Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
A relatable and honest podcast about the highs and lows of being a youth hockey parent. Join us as we share real stories, struggles, and wins from the rink, offering insights and support for parents navigating the world of youth hockey.
This is for the sled dogs in the trenches. Real hockey parents, real stories. The Good and the Gong Show. No filters, no sugarcoating, no politics, just straight hockey talk, and the best guests around the barn. Welcome to the Crazy Hockey Dads Podcast.
Intro:Alright, boys. Grind them corners, chirp responsibly, and bring that savage fire.
Jamie:Welcome back to episode 80 of the Crazy Hockey Dads Podcast powered by Pacific Rink, the unfiltered podcast for hockey parents. No politics, no sugarcoating, just real talk for hockey parents in the trenches.
Scott:Yes, sir. Trenches and they are being dug as we spoke.
Jamie:They are being dug and we are at Episode eighty?
Scott:Eight zero, my man. What? I know. I know it's been it's it's yeah.
Jamie:I mean, wow. Eighty. Well done, sir. Likewise. Stuck with it.
Jamie:Eighty. Yep. I feel like we're supposed to have Bob Mancini on. Why? Because we had him on at twenty and forty.
Jamie:So I feel like I feel like we were supposed to have Bob Mancini on
Scott:Like every time we double? Exactly. So then 01:60 etcetera?
Jamie:Correct.
Scott:Well, he's not gonna be on this one.
Jamie:He's not.
Scott:Instead Instead.
Jamie:Instead we have
Scott:Instead. Instead. We have Stanley Cup champ.
Jamie:It was Bob Mancini as Stanley Cup champ? No. Oh, you're saying like
Scott:No. Right. Segue away from Bob Mancini.
Jamie:Yes. By you. Well done. No. No.
Jamie:You're right about that. He is a he is a Stanley Cup champion. His name is Brent Sopel. You guys might know him. You Blackhawk fans should know him.
Jamie:You wanna cup with the Blackhawks. Brent has been nice enough to join us today. I'm a kinda get into him a little later, but but he is a Stanley Cup champion and a very big advocate for kids with ADHD and dyslexia.
Scott:Yes. Having having both of those himself among other things Right. It was really his his path and his journey was was probably different than than a lot of people's. There's surely there's probably other people out there that have gone through or have similar things. But yeah, like you said, we'll we'll talk about it more, but really interesting conversation.
Jamie:Very. Yeah. Yeah. He was great. We we appreciate him coming on.
Jamie:Everything he does for kids is really impressive. So we wanna wanna help shed some light on on everything that his foundation do. Yeah. Which is awesome. Yeah.
Jamie:Yeah. So with with that, you wanna do a little Howie's Hockey and then we'll kind of Yeah.
Scott:Let's go. Let's rip it.
Jamie:Alright. Good. So so go check out Howie's Hockey. Go use our discount code crazy 10 for 10% off. The season is getting near like maybe a little more near than some of us would like.
Jamie:I ran into a hockey dad the other day.
Scott:Oh, it's near.
Jamie:I ran into a hockey dad the other day. He's like, Jamie, he's like, I kinda liked being off for the last couple months and not having the chaos. I was like, I get it, man. And the chaos is back.
Scott:Yeah. Every weekend.
Jamie:It's back, basically.
Scott:Yeah. And so Noah
Jamie:It is back.
Scott:Is totally back, and we got a bit of news. So Noah does cheerleading, but last season, they didn't have like, so she's going into third grade. Right. So last year as a second grader, she did cheer, but they didn't have they didn't have enough kids to field like the youngest team. So there was only one football team that wasn't a high school level team.
Scott:Right. And so they they the girls, both the senior cheerleaders and the younger cheerleaders Right. They split the season in terms of cheering games because there's only one team. Right? So it was like every other game, my daughter so she had like every other like weekend off from cheer.
Jamie:And they cheer for high school?
Scott:No. No. If I wasn't clear, I'm sorry. Full cheer schedule. Every weekend we have a football game and at least a hockey game or two.
Jamie:There's if you have one game in a weekend, like, you're getting off easy. Yes. Most of the time it's not gonna look like that.
Scott:No. So in any event,
Jamie:there's As a your parents know.
Scott:Yeah. But at least the football travels closer.
Jamie:Right. Right. Listen. I I hope that I hope that for your sake, you're not running all over the place. But I think you're gonna be.
Scott:Oh, yeah. For sure.
Jamie:I only have one hockey player in the family. And my other one's like a brainiac, so like, we don't he's easy.
Scott:Fair.
Jamie:You know? So I don't have the craziness.
Brent:You don't have the
Scott:same kind of commitments. Correct.
Brent:Right.
Jamie:Like, we just have a hockey player.
Brent:Right.
Scott:Which is still a lot. Still nothing. Not nothing.
Jamie:It's not not Correct.
Scott:Not nothing. Right.
Jamie:Yeah. Alright. Listen. Well, the craziness is here.
Scott:It is.
Jamie:And for those of you that need
Scott:Tape.
Jamie:Tape, laces
Scott:There we go.
Brent:Candles. Bringing it
Scott:back, Wow. You did it.
Jamie:Scissors. You know, anything. Go check out Howie's Hockey. They have awesome gear. The blackout sweatshirt is awesome.
Jamie:They were nice enough to send Scott and I. A blackout sweatshirt is awesome by the way. I mean, it's it's sick looking.
Scott:Wait. If if you if and for those of you that can't like, you know,
Jamie:see Visualize?
Scott:It's just imagine this. It just imagine the color black and that's what
Jamie:it looks like. You'll look like a ninja. You'll
Scott:be like a locker room tape ninja with yellow handed scissors.
Jamie:Yellow handled exactly right. Yeah. Exactly. Well well done. Yeah.
Jamie:But yeah. So yeah. So go check out Howie's Hockey. Use our code, our discount code crazy 10 for 10% off. Like I said, the season is here.
Jamie:Go go get all your stuff, and you might as well stock up now because, you know, once the season gets going, you're probably not gonna have time to. So you might as well go stock up now. So go check out Howie's Hockey, our discount code crazy 10 for 10% off your Howie's Hockey gear.
Scott:That's it. And we're on that final stretch of, off season training. And so any of you that are looking to get some additional reps before you hop back on the ice, and truthfully, you can keep on doing those reps once the season starts. But if you're looking for, you know, quicker hands, faster feet, stronger stride, you gotta check out hockeytraining.com with coach Kevin. Check out his Instagram, hockey training h q, And he's got a load of off ice training programs that's gonna work on your speed, strength, and agility, and you know, transfer directly to on ice performance.
Scott:And for this summer, he's offering a free thirty minute live stick handling session. It's like a Zoom, but it's on the Hockey Training HQ app. And if you don't have it, download it, check out the schedule, find it, and then you can sign up and just, you know, try it out. Yeah. See see see if you like it.
Scott:I I I watched a replay because he also post the replay from the from the stick handling classes. In case you missed it, you can go back. Yeah. There's a bunch of kids on there. He's shouting them all out.
Scott:Yeah. Guys, girls, all of it. So a 100% check out hockeytraining.com before this season gets going.
Jamie:Yeah. And it's here, dude. It is here already. So you're behind the eight ball if you haven't done it yet with him. So we might as well get get cranked up with him now.
Jamie:And then Scott and I trust our kids in Titan battle gear. We think it's the best base layer on the market. It looks great. It has most protection for your kids. God forbid they get cut by a skate, or they come in contact with a skate.
Jamie:Right? Hopefully, Titan value will stop it. With the a nine protection, it will stop it. I'm telling you, they have awesome gear. Like I said, the the it looks awesome too.
Jamie:They have the Miami Vice three point o. They just released the white out camo. Mhmm.
Scott:You know,
Jamie:they have the they have the like I said, Miami Vice three point o. They have white out camo. They have paint splatter. They have the Frozen Rocket. I know get your minds out of the gutter.
Jamie:We're talking about something that looks like a bomb pop here.
Scott:I don't know why you keep going there with that.
Jamie:The rock the rocket rocket part?
Scott:I don't know. I I mean, you say rockets nowadays, people think SpaceX. Some. Some. Some do.
Scott:Some that aren't. Some. Like you.
Jamie:Anyways, so go check out their stuff. They they have awesome stuff. Like I said, the best protection on the market. The the gear looks awesome. The limited edition USA stuff is sick.
Jamie:Dominic got it. It's fantastic looking. And like I said, it's the most protection for your kids. God forbid something happens, you you don't wanna you wanna be able to stop it before it happens. So go check out Titan Battle Gear.
Jamie:Go check out titanbattlegear.com backslash Crazy Hockey Dads in our show notes. Use the discount code Crazy Dads 10 for 10% off your Titan Battle Gear.
Scott:Do that. And we also have athletic performance insight. Now it is it it we're getting close as we keep on saying. But any, coaches or managers that are still taking a look for, video analytics for your team on this upcoming season, you have to check out athletic performance insight. Fill out the contact form on the website.
Scott:Eric you'll get in touch with Eric. He'll give you a demo of the platform, no cost. He will break down a game for you, no cost. You can see all the analytics on the other side. It's great for team video review, helping those kiddos with the x's and o's and learning from team play to individual play.
Scott:It's got all the stats that you could possibly need. Teams as young as mites up through college ranks use it. So if you are not familiar, check out athletic performance insight and reach out to Eric. Oh, and don't forget, new users, 10% off.
Jamie:$100 value.
Scott:Mention Crazy Hockey Dads.
Jamie:In the form.
Scott:That's
Jamie:it. $100 value.
Scott:$100 value.
Jamie:And with the prices of gear these days, that money goes a long way.
Scott:It does.
Jamie:Maybe it doesn't go a long way.
Scott:Well, it goes it it gets you closer.
Jamie:It's a $100.
Scott:It gets you closer.
Jamie:It does get you closer.
Scott:So speaking of gear, and I'm not gonna name any we're not gonna I'm not gonna name any brands. Right. But, you know, it's like all these these expensive sticks and breaking. I am it's just it's so ridiculous. I've seen more sticks break recently between my men's league game.
Scott:You know what I actually had? Dude, I I was so I was playing pickup. Otto was there too. And this was this past Sunday Mhmm. And I wasn't playing well.
Scott:I wasn't you know, I was annoyed with myself and, you know, we talk about it. And this is true. I I was actually Right. Thinking of this on the ice. And it's like, okay, we say if, you know, we tell our kids, if you're not playing if you're if you're, I don't know, you're you're making bad passes, you're not putting up points, you'll find another way to be productive.
Scott:Yeah. Be better in the defensive
Jamie:end. Sure. Yeah.
Scott:So I I decided I was gonna up my defensive efforts because I I was had made some stupid passes, turnovers, like, I think this I'm so there's a puck battle in the corner. Mhmm. And I gave it a little more A
Jamie:little more juice?
Scott:Juice than I normally do. Okay. And I actually there was there was a guy in the ass who said, yo, watch out. I spent like $300 on this stick. And I was like, what?
Scott:I'm sorry? You're like, what? I'm like, what? Who says that? I don't someone that I played with, but the point is is like, what?
Scott:Douchebag. No. I'm not saying that he's that. I'm saying that. Okay.
Scott:Fine. You can say that. But I'm not saying that at all, but I was just like, you if you're if you're worried about your stick getting
Jamie:broken are a 300
Scott:stick? Just go
Jamie:buy go buy a $150 stick and you won't worry you won't have to worry about if it breaks. But first of all, so so because you're using a $300 stick, I shouldn't go hard?
Scott:Right. Well, and and the truth the truth is it wasn't even going that hard. But like, I was, like, know, being aggressive with my stick, you know, you know, trying to stick flitch, stick lift, you know, kinda poke the puck away. You know, I probably came down on his stick to stop him from, you know, moving in a certain direction in any event. Yeah.
Scott:I thought that was annoying, and a weird thing to say. But it just goes to show that people these sticks break, and like, Otto has another stick that broke, I told him, like, dude, okay. I don't care if you're buying it with your own money, because we often make him use his own money to buy stuff. But I was like, dude, I'm not letting you buy an expensive stick. It is a total waste of money.
Scott:There is not you are not capable of taking advantage of the subtle differences between a $300 stick and a $200 stick.
Jamie:Probably not. Probably not. Probably not. Probably not. Did I tell you what I did this afternoon?
Scott:You bought another stick.
Brent:I I don't know
Scott:why you're doing it. No. Seriously.
Jamie:I don't have an answer for you. I don't have a logical answer for you.
Scott:This is what I just why I
Jamie:have an
Scott:answer not logical. Just buy just buy either off brand or like not the the main brands.
Jamie:I again, I don't have a rational answer for you. I don't. I wish I did.
Scott:Know. Listen, I bought so I my
Jamie:stick I'm not alone out there by saying that. Because I shouldn't be buying a $275 stick.
Scott:No. It's I don't I I mean, it's it all comes down to kids just wanting things that make them feel that stroke their ego. You know what I mean?
Jamie:Listen. I I can't disagree with what you're saying. You know?
Scott:Look. Yeah. But so this is what this is what I'll say in fairness to your you know, like, obviously, Dom's been working with a shooting, you know, a shooting coach and taking shooting instruction.
Jamie:I mean, listen.
Scott:No. No. No. No. But like in all fairness, like, if he was using a stick with the flex that was like, let's say he wanted, you know, you need to go up and flex or maybe different kick point.
Scott:Okay. Like, but that's not like buying this, you know, the same specs on like a stick that's, you know, twice as much.
Jamie:He he definitely does trigger the flex when he uses it. Right? He's of that age where he does. Yeah. You know?
Jamie:But do I need a $275 stick for him? Probably not. No. You know? I have to tell you, it's more about and this is probably not and this is not an excuse.
Jamie:But Dominic's not happy with his shooting.
Scott:Okay.
Jamie:Okay? Now that's not to say that he wouldn't be happy or unhappy with a $175 stick. Right? Yep. Like I I I have no idea.
Jamie:You know, but he's so so and this sounds really stupid. I don't know why I'm saying this. But like, you know, again, this is gonna sound like I'm a total fucking idiot. But if I can get him a stick that he's happy with Yep. Right, maybe it takes some of the pressure off of him like, you know, because he goes after himself when he's not performing, you know?
Jamie:So if I can get him what he wants, and it's not an excuse. I should be buying him a $175 stick, but there's no $175 stick that he's like, dad, I really like this. I wish there was, you know?
Scott:That was like so so this
Jamie:And again, I'm not making an excuse. I I should not be buying a $275 stick for him. But I did.
Scott:I just think it's a waste
Jamie:of money. Of course it's It's waste of fucking awful.
Scott:So this was this was great. So this weekend so Otto got a scooter this summer.
Jamie:Right.
Scott:Bought his bought it with his own money. He came back from Woodward Camp, and he was now into scootering. Right. So he we're adding that to the list of things he likes to do. So now he needs to take the scooter to a skate park.
Scott:And my my sister-in-law lives in the city. We went to the skate by the city this past weekend. We actually went again today. But so Otto's in the skate park, and there was no scooter dudes there. And then so he's doing his thing and trying to get stuff, and he's, you know, whatever.
Scott:He's working on it. And I give him a lot of credit. He was persistent, and he was trying, and like Cool. He yeah. My hat's off to him.
Scott:Cool. But some scooter dudes came and this one dude was there and his like wheels were really janky. Like, you know, like they were kinda it sounded like the bearings were messed up. Like the the wheels seemed to be like of a hard plastic, not of like
Jamie:Okay.
Scott:Like that roller blade rubber type of thing.
Jamie:Got it. Got it. Okay.
Scott:And I turned to where I said, look. Look, this guy, he's nailing these tricks out there and his scooter may I mean, maybe it just looks not good and it's really expensive. I didn't think so. It seems like a total, like, you know, he he worked on it. He put pieces together, you know, and and he was crushing it.
Scott:Sure you
Jamie:don't you don't need
Scott:you don't need expensive shit to It's
Jamie:the person,
Scott:not the gear. Of course it
Brent:is.
Jamie:You know, it's definitely the person, not gear.
Scott:A 100%.
Jamie:It's like a golfer. Same idea. Right? I mean, like, you know, guys go buy these fancy golf golf clubs and they still can't hit the ball. You know?
Jamie:I mean, it's the same no. I'll tell you if it's off.
Scott:Yeah. Well, I can't see
Jamie:if yours is off. Trust me. I'll tell you.
Scott:Yeah. In any event. Yeah.
Jamie:So We have new mics and like they have like a mute button right in here. Right in here.
Scott:In a place where it's very easy to touch enough.
Jamie:We turn we turn our mics around so they're inside the bracket. So hopefully we don't touch them because there have been multiple times where we've muted ourselves.
Scott:Yes. That just definitely happened.
Jamie:So we're we're figuring out our new gear. But but yes. So I bought the I'll make a new stick. And again, I'm not making an excuse for myself. Like it's it's I I don't know the answer.
Jamie:He's not happy with himself.
Scott:Mhmm.
Jamie:You know? So I'm trying to make the world around him as easy as possible and that's not and that might not be a good thing by the way because I'm and I'm all about making life difficult for him Yeah. Because I like him to work through really hard things. Yep. Right?
Jamie:But he's going through a he's going through a phase right now where he's not happy with the shooting.
Scott:Okay.
Jamie:And he's getting really down on himself and really frustrated, you know. So I'm trying to and again, I'm not saying it's right, but I'm trying to take some pressure off him in spots.
Scott:Well, I I would say this. I I remember when we were kids, right, we played tennis and sometimes we'd play like indoor tennis, like you know, indoor courts.
Jamie:Yeah.
Scott:And like or even the outdoor courts, you could demo a racket.
Jamie:Sure.
Scott:Right?
Brent:Yeah.
Scott:It'd be cool if the kids could like demo sticks. Right? Because it and right?
Jamie:There's gotta be a program somewhere for
Brent:that.
Scott:So you can like figure out like what even the height, you know, the flex, the the curve.
Jamie:There's gotta be appropriate somewhere for that. There has
Scott:to be. In my opinion, I don't think it's a crazy thing to like have your kid, you know, try out a few different sticks. I wish you didn't have to buy such expensive sticks to have them try them all. But I think that that's a reasonable thing is like kids are as they're getting coming into their own and like, you know, I I I think that's a worthwhile thing to try to do, but to buy all the different, you know, I wouldn't do that. But I wish there was something.
Scott:Or maybe there is and we just don't know about it.
Brent:Or you
Jamie:can say if they do, it's not around here.
Scott:Yeah. I don't know. It'd be pretty cool though.
Jamie:Yeah. It would be. It's funny we're talking about gear because the season is is now like two weeks away. Well, Otto's got mini camp next week.
Scott:Next week. Yeah. I I think last episode I said it was this week. I misspoke.
Jamie:Alright. Dom's got a game with his team this weekend. Where? In up in Brewster.
Scott:Again?
Jamie:Yeah. They set they set up like a thing. Like, it's like their third or fourth one with this team. They have ice and and whoever can come comes, type stuff. But apparently, most of our most of our kids are gonna be there.
Scott:You need a you think you need a second year pee wee on that
Jamie:for that game?
Scott:Maybe Tyler wants to take a look at that.
Jamie:I I don't I mean I mean, I would say yes. The only issue is is that there's hitting.
Scott:I don't know. He just took a he just did a checking
Jamie:He's checking class. So he's good to go. He took one checking clinic. That's amazing.
Scott:I'm just saying.
Jamie:He's ahead of the game, you know. But but yeah. So so our our team's playing a game and not doesn't count but we're playing a game. Like I said, the season's here. Yeah.
Jamie:And I'm sure everybody out there is scrambling for gear. Yeah.
Scott:Right? Oh, Pacific Rank.
Jamie:Well, yeah. If you need a hockey bag, by the way. I mean, go get a Pacific Rank bag.
Scott:One hundo. Like,
Jamie:there's not there's not even a close second to that, by the way. No. If you need a stick bag for getting on a plane, if you need a tape bag, if you need a pond pack, if you need a hockey bag
Scott:What's a pond pack?
Jamie:What's a pond pack?
Scott:Oh, what's a pond pack?
Jamie:A pond pack is a backpack. Yes. It was produced by Pacific Rink. It's a backpack. Now everybody's copying them.
Jamie:It's a backpack and you can fit it's for it's it was made for pond hockey or shinny from our our our neighbors to the north. Yes. Right? And you can fit a helmet Yep. Gloves Yep.
Jamie:Tape, like, whatever you need, like a scissors yellow handled scissors. If you want, you could throw some hockey wax in there and one of Scott's favorite candles from Hockey. Yep. And you're With the ambiance.
Scott:Exactly right. Pond ambiance.
Jamie:You need the pond ambiance, right? Because it makes sense to burn a candle outdoors. Yeah. Right? You know, so I mean, lakeside that would be lovely, right?
Jamie:You know, so so yeah. So and then your skates, there's there's spots for your skates on the outside, little little kinda like slots for your skates to go. Made by Pacific Rink and it is for pond hockey. And to be honest with you, I don't play pond hockey but I use it to travel.
Scott:There you go.
Jamie:I stick my sneakers in where the skates go and I could fit a shitload of stuff in this thing.
Scott:Excellent. I
Jamie:could fit my laptop in there. There's a spot for my laptop. I mean, it's great. Yeah. And you'll fit a ton of shit in there.
Jamie:They have puck bags, I mean it's it's and their hockey bags are second to none.
Scott:Yeah yeah yeah.
Jamie:You know, like YKK zippers, I mean it's a legit hockey bag, you know? Absolutely. So we love Pacific Rink. Go check out Pacific Rink. They're our main sponsor.
Jamie:They have been for a while now. If you guys need a hockey bag and I'll give you guys a little heads up that we did last couple episodes, we are going to have Brad Serkin, the CEO or one of the two founders of Pacific Rink on for an episode.
Scott:Yes,
Jamie:sir. And after that episode drops, and this will not be anywhere in writing, you'll have to listen to our episode when it comes out because we're gonna have a discount code for our listeners. It's only gonna be up for a certain amount of time. Only gonna be up for like a day or two, maybe three, maybe. You know?
Jamie:So keep paying attention to our podcast. Tell your friends if you because Pacific Rink does not have sales. Their bags do not go on sale. They don't have like Labor Day sales. They don't do that stuff.
Jamie:So we're gonna have a discount code for our listeners. So keep paying attention to the podcast. We'll probably drop it on social media somewhere, I would think. Right?
Scott:Absolutely.
Jamie:Right? Wait. Which way,
Scott:hold on.
Jamie:Drop which part? The the we'll drop the fact that an episode is coming up.
Scott:With the discount code. Oh, yeah.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if we can put the discount code on.
Scott:No. We wouldn't put it on.
Jamie:I don't think so.
Scott:No. But I'm just saying. That's why I was asking what it is that you said we're gonna put up.
Jamie:Logistically, we I'm sure we'll go through that with with Brad as we get closer. But make sure you keep listening to the podcast and don't catch it four or five days late because if you do, you're gonna miss it.
Scott:There it is.
Jamie:Right? So yeah. So we how do we oh, we're talking about gear. Yes. We made bag a 100% with Episode.
Scott:Nothing because I will tell you, the the one that we got in our gear package pales pales in comparison.
Jamie:Yes. Yes. You got you got another kind of name brand bag with the the gear package for our fall team. And it's just yeah. It's just a yeah.
Jamie:It's not the same. Nope. Definitely not the same.
Scott:No. I wonder if so we also noticed that there were some new unis that we got.
Brent:Know what
Scott:would be cool? Would love to see any, you know, any of our listeners out there that are psyched about their year package and like the the new unis they got looking sharp for this season. Yeah. And like send us some pics.
Jamie:Drop us a picture and tag us.
Scott:A 100%.
Jamie:You know what I mean? Definitely. Well, I love looking
Scott:at We gotta see everyone get I remember I remember the first time I saw a gear package thing was when when Dom had gotten his CJR pre brick. Brick and I think remember it was like in front of the fireplace and he had it like opened and laid out. He was so psyched.
Jamie:That was a cool bag.
Scott:That was really cool.
Jamie:Yeah. They put his name on and everything. Yeah. That was cool. Did a nice job.
Jamie:Can I tell you, those gloves for Dominic, like he was like eight at the time? Yeah. Okay. And they He
Scott:still wears them?
Jamie:And they they couldn't they could not put the CJR logo on gloves under a size ten.
Scott:Okay.
Jamie:Can just tell you like it took him years to fit into those. Oh, really? Years.
Scott:Did he ever use them?
Jamie:Actually, no. No. He didn't he didn't. He went right past them.
Scott:Wow. That's wild.
Jamie:Yeah. Because at the time when when he finally fit into tens Yeah. I think we're playing for the Rockets.
Scott:Right. It was like PV Quebec?
Jamie:Yeah. So like it was but that's like the it's funny. Dominic makes a joke. Yeah. So when Dominic was at Penn State's camp this past summer, like a month ago, and then Princeton, Dominic makes a joke that he has yet to go to like a hockey camp and actually get a jersey that fits him.
Scott:Oh, really? But they're always
Jamie:They're always he always has to talk to me because they're always enormous.
Scott:They're always enormous.
Jamie:They're always like adult mediums or adult larges. Dominic's like dude, he's like, I'm like, is it gonna I may be an adult small at the moment. Right. But maybe.
Scott:Yeah. Well, listen, it's not the worst thing in the world. I get it. If it's always happening, it's gotta be annoying.
Jamie:Dude, it's always happening.
Scott:Yeah. Alright. Well
Jamie:I mean, like, you you name it. Like, it happens to all all of his gear. Yeah. And he he keeps alive. He's like, dad, he's like, one of these days, something's gonna fit me.
Scott:Well well, no. Yeah. But I mean, those are just the practice jerseys. I mean
Jamie:Well, yes. Those are practice jerseys. Yes. Whatever. Yeah.
Jamie:The the game gear is good. For the most part, our his game gear is solid because you order it and you order sizes. Yep. But like any like hockey camp, it he's never fits him.
Scott:So speaking of hockey, any any hockeying on your end this past
Jamie:So he's been he's been doing some he's been doing some, like, skating and stick handling, right, and some shoot. He's been shooting with Ryan Murphy, our buddy down in in Red Bank. Skating. He's been skating. He skated with RJ from top line on Friday.
Jamie:Yep. Right? So he's been with Ryan Murphy. He's been with RJ. So he's been doing a little bit since we're back from vacation.
Jamie:Good. You know, again, just kinda trying to ramp up again just because the season is here. So yeah. So he's got like I said, this week he's got a game with his team on Sunday. Yep.
Jamie:I think only two or three kids are missing. So it's the full team, so that'd be cool. And then on Saturday, I was just asked to play in a three on three.
Scott:Oh, yeah?
Jamie:Yeah. So we're gonna do a three on three because it's fun.
Scott:Yeah. Totally.
Jamie:I'm aware. At home rink. Yeah. No. Not good.
Scott:Oh, right on.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah. So that'd be fun. Just like, you know, you you need to keep this fun for the
Scott:kids Absolutely.
Jamie:At any age. Yeah. Right? So it shouldn't be a job yet. So you know, he he he works hard, you know, with stealing and shooting and stuff like that and skating.
Jamie:So I figured it was a smart thing just to get him go let him hang out and
Scott:Have some fun.
Jamie:Have some fun.
Brent:Yeah. That's great. Nice dude.
Jamie:Yeah.
Scott:Nice.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah.
Scott:Otto was he what he did, Boston body checking work, clinic, camp recently. So that was good. Know, and again, he's not body checking this year, but it was open to second year Pee Wee's. And so just to whenever get be do a clinic that he hasn't done before and
Jamie:get right?
Scott:Like four days. Right. Yeah. You know, but it was it wasn't it was, you know, just getting some reps in.
Jamie:Was like
Scott:I thought it look, my my the idea was just to go and do something different.
Jamie:Right.
Scott:Right? Like he's never done a body checking, only, you know, camp or clinic or whatever.
Brent:Right. Right.
Scott:So in in just an effort to generally be more physical, get some more reps, I'm like, yeah, just go have And at
Jamie:it worked?
Brent:I don't
Scott:know how it works. I mean, I think he he enjoyed it. You know. It was it was doing different things. But yeah, all good.
Scott:We'll we'll see. Yeah. We'll see. You know, it's you know, a lot of the drills were just like battle drills and they were closing, you know, taking away time and space and, you know, learning about timing and stuff like that. So, you know, I think it was even if you're not body checking next year, it's certainly helpful.
Scott:Right. Like, understand angles a little bit more and how you're kinda coming in to, like, you know, cut their hands, all that other stuff.
Jamie:So it was good.
Brent:Good stuff,
Jamie:sounds like.
Scott:Yeah. I think so.
Jamie:I I can't believe the season is here already. Like I can't I can't like I said, was talking to my dad yesterday, and he's like, it was two was yesterday or two was last week. It was last Friday. And he's like, yeah. He's like, he's like, I can't believe it's here already.
Jamie:He's like, I was kind of enjoying this. Well The chaos is here again.
Scott:I know. You gotta like ramp up for it because it's like from zero to a 100.
Jamie:I feel like it goes so quickly. I feel like the off season goes so quickly.
Scott:But doesn't
Jamie:like it
Brent:Like it
Jamie:it mean, we're all finished just
Scott:Time like goes by fast. But the time generally just goes by fast as as you age and get older. Like, things that used to seem like take forever are just like the blink of an eye. It's crazy. It is.
Scott:It's absolutely crazy.
Jamie:And I and you for those of you who have children, which is I'm assuming probably most of you, you know, when you have kids, I mean, how how how funny is it? I don't know if you if you feel this way too, but I remember when, like, when we when I first got married, you know, like like people that were older than me would say, like, oh, you you just got married. Know, when you have kids, yada yada. And they're like, oh, when you have kids, time flies by. And I was like, whatever.
Jamie:Yeah. Like, how fast could it go? You know what mean? Like, that's I'm assuming it's just gonna go by like it has the last twenty four years or however old that was when I got there. Not even
Scott:a little bit.
Jamie:And can I tell you, I mean, as soon as you have children, time fucking takes off? Yeah. It takes off. Like the day the days, the weeks, the months, they just go flying by.
Scott:Yeah. That's the the
Jamie:It's nuts.
Scott:The that expression, the days are long but the years are short.
Jamie:It's unbelievable.
Scott:You know? It's like by the end of each day, you're just like, how did I get through this day? And then
Jamie:It's crazy. Yeah. I mean, weeks go by at like the blink of an eye.
Scott:Without a doubt.
Jamie:I remember saying to Nancy when our first one was born, he was now 17, which is ridiculous. But I remember saying to her when he was just born, he was like, I call it like six months old, four months old, something like that. I remember he was kind of like in bed with us at night. And I remember saying to her like, oh wow, I wonder what he's gonna look like when he's like five years old. You know?
Jamie:And can I just tell you, five years old went by and now he's 17? So I mean, where five through 17 went is beyond me. I I still can't even get over the fact that he's, you know, that he's 17. So, you know, for for you parents out there who have kids, man, I mean, you know what I'm saying. It just absolutely takes off on you.
Jamie:It's it's you know. It's it's just ridiculous, You know? Yes. So I mean but anyway, but but yeah. So the season is here, man.
Jamie:Yeah. And the insane weekends, the insane weeks.
Scott:So let me ask you this. Do you have as far as like once the season gets going, we're back in school
Jamie:Right.
Scott:Like, do you have do you have additional training or, like, skill sessions or anything kinda, like, locked in? Like, what's your approach for the season? Are you gonna do a lot of, like
Jamie:Extra stuff?
Scott:Yeah. Continue with skating instruction. Are you gonna be going you know, like are you gonna be doing things in addition to team, you know, practices and then in the games?
Jamie:It's actually a good question. So Dominic obviously, you know, like works out during the week.
Scott:Right? So because he's in that environment. Right. And for anyone that doesn't know, Dominic's going back to Parisi Academy. Yeah.
Scott:And part of that, he's reclassing. He's repeating eighth. Correct. And part of that program is working on speed, strength, and agility. Bigger, stronger, faster type stuff.
Scott:Yeah. And that that's like part part of the academy is athletic training.
Jamie:I I mean, it's the main focus of the of the of the it's the main focus of their
Scott:Outside of academics.
Jamie:Although their academics are phenomenal.
Scott:Right. But outside of the academics, that's that's what the kids are spending a lot of time doing. Correct.
Jamie:Yes. Is a it is a speed it is a school for athletes Yes. You know, to get bigger, stronger, faster. We're using it because we did not hold Dominic back in kindergarten like we should have. So we're using Parisi as a vehicle to then now give him some more time to mature, you know, give the academics more time.
Jamie:Not that he's a bad student, but he can always use a little more time to mature and for the brain to develop. Right? You know? And and listen, the secondary part of it is the fact that he's gonna get bigger, stronger, faster.
Brent:Right.
Jamie:Right? So I I like that. You know, but the schools I love it.
Scott:Yeah. I know.
Jamie:You know, I I think it's great.
Scott:Well, speaking of which, we're gonna have we're gonna have Bill on.
Jamie:We are gonna have Bill Crazy on. For those of you who don't know Bill Crazy is, you should go check him out on Instagram. Bill Crazy built the Crazy Speed School. Matter of fact, when Scott and I were kids, he had Yes. The original one was like around the corner.
Scott:In Wyckoff?
Jamie:It was in Wyckoff.
Scott:It was in Wyckoff and I remember it was football players were going there. I think it was mostly football players.
Brent:I think
Jamie:it was mostly at the time. Now now he and it's still big in football. There are still people that fly across the country to go train at Parisi Fairlawn, which is where Dominic's school is.
Scott:Oh, yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.
Jamie:Yes. It is a I mean, if you if you know Bill Parisi, he travels the globe. You know, he works with college programs. He just worked with a bunch of NHL strength conditioning coaches.
Scott:Nice.
Jamie:You know, so Dominic had his so Dominic is the only returning kid to to Parisi.
Scott:Oh, the other three kids aren't coming back?
Jamie:Dominic Dominic was one of three true eighth graders last year. Yeah. So there's 36 kids total every year. Dominic was one of three true eighth graders last year. The other two eighth graders went to high school along with the other 33.
Jamie:So Dom is the only remaining kid to to to do school again.
Scott:So those kids didn't reclass?
Jamie:They did not. There's two kids that did not reclass. They just used it as an eighth grade.
Scott:Interesting.
Jamie:Yeah. To get bigger, stronger, faster.
Scott:Yeah. Okay.
Jamie:Okay. But I must say, the academics the academics are like are no joke.
Scott:Yeah. I mean, they are You've you've always said that.
Jamie:So Dominic was petrified last year when he started school because the first day of school Mhmm. They made him public speak.
Scott:Oh, there you go. Thrown right into the fire.
Jamie:Literally. Yeah. And who public I mean public speaking is a skill. Right?
Brent:Of course.
Jamie:It's a life skill. Yeah. You know, so Dominic had to public speak the first day of school. He came home freaking out because because because he because because there was another one at the end of the week.
Scott:Oh, right.
Jamie:So he now Dominic now is a phenomenal public speaker.
Scott:That's great. Phenomenal. Phenomenal. How many times does he public speak?
Jamie:Well, with because of the school.
Scott:Yeah. But did you see him public speaking?
Jamie:Oh, Oh. Oh, he's great now.
Scott:Oh, but like what what what's the forum in which he's public speaking?
Jamie:So they they will pick anything and everything to public speak
Brent:on. Okay.
Jamie:That doesn't matter.
Scott:Okay. What else? Record it or they invite the parents in? Like, have you
Jamie:I've seen videos of him. Yeah.
Brent:Yeah. Yeah.
Scott:Okay. That's great.
Jamie:Oh, it's it's fantastic. Something he was petrified of
Scott:Yeah.
Jamie:Is now one of his biggest strengths.
Scott:That's amazing.
Jamie:Isn't that great?
Scott:Yeah. That's awesome.
Jamie:You know, so they put them in uncomfortable situations
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Where the kids are forced to get comfortable.
Scott:Right. That's great.
Jamie:You know, so so they do stuff like that. You know? And even like the science curriculum, you know, the teacher structures it around because they're athletes, right, and lifting weights and they're trying to get bigger, stronger, faster, you know, they talk about the muscles. The muscle fibers, right? You know, they make their science curriculum around the human body.
Scott:Right, and exercise, Correct. Physiology all that stuff.
Jamie:And biomechanics, stuff like that, right? You know, so it's pretty cool.
Scott:That is awesome. So he's learning that's interesting that he's learning things that are highly applicable to what he's doing day in and day out.
Jamie:So it makes science fun.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Right? That's great. Which is cool. You know, the the books they read for the language arts are like, know, one one last year was called shit, what was it called? But it had to do with that.
Jamie:It was it was an athlete book. Mhmm. About a kid, right? Then there's another one this year. There's three new books this year for language arts.
Jamie:So yeah, I love it and I asked Bill Priest when we saw him at orientation. I said Bill, would you like to come on for an interview? I think he'd be fantastic. Like I said, he travels the globe speaking about performance. Know, so Matter of fact, our buddy Jeff Lavecchio follows him.
Scott:Oh, that's not surprising. I mean, they're
Brent:they're in
Scott:the same industry. There's a Priestys everywhere. I didn't even realize until I went to their website. I said, oh my god. There's tons of
Jamie:these Global, not just in The US.
Scott:No. I know.
Jamie:You know, so for those of you who are listening, you may know Pre C Speed School not far from you.
Scott:Yeah. Take a look online if you're interested.
Jamie:So Dominic actually goes to the academy. There's actually a school Right. That Dominic goes to that he does where he does academics and speed in strength training.
Scott:That's awesome, man. It's cool. Good stuff.
Brent:Well, good
Scott:luck to him this
Jamie:upcoming year
Scott:over there.
Jamie:Appreciate it. So you asked if we're gonna do other stuff. I'm not sure yet.
Brent:Yep.
Jamie:You know, I I might I may make might do like a skill like a skating class that I did all last
Scott:year Mhmm.
Jamie:You know, with our buddy RJ from top line. Mhmm. You know, Dom met with him once a week.
Scott:RJ top line.
Jamie:RJ top line. That's right. Yep. You know, RJ Burns top line. So shout out to RJ.
Jamie:So yeah. So I think we're gonna do that, you know. And other than that, I'm probably gonna keep it, you know, because he's got late practices this year.
Scott:Yeah. I know. Super late. Well, that was like a
Jamie:As you go to practice, you get later and later, man.
Scott:So so Otto was hanging out with one of his buddies from his team last year, and the his his buddy is still, you know, he's with the double a team.
Jamie:Right.
Scott:And they were just talking about their schedules or whatever, and, yeah, they have a lit they've got late practices.
Jamie:I think they prioritize Nice. It's triple a
Scott:to tier one. Yeah. For sure because that kid, he's probably not getting home until close to like 10:00.
Jamie:I'm sure. If not Our practices are pretty late. Yeah. You know?
Scott:Yeah. But this group of kids is two years younger than Dom.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. It's second
Scott:year pewies, not second year bantoms.
Jamie:No. It's not. You're right about that. Our practices are are late too. Yeah.
Jamie:Bunch of parents were not happy about that.
Scott:Yeah. I guess we we'll we'll take that win.
Jamie:Listen. You pay more tuition, you get a little friendlier ice time.
Scott:And you get a bag and gloves. And you get
Jamie:a bag and gloves that the tier two did not get. That's right. You get a bag and gloves.
Scott:Yes. So wow, man. I can't believe it's it's here. But no, listen, exciting stuff. I'm looking forward to look, I'm I'm looking forward to, I guess, some of the the structure that comes along with it.
Jamie:You know? Like the school year
Scott:and and Yeah. A little bit. It's, you know, just like the loosey goosey stuff when it's like, you know It's hard. We leave things to the last minute, you know, it's kind of like you're you've got these options in front of you in terms of doing this or that and
Jamie:You don't have to fill time
Scott:like you do in the summertime sometimes. No. No, I think it was good. The summer was good. Otto spent, you know, time on the ice.
Scott:He got to do mountain biking, did scootering, still scootering, whatever. It was all good, man.
Brent:Nice. Yeah.
Jamie:Yeah. No. It's it's it's gonna be it's gonna be an interesting season. I'm curious how this whole thing is gonna play itself out. Yeah.
Jamie:You know? We'll see.
Scott:Well, let me ask you. Do you wanna talk a little bit about a little bit more about Brent? You want
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah. A 100%. Yeah. Brent so Brent, you know, again, for those of you who don't know, Brent is a Stanley Cup champion with the Blackhawks, and he overcame some unbelievable hurdles Mhmm.
Jamie:To get to where he got. Yeah. You know?
Scott:And so right. So basically, you know, ADHD, dyslexia, self esteem issues, other dysgraphia. Dysgraphia, yeah. Like a lot of a lot of, I don't know, disabilities that
Jamie:Yeah. Challenges, right? Whatever you wanna call
Scott:them. Mean, I think he he himself during he said he likes to refer to them as disabilities just because that
Jamie:It's more of a buzzword.
Scott:Or it gets people's attention a bit more. It's yeah. And and he
Jamie:wants to bring he wants to bring eyes and ears to it Mhmm. To try to help the situation more.
Scott:Yeah. So I get it. And even just thinking about this and part of part of his message when it comes to coaching was not all kids learn the same way. And you don't have to have a kid that's got dyslexia, ADHD, dysgraphia. Like there's plenty of kids that aren't don't have diagnoses that also learn in different ways.
Scott:Sure. So I think for any coaches listening, you know, and if look, you'd probably don't need you certainly don't need me to tell you this, but, you know, we talk about communication all the time. And like for some kids, if they're struggling, don't just assume that like, you know, they're dicking around or they don't care like maybe maybe there's something else going there about what the way they learn that they're having a hard time with, you know.
Jamie:No. It's true. And he he's he's been an advocate for these kids and he he's looking to help whoever he can. It doesn't matter. Know, he realizes that he struggled as a kid and he's on a mission.
Jamie:He's on a mission to help as many of the dyslexic slash ADHD kids that are out there.
Scott:Right. And now he's running the Sopel Foundation for Dyslexia. Yeah. So that he's got that going and that's his main focus now. Yeah.
Scott:You know, post playing and that's, you know, just that that's where that's his life's purpose right That's
Jamie:where his that's where his energy is going.
Scott:Yeah. To help people that are, you know, afflicted with the same things that he had and and and helping give people resources to get through it in ways that he wasn't able to.
Jamie:Listen, he's been great. He's he he he sent when when when I reached out to him, we started talking, he sent Dominic like a like a like a I guess, I I wouldn't call it a care package. Right? But it was a box, and it's got the Sopel Foundation logo on it. And it had all this cool stuff in it, like a sweatshirt, like a wristbands, like a, you know, like, all this cool stuff in it.
Jamie:Like, you know, he he is he is trying to reach out to as many of these kids as possible to help them. And and I have to tell you, Dominic speaks to him, you know, every once in a while. They correspond because Dominic is enamored by the fact that he found somebody that has similar or still has similar challenges that he has Mhmm. And has made it to the pinnacle of his sport. Right.
Jamie:Right? So that takes so somebody like my son Dominic, you know, he looks at that and he wants to pick that person's brain, right? Because they they speak the same language, right? And he can understand him, right? So he's been fantastic just for my son as a sounding board.
Scott:Yeah. That's amazing.
Jamie:You know, he again, he he he's more than generous with his time and and he's he's
Brent:he's
Jamie:a very impressive a very impressive man.
Scott:Yeah. No. Without a doubt. And had a had a long career, won a cup, and just really Long career. Right.
Scott:Over overcame a lot. So Yeah. It was great talking to him. But before we kick it over to him Yeah. We should just shout out Sparks.
Scott:Sparks skate sharpeners.
Jamie:We should. Yeah. We definitely should. Do you wanna do or you want me to do it?
Scott:Yeah. You can go.
Jamie:So so we've kinda partnered with Sparks. For those of you who don't know what Sparks is, I can't imagine that most of you hockey parents don't unless you live under a rock. Fair. So Sparks is a is an at home skate sharpener. Okay?
Jamie:I always thought that the smarter thing to do was to go get your skate sharpened by somebody who's been sharpening for twenty, thirty, forty years. Right? And it's an art form to sharpen the skate. Right? When they do it by hand.
Jamie:You know all the machine I'm talking about in the pro shops. So we've partnered with Sparks and they sent sent us each a skate sharpener.
Brent:Yep.
Jamie:Right? I opened mine this weekend and I am very impressed at what I am seeing so far. Yeah. Very impressed.
Scott:Well, listen. They're used by pure hockey.
Jamie:Everybody almost.
Scott:Like, they're they're they're all over the place.
Jamie:They're everywhere.
Scott:Yeah. And, you know, skate sharpening. I don't know. Like, I was actually surprised, like, when auto played at Wolfpack, they didn't have a pro shop at either rink.
Jamie:That's right.
Scott:So you had to go to, like, the nearest Hockey Monkey.
Jamie:Neither did the Rockets, by the way.
Scott:So I and and and where was it? Shoot. No pro shop there either. No. There was there was somewhere else where he was and there was no pro shop and like it occurred to me, I guess there's more places, more rinks that don't have pro shops than,
Jamie:Some you of them don't do well in certain buildings.
Scott:No. Fair. No. It's true.
Brent:All I'm
Jamie:saying space out to something else.
Scott:But all I'm saying is that like in now nowadays, you know, you got two sets of steel. 100 A lot of kids do. 100%. You know, and just in terms of the convenience of doing it at your house, it's now, you know, listen, they're not cheap, but they're certainly afford like they're more affordable than they've ever been. Yes.
Scott:And they're great machines. Yes. And especially if you got more than one skater in the house Yep. Like, the ROI, like, is, like, happens kinda quick.
Jamie:If you if you or your child skates together, like, if you like, if you bought one, Scott, when you guys first started playing, when Otto started playing, you would have been very much in the black right now.
Scott:Fair.
Jamie:You know? I mean, if you have more than one child in the house or you as an adult skate and you sharpen your skates, I mean especially with everything rising cost wise these days, right? I mean you can't sharpen skates for like $89 anymore. Or although very maybe you can in your hometowns, it's not
Scott:That way around here.
Jamie:Correct. And it's not widely. When you go up to Boston for the most part, you can't show up in skates for like $89 anymore.
Scott:No, it's wild. Right?
Jamie:It's like $12.13 dollars depending on where you are, right?
Brent:Sure.
Jamie:You know, so the machines are not cheap like Scott said, but they're consistent. Yep. Right? And if you buy it when your kids are young, I can almost guarantee you. And you could probably sell it when your kids stop playing too.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:This thing has value. You're not done. Once you guys are done, just sell it on eBay or something like that. You know? But I'm very impressed with what I saw so far.
Jamie:Right? So Sparks and Crazy Hockey Dads are teaming up. So we're gonna have we're gonna do an unboxing.
Scott:Yeah. We'll do an unboxing video so folks can see.
Jamie:Right. We'll do an unboxing.
Scott:Anyone that hasn't seen the machines yet.
Jamie:Right. And then we're gonna have and then so you guys are gonna hear you're gonna hear about them more on our on our shows probably in the next two weeks Yep. Is the plan.
Scott:But just wanted to give everyone a
Jamie:heads up. Right. That you'll be hearing more about Sparx Skate Sharpeners from us.
Scott:That's it. Alright. Alright. Well, with that said, let's flip it over to Brent.
Jamie:Sounds good. Enjoy everybody.
Scott:Alright, dude. Thanks so
Jamie:much. Alright, guys. Tonight, we are here with our next interview. We have NHL vet Brent Sopel, Stanley Cup champ. Brent, man, thanks for thanks for hanging out with us tonight.
Jamie:Really appreciate the time. Well,
Brent:thanks for having me on and listening to me blab for however long you have me.
Jamie:No. No. That's what this is all about, man. We had a request for you, like, six months ago. One of these dads that I didn't know who you were, and all of a sudden your stuff popped up, and I'm like, Oh, shit.
Jamie:I'm like, Okay, here we go. Right? Know?
Brent:Was that parent what was he saying? Because I I look at learning disabilities differently, you know, No. Part of hockey?
Jamie:He he his child had ADHD, and I people that listen to this podcast know that I speak very honestly and openly about Dominic's ADHD. Right? So we were kinda going back and forth, he's like, you should have Brent Sopel on. I was like So, you know, so I'm like and I'm like, oh, shit. I'm like, I know who this is.
Jamie:And then and I'm like, okay. I'm like, here we go. So it worked out perfectly. But, yeah, man. So do our listeners a favor for those who don't know who you are and kinda what you're doing now.
Jamie:Tell everybody what you're doing now and what kinda, like, your mission is right now.
Brent:Yeah. Obviously, life after the game, I guess it's it's been eleven years since, you know, since I hung up the skates after eighteen years pro, and I started my own charity foundation. Actually, last on the twentieth was nine years. So the Sopel Foundation for Dyslexia, it's a five one c c three worldwide. Obviously, you know, I'm dyslexic, but it's all for all types of learning disorders.
Brent:So I've got dyslexia, I got dysgraphia, which is the writing portion, dyscalculia, which is the math portion, and ADHD. You know? And I didn't find out till I was 32. So I was reading a grade four level in high school.
Scott:Could you repeat that? Sorry. Think I talked earlier.
Brent:I was reading in a grade four level in high school.
Scott:Wow. Wow.
Brent:That's wild. And, obviously, nobody oh, you're the hockey guy, you're in Canada, you're the hockey guy, know, wouldn't write a final, I wrote my name on, handed it, they're gonna be, you you're the hockey guy, you're the hockey guy, right? You know, coming from Saskatoon, and my daughter was struggling and she was in grade one and I end up, you know, my ex wife and I got her tested, you went to a neuropsych and this is we go back for the results and like, oh, boom boom boom. So that's how I found out that was me. I've never heard the word dyslexia or obviously, nowadays, things are more prevalent, right, you know, growing up with testosterone.
Brent:He was just a dumb kid. I I and I was called dumb, stupid, and lazy. I remember throwing a desk at a kid in grade three, like, just things that but hockey was my only place and I lived on the rink, obviously, in Saskatchewan, we have winter, you know, ten months a year, you know, outdoor rink outdoor rink in every every school so we can go on the ice and before school and lunchtime and recess. So I started the foundation when I got sober and that's my purpose and mission and is for every dyslexic, you know, for the understanding and then wrap around the education into, you know, sports. You know, for me, I struggled.
Brent:Never read a book before in my life. You know, reading at a grade for low in high school, obviously, you talk about that as that grows and I still struggle with reading and writing and all those things after the game. So it's my purpose to leave the world in a better place when it comes to mental health and sports because now, it's for me, it wasn't a sport, it wasn't a job, it was a self esteem. It was the only thing or only place I could get my self esteem, it wasn't. Couldn't do anything now, all the other simple things that you guys are I call it you normally as you can, I couldn't do that?
Brent:So I struggled mightily except for on the ice. Right. Wow.
Scott:And when you were growing sorry, James. No.
Jamie:No. Go ahead.
Scott:Sorry, dude. I feel like I do that all the time.
Brent:No. You're good.
Scott:But growing up, I mean, obviously, if if there's no diagnosis or there's no knowledge of, like, some of these challenges or these disabilities, like, was just normal to you. And it wasn't really until 32 that you that you really, like, connected those dots, like, wow, something's wrong with me, or, like, along the way, did you feel like something was up, you just never never figured it out?
Brent:Well, you you know, it was it was funny. I didn't start kinda connecting the dots till a couple years ago.
Scott:Mhmm.
Brent:So I I I knew I I was different, you know, as a kid, you you know something's up, but you can't pinpoint it, you know. So I never connected with any of my teammates, you know. I didn't connect with my first person till I was 46 years old and if you watch when we won the Stanley Cup and winning the Stanley Cup was the most amazing, emptiest yeah. And I said, emptiest feeling I've ever had because when we were you know, when Jonathan Tays raised that cup, I was kinda around there circling because I had no idea if anybody was ever gonna give me that. Pass me the cup.
Brent:Wow.
Jamie:Why? I'm curious. Why'd you think that?
Brent:Because I didn't have that connection.
Jamie:With your teammates?
Brent:And I never met, you know, with my teammates, so I never really understood all this as as to my point, and and I'll tell a story is, you know, every NHL guy or pro guy always takes a pregame nap. I never did. Yo. My day was, you know, for playing in Anaheim. I'd go to Disneyland and walk around, or I'd go to the mall or plan at home, get the oil change in the car, pick up the kids, whatever it was, or, you know, Saturday was the only time I'd stay on the road, stay at home, you know, watch college football or whatever.
Brent:I was always doing something. Because the more tired I was walking into the rink, the less my dyslexia worked and my ADHD. So I could play hockey, not think hockey. And I never connected those dots till a couple years ago, as I was growing the foundation and understanding the foundation and understanding dyslexia and that kind of stuff more, then I'm like, oh, I did that. Now, I know why I did that.
Brent:So I it was my defense mechanism, it was the glue that kept me together, but I didn't know why. Right? So to your point is I knew I was different, but I couldn't I didn't understand why.
Jamie:So you would almost like tire your brain out. Right? So the and it's so funny that you say that because so Dominic, when he was in kindergarten, first, second, third, you know, he was always like upside down in his chair. Right? His
Brent:Oh, yeah.
Jamie:Right? I mean, he'd right. I mean, I was that way. When I was in when I was there was a story, you know, I went to when I was younger, I went to a private school called Montclair Kimberley, and my parents came to see me in first grade for like parents can come sit in the back and watch, right, for a couple hours. And my mother still tells the story today.
Jamie:She's like my father was going, Sue, why is Jamie upside down in his chair? Like, what what why he's the only one, like, not, like, not really paying attention. Right? So it's it's so funny that you say that, Brent, because when Dominic was in the fourth grade, we it was COVID hit. Right?
Jamie:And and I saw they were only need to be in school for, like, three hours a day. So we pulled him out, and we actually put him into a hockey academy where he got on the ice at like nine, he got off the ice at like 10:30, they went to do off ice from like eleven to like twelve, 12:15, and then they went into the classroom, and he could focus more because he was exhausted. Right? So it's almost like they got the energy out of his system. He can actually sit for a couple hours and concentrate on school.
Brent:Well, you know, and I'll take a little bit of a different angle on that. Yeah. Probably some of that's a little bit, but he also was he filled up his self esteem tank. So think of self esteem as a gas tank. Right?
Brent:So he went there for, you know, three hours or four and he filled it up. Right. Because, know, we go there for school, let's just use eight hours for normal school. Right? That's I called it sitting in an electric chair.
Brent:The anxiety going on, you know you're different, you can't do this. I'm grade six, I just want to keep on to like me. I can't read. What's wrong with me? You're dumb.
Brent:You're lazy. Why aren't you working hard? You know, this is stupid. Why can't you why like, why why why are you doing this? All these things wrong.
Brent:Right? So he got to do something that he was good at and that goes back to earlier my earlier conversation. Right. You know, why self esteem is so important to me and that's why the foundation and kind of what I do is a very different angle is if you don't have self esteem in anything in life, you're a fireman or a policeman or a lawyer, you've got you've got you've got nothing and for us, kids with learning, you know, learning difficulties, disorders, we just learn differently. We're smart.
Brent:We just we just learn differently and I always equate it to love languages. Right? If your love language of your wife is, yo, gifts, and you only say I love you, you never give her gifts, at some point in time she snaps, right? So does a kid. So you talk about sports, no matter what sport that is, if you're trying to tell the kid the wrong way, we shut down.
Brent:Like, I threw a desk at a kid in grade three, I shouldn't be shouldn't be doing that. Why did I throw it?
Jamie:Right. Frustration, maybe, something like that?
Brent:100100%. Yeah. The you know, and so if I went to the game, my brain wouldn't work. I could play hockey and not think hockey. Mhmm.
Brent:Soon as I was rested, oh my god. I felt awesome going to the rink, felt awesome there till I got in the ice. Because then my brain started working. Interesting. And You were equated to thinking hockey, like, you go to make a play instead of reacting, you're thinking, then reacting obviously.
Brent:And then, you know, that's too late. Instead of just going with your instinct and and playing the game of hockey, I'm, you know, thinking that game of hockey. Right.
Scott:Uh-huh. And that was and that differentiation was true throughout your, like, youth career, you know, as you moved up the ranks, it was the the same thing from from as far back as you could remember?
Brent:Yeah. You know, so obviously, dyslexia you're born with dyslexia. I was born with all this stuff, you know, so I had this, you know, my whole life, and I was obviously one of the slowest, you know, I was always always rated the slowest and not only in the NHL, but, you know, I could anticipate and, you know, same thing, you know, growing up. So it's been a part of me my whole life and now I'm just kinda connecting the dots with the understanding because the work I'm doing in the foundation and everything else that goes with it, but it was definitely still it's still mental health is just still a major factor in, you know, in my life. It's my mental health is terrible because of finding so late out in life and again, then the only thing I was good at was hockey.
Brent:Only thing I could do, right, take that away. What do you have, you know, and what do you have? And that's why for me, you know, you sports and the mental health and the education of teaching the kid the right way and I get calls and emails all the time, you know, does dyslexia affect hockey IQ? It only affects a hockey IQ when you're taught the wrong way.
Scott:And so for for yourself, I know that was a question I was gonna ask. I'm glad you brought that up. But from the x's and o's point and the hockey IQ's, you know, perspective, what like, in what ways was it, you know, best for you to receive that information, to consume it, to sort through it, like, anything in particular that you would do?
Brent:Well, you know, it's you know, and every kid is different. Thank God there is, you know, some video and whiteboard. Mhmm. Like, you've you've give me a verbal direction. Yeah.
Brent:I'm ill. And my our brains work in a very, like, a one two pattern. That's it. So let's just say, Dominic, go up to your room, clean your room, brush your teeth, make your bed, then come down. I guarantee he only does one, maybe two of those things.
Jamie:You're a 100% right about that. Yes.
Brent:Right. Because our brains don't work that way. So now, you're giving a kid a drill, and I'll talk about When I coached mites, I did numbers, not positions. One, two, three, four, five. So I started the year, we did it on the out there ring.
Brent:I I set up the position. So one was left wing, two was center, three was right wing, four was right d, five. Because how many kids at four to eight have another lesson rights anyways?
Scott:Okay. It's true.
Brent:So I bring bring them in one door and out the other one 234. 1234. Right? And then as they started understanding their positions on the ice, then I start attaching positions to those, excuse me, those numbers then okay, one is left wing. Two because you know, your coach that near side or far side, they don't know what left, right?
Brent:It just becomes near side then then you flip ends. Is that near side? But coach, is that near right? Now, that's creating anxiety.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Right. And when the kids are
Brent:anxious, they can't play well. Right. Eliminating, you know, if we can eliminate that, right, just go out there and, you know, so it's just, you know, simple things like that. So much easier makes makes the game so much easier for kids. Right?
Brent:Now they can go and enjoy it. Now they're not questioning, you know, everything. That's one question less about that, but I I struggled with it all and, you know, your obviously original question was, I need to see it. Just like, I need to see it. Sam drove 10 miles in school.
Brent:I don't know what Sam is. Show me where Sam is. Right? Right. Kids with learning disorders are touch and feel.
Brent:So it's okay if you go on the whiteboard. And ADHD, you'll explain that. You know, there's two types of ADHD. There's one that's obviously bouncing off the wall, but there's two where you don't process the information fast enough. So coach has drawn the drill and maybe the kid processes half the information.
Brent:He's gonna get so excited. He's probably gonna go first in line because you guys ever heard of the Drill Buster. He thinks he can do it, then he starts it and he doesn't process the whole drill. Right. So it's I need to see it.
Brent:I, you know, I need to touch and feel it, you know, kinda doing it also, instead of, you know, as young kids, alright, though, one two two four check for you know, until they're old enough, what does it know, what does that mean? Sure. Show them.
Jamie:It's it's funny you say that because, you know, it's funny. I would always I would always say to Dominic, like, how come you're never in the front of the line for a drill, bud? Like, why are always in the back or toward the back? And he's like, dad, he's like, I need to see the drill. He's like, so I watch everybody else do it.
Jamie:He's like, and then I can figure it out. So I'm like, I just hope that the person in front of knows what they're doing too. You know? But that's you know, but, you know, I'm I'm joking around about it, but it's true. He always puts himself mid toward the back of the line, so we could watch.
Brent:Yeah. And, you know, this morning, you know, in the foundation, we recorded an episode with the chief of staff of Texas University of Texas football. You know, him and I put together a slide PDF of how to coach us. Like, you know, I've had calls when I was coaching, I was running a program and I had a coach that wanted to kick a kid off their team at ADHD because the kid was sitting there spinning and he's like, he can't not pay attention. Well, you know, for a kid with ADHD, for myself, is sometimes when I'm talking to somebody, I gotta stare at the ice.
Brent:I gotta hear what you're saying. Maybe the kid with ADHD is looking at the birds. Right. But he's listening in his own way. I said to the coach, he and he wanted to kick him off the team.
Brent:He put him in a different dressing room, you know, and now, I start getting hot, losing my mind, start motherfucking. You know I'm Yep. Yeah.
Jamie:Yeah. No.
Brent:Because You can swear. It's all good. So important to me because you just don't understand that kid. Yeah. And there's a difference between coaching and teaching.
Brent:We shouldn't have coaches. We should have teachers. Kicking off that kid for what? Because he listens differently. I said, was he shooting the puck?
Brent:Was he bothering anybody? No. But, you know, we pay attention to our different you know, you know, if I'm looking up, I'm still paying attention in our own way. And that's your point, know, Dominic's learned that and how to process information, where to be, and yeah. Hopefully, the kids are doing it the right way, but Yeah.
Jamie:In front of them. Right. You know?
Brent:The worst part is is him going first, screwing it up, and getting yelled at. Because guess what? His self esteem now just took a hit.
Jamie:I was just gonna say because
Brent:he was excited to go first. Yeah. Yep. Everything to me is self esteem, you know, because it's all Oh, yeah, till you're inside till you've had 16 different knives stabbed in your heart all day long. Most normal kids, you know, I call it normal, right, kids with all learning disorders only have one or two during a day.
Brent:We might have sixteen, seventeen, 18. Right.
Scott:It's interesting. So was there was there a point along the way? And and I I think I know the answer just because of, you know, you shared how you've more recently discovered some of this stuff, but without without the diagnosis or without the clearer picture that you have now, did you get to a point where you were able to, like, articulate some of this to whether it be coaches or coaches specifically to be like, listen. Like, I best received the information like this. Like, was there ever any, like, you know, like bridging that that, you know, that gap with with coaches along the way or or no?
Brent:No. And I think, you know, a lot of this stuff is more important at a younger age, again, it's self esteem. Right? So, obviously, when I was older, you know, 30 years old, you know, when I got the diagnosis, I didn't care. I was, you know, I was still obviously in the heart of my career.
Brent:I just focus on my daughter. Okay. What does my daughter need? You know, what resources? What IEP?
Brent:You know, all those kinds of things come through. But I never really laid it back to me. So a lot of the stuff is, you know, at the younger ages. This is where the it's so important to teach them that way. And so to your question, is it no?
Brent:But I found my kind of I call them defense mechanisms around around things. Mhmm. You know, I had a foundation by then. Okay. And I guess that's that's the difference is, you know, these young kids and these kind of things don't have a foundation if we don't build a proper foundation, you know, that con you know, that concrete brick is gonna break at some point in time and for me, my biggest problem is when I was on, confidence.
Brent:I was one of the best. I obviously want to stand in the cup, player of the week a couple times, you know, one week tie with Marilyn Mew. Right? Then there's other week, you know, other times when I was playing, I didn't even deserve to be in the AHL because I was so bad Because my mental health and my self esteem were so bad. And There's no consistency in my game.
Scott:Yeah. Because there now it's so much more common to hear about players that are taking leave of absences to attend to, like, know, like, personal or mental health issues. Was was there from you, do you recall that being something that was done when you were playing, but it was, like, less publicized, or it that's definitely not something that went on back then?
Brent:No. There's you you walked away. You know, I all my injuries, you know, hundreds of broken bones. You know, every broken bone I played with, you know, I got during the game, I finished every game because actually, somebody asked me this just recently. When did you think you made it?
Brent:And I said, there wasn't a day in my career I ever thought I made it.
Scott:Wow. Interesting.
Brent:Because I was always looking over my shoulder.
Jamie:You always worried that shoe was gonna drop on you?
Brent:She was gonna drop. If I got hurt, I didn't play well, they put somebody else in, they didn't, you know, they don't care about you. Right? Piece of meat. Oh, he's playing better.
Brent:He's playing better. Guess what? We're keeping him in the lineup. And so that was not there was no options, you know, of that. And again, I didn't even understand myself that could have fallen into place with that.
Brent:Obviously, I'm just learning this kind of stuff now in the last five years of kinda understanding myself and what this all really entails. So even if they came up to me and say, Brent, would you like step away for a week or two? I would I would have said no. Mhmm. Because I didn't even understand what that meant, and truly, it was too late to to help me anyways when it came to that stuff.
Jamie:Essentially, it it it almost motivated you. I didn't almost I mean, it did motivate you, you know? I mean, you kept going and playing through injuries and doing whatever you needed to do because you were always worried about somebody, you know, looking to cut you over your shoulder, and it really motivated you, and that's what I would think that's probably one of the reasons why you played so long in the NHL. I mean, you never got comfortable, you just kinda kept plowing The
Brent:only thing I had was, you know, my work ethic, and most kids with dyslexia and stuff have to work harder, like, you know, we're usually on an average, know, three to four percent, I don't know, harder, we've gotta work a daily basis just to get through the normal stuff. Right? So, that was ingrained in me, but you know, obviously, at what point is mental health? Like, I would have given up my NHL career and my pro career in a second. My ring, my cup, anything to figure it out myself and diagnosis at a young age.
Scott:Wow.
Brent:Hockey, you know, hockey ends at some point in time, right? You know, I've ended up to 40 right now and the last eleven years and the worst years of my life. Yeah. Me and my wife just, you know, just married just less than a year, but she's ADHD. She's the second person I connected with and, you know, I'm almost 50.
Brent:Yeah. Because I didn't have understanding.
Jamie:But you found somebody.
Brent:Oh, yeah. You know, it's Right. You know, it's been it's been amazing, you know, to that point in time. But, you know, you take a look at, you know, Dominic or your kids, you you don't want them to suffer one day. Never mind, forty years or thirty years or or or whatever that is.
Brent:And, you know, I was talking into relatability terms and, you know, cancer. Everyone knows that. Right? If you wanna find it at stage one, not stage Yeah. Same same thing with this kind of stuff and that's why when I talk to the foundation and sports and hockey, why I take such a different approach and people in the game of hockey look at me like, what?
Brent:You're a weirdo. What are you talking about? Why would I do numbers? This is not how we do it. Oh, guess what?
Brent:The game today is nowhere near what the game was thirty years ago. You know, we've developed, we've evolved. Why couldn't something like this work? Sure.
Jamie:It's true. It's very true. You must you must feel I mean, even with all the challenges, right? I mean, you you played I mean, you you got to the top of the heap. I mean, so, you know, for kids that have dyslexia, ADHD, any that stuff, I mean, you know, you're a role in my opinion, you're a role model for those kids, you know, because, you know, Dominic was saying before he met you, you know, he he was saying things to me like, dad, I'm I'm looking for somebody who, like, has what I have because I wanna talk to that person.
Jamie:Right? Like, I wanna like, I wanna find out, like, how they dealt with it. Right? It's it's you just kind of figure out I I mean, listen, I wanna speak for my for my kid, but, you know, as he's getting older, he's, I guess, figuring out a way to cope with it. Does that sound accurate?
Brent:Yeah. Well, obviously, you you gave me Dominic's number, and Yeah. Dominic called me, you know, and and I talked to him. Yeah. It was actually an interesting conversation because he said to me, he's like, yeah.
Brent:I'm working with my sports, you know, psychologist. And he said, you know, my sports psychologist tells me I've got
Jamie:Oh, yes. Performance Performance Yes. Yes.
Brent:So we're kinda walking through it, and he's like, you know, when I'm doing a drill or on the ice, I don't do the right thing, then I shut down. I'm like, well, Dominic, you don't have performance anxiety. There's no performance anxiety. Self esteem. Right.
Brent:Now, if he screwed up going before, right, couldn't get on the ice, you know, he screwed up. Now, start guessing what's wrong with me. Why did I do it right then? Why did Johnny in front of me do it? Right?
Brent:That's not performance anxiety, you know, and that's so it's I hope I'm a role model. You know, I hope kids can can look up to me and I'm honest about this stuff. Right? Because I'm not the only one. You know, dyslexia is obviously, you know, it's one in five and it's hereditary.
Brent:You know, know their NHLer, know, you know, has it. Obviously, he's still playing, but nobody else talks about it. So you look at the percentages. Forty percent of us have ADHD. Right?
Brent:And that's a Dominic. Right? So I hope I talk about this honestly so that I know there's kids that are gonna hear it. There's parents that are gonna hear it. They're gonna resonate it with it, and that's why I'm truthfully honest because it's not something that's one in a million or one in ten million.
Brent:You know, it's one in five. And nobody, like, nobody talks about it, you know, 800 and some players in the NHL every year and I know of two, you know, and I think there's 10,000 ever played in NHL. Right. There's a lot more. That's why I'm open about it and honest about it, and I hope that I'm a, you know, I'm a role model to these kids and whoever wants to reach out, like I said, you know, I gave you my number, you know, you get me, your daughter called me.
Brent:I don't we all put our parents on the same way and so do I. You know, if I can help anybody at any point in time, I always will because that's my purpose now.
Scott:Well, if if you wouldn't mind, if we could just maybe like rewind the tape a little bit and just you know, we're always curious, like I mentioned before, just about people's paths. And, you know, if you could just kind of paint that picture for us, right, like as a kid, how you came from a hockey loving family, maybe, maybe not. You had crazy hockey parents, maybe, maybe not. So, you know, just if you wouldn't mind kinda going through some of the, you know, some of the that roller coaster, that roller coaster that you went on to get to the NHL.
Brent:I don't think the parents were as crazy than than now. Oh, fair. You know? Okay. You know, because now now, it's youth, it's not a youth sport, now it's a youth business.
Scott:Yeah. Well put.
Jamie:Very well put.
Brent:So I'm sure my parents are great, but it was back then, you know, it was about the kids. Mhmm. You know, I you know, I we grew up in Saskatoon, played by minor hockey. We had a farm three hours north. Go up there every weekend, summers.
Brent:I loved it, lived everything, but, you know, the game of hockey was about the kids back then. Never on a plane. It was a two hour drive to to the next tournament or, you know, for us, I think the longest I never was on a plane for hockey until I got drafted to the NHL. Alright. Got drafted by the Vancouver Canucks in the sixth round, hundred and forty fourth overall.
Brent:Then they had development camp, which is, you know, a week or two after that. So draft for me was in Edmonton, so it was a five hour drive. Drove with my family. So I wasn't on a plane for hockey till I got drafted to the end. So I gotta go to Phoenix.
Brent:I gotta go. No, you don't. You know, so, you know, again, played locally and, you know, at that point in time, wherever you lived, you played. You know, there wasn't played minor hockey there till I was 14, played midget triple a. I got protected by the Sastine Blades, WHL.
Brent:Played there for my 16 year old there, got traded to Swift Current, played the Swift Current Broncos, you know, got drafted by Vancouver. Their right their HL team was in Syracuse, New York, that's where I started started my career and, started the minors and, like I said, we never we had mini stick tournaments in our hallways, but we didn't travel two hours, know, we had, you know, a tournament twenty minutes out or, you know, it wasn't This this notion of, again, youth sports has become a become a business and Big one. Big big big one. Private private lessons and majority of the people that I've come across don't have a clue what they're teaching. They bring out all the bells and whistles.
Brent:Oh, I'm gonna put a mic on, and I'm gonna have some beep in, and I'm gonna have an iPad, and I'm gonna have all these things to bounce over just to mesmerize you by all these apparatuses out there and make my kids go a 100 miles an hour, and I have no clue what I'm talking about. You know? For me, it feels right, it's wrong.
Scott:That's it. Can you elaborate on that a little bit, or give an example?
Brent:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Know. Because if you're coming off your season, right, you're trying to learn new things, you gotta be outside your box.
Brent:You gotta be outside your comfort zone. So if it feels right, you're back to your old habits. Yeah. So I needed to feel wrong to do this better or to you know, we're trying new things. It shouldn't feel right.
Brent:And, you you can't go a 100 miles an hour, you shouldn't be you shouldn't even be breaking a sweat. Because if you can't do it at 10% of energy, how are you gonna do it a 100? You're not. You're just gonna go back to your old habits. You know, obviously, you know, the summertime, know, season's over, you gotta start slow, right?
Brent:You gotta feel comfortable. You know, you gotta feel uncomfortable, then a certain point in time you get comfortable, then now you can ramp up, you know, ramp up the speed. So you if it feels right, it's wrong.
Scott:Interesting. Well, I I guess I'm always improving in my beer league because it never feels right. What?
Brent:Let me tell you, I'm sure the beers after the game feel right.
Scott:Yes. Yes. No. Not for not for me. That ship has sailed on my my my behalf.
Brent:You too. Me too.
Jamie:Yeah. So so you get drafted, you're playing the minors. Tell us kinda what what that was like, and how how long it took you to get up into the to actually get to the show.
Brent:Yeah. You know, for me, it was awesome. You know, I played obviously in, you know, in Swift Current Journey. We're playing seventy seventy games a year plus playoffs. There's there was no working out back then.
Brent:Right? You know, I think our longest bus ride was was 24. Wow. Yeah.
Scott:That's long.
Brent:I've lived on the road since I was since I was 14. Yeah. On the West Coast Swing, Portland, and and Seattle, and finished the game with, you know, two bus drivers, drive all night, stop at a truck stop at nine in the morning and then, you know, and go in for breakfast and I also get drafted and for me, I was late, you know, late bloomer. Right? It was obviously my hockey sense and my skill was there just on, you know, my skating.
Brent:So I had to kind of out thank people in my anticipation of where the play was gonna go and I had to learn how to be a pro and what that meant. Right? And, you know, so the AHL was great. I don't know what I end up playing, couple 100 games before I I called up and made my stamp, you know, and stayed there. But it was, you know, it it was being a professional.
Brent:It's what that meant every day, you know, coming to practice, playing consistent, understanding what that meant, you know. Now, I'm living on my own. Obviously, in junior hockey, you're living with another family. Now I'm living on my own.
Scott:And Right.
Brent:What does that mean and what goes into that? And we're playing in three games in three nights, and now you got you got a gym. Now you got a train, you know, trainers, you know, strength coaches in there. And I needed that time in the minors to kind of understand what all that meant, you know, for the game of hockey because back then, now it's twelve months a year. You know, back then, it wasn't.
Brent:You know, obviously, the working out wasn't the way it is, right? The nutrition wasn't the way it is, and Yeah. Guys would come to camp to get in shape, you know, and
Jamie:As opposed to getting there when they're already in shape.
Brent:Oh, yeah. Know. The training camps. Yeah. You know, nine exhibition games, and you know, all the all these kind of things that that we had to do back then that, you know, they don't do to now, but it I had to understand what all that meant, and how it was playing, you know, 82 games, and now I'm playing against men.
Brent:Right? Now, you know, the fights, you know, you're fighting bigger boys, you're blocking more shots, you're playing more games, you're, you know, everything was bigger, harder, faster, and that took a toll on your body and how to manage that. So the h l was awesome for me. I needed it. You know?
Brent:You if I were to try to jump into the NHL, you know, it's, you know, nineteen, twenty, twenty one, you know, throwing me in the walls, I would've, you know, self esteem would've been so demolished. I never I never would've made it back. So, it was a perfect journey for me. I I needed it. You know, obviously, the game has changed now.
Brent:I think all the kids are a lot more mature. They're coming in shape a lot more, and so it was it was it was a fun time, a lot of drinking, you know, playing three games in three nights, and learn how to learn how to play guilty, going out the night before a game, and the funny thing is, that was some of my best games ever. Right? Really? Hungover, getting home at five in the morning, six in morning, some of my best games.
Brent:Why? Because I could play hockey, not think hockey.
Scott:Wow. Well,
Brent:and and Playing guilty, know? I just play and not think.
Scott:But so that if you were to take, like, that analogy or maybe it's not analogy, I don't know, but, like, you know, just saying, like, you couldn't think hockey, then does that same principle apply to, like, other facets of your life where, like, whatever it is you're trying to accomplish, whether it's a project, whether it's a whatever going to the grocery store, did you still did the similar ideas apply or was it, you know, that was very hockey specific where the thinking would get, you know, in your way so much?
Brent:Yeah. My thinking, it still gets in my way, right, you know, my head. Because, you know, for me is I'm dyslexic, so you guys read with your left, we read with our right. So we're looking at things differently. You know, for an example, you kind of take take a tape measure.
Brent:You know, you look at one. Hey. You take a tab, one, two, three. That's what you guys see. Every little notch in between is what I see.
Brent:So very differently. So I can see a kid's stick being turned a millimeter in or out from across the ice.
Jamie:Wow.
Brent:So now apply that to, you know, how I see the world is so different. Right? So I get quite, you know, be misunderstood as any person is the hardest thing in the world. Right? So, you know, back to your question.
Brent:Yeah. I my head, I'm always questioning. Did I do that right? Are they gonna understand me? Are they not gonna understand me?
Brent:This project, is this gonna make sense to and you know, non dyslexic or you know, I I talk on a foundation, you know, online that I use a million times a day. I'm like, hey, does that make sense? Because makes sense to me. Now, it doesn't make sense to, you know, a left brain person. So, My head's the worst place in the world to be.
Brent:You know Nobody wanna be in here more than five minutes. They they jump.
Jamie:You know, it it's it's funny because because I think Dominic kind of over overthinks things too. Right? He's always you know, but I I have to tell you, you know, so Topher Scott I don't know if you're familiar with Topher Scott. So Topher Scott right? We so he he has a child who has as well.
Jamie:And he said it perfectly, which I've been telling Dominic for years. I'm like, buddy, Mike, you have a superpower. Right? Like, people with ADHD have superpowers. You know, and it's funny, you just kind of alluded to one of them.
Jamie:I mean, you saw people's sticks turned in. You so you had to you used your superpower, Brent, you know, however you wanna call it, you know, to like you said, you weren't the fastest. Right? You know, you you weren't you said you you you called yourself the slowest. Right?
Jamie:You know? But you figured out a way to navigate the ice and be in position or whatever it is, and you played at the highest level. Right? I mean, you figured out a way to even even if your self seems low, you figured out a way to stay. I mean, that's remarkable.
Brent:That's remarkable. Yeah. I talk about, you know, it can be a superpower if there's understanding behind it. Of course. Right.
Brent:You know, and that's I think 100%, it it can be if there's understanding, you know. You know, it's funny, you know, you talk about Topher. He's getting ADHD. I've never heard him ever talk about learning disorders. I've actually made comments about it on some of his videos.
Brent:He's never talked about it. So, you know, I think that's kind of a, you know, a funny statement because I actually he had somebody on there. Said, what about learning disorders? Never talk about it. Dead silence.
Brent:No response. So to your point, it can be 100% if there's some understanding and it's taught the right way and the kids able to harness the right way and you know, for an example, lot of dyslexics don't want to left some rights. Go dot take, you know, and turn left. What? Yeah.
Brent:I said turn left. Right. Right? And guess
Scott:what? Now we left.
Brent:Right? Yeah. You know, and then, oh, I did in front of everybody. Now you're getting yelled at, you know, and so you see how quickly can can seem all, but Jimmy a 100 It can be if if it's taught the right way. It's understanding.
Brent:Yeah. That come in there and and harness in the right way and not take not an approach. I made it right a 100%, you know, but I would have given it up in a second to have understanding. Mhmm. And that's kinda why I'm honest about it.
Brent:And and, you know, Dominic, you know, he's got more understanding than I ever did.
Jamie:I wonder I wonder if that's just the the of like the time that you grew up in, right, and the time that he's growing up in. Right? You said before, nutrition wasn't really a thing back then. Mental performance coaches weren't a thing. Right?
Jamie:So clearly, we've evolved around
Brent:Well, I knew till I was 32 also, so he's light years ahead of where I was.
Jamie:Right, right. You know, so you known, may not but you figured out a way to, again, gonna say cope, or deal with, you know, whatever challenges you had, it's funny too because they say that ADHD kids make some of the best entrepreneurs because they need to figure out other ways to get things done that they know that they're struggling with, right? So they wind up figuring out other ways to get something done that maybe the regular kid maybe regular kids, you will, I don't know what to call
Brent:them, but they do it a different way. The NARMIs.
Jamie:Right. Exactly. It's funny. They made me think of NARPs, Scott. We just we just interviewed a kid from Princeton.
Jamie:So Dominic and and Scott's son, Otto, were at Princeton Ice Hockey Camp last week, and we interviewed one of their one of their defensemen. Really nice kid. And he he called the the regular students narps, non athletic regular people. That's that's what they call the
Brent:regular the
Jamie:student types. Yeah. So that reminded me of that. But but, you know, so so the ADHD kid, right, they figure out a way to do whatever they need to do, and you did that, Brent. I mean, you again, and you got to the pinnacle of your sport, which, is remarkable.
Brent:You know, a 100%, you know, and that's kinda why I talk about it so openly and so honestly is that, you know, fifty percent of dyslexics in prison in the world are dyslexic. Fifty percent.
Scott:Wow.
Brent:Yeah. Or sixty four percent more chance likely to commit suicide, but forty percent of self made millionaires are dyslexic. Right. So, you know, I talk about this honestly, so it's one or the other. Yeah.
Brent:Now, that's why self esteem is so important to me, so, because it's, as as somebody with learning disabilities, we're always gonna choose the bad path, not the good path.
Jamie:Why do you think that is? I'm curious.
Brent:Because it's easier. Because we've struggled for our whole lives. So it's a
Jamie:path of resistance.
Brent:Right? For me, it's it's the more we connect with. Right? So for me, I've never read a book, so I started struggling when I grabbed that first book. What what are you?
Brent:A year old, two year old, three year old. Right? So I talk honestly and openly, so there is understanding and that's where the self esteem comes in. Right? So a normie kid or whatever, they didn't have all those struggles for the first five, six, seven, whatever that ends up being, you know, obviously, just talking, you know, hypothetically, but Right.
Brent:If you didn't have that, we wouldn't fall on that negative side. So that's that's what we connect with. Right? You know, we're always going to change that side. You know, with some understanding if we can shorten that gap between, you know, the good and bad because there's more understanding, you know, and then that's where sports and hockey.
Brent:So, yeah, it's so important to me is coaching the right way, then we close the gap and the successful and for me as a coach, if if I can make you still be playing beer league when you're 30, 40, 50, I've done my job. Yeah. Because, yeah, obviously, everybody's goal is to make the NHL, but less than 1% ever do. You know, I was guessing, you know, Hank, I saw it the other day in the NHL alumni, I'm like 300, 3,476, that was my number, so I think there's only 8,000 people ever played the game in a hundred years, like, so we can teach the right kids the right habits and the right understanding and team play and work ethic and all those things that comes with it. Struck correlation with real life.
Jamie:Yeah.
Brent:Oh, you don't like your teammate? You don't like the guy you work with? But guess what? We're in the trenches now, we gotta work.
Scott:Yep. So when you when you were growing up, and you had mentioned this earlier just about the the social socialization piece and, you know, just having that camaraderie with, like, teammates in the locker room and how, like, you didn't have, like, the pregame nap. You went out and, like, you know, got some energy out. When you were younger, do you, like how how what was that like for you? And I I asked just because I'm sure there are people that are going you know, that are listening that have, you know, kids that are having trouble adjusting socially, you know, for similar reasons.
Scott:So just curious how what that was like for you and how and some of the things you might have done to to cope.
Brent:Yeah. I know a 100 you know, it's funny, you know, good performing portion of dyslexia have that, you know, have that trouble connecting. Right? Because we we think differently. Now, you think back as a kid.
Brent:Oh, you're that weird kid that says weird things. Well, in our brain, it's not weird because our brain is wired differently. And that's why the self esteem is so important, like, to me, and that's why I keep keep coming back to it is whatever that self esteem as a parent, keep doing that. Keep repeating that. If that's chess, that's piano, that's hockey, whatever, and, you know, the kid's struggling with homework, close that book, go play that sport because guess what?
Brent:Sucking the life out of the self esteem out of the kid doing the homework, it not helping, yeah. Right? The self esteem where they can go and get it again. So, there's gonna be a lot of dyslexic that that don't have that. So it's trying to find that connection, right?
Brent:What do they love to do? Right. You know, if that's just going in the basement and shooting pucks. You know, you talk about memory and you fell in love for the first time. How amazing that felt.
Brent:Right? How that changed your life. How, you know, think of that as a kid. They fall in love, you know, their love is hockey. Right?
Brent:Let them go and shoot. Yeah. Let him go downstairs and stick handle. Let him right? That's to me and everything, you know, they don't have that connection.
Brent:They don't have the the the teammates crowd around, you know. Alright. Let's find, you know, find ways to get that self esteem, you know, back up. Whatever that ends up being for that kid.
Jamie:Right. Did you have so I'm curious, when you became a pro, and you started playing, you know, in the NHL, did you I guess, were your teammates more accepting of like, did they know that you had that you were dyslexic at the time? Or no, they didn't, right? No. So were they more accepting of you than say, you know, because kids when they're young can be nasty.
Jamie:Right? Because now you're talking about playing with grown men. Were they more accepting of you as opposed to like
Brent:I'm always known as a weirdo. Right? You're the weirdo who never napped.
Jamie:But you still performed at a high level, so who gives a shit?
Brent:You're right. You have some guys that take a four hour nap.
Jamie:Right.
Brent:Right? Some guys would take a third nap. You're the weirdo, like, I never had roommates. Nobody wanted a room with me. Right?
Brent:Because I never slept.
Scott:Oh, man.
Brent:So, in my earlier career, I'd be hanging in the lobby.
Jamie:In like the middle of the night?
Brent:While my roommate was sleeping, right? Because I didn't want to wake him up, I didn't want to be that guy, so Right. Yeah. Obviously, adults are are are more forgiving than than kids are a 100%. Kids can be ruthless, and obviously, nowadays with social media, you know, all that stuff.
Brent:Yeah. I was always known as a weirdo. Still, you know, still am. But I guess more understanding around what I am and who I am now and you know, obviously, not finding out all these kind of things till I was 32 and really not connecting the dots the last couple years, so I'm only I always will be known as weird the weirdo that did an app, I'm sure there's or, you know, when I was in Vancouver, you know, the day before the playoff game, I used to play Dallas, and, you know, game one, you know, I've had three herniated discs in my back, and my daughter dropped a cracker, you know, I was holding her, and she was, you know, six months old or something, and I bent over and threw my back out, so. Oh, boy.
Brent:You know, picking up a cracker, so that's, you know, I'm known in Vancouver as, you know, I'm sure you can go on, there's there's many crackers on eBay selling right now.
Scott:Original cracker. You know,
Brent:300 discs, you just turn the wrong way, no matter what you're doing. It just goes, so Yeah, definitely, kids are obviously ruthless, but I'm always knowing if, you know, what I am and, you know, who I am. Long, gray eyes, get called on, you know, greasy hair. I I, you know, things I was called for.
Jamie:Well, I'm assuming the chirping was probably very similar back then, right, than it is today. I'm assuming that hasn't changed a whole lot.
Brent:You know, I I think chirping was way worse now, right, because guys guys are always, you know, obviously, very different now. You go back in the day, you know, you had the Bob Probirds and Yeah. You know, the Chasers and, you know, the Twisters and, you know, Grimsons and those guys that that
Scott:Kosher.
Brent:Would have put your head in the, you know, in next year. Now, obviously, the game doesn't have that. You know? There's a few tough guys, you know, in the league, but there used to be two or three on every single team and Mhmm. You know, here's you know, when I was my first game for Vancouver, first NHL game was in Chicago.
Brent:You know, obviously come full circle and I'm on the starting lineup and I look across and there's Bob Polberg, I'm like, shit, I'm gonna die in my first NHL game. At least I got an NHL game under my belt so my parents could be happy.
Jamie:I don't
Brent:think the turf is quite the way it is. Right.
Scott:Did you drop him that first game?
Brent:Oh, god, no. I was trying to run away, just as far away as
Jamie:I can.
Brent:I can't say I blame you. Oh my god. Yo, he was he was a killer, but he could play. Yeah. Wow.
Scott:Yeah. Wow. So one of the most talented, like, enforcers that, you know, that you've come across?
Brent:Yeah. Obviously, I think, you know, he had one or one or two thirty goal seasons, I I believe, in Detroit. You know. Mhmm. You know, at the same time, he just beat yeah.
Brent:You know, he he he had the whole package, right? One scary dude where he could put the puck in the net and, you know, that doesn't exist now, right? The game's, you know, very different, obviously, you you go and tow drag through the middle back in the day, you get Scott Stephens.
Jamie:Yeah, you're not gonna get up, yeah, exactly.
Brent:You know, now, it's, I don't wanna, know, I don't wanna hit you, or, you know, so, the game's changed to, you know, just a tad bit.
Jamie:Do you think you could play in today's game, Brent?
Brent:God, no.
Jamie:No? Don't think so? No. Why? Lack of skill, lack of skating?
Jamie:What do you think? Or But
Brent:both of them, you know. My obviously, my speed was never there, right? You know, I get up and down the ice, but it, you know, it wasn't the way it is and, you know, back when I play, there's a lot of, you know, stopping starting. There's lot of, you know, I played in the hooking. I played with the I played in the air of no red, you know, when there was a red line.
Scott:Right. So
Brent:my first NHL goal was tied in a one one tie. Oh, there you go. Yeah. Alright. So that's how far back, you know.
Brent:I go off to the skill. The speed and the skill is elite right now. But, you know, you talk about youth and everybody wants to do their one on ones, but what I watch is everybody can shoot and everybody can skate. The biggest portion that's missing now, kids don't make it, is the little details. Like what?
Brent:Yeah. You know, stick Stick angling, you know, giving goes. Right? Though those little details in the game, I want to take it and hold right. Okay.
Brent:What's where we are? Where am I on the ice? What's the time of the game? What's in front of me? Do I have guys changing?
Brent:Can I chip to myself? Right? Dumping it. Let's dump it with a purpose. You know, you just lay it in there so so the demon can go with it.
Brent:Not putting it in soft in the corner on the yellow. So I'm going back there. Yo, I'm gonna take, you know, I'm gonna be eating the glass because it's it's laying in there. It's putting checker. It's, you know, coming across support, where's his stick?
Brent:You know, am I in his front pocket or his back pocket? If he's, you know, all these little things that coaches don't teach, they don't know and that's that's the missing part. They all can go up and down. They all can toe drag. They all can shoot.
Brent:But does that translate into the details, you know, of of the game and, you know, a d to d positioning wise, where where are you? Are you outside the dots? What's in front of you? Where are your shoulders? Where, you know, so all those little things, you know, in front of that, you know, if you're boxing out two two guys across as a double screen, you never want a double screen because the goalie can't look around you.
Brent:You know, it's being in front. The demon always wants to be in front. You always want the guy behind you and tight against you because, you know, then you tie up a stick and you push him back in the goalie. Now, he hits the goalie, so it's goalie interference, but now you're fronting the puck. Now, you're on the offensive side.
Brent:Right? Now, you know, it's like, so all those little details are the biggest portion of the details of the game that that I've seen, that I've watched, you know, watch hockey and and coach hockey. It's I only coach the details. I only teach the details. I've never teach taught a a stickhand in class or any of that because they all can do it.
Brent:Can you do the little details?
Scott:So and then that's such a great point, and and I do wonder often when I speak to people, like and we don't always talk about it, but, you know, when when did, you know, whoever it is we're talking to, when did you really immerse yourself in those details? Like, at what point in time did that become important to either your role or the team that you are on? Because there are so many little things, and there's the amount of things you have to process, like, so quickly and just have muscle memory on them, like, all those all those things. But for you, were was any of what you had just described, like, things that did come much easier to you in terms of picking up on those details?
Brent:Yeah. Because of my dyslexia. Right? Because how my brain processes. Right?
Brent:So go back to my earlier point, I can see, you know, a kid stick played here and you know, in you know, a degree down the road down, you know, down the ice. Right? So is that stick on puck, you know, is it really stick on puck or is it kind of half on stick on puck? Well, if it's only half stick on puck for an example, I can still, you know, the guy still can make the play. Right?
Brent:So it's those those little details is why I based my game around. That was the only reason why I stayed so long is that I could do those details. I could see those details. I could see those details quicker. Obviously, dyslexics, my spatial awareness.
Brent:Right? That's part of dyslexia. Right? Knowing where on the ice and what's on the ice and what's around you. Like, you know, I started the career off, you know, off power play guy.
Brent:Right? I my most was 42 points, but I ended up as a PK guy in the end, so blocking shots. Mhmm. I knew where I was in the lane. There's a difference between, you know, kinda in the lane or faking the lane.
Brent:Right? You gotta know where you are on the face. Right. You know, game of you know, it's not a gain of inches. Right?
Brent:It's Game
Jamie:of a million years. Yeah. Right.
Brent:You know, it's and everybody equates that to scoring. I never do. It's is your stick in the lane? Do you tip the puck? Or do you stop it?
Brent:Or do you stop it? Or do you make the guy make a bad pass where he doesn't want to be, and you don't even touch it? Mhmm. So, stick's in the right position. You made him make a play that he doesn't wanna make.
Jamie:Right.
Brent:That's still a great job.
Jamie:Yeah. Mhmm. And it doesn't show up on the score sheet.
Brent:Doesn't show up on the score sheet. Most coaches But
Jamie:wins games.
Brent:Right? 100%, you know. Like, when I was coaching mates, you know, I I had five practices with one stick one one hand on their stick.
Scott:Well, the whole time.
Brent:I wanted them to push the puck, you know, push the puck, right? No stick handling. Yeah. Second ball, stick position. Stick on puck.
Brent:I was teaching at at at five. I was teaching hitting at five. Right? Those are the details. Parents still come to me today when when I see them somewhere, they call my my son or daughter, because, you know, I had girls on the team.
Brent:They angle the best. Well, I worked on angling. Uh-huh. I worked on stick on puck. Worked on finishing the checks.
Brent:I had pat you know, gym mats Velcroed to the boards. They'd angle from buying that stick on puck right right into the boards. Right? Right. Going through the stick, going stick on puck.
Brent:Right? Those those little details are habits they'll have for the rest of your lives, but those are the details, you know, you're going in there and somebody's got your stick in the air. Like most coaches would never do that. I've seen coaches yelling, I could hear them yelling, they're like, two hands are your stick, should never have two hands are stick except for when you have the puck. Because if your stick's in the air, you're you're opening up the passing lane anywhere you are.
Jamie:Yeah. So it's gotta be on the ice.
Brent:Yeah. Puck's going faster than you are. Yeah. So no matter where you are, you should always have your stick stick on puck. Right?
Brent:So if you're in front of that, with a forward or d man, whatever it is, should never be up up here. I do. But to be honest with you, I've been ran out of the game. You know, was running a program here, and I was told every day how stupid I was, and I have no idea how to play hockey.
Jamie:By the people that were running the youth organization?
Brent:By parents.
Jamie:Oh, who gives a shit what they say?
Brent:Well, you know, and then I got I ended up getting fired because I'm like, I'm here to develop. I wanna develop kids. Yeah. Right? And my my drills are one two because my brain only processes one two.
Brent:I can't go here and then flip and do my brain doesn't work that way. But at the end of the day, are they developing?
Jamie:That's all that matters. We all
Brent:wanna go to one to 10. But is that reality? Right. And I'm one to two, and for me, I would never leave one till we got two, and I'd never leave two till we get to three. Right?
Brent:Because I gotta build a foundation. How do you build a house? Roof down? Or the foundation up? And parents are like, this is dumb and they're not moving fast enough.
Brent:You don't know what you're doing. So I I've kind of removed myself from the game because my mental health being told you're dumb can only last for, you know, for so long when you you see it, you know it, and and they don't.
Jamie:You know, it's funny. What sounds dumb is a parent not wanting their kid to learn how to play the game from an NHL veteran. That's dumb. And that's like, that's that's not that's so fucking dumb, I don't even know what to say right now. Like,
Brent:mean I started meeting my wife now. She's like I told her this when we first started dating because I was already coding. She's like, she come to games and parents are screaming. The things have gone on. Like, I I don't know what to say.
Brent:And when I tell these stories, people think, you know, I'm I'm lying, but no. They no. I'm I want to be able to flip the puck and I wanna do the Michigan. Okay. How many Michigan's do you do a year?
Brent:Zero. So why am I gonna work on that? How many times are you gonna flip up the puck and cut through the mill? Zero. Okay.
Brent:Why am I gonna work on it? Yeah. No. How many times are you gonna come across and chip it to yourself? All the time.
Brent:So, we're gonna work on that. Right. I wasn't the flashy guy, know, you know, still still not a good looking dude and my game wasn't good looking, but the dude, the But it worked. Details. Yeah.
Brent:The details are to me are so important because when a kid gets it, you see a smile. Mhmm. He figures it out.
Jamie:Oh, God. I got it.
Scott:Yeah. Right.
Brent:And their face lights up, and they're like, oh, this is amazing. I can do it. Now we can go on.
Jamie:Right. Yeah.
Scott:Yeah. Yeah. My son so I brought him to play a pickup game the other morning, playing on the weekends. It's an early game. And we're out on the ice, and he decided it was actually really funny.
Scott:He he told me, he's like, dad, I wanna play against you today. Okay. He hasn't played against me yet. I said, I wanna play against you. I'm like, yeah.
Scott:Why is that? And he said, because usually on the other team, on the dark team in the morning, there's a guy that played in the in the coast. And so he goes, I wanna play with the guy from the you know, played in the coast because like, he's got all these details dialed in.
Jamie:It's like,
Scott:it's unreal. So funny enough, so this guy's name is Scott also, and and he decided to go light. So he was wearing a white jersey. I said, are you gonna change? And my son's like, no.
Scott:So he's playing against me, and I'm way bigger than he is. But
Brent:we're playing, and I pick up
Scott:the puck along the wall, and and he he was coming to you know, I play defense, and and he's playing wing. And I was picking a puck along the half wall, and dude angled me off the puck. I swear to god, like, position I would always tell I swear to god, dude. And I always say, I said and this was after, like, he tried to get the puck for me, and I kinda just left. I I, you know, I put my leading leg out just to kinda shield the puck, and he bounced right off of me, and I think he was pissed.
Scott:He So was like, come in to get me, you know? No. But he for real angled me off. I'm like, dude, you see, that's position before possession, bro. Like, you know, like, that those are the things that you need to do more often,
Brent:you know? Mhmm. Anyway, it was it
Scott:was great to see. But, yeah, like, details, like, when you do see kids starting to get it, know you said, like, when you see a kid get it, they light up. But also as, like, a teacher and educator, like, I I used to coach my kids' team, but when you see kids start to grasp ideas, you know, it's it's also it's really rewarding.
Brent:100%. And
Jamie:Yeah.
Brent:You know, as an analyst, you go and tell me 15 things. I don't remember them. Mhmm. You know, little wins, you know, I'd rather hit 3,000 singles in baseball than, you know, couple 100 home runs. Yeah.
Brent:Sure. The little the little wins add up so quickly Mhmm. And so much more on kids and youth development and teams and so, like, simple thing is talking on the ice. Like, I coached mites, every single day we started practice. Hi, my name is Brent.
Brent:Hi, my name is Jamie. Hi, my name so everybody had to call for the puck. Mhmm.
Jamie:Right. And they
Brent:get so excited when they do it. So you give them the simple tasks, they do it and oh my God, we got it. We got it. We did it. We did it.
Brent:Oh, I did it. Hey, coach. Right? Yo. That's what it's all about.
Brent:Right. Instead of beating them down, right, and trying to go to 10 and do, you know, so it's those little things add up quickly and then you see the parents like, oh, my kid's smiling. I'm buckling my kids. I don't remember, you're buckling your kids in the car seat with their sippy cups still. Leaving happy.
Brent:Yeah. And that was my only goal. Fun is the number one thing. Yeah. You have fun, you get self esteem, you stay around.
Brent:You hate it, you're getting yelled at. You're not staying around. Yeah. You're not doing the extra work because it's not fun, you know, it's like sitting in roofing nails, we don't wanna do that. But if we're having fun and
Scott:Do you know what learning feels like?
Brent:Oh, yeah.
Scott:I'm sitting
Brent:at roofing nails. I've never heard of that. That was my twelve years of school, sitting at
Jamie:roofing nails
Brent:every day.
Scott:Oh, God.
Brent:Brent, can you read in front of the class? Oh, yeah. Brent, you know, what's this say? You know? Yeah.
Brent:And dyslexic, when we read out loud, words will appear in the period, so I'm saying the wrong words and kids like, oh, you're dumb and stupid. I'm, you know, I remember one biology. I'm like, fuck you, I'm gonna beat the shit,
Jamie:you know? That's right.
Brent:And I still live a day, you know, I still think about it today. Right? And that's, those scars add up for kids and that's kinda Yeah. Why the fun and self esteem for me, you know, in the in the coaching world, you know, is so important because at the end the day, never want a kid to feel the way I do every day. Mhmm.
Brent:If I can do that, you know, I've succeeded in leaving this world in a better place.
Scott:Can I'll coach you.
Jamie:So I was just gonna say, so we're we're talking a little bit kind of touching on, like, youth hockey parents and youth hockey, right? What would you say before you stopped, you know, stopped coaching, but I'm sure you still have a pretty good idea. What would you say is the biggest mistake that youth parents are making today? Besides not wanting their kid to be coached by an NHL veteran Stanley Cup player, but other than that
Brent:They they need to play two sports, Two or three sports, you know, till they're 12, 13, 14. Right. You know, one, what's the stat? Seventy percent of kids quit before they're 13. Uh-huh.
Brent:You know, and and you talk about, you know, know, on the mental side of the game, you know, for me, when I when I played, whenever I finished, I was done. You know, I went to the gym, I worked out for a couple months, but I didn't go on the ice for a couple months. I need a mental break. You go to work sometime remembering that you needed that vacation, the mental break from that vacation, you know, from the from work on that vacation.
Jamie:Yeah.
Brent:So what do you do with your sport? Right. The repetitiveness. Right? It it's a grind, you know.
Brent:It ends up not being so much physically. Like physically, what I did in my body is fine, but it's the mental side. But you got as a kid, go play baseball or soccer. There's other skills, right? There's other muscles that you're not developing.
Brent:You can only develop the same muscles over and over again. Right? So it's put them in a second sport, you know, and play. You know, for me, I I played softball, you know, fast pitch, you know, obviously, girls college has it. We never we we didn't have baseball or in Saskatoon where I grew up.
Brent:It was you know, we had tournaments and Right. I was pitching at 80 miles an hour. Was fast. It was different message. Right?
Brent:I was running that conditioning. Right? Developing different muscles and strengths, and, I got my way mind away from the game, but when I went back, I was rejuvenated, I was excited to be there, but I just worked out all summer long because I was practicing, I was running, I was playing, but it was just different muscles. Now, if you play one sport your whole life, can you really be called an athlete?
Scott:Yeah. It's a good point. Interesting question.
Jamie:Yeah. It's a very good point. I mean, yeah. I would say no, right? You're not you're definitely not well rounded, that's for sure.
Brent:Yeah. You know, I think that might be a better way of you're not a well rounded athlete.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah.
Brent:Exactly. You may be an athlete, but you're not a rounded athlete.
Jamie:Yeah, not even a little bit. Matter of fact, we it's funny, we had somebody on God, it was probably a year ago. He was a hockey dad, and I think Scott, remember Chris Volmer, I think he said something to the effect of, like and the kids were like 11 or 12 at the time, and he's like, You see these kids when they get off the ice, they really don't know how to run the right way. Right? Because they don't run, they skate all the time.
Jamie:Right? Remember that, Scott? You know, It's a shame, you know? We talk all the time, you know, we have college coaches on, you know, and you ask them, you know, like, what they want when they're looking for kids, what they're looking for. Junior coaches, what are you looking for?
Jamie:They want athletes. Right? That's what they want.
Brent:And, you know, parents love, like, you got a coach, you know, obviously, I'm in Chicago, I've got a guy who puts on the microphone, he puts 60 kids on the ice, and he's like, I was a ref, never played the game. Right? Bowling the whistle, this. You had 60 kids there, you never cracked them, so you're wasting your money.
Jamie:See that all the time. All the time.
Brent:You know, and here in Chicago, there's there's people you're just wasting money. Yep. Because they're not getting better. They're not getting coached. You're getting you know, so why wouldn't they go play a soccer or why wouldn't they go play baseball?
Brent:Why wouldn't you go you already get more out of it than being on the ice and all these camps. You're getting, like, doing a camp here and there, no problem at all. Right? It's when you're on the ice four, five, and eight, the the spring hockey, and you don't get better in games.
Jamie:No. Not even a little bit. I say it all the time. I it all the time.
Brent:I'm get better practice, so why I'm gonna join this spring team, or I'm gonna spring this tournament, and Yep. We're gonna do Yep. For what? It ends up being for the parents so they can drink. Well, it's intrusive.
Scott:Or to put like another live vicariously through their kids or just put that feather in their cap that they think means something at the time, but ultimately ultimately, it doesn't.
Brent:And I think the sham of they see the financial benefit. Right. My son's gonna, you know, make it to the NHL. Okay. Maybe.
Brent:My son is or daughter is gonna get a college scholarship. Do you want? Now, look at the numbers. You know, you're talking about when you start going pro, you're talking about the world now. Yeah.
Brent:Right. Yeah. Even in college. Not just your area. Junior.
Brent:High school is now. Jersey. Yeah. Right. Or Minnesota or here in Illinois.
Brent:But we're talking the world now. Right. There's less than, you know, like, less than 1% or 1% ever make it. So he he or she's gonna sign, you know, obviously, the p w h l, you know, in the NHL, you know, you got Carlson's on 80 my son's gonna make $80,000,000, and he's gonna pay for them.
Jamie:Good luck with that one. That's what you're hanging your hat on. Might as well start going to play the lottery. Yeah. Right?
Brent:Your return on your ROI your ROI Yeah. Yeah. Is is not very good. No. Your return on investment is not, you know, is not good.
Brent:It's so I think a lot of that is is that portion of it. You know, if I invest this money in my kid, they're gonna make it. Well, I hear, you know, all the time, I I just want my son or daughter to get a college scholarship. Again, you're dealing with the world. Yeah.
Brent:Yeah. Now, you wanna go d one? Do they have the grades? Right. People always ask me, hey, did you go to college?
Brent:College of hard knocks. Right? I wasn't smart, I could barely write my name down. Right? So and that now has become biggest business ever.
Brent:So, are they making that? Again, they may be the best 12 year old, still living, still going home in the booster seat, great. What does that do? Have they hit puberty? Yeah.
Brent:How's their mindset? When they go away, are they okay? Mhmm. Lot of things happen there, you know. Great.
Brent:I hope your kid does. I hope your kid does make indenture. But the what if? Right.
Scott:Yeah. Me let me ask you a question, and something that keeps on coming up throughout this conversation is the the idea of self esteem. And you talked a lot about making sure to, you know, like, it's you know, with enough, you know, a negative feedback, you know, right, like, that cup that cup lessons, it empties, and then it needs to get filled back up. That that process of filling it back up, like, for you, was there anything in particular, like, you're kinda go to that would that would, like, help start to rebuild that foundation? Know, I I I know a lot of what we've talked about today and tonight, you know, is is definitely through the lens of, like, ADHD, etcetera.
Scott:But there's also plenty of people, and we had a conversation with an NHLer a couple weeks ago who also talked about a mental spiral and how it's hard to get hard to get out of it. Right? So I know that it might be different for people that have certain disabilities, but even for those that don't, you know, like, kinda what were some of your tools to to start filling back up that self esteem cup?
Brent:Yeah. I know a 100%, you know, and again, obviously, I always take a look at it, focus from obviously, with learning skills because that's what that's what I live. Yeah.
Scott:Of course.
Brent:Every single day. Totally. You know, then, you know, and we all struggle, you know. Yeah. I think if we all stood in a circle and threw our problems in the middle, we jumped to grab our problems because there's plenty worse out there and
Scott:Good point.
Jamie:Very well said.
Brent:It's finding out it's finding out what what you love and you know, hockey was the only thing for me because the only thing I was good at. And that's so why, you know, I you know, a harp kind of on that fun and self esteem because I was the only thing I was good at. Right? You know, some kids love reading. Cool read.
Brent:Awesome. Some kids are chest or, you know, and I think the big one now is video games. For a lot of kids with learning disabilities, video games aren't video games. Video games are self esteem. Mhmm.
Brent:Interesting. They're good at it.
Jamie:It's so fucking true. My kid is the my kid is such a good example of that. It's unbelievable. It's the one place where he can go, where he's good at it, and he it's mindless.
Brent:Right. Yeah. You know, and mindless for, you know, for me is, you know, turn on TV. My wife's like, didn't know golf was played this much because I'll turn on golf and nothing else because I know I can just watch it and not wonder what's next. I'll never turn on a new TV show because now I'm like, okay, how do I what's coming next?
Brent:What's coming next? You know, and that's how I live my life is how do I have to get my live meeting? How do I get around this next thing? What what's gonna come up where I gotta zigzag? Never is a straight line for me.
Brent:So so you can just hear the anxiety of all that. Right? You know, it's so for me, it's like turn on golf and
Jamie:It unwinds
Brent:you. Video games. Yeah. You know, again, it's and and it can be for you've got to know your kid. You don't have to have learnings as Bill.
Brent:I just use that. You know, they're good at it. Now, find other things they may, you know, again, chess or or whatever it is for me and that's why, you know, it was only hockey because I struggle so badly for so long, you know, being dyslexic, not finding out till I was 32 and told I was dumb and stupid and what's wrong with you my whole life, right? So my stories that you know, have your impact, you know, from that that that side of it but it's what is it? You instead know, of curl, you know, knitting, obviously, not gonna be knitting, but is it, you know, is it making bracelets?
Brent:Is it whatever that is? Find it and know it and use it. You know, none of us want to stuff, you know, you know, if your wife came and started stuffing food down your mouth that you didn't like, you'd be pissed. Same thing as kid. If you're stuffing that game or that axe down their throat, are they enjoying it?
Brent:Same, you know, same kind of concept. Right. So it's learning your kid whatever that ends up being. There's no right or wrong. It's just learning it.
Scott:So so now now that you're the game is behind you, I know that you were saying earlier that, I guess, maybe the last eleven years have been has been challenging in terms of, like, filling that void. Is there any anything in particular that, like, you like, newfound pleasures, enjoyment that, like, post playing that you're, like, really into now?
Brent:Yeah. You know, it's my foundation. Your foundation. It's it's everything to me. My phone's on, so I go, said earlier, I gave, you know, Donald Scott my number, he called me.
Brent:Yeah. Asked me questions. Yeah. It's the one thing I know. Right?
Brent:Mhmm. Again, goes back to I know this area. I'm a professional in this area because I've lived there for forty nine years. Right? So Right.
Brent:I've had so many negative things happen to me, but I don't I don't say that negatively because I can help anybody. So, you know, I've been sober almost ten years. I got a month away If I make it, you know, ten years sober, right? I've had so many things to me. Helping people is everything to me.
Brent:You know, how can I help you? You know, I check-in on people, you know, the foundation is my purpose and that's where I get my cup is is, you know, having these conversations because I know somebody's gonna need it, you know, and anybody you got questions, know, know, obviously social media, reach out to me, I'll get back to you. Don't send a three page script, you know, might take a while to get back to you, but I will because I care. You know, I care about people, I care about, you know, helping anybody. So that's that's definitely what it is and I try try and golf, but, you know, I suck at that with all my with all my injuries, so Doesn't matter.
Scott:As long
Jamie:as you enjoy, who gives a shit what your score is, right?
Brent:I enjoy it because I hit it hit it good every once in a while, man. Yeah, God. And it keeps you coming back.
Jamie:Fuck it. I know. It's a fucking it's addicting, isn't it? It's the worst game in the world. Then you hit that one ball, you're like, goddamn it.
Jamie:You're like, why can't I do this every time? But it keeps you coming back.
Brent:Right. Right. You know, it's you know, and that's why I love watching it too. Obviously, I know how hard it is and I know how the little details that go into it, it goes back, know, here we are talking about details again, you know, guess details in a company, if you own a company, you need to know all the details. Need to know how this knot works.
Brent:I need to, you know, same thing in in hockey and so But back to the point is, foundation is is my my cup of tea and that's it's what I do every day, it's it's my purpose that I get up and and go to bed too and, you know, knowing how anybody, mental health and addiction and learning disorders, I've got them all and I'm willing to help anybody I can, however I can.
Jamie:Speaking of, where where can everybody find you, bro?
Brent:Yeah. Obviously, on on all over social media, you know, Instagram and Facebook, you know, Sopel Foundation Instagram page or or Brent Sopel, you know, here in Chicago, but obviously social media reach out anytime. I'll always try and get back to you. I will always get back to you at some point in time. It's just sometimes it takes a little bit longer for me to read, you know, go through things and read things and understand what people are saying because my process of it, but, you know, feel free to reach out.
Brent:I'll always do what I can.
Scott:That's amazing. And and listen, I yeah. And thank you so much for doing all that you do. And and, you know, just like you had talked earlier about, like, number of people that have, you know, similar similar disabilities, you know, this conversation I'm sure is gonna be, you know, well received by a lot of families. So thank you so much for doing what you do to help people out.
Scott:It's it's really it's a gift.
Brent:Yes. It is. Yeah. No. I appreciate you guys having me on.
Brent:This is me, Blob, and I was here, you know, to help anytime. Know, willing to jump on anytime because if I can help one kid, you know, as I relate in my foundation, you know, one tagline is you're not alone, the other one's the kid in the chair. You know? Mhmm. I'm looking to help any kid in the chair.
Brent:He can't get to two till he get to one. Right.
Scott:Yeah. Amazing stuff. Brent, thank you so much. This was unreal.
Jamie:Awesome conversation.
Brent:Appreciate it. Thanks.
Scott:Good. Alright, everybody. Welcome back from our interview with Brent Sopel. Alright, guy. That was interesting.
Scott:I mean
Jamie:Different than than anything we've had on to date.
Scott:Without a doubt. Yeah. And and you know, the the part that I don't wanna say that I like the most, but just talking about a player's self esteem. Right? And Huge.
Scott:It doesn't take dyslexia for people to feel down on themselves, you know, or any of the other challenges Awesome. That Brent had. And but I just think hearing him talk about how Yeah. How challenging things were for him and like if he can get past that stuff, you know, it is certainly not easy. But it's just let him be an example of someone who's like, you know, been able to get through Correct.
Scott:All of these things and then, you know
Jamie:And make it to the pinnacle.
Scott:A 100%. And he didn't even realize. Right? Like, you know, for like he he like he said, he only started connecting some of these dots like after he
Jamie:When he was much older.
Scott:After he finished playing.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah. So know, it's funny. He, you he kept saying, you know, he kept saying something to the effect of like, forgot how he put it. But he kept saying like, you know, like, when I was younger, like, I had so many challenges.
Jamie:Right? Like, you know, like, he kept saying like the kids were making fun of him when he was younger. Right? Something about his reading and stuff like that. But I have to tell you, that probably I mean, Everything shapes you.
Jamie:Right? And that shaped him into the man he is today. Right? And now he has had, you know, a successful NHL career at the highest level of the sport that he plays. Know, and now he's, you know, helping other kids deal with the stuff that he maybe didn't didn't know to deal with as a kid but knows now that he's an adult.
Jamie:Right? I mean, as far as I'm concerned, that's a success. Yeah. Like you don't get much more successful in life than that. No.
Jamie:I mean, that's phenomenal.
Scott:No way.
Jamie:And like I said, he had a long NHL career.
Scott:Long NHL career. And and he figured his way. But for but like yourself
Jamie:He figured it out.
Scott:But like for yourself and other families that have a clearer understanding of
Jamie:Clearer, I
Scott:mean. Clearer of like what their child's going through. But like, you know, it's it's an opportunity. Like, you can have these con you can have conversations with coaches, and you can say like, you know, just give them a heads up. Like, this is this is part of my son's story, and these are the way he learns best.
Scott:And if you see this happening, don't immediately think it's, you know, not paying attention or goofing off. Like there are some challenges there. And, you know, look at at the younger ages, coaches, you know, the the the having a parent come to them with that, I think would go a long way in in in helping, you know, that kid's development.
Jamie:Listen, I I have been doing it since Dominic was a squirt.
Brent:Yep.
Jamie:You know, when we would like when we changed teams after his last my year, you know, I went to the coach and I said, listen, like this is the story and I've done it to date.
Scott:And what what are some of the things that coaches in response have done to help Dom along the way?
Jamie:Well listen, think some understand more than others.
Scott:Fair.
Jamie:Right? You know, but I'm gonna give them the full picture because one thing my wife said when Dominic was younger is she did not and and he and in school, she did not want him to and so obviously sports too but school is kinda really the main focus. You know, she didn't want him to be labeled as a behavior problem.
Scott:Mhmm.
Jamie:Right? Which most of these kids do get labeled as.
Scott:Right. Yeah. Right.
Jamie:Right. They can't sit still or like they're doing like a math problem and they get frustrated because they because they maybe they learn a little different. They need a little more time. Right? Mhmm.
Jamie:You know, so these kids get pegged with a certain label. Not all but a lot a lot I would say. And so I and the two of us have been very forward when Dominic is playing, you know, and Dominic has gotten better as he's gotten older. Don't get me wrong. Right?
Jamie:But he still has the ADHD still breaks through, but I'm very open and honest with coaches.
Scott:Yeah. Of course.
Jamie:And I tell them upfront like this is what you're getting, and if you don't want it, no problem. Right. Luckily he's a good player. Yeah. You know, so they kinda take, you know you know, take the good with the bad.
Jamie:And again, he's not bad. Don't get me wrong.
Scott:No. Know. I just thought I surprised
Jamie:you were saying that. I'm telling our listeners, but listen, does Dominic have trouble paying attention sometimes? Yeah. Yeah. He does.
Jamie:Yeah. You know, you know, like you know, like Brent said in in our interview, you know, he's like, if you ask me to go upstairs and brush my teeth, clean my room, and do this and do that, he's like, I'm probably only gonna do one of them.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:You know, so you need to be very specific.
Scott:About what you need and not to give too much. Correct.
Jamie:Because too much is like overload.
Brent:Right.
Jamie:Right? You know, so Dominic and Dominic is also he is he knows what's going on with him. Mhmm. Right? And he's so he's aware of it.
Jamie:And he he focuses really hard on which maybe some kids don't have to focus so hard on. Mhmm. But he focuses really hard on paying attention, you know? Which is not something that a kid without ADHD like, they have to pay attention, but these kids have to pay more attention.
Scott:It's not something they have to think about.
Jamie:Right. They really have to use a lot of brain power to try to focus. Right. Right? It's hard.
Jamie:Listen, it's not easy. So yeah. So we're very You're talking about communication. We're very open and honest about when we come to a new team and say, hey listen, this is the story. This is the situation.
Jamie:And most of the I've never heard a coach go, listen, that's not gonna work.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Right? I've yet to encounter that. I don't think I'm gonna ever encounter that.
Brent:Right.
Jamie:Maybe some people do and I'm sorry if you do. It just means go find another team.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Right? But you know, I'm open and honest. So they know the situation, so they can take appropriate kind of steps.
Scott:Yeah. You know? Yeah. And it's great that he's made himself available to talk to Dom and continue to be a sounding board like you said earlier.
Jamie:Listen, he's I think he said it in our in our interview, he's very open with people. I mean, if you have a a problem or you wanna talk to him, reach out to him. Yeah. He's very available. Yeah.
Jamie:You know, and he he like like you said, his mission is to try to help kids
Scott:Right.
Jamie:That that go that are going through something that or that he still goes through on a daily basis. Right. You know, so he if he can shed any light, if he could help I mean, again, he's a phenomenal Sandy boy for my child. Right? Because my kid's been looking forever for somebody that is like him.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Right? And has made it to the to the high levels.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:You know, and and and he found Brent and now they kinda correspond back and forth and he's been great for
Brent:him.
Scott:Yeah. No. That's unreal. I I know part of what he wants to do in terms of like, you know, when he's coached and coached in the younger ages, just coach in ways that that really help me ensure that the kids are understanding Right. Like, you know, what what the goals are, what he's trying to accomplish.
Scott:And, you know, it's not always a one size fits all model, and he's a great example of someone that just needed a different size. Know? And he's trying and he's and he's working really hard to give that back and pay it forward. So, you know, just just a great great guy.
Jamie:Yes. He is. I I think I think that we have a lot of I know we have a lot of parents that listen to us because I've talked to a bunch of you. You guys you've reached out to me. We have a bunch of parents that listen who have kids with ADHD.
Jamie:So I hope that this helps, you know, kinda shed a little bit of light on some stuff. And and Brent is there, you know, if if if if you guys need to reach out and and he will help He's fantastic.
Scott:Good stuff, dude. Yeah. Alright. Alright. So what any what else in the world of hockeying, you know, where we already talked about the seasons upon us.
Scott:We
Jamie:have Yeah.
Scott:Otto starting to skate next week. Anything I'm trying to even think like NHL wise. What's what's new NHL wise? Anything that we haven't spoken about?
Jamie:You mentioned
Scott:NHL. Apparently, Jack Hughes and Tate McCray have broken up.
Jamie:So I saw something like that the other day. Apparently. I I thought that's what that was. I didn't read it, but I kinda glanced by it. I'm assuming that I assumed that's it was.
Jamie:Mean, not surprised. You know, so it's so funny that you asked that because I'm on nhl.com and there's a thing they did like a feature on the devils.
Scott:Yep.
Jamie:Right?
Scott:With Sunny.
Brent:What With Sunny
Jamie:made up. Sunny they talk about Sunny, the GM. But it says, you know, Hughes' ability to stay on the ice. Goal tending among questions for Devils.
Scott:A 100%. A 100% it is. Yeah. We'll see.
Jamie:Is I mean, remind me, is Jake Allen the number one goalie now?
Scott:I think so. I mean, Marksham's gone.
Jamie:Marksham's gone. Did they bring any or are they gonna bring up, like
Scott:But don't they have a Russian goalie that was at?
Jamie:From the b u.
Scott:From b u. Gorgiev.
Jamie:However you
Scott:say something like that. Yeah. I think that's true.
Brent:I mean
Jamie:to come up?
Scott:I don't know. It's it's hard. It's it's a hard job, like, so I know from b u there, Drew Kameso, he's he's in the Blackhawk system, and he's been in the Blackhawk system. I think he might have started playing the year before Bedard.
Jamie:Okay.
Scott:So maybe this is gonna be his but this is Bedard's fourth year.
Jamie:I wanna say fourth.
Scott:Fourth, so maybe it's his fifth year, and he's he's come up and down as as Chicago has not been great. And he was he was, you know, in recent memory, one of the better goalies that I think BU has had. Yeah. This kid's phenomenal, by the way. Komeso?
Scott:No. Oh, but this other kid that they brought they brought up, and he when they brought him up, it was like they they weren't they he came up, I think, like, mid season.
Jamie:He came from the USHL, I think. He came up mid season.
Scott:That's correct. In USHL. And,
Jamie:like, was a stud all of a sudden.
Scott:So who knows? But I'm just all I'm saying is that, like, he's he hasn't been around the block yet. You know?
Jamie:So No. He hasn't.
Scott:This is
Jamie:I'm assuming Allen's gonna be the number one.
Scott:I'm assuming.
Jamie:Unless they do something trade wise. You know? Well, our buddy Evan Rodriguez was in that trade, in the market trade.
Scott:What any did anything shake out with Hella Buck? Because he he's not moving anymore. Right? You mean combining them? Correct.
Scott:You've now made a new one? Yeah. Yes. That's like ginormous.
Jamie:Right. It's
Scott:like ginormous.
Jamie:It's like ginormous. Yes. That's what I do sometime with my
Scott:Yeah. So I think it looks like Jake Allen's expected to see major share of early action.
Jamie:Yeah. I would think so. Yeah. And listen. The Devils I mean, listen.
Jamie:For I hope they're good, but Jack has to stay healthy. Right? Like, we always talk about every beginning of every season. And we'll do, like, we'll do, like, an NHL. You know, we'll we'll we'll do our we'll do our Stanley Cup champion who we think is gonna make the playoffs, you know, as the season gets closer.
Jamie:But I'm not gonna lie. I'm really excited for college hockey.
Scott:Okay. Like, I am really excited for college What about college hockey is getting you excited?
Jamie:Just everything. I I love college sports. Not that I don't like, you know, pro as pro as well, but I love I love college
Scott:sports. Okay. But what particularly about I mean, like, is there is there something about BC that you're stoked about? Is it
Jamie:Just college in general. Princeton, BC, you know, the college game to me Yeah. Is I wanna say more exciting, right? Because I don't think exciting is the right word, but there's like a I wanna say a purity in it because now they're getting paid too. Right?
Jamie:So it's a little different than it used to be. But again, but these kids are trying to make the pinnacle of their sport.
Scott:Right.
Jamie:Right? So and is it listen, could they be giving more effort than some of the pros? It's possible. I don't wanna say it to and say the pros don't give a lot of effort. Right?
Jamie:You know, but they've already made it. They're making big money. But there's plenty of guys
Scott:in the NHL that are trying to stay there. Of course. And like every night's an audition.
Jamie:There's no question about that. But there's something about the atmospheres of college ranks
Scott:Different energy.
Jamie:Student sections. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Hear fan base.
Scott:I hear you.
Jamie:There's just something about college sports to me that
Scott:That gets you going.
Jamie:Yeah.
Scott:Yeah. I hear you, man.
Jamie:Yeah. It's college football too, not just college hockey. Yep. I I love I love major college sports.
Scott:I do not watch pretty much anything but hockey.
Jamie:But you watch college hockey? I
Scott:do. Yeah. Yeah. A 100%. I'll put on BU.
Jamie:Oh, I see you.
Scott:Yeah. Without a doubt.
Jamie:Just BU or will you watch like Michigan Penn State or like
Scott:No.
Brent:I I North Dakota.
Scott:I'll watch I'll other bigger matchups.
Jamie:You will.
Scott:But I don't necessarily tune into like like non Boston or Hockey East lower matchups. Okay. You know what I mean?
Jamie:I do. Yeah. There can be some decent players
Scott:on those No. I'm not saying that.
Jamie:I'm just
Scott:I'm just saying I I don't I'm I'm not watching that much.
Jamie:I understand.
Scott:You know?
Jamie:I I I for some strange reason I gravitate toward college sports.
Scott:Yeah. Listen, it's good. And and also you have an opportunity to go and you know, you can cheer them on. It's less expensive. You go with the family, whatever the deal is.
Scott:It's a It's a little little more more accessible in some ways for sure.
Jamie:Yeah. I mean, you go to like an NFL game with four people
Scott:No, thank you.
Jamie:Your husband and wife and two kids
Scott:No, thank you.
Jamie:Or like an MLB game.
Scott:No. Oh, would go.
Jamie:Yeah. You would? You've got a Major League Baseball?
Scott:Yeah. Almost took Noah this the other day. Did you?
Jamie:Yankee Stadium?
Scott:No. I wanna go to City Field.
Jamie:Are you a Met fan?
Scott:Yes. Are you? Well, I'm not let's just put it this way. I'm not a baseball fan, but I spent because of work years ago, I spent a lot of time at City Field.
Jamie:Oh, you did.
Scott:That's right. I developed a fund forgot about that. For City Field.
Jamie:So you like City okay. You like
Scott:City
Jamie:So you're gonna take her to a MET game?
Scott:Yeah. I probably will.
Jamie:Well, MET the METs are shit now, so the tickets are tickets are really cheap.
Scott:Oh, they're not good?
Jamie:You could walk up to you could walk up to the
Scott:Were they giving money to go
Brent:in there?
Jamie:You could walk I don't think they're at that point yet.
Scott:Okay.
Jamie:But you could walk up to the ticket window probably and probably like be like, hey, listen. Give give me the cheapest seats.
Scott:And then sit.
Jamie:Could probably walk in there for and you could move down because they suck. So you could probably move down like no problem.
Scott:You wanna hear something interesting?
Jamie:You could probably sit in like $500 seats for like $20.
Scott:I'll just ask them immediately for a for a complimentary upgrade.
Jamie:Well, I don't even think you need to do that.
Scott:No. Okay.
Jamie:You savvy can about moving around stadiums.
Scott:Oh, I got you.
Jamie:Yeah. Like it's pretty easy to like bypass ushers.
Scott:Well, listen, this was interesting. When when I when I was working at Citi Field, what we would I I worked in hospitality and food and beverage
Jamie:Right.
Scott:When I was there. So it would the attendance was really important to us. Of course, it was. So but this is the thing. When they would report attend there was two different attendance numbers.
Scott:There was attend quote, unquote attendance, which usually gets broadcast over the airwaves, which is like tickets sold. Okay. Against turnstiles. Turnstiles are different number.
Jamie:Well, I'm assuming it's always lower.
Scott:It's oh, yes.
Jamie:Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Because there's season ticket holders that don't show up and don't sell their tickets.
Scott:So we would always need to ask like, you know, others the in the stadium be like, listen, we we need to understand how many people we're potentially serving. Like, what are, you know
Jamie:So would you would you find that number out after the game
Scott:Yeah. You don't know before. Okay. Yeah. But that that
Jamie:And even after the game starts, the turnstile numbers go up.
Scott:Even after the game starts, the turnstile but not enough People
Jamie:come late.
Scott:Right. Right. But like
Jamie:Not enough to make a difference.
Scott:No. Probably not enough to make it. But the the thing for us was like just because there's a few things. Like the concessions, they they would stop after like whatever the seventh inning. Stop selling beer.
Scott:Yeah. Like, just to understand, like, you know, kind of what was ahead of us.
Jamie:So and would you guys be, like, locked and loaded, like like, ingredients wise for like
Scott:Yeah.
Jamie:How does that work? I'm so I'm actually curious how that whole situation works.
Scott:Yeah. So so part is it's that's so frozen food in stadiums is is important for a reason because like, none because it just stays frozen, you use what you need. Right? So it's when you're
Jamie:I'm assuming most of it's frozen.
Scott:Oh, but not in a less and less. Right? Like, because you're having, you know, higher quality, better ingredient concessions and like, you know That's true. For us, we would have to, know, kind of forecast and then Okay. You you if you ever if it rains, you're kinda SOL for something.
Scott:You know what I mean? So like there's only so much that you can do, but part of it was understanding like, who know we looked at it interesting.
Jamie:Also, bigger match ups, who's coming to
Scott:the building? Who's coming to the building who's gonna influence attendance?
Brent:Who's pitching?
Scott:Who's pitching?
Jamie:Because Also huge.
Scott:Better pitchers are going to
Jamie:Draw more of a draw.
Scott:Well, no, not that. But listen to this, if you have a pitcher that's like striking more people out, they're gonna be going they're gonna get to the seventh inning faster. Game's gonna go faster. Sales are lower when you have high end pitching.
Jamie:Right. So as the so oh, that makes sense. So as the innings are drawn out and are longer, you guys obviously are making money. You're selling more products. Oh, that's interesting.
Jamie:So like like if you have like two aces going, like two number ones going, right? Like that theoretically should be like a low scoring, low hit game. Yep. So those innings are gonna
Brent:go Yep. Much
Jamie:That's interesting. Yeah. I'm just curious, what is was there like a normal game time like for like MLB games? Was it like three hours or like two and a half hours?
Scott:Oh, I don't remember to be honest with you. I don't. But I'm sure that statistic's available.
Jamie:And you guys would obviously sell more product as the game drags on.
Scott:Well, yeah. Because there's a concession stands open longer.
Jamie:No shit. Yeah. Isn't that interesting?
Scott:It is.
Jamie:Yeah. No shit. That's that's actually pretty cool. Yeah. Totally.
Jamie:That's neat, dude. Yeah. That's actually really cool.
Scott:Anyhow, as you go off on a tangent.
Brent:So you
Jamie:are so you were you were gonna take Noah to a Mets game?
Scott:Yeah. But we'll probably I don't want to go to, I think. We'll we'll probably go to a game before the summer. Let's we're looking at Open also over the same area. That's upon us.
Scott:US Open.
Jamie:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Haven't been there in years.
Scott:I know. Me neither.
Jamie:Place is great.
Scott:Yeah. It's a it's apparently it's like a whole like, spend the whole day there.
Jamie:I'm sure it's gotten so much better
Scott:than the of the Yeah. I'm looking forward to US Open. I like I like the major tennis tournaments.
Jamie:When was the last time you've been?
Scott:US Open? Yeah. It's been years. At least a decade.
Jamie:It's been longer than me.
Scott:Probably probably longer.
Jamie:I haven't been there. My my dad, when he worked for Chase Manhattan Bank, had like a tent they had like a tent there. Yeah. So that's the last time I was there, he's been that was a long time ago. Yeah.
Jamie:Long, long time ago.
Scott:Yeah. Yeah. Oh, dude. We need to so we need to wrap this one up. Sorry.
Scott:I'm just checking the time. Mhmm. But on that note, anything else before we we wrap up?
Jamie:No. I don't think so. I think we have nice laps out here.
Scott:Alright, dude. Well, this was a good one. I hope everyone enjoyed it. Different angle, but really important. I'm sure it's gonna be really helpful for those that, you know, need to hear the message.
Jamie:Yes. And for those of you that need it, you can reach out to Brent. Like I said, he's very approachable, very reachable. Know, he's you can you can if you need him, you can find him.
Scott:Yep. Yeah. Alright. Yeah. Well, that's a wrap, dude.
Jamie:Yeah. Thank you everybody for subscribing and downloading and listening to our show. We have some really crazy stuff coming for you guys. Our guests keep getting bigger and our sponsorships keep kind of adding up here. So we have some really cool gear reviews and really cool giveaways coming.
Jamie:So keep paying attention.
Scott:That's it.
Jamie:Alright, buddy.
Scott:Alright, man. See you.