TSN & The Athletic's Pierre LeBrun (3/18/26)

0:00Hey, it's Bob Stoffer. I just wanted to let you know that you can listen to Oilers Now, Add Free, on Amazon Music, included with Prime. Spring starts at the Home Depot, and we are bringing the heat to your backyard this season. Fire up the flavor with our wide variety of grills for under $300, like the next grill for burner gas grill that's perfect for hosting your spring cookout. Then set the scene and turn your outdoor space into the go-to spot the patio sets for every budget. Bring it this season with grills that deliver flavor and patios that set the vibe from the Home Depot. Start your spring with low prices guaranteed at the Home Depot, exclusive supplies at Home Depot.com slash price match for details. You've been there, settling in for an evening of TV only to waste half the night scrolling. Enter Fire TV. Entertainment with zero effort required. Fire TV serves up personalized recommendations from across all your apps. Not sure what to watch? Let's tell Alexa Plus what you're in the mood for and she'll pull up the perfect recommendation.

1:00Problem solved. Stop the scroll. Start the show. Find what you're looking for with Fire TV. Subscriptions may be required. This is Oilers Now. We're going to get quickly into the show today. Oilers Now brought to you by our title sponsor, World of Spaws. Straight into our top story for legacy heating and grilling, home and opa payments to no interest for one year. Let's tell you about the legacy Bobby and Steve and the team at legacy heating and grilling courtesy of TSN in conversation with Geno Reda and we always courtesy the source. Here is stand moment today upon leaving the NHL GM's meetings on Leon Drys' title's timeline. Optimistic. I mean, it's only been a couple days here, but I'm going to have to see how he responds to the treatment, but you know, the timeline they gave is based on their expectation of the normal.

2:01These injuries normally how long they take to heal and yeah, so I don't have any reason to doubt that. And saying that the hope is to have him optimistically back to the start of the regular or the playoffs without further ado, we're going to head off to the River Creek Resort Casino Hotline 7804518800, the River Creek Resort Casino don't miss George Thurgood and the Destroyers tickets at the River Creek Resort dot com excitement bet on it. That goes tomorrow night and we're pleased to welcome back to the show. I'm not sure if he's back in Ontario or still down on the States, but from TSN and the athletic, it is Pierre Lebron for Riverside, Honda and Skadoo. It's your dream right at Riverside. Hello Pierre. How you doing? I'm all right. I am still and I'm still in cold and rainy and windy Palm Beach, Florida, the worst weather we've ever had and 25 years of covering, and I know that everyone looked thinking at me as a giant violin L right now for me.

3:03Yes, well, it got to the point where I stopped describing what it was like on the road when I was hosting shows at various different times. You can figure out why mainly because I'm married remarkably still and have kids and wouldn't feel nothing but empathy. Thankfully, we had great neighbors for a number of years and always made sure that the driveway and the walks were shoveled for us. So that was part of the reason why. So Leon Rice is getting hurt on Sunday night and that unfortunately became part of the storyline of the coverage of the NHL GM's meetings. And I know, do you know, had a lengthier conversation and Stan Bowman saying today optimistically the hope is the tricycles ready for the start of the playoffs. Edmonton's got to do some work here to get into the playoffs. I was just going to say and I was thinking last night as one child be bossing overtime but the older than the Canadians have to do their job here because can you imagine a play out without Canadian teams?

4:05I mean, there's nothing guaranteed here. The odds have been dropped back towards the group with Columbus and Ottawa charging. Now, I thought of what gets in, of course, I would take care of that, but it's nothing's guaranteed for Montreal. Nothing's guaranteed for Edmonton, although I think Deutschland won't get in. You know, I heard what Tantal, Gino, I was standing nearby, you know, was good to hear the optimistic view of that. I felt like the statement, the statement wasn't encouraging that one out yesterday, so I mean, it just feels to me like we'll see how he feels once the playoffs roll around. There's my way of reading into it. Yeah. And again, we don't even have full clarity on what the injury is other than it is a lower body injury. So there we go. What was your biggest takeaway? What were the focal points, do you think, for the GM's meetings this year? This Friday, the time traveling comedy movie of the year arrives, Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice, only on Hulu. The film stars Vince Vaughn, James Marsden, and Ace of Gonzalez, and a wild action comedy

5:07about one disastrous night that spirals out of control. And here's the twist. There are two Vince Vaughn's. Don't miss Mike and Nick and Nick and Alice, written and directed by Ben David Grubinsky, streaming this Friday, only on Hulu, rated R. USAA knows dynamic duos can save the day, like superheroes and psychics, or auto and home insurance. With USAA, you can bundle your auto and home and save up to 10 percent. Tap the banner to learn more and get a quote at USAA.com slash bundle, restriction supply. Yeah, obviously the roll cup news on day one was pretty big, understanding what the tournament's going to look like and where it's going to be staged. But I will say that in the last 20, for our, a couple of spicy little takes that took a little more reporting to get out, and they both involved Eric Talsky, the GM, the Hell and Hurricane, to just appeal back to the onion here. One is that Bowie and the Fearance video review came up yet again. I don't know if you remember what a year ago, they spent a lot of time on it here at the

6:09Gem meetings and felt they were coming out of the meetings here with a clear standard for a coach's challenge pulling the Fearance video review. But then last Saturday in Ottawa, and I'm, gave up a goal in Ottawa that they absolutely felt should have been this allowed after contact with Billy Hueso, and it was not this allowed. And Pat Rubik, Dr. GM, came into these meetings a little hot and wanting clarity, and I'm not sure that he was particularly pleased with basically what he was told by the NHL. And Eric Talsky, the Hurricane, added to that by saying that he felt the standard has shifted here, and that you're in the eye of the league. Frankly, I think he's right. I mean, if you look at that play, people listening from Google it afterwards, but it's in my piece in the athletic today and my wrap up of the Gem meetings, but Hueso, it's clearly contacted in the blue paint and since Susla went in there on his own. Well, if that's a goal now, I got to tell you, what do you think teams are going to tell

7:10their forwards come play out by him? They're going to stay cross-free. Yeah. So, I'm merely concerned that the league has let the slip a little, and listen, I think they get it right most of the time. I don't want to be over dramatic about it, but there's a reason why we're being wanted to clarity and Talsky added to it. So that got a little spicy, but also we found out a few hours later, the sources that Talsky also raised the subject of whether headshots are still being called the right way, and that absolutely drew the eye here at that moment. So, even though the game's journaling good shape, we still had some spicy moments here this week. Well, I'm not surprised we had spicy moments because I got to tell you, and I guess we can discuss this a bit here, Toronto's response to the knee on knee hit involving medical goodness was not enough, and as I stated during one of the intermission panels, I can go

8:15on any bar in Chattwend, British Columbia, or Grand Prairie, or high-level Alberta, or Wavering, Saskatchewan, and find three guys that wouldn't willing to go out there, and either cross-check or punch or ethical goodness in the head if they've done that, what they were on the ice with Austin Matthews, so that's one side of the problem with it, is the league, and to me that should have warded more than a five-game suspension, especially given the fact that he's a multi-time offender, and it also reinforces, and Judd Moldaver said something quite strong, the perception of some including myself that unlike Saley NFL, which protects quarterbacks, or the NBA, which protects their star players, does the NHL, is it too egalitarian in its approach? Do they need to protect the star players more? What was the overall sense that you got from me there, because I don't got discussed in terms of the... Yeah, no. I mean, no question about it, Bob, sort of interrupt, I mean, coming into the meeting, that

9:17wasn't the... That was the hot and heavy conversation, and George Farrell did speak to the media yesterday morning, and then today, Gary Berman and Bill Daley came strongly to defend himself that his suspension of the goodest was right, and the process is not flawed, and Daley went to the extent, and I think this was in response to all this chatter about the players made me wanting this look at, Daley went to the extent today, Bob, of sharing that during the CBA negotiations last year, on the CBA extension player discipline, think about once, from the VA. So, look, there's a lot to unpack here, and I know a lot of my readers have been particularly like might take on Monday in the athletic when I wrote about this, because, yes, do I think it should have been a lengthier suspension, absolutely. But I do think there's a bit of an exaggeration to this event, because, hey, it's a Toronto Maple Leaf star. Hey, it's a star, and be it the Toronto Maple Leaf. See, it's in the middle of a season gone off the rails for the Toronto Maple Leafs.

10:20And D, it involved Rockwood Buddhist, who has a repeater of thunderstatt's path, so the confluence of events, the recipe was perfect for a grenade, all of it. But the reality is, suspensions are way down, and this kind of incident, which you don't want to see, which is terrible, is quite rare in a modern NHL. I mean, when I started carving NHL in 1995, this happened once a week in the NHL. The game has completely changed. It's cleaned up big time, and so I still think that we are overreacting to one incident as bad as it was. Now, I haven't said that. It doesn't mean that we can't have the conversation. I mean, for John Moldever, for coming to the defense of his client, and then raising this to a higher level as far as the discussion. But at the end of the day, the one part of it that Judd didn't put into a statement is probably the most important part, which is where is the NHL PA in all this? Like if you want stiffer suspensions than a culture ship in this ecosystem, the players

11:26per the CBA are 50% of the decision. Do you guys want your own guy suspended longer? If the answer is yes, great, then don't appeal when there's a culture ship and it's a 15 game suspension, because that's always been the fear from players' safety, is that if they... Yes. I tried to push him on that 15 years ago, what he was in charge, and the threat was well, we're going to appeal that. So I'm not trying to throw the PA out of the bus at all. I think they're in a tough spot, because they are a union, and they shouldn't be shouting from the rooftops that they want to dock wages from their own members, I get it. But at the same time, if we're actually going to have a grown-up conversation about cleaning this up and changing the threshold for suspensions on dirty plates, the players have got to be involved in the ground level. Okay. Well, there's entirely too much reason and logic in that perspective, so I'm not quite sure why you took the amount of heat you did. I got to tell you, I feel a bit bad for Toronto, and they've played in a tough division

12:32for the last number of years. Obviously, everything that could have gone wrong has gone wrong. The response we all know wasn't great, and that's, you know, on the dry settle situation, tonight, you know what, I know Leon, when he's got the pain threshold of a cadaver, when he goes straight off, that's right, sir. But I loved that Captain Pankolz and both tried to get it wise-blat, and you know, Captain is not going to fight, but the stick is also a great equalizer, and Pankolz and got picked off by Nicholas Hague, who I don't think thought Pankolz was going to fight him, and went ahead and fought him. I thought it was great. I had no problem with Frederick going after, wise-blat. I had no problem with Accom getting in a sketch, and the hit on Wallman was, you know, teams have, there comes a point, you can't necessarily, in every situation, you might not get the call that you think you're going to get, so you have to police yourselves as well. That just comes. Well, and you just eloquently, you know, explain the difference between one team that's

13:36gone to the Sonic of Final tears, and another team that has failed, that's played out five every year, and, you know, the non-response by the leases and excitement on the culture of that D. I'm sorry, that's not the way to explain it, but don't forget, it's the same leasing that didn't bat an eye when Sam Bennett took out their goal in the playoffs last year. So, you know, I mean, it is what it is. I mean, actually, speak louder than words, or in this case, non-action. Well, it's funny, because we have people in our market. Tomorrow, Matthew could chuck in the Florida Panthers come to town, and they did not like the comments from Matthew could chuck when he's the third best player on his line playing with his brother Brady and Jack Eichel, who's a top eight center and league champion Leon Drysettle, when Leon's got Josh Semanski with games of NHL experience and Frederick Tiffles on his wing. You know, like he's, Leon's taking a pocket knife to a gunfight there, and this is going to allow me to transition to something else.

14:37That occurred at the Olympics. You said when you started covering the league in 1995, at that time, the Emmett's and Anders Ravich in about 7,000 fans per game. Even until the 0405 lockout where Cal Nichols famously said on my show, Bob, this is the battle for Alberta, not the battle of Alberta, the Canadian Assistance Program here. In your wildest dreams, could you have envisioned a time that came where the biggest event that the NHL and the NHL PA could control the world cup of hockey ends up in Alberta in Calgary and Evacuate? Would that not have seemed foreign to you when we had the Canadian Assistance Program back in the early 2000s? I hadn't even thought of it from that vantage point, but that's a great point. I mean, honestly, not to bring up old memories, but was it less Alexander from Houston touching down and Emmington once, I mean, he was touching go for a while, and you look at that, not

15:40just a beautiful arena that Emmington built, but the old area around it, I mean, and this obviously spurred on what Calgary is doing. I actually got, I saw some footage today of the Calgary rank and looks at Bill, unbelievable how quick they're building that thing, and so this will be a tremendous celebration and a huge event. I mean, best on best hockey, there's nothing hotter right now in terms of the appetite for it. The CV numbers suggested, but I think it's a feather in the cap of the oilers and flames to have been big for this, and it looks a money dot. I think they made some commitment to the league that, honestly, none of the other bidding markets were ready to go to that level four. I mean, there's some point in markets, I can tell you, Boston wanted it, after four nations, they wanted back in, they get put in a strong bunch of oil back in there, but at the end of the day for Calgary Emmington joined Bids to win out is really impressive. And by the way, I'm also excited about programming part of it, because this is an international event.

16:41Yes. NHL is a very international league, and I always feel bad that European players don't get nearly the same kind of, you know, they don't get to play in front of their own fan very often. And so I love the fact that the woke up will have a big segment of it in Prague as well. I mean, you have a federal government that is liberal with a provincial government that is conservative coming together with a municipal government, which frankly is left of the liberals currently in Edmonton. So three different, you know, jurisdictions working together with two organizations in one of the most heated robberies going with ownership rates that both found a way to get new buildings done in challenging times and challenging climates. It's quite the story, really, when you think about it. So there you have it. Safe travels. Safe travels. Okay. I got to go warm up back in Toronto and get out of cold Florida. Yeah. Thank you, Bob. Well, I won't be cold tomorrow night when the Panthers play the orders.

17:43I can tell you that. Thanks, Pierre. All right. Thanks, Fabian. You bet. That is Pierre Lebron from the athletic and TSM 4 Riverside Honda and Skidoo. It's your dream right at Riverside. And Pierre is also one of our two orders. No headliners today for Wilhock beef jerky. Others can try to imitate, but nobody can duplicate the great flavor of Wilhock beef jerky. Only available in Ladouk. I saw Trenton as buddy Lloyd last night. And we made our way to a downtown establishment. Oh, I was going to say that we shall remain nameless. But we went over to pub 1905 had an awesome time and bumped into my main man met Shadow Westlock. That was great too. And my wife is one of our relatives with five-three victory. We'll tell you a little bit more about that when we come back and orders now. It is for 23 in oil country. My day get's off with a refreshing Celsius energy drink. Then straight to the gym. Pre-get pickup, back home to meal prep. Time for my fire session shift. One more Celsius. Gotta keep the lights on.

18:44When the three alarm hits, I'm ready. Celsius. Live, fit, go. Grab a cold refreshing Celsius at your local retailer or locate now at celsius.com. Two teams, one cup. The prime time stage is set for the TGL presented by SoFi finals, Los Angeles Golf Club versus Tiger's Jupiter links. Keep up, it's playoffs. Tune in Monday, March 23rd, 9 p.m. Eastern on ESPN 2 and Tuesday, March 24th, 7 p.m. Eastern on ESPN and on the ESPN app. Everybody Bob stopper from ice district. It's 427 in oil country. Of course, you can always text us on the actually five floors text line 7 8 0 4 5 1 8 800. Find the new floors. You always wanted 143rd Street, 111 W or head to actually find floors dot com for more information. The show X account is at orders now. You can tweet me personally Bob underscored stop for Aden Ganem at Aden Ganem underscore. We're also now on Instagram at

19:44Euler's underscore now underscore. And we will have lots to get to in the next half hour block, including an audio recap of last night's 5 3 victory. I'd like to get your thoughts on that win. Is that a recipe for success for Edmonton a diversified scoring attack? Another solid goal tending performance Conor Angler, by the way, 13 of his 20 starts this year are have been quality starts. It's a 650 percentage. Those are good numbers. I mean, he's he's been solid. He's given the orders of punchers chance he made some big saves late in the second period of that game. We head off to an 8 80 news whether a traffic update with Thomas Dias. Lots to come still on orders now. Ryan Reynolds here from it mobile the message for everyone paying big wireless way too much. Please for the love of everything good in this world. Stop with mint. You can get premium wireless for just $15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpay no judgments, but that's weird. Okay, one judgment. Anyway, give it

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