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00:00That itself is an interesting question about what the playoffs will look like, is does that change?
00:06Yeah, I know.
00:07Do you get into the third period and just lean on your top two lines?
00:11I mean, I feel like to backtrack a step, the first thing he said there, I mean, here's Mike Kelly,
00:20who he's numbers.
00:21He knows a lot.
00:22I only mean this as a compliment.
00:25He says up front, like, well, they're goaltending, man, it's been half a season.
00:30He sort of stops himself from questioning it.
00:33Right.
00:33And then he says, I don't really have any data for this.
00:36I can't tell you what's going to happen with the goalies.
00:40And damn right.
00:42I mean, that's how goalies goes.
00:45I mean, he's right to be humble enough to not try to, like some people, tell you how it's going
00:52to go with goalies.
00:54Because nobody knows that answer.
00:55So good for him.
00:57But that's a goalie is microcosm of the other point, which is, all right, well, I've gotten here how?
01:04With two guys going back and forth almost literally exactly for weeks.
01:08And maybe that continues all the way to the end.
01:11Maybe, what's tonight, 73?
01:14Whatever, odd or even, whatever tonight is.
01:18Whoever plays tonight maybe doesn't play the last game.
01:20However it lands.
01:21Guy plays the last game.
01:23The other guy plays game one.
01:25Right.
01:25And I kind of want the Sabres to keep rolling like that.
01:30But, you know, in terms of their forward, their lines and just their skaters, they probably will get into games
01:38and rein in certain players and lean on others.
01:43So, I don't know.
01:44It's one of the goalies themselves and then just sort of from a team.
01:48That's a whole separate thing.
01:50Macro.
01:50It's one of the more, maybe the most interesting thing to talk about with them and how this is going
01:55to evolve.
01:56There are, I don't have exactly the number of games left sitting right in front of me.
02:01But, you know, if they intend on choosing a guy, maybe they'll announce that.
02:14Maybe they won't.
02:15My sense is they probably won't.
02:17Right.
02:17We'll just, we'll be waiting before game two at the game day skate for clues as to what's going to
02:24happen following game one.
02:26And, you know, maybe win or lose, they get lost, it'd be easier to just stay with the rotation.
02:30If they win, then I think there's a lot more maybe edginess to the whole scene.
02:35Right.
02:37But if they want to, if they think, like if Lindy or the coaching staff thinks, and I have no
02:43idea what they think about this, but traditional hockey, like we talked with Flutus and Zawa yesterday,
02:48he wanted the Bruins when they had Olmark and Swayman to keep going with the rotation, but they didn't.
02:55Right.
02:56Traditional hockey is, he's my number one, that's it, you're playing.
03:00Right.
03:02If they want to do that, they probably should at some point here with 11 games left, try that out
03:10with games every other day.
03:12Right.
03:13Like if you think Lukonen is going to be the guy, you might want to play him three in a
03:17row to see, or four in a row to see what happens.
03:19And same with Lyon.
03:20And maybe each guy should get a turn.
03:23If you want to do that.
03:24But if, I might suggest that if they don't do that between here and the end, then maybe that's a
03:32sign that the rotation is going to continue.
03:34Really interesting.
03:35Because these guys have not played.
03:37Lukonen one time had two starts in a row.
03:40I'm not sure if Lyon has, he probably did while Lukonen was hurt.
03:43But yeah.
03:44Wow.
03:45Lukonen, yeah.
03:47I mean, at least once the rotation was going, it's probably like if one guy was in or out, maybe
03:52they played more in a row.
03:53Like Lyon, I think at one point, while Lukonen was on the shelf the first time, not at the Olympic
03:58time, probably did.
04:00But I still think you'd want to make sure how they're going to handle it.
04:04How do they look in game three of three in a row versus game one?
04:09Like, are they fatigued?
04:10Are there signs of fatigue?
04:11Whatever.
04:12I don't think you'd want to just start out of nowhere on April 18th.
04:16Okay, you're going to play the next 30 games.
04:20That's insane, I think.
04:22So, if they don't start giving someone a few in a row, maybe that's a clue that they're going to
04:28just stay with the rotation.
04:30No matter what?
04:31Yeah.
04:31Well, yeah, but that's, again, that's where, like, I don't know if a guy, if they're flipping back and forth.
04:39It's so interesting.
04:41It's so hard to know.
04:42They win game one with Lyon.
04:44Lukonen goes in game two, they lose.
04:46Goodbye forever.
04:47I want the opposite.
04:48I want Lyon in game one, they lose.
04:50Lukonen goes in, he wins.
04:52You stay with Lukonen now in game three, right?
04:54There will almost always be a day off.
04:56That's how it always goes, right.
04:58That's the out the coach has, is almost always there will be a day off, at least one.
05:04Absolutely, yeah.
05:05There are never back-to-back games.
05:06I'm not saying they need, like, back-to-back nights.
05:09I'm just saying back-to-back starts.
05:11I know.
05:11Because they haven't done that at all.
05:13But if the coach went, a coach, I mean, Lindy,
05:17if a coach went to the same goalie the next night, because there were back-to-back games,
05:23that would be easier to question.
05:25That would be under more scrutiny.
05:26That's right.
05:27Then, if a day off, and a lot of those days off will be travel days, too.
05:31I'm not sure, really, how much that has to matter.
05:34But, very interesting idea to test that now.
05:38And that is somewhat a question of how badly do they want first place?
05:46Yeah.
05:46I mean, first in the conference is in play.
05:49Carolina loses.
05:50Yeah, they're a point out.
05:51To Montreal.
05:52Hopefully, you had that bet, by the way, from us yesterday.
05:55Yeah.
05:55Plus money, Montreal at home against Carolina.
05:57Who's the better team?
05:58And Blackhawks on the money line last night, too, by the way.
06:00Let's go.
06:01Who's the better team?
06:03I'd rather play Carolina in round one than Montreal.
06:10I don't know.
06:11I don't know.
06:12I can't play Carolina in round one, I know.
06:13No, yeah, right.
06:14But Montreal is pretty scary.
06:17Montreal is.
06:18Montreal-Ottawa is a realistic conference final.
06:21Montreal is really scary high-end.
06:23Like, I just, I'm not sure how buttoned up they can be.
06:27Like, I feel like I've seen evidence of the Sabres locking games down plenty of times.
06:35I'm not watching Montreal necessarily do that.
06:39I think.
06:39I'd say they're not doing it, but I'm not.
06:41I don't think they're as good at that.
06:45Their goaltending has been suspect at times.
06:49Yep.
06:49Three guys.
06:50Yeah.
06:52Carolina maybe badly outshot them, too, last night.
06:55Carolina outshoots everybody because they shoot from everywhere.
06:57That's right.
06:58That's their M.O.
06:58That's right.
06:59They just chuck pucks from the, whatever.
07:01Just get it to the net.
07:02Darlings.
07:02That's their plan.
07:03The Darlings of the league.
07:04Right, right.
07:04That's why their numbers always look good, and then, you know, the playoffs get here,
07:08and they don't win.
07:10At least not, you know, they don't go far.
07:12I'm sure they don't.
07:13Well, I mean, opinions are welcome on this.
07:15Like, how to play it.
07:17Well.
07:17If they keep rotating, it's easy.
07:20This is what has worked.
07:22Mm-hmm.
07:23Everybody's used to it.
07:24We trust both guys.
07:26And, you know, okay, give me any playoff scenario from the beginning.
07:33They win the opener three to nothing.
07:36Who plays game two?
07:37The other guy plays game two?
07:38Then he loses.
07:39Then he's gone.
07:40He's dead.
07:41I mean, or just, then they win game three with the first guy,
07:44and they go back to the other guy in game.
07:46Nope.
07:46No.
07:47Not usually.
07:48Right?
07:48That's not how that works.
07:49That's not going to happen.
07:50Right.
07:51Eventually they're going to break the, that's the point, isn't it?
07:53Eventually they break the cycle.
07:55Yes.
07:56I think.
07:56It's a question of when and on whose terms.
07:58It would be way too easy, way too much of a joy ride for them to get into the playoffs
08:05after having not been there for 14 years and have it go smoothly enough that they can just
08:12keep rotating goalies every other game.
08:14I mean, it just never happens that way.
08:16So I'd be surprised, but again, like there might be a clue within these last 11 games
08:22about their intentions.
08:23You mentioned how bad do you want first place, right?
08:26We talked a lot in the last couple of days, couple of shows anyway, getting back even to
08:31last week about Metza and Stanley.
08:33Like, okay, third pair is stabilized.
08:35This looks good.
08:36Right?
08:36Paul will tell you with authority, Metza's their number five defenseman.
08:39Is he coming out?
08:40Guess who's coming out tonight?
08:41Right?
08:42Timmons is healthy.
08:43What are they doing here?
08:45My guess is they know what Metza's capable of now.
08:49They know if they get an injury in the top four, I'm almost guaranteeing he's the guy
08:54that goes in.
08:55Any one of those four guys goes out, he goes in that spot.
08:58Metza.
08:58Metza.
08:59Maybe not Darlene, but Samuelson, Power, or Byram, I feel like unquestionably, that's
09:04what's going to happen.
09:05So they know what they've got there.
09:08They've tried him out with other guys.
09:10They've tried him against better competition, so they know.
09:13What they don't know, right, if there's an injury, what is Timmons?
09:16And what is Timmons with Stanley?
09:19So tonight is a little bit of a kind of like what you and Shen played with Stanley.
09:22You could be fearful of what those results would be, and you were largely correct to
09:26be fearful, because it didn't go well.
09:28We'll see what Timmons gives them tonight with Stanley, and how Stanley reacts to not
09:33being with Metza.
09:34But all they're doing to me is trying to figure out what they've got to do when and if someone
09:38gets hurt.
09:39I'm okay there.
09:39Yeah, I mean, I think they, it makes sense to want to see it, but you know, they don't
09:44just get to game three of the second round, like, oh, power's missing.
09:50What do we do?
09:51Like, well, let's see.
09:52And nobody on our bench has played in a month.
09:54Right.
09:54Or two months.
09:55So I think that's, and yeah, Timmons has been a very, very long time.
09:59I'm okay there.
10:00I mean, I think it's just not, it's still hockey.
10:03It's not Josh Allen.
10:05It's still not consequential enough for it to be a big scene.
10:10And there's also, I think, no reason to question Ruff on Metza from how he's talked.
10:17Right.
10:18I don't think he's, he's being punished.
10:20No.
10:21Or they know what he is.
10:23They know what he's capable of.
10:24Obviously the big four are their meal ticket, but I think they trust that he can step in
10:29there.
10:30So let's give him a night off and let's see what, let's see what Timmons does with Stanley.
10:34Maybe another game.
10:35I don't know if this will, you know, I don't think you want to necessarily sit Metza for
10:39games in a row here, but at some point they will probably do the same thing with Kesselring.
10:44They've already done it with Shen.
10:46I think they know what Shen is and, you know, it didn't go great.
10:50So hopefully they don't get to the point where they got to worry about using him.
10:54But Kesselring and Timmons are both, you know, competent, easily, I mean, geez, Kesselring
11:01is supposed to be a top four guy.
11:03He was basically supposed to replace Samuelson before Samuelson showed up and just took the
11:08season by storm this year.
11:11So let's see what Timmons and Stanley can do just in case we need, again, to get there.
11:17If it happens, it's a long road here.
11:20Anything could happen.
11:21You know, you're playing Zdoroff tonight.
11:23I mean, he could knee job somebody and then you're stuck.
11:26So they're just trying, I think, to figure out who's who.
11:29I don't take tonight as a troubling sign at all for Metza.
11:33In fact, I think it's a compliment.
11:35I don't know Tampa's depth well enough to know if there is a comp with them.
11:43They've won a lot more.
11:44They've been in the playoffs every year and gone far.
11:47Like, they're not a team where they'd have to sort of, like, think, all right, how are
11:52we going to react to the playoffs?
11:53And maybe the Sabres shouldn't think that way either.
11:56I feel like probably they shouldn't because games are games.
11:59But, you know, everybody talks like the playoffs are different.
12:02I wonder if Tampa has a little bit of an easier time navigating the end game than maybe the
12:11Sabres would.
12:12But so far, I'm fine with everything.
12:15Like, if they want to mix up, take in a couple of guys.
12:17They're going to play Wednesday, Friday, Saturday here.
12:19The schedule is still compacted.
12:21Like, you know, you want to try different things out like they have been doing?
12:27Okay.
12:28I'm not going to complain.
12:29I'm not going to criticize them for it.
12:31Mike Schoep and the Bulldog at Roswell Park.
12:33The ride for Roswell officially opens, launches, starts.
12:39This is a kickoff event.
12:40We're not riding today.
12:41Right, no.
12:42But it's the kickoff event.
12:43Three months from Friday is the ride, I think.
12:46Right?
12:46Today's the 25th?
12:47Yes.
12:4827th.
12:48Yeah, so June 27th.
12:49Three months from Friday.
12:51I won't even be to the dentist by then.
12:53No?
12:53Wow.
12:54It's that close.
12:55Yeah.
12:57Meanwhile, I'll have two more haircuts by then.
12:59At least.
13:00Unless I trade with you for an eye appointment or something.
13:03I'll throw in a fifth.
13:05I do need an eye appointment.
13:06I'll throw an eye appointment and a fifth for your...
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