Puck Soup: Almost there

On this week's episode of the Puck Soup podcast:
- One last tour around the league before the season begins on (checks notes) Friday?
- Mathew Barzal signs, Jason Robertson doesn't, Alex DeBrincat maybe does?
- The ads on the boards are animated now
- The Leafs experiment with Marner on defense
- Which 2022 draft picks might make opening night rosters?
- Over/unders on this year's top goal-scorers
- More nonsense from Hockey Canada, Cam Talbot is hurt, Who He Play For? and more...

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The prediction contest returns, with a new question and an even tougher bonus

Two years ago, I introduce what I thought would be a fun prediction contest with a simple concept: I ask you some easy questions about the upcoming season, you give me the easy answers, and then we sit back and realize that the prediction business isn’t all that easy after all. It ended up being a lot of fun, with roughly 800 entries and a close race down to the wire.

Last year, we doubled up to nearly 1,600 entries, added a new all-or-nothing bonus question, and saw even more chaos thanks to curveballs from Joe Sakic, Joel Quenneville, Barry Trotz and an injured Nathan MacKinnon, among others. Many of you followed the results all season long. Many more were basically eliminated by November.

It goes without saying that we’re doing this again this year, with essentially the same set of rules, plus a new question and a tweak to the bonus. As always, read the rules carefully and please follow the formatting guidelines. Good luck, and remember, this should be easy because the NHL is super predictable.

>> Enter the contest at The Athletic

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Predicting the NHL season, from the bottom-feeders to the true contenders

Warning: This post contains spoilers for the entire 2022-23 season. Don’t read any further if you want to be surprised.

That didn’t sound convincing, but I’m trying to manifest here, so stay with me. This is my annual attempt to sort the NHL into four divisions, based on how I’m expecting them to do this year. We’ll have the contenders, the middle-of-the-pack, and the basement dwellers. And as always, we’ll also have the division made up of teams I can’t figure out. Let’s just sat that’s the toughest one to narrow down.

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

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The Athletic Hockey Show: Sens of Optimism

On this week's episode of The Athletic Hockey Show:
- Have the Senators done enough to make the playoffs?
- Kyle Dubas on the hot seat
- This year's most intriguing names
- Jesse Granger on the Rocket Richard odds
- An argument about what PIM stands for
- And more...

The Athletic Hockey Show runs most days of the week during the season, with Ian and I hosting every Thursday. There are two versions of each episode available:
- An ad-free version for subscribers that you can find here
- An ad-supported version you can get for free wherever you normally find your podcasts (like Apple or Spotify)

Puck Soup: Preseason warmup

On this week's episode of the Puck Soup podcast:
- Who's hurt?
- Who's still left unsigned?
- Who's on the trade block?
- No really, please tell me, I haven't been paying attention
- Also the cap goes up, there's about to be a new mascot, Survivor and more...

>> Listen on The Athletic >> Subscribe on iTunes.

>> Listen on Spotify

>> Get weekly mailbags and special bonus episodes by supporting Puck Soup on Patreon for $5.