- 2 days ago
Friend and Radio play-by-play announcer for the Florida Panthers Doug Plagens joins the show live in studio! He gives us insight on how he is able to call quickly and how body language awareness helps! Leroy takes advantage and gets all his hockey questions answered on empty netters. He states how Brad Marchand is showing no signs of slowing down!
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00:00talk to our next guest joins us uh in studio the voice of your florida panthers right here
00:08on wqam as the cats won a wild one last night leroy eight five over the canucks
00:14doug plagan's joining us here hello doug how are you what's going on how cool is this
00:20usually we see you in your house yeah this is awesome it's uh it's awesome to have you that
00:24was a wild one last night man it was it i was just telling leroy before we jumped in here it
00:29almost felt like two or three different hockey games in one the way that it started panthers
00:34fell behind early and it wasn't for a lack of execution or anything like that vancouver just
00:40came out cashed in on some early opportunities even though the panthers had some good pressure
00:44stuck with it as we've seen has been a you know kind of a hallmark trait of this team in recent
00:49years they really don't panic and we saw that again last night and you know that's a trait
00:54that they've had for a while and got that big lead then vancouver battled back and the panthers
01:00ultimately ended up pulling away at the end so again uh there was a little bit of everything in
01:06that game do you like calling games like that all of the goals is that exhausting uh you've gotten
01:10used to to the paul ball style and low score we had this a few years ago when they were high flying
01:16scoring all the time did you did you miss did you harken back a couple years to a game like that you
01:20you know from our perspective uh and you always hear players sometimes enjoy playing in games like
01:25that because the panthers set a franchise record last night with 16 different players getting a
01:30point including sergey bobrovsky i heard that i heard that from the folks on siriusxm early this
01:35morning that was uh uh a team record that 16 different panthers had a point last night and
01:40even sergey bobrovsky had an assist in the game it is fun high event hockey as you'd say but i guess we
01:46are fortunate in that the way this panthers team has been constructed and the way that they've
01:51played the last few years even when they're in low scoring games the panthers games are interesting
01:57their low scoring games are still fun you can't say that about every team that we've seen over the
02:02last uh you know over this era or going back to previous eras sometimes low scoring games can be
02:08a little bit uh you know low event but that was a high event game we certainly had a good time with it
02:13no doubt about that we were talking about this with you because like hockey i mean i'm sure you
02:16you've been doing your whole life you've been getting ready for this and all that stuff how
02:19the hell do you see the deflections you call them so well all the time these things are blasting shots
02:25it's just a little tip by are you on binoculars like how do you did you just grow this this hockey
02:30eye how do you see this damn thing the game's moving so damn fast well i appreciate it first of
02:36all and i'll admit there are times that i'm having to look at body language a lot of times first and
02:41foremost players body language will usually tell you what you need to know and then they start
02:46celebrating you know he must have you know like if yeah and if just from the perspective of if you
02:51know sometimes the puck goes in and out so quickly or it barely goes in the net and a player's body
02:58language will usually tell you that you know they know when the puck went in whether it's you see guys
03:02start celebrate or you see somebody from the team that got scored on start to let up on the play because
03:09they know that the puck just went in the net so a lot of times just watch the players that'll tell you
03:14what you need to know but i'm very fortunate and it's probably because he spent so much time
03:20in front of the net in the national hockey league battling with defensemen but billy lindsey has a
03:24really good knack for noticing a that a deflection happened and b what that might have gone off of and
03:31a lot of times what's happening in the booth is that deflection happens the puck goes in and even if i
03:38even if i've caught it billy will grab the sheet and he starts pointing at a number and so so it
03:43happens a lot so yes the teamwork does happen billy has an unbelievable eye for that but it also just
03:49comes with um it just comes with doing a lot of games the repetition and i think you could probably
03:54say that about any profession out there but you just start to get a feel for for how things look where
03:59the celebration starts and let's say you know the guy who takes the shot isn't the one who's kind of
04:06leading the fist bump line over the bench then you kind of know that the guy who is the first over
04:11leading that fist bump line tipped it he knows he tipped it or his teammates know he tipped it so
04:16you get a feel for it that way i gotta tell you i've never seen a situation where they stop a goal
04:22so you know instead of deflecting it you know oh if you would have just left it alone it was in the net
04:27i've never seen that so like is everybody on the ice that aware of that puck like today like holy
04:36smokes they they do practice it a lot oh really deflections are a thing that gets practiced a lot
04:42and that's why and paul maurice has used this terminology before but with a player like matthew
04:46chuck for example and sam reinhardt one of the best in the business as well there is an art to tipping
04:52pucks but you can take it a step further and a couple of these guys are so gifted with their hands
04:57their skills with the puck and chuck and reinhardt are prime examples of this but it goes beyond just
05:03deflecting a puck and paul maurice has said they they almost steer it it's it takes it to a different
05:08level they're so good with that part of the game but in the modern era the goalies the goalies have
05:15gotten so good and the goalies are only getting bigger i mean it seems like you know we're looking at
05:22six three and six three and up for the size of these goalies which comes with huge wingspan that
05:27the days of uh you know a mike vernon for example going back to the 90s or somebody like that who
05:33um you know was a five five nine five ten goaltenders you just don't see those as much
05:37and when you see a goaltender who's listed at for example six foot even he almost gets viewed a little
05:43bit on the the smaller side as far as the game blew me away when i first met bob i was like
05:48tiny you're not very you're not you're not you see all that gear but you're six six one slim
05:55and all these goalies now are enormous they're only getting bigger it feels like and you see
05:59you're starting to see goaltenders that are like i said six three seems to almost be in the middle
06:04nowadays and you're seeing more and more six four six five even goaltenders getting into that six six
06:09range which when you have a guy that big who then is going to have a wingspan that big and then is
06:15going to have equipment that needs to be that big to to accommodate him it's tough to find openings
06:21it's tough to find a window to shoot at and that's why these deflections especially in the playoffs and
06:26in the big games and against teams that defend really well it's become such a huge part of the
06:31sport what have you oh god i'm just the other thing is is it we like is it just me because i don't
06:39watch as much hockey but it seems like they go to the empty net a lot sooner than they were before
06:47so that it's a good observation because it definitely has been like five minutes left they
06:51go oh goalies i'm like wait a minute we still got a quarter of the period it almost used to be if you
06:58go back to like the 90s for example it was kind of like the unwritten protocol that you'd get down to
07:05about a minute and a half left a minute left right you'd pull your goalie and it kind of changed you
07:12go back maybe a decade when patrick law had his first tour of duty as a head coach when he was
07:17coaching the colorado avalanche and again you go back about a decade and you started to see coaches
07:22kind of just trust their gut the feel how's the game going if my top guys are rested and i feel like
07:28maybe we're coming out of a media timeout at uh you know and there's you know five minutes and change
07:33left and i'm just feeling good maybe that's our opportunity and we're going to get the goalie out
07:38and it does it does change the dynamic and how a game is played too if a team's down one and all of
07:45a sudden you you go that route you play that card if you will it can it can send a jolt of momentum
07:52into a team you might have your group with your top guys rested you might calculate it to where okay
07:57my top guys are rested their top checking unit is not so i have a good opportunity with a matchup
08:03late in the game that i want to get try and tie this thing up it's not as rigid as it used to be
08:08where you would have coaches okay minute and a half left let's start to think about getting the goalie
08:12out and and we'll do it that way you've we've seen it now routinely some go some coaches have have
08:18really taken it to different levels i mean you'll see you'll see it occasionally five or six minutes
08:23left desperate times call for desperate measures and and uh and a coach will pull his goal i gotta get my
08:27hockey stuff out because when i ask him a hockey question he gets mad at me right you asked so
08:33specific questions no no you have like i ask situations because i'm trying to i'm trying to
08:38learn that was a very that was a fine question like yeah to ask like uh does that happen but
08:42also you're on the power plate does that count here's the other thing you got like you got rule
08:4641 a dash two like that's what the things that he asked me so dude i don't know did you know if
08:53you're in overtime and you go empty net and you lose you don't get no point yeah like i'm like
09:01holy smokes why and that came into play in recent like yes that's why yeah remember i asked you about
09:08the last year and they said we need two points like we need two points which that that can't happen
09:15and there you know there was a specific incident we're going we're going way back there was a game in
09:19in the late 80s where the new jersey devils went into overtime against chicago late in the game and
09:25i think a guy that a lot of folks have come to know as an analyst darren pang was actually the
09:28goaltender for chicago in that game but the devils and the blackhawks went to overtime it was either
09:33late it was late in the season may have even been the last game of the season the devils needed two
09:38points to move to make the playoffs the one point for getting into overtime wasn't going to do it so they
09:44they had to win and you might get into situations like that where that second point means so much and
09:48you look now too um across the league that's part partially why it's so difficult to make up ground
09:54and why really the worst thing you can do in the national hockey league is have a dreadful start
09:59you want to at least come out of the gate and be in the middle of the pack and at least tread water
10:05and and do what you need to do to accumulate points because if you fall behind to try and make up ground
10:11when you have all these three-point games especially in a season like this where i don't know that we've
10:16seen i know a lot of folks like to use the word parody you hear the the phrase competitive balance
10:22used a lot and i think that's almost more of what we have here and it's it's that all these teams
10:27truly night to night are capable of beating each other i can't remember a season where you go into
10:31it and i know everybody's gonna always say the right things but you go into it and we can all look at it
10:36we we know who the contenders are who the teams in the middle are we know what teams probably for lack
10:43of a better way to put it have a better chance at the draft lottery at the number one pick than they
10:47do it at winning the stanley cup this year you go into the season there's like like 27 out of 32 go
10:53into this thing probably with realistic playoff aspirations and some sort of expectation that if
10:59it isn't met there's going to be questions that uh that have to be asked i don't know that we've seen
11:04a season like this in a long time where you have so many teams that are in it and that's where these
11:09these three-point games come into play and why if you if you fall behind it's tough to make up ground
11:14i guess it's a really lengthy way of answering why night tonight right it's it's important to to try
11:22and try and get those two points any way you can and sometimes you get into spots where you absolutely
11:26have to have the two points is it more important now with the injuries and the guys trying to and so
11:32many guys called up aware just to stay afloat and try to stay within reasonable distance from
11:40the top of the division or the conference because you know when those guys come back there's going to
11:45be a lot of pressure on them to to kind of get that charge going yeah you know the panthers if we're if
11:50we're just taking it to the panthers perspective here at this point in the season they've done a really
11:54good job of that there are a couple of games over 500 a lot of home games coming up here so there's a
11:59good opportunity to make a move and i know i mentioned it with with hawking crowder the other
12:04day but there are a lot of teams out there and it just goes back to first of all how strong the
12:10leadership group in the room is this team's won back-to-back stanley cups been to three straight
12:14cup finals and there's nobody sitting here comfortable with just what they've accomplished
12:19in the past these guys know what they what they can do and that they're in the middle of a contending
12:23window that spans years into the future with how many key players are signed it speaks to what
12:28paul maurice has been able to instill as far as a system that uh you know is is picked up guys know
12:34what to what to expect they know what the standards are they know what to go out and do each night
12:38and it speaks to what bill zito has been able to build here as far as the roster goes and the
12:43organizational depth there are a lot of teams out there if you were to take their top line center
12:49another all-star forward who's a point of game guy a regular defenseman that played in the cup run last year
12:56two-thirds of their fourth line we're talking about tomas no second jonah gadgevich from the
13:00playoff run last year if you to take these guys out of the lineup and i you could take just the
13:04two guys the two all-star forwards out but going beyond that the five players i just mentioned
13:09a lot of teams if you took that out of their lineup they're they're they're prepping for the
13:12draft lottery party the party's over right but what the panthers been able to do here they're to say
13:19they're in it is an understatement yeah they're right in the thick of this thing it's a team that still
13:23has elite players up and down the lineup whether it's you know elite players in the league guys who
13:27are elite at the roles that they're they're filling it's uh the panthers are in a great spot right now
13:32even with these players out and and with uh hopefully returns down the road on the horizon
13:38still very much a wait and see with with all of these players an opportunity to to get some
13:42reinforcements perhaps down the road what uh your first full season call on brad marchand every single
13:48night this has been an unbelievable run that it's been on but what are the things that just stand out
13:53about him every night that you watch and you just appreciate that maybe you didn't when he was on
13:57boston yeah on the ice the things that we knew with the boston bruins you knew about the fact that he
14:04he played with that emotion and it was infectious and his teammates fed off it so you knew about that
14:09you knew how how good of a penalty killer he is maybe the best penalty killing forward of this
14:14generation uh not just you know in bruins history not just you know he's he's one of the best penalty
14:19killers the game's ever seen unbelievable hands and paul maurice has talked about this too but
14:25he does love his hands yeah he's gifted he's so gifted offensively and in tight spaces it's it's
14:34really impressive to watch and um at this you know he showing no signs slowing down and then you take it
14:41a step further and we're fortunate to be around these guys at the practice rink and whether it be on road
14:47trips whatever the case may be for a guy who's been in the game this long who is a future hall of
14:53famer the attitude he brings every single day he knows when to keep things light but he also plays
15:00with you know an unmatched intensity i asked evan rodriguez the same question the other day just to
15:05you know he's still one of the newest panthers brad is because he just came at the at the deadline last
15:10year but he was obviously involved in the cup run and and evan said one of the things you appreciate is
15:15just seeing how much he loves and just values doing this every single day and it just that's
15:24something that rubs off on everybody so it's it's been special to watch him play every single night
15:30and it's a really rare instance now that we're seeing where he's when it's all said and done and
15:36you know the way he's playing no signs of slowing down we're talking years down the road but when it's
15:41all said and done he's going to be absolutely beloved by two different fan bases which is a
15:48rare situation for for an athlete you know a lot of guys might be beloved in one place have a little
15:54bit of success somewhere else contribute to something but this guy's going to be absolutely beloved in two
15:59different places and when championships in both places um like i didn't realize how just fast and just
16:07he's all over the place because a lot of times we say oh i hate that guy he's a menace and and when
16:13you think of guys like that they play a different style of hockey he does yeah he's that he's an
16:20antagonist but the style of hockey he's not like you know a bruiser or anything like that he is
16:27it's fun he knows the game within the game uh and in the same way that that matthew could shock i
16:32thought that you know coming into the year or coming in just i've thought since he was a panther that
16:36there's really nobody who knows that the game within the game maybe who has his finger on the
16:42pulse of a game better than matthew could chuck when you talk about knowing when the perfect time
16:46to lay a big hit is the perfect time to you know try and turn the momentum of a game he just knows
16:53exactly he's just so dialed in brad's that same that same kind of guy doug plaguen's joining us here
16:59and so before we get you out of here uh a couple big ones coming up you got new jersey's having a hell of
17:04the season coming up on thursday and then no jack hughes the freak injury that uh that happened
17:08there and then uh you got the the cup rematch coming up on this week is there one out of those
17:12two you're more looking forward to or or just kind of see where this team is at they're both important
17:18games i think uh you look at the new jersey game even without jack hughes for the better part of a
17:23couple of months what they're saying it's still a very talented team and a team that's going to be
17:28playoff bound if if somehow new jersey didn't make the playoffs it then there was a collapse that
17:34took place so it's uh i know we overuse people people in our seats overuse the phrase measuring
17:40stick game uh sometimes but but these are you have to look at them that way in a sense because
17:46i mean don't look now we've already played about a quarter of the season we're getting close to that
17:49that mark of the year 25 of this thing's flown by faster than i think anybody could have ever
17:54envisioned because the condensed schedule the olympics this year everything like that
17:58so you do need to look at games like new jersey coming up a team that you may run into uh down
18:04the road in a playoff matchup something like that but always uh interesting with edmonton it's gotten
18:10to be that way obviously a history to say the least between these two and the panthers have uh
18:15beaten them in the cup final back-to-back years and edmonton not having the type of season they would
18:20like to be like are they do you think because i'm not
18:24following them day to day like are they going through a lot of just the fatigue of
18:28the runs too you think that's happening or are there other struggles that they're dealing with
18:32they had a tough start last year um i if we're talking about it right now i don't love the
18:38supporting cast of the roster that they have now as and i didn't really i haven't loved the
18:44supporting cast i've been fine if i'm looking at it from edmonton's perspective the last couple of
18:48years i couldn't say i was ever more than fine with the supporting cast that they had i thought the
18:53supporting cast and when i say the supporting cast i mean the guys who aren't mcdavid dry
18:57sidle evan bouchard so when i think the first year the two teams met the cup final the series that went
19:03to seven i thought that edmonton's supporting cast was the strongest in that of these three seasons of
19:09in that year i thought it was the strongest last year i thought it was a little bit of a notch below
19:13the previous year and this year i think there are some unknowns there's some young guys some guys
19:18that maybe haven't turned the corner yet um and you know it's a team that has had some some slow
19:22starts in recent years and i mean leroy you might be able to speak speak to this more just knowing
19:28what what a pro athlete goes through and and the grind of everything but in their scenario to go
19:35all the way to the finish line back-to-back years and then fall just short and then have to wind it all
19:41back up and try to do it all over again i mean that has to that has to take a bit of a toll the biggest
19:47problem with all of it is is that you bring you know the whole organization comes out with this plan
19:56to beat the florida panthers but all the other teams are doing it too so the next team that you
20:03might have to face to win the stanley cup might not be the florida panthers and now you've gotten
20:10ready for a team that's not there and it just keeps you know it's so rare for a team to go to three
20:16straight finals and anything so to say you're getting ready for them it's not like florida getting
20:22ready for tampa or florida with carolina right this is totally different there's a lot of good teams
20:29out there and i give you a perfect example we went 15 and one we lost to atlanta in overtime which to this
20:38day drives me crazy we figured we're that good we'll come back this next next year we we're okay
20:47we got to the playoffs guess who we ran into the greatest show on turf we were up 27 to 20 so we go
20:57in at halftime no bigs go finish this i'll go to the next one we lost 49 27
21:03jesus and that was we think we're getting ready for denver and we're getting ready for atlanta and
21:12here comes the greatest show on turf who had a run of three or four years that's how sports is crazy
21:17and that even when we project even when i say when we project nfl season or what team's going to be
21:25good or not we always forget about the teams getting better yeah we only think about the teams we saw last
21:30year who's going to be that team that comes out of nowhere that finally puts it all together like
21:36the panthers did three or four years ago there's going to be a couple of those teams they're going
21:41to be a couple teams hey that's the you always have to remind yourself there there are 31 other teams
21:46trying to win this thing too yes and the panthers so what the panthers are doing is absolutely right
21:51historic and then you have the short off season so that's how do you how do you how do you recover how
21:56how do you how do you overcome the the short off season not having that time to heal well it's a
22:01lot easier to deal with when your short off season is full of parading the stanley cup around and you
22:06get to experience that and then you get to have everything and you get to raise a banner yeah
22:10imagine imagine being the edmonton oilers and playing all the way to june 24th one year and then
22:14playing all the way to june 17th the next year and all you have is a couple of conference
22:17championship banners to show for that has to take a toll i i think that this team is kind of feeling the
22:24wear and tear a little bit as far as the panthers but they've done a good job of getting other guys
22:29in give them a chance to get healthy i think the biggest issue is you can just see some of the
22:34injuries that they're having it's like muscular like we could chuck groin it's not bone stuff it's like
22:41groin because you've just been going at it for so long these guys have played almost an extra season of
22:49hockey so and everybody else has played three seasons of hockey they've played enough games for
22:56four so just imagine adding an extra year it catches up and you have to be you know safe they
23:03they i mean they're in really good shape because i've never seen i've never looked watching on uh on
23:09the ice and go that guy's taking a break like i've never seen i play hard right they play hard and to
23:16do that but it takes a different type of person to be able to go through that and paul marisa just
23:25has a way of getting it out of them it's hard you look at anton lundell for example he's a fifth year
23:31guy who basically has played six years in the nhl because you add up the basically a full season's
23:36worth he's also the most spoiled young player oh yeah no kidding five years i've been to three stanley
23:42cups uh catch doug play against thursday night cats and devils you can hear that right here on qam
23:49doug appreciate the time man thank you so much thanks so much for having me great to see you guys in
23:52person great to see you
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