Podcast Ombudsman Report for Blueshirt Bandwidth Ep. 83

Welcome back to the Blueshirt Bandwidth Podcast Ombudsman Report. Each week, Charlie Vidal will listen to the latest episode of the podcast and correct the record on anything Joe and Eric get wrong. If you aren't already, you can listen and subscribe to the podcast here.

Episode 83

Although he has never played in an NHL game, Ryder Korczak worse #83 for the New York Rangers during the 2023 and 2024 preseasons:

Why is Toronto Up Here?

During the drawing for the second overall pick, Joe asked why Toronto was up there again. Even though Toronto had already won the first pick, their lottery ball combinations still existed for the drawing. Had Toronto “won” the second drawing, then they would have redrawn the second pick.

The Dallas Pick

Eric and Joe were asking how high the Dallas Stars draft pick that the Rangers will receive can be.

In the NHL draft, the final four picks of the first round are reserved for the teams that lose in the Conference Final (29-30), lose in the Stanley Cup Final (31), and win the Stanley Cup (32). Picks 17-28 are held by the teams that lose in the first two rounds in the inverse order of their record in the standings. To make matter more complicated, the Senators’ pick is now the final pick in the first round, so every other pick for a team that makes the postseason is moved up one slot.

The Stars finished with the third best record this season, behind only the Colorado Avalanche and Carolina Hurricanes. The Hurricanes have already advanced to the Eastern Conference Final and will hold one of the final four picks from the first round. If the Avalanche don’t blow a 3-1 lead and advance to the Western Conference Final, then the Stars will be the team with the best record that didn’t make the Conference Final and that pick will be 27th overall. If the Wild come back and beat the Avalanche to reach the Western Conference Final, then the Avs will get the 27th pick and the Rangers will get the 26th pick from Dallas.

Note: The Colorado Avalanche defeated the Minnesota Wild 4-1 to advance to the Western Conference Final. As a result the Rangers will get the 27th overall pick from Dallas.

Kravtsov Pick

Joe said that the Rangers picked Vitali Kravtsov because of his KHL playoff performance. During the 2018 KHL playoffs, an 18-year-old Kravtsov put up 11 points in 16 games with Chelyabinsk Traktor as they beat Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk and Salavat Yulaev Ufa before falling to Ak Bars Kazan in the Eastern Conference Final. Those 11 points were good for 12th in KHL postseason scoring that year.

Is Hartford a Desirable job?

Joe asked if being the head coach of the Hartford Wolf Pack is even a desirable job. Keegan said that it is just one step away from being an NHL coach. Since the Rangers moved their AHL affiliate to Hartford following the NHL’s decision to move out of a shopping mall in Connecticut, the Wolf Pack have employed seven different head coaches (E.J. McGuire, John Paddock, Ryan McGill, Ken Gernander, Keith McCambridge, Kris Knoblauch, and the recently fired Grant Potulny). Of those, only Paddock (2007 in Ottawa) and Knoblauch (2024 in Edmonton) would go on to be named the head coach of an NHL team.

Successful Coaches

Eric and Joe talked about how successful NHL coaches are mostly journeyman types. We are staring down the barrel of the Eastern Conference Final featuring Rod Brind’Amour and Martin St. Louis as coaches, both of whom amassed over 1,000 points in their NHL career. Rick Tocchet, head coach of the Flyers team that was just bounced in the second round by Brind’Amour’s Hurricanes, put up 952 career points.

Gary Thorne

The discussion of the Mount Rushmore of broadcasters prompted Eric to talk about his love of Gary Thorne and how much better Thorne’s call of Scott Brosius’s home run in Game 5 of the 2001 World Series was than Joe Buck’s.

Here is Joe Buck on the FOX feed:

And here is Gary Thorne on the MLB International broadcast:

And for good measure, John Sterling’s (RIP) radio call: