuous however you

6:04

want it should be insane New York

6:06

Rangers summer and it all starts with

6:08

these eggs interviews But any thoughts what

6:10

on the Sam Rosen kind of last

6:12

game they win 4 -0 14 is on

6:14

or they wear the worm of jerseys

6:16

the Sam cam by the way a

6:18

great job by MSG Me I wasn't

6:20

one. I don't want to watch the

6:22

game. I just wanted to watch Sam

6:24

our friend Jess who we've met at

6:26

a couple of Meetups did these posters

6:29

that thank you Sam. They a hundred

6:31

people hold them in the in the

6:33

audience They showed him on the Jumbotron

6:35

Everything was like it felt good and

6:37

it felt better than losing in the

6:39

first round. So my summary is this

6:41

Greg I think it was better than

6:43

what's happening to the devils It I

6:45

don't know devils have it a fine

6:47

day. They apparently acquired Quinn use so

6:49

we have nothing else that can really

6:51

compete with that at this year in

6:53

time It's gonna happen I Jim Rutherford,

6:55

the gift that keeps on giving. I

6:57

hope that man never turns down an

6:59

interview. We honestly should put in an

7:01

interview request for him because I bet

7:03

we can get some good JT Miller

7:05

stories before next season start. That man

7:07

has no filter. All right, I'm

7:09

going to walk you through my Thursday a little

7:11

bit, Ryan. I think that's the easiest way to

7:13

do it. Obviously

7:16

Thursday sucked. You

7:18

and I talked about it for 30

7:21

uninterrupted minutes on BSBOT, which we have

7:23

made available. for everybody

7:25

to listen to. If they so choose, all

7:27

you have to do is go to our

7:29

Patreon. Don't have to support us at all.

7:31

You just want to hear our takes on

7:33

everything that happened with Artemi Panarin. Go forth.

7:35

It is there for you. It was, yes,

7:37

it was an immediate reaction too. So it

7:39

was a three hours after it happened, I

7:41

think we recorded. So it was pretty quick. It

7:44

was before the game, which is important

7:46

because when you listen to this OT episode,

7:48

you're going to hear us say we

7:50

don't see any possible way. Artemi Panarin can

7:52

be playing tonight. on Thursday in the

7:54

ranger season finale. It would have made all

7:56

the sense of the word for him

7:59

not to. Obviously he did. So if you

8:01

guys take, if you guys are caught

8:03

off guard by the tone that is used,

8:05

it was pre -game Thursday. We

8:07

didn't want to wait for after the game to

8:09

do a BSBOT. We didn't think that

8:11

would have been timely. So we reacted to

8:13

it in the moment. It's up there. It's

8:15

there for you to listen to. We don't

8:18

want to avoid the topic. We

8:20

just, to be perfectly blunt.

8:23

I'm happy and satisfied with how we set

8:25

it on Thursday. Meant it then, mean

8:27

it the same today. I don't want to

8:29

repeat myself episodes there for you if you

8:31

need it. Anyway,

8:33

Thursday, that happens. So

8:35

when that happens, I

8:38

wanted to watch for Sam's last game.

8:40

I wanted to take in Sam one

8:42

more time, but I'll be perfectly honest.

8:44

I didn't really have an appetite

8:46

to watch two and a half

8:48

hours of New York Rangers hockey,

8:50

and the Mets luckily had a

8:52

game on. So, you know, I'm

8:54

walking you through how I digest

8:56

Mets baseball. The Mets get

8:59

the primary TV. That's surprising to

9:01

nobody. But I need like a

9:03

balancing TV, a balancing something else

9:05

on the second screen so that

9:07

when commercials are playing, I'm not

9:09

looking just at that. That is

9:11

just where I am in my

9:13

life. So I was way in the

9:15

options, Ryan. And I said, well, I

9:17

could either watch the entirety of the range game. That

9:19

doesn't sound fun. Or I could pick a movie

9:21

to watch. And the movie could be

9:23

interesting. Yeah. Do you want to

9:25

take a stab at what movie I settled on? I

9:27

don't know if I talked to you about this.

9:29

I think you said it, but I didn't read a

9:31

master and commander. Oh, God,

9:34

no, that would have been a lot more

9:36

uplifting. I watched Schindler's List during the Met

9:38

Game on Thursday. What? You

9:40

did what? I watched Schindler's List. It's on

9:42

Netflix. It grabbed my eye. I'm trying to

9:44

do this thing where I don't say no

9:46

to a movie. I

9:48

just hit play. So Schindler's List

9:50

was playing during that four -to -one Mets

9:53

win, the entirety of it. Craig,

9:55

you are a strange bird, my friend.

9:57

God bless. My therapist will

9:59

back that up. I did stop the

10:01

movie, though, and I made sure

10:03

to watch the third period because I

10:05

wanted to get, like,

10:08

I wanted to see how it was going to

10:10

end, essentially, with Sam. And,

10:13

you know, I... think

10:15

I was getting angry at myself because

10:17

I wanted to feel more nostalgic about

10:19

it. I wanted to be more upset

10:21

by it. And I was. I'm

10:23

not going to sit here and say that

10:26

I felt nothing and that this Ranger team

10:28

ruined everything. But I

10:30

agree with you in your take

10:32

that I'm happy we had

10:34

this final moment with Sam where

10:36

we didn't have to worry

10:39

about this Ranger team losing a

10:41

playoff game and having that

10:43

be Sam's farewell. I'm

10:45

happy the game itself didn't

10:47

have to be important, and

10:49

the only important thing that

10:51

happened during the game is

10:53

Sam. That feels right and

10:55

justified in hindsight, but I've

10:57

said this to anyone who would

10:59

listen. I've said it to you. I've

11:01

said it on the podcast. I've

11:03

said it anywhere. This truly

11:06

was the least enjoyable sports

11:08

season I've ever seen. I

11:10

think Sam Rosen agrees with you, by

11:13

the way, in a big way. I

11:15

think so, too, because, again, we've seen

11:17

bad ranger teams. We've seen untalented ranger

11:19

teams. I know the people, the

11:21

diehards would be yelling at us, was like, you

11:23

weren't there for the Dark Ages of the early 2000s.

11:25

I was. Yeah, buddy. I was playing Call of

11:27

Duty 2 on Xbox. Relax. I was around, but I

11:30

wasn't paying the attention I am now. Correct. I

11:32

have Bobby Holick memories. I

11:34

have many Malhotra memories. I

11:37

saw, like, the corpse of Eric Lindross

11:39

definitely was a guy that I saw

11:41

play for the New York Rangers. I

11:43

was there, it stunk, but

11:45

I kind of was expecting

11:47

it to stink a little bit.

11:49

You know, this season wasn't

11:51

supposed to stink. And then not

11:54

only did it stink, like

11:56

it went rotten. It

11:58

went like this season to me

12:00

is as close to a

12:02

sporting equivalent as you can get

12:04

to the Chernobyl disaster, where

12:06

not only was it bad in

12:08

the moment, But we're going

12:10

to have to be doing cleanup

12:13

for a very long time

12:15

on this one. Like, I

12:17

don't know if we're going back to

12:19

that city for quite some time. I

12:21

just, I'm happy Sam got

12:23

the moment. I

12:25

wish, I mean, even if MSG, I

12:28

don't think people were looking for a reason to

12:30

turn off Sam as soon as that game ended.

12:32

So I don't think MSG had to necessarily do

12:34

marketing to be like, stay tuned afterwards. We're going

12:36

to have Sam Rosen, blah, blah, blah. I

12:39

just, I'm with you. I've never

12:41

needed to turn a page harder

12:43

on a season than this season.

12:47

Listen, everybody knows, I'm not breaking

12:49

news here, the Mets are my

12:51

number one team. I survived 2007

12:53

with the Mets when they blew

12:55

the 7 .5 game division lead in

12:57

17 games of all teams, the

12:59

Philadelphia Phillies. I was there for

13:01

it, but that was a team,

13:04

the Mets... not that they didn't quit.

13:06

They just suddenly became not good enough

13:08

and their bullpen was horrific. And you

13:10

can justify it because the performance on

13:12

the field was so bad, but there

13:14

was nothing to prevent the performance on

13:16

the field from happening. The Mets didn't

13:18

have the right relievers. They sucked. So

13:20

they didn't make the playoffs. To

13:23

this day, the most frustrating thing

13:25

about this Rangers season, Ryan, is we're going to look

13:27

at it. It's not that the Rangers didn't have the

13:29

horses. It's the same

13:31

fucking team that won the present

13:33

trophy last year. It's that they

13:35

effectively worked against themselves. Some

13:37

of the quotes are

13:39

pretty damning. We've

13:42

talked Can

13:44

I ask you before we read into the quotes? We're

13:47

not going to read into them yet because we're still on Thursday.

13:49

We have a whole weekend to get through, but continue. But

13:51

when we get to the quotes, do

13:54

you think the players are self -aware

13:56

enough to know that some of the

13:58

players, I should say, the things they

14:00

are harping on, they are also responsible

14:02

for? Think I

14:04

I unfortunately did this on the

14:06

New York Rangers YouTube page.

14:08

They uploaded every single post game.

14:10

I'm sorry exit interview with

14:12

the exception of her Tammy Panarin

14:14

for reasons you can understand

14:17

I watched I would say all

14:19

of them and person in

14:21

is like a minute and 20

14:23

seconds His comment is wish

14:25

I could have played more Matthew

14:27

Robinson was fun to make

14:29

an NHL debut but The people

14:31

that I found the most

14:33

interesting, I'm not going to say good or bad, are

14:36

the people you would think it was. JT Miller

14:38

couldn't be there either, obviously. The Pope died today. So

14:41

I think he actually, he legitimately had someone in

14:43

his life pass away this very close to him, so

14:45

he couldn't be there, so he got to leave.

14:47

But the Pope. Yeah, the Pope, of course. JT

14:51

and Francis, man, they were glued at the hip.

14:53

I've always known. I love that. I mean, whenever

14:55

they would, he would come off the ice. The

14:57

Pope would always point to them whole thing. Whenever,

14:59

whenever he would score, JT would just look up

15:01

to the heavens and say, thank Christ. And Pope

15:03

Francis would be like, you got it, bro. I'm

15:05

here for you, dog. I

15:07

wonder if he, if he blessed the

15:09

trade to New York. So before

15:11

he went. And so anyway, I watched

15:13

all of them and the only

15:16

people that I think had real insight

15:18

and it's not going to surprise

15:20

you. Migos have been a jet. Adam

15:22

Fox and Chris Crider were the

15:24

three most most insightful of the exit

15:26

interviews. I think Fox

15:28

was the most aware as I

15:30

can imagine he usually is that

15:32

they fucking suck. And some of

15:34

his quotes really stick at home as in we

15:36

got to really look in the mirror because we

15:38

were not even close to who we were last

15:40

year and we're the same guys for the most

15:43

part. So

15:45

I would say he's the most aware.

15:47

And then Chris Crider next Mika like. And

15:49

we'll get to it. He

15:51

is trying to be the most truthful,

15:54

but he does word salad himself into

15:56

trouble a lot. But

15:58

we'll get to that. So let's stick on

16:00

Thursday. Is that your question? Sure,

16:02

I don't know how we're sticking on Thursday. I thought

16:04

we talked about it pretty great. OK, so now that

16:06

we're done with Thursday, we go to Saturday. Oh,

16:09

oh, my God, they fired

16:11

a coach. Yes. Oh,

16:13

shit. That's a great. Ryan,

16:15

great fucking call, man. Forgot that happened. Thanks,

16:18

buddy. I'm here for you. I'm doing my hosting

16:20

duties. I don't have notes, but Friday, I'm

16:22

getting a lot of I'm talking to a lot

16:24

of people is like, Hey, is lobby like

16:26

going to get fired at five p .m.? Nothing

16:28

really happens. I heard a

16:30

couple of as you can imagine, I talked

16:32

more New York Rangers Thursday, Friday, last week

16:34

than I had in the past four weeks,

16:36

pretty much just constant nonstop phone calls and

16:38

weird shit going on because I'm trying to

16:41

figure out what the hell is happening. And

16:44

Laviolet gets fired on a Saturday

16:46

right in the afternoon. And

16:48

at that point, Vince has

16:50

already tweeted out that morning that

16:52

he had heard that Laviolet might

16:55

survive the weekend, but that also

16:57

James Dolan might meet individually, maybe

16:59

meet individually with every single player

17:01

before the exit meetings. And

17:03

he did this with the Knicks and he found it

17:05

very helpful. We are not aware at this point

17:07

in time if those meetings happened. But

17:10

I'm going to just assume they did it

17:12

for the sake of talking about them

17:14

for a minute. What was the parson meeting

17:16

like, Greg? Just

17:18

just just just just go with

17:20

me. What was that like? I

17:23

mean, there's no way if James Dolan

17:25

had a vocal part in this meeting,

17:27

it wasn't just sitting in there behind

17:29

the two -way mirror. I

17:31

there's no way parson walks in the room

17:33

and Dolan just goes and who are you?

17:36

Yeah, like, OK, James Dolan wants to meet

17:38

with every single player and just just maybe

17:40

get some feedback. Maybe there's like a three

17:42

question questionnaire that is like these are the

17:44

three things I'm trying to learn from everybody.

17:47

Now, here's the real thing, though, Ryan, the most

17:49

important question that we need to answer immediately. Of

17:52

all the meetings that took place, allegedly,

17:54

with James Dolan in the room, is

17:56

there a meeting you wanted to

17:59

be included in more than what

18:01

ever happened in that meeting with

18:03

Calvin Dott? They're

18:05

the only one that's closest, Chris Greider.

18:08

It's the only one that's close. No,

18:10

because with Greider, I could see like

18:12

corporate speak, just going back and forth,

18:14

which, you know, Dolan doing the whole,

18:16

Hey, man, thanks for being a legend.

18:19

Thanks for everything you did for this

18:21

organization. No matter what happens, just know

18:23

that you've played an important role, blah,

18:25

blah, blah. I could see like the

18:27

bullshit parade going there, but Dolan doesn't

18:29

have any relationship with Calvin DeHaan. Calvin

18:31

DeHaan has nothing but gripes. Fair gripes,

18:34

I should mention. So Dolan,

18:36

to me, would go in just being like,

18:38

oh, it's one of our extra defense when

18:40

we got a deadline. Did he play much?

18:42

No. Probably not going to a lot happen

18:44

here. And Calvin DeHaan strikes me as an individual

18:46

that has zero fucks to give about anything

18:48

and anybody. And I think Calvin would

18:50

just be like, yeah, interesting situation

18:52

he got here. Seems kind of

18:54

fucked. His

18:56

interview, if you have a chance to watch,

18:58

is worth it. He's very candid. Like, hey,

19:00

they telepromptered me like, we great. Welcome to

19:02

the team. We can't wait to play you.

19:04

And then just like didn't do anything. I

19:07

don't think since since the end of

19:09

the season until today, going as far

19:11

back as Monday last week, I went

19:13

from I probably won't ever have another

19:15

Calvin Dahan thought in my life to

19:18

I don't. There's nobody I want coaching

19:20

his team more than Calvin Tom. If

19:22

the Rangers named him coach, I am

19:24

so far in. He called

19:26

himself a third pair of crumb in the

19:28

interview. He's like, I'm old and hockey.

19:30

I'm just trying to make it. You could

19:32

tell the frustration was there. Clearly,

19:35

I think we would have gotten

19:37

a lot more if this one didn't

19:39

become a big like Twitter story

19:41

like pretty quickly and PR just tackled

19:43

him on the ice. But

19:45

he's still kind of laid it on the line

19:47

for the most part. But you could tell he

19:49

was being careful because he wants to get one

19:51

more job if possible. Yeah. And I hope that

19:53

job is coach of the New York Rangers. Like

19:55

I do. I'm all the way in. I'm here

19:57

for it. Me too. I will

19:59

say he did mention he was the only

20:01

person I think I might have been

20:03

one or two others that really hinted that

20:05

there were more meetings after the media

20:07

exit meetings. So I do wonder if they

20:09

meet like they're clearly going to meet

20:12

with Chris Drury. Right. That always happens. Like

20:14

tell me what you thought about the

20:16

season, how you feel, whatever. And then afterwards

20:18

maybe they meet with Dolan. Don't know.

20:20

But that's that's only something we can assume

20:22

that. We did know that MSG said

20:24

that he was considering meeting with every ranger.

20:26

So I assume you only met with like

20:28

maybe five or six. We've already found a

20:30

way. It's so funny. We've already found a

20:33

way to pivot away from saying Peter Laviolette

20:35

was fired. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I

20:37

had one person call me last week and

20:39

said I've never seen a coach quiet quit

20:41

like that since January. Like he just showed

20:43

up and didn't do shit. And like he

20:46

knew he was fired and it didn't matter.

20:48

So he just didn't coach. So. But here's

20:50

here's my thing. I feel like

20:52

we've been really consistent with this throughout, because

20:55

I've seen a couple

20:57

people get angry with hindsight

20:59

that the Rangers didn't

21:01

fire Laville at earlier, and

21:03

they're blaming the coach

21:05

for how the season ended.

21:09

The Gabe stuff blew all this

21:11

up, where suddenly Gabe... already

21:13

is burning a year of an ELC, no

21:15

matter what, is being scratched the final couple games

21:17

and only gets into line up once the

21:19

Rangers season is completely complete, even though the Rangers

21:21

season was already completely complete. And that's the

21:23

whole point of this. So I've seen a lot

21:25

of people last week being like, well, should

21:27

a fire lobby all that earlier? This was all

21:29

the waste of time. I don't understand why

21:31

we did X, Y, and Z. Why wasn't he

21:33

gone? A different guy could have gotten more

21:35

out of this group. I have

21:38

to say, pretty forcefully, pretty

21:40

convinced in my feelings. Fucking

21:43

Mahatma Gandhi wasn't getting more out of

21:45

these New York Rangers this year. Like

21:47

I Said this way back when things

21:49

really went sour It wasn't a pro

21:51

la violette take. I don't think la

21:53

violette is too good of a coach

21:55

to move on from I don't think

21:57

la violette Should get the benefit of

21:59

the doubt just because he won a

22:01

president's trophy last year I don't think

22:03

la violette is a guy worth throwing

22:05

your body in front of the bus

22:07

for at the same time I

22:10

don't think any coach would have kept

22:12

these players from quitting. So

22:15

if these players gave up

22:17

on Peter Laviolette, a guy who,

22:19

by the sound of the

22:21

exit interviews, just about everybody liked,

22:23

this court just didn't deserve a coaching

22:26

change. And I'm, the

22:28

worst thing, it's hard to frame

22:30

this as a worst thing, but in

22:32

my head, the worst thing that

22:34

could have happened is your fire Laviolette,

22:36

you bring in an interim guy.

22:38

The team starts playing better, not because

22:40

of the coach, but because simply

22:42

the team sees the removal of the

22:44

head coach as some kind of

22:46

beacon that they can all of a

22:48

sudden turn it on. This team

22:50

makes the playoffs, maybe even wins the

22:52

playoff round and then gets unceremoniously

22:54

bounced once they have to play a

22:56

real hockey team. That's a

22:58

worst case scenario for me because now how do

23:00

you move on from that interim coach? How

23:03

do you justify taking that guy

23:05

out of the position when... have to

23:07

take that guy out of the

23:09

position because we're not done taking the

23:11

players out of position on this

23:13

roster. So why fire Peter

23:15

Lavile at mid -season? Just to

23:17

lock into a coach who, you

23:20

know, if things continue to go poorly,

23:22

that's not good for that coach. If

23:24

things miraculously improve, that's not good for

23:26

the organization long -term. I've never understood

23:28

why the Rangers would have fired Lavile.

23:30

Not even a little bit. Every

23:33

single comment, I have a bunch of quotes up

23:35

here that we're going to read and go through for

23:37

the most part in just a minute for the

23:39

exit day. They're quotes

23:41

from Vince. They're quotes from Molly, quotes from Peter.

23:43

You can go on and check. You can watch all

23:45

of them. I would recommend it. If you're doing

23:47

that, you're probably a psychopath, but I did it for

23:49

this show. Every person that was

23:51

asked about lobby let pretty much

23:53

said the same three things. Love, lobby

23:55

let. Hate when this

23:57

happens. Nice

24:00

guy. But that's that no one

24:02

really was like, it's an absolute shame.

24:04

This guy was fired. It's a crime. It's a

24:06

travesty. And pretty much everyone said, it's a

24:08

part of the business and I like the guy.

24:10

And I think that's the relationship they had. They,

24:14

you're right. Nobody was changing this team. But

24:16

if you did replace with somebody and

24:18

you did make the playoffs, the fan base

24:20

will be crazy right now. You'd be

24:22

like, you can't fire this guy. He got

24:24

them to the playoffs and got them

24:26

to respond after the lobby light did nothing.

24:28

And now you're gonna have this extensive

24:30

coaching search and we don't need to get

24:32

into the names today because we'll be

24:34

spending a lot of time this offseason talking

24:36

about them But in general like lobby

24:38

let I mean had the best season in

24:40

New York Ranger history on their on

24:42

their team Just came short of the of

24:45

winning a Stanley Cup with them of

24:47

getting to the finals rather But the second

24:49

year just a complete disaster and I'm

24:51

not sure it was his fault, but it's

24:53

not zero percent his fault. No No,

24:55

no, we've made sure to say that the

24:57

entire way through. Pitilaviolet

24:59

is not innocent for what

25:02

happened this year. He's just maybe

25:04

not the direct murderer. You

25:07

guys, you can go back as

25:09

far as, to me, the

25:12

true flag in the sand

25:14

where things started to change was

25:16

the Panthers game in October. When

25:19

it's early in the season, the Rangers

25:21

are off to this good start. It

25:23

is a game at MSG.

25:25

It is against the Florida Panthers

25:27

and Peter Laviolette Managed that

25:29

entire game as if it was

25:31

a referendum on game seven

25:33

and to me Given what number

25:35

game it was in the

25:37

season given How the Rangers had

25:39

been playing to that point

25:41

given all the circumstances that led

25:43

up to that decision His

25:45

coaching performance in that game forever

25:47

tainted how I was going

25:49

to view Peter Laviolette as a

25:51

coach moving forward. He

25:54

panicked early with the line

25:56

blenders. He panicked with the

25:58

defensive pairings. It just seems

26:00

like that moment, a regular

26:02

season game before, I don't

26:04

even know what number it was. It felt like it

26:06

was early enough in the season where it was before game

26:08

20, somewhere in that range. Like the

26:10

New York Rangers haven't even established themselves as

26:12

who they wanted to be quite yet for

26:14

this season. And Laviolette was like, oh shit,

26:16

we're not good enough. to beat the Florida

26:18

Panthers. And it's not that he was right

26:20

or wrong in the moment. It's

26:22

just that if Carlos Mendoza treats

26:24

tonight's Mets Phillies game as if

26:27

it's game five of the

26:29

NLDS, it's going to affect

26:31

how I look at Carlos Mendoza, who

26:33

I think is quite a good

26:35

manager. He allowed the

26:37

moment to be bigger than the game. And

26:40

he came on BSBOT. I

26:42

was, besides myself, I didn't understand.

26:44

What I was seeing, I didn't

26:47

understand how this veteran of a

26:49

coach could allow this immaterial of

26:51

a regular season game become this

26:53

huge moment for him in a

26:55

season in which there would be

26:57

plenty of other moments to follow.

27:01

And yeah, you know, you and I

27:03

have been hearing since what, probably

27:05

the A -2 drubbing against the Sabres

27:07

after Four Nations, that was all

27:09

but decided Peter Lavalette wasn't coming back. He

27:11

was cooked for months, for months. There

27:14

had been rumblings as far back as December

27:17

But I think the true nail in the coffin

27:19

is when they come out of the break

27:21

and the Buffalo Sabres vault team embarrassed the New

27:23

York Rangers It was over but the reason

27:25

Jerry didn't do it was for all the reasons

27:27

we said where he wants to be able

27:29

to hard reset This offseason and the only way

27:31

you can truly do that is if you

27:33

wait until the offseason to fire the coach So

27:36

this this was this was planned and if

27:38

you're a fan listening to this podcast and you're

27:40

angry that the New York Rangers didn't make

27:42

the playoffs And you're angry that Chris Drury waited

27:44

on a decision that could have impacted the

27:46

Rangers ability to make the playoffs. It

27:48

was always going to be up to the players. If the players ever

27:50

wanted to play better, they'd be in the playoffs. The

27:53

players at no point wanted to

27:55

play better. They made it clear what

27:57

they were capable of all throughout

27:59

the season. And at some point,

28:01

you just have to listen to that.

28:03

Let's talk about some of what the players

28:05

thought in their exit interviews here with

28:07

the media and maybe one of the reasons

28:09

they weren't playing. I hate

28:11

this time of year because it's it's

28:13

this time of year. It's super convenient and

28:15

it's it's not that the play listen

28:17

You want to do you want to start

28:19

with Crider? I have it up here.

28:21

Okay Crider hit the pinnest with the quote.

28:25

I Have a couple quotes from Crider. This is

28:27

Crider on on the trade memo and his name

28:29

leaking out of how it affected him That wasn't

28:32

the first time and it won't be the last

28:34

time that kind of stuff comes out. That's part

28:36

of professional sports Unfortunately, I'm lucky. I don't have

28:38

social media. That's a lie I wasn't really aware

28:40

of it until people close to me brought it

28:42

to my attention. But just try to show up

28:44

and do your job to the best of your

28:46

abilities. Guys come and go. Unfortunately happened to a

28:48

lot over the course of the season. And

28:51

there was a lot of the roster

28:53

change. Usually within a season, there's a certain

28:55

brush points where you expect it. Obviously,

28:57

this year was different and challenging. You

29:00

want me to find the quote about his back, right?

29:03

I don't think people need us to do the

29:05

exact diagnosis. Dr. Fred Kaplan's not on the episode

29:07

today. He can't tell us any of this shit. But

29:09

a player who had back issues all season, Vertico,

29:13

in the middle of the season. Due to an

29:15

ear infection, allegedly. Great. And

29:18

a hand injury that occurred immediately in that

29:20

buffalo. We believe in that buffalo savers. He

29:22

states in the interview, which was not quoted

29:24

by any of the beats. It was in

29:26

the third period they were down 8 -2

29:28

and someone hit his hand and he tried

29:30

to play through it. He is now seeing

29:32

a doctor. He still doesn't know. He doesn't

29:34

know if he needs to get surgery or

29:36

not. He tried to play through with a

29:38

lot of tape. He'll be seeing a doctor

29:40

to see. He probably needs hand surgery in

29:42

the next week or so. We've done this

29:45

every year. We'll do it right now and

29:47

we'll just say it once so it's said

29:49

because I don't think people need us rehashing

29:51

this again. If you are this hurt where

29:53

you have this long of a list of

29:55

injuries, Why the fuck

29:57

are you playing? And

29:59

this is the only

30:01

sport where this happens. Can

30:04

I go a little further than we usually do

30:06

in some ways? Yes, absolutely. I'm

30:08

going to I'm going to come at this and

30:10

I can't believe I'm going to do this, but I'm

30:12

going to come at this from the view of

30:14

James Dolan. OK. Yeah, hit me. So James

30:16

Dolan is a business owner who cares about

30:18

money. This is not a shock to anybody listening

30:20

to this. And I do think James cares

30:22

about winning. One of the reasons he might

30:24

care about winning is that he

30:26

gets money when they win.

30:29

Yes. So if selling out Madison

30:31

Square Garden for the playoffs

30:33

is probably an extremely high up

30:35

priority for James Dolan. If

30:38

Chris Crider is playing through a hand

30:40

injury, vertigo and a back injury, which

30:42

Chris Crider, by the way, said cleared

30:44

up mostly the back injury at least.

30:47

Interesting how the back injury cleared up just

30:49

as the trade deadline passed, right? Yeah, it's

30:51

interesting. He said it cleared up and then

30:53

unfortunately due to the the injury that happened

30:55

at Buffalo, which was re -injured during Four Nations.

30:58

No, but you have the math

31:00

wrong there. Either he said

31:02

it wrong or something. Four Nations happens before

31:04

the Buffalo game. Sorry, it happens at the Buffalo

31:07

game. But he did say he was injured

31:09

during Four Nations as well. I thought that was

31:11

the back injury during Four Nations. I'll

31:13

have to watch again. But he does

31:15

say he was injured during Four Nations and

31:17

then he gets hurt in the Buffalo

31:19

game. That was the timeline. OK. So I'm

31:22

James Dolan. And I want to make

31:24

the playoffs because making the playoffs makes me

31:26

a lot of money towards the bottom

31:28

line. It is best for business to steal

31:30

a line from WWE, who you have

31:32

to talk about eventually, unfortunately, that

31:37

the team makes the playoffs. If the

31:39

team makes the playoffs, the best way to

31:41

do that would be not play your

31:43

injured players who are clearly battling through something

31:45

and play players who may be a

31:47

lesser caliber, but at least can play at

31:49

a high level. Say, can I tag

31:51

in real quick before you just one second?

31:53

Then you can tag in. This is

31:55

my last part. OK, say a lot

31:57

for an year back to his natural wing and

31:59

left wing and say a Calvin Dahan to play

32:01

for Braden Schneider. Those are two small little changes

32:03

that can be made that can maybe win your

32:05

game or two to help you make the playoffs

32:07

in that time. Go ahead. I just

32:09

want to tag in because it's not it's not

32:11

just it wouldn't just help the New York Rangers

32:13

if you take an injured player out of your

32:15

lineup and put a healthy player in like I

32:17

listen, you and I can't dictate. is

32:20

100 % of Johnny Brzezinski better than

32:22

70 % of Chris Crider. We don't

32:24

fucking know. All I know is

32:26

one guy is hurt or injured in

32:28

this instance, because there's a difference.

32:30

He's not playing with a sprained ankle.

32:32

He's playing with a broken back

32:34

fucking vertigo, which, holy

32:36

shit, and a busted hand.

32:38

There are plenty of reasons to sit

32:40

him down. The Mets still haven't promoted

32:43

Jeff McNeil and his tum tum hurts.

32:45

That's the only thing keeping him from

32:47

playing. I am still watching Brock Beatty

32:49

because Jeff Begneal is like so when

32:51

I turn I'm excited to buy you

32:53

that gift by the way I really

32:55

am I don't know if you're gonna

32:57

we're running out of time it's only

32:59

two weeks I know and so many

33:01

Mets are hinted if Mark Vientos goes

33:03

on the IL in the next two

33:05

days you're gonna win which bullshit not

33:07

the way I wanted to the only

33:09

way you were going to which was

33:11

like boy I hate this I hate

33:13

this so much anyway These are legitimate

33:15

injuries that Chris Crider is suffering from.

33:18

And the New York Ranges, if you

33:20

take them out of the lineup, not

33:22

only does it improve your lineup right

33:24

now, it allows the player time to

33:26

be healthy, Ryan, when the money is

33:28

set to be made. That's

33:30

my frustration. If Chris Crider took a seat

33:32

in a perfect world, obviously you want a

33:34

100 % Chris Crider the entire season. But

33:36

if I could take 70 % Chris Crider and

33:38

his health bar out of my lineup for

33:40

two months, allow him to rest, recover, rehab,

33:43

and get back in the lineup, That's going

33:45

to help the New York Rangers win, I

33:47

don't know, they have to win hockey games.

33:49

I just get so frustrated with NHL

33:52

Breakup Day because you hear about

33:54

all these ridiculous injuries, which is the

33:56

perfect segue in the brain, Schneider.

33:58

You're telling me this motherfucker's been hurt

34:00

for three years? Ah,

34:02

here we go. This is from Vince.

34:04

Brady Schneider is rocking a big brace on

34:07

his right arm. Said he had already

34:09

had surgery on his torn labrum. Will be

34:11

ready to go next season. Craziest part.

34:13

Schneider sustained this injury during the 2022 -2023

34:15

season. Played with it in 23

34:17

-24, but the tear got progressively worse this

34:19

season. To the point where the surgery

34:21

was recommended, he wanted to play as long

34:23

as the team was alive, but it

34:25

hindered his ability physically. What are

34:28

we doing? He's not even a good enough

34:30

defenseman for that to make sense. Maybe he is a good

34:32

enough defense, but he has no shoulder. I

34:34

don't know. I really don't. His development was

34:36

hurt in a big way. He was a

34:38

physical defenseman. He's right. You know what, he

34:40

wasn't these last two years? A physical defenseman.

34:42

But he wasn't great shakes when he made

34:44

his debut before his injury, Ryan. Fine. This

34:46

is like, this is a chicken and an

34:48

egg situation. can shake the brain and shatter

34:50

all you want. He played with a torn

34:52

labor for two and a half years. I

34:54

know, but that just feels convenient, okay? If

34:57

getting the surgery now allows you to

34:59

be healthy by training camp. I was

35:01

there for when the Rangers lost to

35:03

the Devils super early in the playoffs.

35:06

And if he had that injury before

35:08

that series, and after that

35:10

series, it's

35:12

what? He couldn't get the surgery

35:14

then? The case that our friend CJ made

35:16

and some others I've talked to is

35:19

that - We have a friend named CJ,

35:21

who's our friend CJ? Okay, my friend CJ.

35:23

Oh wait, no, no, CJ, CJ, CJ,

35:25

CJ, Wagon. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. No,

35:27

see, just a friend. See, just a friend of

35:29

the pot. You just put you put initials out

35:31

there that I was unfamiliar with. I don't know.

35:33

I call him. He shit himself in that moment

35:35

right then. When I wish

35:37

I could get a live

35:39

reaction to CJ's BSB listening

35:41

experience in that moment. So

35:45

he made the case that like many players try and rehab

35:47

those things. And we've seen this too. We've seen it

35:49

in baseball. Like Tanaka was like, I'm not going to get

35:51

the surgery. I'm going to try and rehab it. Look at

35:53

that throwback. But I

35:55

think Schneider tried that for two years. And

35:58

unfortunately, now he's like, I was gotten to a

36:00

point where I need to at least to do that.

36:02

But you're not going to throw big hits if

36:04

you have not toward labor. I'm like, that's not how

36:06

you're going to play. And this is why if

36:08

I'm Calvin DeHaan or even if I'm Zach Jones, and

36:10

again, not that you should be playing Zach Jones,

36:12

we've had the Zach Jones conversation. No, once again, Calvin

36:14

DeHaan is right. Brayden Schneider

36:16

is physically unable to perform

36:18

his duties to the best

36:20

of his abilities. and we're

36:22

continuing to keep Calvin DeHaan

36:24

out of the lineup, you

36:27

once again, if you're Calvin DeHaan, you get to be angry. Yes,

36:30

because you came in the lineup, you

36:32

were 2 -0 -1 in that time, and you

36:34

thought you were playing well, and you're playing

36:36

for another contract, and people care about the

36:38

games played, and if you're benched, unless you're,

36:40

well, Morgan, who was benched in Seattle,

36:42

and then got a five -year contract, but this

36:44

is... This matters a lot and if

36:46

you're well if you know for a fact

36:48

and you probably do that brain is started

36:50

playing hurt and you're good to go and

36:53

you're trying to make that money Like that

36:55

that sucks a lot. I get that. I

36:57

think I have the Calvin Dahan here quote.

36:59

Let me try and find it We can

37:01

go right to him. Yeah Calvin Dahana communication

37:03

during his string of stretches String of scratches.

37:05

There we go. String of stretches string

37:07

of stretches I mean, I think it

37:09

could have been better. I've never really given a direct

37:11

answer as to why in an hour or so

37:14

I'll hopefully get some answers. I think it can always

37:16

be better. I'm not blaming the coaches. I'm not

37:18

blaming anybody, but I think it can be better in

37:20

general. Let me just try this. Let me just

37:22

read this again. One more time. I'm

37:24

not blaming the coaches. I'm not blaming anybody,

37:26

but I think it could be better in

37:28

general. Sounds like you're blaming some people. At

37:30

some point, someone's got to be at fault,

37:32

right? Yes. You're doing the

37:34

PR thing where... This quote

37:37

was floating around today because the

37:39

Pope had died, but you're a big

37:41

parts and wreck guy. Do you

37:43

remember when Leslie's running for office and

37:45

the Catherine Hahn character is like,

37:47

listen, I'm not saying so and so

37:49

killed the guy, but I'm saying

37:51

it should start asking questions per se,

37:53

like, did so and so kill

37:55

a guy? And that's essentially

37:58

what Calvin Dahan is doing. He's like,

38:00

I don't want to blame blame, but

38:02

I'm asking you who should be at

38:04

fault. It's true. It's

38:07

I and Calvin is very candid here,

38:09

and he's not gonna be with the team

38:11

next year. No shit. No surprise Unless

38:13

he's coach unless he's the coach and you

38:15

should get an interview Some people are

38:17

getting interviews that don't deserve them and that's

38:20

okay. So that's not for this

38:22

week, right? That's not for this week, but

38:24

man, it's fun this season's over and we

38:26

still haven't done the Joe Quinn available episode

38:28

yet Isn't it great that we just have

38:30

that to look forward to? I think the

38:32

Coenville episode will be very short because I

38:34

think, especially after the Artemis Panera situation, they

38:36

wouldn't want to go down that road. But

38:38

I've been surprised before, Greg. I have news

38:40

for you, Ryan. Yeah. It is

38:42

professional sports, but most notably

38:44

the National Hockey League. Yeah.

38:47

You're crazy. I like you, but

38:49

you're crazy. Yeah. Well,

38:52

I mean, we're going to end up talking about Panera more

38:54

this summer, whatever. Great. Wonderful. I'm so looking forward

38:56

to it. going to go back to Chris Crider for a moment. This

39:00

is Chris. How much does Chris Carter want to stay with the New

39:02

York Rangers? I mean, this is home for me.

39:04

This is an organization that gave me an opportunity to

39:06

live out my dream. I've developed so many incredible relationships

39:08

and grown up and spent in this area. So obviously,

39:10

this is where I want to be. This is the

39:12

group I want to help in whatever fashion win hockey

39:14

games. Yeah.

39:18

So great. The

39:20

thing again, the thing that's great

39:22

about Breakup Day is whatever your

39:24

motivation is, you could find. a

39:27

reason to justify your

39:29

motivation today. So the,

39:31

the Criter Truthers are

39:33

saying, I don't, I'm sure

39:35

you saw it too. If you spent even

39:37

two hours on Twitter today, the amount

39:39

of people being like, oh, but I thought

39:42

he just quit on this team. That

39:44

was a really popular

39:46

opinion I saw from

39:48

those who, rightfully, I

39:51

don't think they're incorrect for saying, Chris

39:53

Criter is a club legend. I would

39:55

like him to have a redemption season.

39:57

I don't think that's an insane opinion

39:59

to have. No, not. At

40:01

the same time, you can see the other

40:03

people, the critered deniers saying, this guy

40:05

was so selfish, he was trying to play

40:07

through all these injuries. He wasn't helping

40:09

the team. He was hurting the team, get

40:11

this guy off my team. You

40:14

can use all information. I'm in both camps. I'm

40:16

in both camps. I think he quit in

40:18

many ways. He didn't

40:21

help the quitters.

40:24

So at some point, you're Tainted

40:26

by association and that's I'm long -standing

40:28

my feeling is I still need a

40:30

lot of guys off this team and

40:32

if a lot of guys aren't off

40:34

this team by October It'll be really

40:36

hard for me to be over the

40:38

moon excited Depending on what else the

40:40

Rangers do that that Chris Crichter is

40:43

one of them for sure Chris Crichter

40:45

To put it bluntly like Chris Crichter

40:47

is most in the camp of guys

40:49

I want off this team simply because

40:51

he's the easiest to move in terms

40:53

of the math and the financials And

40:55

the contract status, I did

40:57

this today, Ryan, of the

40:59

veterans who have at least

41:01

partial no -trade clauses that the

41:03

Rangers could trade that are

41:05

making over $5 million a

41:07

year. It is Criter, it

41:10

is Lafrenier, it is

41:12

Igor, it is Fox. Everybody

41:15

else is fully locked

41:17

up. Trochex locked up, no

41:19

movement clause. Zabannajad's locked up, no movement

41:21

clause. JT Miller's locked up, no

41:23

movement clause. Artemis Panera's locked up, no

41:25

movement clause. You're not trading Fox.

41:28

You just signed Igor. You just signed

41:30

Laffrinier. And while you and I would

41:32

love to have a conversation about maybe working

41:34

out a blockbuster that includes Alex Laffrinier

41:36

going the other way, we both admit that's

41:38

pretty unlikely. So at some point,

41:40

if you're just doing the math, it

41:42

leaves one guy. with a salary

41:44

north of five million dollars, who doesn't

41:46

have full trade protection, that you

41:49

could move out. One.

41:51

Let's do one. I like to laugh for your quote. I

41:54

have open. I saw. Thanks.

41:56

Sorry. That's pretty much. Yep. You

41:58

said it. I'll read it anyway, but you said

42:00

it. I thought I had a good start that

42:02

I struggled to be consistent in my game. I

42:04

didn't really make a difference or sorry. I didn't

42:06

say I didn't really. He said, didn't really make

42:08

a difference. Obviously, I'm obviously disappointed in my year.

42:11

How much pressure did the extension add? And

42:13

how does that impact your expectations of yourself

42:15

going forward? I always expect a lot of

42:18

myself. Obviously, when you sign for more money, there's always a

42:20

little bit more pressure. I try not to think about it

42:22

too much. If I make whatever amount of money I just

42:24

want to perform the best I can. I don't think I

42:26

did that this year. You said it. You said I sucked. You

42:28

said I sucked. The weirdest thing,

42:30

the weirdest nut for me to crack

42:33

with Alexi Lafreniere, if you went off

42:35

his charts, red bar is good, blue,

42:37

red bar is bad, blue bar is

42:39

good. If you just wanted to

42:41

live in that world. Would

42:43

it shock you if I said this

42:45

was a career year for Alexi Laffronier? Yes,

42:47

bro. I watched a lot of him

42:50

with my eyes and he was miserable. He

42:52

was bad. You look at the charts.

42:54

He was Better than he had been sure

42:56

like I like this is when the

42:58

good good bar whatever good bar bad good

43:00

bar bad bad bad Hershey's good bar.

43:02

Mr. Good bar. Like it doesn't guy by

43:05

the way, never fan. Oh, huge fan.

43:07

I love the peanuts. You would I love

43:09

nuts in my mouth You sure do.

43:11

Yes, sir. I just think Alexi left for

43:13

Nier just in general. Like I've watched

43:15

a lot of his game where he just

43:17

didn't impact the game at all. Or

43:20

if he was clearly, if the New York

43:22

Rangers didn't have the puck, he wasn't

43:24

engaged. Even a little bit. Even a little

43:26

bit. Let's do Zach Jones really

43:28

quick, if you don't mind. I mind a little,

43:30

but do it anyway. I only say this because

43:32

it comes to the narrative around Calvin Dahan. That's

43:34

why I'm bringing it up. Zach

43:36

Jones on how he navigated coming out of the lineup. Listen, I said

43:38

what I said this year and I don't want to take it back.

43:40

I stand by what I said. When you're in this role, some days

43:42

are better than others. You get questions, questions, questions.

43:44

I know you guys have a job to do, too,

43:47

but sometimes that eats at you and eventually you just kind

43:49

of blew up. I shouldn't have said what I said

43:51

to you guys. That's on me. I should have kept it

43:53

private, kept it in the locker room. Some things happen,

43:55

emotions get the best of you. I only read this to

43:57

you, Greg, because I want to emphasize that His agent

43:59

and NYRPR came to him immediately after and were like, hey,

44:01

shut the fuck up. And,

44:03

uh, and he'll never say anything ever

44:06

again. Ever interesting to anybody. Well,

44:08

I mean, probably won't have to worry about it. I

44:10

still have strong doubts that he's back here next year.

44:12

Just with all the moves the Rangers need to make

44:14

and all the bodies, they got to move out. It's

44:16

just the easiest one to move. And I just need

44:18

to say this once again, if a Zach Jones truther,

44:20

I'm not disparaging you in any way. If any of

44:22

the other 31 teams wanted Zach Jones in any way,

44:24

shape or form, he'd be there. He'd

44:26

be there. And sure, the New York Rangers could have

44:29

handled this better. They could have

44:31

given the players more opportunity. They could

44:33

have put him in the lineup. I promise

44:35

you there were worse players that played

44:37

ahead of Zach Jones this year, but I

44:39

just need to emphasize once again, if

44:41

any of the other 31 teams in the

44:43

National Hockey League had even a passing

44:45

interest and wanted to give up a sixth

44:47

or seventh round pick for Zach Jones,

44:50

Zach Jones would be playing hockey in that

44:52

organization. I just have to remind

44:54

you that he is still a New

44:56

York Ranger. Choose your own adventure here. Sorry.

44:58

We're doing Zach Jones. We're done. Honestly,

45:01

I want him to find a better

45:03

job next off season, also because I

45:05

just don't want to talk about him

45:07

ever again. Igor Trocek, Keondre Miller, which

45:10

one do you want to do? Let's do Keondre. Keondre.

45:15

Country Miller on his feelings going to the off

45:17

season, needing a contract and NYR future. Kind of

45:19

hard to talk about my future here, obviously. I

45:21

have a great agent. Such a weird thing

45:23

to say. I have a great agent that's going to help

45:25

me throughout the summer process. I love being a New York

45:27

Ranger. I think it's been some of the best years

45:29

of my life. These last five years are unforgettable in every aspect you

45:31

can think of. I love New York and I wouldn't want to play anywhere

45:33

else right now. Right now. Right

45:36

now. I think right now does a lot of

45:38

work in that sentence. I agree. I

45:40

think if some other organization wanted to

45:42

pay him more money to play there. That

45:44

right now becomes a past tense. I

45:47

agree. He was a very big nothing

45:49

burger when you watch his talk. He talked

45:51

about it like how it didn't go

45:53

the way he wanted. And you hate to

45:55

see it. I just I think we're

45:57

at a point with Keondre Miller where if

45:59

you want to keep him in New

46:01

York Ranger, you have to play him with

46:03

Adam Fox. And if you try to

46:05

play him with anyone else but Adam Fox,

46:08

you're wasting what could be a very

46:10

good top tier NHL pairing. You're also wasting

46:12

to like Keondre Miller's best abilities. If

46:14

you don't want to play, if if counter miller

46:16

plays without a fox, I think it can be

46:18

a top four defenseman. And I understand that's a

46:21

bit of a caveat statement because any defenseman playing

46:23

with Adam Fox, to a certain extent, all you

46:25

have to do again, look at Carson Susie's blue

46:27

bar, good red bar backtracks. I know I just

46:29

shit on models, but every single model has foxes

46:31

like a top 10 NHL player. And they had

46:33

Carson Susie as the second most impactful New York

46:35

Ranger defenseman since he came over in a trade.

46:37

And that's mostly because Carson Susie play without a

46:39

fox. So again, I understand anybody

46:41

can be a top four defenseman to

46:43

play near Adam Fox but Keondra Miller

46:45

significantly better when he plays with Adam

46:47

Fox that is point proven. Also Keondra

46:49

Miller in the top four playing with

46:51

anybody but not besides Adam Fox has

46:54

been not good enough. So if you

46:56

are keeping Keondra Miller and you are

46:58

playing him in the top four and

47:00

you are paying him money equivalent to

47:02

that of a top four defenseman and

47:04

you're not playing him with Adam Fox

47:06

you're just incorrectly diagnosing the player. I'm

47:09

just asking the Rangers. If you

47:11

sign them, keep them with Fox. Enough

47:13

of this, make the lineup longer,

47:15

bullshit. Play him with

47:17

Fox. He is great with Fox. Let

47:20

those two fucking cook. They'd be

47:22

electric together. If you don't

47:24

want to play with Adam Fox, you

47:26

don't sign him. You move on. You

47:28

call it a day. And I'm just

47:30

begging anybody to make sure Chris Drury

47:32

hears that. Because we're not doing this

47:34

shit again. If the Rangers go into

47:37

next season and they're top four, is

47:39

Fox, Susie, Miller, Borgen. Ryan, it's not

47:41

good enough. It's not. You

47:43

know how I know it's not good enough? I

47:45

just fucking saw it. I watched a lot of

47:47

it. I know the stench on this team, which

47:49

will have Igor. What's really worse? Sturgeon's quote about

47:51

the stench on this team. In my mind, something

47:53

broke during the season and went the other way.

47:55

We couldn't handle it. You want to know what

47:57

the thing broke? Their collective will

47:59

to live. Pretty much the

48:01

collective will to try and win. Fuck

48:04

this team. I can't wait. For the

48:06

first transaction that first transaction is going

48:08

to hit like the purest powder from

48:10

Columbia the second I see I am

48:12

I'm the summer will be our last

48:15

summer was going to be very boring

48:17

I think this summer will be very

48:19

interesting because we have Eichel or anything

48:21

like on the preface this we can't

48:23

name to you what's going to happen

48:25

We're not waiting for the moment to

48:27

drop, but we are like Things need

48:29

to happen. Well, and the key phrase

48:31

there is things need to happen. And

48:34

if things don't happen, that's also interesting

48:36

in a much worse way, but still

48:38

interesting. Much worse. Let's talk

48:40

about how things might not happen if it's

48:42

a trocheque. I really believe in

48:44

this locker room. I'm going to stop you right here.

48:47

You said, we have a guest coming up, our

48:49

buddy Joe Fortune, I was coming on the plot

48:51

today. When we fired up at four o 'clock, you

48:53

said, this should give us enough time to do

48:55

the whole show before we talk Joe. I'm an

48:57

idiot. I'm an idiot. He's

48:59

going to jump in while we're still recording part. I

49:01

texted him and said, don't jump on until I

49:03

text you. OK. This is

49:05

from Vincent Trocek. Let's do Trocek, then we'll go to

49:08

Joe. Yeah, because Joe wants to talk about Mika, which is

49:10

the only quote I have left. Yeah. Vincent

49:12

Trocek, I really believe in this locker room. I

49:14

believe in everybody. I honestly believe in the talent

49:16

we have. I just think it's a matter of

49:18

us sticking together as a team, figuring out the

49:20

right way to go about moving things on to

49:22

next year. And once we've had the team belief,

49:24

then it all starts to snowball in a positive

49:27

direction. Before you

49:29

finish the quote, Vincent Trocek now

49:31

has to say that because everybody

49:33

in the locker room is his

49:35

friend. Yes, I agree. And

49:37

he's trying to be what is called the

49:39

captain. I think it's on

49:41

us inside the room in order to make make

49:43

sure that outside noise doesn't get to us. Huh,

49:45

I thought no outside noise happened. Outside

49:48

noise being this shitty podcast. That's interesting. Whether

49:50

that's back to the quote, whether that's something

49:52

that's talking to somebody individually or just taking

49:54

together as a team, as a family. I

49:56

think we can get better lifting guys up

49:58

instead of bringing guys down. I think that

50:00

goes a long way. Hold on. Hold on.

50:02

Can we just stick on that last one?

50:05

Lifting guys up instead of bringing guys down. I think

50:07

that goes a long way. Is that saying there's a

50:09

lot of bringing guys down now? Am

50:11

I am I reading that wrong?

50:13

I mean that would be the way

50:15

to read it. I You know

50:17

how This is big Bill Simmons trope

50:19

and he did this doctor. I

50:21

will not not just that I was

50:23

listening to his Brian Windhorst interview

50:25

today and they were talking about Ricky

50:28

Rubio and Bill Simmons love to

50:30

play the if we played out his

50:32

career a hundred other times I

50:34

don't think it happens the same way

50:36

that it does if we played

50:38

out this season this exact season when

50:40

a hundred different times I

50:42

don't think we spend

50:44

as little time as we

50:46

did criticizing Vincent Trocek's

50:48

play. If there's any player

50:50

on this roster that

50:52

in hindsight I wish I

50:54

was harder on and

50:56

more firm about throughout the

50:58

entirety of the season, it's

51:01

Trocek. The only time I can

51:03

really remember being tough on him was

51:05

back in my youth in October

51:07

when Mika was playing like shit and

51:09

the entire fan base was on

51:11

Mika. And I was doing the whole,

51:13

look at this man's career numbers.

51:15

He literally doesn't wake up until Thanksgiving.

51:17

Why are we angry at this

51:19

man? And at that time, when

51:21

the Rangers started losing games, I had

51:23

said, you want to be angry at

51:25

Mika Sabanajad, but Vincent Trocek is playing

51:27

like shit. And you wouldn't be this

51:30

mad at Mika Sabanajad if other players

51:32

down the lineup were playing better. I

51:34

used Brain Schneider as that example too,

51:36

and you got real uppity with me.

51:39

I remember vividly, but for some

51:41

reason once this team went belly

51:43

up and they went belly fucking

51:45

up We did you and me.

51:47

I'm throwing us both onto the

51:49

bus here a little bit. I

51:51

don't think it's that we gave

51:54

Vincent Trocek a pass We definitely

51:56

were more angry at other players

51:58

than we were Trocek and I

52:00

think Trocek got to avoid some

52:02

of the ire that we should

52:04

have been focusing on him because

52:06

someone asked me today like bluntly

52:08

What's up with Alexi Lafreniere? And

52:10

my answer was he didn't do himself

52:12

any favors, but playing with Vincent Trocek

52:14

this year also did him no favors.

52:17

Vincent Trocek was horrible from the

52:19

word go. Whether

52:22

you think he was part of

52:24

the mutiny that happened here and

52:26

quit, it almost doesn't matter

52:28

if he was a vocal participant

52:30

because judging him by his play

52:32

fucking sucked. And if the

52:34

Rangers want to be good next year,

52:36

which they do. Vincent Troche is going

52:38

to have to play significantly better than

52:40

he did this year. And he's going

52:42

to have to do it in what,

52:44

in age 33 season. That's a yikes.

52:46

That's times yikes. I just, you know,

52:48

we've heaped a lot of plays on

52:50

Vincent Troche on this podcast. We love

52:52

his style of play. We love what

52:54

he brings to good hockey teams. We've

52:56

loved what he's brought to good hockey

52:58

teams that we've been able to watch,

53:00

but make no fucking mistake about it.

53:03

He was a huge reason why this

53:05

season went tits up. He doesn't get

53:08

to avoid the blame and when people

53:10

ask Oh, you want Mika gone? Oh,

53:12

you want Kryder gone? Well, what about

53:14

Troce? If I could move in my what? I'm

53:17

pretty confident I could get whatever the fuck I

53:19

wanted for him on the trade market because this

53:21

league is utterly dumb I would too but I

53:23

could tell you that when this is the last

53:25

thing we'll say before we get to Joe Fortunato

53:27

Vince tweeted out last week and I agree with

53:29

him Of the of

53:31

the whole team he thinks everybody can

53:33

be gone with the exception of four

53:36

people JT Miller Vincent Trocek Igor Sturkin

53:38

Adam Fox. I don't think he's I

53:40

don't think he's wrong. I think

53:42

Trocek is one that's staying though. I would

53:44

get I would trade him right now I

53:46

would be able to wash my hands of some

53:48

the problem is I also I will admit

53:50

the second we trade him I'm sure he'll

53:52

go back to being fine. He will I think

53:55

The reason to keep him is if

53:57

you do manage to overhaul this

53:59

team significantly, I think

54:01

Vincent Trocek would have a natural bounce

54:04

back because he'd feel empowered by

54:06

the turnover if he stayed. I

54:08

understand that. At the same time, he's got

54:10

a lot of work to do to get me

54:12

to trust him again. There was a stench

54:14

on him that isn't just going to come off

54:16

in the shower. Yeah, we'll talk

54:18

about some of that with Joe. So let's get over to

54:20

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56:58

Hey, we're back with our first guest of the

57:00

day. Long time friend of the show, former rival

57:02

Joseph Fortunato. Joey, how are you? I'm

57:04

fantastic, Ryan. How are you? I'm

57:06

okay. I'll go fuck

57:08

myself, Joe. That's fun. Well, Craig, you didn't ask

57:11

me how I was. I figured you would jump

57:13

in at some point. No, that's fine. You should

57:15

you should distinctively address me the same as Ryan

57:17

when he speaks is speaking for me to Let

57:19

me just say Not true that it wasn't the

57:21

last time I was on the show because that

57:23

was when Ryan allegedly had sex and had a

57:25

child But the time before that I think you

57:27

guys opened with like, ah, it was a holiday.

57:29

I don't remember what it was. You guys like,

57:31

ah, we couldn't get anyone to get on the

57:33

show. And then we were like, oh, let's have

57:35

Joe. And I was like, that's probably the best

57:37

opening possible to just kind of bring me on.

57:39

So this is what happened. We got our other

57:42

guests canceled. And we were like, fuck, who actually

57:44

likes that? I completely, you know what, Greg? I

57:46

hope you're doing really well, buddy. Fuck Ryan. How does

57:48

that? Now you're now you're home,

57:50

big dog. You've done it. All right. All right. Just

57:52

like because of Greg, that's what he said. You

57:54

didn't want me on Ryan. I don't know why. I

57:56

was told we were all just gonna be me

57:58

and Greg today, and all a sudden he's like Joe

58:00

Fortune. I was like him. What? Ew.

58:03

I talked him last week. That tracks.

58:05

Let's do, we've done a lot of exit interview

58:07

quotes today, but we, you and I texted today

58:09

about a player named Mika Zabinajad. So we'll kind

58:11

of start with him. And I will

58:13

read the exact quote here. It's from our dear

58:16

friend Vince, who says, it starts with

58:18

us, the players. We have to

58:20

take ownership on what we do and

58:22

how we go about things. I think. But

58:24

I think it has to become cohesive

58:26

with everybody. The organization doesn't work without the

58:28

players. The organization for us players doesn't

58:30

work for the people that work above us.

58:32

We have to work together as well. And

58:35

we have to look at it and we have

58:37

to talk about it. First of

58:39

all, could have said that easier. Second

58:41

of all, I think he's saying that everyone

58:43

needs to have better communication. Am I

58:45

reading that correctly, Joe? That's

58:47

half how I took it. It almost sounds like

58:49

what you would say before you go on strike, which

58:51

is like, hey, if we don't get this, which

58:53

is kind of what the Rangers did, I guess. Let

58:55

me ask you to a question. Greg, can you

58:57

walk into your boss's office today and just be like,

59:00

I haven't gotten communication from you, so I'm just

59:02

not going to show up for six weeks and still

59:04

have your job at the end of that six

59:06

week period? This is an interesting

59:08

conversation today because I was brought into

59:10

a meeting and I have to give

59:12

a presentation on the importance of messaging

59:14

in our company. And why it's important

59:16

that we all understand what our core

59:18

value messaging should be when we go

59:20

talk to other people and how that'll

59:22

make the company better. So,

59:24

uh, no, I did not

59:27

say that. But

59:29

would you be fired is the question?

59:31

Um, I think it would raise some questions.

59:34

It would, uh, here's

59:37

my Joe, let me, can I answer your

59:39

question with a question? Sure. You

59:41

have people in your life that you care

59:43

about allegedly. I've heard. If someone

59:46

close in your life has

59:48

spent the last, let's say,

59:50

three months complaining about where

59:52

they work, complaining about the

59:54

people they work with, and

59:56

I'm not doing the normal,

59:59

we all complain about co

1:00:01

-workers' stick, but having what

1:00:03

they believe are detailed, inherent

1:00:05

complaints about how the culture

1:00:07

they are working in is

1:00:09

no longer a culture that

1:00:12

fits. with their vision, their

1:00:14

values, their morals. And

1:00:16

they feel that part of

1:00:18

the problem is at a leadership

1:00:20

level. If that person is

1:00:22

complaining to you for three months,

1:00:25

at some point, why don't

1:00:27

you, as a caring person, take

1:00:29

a step back and tell that person

1:00:31

in your life, hey, we thought

1:00:33

about leaving. Yeah,

1:00:35

if Greg, if you as a person

1:00:37

I love dearly in my life said, hey,

1:00:40

I'm miserable. at my job is killing

1:00:42

me, I can't take it anymore. I'd

1:00:44

be like, yeah, why don't you get another

1:00:46

job? Here's the reality to actually answer the

1:00:48

question that you're asking, Ryan. This

1:00:50

one fired me up really good. I

1:00:52

thought Adam Fox had a very good

1:00:54

breakup day. He took responsibility, talked about

1:00:57

some of the wider points. No,

1:01:00

it's funny the way you phrased it.

1:01:02

I thought Adam Fox had a good

1:01:04

break update. had a good break update.

1:01:06

Yeah, he did what I wanted him

1:01:08

to do. He the most forthright in

1:01:10

like self -analysis of what's going on. And

1:01:13

when I see that quote from

1:01:15

Mika, and Steve Vallicat ended up

1:01:17

articulating it better than I did,

1:01:19

but my takeaway was on some

1:01:21

level, this dynamic between Drury and

1:01:24

the players has brought out two

1:01:26

camps. The camp of... Drury

1:01:28

was too mean to the players, so

1:01:30

the players have the right to not play

1:01:32

hockey and quit and literally tank a

1:01:34

season. And then the other camp, which

1:01:36

I think the three of us firmly sit in, which

1:01:38

is, there is no excuse for the players to

1:01:40

do what they did and quit on the team. Not

1:01:43

everybody, but a vast majority of them.

1:01:45

Just to cut you off, because you mentioned

1:01:47

Steve Valicant. I do want to

1:01:49

read what he said. Oh yeah, read his

1:01:51

quote. When a Calon ability is shared by

1:01:53

everybody, it's usually owned by no one. Managers

1:01:55

manage coaches as coach players play. The line

1:01:57

has been blurred for the New York Rangers.

1:01:59

And I'll just make point. Howie

1:02:01

Rose followed that up with a

1:02:03

retweet and said that first line

1:02:06

that Valakit used was an exact

1:02:08

quote from Mike Keenan, who, I

1:02:10

gotta tell you, a lot of

1:02:12

players on the 1994 New York

1:02:14

Rangers fucking hated. Remind

1:02:16

me, Joe, what did the 1994 Rangers

1:02:18

do? Well, they did something incredible,

1:02:20

Greg. They won. What? I wrote my

1:02:22

eulogy about the Rangers today on

1:02:24

Blue Shirt Panther that if you're a

1:02:26

subscriber, you can read. And in

1:02:28

it, I said that this core, while

1:02:30

doing a lot of really good

1:02:32

things and being very fun, they lose.

1:02:35

And that's the part of the equation that I

1:02:37

think people are forgetting. My response

1:02:39

to Mika, who wants this open

1:02:41

communication with Drury, I think Chris Drury

1:02:43

was very forthcoming about what he

1:02:45

wanted to do. He had expectations for

1:02:47

this team, and what really pisses

1:02:50

me off is Chris Drury gave this

1:02:52

core an opportunity to keep the

1:02:54

friendship circle together since he got here.

1:02:57

The really first time that he dug his

1:02:59

feet in, came after the Florida series last

1:03:01

year, this summer with Goudreau and then for

1:03:03

Truba, and I gotta be honest with you,

1:03:05

and I've said this on my podcast, I

1:03:07

think if Chris Drury was meaner and just

1:03:09

waved Truba or did that game over the

1:03:11

summer, we might not be here right now.

1:03:14

But if Mika's advantage had wanted things to

1:03:16

be different, he could have scored more goals

1:03:18

against Florida last year. Or he could have

1:03:20

played hockey for six weeks this year between

1:03:22

November and December. I think all

1:03:24

of the people who say, well, it says more

1:03:26

about you than you think. If you're siding

1:03:28

with Chris Drury and the Rangers organization on this,

1:03:30

he created this mean work environment. The

1:03:33

players have a job to do. If you want to

1:03:35

let them off the hook for what they did, that's your

1:03:37

prerogative, all the power to you. I've

1:03:39

been called a water carrier for

1:03:41

this organization for a long time. First

1:03:44

time Joe Fortunato has ever turned on the

1:03:46

players like this and I think you're in

1:03:48

this boat too Craig or Greg Well, I

1:03:50

just want to I want to I want

1:03:52

to be clear about something I Don't think

1:03:54

Chris jury is blameless, and I don't think

1:03:56

any of us think Chris jury is blameless

1:03:58

Nope, I I could give him the benefit

1:04:00

of the doubt here and there where maybe

1:04:02

I shun it But I want to be

1:04:04

forcefully clear if the New York Rangers decided

1:04:06

to move on from Chris jury I would

1:04:08

not be picketing outside MSG I think you'd

1:04:10

have a valid reason to do it given

1:04:12

how this season went I just have what

1:04:14

some people might call multitudes, where my anger

1:04:16

for Chris Drury, it does exist. I

1:04:19

can't look at these hockey players the

1:04:21

same way again. They wasted

1:04:23

my time. In some instances,

1:04:25

they wasted my money. Like, I

1:04:27

take it quite personally. And

1:04:29

now I also couch that

1:04:31

by saying, that's the

1:04:33

most privileged statement I could possibly garner,

1:04:35

right? Oh, these guys offended me. I'm a

1:04:37

big, strong, white guy who has a

1:04:40

lot of good things going on in his

1:04:42

life. If this is the worst thing

1:04:44

happening in my life, God bless. I'm living

1:04:46

a good life. I understand that. Jokes

1:04:48

on them, it's not. That's

1:04:50

another story for another day. Neither of you

1:04:52

are my therapist. But,

1:04:55

like, guys, you don't have to pick

1:04:57

a side. You don't have to

1:04:59

be team jury or team players. You can

1:05:01

hate all of them. Ryan

1:05:03

and I did this when we talked about Laviolet. I

1:05:05

understand that this season sucks for Laviolet, and I

1:05:08

don't think he's at fault. That doesn't mean he

1:05:10

doesn't have fault. He's responsible for part

1:05:12

of it too, and he had to get his walking

1:05:14

papers. If the Rangers wanted to get rid of everybody,

1:05:16

great. I can't defend any of them.

1:05:19

And to the point that you're making, Greg,

1:05:22

and just to clarify, I would agree. I

1:05:24

put blame on the players. I put blame

1:05:26

on Laviolet. I put blame on Drury. My

1:05:28

percentages are pretty high to the players. Oh,

1:05:30

I'm right there with you. If the players

1:05:32

had not quit in November, December, right? And

1:05:34

they actually tried and they played. And this

1:05:36

was the ultimate outcome that they didn't miss

1:05:38

the playoffs or they get blown out in

1:05:40

the first round. My percentages changed a

1:05:42

little bit more towards Laviolet. Maybe the messaging

1:05:44

wasn't getting through. And then maybe to Chris Drury

1:05:46

in that, and I've said this from the

1:05:48

beginning, he had to know how the

1:05:50

locker room was going to react to a

1:05:53

public gauntlet thrown down with the Truba Criter situation.

1:05:55

that started this, that was really the instigating

1:05:57

event, if you want to go back that far

1:05:59

to the team kind of reacting like this

1:06:01

in November. I'm also of the mind

1:06:03

with you, Greg, that they just accelerated the timeline.

1:06:05

We're probably going to figure this out in

1:06:07

the spring one way or another. This kind of

1:06:09

sped it up. But let me go back

1:06:11

to the, I guess, really the reason I'm here,

1:06:13

which was the tweet I posted about other

1:06:15

teams going through adversity. The Tampa

1:06:17

Bay Lightning had their captain begging to

1:06:19

stay with the organization last year. lovable

1:06:23

figure who, by the way, Greg, won Stanley

1:06:25

Cups in Tampa Bay and kind of put that

1:06:27

team on the map and was almost famously

1:06:29

a New York Ranger at one point. The

1:06:31

lightning were like, no, fuck you, go on

1:06:33

your merry way, you know, go to another team.

1:06:35

We went to Nashville. We all know how

1:06:37

that played out. You can make the argument that,

1:06:39

all right, but the players kind of knew

1:06:41

that was coming. It was a natural progression. Obviously,

1:06:43

you know, yes, the locker room kind of

1:06:46

banded themselves together in the way that the Rangers

1:06:48

didn't. But let's use the other example. Miko

1:06:50

Rantonin gets traded blindsided, right? All the Colorado players

1:06:52

came out and said that they weren't expecting

1:06:54

it. They were expecting him to be there a

1:06:56

long time. He said he really hadn't negotiated

1:06:58

with Colorado. So a very similar experience

1:07:00

to the general manager not really being on

1:07:02

the same page as the room. You know

1:07:04

what Colorado didn't do, Greg? Or Ryan? They

1:07:06

didn't quit. They went out and traded

1:07:08

for Ryan Lindgren. And they're in the playoffs. And

1:07:11

to the other point, and Greg, I'll let you make it because

1:07:13

you were making it before he went live, Carolina

1:07:15

gets thrown into this mix, too. They

1:07:17

go through even more turmoil, and they're in

1:07:19

the playoffs and beat the shit out

1:07:21

of the Devils over the weekend. So

1:07:24

other teams seem to manage

1:07:26

this turmoil just fine. In

1:07:28

fact, I would argue the Rangers are

1:07:30

the only team that sunk themselves to

1:07:32

this depth. Yeah, the ranting

1:07:34

point is why I wanted you on the pod,

1:07:36

because when you sent that tweet, I was like, god

1:07:38

damn it. Why didn't I think of that? I

1:07:40

don't have to give Joe credit for anything. But you

1:07:43

did and it was great. The Hurricanes part of

1:07:45

it is the one that really stuck out to me

1:07:47

because at the time of the trade, I'm sure

1:07:49

we all remember, the Carolina

1:07:51

Hurricanes probably per capita have

1:07:53

the most amount of fins

1:07:55

on their roster. That is

1:07:57

essentially the Finnish team south.

1:08:00

That is there in Carolina. You would think Michael

1:08:02

Rantinen would be able to gel in that locker

1:08:04

room. would be able to click with those players,

1:08:06

would be able to have an immediate impact

1:08:08

on the ice, and whether he wanted to stay

1:08:10

long -term or not, you would think, this is Carolina

1:08:12

pushing all their chips in, and we are

1:08:14

going to go for it this year. And

1:08:17

Carolina's GM and team president

1:08:19

and Rod all said, nah,

1:08:22

fuck it. He doesn't want to stay. We don't

1:08:24

want to lose the player for nothing, a decision I

1:08:26

don't agree with. So they sent him on to

1:08:28

Dallas. And like you said, Joe, that's not a team

1:08:30

that necessarily had a hiccup. I'll go

1:08:32

one step further. I was thinking about this

1:08:34

on my way home. We talk all the time

1:08:36

about how it was something I said in

1:08:38

the summer, it was something I said in September,

1:08:40

it was something I said in October, and

1:08:42

I think at one time I said it in

1:08:44

December. If the New

1:08:46

York Rangers want to let Barclay Goodrill be the

1:08:48

reason why they don't want to make the playoffs, I

1:08:50

think that needs to tell you all you need

1:08:52

to know about this core of New York Rangers. But

1:08:55

also, have we ever thought

1:08:57

about the inverse? Barclay Goodrill goes to San

1:08:59

Jose, a place he didn't want to go, a

1:09:01

place he had already been once. a place

1:09:03

he didn't want to revisit. It didn't

1:09:05

make sense with his career timeline. He wants

1:09:07

to play for a contender immediately. He

1:09:09

wants to be in a playoff chase all

1:09:11

year. He left that life behind him. He doesn't

1:09:14

want to go back. That was Barclay Goodrow

1:09:16

in the summer. We as Ranger fans obviously stopped

1:09:18

thinking about Barclay Goodrow after that. We had

1:09:20

bigger fish to fry. But what's the story you

1:09:22

hear all year from San Jose? It's

1:09:24

the most fun place to be in hockey.

1:09:26

Yes, they're losing right now, but it's clearly a

1:09:28

team building an identity. clearly a team building

1:09:30

for the future, clearly a team that has a

1:09:32

plan and is continuing a longer path. And

1:09:34

they're probably not going to be ready next year.

1:09:36

But in two, three years, that team is

1:09:38

going to be electric, exciting and fun. At

1:09:41

no point this season did you

1:09:43

hear about Barclay Goodrow kicking trash

1:09:45

cans, bullying rookies, sitting out games,

1:09:48

being upset that he's in San Jose. Barclay

1:09:50

Goodrow just went about his business. He

1:09:52

was upset. And

1:09:54

then he realized, oh, someone's paying me

1:09:57

$3 .6 million to play hockey. Oh, and

1:09:59

I'm doing it in Southern California. I

1:10:01

guess life could be worse. And

1:10:04

he just went about life. What are

1:10:06

the rate? Like the Rangers are still complaining

1:10:08

about he came up today. Now, to be fair,

1:10:11

I'm sure Mika Zbentajed didn't go into

1:10:13

breakup day, hoping someone would say

1:10:15

the name Barclay Goodrum. It is not

1:10:17

Mika Zbentajed's fault that somebody asked

1:10:19

him a question and he answered it

1:10:21

honestly. That's fine. That doesn't

1:10:24

mean I have to like the

1:10:26

honest fucking answer. Grow up. You're

1:10:28

an adult. You're in your

1:10:30

30s. You are married with a

1:10:32

child, sir. Barkha, I have

1:10:35

great friends in my life. If they

1:10:37

move away from me, I'm not this upset.

1:10:39

Like, what are we fucking doing with

1:10:41

this team? I'm just, I'm beyond the

1:10:44

point of anger at this point. Like, at

1:10:46

some point, I just, I, again,

1:10:49

we all interact with sports

1:10:51

differently. We all have different interpersonal relationships

1:10:53

with these people we don't know. And if you

1:10:55

want to be pro player, I'm not going

1:10:57

to stand here and tell you you're an idiot. But

1:11:00

you can't stand there and also tell me I'm

1:11:02

an idiot for overreacting this way. This is fucking

1:11:04

ridiculous. I can't tell you

1:11:06

you're an idiot for overreacting this way.

1:11:08

I can give the one piece

1:11:10

of kudos I can give to Mika

1:11:12

Zbeneget as this. He actually says

1:11:14

some shit that's not standard boilerplate hockey

1:11:16

responses. And if you get the

1:11:18

chance to watch his actual video, he's

1:11:20

pretty candid about everything. And while I

1:11:22

don't agree with him, and his stance

1:11:24

on, hey, you know, there was some

1:11:26

turmoil and like we get there. There's

1:11:28

clearly he's done a lot of self

1:11:30

-analysis and at least he's willing to

1:11:32

say some shit that others are not.

1:11:35

Like Chris Crider, like Fox at least

1:11:37

called it out. Crider did his best,

1:11:39

but he's very, you know, cryptic as

1:11:41

Crider has always been. Mika tries

1:11:43

to be candid, like, hey, there's a lot

1:11:45

of problems and communication is a big one

1:11:47

of it. That being said,

1:11:49

I don't know if he's headed in the right direction, but

1:11:51

at least he tries. I don't know if that counts for

1:11:53

a shit, Joe, but. He seemed

1:11:55

pretty authentic Yeah,

1:11:57

I I think I

1:12:00

Think on some

1:12:02

level Joe did you

1:12:04

die? Yeah, you're

1:12:06

back. I don't know

1:12:09

you just said

1:12:11

recording stopped the host

1:12:13

stop. we're still

1:12:15

recording big guy. Oh,

1:12:18

we are okay So

1:12:22

she should be good. I don't know.

1:12:24

I'm recording. We'll find out. All right.

1:12:26

I apologize. I'm sorry. Well,

1:12:28

if you cut out, we'll find out. I don't

1:12:30

know. It does say 100 percent uploaded, which is weird,

1:12:32

but it probably rerecorded. Don't worry about it. Just

1:12:34

keep talking. All right. I'll just go.

1:12:36

This would be the time for us to stop

1:12:38

and restart just saying before he gives his

1:12:40

answer. OK. Anyway,

1:12:43

you're saying, Joe, a little hiccup. Yes. So

1:12:45

authenticity, Amika. Go ahead, Joe. Look,

1:12:47

I do think on some level. It's better

1:12:49

than some of what happened earlier this year with

1:12:51

him with the Larry Brooks story about his

1:12:53

ice time. And there was really no self -respect

1:12:56

of like, oh, you know, I'm not playing

1:12:58

as well as I could be, right? Yeah,

1:13:00

on some level, it's better to hear than not. I

1:13:02

think a big part of, and I think you had said

1:13:04

this, Greg, a couple of weeks ago on the show,

1:13:06

which was like, I think part of

1:13:08

the reason people really want John Tortorella here

1:13:10

is because John Tortorella says the shit I'm

1:13:12

thinking. You know what I mean? Like he

1:13:14

calls the penguins winers, he fucking goes off

1:13:16

on Crosby and they're like, yeah, those are

1:13:19

things I'm thinking from the couch. So some

1:13:21

of these players I want to hear roast

1:13:23

themselves. And Adam Fox, I made the

1:13:25

joke that he was having a good breakup day.

1:13:27

I think he led, or at least it was

1:13:29

the first quote I saw, which was like, look,

1:13:31

there's problems here. We were not good enough. We

1:13:33

have to take a hard look at ourselves. I

1:13:35

think Vincent Trocheck said something kind of similar. Does

1:13:37

it count for anything, Ryan? Sort of. But again,

1:13:40

Mika falls in this category for me of, and

1:13:42

I loved Mika before really last year. I

1:13:44

think I kind of started to turn that maybe

1:13:46

this relationship was going to sour. You

1:13:50

showed me what I needed to see out of

1:13:52

you in November and December. I don't need to see

1:13:54

anything else from you. Mika could have

1:13:56

said nothing about the communication and been like, I wasn't

1:13:58

good enough. I had the worst year of my career.

1:14:00

I got to get better. I have to be better.

1:14:02

It's like, great, but I already saw the worst of

1:14:04

you and I don't need to see anything else. I

1:14:06

can never look at Mika as a bandage out the

1:14:08

same way. I just can't. Well,

1:14:11

I'll push back a little bit, Joe,

1:14:13

of all people. I'll never

1:14:15

be confused of being a Mika. Apologist

1:14:18

at this point in time. I

1:14:20

was there in October. I graduated. I

1:14:22

got my diploma. I'm no longer

1:14:24

if Nika was Reflective and said, you

1:14:26

know what? I sucked. I was

1:14:28

terrible. I let off ice factors impact

1:14:30

on ice play and While we

1:14:32

need to address those off ice factors

1:14:34

in the offseason buck stops with

1:14:36

me. I didn't have to let it

1:14:38

affect my play I did that's

1:14:40

on me. I need to be better

1:14:42

if he said that I think

1:14:45

I would have came on the pod

1:14:47

today and been like, he's

1:14:49

got a lot more work to do to repair this

1:14:51

relationship, but that's a good first step. I think

1:14:53

that's where I would have been. But

1:14:55

saying that, you know, I just, I

1:14:57

really don't want to, I don't want

1:14:59

to hear it. Communication

1:15:01

issues from top down. It's not

1:15:03

that the New York Rangers are aces

1:15:05

when it comes to communication. They're

1:15:08

clearly not. They have their issues. Lord

1:15:10

fucking knows. With the last week,

1:15:12

this organization has had, at the same

1:15:14

time, If I have

1:15:16

a problem with my boss and I

1:15:18

don't think my boss is communicating

1:15:20

to me effectively, I either address it

1:15:22

with my boss and it's done

1:15:24

or I say this isn't going to

1:15:27

fix itself and I either need

1:15:29

to get used to that or I

1:15:31

need to move on. I

1:15:33

add something to that? Sure. Calvin

1:15:36

DeHaan has the right, especially with

1:15:38

some of the things that he said

1:15:40

today, to say there was no

1:15:42

communication with me. At every turn, Mika's

1:15:45

advantage ad was given rope and

1:15:47

more rope and more rope. So if

1:15:49

Mika thinks he wasn't communicated to

1:15:51

about his struggles and his play, it

1:15:53

didn't seem to hurt him at

1:15:55

all. That man was

1:15:57

given every opportunity and then some. There's

1:15:59

no way there wasn't communication happening with him

1:16:01

behind the scenes. And if there wasn't,

1:16:03

it wasn't like it hurt him. We

1:16:06

played, you know, Calvin Dahon got

1:16:08

here. What did he say? He got like a teleprompter

1:16:10

answer of like, welcome to New York. And then they were

1:16:12

like, all right, go play three games. Oh, you look

1:16:14

pretty good. Go fuck yourself. Sit in

1:16:16

the box. We're not even trading you to

1:16:18

another team that's contending for the playoffs. Don't

1:16:20

fucking play. By the way, Braden Schneider needs

1:16:22

surgery that he's needed for two years. You

1:16:24

still can't fucking play. Go fuck yourself. And

1:16:28

I'm gonna, like, Mika's gonna complain

1:16:30

about the communication. Please spare me. I

1:16:33

have Calvado Hanes had the week of

1:16:35

the gods. I really want him involved in

1:16:37

this organization moving forward. I really think

1:16:39

he should be the coax. He could be

1:16:41

a player coax next week. And I'd

1:16:43

be like, this is going to be the

1:16:45

greatest year in Rangers history right here. It's

1:16:49

him. He'd only give himself 12 or 15

1:16:51

minutes of ice time. He admitted it himself.

1:16:55

It's what he should have had. He'd be

1:16:57

brilliant. It's what he should have had

1:16:59

the entire time. Unfortunately, that just didn't. Lavi

1:17:01

set the lineups and he's no longer here either.

1:17:03

You're not surprised at Lavi like I fired, I

1:17:05

know that. Were you surprised that the injury is

1:17:07

at least? The reason I'm

1:17:09

surprised about the injuries is because this

1:17:12

is the first year I can remember

1:17:14

and I guess I'll make Greg angry

1:17:16

because I'll invoke Zach Jones here. If

1:17:18

you're playing Schneider who I don't even think

1:17:20

is particularly playing well this year or did

1:17:22

not play well this year. Oh,

1:17:25

injured. over a guy like

1:17:27

Zach Jones who's just sitting there and looked

1:17:29

at least somewhat effective when he was in

1:17:31

the lineup. I'm not really sure what we

1:17:33

were doing. Chris Crider is playing

1:17:35

with a bad back and what, like an injured

1:17:37

broken hand, whatever the fuck it was. He

1:17:39

wouldn't reveal what the hand was, but he also

1:17:41

had vertigo and an ear infection, so. Why? You

1:17:44

have kids that you're sitting. Brennan Hoffman

1:17:46

could have been playing top six minutes. You

1:17:48

could have gotten Bret Barard in there.

1:17:50

Yeah, Greg, before you even say it, I

1:17:52

don't disagree that it really wouldn't make

1:17:54

a difference from a wins -loss perspective, but

1:17:56

I am of the mind that the season

1:17:58

was over really in December and January. I'd

1:18:01

rather have the long -term

1:18:03

runway data on these younger

1:18:05

kids. Why are you playing injured

1:18:07

guys who are not making the team better?

1:18:09

And that's really what I think instigated the

1:18:11

Dahan thing. where he looked around and he

1:18:13

had to know something was wrong with Schneider

1:18:16

and I can't get into the lineup. Why? Listen,

1:18:19

I did this rant earlier on the

1:18:21

pod. You weren't here for it. I'll never

1:18:23

understand why teams play guys injured in hockey.

1:18:26

Again, this doesn't happen in any other sport. It

1:18:29

happens to a certain extent in football

1:18:31

when you get to the end of

1:18:33

the season. But like, if

1:18:35

Chris Crider at that point in the

1:18:37

year, like we're talking week 12, he suffers

1:18:39

an injury. If he was on the

1:18:41

well -run football team, I was gonna invoke

1:18:43

the New York Jets. I corrected myself and

1:18:46

I said a well -run football team. The

1:18:48

team would simply not play him. They

1:18:50

might have to force him into the lineup

1:18:52

around week 16, week 17, week 18,

1:18:54

but they'd give him a month to get

1:18:56

better before they're like, well, now we

1:18:58

don't have a fucking choice. The season's on

1:19:00

the line. It was February. And

1:19:02

Chris Crider already had a bad back and

1:19:04

then he broke his, something happened to his

1:19:07

hand. Oh, and he can't stand up. without

1:19:09

feeling like the world is going to fall

1:19:11

around them? At some point, don't play them.

1:19:13

What are you doing? And you have kids

1:19:15

that are there that can be inserted into

1:19:17

the lineup and you look good. Joe, even

1:19:19

if you, honest to God,

1:19:21

even if you don't have kids

1:19:23

and it's just Johnny Brodzinski that

1:19:25

just play Johnny Brodzinski or Jimmy

1:19:27

VC, like just put these guys,

1:19:29

these are tested veterans. They've been there before.

1:19:31

You trusted them last year with Ice

1:19:33

Time. What are you doing? But

1:19:36

you gotta get your Johnny Brzezinski top

1:19:38

six minutes, so you can't lose that. I

1:19:41

will add one thing about Drury

1:19:43

here, though. Where I have begun

1:19:45

twisting in the wind a little bit

1:19:47

with Drury, because, and I'm with you, Greg,

1:19:49

my hatred of the players right now has

1:19:51

really overtaken. I think Drury deserves more blame

1:19:53

than I'm really giving him. But when you

1:19:55

look at the whole silhouette of the organization,

1:19:58

or Mosaic, I guess I should say, of

1:20:00

what's happened this year. There's a lot of

1:20:02

times when I think we're all in

1:20:04

agreement that Drury is not interjecting himself into

1:20:06

the lineup card, that he's not really, he

1:20:08

wasn't getting involved into the day -to -day. Maybe

1:20:10

you should have gotten into the day -to -day

1:20:13

a little bit and made sure that some

1:20:15

of these things weren't happening. And I guess

1:20:17

there's an argument to be made if everybody

1:20:19

knew that Chris cried, this was his last

1:20:21

year in you, but then play him the

1:20:23

last couple of games of the season, who

1:20:25

cares if that's the way that you're gonna

1:20:27

go down the road. I just feel like

1:20:29

Drury really kind of went laissez -faire with

1:20:31

this group. And my conspiracy joe take to

1:20:33

do a Bill Simmons bit is maybe Drury

1:20:35

was letting it get really bad because he

1:20:37

knew the season was lost and he's really

1:20:39

going to burn it down and he needed

1:20:41

an excuse to do so. But I got

1:20:43

to see a lot more evidence from Drury

1:20:45

over the next six weeks. Coming out

1:20:47

of July 1st, I'll have a really good

1:20:49

idea of how much blame I should be assigning

1:20:51

to Chris Drury. Right now, it's probably in

1:20:53

the 15th to 20 % range. But I go

1:20:55

back to this and Eric and I say this

1:20:57

on the podcast a lot. I have a

1:20:59

lot of issues with Chris Jury. I

1:21:02

definitely think he's probably a little bit harder

1:21:04

than he needs to be. He doesn't have

1:21:06

a soft touch. I don't think he handled

1:21:08

things well this year in terms of the

1:21:10

way things played out publicly. But at every

1:21:12

major decision, at every turn that he has

1:21:14

made, his identification that this team was not

1:21:16

good enough when they were sporting a 12

1:21:18

and 4 record, he has been spot fucking

1:21:20

on. He is absolutely correct in those decisions.

1:21:22

The way he did it and went about

1:21:25

it, I certainly might not agree with and

1:21:27

I think it's the biggest part of his

1:21:29

criticism. But he identified these guys were not

1:21:31

good enough after Florida. I thought he let

1:21:33

Truba off the hook and it ended up

1:21:35

fucking him over in the summer. But at

1:21:37

12 and four, I would say 95 %

1:21:39

of other general managers would have said, you

1:21:41

know what, let's just ride this team out,

1:21:43

let them go to the playoffs, see what

1:21:45

happens and burn it to the ground over

1:21:47

the summer. And Drury was like, nope, they're

1:21:49

not good enough. I know they're not good

1:21:51

enough. What are we waiting for? I take

1:21:53

heart in that, I really do, that he

1:21:56

made those decisions and was willing to do

1:21:58

that. This podcast

1:22:00

generally, I wouldn't say bows at the

1:22:02

altar, but we were pro -jury a lot of

1:22:04

the time. No, at some point, Ryan, I think

1:22:06

we said the exact words that we bow at

1:22:08

the altar. We have bowed at the altar. Did

1:22:11

you want Peter Surelli to walk through that door?

1:22:13

Who is replacing jury? That's the

1:22:15

other thing you people need to

1:22:17

think about. You keep on talking.

1:22:20

Really, I'm getting a lot of this from

1:22:22

my own site, to be honest with you.

1:22:24

The banter really is kind of protect there.

1:22:26

At least the commenters are more on the

1:22:28

jury side. You want Peter Shirelli? Like,

1:22:30

who do you think is coming in? Ken

1:22:33

Holland. The devil you know is

1:22:35

better than the devil you don't, honestly. Yeah,

1:22:38

I mean we we had this conversation

1:22:40

during the season about the coach everyone

1:22:42

is like fire Peter Laviolette fire Peter

1:22:44

Laviolette And I was like until one

1:22:46

of you actually brings a name before

1:22:48

me that I'm like that's a good

1:22:51

idea That's edible that you can actually

1:22:53

get yeah, I'm not firing Peter Laviolette

1:22:55

until that name presents itself because listen

1:22:57

if the Rangers fired appeared Laviolette in

1:22:59

December David Carl wasn't gonna leave Denver

1:23:01

midseason Mike Sullivan wasn't gonna bully his

1:23:03

way out of Pittsburgh mid -season, he's

1:23:06

probably not going to bully his way

1:23:08

out of Pittsburgh. Now, in fact, I'm

1:23:10

prepared to say, on the record, he's

1:23:12

not leaving Pittsburgh. It's over. That

1:23:14

dream is dead. I will say this.

1:23:16

Fitz has talked about this to me,

1:23:18

and he's talked about it in our

1:23:20

insider group, and it's worth mentioning. What

1:23:23

has Rick Tocket done to deserve

1:23:25

this kind of glazing he's getting

1:23:27

in the media? Did

1:23:29

you see my response to Fitz that I think talk

1:23:31

it would be one of the few things that

1:23:33

would come in and make things worse than last year?

1:23:36

I don't like I think of how deep down to

1:23:38

the bottom of the barrel you have to get to

1:23:40

be like Yeah, that's something that would make things worse

1:23:42

talk. It's that guy for me I just what what

1:23:44

season am I supposed to hang my head on and

1:23:46

be like, you know, Rick talking to the good job

1:23:48

there? Don't

1:23:52

go look at who Stan Fischler thinks should be the coach.

1:23:55

I I can't help it like The

1:23:57

high council keeps sending me the tweets from Stan

1:23:59

Fischler because they show up in the newsletter. I

1:24:02

was gonna respond. He's been like responding to some

1:24:04

of my stuff recently and I don't really know

1:24:06

how to feel about it. And I looked at

1:24:08

that and I was like, I'm not even touching

1:24:10

this. This is such an insane. Oh, see, you're

1:24:12

a better man than I am. I believe on

1:24:14

Easter Sunday, I took the SpongeBob. How many times

1:24:16

do we have to teach you this lesson old

1:24:18

man and retweeted that on top of his tweet?

1:24:21

I'll go back to what you were you

1:24:23

two were saying on the OT last week

1:24:25

while you were talking about the Panarin situation

1:24:27

Which is like I missed the days of

1:24:29

the piggy Iggy where that was the thing

1:24:31

that pissed me off about Stan Fischler Which

1:24:33

was like you don't want to sign Igor

1:24:35

Shisterkin like those were the good days when

1:24:37

that was what we really cared about Yeah,

1:24:39

well, I it was the biggest story of

1:24:41

the season what I said right asshole I

1:24:43

guess we'll end here Joe any any final

1:24:45

thoughts on Sam Rosen and his final week

1:24:47

as a broadcaster God,

1:24:50

I wish it was better. Sam

1:24:52

did not deserve to go out

1:24:54

like this. I

1:24:57

think the whole thing is really

1:24:59

depressing and sad. Look, I'm 36

1:25:01

years old. Sam Rosen is

1:25:03

literally called, and unlike you, Greg, I don't have

1:25:05

the Mets to fall back on, like the Rangers

1:25:07

are the only thing I care about. Sam

1:25:09

Rosen has been the voice of my favorite

1:25:12

team since I was born. I

1:25:14

think we are remarkably lucky, like going

1:25:16

from Henrik Lundquist to Igor Shisterkin lucky. to

1:25:18

go from Sam Rosen and Kenny Albert,

1:25:20

but Sam is one of one. There

1:25:22

will never be another guy like him. He's

1:25:25

the best, and we are worse

1:25:27

off for not being able to listen to him,

1:25:29

but my God. And I really do think the Rangers

1:25:31

should try to figure out a way to do

1:25:33

a, it's a power play goal thing that happens maybe

1:25:36

in MSG when the Rangers score a power play

1:25:38

goal. I'll allow what the Yankees did with, now

1:25:40

his name is blanking, but who's the announcer Greg,

1:25:42

you would know. Bob Shepard. Here's

1:25:45

my thing, I'll actually put. I'll actually

1:25:47

push back on that. I really didn't like

1:25:49

when they had a new public address

1:25:51

announcer, but Derek Jeter required Bob Shepard to

1:25:53

keep introducing him. Yeah.

1:25:55

I love, I love Sam. I think

1:25:57

they should have raised the banner for

1:25:59

him. I think it's really weird that

1:26:02

they didn't, but that's my, like that's

1:26:04

an organizational thing. My guess, my guess

1:26:06

is they'll, they'll do, I don't know,

1:26:08

the banner stuff's hard. Like the Mets

1:26:10

didn't do it. They. They

1:26:12

announced when Bob Murphy and Ralph kind

1:26:14

of retired and they opened city

1:26:16

field. They gave both of them plaques.

1:26:18

Bob had already been dead for

1:26:20

a long time, but I think they

1:26:22

renamed the radio booth at Shea

1:26:24

Stadium after Bob when he retired. My

1:26:28

guess is they'll put a banner up

1:26:30

next year. They put banners up for

1:26:32

everything else. So why be

1:26:34

holier than thou and decide you're not going to

1:26:36

put one up for Sam? I'm fine if

1:26:38

they didn't want to do it in season. It

1:26:40

just gives you an excuse to bring Sam

1:26:42

back when they need him to come back and

1:26:44

they need good PR. Well, next year is

1:26:46

the hundred year, right? So there's got to be,

1:26:48

there's got to be something. You

1:26:51

would think. But yeah, Kenny

1:26:53

Albert's great, though. That's not a slighted him. Kenny's

1:26:55

going to be awesome. No, Kenny rules. I'm

1:26:57

happy for him. He deserves it. It's always been

1:26:59

his job. I'll just miss him. But I'm

1:27:01

happy it's over at the same time. Very happy.

1:27:03

We're on to the next the next year

1:27:05

of this shithouse team. Yeah, Joe,

1:27:07

I'd love to keep talking, but we have to go finish. are

1:27:09

actually the rest of the podcast and I think

1:27:11

we've already recorded for an hour. So

1:27:14

we'll have to talk to you soon. Yeah. Well, thank

1:27:16

you guys for having me on. I really appreciate it.

1:27:18

Greg, I'll try to find more tweets that get me

1:27:20

back into your circle. Wow. That

1:27:22

Mika, that Miko tweet, it really, it

1:27:24

hit like a fucking ton of bricks. I

1:27:27

was like, this motherfucker is making a

1:27:29

good point today. If you, if you

1:27:31

want more Ranger content and surely you

1:27:33

do blue shirts banders out there for

1:27:35

you. Thank you. I appreciate that. Love

1:27:37

you, Joe. Talk to you soon. Bye.

1:27:39

Love you, too, guys. McDonald's

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terms are responsible. Thanks

1:28:56

to Joe for joining. Appreciate my

1:28:58

man. No, and we're back. Who

1:29:00

are you? Oh, sorry. Let's try

1:29:02

this. And we're back. Okay.

1:29:05

If you want to leave a five -star question on the show, you can to Patreon .com.

1:29:07

So, it's pleasure to break away today to get actually to the discord. You go to

1:29:09

the right here. I'm just going to get

1:29:11

some promotional material we need to tell the people

1:29:13

about here. Yep. Step number one. If you're still

1:29:15

listening. If you're still listening. And if you are

1:29:17

listening, you're already a part of our Patreon, so

1:29:20

this doesn't even apply to you. That's true. The

1:29:23

therapy sessions are coming back. I'm going to give

1:29:25

this season a little bit of time to breathe.

1:29:27

I don't think we need to talk about the

1:29:29

New York Rangers immediately. But once a week, I'm

1:29:31

going to fire up in our Discord, take

1:29:33

your guys' calls, post it afterwards.

1:29:35

Should be fun, too. Oh,

1:29:37

sorry. Do you have a question about that?

1:29:39

I do. And I have an update. I want

1:29:41

to try something with you. OK. Let's do

1:29:44

a business part right here. Let's do it. This

1:29:46

is what we do best. This is what

1:29:48

we do. I think Riverside has an ability for

1:29:50

me to play media that both you and

1:29:52

I can hear at the same time. I

1:29:54

think the problem with that is

1:29:56

we'd then be asking people to

1:29:58

audibly submit something beforehand. I'm not

1:30:00

saying the whole therapy. I'm just

1:30:03

saying I think this summer for

1:30:05

the first time we're going to

1:30:07

try and take a voicemail call

1:30:09

once or twice. Not on

1:30:11

the main show, maybe on OT. Okay.

1:30:13

You know, but also the the therapy

1:30:16

show these guys this is it happens

1:30:18

long I'm not shitting. I'm just a

1:30:20

totally separate idea. I think that's an

1:30:22

interesting idea for OT Okay, I would

1:30:24

say that That's interesting summer OT summer

1:30:26

OT because what else are we gonna

1:30:28

talk about? I mean again, this team

1:30:30

will provide plenty and also the New

1:30:32

York Mets but speaking of the New

1:30:35

York Mets playback is back They have

1:30:37

an agreement with MLB, so I'm gonna

1:30:39

be doing met games Throughout the summer,

1:30:41

I haven't been doing back in the

1:30:43

New York roofs as much as I

1:30:45

would like. Life has been crazy. The

1:30:47

Rangers have been crazy. Life is

1:30:49

going to continue to be crazy until the end

1:30:51

of July. But I will fire up. I've

1:30:54

got a merry band of misfits coming on

1:30:56

with me to talk through some of that

1:30:58

games. First one, Ryan, if you want to

1:31:00

join, it's Friday against the Nationals. I'm going

1:31:02

to fire up for playback Friday night. I'll

1:31:04

probably be on date night with my wife,

1:31:06

but I just purchased a box of baseball

1:31:08

cards. I will be live cracking it. So

1:31:10

we'll do a break. Why not? There you

1:31:12

go. You can do that however you want.

1:31:14

I will. I'll probably just post it on

1:31:16

Patreon. When I say you

1:31:18

can do that however you want, that

1:31:20

isn't me saying you should do it a

1:31:22

specific way. Cool. I just

1:31:24

wanted to open baseball cards. It's been so long. Cool.

1:31:27

Anyway. Do you want

1:31:29

to sell my baseball cards for me? I need