Last Minute Blues Podcast | Early Season Takeaways But Let’s Not Overreact

Last Minute Blues Podcast | Early Season Takeaways But Let’s Not Overreact

This is the Last Minute Blues podcast with Donny Alex, Jeremy and Jeff Burton. Well, welcome to another edition of the Last Minute Blues podcast is presented by Blue Note Roofing roofing, siding and gutters or St. Louis roofing experts. Visit BlueNote roofing, STL dot com for a free inspection. Donny Fandango joined by Alex Ferrari, oh, from one on one ESPN also handling your blues pre and post game and intermission entertainment and from the athletic. The one and only Jeremy Rutherford Jr. What’s doing? I don’t know what’s doing. No, Jr. Is fine. Look at this guy. I’m the suit guy on game days and I roll in and Jr. has got a collared shirt on and a jacket on. Well, I saw Jr. come in and I saw the jacket and I didn’t think about you being gussied up for the game as well. I really just had no idea that I was going to be the the schmuck in the podcast. And the t-shirt, the t-shirt. Oh, yeah. But you know what? That’s just always how this is going to be. You know, I honestly, this is not even a joke. I do not I do not own a sport coat right now. And I have one pair of black dress pants that probably fit. Probably. I’m just not a guy. Well, you did that when you came up and did that blues the pregame with me during postseason, you came in with a shirt and tie on. Yeah. I’m like, oh, time is I love you, buddy. But this is weird. I have not seen you in a shirt and tie. And this just doesn’t match with me. Dude, outside of Burton’s funeral, like literally, that is the only time in which that I have had a tie on. And I know that that dude would appreciate it that I tied up for that particular for that particular day. But you guys look great. Of course, blues and and Hawks tonight. Little bit later on at Enterprise Center. A little bit later on. What is it? A seven? No, it’s an eight thirty, which really an eight fifty two puck drop. So it’s like first round of the playoffs. Yeah. No, those are like nine thirty pucks. Are you guys serious? It’s eight fifty two. Well, it’s an eight thirty puck drop. But we all know how this goes when it’s on national TV. It’s like, oh, eight thirty, but we got to wait for the other game to end. And then we do our pregame stuff. So yeah, I think it’s like eight fifty or something like that. Oh, is that like the TV voice or something? Yeah, that was a producer. Yeah. I was a producer on that one. I went into another, I went into another mode. Sorry. Before we get crazy with the hockey things, I want to just ask sort of a general question to you guys. Alex, younger than than you and I, J.R. That younger enough. But I have just a kind of a radio question for you guys. I like radio questions. And I’ve been doing this for a long time, but since with a little bit of a break in between, I’ve been doing this radio since about 1996. And I. This is just such a basic question. But do you think the average person that listens to me on the radio, on the point or on the arch think that I pick the songs that I play every day? Oh, that’s a really good. I know. I’m you saw my post. OK. I’m my Facebook post. And I’ll talk about that in a second. But do you guys think that the the general masses out there? Because sometimes, man, I’ll be very honest, I have a hard time because I’ve done this for so long. And, you know, when wanting to do it in the late 90s, you know, I was learning about why radio stations played what they played and when they played them and all those sorts of things. You know, I was kind of learning the X’s and X’s and O’s rather. But I thought like over time that it became fairly obvious that, you know, that you’re not the one just playing your iPod shuffle. Right. Right. But then, like, I got an email last week from this guy that was really pissed about me playing Gorillaz Clint Eastwood. Again, like super pissed. And I’m like, I started to get a little agitated about it, but I’m like, I don’t know what I don’t know. I don’t know what people think. Do they really think that we’re picking the songs? I thought it was pretty clear when a couple of times I’ve heard you over the years where you say, I don’t really dig this tune, but here it is. Well, I put this in pretty clear. OK, well, here’s the thing with that. When I hear him on the arch, I assume he loves Backstreet Boys and Eminem. That’s all I hear and play. Bye bye. OK, so the thing is, is that from time to time, when a song is really big or a band is really big, I might say something to the effect of, hey, I don’t particularly get everything that’s going on with this band right now, but they’re blowing up, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Because I feel like to me, that’s much more genuine than me saying that I love every single band and every single song, which I do not. But I think the thing that really like I don’t understand is, is that if you follow me and you know me and if you followed or know me for any length of time, I am a I mean a music junkie. Like I am always posting about something different or a new band or a new song. And I just am perplexed by people thinking that I would want to choose to play Evenflow every single friggin day. Like so I just don’t and I don’t want like, you know, man, like I just I it’s just something I’ve been thinking about over the course of the last day or so. And I wanted to throw it at my boys when we started the pod. So so I don’t know like where the age gap would be, but I can tell you for a fact because I adjuncts a teach at Lindenwood and I do radio production. And some of the kids that I have in there are freshmen just getting into college. And one of the assignments I have is I have them listen to one radio station in a certain time block, they let them pick their choice. And then I have them like write a description down of what they’re listening to, just so they get into the rhythm of it. And I’ve had kids before say like, why did they choose this song? So I do think there are some people out there that probably hear it and are like, why was he just picking the songs that he likes the most and just sifting through the radio and picking those? So I do think that there are some people now I think it’s more younger than the older parts, which would make sense. Yeah, that makes sense. But yeah, the older side of things, I’m not too sure. But yeah, I’ve had kids that say like, why do they pick these songs? I don’t know. It’s probably nothing that I even need to. It’s the same thing that you complain to J.R. about the like, J.R., stop writing these articles. I want to read this, you know. The J.R., I’m sick of reading this one, right? This one. I just did, you know, I just just as as as, you know, the music side of radio is definitely in a much different place than than the sports talk side and all those sorts of things. And so as I really try my damnedest and man, I annoy Tommy the boss on a weekly basis about pushing musical envelopes, meaning playing more, playing different. Like if there is one thing that Tommy, I’m sure, is absolutely annoyed by with me. It’s that I’m always trying to get more, more, more, more onto the radio, which I don’t know for my age is necessarily a good thing because it seems like everybody my age, like, is stuck in their own same patterns of things. Well, I’m that way. And so it’s so it’s just kind of I don’t know, man. I just kind of wanted to ask you guys. I’m glad you brought it up, because until this conversation, I just thought that the station I listen to, the DJ just love the song. They ain’t like us. Well, a year ago, it blew my mind when I found out his last name wasn’t Fandango. So I honestly, there was an appearance once where I told a woman that and I swore to God that she looked sad, bona fide, 100 percent sad. I ended up giving her a hug. And I was like, I’m so sorry, but I didn’t think that everybody thought that that could possibly be my real last name. That’s his office. And I saw the name time like, what the hell is this? Don, what? This is a trash. What next? Santa Claus? Well, I just assumed you were related to the people that owned that app on your phone or you could check movie times like Donnie dominate the movie market, the music market. If I could have copyrighted Fandango, I wouldn’t be here. I’ll tell you that right now, man. I would not be here. Plus, anyway, that Alex Thompson’s didn’t know that. Yeah. Alex Smith over here didn’t know that. That’s my radio name, Ferrari. You didn’t know that, did you guys? Vroom, vroom. All right. Well, listen, guys, I got a couple of emails and then we can kind of chop it up about our. Hell yeah. About our blues. Emails flowing in hot these days, J.R. Yeah, man, we like it a lot. L.M.B.P. at 105, seven, the point dot com. Email the way this will come in. Vroom may concern. Actually, I will say that I do get the emails, which I guess just means that. Send it to Donnie. The next hate mail will definitely come to me. But regardless of this one from Daniel says, God dang it. He says, my question is, how are you guys feeling about the way and Cairo slow start to the season? And is there any concern with that? Kyrie to me has been skating well just a matter of time before he starts scoring. Here’s the thing. OK, Daniel, I’m just going to stop it right there. I think you’re a really great guy. But we’re four games into the season. I think we just need to take a breath here. Also to me saying that Jordan Kyrie would score 40 goals. I don’t know. I don’t know why I would think that that isn’t me snake biting that poor man for the entire freaking rest of the year. I’m not I’m not concerned about these guys. You guys might look at it a little bit different. But for me, man, it’s I mean, we played three games. Yeah, I don’t know. You guys are on the pace for zero goals and 82 games. It did. You know, they don’t have to just go in the net. You can make a pass, right? Did Jordan Kyrie net set up a goal to Braden Schadler? Yeah, that’s pretty beautiful set up. And I mean, I the way that they play, it doesn’t look like they’ve missed a step. Sure, they haven’t scored. But I mean, does it look like they’re slow or they’re they’re off chemistry or anything like that together? Because to me, it looks like they looked like last year. It’s just you’re trying to get it going right now. And the one thing that the Blues have are four lines that they can play. Yeah. And and again, you know, three games into the season tonight’s four. But also those guys are going to be heavily counted on. They’re going to produce their numbers are going to be there at the end of the year. But Jim Montgomery did say yesterday when we were actually asking him about Logan. Maybe sometimes the coaches take it a different direction. And he said that, hey, look, you know, if you’re not contributing to the team, you know, you’re going to be pressing. And he said, look at Kyrie and Holloway. They’re pressing right now. And so, you know, are there parts of their game where they look like they try to force it maybe a little bit. But, you know, these guys, those goal scorers, it takes one game. All of a sudden they’re on track. And well, let’s not forget, Kyrie has been a slow starter out of the gate in the past and a streaky player, this janky player. Holloway last year started off the off the season a little bit slower and then really picked it up once Jim Montgomery took over. People don’t remember is and I’m not making this like a negative towards Daniel here, but you got to remember most of these guys only play like two or three preseason games. They don’t even play with the guys that they’re going to be skating with in season with. So essentially the first three to five games are getting warmed up to the NHL because you’re going up against elite competition on the other side compared to what you did in preseason. So I mean, it’s like in baseball with spring training, right? Or in football with preseason. It’s going to take a couple of reps before you start to see them actually get into the rhythm of the season. So, no, I mean, if we’re talking at the end of October that these guys still are without a goal, then we can start asking questions of what’s going on, but not three games. And I really do think that that might have played, even if it’s a small part, a part in the blues game against the Minnesota Wild is those guys didn’t play together throughout camp and the team really, you don’t see the whole team out on the ice together. And then when they played the game against Dallas and Dallas brought the big lineup, you didn’t see that line that group out there. And so, you know, you have that game that they played OK against Minnesota, but the Wild jump out to the three nothing lead and kind of you can play differently. Right. And so the Blues weren’t in that game. But I think then once you get into OK, a couple more practices playing together, the whole teams together, I think that’s part of the reason why we saw them take a step and two more nuggets before we move on. Minnesota, to go back to that first game of the season, if I’m not mistaken, Minnesota played their NHL lineup, the final two games of preseason together, and they actually went up against some pretty decent competition. And the other thing into this one also is I can’t wait to see what next year looks like in preseason because you only play four, four games, three games, I think. For yeah. Yeah. I wonder if like two of those games are going to be all NHL and they’re going to match it up with the other teams of saying like, hey, these preseason games, let’s put an NHL roster out there. These preseason games, let’s put a minor league roster out there. I wonder if teams try and address it that way in preseason next year. It’s a it’s a fine balance, though, right? Because I mean, you want to get the boys together, you want to get that continuity going, but also at the same time, you’re about to play eighty four games or eighty two games over the course of nine months. So it’s that forever balance of not wanting to put them in a position to get into. You know what I’m saying? So it’s really it will be very interesting to see if it’s tackled a little bit differently with only three or four preseason games. I kind of think that they’re going to address it that way to where they con they they converse with the other teams that are on their preseason schedule and say, like, hey, how do you want to handle this one? Should we throw an NHL roster out there? You’re traveling. Do you want to do a like? I wonder if teams are going to try and measure that out a little bit more so that you actually get the reps that you want in preseason rather than wasting three of the four preseason games going up against an AHL roster or you don’t send any guys that are out there like you want that chemistry to hit pretty quickly. Absolutely. The next email coming in from Spencer says, hey, Donnie, Alex and Jeremy Blues fan in Oklahoma, writing in the wife and I are taking a little fall break trip to see the city and come up for a teacher’s night against the stars their first time at Enterprise Center. This is my wife’s first time in St. Louis. What are the must sees that I should take her to do in the city on a teacher’s budget? First of all, I would like to say to both of you for being teachers. Yes, absolutely. God bless both of you. Thank you so much. Yes. So before we get into the hockey part of Spencer’s email, must do for a St. Louis weekend trip on a teacher’s budget. I have a couple things that I thought about. One, I think the Hill for some Italian food. If not the Hill, I mean barbecue, I mean wherever, find a good St. Louis spot to hit. But I would say since you’ll be kind of maybe closer, the Hill is a really great spot to go. Also too, if you guys have never been here and I know this might be kind of hokey to St. Louisans, but I had, it had been probably 20 years since I had went on a field trip to the arch and then I had later on taken my two years there. What a really amazing, amazing, and right they had completely redone the museum underneath the arch going up and it is so neat. The arch grounds are beautiful. Also too, they still have the Tom Sawyer and the Becky Thatcher I believe running on the Mississippi. Oh, do they really? So you can take that, you know, sort of like a little cruise and see the Mississippi. I don’t believe that it’s super expensive and it’s just a really rad, you know, kind of way to do the city. So that’s that. And there was a last time I did the arch and the Becky Thatcher Tom Sawyer thing was like third grade. I don’t think I’ve been up there since third grade. It’s been a long time here, but I took the kids there on a spring break, man, and I was friggin father of the year. We had a blast, man. We had a blast. I always say the zoo. I mean, I know it’s cliche, but now if you’re coming in the fall, oh man, that’s fun to do at the Halloween time. Yeah, I love all the Halloween stuff. Anytime you get to the fall season is the best part for me around St. Louis. Yeah, I think they’re right. Like when they’re driving around town listening to Evenflow ten times. Yeah. They can hit the zoo, hit the hill. Those are some good spots, hit the arch. And you know, I know those the things that we mentioned here are pretty customary. Everybody thinks of the zoo or you think of the arch, but same thing. Like I haven’t been out of the arch in a long time. I don’t think my 12 year old’s been to the arch. So it’s some things that you take for granted. You don’t get down there. And also too, not to interrupt, but I mean, Forest Park. Oh, I mean, if you’re going to do the zoo, Grant’s farm, do the art museum is wonderful. The History Museum is wonderful. You know, so there’s just there’s really a lot to think if you’re coming, though, like Donnie and Jay are mentioned, get good food while you’re here. Like that’s the number one thing I say. It’s if you’re getting lunch, go to the hill. If you’re getting dinner, go somewhere around the area. They got tons of different options for you, but you got to get yourself good food if you’re here. I mean, then go to Ted Drew’s. I mean, come on. You know, I was at Ted Drew’s not very long ago and I got a hot fudge Sunday and they did not put chocolate on it. And you took it back. Absolutely. And then when I was explaining to the person why I was unhappy, they seemed a little confused. And I thought that the hot fudge was a, you know, important part of the hot fudge. Anyway. All right. So back to Spencer’s hockey questions here for hockey related question or two. First, how great are curbs and Joey on TV? I really like what I saw of Hunter Skinner in camp. He’s Broberg’s age. That experience looked better than Linstein and and and Jirocic. I don’t see why he’s not getting an HL ice time. Folks, a penalty 36 seconds into the home opener and may use rough first season game, maybe feeding more into this belief. Really hope the boys turn it around and whoop the Hawks so that my wife and I will get a good game next Saturday. Thanks for all the great time. I love the non hockey talk. Don’t listen to the other guys. Let’s go Blues. That is from Spencer. Hey, at least on the drive here from Oklahoma, you might be able to they play a couple more games so it might be a little bit better about some of those guys. Yeah. Who’ve had a tough time. I’m trying to like go through all these. So the year check one, I mean, if you think may you looks rough for those that think he looks rough right now, your check would look rough too. I mean, raw. What is he 18 years old? So I, I think they’re in a good spot with those guys. Three games and let’s yeah. Let’s all let’s do this. Let’s do this. Let’s take a break. Let’s come back and then let’s get into some things that we’re seeing that we’re not seeing because this I think it’d be a nice continuation of more of the last bit of blues podcast coming next. All right, so I love Blues fans because we care so much, but sometimes we are a disjointed bunch. We are a not realistic bunch. And we’ve talked about it already. Three games in, playing game number four against Chicago tonight. But I know that you especially, Alex, have heard a decent amount of kickback on Logan May U already. And that to me, it’s not surprising because his sports fans were knee jerk reaction people. I mean, I’m listening to Buffalo Bill’s podcast and thinking that the world is coming to an end. So like, I understand, but Logan May U’s a kid. Like, I can’t believe we’re even talking about this three games into the year for real, for real. Well, I can because of one guy and it’s Zach Bullduck. I mean, unfortunately that’s where we are to where when you see a trade happen, the first thing you’re going to do is, yeah, but what’s the guy doing that you traded away? And in the past, Doug Armstrong has traded pieces that you look at and you’re like, okay, well, that guy’s not going to amount to much. This was a trade that you looked at and you’re like, man, I don’t know what the Blues are doing right now. And I think some of the reason people are frustrated with the Logan May U is all of these articles coming out. I mean, everything coming out of Canada and sports not saying like, I can’t believe that Zach Bullduck was available via trade to get, you got to give. And when you look at the Blues, this was my biggest frustration when it’s looking at Logan May U, it’s like, what else were you going to trade to get that right-handed defenseman? Because I know people wanted to keep Bullduck, and I get it, Bullduck’s a really good player. But go through the other wingers that you have. Who are you going to trade to go get that right-handed defenseman? Neighbors, I think you need guys like neighbors on this team, Snuggerud, absolutely not. Now you’ve got the Kyru’s and the Boochnevitches who have no trade clauses. And then you go into the minor league system who they just invested in. And it’s an unknown commodity, which is not what Montreal wanted. So you needed a right-handed defenseman and for May U, it’s three games, but like watching him play, it hasn’t been alarm bells going off. Like, oh man, this guy doesn’t look like he gets it. There’s been a couple of plays that you’re like, man, what happened here? Like in the Minnesota game to where he and Tyler Tucker both go aggressive for a puck and Minnesota just sneaks a guy in front of the net. All right, that’s a young guy’s mistake that he’s figuring out. It’s just way too early to look at. And Logan May U, regardless of exact Bullduck, puts up 10 goals in the first 10 games of the season. It’s too early to look at Logan May U and say, why’d they trade Bullduck for this guy? Because I think Jim Montgomery said this a couple of weeks ago, goalies take the longest to develop, defenseman take the next longest, forwards are the quickest. Doug Armstrong said, like and Al McEnnis is the one that talks about this, 200 games is where you got to get to before you figure out what your defenseman is. And they’re not using May U any differently than other teams use young defenseman. Like Broberg in his first season with Edmonton, he wasn’t playing more than 13, 14 minutes in his first couple of games. This is the slow play. It’s letting them figure out even strength, figure out who you’re playing with, build some chemistry, work the kinks out with a new team, and then you’re off and running. I have no concerns over Logan May U. Yeah, I think you have to look at it one of two ways. You’re either looking at it at the here and now, and the here and now is the blues. Say that nobody claimed the third line right wing spot, although Matthew Joseph is playing pretty well right now, but nobody claimed that, so there’s a hole there. And when you picture Zach Bullduke in that spot, you picture he only scored two or three goals for the blues at this point, and that line looks pretty good with neighbors and suitor. And then maybe you got a Kessel, Matthew Kessel, playing that third pair on the right side where Logan May U is now. Those are the people who are thinking in the here and now. The blues on the other hand, like Alex said, are thinking big picture. We want a guy here who’s gonna be long-term, who we can groom, who can be that right shot, right side defensemen, whether he’s a top four guy, or eventually takes over for Colton Perrico. That’s what they’re looking at. And so I can understand how and why fans are looking at it the way they are. The team wants to be competitive right now, and you’re missing a piece in Zach Bullduke who could be helping you right now, but that’s just not how they’re looking at it. And that’s not even to get into the forward versus defensemen comparison. It’s just gonna take time for a defense. He can’t show what Zach Bullduke can show playing in the top six with the Montreal Canadiens. So all we can say is it’s gonna take time, but in saying that, it does not guarantee that the trade is gonna work out for the blues. You can pull this clip up right now in three years and say, Jeremy, you said it was gonna take time. It never worked out. That’s possible, and that’s what a trade is. Yeah, it’s what a prospect is too, right? Like it’s what a young player is. You see him play in the AHL. You don’t know what it looks like in the NHL. I mean, there is a real possibility that we’re not gonna know, well, this is a, no, I’m sorry, this was dumb answer. There are no questions here. We’re not gonna know if this is a good trade for another couple of years because of how long, as you’re saying, it takes a defenseman to develop. You’re probably gonna see Bullduke do sexier things and have sexier numbers, but as long as we’re seeing growth from Mayhew throughout the season, that’s what matters. And there’s going to be lots, for real, there’s gonna be lots of bumps for this kid. 19, 20 years old, playing in his 12th, 13th NHL games. Like guys, we, listen, I am a diehard Blues fan, but for the love of Pete, I think we need to be somewhat realistic on giving this kid a chance to frigging grow. Yeah, I mean, like he’s gonna be in the press box at some point this season as a healthy scratch. Like it’s, I would imagine it’s gonna happen, but that’s not a bad thing. Like Thomas did that when he was with the team. Like sometimes it works to sit up top and see what’s happening. Bullduke did it. Bullduke did it. Yeah, and when that was the other thing too, guys, Bullduke looks this good because he has just gone through the system of the Blues and them working with him and growing him to what they want him to be, and now he’s flourishing. They’re doing the same thing with Logan Mayhew, and it just is gonna take some time. Like for me, and this is way too outlandish of a scenario, so don’t like expect, like, if the Blues were to win the Stanley Cup this year, projecting forward, let’s say they win the Cup, Bullduke scores 40 goals, but the Blues win the Cup and Logan Mayhew plays in 75 games and has an impact at some point throughout that postseason run. Does it look, is it looked at as a lost trade because the other guy scored 40 goals, or do you look at this as, hey, you just opened up a competitive window and you found another piece that complements it? Like that, it’s, that’s to me where the Blues made this move. They needed depth on the right side of their defense. They needed young pieces that they were saying, hey, we need something that’s coming up to the system that we can look forward to. We’ve got a ton of wingers. We’ve gotta go out there and fill the void on one spot, and I’ve seen people say, well, why not just go trade for a guy? Or I’m sorry, why not sign a guy a free agency? Because you are paying over the price that you probably should be for somebody like that, whereas you got this guy on an entry-level contract and he’s 22 years old that you’re growing with. Yeah, and my only question is this, and he mentioned the emailer earlier mentioned, Eurochek, you know, they wanna see him get healthy and play a full season, right? But he is healthy now, and he is playing, and he looks pretty good. And Corey Pronman, one of our prospect gurus at the Athletic, he said he looks NHL ready. We saw on camp some of the qualities that this guy has. So let’s hypothetically say that Eurochek is ready to play in the NHL next year. You know, are they moving Justin Falk out? And even if they play out the last two years of the Justin Falk’s contract, are they gonna have Mayu and Eurochek in the lineup together on the right side? So I know they went out to get Mayu because they wanted that young right shot guy to kind of bring in and develop. They have it in Eurochek. Are these two gonna come up, you know, playing in that second and third pair for the Blues? You know, maybe, it’s not like they’re surprised by Eurochek’s success. They drafted him in the first round. But like, what’s the play here, losing Bullduke, bringing in a Mayu when you have Eurochek? Yeah, well, and I would imagine when you make that trade for Mayu, you’re waiting, you’re expecting like two years before Eurochek gets on the scene. And if he impresses, then that’s great. But if you’re the Blues, you slow play it still, wouldn’t you, to where it’s like, let’s wait until Falk is gone. And then you’ve gotten Mayu, who’s got, what, two years under his belt as an NHL defenseman. And even if Eurochek’s playing in the minor leagues next year, by the time he’s ready to play at the NHL, now you’ve got three-year-seasoned Logan Mayu with a Colton Pareco and an Adam Eurochek. And maybe you need some of that depth still. Like that’s just the part that it’s an unknown. The other thought in all this, one of these guys might not be here still. Like they always make those trades to get better in another area. So for the now, I understand it because you’re seeing Bullduke score, but for the bigger picture, man, if you were to say Kessel on that third pair defenseman or Logan Mayu, I think I would rather see a Mayu with the upside, not anything degrading against Kessel. It’s just, I’ve seen what Kessel is, and I think there’s a higher ceiling for a guy like Logan Mayu. Absolutely. More with the Last Minute Blues podcast in just a couple of seconds. Standby. We’re back for the last segment on the Last Minute Blues podcast. I also just said the word stand by for the first time. I’ve never done that before. Hey, you remember the break. That’s all that matters. Right. Absolutely. Thank God. So guys, you know, like we’ve talked about a bit already here and there, you know, you don’t want to look too far into the three games. You don’t want to take things too, you know, you don’t want to put too much into it. But guys, I just kind of in general want to know some things that you have each seen from the blue so far that you have liked. I like Jake neighbors. I think, I think that, uh, listen, when you tell Jake neighbors, you’re going to start the year on the third line. Guess what he says? Yep. No problem. All right, cool. And he goes and he’s the best player on the third line. And then you in game need to bump somebody up to the first line. Who do you do? Uh, Jake neighbors. And what does he do? Score a couple of goals. And Alex, you’ve probably felt this too, going in the locker room. A lot of times you go into locker room and you ask specific questions about, Hey, where was the net front? Like you guys know that that’s important and you’ll get some canned answers over the years. I’m not just talking about this locker room, but with Jake neighbors, you really sense that when he tells you, yes, we need to do it. And when it’s your turn, you go do it. And when it’s my turn, I’m going to go do it. And then he gets on a plane, flies to Calgary. I turned my TV on and I watch him do it. That’s what he does. He does what he says he’s going to do. So to go through, I like what he’s done. You know, I like in the Calgary and the Vancouver game, the Blues played with purpose after that dud against the wild. And I think guys are starting to come together. Like we touched on earlier, individually, Matthew Joseph, like I felt like he was noticeable on that Western Canadian trip. And now listen, people are going to say that he’s had this great camp and he’s played great and he’s earned it. Jim Montgomery said, nobody grabbed the positions. So I think sometimes people are making it like Matthew Joseph had this amazing camp, which he wasn’t bad, but Jim Montgomery would have said, yeah, Joseph has grabbed this position. He didn’t do that. But I think he’s played well in these couple of games. And then you can’t have this conversation without talking about Joel Hofer. I mean, they don’t win the game without him. And I think there’s going to be, you know, I don’t think like it’s like taking Jordan Minnington’s job whatsoever. But I think as Jim Montgomery said the other day, he’s going to start more games because of the schedule, because of the Olympics. And if Joel Hofer, like he’s not going to play like that every night, if he can, if he can take that next step this year in his progression, which everybody expects him to do, like he is really going to solidify himself as the future goalie of this team. And how many starts is he going to grab from Bennington? Yeah, I mean, that to me is you’ve got one of the best, if not the best goalie tandem in the National Hockey League. And Hofer showed that in Calgary. Bennington showed it in Vancouver. Like you’ve got a one, two punch that you could play at any time, which you feel good about. You know, going back to your Joseph comment, to your point, if Sunquist’s injury doesn’t happen, I don’t know if Joseph’s in the lineup that first game, because it would have been Torb Cenko, Sunquist and Walker. And Buikstad would have been on that third line wing. So like that goes to show you how good it was to see Joseph take those steps in that Western Canada road trip because of how they performed. And that was the biggest thing that I’ve noticed so far. And again, it’s three games, but man, when they’re at even strength, they’re a tough team to play because they’ve got four lines. Like they’ve talked so much about that pack mentality. The Vancouver game is the one that opened up my eyes to where it’s like when four lines were humming, Vancouver couldn’t get out of their own end. It was, it started with the Cairo line and then it was the Thomas line. And then it was Snuggaroo with Pew Suitor and they score and you get the Nathan Walker line. Like they are a effective team when it stays at even strength. And it’s because you have that ability to roll four lines. That’s the dangerous factor in them. I want to ask a real quick sidebar about Vancouver, if it’s all right with you guys. And I’ll be very forthright in saying that on Monday night, I was watching the Blues game while listening to the Bills game. So I did not have the audio on, but real quick, a non-Blues related question. Guys, what do you think is going to end up happening with Patterson in Vancouver? Because in watching that game, it did not seem to me that that was a player that is the best player on there. But a lot of times when I’m watching a team, you’re watching you go, Oh crap, obviously you see he’s the best player on the ice. Well, there are times being where I’m watching Vancouver and I can’t even tell dude is on the ice. Like what is going on with that guy? It seems like there is an absolute world of talent, but that the talent in the brain aren’t working together or something. Am I wrong? JT Miller stuff must have really wrecked him because the prior season, what was it? Two years ago, like a hundred points. I thought, I mean, it looked like one of the best teams because you had that one, two punch of Miller last year happens. I mean, what’s going to happen with Pederson? Nothing. You traded JT Miller. If you’re Vancouver, you’re riding because Pederson’s our number one center. I think the bigger question for them is what’s going to happen with Quinn Hughes? Yeah. Because if you lose, that’s your best player. And what are you going to do with that? Yeah. Pederson’s a regressed and they traded the wrong player, but maybe it’s because there wasn’t a lot of interest in Pederson, especially the 11 million AAV. Yeah. Well, and especially for how he was playing. So I mean, I actually watching that or looking at that team on paper before they played that game, it’s a decent top six. Like you got Pederson, you’ve got Garland, you’ve got Besser, you’ve got to brusque, like it’s not a bad top six. You got Quinn Hughes, which is good. Demko was really good in the early portion of the season. But I mean, when your best player is not your best player, what are you going to do? Do you think when Hughes winds up in New Jersey with his brothers? Probably at some point, you know, that’s always the St. Louis. Do we carry that storyline out a lot with the hometown guys? No. What are you talking about? We are very very well understand. It’s like we were like, like crazy about your fair chucks and I don’t know what you’re talking about. At some point, but I think maybe even more of a probability than than New Jersey, which could happen someday is I think at some point it’ll be wanting to leave Vancouver. I just don’t know what they’re building there. And especially when you have that anchor of a contract with, you know, Pederson and what he’s not doing. So at some point, one of the league’s best defenseman is going to go want to play with a better team. Well, and also look at where both teams are projecting to go. Like if Vancouver doesn’t figure their stuff out, they’re going to start going down the other way because most of their guys aren’t getting any younger. New Jersey’s on the uprise. Like they’ve got the guys on forward. They got their forward set with the younger group of players. They’ve got some defenseman in place and then you’ve got the two Hughes connection. So I mean, if I’m Quinn Hughes, where would I want to go play for my career? Well, I got a shot to win a cup soon versus this one. I don’t know if we’re ever going to get there. Maybe our best chance to win. We’re like three years ago. Right. Right. All right. So then, and I don’t want to spend a lot of time on this, but just, has there been a thing or two here, guys that, that you’ve seen that you go with the blues, that you go, whoop, don’t love that. Hope that does not become a trend. Has there been anything like that, that sort of stuck out to you in these three games? I don’t like it, but I’ve, I don’t like the scrambledness that you see in the defensive end at times. And I think it was more prevalent in that Minnesota game and it got tightened up in Calgary. Didn’t see it a whole lot with Vancouver, but it does feel like they’re not as concise with their decision-making in their own end. Like I think they led two of the three games in D zone turnovers between the two teams. So that’s the part that like the intrusive thoughts I have before the season began is like, well, man, what if the defense actually isn’t improving? What if they still struggle? That stuck out to me. But again, it’s one of those things that it’s so hard for me to judge them off of because I haven’t seen these guys play consistently enough yet. Yeah. I think the two wins in Western Canada kind of answered a lot of the questions or worries that you had after that Minnesota game. But to me, even in the victories, too many penalties. Yeah, that’s a really good one. I think that’s probably got to be it. You know, too many minors, you’re putting your PK out there, which has been pretty good. And the six and five against, you know, late in the game. How about that? Yeah, I didn’t get to bring that one up. That felt nice. It’s fixed, Donnie. It’s fixed. But you know, maybe the Justin Fauck penalty 34 seconds into the season was an omen for what was to come because they sure have taken a lot of penalty. And if you’re talking to it’s like, why did it have to be me? Absolutely. So yeah. And I mean, it’s just also like just after three, I mean, you know, there’s not much. Everything just feels very like, yeah, let’s wait a little bit. You know, like the stuff you could get excited about, like the Jake neighbors, that’s very exciting. And you just want to see more of it. The stuff that’s concerning to you. It’s like, I can’t get worked up on this yet until I see things play out. Like the positives outweigh the negatives three games into the season, at least for me, because Jayar mentioned the penalty kill. I know they’ve given up two power play goals, but man, they’re penalty kill those two power play goals. One, it was off the crossbar right in the crease for the Minnesota wild player. And then the other one was Calgary, where it goes through the crease and goes off of Tucker skating into the back of the net. So I mean, your penalty kill has been really good in three games. All right. I want to ask this final question here. And I’ve been meaning to ask this for the last couple of podcasts, but it seems as though that we ran out of time, but I feel like we’ve got a minute or two that we can stop. I just sent it to another break. Nope. I’ve already done the two breaks. Guys, can you, for us hockey fans that might not completely understand this, there has been a very big change this year when it comes to NCAA hockey, college hockey, and then also like the CHL and eligibility. Guys, can you kind of explain to me what has happened, why this is such a big deal? You’ve got that. I believe his name is Gavin McKenna, who could be the number one pick next year. He’s went to, went to Penn state and there’s been some guys that probably would have went the Canadian hockey route that have instead went and are playing at an NCAA school, which I know I’m sure has a lot to do with NIL money and things of that nature as well. But for us, normal, regular hockey fans, whatever you want to say, can you kind of explain what’s going on? Yeah, it’s just a situation where players, especially in Canada, were kind of restricted to who they could play for. And a lot of them were, you know, connected to the junior leagues and, you know, you stick with that team. And, you know, it’s just like in St. Louis, where you have a Blues player, and if you don’t want him on the roster, you can’t send them to Springfield. You have to send them back to his junior team. Like Justin Carboneau. Yeah, because Justin Carboneau. So they’re like the controlling entity there in the players rights. And so now these rules have loosened up and they’re allowing them to go to play NCAA hockey. And that’s what a lot of these players are electing to do. So it’s going to be beneficial to the NCAA hockey teams. You know, one of the guys who’s going to be the number one, Gavin McKenna. People are watching college hockey a lot right now. Goes to Penn State. And then this ties in with, and I think there’s a story at the athletic today about the changing landscape of NCAA hockey, because they’re going to get a lot more of these players. It coincides with the storyline of the NIL money and the money that a lot of these players are going to get. You know, you look at McKenna, NIL, and you know, they have the deep pockets there at Penn State with the family there, the Buffalo Bills family. Well, not deep anymore. Not deep anymore after they fired James Franklin, but we can get into that another day. Yeah. But, you know, that’s what it boils down to is it’s a little bit looser and these players can go play for the NCAA teams. And then also there’s going to be the ability to make that money. And I think the competitiveness too, like I just, it feels like college hockey is a lot more competitive than what it’s been in the past in juniors hockey. Not that that’s not competitive, but I don’t know. It’s just development purposes of like, you feel like some of the guys are developing faster at the college level. And when they get to the NHL, they just mesh right away into where they’re playing. So do you, I mean, so this obviously is going to have a pretty negative effect on these Canadian hockey leagues, right? Like because some of the, because some of the star talent that would have went there is going to go to the NCAA instead. Or am I reading that wrong? Yeah, yeah, it definitely could. And especially if it becomes an influx of players that are leaving, obviously there’s been some big names that have left so far, but I don’t think it’s like a stampede of players, but it could get to that point. And that’s the thing is, you know, you always, you know, take a point in time, like maybe two years from now and you look back and you say, yes, that did have a dramatic impact in junior hockey. And, and, you know, people are writing articles now, speculating what it could do. And we’ll just have to see how everything unfolds. Is Lindenwood a D1 now? Yeah, D1. How crazy is that? We got D1 a couple of years ago. I know Rick Zombo was like forefronting that for the longest time before he stepped down as the head coach, but yeah, they’re, they’re D1 and got that nice arena that they play in over at Centene. So great to be a hockey fan in St. Louis. You could be a hockey fan on so many different levels. And the fact that I have not went to a game of Lindenwood, I got to change that. And also they got that rink out in Maryville for the Maryville team. And I’ve never been out there as well. I got to do something. You need to go on a college hockey tour there. Kind of so. Then on your off days, if you play here, you can go to the hill, the art, the zoo, we can just do all of this stuff. Tell you what to do. All right. So guys, we feel like we covered basis. We got everything done. We’re there. Three games in and where none of us are panicking. Good job, everybody. I like it. I like it now. Some of the listeners panicking. That’s fine. That’s fine. We’re here. We’re kind of like the therapist for him. We’re here to make life a little bit more calmer for you. I don’t think the idea of me being a therapist for anyone or anything is a good idea for anyone. Go back and reference the first 10 minutes of the show. It is the Last Minute Blues Podcast for my dudes, Alex Ferrario from 101 ESPN, Jeremy Rutherford from the Athletic, Jeff Burton. We miss you so much. I’m Donnie Fandango, the podcast brought to you by Blue Note Roofing, Roofing Siding and Gutters, your St. Louis roofing experts. Visit blue noteroufingstl.com for a free inspection. Thanks for listening. And as always, let’s go Blues. The Last Minute Blues Podcast. Hear more at 1057thepoint.com.

One week into the season, and plenty of areas to discuss, including a slow start for a few forwards, areas that stood out to the guys, and any concern over Mailloux’s start to the season. They also read a few of your e-mails and the common shenanigans they love.

Last Minute Blues Podcast is presented by Blue Note Roofing!

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