Pod Excl: Do Fans Love Tanking?

0:00Protein is now at Starbucks and it's never tasted so good. You can add protein, cold foam to your favorite drink or try one of our new protein lattes or matcha. Try it today at Starbucks. America leads the world in medicine development. It matters. We get new medicines first nearly three years faster. Five million Americans go to work because we make medicines here at home. And not relying on other countries keeps us safe. But China is racing to overtake us. Will we let them or will we choose to stay ahead? When America leads, America cures. Let's go to Washington to keep us in the lead. Learn how at AmericaCures.com. Pay for by Farma. In the special exclusive edition of the Jetset Nune podcast, myself Cam Poitrus, Jim Toth and Tyson, Rewiki, discuss tanking. Can you stop it in the NHL? And is fan culture pushing it too much? We discuss.

1:06Well, well, well, well. If it isn't the guy that said the Jets have a good chance of making the playoffs, says to a takeaway all it has of taking the dolphins to the Super Bowl. Well, well, well, well. If it isn't the guy who said, Nazim Kady will never go back to Colorado. They let him go and he hates it there. Plus, he'll have no chance to win again. If it isn't, that was a strong take. Well, well, well, well. If it isn't the guy who said there's no way that Miami dolphins are going to eat almost a hundred million dollars of dead cap space. Well, well, well. I was surprised that they didn't cut him sooner. That's why I didn't comment on that. It's like two games into the season. It's like, you might have to eat some cash. This is added for disaster. Well, well, well, well. If it isn't the guys who said, the, oh, you just,

2:07it wasn't, that was not good. It's a keep going, keep going. It's a two guys. It's seven all morning. The tanking is their favorite part of the NHL season, not just the NHL season, but sports in general. And now look at you. You're, you're marking your words and you're eating them for my words. Didn't Ricky say make, he's always like Julian. I'm going to do this. You make my words. But that leads us into the topic yesterday, of course. Let's get to it. That tanking is ruining the NHL and the NBA. To be fair, but way worse in the NBA. It is way worse in the NBA. But we just like, how much they find them? 500,000? Well, I mean, they were just like, we're not playing these guys. Have they changed? Have they changed? I think like every now and then they're like, oh, he's got a headache. He can't play. Like, as long as the NBA is what is everything that's wrong with pro sports. And I say this is a guy who grew up playing basketball.

3:08I love basketball. I can't wait for March madness. I haven't watched a full NBA game in a decade because it's everything that's wrong with pro sports. Well, I would agree. If you have a list of all the things that you don't like about pro sports and thinks it has things going in the wrong direction, the NBA is at the top of every single game of our fun. You can harp on Gary Bevin all you want. Adam Silver has completely destroyed any moment in that the NBA was building and he's ruined it. Any time we get a call in Jetsett Newton and say, well, time zones. These NHL players are pampered and blah, blah, blah, blah. Do not watch the NBA. They literally get nights off to rest to sit and watch in their sweats. Then this, then we're going to tank. We're not going to play our stars even though we're paying a millions, millions to do so. And the league just sits around and goes, wow, we got to take care of these. Adam Silver is the perfect example. Well, like what about fans? Like fans paying money for tickets to see the best of the best. Go at it. Go at it. But who cares about them? The only thing that's wrong with pro sports is in one league

4:09and it's the NBA. Adam Silver will say is the problem with Silver is that he says yet everything to the owners and the players. And he has no backbone. He has no pushback. He's like, oh, okay. I guess you guys want that. We'll call it now. The seventh guy coming off the bench is worth more than him. Yeah. 100%. The owner can make the country stop. But some of the owners in the NBA. They can make, you know, they can buy an island. Do you think David Stern's allowing all this nonsense to go on right now? Oh, no. Well, that's what I mean. But he had power back then, right? Yeah. He has no power. No, no, no. It's been the NBA has made a series of disastrous moves. Michael Jordan couldn't gamble on his own time because David Stern. I'm on my own time. I got on my own plane. You can't do that. Oh, he was telling players what they could do. And not do away from the court. This guy can't even get him to play. No. Anyways. But the NHL, okay. So tanking. Yes. And it's been watching these last couple of Jets games that's been the realization.

5:12Jets are not tanking. No way about that. No, it's been the realization. But there's so many. Why are they drawing penalties? There's so many fans that are absolutely choked about this recent success and recent winning streak. And you know, whether your opinions on, however you want the season end for the team, regardless, you should not be cheering for your team to lose. Like even if you want your team to lose and get a higher traffic, they really shouldn't be. You shouldn't be watching your team at the end of the season and going like, oh, yes. Well, I went on to drop five. I went on to the Kanox forums and because they lost the Jets and over time, right in a game they got their clocks clean. Let's be honest. Kanox got their nuts kicked in. They were lucky to get that point. 100%. That's a great one. Yeah. I'm going to use that. I had a high school. I'm a junior high teacher. Mr. Hawkins. I don't know Mr. Hawkins if you're listening to this. But he would tell a story. He played football when he was younger.

6:15And he leveled his shoulder into a guy. He told the story when we were in grade nine at Robert Andrews in the same ball. And he put a shoulder into a guy right in the right and the groin area and he shot him right up into the guy's body and they didn't they didn't. So anyways, after the game, he was walking, he tells us he was walking down the hallway. Past the area. Mr. Hawkins was such a nice guy. But he was like, one of those like outside of the field, he was just like the most loving kind guy. But like, and you put him in an arena and he's a monster. And anyways, he walked down the hallway, he told the story and he saw the guy that he did it to. The guy was jumping up and down, trying to get his testicles to get out to drop. So the the team trainer was like, you got to jump up and down. And he was trying to jump up and down to get his, because he knocked him right up and do his body. You ever take a puck in the nuts? No. Oh, yeah.

7:15It's literally. The joke almost makes, well, it's obviously protects it. It doesn't make it as worse. But it sort of feels it. But sometimes, I mean, like, because it like do not be a too graphic, but yeah, like if you have the, if the joke moves a little bit and then it's like a wedge impact, you know what I mean? Yeah. The pinch. I'll go back to the moment I was saying, I was reading those Kanan's forums and they were saying, oh, that was the best result that could have ever happened. They went over time. You know, they were competitive, not really, but they were not competitive on this. They look competitive on the score. If you just look at the score after the game, they look competitive. They worked hard. They worked hard. They skated fast, but they were not competitive. Yeah. Yeah. So they said, oh, that's the best result we could have got. So I hope that they don't, I hope they don't get the mechanics. They're not. They're not kicked in. But I mean, they did. They were all. They were. The chance rolled the man. How do you fix this, though? Like that's the main problem. So this is the problem. And the culture. It's a culture. It's a fan culture thing. Yeah. The fan of calling on Friday and said, well, Jim's happy with the mushy middle.

8:17No, I'm not. Like to me, the bears, my bears have been the mushy middle for 20 years. Just good enough. I like to call it just good enough to keep suck it. Yeah. So you got to be good enough to stay in the middle and not be terrible enough to go down. But you can't stop this, you guys. Like what's always lost in the fans perspective is Josh Morris. He goes out there. He's back in the lineup. He has two points, the record, all that. But he's going to get his millions. He's going to he's got a contract for years to come. He's got. What does Josh Morris want on a night in March? He wants to win. He wants to make the playoffs every year. Every one of that room thinks that they can take Colorado out in the first round if they make the playoffs. Correct. Nobody else outside that room thinks they can take Colorado out in the first round if they make the playoffs. But in that room, they do. They're getting to make a number of years ago, man, there's precedent for the sort of stuff. It's a competitive nature of and there's no switch. There's no, you know what, I'll try not to get hurt this year.

9:21Blah blah blah. We'll come back next year. It's an ominous year. We'll bounce right back. There's no switch like that when the puck drops and the connects start coming at you. It's just it's not going to happen. And for the fans to do, and I talked to some people in the weekend that said, this is an easy fix. Like some people agree with me. I know a lot more don't, but they were like, this is an easy fix. And if you could get that high draft pick, like you get a McKenna in here and a sign and a guy or two, he goes, we, the thinking, just turn it right back around and go right back at it. But you got to get there, right? And how you get there, it's just impossible to go, don't try. Two possible solutions that have been brought up, although go with the one that I think is stupid and won't work, but getting rid of the draft entirely. Once you turn 18, you can sign with any NHL team you want. All the jets are being finished. They might as well move into that. I am with you. No, no, no, I honestly, the jets, they might as well move now because that team will never do anything. Now, some people would say that some prospects would see a place like Winnipeg and Goal.

10:23Well, there is an opportunity for me, but I can go right, but they would not be high in prospects. Even the mean prospect would go, even the kid who is born and raised in Winnipeg is a lifelong loving jets fan will go, can I play in Florida? Yeah. I mean, I am with you. Like it is. Can I live in Florida and play the game and make you're going to get a few kids and come and pop in the summer? Yeah. You're going to get a few kids who maybe go out and want the opportunity. I was born in Winnipeg, blah, blah, blah, blah for the most part. Very few. Toronto, all the East Coast, U.S. teams, the Florida teams, California teams, just going on. Everybody would sign with the Rangers. What does it want to work in? Yeah. What you would be doing is asking any 18-year-old that was good enough to play in the league, anyone to go forget hockey, where would you like to live at 18 years old? Yeah. And they would base it on that. This isn't like NCAA when you have the coach out and he's trying to recruit guys. I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's definitely the next option because that was dope. That one sucked. The Golden Rule with the PWHL has and so that for those that don't know, it was created

11:26by a student actually who was, his last name was Golden conveniently enough. That's why it's called the Golden Rule. That's the first thing. I think it sounds like a member of the tribe and Golden respect. But we didn't get his nuts kicked. He, his idea that is now used in the PWHL is that once you become eliminated from playoff contention, you have the opportunity to win as many games as you can and collect points once you're eliminated. And whoever has the most points after the season ends, after they've been eliminated gets the number one overall pitch. See, it, it sounds good on paper, but I had more I think about it. It sounds like, okay, that's a good idea. I, I think you just have team's tank in the beginning of the year and then they would turn it on once they're absolutely out of it. Yeah. And then is it points percentage because teams obviously would be knocked out of it earlier on, right? Right. I guess, yeah. You'd have to use points percentage for the NHL. I don't know. Teams would just tank early and then they would just, as soon as they were eliminated,

12:26then they would just, they would just, you know, there would be ways to game it. There's no perfect rule. I hate, I hate comparing it to fantasy sports because there's no comparison. But in some leagues, I'm in. So there's eight teams that make the playoffs and four that don't. And when the playoffs are set, those four teams have to play each other for the first overall pick. So you might not, you might be the worst team of the four and not have a chance, but you have to like keep feeling a competitive lineup. You have to keep putting something in. There's something to fight for. And if you want the first overall pick in next year's fantasy draft, you have to win the bottom four seat. Now, the one is should have you concerned with that is Florida this year. And it's like, oh, we're getting all our guys back and that is, yeah, you imagine they win the draft lottery? What if Florida wins a draft lottery? Yeah, but that's a real real, that's a real, I don't know, a first round pick. So that's true. But here's the thing though, does it not make it more interesting? Like, when we go all that wouldn't be fair of Florida's there, it's because we want

13:30the worst place team to get the first pick. We want the next place team. So just go back to that then. And if teams try to tank or whatever and that their players mix in a win, I honestly believe the best way to do this is go back to worst place team gets the first pick. Second worst team gets a second pick, get rid of the draft lottery. And for those teams that want to lose and try to get the first overall pick, then you're competing against other teams that want to lose and get the first one. Now it makes for horrific hockey for the last 20 games of this season, because if you're playing Florida, who wants the first round pick and they're dressing nobody and you're win a peg fighting for the playoff spots, there's no easy fix, but to the point of not wanting Florida to get the first overall pick, do you want it to be fair or do you want, isn't that interesting? Yeah. If Florida was fighting the Vancouver connox for the first overall pick, doesn't that make it more interesting when you watch more should clarify to actually do believe that their pick this year is protected. So they would get it in the event that they were to win the lottery like in the top three. So still could get it, but it's tough.

14:32You just don't really have any real options. Everyone's been playing at something at the end of the day, true. This episode is brought to you by Athletic Brewing Company. No matter how you do game day, on the couch, in the crowd or manning the snack table, Athletic Brewing fits right in. With a full lineup of non-alcoholic beer styles, you can enjoy bold flavors all game long. No hangovers, no buzz, no subbing out for water in the second half. Stuck the fridge for tip off with a variety of non-alcoholic craft styles available at your local grocery store or online at AthleticBrewing.com. Near beer, fit for all times.